Thriving Women's Conference Review

I had the honor of attending the Thriving Women’s Conference in Raleigh in October.. The event was fantastic with a beautiful atmosphere, motivational speakers and ultimately a room full of women there solely to build each other up and grow together.? One of the speakers said if you aren’t uncomfortable you aren’t growing.? So here I am writing my first blog post if you can call it that?

Lisa Hansen, our gracious host that put this whole event together, spoke about our core needs.? She said we as humans, and women, have the need for:

• Certainty
• Variety
• Significance
• Connection
• Growth
• Contribution/Help

As a wife, mother, daughter, sister, friend and individual contributor at my job, I realized the need for these things vary but if I can fill those needs across my personal and professional life, I can be my best self.? I started to think about which need is most significant in each aspect of my life. As it turns out, they are all pretty much equal across the board.

?I want to ensure comfort at work because I don’t want to look like I don’t know what I’m talking about. I want to be trusted, respected and a “go to’ for my colleagues.? I crave variety because who doesn’t? My job allows me to solve various customer challenges every day.? I may be working with my rock star support colleagues, I may be in the trenches with my core team figuring out how we move a project forward or I may be working on a project with my boss…but the variety keeps me excited to get up and do my job every day. The need for significance I think speaks for itself.? Who doesn’t want to be valued in their job?? Yes at the end of the day if I left, they would just hire someone else, but I feel valued because of my tenure, the relationships and trust I have built inside the organization and with my customers.??

The next core need is connection. Now this is where a recent personal experience really drove this one home for me. I lost one of the most precious women in my life, my Grandma. For anyone that knows me, you know the special place this woman has in my heart.? Losing her was like a kick straight to the chest. I needed time to grieve and time to just be. I am so blessed to have the core need of connection filled at work.? My boss told me to take all the time I needed. She texted me every day ensuring I was okay. She sent beautiful flowers from my team. She offered to door dash me lo mein because it’s my favorite. In one of my lowest points, she showed up big for me. I encourage you, if you don’t work for someone who will show up like this for you, find another gig.?

If you’re still with me, thanks.? Two more core needs to go. Growth…the goal of most people I believe is to be better every day. But are you given the opportunity to do that where you are? I had the fortunate opportunity to start my career in sales and move into a customer success role as my desire to be home with my family grew.? Not only was this shift filling my personal bucket, but also my professional. I now had the opportunity to learn from our customers. How they use our technology, how is their engagement? with our post sales teams, how could we better the customer experience? 6 years later in this role and it’s still pretty darn cool.? The last core need is contribution and help.? If you know anything about Red Hat, those are some of our core company values. That is the meaning of open source and what we do every day.? I have been given the opportunity to work with some of the smartest people out there. Don’t get me wrong, half of what they say still goes over my head, but I get to bring them to customer meetings. I get to pick their brains and figure out how the powerful technology they build can add value to my customers' business.?

SO…all this to say. Thanks for reading. Reflect on the core needs as noted above. Where is your cup full? Where is it half full? How can you make a change in your personal or professional life to fill those buckets so you have a chance at being your best self?

And again…if you are not surrounded by people who value you and show up for you, make a change.