Transform Your Team with Beth Cannon

Speaker A: Business growth podcast, the first one of 2026. I am super excited to have the amazing Beth Cannon with me today. We've got some exciting news. Beth, before we get stuck in, tell us a little bit about you, if you don't mind. For those that you're not aware of you. I'm sure there are only a few people in the world because you are so amazing what you do, but tell everyone a little bit about you first, if you don't mind.

Speaker B: Thanks, Nick. I am, I've been in ECE for nearly three decades. I am excited, excited to say, starting in 2026, that I am an author and a TEDx speaker. Um, all of those things just transpired in the last few months and I speak at conferences, do uh, leadership retreats, team building keynotes, and I'm a leadership strategist, primarily in ah, early education.

Speaker A: Love that. And so obviously you've come, we've had you speak now. Uh, is it four for our CBG live events?

Speaker B: Four times, Nick. Yes.

Speaker A: That just shows how much we love you, Beth, and the impact and everyone keeps asking for you to come back. So always super grateful to have you there. One of the things, obviously we've got the book launched coming up. Tell us a little bit about the book. Why this book? What is this book all about, first of all?

Speaker B: Well, the book is called transform your team how to fix what's broken and build what matters. And the thing that I didn't say in the intro is that in addition to that, I also run a team of, uh, 50 employees. We have 14 franchises at the company called stretch and grow and been doing that for a long time. And you know, since when the cough heard around the world happened In March of 2020, um, our business completely shut down and all of our accounts, you know, closed. My entire life's work was gone and we had to rebuild. And what surprised, uh, me was not just the, you know, the coming back and scaling at breakneck pace, right. To get everything built back up was the seismic shift in the workforce. And you know, we're nearly six years out from that. But I feel like in many ways we're still reeling a little bit from the way that humanity changed over that time. And so this book came out of, um, the last few years of me rebuilding my business, rebuilding my team, walking through some professional and personal challenges and realizing what does it take to, to lead a team in this post Covid modern workforce thing that we utopia that we are living in now.

Speaker A: I love, I love that. So, so you, you talk about you know, was. Was that the kind of moment that. Or there a series of moments, you kind of realized that you needed, or leaders needed this new kind of book or this kind of leadership strategy. What. What was that during that time that that happened?

Speaker B: Well, I wouldn't say it's a moment, but it was a bunch of, uh, death by a thousand paper cuts moments. So, you know, I work with leaders all the time, and I'm in there, and I'm, um, in their organizations, I'm working with their leadership teams, I'm helping them with their team, and I'm seeing these challenges happen in real time. Yeah, I am seeing absenteeism is up, uh, accountability is down, attitudes are off the chain. We're seeing all of these things. I'm experiencing it myself and. And I'm watching it happen to these people that I serve. And I'm like, something. Something has got to give. And I think that the one thing, Nick, that really shifted since COVID is, you know, after the whole great resignation and the workforce left the building.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Everyone was afraid to have hard conversations with their team because they were afraid they would hurt feelings. They were afraid they would quit. And so they stopped. Stopped having hard conversations because everyone thought, life is already so hard. I don't want to make it hard. I need. And. And so what we. We began to do is just avoid sitting in a seat of discomfort, avoiding these hard conversations. And what happened is standards began to lower. Yep. Uh, and then they begin to experience. Well, they don't care if I'm late. They don't care if I don't show up. They don't care if I'm, um, on brand or what, you know, whatever those challenges are. And. And so then I start to see leaders really frustrated, saying, hey, I love my team. Everyone's so fragile right now. What's changed? What's different? And so I just began to study what was happening. And, Nick, I was just relentless about figuring out the root cause of all of these things. And there's lots of symptoms. There's lots of things that, you know, the broken record conversation, which I'm sure you hear all the time, no one wants to work anymore. That's not true. What's true is so many of the challenges that we're having doesn't necessarily start with the team. People love to tell me all their problems with their team, but I just believe this. If you're having issues with your team, you, as the leader, either created the environment for that to continue to happen. You tolerated the dropping of the standards or you celebrated the wrong things. And so, um, it wasn't one moment. It was just. It was a series of moments that I realized if we want to recapture our cultures, something has to change. And that's where the book foundation came from.

