Aspire for More with Erin
Aspire for More with Erin
From Stuck to Growth: Leadership Insights with Kerry Chartrand
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Welcome back to another episode of aspire for more with Erin podcast where I have. A special guest today that's going to talk about this sentence. But I've been here for 10 years and dang it. I do a good job doing what I do. If I haven't been that person. I've been that person because I've told you over and over again and now Kerry chartrand has is here to talk to me about her experience with. People like me and people who want to are scared to grow because she was a frontline and an executive for. In various different operations roles for 17 years inside senior living and she is now the founder and ceo of win two And she's Canadian. So I am still on my, international podcast streak, which is exciting. So Kerry, thank you for being here. I appreciate it.
Kerry:Hey, Erin, thank you so much for having me. Unfortunately, we're not face to face in the great white North, which is not white yet. Quite yet where I am, but it's great to be talking to you down in the U. S.
Erin:I know. I really want to get there. I'm, I thought I was going to get there this year for, just to see the Niagara Falls, take my husband to a Buffalo Bills game for our anniversary, but. that's not going to happen this year. So 1 day soon, I'm going to get that passport. Okay,
Kerry:do it.
Erin:All right. So I think it's really cool that we're going to talk about this sentence. You have the experience of both being inside the community and then being in the corporate level. Now you have the outside experience of starting a tech company and I have worked for a tech company. And I have seen different versions of my stubborn self. and that sentence is really important. And it's something as a leader, we have to learn how to navigate with our teams. Because we might, as a leader may not think that, but somebody else does. So tell me all about it. Talk to me about it.
Kerry:Yeah, sure. I love this. I love this sentence. I love how we've framed this conversation today because really great people stay loyal to the organization and do a fantastic job every day. And I do want to start by saying those are necessary members of our team, and they have a Tremendous value. just to start, I don't want to devalue that as, part of contribution, but I think what we want to talk about today is that, when you want the promotion, when you want to take the next step, when you can see yourself as that greater contributor in the next role, and you're not getting there, and this is what's turning around in your head. how come I'm not getting there and that can be so frustrating for aspiring leaders and there's nothing I love more than giving really tactical and useful, advice and recommendations to folks that want to grow. So fantastic topic. I'm thrilled to talk about it today. And, certainly in my role. Growing through my career. this has come up many times. And on the flip side, as someone who's grown a lot from the beginning, I have had to look at, the next step from a very different perspective from, I've been here from 10 years for 10 years and I'm doing a great job. I've had to really be keen to say, I don't want to be here for 10 years. And so what is it beyond doing a great job that it's going to take for me to get to the next level? And I think that's those 2 kind of things intersect, for this conversation today.
Erin:Yeah, it's true. It's I think 1 of the main mistakes and even now I can make it if I'm not careful. It's what do I want?
Kerry:Yeah,
Erin:what do I want?
Kerry:Yeah,
Erin:if you don't know what you want. Then you have nothing to leverage and you're always waiting for somebody to tell you what you want or to give you options to choose from. But if you have a starting point of what you want, then every choice you have is filtered through this known fact that you want that, what you want, and if you want to stay where you are, that's great, but that doesn't mean that you don't change. Because tech is coming, tech is here, and tech is going to require you to change. you don't get to stay the same as you've been doing for 10 years. that's not an option anymore.
