Monkeys and Mindset: A Delegation Masterclass
Leadership consultant, TEDx speaker, and bestselling author Brenda Reynolds joins Beck Moore and Heather Holloway to explore how leaders can delegate more effectively—without burning out.
Brenda introduces the concept of “monkey management” and unpacks why so many leaders feel overwhelmed. Together, they discuss practical strategies for building trust, setting clear expectations, and creating trauma-informed workplace cultures where everyone can thrive.
Plus, Brenda shares details on her “Coming Together” mastermind for women leaders.
Don’t miss this powerful conversation on letting go, lifting others, and leading with intention.
Thinking CAAP Talking Points
00:00:00 - Introduction and Guest Overview with Brenda Reynolds
Beck Moore and Heather Holloway introduce Brenda Reynolds, a leadership consultant and executive coach. Brenda’s extensive background includes being a two-time Amazon bestselling author and TEDx speaker, specializing in leadership, resilience, and navigating change for individuals and organizations.
00:02:50 - Understanding Monkey Management and Leadership Overwhelm
Brenda explains the concept of monkey management, coined by William Onkin, describing how leaders accumulate “monkeys” or tasks on their shoulders.
The challenge is learning to manage these responsibilities effectively to avoid overwhelm and stress in leadership roles.
00:06:30 - Common Beliefs That Hinder Delegation and Effective Leadership
Brenda discusses common limiting beliefs leaders have about delegating, such as fearing undesirable outcomes or feeling it’s easier to do tasks themselves.
These beliefs often prevent growth, trust-building, and the development of team members’ skills.
00:08:45 - Building Trust and Leveraging Team Strengths for Effective Delegation
Heather and Brenda emphasize the importance of understanding team members’ strengths and setting clear expectations to delegate effectively.
Building trust through gradual responsibility-sharing is critical for leaders to offload tasks confidently and empower their teams.
00:11:30 - Clear Communication and Setting Expectations in Delegation
Brenda highlights that delegation breakdowns often stem from unclear instructions. Using detailed examples, she stresses the necessity of clear communication and providing resources so team members can successfully complete tasks without frustration or failure.
00:12:58 - Overcoming Delegation Challenges with Intentional Communication
Brenda Reynolds discusses her natural tendency not to be detail-oriented and the importance of intentional delegation.
She emphasizes inviting questions to uncover communication gaps and improve delegation effectiveness, highlighting common pitfalls such as assumptions and unclear responsibilities.
00:14:04 - Understanding Personality Types to Improve Team Dynamics
Beck Moore and Brenda Reynolds explore how personality assessments like DiSC and AcuMax provide insights into team member differences.
They discuss how awareness of traits such as being a control freak or driven by fear can help leaders delegate more effectively and build trust within their teams.
00:15:44 - Recognizing Bottlenecks and Managing Monkeys on Your Back
Brenda Reynolds explains the concept of "monkeys on your back" as overloaded responsibilities causing bottlenecks.
She emphasizes the importance of self-awareness and feedback from trusted colleagues in identifying when leaders are overwhelmed and in learning how to delegate effectively to avoid becoming a team bottleneck.
00:19:05 - Time as a Valuable Resource: Investing It Wisely
Brenda Reynolds uses a time analogy to highlight how people guard money but often waste time.
She urges leaders to evaluate how they invest their time strategically rather than clinging to familiar tasks, which may limit growth and promotability within their organizations.
00:24:14 - Balancing Emotional Motivation and Delegation in Human Services
The conversation addresses the challenges human services leaders face in delegating due to emotional attachments and mission-driven motivation.
Brenda Reynolds underscores the need to take breaks.
00:27:45 - Understanding the Zone of Genius for Effective Leadership
Beck Moore and Brenda Reynolds discuss the "Zone of Genius," emphasizing focusing on tasks only you can do well, like strategic thinking and team support, while delegating less critical work to maintain passion and effectiveness in leadership roles.
00:29:46 - Aligning Work with Passion and Delegation Strategies
Heather joins the conversation, explaining how leaders should categorize tasks they love, must do, or dislike, urging delegation of tasks outside their strengths to optimize productivity and reduce procrastination.
00:34:08 - Levels of Decision-Making Authority in Delegation
The hosts introduce a five-level decision-making framework to clarify delegation authority, preventing miscommunication and trust issues by setting clear expectations on who decides and how much autonomy is given.
00:38:16 - Key Ingredients for Effective Delegation and Communication
Brenda Reynolds outlines essential components of delegation, including clear scope, expectations, timelines, available resources, and milestone check-ins to ensure delegated tasks succeed without burdening leaders.
The conversation highlights a real example of delegation failure due to unclear instructions, causing distress for a new team member, underscoring the need for detailed communication, authority levels, and feedback in delegation processes.
00:41:32 - Understanding Workplace PTSD and Its Impact on Leadership
Beck Moore and Brenda Reynolds discuss the often-overlooked concept of workplace PTSD, emphasizing how past traumatic work experiences affect current behaviors, leadership styles, and team dynamics, highlighting the importance of vulnerability and authentic communication to build trust and psychological safety.
00:43:48 - Personal Experiences Shaping Entrepreneurial Leadership
Brenda Reynolds shares her personal story of trauma with difficult leadership, illustrating how negative workplace experiences can motivate individuals to start their own business, emphasizing the need to recognize how past leadership failures impact current leadership approaches and business ownership decisions.
00:47:41 - Creating Psychological Safety Through Trauma Awareness in Teams
The conversation explores how unboxing personal workplace trauma during onboarding and leadership assimilation can foster psychological safety, improve communication preferences, and build trust, enabling team members to feel secure and perform at their best.
00:50:02 - Respecting Boundaries and Trauma Sensitivities to Enhance Team Dynamics
Brenda Reynolds highlights the importance of listening to team feedback around trauma triggers and boundary setting, stressing thoughtful management practices to avoid re-traumatization and create inclusive, respectful work environments that encourage open communication.
00:53:54 - Promoting Women’s Leadership Through the “Coming Together” Program
Brenda Reynolds introduces her year-long virtual women’s leadership development and mastermind program, offering intimate group sessions, coaching, and retreats to empower women leaders, with registration opening for the September cohort, reinforcing her passion for fostering leadership growth.
00:55:12 - Invitation for Discovery Calls and Community Network Collaboration
Beck Moore invites listeners interested in Brenda Reynolds' services to a no-pressure discovery call, where they can discuss ongoing conversations about bringing Brenda’s services to the Community Action Association of Pennsylvania network to enhance support within the community.
00:55:41 - Accountability and Managing Proposal Challenges
Beck humorously acknowledges the pressure of an outstanding proposal as a "monkey on the shoulder" and commits to resolving it, highlighting the importance of accountability and follow-up in professional commitments.
