WAYNE BROWN: Hello, I’m your host Wayne Brown and welcome to the ET project. We’re delighted to be delivering this podcast for executive talent all over the world whom we are affectionately referring to as Team ET. Today, we’re flying into Seattle, Washington and chatting with Stephanie Peirolo, a writer and executive coach who bridges the world of business, faith and personal transformation. Her non-fiction opinion work has appeared in top advertising trade publications and the journals of women’s religious communities, evidence of her rare ability to move seamlessly between secular and sacred spaces. As a storyteller, Stephanie has shared her powerful narratives on The Moth, featured on NPR and in the bestselling book All These Wonders. Stephanie co-hosts the Bad Boss Brief, a podcast that dives into the real stories behind workplace dysfunction and what better leadership could actually look like. She also writes Fierce Grace on Substack, touching on topics from work to grief and dealing with discomfort. With a BA in creative writing from Stanford University and an MA in transformational leadership from Seattle University’s School of Theology and Ministry, Stephanie is a board-certified executive coach who brings deep listings, sharp insight and radical compassion to every conversation. She coaches both corporate and individual clients and leads training for organizations, offering practical tools rooted in story, intention and organizational expertise. Team, in today’s episode, we turn our focus to Stephanie’s book The Saint and the Drunk, a guide to making big decisions in your life and we explore why she believes that we all can build a practice of intentional decision-making based on the ancient tools of discernment, as well as in the process, use our imagination, the genius of the body and other paths to reconnect to our emotional compass. It’s truly a fascinating conversation for everyone looking to find alternative ways towards better decisions. 

INTRO: Welcome to the ET project, a podcast for those executive talents determined to release their true potential and create an impact. Join our veteran coach and mentor, Wayne Brown, as we unpack an exciting future together.

WAYNE BROWN: Hello team, welcome to another week of the ET project. What if you could tap into your internal compass? Something that could guide you through every turning point, without a spreadsheet, without second-guessing. Well, maybe not everything was perfect, but what if the only thing blocking it was an over-reliance on your intellect? That’s the provocative question at the heart of today’s conversation, is we’re going to address our theme, the pragmatic mystic, ancient spiritual technologies for modern leadership. So, we know that most of you are leaders. Hopefully you’re going to take something really valuable away with you today. We’re so trained to think our way to the answers that maybe we’ve forgotten how to listen, listening through our body, our intuitions, even to our resistance. And our guest today has spent many years recovering those lost tools, and she’s here today to share some of her insights. Stephanie Peirolo, welcome to the ET project, I’m really looking forward to our conversation. 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Thank you for having me, Wayne, I’m glad to be here. 

WAYNE BROWN: We’re going to jump into the deep end, you have such a broad career, journalism, marketing, sales, you’re currently working as an executive coach, you’re still writing. When you’re working with a client and they’re feeling stuck, particularly for leaders in this case, what’s the first question that you ask them if they say, I don’t know what it is or what next? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I would say I might invite them to maybe sit with their body or take a deep breath or kind of… whatever it is that helps them step out of that sort of intellectual framework and say, I want you to tune into what you really want. Let’s just start there, put aside the practicalities, put aside what other people tell you you should be doing. What do you want in your like deepest part of you? And it’s interesting because a lot of times there’s some resistance to that, I remember when the book launched last spring, I did a retreat and I had a room full of people, most of them are women from like 20 to 80. And when I said, I want you to start with what you want, there was this sort of murmur of like, “what do you mean?” “Just what I want?” And so that can be a good place to start, like, what do you want? If it doesn’t have to make sense, if you don’t have to justify it, if you don’t have to go and explain to your parents, just what do you want? 

[00:05:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: And then the next thing I would probably do if someone is feeling like they’re stuck is I might ask them to unpack what stuck means for them because that is often a rich area of exploration. 

