Podcast: Download
Monthly Topic: Intuitive Tools in Your Feminine Arsenal … or Permission To Act Like A Woman in Leadership
Women are great leaders they have at least 16 Intuitive Leadership Tools or Strengths in their arsenal that they deploy better than men! Permission to act like a woman in leadership granted!
Here are our 16 feminine leadership traits from the Skirt Strategies Intuition Model. You can assess yourself on which of these strengths you use at Our Quick Assessment.
Collaborative mindset
Inspiring
Mediating
Building relationships
Planning
Multi-tasking
Social equity
Involving others
Keeping perspective
Interpreting
Sensing undercurrents
Empathizing
Sensing intent
Listening
Big picture thinking
Emotional intelligence
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION
Hello and welcome to the Skirt Strategies podcast! The podcast for tips and techniques you can use to increase your confidence and project a powerful image to get the job with a client, the raise or the promotion you deserve.
Katie: Hi Skirt Strategies! It’s Katie Snapp.
Carol: And Carol Wight.
Katie: We’re talking to you today about looking forward with your leadership intuitions.
Carol: Yes.
Katie: And what are you going to do about it? Ladies! What are you going to do about it?
Carol: Good question, Katie. So we have intuitive tools in our feminine arsenal.
Katie: Use your intuitive tools for good and not for evil. And at Skirt Strategies, we want you to have those tools ready in your hip pocket or your cosmetic bag – as we might say it.
And so, to be able to use what’s natural to you is really, really important. It seems kind of like a “Duh!” important. But I would bet that you compromise it sometimes and you let it not get used or you put it aside because you’re in a male-based workplace or you’re not confident or you’re just not listening to your intuition.
Carol: Well, and the interesting thing is, Katie – I think as we have done surveys of women who have heard our message before. I think the strongest message that we send and that women really relate to – is that we give them permission to act like a woman in leadership.
Katie: There’s no shame in that.
Carol: No. And the beauty is – I mean, they actually just go wild. It’s like – “Oh my God!” The sigh in the room…
Katie: It’s like the beetles.
Carol: Yeah. They’re like – “Whoa! I can do that?” “Yes you can.” And the reason is because they’re finding out that we have, women have leadership strengths that men do not have and they are actually more powerful in the workplace today.
Katie: Let’s give the folks an example of what we’re talking about – that sense of – “Ooh! I’m so glad I can do this.”
If I’m leading a group of people – Let’s say that I’m a team lead or I’m a project lead or I’m just influencing them in some way in a room and there’s a group of people. Because group dynamics is often how we get the messages as to what we should be doing.
Well, if you’re in a workplace where it’s normal to command and control or it’s normal to be very forthright in bottom line or you just get the sense that while you’re in front of that group, you should be driving them forward because that’s the way that you do it around there.
Listening to your intuition means – going a little bit deeper inside of yourself and seeing if there is a sense or a gut sense of – “Should I be pulling this group along more collaboratively?” Or rather than just saying – “Okay folks. Here’s what we’re going to do – A, B and C.” Is there a softer approach that you know somewhere inside of you is going to get them buying more?
That’s the difference between choice A: “I’m going to drive it forward because I feel like that’s really what they want me to do.” Versus choice B: “There is a better way of doing this.” And that often is the female way of doing it with your natural instincts to collaborate, to pull people forward, to sense undercurrents and to build relationships.
Carol: So we have identified 16 of these feminine leadership strengths. And I’m going to read through them because some of the women on the podcast may not have heard them before.
But these are strengths that women display more often than men. It’s not that men don’t display them, but it is a strength that we have. And so, I’m going to go through them fairly quickly.
So 16 Feminine Leadership Strengths from our Intuition Model which is on our website at skirtstrategies.com/assessment. And you can take an assessment there to see where you score on these 16.
- Collaborative mindset
- Mediating
- Planning
- Social equity
- Keeping perspective
- Sensing undercurrents
- Sensing intent
- Emotional intelligence
- Inspiring
- Building relationships
- Multi-tasking
- Involving others
- Interpreting
- Empathizing
- Listening
- Big picture thinking.
So those are the things that women do better and men do some.