Kerry:And probably the person in the role for the last 10 years has had change thrust upon them. The likelihood that you haven't experienced change, and change is something that I always say everyone thinks that if you ask a group of people, how do you feel about change? Everyone puts their hand up. They love it. They love it. As long as it's on their own terms, the minute it becomes someone else's decision that you're going to when change is thrust upon you. Typically we don't really have the same relationship with change at that point, but I think that's such a great starting question. Like where am I trying to get to? That's critical. Am I just trying to get a title or a paycheck or you can advance with those two things as what you're aspiring to. or is it that I want to have greater effect on the people? I want to have a greater effect on the organization. I believe I can offer. Insight and improvement. Like, why do you want this next role? What's important? What about it is important to you? I think that's a good checkpoint also. And it's really interesting because I'm going to share a little story with you about my very beginnings when I was just a young lady, 21, and I had my daughter. And I was a single mom and I had 0. I actually 11 in my bank account. I had nothing and I had not yet gone to school and I had to make a decision. And I asked myself that question. What is it that I want? And I had long term goals of what I wanted, which was to be able to put my daughter through university. So that was an 18 year out projection from that time, 19. And also, what do I immediately need to solve for? I needed to solve for putting food on the table. So from food on the table to can I put this kid through university one day, those were like huge goals. And that's what I wanted. It wasn't necessarily that I wanted a certain title or I wanted a certain path. And so the next question I asked myself is what is the next best step for me to take to get there? And it was immediately enroll in school. So that application went in when she was three months old. And when she was six months old, I had a backpack and a baby bag and out the door. I went, to go to school for business and I chose business because I felt it was versatile enough. I felt it had enough pathways for a career. I was confident it would help me reach those goals. And so starting with that question was absolutely vital. So I'm really glad that you touched on that.
Erin:Yeah, for me, the question that sentence I've been doing a good job for 10 years. 1 of the things the reason why it kept me stuck is because I didn't really know what I wanted. Truly, I didn't know and I didn't have an opportunity to grow in my mind, I didn't think I had an opportunity to grow. And therefore, I just stayed This doesn't change the passion that I had for the community. The, all the things that I did for my residents, like all of that is innate. That was just like breathing and drinking to me. So it, that doesn't, this, I'm not talking about that side of the job. It was, I thought all the doors were closed for me. So what's the point? Yeah, I'm really good at what I do. this is what's really good. I've got all this stuff to prove it. And, y'all are coming in at me and I'm, I, it's just that I'm doing a great job, but I didn't realize at the time that the skills that I needed. To grow, even within my own current title were literally like, when people say it's in the discomfort zone, it's outside of your comfort zone. Like I didn't, I did not know how to materialize that into my life. It was uncomfortable. I didn't like the feeling. So therefore I didn't do it. I don't have the time. That's what I did. That's what that sentence says. And now I realize, Oh, this is the discomfort zone. It is this. Oh, in order to. Get somebody to listen to this podcast, I'm going to have to create a clip for it, and I'm going to have to edit it, and I'm going to have to put it out there, and then I'm going to have to write my thoughts, and that took a long time. It took a long time to learn, and what got in the way before was actually the way to the other side. And I had to walk through extreme discomfort to even understand what I wanted,
Kerry:Yeah. And I think that you're touching on something, which is the next, I think the next phase of shifting out of that kind of stuck place. If we go on to the kind of the growth mindset or the abundance, it really was. Okay, I've identified what I want to do. And now I've got a problem to solve. And the problem I have to solve is how am I going to build a podcast? And what. In addition to that, let's build on top of it. What problems am I solving once I get that podcast built, right? You're such a great leader and influencer in the seniors housing space. And so now you've got a platform where the problem you're solving is helping other people get unstuck. And so it's just this layer. And every time you look at something and you think, okay, I see this as an issue. Maybe it's an issue in the sector that we both love and have built our careers on. Maybe it's how do I take my knowledge and turn it into something that's really useful to the sector? What problem am I going to solve there? But as both of us being entrepreneurs and having that, having taken that leap out of the structured corporate environment and into our own worlds, There is just a host of problems that you need to be able to solve to do that. And the mindset around sitting in the discomfort, maybe not knowing, I'll give you an example myself here, as I've been building went to on the same theme as building a podcast, I have a demo video and I was doing the voiceover and it took me hours to get through my voiceover for the first draft. And then I decided I wanted to go back in. Revise it. And then I did it in one take. that the climbing of the mountain was really tricky, but then when I got there and, it's such a simple example, but I think as we go back to those folks who are stuck in doing a good job or are you doing a good job because you've been doing it over and over? Cause now I can do a voiceover in five minutes. But I had to climb that mountain before I could get there. And yeah, I just think that ability to say. What's the problem? Maybe it's the problem of your department. Maybe it's the problem of your organization. Maybe it's the problem of your own personal development, but there's something to be solved there. If you're feeling stuck. There's always something to be solved to get you out of it. You just have to figure out and tap into what that might be.