WAYNE BROWN: Well, let’s circle back to the book. I mean, we’re going to talk a lot around the book, the book is called; The Saint and The Drunk: A Guide to Making the Big Decisions in Your Life, I had the pleasure of reading it as we touched on just before we hit record, Stephanie. It is really thought-provoking, it is also very pragmatic, and hence my theme topic. Let me introduce the book a little bit, it pairs the 16th century Jesuit saint Ignatius with a 20th century co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. And for leaders who maybe have no interest in religion or recovery, the book has so much, even though it comes from that spiritual purpose or that spiritual angle, it’s not necessarily about you need to be religious or you need to have a faith, the book offers you so much you can take away. What was your purpose for bringing the book to life? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Well, I had done the spiritual exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, which is a practice that… it took me nine months, you can do shorter versions, but I did it over a nine-month period in my 30s. And it profoundly altered how I make decisions because I learned how to discern, which is a spiritual practice of making decisions that’s super Catholic. And I would talk to people, sometimes friends, sometimes clients, about insights that I had into decision-making, and they would be curious about it. Like, wait, wait, tell me more. And in an executive coaching situation, I’m dealing with clients where we don’t talk anything about spirituality or religion. And so, I was very diffident to bring that framework to them. And then I realized that in the 12-step model that many people use in recovery, there was a way in. So, when Bill Wilson co-founded Alcoholics Anonymous, it started out as an explicitly Christian program. And some of the early members who were recovering alcoholics didn’t believe in God. They were like, okay, well, what about us, agnostics, atheists, people of different faiths? Are we supposed to just die in the gutter? Where’s space for us? And so, the early members of AA said, what if we let everyone make their own determination about what their higher power is? And for some people, that would be a 12-step meeting. For other people, it would be nature. For some people, it would be God or Allah or whatever. And so, leaving it up to the individual seemed like… it worked very well. A lot of people who otherwise would not have chosen to participate in a program that was explicitly Christian were able to get help. And I realized if I took the Ignatian practice and put it through a lens of, you choose your own adventure in terms of your understanding of the divine, it would open it up potentially to people. And what I find is that a lot of my executive coaching clients, especially the ones I was working with at the time, were very intentional. So, I think of one CEO that I was working with who was a founder of a very, very successful company who was an atheist but had a really deep intention to build a company that was doing good things in the world, to create a place where people could thrive. And he was very ethical and very moral, and he loved this framework, he loved it. He was like, I want to take these handouts and I’m going to bring them home to my partner. And then some younger friends that I was working with also suggested that I put it in a book. And so, during the pandemic, I was starting to use this content with my clients. And what I found was that that original framework, it resonated with them. But what I was finding is that over the many centuries, as we make decisions, we are buffeted by so many cultural narratives, that I realized that anyone that is making a big decision, whether it’s career or relationship or education or whatever, they’re going to have to navigate the different barriers of these sort of recurrent narratives. And so, I took nine of the most common. 

[00:10:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Like, what are your stories about money? What are your stories about work? So as an example is, in a lot of families and cultures, there are certain kinds of work which are prioritized: If you are an engineer or if you are a doctor, you are a good son or daughter. If you’re going to be an artist, there’s something suspect. And that may be valid, and it may resonate for you. But the idea of understanding the narratives and sort of unpacking them, was I realized for modern people, stepping outside of that old spiritual framework, really important. And then I just talk about a really… I just wrote down Pragmatic Mystic, I’m totally using that in my marketing materials. Because that was one of the things when I was making career decisions or deciding what kind of career I wanted to pursue when I was younger, there were so many books and articles about follow your dreams and manifest your… and at the time, I was a single mom with two young kids working three jobs. And I had some very specific realities and duties and responsibilities. And so, I really wanted to write a book that took into account the very real responsibilities that many of us had, and yet still make space for the dream, the leap, the longed for. 

WAYNE BROWN: Right. So, what do you hope people take away after they’ve read the book? If they could just take one thing, say one thing you they’d take. 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I think what I hope that they take is a newfound confidence in their ability to make decisions that are good for them.  

