These two women in Brazil are amazing. I just had to divert the podcast and speak to expedition member Camila Pontual who knows and loves them both about what they did last week. 24 hours after the building had been trashed, when many leaders were hiding in their bunkers, Anielle Franco and Sonia Guajajara joined forces and became ministers in the new government.

I wanted to both celebrate them and learn leadership from them. Leaders have to spot the moment and do something spectacular in it.

[00:00:42] Welcome, welcome, welcome. Julian Middleton, expedition leader. This is the 44th Women Emerging Podcast episode. And I had a glorious episode all lined up for you for this week, but I've bumped it.

[00:01:34] And I thought Camilla was a bit special. In fact, very, very, very special. She was there for an interview for a job, and she got the job. And I left Brazil, and for many years, we were sort of distant friends. Female friendships, they are so important. We didn't really get back in touch again until she heard about the expedition and she's, she made it absolutely clear to me that she was going to be a member of the expedition.

[00:02:33] And I kept on sending messages back saying, what are you learning about leadership? What are you learning about leadership as you witnessed these extraordinary times? And then she sent me this photograph. And it's an extraordinary photograph of two women, one short, one very tall, both in bright colors, both clearly... they were striking women, they were strong women and they were surprising women next to each other looking out from this photograph, and, and I became intrigued.

[00:03:38] But as we went on, she began to explain this photograph that she sent to me, which, I'm not surprised, she was proud of.

[00:03:59] Camilla: The basic thing , basic fixture of, of the leaders that are showing what to do is courage. Courage to take the decision. Courage to assume the, the decision. Courage to understand the gravity of their decision. Many of the decision have huge impact in the country's life, and many people, but courage to be there and to demonstrate it. They will continue to do the, the leader, they will continue to be the leader, then showcase leadership by doing and, um, some of them on the do not example, runaway, literally runaway, uh, decide to go on strange vacations when things happen. So what we, we call here in Portuguese, just expression, that it's like chicken. The person become a chicken and leadership, their leadership starts crackle. People start to question the leadership because why they're not here.

[00:05:44] Julia: Just hold for a second. So that's the first indigenous minister.

[00:06:40] And they decide to do it together as a, as a symbol of power and seeing indigenous leader, which is a community that has been destroyed for Brazilian history and in the last couple of years has been incredible dismantled and suffered and had many of their peers killed and having seen Sônia with all indigenous fixtures like, uh, the, all the, the ceremonial, beautiful clothes and everything, they put it in important moment and see Anielle Franco, who is a girl from a very, very poor favela, very violent favela in Rio de Janeiro, and she became a force because her sister was a force, a community leader in that favela, and her sister was elected city council from Rio Janeiro and was killed by militia with five shots in her head. In, um, in, um, investigation, in assassination then till now, we don't have the number, the, the names of the people who actually did that. We have the people who kill her, but not who were on the top and seeing Sônia, the indigenous leader and Anielle, the sister of Marielle Franco, two huge leaders, one that had to become leader because seeing her people has been killed for centuries and had to step in and say, no, we're gonna be the resistance. And Anielle Franco, who was a teacher, like a school teacher and um, a, a professor and was, didn't have on their, on her goal, the idea of become a leader, but become, became a leader because her sister was killed. And she decided to keep her sister memory alive and fight for other, uh, black woman in the favelas and both become minister of the state.

[00:09:29] It was so incredible and so powerful, like seeing that image in that place.

[00:09:39] Camilla: Sônia is very short. She's shorter than I am, a short person. Sônia is very short. I know Sônia very well. We have good friends together. Like she's, she is... indigenous people tend to be short. She is very short and she was wearing, I don't, the [__], which is the indigenous, um, with indigenous painting and was so beautiful and that building is a very beautiful modernist building made in the fifties and, but it's is a very minimalist architecture, very modern type of architecture. And see that woman with all the colors occupy that, that short woman, that's so important. So big leader, like she's a such a boldest person. Be there and like own that place. And Anielle is the opposite. She's a black, tall woman. So it's kind of like funny a little bit because one is very short, one is quite tall. Uh, being together with the president and the first lady. Going down on that building then tend to be, and it still is, unfortunately, the house of old white men and in the same place that was destroyed two days, three days before.

