Rob:

Okay, let's start with the most obvious your posts you give loads

Rob:

of information and loads of insight in your posts, but they're almost,

Rob:

all of them are dragon themed.

Rob:

Yes.

Rob:

What's the dragon theme and where does that come from?

Rob:

Why is it so important to you?

Sarah:

The dragon is my brand.

Sarah:

It's important for people to identify with the brand.

Sarah:

In the way that When people see dragons or even the dragon emoji, they think of me.

Sarah:

So that was the what is my brand is where it started.

Sarah:

And why did I choose dragons?

Sarah:

I, my Chinese new year is the dragon year.

Sarah:

So fire dragon specifically, I actually have, I can't pull out my

Sarah:

arm, but I have the tattoo here, which is actually the basis of my logo.

Sarah:

When I decided to have a logo, it just seems natural to use my tattoo

Sarah:

and simplify it because my tattoo is, of course, a lot more complex.

Sarah:

And why do I identify with dragons?

Sarah:

Like I said, I am a dragon in my Chinese New Year, but dragons also In a way they

Sarah:

are introverted they, they hang out in their cave they can be quite protective

Sarah:

of their trove, their treasure trove, and they're also known for being loyal.

Sarah:

If you look at like traits of dragons, you have dragons of different sorts

Sarah:

that bring out different aspects.

Sarah:

The fire dragon in particular is actually known in Chinese astrology for leadership.

Sarah:

So they are quite powerful and they let's say take care of their flock in a way,

Sarah:

if you call flying dragons, a flock.

Sarah:

And what I really especially when I'm teaching and coaching people, I

Sarah:

usually like to get people when they're trying to figure out who they are.

Sarah:

yoU have all different types of terms and words for the inner child or let's

Sarah:

say your inner demons or monsters.

Sarah:

I usually talk about monsters that we have monsters in our lives and

Sarah:

when we are younger, we are taught to actually when we're really young,

Sarah:

we love these monsters, so we play with them a little bit, but at

Sarah:

some point we learn to fear them.

Sarah:

And we throw them out of the room we get angry at them, we

Sarah:

yell at them, or we ignore them.

Sarah:

And monsters that are ignored, they get ferocious they want

Sarah:

to burn you they get louder.

Sarah:

It's not like you can just ignore.

Sarah:

them.

Sarah:

What's also very interesting is when you learn to recognize and see and let's

Sarah:

say, love these monsters in our room.

Sarah:

That's where I believe the real power of people come from.

Sarah:

So if you look at my monsters, one of them is very obvious.

Sarah:

If you have followed anything about me is that abandonment.

Sarah:

And I could, if I wanted to ignore that I've been abandoned or I'm

Sarah:

not going to feel this bad feeling.

Sarah:

I'm just going to feel like I'm accepted and embraced wherever I am,

Sarah:

I could Get shameful about having abandonment, it's a hot because

Sarah:

of my past or something like that.

Sarah:

Or I could say, hey, I've got abandonment.

Sarah:

What does that mean?

Sarah:

How does that evolve into who I am as a person?

Sarah:

How does that make me react in certain ways or even in a way?

Sarah:

It's a basis of a lot of my convictions.

Sarah:

So people that have abandonment at least if I refer to myself that

Sarah:

also created other monsters in my life of unrelenting standards.

Sarah:

Because I want to be accepted, I have subjugation because

Sarah:

I'm afraid to be abandoned.

Sarah:

So what happens, I get into this slave mode, like you

Sarah:

are the master and the slave.

Sarah:

I lose my control.

Sarah:

I, there's different aspects of my personality that evolved in,

Sarah:

let's say hyperdrive because I have this abandonment monster.

Sarah:

In my room.

Sarah:

And when I learned how to embrace it and to love it and to recognize like,

Sarah:

aha, right now subjugation is here, or unrelenting standards is here.

Sarah:

I am able to, let's say, speak sweet words to these dragons and

Sarah:

get the power from them instead.

Sarah:

So instead of this fire burning you, you've got the fire to heat up your soul.

Sarah:

So in my case, I have hyper empathy and it's something which not all humans

Sarah:

have an opportunity to develop to the extent that I was gifted by my past.

Sarah:

When you have a past which is full of let's say trauma, in my case,

Sarah:

I had to be hyper vigilant, hyper aware of everyone around me, making

Sarah:

sure that they're okay, which in a way, created a superpower in me.

Sarah:

Now, this superpower Can be toxic if I'm not aware of the

Sarah:

dragons in the room behind it.

Sarah:

When I become aware of these dragons and I use their power for good,

Sarah:

this thing that can be toxic is my power, which helps the world.

Sarah:

That's something which I, in every leadership course or one on one coaching,

Sarah:

or even when I've coached engineers.

Sarah:

And so it's about recognizing these and of course it starts with

Sarah:

vulnerability and it's a long journey.

Sarah:

It's not like that easy to get there, but dragons are my visualization so

Sarah:

I have next to me, my sweet dragons.

Sarah:

And you can imagine when I'm feeling something, I can look at my dragon

Sarah:

and be like, ha, yeah you're sitting here with me and that's okay.

Sarah:

I'm going to sit in this feeling of I'm going to be abandoned

Sarah:

right now and I'm okay with it.

Sarah:

And because I'm okay with that and accept that.

Sarah:

I get the power that comes from it, that helps.

Sarah:

Love

Rob:

that.