WAYNE BROWN: Okay. 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: And I really believe that each one of us has the ability to tap into a sense of calling or purpose. And that for many people, just even to understand like, wait, what is a calling? What is it? If you can tap into that, it can really be life-changing. And for other people who might not resonate with that sense of a calling, just have a sense of, I have an internal compass that is reliable, so every time I have to make a decision, I know how to do that. It’s almost like the difference between someone who knows how to drive a car and someone who does not. You might not choose to own a car, but it’s useful in case of emergency to be able to get into a car and drive it. And I feel like making a decision is as important as knowing how to drive a car. And a surprising amount of people don’t know how to drive that car, we don’t know how to make an intentional decision. 

WAYNE BROWN: Let’s talk a little bit about definition of the word discernment, just so everyone is on the same page. In this case, we’re talking around decisions, but how do you define discernment? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Well, there is the religious decision-making process, discernment is usually used in the context of someone who is deciding whether or not to become a nun or a priest or a monk. I am reclaiming discernment as an intentional decision-making process that is deeply steeped in your own personal values. So, a decision can be, what do we want to have for dinner tonight? And should I buy this television or this television? You can make that kind of a decision using a pretty rational pros and cons, Yelp reviews, whatever, and be okay. But if you are deciding; what kind of career do I want? Do I want to move with my spouse to another country and start a life there? Do I want to have children? There are some decisions which are so personal and so important that having a way of understanding what we want to do that is intentional and deep and takes time. I think we’re used to making a decision in a really… like quickly, like yes or no, like it’s the lightning round. And the large decisions in our life often can take days or weeks or months. And so having a different name, saying, I am going to honor this more intentional longer-term work around deciding with a different name seemed appropriate. 

[00:15:00]

WAYNE BROWN: You touched on something earlier that I wanted to circle back to, when you said that a lot of us are trained to make quick decisions and leaders in particular tend to be rewarded for speed. So, discernment as a practice itself isn’t necessarily something that happens quickly, it can be a slow process. So how do you counter that resistance, if you like, if an executive says, I don’t have the time to sit around and discern, I have to make immediate decisions. 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Again, there are circumstances where a quick decision is appropriate, but I think about it as, again, a skill. Like I’ve had a discernment practice for half my life, so I’m pretty good at it now. And so, I can make decisions using this model very rapidly, sometimes in a couple of hours. And so, it’s not always long, it’s like when you first do it and you first become comfortable with it. But I think it depends, if you are making a decision that is going to have a major impact on your life or your family’s life, it behooves us to treat it with respect and to take some time. And again, this is where I come back to the idea of narratives; what stories have you been told by your culture? Is it bad to take a week to make a decision? Is it bad to decide that you want to marry someone after you’ve been on two dates? On either side, there are decisions we are told we have to make in a certain way. And I feel like what I want to do is honor each individual’s capacity and approach, some of us are slower processors, some of us are very fast processors, there’s no right or wrong, it’s understanding what is authentic to you and then honoring that. Like I am, I speak quickly, I read quickly, I write a lot of words, I’m a very quick processor. My husband is a very slow processor, he is brilliant, he’s very successful, but we’ve had to understand that we think things through at a different pace. And there’s no right or wrong, there’s no value judgment, it’s just understanding, oh, as we are discerning or working through something, we have to adjust to each other’s individual styles. And I think it’s the same thing with leaders, to really honor how you make decisions and then other key stakeholders, how they do the same. 

WAYNE BROWN: So, we have to be very intentional, you use that word intentional, we have to approach things with that intent. How do you go about being intentional? Is there a guide? There’s a 12-step process in AA, but how do you go about it? Do you follow a sequence of steps yourself? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Well, it’s funny because when people ask me that question now, it’s very self-serving, but I say, buy the book, my book is a workbook, it literally is a workbook on how to make decisions. But for me personally, what I… well, there’s some homework that I have already done. So, one of the things that I think is really important is to understand your values and priorities. And, again, without judgment. And understand what is important to you and how it falls. So, for me, family is very important. If there was a wonderful opportunity for me to move to another country, I would most assuredly say no, because my daughter and two grandchildren live 20 minutes away from my house. For other people, it might be a different decision. And so, understanding what is your hierarchy of needs, if you will, and what is it that you will or will not do is foundational. Also, understanding what are the practical guardrails that you have around your life, if you are a caregiver for elderly parents, that is something you need to consider if you’re deciding whether or not you want to go to graduate school in another town. If you have just had back surgery, maybe this is not the time to go on that hiking vacation that you have been dreaming of. So, there are practical considerations that you also need to keep in mind. And then you can get to the like; what do I want? What am I attracted to? What calls to me? 

