Disability & Leadership in Tech (LCPS01E13)
Preview
[00:00:00] Sally: But actually a lot of the questions that's it's the old classic thing. managers, as leaders. I think we often can ask the coaching questions to other people and then we know exactly what we should be asking ourselves and don't follow our own advice.
[00:00:16] Lena: We're all hypocrites, yeah, I admit it.
[00:00:18]Sally: Exactly And you know, the question of kind of how can you best set yourself up for success is a general one that I think a lot of people can benefit from. How do you get your energy? How do you restore your energy after draining times? how do you best receive information? you know, written or verbal, all of these things, I think, are really great questions for everybody to, to think about themselves or to ask, the people around them.
This conversation was recorded in August 2024.
Intro
[00:00:56] Lena: It is August, 2025, and we're in a time of incredible productivity pressure on leaders as well as on our teams, and it's a time where many leaders are under a lot of scrutiny to do as much as possible, or, you know, ideally even more than possible. And we need to talk about that. This is Leadership Confidential with Lena Reinhard.
Real talk on more than two hard things in technology, finding community and becoming the engineering leader you can be today, being a disabled leader in tech.
I vividly remember my first startup job 15 years ago. I was working a full-time job at this startup on the side to also going to school full-time.
My work started at 3:00 PM and often went into the nights and weekends running on infinite cups of coffee that I got from the small red coffee machine in our shared office with the smelly carpet and old desks, I would heap piles of milk foam onto my coffee and generally sprinkle the foam with sugar.
Anything to get through the day. And on especially late evenings, which we had a lot of, we would order pizza and all of that is what I thought I needed to do. To be and to let alone be successful in tech, and let's be real. Those things sometimes still are. There's this hard to shake idea of the always on leader.
The person who works eighty to a hundred hour weeks never says no and treats their body like a machine that just needs the right input to maximize output. For the 2010 era that used to be pizza. Now the stereotypes seems to have shifted to kombucha. that setup certainly wasn't sustainable for me.
It's not sustainable for anyone, I think, and not just that, it's also incredibly exclusionary Founder, Rachel Thomas wrote in a piece that I'll link below. A work in the tech industry where there is an overt glorification and in many cases a requirement of working unhealthily long hours. This is in spite of research showing that putting in longer hours doesn't lead to greater productivity, and instead is harmful.
And when you're ill or disabled and working in this field, the long hours can be not just counterproductive, but discriminatory. And it is also because of these stated ideas of productivity and leadership that disabled leaders often remain invisible, but they do exist, and we are here to talk to one today.
Let's look at some stats first though, because those are important. As part of this conversation, it is estimated that over a billion people worldwide live with some form of disability that's around 15% of the world population. No matter which region you look at in detail. May it be Europe, the us, or apac, for example. You'll find the same number there between 14 and 16% of people. It is also worth calling out because this is a tech podcast that many of the people who use our tools and technology that we build are also disabled. Even you will probably be disabled at some point in your life, either temporarily through an accident, for example, or permanently, and so will I.
But that selfish aspect isn't why this topic matters so much, and I'm so glad to talk about it today. How does a disabled leader manage their time, energy, and their organizations, and how do they do this in an industry that often doesn't recognize different ways of working and how important and beneficial those are?
My guest today and I, we talk about her leadership philosophy as well, and the systemic changes that make workplaces better for everyone, as well as some practical strategies that she uses and that you can apply to manage unpredictable events in your life while exceeding leadership expectations.
In addition, though, I'm also glad that we tackled bigger systemic questions like. Why is there a representation gap for disabled leaders in tech? How do you evaluate whether a company's stated values align with how they actually treat people? Which is a question that I know many of you are thinking about, and what does it look like to create workplaces for asking for what you need isn't seen as a weakness, but instead as the strategic self-management that it is, and that benefits everyone.
The person who shares a lot of insight on that and who I'm very honored to talk about this with is Sally Late. She's an experienced senior leader with two decades experience in roles, including engineering director for trust and safety at Bumble, VP of Engineering at Farewell, and she's scaled engineering teams during hypergrowth at Bonzo.
Along the way. She's also founded her own digital transformation consultancy and speaks at conferences internationally. And Sally will be available for fractional tech leadership, coaching and advisory work from towards the end of 2025. You can contact her through the link on our show notes. Sally also has ME/CFS.
It's a not very widely known illness. I want to give you a quick introduction to its general meaning. We will talk about Sally's specific experience in the impact on her life that it's had later. So hear more about that soon. ME/CFS, written as me slash CFS stands for myalgic encephalomyelitis slash chronic fatigue syndrome.
It's quite a mouthful. I know I did practice before this. So Myalgic Encephalomyelitis,
slash chronic fatigue syndrome is a disabling chronic illness. It's often called in shorthand, just chronic fatigue syndrome or CFS, but those. Things are important to keep in mind. It's not just being tired.
People with me, CFS experience profound fatigue that doesn't go away with rest or sleep, as well as a very wide range of symptoms from things like memory and focus issues or brain fog to muscular issues like intense muscle pain or the hallmark symptom, post exertional malaise, shorthand, PEM, which happens after any kind of exhaustion, which can be even positive emotional intense experiences to stress, to physical issues.