Rob:

What often happens is someone who's been in your someone who's gone

Rob:

through that kind of experience will often have those and they may not

Rob:

even be aware of what's going on.

Rob:

When they are, they'll probably just suppress it and just let it go on.

Rob:

And what you've done is not only embraced it, but you've brought it right out where

Rob:

you can deal with it and you've manifested it as a like actual physical thing so

Rob:

that you're able to manipulate and that's enabled you to go from what was, internal

Rob:

conflict to being an external strength.

Rob:

People don't always recognize that, someone's strength usually it comes from

Rob:

a dark place and that creates a fear.

Rob:

So like I've posted, the Enneagram is one way of looking at it and so

Rob:

like I'm a type 5, and a 5's fear is Not knowing or being incompetent.

Rob:

And so that's led me to seek lots of knowledge, which

Rob:

is then like I have a base,

Sarah:

that's a skeptic, right?

Sarah:

Type of investigator.

Sarah:

It might be just in my mind, trying to figure out which one that was.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Rob:

Do you know which one are

Sarah:

you?

Sarah:

I'm type one, a reformer.

Sarah:

Okay.

Sarah:

So my core fear is being defective.

Rob:

And you mentioned that unrelenting standards.

Rob:

Have you ever come across the work of Dr.

Rob:

Mario Martinez?

Sarah:

I don't know.

Rob:

Basically he says that everyone has one of three core, the three

Rob:

core wounds and it's abandonment abandonment, shame and betrayal.

Rob:

And one of those will be most.

Rob:

Dominant.

Rob:

So you're quite clear and most people aren't aware of that.

Rob:

And so there's a whole aspect of how they are, how they orient

Rob:

to the world and how they are in relationships that they're not aware of.

Sarah:

So I'm familiar with something similar, probably

Sarah:

not with exact that work.

Sarah:

But.

Sarah:

I think it was called reinventing your life and it refers to 11 lifetraps.

Sarah:

And those three are part of those lifetraps like defectiveness

Sarah:

and failure abandonment.

Sarah:

So there's 11 of them which are there.

Sarah:

So it might be some kind of parallel work or something.

Rob:

Yeah, I think, there's lots of different ways of getting to

Rob:

it but basically the same idea.

Rob:

Okay, so what would you say that has led, so if abandonment is like

Rob:

the trigger deep dark situation, what is the strength that gives you?

Sarah:

It's very interesting because early in my life, Before I became self aware.

Sarah:

I believed my core strength or what set me apart from others was my resilience.

Sarah:

I was, and still am very resilient.

Sarah:

I'm flexible I can stand on my own two feet.

Sarah:

I can shift in any environment and make it work.

Sarah:

I have this crazy drive to live and believe in myself that I will

Sarah:

live and make it through this.

Sarah:

And that's coming from needing to rely on myself from such a young age.

Sarah:

And so I had this strength of resilience and this ability to take on everything.

Sarah:

I don't have this fear of that I'm going to fall apart or something,

Sarah:

probably because I had so much happen to me in my life, which.

Sarah:

Should have destroyed me and I made it to the other side.

Sarah:

So I, I got this power to dissociate and to step out of the moment into the

Sarah:

future, which is always nicer or better.

Sarah:

So I thought that was my strength.

Sarah:

And of course that still lives with me.

Sarah:

I have that, that's something which lives with me still.

Sarah:

But it turns out that's also my biggest weakness.

Sarah:

That was the, my biggest blocker for me to find my real power because I

Sarah:

am so fully resilient and independent and I, I guess you can imagine most

Sarah:

likely avoidant attachment style.

Sarah:

I had a very hard time to accept.

Sarah:

help bring someone really close to me because I've always had this wall,

Sarah:

this and it's interesting because I evolved this kind of empathy, but

Sarah:

I wasn't able to connect with it.

Sarah:

So I had this superpower deep within, underneath the This other, let's say,

Sarah:

fake power that was built above my core abandonment issues, which was

Sarah:

hiding the most valuable aspect of me as a person, because without being

Sarah:

able to let people in because of my walls, I couldn't create the connection

Sarah:

which comes with hyper empathy.

Rob:

So you could understand what someone was going through, but because of the pain

Rob:

of feeling it, you couldn't step into it.

Rob:

I couldn't step

Sarah:

into it.

Sarah:

And it's very interesting because people in my whole life, since I was even a

Sarah:

teenager, I don't know how to explain it.

Sarah:

It was like I had a lot of energy vampires in my life or people which really

Sarah:

enjoyed my presence because I made them.

Sarah:

better or they gained from me, but they weren't walking with me.

Sarah:

I kept myself at a distance.

Sarah:

And I felt drained and I felt more abandoned in a way, like

Sarah:

why do all of these people need from me, but I still feel alone.

Sarah:

I still feel I don't exist in this space.

Sarah:

So that was a very hard.

Sarah:

Emotion to understand, and to find out that feeling of alone and really it was

Sarah:

within me and it's something which I didn't, there were people in my life that

Sarah:

most likely would have loved for me to have my walls down and connect with them

Sarah:

in those moments, but instead I could only give to them and keep them for me because

Sarah:

I wasn't able to let people into my

Rob:

core.

Rob:

because the fear is if you let them in they would see who you

Rob:

are and they would abandon you.

Sarah:

Most likely.

Sarah:

It's in the mind, of course when you say it like that it sounds like I, I would

Sarah:

sit in that room and oh, I've got the fear that they're going, but no, it's so weird.

