Six Global Women Members from all backgrounds and industries have shared their life-changing career habits, in a recent interview with Capsule NZ (click HERE to read full article). From visualisations to morning routines, and everything in between — our members unpack the principals and actions that set them up for success. Here’s a round up of some of the pearls of wisdom shared:
“Form an early morning routine” — Annah Stretton, Stretton Clothing Founder, Entrepreneur, Business Mentor and Philanthropist
For Annah Stretton: a 5am morning routine is an indispensable part of her productivity. “I get up and go early to give myself three or four solid gold hours of work before the “adorable chaos” that is my life starts to roar into action,” and adds that the pieces of work that require much focus are placed straight in her morning pile.
“Remind yourself to find purpose in everything you do – and give yourself permission to fail” — Audette Exel AO, Founder and Chair of the Adara Group
“I profoundly believe that when you put purpose and gratitude at the heart of everything you do – including in your career – amazing things happen.” Overwhelm is something we all experience, especially in these complex times. and Audette shares that the trick to keeping it at bay and keeping yourself rooted with confidence is finding purpose and making reflecting on that a habit. “It can stop you from getting lost,” she adds.
“Build confidence to ensure you don’t underestimate your ability” — Jenni Prisk, President at Prisk Communications
Drawing on her personal experience of feeling impostor syndrome when Prisk Communications was formed, Jenny shares that her process unravelling these thoughts was utilising the words once said by Budhha: “What you think, you become. What you feel, you attract. What you imagine, you create.” This mantra became part of her morning routine: where these were turned into spoken affirmations in front of the mirror — followed by a punch in the air and a loud “you’ve got this!”.
“Whaiā te tika me te pono; the pursuit of justice” — Caren Fox, Deputy Chief Judge (Māori Land Court) at Ministry of Justice
Caren Fox’s wisdom centres around harnessing whaiā te tika me te pono as a metaphor: pursuing justice for yourself. For her, this was writing and setting intentions and following this path to the outcome. It also meant being single-minded in this pursuit, but open to new ways of doing things and new perspectives.
Another action she shares that connects with intention setting is Whaiā te Mātauranga me te Tikanga o Ngā Ao e Rua – Te Ao Pakeha me te Ao Maori: “Continually build skills to be the best you can be by taking what is best from both the Māori and Pākehā worlds. There’s always a way to find time to build skills.”
“Visualise your way to success” — Marisa Fong, Madison Group co-founder, investor and entrepreneur
Marisa muses that “it takes a lot to keep motivated and so knowing “why” makes it easier.” She shares how visualisation shaped her outlook to her career. Interestingly, it began almost subconsciously and was later purposefully and strategically harnessed: “my desire to be financially secure meant I pictured in my head what that looked like. Without even knowing I was doing it, I was using visualisation. Later on, my drive to have financial freedom included being a master of my own time. That was another goal and that’s what I visualised.”
She shares that the more detailed the visualisation — which now includes a vision board — the better. Not only that, she says the practice helped her get peace of mind and helped me to keep pushing herself forward.
“Embrace opportunities” — Keren Blakey, Chair and Senior Partner, PwC
Keren’s advice centres around the importance of a sustainable and enjoyable lifestyle “where you get the right balance between looking after yourself and those you care for and being open to career opportunities can be challenging.” She adds the note that “when you’re trying to hold a lot of moving parts together, it’s easy to lose sight of what’s an opportunity.”
For Keren, her trick to cut through the clutter and seize opportunities was developing a sense of ‘why’: to use this lens to reflect on what contribution you can make to others, what makes life worth getting out of bed for, doing hard mahi for. “It may mean that something has to come off the table to allow me to pursue it but, if it resonates with my purpose, it’s worth it!”
Also reflected on was remembering to mitigate self doubt. She adds, “people who have your best interests at heart will challenge you to lean into your vulnerability – or fear of failure – and overcome it. “