This transcript has been lightly edited for readability. It may still contain transcription errors.
Intro#
James: Hello, and welcome to Graduate Theory. My guest today graduated university in 1994 from the university of technology in Sydney with a bachelor of business and a bachelor of law. In that same year, she started working as a research analyst at investment bank city group later, moving to a small company equity sales.
After working at Citi for nearly 10 years, she moved to credit Swiss, where she continued to work with small companies. And in 2006, my guest took a new role as executive director of small company equity sales at Goldman Sachs four years later becoming the managing director of that same year. In 2013, she started work as a partner at reunion capital partners and in 2018, completing her masters of coaching psychology in early 2020, she started her current coaching brand titled on purpose.
On purpose supports leaders and teams to effectively operate in today’s complex business environment. Teaching conscious leadership. My guest today helps leaders work on their inner game towards self-mastery and wisdom to act with authenticity, integrity, courage, and compassion. So that breakthrough performance and results can be achieved.
Please. Welcome to the show. The wonderful Lydia.
Lidia: Hi, James. Thank you very, very much for that lovely introduction. And I’m really looking forward to our chat.
What Does it mean to be ‘On Purpose?’#
James: Amazing. Well, it’s clear you’ve had an outstanding career. Well, one thing I want to ask you first is your coaching brand is called on purpose. So what, what does it mean to you to be on path? Is.
Lidia: So the name came to me because trying to think of business name that captured a number of things. So on purpose to me means doing something on purpose. So doing something with intention, and if you’re doing something with intention, then you’re doing something consciously. So I wanted to bring that in, but I also wanted to overlay this idea that, stage in our lives, whether it starts in teenagers, The sum, whether it starts in early adulthood, we kind of yearned for this connection to our purpose, whatever that may be.
And it’s this kind of vague thing. We never, people have real clarity around their purpose and it’s not something that you can know with your head. It’s something that you feel. And so, done the uh, Masters in coaching psychology. I really became interested in working with people to ensure that whatever it is that they’re doing, they feel that connection to, yeah, this is right.
This is my path. This is what I meant to be doing. Or alternatively, when you’re in a role and you’re doing it for a whole lot of extraneous factors, but inwardly you’re suffering or inwardly, you’re waking up with that dread of, I just don’t want to go in today or I don’t want to do. Then helping people to have the courage, to explore with intention and consciously what it is that feels more like their purpose.
yeah, that was the reason behind.
How do you find your purpose?#
James: Yeah, I really liked that. And that’s something that’s. In a few of the episodes I’ve done so far is, that idea of like almost following your gut in what you’re doing. And, and I guess that comes back to what you were saying really it’s, something that’s kind of hard to describe and something that, you never really find it and, you know, when you have it, But it’s difficult to, to find that and following your gut is absolutely, it’s something that has come up a lot and it’s something that, is quite important.
One thing I want to ask you to follow on from that is,, is there any steps that you would take to find your purpose? I mean, it’s something that is, is difficult, but what would you, what would you say? How can we find that?
Lidia: So when I work with people to explore this had to do a whole presentation on this topic. And so I, you was putting together the slides for it. And this is sort of, form of doing it with a visual kind of cue. The other is when I’m doing sort sessions, I sort of, clients to sort to a place where they can visualize this for themselves. I threw up a whole heap of images that I’ve found of children. around the age of four or five. And, you know, dressed up as a doctor and one’s dressed up as a superhero and wants dressed up as a little scientist in a science lab and the others standing on a stage singing and, and others, ready um, dance clothes. And the reason I throw out these images is because when it comes to output. When we go back and weigh on rebel it purpose is very strongly linked to two key things. What are our strengths? When we love to use our strengths, there are God-given talents. They innate. And when we give them expression, it feels really, really good.
It feels natural. It feels like we’re doing the right thing. So, links linked to strengths and better. What’s important to us. And what is it that we value? Why does one person valued doing a certain thing over another person who value something else? It all links into this intricate internal system that has this knowing.