Sarah:

I was smiley and I was the one which was the source of so many people,

Sarah:

like I fixed relationships and I made people better in their careers

Sarah:

and I was the source of making other people better, but I wasn't truly

Sarah:

connected with them in a way in which they could walk with me on that path.

Sarah:

And therefore there, my real power was blocked.

Sarah:

There was something blocking me from really being able to transform.

Sarah:

And being a reformer.

Sarah:

It's all about transformation.

Sarah:

So I was stuck leveled down instead of leveling up until I could access that.

Sarah:

I wasn't even aware.

Sarah:

That.

Sarah:

I had trauma because I was so resilient.

Sarah:

I always thought that I worked it out and I'm so strong.

Sarah:

So I think people like me are even harder to shift into that

Sarah:

vulnerable state because I was like the anti of vulnerable in a way.

Sarah:

I was like, even if people asked me about my abuse as a child or trauma,

Sarah:

I would always say I got over that because I worked it out myself.

Sarah:

I'm strong, it doesn't bother me, it doesn't affect me those

Sarah:

are the kind of words that I had.

Rob:

And when you come from that looking from the perspective of the

Rob:

one when you come with that frame, the fear of, I must be defective.

Rob:

Is the hardest thing is going to be to actually look at it.

Rob:

It's very easy to make yourself think that you're over it

Rob:

and you've worked through it.

Rob:

But it's so hard to look.

Rob:

And I also think Not having a good start, like not being around people who

Rob:

you can trust and where you feel safe.

Rob:

pEople who will give you that strong foundations.

Rob:

It's so difficult because you're starting from a place where you don't

Rob:

know who to trust or what to trust.

Rob:

Whereas if you grow up and you grew up in a loving, safe.

Rob:

environment, you learn that you have something to relate that to.

Rob:

But if you have nothing to relate from that it's always hard that there's

Rob:

no, you've got no reference point.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Sarah:

Trust was, it's so weird.

Sarah:

Because in there's something about me, which was always a bit like, I

Sarah:

remember my mom, she's my adopted mom, but she said I was like a carpet

Sarah:

that people could like, Put their feet on or wipe their shoes on in a way.

Sarah:

And I have this kind of never ending.

Sarah:

It looks like trust because I was always a bit vulnerable or very open

Sarah:

in a way, but I actually wasn't.

Sarah:

On the surface in that space of being defective, even the road to strength

Sarah:

if you have that core belief is really hard because even the process or the

Sarah:

road you want to be perfect at it.

Sarah:

You want to do it good and be a good girl and not make any mistakes and you

Sarah:

so even you can go into unrelenting standards on your healing path.

Sarah:

Now that I'm a coach and a trainer, I've encountered people that a

Sarah:

bit like me, a couple of them.

Sarah:

They're the hardest.

Sarah:

They're the hardest to actually help because they are just like me.

Sarah:

I remember gosh, there was a therapist once and the therapist

Sarah:

said you don't love yourself.

Sarah:

And I got in an argument with them like, what do you mean I don't love

Sarah:

myself of course I love my, I was really like if someone would say something

Sarah:

like, You're having a fake smile or you're hiding, I would get so angry

Sarah:

because, you don't understand me.

Sarah:

I really care, but I didn't get it.

Sarah:

I didn't get like there, there was something that I was hiding from

Sarah:

myself, even so I couldn't see it.

Sarah:

But it's a hard journey to get there.

Sarah:

Like the one therapist that said, I didn't love myself.

Sarah:

And then another therapist that asked me, it was such a simple question.

Sarah:

And it was, what do you like?

Sarah:

What do you like to do?

Sarah:

It made me fall apart because I didn't know who I was at all.

Sarah:

I didn't know what I like.

Sarah:

And it was so weird to be in my late thirties or something and not

Sarah:

know who I was or what I liked.

Sarah:

Like, how could I?

Sarah:

Was everything I do, was doing until then for other people?

Sarah:

I remember having this crisis of, do I not exist?

Sarah:

Am I not a person?

Sarah:

I started then also looking at my patterns.

Sarah:

I also learned that I can't change other people.

Sarah:

And that was probably the biggest learning.

Sarah:

I can only change myself.

Sarah:

So if I want to make this better for my children, I want to make my life better,

Sarah:

I'm going to have to find something in myself that I need to change,

Sarah:

once I started let's say I got pointed in the right directions.

Sarah:

I ended up taking schema therapy and diving into my past traumas and

Sarah:

it's almost like it became this ball rolling snowball rolling down the hill.

Sarah:

Like I started making more and more connections and everything

Sarah:

just started to make more sense.

Sarah:

And everything in my life just started to get better.

Sarah:

I learned how to step out of the drama triangles.

Sarah:

. I learned how to set boundaries.

Sarah:

I remember my therapist.

Sarah:

Was talking about people and boundaries and you have a wall in between and

Sarah:

people usually have their boundaries here and the other person has theirs

Sarah:

and once it crosses the wall, then people move away like toxic people.

Sarah:

They explained to me that I'm, they called me this pure altruist.

Sarah:

With zero boundaries.

Sarah:

And so I have this but very strong wall there.

Sarah:

Like you have this really tall wall, but you have where people have normally

Sarah:

the line you're like right here.

Sarah:

So people can cross over the line.