Erin:Yeah, that's so true as a leader as you grew in your different operational roles inside of the community, whether it was the administrator and the executive director, higher up regional vice president, whatever it is. That your title was when you identified someone who was stuck. what were some of the stories that. You were able to get somebody unstuck or the negative story of they didn't get unstuck. And therefore, they couldn't work there anymore. give somebody advice, maybe you're not the person who is unstuck, but somebody inside your community is or on your team is what is some advice for them that you have.
Kerry:Yeah, I think that's a fantastic question. And definitely there's both sides of the spectrum, right? There is, it's a very internal mindset shift. I do believe that as an individual, if I'm not getting to where I'd like to go, I definitely have to take responsibility for my mindset first. All the advice in the world can then be absorbed. so that's number one. So that would be my first kind of piece of advice to anyone who's struggling with this right now is. Self reflection is going to be really important. Am I staying comfortable? so that's one. I have seen those people who have been able to shift forward after feeling like they couldn't shift forward, to really try not to be a thou shalt kind of leader, right? You should go do this, you should go do that. You just need to this, you just need to that. I would be more likely to put a problem in front of that person and say, okay, how would you solve it? And so by giving them those things, and even saying, okay, so the ability to solve this problem is what is going to develop your skill set to take on that larger role. Because as you grow in seniors housing, as as you grow into different roles in the sector, the problems. roll up to you, right? I'm sure this is through many industries. And so that's a real leadership skill to be able to say, okay, I'm going to look at this from a high level. I'm going to look at this from a granular level, and I'm going to figure out which pieces I need to. To fix which I need to delegate it. What can I ignore? And so the only way I think to grow and flex that muscle is to put in front of a leader, an aspiring leader, something that they can start to learn that skill set. And then you're coaching and you're guiding along the way. But I, if I had to bestow advice, because, I don't have projects to hand out on this, but. On the podcast. if I really had to sit in front of someone and say, okay, we've got 5 minutes to talk about this. let's nail down how you're going to approach this. My 1st question would be, what's the most important thing to your organization right now? And let's just table occupancy because we know that particularly right now in the sector, that's critically important. But let's just go down a different path. What's critically important. Are you struggling with staffing? Yes, most of us are. Are you struggling with compliance? Or is your team burnt out? what is the issue that's most pressing right now to your organization? And how are you the contributor to the solution? Not just offering up what the problems are. And that has to happen. I'm not saying don't complain. No, complain, right? Bring the issues forward. And with every issue that you are bringing forward, you should be thinking to yourself or presenting back to the leader that you're working with. Okay. Here's what I think we could do about that. Once you start just saying, here's what I think we can do about that. All of a sudden it starts to open up and it starts to build. And if you say that in a room with other team members. And you all start saying, Okay, this is what we can do about that. You're doing it. that's the muscle flex that muscle. Keep flexing it until you feel confident in taking on bigger challenge challenges, being confident with maybe greater disruption to your own day. there have been times where. Just as a, as an individual problem solver, I've sat with my head down in a computer trying to come up with whether it's a creative idea or a process idea to really crack a nut for a company that really was struggling for whatever reason. And I've spent hours doing it before, right? And it, there is a little bit of the, I don't have time to save time. Like where do I fit this in? But what you gain from it is worth the time you'll take away from going through the motions, going through the day to day stuff that you already are really comfortable with and know how to do, get that out of the way, set it aside and really let your, yourself sink into that problem for a little bit. If that's what you need to do.
Erin:Yeah. Problem solving is key and it is a skill. That you really need great practice in, like you should welcome them. Some of them is act are like, I don't want them. This is really bad. I wish I didn't have them. those are the ones you really need to sink your teeth into. because that's a skill set. If you can think proactively, logically through every problem, even the most emotionally riddled problem, you have a huge advantage over other people.
