Finka Jerkovic is a business and leadership coach. She helps her clients use their personal brand to increase sales and grow their business. Finka believes when you bring authentic leadership and a mission-based mindset to your business, you can achieve inner fulfillment, outer success, and leave a transformational impact. In this episode, she talks about demonstrating leadership through self-awareness and creating emotional connections.
Finka Jerkovic is an international speaker, workshop leader, and coach. She brings over two decades of experience in corporate Canada in the financial services industry, with expertise in sales, leadership, communication, and coaching.
As President of FINKA Communications Inc., she consults with clients in areas of personal branding, leadership development, sales and marketing, client experience, and employee engagement. Finka is the Program Director and Lead Coach for How to Fascinate®. She has personally trained and coached nearly 10,000 thousand people using the Fascination system and tools.
Finka helps her clients discover their “brilliant difference” so that they get 100% clear on their unique talents, skills, and expertise enabling them to use their personal strengths to grow their business.
In this episode, we discuss the importance of leaders getting comfortable with themselves, bringing awareness to their emotions, and being able to create emotional connections. Finka explains that a declaration of fear and uncertainty is also a demonstration of leadership and strength. She talks about the importance of finding the right ways for a team to work together towards one main goal - to serve clients.
Finka emphasizes that the love and support nurtured within our communities will be our guarantee and safety net during uncertain times. She talks about how this global phenomenon of being alone that people are all experiencing at once can be an opportunity to create more togetherness, kindness, and empathy.
Find out more about Finka on her website: www.finka.ca
Connect with her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/yourbrilliantdifference/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/finka-jerkovic-66763160/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/finkajerkovic/
- Welcome to, "Leading Through Crisis," the conversation series exploring the idea of leadership in challenging times. Hi, and welcome to, "Leading Through Crisis," I'm Celine Williams, and I'm here today with Finka Jerkovic. Finka's a business and leadership coach. She helps her clients use their personal brand to increase sales and grow their business. Finka, I wanna thank you first of all, for being with me today. I'm really happy to speak to you.
- Thank you, I'm so glad to be here too, so thanks for inviting me.
- Absolutely. Because you are a leadership coach, and you work with leaders in, at various levels in different places in their career and their life, and all over the place, I wanna ask if you're seeing any trends with the people that you're speaking to. You know, are there things that are working really well for them, or things that they're struggling with right now.
- I think with our current environment, a big part of what's happening is, you know, people are asking a lot of questions around what is most important for them to be focusing in on, you know, I think we all started the year 2020, this whole new decade with, you know, big visions and aspirations of what's gonna happen in the next 10 years. Who thought that this would be where we are today. I don't think any of us envisioned this in our future. And so, I think a lot of people are really looking at what's happening today compared to what they thought they were gonna be doing today. It's putting people in a position of, there is a lot of uncertainty, and a lot of questions, a lot of inquiry, and I think that's a good thing. I think always coming from a perspective of asking questions and being curious as to what needs to happen now, what does the world need of each and every one of us as leaders, how do we need to show up? I think, especially in times of now, it's really an opportunity for us to really demonstrate what true leadership is, even though it's gonna be hard.
- Absolutely, and it's interesting, because I think that often leaders are looked to for answers, not to be asking questions.
- I agree.
- I'm not saying that is right or wrong, but I think that a lot of leaders, that has been their role historically. So, the switch to, I'm a person that is leaning into the unknown and asking these questions, I think my guess is, that it's probably quite challenging for some of those people, and I don't know if you're seeing that, and how people are managing it, or how you're helping them manage it.