00:56:08 - Gratitude and Listener Engagement
Beck thanks Brenda Reynolds for sharing valuable insights that resonated deeply with the hosts and listeners, emphasizing the episode as a "master class" and encouraging the audience to join the extended mastermind for ongoing growth opportunities.
00:56:49 - Closing Remarks and Future Episode Teasers
The hosts thank their audience for tuning in, encourage continued learning, and announce upcoming episodes, reinforcing their commitment to providing valuable content and inviting listener interaction through questions about community action.
00:57:12 - Subscription and Contact Information
Beck Moore reminds listeners to subscribe and follow the podcast to receive updates on new episodes, and invites community action-related questions via email to foster engagement and tailor future content to audience needs.
Transcript of Episode 18 - Monkeys and Mindset: A Delegation Masterclass
00:00:00
What's up, everybody? Welcome to the Thinking CAAP. I'm Beck Moore, CEO here at Community Action Association of Pennsylvania. Wanna recognize I'm coming from you today recording at Bucks County Opportunity Council, one of our amazing amazing agencies in community action. But also with me is my fearless cohost, Heather Holloway.
00:00:15
What's up, Heather? Oh my gosh, what's up? Life is up. Life is amazing. Thank you so much, Beck.
00:00:20
I am so happy to be here. I was listening to a bunch of our episodes again, and there was one episode in particular that you referred to yourself as Robin to My Batman. And I don't I think we gotta think of a better you as a different listener,
00:00:32
But I just was listening to some of our episodes and just love having you as a co-host. Just wanna oh. Give that gratitude to you. Oh my gosh. I received that gratitude. Thank you so very much.
00:00:42
We can be peanut butter and jelly. We can be toast and avocado. I mean, you let me know. We'll figure it out by the next podcast episode. I love that plan. But with us today, we have a special guest. I wanna turn over you to Heather to kick us off.
00:00:54
Yeah. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Beck. My goodness. Do we have a fantastic guest today on the podcast? We have Brenda Reynolds, founder of BKR Consulting Inc, a trusted organization and leadership consultant. She's an executive coach.
00:01:08
She's a two time Amazon best selling author, our first one on the podcast, I think so, Beck. Right? I think so. I think officially, yeah.
00:01:16
And check this out. She also is a TEDx TEDxer, an international speaker. She specializes in guiding individuals and client organizations through their now what? moments to lead with confidence, navigate change with ease, and build unshakable resilience.
00:01:31
Leveraging her two corporate leadership roles, her entrepreneurial background, and her ability to convert complex topics into simple strategies, Brenda has served clients including Fortune Brands Innovations, Sherman Williams, QVC, Villanova University, go Wildcats, Junior League, International, The Body Shop, Goldman Sachs, and more. Brenda resides in the greater Philadelphia area. And the first question we have to ask you, Brenda, is, are you a Phillies fan? Yes. I was just to a Phillies game with a client two weeks ago. Yes.
00:02:05
Awesome. I love the hesitation. Then she's like, yeah. Well, I was like, did she say Eagles or Phillies? I mean, it's yes to both.
00:02:12
I don't know why I hesitated, but, yes, I was just there recently. I had a blast. Awesome. Awesome. Huge Phillies fans over here.
00:02:19
Beck, let's turn it back over to you for the first question today. Brenda, thank you so much for joining us. Absolutely. And I will say thank you to Brenda for being willing to be on the call today on the podcast.
00:02:28
Today, I had the great fortune of getting to know Brenda a little bit from my wife who is actually enrolled in one of Brenda's leadership courses, and I know I will say has just spoken so highly of the coaching and the support that Brenda has offered her. So, you know, up close and personal in my life for the support that she's providing to my amazing wife. So just wanna give you that shout out before I jump into questions. So today, when I asked you, we had we're kinda talking about the the podcast. I said, you know, what is something that you really wanna kinda hone in on, talk about? And you shared with me that you wanna talk about monkey management.
00:03:00
So my first question for you is if you can just help our listeners who may not be familiar or ever heard of this phrase before, a little bit about what monkey management means and where the concept comes from. Yes. I can't take credit for it. It is from the late William Onkin eons ago, who coined the term, and how he defined a monkey is a monkey is whatever the next move is when dialogue between two parties breaks off. And so we collect monkeys everywhere we go.
00:03:32
Leaders in particular. You're walking down the hallway. Somebody makes a comment. You say something like, oh, let me look into that, or I'll take care of that. You get an email. Every email is an incoming monkey. You open up your physical mail.
00:03:48
Those are monkeys. Every voicemail, every open loop, every phone call is a monkey. And what I want people to be aware of, and I'm I brought my monkey for those of you who can meet him. This is for our listeners.
00:04:04
Brenda literally has a monkey right now. Very cute, very cute. And years ago, the Onkin group had this amazing video. I cannot believe it doesn't exist anymore. You had to use the old VHS version of it way back when.
00:04:17
But in it, they had these little monkeys dressed up in business attire, and they were swinging from the lights and rolling in from the phone and getting leaping on your back from the hallway. And what I liked about it is in that video, they showed this monkey, and this is as close as I can get to demonstrating it for those of you who can see it. You know, for as as long as you're in dialogue with somebody, it's like one foot is on your shoulder and the other one is on somebody else's shoulder.
00:04:44
But when the dialogue breaks off and you part ways, the monkey leaves on somebody's shoulder, one person's shoulder. And I think the overwhelm that we in leadership spaces feel in large part has to do with all of the screaming monkeys on our backs far more than we can feed. So the question is what do we do about that? Yeah. I have an a a house filled with monkeys right now, and drawers filled and backpacks filled.
00:05:16
And if you're if you're neurodivergent, ADHD, you might have something called a a doom box, which is literally just, like, stuff you put in a box and, eventually, you'll get to it.It's like a box of monkeys that are sitting around. So forget the can of worms analogy. I would say it's like boxes of monkeys sitting around. And some of those monkeys have been sitting there for a while. Mhmm.
00:05:31
So if you don't know what I'm talking about, Google it. And it's very violent. AndI don't recommend this languaging. But, honestly, I'm quoting the late William Onkin. He says, some of those monkeys need to be shot. We can't we can't manage them all.And and in lighter language
00:05:47
Politer language. Beck. Sometimes we need to go back to that box of doom or our everyday email box and say, what do I really if I can get real with myself, am I really ever gonna do this? Right.
00:06:01
Yes. That's a conversation I have with myself all the time. So I'm gonna say release the monkeys into the wild. Let them live freely. Yes.
00:06:07
Yeah. Or or, to adapt to saying, not my monkey, not my circus, not my monkey, not my monkey, not my circus. Is that is that another one we can use?
