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Carolyn Swora

Carolyn Creates
December 6, 2022

Christmas Compassion

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Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
December 15, 2021

CHRISTMAS CONFESSIONS

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Carolyn Swora
Why are 10 guideposts about the Gifts of Imperfection important to you as a leader?
Carolyn Creates
July 22, 2021

Why are 10 guideposts about the Gifts of Imperfection important to you as a leader?

Simple. Life threw us all into a pool of vulnerability and forced us to experience things like never before. Our responses and reactions to global events of the past 18 months have varied but there's no doubt that it has given us a chance to see ourselves in a new light.   “Who you are is how you lead.” Brené Brown I remind people of this fact every time I facilitate a Dare to Lead™ program. We might have fooled ourselves into thinking we had separate work and home personas before but the pandemic proved it was a fallacy. It only made sense for me to take a deeper look and reflect on who I am and the summer felt like a perfect time. I invite you to join me in this personal learning experience and explore the 10 Guideposts from The Gifts of Imperfection. Start by taking Brene Brown's wholehearted inventory Then listen to the Unlocking Us Summer Series Podcast, (This article is about Episode 3). Share a response to this article or write your own! https://open.spotify.com/episode/6WwScZEpyU3YrsLFI9cq7m Key insight #1 Key insight #1 from this episode. A joyful life is attainable when we can appreciate simple moments and practice gratitude. Were you able to connect to the simple things during the pandemic - having dinner together, cooking new dishes, having more game nights? All of it happening because we couldn't be anywhere else but in our house with each other. There's joy to be found in these simple moments. And the power of practicing gratitude in those moments…
Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
July 6, 2021

Imperfect Strawberries

It's the end of another strawberry season in Ontario. I've purchased this fresh, delicious fruit at our local market for the past four weeks. When you buy fresh produce in bulk amounts like this, you're inevitably going to see a variety of odd shapes. I’m washing a pint of these yummy red delights and I look down to see the strangest formation. I smiled at its uniqueness and thought this one is going to taste great as I popped it in my mouth. Meanwhile, the kitchen speakers start a new podcast from my playlist and next thing you know it's Brené Brown and her sisters talking about the gifts of imperfection. Hmmm. Was the universe sending me a message or what??!! I took that strawberry as a sign. How well do I embrace my imperfections? I think pretty well but now feels like a better time than any to explore it further. So, I dusted off the book The Gifts of Imperfection, head to Brene's website to complete the wholehearted inventory and commit to following the Gifts of Imperfection summer series on the Unlocking Us podcast.   https://open.spotify.com/episode/2cZSnElaA0B8K2lV5RS47b I’m inviting to you join me on this endeavour. Wherever you are on your journey in life there is much that can be learned exploring the 10 Guideposts from The Gifts of Imperfection. Each week I'm going to share my own personal reflections on the guideposts discussed in the summer series podcast with the hopes that we elevate connection and relish in our common humanity. Guidepost #1 I started off with a…
Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
June 23, 2021

The Secret to Avoiding Burnout For You and Your Team

In my previous corporate life, one of the roles I had was a sales manager. I would regularly spend a day with each of my sales reps in turn. At the end of that day, I would always follow up by sending them a coaching letter which would usually only take me ten minutes to write. One day, as I sat behind the desk in my home office, I laboured for two long hours to produce that letter. Not because there was anything contentious or sensitive about what I had to say, but simply because I was struggling with cognitive overload: my brain was being forced to make a decision and use more energy than it was physically capable of in that moment. Friends and family had been telling me that I wasn’t ‘fine’ for a long while, but I was convinced otherwise. I just figured that how I was feeling was all part of the unending work cycle of decision making and action taking just to meet targets in the face of information overload and ever shorter deadlines. Which productivity are you focused on? We are used to a particular way of measuring productivity; it’s part of what I call industrialized thinking. In that view of the world, productivity is simply about how much work you can do in a certain amount of time. It’s a logic that also says that if a job takes one person 90 days to complete, you could give it to 2 people and have it done in 45 days, or – as is more often the…
Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
November 23, 2020

Our World Has Changed. And So Has The Way We Work.

It's hard to believe how much has changed in one year. For many of us it’s been a paradigm shift in how we work, how we live and how we spend our time. How do you adapt your leadership to this new reality? The best way you know how. The thing is that we haven’t had to do this before so our our “know how” might need refreshing. It might even need a full overhaul. What skills help you lead through a pandemic and address pressing social justice issues? First step is self-awareness. To quote Brené Brown, my favourite researcher and storyteller, “So much shitty leadership happens outside of our self awareness.” Now is a perfect time to invest in your development, to understand your motivators, discover unconscious behaviour patterns and expand your emotional literacy. Self-awareness is a journey, not a destination. No matter who you are, there is opportunity for growth, especially in this demanding environment. Second step is acknowledgement that everyone is a leader. Will you accept the call? Titles are irrelevant but behaviours will define you. Leaders use curiosity to uncover facts instead of judging and telling. They connect with others and share in the humanity and they create spaces of belonging instead of expecting people to simply fit in. Cultivate these skills in yourself and in the people around you. Finally, take self-care seriously. Our intense focus on productivity has grinded our batteries to dismal levels and COVID has pushed us beyond empty. You can't expect high-level performance when you don't have…
Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
November 17, 2020