- Again, I think that's a really wonderful observation, because I think when you look at a leader, a leader's supposed to know, where are we going, what are we doing next. There's this level of confidence that they need to move forward in. Whether you're leading a team of others, or even just leading yourself. And so, I think there are two things going on. There is leadership being demonstrated, meaning that people are moving forward. People are taking action, people are doing things. When I'm working with my clients, what I'm also noticing, is we need to be asking ourselves the question, "Where is this decision, this action, "this thing you are being motivated to do, "where is it coming from?" If it's coming from a place of fear, of uncertainty, a doubt, in that if you do this thing that you're gonna feel more comforted, you're gonna feel safer, it's a place to say, "Okay, let's maybe pause for a moment." I'm seeing people acting really quickly, in good, and as well there might be things they're deciding that they might not, because of the fear that's motivating that action, they might actually regret. And then, there's another camp, who are really just pausing, and being a little more thoughtful, and a little bit more, I hate to use the word strategic. But in a way, it is strategic to take pause, and to just really give people, I think as a leader, you can give people permission not to know. Permission to not take action, even though that is a form of action. So, I think it's especially in a time of urgency and crisis, and emotional upheaval that we're all experiencing.
- I think a really thing inside of what you're saying, is that it's not only about giving people permission not to know, it's about giving yourself permission not to know. By giving yourself permission not to know, and coming from that place, you do, you also give others permission as well. But, I think that internal dialogue has to shift to, "It's okay that I don't know all the answers. "It's okay that I am uncertain." Because, people will not feel like they can be uncertain if you are operating the same way as sort of regular business times, or regular times in the world, where certainty's a myth. I recognize that, but where it feels more certain.
- Think about even this morning, my daughter, and I think this is again, as parents, you know, those of us who are where you can demonstrate leadership. She came up to me, and she's just not having a good day. She's 12, and you know, we are, she's been at home already for four weeks, 'cause her March break started early. She just got off a Zoom call with her classmates, and she was sad, and I'm like, "What's goin' on?" And she's like, "This is hard." I think just giving ourselves permission to let it be hard. And I'm like, "I know it's hard." She wanted answers, "When is this gonna end? "When can I go back to school?" All I told her was, "I don't know any of those answers, "and all I do know is, "it's probably gonna still be a little harder. "It might actually get harder than this. "But, what we have is each other as we go through this." I think that's what we can, that's the certainty. The love, the connection, the supports we have around us. That's what we can, I'm just getting goosebumps thinking about it. That's the guarantee, that's the safety net. That's the only thing I can assure her of. When I think of leaders of organizations or leaders of teams, you don't know. You may not know. You might, and I think it's a good thing to let your people know that you have no idea, and that you're afraid. It's in the declaration of that fear that you actually one, demonstrate your leadership, but also your strength. In that, you know, what is certain, that the team is still together, that they are still there to serve a client or a certain purpose, or build a particular something that, what a project that they're building, but there's still that there. Whatever it is, that there's certain things that you're certain of, and so, yeah.
- What I find, I love the story of your daughter, by the way, and what I find really interesting and super applicable to leaders in other situations is, I think, and this is my perspective. By no means is this, you know, solid gold or anything. This is not the be and end all of the world. I think generally, in a family dynamic, and an intimate setting, whether with friends for example, that we are better at acknowledging the feelings and the fear and talking about it. Again, not perfect, not across. But, generally speaking, that is a safer place to have that sort of conversation. Historically, we have had all this language around, you don't bring emotion into business. Business is completely rational, logical, there's no feelings there. That's not a thing that we talk about. Don't be, don't, you can't show emotion, it's weak. All of that sort of crap has historically, it's built the foundation of how most businesses operate today unless they are actively work, you know, changing the culture to not be that way. Quite frankly, unless that is an active consideration, the default setting is more in that area. And so, you know, I say that, because I actually read this morning there's a Brene Brown quote, I'm gonna butcher it. But it is basically that if you, this is not the quote. But the essence of it is, that if you were not dealing with the emotions in a workplace, if you're not dealing with those fears and positive or negative emotions, then in the end, you'll be dealing with problems. I say that, because I think that skill set that you demonstrated, you spoke about with your daughter, is very applicable and transmittable to any kind of workplace. Whether you're leading a company, or a team, or a small business with contractors, whatever it is, where acknowledging and dealing with what people are feeling right now has to be part of what we're doing, or we will be dealing with problems in six months, or three months, or whatever the case may be.
