Why You’re Failing at Leadership (And the 1 Shift That Fixes It) - with Helen Wada

Him to today's episode of Thrive after 45. I'm Denise Drink Walter heart whisperer, midlife mirror and mentor. And every week I am honored to share energy and space with inspiring guests whose stories reflect. So many possibilities of thriving beyond 45. Together we'll uncover the whispers of the heart, the power of midlife transformation, and the wisdom that fuels expansion. What if the qualities we've been told don't belong in serious business? Presence, trust, curiosity, self-awareness are actually the ones that create real influence and sustainable growth. It is an honor and a privilege to welcome Helen Wata to the conversation today. Helen began her career as a chartered accountant at Arthur Anderson. Never imagining a role in sales. In fact. Actively avoiding it. And yet over nearly three decades, she found herself at the heart of commercial leadership, gaining deep commercial experience during the integration of Fox Family into Disney, studying organizational change to better understand people and building a consulting career at KPMG that led her to become a global client leader. Responsible for creating new business across the firm. Life as it does reshaped the path Motherhood Coach training in 2015 and later early stage breast cancer. As she was leaving KPMG, Helen took intentional time to be with her two boys and to reorient around what truly mattered today. She's the founder of the Human Human Advantage, a leadership development and executive coaching business working globally with nearly 200 individuals already supported through her programs, through her human framework. Her book, human Wise and her Work is a coach and Speaker Helen challenges the idea that commercial success and human-centered leadership. Sit at opposite ends, revealing instead, how meaningful conversations, trust and presence are the real drivers of growth. Welcome to our show today, Helen. I can't wait for this conversation. Thank you, Denise. And what a warm welcome. It's an absolute delight to be on your show. And when we were connected that whole thrive after 45, it really struck a chord with me. Mm-hmm. Because when I think back, I was 45 when I made probably the biggest leap of my career, which was to set up on my own and, and set up the human advantage. Um. And it had never really been in the plan. You know, that was never something that I'd dreamt of at the age of 21. You know, I think you said it there. You know, I actively sought time away from sales, let alone leaning into it, and, and then I found myself. Leading teams and winning work. And I was like, well, what is this? People are like, well, you're selling. I'm like, oh yeah, yeah, I'm what? Why am I good at what I do? And that was the question that got me started. Um, and started the shift, you know, just before 45 and then at 45 to go, if I don't do it now, when am I going to do it? Right? Yeah. Isn't that a question that lands in lot of our, uh, minds, you know, if not now, when. Yeah. And then I find a lot of us women in particular have that thought, but never move that needle. They, the question is always there and isn't it interesting like how your ability. To step back and what caused that to happen was a big event in your life. Right? It really was. And you know, we are talking from opposite sides of the world. Yeah. But actually it was a trip to Canada back in 2019 when I started the juices flowing off. What do I do? So, um, we went on a big road trip out in, in the West coast and wonderful time and it was that big break, you know, the boys were sort of eight and six, just trying to think. Now, you know, they grow up so quickly and we had a wonderful time. And I came back to my husband and I said, I. I haven't really thought about my career. What am I going to do? You know, I, I'd done, we got through the baby years, right? I was in a place where I was thriving. I was loving the role, but I, I felt that there was more, a bit like what you said, you know, I felt that there was more, um, and it was starting to create some space. Mm-hmm. To think, well, what is it? If I'm going to do something, what is it? And, and people had said to me, why are you good at what you do? Hmm. And I didn't know Denise,'cause I'd never wanted to, to do sales. Right. And it was that question. And as a coach, you know, you, you get this right. The, the power of a really good question. Why are you good at what you do? And it was that that really spur a thought. And, and I talk about it in the book that, you know, I started to scribble and started to think about things and what is it this commercial focus, but, but yet we need to be more human centered in organizations because it was just all about. You know, new targets and what are we gonna do? And, and for me, I truly felt that there had to be a different way. Mm-hmm. And I was operating a different way. I wasn't the same as my peers. You know, when I looked at businesses that I worked with, I, I was a bit different. Yeah. I