Episode 34 | Validation to Value in HR: The Self-Respect Revolution with Dr. Katherine Iscoe
Reimagining HR with Trina Sunday tackles traditional HR practices
Trina Sunday: If your organization’s full of people pleasers or high achievers, or maybe that’s you, then you might want to tune into this chat with Dr. Katherine Iscoe. We’re talking about self respect and how that can cut through getting rid of people pleasers and high achievers, even if that’s you, so that we can let go of the imaginary judgement and criticism and make awesome things happen. It’s about taking bigger risks by letting go of the self doubt. Welcome to Reimagining HR with Trina Sunday, the rule breaking podcast where we challenge our thinking and our current people practises. This podcast is for time poor HR teams and business leaders who are feeling the burn, lacking laughs and not feeling the love. I’m Trina, your host and I’m here to cut through the bs, explore different ways of thinking and create high impact HR functions because happier, healthier organisations are better for our people and our bottom line. So if you are keen to flip traditional HR on its head, hit the follow or subscribe button so you’re the first to know when new episodes drop. Um, I’m here to help and also to shake things up. So let’s get started.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe is taking leaders from self doubt to self respect
Welcome. I’m joined by Dr. Katherine Iscoe today. She’s a female motivational speaker, a board member, a former tech CEO of a duly listed public company. She’s an author, multiple scholarship winner and an aspiring actor dreaming of playing a therapist on the big screen. So we might lean into that in a bit. But she’d probably also say that her career history and achievements kind of show up the masks that we often wear in life right where the realities don’t match up with the achievements. And now through her research and work, she’s taking leaders from self doubt to self respect and challenging them to take bigger risks by letting go, of imaginary judgement and criticism. Oh my gosh, imagine that. Let’s get stuck in. Welcome Dr. Katherine.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Thanks so much. I’m so excited to dive in. Even like, you know, there are five minute chat beforehand. I was like, oh, this is going to be great.
I’m interested in what role self respect plays in HR leadership
Trina Sunday: It would be great to start for people that don’t know you. Maybe we can start a little bit with your story and kind of what’s led you to where you are now and this focus that you have on self respect and how it’s kind of shaped how you’re showing up in the speaking that you do and the work that you do. It’d be great to hear kind of what’s led you to where you are now.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Of Course, I mean, as everybody’s story, there’s so many, you know, backlog and details and so forth. But I think the best way to describe my past is. I don’t know if you’ve ever done this, where you walk into a meeting or room or you’re pitching to a client and you think, why am I here? Like, I’m so unimportant compared to them. They’re so experienced. I’m not experienced. They’re richer, smarter, whatever the adjective is. I’m not that I don’t deserve to be there. And that’s really what self respect is. You know, confidence gets you in the room, whereas self respect keeps you standing tall within that room. And I mean that, you know, in my case, literally, but also figuratively, because I think confidence is extremely important. And the way I describe confidence is to give something a go. It’s such a great Australian saying, to give it a go, mate.
Trina Sunday: Yep.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Which is great, to trust yourself to give something a, go. It gets you in the room. But what happens when you’re in that room? If you say the wrong thing or someone looks at you not in the way you want, all of a sudden you’re triggered and you lose yourself. You start becoming someone you’re not. And that’s really the summary of probably the 47 years of my life. For a majority of that, I was someone I wasn’t because I thought people were more important than me or people were more special than me. And I think we’ve all had that experience where you especially wake up, you know, 30s, 40s, 50s or even 20s, where you just look in the mirror, you’re like, what the hell am I doing with my life? And that’s really why I’m so interested in self respect, because self respect is that feeling like there’s something special about me worth protecting. And I think that is incredibly important, not only for everyone to hear, but especially women.
Trina Sunday: Mm. It’s really interesting because I think, and as you know, like, I work with a lot of HR leaders and organisations, but I work with the people. People. Right. To try and look at how we can transform our people. Practises, transform organisations, show up better, more respectfully inclusive environments. But the respect starts with self. Right. And I think, you know, there’s a critical role in leadership which I feel is really timely and it resonates with me around what HR professionals are facing. Because the reality, the HR leaders that I’m coaching, I don’t feel like they have high self respect and I have lots of tools and, you know, psychometric stuff that helps me back that in from a scientific perspective. But you just feel it, like the self doubt, the self deprecating language. It’s something that’s really interesting to me to kind of lean into, which is why I was so keen to chat, because you said that, like, you know, you can walk into rooms and have that feeling. Where did you experience that the most? I guess in the roles that you’ve had before coming into this work that you do for yourself. Like, what did it look like in those organisations? Like, was it every day or was it on occasion we talk a bit about imposter syndrome? What is it in the career backstory, I guess. And that back catalogue, was there a specific space where it was more prevalent than others?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: I think it started when I was young. And this is not to point fingers by any means, but I think many of us grew up with, you don’t get to go first, let someone else go first. You know, wait your turn and then finally you’ll make it. like, don’t worry about what you think of yourself, worry about what people think of you. And again, this is not to point fingers. You know, I was born in a generation where kids are seen and not heard, so I think a lot of us have experienced that. So I think that backstory is so incredibly important when it comes to our roles today. And I wish more organisations really would take some time to understand a person’s backstory, because you can do all the training in the world, which is incredibly important. Confidence, training, self care, all incredibly important, but without that foundation and specifically not letting go of the past, but just understanding it and understanding that you were a different person, that back then you didn’t have the knowledge that you have now. And I think that’s, you know, to answer your question, walking into those rooms, if I would have just understood my past and I could understand my present and why I react the way I do in certain situations, whereas other situations not. And I think my goal in life is to be the person my dogs know I am in every situation.