- I think it's a couple things. I think when we're in business, the emotions, so there's two types of emotions. There's like being emotional, and then there's being emotionally connected. When we're in business, we like ROI, so your return on investments, we like digits, we like to, even the term monetize. When like you're taking something that might be soft, something that might not yet, you're always trying to come to a logical, linear, data fact based outcome, because it's easy to measure. We like compartmentalizing, we like, you know, graphs, and when it comes to emotions, you can't do that, and being emotionally connected. Now, when we make decisions, I think this is where in business, we know, like even as a consumer, we buy on emotion. We buy, and then we justify and rationalize based on logic and why I need this, and we let our left brain get to do that work for us, right? But in business, it's like we've taken the fact that we can't make emotional decisions because they're business decisions, 'cause we need the logic. We've now also said, "Okay, let's get all of emotion outside of business." But it's like, you still need emotional connection. You still need to connect, still need to wear our hearts on our sleeves. We can also wear our heart on our sleeve and make a, really judicious decision based on logic and emotion, right? And so, I think we've just, it's like the pendulum, right? It's like we swung it way too far on the logic side, and away from the emotion side, and so it's kind of like, always in that middle way. A little bit of emotion with some logic, or with logic, a little bit of emotion. To be able to make those balanced decisions is super, super important, so I think leaders, we all have an opportunity to demonstrate emotional connection. But right now, it's being thoughtful about how we're making our decisions, and to ensure we're not making emotional decisions. When I say that is ensuring that our decisions are not all fear based. So, really asking ourselves if, like am I choosing to do this because it's coming from a place of fear, or is really coming from a place from love and connection. That's the deciding factor.
- A couple of things very quickly. For leaders that, when you said, okay, I'm making a decision from, is it coming from a place of fear or coming from a place of love and connection, I think there are still leaders out there who would be uncomfortable with the concept of making a decision from love and connection. I would offer what I heard immediately was, if that makes you uncomfortable, then think of it, is it coming from fear, or coming from service? If that language is more comfortable for people, 'cause I think that I can picture some people I have worked with who would be like, "I would never use that language in a workplace," right? So, if service is more comfortable, I think that understanding that, and taking the time to identify what is driving it, is really important.
- I completely agree, I think the whole notion of love in the workplace, love in business. I'm writing a book on love in selling. So, that whole notion of you know, can and so yeah, that sense of it comes from a place of service. So, if we need a translation, place of service, a place of goodness, and that. And I think it's that love has such a romantic, like it has this romantic connotation to it, and it's not the kind of love we're talking about. It is just the human emotional connection that is universal that we all feel. Yeah, but I totally agree, I totally agree. I know, I've gone through, I've worked and lived my entire, most of my career in very traditional financial services environment, so to fathom using the word love, or emotion, like even bringing emotion and talkin' about like, when I'm coaching people around their emotions, you don't burn that to the workplace. You leave that behind, but I'm seeing this as, I am seeing change, I am seeing the workplace and business having both types of these leaders. The traditional mindset, and this more evolutionary mindset of leadership of what we did need more of. So, I'm seeing them both in the environment, and so I think they both bring value. I'm gonna say they both are valued and valuable, but we need to recognize that both can co-exist in this type of environment, and that a traditional is not the only way we can make change.
- I think that's a great, I actually really like that observation. I agree with you, I see a lot, I see a mix of both. There is a way to co-exist, and there's a way that they balance each other as well, so it's not actually a bad thing, it's diversity, right? It kind of comes down to diversity is how I think of it is, if you have all of one or all of the other, it's never gonna be ideal, because there's no, then you kind of get that group thing happening. This is the only way. Whereas when you have some of that mix, that diversity, means you're getting better, you're coming up with better solutions, better ideas, better ways of dealing with things, that is going to include more of the people around them, and consider more of the people around them, because it is some form of diversity. It's not just one way of thinking.
- Yeah, I agree, I agree.