was also successful. And so I thought, you know, what is it? I've always been somebody that wants to help, others, wants to. Support others to grow and develop. And unless I could say what it was that I did, I couldn't help them. So it was trying to codify, how do I codify what I did? Mm-hmm. For the benefit of others, and that's really where it started. Was that a challenge to be able to do that deeper work? Yeah. Yeah, it took, it took, it took a long time. I mean, you, you quoted, you know Yeah. We, we are working with over 200 individuals and that number is growing weekly, monthly now. Um, but actually whilst I've been out of the traditional corporate world for five years Yep. It took about 18 months of mm-hmm. Deep work. Yep. To get to where I've got to. So anybody that's kind of looking at doing something different. And then I've had many that have been alongside me. They've reached out and I said, for me it was about 18 months, so I had six months of. Decompression. Now, you mentioned at the outset. Um, just as I resigned from KPMG, I went for my medicals and all, and basically I got diagnosed with something called ductal cancer in situ, which is stage zero effectively breast cancer. Um, and I was very lucky. They were incredible. They took me back, they said, forget the other resigned. Um, we'll support you. I was very lucky. I've been there 16 years. Wow. Um. And then ended up with a lumpectomy and some radiotherapy. I got away without chemotherapy, so you know, I was very fortunate that we caught it early, but basically the whole of 2021. Mm-hmm. I just stopped and I think it was, yes, it was about the boob, but actually it was. It was about more than that. It was about 25 years of working hard, playing hard, having a family, keeping going. And I don't think we realized what it does to our bodies. Mm-hmm. And so my GP was also incredible and they were like, you just need, because I was thinking about, you know, building new relationships, thinking about the business. And she's like, you just need to stop. Yeah. And it was that permission to close the laptop. Mm. And basically recuperate. And so I had about six months that it was decompression. Yep. And then six months of, okay, so what is this? You know, you've made a decision, what are you going to do with it? Um, to sort of curate it. And that start of the deep work. And then it was like, okay, so what does this look like? So for me, it really was a journey. Mm-hmm. Um, and I. I worked with others. I worked with a brilliant coach called Paul Golding, who I used to know at KPMG. He had set up on his own as well, and it was him that, I still attribute it and I attribute it in the book. He said to me, well, what can you do with the human, because I already had the human advantage and that. Putting it into a simple framework, because I think when we are talking about these things of skills, skills, not things, but skills of presence and curiosity and critical thinking and listening and Right. Well, what is it? Right. It it's all a bit nebulous. Yeah. Whereas what I've done and what people like what I've done is, is given it a structure.'cause people like structure to think, oh look, I can put it into this. It wasn't easy work. You're right. It, it took and it, and it continues to evolve. Yeah. The more work we do, the more we bring in what we're doing today will not be what we're doing next year, but it's absolutely. Yeah. I started off thinking about this for technical experts to be brilliant at selling, you know, have the confidence. It is not about, they dunno what to do, it's, it's the confidence inside. Mm-hmm. That's where it started. Actually having run some leadership programs. We're talking about difficult conversations. Critical conversations. Mm-hmm. I ran a session a few months ago now and I wasn't going in with a human. That wasn't what it was about. Mm-hmm. But when you wrap up where we got to, I was like, well, actually, how about looking at it from a human perspective? For sure. For listeners that, that don't know what that is. What I've done is I've, I've taken the sort of the John Whitmore role model, but made it human. So we talk about how you show up. Yeah. Understanding others, what your mindset matters, how do you act and adapt, and what your next steps are, and then how do you use those to negotiate. Mm-hmm. And that is applicable in so many different settings, life. Absolutely applicable in life, right? Yeah. Yeah. But I was coaching a guy and he said to me, you wouldn't believe that, you know, when I was talking to my wife, it's like, actually this helps conversation it. It's kind of ironic'cause you can imagine me around the kitchen with my two teenage boys games. And I'm like, Helen, what do you talk about at work? Yeah, just pause, take a breath, ask them a question. Yeah, but you, you are right. It's leadership and you know it's business, leadership and life. It when you're talking. What came through so loud and clear in my mind's eye. Former educator here, right? 