Speaker A: I love that. Uh, one of the things you mentioned, uh, this was a big thing for me, is you mentioned that burnout is not the problem, because this is something that obviously came up a lot during COVID Um, you know, it's quite a bold statement that. What do you think is the root issue, why leaders are missing when they focus on, you know, only on these symptoms? What do you think that big kind of challenge is?

Speaker B: So think about this. When you're. When your brain gets on a track to where you're constantly focused on the negative, and you speak a narrative over your team, you speak a narrative over your business that no one wants to work, that I, uh, can't. You know, you speak all the negative things that happens, and when you speak it, that's what you see. You know, you. You see what you say. And so as, uh, we. We look at the. The track that we're walking into, we think, I cannot continue to live through this I would call a long season of suck. And so we wake up every day, and our brains are conditioned to see the negative rather than to see the positive. So I think that's one piece of it. The other piece of it is burnout doesn't happen when you get to work. Burnout is prevented when you take care of your life. So if you're not eating well, sleeping well, moving your body, I mean, I believe that movement and real food, uh, those are the medicines, like those, that's the remedy. So if you're taking care of yourself and you're understanding how to manage your eating energy, that is going to help you from getting into burnout. We think it's time management, but I believe it's energy management in. In many, many ways. So, okay, burnout's not really the issue, because guess what? If, uh, you don't like how things are going and you're the leader, you get to change it. And you can either change people or change people. And what I mean is, yep, change the people. Meaning that not everyone is your people. You know, maybe you had the wrong people in the wrong seats because you can't change other people. You can change yourself. Right? So if you realize you can't change people, maybe you need to change people.

Speaker A: Yeah. And you. One of the things as well, that, you know, you've touched on Previously, I remember you talking about this is the fact of. That many leaders feel that they kind of carry this emotional weight of everyone else. Um, how do you kind of think that shows up then in their leadership style directly tied into what you just, just touched on there, really?

Speaker B: Well, let me just say that in early education specifically, leaders are famously bad at not taking on the emotions of other people. Now we are the majority. And again, I do lots of personality and psychometric testing in my work. And so I see firsthand that a lot of early education leaders are in the feeler category. Like, let's say if we could divide humanity in doers and feelers. We have a lot of people who feel in this industry, which is a good thing. Right. Because 90% of ECE leaders were at one time teachers.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: You got to have the gift of empathy to be able to relate and nurture and work with these young, with these little young people. And so you take that same heart into your leadership. And so there's so many of them are natural nurturers. And which the flip side of being a nurturer can turn into enablement because you want to help people. And so sometimes you want to help people by fixing people or fixing the environment to make them not feel uncomfortable. So we've got an industry of people who feel very deeply. And when you feel very deeply, you sometimes absorb those emotions. And what a, uh, big message that I want to give to the people who are feelers is that you don't have to absorb other people's emotions because that is going to exhaust you. And I do believe that leads into a lot of burner burnout in this industry. Specific is because you take on what you believe is your, like your superpower isn't making people feel good, is it making people feel supported? Which is not a bad thing at all. Right. That's a beautiful gift, but it goes to the negative because sometimes you attract people who need to be saved and who need to be rescued. And you probably may be a great rescuer. So there's that. Okay. But then there's the doers. The doers. And I'm in that doer category, Nick. Uh, the doers sometimes are seen as non empathetic because we can get a lot of things done without a lot of emotion behind it. And sometimes we're seeing as, uh, well, you're not empathetic or you don't care, and that's not necessarily the case. But we move through things by getting things done. But I also learned through writing this book, there's a psychologist named Adam Grant. And in his work he talks about a lot about the doers. And he says that sometimes the doing is actually a trauma response and a thing of control that we think that if we can just move through life doing, we can sometimes feel, get a dopamine hit by saying, well I didn't get stuck in my emotions, but look at all the things I got done today. And so, you know, there, there's a healthy balance to both of uh, these personalities. We just have to understand what our bent is and connect with our team. So doers you've got to downshift and be a good listener and be willing to be present. And then feelers you've got to be willing to say I can sit with you without drowning with you.

