Want to know the secret to building and leading a thriving organisation!? If so, this episode is a must-listen for you! Joining Aoife this week is the founder of Upside Thinking, international best-selling author, expert leadership coach and keynote speaker Lisa Marie Platske. Lisa’s mission is to transform lives through leadership, allowing people to break expectations and bring their whole selves forward.

Throughout the discussion, Lisa provides insight into her past experience working in a male-dominated industry as a federal law enforcement officer on the piers of New York. So much ground gets covered in this discussion as Lisa unpacks the benefits of allies in business, the need for honest dialogue in the workplace, and breaking workplace gender bias. Lisa also reveals the key to becoming a better leader. Further key points throughout include;

- An introduction to Lisa Marie Platske

- Being a woman in a male-dominated industry

- Carrying experience into the living present

- Why Allyship is excellent for business

- The importance of emotional intelligence and self-awareness

- Own your voice and make the world better

- A permission workplace culture: How leaders can allow organisations to thrive

- How psychological safety begins with you

- Seven areas of well-being and three V’s of courageous leadership

- Ignite your empathetic leadership skills

- What Happier at Work means to Lisa Marie

‘’The expectation that I had in law enforcement when I showed up on the job was people expected me to be compassionate and not competent. Because in my female body, the expectation was that I would be compassionate. And yet, when they got somebody direct, they were like, hey, that doesn’t compute with my brain.’’ – Lisa Marie Platske.

THE LISTENERS SAY:

Do you have any feedback or thoughts on this discussion? If so, please connect with Aoife via the links below and let her know. Aoife would love to hear from you!

Resources:

https://www.danielgoleman.info/

Listen Back: Previous Happier at Work episodes:

#66: Workplace Psychological safety with Susan Ni Chriodain

https://happieratwork.ie/happier-at-work-66-workplace-psychological-safety-with-susan-ni-chriodain/

#69: Psychological Safety and Effective Team Dynamics with Duena Blomstrom

https://happieratwork.ie/happier-at-work-69-psychological-safety-and-effective-team-dynamics-with-duena-blomstrom/

Connect with Lisa Marie Platske:

http://upsidethinking.com/

https://www.facebook.com/lisa.marie.platske

https://www.facebook.com/UpsideThinker

Connect with Happier at Work host Aoife O’Brien:

https://www.happieratwork.ie

https://www.impostersyndrome.ie

https://www.linkedin.com/in/aoifemobrien

https://www.twitter.com/HappierAtWorkHQ

https://www.instagram.com/happieratwork.ie

https://www.facebook.com/groups/happieratworkpodcast

You're listening to the Happier at Work podcast. I'm your host Aoife O'Brien. This is the podcast for leaders who put people first, the podcast covers four broad themes, engagement and belonging, performance and productivity, leadership equity, and the future of work. Everything to do with the Happier at Work podcast relates to employee retention, you can find out more at happieratwork.ie.

If I'm only told well, you only can have these gifts because you're a woman, and you only get to have these gifts because you're a man. Well, that's terrible. Like we don't really get the best of who somebody is. And so for me, that's the reason why this is so important.

Hello, and welcome back to the Happier at Work podcast. In today's episode, I'm joined by Lisa Marie Platske, who is an award winning leadership and behaviour expert, we have a really interesting discussion, we veer into lots of different topics, things like women at work, especially in male dominated industries. We talk about things like the beliefs and the assumptions and the norms that we show up with as individuals that we're bringing in to the work. So in other words, our own programming that we bring with us when when it comes to the workplace as well. We talk about emotional intelligence, and especially around self awareness, and moving into self regulation. Do stay tuned till the end where I will do a synopsis of some of the key points and put some challenges to use some actions that you can take today that will help improve your work life and create happier working environments for you. And for those around you as well. Do feel free to get involved in the conversation over on social media as well. The best place to do that is through LinkedIn. And you can search for me there Aoife O'Brien, and I look forward to connecting with you there. Lisa Marie, You are so welcome to the Happier at Work podcast, I'm delighted to have you as my guest today, I know that you are a listener of the podcast, would you like to introduce yourself to listeners so they can get kind of a flavour or a feel for what you do? who you are and how you got to where you are today?