Kerry:Agreed. And really, I'm going to take it to WEN too, because that was a problem and that was a problem in the field. And now it's a tech company. Because as I met with a group of leaders and they were bringing me the, so I said, don't be afraid to complain. I asked them, Hey, guys, what's going on? How are you doing? And they, I knew they weren't doing well. It was post COVID days. And we hashed out the problem and they. They brought all the things that were in the way and what was happening for them. And they were underwater on trying to remember everything themselves, trying to keep a handle on what their teams had and hadn't done. The other frontline leaders that were reporting into them, this is a group of building leaders. they were doing the work for other people because they saw that they were really struggling. this was a problem. This is a huge problem. We were missing all our KPIs. At the time, and we knew it wasn't sustainable. They knew it wasn't sustainable. So did I, but we just were so stuck in the muck that we didn't really know how to solve for it. And so that's where I I dreamt up the concept of went to was to say, how do we. How do we take the operations requirements, the regulatory, the other stakeholders, the finance, all those things. How do we take all that and get it off of people's minds and stop them from spinning around, follow up in emails so that they can just focus on the parts of the job that matter. Because that's the people we're here for people. And so when I thought about that, and I thought, how do I solve for this? It really became when to, and I didn't say, okay, I want to get into tech. Let me come up with a tech idea that I think will be really great and then give it to people like, I'm going to. Concoct a problem that maybe doesn't exist and then offer it up to the sector. I said, what is a huge problem in the sector that no one's looking at right now? I think that's a little bit of a silent burnout path for people that regulatory kind of organizational requirements. It's a silent killer, if you will. and so I just said, okay, how do I make their lives easier? That's it. That's all I want to do. I just want to make their lives easier. This is the one thing that for all the time I've been in seniors housing has been talked about as an issue, but we've never known what to do about it. And so we've backburnered it and ignored it and just accepted that's the way that it works. And I said, what if we didn't have to do that? And that's where that growth mindset comes in, right? That's where that problem solving comes in. Nobody said, Hey, Kerry, could you solve this problem for the sector? No one asked me to do that of my own accord. I said, I'm going to step away from my corporate role and I'm going to build this software knowing that if it gets into the hands, when it gets into the hands of the right people, their lives will be better. That's it. And so it's really indicative. I think of that. Of that perspective of what if we just take a step back and ask the questions and we just looked at what is most important to the business. Our people are the most important to the business. Did I try to solve every people problem? No, I'm just take 1 small lever and said, let me pull that lever and make it easier
Erin:leverage. I talked about leverage recently in a, presentation and that's what problem solving is. It's leverage. Your knowledge is leverage. your ability to look at the 1 problem and solve it is leveraged. Then your ability to solve that problem and see how it connects to the others is leverage and to your point, we. Sometimes underestimate our uniqueness and our abilities, and if we don't think what we have is unique, or we don't think that this problem solving skill is a muscle that. We need to grow, or we think that other people are going to do something. Then we lose our shot and that's not, you're going to hear that in entrepreneur stuff. You're not going to hear that in executive director, circles, because we don't talk to executive directors like that. And I think that's a shame. if you're an executive director, or a leader of any kind, you got to figure out what makes you unique. You got to figure out what problem you solve, because that's your leverage. How well do you do it and then that's the difference maker inside of your community when you bring occupancy back in the table, when you want to hire somebody, what kind of people will work for you. And then you start talking that language to attract them. Um, and that's what how entrepreneurs are trained. Yeah, that is not how executive directors are trained, but it's the same thing. We need the same thing.