[00:20:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: But you have to have done some of that foundational work before you can get to the actual discernment part. 

WAYNE BROWN: So, the pragmatic element comes in, we have to have that basis and then we can start to really think more broadly, I guess, about the decision that we need to make. One of the elements that I read in the book was around imagination that I think Ignatius brings this in through his teachings, but how does imagination play a role in the discernment process for you?

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: So, Ignatius was a mercenary before he was a priest, and he was injured, both of his legs were, I think, broken or very damaged. And he had a lot of surgeries, and he had a lot of time to recover in his family’s castle in Spain. And he had very few books to read so he spent a lot of time thinking. And he came up with this process as he was in his sickbed, where he would deeply imagine going back to being a mercenary and he would imagine being on the battlefield and the excitement and what it smelled like and what it felt like in his body. He was also considering whether or not he wanted to become a priest. So, he would, as a different exercise, stop and deeply imagine being a priest. All of the things that came with that and he would imagine what it tasted like, what it smelled like, what it felt like in his body. And he would watch and see what happened emotionally to him. And what he found was that when he did that sort of meditation on becoming a mercenary again, he felt an uptick in emotion. He felt the sort of elation and energy which quickly fell off. When he thought about becoming a priest, he felt good in a sustaining way and stayed there. And so, the whole process of discernment came from Ignatius imagining himself in these two scenarios. And that is actually how I have described this to friends, not clients, who are trying to make a decision. I talk in the book about talking to a friend of mine, Danielle, we worked together and she was trying to decide if she wanted to become a photographer and leave the advertising agency where we worked. And I said, deeply imagine a day in the life in each scenario and then see what comes up for you. And she was like, oh my God, that’s genius. And I’m like, yeah, it’s the signation, whatever. And so, the imagination can be very rich for some people. Again, this might not resonate for you, but really imagining what your life is like in this possible scenario and then sitting with; how does it make you feel in the moment? And then how does it make you feel over time? 

WAYNE BROWN: Is there a distinction you draw between that and people who fill their thoughts with wishful thinking perhaps? Like is there a distinction between taking it too far? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I think the idea of… and part of this is again, in any kind of spiritual practice, whether it’s meditation or prayer or whatever, I believe you learn how to understand the different sort of movements of your mind or your emotions or spirit or whatever language you use. And I know for me, when I am daydreaming of fame, it has a kind of fizzy electric energy, which is initially exciting and then kind of depleting. Whereas if I am deeply imagining in the Ignatian sense, it’s more of a meditation and I’m more just sort of listening. And when I find the answer, it feels like Ignatius described, a kind of calm certainty. Like when I wake up and I know that I have made a decision, it is with a grounded, clear, very much of the earth sensation rather than that sort of fizzy, wouldn’t that be fantastic? Kind of energy. It’s like the difference that I might feel if I drank like an entire pot of coffee, as opposed to a couple of glasses of water. 

WAYNE BROWN: Okay. How do you encourage your clients to really tune back into their body and the physical aspect rather than the rationale, the intellect?

[00:25:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Right. So again, important caveat, this is a challenging one for people who have had trauma. So, I just want to name that there are other things you can do. But for people who are wanting to touch into their body, I usually give them a couple of suggestions. One, find an exercise and do it without any distraction. And ideally an exercise that you do alone that is rhythmic. So, I love to swim, I swim, I don’t have any headphones, I don’t have anything, I go to the pool when it’s very quiet and it’s very contemplative for me. And a lot of times I go into the pool in one mood and come out of the pool with something completely different that’s arising from my body, not my brain. For some people it’s walking, Tai Chi, but try to find some sort of movement that is rhythmic and just clear your head, do it like a meditation, no noise, no podcast, just be, see what arises for you. I also suggest that people can try to play with their senses, like Monday can be hearing day, listen to your favorite music, maybe put on headphones and dance around. Tuesday could be taste, eat your favorite foods, have your favorite bottle of wine. And the idea of tuning into sex and sensuality can be a way for people to tap into what’s happening in their body, a massage, body work. Just look at whatever it is that you can try and maybe try a couple of things, whether it’s a long bike ride or a bath where you are focusing on your body and just see what happens. And then be ready for anything, sometimes anger can come up, sometimes grief can come up, sometimes you could start laughing or maybe it’s much subtler, but it’s almost like you’re trying to tune into a radio station and the reception isn’t very good and you have to kind of go back and forth and try some different things. But when you get it, you know. 