Trina Sunday: Talk me through that. How would your dogs describe you if I was the doctor doing a little of, um.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Weird, quirky, like the kind of girl that laughs uncontrollably at a fart? I think I. I just think that they’re the most funny things in the world. The kind of person that loves to go deep into a conversation with an Uber driver within the first five minutes, you know, just being silly almost. And I think that also comes from. And I’m sure we’ll get into this. You know, getting into academia and having that validation. Ooh, you have a scholarship. Ooh, you graduated summa cum laude and getting that validation. And then after graduating, after 3,000 years in school, you know, oh, you’re a PhD. Talk like a PhD. Oh, you can’t swear on stage. Oh, goodness. Like, and I remember so someone I was working with, someone, they even said, you have to have two closets. You have to have your Dr. Katherine closet, and then you can have your other closet for how you really want to dress. And that, I think, is like, the summary of what we’re talking about. Like, be the person that your dogs know you are. But it’s really, really difficult because, you know, we talk about authenticity as almost like a noun, not a verb, meaning that, oh, yeah, yeah, just be yourself. Oh, but not like that.
Trina Sunday: Yeah.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: You know, So I think that’s so incredibly important, and especially when we’re talking about creativity and innovation. How is someone going to think outside the box if they’re told, you can’t live outside the box? You know, oh, that’s inappropriate.
Trina Sunday: So powerful. Because I think I, have these conversations all the time around. We want everybody to be authentic and turn up as their true selves. I’m like, on some level, you don’t want to see the all of Trina in a workplace. You’re not ready for that. You’re not ready for it. But I think it’s really interesting because the inside and the owning ourself, part I see so strongly for women, entrepreneurial women especially, and women that are in business for themselves. And I even had this conversation this morning at a breakfast where it was like, to be unapologetic about it.
So I was asked about podcasting given that you consult to corporates
So I was asked about podcasting. I was asked, and I was like, well, I don’t mean for it, and it’s not in the small print, but it’s like, half my episodes have, like, an explicit warning on them because I just. I just show up as myself. And I was asked this morning, well, how does that fit, given that you consult to corporates? And I thought, do they know I’m speaking to Dr. Katherine later today? I was like, but it is. It’s like, be yourself, but on my terms. And it’s like, the irony of it is not lost on me that it’s like, you don’t get to decide what version of self I am. Like, it’s self. Like, it’s me. Right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah. And I think it’s finding that balance because I think we have to understand that if we want to connect with others, they might not be at the same place that we are. And so to be respectful. I think there’s a difference between being so authentic but it’s not the right time within that relationship. So, I mean, if I’m, you know, pitching to a massive corporate and I’m meeting them for the first time, you.
Trina Sunday: Know, I’m not dropping F bombs in that meeting.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, exactly. I think it’s like bricklaying, you know, I think bricklaying is a good example. Like to build a house, you have to go back brick by brick. I put a brick down, you put a brick down. We trust each other just a little bit more than I put a brick down, you put a brick down. So it’s that almost ping pong back and forth and sometimes you just say, you’re not my vibe, we’re not vibing. And I think that’s like the perfect word for it. And that’s when you know, okay, you know what? I think I’ll just hold myself back. Not because I feel like I have to, but I want to because I don’t want to disrespect this sort of energy, if that makes sense.
Trina Sunday: Yeah, you know, you could be the.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Juiciest peach in the world and some people just don’t like peaches.
Trina Sunday: That’s it. Be juicy though. Be you.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yes.
Trina Sunday: But I think there’s an element around that where I feel like there’s a safety and a self protection in that. Right. Like that is not always safe to be your true authentic self, depending on the environment and what that looks like. I mean that on really nuanced, um, levels too, you know, like, I think safety can just be. If I’m that brash, then I’m going to lose my job or I’m not going to have that promotion. Not necessarily on the spectrum of if I’m my true self that I’m going to get harassed or bullied or, you know, there’s a spectrum with that.
