Tell us about your experience in the She Leads program?
I work like a Trojan, then I go on training courses, I love to go on training courses, because you don’t get an opportunity to stop and think when you’re just working. I love the opportunity to step back, figure out if I can do a few things differently, come back and try them out. But you can’t come back and then suddenly do it, because everyone will look at you as if you’re daft!
For the first few hours of the first session of the She Leads signature program I thought "I don’t really know why I am here", because I thought, "I’ve been there, done that." I was a director of a small organisation in the UK, and I had told myself that that’s as far as I wanted to go in my career. I didn’t want to go any further. I went into the workshop with a closed mindset. As Jessica worked through the morning, I started thinking about my branding: Who am I? Where am I going? I thought, "I can't stand up and say nothing." I had that horrible panic attack type of thing where I thought: "I haven’t got anything to say." And then I started to think and look at things a bit differently. Because I love what I do, and sometimes when you love what you do, you have to leave behind some of the doing that you do to take that next step up.
It was good to listen to other people's views as well. And you’ve got different age groups, different cultures, all sorts of things, at play in the group that we were in. So that opened me up. I realised I had been given this wonderful opportunity to grow. I had been thinking: "close it off", and then I thought..."No I can’t do that. I'm not done yet."
And where has that shift taken you?
So this journey has made me open my mindset and think: "You know what? Actually I’m in my mid 50s I can do more, it's not dial down… I’m still doing the same role within the enterprise testing services, but I’m the captain of that faculty now. I put my name forward to be a captain. And I ummed and ahhed about whether I should just be a finder. But I thought, actually I want to be a captain. It took me a few weeks to apply. it was a bit like a Miss World, reading what other people had written about how they were going to change this and change that. I thought I just need to be myself. I want to be able to participate, I want to be able to bring my knowledge, skills and experience to the fore, and learn and work with others. I got it and I was really really pleased. So that in itself has helped.
What do you want, moving forward?
One of the key things for me is that I want to be able to be adaptable in the organisation. I want to go to another area and help there or actively participate in things and learn and be a part of this game changing technology work that we have got going.
Karen in action in the Symes Group "She Leads Signature Program" 2016
YOUR CHANCE TO WIN!
A spot for yourself and a colleague
@ YOUR BRILLIANT CAREER
Facilitated by Barbara Harvey and Jessica Symes
on Friday 12th May
at The White Loft, Crows Nest
Email [email protected] and tell us in 200 words or less why you want to enrol in this session!