Kerry:It's the same skill set. You're right. And I think too, what can happen is When we talk about this kind of solve the problem, it can be really tempting as a front line leader to then look at that as providing an external solution up the chain. And that happens a lot in seniors housing, and then that isn't necessarily something that can be adopted because change management costs, all of those things that are going on. So if we're talking, how do you evoke change at. The site level. Okay. So I know that to grow. I need to solve problems, but I don't have the role that allows me to solve organizational problems because those are bigger kind of than my scope. That can be a little bit of a barrier. I would say for people, but I would say if you're looking at look at your own building, right? Look at what's in your building. What small item if you solve for that today could move the needle. So I'm going to give an example of this. Okay. Many years ago, this is pre seniors housing, but many years ago, I had a boss and he had a great company. He'd been operating at 25. We were an electrical contractor. He had 25 electricians out in the field and he had built this beautiful building by all measures, very successful. He comes to me and he says, Kerry, I don't understand. My project managers are quoting jobs. They are writing down a percentage of profit. They're giving it to me, and I'm, we're doing all these jobs. But then when I get my financial statements at the end of the month, it doesn't tell me I made as much money as it said on those quotes that I was going to make. And I don't understand. I need to understand why. And so I took it away and I was going through what they were doing and just taking a look at it. And I said to him, you're not accounting for your overhead when you're quoting based on direct costs and you're not accounting for your overhead. So let's do this. Let's allocate overhead as labor hours and just add it to the bottom of each of those quotes. And you will have a more accurate Number, and it might be a negative, right? But it will be accurate. And now you can start pricing different or make decisions, whatever you need to do with that. I'm not trying to solve for profitability for the business. All I did was say, if we look at this one number with this different lens, it gives you a whole lot of information to make decisions. I wasn't the owner of that company. I wasn't an electrician. I was really doing bookkeeping at that stage of my career. And but I solved a major problem for him. I didn't recommend going and getting a third party. I didn't recommend a new software. I just looked at the data. even a site leader in seniors housing and executive director can look at the way that something's being executed operationally, you could look at the way at reporting and say, hey, we're missing this key metric. When we're talking about this reporting mechanism, it can be any thing. Really small thing that if you were to just look at it a little closer and offer a new perspective. Now, that's something you can offer. And someone can say, oh, wow. because of that piece of information, I can start looking at things differently. it doesn't have to be a reinvention of the whole org structure to be super, super meaningful.
Erin:Yeah, absolutely. Such good advice. Now, I want to switch to, okay, you have a tech company. Yeah, name is Wintu. And where did that name come from? Oh, I love this question. That is an interesting name. And for those who don't know, when you start a business, The name, the brand, the colors, like all these things matter and I didn't know this at the very beginning, just like how much all of this matters. And, I'm sure there's a story. So I want to hear it.
Kerry:There, there is a little story behind the name of when to, and I love this story. So my youngest daughter, I told the story about my older daughter earlier. My youngest daughter, she's, she's a real sidekick for me. She's very much like me, but I knew that I wanted to build when to she, she plays into this. I'll circle back around to that. Her name's Eva. And I knew I wanted to build when to, it was in my mind. It was. Spinning around for some time before I decided to take the leap and do it and I knew exactly how it would function, right? We would take all the requirements that need to be executed in seniors housing, and we would put it in a time management task management tool that is. Just for seniors housing. I feel as though lots of us are grabbing tools and we're squeezing it into our little sector. And I thought, no, we need a dedicated software. So that's how I got to went to. So this was going on for quite some time before I decided to finally do it. And I was at the point where I needed to actually incorporate. And I didn't have a name yet, it had been six weeks, and I am writing, I had books full of ideas and names and I'd come up with something I thought was genius and it would be gone and around and around. So finally one Sunday, I sat down on my couch and I said, I'm not leaving this couch until I have a name. For this software and eight hours later, my youngest daughter, Eva walks in the door and I'm still on the couch and I still don't have a name and she says, what are you doing? And I said, I got to name this software and I'm not like I has to get done today and she says, she's a little bit of a, she won the problem solving award for in grade eight. Actually, funny enough, she got an award for problem solving, which I thought was a fantastic award, but, so anyway, like apples and trees, right? And so she says to me, okay, let's back this up. She's 14 at the time. Let's back this up. Tell me again exactly what it's going to do. And I said, it's going to tell everyone when they need to do what they need to do. And she says, just call it when to. first words out of her mouth. And she, of course, was a teen. It's a teenager. So it came with a little bit of this isn't that hard, and, it was the name. And so you'll notice our logo is balancing rocks and. The goal of when to really is to create balance for seniors, housing leaders by getting this stuff off their minds and knowing that they've got a mechanism that will have their backs. And yeah, that's how it that's how it got its name.
