Bossed Up

Community, connection, and collaboration: these are the keys to our survival as a species if you ask Baily Hancock, a community architect and strategist with more than three decades of experience. Prioritizing these concepts within both her own career trajectory and her client work has positioned Baily as an expert and thought leader who helps organizations conceptualize, launch, and grow successf...

Writing cover letters is stressful. If I surveyed a thousand job seekers about their least favorite parts of the job search, I bet most of them would put this task near the top of their list. But as awful as they can be, they’re still important and can help set you apart. A good cover letter lets you highlight the most important details of your application right away.  Here’s my straightforward, b...

Resiliency is an important trait for any leader, but the systemic barriers that underrepresented professionals face, on top of persisting gender and racial gaps, make this skill even more vital. My guest, Jacqueline Twillie, quite literally wrote the book on resiliency for these leaders, drawing on her experience working to reduce worldwide inequity.  In this episode, we discuss her book and her a...

How does your LinkedIn Skills section look these days? Whether or not you’re currently on the hunt for new employment opportunities, this is your friendly reminder to get your Skills section in order. LinkedIn places a huge focus on this section of your profile when it comes to recruiters looking for candidates. In this episode, I walk you through how to amp up your Skills section. With everything...

Whether an organization’s teams are centered in a single city or dispersed across the world, cultural differences inevitably emerge. For leaders accustomed to knowing the answers and acting on their singular understanding of situations, it can be difficult to recognize these differences, much less level up the listening skills needed to address them for the good of their organization. For more tha...

How many meeting invites do you get each week? If your company is like many American organizations, it’s probably too many. Recent research shows that 70% of all company meetings are keeping teams from completing their tasks. On top of that, a Harvard Business Review article reports that “Ineffective meetings that waste our time can negatively impact psychological, physical, and mental well-being....

Pay transparency is one of our policy priorities at Bossed Up, and in this episode, I speak with a scholar who studies the subject: Zoë Cullen. An assistant professor of entrepreneurial management at Harvard Business School, Zoë has spent the last decade studying gender gaps within the workforce, and most recently has focused on the effects of pay transparency laws.  Her research reveals a lot of...

When you need a reference, what’s the first thing you do? Almost everyone looking for a new job will need a reference or two, and a former employer is the most common choice. However customary this exchange might be, though, no one appreciates having a reference call sprung on them without warning. I recently received just such an out-of-the-blue reference check. The uncomfortable experience promp...

Most of us have or will experience the classic post-promotion “freakout.” This crushing crisis of confidence leaves us wondering how we got here and whether we can handle our new responsibilities. Jodi Flynn, a leadership development expert with more than a decade of experience helping organizations with attracting, developing, and successfully promoting more women into senior levels of leadership...

Recently, a member of my HIRED Job Search Accelerator community asked a very important and relevant question: how do I get back into the job search after years away? If you or someone you know is preparing to take the plunge back into the working world, the four tips in this episode will familiarize you with how the job hunt landscape has changed and leave you feeling more confident in the career...

What’s the last self-help book you read? These days, whatever life change you’re hoping for, there’s a self-help guru and their associated memoir eager to explain how they did it and you can too. The problem is that most of these books are written by the people for whom our capitalist society was built. In this episode, I speak with Sharon Podobnik, a seasoned executive leadership coach and former...

What do you do if a job offer comes in with a low-ball salary? In this episode, I dig into a topic inspired by a listener's email that echoes the experiences of many job seekers. The thrill of a job offer in your inbox can be quickly curtailed by a proposed salary that doesn’t even hit the bottom of your range. The let-down stems from a combination of systemic issues around hiring, genuine frustra...

Content warning: this blog post and podcast episode include mentions of pregnancy loss.  Odds are, you either know someone or are someone who has experienced infertility or pregnancy loss firsthand. The visibility of this common but traumatic experience has been on the rise, but there’s still a lot to do before people feel as comfortable discussing a pregnancy loss as they do a migraine or knee su...