00:06:14
Yes. PETA, if. PETA, if you're listening, we are not advising about. Oh, yeah, you know, monkeys. We love monkeys.
00:06:20
We love monkeys. They're way too cute. Relocation. Relocation. Relocating.
00:06:26
So thank you for that. I'd like to kind of dig into this a little bit more and pose a question around. What are. What are the beliefs that you feel like that get in the way of, you know, continuing to have the monkey maybe straddle two people or, like, not giving up over the monkey? So delegating ultimately.
00:06:47
Right. Is what it comes down to. What are some of the beliefs that get in the way of that? And I know that I can speak to plenty of those things, but we'd love to hear your take on why this is a challenge oftentime oftentimes in in business.
00:07:00
Yeah. And I think we can all relate to these. Right? Everything from, you know, it's just easier for me to do it myself. I can do it faster.
00:07:11
I can do it better, especially if your options are, do I give this to the new person on staff? Or I can just do it better and faster. And it's easier because they don't have to train anybody up in it.
00:07:26
I don't want to get any undesirable results, and I know the results that I can produce. So I maybe I'll just hold on to this one. Or, gee. This task may feel undesirable if I pass it on to someone else. They may feel like I'm dumping on them. The funny thing is, oftentimes, what we think is an undesirable task, other people welcome. They don't really find it undesirable.
00:07:48
They get a little excited about it. They feel like, oh, Heather had confidence in me to give me this thing. Or some of it is unconscious. Some of it is just I've gone from being an individual contributor. I'm in an early management position, and I have my identity attached to these things that I do really well.
00:08:13
And so I feel confident in those. I wanna hang on to those because they put me in a good stead, and we unconsciously hang on to them, which keeps us from doing other work that we really need to be doing. And some of those things are really what get in our way. So I want to dig into this a little bit, Heather, because I think this is resonating around some couple things that we've talked about. Yeah, yeah, I got notes.
00:08:38
So I think for me, right. And I'm curious what your reaction is to this, Brenda. I think about, right, being able to off your load your monkeys in an effective way, effectively delegating tasks, however you want to describe it as really understanding your team strengths and what, how they show up at work and what they like to own, what gets them excited, what they like to do and if you can lean into those strengths. So I'll use, you know, shout out to my executive assistant, Jen, who is just a rock star inboxologist expert is what I like to call her. She loves a good, complicated project.
00:09:19
One of her top strengths, if you're a subscriber to Clifton Strengths Finder, is responsibility. And so almost to a fault, like, that's her top strength. So when she does something, she's going to dig in hard, right? And she's going to get it done. What I love about her, she's going to check in along, along the way.
00:09:37
But for me, as a leader, managing her and utilizing an executive assistant, she's the very first executive assistant that I've had that I've actually trusted to be able to, I think. Right. Like, it was this idea for me about, like, I'm not going to give my team a task that I'm not going to do for myself. And so I just always felt guilty to a degree. And there was a lack of trust that I had.
00:09:58
Not because the team member wasn't good at what they did. I just couldn't let go of those things. So I'm curious kind of about your reaction to that a little bit. Well, one of the things that comes up for me is this notion of trust. It's a cycle you create.
00:10:11
Because if you don't let go and give someone an opportunity to build that muscle, to build that skill, then, yeah, you are on shaky ground. You may never come to trust them. You may need to slowly give responsibility over to them in baby steps. Let go, build that trust. Otherwise, this is what I say to leaders I talk to.
00:10:34
Otherwise, that thing that you keep doing and won't let go of, I hope you like it because you're going to be doing it for a very long time because no one else can. And I always think about parenting for any of you who are parents. You know, when your kids are in that toddler stage or just learning to do things like tie their shoes, it is tempting every morning when you're trying to rush out the door to just tie their shoes and get on with it. But if you do that forever because you can do it better, you can do it faster, and it's easier, you are deskilling them, and you may be tying their shoes until they are 18 years old. And it's no different than our teams either.
00:11:19
If we aren't letting go and letting people develop and improve themselves, then that trust can't come alongside them. Yeah. Absolutely. And that started for me to be able to let go of things. But Jen was just to make sure that I was really clearly setting my expectations of like, she communicates to my board. How did I how did I
00:11:35
she's an extension of me. So helping her understand what that meant and the language that I wanted to use and, right, what that looked like. And once once we got clear on that, it was easy to let go of.
00:11:47
Yeah. I think it's more you raise a really excellent point, Beck. It's more when when delegation breaks down or that we we're feeling uncomfortable, it's often the delegator who's missing something, who isn't doing the ideal job to set that person up to succeed. And sometimes it's just because we've done it
00:12:07
so often, we forget about things. We but there are so many there are key components to what we need to make sure we're talking to that person about before we turn them loose and ask them to take something over. Yeah. I use the example a lot of if I go to a restaurant, right, and I order a cheeseburger and I'm a vegan or a vegetarian, and I don't say that. I don't ask for the Impossible Burger or the veggie patty. I can't be mad when I get a beef patty.
00:12:30
So the same is true. Alright? Like, it's really simple when you think about it. Like, if I have a very specific template that I wanna fill out or an Excel document, for instance, right?
00:12:38
Give them the template. Otherwise, you're gonna get frustrated with yourself. You're gonna get frustrated with the employee. It wasn't their fault. Right?
00:12:44
You just didn't set clear expectations. Yes. Yes. And we we talked about styles and strengths too. Different styles of different abilities. So I, on the Myers Briggs, am highly intuitive.
00:12:58
I'm not detail oriented by nature. So I already know when I delegate, it's not gonna be perfect because I'm not detail oriented, whereas the person who I'm delegating to probably needs a little more detail than I'm gonna give them. So I have to be really intentional to say, no, no, no, Brenda, think about this. Give them the nitty gritty or invite them to ask a lot of questions.
00:13:23
Because when they start asking questions, that's when I realized how inept my my delegation may have just been. Yep. Yeah. No. It's absolutely a thousand percent. Georgia and I just had a little my chief strategy officer, we had a little bit of a breakdown on somebody accomplishing something, and she was like, were you gonna do this?
00:13:41
Was I going to do that? And we just I think one of like, I assumed she was gonna do it, and I she assumed I was gonna do it. We never clarified, and I was like, did anything ever happen with that? She's like, oh, I thought you were gonna do it.
00:13:51
And I just you know, I am constantly trying to stay, right, authentic about some of my missteps because I'm certainly not perfect. But, Heather, I know you had a a note there. I wanna make sure to to get your question. Oh, I appreciate that.
00:14:04
Yeah. Yeah. I I love the flow that we're we're going in. It sounds like, Brenda, we said awareness. We lead by you you lead by intuition.