I would love to and thank you so much for having me. No, it is it is truly being here happier at work. So this is the joy of being able to be here with you. So my name is Lisa Marie Platske, and I own a business Upside Thinking that I have had for 17 and a half years. Love this, in the leadership development space started off as a training company after I left federal law enforcement where I actually did leadership training there as well, for the federal government in the United States of America. And in that work, ended up at a crossroads. And getting married was going to have a competing career with my husband. And so I made the decision to take a left instead of to go straight and open a business. And in opening the business. I gotta tell you, nobody told me about business about about I certainly didn't talk about happiness, that was not what it was about. It was it was about like, you know, being connected to freedom and fun and flexibility, which allowed me to then be happier at work. And in my leadership journey. This having a business has been the the most challenging journey that I have had that I've been on, which you probably understand yourself in, in having in being in that world. And I now have moved almost 11 months ago to Richmond, Kentucky after living in a variety of places in the United States. And the majority my work now is in the space of leadership coaching with business owners and their own journeys to health, happiness, success and meaning. And I would say that with the events and the retreats and the conferences that I have put on for the last 15 years, it once again that the business serves as a great big teacher for me. So I am I am a student.

I can I can absolutely relate to so much that you said there and like the first thing you were saying about being involved in federal law enforcement. All I can think is like the TV shows that I've seen and I'm wondering, is it is that what it's really like and the books that I've read and no, that's not really what it's like, okay, she's shaking her head here for people who can't see.

Well, I love you asking that because that's what I thought like I I don't know if you've ever heard of the show Charlie's Angels. So like, like, that's what I thought, like, I thought like, oh, this will be like Charlie's episode of Charlie's Angels, like I, you know, I will get to, you know, have the cool place to work. Oh, no, no, no, you know, I show up. And it's, it's the piers of New York and it's dirty, and it is like rat infested. And it is like, you know, there is no desk that is mahogany with my name on it, you know, there is, there is none of those things. And I have to say that the disconnect that my brain had with what I had seen on TV, and what I actually showed up for was like, how did this happen? And then, you know, just the journey of being a woman in a career that it sounds like, it would be something that would be sexy, or something that would be you know, there's a camaraderie in law enforcement. But I have to say it was hard, like it was really hard, being in there and being being a woman where there just weren't very many. And did I have benefits from that? Absolutely. Like, there were certainly definitely benefits, in some ways to to being a woman in law enforcement. But there were also ways that it was equally confronting and challenging.

Yeah, it's really interesting. And, you know, kind of bringing it back to what you're doing now? Like, yes, absolutely. 100%, if someone had told me what it was like to run a business, before I set off, I probably would have opted out of this, I went into business very naive, and I'm not afraid to admit that, and very naive about a lot, a lot of things. And I'm definitely learning something, I would say probably every day. And as we mentioned, before we started recording it issues and you know, I am my own IT person at the moment. So I'm learning a lot of that stuff as well. And I'd love to say I can outsource that. But it's the kind of stuff that it's, it's on my actual laptop. So without having to give my laptop away, it's probably something I have to actually do myself. But kind of bringing it back to what you do now. And you know, something that I'm really interested in is leadership equity. And in particular, because I'm a woman, and because of experience sexism in the workplace, because of experience, misogyny, that's something I'm quite interested in is supporting women to get to those more senior positions and supporting men and getting men to be our allies. Is there something that you're noticing in what you're doing now, that kind of reflects or mirrors what it is that you saw when you were working in law enforcement?