Sarah:

And get really close on to you until they're like right on and that's when

Sarah:

your walls start coming up, but it's a bit too late because at that point,

Sarah:

they're like that big, around you.

Sarah:

And I was told to set fake boundaries at first because I said, I don't

Sarah:

understand about setting boundaries because I don't have a problem with the

Sarah:

situation like if I don't care then why would I set a boundary, like they said

Sarah:

just start doing it even for fake, I know you don't care, but just do it.

Sarah:

Set a boundary here, set a boundary there.

Sarah:

It was life changing.

Sarah:

I started to realize I do care, but I had to first do it before I could

Sarah:

understand that I cared about it.

Sarah:

My, when I dived into my past and the stuff I went through,

Sarah:

it's my past was really extreme.

Sarah:

As a process.

Sarah:

I learned to survive in this world by making everything great for

Sarah:

everyone else around me and making sure that no one is bothered.

Sarah:

But I didn't exist.

Sarah:

And so I was the problem.

Sarah:

I allowed that to be like that and it's not that I did it on purpose because

Sarah:

I remember going into arguments, but I don't care, no, it's not on purpose.

Sarah:

That's how I evolved and it can change.

Sarah:

And it starts with that, creating those fake boundaries.

Sarah:

And I remember expanding into that space over time and liking the feeling,

Sarah:

liking the people that were now in my life, like somehow those toxic people

Sarah:

started to not want to be with me because the, they had the wall in the

Sarah:

places like, Oh, but she's not somebody I can, and so they went away from me.

Sarah:

So that started to change my life, but the moment was I, it was around my children

Sarah:

and wanting to make their life better, not wanting to recreate what you call

Sarah:

the multi-generational traumas in them.

Rob:

It's funny how it can be someone else's needs still that is the stimulus.

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

I Always think with relationships, you can, like everything is out

Rob:

there and every kind of relationship, and it's how you navigate and.

Rob:

Here's someone who is very giving someone who is very concerned with

Rob:

other people is going to be the person that's going to attract people who

Rob:

are going to take advantage of that.

Rob:

oKay.

Rob:

One last question on that, but I'd like to move on to what you're doing.

Rob:

But one last question is you talked about how hard it is when you're

Rob:

looking at The fear of feeling that you're a bad person and how that is

Rob:

a key to the growth and acceptance.

Rob:

Was that about your children or what was the link that made?

Rob:

you let go of that?

Sarah:

That happened a few years later.

Sarah:

I've taken so many leadership courses and stuff.

Sarah:

I was always over addicted to personal development.

Sarah:

One of those people that go to that section, the self help

Sarah:

section at libraries and stuff.

Sarah:

And always trying to fix myself.

Sarah:

Anyway, in one of my leadership courses Not quite sure if it was

Sarah:

because it finally was at that point in my evolution that I got to it,

Sarah:

or if it was that course in itself.

Sarah:

But at the end I had to write a we had to write a synopsis for

Sarah:

back of a book or something and we had to do it very quickly.

Sarah:

So I've shared it.

Sarah:

The poem water that I wrote.

Sarah:

I wrote it in 30 minutes and it poured.

Sarah:

From my pen.

Sarah:

So the one that I shared on my LinkedIn post wasn't even edited.

Sarah:

That's just what came out of my pen.

Sarah:

So like the castle and the barren lands and there being life in it and

Sarah:

Being able to finally get into that castle and that well deep within and

Sarah:

not wanting to rot the air around me and like somehow my mind's very visual.

Sarah:

I'm a poet in a way or I've always been I speak in metaphor often.

Sarah:

Anyway

Sarah:

there was like a moment when I realized that You know how

Sarah:

everyone has that one fear.

Sarah:

Some people have that fear that

Sarah:

they will die alone, or they will people have different people.

Sarah:

End of life fears, for example, that they will die in pain or they will, whatever.

Sarah:

And what I realized is that I will evaporate, that I don't exist, that

Sarah:

I'm just water that evaporates in the room, that I'm not there at all.

Sarah:

And I related myself to water in the way that I'm the water which nourishes life.

Sarah:

I make you live.

Sarah:

But as soon as there's like heat or something, then I'm just gone.

Sarah:

I'm not there at all.

Sarah:

It's just, I'm not existing.

Sarah:

And that happened in that leadership course.

Sarah:

And I remember making a vow to myself that I'm not going to be

Sarah:

the water that evaporates anymore.

Sarah:

I'm going to be the water that nourishes.

Sarah:

And by doing that.

Sarah:

I'm going to stand in my power and exist.

Sarah:

I'm going to exist in the room even when I get that fear of conflict

Sarah:

or that fear of I'm not good enough or somebody by the way, writing on

Sarah:

LinkedIn like I do now, I would not have been able to do 10 years ago.

Sarah:

I was the one that made everyone else successful, but I would have never stood

Sarah:

up and said, I'm the one that did it ever.

Sarah:

Like I was, I remember the fear I had, even in writing my first post,

Sarah:

like that people are going to say that it's stupid or where did I get

Sarah:

my ideas from, or, like I had all of this fear that I'm a defect or that I.

Sarah:

I don't exist or shouldn't exist.

Sarah:

And that I just wanted to be not in the room at all.

Sarah:

ThE realization was in that leadership course.

Rob:

That's so powerful on so many levels that I really like the the water can

Rob:

be vaporized or it can be nurturing and that speaks to me because I always say

Rob:

like, All kinds of relationships are out there and it's how we navigate them.

