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I don't know how to people.

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[laughs]

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And it was really focused on the idea of understanding people at the core, the human dynamic

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side of it, and a lot of times we can try to focus on efficiency gains and say, you know,

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how do we move all these chest pieces around, make this work, and sort of forget that you're

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dealing with actual people.

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There is no destination.

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There's no I've arrived.

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I've achieved.

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I've got this title.

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I've got this accomplishment.

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You're really, you're always learning, and the more I learn, the more I know, the more

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I experience, the more I realize, I don't know anything.

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[music]

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Welcome to the Executive Connect podcast where we dive into the minds of leaders and innovators

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today.

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I'm excited to have Elizabeth Bianneck with us.

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She's an author, speaker, and consultant whose work spans over two decades in innovation

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and leadership.

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She's recognized as one of the top 10 most influential pioneering women in technology,

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and her career spans Fortune 100.

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Innovation has shown us the importance of what she calls good people in.

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Elizabeth, welcome to the show.

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Thank you Melissa, great to be here.

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I want to start out and just talk a little bit about your career path and talk a little

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bit about some of your pivotal roles and experiences in corporate America.

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Sure.

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I would say I took this scenic route in my career path, so definitely went around and saw

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all the sites on the way.

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The commonality across even different industries, different roles was the desire to always

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want to ask why.

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Not from the point of just being annoying, but really wanting to fully understand and wanting

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to understand how my piece fit into the whole understanding what are the challenges we're

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facing.

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How could we do this better?

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And I think that eventually wound me into a strategy role for a Fortune 100 company, and

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I got a great chance to ask why and asking them why a lot more times turned me into proposing

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an idea for a startup way to pursue new tech in that space, not thinking that I would be

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involved in it more thinking, hey, we as an organization should be looking at this is

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a great opportunity.

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But then the whole who should lead this, what should we do?

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Nobody was standing up to that and I ended up just sort of, well, nobody else is going to

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do it.

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This needs to be done.

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Let's just do it.

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Again, thinking I do is for a phase and then hand it off and then another phase turned

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into another phase and then eight years later, I was like, oh, I guess I'm doing that.

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So it was an interesting journey that got me into what I would say accidental entrepreneurship

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inside of a large organization.

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And then most recently my change is parting ways with corporate America as of this last

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spring, branching out on my own, launching my own consulting, speaking firm.

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And I wrote a book that really captured on that journey, that accidental entrepreneur journey.

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And what is that book called and what can we find inside that book Elizabeth?

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The title is Cake on Tuesday and the subtitle is 25 lessons to unlock corporate innovation.

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And it really is just the journey, the good, the bad, the ugly, the learnings along the

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way of finding myself in that accidental entrepreneur role and what I learned about myself, about

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people, about tech, everything along the way.

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So you can find that book, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, pretty much anywhere you can get a book,

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Cake on Tuesday.

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I love it.

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And there's one thing that you said that I think is so important in our journeys as innovators

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and leaders is going with it and sticking your hand up and figuring it out as you go.

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I think a lot of times in leadership, we just wait until we have all the boxes checked and

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then we step into roles.

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But I think a lot of what you were talking about at the beginning is you just went with it.

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It needs to be done.

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Someone's got to do it.

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I'll do it.

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And you kind of just, what I like to say, road the stream, road downstream on the raft versus

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kind of fighting the path upstream.

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So I love that you mentioned that.

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I want to talk a little bit about what your vision was when you co-founded WebExes, hologram,

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and just maybe some of the challenges you faced with bringing that product forward in your

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journey.

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Sure.

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At the time I can mention I was in a strategy role for Cisco and my role was really looking

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more at strategic partnerships and we had someone else in the organization that focused on the

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long range strategic planning for our organization.

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Same manager that managed both our groups and I was having a little bit of maybe a cheeky

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conversation with my then boss about poking holes that are long-read strategic plan and

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saying, why don't we do it this way?

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I think we could be doing so much more external to the company, getting outside of our

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four walls, outside of what we know and really be, shake this up, be groundbreaking.

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And he was being particularly tolerant that day and decided to give me some runway and

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kind of challenge me back if you think you can do better than show me.

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And that led me down this path of being given an inch, so deciding to take a mile of what

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can I find out?

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If I, somebody granted me the strategy, the one for the day and I could own all of corporate

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strategy for this, what would I be doing?

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What would I be going after?

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And so I started really getting my head above the trees if you will and looking outside

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and seeing what's happening in this industry at the Thomas Focus in the collaboration, space

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corporate collaboration and saying, who's doing what's really earth shattering?