00:14:13
I am the same way. So, we have a a four four person squad at Holloway Media Services, and so we dove into disc profile, and that was enlightening. We most recently did the Accumax, which was hugely is that a word?
00:14:30
It was really beneficial. It is now. It's been a it was really beneficial to our team. My first hire, Amy, if you're listening, she's direct opposite. I'm in the clouds.
00:14:43
She is planted firmly on the ground. And I'm sure, though she would never tell me because she's so sweet, in the first couple years together, it must have drove her nuts because I just out with ideas and details. Get me out of the weeds. I will, I will.
00:14:58
I will perish in the weeds. So I. So I feel you on that. So coming coming to my question here, going back to the different types of, examples that you provided, But there is couple words or maybe themes or personality traits of of these examples. So we have a control freak. Right?
00:15:20
Like they must control it. Then we have the person that it's self preservation. They're going to hold on to it because they want their job. And then finally fear. And that comes down to trust.
00:15:31
So how do we become aware that we're this, this type of person? Because I really do think it comes down to awareness. How do we point out the monkeys on the back? You got a lot of monkeys on your back, Heather. Hey, there's a monkey hanging out behind you.
00:15:44
Right? Right. Well, I mean, there there are ways you know you that it this is not going in your favor. To your point, Beck, you you know, you know you've got too many monkeys on your back, or you have a trusted colleague that you back can say to Heather, Heather, you've got a lot going on. Is it necessary for you to do all of that?
00:16:07
You're gonna know something's awry when you're becoming a bottleneck because you've got so many monkeys on your back. Everyone's waiting for you to handle them. We just talked about this, Heather, on the episode that we recorded about managing it up. Sorry, Brenda, to interrupt, but it's I recognize and I've said to the team, they talked about it, I think, on the episode. Right?
00:16:27
Like, I know that I've been the bottle bottleneck, and I need them to tell me and manage up to me. And I will fully accept and be like, okay. I'm stepping out of it. You tell me when you're ready for me to gut check something and happily will. But I feel that all day long. I think the other thing is just you have to realize that when you're when you have that many monkeys on your back, truly, other people are supervising you. You have taught them to come to you with their issue,
00:16:57
and they say, oh, Heather, this thing is happening. You know, we gotta handle it. You notice the we. The word we is a sign that the monkey that's currently straddle your shoulders is about to hop on you, Heather, the leader's back.
00:17:14
We've got a problem is the first step toward shoving that monkey over to you. And so they're supervising you. And I often use the example of this is, like, going a little bit off to the side, but it makes a point relative to what you just asked,
00:17:34
Heather, you may know that song 84,600 seconds or minutes or whatever it is from. From Rent. So imagine that we have 84,600 seconds available to us. But I want to do this first. Imagine I came to you and said, Beck, bad news,
00:17:55
uncle Herman just passed. Or, no, didn't pass, but is is on the end of passing. And he wants to give his inheritance to you while he's still here to see what you do with it before he does pass. And so start thinking about what you want to do with it, because his one wish is that you spend it. You can't save it.
00:18:18
You've got to spend it. So Beck comes up with his list of what he's gonna do with those $84,600 But I go to Heather and say, Heather, you know, Beck only has twenty four hours to spend this. That's what his uncle stipulated. So why don't we help him?
00:18:37
What would you like to do with that $84,600 for on, you know, on Beck's behalf. We're gonna help him. So,
00:18:48
Can I answer? Give me a couple of juicy answers. Oh, man. First, we're going down to the Mercedes dealership, and I'm buying my G Wagon. And is it for you or is it for Beck?
00:18:59
It's for me. Oh, it's for you. Really kind. He's just a really kind guy. He's never going to be able to spend all this money. Yes.
00:19:05
Yes. Okay, so. So maybe that. Spend it all, probably. Beck, is that what you would have done is run out and buy Mercedes for Heather?
00:19:16
I mean, maybe not. I mean, you know love me. I do love you very much. I do appreciate you so much, but I don't I don't know that I would I I would probably buy myself a boat first maybe, you know, pay off some of my debt, you know, just
00:19:27
Right, Saying. And that's the point. We guard our money. We would never freely give our money away to people to spend for us, but we do it all day long with our time.
00:19:41
And so that can be a reality check too to say, oh, you know, where should I be investing my time differently? And here's another reality check that sometimes gets people thinking differently about get letting go, which is, alright, Heather. I know you've got these favorite things you like to do, and you don't wanna let go of them because your identity is attached to them and you're a rock star. However, if you keep doing them, let's say the day comes when there's a promotional opportunity for you, and it's between you and this other candidate. The other candidate, however, has delegated, has developed, has skilled up their team. We've got to make a decision about who gets promoted.
00:20:34
People are not aware. They don't think about this, but they've locked themselves. I have a true client situation, a client that is in this situation right now. I saw the light bulb go off in her head when she said, oh, that's why I'm not getting promoted. Yeah.
00:20:50
Because if they take her out of that position, it all falls apart.
00:20:56
If they take the other person who's been delegating and developing the team, it's seamless. They can promote that person. Life goes on in his team. And so we are limiting our own promotability because we're also not freeing ourselves to take more of those high level roles and responsibilities on either because we're still down here doing the stuff we've always done. Think it had to do with that not getting promoted because you're hanging on to your stuff.
00:21:27
I mean, my client was literally not only did I see the light bulb go off in her eyes, she's she got really emotional. She kinda started to to cry because she realized what she was contributing to being being stuck. It's not that she wasn't capable and competent.
00:21:45
Yes. Thank you.That got me back. So back in the day, old school theories, right, like, do what you're told, get it done, work, work, work.
00:21:53
This culture is a culture of of of of of grinding. Make yourself indispensable. Do we believe in that? Do we believe in that? Do we need to shift that?
00:22:07
I'm, I mean, I’m so curious about your reaction to that. I'm gonna say that there's a way to make yourself indispensable without owning all of it. Agree. Yeah.
00:22:21
I mean, we make ourselves indispensable. However, we wanna what we if we haven't so if we're doing all of the day in day out stuff and we're not letting go of those details, we're limiting our ability to work in a strategic space or a creative space or an expansive space where we're out in the community and we're doing big picture future focused activities. Long range, that's what's gonna make us indispensable.
00:22:50
But I think, Heather, you're right. We're still glum on to this notion of but if I'm busy and I'm doing good work and I'm doing a lot of things, surely I'm indispensable. Yeah. It's easier to hire someone to do that work though than it is
00:23:08
you're more indispensable when you've got that strategic hat on. Well, I think what this really resonates for me, right, is ensuring that tasks are appropriate for the level of staff member that, right,
00:23:21
those tasks should be responsible for. You know, it costs a lot more for the organization for me to schedule all of our board meetings for the year than it does my executive assistant. And so what's the ROI of my time? Right? And my board should want me spending time in executive,
00:23:35
right, thought about the strategy of the organization and the vision of the organization. But if I'm so busy doing administrative tasks because I can't let go of them, then am I the most effective leader I can be? Or are you a leader? Are you really just a glorified administrator?
