Ep. 108: Who Are You Without Your Job?

<p>In this episode I have a riveting conversation with Susan A. Miele; author of the recently released 'PAUSED.', scholar, and former HR C-suite executive. Drawing from her own experience and her PhD in Human and Organizational Systems, her passion is at the intersection of personal transformation, theory, and leadership.</p><p>Susan is one of the 12% of women who went through menopause before 45, and hers went undiagnosed for years. Her performance declined, doctors told her it was stress and anxiety, and she resigned from the job she'd built her whole life around. In the process of trying to "get back" to where she was, she downsized her house and just when she was about to start a new role, her house literally went up in flames. Susan describes standing there thinking everything was gone, and realizing somewhere in the process of rebuilding the house that she also had to rebuild herself. There was no going back. That person was gone.</p><p>What she found on the other side was returning to the C-suite seven years later as a completely different leader. Her purpose shifted from ambition to enabling other people. Her values softened from success and drive to compassion, curiosity, honesty, and bravery. She became in her words 'much more human'.</p><p>This conversation covers so much ground; from how identity forms young, to why so many high performers blur the line between who they are and what they do, and what liminality actually asks of you. As the title of her book reveals, we also talk about why the pause is not permanent but is sometimes essential.</p><p><b>Episode Highlights:</b></p><ul><li>Why 25-30% of women step out of the workforce because of menopause symptoms, and what that costs the leadership pipeline.</li><li>How Susan conflated ambition with purpose, and why that made rest impossible.</li><li>The identity framework: who am I, how did I get here, and where am I going.</li><li>Losing the job, the health, and the house, and what rebuilding actually required.</li><li>How her leadership shifted from performative to human in her second C-suite chapter.</li><li>How do you coach someone who is living outside their own values?</li><li>Liminality: the space between two knowns, and how to get unstuck.</li></ul><p><b>Quotables:</b></p><p><i>"They don't know themselves without their job. What they do is who they are. And there's no daylight in between them."</i> — Susan A. Miele</p><p><i>"My ambition became my purpose. I conflated ambition and purpose