So, I throw up those images or when I kind of encourage clients to come up with these images for themselves, for example, the child who’s standing on stage performing. I invite clients to about a time when they might’ve had these images for themselves. And the point of the image and the, the metaphor of the child on stage performing is not, I want to be a singer or an actor or a performer necessarily.
It may be, but it is a indicator that something within you really enjoys expressing it. To an audience. So you may need to find a role that allows you to do a lot of presentations because when you’re presenting you feel on you feel energized, you feel vital. You love looking at the responses from the people that are sitting in the room in which you are giving your performance.
Yeah. For others, it may be the kid in the science coat there. They may have curiosity as this burning feeling within them, and they need to work in a way that ignites that curiosity about the world. And so it’s those in roads that really link to finding our purpose and the reason why childhood is a really first hole, a place to do some of this exploration. Is because when we see children at play and this has been studied by psychologists, children, and very naturally into what we call the flow state. And of the um, renowned kind of researchers and psychologists in these um, areas are gentlemen cold um, me hi and Hey, did you know a lot of research?
Various other psychologists have sort of in on this area of um, exploration. But what they’ve found is that when we enter a flow state, we are doing something that is truly engaging, but just challenging enough. And when we get to that place, we can do it for a very long period of time.
Time actually doesn’t even occur to us. So we kind of go into a timeless. And are very focused on the task and we’re not focused on ourselves. And so the flow state is actually the state that we want to get high performing athletes into it’s the state. We want to get, you know, a functioning corporate executives into, but you can only enter flow state when the activity genuinely engages you.
And it’s called having some sort of intrinsic motivation around. So, That’s why childhood is such an interesting place to start exploring this because we don’t have any of those. I should, I ought to, everyone says, I must all those other externalized conditioning, of statements that create beliefs within us.
We are just who we are. And so it enables us to go back and look at, yeah, I really love doing that. Of course then there’s the practicalities of you know earning a decent income, et cetera. you need to sort of to then map some real world stuff over it. And the practicalities of those, interior kind of motivational states, but it’s a really good place to start to find that.
James: Hmm. No, that’s really cool. And I think that’s something that as well, that I’ve heard, like from some of my friends that have gone down one path and then changed and gone somewhere else, it was really a process of kind of winding back, th their life almost to get back to stage.
They maybe made a key decision where they decided to maybe it was to study a certain thing and what to pick a certain set of subjects in high school or whatever it was. And then really go back to almost that crossroads and, and reassess, was that the right choice there? And then maybe you can try, even though, you’ve got to wind back a little bit to, to start going somewhere else that, maybe resonates a people.
With yourself. So I think that’s, that’s really interesting.
Lidia: That’s right. You know, that life affords us so many opportunities where, you to a crossroads at various stages and they present themselves at different times for different people. But those crossroads emerge because we’re being invited to answer that question, is it that I really want to do?
And the deeper element to that. We think about it as, what do I want to do? Do I want to do this subject or that subject or this course or that course or this job or that job but underlying it, if you dig beneath that surface, it’s what part of me needs expression here. What part of me do I want to give expression to in some outer world context where I’m applying myself to that every day.
And so knowing what your strengths are and knowing what your values are. I can help you to navigate making those decisions so that you’re more closely aligned to giving yourself that expression, because that’s really what leads to from a psychological standpoint. That’s what leads to fulfillment.
That’s what leads to life satisfaction. That’s what leads to happiness.
James: Yeah. Yeah. That’s really cool. And just on the purpose and things like that, do you think it’s possible to kind of find your purpose, like, like holistically or is it kind of this thing that you’ve kind of getting closer to. But it’s this moving target where maybe it’s changing over time and you.
Trying to get closer and closer to it, but perhaps you never, you never really get to that. I guess, I know stories of people and even for myself sometimes where, you think, okay, I’m going to find my purpose and I’m going to do this and okay. Yeah, this feels good. I’m going to keep going, but oh, maybe it’s not quite right.