It's still, to this point, not known what exactly causes ME/CFS, but we know it's a physical illness and not just a mental or psychological one. That's unfortunately still a common misconception, including among me medical practitioners. ME/CFS cases have also increased with the COVID-19 pandemic, and it often starts with an infection.
All of this unfortunately also means that it's still difficult to get the differential diagnosis that's needed for it, and treatments are currently only available for symptoms. That's the end of the ME/CFS introduction. Again, Sally's situation is specifically hers, but this is what this illness means.
We'll also add a couple resources for how to get closer to a diagnosis to the show notes. I'm very honored and grateful to Sally. For having this open conversation with me and for sharing so many tools and lessons learned that I know will be valuable for everyone, they've certainly been valuable for me already.
Sally's insights about energy management, boundary setting, and intentional leadership are wonderful for all of us. So here's real talk on more than two hard things in technology with Sally Late.
Our conversation
[00:08:08] Lena: Who are you and what's your experience been in tech so far?
[00:08:12] Sally: I'm Sally Lait. I've been working in the tech industry in various different roles and different places since about 2005. I started originally managing about five years later, but I've had a, a really varied journey.
I kind of contracted, then I worked for myself for a good chunk of years. I came back to, employment and kind of formal management roles about six years ago now. But yeah, it's, it's really interesting that you've invited me to talk about this topic. it's something that is newer for me in all honesty.
But really, really happy to be here and, and chatting about it and hope that we can, you know, bring this to the masses of it.
[00:08:51] Lena: the masses, I might not be able to deliver,
[00:08:55] Sally: The masses of, you
[00:08:57] Lena: however many people will like, but I'm, I'm very happy to, you know, be able to. talk about this with you, and I'm really grateful that, you honestly, like, agreed much faster to do this than I thought you would, so that it means a lot. And so that probably segues nicely into the second question that I'd like to ask us now.
Because many of course are here anonymously and I want to make at least make sure there's a bit of a window for people to share a little bit about themselves because like representation matters. And so the second question is like, is there anything about your identity that you find important to share?
[00:09:35] Sally: Yeah. I mean, It's a really interesting point and, I guess goes into the question that you and I talked about a bit of, given the, you know, the anonymity in the podcast and how I, I really think that is super important to, to give people those options. how much of this I wanted to kind of associate myself with and how much, it is part of my identity.
It is, something that is, like I say, still pretty new for me to be kind of, associating with myself. actually the first time was really, earlier this year as part of one of the lead dev events, I got asked to be part of a, what was called a community representation group where the idea was to kind of connect with others who had similar backgrounds, similar experiences, and to really help people build up a sort of peer network for support.
So that was the first time that I guess. I kind of really started to explore, like, this is part of my identity. other sort of things that I think I have, sort of really had to think about over the last few years, becoming a parent has become a really big part of my identity as well. being a woman in tech has always been a, you know, interesting challenge to, to navigate, a thing.
But yeah, I think that, one of the things that I'm trying to, you To think about more and more is, is trying not to pigeonhole myself, trying to, to sort of be, a person who has these different kinds of attributes, has these different, yeah, communities, I guess, to sort of work with and try to bring my experiences to, to the fore. Especially if I can kind of lend my privilege as well. I think that's, that's really, really important.
[00:11:09] Lena: And I love the kind complexity of it. You know, identity and what it means to especially, I think, be in tech with them. It also honestly reminded me a little bit when you, talked about sort of, oh, it's only something that I'm starting to, talk a bit more about and sort of be more open about and all that.
And it reminded me a little bit that, Might be a bit different, but like something I think about a lot is that I've been in therapy for a long time, and, I recently spoke with a friend, who's like considering like working with a different therapist, not because their current one isn't good, but because, I found that there is always an interesting thing like saying those things out loud about yourself and saying some kind of new things or things that you haven't said as much out loud.
where I've encountered that a bunch of times myself when I was like, Oh, I'm saying something that I hadn't even kind of thought in this way. and now it's loud and it's, it's interesting. audible, even if it's just for one person. And it makes me sometimes feel like there's a different version of myself that I'm encountering.
Yeah. I don't know if that resonates with you, but it, it, it kind of reminded me of that a little bit. It's
[00:12:16] Sally: I mean, giving, giving something a name, saying it out loud, it all becomes more real, doesn't it? And I think, when I was on the train this morning and I was just thinking about, on the one hand, there is still a ton of bias. you know, there are very stereotypical views of what a leader looks like.
disability is not always entirely aligned with that. And I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't, it's not that I'm concerned, but I guess that, you know, there is the chance that people might see a headline or they might not listen to this properly. And there might be somebody who comes away thinking, Oh, I don't want to work with her in the future.
and you know, different levels of privilege, I think means not just for me, but you know, for other people in similar conversations might be that you can afford to or not say, well, those are people that I wouldn't want to work with anyway. But I think for me, coming back to. why I wanted to use my name. If I was anonymous, I feel like it would send the wrong message. And so as much as labels can be nuanced and, you know, there could be some kind of personal challenges. I don't want these conversations to be something that we hide away from. If anything, again, you know, it's that, that word privilege. I want to use my privilege to, help show people that they can succeed.
