Leading with Courage & Integrity

In this episode of The Impostor Syndrome Files, we dive into what it really means to lead with courage and integrity in complex and sometimes disheartening environments. My guest this week is Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves, historian, women’s leadership expert and author of Leading with Courage: A Career-Long Guide for Idealistic Women. Jodi brings decades of experience in higher education, feminism and mentorship, and shares how she’s translating these values into community leadership and career coaching.

Together, we explore what it looks like to lead from your values, even in systems that don’t always reward that. Jodi opens up about the grief she feels as DEI efforts are increasingly under attack, but also the hope she sees in those continuing the work. We talk about managing your idealism over the course of a career, how to build coalitions for change from inside large institutions and how to define your legacy through the lives you touch, not just the structures you build. She also shares powerful insights on intergenerational mentorship, networking for values-aligned connection and how to stay grounded when perfectionism and urgency take over.

About My Guest

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves is a leadership strategist, coach, consultant, facilitator, editor, and author. Her work with organizations and individuals builds on more than 25 years of experience in higher education, non-profit leadership, authorship, teaching, and mentoring.

She empowers leaders and facilitates career journeys for people at all stages, with an emphasis on values, social impact, and creating inclusive communities. She is especially committed to developing diverse women's leadership.

With a doctorate in History, Jodi taught and held leadership roles for many years at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, focusing on systems of privilege and inequality and social change. Her specialties include women’s history and gender, race, and leadership. She also directed her community's Diversity Council.

Jodi is the author of Modern Motherhood: An American History (Rutgers University Press, 2014). Her latest book, Leading with Courage: Empowering Women for Impactful Careers, is available for purchase.

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Connect with Jodi:

Online Leadership Course: https://www.jodivandenberg-daves.com/onlineleadershipcourse

Website: https://www.jodivandenberg-daves.com/

Book: https://bookshop.org/lists/leading-with-courage-a-career-long-guide-for-idealistic-women

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Transcript

Kim Meninger

Jody, welcome, Jody. It's so great to have you here. I'd love to start by inviting you to tell us a little bit about yourself.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

It's great to be here. Thanks. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I am. I spent a lot of my career in higher education as a professor, trained in history and Women's and Gender Studies, and I moved from, eventually, from the history department to that Women's and Gender Studies Department, and ended up being a department chair, doing a lot of different leadership roles over my time at the University, and kind of spreading in lots of different directions. I was the director of the Diversity Council in my region for a little while, kind of on the side, I been an author and an editor. I've facilitated grants, and over the course of my career, I, you know, I've always just loved digging into fascinating topics in history and kind of using knowledge of history and society to try to create more pro-social values and empower people towards justice. But I really, over the course of time, I think, became also much more of a mentor to people and valued ways of creating community and connecting. So for example, I created a Mentoring Circles group to connect my undergrads to women leaders in the community, and I guess a couple of big projects that have been important in my career are writing the first synthesis book on the history of motherhood, which is a course that I taught for many years. I am also a mother of three grown children, married 35 years. And then most recently, I kind of took all that mentoring, connecting the leadership education I was also doing in the classroom and in the community, and wrote a book called leading with courage, a career long guide for idealistic women, and that I'm proud to have out into the world finally, and that dovetails with my move towards More community speaking, consulting and career coaching that I've been doing. So I left the university in 2023 kind of had my capstone project of overseeing the merger of two departments, and I thought, I, you know, I'm ready to branch out and create more opportunities to do things in my own way, create my own communities and connections and so, so that's where I where I am today.

Kim Meninger 

Wow. So congratulations on going out on your own and on the book, which I'm excited to dive more deeply into. I want to comment first though and get your reaction to what's going on in the world these days with the response to women and gender studies and DEI and just some of the controversy. And I wonder, you know what it's must be near and dear to your heart. How are you feeling, and what are you particularly seeing?

