This episode is part of the Happiness Reset at Work campaign, where Klaudia introduces you to 5 drivers that contribute to building more satisfaction in our careers so that you can reconnect and re-energise with your work in 2025. 

The 3rd driver of happiness at work is: Purpose.

Finding purpose at work is a vital driver of happiness and satisfaction in our careers, as discussed by Klaudia and her guest, Christine Brown- Quinn.

Christine, with her extensive background in international finance and a successful career transition into coaching, emphasizes that purpose can unveil itself over time and is often tied to our values and experiences. She shares insights on how to reflect on what's truly important, suggesting practical tools like vision boards to help individuals identify their core values and aspirations.

Hello, happiness seekers, my name is Klaudia. Welcome to the Happiness Challenge.

This episode is a part of Happiness Reset at work campaign where I introduce you to five drivers that contribute to building more happiness and satisfaction in our careers.

Across January, I release three short episodes for each driver in which I bring you the science behind each driver with success, set of reflective questions, hands on ideas to implement in your working life, and a piece of expert advice. And that's why today I'm here with wonderful Christine Brown Quinn, who'll be sharing her insights on finding more purpose at work.

Welcome, Christine.

Thank you. Great to be here.

Christine, first of all, give us a quick intro of who you are and what you do.

Sure. So my background is in international finance.

I came to the UK originally from the US in the early 90s, recruited out of an MBA program, loved banking, was in international finance for nearly two decades. And on cue here I had a calling and I was asked to talk at the launch of a women's network. What's the woman's network?

And it was explained to me that this is really about supporting more senior, helping women progress through the bank. So I said of course I'll do the talk. Did the talk, Klaudia and literally it was an aha moment.

As I was doing the talk, a little voice in my head said, Christine, this is what you should be doing. The next generation of women enjoy their personal life and really be satisfied and enjoy their professional life.

I left the bank, not the day after, after some self talk and like, okay, time to take risks. I launched the female Capitalist, a career consultancy about that was about 15 years ago.

And what I do is my whole really clear, it's about supporting women and that as I say professionally and personally.

And I do that through one on one coaching, online training, what I call all the soft skills that are career critical, especially as you try to get up the ladder. And then finally I've written a couple books. The last book called unlock your career success is an Amazon number one bestseller in the uk.

And really excited to talk about my perspective on purpose and ambition, which might be different from what you were thinking, but it'll be good for the discussion.

Oh fantastic. And it's lovely to see straight away.

Okay, so it is possible to be in some point in life and get, oh, I have a calling, this is what I need to be doing.

I love that example because you know what for me, purpose calling at work, it's quite grand, it's quite big and so it's quite nice to understand that it is possible to get that Feeling, Yes. Christine, you already know it from your work that one of the drivers of happiness at work is purpose.

As I already mentioned, it might be sometimes difficult to find that purpose and meaning in our work. Sometimes we fall into certain professions. So how would you go around defining our purpose, defining our ambition?

I think purpose is an interesting one because I think for some individuals, they know at a very early age that this is what I want to do. That wasn't me and now my older self. Looking back, what I have seen is purpose can unveil itself.

And in the beginning there, you know, there's many people that I've met over the years who said, oh, you know, now you're doing something, you know, really purposeful. I say, hold on a second there. I love my career in banking, and. And I believe that the financial system is really important.

You know, a solid financial system is really important as a foundation for our economic system. Like, it's not, you know, I think that is a good purpose. But also purpose is.

It's almost as if career is a medium or a medium for expressing who you are. So those values, and I certainly had that approach early on, my values around quality and really inspiring others to reach their full potential.

And also humor. Like, I would go to work and I was like other people, happy. Like, I want it to be a fun and fun environment.

So in a way, the career is almost agnostic. It doesn't matter necessarily that it's that vehicle for being who you are.

I did have a little niggle in the back of my head, though, about how am I serving others. So I went to a Jesuit university in the US and that's part of the motto, the Jesuit education. You educate yourself in service of others.

So I knew that there was something there. And what I would say is that calling, that was definitely a calling, and it was time to do that.

But in fact, had I not had all of that experience in banking, I would not be able to help others like I am today. Right. So they're not separate. It's a journey. And what I would say is that in terms of purpose, that is a spectrum.

And people will have different, different experiences. And if you're not sure the moment, gosh, what is that bigger calling? I'm just not sure. I would say have faith that you.

It will unveil itself, but be sure that you're true to who you are and that you're living out your values through whatever career that you choose.

Oh, love this.

There's a few things that really are really speaking to Me personally, I think this idea that we are building that career capital in life and actually that's what helps us to fulfill maybe purpose at the later time. As you said, all of that experience you had was what allowed you to serve others and help women so successfully.

So that's really interesting aspect and this idea of a spectrum as well that we might be very clear what is it that our purposes we might be less clear. But ultimately the career is that that way of expressing who we are.

If we want to reflect a little bit around values and what's important to us, how would you start?

Because I know that you do lots of one to one coaching and I can imagine that some coaching conversations are around, I don't know what's important to me. I never really had a headspace or a role model who could help me to unreveal some of those aspects. Where would you start?

Yeah, I really like that question. And when I transitioned out of banking and started to train as a, I was very okay, this is the way to do it.

And then I realized that I had to first help people see what was important because that's the foundation of everything.

And so how I do that is before I start a one on one coaching, I little questionnaire I get clients to fill out to get them to think about what's their career been to date, what's important, what's their vision of success, those kind of questions. And then the thing that I really enjoy is I get to do a vision board.

So this is just putting together images that resonate with you personally and professionally. And that's all the instructions I have. And they come in different kind of formats.

It helps people pause though and say, you know what, it's really important for me. Family always comes up. Family, friendships, health. A lot of times that's an area where it's important.

But they have under invested for certain reasons. And then it starts to then help form the career. You know, what I really enjoy in my career is developing others.

So that kind of reflection is excellent because then as I'm working with clients on okay, let's try to articulate in terms of what that vision is going forward. I can help. I can also remind them to say, okay, so you're looking at these different options.

How does that link up to what you said was important to you? Right. So it is the foundation. And as I said, I did not really appreciate that before I got into coaching.

That is really key that reflection and pausing is actually they love it because they're on such a fast paced part of their life. They don't have time to stop and say and most of the time I'll be like I really enjoyed that. I really enjoy doing that vision board.

Mm. So interesting. And I agree as often it's very simple.

It doesn't have to be anything, anything very deep down reflection, but just stopping and giving ourselves a pause to think for a few minutes. I love doing mind maps as well. Well, so ask myself, quick coaching question, few answers, but it's just that idea.

Okay, I'm stopping and I'm reflecting onto something. And I love the idea of a vision vision board as well because then it's there, I can look at it and I can keep adding to that.

Thank you so much Christine. This has been very insightful advice about how to bring that purpose aspect into work. If listeners would like to find more where they could find you.

Sure. So fortunately my name is unusual so you can Find me on LinkedIn. ChristineBrown Quinn also My website.

Either google my name or female capitalist and my website will come up.

Fantastic. Thank you so much everyone for listening to this Happiness Reset at Work campaign. I hope this episode has been useful and impactful for you.

If you are up for receiving summary of the third Driver of Happiness Purpose, please subscribe to my newsletter on LinkedIn or on Substack the Happiness Challenge and I see you at the next episode 142 where I'll be diving into the fourth driver of happiness Belonging. Thank you again for listening and as always, I dare you to be happy. Thank you.