- So, and you may not have an answer to this question. It just popped into my head. In the work that you've done and the coaching that you've done in all the work that you've done with different leaders and in corporate setting especially, have you found any, have you seen anything work to help people get more comfortable, help leaders get more comfortable with this concept of emotions in the workplace? And also, because I think there's some connection there, this idea of slowing down. Because, I feel like the leaders that tend to be more comfortable with emotions, this is not everyone. I can think of one person in particular I've worked with who is not on this scale. Very comfortable with emotions, moves so fast. But I think, often the people who will take the time to get comfortable with the emotions, are more comfortable slowing down. It's easier, that's my perception, not necessarily real. How have you found has worked, or what perspective can you, would you offer to help people shift or become of aware of it in some way.
- Think like the best way to become aware of it, is when we are in a place, it is just, it is the self awareness. You know, really learning more about you and how you respond, and seeing what is driving your actions or your behaviors. So, I think there's a lot of you know, as a leader, it's asking again, I'll go back to asking better questions. If you're finding yourself, and I'm trying to even just think of a situation, just give me a second. I wanna just see if I can think of a situation that I can actually use as an example with. Just thinking in my coaching with my leaders. So your question was really around, how do you get in touch with your emotions, and does pause and thoughtfulness like, does pause help you get in touch with your emotions?
- Yes, and is there, and if that's not the thing by the way, I'm not married to it being if that being the solution. But, how could you recommend, or what have you seen work for people to get more in touch with it, to become more comfortable with their emotions, other people's emotions, the whole, that whole piece.
- I'll go back to, self-awareness is important. I think just becoming aware that you are experiencing an emotion, and calling it out, especially when they're negative emotions or emotions that we've labeled negative, like you know, fear, doubt. At times, I think of leaders that are really confident. They might actually be experiencing some doubt and fear, and then they mask it with even more confidence, and so they show up with an even more assertive approach. Because, underneath it is doubt or a lack of confidence. I think being really aware of what might be happening below the water line, you're gonna notice it. So, if you're not self aware, if you're not, if you're starting to see that people aren't listening, or people not following you, or your relationships are being affected, and maybe people only do things because you tell them, not because they just show up taking initiative and wanting to. It could be a sign that there might be something what you're doing is contributing to the fact that people aren't following, or people aren't, you're not being the most effective leader that you can be. I'm gonna say, acknowledging and calling them out, I think it's tough to experience challenging feelings, things we don't like. I think right now what's gonna happen is, so I'll just use self isolation as an example. My concern is that we have not as a society learned how to be with ourselves. What I mean by that is, whenever we're alone, we're very quick to pick up our phones, to get absorbed in Instagram or Facebook, or on our email. Maybe you pick up Netflix 'cause you're bored, and you start three hours, finding the right TV show or movie. Or, we go shopping online, grab a glass of wine. We just don't know how to be with ourselves. So, my concern is that over time, those things are gonna get boring. We won't be able to even be with a social media, it's not gonna do enough, because we're inside our homes, and we're gonna have to be with ourselves. That's that emotion we have to be able to be with. The uncomfortableness of being bored. The discomfort of saying, "I feel empty." The uneasiness of feeling, "Is this what my life is all about, is this what I created?" And actually facing that reality. How we go through that will inform how our future will be. I think that's the biggest thing right now. I see this crisis as a big thing, but I think it's the effect of isolation and learning how to, my concern is we're gonna, many people, we're gonna connect to ourselves and say, "Wow, I'm alone, or I feel alone, "and I've been using all this stuff to hide something "and mask something that I didn't wanna face, "and now we have to face it." I know growing up, I wasn't taught these things, because they didn't know these things. I learned, I'm still learning, and I'm still gonna continue to learn, this experience is gonna give me another way of learning how to be with myself. How to face the loneliness, how to face the parts of myself that I might not love. Face the parts of myself that I don't think are enough that I try to you know, get things, or be things, or do things to make up for it. I think that is what self isolation is gonna get us to look inside for. My hope is that I, and anyone else who's going through this experience, as we go through this, that we see that we're not really alone, and that we're not lonely. We are loved, that we are whole, that we are complete, and all these things have just been distracting us from what was already there.