It's, it's so fabulous that you bring that up, because when I started my business originally, so being in law enforcement, I primarily worked with men. And then opening my business, the clientele that I got, were primarily men early on. And the reason why is because the energy of which I brought from being in law enforcement was such that there could be a relatability to that. And the other thing is, I'm direct, like, I'm, I'm I never, you know, I have, over time learned the value of empathy and the value of forgiveness and kindness and all of those things. And my passion, my extreme passion for things and directness, sometimes has people go, you know, like this is that I'm not I'm not used to that, and especially in this female body. And so, that being said, the early on business was a lot of men, that I went into their organisations and did the training and the, and the presentations and working with their teams. And then what happened is, as my writing, you know, my my writing my online writing my marketing, my newsletters, had sort of a feminine spin to it, I began attracting women. And as that happened, I was like, this is interesting, because I've not experienced this before. And then my coaching programs became all women. And I was like, That's really interesting. And what I realised for myself, much as I say that the business is a teacher, I needed to learn how to operate in that space, and in the space of which on which was different in how women were interacting with other women and also in the workplace. And so, three years ago, approximately, I started to get men again, come in droves into my coaching programs, and I was like, Huh, what is this and now there's this blend, you know, where I'm looking at the numbers for my Annual Conference in January. And it's a 60/40. And it used to be where it'd be 90/10. Not, you know, 90% women and 10% men, and it would be like, you know, one here, one here. And, you know. And so when you talk about, like, noticing, like, what are the trends? And what am I seeing. And what I have found is that and maybe this is true for you is that every experience that I've had, like all of the things in law enforcement, and then that piece of working early on with men, and then working with women, and then to working with, like, everything that I've am doing today, I got all of those things that I needed along the way, in order for me to do what I'm doing now. And if I wouldn't have had all of those experiences, I wouldn't be able to do what I'm doing now. And what I'm noticing is that there is this need for ally ship. In both ways. There's a need for men to have allies as women, in the sense that for many of them, and I work internationally, so it's not like I work only in the United States. And so there's different things depending on whether or not it's a German company, or a Brazilian company, or you know, you know, I will say there's, there's certain cultural differences. But overall, when we look at men and women and what I'm in the noticing of that desire to bring whole self to work. And to not be be judged as men operate this way, women operate this way, but to be to show up as a whole self, a whole human being at work. And the ability to feel and think and bring all gifts and abilities and talents and experiences is something where men need women to be allies in the permission to bring whole self and topics that are sometimes delicate. And women need ally ship, in terms of being able to be strong. And so you'll sometimes hear people speak about whole brain madness, you know, like left brain, right brain like whole brain it is. And for me, it's whole personhood. It's not. It's not just the the brain that you're bringing, it's like, it's like, the expectation that I had in law enforcement, when I showed up on the job was people expected me to be compassionate and not competent. Because in my female body, the expectation was that I would be compassionate. And yet, when they got somebody direct, they were like, Hey, that doesn't compute with my brain. And it was like, No, you can be both you can you want the person to be whole. And so the same thing with men that have the expectation that they're going to be able to be fast decision makers, and yet not necess not necessarily somebody who is the person that you would come to, when you have a difficult situation. And it's like, no, we need allies in order to be able to allow for the whole self to show up in leadership. That's how organisations get better.

I love this whole topic. And this whole thought of the whole self. And yeah, it's it's really important, do you think is to do with this idea of traditional roles, or women are traditionally seen as more empathetic and more compassionate. And to back to your point, maybe less compassionate and less competent because of that, whereas men are seen as strong, they're seen as leaders, they're seen as the less compassionate and so so it's bringing out more of the whole self where men need to embrace more of their feelings and more of their compassion side of things. And women then need male allies too, I suppose. And I liked this word permission that you used as well. Really, really important. So men almost are looking for permission from women or from other men as well to take more that to be more human at work. Whereas women need male allies for for the strength and for the negotiations for salary discussions for for talking about them when they're not in the room for I was gonna say promoting them. But I mean, that in the sense that, you know, being a sponsor for them, so yeah, talking about them when they're not in the room being used all the same words that I was saying before, but like being an ally for them, and helping them to understand what they need to do to get to those more senior positions, because I think, you know, and there's a lot of people talking about this, that it's still traditionally male dominated a lot of those leadership positions, then really glad to see that. It's not always the case, but But definitely, a lot of the time that is the case.

I think that it's about providing an opening so that's what I really didn't get early on. And I didn't realise, I didn't realise how much my own programming, you know, was that, that I brought into the workplace. And so you know, in Daniel Goleman's work around emotional intelligence, you know, he speaks about the importance of, you know, there's 26 competencies, and to start, and five major like, you know, elements, and then various competencies under each of them. And at the most basic level, he speaks about self awareness, like before you can get anywhere, you've got to be self aware, and then you can get to self regulation. And when I think about that, it's like, I walked into the doors of law enforcement, and then my business, not just law enforcement, but in my business, with this, sort of, like, basket full of, you know, or, you know, you know, bag in my hand without realising it, and consciously aware of, like, here are the ideas, beliefs, norms, you know, that I'm showing up with. And so, in my being told, over and over and over again, that there was a certain amount of a certain way that, that people should behave, you know, people shouldn't behave, that shows up. And I believe that in, in, in work environments, that's one of the pieces that is often not considered or taken into consideration. And so when I showed up at the Academy, I remember I can look back now, in fact, as you're, as you're asking me this, I'm like, oh, that's so interesting. There was a gentleman who used to say to me, Lisa, be nice. And I went, or you should be a little nicer, or something like that. And I went, Oh, that's really interesting. And like I say, I didn't realise this until, like, 20 years later, it's that the definition of what good girls do? Or, you know, what I mean?