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

I'm feeling a lot of grief. You know this? This took decades and decades to build and really centuries, in a way. I mean, you know, these movements for feminism, anti-racism, racial justice, these are not new movements, but the ability for us to have it kind of to create spaces within our educational institutions to talk about that, to to help people feel seen, to help that, you know, to really kind of build out the complexity and tapestry of human experiences, and decentering the great white man, theory of history like that. That took a lot of work, and it is now. I think it's a really scary time to be in the classroom. I even have, like, a little bit of survivor's guilt that I'm not in the classroom right now, because I know some of my colleagues feel that they have to police their language. They can get put on a professor watch list. It's, it's a very, very scary time. And I think that there's a reason that you know, feminism, anti-racism, LGBTQ, plus studies are under the, you know, they're, they're seen as threatening, in part because we've had progress. We've had amazing accomplishments. We've diversified our leadership and our voices and created a much more rich society because we've quit silencing so many people, and we've developed, you know, social theory and new histories and all that other stuff. And, you know, in history, there is kind of, like, when there is that progress, there's often a big backlash. The power, the multifaceted power of this backlash, is very disturbing, because it's, you know, federal power. You know, even like right in our classrooms, and the ability of things to be put on social media and twisted and things like that. So I'm, I'm very concerned, and yet I also believe in the resilience of the people doing the work, and that this is just too big to squelch. You just can't squelch the ideas around freedom and justice. And so I just am so proud of my colleagues, you know, continuing to do that work in the classroom and in other ways. And I'm trying to do that work in my speaking and educational things out in the, in the world, beyond the university as well, and amplify that work. And my book is, is really partly about giving voice to this the it. I hope that it's a hopeful book, because it's about taking those kinds of values through the course of a career. So I some of my interviewees are older women who've been through lots of different cycles and iterations and challenges and, and faced really hard things, but there's a resilience through line that we find, and I think, mining our stories and paying attention to our elders and our ancestors is part of how we get through this time.

Kim Meninger 

Well, I'm glad to hear that the work is continuing. I know it's a particularly challenging moment, and I am. I don't envy people who are in the positions that you're describing. It's a really tough place to be right now, but it's such important work. And so talk a little bit more about the book too. So what inspired you to write the book? What is so what's the core message?

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves

The core message is that leadership can happen from anywhere. And when you ground and anchor in your values and what you believe, it can be empowering for you and for others, it's we know that there's so much research showing that women tend to make really great leaders for because they are they build teams, they help people manage their workload. They're more attentive to different kinds of injustices and needs in the workplace. You know, women-led companies are more likely to attend to social to sexual harassment or to have childcare on site, or women leaders are more likely to do the diversity, equity inclusion work. Not all women, for sure, and also people of any gender, can do this work, but their research suggests women we need to be listening to women. So I wanted to bring that up. A lot of the leadership literature for women. It's kind of a women's advice literature is, it tends to be kind of values-neutral and kind of about just, you know, go do it and get the corner office. And it's kind of transactional. And I wanted something that lifted up pro-social values, and I wanted something that would speak to the many generations, to the generations of students that I've worked with over time who want to figure out how to bring their idealism, basically, their beautiful, you know, social imagination and their and their challenging questions into the workplace. And so I spend a lot of time on that early career stage, you know, of trend like owning what you how you've already led, how you've already raised your voice, how you've already, you know, develop coalitions, and how do you bring that into a workplace, and also learn the politics and challenges of a workplace and the, the need in your 20s to be establishing your credibility as a key developmental task. So, so I guess I'm getting into the another piece is that I wanted something that looks at all those chapters of career and highlights stories and through lines, and I didn't see a lot of that in the literature either. And to make a really short point of it, I didn't have good things to assign to my students. When I taught about gender, race and leadership. I shouldn't say good things. That's an overstatement. I didn't have I had good things, but I didn't have this kind of thing. I didn't have something that a lot of the students could relate to, especially because it's often written. The books are often written. I mean, the classic is Sheryl Sandberg, you know, somebody who's the head of a corporate behemoth who has whose reputation has done nothing but slide in the eyes of students and many progressive thinkers. And you know that does also she's not that relatable for you know, a lot of women in the medium-sized community where I work, either you know, we need more relatable, real life stories, and we need stories of dealing with hardships, but overcoming and so those are some those are some key reasons why I wrote the book.