Katie: Men do, but they look differently. In fact, there’s a lot of research out there that backs us up on this. And one of the things that men do naturally more than others (and this is through some research done by McKenzie a couple of years ago) almost unilaterally – is they command and control very well and they independently make decisions very well.
Now women, of course can do that. Sure, but it looks differently. And by the way, when I’m drawing conclusions on this – I’m saying, “Most women are different than most men.” It doesn’t necessarily mean that a man can’t do this and a woman can’t do that obviously.
But women have a lot more strengths that they do uniquely differently which includes – building those collaborative relationships, inspiring others, developing others.
So our message to you is to listen to those and use those. Those intuitive strengths are amazing and you can be using them more often. You can, you should, I don’t know. You should, but…
Carol: Yes. And a lot of times we talk about male-based work environments. And the only reason we kind of harp on that is because most women are in male-based work environments and most women do better if they don’t try to be like a man. They do better in leadership. They do better in management, all sorts of other things. So just take a deep breath.
Katie: Take a deep breath. That’s where…
Carol: And we will give you permission to act like a woman in leadership.
Katie: That’s where you said, Carol that we as women – find it so encouraging. It’s like that – “Ooh! Thank God!”
Carol: “Thank God! I don’t have to be acting like a man anymore.” Yeah.
Katie: Well, think about what it would look like if day to day you felt genuine, nonstop.
Carol: Wow!
Katie: I’m not suggesting that you ladies aren’t genuine.
Carol: Exactly.
Katie: However, I know that I’ve been in situations where my hair is up (figuratively speaking.)
Carol: No way! On the back of your neck or…?
Katie: No. Actually, I really mean my ears are up.
Carol: Right. Okay.
Katie: My ears are up and my radar is up. In the engineering world, we often say, “Well, I got my radar up.” I’m very attentive to what’s going on. I’m very careful about what I say. Maybe it’s a political environment and you can’t really necessarily be yourself.
I would love it if I felt the same way in all of those work environments like I do when I’m sitting around with my girlfriends.
Carol: Sure. Yeah. How much more comfortable would you be if you could just take a deep breath and maybe use your intuition a little bit more?
Katie: If any of you have ever been interviewed on the radio, you’ll notice that… and maybe you didn’t notice, but you noticed that the conversation that goes on when the mic is off is so completely different than when you’re actually on the air because we’re careful about what we say.
Carol: True.
Katie: That’s good. That’s appropriate, right? Where does the line between – “I’m careful about what I say and I really am being myself” come into play when you’re at work and you’re influencing others?
Carol: I’ll tell you. I was on…
Katie: You don’t want to roll over people, but…
Carol: I did an hour long radio show the other day and it was kind of grueling because you had to pay so much attention. I mean, you really had to think about your answers before you got them out of your mouth. And it was a little bit nerve-racking.
Katie: Well, you have a better filter between your head and your mouth than I do.
Carol: I don’t think so!
Katie: I learned to be really careful.
Carol: Ha-ha!
Katie: One of the other skills that you all can think about, walk away with is the empathizing. It sounded like you said emphasizing.
Carol: Oh, I may have.
Katie: But I knew you meant empathizing.
Carol: I was reading.
Katie: When we empathize, we’re bringing into the conversation what someone else might be feeling. Think about how many workplaces could turn around and say, “Well…” You know, they might not be so brutal as to say, “It’s not about feelings around here.” Not many workplaces are that way anymore – although, there are some.
Carol: No, there are some. Yeah.
Katie: Many workplaces will not necessarily encourage that. It’s not that they discourage it – it’s just that they don’t encourage understanding where people are coming from.
In a meeting – if someone wants their voice heard and they don’t feel like it’s heard, it isn’t empathized or their position isn’t empathized, they tend to argue it over and over again or they feel like they’re not heard or they stop contributing. There are lots of downsides to not empathizing.
Carol: Right. And by empathizing – it’s simply reflecting what somebody has said. And if you do hear somebody repeating themselves over and over again – somebody in the room needs to say, “So what you’re saying is…”
Katie: Exactly.
Carol: And repeat what they’ve said. “Is that right?” And they can at least let go. Now somebody knows that they’re alive.
Katie: Yes. “Hello! I am being heard.”
Carol: Yes. And isn’t it fabulous that we as women will see that happening in a room?
