687 Lia Garvin:

Ever felt stuck? Stuck in a repeating pattern, stuck in a circumstance or relationship stuck in a career or a business that is not serving you? It happens to the best of us, and my guest today – Lia Garvin – is all about helping you get “unstuck” – in fact, she wrote a book about it, so listen on for practical ways to get “unstuck”.

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock and welcome to Wings of Inspired Business, where we share the inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders … so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams. I’m a 5-time serial entrepreneur who has lived and breathed the ups and downs of starting and growing businesses, currently the game changing social podcast app Podopolo. Wherever you are listening to this, take a moment and join the Wings community over on Podopolo, where we can take the conversation further with your questions, perspectives, experiences, and advice for other female founders at whatever stage of the journey you’re at! Because together we’re stronger, and we soar higher when we fly together.

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur who spent a decade working in Big Tech – across Microsoft, Apple, and Google where she became the senior operations leader. Lia Garvin says she learned a lot about the common challenges people face in the workplace – and what it feels like to be “stuck”.

Lia decided to get unstuck herself by finding new purpose helping professional women who are trying to break through to the next level in their careers – maybe it’s how to navigate a career shift, how to ask for that promotion, or how to demonstrate the impact of their work. Lia is also the author of the new book Unstuck, which is all about the power of perspective and how we can use it to reinvent our lives to do the best work we possibly can. Lia is a TEDx speaker for the 2022 TEDx Conference in Boca Raton and is being featured this week at the SXSW Conference in Austin in 2022.

Ok so we all know what it’s like to feel stuck – and how hard it can be to get ourselves “unstuck”.

Lia Garvin is the author of UNSTUCK: Reframe Your Thinking to Free Yourself from the Patterns and People that Hold You Back, leaning into nearly 10 years of experience working in some of the largest and most influential companies in tech including Microsoft, Apple, and Google to explore the power of reframing to overcome common challenges found in the modern workplace.

As an operations leader, speaker and coach, Lia is on a mission to humanize the workplace, one conversation at a time. Through her writing, leadership coaching and savvy program management skills, she says she brings an authentic and irreverent sense of humor to teams to help them examine the challenges holding them back and focus on what matters.

She has built robust diversity & inclusion programs, launched the world’s first holographic computer, driven programs and initiatives around team inclusion and organizational effectiveness, and now coaches people on how to drive impactful work and thrive working in tech.

So let’s all get unstuck – and put on our wings with the inspiring Lia Garvin.

Melinda Wittstock:

Lia, welcome to Wings.

Lia Garvin:

Thank you so much. So happy to be here.

Melinda Wittstock:

I’m excited to talk to you because there’s a lot of people who are stuck in various situations, or circumstances, or just wondering what their purpose is. What was it that inspired you to write Unstuck?

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. So I think it’s funny because I started writing it about two years ago and it’s only become more and more relevant and needed as we entered the pandemic, and so many people have felt more and more sort of stuck in questioning what do they want? What do they want from their lives and work, and what’s the bigger story about themselves?

And for me, Unstuck came from feeling I had read all the books and done all the trainings and followed all the advice that people gave women of how to succeed in the workplace. And when I would try it, it didn’t go the way they said it would. When I would ask for that raise or promotion, I’d be told, “No, it’s not your time yet,” or, “You don’t know how this works.” And when I would really advocate for my work, people would look at me like, “Hey, slow down.” Or when I would try to leverage my network instead of just building relationships, but leveraging them, people wouldn’t necessarily help me.

And I felt like there was a piece missing in how we were talking to women about professional development. And as I started working more in coaching and mentoring and on team dynamics as a whole, I started to see that a lot of what was the problem had to do with the perspective we had when we encountered a challenge. And that if we didn’t shift our perspective, we could try any tip or tool or suggestion somebody had, but we were still going to be stuck because we were still going to be looking at the problem through the same lens.

