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The rebel Leadership podcast. A refreshing take on authentic leadership told through real stories. Let's smash the status quo and change. How leaders lead once and for all the art of the aha moment is a tricky thing. You can see it happening. A lightbulb, a revelation, a revelation. But to arrive, there requires self reflection. A pas moment. Katie mcgrath tells her powerful story on today's episode. It's about an aha moment she just experienced and how she arrived there. Listen, reflect and embrace your next aha moment. So the last year has been quite the roller coaster. You have two young kids. I have two young kids. So that layers on a whole nother level of the COVID world and the daycare situation and the constant work from home. The kids are home, the kids are back. Oh, wait, nope. Got the phone call. So there's been a lot of external pressures on you this past year and I've seen it all over your face and you're smiling at me. So describe to me like what that roller coaster has felt like for you and how you see yourself at work in your role. You're gonna go right into it. Huh? Okay. So obviously the past year has been difficult for all of us and for me personally, it's hard. Right. Because I want to be the best mom, the best wife, the best friend and the best at my job. And I understand I know that I cannot be 100% of all of those things at all of the time. But the reality of that is incredibly difficult for me to actually understand and feel and accept because you're like in the grind every single day. So you're not like you don't have all this exorbitant amount of time to really think about it and pause. It's hard, right? And you're so we've been so busy that it's so hard to take a moment to actually stop and think about what am I doing and when you don't do that situations happen, what happened the other day. So replay that moment, okay. So we were in a team meeting and there was a big reveal about something that was going on with the company, a good thing that was going on with the company, but a big thing that was very surprising to me and I didn't know anything about what was being revealed or how it was going to play out, absorbing all of the information and trying to play out in my head, how I was going to be affected, how my team was going to be affected and how the company was going to be affected by all of these changes that you were sharing with us. And so I was also jumping to the next slide before we were at the next slide, right? So I'm listening and absorbing and trying to process but not really listening, processing like hardcore processing. So in that moment, you saw my face and it was like full on processor moments, right? Like I just, I don't know what it looked like to you, but to me, I just felt like I looked like I was listening. Honestly, I have no idea what my face looks like in those moments. Um If I could zoom record those, maybe it would be helpful. But you saw something on my face that was emotional. Yeah, it was emotional and you asked me, are you okay? It looks like you're going to cry and I really wasn't and I didn't have tears in my eyes. But for some reason, that question caused me to have an emotional breakdown and I could not stop crying in that moment or quite frankly, for the rest of the day, I had no idea why I felt that way or reacted that way. I don't like reacting that way. It makes me feel weak. It makes me feel like especially when I'm in a room full of my peers um that I'm lesser than an Not good enough, right? Because I always have that feeling of not good enough because I'm not 100%. Right. So, if I'm crying in the middle of all that, I'm, like, not even close to 100%. Well, there's so much in that from a learning standpoint. Yes, one was that I felt so terrible after the fact, I never should have said that. Like that is, that is on me in that setting. I did feel it that you were going to burst, but I didn't need to say it in that room. I could have pulled you aside. So from a leadership standpoint, that was my mistake. And I'm sorry for that. And I appreciate that, but it's true, right? We have to be able to read the room and in that case, I read the room but I said it right. So, so it changed the dynamic of what was going on because they really were really positive changes that we were talking about and, and the whole momentum that the agency felt after is like amazing vibes, right? But it did change it in my psyche of like, maybe this isn't the right thing. Maybe people aren't going to take this the right way. But like that was triggered by a question I asked you in the wrong time. So that's one major learning that I've personally reflected on since that happened since I realized what happened. The other part was, I don't know that you realized like that was your peak of this past year, that specific five seconds was like, when it all came together for you and, and to me, when someone has experienced a very extreme emotion to something that they don't understand why they reacted to me, they're on the verge of an aha moment and I've seen so many of them happen and that's the best I get goose bumps. Thinking about it is my favorite part of leadership. It is the point in time when like all of the stuff, all the stuff, the emotions, the concerns, the learnings, the observations, the conversations, it's all coming together for that person, but you can't teach someone to have an aha moment, they have to have it themselves. And so we might not have realized it right then. But what happened the subsequent days after that? So I actually didn't realize it. Then I was just having an incredibly emotional day after that meeting. I tried to get my act together. Um continued about my day, then had a conversation with Brynn about what had happened and again, you know, eyes pouring. Um and still didn't understand, I still couldn't really get there. Right. Um I don't, I didn't know why I was so upset but it's not, you know, the thing about part of me. Right. Yes, I'm an emotional person but it's not because I don't cry because I'm sad. I don't cry. And this was something that I felt like I had to share with Brynn because I don't know that he truly understands it because it's just emotion and it comes out of my eyes and it's because I'm anxious, it's because I'm nervous. It's because I'm put in a situation that I don't understand your output. It's so many different reasons. It can be because I'm angry about something or I'm really frustrated about a situation. And so it's not just sadness or loss or, you know, a feeling of, I didn't get something right that somebody else did. It's not that it's just the way that I express myself and sometimes it just comes out at the wrong times after that day, that night. Um I was actually taking my second um strengths assessment. So subscribe to that, we have had you through a coaching training curriculum where the companies investing in because we really care about you and want you to feel like you're able