Kim Meninger 

Well, I want to just dig a little bit more deeply into this too, because I know it can be really challenging under the best of circumstances to do the, the work that you're talking about and, and a lot of what we perceive to be the values of, you know, traditional corporate structures these days is just return to shareholders, right and right and just getting, getting as much, making as much money as possible. And there's a lot of ways in which the systems are designed to incentivize that kind of behavior at the expense of workers, at the expense of ethics, sometimes, right? And so. Hmm. So I wonder when you think about especially because you use the term idealism, preparing women, in particular, to go out into the world. Do you see, and this is kind of a complex question, but do you see opportunities for women to create change from the inside of some of these systems, or do you think it needs to be separate from I guess I wonder about pacing, because it can feel really daunting and really, really big, thorny challenges to solve, and I can imagine, and I've experienced myself working in the high tech industry, that idealism can collapse pretty quickly when you start to bump up against reality.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yeah, and it's no, there's no easy answer here, but I like the way you brought up pacing, and that's part of the reason that I, I have these stories where you see that people have setbacks, you know, and that people have to leave sometimes environments that are just they're not going to find even pockets of value alignment. But, you know, one leader I interviewed was in a pharmaceutical company where she said, I would never want to work there again, and I just needed the job and paying off student loans. But it, you know, didn't agree with a lot of the, the values and the bottom line and all that, but got the most amazing mentoring and leadership. Got to take on projects where someone always had her back, even if she made a mistake, that person you know sort of took, took the heat for that mistake, because he was invested in her growth, and, and she had more than one mentor like that, and, and so sometimes these spaces can be learning spaces, and maybe that are not your forever spaces. But yes, change within change is, you know, it's often slower than we want it to be, but I feel like I try to bring out that you want to honor different kinds of leaders, leadership, you know, practices and gifts and team up with others. So maybe you are an architect of compassionate systems. Maybe you are a questioner. Maybe you are a team builder. And actually, you know, we know that part of the bottom line of all these companies is keeping good talent, and so if we don't create space for people to use their voices or to have some values alignment, they're going to leave and that creates its own kind of bottom line issues. I'm not saying it's easy, but I think it's, it's partly about not making sure you don't feel alone. So whatever that takes for you, whether it's groups that are beyond your organization, to kind of build you up, employee resource groups, mentors, ways to think about building coalitions and amplifying the and teaming up with the people who are raising interesting questions, doing interesting projects. Maybe you only find pockets within a large organization where you can make that change. Maybe it's a mentoring program. Maybe it's a community-oriented program, and you're learning, and maybe, maybe the you do make social change in that organization, and you grow and thrive, and new spaces open up. Or maybe it's practice, and you raise some questions that also some people might still be thinking about later, when you're gone, you know. And so it's just, I think also being a historian, change is so complicated. We actually do need it from the outside. We need policy makers pushing we need community activists. We need thought leaders of all kinds. We need them outside, and we need them inside. And we'll, we won't make change unless we have all of the above, you know, and there's sometimes two steps forward, one step back, or whatever we want to call today, yes, yeah, I try to maintain my optimism. It's not always easy, but, you know, you raise, like, critical questions there.

Kim Meninger 

Yeah, well, and I appreciate the optimism, because it is really important for this work to continue. And I think what I'm hearing you say, too, is expectation setting? Yeah, important, right? And, and, kind of a cliche, but small wins are also important. I think that you know, sometimes when you're feeling particularly passionate about something, or you're very enthusiastic and ready to change the world. Our definition of success may not align with what's possible in the moment or in the environment, and so being able to recognize that as you're describing some smaller, smaller moments can have an incremental effect over a longer time horizon.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yeah, and I like to think about claiming any legacies that you have, anything that you made better, you know, maybe you translated something into a community-friendly format. I mean, that's, that's a win. You know, maybe you like, worked with a group on the employee handbook about the dress code so the trans people feel more calm. In the workplace, those are, those are wins that might Outlast how long you are in an organization. You know?

Kim Meninger 

Yeah, yeah. And, and I want to go back to what you were saying too, because I think that the power of the collective is so important here. Because I think that many of us are trying to make change, or we're trying to navigate the complexities of our environments individually. And yes, there's so many of us who are similarly focused, right? And so to come together is it's not just more effective, it's also really important for our own mental health and wellbeing as well.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Absolutely and in the kind of cultures of urgency that are in the workplace, most of our workplaces now, it can be really hard. It takes, it takes effort. But you know, it's really worth the investment to nurture your connections and to notice how maybe your role is changing, and you need to, you need to expand your networks. Like, when I became a department chair for the first time, I thought I have a lot of nice friends on this on this campus, and not them, still keeping them. But I also need to, like, change my net, like, expand my network, so that people who are doing similar work I can, I can, you know, connect with, maybe team up with, on things, amplify one another's voices, if we're kind of aligned on some of our commitments.

Kim Meninger 

So do you have any advice for people who have maybe been really busy in their day jobs and haven't, haven't taken the time to explore the outer environment, like what? What's a good way to find some legitimate opportunities externally, to connect with people or to get involved in different types of this type of activity that we're talking about?