Enjoy The Silence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzR62JJCMBQ I haven't always enjoyed silence. In fact, I've spent much of my life avoiding it. It felt uncomfortable and unproductive. As a working parent, I felt compelled to be 'doing' something all the time and would feel guilty if we didn't have plans or activities in place. I'll be honest, even before I was a parent, I relished in having things to do and places to be. Silence and stillness were foreign to me. I didn't realize it at the time, however my worth was tied to external validation and being busy. I thought it's what you had to do to be happy and 'make it'. I wouldn't brag about being busy, that felt pretentious to me, but my actions clearly revealed it. As a result of this love affair with productivity, my mind was constantly running, waking up in the middle of the night with racing thoughts, jumping out of bed as early as possible to get stuff done and avoiding any quiet or silence. Slowing down felt selfish and lazy. Sound familiar to anyone? It was this TedTalk from Andy Puddicombe, the co-founder of Headspace that broke the cycle. I downloaded the app and tried a few exercises each week for 1-2 minutes. Slowly, mindfulness seemed less 'woo woo' and more practical. That was 6 years ago. I've come to learn that silence is not only a good thing, it's regenerative and essential to my well being. I'm up to 15 minutes a day of meditation now and I still need an app…
Carolyn Swora
3 Lessons About Workplace Culture From Riding The Train
Carolyn Creates
January 19, 2018

3 Lessons About Workplace Culture From Riding The Train

Have you ever overheard a conversation on a topic you know a lot about and but you decide to keep quiet? The other day while on my 45-minute commute via the GO train, I did just that. I was sitting quietly like most passengers while working away on their computers and I overheard this middle-aged man trying to deescalate a client situation over the phone.  I wasn’t trying to listen in but it was so difficult to ignore what was unfolding. Let’s call this man John. His client appeared to be upset due to their order not arriving.  I was impressed by John’s empathic, courteous approach to resolving his issue.  He assured the client he would take ownership of the situation, listened attentively and was focused on creating a positive experience for the customer.  I quickly glanced over and gave him a smile while thinking to myself “I would like to deal with John if I had a problem!” To my surprise what happened next shocked me!  I heard John mobilizing the plan to resolve the customers problem by talking to a colleague. From what I could gather he worked in another division and his team’s actions were reliant upon ensuring the product was delivered to the customer.  Like Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, John went from being an empathic leader to an egocentric commander, while raising his voice and speaking to his colleague with a sharp and intrusive tone.  To make matters worse he hung up from his call visibly upset and played off his behaviour by explaining to…
Carolyn Swora
Why it's time to connect with people, not process
Carolyn Creates
October 17, 2017

Why it’s time to connect with people, not process

In April this year, the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, the watchdog charged with protecting consumers of financial services, launched a probe into business practices at major Canadian banks. TD Bank found itself uncomfortably forced into the spotlight when hundreds of staff came forward to the media and spoke openly about living in fear of losing their jobs if they didn’t hit their targets. To meet their quotas, sales employees were selling products that weren’t always right for the consumer. They knew that what they were doing was unethical, but the process forced them to do it. How did things get this way? To answer that, let’s see what happened in the past to lead us to where we are now. Before mass production, individual artisans created goods from start to finish; there was a network of relationships, and in business and society the mindset was collaborative. Mass production changed all that. Companies structured themselves as machines with many parts (departments), each with a specific role to perform. And so, the industrial mindset was created: as long as every part of the machine does its job, we can drive the machine to be productive. Questioning procedures and innovation was not encouraged or tolerated. Deviation from the plan would lead to failure. Information was tightly controlled by a strict hierarchy on a need-to-know basis which created a culture of secrecy. The high-ups would filter information and pass it down to their staff when—and only when—necessary. At that point in history, it is safe to say that the word transparency was only ever…
Carolyn Swora
Carolyn Creates
August 30, 2017

The 4-Letter Word Disrupting Your World

I wonder if when the philosopher Heraclitus said, “The only thing that is constant is change,” in c.500 BCE, he had any idea that his words would be used to sum up the zeitgeist some 2,500 years later. The quote may be familiar, but what does it actually mean in today’s workplace? Change used to be an event, something that could be managed through well-defined change management plans each quarter. Now, it’s something that seems to happen everyday and you’ve probably noticed that organizations can’t always plan for it. What’s causing this? Change happens because businesses are at the mercy of four forces: Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity, or VUCA for short. Let me explain how each of them impacts you at work. Volatility: The Universe’s Curve-Balls Volatility refers to how easily external forces can change a market or situation. We are all familiar with the word volatility being tied to sharp rises and falls within the stock market in response to an item of news. The same applies to cost of goods. When grocery shopping, you may grudgingly notice the price of your favourite brand of coffee has increased. What you may not know is that the increase is due to a storm that destroyed part of the crop in the Brazilian rainforest. A new technology can destroy an industry just as easily – think of the effect that streaming video had on video rental stores. No one was sitting at Blockbuster Video wondering each day whether they would still be there a year later; it came out of the blue. Uncertainty: Anything…
Carolyn Swora

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