And, do you think you ever get to that stage where, I’ve found exactly what I’m going to do? This is it. I finally made it that kind of stage or is it, is it all. This yeah. This moving target situation where you’re getting closer to it and finding your way, but yeah.
W what do you think of.
Lidia: Yeah. So I think that we burden ourselves with this idea that there is a purpose. Some Amazing individuals are born to a purpose as in one, you might say that you might think that if you think back over the career of, you some great sporting person is always a, you sort of way to understand this.
You might think that Michael Jordan was born to the purpose of being one of the best ever, will players the world has ever seen. But then that would Rob him of having any purpose now. Right. Because he’s not doing that anymore. So the way I like to think about it is that we have a purpose and that may be a staged experience.
So my purpose in this role, and at this particular time may simply be. An apprenticeship. I mean a learning mode. That’s my purpose right now, I’m in a skill acquisition mode. And that mode needs to be aligned with where I have natural interest where I can develop real competency because then I feel good about myself.
Like I need to be doing something that I can actually see myself improving it. Otherwise I get demotivated. Purpose can be for this moment in time. This is the right place. And this is the right role for me. As long as I’m giving the fullest expression to things that make me feel bottled and engaged, when that has run its course, for reasons, we all have experienced, but who can explain it over a period of time, you suddenly stop whining in your interest.
It’s like, It’s just not doing it for me anymore. I’m just not that intro interested. And that is a sign that it’s time for you to move into another phase. It’s still your purpose because life’s, as you say, you never get there. What’s there, it’s just a journey of giving yourself the opportunity to express yourself in your fullest capacity and at the highest functioning level that you can, some phases of.
are Learning some phases of that might be working on something to prepare it for the next stage. And they kind of like Lego blocks, right. They build on each other. You may then have a peak experience and that peak experience in your market Jordan is an example that lasts for a number of years. It may be something that, you claimed or revered or, you of recognized. But maybe it doesn’t have an outward recognition. Maybe it’s just your own experience of it being like a golden era for you. And then it changes and then the purpose moves into something else. And so our purpose is interwoven through kind of a journey where we change in our wisdom and our experience.
You stage of. Also determines, you know, it is that we’re more attuned to. So I, yeah. I like to help people by unburdening them of this idea that there’s this one thing, there are many paths to getting there and they may all lead to this, you know, I know, I think everyone wants what we’re talking about is that peak expression.
That golden moment. Yeah. And sustaining that. And so, ways to then try and ensure that you sustain it. when I talk to executives about, you know, performance and, this idea that it’s marked by certain external, still only recognized success kind of factors.
And that can be a component of. But in truth, what peak performance is, is, you know, level of optimized functioning and to, to arrive at your level of the most optimized functioning you need to obviously, you know, assuming that, you know, competent, you’re good at what you’re doing.
That’s a given you have to work to the point where, you know, established that. To uh, sustain that really, really highly optimized functioning. We can’t be constantly painting because when it comes to performance curves, they’re kind of like this sloped hill, it might go up gradually and they may drop off really sharply.
And at the top of the curve obviously is peak performance. And so you’re building up to it. And then there’s after your peak performance is a little extra sort of the other edge of the hill before you slugged down. And that’s your stretch. And if you don’t step back from peak performance in stretch zone and go back down the hill towards zone, you can’t sustain the peak performance.
The other side of the slope after stretch is just overwhelmed and the performance drops off very rapidly and sharply, and that is exhaustion, burnout, health issues, you just some kind of. Physical mental, emotional or spiritual crisis because we can’t sustain ourselves in those peaks. So the idea about, you know, to our purpose, sustaining ourselves in these peak moments is, is kind of like this dance where we go there, we tasted, sometimes we have to then go back down the hill.
And so in the context of purpose, we have these pictures. We’re on, we’re on fire. Everything’s going our way. You know, winning deals, where, businesses growing, where we’re, usually we’re working long hours. it’s a pleasure. We might work our weekends because we’re engaged in some creative process and we’re loving it.