Speaker A: Okay, that's an interesting, very interesting thought. How, how does that apply to. Let's imagine someone's a multi side owner. They remove from that day to day side. How do they kind of make sure that comes through in terms of their directors or management staff that they have in place in those centers as well? Because obviously it's a different type of leadership there, isn't it?

Speaker B: Very much so.

Speaker A: So if I'm someone that manages multiple locations or I've got a team that's managing multiple locations, how would you apply that scenario to what, what you've just touched on there?

Speaker B: So think in terms of uh, the org chart and think in terms of who your direct reports are. So the owner affects the culture of that leadership team. And that's me, like I'm an owner, I've got six people on my leadership team. The owner affects that leadership team. So it's the owner's job to make sure that he or she is connecting well and leaning in and listening to their leadership team.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: The people who are the school leaders, right, the boots on the ground in the school, they are the carrier of the culture of uh, their building.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: So when, so a multi site owner is not necessarily going to be connected to the educator staff. Yeah, the carers as you would call them. So there's a little bit of a different level now. They may have a relationship with them, but they're not going to be their day to day leader. So when you look at the, you look at the org chart, the org chart has energy, right. And the leader who is looking at those people who are not necessarily underneath them. I believe in circular leadership, right. I believe in servant leadership. So but when you're looking just in terms of the visual org chart, those people who are directly under you, they are your people. And if you have people that you are directly leading, you are the carrier of the culture, you set the tone for those people. Does that make sense?

Speaker A: Yeah, I love that. One of the things we see a lot is we talk a lot about growing too soon. And, uh, sometimes you bring in someone from a different type of facility that you know, and then they tend to bring their team with them as well. What's some of the, uh, what's your advice around that? Because I've seen it where I know I've got examples in my head. People right now I can see that have opened too many locations too many too soon, and their whole culture and everything has been affected by that. Where do you think that particular issue is? Is it because that the owner's just desperate to bring in those staff and they worried that they walk in on eggshells a little bit, that they need to bring team members in and the culture then gets affected by that? What would be your advice in that strategy?

Speaker B: Yeah, that's interesting because every time, excuse me, Every time you scale, you break every system that you have. And so understanding first of all is when you're having issues, is it a people issue or is it a process issue?

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: And I write a lot about that in the book. A lot of times it's a process issue. And you're, you're blending families, right? You're, it's, it's like a blended family. You know, you've got a mom bring, you know, one, one partner's bringing in this whole group, another partner's bringing in this whole group, and everybody lives together in the same house. So values matter. So I believe you've got to start with the values because what we value determines what we do. And before you enter into this partnership, I think the one who's bringing, doing the bringing in needs to be very clear on what their values are and what their non negotiables are. And so it's a very different dynamic when you're blending like that, because people bring in what they think is their superpower. And maybe that leadership style is more, uh, authoritarian, right? More of it. Like the dogmatic dictator, like, here's the rules, I don't take it. You know, I take no prisoners. You do what you said you're going to do or you're out. And then another one was like, well, I know, I know that we have these standards, but I mean, this is happening and you know, we, they just need to be very clear about what those non negotiables Are, Yes. And sometimes that gets really messy. And most of the time, especially people who are visionaries, a lot of leaders are visionaries or big picture people. You don't want to go into the pain of, uh, looking at all those systems and making sure everything is aligned. But if you don't do that, hear my heart on this. You are borrowing pain from your future if you don't take the time now to nail down your values, your vision, basically what you believe. And in the book there's, uh, section two is called design the direction. And there's something on what you believe, which is your core values, your vision, your mission, what you're building, which is the systems and how you behave, which is how do we operationalize the values that we are going to have in this organization. That's the thing. You can have values if they, you know, they not just, uh, can live in the halls. Like they've got to be lived out, you know.

Speaker A: I love that, I love that because I, I see it a lot. We, we have, um, we had an example recently where there was someone that went in, they bought a new facility, they took it over, and they spent six months, majority of their time, 70 to 80% of their time is in that business, really getting that culture in there, sharing the visions, the values, etc. On the flip side to that, you'll see someone will take on a new center. Maybe it's a takeover, maybe the business was potentially going under and none of that happens. There's a fine line is the balance between the two. Um, I've got a couple other questions I want to ask you as well. Just note them down. One of the things I've touched on here is, um, how can leaders tell the difference between a people issue and a leadership issue, especially when emotions are high and performance is slipping.