Self esteem is whether you like your house. So self worth is also variable
I’m interested to hear you talk a little bit about the difference as well between self esteem, self respect, confidence. Like because we throw labels at lots of things, I’m keen to know. Kind of it’s foundational for good leadership. Right. And for us being great at stuff. How do you talk about it? What language do you use?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Let’s use a house analogy. And I know I sound very Canadian when a house. When I say that, but a house. So self esteem is whether you like your house. And obviously I’m using The metaphor, the analogy that we are the house. So self esteem is, do we like our house? Now this is really challenging because, like, let’s say you’re trying to sell the house and you’re inside and you overhear someone saying, oh my God, I love this house. All of a sudden you’re like, oh, yes, I really like my house too. But if you overhear them saying, oh my God, what were they thinking with that pink colour, obviously you’re not going to like yourself as much. So self esteem is quite variable in that sense. Self worth is also variable. Similar to the change in markets, you’re going to value yourself differently in different environments. So if you’ve been in an organisation for five, 10, 30 years, you’re going to feel really comfortable because you know how your talent, skills and the way you do things are of value to that organisation. You feel comfortable in that environment. Whereas if you’re just on the first day, you’re going to feel a bit wonky, right? And you’re not going to understand your worth in that environment yet. When it comes to confidence, confidence is your ability to sell your house, to say, yeah, I trust that, you know, I’m sort of, pretty good, I’m going to be able to trust myself to sell it. But you have that recipe of self esteem and self worth that sort of gets, put into that pot. Now, where self respect fits in is that’s the foundation of your house. So everything, you know, you could have tornadoes, earthquakes, everything in the world. You know, Covid, I, can’t even imagine how HR professionals got through that. I mean, what a shitstorm that was for them. That’s when everything, your house gets absolutely knocked down. Self respect is still there. Self respect is that ability to tell yourself, every single thing in my life is going wrong, but that doesn’t mean that I’m wrong. I can still rebuild myself. It’s almost like an insurance safety net is that ability, you know, getting back to the analogy of walking into that room and all the important people are there and you’re pitching this big deal, your ability to walk out of that room and say, oh my gosh, I said the wrong thing, I did the wrong thing. I, you know, I totally screwed that up. But that doesn’t mean that what I have and who I am is not important. You know, just because I, I didn’t show my best self doesn’t mean it’s almost. I guess the analogy is, just because I make a mistake doesn’t mean I am a mistake.
Trina Sunday: It’s Mistakes not defining you, right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, but we let it. Don’t we let it?
Trina Sunday: Why do we let it?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: I think again I’m of the mindset that I think we underestimate the power of our past. And I say power in both sense of the word, positive and negative. You know, if you were raised where your parents are like, just go for it, don’t fall, scrape your knee, do whatever, don’t worry about what people think of you. You’re going to have that supportive mindset growing up. You’re going to be like, yeah, sure, I’ll jump off the cliff, my parachute’s going to be fine. You know, Whereas if you don’t, if you have maybe that high achieving environment where you got to get the A plus, you got to get this, you got to get that, it’s going to be very, very difficult to look at the world in a different way if that’s how you were brought up for 10, 20, 30, 50 years. And I think we have to understand that to be able to get out of that. I think that’s a challenge here. You know, you just think, oh, the past is the past, let’s just look into the future. It’s so incredibly valuable. And at the core of it, what you need to do, you have to forgive the person who made you the way you are. And that’s really at the core of everything that like we’re talking about. This is like after the bottle of wine.
Trina Sunday: There’s a lot of therapy in that, right? Like there’s a lot of support. And I don’t say that flippantly either, in case anyone misinterprets me on that because there are tools to this stuff. You don’t just wake up one day saying, I really need to examine my belief systems and I really need to lean into this. And I’m saying, who is Trina at her core? Like, who am I? Like? No one wakes up with that clarity. There’ll be an incident, there’ll be an event, there’ll be a realisation of behaviours that aren’t serving us, you know, not healthily anyway. And there’s tools like to look at that. And I don’t feel like in organisations we do that or support that process particularly well. And it’s really interesting. I’ve done so much more self examination work as a businesswoman because I am my business and if I don’t figure out how I roll and how I can leverage my strengths or where I’ve got gaps that I need to compliment with someone else, with superpowers in that space, then I’m not gonna be successful. Right. So I’ve leaned into it far more earnestly. But it’s because I didn’t have a fear space though, of the judgement that we talked about in the beginning or the criticism. Like I wasn’t exposed in that way. Cause it was just me trainer Sunday trying to figure out how I roll. But the house analogy is really interesting because I think about when you talk about the market share, couldn’t help it. I’ve got Trumpisms in my head all the time. I can’t get him out. I’m so glad you mentioned you’re Canadian. So no one misunderstands. But I. It’s an external thing, isn’t it? The external, internal. So like you talk about self respect being that foundation. It’s the space that comes from within and so you can rebuild because you’re not relying on anyone else. When I hear you talk about being subject to the market and those change, that’s the external validations. It’s the external kind of acknowledgements and or criticisms. Goes both ways.