And Unstuck is about tapping into the power of reframing or looking at a challenge through a new perspective. Because when we do that, we see that there are so many possibilities that weren’t there before. And so, as I started thinking about, well, where does this concept of reframing apply? And writing Unstuck, it applied really actually to an infinite number of challenges, but I narrowed it down to 12 areas that felt like the most visceral, the most frustrating, the most relevant in the workplace from feedback to talking about our work, to decision-making, to negotiating, to comparison, all of how to use this tool of reframing to get unstuck and to open up new possibilities.

Melinda Wittstock:

It’s so hard sometimes to see things through a different lens without really accelerating your awareness and empathy and whatnot. I mean, when you work with people around this and just even from your own experiences, having this epiphany that, “Oh, I’ve got to look at this problem in a different way,” I mean, what are the ways that people can actually do that? Because it sounds easy, but I know it’s not.

Lia Garvin:

Oh, yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

We’re so tied to how we’ve experienced life to date.

Lia Garvin:

Exactly. And actually, in the end of the book, I have a little myth-busting section where I explain just that. Reframing is not just saying, “Oh, look on the bright side,” or, “Get over it.” It’s often misunderstood that we think we’re reframing something, but we’re looking at it from the same sort of narrow perspective. And like you say, it’s hard to know, “Well, how do I know? How do I do this?” And one simple strategy I have for folks is to look at the questions that you’re asking yourself when you’re feeling stuck.

And a lot of times, those questions start with why. “Why did this happen? Why did they say this to me? Why did they do that to me? Why me?” And when we’re in this why space, why is great for problem-solving with product things in business settings, but it’s not a great question for us, for our own self-analysis. Why when we’re doing self-analysis gets us deeper, deeper into a spiral of kind of walking through reasons of things we already thought or know?

So, the shift there is to ask questions to ourselves that begin with what. So reframing from why to what. And instead of asking “Why me?”, we say, “What happened? What did I miss? What might be here that I didn’t think about?” And maybe best of all, “What might be going on with the other person or with my manager or with the situation?”

And when we ask ourselves what questions we see that there’s actually so many more possibilities, and we get into this generative space instead of analysis and judgment and kind of spiraling.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. The judgment thing is interesting. I mean, just even if you use kind of road rage, right?

Lia Garvin:

Yes.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. As an example, right? So you’re stuck in a traffic jam, or someone cuts you off, so you could assume all kinds of things about that person. “Oh, what a jerk. That person just cut me off.” Or they could be racing to the hospital, you don’t know.

Lia Garvin:

Yes, exactly. Exactly.

Melinda Wittstock:

And so, the ‘what’ is really interesting: I hear you about spiraling because when it was like why, why, why, we just doubled down on the same lament, I guess.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah, exactly. And I think the example around the road rage is a great one. I mean I have a chapter on reframing the ego. And I think the other real cue that we need to reframe is when we’re sort of centering everything around us like someone is out to get us, or someone did something to us, or someone is watching us, waiting for us to make a mistake. And we can have sort of a heightened sense of ego even when we’re feeling pretty bad.

Lia Garvin:

And I think people think maybe sometimes, “Oh, I don’t have a big ego because I feel bad about what’s going on in my life.” But having a big ego is an over focus on the me and that everything is about me. And I think we can start to actually find a lot of space from feeling this judgment, feeling like people are out to get us. And even overcoming imposter syndrome in a way by recognizing not everybody is thinking about us all the time. In fact, most people are not, most people are thinking about themselves and like you said, are in their own world, are going to their own, whatever they have to do. And what they did to us did not have to do with us, right? We’re not even on their radar maybe.