Speaker B: Uh, I have lived this beautiful scenario, Nick. And, um, so how do you tell number one, I would say check your own pulse before you go pointing fingers. When someone's not getting something done that you need them to get done. Look at the process first and ask the questions, hey, I want to visit about this issue. You know, this thing that didn't get done. What was your understanding of the results that you were responsible for? What did you think was supposed to happen in this? Because this is what we. I thought would happen. This is what did happen. So I want to go back and trace the steps of where that disconnect happened. Okay, so let's look. When I delegated this to you, where, you know, you as the leader were, was I clear, Did I say who is doing what by when and how's it going to happen? Like, was I clear on that? Because most of the time people delegate. And this is what we. You know, my party trick is this. I'm a visionary. I have a billion ideas before breakfast. I'll get on my leadership team call. And you're the same way, Nick. I know you, and you drive your team crazy just like I do. You'll spew out all these great ideas, and then at 2:00 clock in the morning, three weeks later, you'll wake up and be like, did they do what I told them to do? And your expectations live in your head and not in your systems.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And that's. That happens. And it's not a bad thing. But we as leaders need to be mindful that, hey, I had an idea. Number one, were the people that are executing, did they have the capacity for it? And was I clear on who's doing what by when? And so if you retrace where the disconnect was, I find most of the time it was a process issue. So I dealt with this in my. In my company, had a leader, been with me for a long time, and I thought, you know, she knew what to do. Things were all of a sudden not getting done. So I'm like, okay, let's go back and look at the systems. Because this is post Covid, right? We're coming back. Every system we had broke. So I'm like, what is it, the person or the process? So this is what we did. We figured out what the processes are. We. We put playbooks in place. We made them super clear. We were very clear. These are our routines that we're doing daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly. These are our projects that we do. We created an annual plan. We were clear on what's happening in January, what's coming in February. We did all those things then. There were still disconnects.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: That is when I realized I had a people problem. So the person was not executing. I was clear on what needed to get done. But then the flip side of that, Nick, is that I was the person who absolutely knew it, but held back on those hard conversations because I was afraid of what would happen if someone quit. But the reality is the thing, I was afraid it was actually happening while they were still there. M. And so did I. What, so what happened? I created an environment to where I accepted mediocrity because I was trying to hold space for the challenges that someone was having in life. And, Nick, this is what I learned And I want your listeners to hear this. You can hold space for the true challenges that someone is having in their life, but you can also uphold your standards at the same time.

Speaker A: M. I love that. Let me. There's a scenario that we had very similar to this recently in our business. We, uh. I'm gonna ask you a question that ties in perfectly to this. One of things I want to look at is I. I say conveyor belt all the time. Talk about what was the conveyor belt, what happened, you know, did we do everything we needed to do? Where was the gaps in the process, was it a process issue, was it someone didn't do something, etc. Very similar to what you touched on. One of the things that happened, though, is I realized that I needed to go back in more from an operational perspective to reveal a lot of the things we were. I'll openly share what was happening for us. Things were taking too long to get out the door for our clients, and I couldn't understand why these things were taking so long to get done. And it was because when I went in, we realized we spent six weeks looking at the systems and the processes, and people had just made them too complicated. So as a leader, uh, what do you think is, you know, how often should you be going in, looking at this type of stuff that's happening in the business? Is this. Is this, you know, how long is a piece of string scenario? Is this a quarterly thing? Is this, you know, what's your personal thoughts around this?

Speaker B: Well, Nick, I like. You feel like sometimes looking at systems, I can compare it to being waterboarded. Right. It's torture sometimes. Not really, but I mean, it can be torture to do that. And I think when you're having an issue, that's a 911, and when that issue comes up, you definitely need to stop. And I've seen it so hard sometimes for leaders to stop and work on the business and not in the business.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So, you know, depending on the level of pain that you are having, you know, I think when you, you know, take a look quarterly or in. In our business, we usually do it by the semester. Right. Because the education world runs in the US at least by the fall winter session, the spring session, and then the summer session. And so we usually take a look as we're going into the sessions, like, you know, hey, let's just do a debrief. Where is there. Where is there a disconnect? So for us, we just kind of look at in those really three times a year. But if something is missing, then we. We make that a priority.