There’s a balance between people pleaser and high achiever in HR
I’m um, interested. Do you see it that as well in terms of internal and external?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Oh, yeah. I mean when people say, you know, especially on um, on socials and so forth, if I do a post and two people like it, that’s going to affect me. I mean, I’m not Mother Teresa, you know, I can’t just go through life and not need any external validation at all. I mean, whoever says that, show me a liar, you know, show me that person, show me a liar. It’s a balance between the two. It’s saying, you know, I hope people like me, but I’m going to find a way to be okay if they don’t. And that’s, that’s, I think, key when we extrapolate that to our careers. I’m going to go for this job or I’m going to have this conversation. I, um, really hope it goes well. I’m going to be disappointed if it doesn’t. But you know what? Disappointment fades, regret stays. And the reason why I say that is go for it. Because if you don’t go for it, you’re going to have that thing in your mind, oh, I should have gone for that job. I should have had that conversation with someone. And that’s what’s going to keep you up at 3am M. And then we talk about burnout. well, no wonder we’re having conversations with ourselves for three hours from 3am because we didn’t say we could have, should have, would have, right? So I think it’s a balance between the two. It feels good if you get a job. It feels good if you have that conversation with someone and goes away that you want, but be prepared when it doesn’t. And that’s where self respect reminds you, you know what? There’s something special about me worth protecting. Meaning I still have that value in me. I still. The way I look at the world and the way I see things and the way I present myself, I. It’s unique. It’s like, as Oprah said, something along the lines of, you, have a special gift that only you can give the world. But we don’t think our gift is that special because we say, you know, when it comes to hr, oh, everyone can do my job. You know, it’s not that special the way I do my job in hr. Because everyone’s an HR person.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Everyone can do my job. No, because the way you do your job, if you get to the core of it, that special way that you connect with people, only you can do that. I really wish people would see that more, you know, that quirky, weird way of doing what they do.
Trina Sunday: Yeah.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Wouldn’t the world be such an interesting place?
Trina Sunday: Oh, so interesting. And we’d have innovation in spades in our organisations because that’s where the magic happens. And it’s interesting the I was just triggered by the everyone can do your job in hr because we do, we have this element around, you know, especially with leaders that we work with, where it will be, you know, I’m a human, so of course I’m an expert in human resources and there’s a whole specialism in there and it’s a whole different conversation around HR and what we need to do for our brand. But part of it is at the core of this and with the conversation with you, the high achiever versus the people pleaser and then you’ve got self respect coming through and going, yeah, good job, guys, but back off. Like I’m here. This is where it’s at. I see this play out in a HR context all the time and we have, you know, we and in humans all the time. Like HR is not absent of being affected by the cultures of our organisations or just being humans generally, but people pleaser and high achiever. Talk me through what that looks like and I find your. The reels that you’ve done where you are acting out these personalities and what scenarios look like if you’re playing the role of the high achiever playing the role of, you know, the people pleaser. And then self respect comes through and cuts through the bullshit, basically. And I just love it. It’s, so engaging. If people haven’t caught it, there’ll be links in the show notes. But talk me through those roles and what you see from your perspective.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, so the high achiever is that person in your mind that says, you know what, we want to succeed, we want to do that amazing thing. You know, not that I’ve ever done hr, so I don’t want to, you know, jump to a conclusion here, but I’m just guessing. I think it’s. My aunt was in HR and she’s been retired for maybe 30 years and I think she’s just now getting over that job.
Trina Sunday: She’s a recovering HR professional.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, I mean, the stories that she’s told me. So you want to make the organisation better place, you want to get ahead in your job, you want to go up that ladder unit. So the high achiever is there, but it’s never enough. Even if you get a promotion or even if you have a great conversation with someone, there’s another conversation you need to have. So it’s never enough. You know, you’re running a race against yourself, but there’s no finish line M because you just keep on pushing that finish line. Now the people pleaser comes in and says, well, you have to be nice to everyone, because if you’re not nice to everyone, then, well, why are you in hr? So you have to be everyone’s best friend. And where does that get you? Nowhere fast. Right. It’s very, very hard to be successful in your job and in your career if your priority is being everyone’s best friend. It’s this hard, especially I think, from the. And, um, I’m making a generalisation here, but the HR people that I’ve met are really, really nice people.
Trina Sunday: Who are those people?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, high levels of compassion, high levels of empathy because they’re trying to put, you know, they put themselves in other people’s shoes, you know, a lot. And that’s really, really difficult because you feel things. You want to be their best friend in some ways. So this high achieving, people pleasing conflict is almost like having siblings in your head, you know, when, like if you have twins and they both want the same thing, they both want the same toy, you know, but they want to achieve it in different ways. So the high achiever, it’s never enough. And the people pleaser hold you back because it says, don’t worry about that, let’s worry about what people think of us. And so there’s a push, pull between the two. And self respect comes in and says, okay, you know, you’ve achieved that. Yes, celebrate it, but yeah, go for that next thing. And the reason why I say that is, you know, sometimes we think of self respect as self compassion. But the reason why I like self respect is it actually really supports high achievers. It says, yeah, you know, you’re, you’re achieving because you do challenge yourself. But there’s a big difference between I guess punishing yourself versus challenging yourself and self respect. With the people pleaser says, yeah, you know, be nice to people but remember to protect yourself first. Don’t allow that shield to come down and allow, I guess when you try to please everyone, you please no one. That’s sort of what it comes down to. Does that make sense at all?
Trina Sunday: Yeah, it does. And I think there’s some real kind of synergy with some of the work I do in culture change as well. And if anyone in HR communities use human synergistics tools.