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Well, there's so many ways, I mean, you know, I like even just asking somebody in a different department out for coffee, you know, maybe it's somebody who's in accounting, and you actually interface with that person on email, but you never seen them, or you, you know, you just or some somewhere, you know, especially someone who is maybe somewhat involved in your work. So that's one way employee resource groups are another way. I've, over the course of my life, both personally and professionally, I've created the groups I needed. Often, you know, you just see people who seem to be excited about or struggling with some of the same issues that you are in a similar life stage. You know, whether it's working motherhood or, you know, a certain kind of maybe you're new to leadership. Reaching out to that way is good. You know, I just joined a group in my community for women, business people, and I'm, you know, this, this time, I actually gave myself the gift. I actually did try to do some of some of that on my own, but this time, I gave myself the gift of plugging into an established network, and I actually pay a monthly fee for that. But I'm super excited because someone else is organizing us, but I'm getting to learn and make and make new connections. And so looking at what's out there that's already established can be good. Yeah, and you know, maybe doing more like, even if it's you're doing a power walk over part of your lunch hour with, with someone who is like minded, and you just, and also finding people who go, Well, you know, you can reach out and say, I'm really interested in that project you're working on. Can I just learn a little bit more about it? Or maybe there's a way I can contribute to it, because this is the kind of work I want to be doing, and being, being intentional about the kind of work you want to be doing and the people you want to be working with and figuring out how, if you're in, you know, a large organization, how can you learn about that claim that and say, you know, I would like this to be part of my work assignment, if possible, because I think it's adding value to the organization in these ways. You know, being more, being more in charge of your own like projects and people that you connect with to the extent that you can. You know, of course, sometimes you just can't, but I think it's also naming that, that culture of urgency, how is that getting inside me and maybe making me do more than I need to be doing for my role? Especially this is true for women. Often like people pleasing kind of hamster wheel. I encourage people to take an audit of what their role is, what they're doing, and how much they might be over-performing in areas. I know you talk a lot about imposter syndrome, because they're, they're perfectionistically behaving. I'm not. I don't call people perfectionist. I, you know, I just it's a behavior. It's a learned trait they might be engaging in perfectionism or imposter syndrome. So how to take an audit and go, where am I putting too much of my energy, spending too much time polishing the gem and trying to be perfect. How can I pull something back so that I have room to do these more intentional, joy-filled things with the people I want to work with and the learning I want to do and not get overwhelmed by, necessarily by this is my first and last job, and if I don't like make the change, get the. Emotion feel fully value-aligned. It's all it's all a loss. It's not you're growing no matter what.

Kim Meninger 

Yes, oh my gosh, you just said so many important things there. And I think that really looking at how you're spending your time today is a great start, because there are ways in which we may be consuming a lot of energy and not really getting a sizable return on that, or meaningful return. I also think that there is a consciousness that needs to happen, that maybe we are just so heads down, focused on our own work, that we're not paying attention to some of the other conversations that are going on around us, or some of the work that might be outside of our own four walls. And that's a really important opportunity, too, and I often recommend to just listen differently when you're in things or you know you're talking to people from different parts of the business, because if you're just waiting to talk about things that are relevant to the work you're doing today, you're likely missing a lot of opportunities outside of that.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

I like the way you said that. And I think that the like, What conversation, what conversations do you want to be part of, is another valuable question to ask yourself, in general, you know, and working with students too, is like, what, what kind of problems in the world are you interested in spending some of your energy and time on? And if you're that's, maybe that's, you know, really big. But when you're narrowed down in an organization, what are the problems that are interesting? What are the conversations we want to be part of? Who's having them? And how can you be bold and go connect with those people and, and not wait for someone to notice you?

Kim Meninger 

Yeah, and can we pick up on that? Because I think that's a big part of this too, is I'll often hear from people who say, Oh, people are, you know, that person's really busy. I don't want to bother them. Or there's that fear that I'm overstepping, or there's some sort of inner critic in their head that's telling them that this it's not appropriate to reach out to them in this way.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yeah, yeah. Another person I interviewed for the book said that when she was fairly new in her role, and I don't remember where she was in the organizational chart, maybe manager kind of level, but she's she asked all the VPS for a 15 minute coffee date or soup date or something, and they all said yes, and they were all and then she said, then they know my face. I'm, you know, and it's less intimidating for me. I'm on their radar. And, you know, I've always, I have three young adult kids, and I'm always telling them, like, people want to help you. You know, yes, they're busy, but it often is the highlight of your day to be able to talk to a younger person. And maybe it is, you know, 15 to 30 minutes just can I? Can I ask you some questions? I mean, going in prepared about here's some things I'm interested in learning about in the organization, about the work we're doing. I'm interested in learning about the work you're doing. Maybe, maybe you are not bold enough to go to the VP. That's okay. I wasn't, but there might be somebody you know that you think is super busy, but you just admire the work that they're doing. And they get to pause in their day and reflect on their purpose and their learning, and they get to give back, and most people want to do that. And if they say no, they say no, go find someone else. You know?