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What's new in coming?

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Why does the potential to be really disruptive?

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Either in a good way or a bad way to our business.

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And I went to a ton of conferences, talk to accelerator startups, every demo I could get

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my hands on, I tried.

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And at the time, this was several years ago, at the time, really looking at augmented reality

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as a way to shake up the way we looked at corporate communications and holographic technology

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specifically of, can you find a way to feel as if you are together?

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The idea of co-present of being together when you physically can't be.

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And holographic interactions were really cutting edge at that time in that everything that

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you saw out there was a record in playback or doctorate in some way.

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Nothing was real time capture.

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And there was a lot of interest and potential of, can we do this?

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Could we do this in real time?

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Could we capture a render in real time and have that feeling of togetherness in a meeting?

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So rather than maybe here, you be there, we have a screen between us.

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Who we actually be together and have an interaction in that way.

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And we didn't know the answer to that.

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This was a new tech, nobody had done this before.

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Nobody had tried to do it in real time and done it successfully without significant lag

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or other issues.

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And so that was what this whole exploration turned into.

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It was really like baby steps along the way of, "Oh, that's an interesting idea.

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Could we do it?"

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And then that led to, "Well, let's form a small tiger team and pulse people together and

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check it out and see if we could do that."

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And I was like, "Oh, I think we could do this.

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What if we did something more?

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What if we put this together even more?"

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And again, not thinking I was going to lead this.

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At the time I was thinking I was creating a cool proposal to hand off to somebody else to

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lead.

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And then one thing led to another and before long I found myself saying, "Let's just do

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this."

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I love it.

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It's so fascinating to hear your story with that.

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I want to talk a little bit about your philosophy of good people and just your thoughts

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on that as it pertains the leadership in uncertain environments as we are in our world today.

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My poor grammar of good people probably came from a conversation that my husband and I

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had.

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We have been fascinated with this topic for a long time and just a bit about this of transferable

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skills.

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And the fact that people that are very good at something don't always necessarily have

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the appropriate pedigree or background or approval or permission to do that something.

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You don't know until you try it.

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They might be amazing at something.

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The idea that passion can count more than pedigree and the idea that what somebody's most

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amazing contribution could be might not have anything to do with what they've already

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done but more of the potential of where they could go and what they could do.

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And we would find a lot of times over coffee or a cocktail having a chat about I encountered

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this at work, you encountered that at work and like well that's just good people or this

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person handled that situation poorly because and it's not a one for one trade out of.

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I'm going to take this person off here and put this person on there and boom that's

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just going to work.

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People have different skill sets, people have different ambitions, desires, how they work

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their culture and they get jazzed and excited by different things and people are messy and

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fun.

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And just a whole big mess to get into.

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So the idea of good people was really around looking at the unique, crazy, wonderful individuals

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that you have and how to get the most out of them and help them be the most fulfilled

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in their role.

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First of all, I love the good people.

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I think that's a great analogy and it's so spot on too because I think a lot of times

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in big business and kind of the world today, people are like transactional, right?

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They're like puzzle pieces, pull someone here and move them there, they're better over

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there.

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So it's a lot of, you know, it's not peopleing, right?

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Like you said, it's a lot of just moving people to solve a problem without actually asking

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them or being empathetic to their needs.

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And I think what I understand in our world today is so many things are really unclear through

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even long term companies, publicly traded companies.

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There's a lot of change, there's a lot of concern these days, which is why we see a lot

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of really senior people leaving companies or transitioning to their own thing.

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And so I want to talk a little bit about this thread of uncertainty in our world these

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days and transactional lines that I need you to do this without helping people.

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And so I want to talk about really guiding teams that are uncertain of the environment

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and how to keep them motivated and really focus on the mission, whatever the mission is,

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even when they don't know what it's going to be or they're unclear of their specific

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contributions to it.

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Yeah, that's a really salient point for, I think, the dissatisfaction a lot of people have

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in their current environment or why things aren't working is not necessarily being aligned

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to the vision or understand how their piece fits into the whole or getting excited about

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it or knowing what they add that's unique.

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So I think really looking at can you convey the core vision, the core goal?

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What are we excited about?

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What are we trying to do and why?

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Before you get into the minutiae of this is exactly how we're going to do it.

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And I think when you convey that and you can get multiple people aligned to this is the

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north star, this is where we're going.

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It's not going to be a straight path.