I’m seeing HR leaders coming with less self respect than other leaders
But when you talk about some of the self respect elements, it’s really, there’s strong parallels with that self actualizing part of us where, you know, is coming from meeting our satisfaction needs. It comes from knowing who we are, what we value, how we show up. And so you can deflect, right what others view your achievements or friendships being everyone’s bestie. But it does hold you back that tension because it’s like you can’t have a difficult conversation if you’re trying to be everyone’s mate. And you can’t be looking at things holistically if you are so high achieving that you’re not looking at what the landscape has in front of you to know at what cost. And that’s where it becomes, you know, not a constructive kind of, strive like smash those stretch goals, like go for the stars, but watch the collateral damage that you might leave in your wake. But I think about HR leaders that I work with and I think, and this is where it can blur and you can oversimplify it, where it’s kind of, they put themselves last. And so the self respect is really in some of the work that I’m finding in the coaching that I do, it’s just not there. Like the sense of self isn’t there. And so I do a lot of work with my clients around, you know, finding your identity, finding that uniqueness, the quirk, how you own it. I call it superpowers. So I talk about Knowing what your superpowers are like, that you know, you have that other people don’t have and it becomes part of your personal brand. Really what you unique selling proposition is, is your quirks. It’s the things that make you you that other people can’t replicate. But it’s knowing how to use it then. And I see a bigger gap in this with HR clients that I work with than other leaders. So what I see, and maybe it’s also because the HR profession’s dominated by women. So I have no science to back this up. This is a world according to Trina. But you know, we’ve got HR leaders dominated by women, I’m going to say 70% in terms of, you know, clearly making that up, but it’s definitely a majority. And so there’s layers of the gender belief system and you know, there’s a whole patriarchy and a whole, there’s a whole thing in there. It’s a chat for another day. But I’m seeing HR leaders coming with less self respect than other leaders in the leadership development work that I do. And hence why I reached out to have a chat because I think you talk about the self respect revolution and I’m keen to hear more about that because I feel like there is something in this where HR teams that are striving for that authenticity and I talk about high impact, you can’t do it without self respect.
People pleasers have this irrational fear of coming across as narcissists
And so then the next question people have is, well, where do I start? So where do we start?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: A great way I guess. I think the thing that we have to concentrate on is our fear of coming across as narcissists. The irony of that is that if you were a narcissist, one you wouldn’t be worried about if you’re a narcissist. People pleasers have this irrational fear of coming across as arrogant, as selfish, as self serving when we’re not. We’re not. Because likely if you’re a people pleaser, you know, just focusing on that is this has been years, you know, years of being the good girl, years of being the selfless one. So over time if you picture a spectrum, you know, on the right, on the very, very top right is a people pleaser, on the very bot, like the left is a narcissist and then the centre, it’s your average person, some days, you know, they’re a little bit nice, sometimes they’re a little bit selfish, but on average they’re average. So over the years if you picture on that spectrum you’re sort of sidestepping to the right. You’re becoming more and more of a people pleaser. Meaning when you think you’re being selfish, you don’t think you’re just normal, you think you’re going to be a narcissist, you jump all the way down. I’ll give you an example of this. So a normal person, if they go out to a restaurant, they order a steak, you know, they go to rock pool. It’s like $3,000 for one ounce of meat and it’s overcooked, right? A normal person would say, listen, looks really delicious. However, I ordered a rare and it’s like nuclear, right? Or something like that. Would you be able to do another one, please and thank you. Fine. Kosher. Bada bing, bada um, boom. A people pleaser will go into their head and say, if I send this back, the chef is going to hate me. He’s going to talk or she or he is going to talk to the rest of their team. They’re all going to come into the kitchen and look at me, they’re going to remember my face. They’re going to say, she’s a psychopath, she’s the worst person in the world. Then they’re going to take that step, same steak, spit on it and send it back out. I, swear to God. This is what goes through our mind, sending a steak back. This is the difficulty that we face. We think when we’re being a little bit proud of ourselves, a little bit selfish, we go into our mind and catastrophize into the future that we will be put on Channel nine news as welcome to the world’s worst person in the entire world. And I swear there’s going to be at least one person listening to this saying, did you read my diary? So when it comes to what we need to focus on, especially as high achieving people pleasers, is to start realising that when we’re a little bit selfish, when we put ourselves first now and again, we are not narcissists. This is actually a step towards just being average, normal, healthy, self respecting human beings. And we start to look at that in our daily practises. When someone says, what do you want for dinner tonight? Your automatic reaction is, whatever you want. Start there, start saying, you know what? We’ve had chicken for the past 18 years. I want fish. What do you want to watch for TV tonight? I want to watch the Kardashians. But I hate the Kardashians. Who cares? We’ve watched killing movies for the past 60 years. I’m watching the Kardashians. I’m being a bit, you know, obviously tongue in cheek here, but when we start looking at those practises each and every day, especially when we jump into the corporate, you know when someone comes up to you and says, oh, can you help me with this thing? And all of a sudden you, you look at your schedule and you have a full deck. You are so behind on your work. This is your chance to say, listen, I would love to help you with that, but I’m really behind my work. Would you be able to ask someone else? It’s those little moments in your day where you can just start tweaking, sidestepping. Back to that normalcy.
