Workplace advice centers on setting clear boundaries around late-night emails, unpacking how these midnight messages create implicit expectations and anxiety even well outside business hours.
Dana encourages teams to “detrigger yourself” early and often, letting go of anxiety so you can see options more clearly rather than reacting impulsively.
The recommended approach includes crafting a respectful, thoughtful proposal to your boss—one that balances responsiveness with realistic work-life needs, showing you’ve “got her back” while protecting your team.
She suggests using a “promise-by” response: acknowledge receipt, clarify priorities, and commit to a specific response time—backed up by integrity in following through.
To address boss bypassing your role, Dana advises asking to be CC’d on direct requests or have your team forward emails: this helps manage priorities, reduce confusion, and enhance your visibility and value to leadership.
Dear Dana, My boss is driving our team crazy with the emails she sends us in the middle of the night. It’s not uncommon for her to ask for a response by 8am. Keep in mind, our official office hours are 9-6pm. She also emails my team directly and they come to me panicked in the morning because it’s 9:15am they are just getting to email and feel guilty because they didn’t see her 2am request. My team is coming to me for solutions and I’m not sure what to do. I have the same questions: Should I talk to her and ask her to stop? Should I ask my team to forward her emails to me and check-in frequently during the all night? I hardly get enough sleep as it is. Help! – Panicked in Seattle
Dear Panicked,
I feel your pain! I had a boss like that who was hired under orders from the CEO to “clean up the marketing department” right after our internet startup’s IPO. She came from a company which was notorious for round-the-clock work, and she honestly believed her 2am emails with requests for 7am answers were some kind of kick-ass work ethic. Sadly, her style conflicted mightily with my preschool-kid schedule and 45-minute commute. It’s an understatement to say it sucked.
From reading your letter, it sounds to me like you have two problems.
First, work-life balance boundaries.
Here’s what’s probably going on. Your boss is under pressure, is sacrificing her own work-life balance and is probably worried about getting a call on the way in to the office from her boss asking for an update. If she is stressed, you don’t want to trigger her into even more stress (which she may take out on you or your team unwittingly, or wittingly if she is bully-behavior-prone). And don’t trigger yourself and feel anxiety with thoughts like, “I’ll get fired if I don’t respond to every midnight missive by 4am.”
Like I always say, detrigger yourself early and often because it’s unlikely you’ll get fired over this and when you’re detriggered you’ll find it easier to let go of the 3 A’s (anger/annoyance/anxiety) so you can see your options more clearly. For all you know, your boss is just trying to see how far they can go before you establish a boundary. (Not terribly proud to admit I’ve done this before myself…ahem.) But even if your boss is just testing your boundaries, she is still likely to get nervous and put you in the “not my best team member” category if she doesn’t feel like you’ve got her back. So your challenge is to make sure you work out an “I’ve got your back” agreement with your boss that supports the boundaries and work-life blend you and your team need.
What will it take for her to feel l like you’ve got her back?
Unfortunately, I don’t have any insight into this – there are too many factors. You simply won’t know until you ask her. The best way to approach her is to go into a meeting with a proposal that you believe is responsive to her needs and respectful of you and your team’s work-life needs. Start by talking to your team to understand what their work-life needs are. Maybe some people are willing to be responsive in the off-hours if they get flexibility options during work hours. Maybe this is a trade-off you can make, personally. Use this info to help you develop your proposal. Start your conversation with your boss by saying you know it’s important for your team to be responsive to the business even when the business isn’t 9-5 but the team is struggling to figure out what is urgent and what can wait ‘til regular business hours.
Make your proposal and be willing to negotiate.
Also, allow yourself (and/or your team members) to give a “promise-by” response, which simply says, “Got your message. Need to do X, Y, Z before I respond. Will respond by TIME/DATE.” The key to making the “promise-by” response work is you’ve got to follow up with integrity. If you say you’ll respond by 11am today, then be sure to respond by 11am today! You can also add a “prioritization option” in there, which says, “I’ll respond by 11am today, unless you feel this is more important than my meeting with Customer X in which case I’ll need to find someone to meet with them. Please let me know by 8am if you or someone else can take the customer meeting.” Giving your boss choices like this pushes options at her, which she may or may not take advantage of, but at least you’re giving her the chance to do her job and make decisions.
The second problem I see: end running.
Your boss is doing an end run around you by going directly to your team in ways that make them uncomfortable and confused. While you don’t necessarily need to be in the middle of every communication when things are functioning well, in this case they aren’t. The good news is that this gives you an opportunity to make yourself more valuable to your boss personally and strengthen her belief that “you’ve got her back.” However, it also means stepping up to some additional responsibility. A good solution is to ask your boss to cc you on all requests to your team (and ask team members to forward them to you if the boss forgets). This allows you to set priorities for your team and when it’s not clear to you, get with your boss to have her help you set priorities. This prioritization can feel like a thankless task if your boss isn’t good at it, but think of it as the reason you get the big bucks. When you do it well, it burnishes your personal brand.