- Right now, we are all, or most, I recognize maybe not every part of the world is in isolation or some form of quarantine. But, I'm gonna say all meaning most. We are all in some form of isolation. To your point, we are all on our own and in that, for a lot of people, very uncomfortable space of being on our own or suddenly being with our family all the time, which can make that worse some times, not always better. And, at the same time, there's this narrative and this, and I've seen it come up, and I've heard it come up in so many conversations. That we are also globally all in this together. That is a really interesting sort of dichotomy that might not be the exact word, but that we are experiencing right now, that I don't know how else we could have come to that space where we are both having a very individual experience, as well as a very connected experience.
- Beautiful example of the love opposites that, you know, you've got this one extreme of self isolation, and then this global experience of togetherness, and it is. When I think of it is, it's just a beautiful example of how both exist, and that's just, that is the world we live in. I think it gives me hope, because when I think of the hardships and the challenges that many are going through, that equally there is also the goodness, and the ease that people are experiencing. Both are co-existing at the same time. I think it gives us permission to remember if we get too far down in the hole of, "This is so crappy, this is so hard, "I can't believe this is happening." To, "Oh my God, there's so much goodness, "there's so much gratefulness, "there's so much blessings." It's like, you know when sometimes you get that line of like, "Oh but, it's a challenge or it's an opportunity." I'm so tiring of hearing it, but it is so true. They both exist. We can look at is as this is hard and this is uphill. I'm swimming against the waves or the what is it?
- [Celine] Current, current?
- The current. Right! What is that?
- Yeah, I got it.
- Or, it's you know, or it's the perfect opportunity to create more connection, more togetherness, more kindness, and more empathy. So, I think it's says yes and all the time.
- Always.
- [Finka] Always.
- Yeah, we were talking about this before we hit record, is that idea of like living in the gray. That it's not, it's almost, I mean, I don't think ever, and I'm sure someone would be like, "Well, there's this one example where it's either or." But, I think that 99% of the time it is both and. There's not one or the other. It really is, and everyone is having a different experience inside that scale. One day might be one experience, and one day might be another experience. Both of those things, all of those things, anywhere on that scale is okay. I think, you know, one of the things that I hear inside of what you're talking about is that when we as leaders are comfortable and are able to identify what, where we're at today, moment by moment even, what that looks like for us, it becomes much easier to be comfortable with the whole scale. Good or bad, take the judgment out of it, it just is. Being angry about it is not bad, it just is. It's okay. All of the feelings, all of the emotions are okay. And then that by proxy lets, helps you become comfortable with other people on your team, in your family, whatever the safe situation is, where they are, because they're just in a different place on that scale.
- I agree, I agree. I think that as each of us individually and a leaders, become more comfortable with the uncomfortableness that we're experiencing, and we allow ourselves to process that and be with it, even for a little bit before we pick up that phone, just a little bit. You create resonance, because when your kid's going through it, or your employee, or your colleague, or your direct report's going through with, you're like, "I totally get that 'cause I just did that this morning." You understand it, so then there is less judgment, there is more acceptance. There is less fear and there's more kindness. I think when I look at as a leader, the best teacher and the best student is you. As long as you're open and continue to use you as the experiment, and you're the lab rat, you are the one that you allow yourself to pick and probe yourself. It'll help you be a better leader, because you will stand from a place of vulnerability, openness, empathy, understanding, because you know what it's like to be that person in those shoes, 'cause you're not hiding it.