Every single day we have a chance to speak up and say something
I’m getting on my soapbox here that I’m um, very ferocious about this topic. Because it’s. It’s those small things. It’s. It’s those small things that are so freaking normal, but we’re so scared of them.
Trina Sunday: But it’s the habit stacking, right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Oh my God. Yeah.
Trina Sunday: And so it’s kind of. You have to focus on those small things to retrain your brain to be conscious of it because it’s automatic response. Like, and it goes back to childhood, as you say, and it goes back to, you know, and I’m not a psychologist, not pretending to be, but we know that we build those automated responses and habits really early and then they get kind of cemented over time.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Right.
Trina Sunday: In the different environments we move through from education into work, life, life or whatever. But it’s being conscious in the moment. Conscious enough to not automatically go, sure can help you with that thing. And it’s like, I don’t have the cognitive load space to tell you what we should have for dinner because I literally can’t think of how I’m putting my foot in front of the other at this moment in time. And so we default to things, thinking. It’s easier sometimes too, but it actually makes it harder for us. Right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Mhm. And we stay quiet a lot. Right. You know, we suppress our discomfort to keep the comfort of others. But the thing is, if you don’t speak up, your silence is going to talk for you.
Trina Sunday: Yeah.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: your silence says way more about you than any misstep or any silly thing that you say. Silence says so much. If you don’t mind, I’ll tell you a really, really quick story about this.
Trina Sunday: Yeah.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: My great grandmother, this is back in 1938, she was Jewish. This was in Communist Czechoslovakia. I’ll tell this, you know, very long story in a, truncated form. She knew that there was these raids, you know, the equivalent of the Nazis. They were called the Linka Guard, which was a paramilitary organisation, but sort of think of them as the Nazis. She knew that they were doing these raids. She was a very wealthy woman, Jewish, lived in this penthouse. And so two armed guards showed up at her doorstep one afternoon. Her daughter was there. So in Jewish face, it goes through the mother. So her kids were both Jewish. And she had to make a decision there because they said, come with us. You know, drop everything, you’re going to come with us. Her daughter fainted. So for the moms listening to this, imagine you’re at the door, you have rifles pointed towards you and your daughter has fainted. She had to make a choice. Does she stay silent or does she speak up? Hard decision. Right now she’s my size, she’s five foot. On her very best day, she’s no longer with us. But, she was the scariest woman I’ve ever met, by the way. She had to make a decision. She took those two men with rifles over to her balcony and said this. You can either push us off or shoot us right here. We’re not going with you. They left.
Trina Sunday: My gosh.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Oh, yeah. She was really frigging scary. Let me get you, like. But the point, this is a very, very extreme example. Um, I’m cognizant of that. Right. But I think it’s a really good lesson for every single day of our lives. Every single day we have a chance to speak up and say something. But as high achieving people pleasers, we don’t. It’s not the right time. The other person is stressed, they have more work than I do or enter excuse here. Every single day we have the choice to speak up and we don’t because it’s easier. And this is where I think self respect comes in. And obviously I’m biassed here. I think we go through life thinking that the key to life is happiness. What a bullshit statement that is. I mean, because let me tell you.
Trina Sunday: In that situation, unattainable, right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah. You know, when you don’t speak up, you keep the peace. Everyone’s happy, right? Everyone’s, oh, yes, that’s the key to life. Let’s just go through life and be happy. But just because you’re happy doesn’t mean that you’re proud of who you are as a person. When you go home and you’re going to coulda, shoulda, woulda, said that, are you proud of yourself? You are not. Right. So I think Rather than thinking about what can I do to keep the peace, to keep, everyone happy in my life, start asking the question, when I get home at night, am I going to be proud of the person that I am and the decisions that I made that day? And if you say no to that, you got to look hard in the mirror because let me tell you, this life goes by in an instant. And there’s a great book called the Five Regrets of the Dying. The top regret was, I wished I’d lived a life true to me, not the life others expected of me. That was a top regret of both men and women. And this is why I have a tattoo on my arm. To thine own self be true. This is a tattoo that my. It’s a quote, from Shakespeare. It says, love, dad. Because my dad told me this quote ever since I was knee high to a grasshopper. And you know, you know, parents giving you advice, you’re like, you’re weird, I don’t understand you.
Trina says sometimes people feel like they don’t have a choice
This only made sense to me about two, three years ago. And this is a reflection of every single moment. It’s those hard things that we need to do that it’s going to take away our happiness. But at least we can put our head down on the pillow and say, you know what, I’m proud of that decision, even though it was really frigging hard. I’ll get off my soapbox now.