You’ll see somebody shutting down because they haven’t listened to, they haven’t been heard. And maybe it’s a woman on the other side of the table. And you can come to the rescue and say, “So what you’re saying is this. Is that correct?” “Yes.” “Great!”
Katie: And redirect it. I’ve even heard women bring it back past… after it’s already been rolled over. I might turn to you and say, “Carol, a few minutes ago, you had a great idea. A few minutes ago, I got the sense that you really wanted to say something about blah and blah.”
Carol: Right.
Katie: “Say more about that.” Or if I’m careful about not giving her too much of her time, maybe she hasn’t been listened to because she’s a blabbermouth.
Carol: Yeah. Or the point is not that much.
Katie: Yes.
Carol: Yeah, it’s not a great point.
Katie: I can still bring it to the surface as – “Carol. The point that you made a little while ago sounded like it was directed towards this.” And then I’d redirect myself. I might say, “Well, I’d like to build on that with.” And now I’ve redirected it without really giving you the chair back.
Carol: Right. Good.
Katie: Yeah.
Carol: But it is important that people feel listened to. And we talk now about command and control. Would you define that for us?
Katie: Command and control?
Carol: Yes. What does that look like? Because we use that phrase a lot – and I thought, “Well, do people understand what that means?”
Katie: It has a negative connotation in so many places where I’ve been. However, I do want to say it is an asset in so many situations.
If you’ve got a dysfunctional group, if you’ve got an indecisiveness, if you’ve got a decision that has to be made right now and everyone’s looking in the air like – “Where are going to go with it?” A command and control decision can be a huge – “Aha!” It can be a – “Thank you. You have just saved the day. Thank you for that!”
Carol: Well, there’s a point too. And where being a collaborative – you can’t just keep wishy-washing on decision making. You’ve got to make decisions. And interestingly, any decision is better than no decision.
Katie: I would say that.
Carol: It truly is – because at least it gets you moving. You may get a little bit down the road and find out that it’s not the right decision. But at least you’ve gotten down the road.
Katie: Well, so many could argue at that. It depends on the nature of the relationship.
Carol: Sure. I mean, if it’s rocket science. You probably don’t…
Katie: You’re not going to put someone’s life at risk or something like that.
Carol: Right.
Katie: But I think leaders do much better airing on this side of action. “Air on the side of action.”
Carol: Good. Yeah. That’s it.
Katie: So the command and control that we do see that tends to go too far is doing it at the expense of others involvement. I don’t know. There’s so much value in others involvement. You don’t want to throw that at the door.
Carol: Well, and that is it. Yeah, I think that’s what we’re talking about here.
Katie: Yeah.
Carol: You do want to empathize with them. You want to hear what they have to say because a lot of times, what they have to say is very important. And there are people who will shut down if they’re not heard. So you want to get their opinion and get their input.
Katie: So the intuition model is on our website. There’s some more description about it. Probably what’s most valuable to those of you that are listening – is to identify where in those 16 leadership skills do you tend to play more prevalently than any of the others.
And so we have that in a model that builds it into one of four types of influential areas based on your intuition. And that’s whether you’re a very inspiring leader, a very intuitive leader, a very strategic leader or a very organized leader.
skirtstrategies.com/assessment will take you to a quick profile measure. It takes about 3 or 4 minutes. And you will get an immediate report as to which of those you might emphasize more.
It’ll also give you some ideas for further training because we certainly believe “Tiny trainings, big results.” Introduction of new concepts, but also regular review of the fundamentals, the basics – you master things by mastering the fundamentals and the basics and then building on top of that.
Many of these skills have to do with assets that require maintenance over and over again.
Carol: Oh, yeah. You know what? Every time we talk about things. I mean, I consider myself a good manager and a good leader. But every time we talk about something, I’m like, “Oh, I need to probably bring that back into my feminine arsenal or my cosmetic bag of things that I use on a daily basis to manage other people.”
Katie: Regular over and over and over and over. I talk about it all the time and I still don’t do it regularly. I’ve gotten so much better though because I do talk about it all the time.
That’s the concept of Skirt Strategies. It’s the small regular exposure. “You can do it! You can do it!” Be with us. We encourage you. We pay you on the back. We make you feel good. We toast to you. We have a little webinar every once in a while with a glass of wine.