00:23:50
Right. That too. I think that that's really fair. I, you know, I feel like in the world of human services, this is this is, a hard thing for people to figure out and balance because there's a certain, you know everyone and I would argue that everyone in any business right now is probably overwhelmed to a degree.
00:24:14
But in human services, right, like, if you think about people being motivated by emotion or or, like, rational thinking, I would say more often than that in human services, we we tend to be more on the emotional side because we're mission driven people. Right? And that's where our focus becomes. And so then there's a different, when people are more emotionally motivated, right, the feelings of guilt that we have, right, to offload something or to, right, effectively delegate something. It just I feel like it gets in the way. And I try to we I do a lot of discussions on this in coaching and managing team members about how to effectively manage, how to effectively delegate because it's just such a it's such a weighted mission driven piece in the work that community action does.
00:25:01
So I just for those of you who are listening who are community action, I think that that I just wanna recognize that. I I see you. I feel you. I know that it's a challenge. You know, more often than not, when you ask the question in human services world, I have found I'll ask the question, right, how often are you meeting with your team? Are you having regular one on ones? And more often than not, the answer is no,
00:25:21
because, you know, that manager is also seeing clients, that manager is also doing this, that manager is also doing that because the balance of work, there's not enough people potentially. But I also think some of that and I'm not trying to throw shade at anybody. Right? But I think a lot of that sometimes is how do I break down the tasks differently in order to help the peep help people be more effectual. And when we spend time digging into a specific task, the gaps that exist in a task, who's who has what strength to drive a task forward comparatively, it starts to alleviate administrative burden. Yeah. I think we also assume that when we delegate I mean, those folks that you're talking about in your organizations who are feeling oriented anyway. We sometimes jump to this conclusion of, yeah. But if I delegate this thing, you know, I I don't wanna put them out. I don't wanna insult them.
00:26:18
This seems maybe a little menial. But my wake up call when I was in a leadership position, we had end of year sessions, and one of the conversations our team had was, what's really exciting you about the work you've been doing this year? And which things, if you could trade them off to someone else, you would happily do so? And I was always stunned. I have still remember this one exchange where a woman named Esther stepped forward and said I said something about, I don't know, editing things and some nitty gritty detail thing. And Esther spoke up and said, I love editing and proofreading. And she was so turned on by it,
00:27:08
and I was like, really? I would have assumed giving her that task would be an insult, and here it was something she loved doing. So we wanna test our assumptions too. And it's an insult to you.
00:27:22
You may not wanna do it. So how therefore, how could anybody else wanna do it? I as a leader in my in my agency, first time entrepreneur, it was all on me for the first three years, and I hired Amy. And I went through those those growing pains of you really you really wanna do this? You know? Or, like, finding the task for Amy.
00:27:45
Last year in 2024, I spent the entire year with, Women's Business Enterprise National Council, WBENC, And we had back to back to back trainings on executive leadership, and and it there's so much content around delegation, delegation, delegation because we just wanna hold on to it. I'm gonna say three words to you, and I just wanna hear your reaction. Zone of genius. Zone of genius.
00:28:10
Do we know what that is? I don't. Yeah. I don't know what this phrase is. Oh, cool. Brenda, do you have a take on that? Because I learned about this back in 2022, and it changed my life.
00:28:19
I think it's about staying in our zone of genius. You know, what is the stuff that you need to do that no one else can do? So for back to Beck's example with the team members, no one else can have one on ones with your team and help them feel valued, have great conversations, supportive conversations, and retain them. That's a leader's job. No one else can do that.
00:28:41
That's in your zone of genius as well as perhaps it's, hey. You're the biggest strategic thinker in the in the group. That's your zone of genius. You want more of your work falling there than in the other places. That might be fun, or you don't wanna give them up because what I find is as we get promoted through the ranks, sometimes we get a little further and further and further away from the work we really love to do. Yeah, And It's a it's I think it's a it's a hard
00:29:16
Yeah, I think that's a hard thing. It is. Especially when you're talking about organizations like yours who are very heart centered, mission driven. They're in it for serving that mission. But you start getting promoted more and more and more and you're getting a bit more removed from that.
00:29:35
It's different. Tell me, Heather, what your take on the zone of genius is? Yeah. Oh, thank you so much for asking. Because I wanted a part two to this because the way I was taught back zone of genius.
00:29:46
Okay. You have the things you love to do in your work, the things you have to do in your work, and then the things you absolutely despise. So the the love and the despise, they can go somewhere, but the things that you have to do, you have to do. So Brenda, is there like a
00:30:05
that's good, but a layer deep. You know? Should should we go a layer deeper there to get on the strategic as leaders, you know, we we are hanging out in in in meetings and planning strategy and the vision. So your take on zone of genius, things you love to do, things you're, you know, have to do or okay doing, and then things you delegate. Oh, you want my own personal my own personal experience?
00:30:27
What do you think about that? I I think it's right on. Oh, Nice. You know, whether you're an entrepreneur or you are a leader, you have them. Now and it's so it's slightly different for an entrepreneur. I do my zone of genius and say, what am I either not great at, don't like to do, procrastinate, will never get done
00:30:45
if I have to do it. I better be outsourcing that. Yes. And, man, does that Yeah. My that helps me to focus on the love to do. This is what I do well. You know? If you know?
00:30:58
So I outsource my social media marketing, and I outsource my finances. You don't want me doing my accounting and finances. Samesies, samesies. I mean, that's why, you know, Heather exists at CAAP. Because we needed to outsource
00:31:13
because I know just enough to be dangerous. Not my skill set. Not my skill set. I know, you know, enough, but, you know, I can ask good questions, but other otherwise, like, I need the experts to do it. The same for finances. Like, we
00:31:23
when I first got here, we had a finance person. She ended up leaving. And I was like, we that's not my sweet spot. I don't want to have to manage those processes. I've played a CFO on television.
00:31:34
I'm not good at it. I can manage the finances of the organization fine. Right? I can be the strategy person.
00:31:39
I can speak to the P and L, but I'm not doing the books. Right? Like, that's not I know how to, but I don't want to. I don't
00:31:49
so thank you very much to Miller, Dixon, Drake, our financial services team at CAAP. Feel free to, you know, call us and sponsor our podcast, by the way. But I just think, right, like, to your point, it's I am a procrastinator.
00:32:02
I will openly admit that. The things I procrastinate on the hardest are the things that I just don't like, it's the fine details of something. Right? It's getting something across the finish line. I'm your idea guy all day long.