Trina Sunday: No, stay there. I like it. I think there’s so much in that when I reflect on the story, there’s so much power and you can’t think or act boldly. In my opinion. World according to Trina, if you don’t know who you are, it’s very hard to step out and buck. The system would be the Australian term for it. Or to challenge the status quo. If you’re corporating up this thing. But to boldly go, no, actually I’m not going to do that. That’s not cool. Because of X, Y, Z. And then you take it to a constructive place of, uh. But I see what you’re trying to achieve and I think maybe we could do it a different way. Like can we explore this? But I feel like we have this gap in terms of this sense of self that means that we can’t step into the world boldly. And I feel like we blame then systems and organisations sometimes. This will be controversial for some of my HR crowd. I think we blame the systems and the cultures of our organisations for not empowering our, workforces. But I think there’s also an element of resistance to taking up the power. I think that there are people that have the limiting beliefs that have the lack of self respect to go, yeah, I’m going to take that, I’m going to run with it. And I don’t know the answer for it yet. Might marinate on that after our chat as well. But I don’t know if you have any thoughts on that. But I think there’s something in that where you can try and empower, but people have got to step into that for themselves. Right.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: I think a lot of people feel like they don’t have a choice. I can’t remember who I was chatting with and emailed, me. Oh, but I don’t have a choice. You know, this is what I have to do. I, said I understand that mindset. but you actually do have a choice. The problem is the choice that is good for you often goes against your morals, your values.
Trina Sunday: Example.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, yeah. So I was at this talk, I can’t remember at, one of the big oil and gas, you know, massive, there’s probably 300 people in the audience. The CFO of this huge organisation was talking and someone from the organisation raised a hand and just said, listen, I’m in this really, really toxic team. What should I do? She gave some suggestions. Have you considered this? And that? He came back, tried all those things, they went back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And at the end she said, listen, at the end of the day, you have two feet, you can walk. That’s a choice. We don’t do that because it’s hard because we have mortgages, we have kids, you know, that we need to feed, we have school fees. But I think the most important thing to recognise is you do have that choice. And I think just knowing that, I think sometimes we forget that we have that choice. It’s a really, really hard choice because we don’t want to be selfish. And this is when, again, that concept of, you know, being this selfish, arrogant narcissist, oh, you know, I’m going to quit my job. Who cares about whether my kids can go to school or not? That’s scary. But sometimes we have to balance of, you know, am I happy or do I think I’m happy in this job, but am I proud of being in this job? And I think that’s the push pull there, if that makes sense.
Trina Sunday: Yeah, it does. I think proud’s the interesting lens there. it’s probably not a word that I’ve gravitated to in pondering this and that’s why I talk to people that are not me. Right. So that you can kind of look at the language that you use. But I think there’s a lot of fear in that. Right. There’s fear based decisions in that. the same as we have fear based leadership, which is what’s setting the tone for this in organisations as well. Because our leaders are also not bold or self respecting or finding the power from within to stand their ground for things they believe in. Yeah, but I think neither of us are sitting here flippantly saying just quit your job. Like neither of us are saying that. And you’ve acknowledged kind of the adulting that goes with, you know, decisions like that, kids, school fees, mortgages, which are through the roof. Right?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah.
Trina Sunday: But at the end of the day, I think there is always a choice. And to your point, I think it’s around how it feels though. If you feel like you’re trapped, it feels like shit. If you feel like you’re trapped, everything feels absolutely like it feels shit. Right. Because there’s no hope. Like when you feel trapped, there’s no hope. Or if you feel like you’ve got a way of saying, well, what are the options that I have here? And walking is always an option. and I talk to my clients around and a lot of HR leaders, cause a lot of them are in career transition. A lot of people will come and work with me. They’re either trying to level up their game changers, wanting to innovate in the HR space, reimagine how they do it, or they’re at a career crossroads or they’re like, I’m burnt out, I’m imploding. Covid’s absolutely caned me. There’s been no relenting since either, by the way, because we leaned everyone up and didn’t rebuild teams, but expect three times the work. So it’s looking at, well, what are the options here? And do you stay in toxicity? I wouldn’t continue to smother my body with chemicals once I found out they’re going to give me cancer. Not knowingly. Know better, do better.
Self respect comes in when you’re in toxic situations
So once you know you’re in a space that’s toxic or it’s not serving you, that’s gotta be where the self respect comes in to say, I’m worth more than this. And self worth isn’t the term you use, but like I’m worth more than this. I value myself more than this. So I have to go somewhere. Something has to change.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: There’s something special about me. Worth protecting.
Trina Sunday: Yeah.
What are some practical things that could be introduced to help boost self respect in organisations
What are some practical things that could be introduced or considered to kind of help shift the dial on self respect in our organisations? Do you have any thoughts?
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: I don’t want to jump in and say, you know, I know that world. I think that would be an insult, um, to them. But what I do know is people I know mindset and I think the first thing to recognise is sometimes we try to. What’s the saying? I think it’s an Australian saying, you know, putting lipstick on a pig or something like that.