They can be in leadership roles in tech. and I think that from the conversations that I had earlier in the year, this is something that people are really worried about. It's something that they don't necessarily see as being able, you know, for them to do in their future. It's not an option. So yeah, it's kind of like if I can help play a part in that as other people have for me being role models in the past, then that's something that I think, it feels like it's really important to do.
[00:13:58] Lena: I find that so, so important. And that's why, you know, it's never a question that like, of course, I, I so love, you know, having you here in this way. and it's, you know, it's something that, I've been grappling a lot with in the making of this, podcast as well. But, side note, but,Initially, like, I basically let people choose, if they want to be anonymous or not, and currently, at least, we're recording under the premise that people will be anonymous.because I've realized that there is a material difference in what the conversations are and what people are comfortable talking about. And it goes exactly like I, I think I've recorded about seven episodes that, you know, are still like, they're still great. Like the people are smart, they're sharing interesting things and whatnot.
But the degree of vulnerability that's possible and the degree of like openness, especially with challenges and all that. was so vastly different, like to a degree, honestly, that was shocking to me. And, you know, shocking as like, I, I started this whole thing here, under the premise that, oh, I'm hearing so many things sort of behind closed doors and in one to one conversations that I also know so many people are struggling with.
And that's why, you know, it's such an honor. and I'm so happy that you're here and that we can talk about this.
[00:15:09] Sally: Yeah. Thank you.
[00:15:10] Lena: And now we should probably actually talk about what we're here to talk about. So, what's the, you know, two to three sentence summary of, what you're here to talk about with me.
[00:15:21] Sally: absolutely. Yeah, we should probably get onto that. so as I mentioned, earlier this year, you know, I was invited to be part of this community representation group. I had spoken really openly, with Mary Williams, who I know we both know about chronic illness. Mary is the chair of the Lead Dev Conference.
so the context of all of this is I have, ME CFS, chronic fatigue syndrome. it's Begun to be more open about it online. Like I said, I talked about it kind of one to one but I think it really surprised me. well, first of all, I You never know who's going to turn up for these things where it's at lunchtime at a conference we had some amazing people turn up who had all kind of different levels of, you know, experience with disability, whether that was personal, whether it was with, their loved ones, their colleagues, there were people who were just there to listen and learn.
and I think that for me, I came away from that with a real hope that by, Bring it to the matters as we say, you know, but by, by talking about these things more that we can little by little break down some of that stigma, spark thoughts, spark discussions, help leaders, you know, feel like they've got the, either the kind of like the language or the starting point to, to be able to explore this, if it's not a topic that they've come up against really.
And just generally to, to try to bring a bit more equity into work. And I think that it's something that also was really highlighted to me recently as well of, do you know that, that graphic that I think it was by Microsoft, which everybody uses in the context of accessibility
conversations online, It's the one that talks about kind of accessibility is, sometimes situational so it's got a person with a broken arm or holding a baby and things like that. And similarly, I think, when we think about disabilities, it's very often kind of with the perception of it being all or nothing. you know, this person is either disabled or they're not.
And actually, There can be nuances. So I've recently been working with somebody who's had a horrible reaction to COVID and has not been in this situation before and doesn't know really how to deal with it. And so for me, being able to kind of apply some of the experiences that I've got both personally, but also, you know, just try to kind of put in some support mechanisms, for them more, widely.
You know, this is hopefully something that's very temporary, but I think that you can absolutely kind of, again, make the situation better for everybody through thinking about, you know, everything through these lenses more broadly. So yeah, just hoping to kind of spark some conversation, hear any experiences you may have and, let us know if you have any other thoughts too, dear listeners,
[00:18:08] Lena: yes, dear masses that we're speaking to.
I do, since you mentioned language already, I do briefly want to talk about kind of, two definitions, that, I've, thought about,and so the context of this, like, the one is, basically, I wanted to ask you, I'll just briefly contextualize, the questions of person first versus identity first language, like, the whole idea being that, Person first language emphasizes the person before the disability.
So it's, for example, a person like talking about someone as a person who is blind or a person with spinal cord injuries as an example. And the different way of talking about disability is identity first language, which puts the disability first in the description, like a disabled person. and. Or an autistic leader.
A disabled leader. and I, my understanding is at least that a lot of like folks in the well, disability community, as much as that's a, like, big term that can even be used, but like different folks and choose different language to describe themselves, which is very valid. And so I wanted to check with you, you know, how do you talk about yourself, your own experiences?
What language do you use? Okay.
[00:19:21] Sally: I still struggle to, and this is, you know, this is all kind of, Me, my journey. I don't have any issue with associating, with the word disability. but to me, it's not something that is. Like at the forefront of how I describe myself. So I think, it's not something that I am very, strict with or probably consistent with, and you might hear me refer in different ways.
I think some of that is kind of societal as well, because, I feel like sort of person centric language and identity is still very much emerging. so as I sort of said before, I think this to me is part of my identity, so I would always kind of center myself as an individual. But I, I think that I don't always, do that when I'm talking about it, if that makes sense.
So, yeah, what I'm trying to say is I think there's a lot of inconsistency for me. It's less about the, the terminology and I'm kind of okay with like either way, but as you say, I know that for some people it's very important, you know, to, to have. their, their situation, their experience is framed in a certain way.
so yeah, like for me, it's, it's very, very individual and very much kind of a personal preference, but you're welcome to frame it however you want to. I'm not, yeah, it's not, not the top of mind for me.