- Right, and you're acknowledging all aspects. You're being a whole human. All of these things co-exist. I have to say as this popped into my head while you were speaking. This kind of makes me hope that at the end of all of this, we stop defaulting the defense mechanisms of, "How are you?" I'm fine, I'm fine." 'Cause all of that is not acknowledging what's really going on and it's a defense. It's okay to say, you know what? I've had actually had a really, you know, I mean I'm not saying go in too deep. But, it's okay to be like, "I've had a really challenging morning, "and I'm still showing up, and ready to do this work, "and we're gonna be awesome today." These things can, it's okay to be like, "This is a challenging time, "and I know we still have things to do." Instead of the defense of, I'm using I'm fine as an example, but like, we deflect instead of welcome in and open. I think this is a really opportunity to instead of deflecting, actually open up.
- Agreed, and I will also add on that. For the fixer uppers, the caregivers, the helpers, when someone says, "I'm having a hard day." Or you know, "Things are just crappy." Don't go save them, don't go fix them. It is not your job, it is not your responsibility, 'cause I know the moment I say even to my husband like, I'm having a bad day and this, well, why don't you do this? How about this? Did you do this? It's like, no, no, no, I don't need any of that. I just need to express my discomfort, my pissed off-ness. I just need to like, just tell someone. I know even in the workplace, leaders and managers, when you are jumping to fix your employees' problems, you're holding them back from showing up and being the leader that they can be. You are not their savior. It's not your job to fix their problems.
- I love that, because again, leaders, most leaders are problem solvers, and they hear anything that sounds like a problem, and they're like, "Great, what do we do about it?" In my opinion, you're better off saying, "Can I support you in that?" And, just letting them say yes or no rather than try to solve it for them.
- Yeah, and I would say even add to that, just go with, "What are you gonna do about it? "What are you gonna do about it? "What have you thought about?" You know? "Do you need a place to brainstorm ideas? "I'm here to listen." Don't jump in, don't solve. I think that is a natural reflex. What we can do is just start noticing when we're doing it. That's self awareness. "Oh, I did that again, I went in "and just saved that guy, shouldn't have." Or, "Went to save it, I wanted to, "I gave her like three things that she could do." You know, let's hold back. Let's hold those great ideas, and if they want them, even if they ask them for them, let them come up with a few of their own first, and then you can release yours. But, let them do some work. Let them do some heavy lifting. They'll remember it. I think there was a data point, I think it's like people will only, like if you're a directing leader, where you're telling people what to do, 10% of what you say is actually gonna land into action. 90% of the things you tell people to do, they won't do unless they have named it, identified it, and called it out on their own to do. So, you can give them seven things to fix their problem with, they might, not even with seven, that's not even 10%, .7 they might actually take out of that. It's a waste of time and energy.
- I love that data point, I did not know it, but that's phenomenal. I think it's a really good thing to keep in mind. Before we wrap this up, I wanna ask, is there anything that we didn't get to that you wanted to bring up, or anything that you wanted to sort of emphasize before we, you know, get to the end of this.
- I think the only thing would be, as a leader, and we're all leaders. We all have an opportunity here to demonstrate leadership. Lead yourself first. Take care of you. I think the best leadership that, we can't take care of other people unless we take care of ourselves, I think especially in times of urgency, crisis, moments of uncertainty that we're going through. Do whatever you can to manage your energy, and what I mean by that is self care. So, it might mean, spend as much time outdoors as you can, get in some sunshine, go for that run, meditate, pray. Anything that helps you move those emotions that are stuck in here, in here, or in your body. Processing them physically is going to help you move the mountains that you wanna move. That would be my only last piece, is focus on your energy, and help you be in better alignment to be your leadership.
- That's the perfect place to end this, so thank you for that. I wanna note that there'll be links to be able to find Finka in the show notes for this episode. But, you can check her out online. It's www.finka.ca, which is the best website ever. I love that's the URL, it's so great and simple. I can't thank you enough for sharing with us and being in this conversation with me. It's super valuable, and I love your perspective, so thank you so much for taking time.
- Oh, you're welcome, thank you.
- All right, have a wonderful day. Thanks for listening to us talk around leadership in challenging times. If you would like to learn more about us or any of our guests, you can find us online at www.leadingthroughcrisis.ca. If you liked the show, please subscribe and leave us a review wherever your get your podcast from.