But after whatever it is, peaks in us and in the activity and in the event or in something being delivered, we have to stay. And go back and that’s still our purpose. Our purpose can still be in that recuperation zone where it doesn’t seem as on because we’re getting ready to be able to reenter.
There’ll be a different set of circumstances. It will be a different set of people, different set of challenges, but it’s still brig nights that fire. But if we don’t, you can lose it. It’s not lose your purpose, but you can lose your ability to engage.
How can we avoid burnout?#
James: Yeah, that’s really, really cool. And when do you, like, you was talking about, climbing the hill and getting close to falling off the hill when you get to the tall, how do you, are there any, like, how do you know when you’re getting to that point? Is there any, it’s like, cause you’re sort of like, guess you’re at the top, you’re in the zone, things are going, well, then you are, like you’re saying quite close to, working yourself too hard and then, and then crashing, What are you, how, how can we avoid this sort of falling off the back of the hill and, and rolling back down so we can just, so we can come back up and sustain that performance for longer.
Lidia: Yeah. So, self-awareness is a huge, huge differentiator amongst people who are able to sustain themselves to some degree. been conditioned to sort of success through what I think is quite a narrow lens. We just look at the outcomes, but, we rate. I can sit up the markers and the criteria for success.
Then we can sort spread the base a little bit so we can still keep the outcomes as the objective. to get this promotion. I want to deliver this project. I want to win this deal. I want to break into this market, whatever, there’s the outcome. But if you set along side the outcome, your other intentions, I want to be able to do it and maintain my. I want to be able to do it and still have good relationships with the people that are closest to me. I want to be able to do that and, my mental health, you know, through giving myself the opportunities to have some mindless moments. Right. So, because when you’re engaged, you’re just so on that the mind really does get, you know, utilize.
sometimes even sleep isn’t enough. Well, you may be, you on your sleep. So what we need to do is we need to set up other goals that sit along side, the outcome goal, and then you have the opportunity to creatively. Think about how do you solve all of those things. If I’m going to go really hard on this, then I need to give myself a day, that.
Where I just take whatever it is, 20 minutes for a meditation. And I must do that. And where it, you know, when listen to really, high-performing people talk, there is a real discipline to performing and recuperating, a term they certain um, researchers have called.
For executives and they call them corporate athletes. And the difference between professional sporting athletes and corporate athletes is corporate athletes. Don’t have an off season. They don’t have a team of, of masseur’s ready to help them condition for their recovery, but they need it just as much.
And if you don’t structure it into your own performance plan, then that other side of the hill You know, learn now, you know, youth forgives a lot of ills and we all know that in youth you can party really hard and you can go all night. You can get up and do it the next day. But even though that is doable, your performance, you D you don’t actually know how much better you could be with rest with recovery, with good food, with all the things that go into what we do to support athletes we also should be doing to support ourselves. We need to think about ourselves in that way. When am I on, when do I need to be really on and how do I prepare for that performance? Well, I need to take care of my health, sleep, water, you know, things. It’s, it’s no different it’s there.
Just the difference between an athlete and a corporate athlete is the playing field is different, but the, the physiological expression of pre. And dealing with the performance demands of your environment physiologically.
James: Hmm, that’s really cool. One. That’s a really great analogy. I think because between, The, the physical, the athletes, the traditional athletes, I guess, versus the corporate ones where there tends to be not really as much of a focus on, that recovery and, making sure your mental health is okay and, and, working on your physical health and things like that.
So I really liked that. Definitely answer that’s really, really cool. And it’s, I guess it’s important, as you go through your career that you pay attention to these things, like we just spoke about so that you don’t burn yourself out and you don’t, maybe ruin friendships and, you keep those things in a good place.
Common threads when working with High Performers#
James: So I, I, that was really cool. One thing I want to ask you too, is about. The coaching that you do at the moment coaching these, quite high performance people, what are some things that you sit down with them?
What are some common problems that they have, and, and even what are some common things that you, some tools that you use to kind of extract. Even higher performance.