Should you respond via email or in person? Yes. In the event the boss is extremely unreasonable and you end up in discussions with HR for any reason you need things like this documented. That said, you can nip a lot of problems in the bud face-to-face. When you have the option, use face-to-face and then follow up in email to confirm your agreement.
Incidentally, when I was in your shoes, I followed a lot of these strategies and made my new boss think highly of me while managing to keep my team sane. Once we were in sync I quit, in part because of her slave-driver mentality. I didn’t leave her in the lurch and to this day we are friends and professional colleagues, having helped each other in various business capacities over the years. It can be done. Good luck earning the big bucks!
We hear that women suffer from the imposter syndrome, but what exactly is it?
Key Takeaways:
Imposter syndrome is that sneaky inner voice that whispers you don’t belong—despite all evidence you do—like being terrified someone will “find out” even though you’re clearly capable.
Vreneli uses a vivid driving‑lesson analogy: you rationally know you can succeed, yet self‑doubt screams “you’re going to crash”—and that disconnect is what makes the whole feeling paralyzing.
It’s not a mere confidence issue—it’s often triggered by new roles, ambiguity, and internally high expectations that outpace how you feel in the moment.
Imposter syndrome tends to worsen as we rise in responsibility: the stakes are higher, the peer group smaller, and the solitude more intense—creating fertile ground for self‑doubt.
The most liberating insight: those doubts aren’t personal flaws—they’re reflections of your situation and growth phase, not you—and understanding that helps you move beyond them toward authentic leadership
Vreneli’s succinct description of the imposter syndrome:
The first time you get driving lessons, it is very exciting so you will feel insecure. That makes sense. You have never driven a car before. At the same time, you know that the biggest idiot can get a driving licence, so why not you? These are healthy thoughts. But then, a little voice in your head yells: well I’m sure you can’t do that because you are always so clumsy! Soon everyone will find out that you are not even able to get your driving licence! If you can’t fight that feeling off, you suffer from the impostor syndrome. Rationally, you know that you are perfectly capable of doing it, but you are still afraid of being found out. That fear and insecurity can be very paralyzing and you will be even more susceptible to these feelings in case of new challenges, such as job interviews, a new job, or in a conflict situation.
Vreneli Stadelmaier created a company, SheConsult, to help women conquer imposter syndrome. Watch our second video discussion with Vreneli on how the Imposter Syndrome affects your career.
About Vreneli Stadelmaier
Holding an MBA, registered coach, source of inspiration, speaker, entrepreneur, author, blogger and publisher. She owns the company SheConsult, which addresses imposter syndrome in women. You can get a copy of her book, Sure She Can to better understand her approach to overcome imposter syndrome. In 2015, winner of the prestigious Joke Smit Award for gender equality, awarded by the Dutch government. Divorced, married again (with another man), mother of three children and two bonus children*.
FREE PDF Guide to Women in Leadership
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
Motherhood penalty is a real systemic roadblock, not just a personal experience—it’s built into hiring, pay, promotion, and performance norms that mistakenly assume moms are less committed or competent.
Mothers typically face a per‑child wage reduction of around 5–10 percent, even when fully qualified, while fathers often enjoy a subtle “fatherhood bonus.”
Taking time off—or working flexibly—can interrupt career momentum, reducing experience accumulation, visibility, and access to promotions, which intensifies the penalty over time.
Bias plays a powerful role: employers often rate mothers as less competent, committed, punctual, or promotable than childless women or fathers—even when resumes are identical.
Real mitigation requires structural change: flexible scheduling, transparent pay, parental leave (for all parents), return-to-work supports, bias training, and performance evaluation systems that treat maternity leave as a temporary pause—not a career derailment.
It’s a fact, Ladies. The most fulfilling experience of our lives – nurturing little beings into wonderful adults – is statistically killing our careers. At least that’s what the data says.
In a 2010 study by Michelle Budig and Melissa Hodges of the Social and Demographic Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, “There is a penalty for motherhood across the earnings distribution that persists after inclusion of all variables.” In-other-words, moms at all pay levels make less money and get fewer promotions. And the lower income moms – the ones that can least afford it – pay the highest price. Thus was discovered, The Motherhood Penalty.
The Motherhood Penalty is Real
There’s plenty more depressing data out there, including the ever-presence equal pay gap statistics, women earning 77% of what men earn in comparable positions do globally, and 85% in the USA.
These stats are enough to make you angry, exhausted or both when you think about your own career and motherhood choices, but I’m here to give you a strategy to deal with it, excel at whatever you choose to do, have your cake and eat it too: ignore the stats and then don’t.
Here’s the ignore the stats part: I believe these data are true, but they are looking at only one slice of the universe of the modern woman’s reality. Here are the things they don’t speak to, and that it’s very possible this is your reality.