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There's not a game plan, there's not a roadmap, specifically working in innovative technology.

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Most of the things that you're working on, they've never been done before or they've been

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done tried and failed before or the technology has changed drastically than it was out even

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six months ago.

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So you never have certainty, you never have this like, oh, this is the plan, it would just

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follow this formula and that's going to work.

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There's always ambiguity and when you and your team are comfortable with a certain level

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of ambiguity, that's when you can get really creative.

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You have to be aligned on the goal.

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So the whole thing of this is where we're going, we're all going to this place.

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This is where we want to get to.

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This is the outcome.

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This is what success looks like.

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That you have to be crystal clear on like, what is success for us?

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And that success metric might be learning.

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It might not be, this is the exact product we're going to make.

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So some of that you're figuring out on the way too, but we need to learn X, the answer to

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this, this question.

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And if you're all clear on that, but you give some freedom of how you go about approaching

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that, then I think you get some really amazing, innovative responses from your team.

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And you start seeing that brainstorming or brainstorming of them building on each other's

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ideas.

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And your journey is not going to look very linear in the way you thought it was going to be

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going there, but you're going to find some amazing wins along the way.

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And if you all keep that North Star in your sights, you're going to end up at your goal.

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It's just the path to get there is going to be different in what you thought.

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Yeah, I love that.

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Which kind of brings me to what I wanted to talk about next, but I do think some of the

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best fixes or problems come from the least likely places.

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Sometimes, technical, non-technical people find solutions for technical people or vice versa.

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And so I do, I love that.

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I think that's spot on.

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I want to talk about emerging technology.

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I know I can't get through social media or any magazine without hearing about technology

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and AI.

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So I want to talk about kind of your thoughts on any emerging technology.

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That balance is kind of the human connection with any technological advancement.

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So bridging whether that's bridging gap between human connection and innovation or any other

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kind of technology from your perspective.

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Yeah.

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I think the point you made about sometimes the best ideas come from people who not in technology

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and self-proclaimed.

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I'm an English agree.

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I think it's hilarious that I ended up in a technology field, to be honest, because that

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wasn't my racial plan I was planning to go.

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But even as you said that, maybe think about a web of a hologram and the very first patent

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on the team.

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It's an amazing cutting edge technology and end to end holographic collaboration system.

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The first patent on the team came from our obsolete with an accounting degree.

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It was just amazing because she had an idea of, hey, this doesn't really work.

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What if we did it this way and just thinking out loud and when the end you're just like,

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that's the patent.

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And then they got poking up on that and fleshing out what it was and she wrote up an amazing

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patent.

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And that was the first one on the team.

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So I think being open to the fact that your ideas can come from anywhere.

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And a lot of times with technology, we can sometimes over glorify the tech and get excited

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about technology for technology is sake.

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Like this is amazing.

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This does this thing that's never been done before.

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Cool.

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Does anybody want that?

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What are you going to do with that?

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So we were thinking about how you're actually going to use it.

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I think that's why WebEx hologram was successful because the original goal wasn't to say, let's

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do something cool in augmented reality.

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Let's do something cool with holograms.

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It was a, how do we solve this problem of feeling together when we simply can't be?

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We're in different countries, continents.

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How do we fix that?

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It was always focused on the connection.

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And because of that, the amazing technological advancements were to support that long term

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goal of connection.

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And so there was always a purpose.

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There was never a, let's add a bell and whistle for no reason.

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And I think that's true with anything.

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I think you're seeing that with AI now.

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It's been interesting to see a lot of companies jump to fee in, not knowing what they're going

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to do.

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Just thinking, oh, gendered, AI, we got to do something there's something there.

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But if you don't have a goal or purpose or a mission, why are we trying to do something

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there?

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What are you trying to do?

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What are you trying to do better?

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What problem are you trying to solve?

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How does this help people?

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Great.

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How can we now look at the technology to support that?

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You can't really start with the tech first because it's always about the people.

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Yeah, I love that.

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And it's funny that you said that because I am an engineer and I work in non-engineering

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processes and practices now.

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So it's funny how they crossed over.

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Yeah.

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You know, you jigged an iDrive, right?

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So I love it, but I think that's a really good point is being open to what is this technology

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or widget going to solve for the people that are using it.

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And I agree.

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I think everybody is building things without thinking about, was anybody going to buy it?

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And I think some of the best companies in the world that we all use, that's where they

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started.

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What are we going to do for our customers?

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But solutions are we solving for these issues?

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I look at social media alone, like how that even got started was the people connected.