Lidia: Yeah. So, you know, get even more performance out of a high performer? guess, you know, it comes back to we define a high performance if we’re only defining it by outcome? Then there are ways, you know, can push yourself out. You can, you executive context, there are simply ways where you can turn down the volume on everything else in your life and just focus on that outcome.
Now you might get hot before. Question is how sustainable it is. And the question is at what price. So when I work with clients really, you know, to facilitate. I’m not there to dictate. It really comes down to what they want to achieve. I might challenge them and question them. that, you at the very high and synchrony of level not often surrounded by people who tell them, well, that’s a bad idea, right?
They usually surrounded by people who go. Yes, I think that’s fantastic. part of being in an executive coach at those high levels is having a safe place to be challenged helping an executive to open up to other perspectives, which, which they might not otherwise get standard day to day role.
getting more. comes down to the big role of self-awareness. So if you think about, you know, I use these sporting analogies because it’s so easy for us to relate to them, as opposed to me helping you relate to what an executive might face in their day to day work. But, think about, you know, professional golfers that have two. Step up to the grain and take a shot in that moment. They’ve been preparing and preparing and preparing for this moment, figures and the difference between a great shot and a Porsche. Isn’t so much their skill. They highly skilled at this point, the differences what’s and again, what’s your self-talk, is it positive?
Okay. Are you telling yourself, oh my God, I’m going to throw this, I’m going to flunk it. I’m not feeling good. Or I’m really pissed off with somebody in my life. And I’m allowing that to have traction inside of me in this moment. Right. So what’s going on internally is the differentiator between.
The performance in that moment and that’s what applies to executives. So at that level, it’s no longer really about, you your, a master of your fields, skill industry, you or, you know, politics. It’s not about that anymore. It’s about your self. Your ability to dial down the distractions so that you can, in the moment, when you have to focus, you only focus on the task.
And when it comes to high performance, the real subtle shifts occur between good performance and great performance. The difference is those who can forget in the picture of performance themselves. So they no longer self-focused, the self has actually disappeared from the frame The only thing they’re thinking about is the task.
And so when you get to, kind of superior performance, the kind of goals that you set up and not outcome goals or. Hit that shot and we’ll pop that short into, you a make, you that short in one. It’s not about that anymore. It’s about the process. So the process goal becomes I’m going to approach that shot in a calm and relaxed day.
I’m going to consciously take a moment to ensure that I get into a relaxed state. So whatever cues I need to give myself to trigger that run, that relaxation response. I will work on those. Some people have words. Some people have images, some people channel feelings to instantly get their physiology into a more relaxed state.
When I approached that shot, I’m going to drop my shoulders. I’m going to clear my mind. I’m going to take a breath. I’m going to filter out every bit of background noise. There is. That’s how you get into those moments. Truly extra performance from what’s already very harmful from this. Does that make sense?
James: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s, that’s something that, yeah, I’ve, I’ve heard similar things before as well, where, let’s not focus on the outcomes of what we’re doing. Let’s focus on, doing it the best way we can or, having the right process and then the outcome will just take care of itself.
How does Lidia achieve high performance?#
James: I think that’s, that is really cool. Absolutely. And I, I wonder as well, How do you do that in your purse or in your own life, with these processes, are there any sort of rituals that you have to extract that high-performance out of?
Lidia: Yeah, look so, personally, I’ve been on a, alone journey kind of deliberate and clear. Cultivation of self-awareness. And so, that means is, you we are trying to do anything, whether it’s being in conversation with somebody else or, something that’s maybe challenging also maybe difficult.
We, we kind of can go into the default state is we get frustrated. We get annoyed. You of all these thoughts or feelings emerge that actually are counter productive to what we want to do or counterproductive to allowing the best part of ourselves to be expressed. So that journey of self-awareness is like a muscle that you build where you notice what’s shifting and changing.
Oh, I feel that frustration rising. Oh, I feel I’m getting defensive in this conversation, you know? the skill of almost becoming, yourself a, as an external entity, right? You sort of outside yourself. And so as you notice those things, you develop tools and skills to help yourself stay in a neutral space of curiosity.