Be Smart – Don’t Play The Game
These stats don’t count entrepreneurial women jumping out of the broken system, and in fact the entrepreneurial women’s ranks are swelling.
Women – especially younger women who don’t experience as severe a wage gap, mostly because they’re less likely to have children – are looking at their careers and lives as one integrated whole to help them blend the joys of fulfilling work and life – including motherhood.
Be Smart – Play the Game
With or without kids there are tons of capable, confident and powerful women who have learned to adapt to the corporate environment. Studies show that women who master both “masculine” (i.e., agentic) and “feminine” (i.e., communal) management styles manage to navigate success fairly well.
So what if there are 33% fewer of us with kids in the managerial ranks? That means 33% of us ARE there. Maybe you’re one of them.
If you don’t want to opt out of the corporate ladder scrabble, then learn to play the game. Learn to recruit highly placed mentors and be assertive like the guys do.
Be In Your Own Power – Your Kids And The World Will Thank You
Whether you’re in or out of “the system,” you’re only a stat if you allow yourself to be. Bottom line – you’re in charge of your own life and you’re responsible for the “you” you bring home to your children and take back to the office.
If you’re new to motherhood, you’re starting to realize that you have great power to affect your children, how they view the world and – most importantly – how they view themselves. And you don’t even have to do anything to exercise this power. To them, you are powerful simply because you exist and are their mother. Who you are is part of who they will become.
Guess what? You don’t have to be a mom to access this power. Sure, kids are extra-sensitive to it so it’s easier for us to see the mom effect on them, but it’s a human power this is true for everyone – at home and at work. No matter who you are, everything you do and don’t do affects all those around you. When you learn to manage this power you can do anything you want, accomplish anything you set your sights on, and have your cake and eat it too. And if you happen to be someone’s mom, you teach your children how to access their own internal power just by being you.
When you’re balanced in your personal power, there is no wrong choice you can make about whether you stay home, work full time or try to split the difference. Your choice is the right choice and you won’t second guess it. You succeed at whatever you choose to do because you see the world, your work, yourself and your family for what they are – stripping away the stories and the illusions (including the ones the stats tell us) and dealing with things as they are. When you’re in your personal power, you are more effective at everything you do.
Stats Can’t Measure This Power You Carry Within You. Only You Can.
Now, here’s the don’t ignore the stats part. If you’re a woman, there are other stats that say you have the power to change the world – yes, by virtue of your gender. Numerous studies now show that more women in leadership positions, measurably help a company’s performance and increase group intelligence.
So no matter what you do with the stats and the things they can’t measure, it all comes down to you. You’re a woman, possibly a mom, and in possession of tremendous power. No matter where you are in your career; no matter what choices you have, are and will be making about motherhood; and no matter how powerful you do or don’t feel at the moment, dont hide yourself. Get out there are live freely and unapologetically. Make your choices, live with them and evolve them as you learn what works and what doesn’t. Don’t second-guess yourself. Surround yourself with other women that shine your powerful light back at you. (Yes, it’s best to let go of the ones that hide the mirror.) Learn to forgive. Don’t be shy. Be YOU in your full power.
The stats say you will more than make a difference. The stats say you will change the world, one child, one family, one colleague, one meeting, one company at a time.
What are you waiting for?
Looking for personalized strategies to help you plot your career around the motherhood penalty, to include a healthy and happy family? Brainstorm your strategies in a free consultation with executive coach Dana Theus.
FREE PDF Guide to Women in Leadership
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
Job search is an experience, not just a transaction—whether you’re passive or proactive, treat it as a journey of self‑discovery and alignment, not just throwing resumes at open roles.
The piece contrasts passive (reactive) job searching—waiting for job boards to deliver openings—with a proactive approach that centers on clarity about what you want and reaching out strategically.
A proactive job search means uncovering the hidden market—networking, informational interviews, direct outreach to companies you admire—so you can access roles before they appear publicly.
Rather than applying broadly out of frustration, the article invites reflection: What exactly feels off at work? What energizes you? That awareness sharpens your job‑search focus.
Proactivity isn’t just about applying early or more—it’s about building relationships, refining your career narrative, updating your materials continuously, and feeling empowered rather than frantic in your job search journey
Every job has it’s turning point, that time when you’re not learning as much as fast; or you’re losing interest; or starting to figure out what you really want to put your career energy into… even though you’re not quite ready to declare the job you’re in “ready to go.”
It’s this “itchy point” that marks what should become the beginning of your proactive passive job search, where you’re not actively looking, but you’re proactively exploring what’s next for your career and opening yourself to opportunities that may happen across your path.
Susan has been in her job for just over six years when a trip to a conference woke her up to the fact that she was more interested in the sessions on future trends in her industry than best practices. She was hungering for something new and future-oriented instead of doing more of the same better than last year. At the conference she began to explore her new interest in the future: was it boredom with her job or interest in exploring what she could do with the skills and experience she’d gained that called her forward? Turns out it was a little of both.