[00:20:43] Lena: Yep. Okay, that's cool. yeah, I, see, I did write, the questions that I put together with, identity first language, just because that's my personal preference. Sorry. but, at least Well, now I know.
[00:20:56] Sally: Yeah.
[00:20:56] Lena: Um,and, Justin also, you know, then how, you know, how I introduce you, for example, things like that.
perfect. I think the other, the other bit I did briefly want to touch on this kind of intersectionality, especially because you, uh, think alluded to it earlier, in terms of like how different experiences, can kind of compound, and,how, I mean, you also mentioned kind of the fluidity that kind of disability can have, and so I did just want to, like, you don't even have to define the intersectionally part, we, we can do that, like, for the intro or something like that.
But I just want to ask, you know, how you, how you view that and how it kind of impacts your own, thinking about yourself, but then also about, like, creating inclusive work environments.
[00:21:38] Sally: it's intersectionality I think is so, so important and, you know, it goes back to the, the tick box kind of exercises that people go through where they talk about it, being a diverse team because they have, you know, a white woman on the team. So I absolutely think that it is very, very important to, recognize that people are going to have very different experiences.
And actually going back to your point of anonymity, it would be super interesting if, not to give you extra work or anything here, but like, if we had a follow up from somebody who didn't feel comfortable, but maybe wanted to share a very different experience, I would love to, you know, to again, get that conversation going.
I definitely think that there are, certain, groups, I've, I've sort of talked about this in some of my talks before and can, link some of the stats. afterwards, if that's useful, but just the, you know, the, the challenges that they face with perception, with judgment and bias around their leadership ability in particular, can be exacerbated by factors like, race in particular can be a huge one.
but also, you know, kind of sticking with the topic of disability, you, you talked about how it's not kind of like a spectrum in particular, but, there's, there's the classic of not all disabilities are visible as well. and I think for myself, it's something that has been really interesting to unpick primarily because I am very high functioning often to my own detriment.
and. I imagine that if you spoke to so many of the people that I work with where, you know, they, I'm very open about this, but if you, you know, kind of took everything at face value, they would not think that I had a disability. It doesn't show up in so many ways. so for me, It's kind of like, can you pass, you know, non, non disabled as well.
And how does that affect you? so there's, there's so many different factors. I think you're, you're absolutely right to call that out.
[00:23:36] Lena: And I do, this is a bit of a hard pivot, but since you just mentioned it, I want to ask, how did you go about, telling your coworkers? just like briefly also backtrack a little bit. like we don't have to talk about it explicitly, but like, My assumption was that, you know, ME CFS wasn't always a thing in your life and then at some point it became one.
but maybe that's also wrong. but so, you know, I was curious to hear how that, how you shared it with your coworkers.
[00:24:02] Sally: no, absolutely. And like, I'm, I'm happy to talk about this kind of thing. It's, it's not an issue for me. So yeah, I think, for those who don't know, ME CFS is, it's a long term chronic condition. The cause is currently unknown and symptoms really vary. for me they are around being extremely fatigued, having sleep problems, having brain fog.
there's a key kind of factor, which is called post, post exertional malaise, which is basically feeling terrible after you do physical or mental or emotional exertion, which is fantastic for manager, obviously.but I get these, these really weird kind of, they call them flu like symptoms. So I just feel really ill.
and also have other kind of factors like short term memory problems and things like that. And it's something that I just lived with for so long. And actually, you know, I had other things that came up. so I have, hypothyroidism where some of the symptoms can overlap in terms of fatigue. And I got to points where I was like, Oh, great.
I'm on medication for this. It'll all be fixed. but really for me, Having a child two years ago kind of really changed everything and I wouldn't say that I went through a bit of like an existential crisis, but it made me have to be very deliberate about my energy management primarily, Thinking about how I want to balance my life inside of work with my life outside of work and so actually When I, came back from my parental leave, I needed to take a bit more time off until my kid could start nursery.
And. I realized I wanted to kind of redesign my work. so I did some a very easy thing of starting, you know, coming back to work after having a child and joining a new company, which actually was great. But it, it gave me an opportunity to really think very deliberately think through how do I interview?
How do I ask these questions? What are the kind of touch points where I can get a sense of, is this company somewhere that I can. Be successful. Is this somewhere that I can be open with my, my colleagues, my coworkers, all of that kind of thing. so I think in terms of interviewing, I was very interested to, to hear stories of people, you know, it's the classic people like me, There weren't so many, you know, very visible touch points of, folks who have disabilities, things that I could find.
but I did find a blog post of one of my coworkers who talked about how she found out she was pregnant with her third, third child whilst actually interviewing. And I was like, okay, cool. If this is, A place where you can be very open like that, that bodes well. but that, that conversation or that decision of how much to disclose and when I think again, is very dependent on your situation, very dependent on, your, you know, your confidence levels, the company values, all of these kinds of things.
And it took me, I think maybe a couple of weeks. to just feel like, okay, this is what it appears. I do feel safe. My manager was fantastic. I have to say, and I decided to first share with, you know, with him and then with my direct reports, but it's something that I factored into, I have a kind of working with me document that explains a few things about just my, my situation of kind of the fact that I'm not based in London, all this kind of thing.