00:32:14
I can create big strategy. It's why I have a team of two peep two people in particular who are specifically really detail oriented. Shout out to Erica Carpin, our director of operations, Georgia Del Freo, our chief strategy officer. Right?
00:32:27
Like, they make big things happen here. Mhmm. Yeah. All day long. And I think at every level, it does you don't have to be the CEO. You don't have to be the head of an entrepreneurial endeavor to be thinking this way. So for anyone who's in that their roles, I think this this applies to say, you know, even in our personal lives,
00:32:49
what you know, just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. I watched the angst my oldest son experienced right before he mowed his lawn a few weeks ago. It is a bear of a lawn to mow. I mean, the emotion that came pouring out of his body was outrageous.
00:33:09
And I'm sitting back watching the whole thing thinking, you should be hiring someone to do this.
00:33:17
Yeah. Why are you do that. Why are you spending your time doing he'll figure it out eventually. But we all have those things in our personal life and in our professional life where we just because you can do it doesn't mean you should be doing it. Yeah. Well
00:33:33
andI ultimately think if if you are the chief banana in charge or a manager of teams in general, I would encourage you to really get to a point where you can identify what are the right strengths, skills, whatever you wanna describe it to hire for. To your point, Heather, right to your point, Brenda, you know, when I look at at CAAP and how we've been able to evolve so quickly, it's because we've had people who have really excelled and complimented one another to do this. Otherwise, we would have never gotten the things done that we've done in the last three and a half years and grown at the rate that we've grown.
00:34:08
It's because of the. It's because of it it because of really getting visceral and, like, very specific about, I need somebody with these specific skill sets. And then, Beck, not only do we hire them and know they've got the skills and ability, this is important and we haven't said it yet. We've got to delegate the appropriate amount of authority along with the the task or we are setting them up to fail.
00:34:34
And if you wanna humor me with this notion, I I've see light bulbs often go off with leaders around this notion of levels of decision making. When you dealt when and we we can use this as a leader. We can use this when we delegate.
00:34:49
But a level one decision is leader made. This is a decision the leader makes, bar none. And there are very appropriate decisions that leaders just make. That's it. Then there's the level 2 decision,
00:35:03
and there there's 2A and 2B. 2A is, you know, I'm gonna solicit quietly. I'm gonna solicit input from people, and then I'll make the decision. 2B is. I'm going to be very transparent to say, I don't know.
00:35:18
I'm gonna check-in with you all. I'm gonna check-in with people. We're gonna talk about it at the meeting. I'm gonna gather information now. I'm still gonna make the decision,
00:35:26
and it may or may not go the way you think it should, but we're real clear about that. Then a level three decision is we're going to make the decision. It may be a consensus decision. Level four is why don't you drive this one, and you ultimately make the decision, but check-in with me before you pull the trigger on the decision.
00:35:51
And a level five is just, it's all yours. Go all day long. Plan the team picnic. I don't care where we go, what we eat. Here's your budget.
00:36:03
Here are the parameters. As long as you follow those, it's you all day long. And we we often have a lot of miscommunication when, as leaders, we're not clear about the level the decision is gonna be made at because the you go out and you start talking to employees about their opinions, and that's a level two B.
00:36:23
And so they think, oh, they gather around the water cooler and say, yeah. We told Beck this is what we want. We're pretty sure we're gonna get it. Right? And then Beck comes out and does the opposite. And they go, woah. That was a betrayal. What's up with the trust?
00:36:37
You know, trust just went down. So we need to be really clear what level is the decision being made and how much authority are we giving people when we involve them. I love that. The authority scale. I love that.
00:36:50
Is this in a book somewhere we can get a copy of? No, I haven't written about that, but it's. That's pretty good. Yeah. Yeah.
00:36:58
I mean, you know, I'm talking about it. That's what matters. I'm putting it out. Yes. Yes. But I don't I don't but I don't think we've mentioned this yet.
00:37:05
We wanna make sure to to give a shout out to your book, Brenda. So TBD, To Be Determined, Leading With Clarity and Confidence in in Certain Times. So, yes, if you're if you're watching, she's show showing you her book right now, but born of your own personal and professional experience
00:37:17
and now what moments? TBD, you know, that's where the description is. Right?. Helps leaders find power and clarity in the midst of any change. Easy read with big impact, and we know that leaders are busy.
00:37:27
It's available on Audible for anyone who prefers to listen. And it's, of course, as you mentioned already, Brenda, narrated by you. So, appreciate you, sharing that with us and look forward to you writing about this topic because I think it's something that, more leaders need to think about. And I it's something that I think it goes to one of the questions that I wanna kinda get us close to
00:37:50
our wrap up point here around is, what are some of those, I think, strategies for leaders to avoid the monkeys jumping out of their back? So I think, right, like you've talked about the level of decision making power. Is there anything else that you wanna point out there? What we haven't talked about yet, and I think it's really important, is what does effective delegation sound like? You know, what are the what are the ingredients?
00:38:16
Because we've all agreed maybe we are more intuitive and less detail oriented, yet the people we're delegating to need those details. So our job and I like to use this metaphor of our job is to create a picture frame for what we're delegating, and then they can paint inside of that frame and be on track. But if we never give them the frame, they don't know where the goal is. So what is the exact scope that you're delegating to them? You know, what are you expecting them to do?
00:38:51
Do you have examples of effective results? Maybe you've got a template or a a report from before that was really well received, and they can use it as a model. But not only what are their job aids and tools they can use, are there other people on your team or you? When do you continue to become a resource to them, or who else might you point them toward? So we have the what are you going to do
00:39:18
and the how are you going to do it so they know what success looks like. When, you know, when is this due, and will there be milestone check ins along the way? And if so, who's gonna initiate those? Will they be part of your one on one discussion, or is this something you want them to come to you with, which is ideal, by the way? Otherwise, you've got yet another monkey on your back, leader. Yep. Absolutely.
00:39:44
So you're saying, Heather, when you get to this point in the project, check-in with me. Let's review what you've done before you go further because you may be off track. And I don't want you to keep doing these calculations based on the wrong numbers. And I've got an example of this from, a situation that I became aware of last week where this young woman who is brand new on her team was her first task with the team, and she was, you know, you wanna make a good impression. Here you are. You're doing your thing. She's crunching numbers because she's low person on the totem pole. The client, who had been very ambiguous in their delegating, wasn't crystal clear about which numbers on the spreadsheet should be referenced for her calculations.
00:40:29
She ended up in a room with 20 head honchos from a prospective client and on her own team with everyone looking at her because this wasn't right. But, really, it wasn't her fault. It was the client who was not clear in the delegation. The young woman was traumatized. Traumatized.