Opening yourself to opportunity makes you easier for opportunity to find”
Identify Your “Perfect Job” To Fuel Your Passive Job Search
When you realize you’re ready to start thinking proactively about the next step in your career, it’s a great feeling. You’re content enough where you are, probably being recognized and feeling accomplished. You’re not in a hurry and can take your time to find a great fit while you’re at the top of your game, maybe with your current employer. Don’t let this opportunity go to waste! Get serious about how to move forward in your career—at your own pace and in your own way.
Refine your LinkedIn profile to position you as a candidate for your Perfect Job
Use your network to validate that it’s “perfect” and open yourself to opportunity
Susan started the process of understanding what kinds of jobs would satisfy her interest in industry trends. Did she want to become an analyst? Or move into leadership to help strategize her company’s response to trends? Stay in sales? Move to marketing? She settled on the leadership path and began engaging with her network to better understand which leadership positions would give her a more strategic focus. To her surprise, staying in Sales but moving to a startup where a sales leadership role would put her on the executive team felt like a better move than switching to marketing. Describing her “perfect sales leadership job” and positioning herself online as a good candidate for it allowed her to reach people in the startup space, attend networking events and talk to investors. Soon she understood that her perfect job would probably be in a company that had received second or third stage funding. About this time at a networking event she met the COO of a company at the end of its first stage funding cycle who was planning their second round. They were looking for a strong sales lead and Susan’s experience and track record was just what they were looking for.
The Power of Knowing Your “Perfect Job”
When you’re desperate for a new job, you’re more willing to accept anything. But in a passive job search, you’re not desperate. You’re content while considering your future. That’s the time where your focus on your Perfect Job is most powerful. Taking the time to understand what it is, and why it’s important to you, allows you to talk to other people in your network about it with enthusiasm and excitement. That enthusiasm allows others to “see” you in that role and help you connect the dots to find it. You can be patient. You can take the time to network and suss out what it is and where you might find it.
When you find it, you’ll be coming at your Perfect Job from a position of strength, too. You don’t need it, you want it.
Does a Perfect Job set you up for disappointment? After all, every job has its downsides. It will disappoint you if you think of your Perfect Job as truly “perfect.” It is a dream, but it’s also going to help you get closer to your dreams than one that feels “only ok.” So go into the process eyes open to the fact that your understanding of what feels perfect to you is guiding you towards a more fulfilling future.
Most importantly, don’t wait to get started! When you’re still happy in your current job is the best time to start preparing for your next one.
Need some good ideas to help you plan your career? Check out our free career advice resources!
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Dana Theus and Mary Brodie engage in a conversation with Mary Schaefer about what a “pro-human” work culture means.
Key Takeaways:
Pro-human workplaces honor the whole person, going beyond “pro‑employee” language to include real needs like appreciation, belonging, vitality, and the chance to make meaningful contributions.
Too often the “human” in employee gets glossed over—this model insists on treating employees as whole human beings—not just cogs or resources.
A pro‑human culture is about embedding human‑centered practices both in formal programs and in everyday interactions.
Addressing human needs isn’t a soft‑and‑fluffy luxury—it’s essential to engagement, morale, and organizational vitality.
Being pro‑human is like caring for any valued asset—when you genuinely care, you get stronger performance and loyalty.
Pro-Human Work Culture
“You may have heard the term “pro-employee” workplace, but what would it mean to have a “pro-human” workplace? You could say it’s about employee engagement, employee satisfaction, morale, spirit, or vitality. The “human” aspect of the human beings who happen to be employees, tends to be glossed over. What would it mean to truly address human needs at work, like the need for appreciation, belonging or to make a meaningful contribution? It’s no different than caring for any other valued asset. In this blab, we’ll discuss what it would mean to be a pro-human workplace, both at the program and daily interaction level.”
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
Emotional Intelligence In The Workplace shows up when petty disputes stay small: In emotionally intelligent cultures, small personal conflicts are resolved directly between people rather than escalating upward—so leadership only deals with issues that truly matter to the business.
Decisions are made as low in the organization as possible: When teams are trusted and empowered to choose, it signals high EQ and psychological safety, rather than central control or fear-based dynamics.
Leaders at every level are actively engaged—with others and with themselves: Emotionally intelligent workplaces foster leadership that is present, reflective, and committed to growth—not detached or reactive.
EI isn’t niceness—it’s healthy conflict and accountability: True EQ lets people address issues, not avoid them; avoiding gossip or forced harmony means managing emotions seriously and openly.
The real payoff: resilience, collaboration, and empowerment: High-EQ teams collaborate better, make smarter decisions, handle disagreements with respect, and stay engaged through change—not just because they’re skilled, but because they’re emotionally literate.
Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is the new miracle ingredient for corporate culture. Too bad it doesn’t come in pill form! While there is more and more written on the benefits of Emotional Intelligence in the workplace every day, the general lack of it in many work environments can make it hard to spot. Because emotional intelligence are often confused with emotions, Both women and men tend to eschew emotions in the workplace, which is too bad as they can help women get ahead when used intelligently. And how can you improve something you can’t find in the first place?
EQ isn’t a new thing, of course; people with EQ are basically what most of think of as well-adjusted human beings. As the research rolls in showing strong correlations between EQ, performance and employee morale, however, it’s worth learning to look at your organization—and yourself—through its lens.
To help you find emotional intelligence operating in your workplace, I thought it would be useful to describe a few habits of an organization that has integrated some key aspects of emotional intelligence into its corporate culture. There are many more of course, but these three patterns may help you come to appreciate emotional intelligence in new ways, and find even more patterns at work, too!
How to Spot Emotional Intelligence (EQ) in Action
When we want more of something, we have to name it and communicate about it. We have to point at it and say, “more of that, please!” or the corporate culture can’t learn how to value it if it doesn’t already. Here are a few examples of emotionally healthy cultural habits and patterns you can look for in your own organization to highlight and encourage people to emulate.
Petty Disagreements Don’t Make It to the Boss
What’s petty in this context? Anything that distracts people’s attention from the business at hand for narrow personal reasons. If you’re human resources or executive management, you’ll know EQ is at work if you don’t see petty disagreements; they get resolved before you have to get involved. Instead, the issues that land on your desk are important and worthy of the organization investing your time to address. But don’t get too cocky if you don’t see petty issues come to you; maybe you’re part of the problem; maybe people think you’ll shoot the messenger (even if you’re “sure” they’d never think such a thing!). Go talk to employees up and down and all around the jungle gym. Ask them how they observe petty personal issues managed.
If you’re an employee in an organization that has EQ, you’ll experience petty issues managed between the individuals involved. You’ll be able to take an unresolved personal issue to your boss and get their support in helping it get resolved so everyone can get back to work. You won’t have to spend crazy amounts of unproductive energy gossiping or listening to gossip as everyone processes the unresolved issues.
WARNING: There can be a fine line between a petty distraction (e.g., how many ceiling tiles the boss has in her office) and important one (e.g., a sick child), but you’ll know where the threshold is if you look at the patterns. And distractions that appear petty on the surface often indicate deeper issues (e.g., when people feel valued based on the number of ceiling tiles they have over their cube, you’ve got a bigger problem.) If you’re going to explore this issue, look deeply for patterns that are important enough to spend your energy on.
Decisions Are Made as Low down in the Organization as Possible
Another indicator of Emotional Intelligence in the workplace is when you see decisions being made at all levels. This is an indicator of empowerment and trust within teams, and trust only happens when the people involved are emotionally sensitive to themselves and each other; and they are aligned and able to adjust and respond to change. When even the smallest decisions have to roll to the top, there can be several things going on: insecure bosses that don’t trust themselves to manage others as they learn to make good decisions; insecure employees who are afraid (justifiably or not) of retribution for mistakes and missteps; and/or an organization that is constantly changing the goal-posts so that no one on the team knows how a decision today will look in light of a new objective tomorrow.
Look at the decision-making patterns in your organizations and see what it tells you about the EQ of the people in it.
Leaders at Every Level Are Engaged with Employees and Themselves
Leadership is hard work from the standpoint that it takes effort to stay engaged with those being lead. It takes effort to manage employees as whole human beings, complete with flaws and idiosyncrasies. An organization that doesn’t value engagement can also be a breeding ground for low EQ/high toxicity. Low EQ corporate cultures breed lazy leadership from the standpoint that the low EQ leaders “get away with” bad behavior and this fact reinforces their belief that low EQ is actually the reason for their success! It reinforces their belief that they don’t need to grow themselves as emotionally intelligent human beings, which is the greatest gift the workplace has to give it’s employees.
Combating lazy leadership isn’t an issue you can address head-on. Emotional intelligence informs us that telling people they’re lazy doesn’t spur them to action. After all, from their perspective they’re not lazy; they’re focused on results, client issues and other problems that need fixing. To combat lazy leadership, you can’t be a lazy leader yourself. You have to polish up your own EQ skills by learning what motivates others and how to help them see their own opportunities for personal growth in the workplace.
Remember, the real power of emotional intelligence is not that it fixes every problem between human beings. Its real power is that it gives human beings the tools to see problems and find situationally appropriate solutions in the context of their daily work.
FREE PDF Guide to Women in Leadership
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
Leadership mentoring transforms both mentor and mentee: The author emphasizes that guiding others invites deeper self-awareness, refined communication, and renewed commitment to one’s own leadership journey.
Mentoring builds bridges across experience gaps: By sharing real-world wisdom and lessons, leaders help mentees navigate challenges more confidently—and foster trust and growth.