It's in there. I share that with new joiners. So we, you know, we had new leadership members, things like that. It's something that, you know, I talk about very openly in terms of if I've had a challenging weekend where I just need to sleep and recoup. that is the stuff that people don't see. So, you know, going back to saying very high functioning, I crash in the evenings and the weekends.
but I basically just tried to kind of, Share a bit of my life and share me as a person to be able to kind of give people that context Which is not it's not always easy to do But I feel very grateful to be in a culture that does genuinely support that and enable it.
[00:28:12] Lena: I'm so glad that, you know, you found this place like that. And it also, it does sound like, again, you did your research while interviewing and tried to find sort of green flags pointing in the direction, but still were like, a bit hesitant initially to like, feel, feel out the place and figure out, okay, is this actually what it sounded like?
Can I trust people? Like, I'm curious, what did your manager? Do that, made you feel after a couple weeks, like, okay, I can share this with him.
[00:28:43] Sally: That's a really good question. And I genuinely don't think that it was any one thing. I think it was a combination of different signals, from seeing how he reacted to other people who were in challenging situations. So we had a, a person on the team who had a young baby and, you know, who was very open with babies at home with me today, bear with me folks, I'm very sleep deprived, all of these kind of things.
So being able to see somebody showing their vulnerability and seeing how he responded to that, made me feel very safe. I think seeing how people were living some of the company values of, kindness and equity. In real life, was really, really key to me. And then also just, again, like getting to know people, getting to know, their different situations, having people kind of share things with me again, in terms of their own vulnerability, definitely makes me feel more able to share back.
And that's something that is genuinely very important to me as a leader as well. It's one of the things that, you know, I try to sort of really build into the cultures that I build. but also some of the, the really practical things, like you say that the green flags, the way that the company talks about, the fact that, I know it's a very hot topic, but unlimited holiday, for instance.
asterisk with minimums, how people use that, the fact that we have things like, uh, what we call focus Fridays, which, you know, for no meetings and that, can really help, folks who, who really enjoy different kinds of work situations. And genuinely that sort of culture of understanding that people are individuals, they have their own lives, their own situations, was.
very, very helpful for me. so yeah, it was no like one thing where I thought, okay, I feel safe with this person. It's just, it's a general sort of, accumulation of signals.
[00:30:38] Lena: Yeah, but it's, it's not the sort of, make a very silly example, but it's not like, oh, I have a disabled friend, like kind of a thing. Um, but, I mean, it's obviously he didn't know. It's like, there was really, it sounds like there's a lot of fake. Just people around you and kind of embodying the company values, but also just like being decent to one another and being like, yeah, open.
And of course, that also takes a bit of time, but that's that's okay. I think that's very natural as well. But, just it sounds like you ultimately realized that there was space for other people to kind of show. their human side at work. and that yeah, it was a signal to you that like, you could potentially do that as well.
[00:31:21] Sally: Yeah, and there's, there's another person as well. So I think it, if it was just one person, I'm always a little bit kind of, you know, am I over optimizing towards how I feel? Because this one person is great. but, there were multiple people, some of my, you know, key cross functional partners. They were absolutely incredibly welcoming.
one of them, I don't know whether to like name people or not, uh, shout out to these people or not. they, they hopefully know who they are. but.
[00:31:49] Lena: You could tell them that like, at the, you know, timestamp, this is you I'm talking about.
[00:31:53] Sally: yeah, exactly. I'll send them the link, but one of my, um, absolutely unique key cross functional partners who I have a huge, huge amount of respect for, she had come back from a very major, health incident, which is, like, life changing.
And that, again, to me, there was a lot of common ground, very different situations, but a lot of understanding, a lot of empathy, and I didn't actually meet her until a little bit later. But, again, it's kind of Just seeing the, the sort of the reality of these people that I work with, are able to understand there is that lived experience, but also just generally the openness to be curious and to, to engage with people was just like, it's, it's great to find people that you can, you know, you really kind of gel with in that sense.
[00:32:38] Lena: That's huge. Yeah. honestly, especially since you mentioned some of the symptoms that you're dealing with, how do you manage? No, in the sense of like, you know, it sounds like, for example, there are some pieces where, I mean, it's like unpredictable, you know, to a certain degree and like, how do you manage just I mean that in the question in both meanings of the word, I guess. But yeah, I'm very curious how, how you make it work for you.
[00:33:02] Sally: No, I think I'm, I'm very grateful that my symptoms are, much more mild than some people's. so I think, you know, that's that's an important kind of caveat, but also I'm mindful of not kind of minimizing. yeah, my therapist would be like, don't minimize too much. Um, but yeah, I think, I kind of mentioned I, I crash mostly behind the scenes outside of work, which is to some extent like the nature of kind of the, the post exertional element of it.
so my weekends, my holidays are, uh, Very focused on recovery and needing to be very mindful that I need to build that kind of stuff in but that is obviously much much harder, being a parent so I I do some things where I also try to carefully plan my days So thinking about things like difficult conversations with people, or if I have to be, you know, really on it to be very reactive to questions, or, you know, have a high stakes interaction, like a board presentation.
I want to make sure that I'm setting myself up to avoid things like brain fog or being inarticulate. but as you say, like there is an element of variability. So week by week. Some weeks I'll be absolutely on it, tons of energy, incredibly productive. And then other weeks I'll need to operate in a different way.