Kim Meninger 

Yes, I'm glad you said that too. Most, most people will say yes. And if they don't, it's not about you, right?

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yeah, yeah. They're just yeah, they're they are too busy, or whatever, their priorities are different. That's okay, yeah, that's right.

Kim Meninger 

And one of the things I found, just going back to what you said about wanting to help people, is that, particularly when you're earlier in your career, there is sort of this, this intrinsic desire to want to give to the next generation that's coming up behind you know, we all benefited from this type of support as we were coming up the ranks. And I think that a lot of people are looking for those opportunities to be a formal or informal mentor to those around them. And so I think for, for people who are looking at this very transactionally as I'm taking but I have nothing to give in return, I think that there's something inherently valuable about just giving opportunities for people to feel like they're being of service to others.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yes, in so in my women's leadership intensive, which is a self-paced course, but with support from me in different levels, I talk about helping, about how to get a mentor, how to be a mentor, how to recognize the mentoring that you're already doing as one of the I mean, I do. It's a lot of skills. It's negotiation and self-advocacy, which is part of what we're talking about here, and it's boundary setting. It's anchoring in the core values and anchoring in the core value, which is what you know, your strengths, but, but we talk about a lot of those things. And part of another part of the reason I wrote the book is, is to encourage those intergenerational conversations. I found it fascinating to write the last part of the book, which is that kind of women over 50-ish, you know, it's kind of like the last chapter of your career. Like that can be defined differently by age, but roughly there. And, you know, a lot of women over 50 face ageism, and can be sort of shunted to the side. But. Women over 50 have a lot of institutional and industry knowledge, and often do want to give back and leave a legacy. We also have to learn how to talk across generations and not kind of have this attitude that we have nothing to learn from one another, or that, like resentment, kind of thing that happens between generations. And so I wanted to do a little work on that. As I thought about that last piece, you know how to make those women less invisible and lift up their value, but make sure, too that older women are not because older women can use their power in unproductive, unhelpful ways for young women, not recognizing that young women are maybe wanting to do things a little bit differently. So things have to be, things have to be two-way, right?

Kim Meninger 

Yes, that's a really good point. And I'm a big fan of like, bi-directional mentorship as well. And I think it requires some humility and, and confidence to be able to say I can learn something from people who are younger and less experienced than I am, and I think that that is a really powerful opportunity for everyone these days, because the younger generations are, they are growing up in a different, very different world than…

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Absolutely and we need to, we need to learn how to ask those questions about, you know, what? What is this like for you, what are your fears and what are your What are you excited about? And how you know? How are you, you know? And I think learning not to say, Well, we tried that and it didn't work. Or like, I mean, you know, just yeah, that humility. I mean, we, I talk a lot about cultural humility, but we need age humility too, you know, Agent Generation Humility for all of us, I think.

Kim Meninger 

Yes, absolutely. I wonder, too, just going back to the idealism piece, because that is something that I think is, you know, tends to be a hallmark of early career, kind of, you know, you're in college, you're coming out of college, you've got all of this, all of this ambition and motivation, and you think you're going to conquer the world, right? How do you, are there sort of mindset practices beyond what we've talked about to maintain the optimism, the idealism that you're talking about, like, is there anything else that we're missing that you think is important for people to, to think about and not losing hope in these days?