Emotional intelligence blossoms through mentorship: Leaders who mentor create space for vulnerability, empathy, and reflection—helping emerging leaders manage stress and strengthen resilience.
Mentoring is a two-way street: While mentees gain insights and opportunity, mentors deepen their own leadership style, feel renewed purpose, and enhance job satisfaction.
A culture of mentorship strengthens the organization: Organizations that embed mentoring programs increase retention, build stronger leadership pipelines, and promote inclusive growth.
Someone once gave me the greatest compliment. She said, “Since you’re my mentor I think you can help me with this.” Until that moment I had no idea I was her mentor! From that day forward, I started paying more attention to my interactions with her, being more clear explaining my thinking, being more conscious of giving her explicit feedback. And something else happened in the process – I became more conscious of my own leadership mentoring style and began to improve it.
Almost ten years later, this young woman has been promoted a few times and is now a strong part of my network – helping me at least as much as I ever helped her. Thank goodness I woke up and started mentoring her!
Self-Awareness Is An Awesome Leadership Skill
The first reason to develop a mentoring leadership style is somewhat selfish. If you read the leadership literature, you’ll see that being a life-long learner is a critical skill, but the best insights don’t come from books. Watching how effective your leadership style is and adjusting your behavior to achieve maximum results is the real work here. This requires self-awareness and feedback. But how many employees are really giving you good feedback? Most are careful to the point of silence about giving the boss insight into his or her own behavior, and most of them aren’t that skilled at giving feedback anyway (this is something they’re learning from you).
A mentee is someone you know is looking to you for help, and you can easily ask them how helpful you’re being. Elicit additional questions from them to help you gauge how clearly you communicate. Watch the results they achieve following your advice (or not) and learn from that experience how you can improve your guidance. Ask them for feedback directly as well. In developing a relationship where open discussion is welcome, they are likely to respect you enough to tell you what they really think so you can see yourself through other eyes. No need to feel vulnerable to their opinion, they’ve already chosen you as their mentor!
You have no idea how much you know, until you share your wisdom with those who don’t know it. – Click To Tweet
Watching how a mentee takes in your insights and works with them will also give you deep insight into the value of what you know. Things you take for granted have great value to someone with less experience working to improve their business and leadership skills. Mentees are a great way to learn to appreciate your own wisdom and knowledge. In appreciating it you can pass it on to even more people more consciously.
Finally, your mentees will teach you things they know that you don’t. Sometimes this has to do with their age group, but often it’s more personal than that. Having someone who trusts you share their worldview with you can be a gift that will help you broaden your perspective, and being a life-long learner this is a handy dynamic!
There’s No Other Way For Them To Learn How To Succeed At Your Level
The second reason is not selfish at all. Just like hiring managers often complain that kids out of college don’t know how to function in a professional setting, some executives also complain that there is so little promotable talent “out there.” I don’t believe this is ever the case, but I do believe that helping people understand what an executive needs to do isn’t something you learn in books or even through osmosis. The problems the executive team takes on are simply different than those newer managers struggle with. Executives worry about more strategic issues and their functional expertise often takes a backseat to their ability to make decisions and create opportunities. Since this is a fundamentally different process than “doing the work” in a functional area of expertise, the best way for budding execs to learn these skills is from the people currently in the job.
One woman said it this way, “I have an MBA and studied strategic business issues theoretically, but going for the C-suite I’d never hired anyone for the position even close to what I was being promoted into. I needed people to help me understand how a COO really succeeds so I could develop my skills and interview appropriately.”
Basically, they don’t teach the skills that separate the leaders from the doers in business school, and to the extent that they do your employees still need to become life-long learners and internalize the lessons that will make them successful. When you mentor, you guide them further along this journey and in the process help create the class of leaders who will make your job easier and ultimately succeed you.
Good for you. Good for them. Win-win.
What’s your experience with mentoring? Have you noticed the benefits of having a mentee? What else can you tell people considering taking on more (or some) mentees?
Underdog narratives keep women small—we’re actually already winning: Despite media spotlighting pay gaps and boardroom absence, the author invites us to see that women are founding thriving companies, earning competitive salaries, and excelling in education and leadership roles.
The fixation on gender “lacking” erodes confidence: Constantly hearing that women aren’t enough chips away at self-belief—leading some to choose comfort in victimhood rather than confront their own limiting patterns.
Reclaiming feminine power matters: When women reject or suppress femininity to fit patriarchal norms, they lose essential identity and confidence that fuels authentic achievement.
Shifting our lens from deficiency to abundance rewires perception: By focusing on real accomplishments—from female CEOs to successful startups—we reshape our internal narrative and develop collective momentum.
Women must own and amplify positive stories: Sharing real-world successes, past and present, and embracing affirmations helps counter negative programming and builds self-efficacy one uplifting story at a time
“The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend”
— Henri Bergson
According to the media, the battle of the sexes continues and women are the underdog. We often hear messages that present women’s situation as lacking compared to men.