Women are nice.

Exactly, yeah. And so because I'm outspoken, the expectation is like, ah, that doesn't make any sense. You know, that doesn't. And even in my relationship with my husband, early on, it was the same thing, it was, like, be nice, and I was never talking about, and now my husband gets it, that passion that I have that passion for life, and that it is, is such that, you know, I was raised by a single mom, who suffered tremendously from the hands of men, where I called the police to come in and save the day to, at the hands of domestic violence, because she was being beaten up. And my mom made it to my sister, and I gave us permission to have a voice, you know, to, to. So I was the one that picked up the phone and called the police and said, you know, come in. And so in that, you know, my realisation that I have a voice, and it is my responsibility to use my voice to make the world better. And that is what the work is that I you know, that, you know, that is, that's the work that I do. And, and so, this giving people permission to use their voice is also that if you see other people at work, and they brought their own stuff and their own, you know, things to work, for better or for for worse, you know, because, you know, some of it was good that I brought in some of it not so good, and some of it limiting and some of it, you know, very expansive. Can you really understand that in this group of humans, you know, that are coming in to the workplace or that you're working with, that they all have their own, you know, beliefs and limitations. And that creating a space with permission, you know, where it is open enough that you can be vulnerable, speaking about whatever it is that you want, and that you will not be reprimanded, shamed, you know, blamed, that's what allows the organisation leaders who do that allow organisations to thrive. And and so I can look back now and go, Oh, that's the reason why I said that that boss was a good boss. It's not because, you know, they gave me awards or did other things. It's that the workplace was such that my opinion counted. And then if I go back and look at the research and go, oh, there's research in a book called What the world's best organisations do. And so when I look at those the research it says, Okay, people want to be in on things, and they want challenging work, and then I go, Oh, why is that true? And it's like, oh, it's true, because I want to be valued. I want my opinion to be valued. I want what my gifts are to make a difference. And I look at it as if I'm only told well, you only can have these gifts because you're a woman, and you only get to have these gifts because you're a man, well, that's terrible. Like, we don't really get the best of who somebody is. And so, you know, for me, that's the reason why this is so important. And permission is something that you give me permission to speak here openly by by how you behave, you know, and I've got to give myself permission that and trust that the listeners can hear whatever, whatever is being shared, but it's, it's, it's, um, it's something that is very much around culture, you know, and how you innovate what you value in life, you know what your core values are?

Do you know how much impostor syndrome is costing your business? The thing with imposter syndrome is that we don't know from the outside who is experiencing imposter syndrome at any given time. On a recent study that I carried out, employees describe their experience of imposter syndrome as feeling really anxious and feeling really stressed. Imposter syndrome is known to be linked with burnout, because we tend to want to hide our imposter syndrome by overworking. And another symptom of imposter syndrome is that we're not sharing our ideas. And so our voices don't get heard at work. And the company that we work for becomes therefore less innovative. Imposter syndrome occurs at all levels within organisations. And it's especially prevalent when we start a new role when we start a new company. And it can become really debilitating when we are promoted to a position. If you'd like to know more about the work that I do with organisations, when it comes to imposter syndrome to identifying as to managing as to overcoming it, please check out my website impostersyndrome.ie. There's a few things I'd love to kind of touch on love to pick up on there. And this is, like what you've said about the ideas, the beliefs and norms. And what we're showing up with, and, I suppose, is one of the ideas I have, and I think, kind of make an inferences from what you're saying. And we take those with us from job to job. So I certainly have done that, where I've worked in one organisation and, and, you know, and and the research that I've done, and this concept of fit and how we fit in at work and how the environment influences us, as much as we influence the environment, that we take those beliefs and norms with us into the next job. And then we kind of, we understand what's kind of accepted there. But if, if what we continue to believe, is not helpful to us, and that can be detrimental for the organisation. Going back to your point on limiting beliefs. So any thoughts on that and how we take our our beliefs and our behaviors from one organisation to another and maybe what we could do to to address that when they're not helpful? Or how to understand maybe what's going on for us?