[00:11:17] Camilla: Yeah. Oh my God. The people who destroyed, not, not, not in that moment when they're coming because they, they did a very good job on cleaning it, that mess. But, um, we saw the destruction images because the people who were doing the riots, that, we calling them terrorists because that's what they are. Uh, the terrorists, they were live streaming on the, uh, Instagram and TikTok, all the social networks. So we have thousands of images and videos, which is easy available, easy accessible on internet of them destroying. It's, it's like they destroy invaluable artworks, like they destroy, uh, so many stuff and it was a funny thing, they didn't, they destroy so many, like they steal laptops, computer, documents, everything. One thing they didn't destroy and they didn't even enter is, was the library. And we're making jokes because they don't know what is a library for, like they don't understand the concept of a library of books.

[00:12:56] Camilla: Exactly.

[00:13:05] Camilla: I learned that leadership is taking actions and having the courage to take a lot of very difficult decision when not necessary everybody agree with you. Because for them to be there, that is the outcome of life, of leadership. That is, um, a moment and is a beautiful, incredible moment and a celebration of the very difficult, hard work.

[00:14:08] Julia: But they also, in that moment, knew the importance of symbolic acts. And that's an important leadership message, isn't it?

[00:15:09] Julia: Tell me about, so the ceremony, did either of the women speak at the ceremony and...

[00:15:16] Julia: What did they... what did they choose to talk about?

[00:15:24] Julia: Were they, this is the wrong word, but I'm gonna use it anyhow. Were they boring speeches?

[00:15:32] Julia: They were? They were the speeches of great oration... I can't think what the word is. Orators, that's it. They were orators. So that's the other thing is, is choose your symbolic moment, but learn to make a speech that makes people listen to every word you say.

[00:17:03] And the singer, uh, went up on the, out end, on the, like there was generals and said there was a part of her family authority together and she went and grabbed Marielle daughter hand and Marielle daughter hand was saying away ofstaying withher and it was like, oh my God. We finally, after so many years, we can breathe. We can breathe because that was leadership and is is inspirational, is courage. But also it's fun and it's, uh, it's beautiful, [__] part of it, and they are so, it's, it's such a different approach of what leadership is.

[00:18:00] Camilla: I think Sônia... I was gonna say like, oh my friend, that's normal. She, she kinda understates a little bit some stuff because I know it is her approach to do this kinda stuff.

[00:18:17] Camilla: And then she gonna, let's go to business, let's work. She's natural like that. I know her for many years and she natural like that. She just wants to understand where is the next party. She's a very...

[00:18:33] Camilla: Yeah, exactly. She's a very outgoing person and she's like, let's celebrate, let's celebrate, but let's work. Like if you go into her [__], you like 24 hours. Like we are like both destroyed. Like, and she like, let's go, let's go. Let's go.

[00:18:55] Camilla: Sônia is more like that than Anielle. I think Anielle is a little bit less like that.

[00:19:08] Camilla: Anielle, I think, um, I think, I think for her there is the, the sisterhood thing because of her sister and, uh, and this sister, the fact that she's still dealing with the death and the killing of her sister. So something... like, during that moment, there was a, a moment when she was speaking about her sister. She stop, she cry and she went back. And so for her, I think, uh, the weight of it, like the important of it, she showed more than Sônia. Sônia tried to, to, oh, it's not that important. Just to avoid to. I think it, it's both mechanism of how to deal with something that is so big and sometimes it's so big and it's kind of scary. And it's freaking scary. I can imagine. It's one, like Anielle cry a lot, but it's cause of her sister. But at the same time, like there was a moment, I'm like, okay, let's go to work. Kind of both, very driven, very driven, um, about the stuff. They need to do it and they understand the unique position of now of doing stuff they have been fighting for so many. So I think they kinda like want to jump in, like very excited, like want to start as soon as possible to put everything practice.

[00:21:18] But as leaders, they knew this was not the moment to share their fears in, in an authentic way. This was the moment for beautiful theater.

[00:22:19] Julia: But it's interesting, isn't it, Camilla? Cuz it took those two women to go out into that place that 24 hours before had been a place of violence and destruction? It took those two women to go and do it.

[00:22:53] Julia: You may now understand why this episode felt necessary, because there's so much learning here about how important theater is in leadership, how important it is to seize moments, how important it is to, to curate moments, how important it is to learn to do a speech that makes people, I suppose, cry, that makes people feel that they're in an extraordinary moment, how important it is to be leaders who can spot that moment, to have the courage to grasp it, and maybe the importance of friendships in leadership, unusual, unexpected friendships in leadership.

[00:24:05] It sort of felt for those of us who are watching what happened in Brazil last week, uh, with all the sort of overtones of what's happening or all over the world, it, this was a very joyful, a joyful moment to catch. So next week, look forward to it. Sending lots of love. Julia,