Women are following a path defined by men – a path they have been paving for a long time. Many women respond by rejecting femininity to be like men.
The feminist movement brought many vital and valuable gifts to women, but instead of liberating the feminine, it locked it away and adopted patriarchal norms, believing that masculine is better than feminine. Instead of bringing the gifts, strengths and powers of femininity into mainstream expression, women changed to succeed in a man’s world. We gained in rights and opportunities and abandoned femininity.
Others respond to the man’s world with fear of losing what they already have, believing that they are not enough to be in his world and it’s impossible to have enough in it. They then enter battle against men to get a fair share of what has been historically denied women. Some become equality warriors, fighting for a 50/50 share in everything from wages, jobs, positions, networking and more.
…somewhere between the classroom and the cubicle, the rules change, and they don’t realize it. They slam into a work world that doesn’t reward them for perfect spelling and exquisite manners. The requirements for adult success are different, and their confidence takes a beating.
Without confidence, a solid identity and self-esteem (lost when we relinquish our femininity), it becomes difficult to define goals.
… if you determine that you are in some way deficient and cannot reach your goal, you are more likely to make less resolutions and goals. If you fall into this category [low self-efficacy], you are one of those people who tends to give up rather than fight and push toward your efforts.
Some women who do not achieve their goals may find comfort in the media’s inequality messages rather than face their own low confidence or self-esteem issues. If these women perceive these same media messages to be consistently correct over time, those messages will transform into beliefs, even if the true reason for not achieving a goal is something else.
For example, let’s look at Jennifer Lawrence’s story of pay inequality.
“When the Sony hack happened and I found out how much less I was being paid than the lucky people with dicks, I didn’t get mad at Sony. I got mad at myself. I failed as a negotiator because I gave up early. I didn’t want to keep fighting over millions of dollars that, frankly, due to two franchises, I don’t need. (I told you it wasn’t relatable, don’t hate me).”
–Jennifer Lawrence, “Why Do I Make Less Than My Male Co‑Stars?,” Lenny
Through one set of eyes, Jennifer Lawrence experienced sexism – she shouldn’t need to fight for money and she was treated unfairly. But through another set of eyes, her eyes as well, her pay was less because she decided not to continue negotiating because she was happy with the money she was already getting.
If we believe what we read about women’s wages, her problem is society’s fault and a legal problem. But given her perspective, is it?
It makes one wonder if women are seeing battles that don’t really exist because we keep hearing that’s how we should be seeing them.
What if we saw the world in a different way?
A way where we are winning and succeeding? A world where there is possibility and abundance?
Hear more about how women are solving the problems – Knowing that some women have achieved their goals gives others hope and inspiration to do this themselves.
Hear more positive messages – from articles to affirmations. I’m a strong believer in affirmations – for ourselves and complements towards others. We know that they work because of how people respond to positive feedback at work and in school.
“Only positive feedback can motivate people to continue doing what they’re doing well, and do it with more vigor, determination, and creativity.”
We can’t depend on the media to change how they write. Negativity gets a lot of attention and can be great for profits.
Instead, women need to take responsibility to shift their own thinking – stop listening to how we are deficient and hear more about how we are overcoming challenges, solving problems and exceeding everyone’s expectations. We need to stop the negative talk to ourselves and other women and ask – How are we enough? How are we winning? What are we doing right? How can can we improve step by step, everyday?
FREE PDF Guide to Women in Leadership
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
goals set the direction, but they’re only the beginning: The author explains that clear goals pull us forward into our future, helping us envision what we can’t yet see—but without the right mindset and systems, they fall short.
Letting go of the need to be “successful” frees real momentum: By shifting focus from outcomes to our evolving identity and purpose, we step into action more fluidly and sustainably.
A compelling vision clarifies the path: Envisioning not just the result but who we become along the way helps us find the necessary clarity and motivation to persist.
Systems and daily practices matter more than lofty aspirations: Success is built on consistent habits and processes—these are the engines that carry us toward our goals, not just the goals themselves.
Enjoying the journey is key: When we focus on refining our systems and celebrating small wins, lasting growth and fulfillment naturally follow—even before we reach the destination.
We’re all surrounded by goals. ToDo lists. Management Objectives. Career Goals. Personal Goals
You name it, we’ve got a goal about it.
Why is it we feel sometimes that achieving your goals is so hard?
In my experience, our biggest limitation when it comes to setting goals is that we make it a completely left-brain, intellectual exercise and we fail to engage our creative, intuitive, innovative and excited right brain.
When we do this our goals sit on a sheet of paper, lifeless and unmotivating. If we’re not careful we can begin to feel the stress of becoming separated from our sense of purpose. This is not a good place to be.
The good news is that you can easily create goals—for yourself and others—that are intuitively energizing, meaningful and motivating.