Carol: Well, and that brings us to the webinar this month.
Katie: Okay. So those of you that might be listening while we’ve just released this podcast and I know we’ve got quite the archives of podcast, but this one in particular is early on in 2015.
Carol: We’re in March 2015 and our webinar will be on the 25th of March 2013 and it’s going to be fabulous.
Katie: 2015. You said 13. That’s okay because I live in the past…
Carol: I did say 13?
Katie: I’m pretty sure. Isn’t that weird?
Carol: Yeah, that’s weird.
Katie: Yeah. Then it gives me all the time.
Carol: No, 2015. Yes.
Katie: And we’ll have a Barb Beck who is an intuitive coach. Barb is fabulous at listening to how you are building your relationships based on where your intuition is driving you.
So I probably cannot even do her justice. But she’s got an incredible ability to coach people through relationships in such a way that they really get to what’s going on, weigh in the kernel of their intent and their pure self. So we’re excited to have her.
Carol: Yes. And we’d love you to join us on this webinar. Do we have a webinar page up yet?
Katie: We don’t have a webinar page. We might by the time this airs.
Carol: Yes, we will.
Katie: But also, if it’s past March of 2015 – all of our webinars are available in the archive. You can view them and download them whenever you would like. So it becomes a product in our…
Carol: Now there’s a cost to that and there’s a cost to take in the webinars.
Katie: Unless you’re a member.
Carol: In which case, it’s very inexpensive to be a member right now. And here’s the interesting thing. Okay. So we are going to relook at our membership. Right now, our membership is $8 a month. Less than a…
Katie: Pair of pantyhose.
Carol: Oh my God! Yeah. And way less than a pair of spanks, right?
Katie: Well, way less. And they’re way less than a nice glass of wine.
Carol: Yeah – $8.
Katie: Or some cheese…
Carol: $8 and you’ll get this webinar. And I think the webinar is going to be at least… How much is it?
Katie: $28.
Carol: So you get this webinar and you get every webinar.
Katie: You always get the webinar.
Carol: You’re right.
Katie: And the webinars are training.
Carol: Yes.
Katie: Do not think of the webinars as – You sit there and somebody dumps something on you. The webinars are professional development training.
Carol: Yes.
Katie: Stuff you would go to and sit in a room and be lectured to. We’re much more fun than that.
Carol: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’re way more fun than that. But it is training.
Katie: Carol. Tell them what else they get.
Carol: What else do you get? Well, you’ll get a lot of training around this topic and any other topic we’ve ever covered in our entire lives which is – we do a lot about communication, we do a lot about self-confidence, we do charisma. Gosh! We have…
Katie: We’ve got a different topic each month. So our gig is that we focus on one topic each month. And March 2015 is “Intuitive tools in your feminine arsenal.”
Carol: “Permission to act like a woman in leadership.”
Katie: Great! The month following that is a crash course in Values-based Leadership. The month after that is “Communicating effectively without leaving a trail of bloodied bodies.”
And then we’ll go into some months about managing multiple priorities and the stuff that we’ve covered in the past – charisma, leadership, building critical relationships, everything in small pieces, small doses that when you’d look back at it after a year, we call it a 12 pack. After a year, you have a nice rounded area of expertise that you’ve refined well.
Carol: Well, and because it’s tiny trainings. You use them in your daily life and big results means that you get to use them in your daily life. It’s not like a workshop that you go to and you spend half a day at this workshop and you come back – “Ra! Ra! I’m going to change my life. I’m going to change the world.” You get right back into your routine and nothing happens.
Katie: Right.
Carol: What we do is the continuous trainings that you work into your work schedule and you’re like, “Oh! Well, that worked. Oh! Well, that didn’t work.”
So you get to integrate them into your leadership and your work and your management. If it works – Great! If it doesn’t – There’s another one coming up. And you’ll always have that tiny trainings and big results for those tiny trainings.
Katie: Well, that’s the way adults learn.
Carol: Right.
Katie: Adult humans, anyway. That’s the way humans learn. It’s to be exposed to something. As soon as you’re exposed to it, you don’t necessarily become good at it right away. So we go to training, we get exposed to something and we walk away. Now we know what we don’t know.
Carol: Right.