WAYNE BROWN: One of the things I was really surprised by in doing a little bit of research for this conversation was how many modern-day and different practices around the world can be so closely tied back to the Jesuit practice or Ignatius way of thinking, his theology, if you like. Even design thinking, I don’t know if you know much about design thinking, but the whole premise of design thinking can be tied very much back to exactly what he was talking about with discernment; experience, reflection, and action. There are so many connections in modern-day that can be related back to it. What is it that you think the practice brings to the broader community? I know you talk about the Quakers, for instance, in the book as one example. Can this be used as a community practice as well?

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Absolutely. And the Quaker practice that I refer to is called a clearness committee, where a group of people will get together to help either an individual or multiple people in the group to make a big decision. And what I think can happen in a community, and it could be a team, it could be a family, discernment says that everyone’s individual experience is valid, and there’s a lot of curiosity. So rather than coming in with an understanding, this is what I should do, this is how I should move. Like, what am I hearing? And you can move that from what am I hearing internally, moving in my spirit, to what is it that I’m hearing internally in the group that I’m with. I do a lot of team coaching, and so, when I have a leadership team that’s maybe working through some conflict and we’re off site for two days, I am absolutely using that listening of discernment in working with this group. I’m not telling them that, but that’s a big part of my facilitation process, is to get curious and think every single person in here is acting from best intention and doing what makes sense to them. How can I make it make sense to me? How can I make it make sense to other people? And in the Quaker practice of a clearness committee, one person who is making a decision invites elders or family members who they respect, and the listeners, they just ask questions, they don’t give advice, they just ask questions. And the goal of the questions is to make the person that they’re asking them of clear. And so, if you think about it so often, particularly in work settings, we don’t really listen to the other person, we’re kind of pausing. 

[00:30:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: And when we ask questions, it’s often in the way that you see on a legal drama, like, I’m going to get you, or I’m going to convince you to my side. There’s often an agenda, and I do this myself. When we can listen intentionally out of pure curiosity to really understand, how does this make sense to you. I want to understand how you are seeing this, what you are coming to awareness of, it absolutely changes the conversation in a really profound way.

WAYNE BROWN: And one of the nemesis for coaches is to become that curious listener, focused on your client rather than on the next question you’re going to ask or answer the question that you have.

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I think one of the things, and one of the reasons… I’ve been an executive coach for a decade, and one of the things I love about it is that sometimes you’re listening on different levels. 

WAYNE BROWN: Yes.

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Like I’ve had experiences where what we are talking about is not actually what we’re communicating. And I have to be careful sometimes, because I will have an intuitive sense of what’s happening, and I might say, kind of, “it seems like you have energy around this, do you want to stop and explore that a little bit?” And a lot of times people… my daughter says I have a superpower to make people cry, which… But what I found is that there are… and it happens sometimes in executive coaching sessions, where I just ask a question, something really like, “what is arising for you? It seems like you have some energy.” And people can respond… they feel seen, they feel heard, they feel like we are co-creating a space where whatever it is, is welcome. And often people can react to that in a really profound way. And then sometimes they’re surprised. They’re like, “I don’t know what’s happening.” And I’m like, “it’s okay, I know what’s happening. It’s my magical superpower.” And I think that’s why executive coaching done in this intentional way is… it’s so hard. I don’t know about you, but I can’t do more than two or three coaching sessions in a day, because I am drained afterwards, just exhausted. And my sessions are only an hour. And so, I think it’s because that deep listening and being aware, and as you said, doing all the logistical things, takes so much attention. But I think if we do it well, it can be really life-changing. Like people have been saying for a long time, like nobody is going to use executive coaches anymore, because they’re just going to go to AI. And I’m not suggesting that that isn’t going to impact, but I do believe there is something that happens when two people show up, even across the screen, as real, vulnerable, present human beings, that is not… you cannot replicate that. 

