The Awakening: Embodied Empathy for Leaders

- Tegan Trovato

There's an awakening happening in corporations and people are now choosing their jobs based on values. And that will force organizations who aren't already inclined to that thinking to really start rethinking their approach to caring for their people and the beautiful thing.

NEW INTRO

Today, we talk about the awakening that is happening in the workforce as a result of COVID, change, and choice. How workers are choosing jobs based on values and what top leaders are doing to welcome and nurture the whole person at work.

And I am excited to have both a colleague and a friend on the show as a guest: Tegan Trovato is the Founder of Bright Arrow, a premiere Executive and Team Coaching firm supporting clients nationally.

Tegan is an HR industry veteran specializing in Talent Acquisition, Talent Development, and Organizational Learning. She has served as an executive or leadership team member for companies like Levi Strauss, Zynga, Xerox and Cielo.

At Bright Arrow, she and her team offer executive coaching, leadership team coaching, and group workshops. All of Bright Arrow’s coaches value authenticity, confidence, courage, growth, and leadership and make these values a priority in every interaction.

Tegan is also the is wife to Brian (a fellow entrepreneur), mommy to Athena (who is really, really bute), and mom to her two fur babies - senior kitties Pascal and Dedier (pronounced D.D.A).

She loves nature and we began our conversation hearing about her recent break from work here in the Indiana summer.

- Liesel Mindrebo Mertes

I would love to hear some of your favorite things that you've gotten a chance to do on your staycation so far.

- Tegan Trovato

Oh, you know, just being outside and my husband and Athena and I all being together as a family is everything, because with the pandemic, we still don't have child care yet. We do have someone starting soon. But we've just been like ships passing in the night, just handing Athena off for for one of us, one entrepreneur to have a meeting and the other one goes and takes care of her and then we switch off again throughout the day.

- Tegan Trovato

So just being together has been and I don't even know what the word is, heart filling.

- Liesel Mindrebo Mertes

Have you have you gotten a chance to eat some good food? Are you finding your being outside a lot? It's been raining and muggy that you know,

- Tegan Trovato

That doesn't stop us. I'm from the South, from the real South where it is always rainy and muggy and we just go do your thing anyway. So, no, that hasn't stopped us. And there's been enough breaks in the rain and we've spent a ton of time. Yeah. Walking on the trail and jogging and setting up the little kiddie pool outside for her.

- Tegan Trovato

So, yeah, that's been that's part of what nourishes me is being outside and and yes. Eating healthy food. So we always eat relatively healthy, but we've been doing a little more of the salads because we've had time and all that good stuff so.

- Liesel Mindrebo Mertes

Well, and who wants to be slaving over their oven or stovetop too much in the high heat of summer? The salad is a great option.

- Liesel Mindrebo Mertes

One of the things I would love to talk with you about is how you've seen the need for empathy grow and change specifically over the last year and a half within your coaching practice. Give us a little bit of a 10000 foot view of what your typical client looks like.

- Tegan Trovato

Hmm. Thank you for asking that. It does help set the stage a little bit for who is seeing what inside of the businesses and from where they're seeing this all unfold. Right. So the clients that we typically work with at Right Arrow are executives. So VPs and above inside the organization, they tend to be very driven, pretty holistic leaders, meaning they do want for their employees to feel good and be healthy and often at their own peril. Right.

- Tegan Trovato

So they're not often not taking care of themselves and trying to pour out for others. The organizations they work for tend to be in either hypergrowth or undergoing major change.

- Tegan Trovato

And that's often why we're brought in is to act as a support mechanism. And sometimes when it's a hypergrowth situation to help the leaders stay on track with the organization's growth so that as the leaders that got the company to where it is, they may also be the leaders that get them to the next growth level.

- Tegan Trovato

Right. Everyone has to grow in tandem with the organization itself. So so we tend to be working with leaders that have been working really hard already. And now with the pandemic, it just folded in multiple other layers.

- Tegan Trovato

On top of that,

- Liesel Mindrebo Mertes

What is the biggest change that you experienced in in the presenting needs of your average client as a result of COV...