You know, you're so spot on, it brings me back to something where I when I started, and I was really curious about how this was going to work for me with with women and I got I got sent to this event, I was probably maybe three months on the job, maybe six months on the job. And I started to notice that difference, you know, being a being a woman. And so they send me to this conference, and I go to this conference and the speaker was a woman who was the head of the FBI in I don't know if she was in the New York area, or if she was in DC. Jody, I remember I just I like I remember, I can't tell you her last name. But it's like, you know, I remember being there in the room with her. And I went and I waited, I waited, we raised like hundreds of people and I waited to talk to her. And my question for her was how did you deal with being a woman like, in the FBI, like, in your career starting when there's just this handful of people? I mean, in my agency, women didn't come on the job until the late 1970s, which is mind blowing to me like, right, like, it's this is just, you know, less than 50 years ago. You know, and the agency didn't get guns until like, it's just, there's a whole lot of pieces to that, that are kind of incredible. Like women wore skirts then and they didn't get the same tools. I'm like, Okay, I can't even my head can't even wrap myself around that. So as I asked this woman this question, and it was in 1994. And, and she's like, she she gives me an answer that at the time I was annoyed with, because she said, Well, you know, they're just there's just no difference. And there was this part of me that was like, really, there's no difference. What are you? Like? What are you talking about? And what I got from that, you know, in my sense of annoyance, which I was annoyed for quite a long time with that it wasn't like it was immediate. But it was, it's been something that I've reflected on over and over and over again. And what I got was two things. One, it does a disservice if you say that there's no difference. Like, it's, it's it does a disservice, because that's not true. There are things that my male colleague could do in law enforcement in uniform, when he was six foot three, and commanded presence that was different than me at five foot six, when I was faced with something, there is definitely a difference. And there is a difference in the perception of me walking on the pier, with long blonde hair and red, white, blue, white and blue nails. And him because I used to get stuff like, you know, do you really have bullets in your gun? Like, I mean, you know, he, he wouldn't get those questions, so so that you do a disservice to that. And if you're so hung up in the fact that there is a difference. This is the second point, if you're so hung up in that, you will block the gifts and the genius that you bring in the skin that you're in, you're in the body that you're in. And so there is a difference. And there were blessings in that that I got.

So like what a lot of things in life, it's about finding that balance between the two. So not getting hung up too much on the fact that there is a difference, but also accepting the fact that there is a difference.

So that was the part for me where it was like, it's like, oh, so if I go, Oh, my gosh, I'm not going to get that opportunity. Because I'm a woman, and the guys don't like me and they don't want, you know, then on and on and on this crummy tape plays. But if I go, Okay, so there's a difference? Like, what is it that I do better? What is it that I do as good? What is it that I need them for? What if, if I really am in the assessment of that, and my heart is open to the possibilities, and I allow for open and honest communication for that, I was able to say to some of the guys, hey, look, like you're, you know, you would never do this, if somebody showed up on the on the job. And you know, and they treated your wife or your daughter like this, I'm like, how would you act? Don't Don't be behaving like that I used to be really like, you know, like, What are you talking about? That is? That is absolutely, you know, unacceptable? And then there were times when they would be you know, the same to me with different things? Well, you know, you can't do that. And I'm like, You're right, I can't, but here's what I can do. But we would be in the conversation. And so I think that when you have organisations that block that or you have it could be people that you don't allow for the honest dialogue to show up for what the differences and the the benefits and the blessings are.

I love that. And that can be applied to so many different situations as well. I think the other point that you refer to earlier was this idea of managers creating that environment where people feel safe to speak up. And coincidentally as we're recording this, so you know, maybe a few weeks before the podcast actually gets released. But today, I posted on LinkedIn all about psychological safety. So exactly that phenomenon where you create this environment where people feel that it's okay to share their ideas that it's okay to challenge the status quo, that it's okay to admit to mistakes as well. And being able to create that environment where people feel feel safe to do that, and kind of how to how to go about that any thoughts on this idea of of psychological safety. And I know there's previous podcast episodes, if people want to go back to Episode 66, Episode 69, both of them. And I remember those numbers, because I just added them into the LinkedIn newsletter today. But if you want to learn more about psychological safety, you are very welcome to go back. But any thoughts from you, Lisa Marie, in relation to this concept of psychological safety or what you're seeing with the clients that you work with, or in your own experience, as you were kind of talking about the, you know, the environments where it has worked really well or hasn't worked in others?