Speaker A: Okay, I love that. I love that. Another question I've got for you. Um, one. This is a question that came in from one of our, um, clients, actually. Mental health conversations at work can feel intimidating. What's one practical way leaders can approach these conversations without overstepping or shutting down?

Speaker B: Uh, Nick, that is the leader's tightrope. Because we're. Oftentimes, one of the reasons we avoid these conversations is because we're afraid to initiate a conversation that we're not equipped to handle. We're not therapists. We're not mental health professionals. It's not our job to judge whether someone is giving excuse language about the reason they can't do their work or if they're sharing a diagnosis. And so in the US There has to be this interactive process when someone comes to you with. With an issue. I'm sure it's probably similar in other countries as well, you know, so you. You want to be empathetic, and you want to kind of lean in and listen. And one of the things that the pandemic did is it really removed the curtain from those types of things. It repositioned the mental health conversation, which was a good thing.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: But when someone shares their diagnosis, I think it's important to understand, are they sharing it because they need support, or are they sharing it as an excuse for why something didn't happen? Like, well, why are you, you know, why didn't you come to work today? Well, I, you know, I was. I had a panic attack in the morning. I couldn't do it. I had, you know, and that's a very real scenario.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: So these are, again, these are. These are real challenges. So I think it's a conversation to have. And I've had to have this conversation, and it is hard. And so it's. It starts with, what support do you need right now? Because this is. These are the expectations of your job. What support do you need right now? Because what. And then in terms of how are they, um, dealing with their issue that they're having? Because if someone's like, I keep getting the flu. I keep getting the flu. I keep getting the flu. The question is, are you washing your hands? Like, are you. Are you. Are you taking good care of your body? Are you taking some, you know, are you taking, um, you know, immune boosters? Like, what can I do to help you? Because I want you to stay well. But we avoid those mental health conversations. There's lots of things they can do to help them stay well, but people have to own their own mental health and their own physical health. And again, and I'm talking about there's a difference in mental illness and mental health. And so I am not an equipped professional to handle that. But I'm a human with the heart who's dealt with it a lot. And I think it's those conversations. But also it's okay to talk to people about how they're coming to terms with their struggles and how we can support them at work. And we have to decide, you know, someone says, well, on days that I'm feeling anxious, I can't be here. Well, then, now we need to talk about maybe a different schedule. Because the truth is, Nick, in the world of education, especially early education, your physical presence matters.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And so it's having those accountability conversations around and telling them stories about, listen, you're great, you are wonderful, and when you are here, you are magic. And when you're gone, your children are dysregulated, the parents are asking where you are, like, and if you don't feel like you're equipped for this role, maybe we can find another role for you. But for you to stay in the position you're in, your presence really matters. And having those hard conversations and helping people understand that we need to matters and not backing down, because this is what most owners. Owners do or directors do. Well, they use that as an excuse. So now I have no choice other than to just accept someone who misses 28 days in a school year.

Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. Another question that ties into that is around, you know, this whole idea around doing quarterly reviews or, you know, doing reviews on a regular basis. What's your thoughts around this? Because one of the things I often hear a lot, particularly around the operations of facilities, is, oh, uh, we're scheduled to do them every quarter, but they only happen maybe once a year. What's your thoughts? Because here's my interpretation of this. On the one hand, I hate giving up, uh. Or I would say in the past, I would hate giving up the time to do them, because as a visionary, you just want to crack on. You want to grow and grow and grow. But equally, when I have the conversations, the ideas and the conversations that come up are amazing. What's your personal opinion around this?