Rob:

And that speaks to navigating to where you can be nurturing and not where you can be.

Rob:

It

Sarah:

means what kind of environment I can thrive in.

Sarah:

If you want a leader that's with, I don't know, all fire and everything.

Sarah:

That's not me.

Sarah:

I'll evaporate in that environment, but I'm also very

Sarah:

powerful when I can be water.

Sarah:

So it's a self acceptance.

Rob:

Yeah, and water is the most powerful.

Rob:

When you look at, like the caves and you look at the structure of a cave that has

Rob:

evolved over millions of years, it's just from a drip of water, just continuous

Sarah:

drip of water.

Sarah:

The waves that ripple from a drop, if you think of a reformer, like it's a

Sarah:

drop of water and it's making these waves of change around it and water

Sarah:

nurtures and water flows and shifts.

Sarah:

Yeah, I really resonate with being water, but it also means there's

Sarah:

some environments I don't thrive in.

Sarah:

You put me into a really hot place,

Sarah:

I don't thrive in.

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

The irony though is you've gone from water to dragons, which is a very hot place.

Sarah:

It's very interesting that I'm a fire dragon, but I am water.

Sarah:

You have to really make sure that flame isn't destroying that you can be sweet

Sarah:

with your dragons and instead make some ripples from a bit of heat and warmth.

Sarah:

There's a difference between the warmth of the passion in your soul

Sarah:

and the heat that comes from a fury.

Rob:

Because fire is nurturing as well.

Rob:

Okay.

Rob:

So that's been fascinating.

Rob:

Now we know you, how does all of that what do you do and how does all

Rob:

of that come into your work today?

Sarah:

Right now, I'm a bit at a I'm a bit at a crossroads in my career.

Sarah:

So I have come from being a software engineer.

Sarah:

So I was a software engineer for some 20 years and I had all different hats in

Sarah:

my career where I was an agile coach and business leader and transformation coach.

Sarah:

And team lead engineering manager.

Sarah:

Now I'm a director of engineering at a company.

Sarah:

And now that I.

Sarah:

Recognize my power and where it lies and where it is.

Sarah:

I am finding myself wanting to help others, which I mean,

Sarah:

what do most coaches do?

Sarah:

They take themselves from 10 years ago, 20 years ago, and they help

Sarah:

them get to where they are today and.

Sarah:

I want to help other leaders step into their power too and use the

Sarah:

talent that I have of seeing people.

Sarah:

"You have to be a leadership that coaches" kind of person.

Sarah:

A lot of people are very like single minded in their

Sarah:

approach "this is how I do it.

Sarah:

So this is how you need to do it in order to succeed".

Sarah:

And instead I can see people, I even can see a red leader and help them

Sarah:

embrace their redness and become an effective leader and stand in the

Sarah:

environments that are best for them.

Sarah:

sO I want to help people step into their core power and their

Sarah:

ability to lead themselves.

Sarah:

And ultimately, if you also can lead yourself, then perhaps

Sarah:

also lead others and help.

Sarah:

I see so many bad leaders out there.

Sarah:

I've had a lot of bad leaders.

Sarah:

I see, and it's not that they're bad people.

Sarah:

They're great people.

Sarah:

They're loving they want to do good and they just don't know how to they're stuck.

Sarah:

And right now I have ABAGASA coaching as a side.

Sarah:

business.

Sarah:

I don't earn any money yet with Avogadro coaching.

Sarah:

And now I figured out that's a real background and not a green screen.

Sarah:

So great.

Sarah:

wHat happens next?

Sarah:

I don't know.

Sarah:

Either Avogadro coaching will end up being my future business.

Sarah:

Maybe I end up joining another venture along the way.

Sarah:

I do know that just being a leader of one group.

Sarah:

Is not going to be enough for the impact I want to make in the road.

Sarah:

Like I want to be able to make bigger change.

Sarah:

That's broader and helping more people than I could.

Sarah:

If I just lead one group in one place.

Rob:

It seems that you've learned you've now done it.

Rob:

You've seen the skill, you've got the skills that you know that

Rob:

you can help other people do it.

Rob:

And so it feels like teaching is how you finalize your knowledge, isn't it?

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

You apply it.

Rob:

It's

Sarah:

how I embrace the reformer in me.

Rob:

Would this be like first time managers or just generally anyone

Rob:

who's feeling challenged who needs to step up a level in order to lead?

Rob:

When I

Sarah:

first started with Avogadro I didn't have a small niche.

Sarah:

iT was like, I can help anyone, which is having a trouble

Sarah:

self leading in their life.

Sarah:

And part of me still wants to do that, but in order to succeed as a business, I

Sarah:

have niched it down to helping leaders.

Sarah:

But

Sarah:

I still don't know if that's the right decision yet.

Sarah:

Like I'm still trying to figure out if I because I feel like if I look at myself

Sarah:

having been this woman software engineer that wanted so bad to do well in my job

Sarah:

and to grow in my career and I had this.

Sarah:

The ceiling like on top of my head and I would work harder and I would

Sarah:

work more hours and I would do great work and I somehow couldn't get that

Sarah:

raise or that position I wanted or there was something really blocking

Sarah:

and to find out that was myself.

Sarah:

And once I could unblock myself.

Sarah:

I just soared.

Sarah:

I mean I just went from one level to the next level to the next level I

Sarah:

feel like I could help so many people in that, like there's so many people

Sarah:

that are with that blockage that they can't, they don't know what it is.