Um,I might need to, you know, like not come into the office or minimize my meetings. and I don't use this so often. Usually it's more in the sense of, you know, external factors like, having a massively busy week with loads of interviews or, you know, some fire burning, but one of my previous.
Colleagues, brought me this idea of having kind of manager service levels really well-defined and shared, so that you can say really quickly, again, I'll, I'll try and link to a, a blog post that she wrote, but, so you can really quickly say to somebody, I'm gonna be at service level two this week for these reasons.
And you have that shorthand of like, what that means. so yeah, like I say, I don't, I don't invoke that very often. but it's useful. And then tons of other things. Like little hacks, like my notebook, it's right here. It goes with the everywhere I write things down. I try to plan my week every week, have a, sort of like a primary goal.
I share that out. I write weekly updates to my org. So a lot of like.a lot of structure works really well for me.some other things that haven't worked so well though, so I actually work nine out of 10 days and the day that I take off is, um, to do childcare and I kind of went into that thinking, Oh, that'll be fun.
We'll go to the zoo or something.
[00:35:36] Lena: Bless your heart.
[00:35:38] Sally: Like that is really not a rest day. I've come to learn.
[00:35:42] Lena: It's probably like nice that you went into it with that optimism,
but
[00:35:45] Sally: I know.
[00:35:46] Lena: oh no.
[00:35:48] Sally: It's, it's a little bit naive. what can I say? It's my first kid. I'm still, I'm still learning. and then the other thing I'd say, that has not worked so well as not sticking to my own rules.
So things like blocking out focus time or whatever, telling myself I'm not going to have, you know, kind of like three hour long meetings in a row. And then book it anyway. Yeah, like that's on me. and I think in general I have Incredibly high expectations of myself. I'm still on that journey of you know, again trying to balance all these factors and trying to work out what is realistic and what's not and where my own kind of like personal aspirations and my pre child career, might be slightly different to, to where I am.
so yeah, still, still on my journey. Would love to, love to hear some tips if people have them.
[00:36:39] Lena: honestly, as I was just listening to you, a big thing that came up for me is that like, this quite simplistic, but I say it out loud, but like a lot of the things that I just heard from you are things that like so many people, you know, including folks who are able bodied and folks who are neurotypical or whatnot, like who have.
not these kinds of challenges to deal with, but like are struggling with the exact same things that are just very inherent to leadership roles. You know, like the, the context switch, the like very emotional demanding stuff, like a lot of interviewing, for example, or like the high stress situations, reactivity, sometimes, you know, different things that you've alluded to.
I was in my head. I was like, yeah, I've, I've talked about this with like, at least two other people this week already who, you know, have very different identities, but, And it, it does, of course, sound like there is a big part where you are, you kind of have to manage a lot of this much more intentionally because the cost of like not managing it as well, it's just much higher than for other folks or it's just, you know, it's a different price tag. I don't even want to quantify those things. but, that was really interesting to me because like, same challenges that come with this kind of work. but the kind of effects of it are just different for you.
Like, yeah, I'm trying to be mindful of like qualitative statements. but yeah.
[00:37:59] Sally: appreciate that. but actually a lot of the questions that's in, it's the, it's the old classic thing. managers, as leaders. I think we often can ask the coaching questions to other people and then we know exactly what we should be asking ourselves and don't follow our own advice.
[00:38:18] Lena: all hypocrites, yeah, I admit it.
[00:38:19] Sally: Exactly And you know, the question of kind of how can you best set yourself up for success is a general one that I think a lot of people can benefit from. How do you get your energy? How do you restore your energy after draining times? how do you best receive information? you know, written or verbal, all of these things, I think, are really great questions for everybody to, to think about themselves or to ask, you know, the people around them.
Thinking about what you need and asking for it for me shouldn't be a, you know, this is a, like a, I can't even think of the word now, see, brain fog. but this is, you know, an accommodation, that's the word, that we're making for you. It's actually, you know, generally how can, how can you best ask for what you need, because again, you know, we're all individual, we all have strengths.
We all have areas where we might need a bit more help. Even if you don't identify as somebody with a disability, again, there might be some situational things that come up and being able to understand your needs in those times, ask for them, advocate for them. and as leaders create an environment where people feel comfortable doing that, I think it's just generally super, super important.
So yeah, absolutely. I think it's, it's something that maybe certain people. are forced into thinking about a little bit more. but we can all definitely, definitely sort of, learn something or try to make our own environment a bit, a bit better.
[00:39:48] Lena: Yeah, like, yeah, he's trying to be better about it over time. I think it's such an important point that you just shared in there, in terms of, the, there, there is a huge, I think, I had one question that I kind of don't want to ask explicitly now, but like one question that I kind of wanted to pose because it's a bit provocative, is like, why aren't there more disabled leaders?
and you that's why I'm so appreciative of you being here and being here with your name attached. because there is, like you mentioned, you know, how important role models were to you, in your own kind of career, and, that you want to kind of give some of that back to other people. but like, there's so much in like even creating that space for like talking about, Hey, here are things that I need to like be able to succeed as a leader.