Trina Sunday: Yeah, I don’t know where that comes from, but we need to unpack that in some therapy I think, because that’s just.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, but it’s kind of like that. Like sometimes you think, I have a job so I should be grateful. You know, I have, you know, roof over my head, I should be grateful. But sometimes, you know what, gratitude is great. But sometimes it can be a bit toxic if I’m allowed to say that. Sometimes it’s okay for you to say, you know what? I really don’t like my job right now. I really don’t like my life right now. And letting that out is. My partner hates when I use this analogy, by the way. But I’m gonna say it anyways. It’s like a fart, right? Sometimes you just gotta fart. But because we’re high achieving people pleasers, we don’t fart, we don’t do anything like that. Sometimes you just gotta let out that fart and be friggin normal and say, you know what, everything is shit right now. I don’t like it. Sometimes you need a little help, you know. But I think especially as high achievers, we say, oh no, you know, we should know how to do our job. And as people pleasers, oh, you know, everyone has it so much worse than us. So why would we bother them with our problems? They’re not as big of a deal. But sometimes you just need a little helping hand to see the world in a different way. Because you can’t see the picture of your life when you’re inside that frame. Meaning sometimes when we’re in that stressful shit, bored tech, when nothing is going right, you can’t see the forest through the leaves or whatever that saying is, right? Sometimes you just need a little helping
00:45:00
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: hand. I’ll just tell you a quick story. When I was in Washington D.C. for my first ever scientific conference, I thought I’d walk to the convention centre, right? Like yeah, yeah, beautiful day, got my coffee, got my blueberry bagel, walk in my Gucci sunglasses.
Trina Sunday: Heels.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: No, no heels. I was wearing, like, Adidas because it was a bit of a walk.
Trina Sunday: Just checking.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Yeah, no, no, that. That would sound like me. It was like four kilometres, let’s say. So I’m walking, walking. I’m like, I think I should be at the convention centre by now. I’m like, nah, then it’s fine. I’ll just keep on walking. Walking, walking. Like, so weird. Like, you know, the houses don’t look as nice anymore. Walking, walking, walking. All the lawns have, like, garbage in them. M. And all the. The windows have bars on them. And not. Not the pretty kind of stuff, the scary kind. I’m, um, like, shit. Oh, shit. And this is back in the day, you know, I had my BlackBerry, but I was in the States. I was in Canada, so my phone didn’t work this and that. So even if I wanted to, I couldn’t, right? But also my pride. It’s a lot of pride. It’s a lot of, oh, no, no, no. I know where I’m going. Everything’s fine. I can do this myself, right? I’m a big girl. So I get to the stretch where there’s, like, a big fence on one side and then just scariness on the other side. So I don’t. I kept on walking. Got to this intersection. This is, um, truncated. Sorry. Two cop cars were sitting on the opposite side. Cops look at me. I look at them, they point and they say, come here. So I walk over and I was like, did see. Like, hi. So I’m just a little bit lost. And I like, yeah, think. And I was like, can you just tell me what bus to take? Or something like that. They’re like, get in the car. I was like, that’s fine. Again, I can do it myself. I don’t need your help. I’m a big girl, right?
Pushback, ego. Sometimes you just need a helping hand
Pushback, ego. I was so mortified with this. So he said, get in. I tried to get in the back seat. It’s like, no, get in the front seat. So the other cop car pulls away and we’re driving. He said, you realise the only reason why you’re alive right now is because the murderers are still asleep and the drug dealers are at church with their moms. I was in the worst area of the northeast eastern seaboard ever. And the only reason why I was still alive was it was a Sunday morning. So he drops me off at the red, carpet of this conference and this. And I said, thank you so much. Like, I’m so embarrassed. He says, you know what? There’s a couple ways to get through life. You can either pretend that you can do it all yourself, or sometimes you just need the helping hand to get where you want to go faster. Um, that’s a very good metaphor for life sometimes, whether we’re in HR or if we’re a new parent with a newborn that hasn’t slept for the past, like, month, sometimes you got to put your ego aside and say, you know what? I need a helping hand here. Things are shit. I don’t know where I’m going. I’m lost, I’m helpless. I’m not perfect. I just need a hand. Please, someone help me. That’s human. That’s human. And I think we need. That’s the way we put the human back in nature. Ooh, that was good.
Trina Sunday: That’s incredible. And that is exactly what reimagining HR looks like. Thank you so much, Dr. Katherine. I really appreciate your time. This has been an amazing chat.
Dr. Katherine Iscoe: Thank you. Thank you so much.
Self respect is more than confidence, it’s the missing ingredient
Trina Sunday: Before you go, Dr. Katherine poses a really important question. If you want to reflect on some things that we’ve talked about today. How does it feel to be you right now? And I think part of that, if you reflect on that, is we’ve talked a bit about self respect today, being more than confidence, it’s the missing ingredient. And I talk about clarity and confidence and capability, but clarity and confidence being key. But that self respect, your self value, worth who you are, knowing your uniqueness and being able to go out boldly into the world, that’s how you’re going to maximise your impact, whether it’s as a HR person, a leader or however you’re showing up in the world. So have a reflect on that. How does it feel to be you right now? And what is it that you value and what’s important to you and what makes you so freaking awesome that you need to protect it, no matter the environment that you’re in.
Thanks for tuning in and leaning in to this week’s episode. As we look to reimagine how we show up for our people, organisations and community, reach out to us via our website at www.reimaginehr.com.au with your HR horror stories or suggestions of people you’d love to hear from or topics you want to explore. It’s all about people, purpose and impact and we are here for all of it.
Until next time, take care, team.