Sarah:

A lot of the time they're at that point still that they're angry at the world

Sarah:

or they think it's other people that are blocking them or they think it's

Sarah:

unfair they're a victim to their life or something like this, and I have

Sarah:

their eyes opened not in a stressful.

Sarah:

mean way, but compassionate way where, I'm walking beside

Sarah:

them while they're unblocking.

Sarah:

Those walls in themselves.

Sarah:

Does that happen at the leadership level?

Sarah:

I think there's so many high leaders that need this.

Sarah:

I even find they may even need it more just because of the different

Sarah:

personality types that can exist once people get high up sometimes.

Sarah:

But are they as open to it?

Sarah:

I don't know, there's a lot of people which have made it to the top.

Sarah:

They're not doing that great, but they're surviving and they're

Sarah:

not self reflective enough.

Sarah:

to let in help.

Sarah:

So that's my experience so far.

Rob:

We have a frame, like our culture and all, everything we've bought has

Rob:

given us what I call the operating system.

Rob:

And that everything we've been taught has been stuff that's worked in the past.

Rob:

And the problem is that the world has changed and leadership

Rob:

is a level of change where.

Rob:

Everything that works, like the frame that we're given is to be a follower,

Rob:

we go to school, we're taught to follow, we're taught to be like

Rob:

this, so we go to work, we follow.

Rob:

And then to be a leader is suddenly to step out in that spotlight.

Rob:

And if you're not comfortable with that, then that, it means that I think

Rob:

what happens with so many leaders is.

Rob:

They're doing things for for the sake of how they look and from their feelings

Rob:

of what people are thinking of them.

Rob:

And so if you imagine like 100 percent of your energy, it's probably 50, 60

Rob:

percent is going on concern what other people are thinking about, which means

Rob:

that you're operating on so much less.

Rob:

And then all of the, and then there's the problem of what made you successful.

Rob:

Is no longer going to make you successful and so you need to change the frame.

Rob:

We've come from a logistical Business of making moving mining stuff and now

Rob:

we're in something where it's about people and about insights And where

Rob:

technology was the great unlock for that, now I think it's more emotional

Rob:

intelligence and it's awareness and understanding of all these things.

Rob:

So in a nutshell, what it is you do, I guess that what you're doing is

Rob:

you're helping people develop their own frames for what makes them like 100%.

Rob:

Able to focus on what they need to do.

Rob:

Yes.

Sarah:

You put the hammer on the head.

Sarah:

Yeah, a lot of leaders they only have the example of leaders in their past.

Sarah:

They try to copy what they saw.

Sarah:

Very often it's not their leadership style.

Sarah:

It's has nothing to do with them as a person.

Sarah:

So they fail at it over and over again.

Sarah:

If I would go in and try to be directive.

Sarah:

It will always fail because I'm not that type, and you may have leaders, especially

Sarah:

if you're in middle management that are telling you to be how they are, and

Sarah:

you keep feeling like you're failing.

Sarah:

This is not working.

Sarah:

I don't get it.

Sarah:

So yeah, I can help those people.

Sarah:

Those people stand in confidence in their, in the way they are and

Sarah:

stand in their core and embrace.

Sarah:

And it starts, like I said, embracing those monsters in the room and figuring

Sarah:

out what the real power is behind the power that they thought they had or have.

Sarah:

And especially in technology, as you said.

Sarah:

The majority of the leaders I've met, they were engineers and they were great at it.

Sarah:

They were content experts.

Sarah:

They were masteries at their craft, exactly what made them good leaders

Sarah:

is making them or good in their craft is making them bad leaders because

Sarah:

you have to let go being a master in the craft and empower others to

Sarah:

be masters in their craft instead.

Rob:

And when your identity is built on being the master, that's difficult to do.

Rob:

It's very

Sarah:

hard, especially when you've got ego wrapped in there.

Rob:

I don't know if you follow soccer at all, but if you look at,

Rob:

I'm sure it's true in most sports, but it's very rare that a great

Rob:

player becomes a great manager.

Rob:

Usually the best managers are players who are average or didn't really make it.

Sarah:

They can empower others to be great at their craft.

Sarah:

They know they need others to be great at their craft.

Sarah:

And I even, had this argument at my last company because there were engineering

Sarah:

managers and they wanted to hire only X engineers as engineering managers.

Sarah:

And I said that's not the way actually some of the best engineering managers

Sarah:

were never engineers before, because they know how to empower those tech leads.

Sarah:

Which are made to be like they are present in technology right now.

Sarah:

And I was an engineer for 20 years, but it doesn't mean what I knew 10 years

Sarah:

ago is still valid today or, and if I try to keep up at it and keep up in

Sarah:

tech and make sure that my coding skills are just as great all the time, then

Sarah:

I'm not where's my time being spent?

Sarah:

It's not being spent on being a better leader.

Sarah:

I think, especially in tech.

Sarah:

Leaders need helpers like you and me.

Rob:

I always look at relationships.

Rob:

And the key to great relationships is a shift in identity.

Rob:

It's going from me to we and being able to shift and to function at two

Rob:

levels or three levels at the same time.

Rob:

And to shift from.

Rob:

An engineer to be a leader is a shift in identity.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Sarah:

And you don't know how many times I have to say when I try to empower, let's say

Sarah:

someone to step up and take ownership of a project or something that just

Sarah:

because you have the accountability.