Speaker B: Well, I'm going to say I have, uh. My leadership team would probably listen and say, is she telling the truth on that? I'm a rule breaker, Nick. I'm a rule breaker. So I think that they are absolutely necessary. So we. I mean, we have a, you know, for sure. When someone's onboarding in that first 100 days, I mean, there's very frequent check ins, you know, going. Going forward. We try to hit those once a semester because I'd like the truth, because our business is remote, so it's a little bit different. But all that to say, I am a big believer in fit talks. Frequent impromptu talks. That's thing number one. But I love a process. If it's kind of. I call it a Glow grow meeting. It's kind of like a 360 meeting. And basically it's where the leader's willing to sit in the seat of vulnerability. And so it goes like this. Hey, let's sit down. So, Nick, let's say, Nick, let's say you work for me, Nick, you know, I just want to connect. Tell me, what am I doing well for you? Like, where do I glow? Where. Where are we supporting you? Well, and then I ask you, like, tell me good things. And then I can say, thanks for noticing that, because we work really hard on that. So you get that bit of information. Then I say, nick, tell me, what's my opportunity for growth? Where can I grow? How. Where can I support you better? So now you're asking for that feedback. I believe in asking for feedback before you shoot it back out at someone. Unless it's like an emergency situation, in most cases are not emergencies. So then we chat. And then I say, okay, Nick, you tell me what you think you're doing well, where do you glow? You get to speak life over yourself. You get to tell me things maybe I haven't seen or noticed. And I can now brag on you. Gosh, Nick, that was amazing. Uh, and then I'm like, nick, tell me your opportunity for growth. What can you be doing better? This is the nugget right here is because now let's say I may realize that, like, Nick, you miss like 20 days. We need to have a conversation about this. But before I pounce on you and say, Nick, are you aware that our policy is we strive for less than five and here you are missing 20. That can be one conversation, but the other conversation can be the connection ahead of time. Nick, what's your opportunity for growth? And you could say, well, I know I've missed a lot of days.

Speaker A: Okay. Yeah.

Speaker B: And then I'm like, okay, I'm glad you noticed that, because you have. What do you think are some. You know, like, what do you think happens when you're not here because you're so well loved and all those things that you just Told me that you're doing. Those are great. But if you're not here, nobody sees that.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And so now it's a conversation about the importance of, uh. Yes, it's a policy, but more than a policy, we're dealing with people. And if I were to say to you how great you are when you're here, how much the kids miss you, how your presence matters, and how you're being gone, that much greatly affects your ability to be as great as you actually are. So what can happen to get you here?

Speaker A: Okay. Love that. Love that. Beth, I could talk to you about this all day, but from my perspective, what are the key kind of messages you want people to take from this book? If you, uh, to get this book in as many people's hands as possible, which we're going to talk about launch day when it comes out. But what do you ideally want people to take away from this book?

Speaker B: Um, the book's in three sections. The first one is called Diagnose the Disconnect. I really want that. I really want everyone to figure out, like, what is actually happening. And a lot of times it starts with the leader. I want this to be something where you really reflect on how can I be the best leader for my team? Because your team's not going to change until you realize that your habits and your heart might need to shift so that you can build the team of your dreams.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: Then it's the design, the direction. Like, if you need to work on your mission, your vision, how you believe what you're building, how you behave, there's tools for transformation inside of that. And then the last piece is develop a team that delivers. And it's how to, you know, how to recruit them, how to build your leadership bench, how to truly connect, how to identify your culture. Vultures. So that you can create a workspace to where people won't need to get burnt out from. Right. You're gonna. You deserve to create a worksp space to where you love your team and your team loves you. And when you guys can. Can get together and that the leader and the team can. Can move forward in the same direction, it's magic.

Speaker A: So if someone's picking up this book and they. Which everyone should do, by the way, but when they pick this book up, when they start on this book, is this the type of book someone would just read through all the way, or is it something that you want them to take away and actually break it down into those sections and work on those things as they. Working through the book that's a great question.

Speaker B: So let me say both. And so when you get the book, there's a QR code to scan, and there are, uh. There's an entire workbook to go with the whole book. Every chapter has what I call a chapter checkup. And it's, what are the symptoms, what is the root cause, and what are the remedies? So you'll get a full workbook for the whole book. You'll also get several templates that I use throughout. So you can go in and you can, you know, pick, pick, pick, pick, pick. Pull out the things that you want to use as strategy tools. You can absolutely do that. It's a book that you can use. And I meant it to be that way because I want it to be helpful. But also woven throughout are real stories of, uh, things that I experienced, um, through my team, how we nearly lost our culture and how we built it back. I'm a storyteller. I love to tell stories. So actually getting to write some of these stories was really, really hard. But if you are compelled by stories, I would say it's part story and part strategy.