Erin:When we overcomplicate things, then a 14 year old walks in and just was like, this is so simple.
Kerry:it really goes back to what we're talking about. I could have stood on that name for 10 years.
Erin:Sure. I
Kerry:get it 10 years. I could have been there. It was a problem. I couldn't solve and that goes to another piece. I think it's an interesting segue, but solving the problem is not always individual. There is a real skill and being able to grab the people around you and pull them into the problem and get them to help you. And in this case, it was my teenager, right? you never know where the best idea is going to come from. And so I think it's important to note that it's not necessarily just individually that you have to do that.
Erin:Absolutely. You got to have, it's a team effort. It can be a team effort for sure. So tell us about the problem that you solved with Wintu. Because I think it's interesting. It's an interesting concept. so tell us, give us the deep dive of it
Kerry:for sure. Yeah. I never dreamed that I would be starting a tech company, going back to those beginning years when I was, projecting out. That was now 25 years ago. I didn't see tech in the future, but it became the solution. So that open mindedness around like where the path is going to lead. I just was very open minded about it. And I think that was really great. So when these leaders presented to me that, we are drowning in all of these things that we have to do, that was critical. Point number one that drove me to went to point. Number two is we were recognizing that they were actually executing the items that belonged to other people. And when I asked why it was, because it was easier to just do it themselves than to make sure someone else remembered to do it. And so now I'm burdened by my own role, and I'm carrying the weight of other people's roles. And I'm not really doing a service to those other leaders by taking on their work. Because they're not growing in their roles. Yeah, It's very heartfelt and I do talk about when to as it's a very heart centered software is really built from. I just have such tremendous love and respect for people at the front line in seniors housing. I really do. And it was hard that day to see. and so I was really excited to see how distraught they were, and I really felt like I needed to make it easier. And so what we do is we take all of the requirements. It could be your finance teams requirements. It could be your state regulator requirements. It's whatever needs to be executed within a time frame. at the front line. So if I'm a director of wellness and I need to do falls reviews, I have quality audits. I need to complete all those items that are sitting in my memory banks and if I'm really great at process that might just be coming to me and if I'm not really great at process, but I'm a phenomenal people leader, I could be forgetting those things. And one of two things is happening there, right? Either my, one of two is probably not fair. It's probably a lot of things that can be happening there, right? But my general manager is, or my executive director is like picking up behind me to make sure nothing falls behind. Or I just have big gaps and the big gaps come out of citations. We find out we have big gaps. The regulator walks through the door and cites us for something. We have an adverse event, which is our worst case scenario. If someone gets hurt because we haven't followed through on one of our regulatory actions. Requirements. And so with when to we're taking all of those bits and culinary has things that they have to do and maintenance has preventive maintenance tasks. And there's all kinds of stuff that have to get executed at the front line. I did the math in a retirement home and it's about 12, 000 tasks a year. By the time you take the requirements into account. And the frequency with which people have to do them. That's how many things have to get done. Isn't that amazing? I don't know if I could have guessed that before I sat with the calculator and put all the requirements in Excel and tallied up how often we have to do them. And so taking all of those 12, 000 items. Putting them into WENTU. So now when I'm the executive director, or I'm the culinary manager, or I'm the director of wellness, whoever I am, I walk in the building, I open up WENTU and it says to me, today I want you to do preventive maintenance on these five items. Today I want you to do these three items. Audits in wellness to make sure that all of your compliance requirements are met executive director. I want you to make sure you submit these 3 financial items today so that that all of that is taken care of. So now, instead of as a leader going home or driving into the morning or waking up at 2 am or whenever it is your kids hockey game. We've all done it right. Ops folks. We know that I know this. I lived it. It was one of them. I went to a building at four in the morning. Once I got up, I went to work at four. Why? Because I had forgotten some submissions and I knew my day would be crazy. And the only way for me to get them done was to go in three hours before the rest of the world and get them done. And that sounds crazy to somebody who's not in our sector and like a completely reasonable thing to do to somebody who is in our sector. Yeah, and I thought no more people shouldn't have that. You should I should have if I had a tool the day before saying, hey, don't forget these 3 things. I wouldn't have woken up at 2 in the morning thinking about it. And if I had, I would have just put my head back on my pillow and thought it's in one too. I don't need to worry about it. And so that's really why I built it, what it does and its purpose.