31 years in education, 2018 retired. I have so many beautiful memories of my time in education, but what's coming back is everything you're speaking of. I think of when I taught kindergarten, early years. How to connect with people, how to use your voice in a respectful way, how to continue to have the lens of curiosity. Obviously it's at a different level in a different capacity when you're working with your people as adults, but the same underpinning of. Connecting. Knowing who you are listening to understand not to respond. So many of those pieces, we try to build foundational components in the early years as we have a more open, um, curriculum at that age and stage. Anyway, so I just think it's so interesting. I love the circle of life. It really is. And I think you hit on a really good point, Denise, because. The people that I'm working with, people that I'm talking to, you think of COVID and the pandemic and how everybody, on the one hand, we got to see the human behind the work, right? So on on one lens, it really opened up to people are actually people and humans and they have a life. And we saw guitars in the background and we saw children and we saw pets and like, but. The downside, and this is why we're seeing the ramifications I think right now, is that you've got a whole generation coming through that have grown up and have developed their working style behind a screen. Yes. Sat in a bedroom. And so actually I'm having conversations now that what were those skills that you may do at kindergarten? And you know, quite frankly, actually I look at my two boys, you know, they're on laptops that screens, they, you know, asking my 14-year-old to actually pick up the phone to his friend to talk to them, I know is like an alien concept. And so. I've come at this from a commercial perspective. How do we win work? How do we grow our businesses? Yeah. But for me, I think it's more fundamental than that now. And, and that's where the, the human really intertwines with the commercial because we've got generations coming through that. Don't know how to have the conversations with potentially their stakeholders within the business, potential clients. It's scary. It's nerve wracking. Yeah. And I get it, right. If you've never done it, of course, then, then that's where if you're not feeling it, you can't do it. So no matter how many times you go and say you need to go and have these conversations, you've got a huge chasm of Yeah. You know, from where they are now to where they need to be. Yeah. Totally. Totally. So how do you help that divide shrink? What are some key things that you feel are absolutely imperative to help move the needle so that that becomes way less of a scary piece? So for me, there's a couple of things at the top that, mm-hmm. That can start to make a big difference. Number one. Working out, why is it important to individuals? Nice. Because if you don't understand why and how it's relevant to you, mm-hmm. You, you can train people till the cows come home. But if I don't understand why it's important to me, I might sit there, but I'll do what I think is important to me, right? Mm-hmm. So number one, you make it about the individual. And number two. For me, I don't think you, you can train to a certain extent. Yeah. But for me, this is where the power of coaching comes in. Yeah. Because you have to get under the skin of what, what are my limiting beliefs? What's stopping me? And it, and it will be different for each and every individual. And I think we are also at a point that there is a recognition that we will. Individuals, everybody comes at things from different, and, and let's face it, our careers ebb and flow over time. Mm-hmm. Whether you are a mother, a father, a carer, an individual, you are globally mobile, you want to be closer to home. You know, we, what's right for me isn't right for you. Yeah. And what's right for me today wasn't right for me five years ago and won't. Right. I love that. For me, 10 in 10 years time, so. We have to be able to tap into the individual. Mm-hmm. But we have to provide them with a framework in which to think about themselves. Love that. And that for me is the difference. And creating this space and trust. Yeah. To connect. I mean, I've had people when we've been running our. Coaching program, say, what do people think when they walk into the room? And you, I was like, oh, that's just what we do. That's what I do from a coaching perspective, so, mm-hmm. I'm, I'm stretching right. What you and I know is from a coaching muscle mm-hmm. And bringing it in and putting a commercial lens on. To say, okay, why is this important to you? Your bus, it may be beneficial for your business to help you win more work, but actually why does, why is that important to you? Is it your career? Do you want to progress up the firm? Do you need to win? Or maybe do you want to look elsewhere in time and you need to build your external network? Mm-hmm. So tapping into that individual piece and, and coaching effectively. Yeah. I love that. I love that. Um, what is the