Episode Summary
Leadership doesn’t pause for personal storms. In this candid conversation, the Divas explore how to lead through workplace “crises” while privately managing burnout, family illness, layoffs, caregiving, and other hidden struggles. Daniela recounts a high-stakes client rescue during her father’s cancer diagnosis; Claudia shares guiding a team through outsourcing while losing her own role; and Misha reflects on leading amid burnout and parental cancer scares. Together they show how honest boundaries, trusted support, and steady—not perfect—leadership sustain you and your team.

What You'll Learn in this Episode

• How to name the real crisis: Distinguish organizational urgency from your personal capacity and needs.
• Healthy disclosure that helps teams: When and how to say “me too” to reduce isolation and build trust.
• Grounding practices for hard seasons: Daily self-check, resilience “anchors,” and small acts of steadiness over perfection.
• Boundary-setting scripts: Practical language for time limits, workload, and availability without abandoning accountability.
• Building your safety net: Identifying a small, trusted network (coach/mentor/peer) before you need it.
• Spotting hidden strain: The subtle ways crisis shows up (sleep loss, overeating, detachment) and what to do early.

Takeaway

You are not the company’s emergency room. Define what’s truly in crisis, protect your non-negotiables (sleep, time, support), and communicate with steady honesty. Leading with humanity—especially when you’re struggling—keeps you effective, strengthens your team, and turns survival into sustainable resilience.

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We peel back the label “soft power” and reveal it as kind, intelligent, human-centric leadership—the foundation that makes hard metrics possible. From biotech to startups to security engineering, Azin Tabrizi shows how empathy, intuition, and clear boundaries turn tense, KPI-driven work into collaborative execution.

She describes being the buffer and bridge: translating “we need it yesterday” client urgency into achievable commitments while protecting her team’s energy and dignity. It’s the everyday touches—quick gratitude, “how are you really?”, picking up the phone—that quietly compound into trust, retention, and yes, better numbers. The crew challenges the “hard vs. soft” binary, landing on a truth: fear can force output; safety unlocks initiative. When people feel trusted, they bring ideas, not just deliverables.

Why It Matters

• Soft power is performance infrastructure. Culture shows up later as KPIs: lower turnover, faster decisions, more creative problem-solving.
• Trust first, then course-correct. “My trust is yours to lose” creates ownership—and makes tough feedback land.
• Leaders model the weather. Vulnerability (“I missed this—my bad”) invites truth early, before small issues become expensive.
• Human > theater. Team-building is built in the micro-moments, not offsites.

Azin’s Soft-Power Playbook (you can steal this)

• Be the bridge. Name client pressures to your team and show the team you’ve got their back.
• Micro-gratitude. “Could you please…”, “Thank you for the quick turnaround”—tiny phrases, outsized compounding effect.
• Trust as default. Hire → grant trust → protect it. Course-correct clearly when needed.
• Everyday culture. Call, drop by, check in. Rituals > slogans.
• Model accountability. Apologize fast; ask “What happened and how do we move forward?” (save the retro for later).
• Guard the standard with kindness. Kind ≠ permissive. Address poor behavior directly and respectfully; protect the culture.

Proof Points & Stories

• Client-team translator: Empathy on both sides turned “us vs. them” into partnership—and better delivery.
• Technician loyalty: Field teams stay for years; clients notice—the culture is visible at the edge.
• Crisis generosity: During COVID, Azin paid meaningful bonuses to essential field staff—loyalty deepened.
• Dignity with customers: When a client mistreated an employee, leadership backed the employee, reset norms, and preserved the relationship.
• Ripple effect: Clients asked Azin for mentorship on building similar environments internally.

Memorable Lines

• “Being ‘soft’ never meant I wasn’t noticing. Kind leadership is intelligent leadership.”
• “Trust is yours to lose.”
• “Culture is built in the day-to-day, not at a team-building event.”
• “Safety invites creativity; fear shrinks it.”

Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review us on your favourite podcast platform! Thanks for tuning in!

Stay Connected!

Thanks again for tuning in to the Coaching Divas Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and review the show. That's the best way you can show your support.

We’d also love to connect on Instagram, so go ahead and take a screenshot of this episode or maybe a photo of yourself listening along to the podcast. Post it to your Instagram stories. Be sure to mention us on www.instagram.com/thecoachingdivas or email us at thecoachingdivaspodcast@gmail.com.

We’ll send some Instagram love right back at you. We'll be back next month with another great episode.

In this episode, we go beyond policies and platforms to unpack the human side of hybrid work. Inspired by themes from past Coaching Divas conversations, we look at how leadership, self-awareness, and empathy play critical roles in making hybrid teams successful—and sustainable.

Hybrid work isn’t just about where you work. It’s about how you show up, how teams stay connected, and how leaders foster environments where trust, autonomy, and clarity can coexist. Whether you’re an executive redefining team culture or a solo contributor managing your energy, this episode will spark fresh thinking on how to navigate the new normal with intention and impact.

In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

• 🧭 Flexibility is Powerful—But Needs Structure
  We love the freedom hybrid work offers—but without shared expectations, that freedom can become fragmentation. We explore how leaders and teams can co-create guardrails that support both autonomy and accountability.
• 💬 Communication Must Be Intentional
  As the Coaching Divas have often said, “What gets left unsaid gets misunderstood.” In a hybrid world, intentional communication isn't optional—it’s essential. We talk strategies for maintaining psychological safety, building team rituals, and avoiding the slow fade of connection.
• 👀 Proximity Bias is Real—And Fixable
  Those showing up in-person often get more facetime—and sometimes, more favour. We explore how conscious leadership and inclusive practices can ensure remote team members aren’t left behind in visibility or advancement.
• 🏢 Culture Doesn’t Live in Walls
  Culture is built in every interaction. We look at how to intentionally shape team culture—virtually and physically—through coaching-style leadership, shared values, and emotional intelligence.
• 🔄 The Inner Work of Hybrid Work
  One of the most overlooked pieces of the hybrid puzzle? Mindset. We discuss how awareness of your own habits, biases, and needs can transform how you collaborate—and how you lead.

✨ Bonus Insight:
Just like past Coaching Divas episodes have highlighted, success in hybrid work isn't just operational—it's relational. The leaders and teams thriving right now are the ones asking better questions, not just implementing better tools.

Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review us on your favourite podcast platform! Thanks for tuning in!

Stay Connected!

Thanks again for tuning in to the Coaching Divas Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and review the show. That's the best way you can show your support.

We’d also love to connect on Instagram, so go ahead and take a screenshot of this episode or maybe a photo of yourself listening along to the podcast. Post it to your Instagram stories. Be sure to mention us on www.instagram.com/thecoachingdivas or email us at thecoachingdivaspodcast@gmail.com.

We’ll send some Instagram love right back at you. We'll be back next month with another great episode.