00:40:54
So when delegation goes wrong, it can have really dramatic effects. We've already talked about the level of authority. We want them to know, you know, what level of authority they have for decision making, how you're gonna measure the outcome in their performance, and how and when they're gonna get feedback. So those are the key facets that we wanna make sure that discussion covers. It's not just a quick toss it to you.
00:41:20
There's a little more to it than that. Right. I mean, hi. If you wanna get to Arizona, but you put coordinates in for Colorado, guess what's gonna happen? I mean, goodness gracious. Yeah.
00:41:32
I wanna I wanna ask, I think, one more question unless Heather has another one. Go for it. And then give you a chance, Brenda, to talk about anything else that's still top of mind for you that we haven't really dug into that you wanted to talk about today. But, you know, one of the things that we're just spending some time with the team here talking about was about workplace culture and about effective management and just some basic, you know, skills and tips and tricks. And one of the things I I spent a little bit of time talking about is workplace PTSD. And I think as a society, we have not you know, Heather, I know you and I have talked about this. I was just listening to one of our prior episodes where we were kind of unboxing some of what your experiences were.
00:42:08
Right? Getting yelled at, being told, right, like, how you just show up, right,
00:42:11
like, physically. I had somebody who threw a chair at me. Right? More often than not, we experienced the things that we don't want to embody as leaders as as as team members. And I think there is a fair amount of workplace workplace PTSD that a lot of people bring with them in the workplace that they haven't unboxed. They haven't evaluated.
00:42:38
Right? Like, how is this impacting how I show up in my new workplace? And then managers because we just don't talk. This isn't something we talk about very often. We have our own.
00:42:50
And so, right, like, how we show up for each other is impacted by those experiences. And I think for me, it's something that we've talked about very openly within our team at CAAP about as something that we need to better understand about ourselves. And that if I say something, I mean it. Right?
00:43:08
And I'm gonna continue to showcase that and be vulnerable about it and be authentic about it. And if I'm not, call me out. But, right, like, this is this is what you see is what you get. There is no hidden agenda here. And for many of our team, right,
00:43:20
there was always a hidden agenda with prior with prior management. So I'm just curious what your what your thoughts are on this topic because I think it's something that when I get my leadership book out, it'll be something that I'm gonna unbox, but I'm just curious. No. It's it's right on. I mean, honestly, especially entrepreneurs. Think if you ask entrepreneurs why they started their business, it's often based on some traumatic event they had where they just said, oh my gosh. I think I'm just gonna start my own business.
00:43:48
That was true for me. I, in both of the corporate positions I had, I had some unthinkable leaders. In one case, walked in. They came in. After me, I had established credibility across this organization with 40 offices across the country and worked up and down the system, and I thought this was a good thing.
00:44:12
She's walking in, I'm going to make her life and job easy. and the first thing she did was literally pull out an org chart, and I write about this in my book TBD. She pulled out an org chart in a big thick red marker, and she drew a line on the org chart and said she said, so you actually talk to these people pointing above the line? And I said, yeah, all the time.
00:44:35
She said, you don't any longer. They're mine. Oh. Mhmm.
00:44:41
Yes. And so that unraveled to issues around related to my maternity leave, not being told while I was on leave that when I came back, I was actually being replaced by the person that I had hired and trained. Luckily, we were friends. And she knew me. And I said, hey, Kim. I just want you to know, based on this, I am going to be starting my own business. I don't wanna leave you high and dry.
00:45:13
I'm giving you a four month notice. I will tell you when I get my first client booked, and then I'll give you four months so I can just tie things up and not leave her in the lurch. She said, okay. So she went and told our boss this, who said to your earlier point back about you never know what other people's stuff is. And she said, what is Brenda trying to pull?
00:45:36
Kim said, I think she's trying to not leave us high and dry. And she said, I don't trust it. Kim goes, then you don't know Brenda very well. She said, I want her. Where's her two week notice?
00:45:50
So I gave her my two week notice. I worked my two weeks, I lapped, started my business. Maybe a month later, I got a phone call from the organization saying, hey, we're wondering how much you would charge us to finish the work you were doing. You can't afford me. No, go ahead.
00:46:13
This is what I was trying to avoid. But my answer, Heather, was three times what you were paying me. Yes. You gave them tax on it. Good for you.
00:46:24
Alright. Helped me launch my business. But clearly, you know, I've certainly had trauma around leaders who have said, oh, no, no, this is my turf. Don't talk to these people. Essentially, they were threatened or they didn't trust that I was being truthful.
00:46:44
Now to make the story sweeter, fast she got fired after I left, eventually. To make the story sweeter, I got a phone call a year later. She said, oh, man. I am in a hot mess down here in this new organization, and the only person I think I could trust to help us figure it out is you. Can we hire you? Now
00:47:08
I had my own trauma about walking into a situation like that again. So to mitigate it, I took a colleague with me, and we partnered. So at any given time, there were two of us in the room, and we could, you know, really move things forward. She sort of stayed out of our way. We fixed the problem and left.
00:47:28
But there is a lot of trauma that people carry, myself included. Yeah. Yeah.I just I wish that it's like a how can we start our onboarding process with a a new team member
00:47:41
by unboxing our trauma so that we don't step in it again? Mhmm. I think it's an important concept to think about. It's like I mean, I use the example for people. Right? Like, have you ever asked your team how they wanna be communicated with? Right?
00:47:54
Like, is Teams better for them? Is email better for them? Is text message? Like, what's the thing? Right? Would they prefer a Zoom meeting?
00:47:59
Would they prefer in person about these topics? And if we can figure that out because communication is usually one of the things that if you do a workplace culture survey, you'll see more often than not something about communication. And it's because, right, communication to you is something different to me,
00:48:13
and we don't define that very often. And so I feel like there has to be a healthier way of understanding where we came from, what we carry with us with respect to workplace trauma so that we help somebody feel secure and safe. Here's the one thing. I've never thought about this until now, Beck, but you're making me think about it, which is sometimes I work with leaders who are new in their roles to do that new leader assimilation, come in, interview their team members, get them a lot of good data to jump start their job really well. And I've never asked it, but as a third party, someone who's involved in new leader assimilation could ask a question like that. Try to collect that anonymous data, confidential data, because some of that is gold for the person starting their job to know what sensitivities their team members have.
00:49:08
Right. Right. I mean, how can I support you if I don't understand your triggers? I mean, it's I know that work isn't therapy, but in order for someone I mean, I feel like I preach this fairly often, so I'll get on my soapbox about it.
