Ambition Theory: Rethinking Leadership in Construction

Have you ever heard the quote "You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with"? I recently ran a 10km road race, and I really felt the impact of this. During the race, I was in a pack of people all striving to achieve a goal. The fact that everyone around me was putting in their best effort and was striving to achieve something brought out the best in me. It allowed me to run fas...

Reva Bond Ramsden is the Dean of Construction for the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT). After learning that females represented only 2% of the student population in the School of Manufacturing, she got really curious about the the gender gap. This curiosity led Reva to become a trailblazer and advocate for getting more women into construction, trades and technology. Through the grou...

Professor Maja Jovanovic is an author, TEDx speaker sociologist and apology-hater. Apologies are confidence killers. So, why are women apologizing all the time? Apologies matter, and with every unnecessary apology we give, we chip away at our confidence. In this episode I talk to Professor Maja about why women apologize all the time and what this does to our confidence and how other people perceiv...

One reason why women rise to leadership at a slower rate than men, is their lack of social capital. In this episode I explain why putting your head down and working hard just isn't enough to get ahead. What you really need to do is to understand the value of relationships in moving things forward. We talk about what the evidence says about social capital and what you can do to start leveraging you...

Mary Bicknell helps women to regret proof their lives. She helps women to take chances and create opportunities for themselves. What she really wants is for women to be able to enjoy their success. She is sick and tired of women feeling like they aren't good enough or they don't deserve what they have. In this episode, we have a conversation about why imposter syndrome exists and what you can do t...

One reason why there are fewer women in leadership positions is a lack of available role models. If you don't see someone like you already doing the job, you don't consider it a possibility for yourself. You may not even realize that you think this way, but it's the truth (and researchers have backed this up).  On this episode I'm having a conversation with one of my role models Madelaine Corke. W...

Debra Kasowski is an Executive Coach, Consultant, 3x Bestselling author and host of the Millionaire Woman Show Podcast. In this episode we talk about abundance mindset and how it is the key to unlocking your personal and professional potential. As women (myself included) we don't always support other women's success. Sometimes without even knowing it we adopt a scarcity mindset and we see other wo...

Just be yourself. That's what everyone tells you to do, so why is it so hard? When you look around and see that people are different than you, is it your instinct to try to become more like them? When your path is different than everybody else's do you try to compensate to fit in? I spent 15 years as a marketing manager and know the power of branding, yet I still resisted the idea of embracing my...

It's nice to dream about opportunities to take your career to the next level. The thing is, so many people get stuck in the dreaming phase. People get frustrated because things just don't seem to happen. Lori Cadelli committed to one simple action:  talking to her boss about how she appreciates their team meetings. That's it. In this episode, Lori shares how simply connecting with her boss led her...

Margo Jay had an amazing career as a marketer in the consumer packaged goods industry. She held Vice President level positions and later went on to start her own consumer insights and strategy consulting firm called 365 Integrated. She is a consultant to some of the largest brands like Weight Watchers, Maple Leaf, Kruger, Cara Foods, and The Source. In this episode we talk about how Margo was able...

In my very first job, I was very fortunate to have a sponsor. Margo Jay advocated for me, she saw my potential and got me my first promotion. In this episode Margo Jay and I talk about the importance of building and maintaining relationships in the corporate world. Margo Jay is the President of 365 Integrated a marketing and consumer insights company that works with some of the largest consumer br...

I’ve read a lot of studies on gender and the workplace recently and they all seem to have one thing in common. In order for things to truly get better for women in the workplace, men need to get involved. A lot of companies are talking about gender diversity, and they want to make the workplace better for women, but, they don’t really know how to engage men. I know this, because most companies hav...

Last week I was reading the  2018 World Economic Forum Gender Gap Report . If we continue to make progress at the same pace, the gap for economic opportunity (i.e. gender parity in the workplace) will close in 167 years in Canada and the US. For the world as a whole it’s 202 years. Yikes! That’s a LONG time. When I first started learning about this I was overwhelmed, I didn’t know where to start a...

In the summer of 2017, I read an article about women's ambition and it wasn't pretty. It said that 83% of women were somewhat or not really ambitious and 2/3 of these women ages 35–45 wouldn’t take their bosses job even if it was offered to them. It was like looking in the mirror, I was a living breathing example of these statistics. The woman who has lost her ambition and has given up on the idea...