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And look at it now.

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There's everybody uses it.

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You know, billions and billions of people a day and hour a minute.

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So I want to kind of just kind of with the last part of what we're talking about.

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For any, you know, leaders or innovators or people that are, you know, non technical, trying

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to do technical things, any feedback that you have for them and how they can build resilience,

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innovate their, you know, motivate their teams, continue to innovate and, you know, maybe

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just any nuggets that you can share with them.

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Sure.

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I love this idea or concept of demystifying innovation and taking it out of the, I've

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reeked tower of the top consultants and the top firms with the top pedigree from the top

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degrees.

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And really saying innovation is really just how do we look at something differently?

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How do we do something new or different, take a different approach?

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How do we take an old thing and just think about it in a unique way?

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And it doesn't have to be tech and it doesn't have to be earth shattering.

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It just has to be a different angle, a different approach.

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So I think a lot of times we say, we say innovation and we immediately jump to like, it needs to

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be this amazing, never seen before technology.

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But when you can be innovative in your process, you can be innovative in the way you lead

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your people, you can be innovative in the way that you make your customers feel seen and

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heard, you can apply innovation to just about anything.

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So for me, that message is something like if I had one thing I could be known for, I'd

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be like, take the mystery out of innovation and realize anyone can innovate anywhere in

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your sphere.

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And we should all be thinking about this.

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I don't think anyone should ever say, oh, I'm not an innovator.

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Why not?

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Yeah, I love that.

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And I'm curious, are there any like specific practices that you practice regularly in your

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life that I've kind of got you where you have in your life, whether it's, you know, leader

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at a big company or your book or you're speaking or all the things you do, anything that you

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consistently do as a habit or a practice that you can share?

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I'm big about changing your perspective and a lot of times it means physically changing.

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So whether that's going outside, turning the problem that you're looking on, a piece of

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it, turning it sideways, looking at it upside down, asking somebody else who has no background

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or experience in the space you're working in, hey, high level, give you 30 seconds on this

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problem.

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How would you think of it?

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Anything you can do to kind of get you out of a rut and shake up that perspective approach

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to get an alternate view, that's huge.

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I think a lot of times we spend too long in our, in our, in our rut, so it's stuck in our

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own thought process, thinking, well, I've got the background in this.

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This is my problem.

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I don't want to burden anybody with it.

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Oh, they don't know anything about the space.

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I don't know if they can help.

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Just share it and see some of the best ideas really come from the most unlikely sources.

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And even if you're not going to, you know, your brother to say, hey, solve my work problems,

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just having an alternate perspective will jog things in your mind of, oh, I didn't think

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about that question or I didn't think about it from that angle or, huh, you're looking at

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that from this perspective.

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I thought we should look at it from this perspective.

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It'll be enough to just kind of get you out of that rut and get you thinking again.

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So I'm a big fan of shaking things up in that regard.

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Yeah, I love it.

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Any kind of final thoughts or anything that we haven't covered that you want to share

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with our listeners, any good wisdom Elizabeth?

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I think finding joy in the journey is probably the other thing that I really, really love.

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I've probably spent too much of my early career thinking I have to get somewhere, I have

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to get to this threshold, this milestone, this next promotion, whatever the case is.

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And I think this just, the older we get, hopefully the wiser we get.

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And looking at things now, realizing there is no destination.

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There's no I've arrived.

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I've achieved.

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I've got this title.

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I've got this accomplishment.

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You're really, you're always learning and the more I learn, the more I know, the more

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experience, the more I realize, I don't know anything.

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And I think finding the joy in that process and that learning journey, falling in love with

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learning, being excited about being surprised and realizing that when combinations are made

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that you never thought of when you're presented with something brand new, unique and fresh,

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that's one really exciting things happen.

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So not feeling like as we get older, we need to be the guru and expert that has all the

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answers in our field.

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But being open to, hey, inspiration come from anywhere, innovation can come from anywhere.

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Let's just enjoy the ride.

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I love that.

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I always think I always tell myself embrace the stock because you're going to add one more

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tool to your toolbox and before long, all the tools are coming out of your toolbox, right?

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And so I love it.

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I think that's such a great piece of advice.

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Thank you so much for being here and sharing your journey with us.

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I know our listeners will get a lot out of it.

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For anybody looking to learn more about Elizabeth, find her book.

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She writes for Forbes and Bloomberg, connects us her own LinkedIn.

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Thank you so much for being here.

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And that's the Executive Connect podcast.

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