And here are expectations that I have that is still, I think it still needs to be normalized. Like it's still like, there's still so much that like, yeah, leaders just, you know, you throw problems at them, they have to get through. And then there's all these associations with like how a leader has to be in order for that to be possible.
And there's obviously so much BS wrapped around all of this. But that's why, you know, I appreciate these examples you gave. like, yeah, here's, you know, how I manage. And it is about being able to express that like, yeah, I, I need things and then I can do a great job.
[00:41:08] Sally: Yeah. And I think whenever you're talking about this kind of thing of like, Why aren't there more women in tech? Why aren't there more, you know, disabled leaders? I think we can go really, really deep here and get into like all the flaws of society and all the things that if we were running the world, we would be able to change.
so I, you know, I, I don't want to discount that there are so many factors, I think that go into these, and I don't want to give you like a really pithy, superficial answer that is going to be like, Oh yeah, if we just change this, everything will be solved but I think that, there is a bit of a gap from when I was prepping for this, I was actually trying to find some stats, and as you would expect, I know, I know you like a survey and some stats and things like that.
Um, so maybe you got some better sources. but I found one from the BCS, which is the Chartered Institute for IT. and there's a post, again, I can share it with you. Back from February this year, which talked about how people with disabilities comprise 16 percent of the UK workforce, but account for 11 percent of the technology specialists.
And so there's a gap there in terms of representation in what, you know, what they're calling IT and so to be equal to kind of workplace norms, generally, there should be an additional 88, 000. specialists with disabilities employed in the UK. And so that's kind of like either those people aren't able to succeed in the industry, or maybe they're there and don't feel able to, you know, to be sharing or sort of identifying.
And so for me, I think there's, there's a lot of things that we do need to do better. I think, you know, A very simple again, you know, I said, I wasn't going to just give you a pithy answer, but
[00:42:49] Lena: take them.
[00:42:50] Sally: like one of the most obvious things for me is, to try and create room for these conversations in the workplace.
So to ask people what their needs are, rather than assuming, again, like we've talked about, this can be in a really broad sense as well. but to use that feedback to, help build equity into the processes, into the policies, and couple that obviously with kind of, you know, individual adjustments if needed.
but just thinking about, you know, policies around, attendance in the office, thinking about, whether you need, you know, a formal diagnosis to get adjustments. it, you know, chronic conditions like mine can be very hard to get a diagnosis for. And I was, as a tangent, that for me was actually really important.
going against what I said about labels, but having a diagnosis allowed me to not just be, Oh, I get tired every now and again. Like it's, It's the language again. but I think that once you sort of, once you start looking at everything through the lens of who is this potentially blocking, who is this excluding, you can look at, for instance, other requirements in your career ladder.
based on the language that you've used that inadvertently make it harder for, for instance, your diverse people or folks with anxiety or chronic pain to be able to, you know, demonstrate this consistently, or how does our hiring process. rule out people before they've, you know, even got a foot in the door.
all of these, I think you can, you can run some quite simple, like thought exercises to see where your process is maybe falling down. how you can, you know, bring, bring these issues to the, forefront, really. So. It's not going to solve why are there more people in leadership positions, but I think that if you can help people come in, if you can provide, environments where they feel like they can be themselves, and they can succeed and then they can progress, they can be recognized, they can be promoted, because you're not over optimizing for, a very, you know, niche view.
Then hopefully, as with everything, again, going back to the intersectionality point, hopefully you get more diverse folks, in leadership. But it's a, it's a tricky, tricky journey. I know you're, you know, very passionate about this as well. And I just hope that, we, we can, you know, turn the tide and get more people thinking about this as well.
[00:45:13] Lena: I appreciate you engaging the extremely silly question.
[00:45:18] Sally: It's not silly.
[00:45:19] Lena: giving such a thoughtful answer to it. And, because honestly, like, it really sounds like a lot of it is what I like to say about hiring, but I think it's so true for anything that's like, ultimately, like, our job is creating an environment where, like, you can achieve business results.
And. People can, like, thrive at least career wise or, you know, to, like, be well and be in that environment. And, There is a lot that's about like build a process that you can trust to get you the results that you want. And so I think even, you know, what you described about, you know, questions that you can ask yourself or look at things you can do to evaluate your process.
A lot of this ultimately just has to do with like making productivity accessible in the sense of like, all of those things are just in the, in the spirit of helping your team communicate well and collaborate well and everyone being able to like do their best work. and that's, again, it's a productivity thing.
I guess there is, of course. I'm always with those conversations about diversity, inclusivity, belonging. I'm always a bit worried and because I ultimately believe it's just, it's the right thing to do. And like, there, there shouldn't have to be a business case for it. But, I also know that so many, it's a complicated topic.
And so I, I also know that like being able to make a business case for it helps.
[00:46:40] Sally: Absolutely. Being able to make a business case helps everything, I think, sometimes.
[00:46:44] Lena: even if you're not like, Hey, you know, I want to look at our, our processes or the way that we communicate and whatnot from the perspective of accessibility. Well, then look at it from the perspective, can everyone on your team do their job?
[00:46:56] Sally: Yeah, absolutely. We don't want people, you know, dropping out. I think we don't want people, with my business hat, not doing their best work, not being as productive as they could be, where there are arguably very simple things that we can do to, to help. Support people with their individual needs and, yeah, like make, make an environment where genuinely we can have different shapes of people.