psychological safety is such an interesting topic, you know, and there are so many different viewpoints on it on on what it is and how people define it. And for me, really big thing is that I recognise that one of the beliefs that I carried on in the world early on was that the world wasn't safe. Because so many things and experiences that I had in my childhood were such that it wasn't and I realised that that colored how I interacted with other was because there was this, you know, the world isn't safe. So you can't tell people stuff, you have to keep information yourself, you have to. And so behaving in that way wasn't necessarily helpful, you know, for the people that I was working with. And so I hear it now in terms of organisations like organisations, and how I look at it is, if you are not investing in people, and giving people individual opportunities to individually grow, and learn within their own personal leadership, like I am a response, I have responsible for my own, you know, my own leadership journey, and you are responsible for yours. And every person is, if you do not have a culture, where you're allowing that I don't care how many trainings, you give people on psychological safety, or how much you use it as a buzzword, it ain't gonna work. Like, individually, people have to come to their own level of safety, before they can engage in a space and create it for others. And so I find like, that's one of the things where you'll hear people create programs or community like a community dialogue, and they'll do it online for their organisation, or they'll do it like in you know, we're gonna have discussions or lunch and learns. And it's like, how much do you really know about the people individually on their journey, because if they are not in a place to do that, that's when stuff comes out in a way that can be damaging to someone, I had a retreat not that long ago, and I had a group of people, a group of leaders. And there's one rule that I have, and I did not articulate this rule for the first time in 15 years, and Gosh, darn it, if it didn't bite me, it was there is no other coaching in the room other than me. And it means like, you don't have the right to coach anybody else, you hear something, you keep your mouth shut, like, you know, you want to ask permission to talk to somebody about something great, but like, you're not coaching somebody, they're coming here for the safety of being able to, and I didn't say that as a first time. And somebody said something to another person. And I cringed like in the in the front of the room, and I was like, I have to clean up now, this is just you know, and the person remembered it, and it was just not a good thing. And, and it's because that person is younger on their journey. And that person is in their 20s. And I always tell people, you know, me being in my 50s, I just have made more mistakes that I've had to clean up and in cleaning them up. You know, I've gotten to learn more along the way, right. Like, that's the hope is. And so, back to psychological safety. I think it's brilliant. I think organisations need it. I think they go about it the wrong way oftentimes.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, I love this idea that it's, it's our own personal development. And as you all know, yourself, setting up in business, I think it's the biggest personal development journey that you can ever have. And you know, everything kind of comes to light, all of your issues, all of your mistakes that you've made. And your mindset needs a huge amount of work. In order to keep going, you're not surrounded necessarily by an entire team. And you have to find ways to make money. So I think bringing this back to kind of from an organisation perspective, if we can allow people that space to understand better their own beliefs that they have, and go on their own personal development journey to develop as people. And this kind of ties in with this, your original thought around bringing your whole self to work that allows people to show up, more fully more holy and to understand themselves and touching on the point of emotional intelligence to become more self aware, and then becoming more self aware, become better leaders, better team players. You know, better better all around humans, hopefully as well. Yeah, absolutely. I'm just conscious of time here as well. Lisa Marie, I'd love to know a little bit more about what it is that that you too. So you mentioned a couple of retreats. So how is it that you work with with your clients?

Well I have several, I've got three programs, which is my upside leaders, my upside influencers and my upside world changers program. And in those programs, there is one on one coaching, group coaching, and the ability to attend these retreats and then people attend them standalone as well. So I learned a long time ago that you need to have several things happen. And one is the ability when you get a question and you write things down. There's something that happens in the brain and that connection to the pen and I'm sure you understand that versus typing like it's different. And so at my events, they give people an opportunity to be in conversation around the Seven Pillars of leadership and these, these three elements of courageous leadership where they get to put pen to paper, and then they have the opportunity to, to verbally to be in partner share so that they, they verbally express because it's a different part of the body. And then there's an embodiment exercise so that you, as you're learning things, your body has the ability to not just the mind, but the body has the ability to absorb the information. And so I do an annual conference. This year, it'll be in Santa Fe, New Mexico, it's always in January, it's a different place. And that is my three day event that's around my seven pillars of leadership. And then I do these three retreats. And I have a program that is a challenge course, once a year that people come in, can walk through the challenge course on my farm. And it's all about being a better leader, and starts with you, you know, your your leadership affects the world and makes the world better. And that's what the programs are about. And, and I want people to make more money, I want them to be able to thrive with their families, their seven areas of well being and what I'm really, really aware of, is that how you take care of you physically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, financially, relationally, and in your work, will will make the world better or not. So I only want 1% better, but I want the holistic, I don't want just one area to work.