And when we get some space from the ego, we start to see that there’s multiple ways to look at a situation, and many of the times whatever happened wasn’t intentional or it’s not the only possibility. If we get rejected from a job we really wanted, it doesn’t mean we are a loser and we shouldn’t try again. It means, “Hey, I was a great candidate. I got all the way to the final round. They wanted another way, but look, I got all this practice and now I can go out there and try again. And so I think it really helps you get that space from the self-judgment.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah, it’s true. So like perspective shifting, the clue is the ‘what’. And so what are some of the what questions digging deeper into that, that you could be asking yourself? So instead of like, “Why am I never getting that promotion?” Or “Why am I having a hard time raising money for my business?” Or “Why is it taking longer to develop that product than I would like?” Or instead of those why, why, why’s, what are some of the ‘what’ questions that you found most effective, say, in your own life or as you transition from the tech world into your coaching business, for instance?

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. I think the biggest question is what haven’t I tried? And when we asked ourselves that, we actually are forced to think about something new. And we also don’t go into, “Oh, I tried that already and it doesn’t work.” Right? And that also comes up a lot in… And I think in business, in general, more generating ideas is that’s not going to work because, this is not going to work because, and we have all these reasons of no. But I think the question, “What haven’t I tried?” allows us to just brainstorm a set of things and we could even go in the next phase of what’s the wildest idea I could think of, right?

We break the mold and we say, or what’s something I would never do? What’s something I haven’t of? What might my biggest competitor be doing? We can sort of, again, the goal is to get away from ideas we’ve already thought of and things that we already know and have tried, and become safe playing around in this space that just because I thought of an idea, it doesn’t mean I have to do it. It doesn’t mean that’s the plan, that’s sort of the future of my business or my work, but that I’m open to letting other perspectives exist and then we can see, “Okay, well, I just shared, shared this wild idea with myself and now I realize, well, it’s not as scary as I thought.”

But I think a lot of times when we ask, when we sort of present, “What haven’t I tried?” Or, “What’s a really bold idea?” And we say that out loud, we realize either this thing I haven’t tried, I should probably try that right now, or this bold idea I was really afraid of actually isn’t that bold and out there, and that could be the thing I need to do to break through.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. I can see this would be really important even with teams. As an entrepreneur leading a team of people, and when you’re trying to ideate, and you may not do all these ideas all at once, but say in a tech situation, right, where you’ve got fast moving product, you’ve got a competitive environment, you’ve got all those things going on and you have a whole team that all has their own kind of preconceived notions because maybe to a certain level, all of us are stuck in one way or another, right?

And so, I can see this as being a really powerful tool to get to that brainstorming without judgment. It’s kind of the improvisational comedy, you have ‘that and’.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. Exactly, exactly. And I love that you called out teams because this kind of generative thinking, as you call out, is something that really builds psychological safety in teams, and that’s been long studied as foundational for building effective and inclusive teams. And I think in this world where it can be hard to know, well, how do I surface an idea? What if I’m not the most senior person or someone might interrupt me or talk over me, when we get in a space where we’re allowing what’s a wild idea? What’s something we’d never try?

And that’s where I think it gives everybody in a team in any role, any level within the organization to be able to contribute. So yeah, it’s a really, really effective tool for fostering participation and inclusion on a team because we create space for… It doesn’t have to be the right idea, it doesn’t have to be the final idea, but we’re in this additive generative space.

Melinda Wittstock:

And creates that safe space away from judgment. I mean, at the heart of this, the self-judgment that we have which comes up in those why questions like, “Why did this happen to me?” Right. And immediately in that question, right away, you’re the victim. And when you’re the victim, you don’t have any real power over your situation occurs to me.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. And I think that’s the struggle, right, is that for women especially, we’re fed all of these biases and stereotypes and roles and we’re socialized to sort of fall into these set of norms for not everyone, but for many different cultures and many sort of upbringings. And then somehow we start to identify with some of those and we start to believe them. And that layers on this inner critic that makes it really hard to push past these.

And I think the key is to both fight against these norms and biases and everything. And as we’re doing that, we’re also recognizing where we are over identifying with them and how to break through. I mean, one thing I talk a lot about is how to articulate the impact of our work. I mean, something hugely important for entrepreneurs and people just building their business and getting the word out about what they’re doing. And I think when we’re over identifying with this belief of, “I can’t talk about myself,” or, “No one wants to hear what I have to say,” or, “No, one’s going to think I’m an expert,” or, “Why am I doing this?” All these things.