The secret is to focus on understanding what your success looks and feels like—deeply. Explore it and imagine it. Keep that feeling of success close and personal as you move towards it.
At InPower Coaching we have a formula for setting goals like this called InPower Intentions. Learn the secrets that make achieving your goals not only more probable but more fun too!!
Take charge of your career development to get the job that supports your work and your life. Check out the tools and resources in the InPower Coaching Career Center.
success grows from a blend of grit and clarity: The author emphasizes that true success isn’t accidental—it’s cultivated through perseverance, wholehearted intention, and a clear vision for your path.
Motivation flows best when nurtured by autonomy, meaningful belonging, and growing competence—these cornerstones energize sustained effort beyond mere incentives.
Resilience is not a fixed trait but a muscle you build; embracing setbacks as learning pivots strengthens your ability to persevere through challenges.
Discovering meaning in your work—connecting actions to impact—sparks deeper engagement, reduces burnout, and fuels long-term fulfillment.
Success is as much about the journey as the outcome: it’s defined by the influence you inspire and the joy you glean along the way—not just end‑points or accolades.
What does it mean to be a success or to have success? How will you know when you’ve made it? Most of the images we see of success involve some version of wealth and affluence—diamonds, yachts and private planes. What is often missing is the story behind the stuff—what was the path successful people followed to reach their dreams?
In his book Give and Take, Wharton professor Dr. Adam Grant offers a unique perspective on success and classifies people as givers, takers, or matchers based on their styles of social interaction. Takers like to get more than they give, givers are other-focused and prefer to pay attention to what other people need from them, and matchers are a blend, wanting an equal balance between giving and taking. According to Dr. Grant, takers view success as getting results that are superior to that of others, matchers view success as a balance between their own achievements and fairness to others, and givers view success based on whether their accomplishments have had a positive impact on another person or group.
Organizations are also starting to view success differently. Gallup’s(link is external) latest state of the American Workplace report reveals that almost 70% of employees are showing up to work disengaged on some level. In addition, when Gallup asked 10,000 people to think about their entire day yesterday, only 11% reported having a great deal of energy (Rath, 2015). As a result, companies are becoming more open to incorporating new ideas into leadership and training programs—concepts like mindfulness, resilience, and happiness. Even companies like American Express, long known for its gold card caché, are taking a new, more holistic approach to the pursuit of happiness and personal success.
Whatever your personal definition of success is, there are certain traits that help facilitate it.
Traits that fuel success today
Grit. Grit is defined as perseverance infused with zest and enthusiasm for long-term goals, and it’s been shown to be an important predictor of success. Studies show that grit scores are associated with higher GPA’s; grit was the most accurate predictor of whether an incoming cadet would finish his or her first summer of basic training at West Point; (Duckworth et. al, 2007) and more recently, grit has been shown to predict the success of women lawyers in the country’s biggest law firms (Hogan, 2013).
Motivation. Many companies and individuals have the motivation formula all wrong. Money, bonuses, and trips rarely produce long-term motivation results; rather, individuals and workplaces should focus on the ABC’s of motivation:
Autonomy (feeling empowered to have a sense of control over your time and choices you make);
Belongingness (having at least a few high-quality connections with others); and
Competence (having the ability to master tasks and be effective at what you do).
Decades of research show that these traits are at the core of what drives long-term motivation and engagement (Deci & Ryan, 2000). Engaged employees perform better on a daily basis, and the higher a person’s level of engagement, the higher their objective financial returns (Bakker, 2011). In addition, higher levels of employee engagement translated into higher customer satisfaction and loyalty, higher profitability, and more productivity (Harter, Schmidt, & Hayes, 2002).
Resilience. When I reached out to my friends on social media about what drives success, resilience was a consistent theme. Resilience is the organizational and human capacity for stress-related growth. Contrary to early findings that resilience was wholly a genetic trait, we now know that resilience is largely a learned set of skills (Masten, 2001). The U.S. Army has been teaching and training resilience skills to its soldiers for more than five years, and in that time, the training has been shown to be quite effective. To build on the program’s success, the Army has developed additional resilience training programs for spouses and teens and an executive course for Army leaders.
Meaning. Meaning at work is important because it gives people the why behind what they do. Many employees rarely get to see the fruits of their hard work because they aren’t directly connected to the people impacted by their work. Meaning matters in other ways as well. People who believe that their lives have meaning and purpose share a whole host of healthy benefits: they are happier, feel more in control over their lives, feel more engaged at work (and high engagement usually means less burnout), report less depression and anxiety and less workaholism (Steger, 2009).
One of my high school teachers defines success as, “When someone else tells you that you influenced their life or had an impact on them for the better.” Another friend defines it as, “Being happy where you are and not regretting the choices you made to get there.” Success is a process — enjoy the ride.
Take charge of your career development to get the job that supports your work and your life. Check out the tools and resources in the InPower Coaching Career Center.
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