Oh, I’m getting frustrated in this conversation or in this experience. I wonder what that’s about. And so you, you stay more open to information and cues in your relationships, in your working life. helps you also go, ah, I’ve taken on this work and I should have known that this, this, and this about it.
Aren’t things that actually, you well with. So it’s this hyper awareness where you become far more attuned to noticing your own ego and keeping it in a place where it doesn’t get control of your reactions and your defensiveness, so that you can get more information. You can make more conscious choices.
And from that you can sort of aligned. Ah, okay. So I’m going to say no to this. It’s okay to say no to this or. Ah, this person’s telling me something really important. I need to actually be open to this and listen, because I can learn something. And so you don’t approach life in this. I need to be right.
And I need to know you approach it more from a, I don’t know, everything and that’s okay. It doesn’t have any, it doesn’t make any statement about me being inferior or lesser than they’re all the kind of judgments of the ego. If I can stay in a state of openness and curiosity, I can probably gather more information to help me to keep shoring out a foundation of feeling confident, good about myself, aligned with what my values are using my strengths.
So, self-awareness as a journey and as a tool is the bedrock falls of how you operate in your personal. It’s the bedrock of great leadership. It’s the bedrock of creating high-performing teams. It’s you know, it’s, it’s that?
How to grow self awareness#
James: Hmm. Yeah. That’s cool. And are there any ways that you like, have you, do you think you’ve always been. Self-aware or has it been something that you’ve improved over time? And if so, how, how did you actually do that? Was it something like, did you meditate or like journal or any of those things, or did it just come with experience where, you know, as you did more things, you kind of realized, I feel this certain way because of this situation and things like that.
Lidia: Definitely meditated on and off throughout my life there, you know, times when it just falls away back to my comment about, you know, come and they’re there for time and they’re there for a purpose and then they naturally move, move away. And then you come back. But I think, I think for everyone, the opportunity to be self-aware and increase your yourself awareness is there for me, I would say that my self-awareness leaps I sort to go and study psychology.
So before that the leaps in self awareness always came through crisis or some setback or some challenge or disappointment. And so, rather than. Glossing over or staying in anger or avoiding thinking about those experiences. I would dive into them and, and look around because, you know, I’d always believed, you know, dark cloud has a silver lining and I’d go looking for the silver lining.
And if you do look, it is there, there is always some learning often about yourself you can incorporate. And if you take that with you, then, you know, start to, to build up your, your own kind of interior, about yourself, about, you like, what you don’t want. Your venues are, who you are, who you want to be, what things you want to avoid.
James: Yeah, I think that’s really cool. And I heard this analogy recently and this guy was talking about, requiring, deeper roots so that the tree can, can grow higher. And certainly resonate with that idea where, going through those challenges or setbacks, allows you to kind of Polish the diamond almost through that pressure.
And then to grow, to grow even further. I think that’s really cool.
Does Lidia consider herself to be a high performer?#
James: I want to ask you too, are you like, do you consider yourself, I know you’ve had this, really successful career is, is incredible. The things that you’ve done and continue to do, but like yourself, do you consider yourself to be a Harper?
Lidia: Guess my answer to that, he’s when it comes to. You need to take yourself out of the picture in some sort of way. So the way I kind of view myself and in life and how I approach it is through this lens or what is it that I want to do? And once I’ve determined, what direction I want to go in or what task I want to take on or what, what you thing I want to move towards, then I set up within myself, the. goals that are really what I call kind of mastery goals. I want to do this and I want to get really good at it. And so rather than being focused on achieving a title or a promotion or an outcome, I get really focused on like, you know, mid days when I was working in um, business banking career, my corporate career. My goals were about building really good relationships. Like that’s what really mattered to me. And in every way, doing things that helped my clients served my clients ensured that I was a very trusted partner for them was, in integrity. Those were the things that I set up, whatever came of that came of that, you I, you know, up X goals, process goals for me, where, wanted to put in the extra hour at the end of the day to review things, to write up a report, to, you consolidate my thinking.