difference about what you do and why should people work with you? Great question. Well, great question. The, the difference is, is we put human at the heart of winning work. So as a great coach, Denise, you will get that. For me, coaching has been, you know, there's different ways that people think about coaching. Does, do people really understand what it is? Is it mentoring? Is it leadership? You know, we've all seen coaching skills for those of us that know, lead it as coach. We know that these skills, and quite frankly, coaching skills are human skills. Yeah, it's just a very different way. What I have done is taken these coaching skills and said they can be directly linked to growing your top and bottom line, and that's the difference. So what we do is we put human centered skills at the heart of winning work. Building relationships. Love it. Yes. There's other things that you can train around and discipline, but again, it comes back to coaching. It's how do you build your resilience? How do you keep the accountability? Where are your accountability partners? How are you reviewing what you do? You know the talk about review, reflect, reframe, repeat, right? We've all the, this is a coaching approach to building and sustaining and growing your top line. So that's, that's the difference, right? Um, and so it doesn't become one or the other. It's one seamless integrated approach. Mm-hmm. That in a world where we don't know where the next opportunity is coming from, or the next technological advance is gonna hit us. Yeah. We have to be in conversations to. To create insight in a world that we dunno where the answers are coming from. Right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love what you're saying because it's helping people. The way I see what you're sharing is helping people ground in who they are and what their purpose is within the connection of their, um, job, whatever that is, that they're working through and on. Yeah. It. It's saying where do you want to get to? Yeah. What is important to you? Yeah. And first ground yourself in why you Yeah. So that's the starting point, right? It's the starting point. Why are you, and I don't think any of us take enough time. You talked at the beginning, about how long did it get you to do the deep work? Yeah. I often ask people in coaching, you know, who are you? And they're like, what do you mean? And who am I? I'm like, well, no. Who are you? If I'm your client, why should I buy from you over anybody else? Because if you can't articulate it, absolutely. Then you can be damn sure that they can't articulate it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Um, yeah, so yeah, pretty putting the ownership on the individual as well. I don't think it's all the full organization's responsibility. Mm-hmm. I think we need to take ownership for ourselves. Going back to, you know. The title of your podcast? Yeah. At 45. Yeah. What did I do? I, I took ownership. It was like, okay, you can't stop observing this and saying, yeah, there has to be a better way. Yeah. Without taking ownership for doing something about it. Exactly. Um, yeah, it doesn't always have to be a biggest step as going out of the organization to create that, you know, many opportunities are there. Within work establishments that, that you may well be in. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, and sometimes those are the best places because you've got people to test ideas with, you've got customers to test ideas with. Mm-hmm. Um, for me, it was a time that I just wanted that step out. My son was leaving primary school, you know, some family Oh yeah. You mentioned, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. Yeah. Yeah. I think I, I think it's really empowering the whole concept. What you're talking about really feeds so beautifully into, you do this for you by you, because of you, you're not looking at the externals anymore. You're, you, excuse me. You've got that inner nudge, that inner knowing, that inner intuition that's hitting and you, we get to listen to it and respond. Whatever that may be. And like you say, Helen, it doesn't have to be, I need to go and, you know, make waves in the world globally for this and no, no, no. Do something for you by you because of you and everything will start shifting without you having to lift a finger. It just starts changing because you are a better you for you. Right? Absolutely. And then what you start to see is people stepping into a zone. Mm-hmm. Where actually they start to thrive and they start to enjoy it all the time. We're doing it because of somebody else. Yeah. You, you go back to, well, I'm doing this because of the measurement and the metrics and, and granted, you know, we need some accountability and mm-hmm. Having goals is a great thing within reason. Mm-hmm. Um, but if. Why are we getting up outta bed in the mornings? Why? Particularly with this stuff, you know, you talk about sales anyway. It's hard yacht. It's any business. Any business Today is hard. The competition is increasing. The