Yeah. So were those that you mentioned, I'm not going to repeat them because I won't do it justice. But are they the seven pillars that you were talking about the seven pillars of leadership.

So there's, there's two things, there's seven areas, there's their seven pillars of leadership, and that was research designed, I didn't have a business degree. And so when I opened up my business, after federal law enforcement, I went and spoke to lots of leaders and got the seven themes. And so that's what the curriculum is, that is in my coaching programs, as well as at the upside summit in January, the seven areas of well being is housed within pillar number four. And that is really what I say is the foundational piece of you're going to grow your leadership, if you come up with one action item. And each of those seven areas of well being and you commit to it every single day, your life will exponentially improve. So physically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, financially, relationally. And in your work, one thing for me, I wake up and do one of my one things and physical is that I do push ups every single day. One of the things spiritually is before I get after I get out of bed right after I open up my eyes, I get on my knees and I pray, and I'm in conversation with God doesn't mean all my clients, you know, call it God, some of them call it consciousness, I'm gonna call it The universe doesn't matter to me, whatever your connection is, is your business. So having one thing that you're consistent with every single day in those areas makes a huge difference.

Yeah. And is there a particular issue that you see in relation to leadership? Or is there one thing if you're saying so I don't want to put words in your mouth? But But what it sounds like is when we work on ourselves, we become better leaders is there is a one particular area that you think that people should focus more on? Or is are there particular areas that you're seeing a pattern or a trend

What I what I believe is one of the greatest areas of leadership is happens to be empathy, to be a great leader, and the three elements of courageous leadership, which is like the 1%, you know, the best of the best of the best, you know, they they've got vision and vulnerability and voice dialed in, you know, their vision is, you know, is unlocked by clarity. And there's a lot of people who aren't clear about who they are, what they want, or why it matters. Vulnerability is unlocked by forgiveness. And there are people who carry baggage around all day long. And voice is unlocked by generosity, not generosity, because I think I'm gonna get something from somebody but true generosity, and all of that, all of that, you know, when you're deeply empathetic, you know, you're, you have a heart for people, you know, you spoke about you use the word human, you know, better human. And so my leadership work, people come to me, many times, they're successful, they're already successful. It's not like they're struggling and they're looking to be successful. It's like, they're successful, and they're going, I'm successful, but I'm empty. Like, why don't I feel better? Like yeah, what why? Why, you know, if I'm doing all of these things, why am I not like, why am I not? The epitome of you know, in your amazingness, and so they want more health, they want more happiness, they want more success, they want more meaning, and meaning comes from contribution, meaning comes from impact. And so that's really what I do is I work on, you know, leadership impacts, which comes from fulfilling your divine mission. And it's not, you know, clients of mine make lots of money, but it's, it's more about, you know, am I, am I doing something to make the planet better? Yeah, am I being a force for good in the world?

I think that that entire topic is an area I'm so interested in. And it could probably really be an entire podcast episode in itself, this idea that, you know, this perception that once we become successful, and I put, you know, you won't see that if you're listening, and you're not watching on YouTube. But you know, you put that in air quotes, because success is defined by different people in different ways. But I think societally, if you have money, if you're famous, like there's these kind of hallmarks, let's say, of what it means to be successful. And when people reach that they think that they're going to feel differently than they do. Come back to your point, they just kind of feel a little bit empty inside. And again, could go right that for a whole nother podcast episode. But but back to you, Lisa Marie, I'd love to know what does being happier at work mean to you?

Happier at work is getting to fulfill my divine mission and purpose. No, you know, I am happier at work. Literally, I am happier when I am working, I am happier when I am contributing. I am happier when I am able to use all of the gifts and abilities and talents and experiences that have been given to me and be able to share them with somebody else so that they get to make the world better. Like that is me being my happiest. And it's the reason why it doesn't matter to me, whether it's Monday or Saturday or Wednesday evening, like when I'm working, I feel I feel happy.