Erin:That's great. and the response is positive. People like the fact that they can sleep a little bit sounder at night.
Kerry:Yeah,
Erin:that it's all in 1 spot and not in multiple different spots.
Kerry:Absolutely. Yeah. The feedback has been tremendous. yeah, it's been really phenomenal and you're right. it's, I can sleep at night. I've had, I've been sitting with people and showing them when to and had them open up an Excel doc where they're trying to do this manually. Probably the most frequent reply, like response back when I share what I'm doing is how come we haven't done this before? And we haven't there. There's there. I haven't found this anywhere else where this is specifically what we're addressing. There's so much great tech out there. but yeah, the response to went to has been absolutely. Outstanding I think the sector is ready for it. I think we're our aptitude and our desire for technology is increasing. You go to a conference now in seniors housing or long term care and tech is a huge part of it. And I think that's. Because the binders and the paper like that just can't be how we function anymore. it worked when it worked and life is just moving too fast. And that's going to. We're going to see that increase over time, right? As our buildings become more full and we have more family members and more residents, and as more buildings open, it's going to be harder and harder to hold on to manual processes and memory banks as our method. yeah, I think it's very well timed. For the sector also, which I'm really pleased about.
Erin:It's true. I still like paper though, elderly millennial. So I do like colored pens and paper. There is just something about it that helps my creative juices flow, but I do put it in a Google doc as well. So I can
Kerry:well, you'll laugh though. when I designed went to, I designed it on paper. I actually sat with the pen and I designed the workflow with a pen and a paper. So it's still an important part of our life.
Erin:Yes. For me and my colored pens and highlighters. That's right. Paper. It sounds like an amazing product. And I hope it's something that many people get to look at and see the relief of it. And, for a lot of case studies to come out, so you can talk about why it's working and what's it doing because it solves the problem of having everything in 1 notebook per se, but it's inside of a tech, it's part of a tech stack instead of a notebook. but it also, it's the silent burnout piece. It's the reason why I'm not sleeping. it's all those things because I did forget something.
Kerry:Yeah, I think sometimes we look at taking care of our teams as being like recognition. This is important stuff, right? I'm not criticizing that at all, but, taking care of our teams as recognition and, giving them how to take care of themselves apps themselves. I don't know if that's the right grammar, but how to take apps to help them take care of themselves, right? and all of these important, meaningful, good stuff. It's good stuff, right? But if I really want to take care of my team, I'm going to give them tools that make the job easier. That to me is the ultimate, I care for my team decision that you can make because the rest of it still puts the burden on the team member to lift it off themselves. And with when to, I feel like I'm saying, let me take this burden off of you. You don't have to do anything, but log in the day it's ready for you. And that is what, The beauty of it is and that's where, people, I just was thinking the other day about, fitting more exercise into my own world. And I came up with all the reasons why that's all the barriers that are there. And so someone standing beside me saying, do a better job at that is not going to help me. But if someone handed me a schedule with all the things that I needed to do in it, all timed out for me so that I don't have to give a moment's thought to what I'm going to do, now all of a sudden they have given me a way To do it a way to move forward. So I'm like, I'm so proud of it to really, I'm so proud that in my career, that experience and that mindset, that growth mindset and that problem solving mindset has led me to such a big evolution of. Of something I can offer up to people because we were there, through COVID. We were there through watching just really good people and they would walk into any circumstance, to take care of others and to develop something that's for them is, it's such a, an honor for me really in a gift that I have the space to do it.