Well, yeah, nobody is going to know what you’re doing if you don’t tell them. And this was something I really struggled with when I’m was first writing my book was talking about that I was writing a book of owning expertise in this area of saying, “Hey, support me in what I’m doing.” I felt like I didn’t want to ask people. I didn’t want to put people out. It was like what is that about? This is a over identification with some narrative that does not serve me is not true, and I just need to get rid of it.

Lia Garvin:

And so I think the self-judgment, as you call it, it can be so detrimental because it can reinforce the stuck situation that we’re in. And if we feel stuck and we believe that we should be stuck, we’re going to just be way more stuck. And so the opposite is saying, “Okay, I’m feeling stuck. I don’t want to be stuck, so I’m going to shift this completely. How else can I look at this?” And I can say, “What’s something I might never do? X, Y, Z. Okay. That’s not very scary. I’m going to just do that.”

And that’s actually one of the things that happened with this book, I was like, “I want to write a book.” And when I stopped saying, “No, you can’t write a book.” When I told my inner narrative, “Leave me alone for a bit,” I wrote it, I started to share it with friends and colleagues and peers, and they were really excited about it. It was helping people work through things that they were working through. And I said, “Wow, look, how much I getting in my own way from being able to help people.” It was just a waste of time.

Melinda Wittstock:

Isn’t it interesting because often the challenges that we have ourselves are kind of the clue as to how we can most help people. The reason we’re going through it is to learn the lessons, and once the lessons are learned, the experience is no longer necessary.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

We’re able to help other people along that same path. But it does take the courage just to, yes, reframe things and take that bold step. So if we go back in time a little before this, I mean, you worked in the tech industry doing all kinds of innovative things at Microsoft, Apple, Google. You were a senior operations leader at Google. Tell me about that and what that was like. So obviously, there was some frustration there, otherwise you wouldn’t be writing a book called Unstuck so…

Lia Garvin:

So I mean, I think one of the biggest challenges for me was being a non-engineer in engineering companies and finding my identity and how to really own the value that I was bringing and the impact that I was making when it wasn’t in a traditional space in these companies. And so one of the things I had to really work through was my own imposter syndrome of feeling like, “Ah, should I have been an engineer? And should I have started doing this stuff earlier in my career?”

And in all of these should, would, could’s and why am I not enough kind of questions. And, and to start to look at, well, I’m not an engineer, that’s actually not even where… It’s not necessarily where I’m interested, where I’d best be situated and what is the value that I bring? And that’s where I started tapping into, “Well, I’m really, really passionate about working with teams and helping people figure out the interpersonal dynamics that get in the way from landing deadlines and hitting our deliverables and letting creative ideas flow.”

And as I started really focusing on what my passions were, which was organizational culture and building psychological safety and fostering inclusive teams, it started to just really click for me. And when I focused on that, work was getting done faster and better, and people were happier. The teams were more connected and I found, okay, this is really where I’m best situated. And it’s just as important as being an engineer or a product person, because all of those things fit together to build great products.

Lia Garvin:

And I think the frustration I had within working some of these companies was first starting with me figuring out my own identity, and then helping other people navigate how do you find your place and talk about your work and get seen and these environments where sometimes only certain kinds of work rises to the top, right? There’s typically more visible work, the stuff that the leaders want to see and hear about it. How do I bring awareness to all that’s happening? And as I started to do that, I found I was just able to really make a bigger impact, help more people and start to change the face of some of the teams that I was working on.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yes. I mean, this is so, so vital. especially for women in tech, because it’s not like there are a lot of role models. It’s not like there’s necessarily in that bro culture, that women are even welcome. And so then you’re trying to find your own way and that’s not easy.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. And like you say, I mean, with so few women, I think the more and more women can support each other, the more… Men are supporting each other, they’re helping each other out all the time. And so I think there’s also the how can we elevate and amplify each other, be advocates for each other’s work, sponsor all of that. Because as we’re building more representation of women in industries like tech, we have to do that work.