relationships are less sticky. You've got, yeah, procurement coming in to try and lower prices, you know, more for less. Yeah, so you have to have an inner drive to know why you're doing it. Um. But you're right. It doesn't have to be solving the world. One of the things I talk about in the book and and programs that we do is, you know, I think if you rewind five, 10 years, purpose had a big agenda, po you know? Yep. If you couldn't think link what you were doing to your bigger purpose, then you know, what were you doing it for? And, and actually I struggle with that. Mm-hmm. And I really struggled with that. And so actually for me, I worked with people to say, well, break it down. Yeah. What's your holistic purpose? What's really important for you, for your family, for your beliefs? Yeah. And then we can get to work purpose. Well, how does work then enable that? Right. You know? And if that is to give me a paycheck mm-hmm. To put the food on the table for my family, to grow my family, and to have great human beings, that's, that's awesome. Right. Absolutely. You don't need to be doing anymore than that. And I think sometimes there's that pressure to do more and link it all in and. But breaking it up into different things. Okay, so this is what you do for work, but then, so what's your job purpose? Mm-hmm. What is the purpose of your role? Why are you doing it? Mm-hmm. And then, so what does that mean on a day-to-day basis? And I think taking a step back, you know, not every day because you'd be constantly thinking, but you know, once a year, maybe in the summertime. Yeah. Where, why am I doing this? Right. You, you, you, you take it down to meetings that people have in every day. It's like, I am working with people that like, why are you going to that meeting? Mm-hmm. Oh, I dunno. It's always been in my diary. It's like, yeah. Okay. Yeah. What decision are you making? What actions do you need? What input? Yeah, exactly. And yeah, before we came on, we were talking about the fast pace right of life right now. Right. And for me, there's something about how we link all of this to actually taking a step back and saying, what are we doing and why are we doing it? Mm-hmm. Particularly with AI coming at us like a tsunami, right? Yeah, totally. Totally. So what do you think then, success. Will look like in 10 years from now. Um, I think what would I like success to look like? I think I'd love to see, if you look at my children. They're 16 and 14, they are operating in a workplace, whatever that might look like. Mm-hmm. Where they can thrive by being true to themselves. Mm. By being who they are. Um, there is no doubt that there won't be jobs for life. They're gonna be moving from place to place and. Maybe sometimes on their own, maybe in collaboration with others, but that we can create a world where individuals can thrive. Mm-hmm. By being true to themselves. And we do that by linking the skills that they need to be able to do that. Two top and bottom line growth because I think unless we do, it's always gonna play second fiddle. Yeah. To what your shareholders want. Like it's always, and and, and that's why I'm so passionate about what we do at the Human Advantage. You asked earlier about what's the difference. Yeah. We absolutely link why that is important and why it's critical to win new work, to create different relationships.'cause if you don't have that diversity of thought. You know, I get on with some people. I don't with others. It's the same with people that I'm coaching, you know? Yeah. It, it's having that recognition, right, that we can bring ourselves to the workplace and, and honestly, 10 years from now, I'd like to see more of it in schools. You talked about education in kindergarten. I, it, I just, certainly in the UK it's not there yet. You know, it's still so traditional mm-hmm. In terms of academic subjects and how children are brought into the workforce. And I'd like to think that 10 years from now we've actually taken a holistic approach at the needs of the world. Yeah. What a, I, I totally agree with you. Um, in terms of the education piece, we're still. Eons behind, and it's just, you know, what can we do as a collective to help the whole world move in a way? And I love what you're saying in terms of being able to be your true self in life wherever you are, that I love. That would be huge success in 10 years for now. And I'm so glad you are doing the work you are doing because you are a big catalyst for this coming. True. Thank you. It's, um, I feel that I'm on the, on the cusp of something. Oh yeah. Oh, um. There was an article in the Sundays, time didn't, and you go Today, yesterday, and it talked about, you know, how organizations are shaping, reshaping the world for graduates and things. But there was another line. We need to develop these and, and even I had it in quotation marks, Denise, human skills. I'm like, no shit. Knock, knock, knock. Hello. You should send it. Send it to the editor. Well, don't, yeah. We want that. We want that. But it's, it's