Do you aspire to lead others? If yes, you’re in the minority. New research shows that fewer and fewer people are expressing the desire to take on leadership roles, with women and Gen Z workers being chief among those losing interest. In this episode, I take a look at what’s behind this hesitance to pursue promotions to people management. Then, we’ll dive into what companies need to do to encourage...

Content warning: this episode includes mentions of pregnancy loss. Growing up, we’re often taught to deny or fight our fears. Fear is weakness, as you may have been told, and the only way to get ahead in the world is to become fearless. But since that’s all but impossible, we wind up spending precious energy we could be putting toward our goals erecting a stone wall around our fears when, in fact,...

How have you been making time for building connections? This is not an easy thing to schedule in around work responsibilities, family events, and hard-earned relaxation time, but it is an important and uplifting part of establishing and growing your leadership community. I dedicated myself to this pursuit wholeheartedly in 2023, and I came away from it with pride in what I accomplished and three t...

Raise your hand if being a mom and working away from home has you STRESSED! Most parents would agree: one of the biggest challenges you face in the early years is figuring out how to patch together childcare you can actually afford!  Most parents in the U.S. have felt the impact of our poor childcare economy. Stiff competition for daycare entry, care coverage that doesn’t reflect the average work...

What wins are you celebrating in 2023? Whether the past year was a breeze or the worst one yet, it’s time to pour yourself a glass of bubbly (or Bubly) and announce aloud all the ways you shine.  Let’s jumpstart your year-end reflections. In this episode, I present three steps that will help you add a celebratory angle to your 2023 review and really remind you that you made progress this year, no...

How can you bring more courageous conversations into your practice of inclusive leadership? In recent years, more and more leaders are seeking to understand what inclusive leadership really means and how to build it into our ever-evolving organization models. It’s not easy work and, all too often, defensiveness and white fragility rear up as soon as the feedback is anything other than complimentar...

How does your career align with your values, and how do you even begin figuring that out? These are questions more of us have started asking this year, as we stop accepting career dissatisfaction and burnout as “just how it is” and re-evaluate our relationship to work. In this episode, I share an approach to career recalibration that has really resonated with me, one that places less of a focus on...

Dealing with divorce can be an overwhelming process, piled atop of what may already be a heartbreaking betrayal. But it can also be an empowering experience in which you take charge of your financial future.  Today on the podcast, I sit down with fraud coach Tracy Coenen, CPA, CFF, MAFF, to learn how to prepare for divorce prudently, how to advocate for your financial future, and how to go from ov...

Women managers have been rated better or equal to men on every leadership characteristic except one: envisioning.  So what does it mean to be a visionary leader - and what does it matter? I'm diving in to the gender dynamics of visionary leadership and why it's so crucial for women leader's long-term impact.  Related links:  Level Up: my leadership accelerator for women on the rise HBR: Women and...

Have you struggled to find your voice at work? Have you started self-silencing? Or overthinking your every sentence?   Today's episode with Samara Bay, author of Permission to Speak, is for you. We're breaking down why it's so challenging to speak up and be heard at work, how to counter voice bias with voice justice, and how to embrace your voice as "the new sound of power." Related links:  Speak...

We've all heard about the "glass ceiling" women leaders face at the highest ranks of their careers. But there's a more significant barrier that contributes to the gender leadership gap: the "broken rung" of leadership.  In today's episode I'm breaking down what the "broken rung" of leadership is all about and how we - as individuals and organizations - can disrupt the status quo, support emerging...

In today's episode, I sit down with Marisol Solarte-Erlacher, M.A., LPC, a trauma expert and resilience consultant specializing in supporting women of color through post-traumatic growth. Together we break down:  The differences between chronic stress, burnout, and trauma; How women of color in leadership can sustain themselves;  And how we all can create more inclusive workplaces where all people...