Katie: But practicing in a training, making it a habit, using it, putting it in what’s natural for your own life and your own style and your own approach is super, super critical. That is more than half of becoming adept at any certain skill.
When it’s in a small piece – (especially if you’re listening to it on podcast when you’re on your way to work) it’s better than being in a hotel in San Diego, overlooking the ocean when you’re in a three day training course and you’re so completely disjointed from the real world of where you’re going to be applying it.
Carol: Right. So we get you to apply it in your daily life on a daily basis.
Katie: And then we’ll have that workshop overlooking the…
Carol: Yes. We’ll do that too.
Katie: That’s good too – for other reasons.
Carol: Yeah. So I’m going to just do a little side commercial here. Besides the webinar this month that you really need to come – we call them “Wine Webinar Wednesdays” and it will be March 25th and we’ll have more about that on our website so do not forget to get on that webinar. And remember, its intuitive training. Woo! A little woo-woo.
Katie: I like that though.
Carol: Yeah, it’s going to be fun. So I was sitting and thinking, “Why would somebody join Skirt Strategies?” There’s five reasons.
Katie: Drum roll. That’s a drum roll.
Carol: Can I give them to you?
Katie: Number five…
Carol: Number five?
Katie: Will we start with five or one?
Carol: Five.
Katie: Okay. Number five…
Carol: Staying connected to Katie, Carol and other likeminded women. And that’s important to your sanity.
Katie: Oh my God!
Carol: You just have to do that to stay sane, right?
Katie: You’ll feel like you’re in the world with likeminded people who get you. We get you. Number four…
Carol: Tiny trainings that fit into your hectic life.
Katie: Number three…
Carol: Big results – because you integrate them into your life and your leadership.
Katie: Kaboom! Number two, Carol…
Carol: And number two – Because you’re worth it.
Katie: Oh! Do not tell L’Oréal you said that!
Carol: Do they have that going?
Katie: Yes. “Because you’re worth it.”
Carol: Dang! Yeah.
Katie: Yeah, it’s probably a trademark.
Carol: Yeah.
Katie: Well, we give them credit.
Carol: L’Oréal.
Katie: “Because you’re worth it.” And the number one reason why women would absolutely go to Skirt Strategies to invest in their own leadership skills…
Carol: The number one reason is – because it will never be at $8 a month again.
Katie: Oh my God!
Carol: Yes. There’s tons of information in here. And for $8, it’s just basically free.
Katie: So we will be changing the price of our monthly membership in the next 60 days. And if you do not get on it now, it will forever be gone to you at that price. If you do get in it now, you’re grandmothered in at that price.
Carol: You are. Not that you’re older. Just that that’s instead of grandfathered is.
Katie: It does make it sound like…
Carol: Yeah. But you will get this until you’re a grandmother at $8 a month if you join now. And just remember – those webinars are $28. So you’re getting easily at least a $28 monthly something. And you don’t have to listen to it at the time. We put it up on the website for members only and for a price – $28.
Katie: We get a lot of woman that say, “I just like the fact that you’re sending me something that’s telling me what I could be learning.” I mean, discussing how the importance of being a woman in the workplace or discussing the importance of listening to undercurrents or discussing the importance of the fact that you…
Carol: You have the permission to act like a woman in leadership. Yeah.
Katie: Yeah. It’s encouraging enough to them. And sometimes, they go to the training and sit and listen to it or…
Carol: Well, the other thing is that you can support these podcast by becoming a member.
Katie: We do love the fact that we have so many wonderful followers. And we love the fact that we give you free stuff. And we work our asses off to get this material out to you.
So if you have any inclination to support the entire cost of women being more prevalent in the workplace and confident in what they do and natural at their leadership skills and being a natural woman…
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Carol: You can sponsor us for $10,000 a month.
Katie: We’re not above begging!
Carol: We’re not above begging!
Katie: Okay, that’s good! Thank you so much, Carol. And for those of you that are listening to podcast pretty regularly, please keep in touch with us at skirtstrategies.com and the assessment is at skirtstrategies.com/assessment.
We’re so glad you joined us for this episode of the Skirt Strategies podcast. We’d love to hear from you with questions or comments. Email us at info@skirtstrategies.com or interact with us on Facebook.
Now more than ever, the world needs powerful, confident female leaders. And that’s what we are!
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