And I know the burden shouldn’t only fall on women and it should be everybody is doing it, and women need to be doing it, right? And so I think it’s just, yeah. I mean, there’s no two ways about it. We have to support each other, and one of the tools I found that really helps sink that in is to celebrate each other instead of getting stuck in a cycle of comparison.

And when there are few people who look like you in a team, in a role, we can start to kind of compare ourselves with the one other person that’s there. And when we do that, we can maybe get into the stack ranking of not measuring up, or why did they do that? I could have done that better, and that doesn’t lead us anywhere productive.

Melinda Wittstock:

Comparisonitis is…

Lia Garvin:

Right. Comparisonitis, it is poisonous. And we get around that by celebrating each other, because we’re going to want people to celebrate us when it’s our turn. And that’s how we build our network, how we get people to champion our work and how we just feel better about what we’re doing holistically.

Melinda Wittstock:

Oh gosh, 100%. I think even too for women, I mean, this applies in all areas. Even my own experience founding tech companies as a female founder and CEO, and then raising money, when women get 2% still two decades later of venturing.

Lia Garvin:

So ridiculous.

Melinda Wittstock:

And so I challenge myself and I think and I fall into the why, why, why? Right? But what’s the what around that? And so it’s like, “Okay, what haven’t I tried. Well, I have tried a lot of things.”

Lia Garvin:

Tried a lot of things.

Melinda Wittstock:

You know what I mean? Well, what’s the wildest idea? I don’t know. It’s interesting, I mean, because you’re in the tech world, have you talked to a lot of other women in that situation? Because it’s tricky, there aren’t a lot of trailblazers really.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. And I think too, it’s what haven’t I tried in my own perspective or around how I approached marketing my idea or getting buy-in around something I want to try. I mean, I think that’s another piece too, is it can be bold ideas around any aspect of how we’re operating. And I think it can also be what’s something small I haven’t tried, right? I think we can often look at we needed to take revolutionary steps to be able to see change, and it often takes very small shifts.

If you find yourself continually comparing yourself to others, starting to be aware of that and just catching yourself when you’re doing it and saying, “Oh, there it is again, I’m going to redirect,” and saying, “Okay, what else? I can think about what I want to have for lunch,” right. And just being more self-aware starts to catch that because when we’re in that judgment spiral, we can’t understand a chance unless we’re aware it’s happening.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. Oh, gosh, it’s true. If you want therapy, just become an entrepreneur because it’s a constant evolution of your own awareness and many other things too like just self-acceptance, just getting your ego out of the way, forgiving yourself, just all that.

But being really in the present moment is so much of it in that kind of awareness and that with each success of startup, with each day, I feel like I go further and further on that journey and it just improves me, but it’s learning to have almost like an unassuming attitude which is kind of weird. It sounds strange because how do you push something forward? Because you’ve got this vision and you’re in the doing and you’re pushing it forward and all that stuff. And inspiring people to go do things. You’re driving it, but at the same time you got to stay in this awareness. It’s not easy.

Lia Garvin:

No, it’s not. And I think, I don’t know the origin story of Podopolo but I mean, thinking about an angle being what’s another way I can bring community to something like podcasting and open the dialogue around? I mean, I love that people can engage with people that are creating content. And so I think that’s a what’s another way we can do this kind of question that it’s like where bold ideas come from, or even having the podcast, right? What’s a way that we can bring awareness to what entrepreneurs go through and how to set each other up for success and how to share these ideas and get people feeling confident? Yeah. I can do this. I can start something. I can get my ideas out there.

Lia Garvin:

So I think it can take a lot of different shapes, but yeah. And I think you’re right, you can still have a vision and a direction. I think it’s about what happens when we encounter a setback. What do we do with that setback? When we get that rejection, when we get that no and when we’re denied something, what is that thought pattern that we allow to take hold?