funny or not funny that one of my very good friends from university is an English graduate. She's now a primary school teacher going back to your kindergarten. Mm-hmm. And you know, she works with children of all needs. Yeah. Everything. You know, you get Yeah. Local, state, primary. Yeah. Some that just can't even put a sentence together right now. Right. And she, she looks at me and she says, Helen, I'm loving what you're doing, but why do we need this with people that have been working for 30 years? So there's more work to be done. Yeah. It's it's true. It's like, but, but the reality is that we do Yeah. And, and unfortunately. Whilst do I love technology? Do I hate technology? Technology is a part of our lives. Yeah. It's, it's made the need for this even greater. And I think for learning and development teams, they're, they're looking going, how do we do this? Yes. And. You know, they, they've known it for a long time, but you get your budgets cut because we want to Oh, yeah. Grow the revenue. Right. And we are gonna, the easy way to hit hit our EBITDA is to take some of the costs off it. And, and then you get rid of the, you know, the, the leadership training because it's nice to have, we know it's better, but it's not, well, no, let's flip the dial. Yeah, that's, that's what the human does. Let's flip the dial.'cause if you do not have these human skills in the age of ai, you are gonna fall behind. Yeah. Yep. Exactly. Exactly. That's the difference. Yeah. And, and, and, and that's where we need to get to is having these board level conversations to say, actually this, this is no longer nice to have. It's an absolute essential for us to win in the marketplace.'cause our, if our people are not out there talking about who they are going back to and what they do, well then you haven't got a business, have you? No. Yeah, yeah. No, it's, yeah, it's fundamental. It's, it's the foundation piece. And until, until the understanding, I mean, who knows what the road's gonna look like per se, but as long as you keep doing what you are doing, and I love to hear that you've got more and more and more people coming in. Yes. Keep going. Um, and spread this great news because until we understand ourselves as people first, no matter what we do, it's never going to sustain itself. Because there's always something new coming in. Right? Yeah. And, and it, it comes back to that sustainable success actually can't say it's sustainable success. Yeah. And, um, and being brave. Mm-hmm. You know, going back to the title of your podcast, whether it's at 45, whether it's at 25, being brave with your views, your opinions, your Thoughts. But that does take. Practice. Mm-hmm. And it takes us to reflect on ourselves. Um, yeah. And one of the biggest skills, certainly for senior leaders and, and I think the earlier you start in your career, the better, but reflection and journaling, you know this from a coaching perspective, what did I learn huge when I. When I think to what I'm using today to run my own business, it's the learning of the last, you know, it was quite scary when you said it, almost three decades, but it really is. It's, um, but, but I can still remember, you know, the taxi rides 25 years ago, going to see some really important clients where I was working with a senior partner and they're like, well, this is what we're gonna do and this is now how you need to show up. We, we take what we want, we make it our own, and we leave behind what we don't. And you might witness behaviors in the workplace that you think, that's not me. Well, that's okay. Yeah, exactly. Yep. That's where I need to do it differently, so, um, yeah. Yeah. Love it. Love it. Huge opportunity. Absolutely. Absolutely. And why not? And like we said earlier, if not now, when. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. So we will have all of Helen's information in the show notes as always. Um, I knew this was gonna be an incredible conversation, so good human wise. That was lovely talking to you before. That's what it is. That's what, yeah. Before we close, I want to share something gently. I am currently stewarding the early formation of a live in-person experience called Ignite, the inner uprising created for women in midlife who feel that quiet pull towards something more truthful, more embodied, more their own it. Isn't an event that I'm rushing or loudly promoting. It's being built slowly with care and very deep respect for the women in midlife who it's meant to serve. So if your body leaned in at any point during today's conversation, if something here resonated beyond words, just know this. There will be a place to gather. But for now, simply stay connected. Follow share. Like give us your reviews so that more women can find us. And when the timing is right, you will hear more. Have a wonderful day. Helen, thank you so much for sharing so much brilliance in our conversation today. It was wonderful to have you. Uh, it was a pleasure to be on the show, Denise. I love what you're doing. Remember to strive after 45.