to convey what your strengths truly are. Your innate strengths were going through Gallup strengths coaching right now. Um And you're like mid, mid in it, but you were so skeptical of it first explicitly to me, you just gave me this look like this is going to be a waste of my time. And I've already done this before and I've been around the block and I said, trust me on this, go through it and keep an open mind. And so that night and I'll replay that night. So that night I took the test, it was kind of funny because there were actually two questions in the assessment that asked about crying, so obviously skewed. Yes, this way, strongly agree. Right. Um So I was like, maybe they are going to know me. So I finished the assessment and I got my results, you get them pretty quickly. I read through everything I really digested it. I went back to a previous one that I had taken. So I had already taken this test as part of my master's program. I think seven or eight years, I feel like a different person. So I feel like a different person. So, and it's interesting, right? Because the way that Gallup looks at it, it's that you are, that's you through and through forever. And ever, you would never need to retake the test. Actually couldn't, the code wouldn't work for me initially because I already had an account and they said no, you can't retake it because it's you and you and you and I was like, well, no, my company is actually paying for this. So you have to give me a new code. So we figured that out and my results, a lot of them were the same, but some of them were different, right? And different in a way that I do see myself today versus then and it wasn't just the results. But then the next day I think I had my second coaching session, right? And I talked through everything and I had shared with my coach that everything that had happened the day before at work and the everything that I had been feeling in the past couple of weeks since our first session, right? Because it had made me start thinking about where do I want to be? How do I want to grow? Where am I these big picture things that I haven't really had a chance to pick my head up and think about in the past year and a half and the ability to articulate it. So the conversation I had with you after this moment was so poised and so professional, but still yourself. But you were finally able to process all the things and all the reactions that you've had and all the ups and downs of recent and say this is why I reacted like that because as your boss on paper, like now I'm able to think about it different and talk to you differently and say like, no, you just don't like surprises in those situations. I'm simplifying. But like as an example, I just need to get your buy in a little bit ahead of time. So you have time to think because you're a learner and processing and an extreme responsibility, but also the need to contribute. So to me, that was also an aha moment where I can lead better and adjust myself and my strength to the individuals around me. So it's like that realization for you help so much more than you can, you can understand at that time. Well, because it's so it's looking at the test. It's like, yeah, that is me. Right. That is who I am. And um you know, also like my faults as well, right. Those are included in there as well. But it's helpful because it's helpful to take an assessment of yourself and really being able to put words behind it and data and be able to have a reason to feel the way I feel about something was extremely refreshing and the other piece of it is self reflection. Yeah. So do you feel like you've always been a reflective person, like really looking yourself in the mirror and saying like, what, what am I doing that? I'm not able to articulate or what's that piece of it in your mind? So interesting because this plays into what came out of my results. But like I love figuring things out. I love um figuring out I'm a puzzle. I am actually like a physical puzzle person. Like I like to put actual puzzles together. I also like to do that at work. And in life, I prefer to do those things for other people rather than myself. Um And I think part of it's like the mom thing, part of it's the female thing, right? Just putting other people ahead of yourself and not taking the time to self reflect. I reflect on situations frequently, but I don't necessarily self reflect on them as much as I could. And I don't think people can come to this giant aha moment unless you do that because the art of the aha is all about you. You have to be willing to see things a different way, read things from a different perspective. Listen, not only to the words but here the meaning behind it what they're conveying. So it was just, it's such a fun ride to see you do that because ever since that moment, I see you differently and I see you acting differently and there's just like this confidence that's come over you, that I think was part of the being able to articulate what you're really, really good at and why that was important for all of us to hear and empathize with what would be the advice you'd give to anybody else who feels like they're like struggling right now. We're confused where their piece either in work or in life or it's hard. It's hard because you can't just tell someone to pause and take a big breath and think about your life, right? It doesn't work that way. Um Life doesn't work that way. Life doesn't afford you the ability to do that. Um But we have to and just like I tell my friends that were all good moms, even though sometimes, you know, yes, I'm saying this in a microphone. But yeah, you don't feel like that all the time. You're still a good mom. Right. And just because you don't feel like picking up the phone when your friend calls doesn't mean you're a bad friend. It just means you can't right now. But we have to find the time for ourselves and whether that's work life or home life or just self care in general, we have to find time for that because we can't be the people that we want to be unless we take a moment for ourselves. And it's so much easier to say that to other people right, then do it for yourself. But it's so incredibly important and I don't think that we can really truly understand who we are or where we want to be until we take that moment to sit back and reflect and, you know, criticize in a good way, but have those moments and you know, whether good or bad look at those moments and try to really dig in and see or why did I react that way? And that's the piece I think that we need to take a look at, right. It's we're all going to react, we're all going to act different ways. Some people are going to swear, some people are going to throw their hands up in the air. Some people are just going to quietly walk out the door. Um I cry. But what made you do that? Right. And it's all of the things that go into that visceral reaction because we're humans at the end of the day that we have to pause and think why? Thank you so much for being so honest anytime.