Speaker A: Okay, um, just. If you don't mind me saying this, we spoke just before we went live. I asked you about, you know, how long did it take you to write the book? And, um, one of the things you touched on was there was. There were times it took you about a year to write the whole thing. And this isn't the book that, you know that a lot of books out right now that it's. It's a book that someone's used AI to write. Beth, I can assure you, has put a heart and soul in this. But one of the things you touched on, Beth, was you mentioned about there was parts of the book you were writing where maybe you weren't in the right space at that moment. Can you just tell everyone what. What you meant by that, if you don't mind? Because I think that's so important.

Speaker B: Yes. I mean, Nick, there are some really hard things, you know, and as a leader, when you're. When you are betrayed or when you're, you know, when you're lied to or, you know, when you pour your heart and soul into someone and they disappoint you. I mean, we're humans, right? We all have ability to disappoint each other. But I was really shocked by some of the things that happened on my team. And there were so many. I didn't see that coming moments.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And as I began writing that, because I felt like, okay, this is a key piece to. To the book. I wrote it. And I realized, like, I'm not really healed from that. Like, I need to work on some forgiveness. I need to get my heart right so that I can tell this story. Story from a healed space, you know, for. If you heard me speak, and you heard me speak, Nick, uh, many times in the last several years, you knew well, that I was speaking from open, gaping wounds.

Speaker A: 100. Yeah.

Speaker B: And then they began to scab over a little bit. And now I can say a lot of those wounds are scarred. And I've done my work to get the healing because I don't ever want to walk through a season like that and not learn the lessons that I was intended to learn.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: And so, you know, some people will say, you never speak from your. You never speak from your wounds. Well, in that season, I had to work, right? And so I was just real. And, you know, I wasn't. You know, it would have been inauthentic for me to, you know, get on a stage or get in front of a group and say, let me tell you guys something. I figured this all out. Do what I do, and you'll never have any pain. Yeah, that would have been a complete. I mean, no one can do that, Right? That's a complete lie. But I think that the realness of, uh, that really helped me to be able to connect a lot of people because they were like, me too, girl.

Speaker A: Yeah. Uh, and I just think that shows, though, that you've really poured your heart and soul into this. This isn't a book that's taken you a couple of hours or a couple of weekends. You've really put everything into this. And, you know, I can. I can. See, I've known you for a long time, and I can just tell it's going to be an amazing book, and it's going to have a huge impact on people all around the world. And as you said, uh, you know, even though a lot of your work is around early child education leadership in general, you do a lot around leadership. So is this book intended for people of other sectors as well? Beth, what would you say it is?

Speaker B: It is, Nick. You know, the majority of my work is with early education, but I, uh, have done. I mean, I've. I've. You know, I've worked for Chick Fil A. I've done some things for different companies. Next week, I'm doing something for a big real estate organization. So it's not specific. The book is not specific to early education. Of course, a lot of My experiences are. The team that I lead is an early, they're is an early education team. But it's, it's for any, it's for anyone and especially anyone leading in this time, leading different generations. You'll appreciate this being from the uk, One of the chapters in the book is called Mind the Gap.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: And it's about leading different generations in the workforce. So it is, it's, it's definitely applicable to any industry. If you're leading a small team and you're affecting culture of the people under your leadership, the book's for you.

Speaker A: Love that. Uh, Beth, tell us when this book is coming out. What's the best way for people to get ahold of the book?

Speaker B: This comes, uh, out January 16th, Friday, January 16th, and it's on Amazon.

Speaker A: Love that. So what we'll do, everyone, we'll make sure we put the link down below. Um, if you want to connect to Beth, I'm sure if there's any follow up questions, let Beth know. Beth, I am super grateful for you as always. I know this book is going to be game changing, life changing for many, many thousands of leaders out there. And I'm super grateful for you taking the time out to speak, uh, with us today.

Speaker B: Thank you, Nick. Thanks for having me.