It would have been easy to just, of hit home at that point in time. But so it’s those sorts of things rather than, oh, I’m, this is where I’m going. And this is, this is, aiming for. I never arranged for a specific outcome. really, I used to do a really, really good job based on what mattered to me.
So, and I was never, you know, very competitive field. A lot of people get caught up in, in the, in the S you know, advisory world, you know, relationships you on is this whole idea of owning a relationship. And I always found that a bit attractive.
You own a relationship. You have a relationship when you invest in a relationship and you support a relationship. And if there is some thing of value in there, then that will be. So, you know, it was trying to take the ego and the ego is fear. Right. there’s this fear of, oh my God, I’ve got to make sure that this person sitting at this firm who is in this position of power likes me.
And so when you’re coming from a place of ego, there’s a lot of fear behind making sure that person likes you. And of course, in the finance industry, there’s lots of. Party tricks of restaurants and bars. And, you a big expense account that you usually allow to sort of, you know, build relationships.
And, thing was that I was quite reluctant, always in that way. It’s not to say that we didn’t take clients out for lunch or, out and have a great night or whatever we did. But I think all my clients knew that just wasn’t really how I wanted to build our relationship.
They were byproducts of already having a good mutual respect for one another. always had to focus on having some genuineness. They, if I was building a relationship, I’d always look for something in that person I really liked and could respect and relate to so that when I was dealing with them, I was coming from a place of authenticity in dealing with.
than all, you’ve got a really important job and you need to make you like me. I don’t know if that makes sense.
James: Yeah, no, no, it definitely does. Yeah. I think, it’s almost similar to what you were talking about with the, the goals versus processes. Like, let’s not try and use, I’m going to be friends with this person and like, let’s focus on that. I’m going to like be a nice person.
I’m going to do things the right way. And as a result, we will have a good relationship and not trying to go straight to it. Although I think that’s really cool.
What lessons did you take from IB?#
James: Is there anything like, anything like that, that, that relationship building or other things that you’ve learned from your time in investment banking that you use in your, in your practice or just in your general life?
Lidia: Gosh, that’s a good question. I mean, look, I’m sure there are, you a, it was an outstanding, like time in my life and time that it was right for me to be there, I loved it. And the thing that I, I learned from it about myself more so is I really liked to work in a way that started.
I like to work in a way where the dyes are on scripted. So when I turn up, I don’t really know what the day is going to have, but I get to respond to it and made it. And so I like to work in a way that quite stimulating that way in that dynamic respect realize that. When I have a lot of autonomy rather than being told what to do.
So I always ended up going for an indeed ended up, I didn’t know this at the time, but the roles where I really excelled and roles that I loved were where it was a blank slate. And I got to within the parameters of what was expected of that role, just decide how it would be played out. So when it comes to, you career now as an executive coach same thing plays out.
You know, when sit down with a client I’m not starting a session with them in any scripted way. have some vague ideas about been talking about these things. It might be helpful to now move in this direction, but that’s a very loosely held plan because I really have to be so present in the moment to whatever’s coming.
And it may just be that they’ve had something completely unexpected unfold in their world. And so I’m meeting them in that, that moment of, wow, okay, what is this? We need to look at this and, and what is happening for them and what might be the best responses that they can make. So it’s extremely dynamic.
learned that. Even in the world of investment banking and stopped working. And even when I was research analyst, I love deep thinking. I loved being an analyst. I loved exploring. love relationship building. Like I actually really do love it. so that carries into what I’m doing now.
Like I really enjoy building those trusted, you know, trust-based relationship. And I’m genuinely curious about people, even when I was working in banking, like the deal and whatever was happening, whatever was going on in the market at the time, I loved very interesting and gripping. But I enjoyed understanding why.
And this is what kind of got me interested in leadership. it was, you amongst my clients is funding. Or amongst the companies that will clients or the firms that we might’ve been, you some kind of transaction for. I was really fascinated to see what was, what were the different differentiating components of what made a good leader why.