Sarah:

Or you have the ownership of this deliverable.

Sarah:

Doesn't mean you're the one that has to do it.

Sarah:

You just make sure it happens.

Sarah:

That's like something, which a lot of people think because they are

Sarah:

the accountable person or the one that owns it, that they have to do

Sarah:

it too, and that's just not true.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Rob:

And it's also a bit like, Oh, I don't want to put the burden on them.

Rob:

It's down to me.

Rob:

I'll take responsibility.

Rob:

We're actually in doing that.

Rob:

You're limiting someone's ability, prove themselves to grow.

Rob:

And also

Sarah:

You're not very good.

Sarah:

We all aren't, I'm not good at it either at looking at ourselves and discerning

Sarah:

if we're doing it really well or not.

Sarah:

We're not, we have biases.

Sarah:

It's hard for us to say, Hey, Sarah, maybe you could have taken a look at

Sarah:

this in a different way, by having that oversight, you can ask the right

Sarah:

questions to get people to think in different ways and empower them.

Sarah:

You're not going to do that for yourself.

Sarah:

You're not going to think of the right questions to ask yourself.

Sarah:

You can try, but we're stuck in our own loops.

Rob:

Okay, so trying to pinpoint typically what are maybe like two or three things

Rob:

that people come to you with that are the key changes or the key changes

Rob:

or the key problems that they face?

Sarah:

I get asked often

Sarah:

like they feel blocked.

Sarah:

So they want to grow in their career and they don't know how to, like they they.

Sarah:

And because I'm a woman engineer, I think this type of thing comes to

Sarah:

me like it's because I'm a woman or there's some like external force that's

Sarah:

preventing me from being able to be who I want or grow that happens very often.

Sarah:

I've actually helped women see that's an excuse.

Sarah:

I know there is sexism.

Sarah:

I've experienced it throughout my career, but because I'm a woman engineer,

Sarah:

they come to me hoping that I will just talk bad about all men, and I

Sarah:

usually don't look at it like that.

Sarah:

Another thing is.

Sarah:

I am a single mom of three kids with two dogs and I'm a leader and I've

Sarah:

always been a high professional working full time and still I have friends.

Sarah:

So how do you get all of that done?

Sarah:

Very often when they come to me, they'll say that for them it's impossible.

Sarah:

I must have some kind of magic that they don't have.

Sarah:

mAybe wanting some kind of reassurance that's true.

Sarah:

And I usually help unstuck that.

Sarah:

Another thing, which I was called in my previous company, the incubator.

Sarah:

So I had engineering leaders come to me with their bad engineers

Sarah:

often that I even got known for it.

Sarah:

There's this person that's not performing bad team member, not a good engineer.

Sarah:

I heard that you have this way of inspiring people or

Sarah:

getting them out of their funk.

Sarah:

And so they would give them to me to incubate them and even put them on

Sarah:

the HR path out of the company, maybe.

Sarah:

And I would instead light them on fire and make them somebody that

Sarah:

everyone wants in their team.

Sarah:

They weren't broken.

Sarah:

Those are usually the reasons people come to me.

Rob:

I can imagine how satisfying that is.

Rob:

Yeah.

Sarah:

It feels good, even when I have new engineers.

Sarah:

Very often leaders will come to you and they're like, Oh, let me tell

Sarah:

you all the history of this person.

Sarah:

And I'll say, I don't want to know it.

Sarah:

I want to develop it myself.

Sarah:

I want to see this person myself.

Sarah:

And I think that the seeing there's some people which maybe engineering

Sarah:

isn't the right field for them.

Sarah:

And that's what I end up seeing.

Sarah:

And we open up other doors to go where they really will thrive.

Sarah:

But I don't know where I get it from.

Sarah:

I love people.

Sarah:

I know a lot of people say they hate people and they think they're

Sarah:

horrible, but I love people.

Sarah:

And I think the majority of people, I know that there's.

Sarah:

I've had some experience with people with personality disorders and stuff,

Sarah:

but I think it's really 1 to 5 percent of the world and the other 95 percent

Sarah:

are amazing, and they just need a little someone believing in them.

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

And it's so powerful when someone does believe in them and it

Rob:

can unlock so much for people.

Rob:

If the fairy with the magic wand give you three wishes and you

Rob:

could change what in the workplace, what would be those changes?

Sarah:

The first thing that I would like to change.

Sarah:

Is that belief that I hear coming from a lot of leaders because I've heard

Sarah:

them say it out of their mouth that the people in their teams are not

Sarah:

capable or they can't handle knowing a bit about business or they are lazy.

Sarah:

I would like to change that.

Sarah:

They see that they've hired.

Sarah:

People which I mean, most of these engineers or people that they

Sarah:

work with have university degrees and they're smart and they're

Sarah:

intelligent and they're capable.

Sarah:

I would love to be able to take a magic wand and get leaders to see their people.

Sarah:

And what I would really love to do is to change the way people

Sarah:

are hired and the way people work.

Sarah:

In general I even have it in my mind that there needs to be a new way of mapping

Sarah:

people to their next jobs around matching values so that people can thrive where

Sarah:

they are and on people's talents and passions rather than job titles, and

Sarah:

that people are empowered and encouraged.

Sarah:

Even if you're an engineer, if you are a highly creative person, maybe you can

Sarah:

help with the creation of the, let's say presentation for something or creating

Sarah:

a new logo, or maybe you like working with events and sometimes you're the

Sarah:

one planning the events, although you're also writing code so that people can

Sarah:

be their whole selves where they work.

