Dannah Vaughan

The thing that I'd like to share the most is be open to honoring people that feel differently than you do, or who are different than you are. The ultimate advice that I had was it's okay to disagree, but it's about meeting people where they are and figuring out a way to find collaboration and compromise. I think that's huge, because I've been at tables where I had a voice, things were great, and I was able to make huge impacts. My teams have delivered over 45, 50 million dollars worth of revenue at some of these organizations, and I'm very proud. I stood on the shoulders of giants. They were amazing, smart people that did amazing things. I just happened to lead them. But the thing that I learned most importantly is that as a leader, if you're leading right, somebody probably somewhere is going to disagree, and that's okay, because that's what drives us all forward. It's not necessarily a bad thing, it's being able to collaborate, meet people where they're at, and find a fundamental way forward. I think that's really the best career advice I've ever had. The other thing I'd mention is, particularly as someone who's a female, it's really difficult to navigate that you're being too assertive at the table. I think the worst advice I ever had was you're being too assertive. I think that's a really bad thing to coach and lead and mentor. We have to show up, and to do that, it does take a bit of confidence. I was at the Women LeadNC conference this last fall in the Raleigh Durham area, and I really loved hearing one of the panelists say, bring your folding chair when you're going to a table. She didn't say a lazy boy that's comfortable. It's because you want to be able to pick that chair up and move to a different table.

The advice that I would give her is don't be afraid to embrace mentorship. I think it's really important to meet people where they're at. Especially as a female, there's gonna be times where you're sitting at tables where there are people that don't get it. I think the ability to be able to say and have confidence inside of yourself as a female professional going into, if you will, sit at a table for the first time, I think it's all about finding the confidence that's in yourself and being okay and grounded in what you do know. And don't let the imposter syndrome that sits on your shoulder, do not let that thing, don't give it power, because what we feed gives it, you know, what we feed becomes reality in our lives. We have to feed our knowledge. We have to feed our ability to collaborate. We have to look at ways to meet people at where they're at, to honor each other, even if we disagree. That would be my advice.

It's definitely the ability to be flexible and adaptable to difficult situations. I think the ability to be resilient in the face of bad things, which are inevitably gonna happen, like layoffs or a bad day. These things happen, and so I think exercising that as a human's important. I also wanted my kids, I have an 8 and a 10 year old daughter, to become the type of women that understand that, hey, you hit the mat, you get back up. Things happen. They've seen me through my layoff journey, they've seen me go through substitute teaching when I had to, to pay our mortgage, and building this podcast and this brand. It's important to me that they see that as women, and that they're not afraid to do and adapt through flexibility.