And I would always be interested to see how other people responded, particularly to a CEO or CFO that were, you know, their rounds, trying to sell an IPO, for instance, You fascinating to say which people responded positively and well, certain people that displayed qualities and characteristics versus those that didn’t because ultimately every investor is answering that question.
Can I back this goal guy? And, you know, are all these subtle things that we do when we sizing somebody up to work out, reliable? Are they good at what they do? Can I deliver. pro solve problems, I actually place in, in, in the context of large sums of money, my faith in, in this person delivering these outcomes.
So, those things kind of still apply to what I do, because I’m still looking at that in terms of, you know, those executives that have that gravitas and have that ability. So deliberate and it always comes down to, self-awareness always those that actually have their measure that know themselves well, that know what they can promise.
those that I’m really hoping, you know, real difference between kind of, I hope this sounds good, but inwardly is not this really rock solid foundation versus those that are coming from such a solid place of, of kind of no. What they can deliver, even with an, you a very slow and externally.
James: Yeah, yeah. Those lessons that you take in a really cool and that you take them into, into your personal life now, I think is amazing.
Lidia’s advice for graduates#
James: I’ve got one last question for you today, Lydia, and that is one question that I ask every guest. And it is if you were graduating university again, starting in the workforce right now, or this year, what are some tips, some advice that you would give.
Lidia: The advice would be that you really do need to take the pressure off yourself from any expectation of having an answer today of what you need to do or should do. Inevitably, you will probably start out doing something and find yourself even, you 15, 20 years down the track, doing, something completely different.
So you don’t have to have it all figured out. it’s important to also understand your own kind of true nature. In other words, you people pursue that. I’m just going to do what feels right, what I’m interested in, and that’s a great place to say. And others are a little bit more strategic.
Well, I’m going to go over here because these fields, have kind of leading fields in terms of, you know, economy and she knew they pay well and all those things. So all I would say is wherever you’re being led in your thinking process, It’s an indication of what indicator of what you value and what’s important to you.
And so you need to listen to that. And as long as you’re not only doing things, because you think you’re going to get some financial reward you know, Yeah, just follow what it is that, you inner voice is telling you, you want to do, because it will lead to something else that leads to something else that leads to something else that leads to something else.
And no really there’s no wrong term because you’re accumulating knowledge and experience. The wrong turn is when you do something. that Has no interest, no appeal does not light you up, does not in any way stimulate you that’s your wrong turn And you need to be thinking about doing something else, you know, had that wrong term very quickly in my career.
It was my first job out of university. I was working law firm and thought that I was going to pursue a career in law. And within three. months I was going home and I had that feeling of it was a dead feeling. I knew I can’t do this. it, when I kind of told friends and family that I was, you know, you know, aborting that mission, they thought I was absolutely mad.
It was like, you can’t just finished the law degree. You’ve got a great job with a great firm You can’t do that. And I’m like, no, I, I definitely am doing that. That is not the right direction for me. And because I knew I, I went home and I answered myself the question if I don’t want the partner’s job, not in any kind of, you know, Machiavellian sense, but just in an aspirational context, if I don’t want the partners.
Then I’ve got nothing to aim for here. I process steps don’t make sense to me. So I need to go find something else that, you know, and, and the differentiator was, you me, the dynamism, the different every day, the unscripted way to work didn’t exist for me in that, in that role. And it existed in what I went on to do.
And so it’s. Really, I mean, have to be stopper stockbroking? No, it could have been anything that allowed me to have that unscripted more dynamic or turn on this whiteboard.
James: Wow. That is really cool. And suddenly at the theme that, through this whole podcast has been listening to your gut listening, having that self-awareness about things that you’re interested in paths you want to go down and like you were saying, it’s not necessarily that there’s one path that would get you those feelings and that end result it’s, there’s many ways to get to.
That feeling of wholeness and that feeling of satisfaction.
Outro#
James: So I think we ended the podcast there today. But thank you so much, Lydia, that has been a fascinating conversation and so much value in there. I think for the listeners today,
Lidia: Thanks so much, James.