Because we can be disappointed still, we can still think it sucks and we can be frustrated, and then what? Right? Because it’s the step after that of how do we move forward? How not get stuck in that spiral? How do we say, “Okay, what did I learn? How do I need to change my approach? What can I try next?” And then keep going. And I’m guessing that that’s had to happen a lot in launching a number of businesses.

Melinda Wittstock:

This is such a big topic, do you know what I mean? That’s why it’s so important to be talking about because I find increasingly that any one of those failures, whether they’re large or little micro failures or you try something it doesn’t work or something goes wrong or whatever, they are really opportunities.

They are opportunities to learn, and again, get into your what questions which I love, because you think of Thomas Edison and what’s that famous quote about creating the light bulb, I mean, I’ve tried 10,000 times.

Lia Garvin:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

And so this is the entrepreneurial journey that it’s like constant refinement, constant testing and validating of hypotheses. And so you have this vision, but you got to pivot a lot to get there because there’s as much you don’t know as you do. It’s humbling really.

Lia Garvin:

Exactly. And I think one nuance here with this why is we’re talking about the why sort of judgment spiral, not the why, the purpose, why? Right? And I think the purpose why actually is this underlying sort of north star that keeps you going. And that purpose and the vision helps you see that what, right? The bigger reason I’m doing this is because of this, and that’s why when I’m confronted with a setback, I’m able to ask the what question and keep trying and try from another angle, because I know this idea will do X, Y, Z thing, and it needs to be out in the world.

Melinda Wittstock:

100%. So tell me the type of people that you work with on the coaching side of what you do. Who are your ideal clients and what are the things that most of them are struggling with or dealing with that you help with?

Lia Garvin:

Yeah. My ideal client is really anyone that’s really eager to work through something and that really wants to own taking action to break through whatever they’re feeling stuck around. So this means someone that doesn’t want someone else to create a playbook for them, because that’s not really what coaching is about, but someone who wants a partner to champion them, but also help hold them accountable.

And I think this could be someone at any level of an organization. I love working with folks both starting out in their careers and really wanting to set up for success and set up strong out of the gate, but also people that are more senior executive level feeling like I’m at the brink of this next thing and I just need to help someone help me break through it.

So topics that come up a lot are around career transitions, whether it’s moving sort of a subtle shift within internally in a company or kind of making a full career pivot, coaching folks that are working on setting up a side hustle or launching a small business themselves, a lot of coaching around really how to talk about our work, how to get our work noticed in the scene within the organization we’re working in.

And then with teams, I coach teams and build workshops for teams on all sorts of things from building psychological safety and inclusive teams to giving and receiving feedback, something a lot of teams struggle with that everybody could use some skills around to just general manager development and really list goes on from there. So I love working with teams on the interpersonal organizational dynamic side. It’s a lot of norm setting needed around return to office and whatever the future of work looks like, so that’s something I’ve been diving into as well.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, I love this. I love what you’re doing. I can’t wait to read your book. I want to make sure that everybody has it and we have the link, so please, everyone, make sure that you do get a copy of this because even if you’re not feeling unstuck right now, chances are that somewhere in your life because we all go, we all get stuck and we get unstuck all the way through life.

Melinda Wittstock:

So I love that you’ve done this book, Lia, and I want to thank you for putting on your wings and flying with us. And I want to make sure too, that people know where to find on social media and how they can find you to work with you.

Lia Garvin:

Yes. Thank you. So Unstuck comes out April 5th, it’s available for pre-order or now if this is already out in the world on Amazon, Target, Barnes & Noble, wherever books are sold. You can get in touch with me at liagarvin.com, that’s where you can learn more about my work, reach out to me about where workshops or coaching.

LinkedIn’s another great place to get in touch. On Instagram, my handle is Lia.Garvin and on YouTube, I have a YouTube channel where I dive into sort of many topics around coaching and career and my channel is Reframe with Lia. So any of those places, I’d love to hear from you, and yeah, thank so much for having me on the show. This was awesome.