Sarah:

And what I would really love is that.

Sarah:

In every team that we put a line around that says this is a team.

Sarah:

So whether it's a 5 percent team or 10 percent team that everyone's

Sarah:

values in that team are honored.

Sarah:

Yeah,

Rob:

I always think, yeah, so for me the way you talk about dragons, my kind

Rob:

of, when I've used the logo, it's like a spiral circle, not spiral circle, yeah,

Rob:

a circle inside a circle, concentric circles and it's because there's me.

Rob:

aNd then there's me maybe as a couple, as a family, as a team

Rob:

and in the community and well.

Rob:

Yeah.

Sarah:

So impact circles.

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

It is partly that, but it's also that my identity shifts from me to

Rob:

being a couple, to being a family, to being part of a team, to being part

Rob:

of the world, being part of whatever.

Rob:

But all of them, I think it has to be fractal.

Rob:

That there's you in all of them and you're the same and they are you as well.

Rob:

Yeah.

Rob:

And it's how relationships are the way that we express ourselves and achieve

Rob:

and experience everything that we want to experience and we do it by joining

Rob:

with others with the same in that.

Rob:

So it's probably a similar view to you have because I think deep down

Rob:

we're all looking at the same thing.

Rob:

We think the same thing.

Rob:

We just say it in different words and from different perspectives.

Rob:

Okay.

Rob:

So I'm going to sum up what I think I've understand of you and you can

Rob:

tell me if I'm accurate or not.

Rob:

So I think.

Rob:

When it, to me, it comes quite simply is that I think you look at people and

Rob:

you're able to see the seed of potential.

Rob:

You're able to see like the blueprint of who they could

Rob:

be or you maybe see the seed.

Rob:

And I can really understand that water nurturing because what you are, I think is

Rob:

like a plant needs the water and it needs the heat and it needs the soil to grow in.

Rob:

And I think what you do in your coaching is that you provide that space, which is

Rob:

like an incubator and you give the heat and the water that people start to see.

Rob:

What they can do and what they can be.

Rob:

And once they have that's like the unlock that you had.

Rob:

Which from there, it can be anything and it will grow naturally

Rob:

and organically as it should.

Rob:

I think that's so needed because so often work has been fitted to you

Rob:

have to fit this job's description and these are your roles and these are your

Rob:

limits and people can't fit into moulds.

Rob:

And what the world of work really needs is for us to.

Rob:

Bloom and blossom and the organization has to be the thing that shapes and shifts

Rob:

around the potentials of the people.

Rob:

sO is that accurate?

Sarah:

Yeah, it's a very interesting also how you stated because Even in my

Sarah:

coaching course that I give, I talk about seeds and I talk about planting seeds in

Sarah:

deserts versus in, to tropical forests.

Sarah:

And I talk about pretty much the words that you came up with now to

Sarah:

help people visualize and I don't tell you what kind of, let's say

Sarah:

tree you're going to be or plant.

Sarah:

That's you.

Sarah:

I may help you figure out.

Sarah:

The right environment to plant it in, but I'm not even going to tell you

Sarah:

not to plant it in a desert if that's what you want, but you need to then

Sarah:

be aware you're going to have to bring bucket loads of water every day to

Sarah:

that desert, if that's what you want.

Rob:

Yeah, I think you've done some Darren Brown tricks and framed it so

Rob:

I'm going to say it in those words.

Rob:

Yeah I think all you can see when it, when the seed is his

Rob:

seed that's all you can see.

Rob:

And it's only over time that you can see what it can

Sarah:

become and I see seeds and Yeah, I believe in them But there

Sarah:

they need to be they need to grow,

Rob:

I think, I think that's so needed.

Rob:

And I think it's can be so powerful, but for someone who senses that they might

Rob:

have that little seed and they want that nurturing environment to develop,

Rob:

how would someone reach out to you?

Sarah:

I Have several ways that people can work with me.

Sarah:

They can arrange a discovery session with me where it's all about

Sarah:

figuring out what they need and how it can map to working with me.

Sarah:

Because I only work 20 percent of my time right now for abacus.

Sarah:

So my time is quite limited.

Sarah:

So I usually choose to work with people which are more dedicated to the process.

Sarah:

anD I think my biggest help right now is the group course that I give so

Sarah:

that it's all about finding your core and moving forward with worthy goals.

Sarah:

In the end, it's a leadership course.

Sarah:

So I offer it in three month and six month Time periods.

Sarah:

And unless Abagaso shifts and becomes more my main company, then I can

Sarah:

imagine doing things more tailored to particular needs of leaders, et cetera.

Sarah:

But the best way right now is to either sign up for one of the courses I have

Sarah:

or sign up for a Discovery chat with me maybe one on one coaching is what you

Sarah:

need, and we figure that out together.

Rob:

Okay.

Rob:

Thank you for your time.

Rob:

It's been fascinating to, to learn more about the inspiring

Rob:

work that you're doing.

Sarah:

Yeah, thank you.

Sarah:

And it's, I'm I feel honored to be able to have this talk with you.

Sarah:

You're one of the people that I really admire on LinkedIn.

Sarah:

I love what you write and how you speak and it feels like speaking to a celebrity.

Sarah:

So that's really nice.

Rob:

Likewise.

Sarah:

Thank you.