Leadership conversations: In finding strengths

Last week, I spoke at Nokia Women Leadership Connects, to a group that wouldn't be short of an overcharge if you put their brains together.

What do you say to 70 women engineers in a room? All shaping the present and future of telecom in the corridors of a name too familiar to us - Nokia.

It took me a while to think about what would inspire a fresh graduate and a veteran with 25 years of being an engineer - both to pat themselves on the back.

I was there to share my experiences, but it was not at all about me. It was about getting a group of super star women pat themselves on the back - hopefully many times over!

We spoke about strengths.

The compliment:

Most women, especially engineers have experienced being the only or amongst very few women in a room. Many times it's in the face, and shows up as the extra chair you pull onto the table.

The twinkle in the eyes is resilience. Resilience of the veterans to have showed up every time. With and without self-doubt, with and without judgement. Resilience also of the fresh engineer who knows ambition, and I hope never gets a compliment for staying on in the race.

Strengths:

Finding our strengths takes work. It is powerful to know them, because you know what you can bank on for yourself.

My own journey with strengths took long, and came from three places:

The boring

Boring strengths are the ones in plain sight and most difficult to spot for ourselves. We do them day in, day out and that's why they seem ordinary.

The question to ask here is, "What would I, my family, my team blindly rely on me for?"

For me, it's showing up - most importantly on bad days. I realized this when I did my first sales job. There are many days where you have a bad news, few where you have a good news. Because sales is by design ambitious, or that's what I was taught. More on that another time.

What mattered was I would always pick up the phone and listen. So, even if we messed up, my customers and suppliers knew I would be there. If there was anyone they could fix it with, it was me.

This, right here - triggered the most conversation. Turns out, the women knew exactly they were doing. Are we still surprised?

The tough

This is usually where we look last. When things go wrong, we are quick to identify where we messed up. But rarely do we sit and think, what we did well.

The question to ask here is, "What do I do when it is outright, unbearably tough?"

This took me to my journey to motherhood. It took us years, but the toughest days were before our child came. Even walking into the hospital, I did not know if I would walk out with a healthy child. There was fear but also helplessness.

My strength was in preparing to fight, imagining the worst but prepared to fight. This meant I never planned a nursery and deprived myself of the joy and anticipation of what was coming. But, I prepared every detail for what to do if it were to go wrong.

Turns out, it helps to know what to expect of yourself when things go south.

The exciting

This is where we look first. But interestingly, this created the least conversation. Perhaps speaks to most of us not giving ourselves enough credit for our work. Praising the circumstances.

The question here is, "What made us win?"

I found mine over and over again to be putting in the work and picking up the phone. Every time, I solved a problem with more people than merry - it created something extraordinary. Call it working hard in a fish market.

There are many ways to reflect and ponder.

Doing it together with so many different, unexpected journeys in this room - made it fascinating.

What is your boring, tough and exciting strength? What else made you spot your strengths?

?

?