Because again, coming back to the DIB kind of conversation, then you end up with better products. And I'm again, a big believer of that as I know you are, it just makes sense.
[00:47:29] Lena: Yes. Yes, exactly. think you've alluded a few times to like, that creating that kind of environment is really important to you. But like, what else is really important to you as a leader? Like what do you care about?
[00:47:40] Sally: So I think one of the threads that has really tied together my career, you know, kind of like looking back in hindsight is working on things that, that have a purpose and that have, the ability to kind of solve, I, I'm loathe to say like real world problems because, you know, the real world is hopefully, you know, embedded in different places, but, the, the sort of the values.
of the people that I work with, but also the impact that I'm kind of leaving in the world has always been really, really important to me. So that's something that I find really, really motivating. the, the legacy that I leave as well, I think the, you know, the culture more broadly, how we can kind of embed some systems, how we can get people,like, Propagating some of the ideas and, you know, being there in little beacons to me is, is super, super important as well.
so thinking about how you can scale all of these ideas, you know, they're not new ideas necessarily, but how you can kind of scare a scale culture and scale some of the, the impact is really, really important to me. but also I think, as you've seen for this conversation and just generally transparency for me is.
It's a bit more of a buzz, more than a buzzword. I really genuinely care about kind of sharing work, as much as possible. sharing, you know, experiences, helping other people, relate to things. I think, you know, I know for me, it really helps me feel less alone in certain situations, or if I can see something that resonates with me, it's like, oh, that makes sense though.
So yeah, just kind of, you know, sharing and being open, and trying to help people, again, be, be themselves as, as much as is appropriate within different situations, as much as they feel comfortable with.
[00:49:26] Lena: I love that. and I've also realized that we're coming up at time already, even though like I could keep talking to you for the next three hours. but, I, Do you want to at least ask, like, is there anything else that you really want to say to, to the masses?
[00:49:39] Sally: to the masses, uh, all two of them that are probably listening, No, I think that the main thing that I kind of wanted to, to really close on was just to kind of go back to something that I, I said before. So I really appreciate you kind of inviting me on and, and having this conversation. I just, I hope that it kind of sparks some people to, to think about these topics, or to, to feel less alone if it's something that they're grappling with.
And I'm always very, very happy if people want to kind of message me and, you know, kind of like reach out and, you know. Follow up on anything or, or talk about their own personal journey. I, I love to hear from people. I will, put the slight disclaimer that I am terrible with my emails nowadays. so if I don't get back to you very quickly, that's on me.
But that's, you know, energy management and all that. So, um, please bear with me with my boundary setting.
Closing thoughts
[00:50:41] Lena: I really enjoyed this conversation with Sally, so thank you, Sally, for your time and for sharing your wisdom with us. I want to highlight for you a few points that stood out to me and that could be valuable for, well, anyone listening to this. First of all, what strikes me most about Sally's insights is just how much.
Of what she shared and what she's learned over the years is making any of us more effective. Like manage your energy intentionally, set some boundaries across the board and be strategic about where you spend your time and energy. The difference, of course, is that for Sally, like many other disabled leaders, developing these systems wasn't optional, but it was necessary, and that necessity has made her approach to leadership incredibly thoughtful and sustainable.
I also really loved the framework of manager service levels have that kind of clear shared language about your capacity in any given week. That's something that can be valuable again for all of us. And so is your point about making productivity accessible, like when we design our processes and expectations, are we creating space for different ways of working and leading, or are we optimizing for just one narrow view of what productivity and impact look like?
I also enjoyed speaking to Sally because her experience speaks to a dual reality in our roles as leaders that many of us experience. We're in positions of relative power and hopefully in a place where we can do a part to make our organizations and teams better places for everyone, including more accessible places and inclusive places.
At the same time, though, many of us in those positions are still impacted by systemic issues ourselves. Microaggressions, sexism, harassment, racism, for example, don't stop because you have a VP or director title. I've often been the only neurodivergent woman on a leadership team or just, you know, the only woman.
And I've always done what I could to make the organizations I ran or that I was a part of. More inclusive and better for everyone. And my lived experience and my connections with people in similar situations helped with that. I know many leaders who are in similar situations, like queer people in leadership positions, men and women of color or disabled leaders who want to make their organizations better, but who also aren't unaffected by the same issues that they want to, and to some degree even have a task and mandate to address and who aren't completely shielded from those just because of the bigger title they have.
I don't have a resolution for that or a ‘Here's what you can do about this’, but I wanted to call it out. As a highlight from our conversation and a continuation of it, and as something that's been been on my mind for many, many years.
Lastly, we also have a bunch of resources from Sally, as well as from me in the show notes to help you become a better leader for everyone you work with and for the users that your organization serves.
If Sally's story resonated with you, or if you have your own experiences that you want to share, we'd love to hear from you. Email us at pod@lenaReinhard.com. We read every message, even if we can't always respond. Leadership Confidential was created, produced, and presented by me, Lena Reinhard. Our guest's identity was not modified for this episode.
Leadership Confidential was created, produced, and presented by me, Lena Reinhard. Our guest voices were not digitally modified this time. Theme, original composition and mixing by Esteban del Pino. Production Assistant, Guest support, and social media by Sly Stark. Thank you for listening.