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Um, yeah, it's a big question. I mean, I think, I think that you use the platform you have in the ways that you can so, you know, being able to hold space for people who institutions are failing and they're really struggling as a leader, when you're in mid-career, that's powerful to just let even let people be heard, to let them know that you're trying to, to use the platform and authority and privileges and power that you might have, what you however limited, to, to make the situation better for them and to honor their gifts. I mean that to me was the power of my continuing idealism, even as I moved through and saw all the and experienced so many of the flaws of my industry of higher education. I mean, they're just, there's a lot of just really difficult things there. A lot of, you know, attachment to hierarchy, a lot of not putting people first, and so to be able to lead in a way where people felt heard and seen and advocated for that that helped maintain my hope. Because, because, if you're making space for them, then they're also bringing, they're able to bring their idealism forward even after you're gone, you know, hopefully. And then I think, yeah, I think, I think just, I use that word deliberately, because I feel like we all still, we all have some and we need to, we need to lift that idealism up. And there are ways to use it. And then, you know, people surround yourself with people who keep giving you hope, who keep amplifying the value of your efforts, you know, or and, and validating the value of your efforts, maybe challenging you sometimes, when you need it, it's not going through this alone. I think that's, that's one of the biggest things, but also not letting go of thinking of yourself as a leader from anywhere, whether you have a title or not, and a leader for, for the values you care about. You're not going to win all the time, but, but you, if you keep that sense of integrity as best you can, and have self-compassion when you fail, you can be an idealistic leader from anywhere throughout your career. I mean, these, you know, the women I interviewed, the clients I work with, they all, they all attest to that.

Kim Meninger 

Hmm. And one of the, one of the themes that has kind of come up in the, in the tips that you've been giving, or the insights that you've been sharing, is legacy. And I'm curious if you can speak to how you think about your own legacy.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Yeah, I did a lot of thinking about that as. I was leaving academia, I started thinking about it before I left academia, that that was intentional on my part, because I could see the end of, like, having kind of explored all the corners of the box, you know, and wanting to do, I'm always kind of trying to do some new things. So I guess that when it all come, you know, it's the seeds you plant. I mean, I'm an educator, lifelong educator and learner. So what seeds did I plant with my students over many years about how did I make them feel valued in their intellect and in their questions and their strengths? That's important. And then the same in terms of my formal leadership roles. It's about how I helped empower people. That is my key. I mean, I look at the institutional stuff and, you know, sure, there's a lot of I taught 21 courses. A lot of them are not going to be on the books anymore. You know, I at one point helped with like maternity leave stuff and FAQs for HR that weren't even on the HR webpage. That's all changed. They're just, they're different. Things that I, you know, I helped, like, merge two departments, and I think that went well. But there will always be changes, you know, and things that, if we, if we focus on the institutional contributions, you know, it's important, partly because they started new conversations. They made people conversations. They made people feel seen. They, they, they lit a spark, they created energy. Maybe, you know, but, but they're not. Nothing lasts forever. So how you, I think it's very, it sounds very corny, but how you made people feel, and whether you were able to help empower people and have the, the excitement of working on projects that were valuable to you, that maybe broke new ground in some way, that made you feel excited to work with other people. I mean, a lot of that's the legacy, you know. And if you're able to be a top leader, and, you know, really do a restructure, great, you know, maybe some of those things will last longer, and other people would probably have different ideas about that, but that's just, that's sort of my, my two cents.

Kim Meninger 

Yeah. And, you know, I think in today's world, that's changing so quickly and unpredictably, you're right, it's not about how long something lasts with the image that's coming to mind, as you're talking is of a relay race, right, like your leg of the relay, and then you're passing the baton to the next person, and then they're going to continue, and they're going to do it in the context of whatever environment they exist within. And so, you know, I think, I think not getting too attached to the moment.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Exactly. I mean just the beginning of our conversation. That context has changed so much since I left two and a half years ago. So like, so like, yeah, it's just, it's just getting ready for that constant change. But those relationships are what holds us and what kind of helps us keep our hope and helps us have more fun with the journey.

Kim Meninger 

Absolutely, I think that's a really great point, too, and this has been so wonderful, Jody. Thank you so much for being here. I'd love to ask you where people can find you if they're interested in reading the book, following your work.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves 

Sure. Jody Vandenberg Daves dot com is my website, and I love to invite values-driven leaders to my Women's Leadership Intensive, to my career coaching. I also do a lot of speaking if you have a leadership summit or things like that coming up. And then the book is called Leading with Courage, as I mentioned, and you can find it. I'm trying to promote it, mostly on Bookshop to support local bookstores. Ask your local bookstore to buy it. It is available at that other giant retailer as well. So yeah, keep in touch, and I'd love to connect with your listeners. Thanks.

Kim Meninger 

Wonderful. I'll make sure those links are in the show notes as well. And thank you so much for what you're doing and for being here today.

Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves

Thank you. What a wonderful conversation. I appreciate it.