WAYNE BROWN: For sure, for sure. Provided the coach is a genuine coach, that would be my caveat to the whole coaching…

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Absolutely. And I think too that, you know, when people ask me like, how should I choose an executive coach? I say, “listen to what your body is telling you, see what you feel like emotionally.” Like see what this one-on-one conversation, what is that experience like for you and then trust that 100%. Like you can check the intellectual things that of course, yes, you should, someone with training and certification and whatever it is, like whatever is important to you, but go with your gut, because that’s where I think the progress is made.

WAYNE BROWN: I want to digress again, if you don’t mind, but you have a podcast yourself, the Bad Boss Brief, is there one decision-making failure that you see with leaders that you talk about?

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: There are so many, that’s why we have 80 episodes of Bad Boss Brief that I do with my friend Eugene S. Robinson. And I think the failure that I’ve been thinking about a lot, I don’t know if it’s the number one, but the failure I’ve been thinking about a lot is leaders who make decisions who lack self-awareness or lack the ability to regulate themselves. 

[00:35:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I also have a Substack that’s called Fierce Grace and I write a lot about work. And I wrote one about how a lot of people are so uncomfortable with their shadow side that they don’t regulate themselves appropriately in a work environment. And I talk about it as like having a dog, like a Rottweiler. And that dog can be very useful, it can protect you, but you need to keep a leash on the dog, you need to have control. And the idea of having… and we’re all going to make mistakes, we’re all going to be unskillful, but knowing these are some of the challenges that I bring, and this is how I keep a leash on them or keep aware of them. And I think the biggest problems in making decisions that I see leaders have is that they don’t know themselves, they’re not aware… like a leader who comes in and says, wow, I’m super afraid I’m going to lose my job and that’s really influencing my decision right now, they’re coming from a place of self-awareness, they can correct for that. Someone who comes in and is absolutely torn apart by fear, but unaware of it or denying it, is going to be much more dangerous in making decisions. And so, I think it’s that lack of awareness, lack of kind of seeing your dark side and correcting for it, or if you will, keeping your sort of dogs on a leash that causes people to make bad decisions, because the bad decisions are the ones that are made out of fear, out of greed, out of anger. And those are some of the dark things that can come up for us and if we pretend that we don’t have to deal with them, often we make decisions that are damaging not just for us, but for the people around us. 

WAYNE BROWN: That opens a lot of doors in my mind. And I’m just thinking about the need for partners through life, your coaching, of course, is one of those partners, but it doesn’t have to be a coach. We talk about our personal board of directors as a visualization, but having accountability partners may not be the best term either. But what’s your feeling about people to be able to understand their dark side and to be able to identify for you when you’re not aware of it? How important is it to have people around you that can be honest with you? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: I think it’s absolutely critical, but there are a lot of people who refuse to do it, they are deeply defended, and that is a challenge. I would just say to people who are listening, do you have someone, at least one person, who can tell you the difficult thing? Who has said to you; you have been behaving very selfishly, I’m concerned about your drinking, you were really unkind to your spouse right there. Who can say those really true, deep, hard things, and they’re right. Do you have anybody in your life who can do that? And the reality is many people do not. And especially, I find that a lot of men lack close friendships, and they rely on often… if they are heterosexual men, they will rely on their spouse. And often the spouse is already being the spouse, sometimes they’re running a family, they’re co-parenting, they can’t always be that person that says the hard things. Whereas I think women tend to have more robust social networks. And then there’s a lot of places where it’s built in. A lot of people who have done sports growing up, they’re used to a coach telling them, what are you doing with your elbow right now? They have that cast of mind, people who have done theater. When you have been in a situation where people have permission to correct you, and you have that muscle memory of taking that on, you’re ahead of the game. And what I find is interesting too is that… I have always been the person who says the true thing and in friendships at work I’ve lost more than one job because of being that person. And there are also numerous situations where I look back and I said to a boss, “if you do this, bad things are going to happen.” And they didn’t believe me and they did the thing and bad things happened. And so, having somebody tell you the truth not only makes you a better leader, makes you a better person, but it also can literally save your business. 