00:49:21
I feel like we can't help somebody do the best job that they can if they don't feel safe and secure, and psychological safety is number one thing that people want in the workplace right now. And so how do we figure out a place to create that and a starting point? And now, you know, for somebody like me who doesn't have a lot of trust in the workplace to begin with, I may not be as forthcoming on month one as I am in, you know, month five after I start to feel safe. But there's just
00:49:47
I think there's there's value in really unpacking that in order for people to feel safe, effective, and show up as their best selves. And so that as a manager, you avoid those pitfalls, right, or the triggers that somebody has that you have you didn't put there, but they exist.
00:50:02
Even as a consultant, and I may have shared this with you back in a past conversation, I sometimes stumble onto it. And I've gotta I've gotta make my sensitivities more heightened than ever because I'll often do an icebreaker or some kind of sharing as part of a team event as we warm up, and I was with a team that's I got the feedback of, you know, some of us have had some traumatic stuff happen in high school or as younger people, and we are really uncomfortable anytime you ask us to reflect back and share something from that part of our life.
00:50:35
So for that team, and I work with them on a routine basis, I will never go back and put them on the spot or not because I know there's a trauma for somebody embedded in there. I don't know who. It doesn't matter. I'm glad the feedback came my way, and they trusted me with it.
00:50:50
And I am highly sensitive, not only now with that group, with with other groups, and it's changed my behavior. Well and good for you for creating a space that somebody felt like they could share that with you, and and good for you. And, I mean, I you know, you wouldn't be doing the things that you're doing if you hadn't, but I appreciate that you also listened and you were thoughtful about it because there have been definitely times I've shared things with
00:51:13
with other leaders and it's just it's it's not respected. And there's that's when you know, right, it's time to go. It's time to go.
00:51:22
This is not this is not helpful or healthy. I've started to put, I don't know if anybody's heard this song before. I've started to put in my workplace culture presentations, a song about boundary setting,
00:51:32
and it's a kid's song about where, like, no. No. I don't like that. This is a boundary, and it's like, I'm not gonna sing it because I have a terrible singing voice.
00:51:39
But, seriously, look it up, the Boundary song. It's and I think sometimes boundary setting in the workplace pushes on people's egos and also, like, triggers some people with PTSD. So I think it's all really important, dynamics to figure out to effectively manage your team for sure. And to bring our topic back to a positive place,
00:52:00
I think it's all tied together, please. Yeah, no, no, it's all tied together, Beck, which is if we can reframe how we see delegating. Delegating doesn't I mean, as a word, it probably is a little bit of a negative connotation. It does not a feel good word.
00:52:16
But done well is a beautiful thing because we are saying to somebody, I see you. I value you. I trust you. I need you. I know you're going to keep growing. And I'm here for that. And it can be a really beautiful thing. Yes.
00:52:40
Thank you for that. I love that so much. Yeah. You brought up many, many positive benefits. You become promotable, if that's a word.
00:52:51
You free up space for creativity. You lead with strategy and all the juicy goodness that you just imparted on us today. So there are so many beautiful positive effects of delegation done right. Delegation done right. I love it,
00:53:05
Heather, Coin that. It's yours. It's yours. We're we're putting it we're putting it on a tshirt. y'. All.
00:53:11
We have a lot of T shirts, Heather. We have a lot of T shirts this episode. Yeah, Yeah. we need to, we need to start our T shirt business, Heather, because we've got some good T shirts. Let's do it. I'm gonna recap the Thinking CAAP to pull some out.
00:53:23
Yep. So I know you don't know if you're peanut butter and jelly yet or what you are, but I had an image of us today. What it oh, I'm dying to know. Oh, and it's just on brand as we leave today. We want some more. Right? Some more.
00:53:39
Got graham cracker, chocolate and marshmallow. Boom. Oh my. I love it. I love it.
00:53:45
I'm in. I'm in. Brenda, is there anything else that you wanna share with our audience today? Any any other plugs you wanna do? I love a good shameless plug.
00:53:54
I know Heather does as a marketing professional. So anything else that you wanna share, plug, or say for our to our listeners? Thank you for the few seconds to do what women often don't do, which is talk about themselves in a positive way. So I'm gonna do it. No, seriously.
00:54:09
I am very passionate right now. What I wanna give a plug for is a program that Beck kind of, foreshadowed early in the talk, which is called Coming Together, because embedded in the word together is the word to get her. It is a virtual year long women's leadership development and mastermind situation. It's done over Zoom. We meet twice a month.
00:54:35
We get you get leadership content focused on women in an intimate setting. It's a small group intimate setting. You get mastermind opportunities for real real world situations, a two day getaway retreat, an online portal of resources, four one on one coaching sessions with me throughout the year. And we have the registration is opening September for the September 15 cohort. Registration is now open so you can go to my website which is BrendaKReynolds.com
00:55:12
Pro programs dropdown, says Coming Together. Learn all you want to.I'd love to see any folks who have that inclination talking to me for a no obligation, no pressure discovery call, See if we're a good fit. And for our listeners who are within the Community Action Association of Pennsylvania, network, Brenda and I are having a couple conversations on how we can bring some of our services of her services to our network. And so more to come on that. I know that I've got a monkey on my back right now of this proposal,
00:55:41
and so I've gonna this is me holding myself accountable, Brenda, to dealing with that monkey so I could set it free for a while. I can't get it to come on your shoulder, but I really wish I could. It's on trust it's on my shoulder.
00:55:53
I acknowledge the monkey is on my shoulder, and I will absolutely be following up to put the monkeys back on your shoulders. Key the key the virtual monkey. I know. Amy Amy, if you're out there, our editor, feel free to put a cartoon monkey in our in our in our video.
00:56:08
Brenda, thank you so much for for joining us today. I really appreciate you taking the time out of your very busy schedule and sharing what I know our listeners will really appreciate. I know that what you've shared resonated with me. I know it's resonated with Heather. Oh, boy. Did it ever.
00:56:22
Thank you so much, Brenda. This was a master class. So if you loved this podcast, it just makes sense to get in on the mastermind where you get this for a year. Can you imagine how much you would grow? So please check that out. Absolutely.
00:56:35
So good. My pleasure. This is in my zone of genius. This is one of the things I love to do and I especially love doing it with both of you today. So thank you.
00:56:45
Thank you for that. Thank you to all of our listeners. I want some more.
00:56:49
Thank you to all of our listeners for hanging out with us, putting on your thinking CAAPs today. And stay tuned for many more good episodes. And we look forward to hear you back, seeing you back again. Thank you, Heather. Thank you, Brenda.
00:57:00
Have a great day, everybody. Bye. bye. Thank you for being a part of this episode of the Thinking CAAP. Check the show notes for resources and links to other episodes. And don't forget to subscribe.
If you have any Community Action questions you’d like Beck or one of our local experts to answer in a future episode, please email your questions about Community Action to info@thecaap.org—subject line: Thinking CAAP.