Yeah, absolutely love that. And this idea of contribution, I think is a really strong one that come through from people and impact as well. Now if people want to reach out if they want to connect with you, what's the best way they can do that?

I'm old school. So I like email. You know, Lisa Marie at upside thinking.com. I know people send me texts. They send me Facebook messengers, LinkedIn, all sorts of other stuff, you know, Instagram, and I'm like, I'm an email girl sorry, you know, so I like it. And, you know, in social media, I love you know, and I, you know, I'm on all the platforms. And I'm e-mail, you know, I'm personal.

Yeah, absolutely, brilliant. Love that absolutely loved chatting with you today. Thank you so much for your time. It was absolute pleasure to chat with you.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

That was Lisa Marie Platske. And I really hope you enjoyed today's conversation, if you want to get involved in the conversation yourself, to feel free to connect on LinkedIn, Aoife O'Brien, or you can follow the happier at work podcast LinkedIn page, and continue that conversation, ask any questions that you have any thoughts that you have on today's conversation, I'd really really love to hear them. I wanted to take some time now to highlight some of the key points that Lisa Marie talked about during the podcast. So we started by talking about this concept of being a woman in a male dominated industry, also about bringing the whole self to work, and how sometimes men need women as allies to bring more of themselves to work as well, which I thought was interesting, and not really something I have delved into in too much detail. In the past, we talked about our own programming, and I'm talking about that from a very personal perspective. So thinking about our own beliefs and our own assumptions about what the world is like. And we went on to talk about that in a little bit more detail. At a later point. We also talked about emotional intelligence, and how it's really important to have a level of self awareness, which leads to self regulation. So first, first of all, is becoming aware of how you are as a person, the impacts that you have on others, and the impact that the environment and other people have on you, before we can learn how to effectively manage ourselves. And I think, you know, we used to joke about this on the the Master's course that we did, that everyone tends to think that they have a higher level of self awareness than they actually do. Everyone likes to believe that they're really aware about themselves and that the problems that they have lie with other people rather than themselves rather than addressing the issues themselves. So I would invite you today to have a think about what's going on in your life. And how you can gain an additional level of self awareness and move on to self regulation and take personal responsibility for whatever it is that's happening in your life, whether that's in work or outside of work as well back to this idea, then of the programming that we have. So what Lisa Marie shared was about this idea of the beliefs and the norms that we're actually showing up with. So we have beliefs and assumptions about the world. And that tends to be what influences the behavior that we show up with, especially in the work context. And if you're meeting people who there you know, there's, there's maybe a sense of conflict, maybe it's because you have differing sets of beliefs as well, what most people or dare I say everyone really, really wants is to know that my opinion counted, that I was listened to that someone asked me something, and the response was actually listened to and taken on board, which also reminds me of something that I saw recently, as well. And I will talk a little bit more about this on an upcoming episode of the podcast. And that is this concept of knowledge versus opinion. So whether or not people are coming to you to ask for some knowledge that you have, versus to ask for your opinion about what they should do with that knowledge. So I think it's quite an interesting distinction there. Another thing that we talked about was not acknowledging that there are differences between men and women at work. And it does a disservice if you say that there is no difference between men and women. But how we can work better together is by asking the following questions. What do I do better? What do I do as well? And what do I need them for? So what do I need help with Lisa Marie also shared about her seven different areas of well being. And we also talked about this idea of courageous leadership and the three V's the three V's being vision, vulnerability and voice. So when we talk about vision, it's about getting that clarity of what it is that you're looking to achieve. When we talk about vulnerability. Oftentimes, that's forgiveness. So getting rid of that baggage that we have, is there someone in your life that you need to forgive? And then when we talk about voice, it's more from a generosity perspective. So what can you share knowledge about that will help other people. And that's it for this week's episode of The Happier at Work podcast. I really hope you enjoyed it and will get involved in the conversation over on social media. I would absolutely love to hear what you think about today's episode. I'll be back again next week for another solo episode. So I'll talk to you then. That was another episode of the Happier at Work podcast. I am so glad you tuned in today. If you enjoy today's podcast, I would love to get your thoughts head on over to social media to get involved in the conversation. If you enjoy the podcast, I would love if you could rate, review it or share it with a friend. If you want to know more about what I do or how I could help your business head on over to happieratwork.ie