[00:40:00] 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: It sounds self-serving, but there are companies that would exist today that do not exist if the leader had been able to listen to me or another truth-teller. And so, I think it’s recognizing that and recognizing the defensiveness. Like, I have lost less coaching clients, more consulting clients, when I have been brought in to do, say, a 360 or an assessment and kind of; what does the team say? What are the challenges? And when I report back, the shoot the messenger has happened. There have been people who have been so defended that they cannot hear the truth that their team is trying to tell them. And so, I think it is important to have someone who tells you the truth, but also to recognize… So, people who are defended against the truth might not perceive themselves as people who are defended against the truth. 

WAYNE BROWN: Yes. 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Which is why I’m trying to give specific examples to provide a little quick mini checklist. Maybe I’ll write a Substack about that one, that’s a good idea. I’ll make myself a note; how to know if you can hear the truth. 

WAYNE BROWN: I was wondering how you would set the conversation up. Based on your experiences in losing clients, is there anything you’ve changed over the years that helps you set up the conversation or set up the individual in preparedness for receiving that truth? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Yes. I think there’s a couple of things that I do. One is my value system is that if you hire me, it is my job to tell you the truth as I see it, so, I’m not going to lie. 

WAYNE BROWN: Yes.

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: However, I have to recognize that my truth is mediated by my perceptions and experiences and so I need to be careful. I also need to be skillful about how I titrate it. I have dealt in many situations with men who are unskillful in how they deal with women. And I have had a lot of experience being sexually harassed at work and some of it has been very difficult for me. So, I have energy around it, I’m coming in… So, one is, I’m all aware. And then I have to recognize how receptive is this man. He may be really defended and so I’ll have to move really slowly. And I might have to say something like, so tell me about that, what you said, tell me about this experience. How do you think that she heard that? How are you working with her? It might take six or seven sessions for me to try to get that man to see things differently. Or if I feel like we have a relationship, I know him, I feel like he’s robust enough to take it, I’ll say, well, how direct do you want me to be? Like, give me a volume level right now. And if he says, bring it. I will say, here’s what I heard. And then I will allow him to have his reaction, allow him to talk about it and process it. And so, it’s very much… I will get the message across. I will just be very intentional and check in with my client or the group as many times as I can. Because once somebody is overwhelmed, they’re not going to hear and they’re not going to be able to change.

WAYNE BROWN: Exactly. I love the advice, I think it’s exactly my point, Stephanie. My own experience… and I can be on both sides of this conversation, I can also be the person not open and receptive to feedback, just as much as the next person. I know the importance of setting it up and making sure that you don’t just hit the person with it, that you actually build that bridge for them in readiness, I love the discussion. We’re tight on time, as usual, we could talk for hours, we’ve only scratched the surface. The book is fascinating for anyone that’s interested in learning more about how they can improve their decision-making process. Where can people grab your book? Where can they buy it from? 

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: So, it’s called The Saint and The Drunk: A Guide to Making the Big Decisions in Your Life, you can get it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble. If you are in Europe, my publisher is Shepheard-Walwyn in London, and so, you can buy it directly from them. Pretty much any place you get your book. There’s also an audiobook now, which I recorded and so you can get it in any place you get audiobooks. If you’d like to find out more about me, I do offer individual coaching as well as corporate coaching and it’s speirolo.com. And all things Stephanie are there.

WAYNE BROWN: Stephanie, great connecting, I’m looking forward to the next book that I just learned today, that you’re in the process of writing. I’m looking forward to that coming out. Thank you very much.

STEPHANIE PEIROLO: Thank you so much, it was great to talk to you, Wayne.

OUTRO: Thank you for joining us on the ET project, a show for executive talent development, until next time, check out our site for free videos, eBooks, webinars, and blogs at ‘coaching4companies.com.’

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