Erin:Yeah. It's a perfect example. I feel like this entire conversation, It's the skill set in the mindset has to come 1st before your skill set improves the difference between someone who is struggling and being stuck and saying that I've been doing this for 10 years and I do a good job and we don't need to move forward or I don't need to learn this skill or what and the person who is. Excelling rapidly is the mindset and I believe your mindset is the story that you tell yourself why you can't do it. And sometimes that story is true. And sometimes you just have to be honest with yourself because my story about exercise is, is a, ongoing conversation and it is what gets in the way becomes the way. You just have to walk through and then you have to be honest with yourself. So the story stops. It's not worth getting up at 5:00 AM for me today. Okay. Okay. I'll do it another time, but today's not the day. Okay. But instead I'm beating myself up. You have to literally say, it's not worth it today.
Kerry:Yep.
Erin:Or I'm not willing to sacrifice 5:00 AM wake up call.
Kerry:That's right. So if I don't get up at five, but I get up at six, what's the 15 minute? That I'm going to spend at least stretching my body if I can't get a workout. And you're right. You're right. It's not always about being. I think there's this overachiever risk that we dabble in when we talk about this. okay. Great example. Okay. So I had was a single mom. I'm working hard. I'm doing great. And one of my bosses who was married to his high school sweetheart and his wife stayed home. He's my boss. And he looks at me one day and he goes, how do you do it all? And I said, there are weeds in my lawn. I am not exaggerating. They are taller than my three year old. She would be lost like it's a jungle if I let her go out the door. That's how bad it was. It was so bad. The neighbors were going to call the city on me. It was awful, but I wasn't overachieving in every aspect of my life. I was getting really great results with my career. I was very focused on loving my kids and making sure they were fed and all of those good things. But was I cutting the grass? No. So you're not getting up at 5 a. m.? Okay, you got up at 6. Is it over? Is it game over on achievement? Absolutely not. It's just not where the energy is going in that moment. And I bet you that those days you're putting out remarkable content and you're moving other parts forward. It's a spectrum.
Erin:It is. It's a spectrum. And there are some people who can do it. And instead of making me feel, me making me feel bad because somebody else can do it. And I'm just like, you go girl, I'm supporting you.
Kerry:I love this for you. I love it for you. The marathon runners. I love this for you. I love it for you. I once
Erin:did a 10k.
Kerry:Oh, my
Erin:Oh, thank you for being a guest today. I love how, we can be vulnerable and talk about the things and, and hopefully give somebody a piece of information that helps them in their moments of being stuck and knowing that we all get stuck and we all doubt the differences. I believe anyone's point of difference is how long you're willing to stay uncomfortable to get better.
Kerry:Absolutely. And that is something
Erin:that I remind myself all the time. Like you got to stay in this, don't run away from it. Stay in it.
Kerry:It's hard to do Erin. I'm so thank you so much for having me. I'm really grateful. I love that. you're coming working your way to the north and I don't live far from Niagara Falls.
Erin:yes, I have been to Buffalo and I didn't realize how close it was and I'm like, oh, my gosh, we're going to do this. So it is on the bucket list. Excellent. It's going to be real. Look forward to it. okay. So Kerry Chartrand can be found on LinkedIn. Yes. Wintu has a website. Yes. What is that website?
Kerry:Wintu. ca.
Erin:Okay. W E
Kerry:N T O O.
Erin:Yes. Dot C A. And, reach out to her, follow her, and thank you so much for being here. And always to my listeners. I guess if you found this, If you find this episode, valuable, just refer it, send it to somebody to listen to, because I think it's really important, to share what makes you feel better and stronger in who you are as a person and always aspire for more for you.