Dare to Try: Interview with Julia A. Nicholson, Former CEO of the Motion Picture Industry Pension & Health Plans
I recently went one on one with Julia A. Nicholson, former CEO of The Motion Picture Industry Pension & Health Plans. Julia is the author of the new book Move Forward Stronger: A Dynamic Framework to Process Change, Loss, and Grief.
Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here? What experiences, failures, setbacks, or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?
Julia: I’m a former CEO, executive leadership expert, business consultant, and adjunct professor of business. I work in the areas of governance, strategic planning, team building, and executive performance. I have also faced an inordinate amount of adversity in my life. In the span of 15 years, I went from a near-fatal head-on collision and a challenging role as single mother of two young children after leaving an abusive marriage, to being the CEO of a $450 million company. I now bring the expertise and passion I learned along the way to organizations and conferences across the country. The transformations that led to my successes are central to my book Move Forward Stronger. You can get a great sense of my spirit and message from my TEDx Talk “The Way We Think About Loss and Grief is Dead Wrong.”
Adam: What do you hope readers take away from your new book?
Julia: Many of us have experienced an unprecedented amount of change and loss, professionally and personally, in the past few years. Some have lost a key member(s) of their team, an important client, prospect, or investor, their job, or maybe even their company. Others have lost family members, close relationships, or have experienced a change in their physical or mental health. As a result, we are feeling stressed and overwhelmed, struggling to cope with so much happening, seemingly almost simultaneously. Before there is a chance to process one change, we are faced with another. We need to know we are not alone, and this is not the new normal. We need a way to move forward with everything we have experienced. My hope is that after reading “Move Forward Stronger,” the reader will be empowered with a new mindset, equipped with practical tools to use when something happens they didn’t want to happen, and have a new framework to process change or loss in a productive way, learn from it, and use those learnings to their advantage going forward.
Adam: What were the best lessons you learned from leading a large business?
Julia: Leading any size business has inherent built-in challenges, whether it be finding and retaining the right people (especially in an environment of daily or weekly layoff announcements), encountering an unexpected obstacle just as you’re closing a big deal, or needing to change direction after implementing a strategy you and your team spent valuable resources developing. No matter how well you plan, how perfectly you implement it, or how well-qualified your team is, there will always be more things that don’t go according to plan than knock-it-out-of-the park successes. These can start to wear on you, negatively impacting your confidence, making you question yourself, your decision-making skills, your leadership abilities, and leaving you feeling deflated, defeated, and depleted.
We tend to spend an inordinate amount of time focusing on the past with a negative bias when something didn’t go well. Don’t let yesterday use up too much of today if reliving the past is not getting you closer to your goals. Only look back as much as is needed to learn from the experience and make adjustments going forward. Recognize there are valuable opportunities to learn from the things that didn’t go well and enormous benefits and exponential growth for you and your team when you are able to apply what you learned to future challenges. I’ve learned infinitely more from what didn’t go well than I ever learned from a plan that did.
Challenges can create uncertainty. Uncertainty tends to make people nervous, take their eye off the ball, and focus on anything other than achieving their goals or getting their job done. During these times more than any other, people look to their leaders for cues. Setting the tone and staying calm is important, as is communicating regularly and openly, but just as important is knowing you don’t always have to have all the answers and there is value in openly admitting you don’t. You must earn people’s trust, which sometimes comes from being vulnerable and showing your humanness, before you can earn the right to influence them. Many times, in the initial stages of chaos, being open, honest, and present is enough.
The greatest determinant to your success and that of your organization’s is not about the number of times you get back up and into the game when things don’t go well, the key is HOW you and your team get back up. Being able to get back in the game stronger, more confident, determined, and resilient depends on how you and your team handle and process the setbacks.
Adam: What do you believe are the defining qualities of an effective leader?
Julia: Many studies have been done in an effort to define the specific qualities that distinguish effective from ineffective leaders. Throughout my career, I’ve worked with, reported to, and learned from both. In general, I have found the most effective leaders exhibit a genuine interest in people, treating them with respect without regard to their title, position, or role they play in the organization’s success. They naturally exude empathy and compassion when the situation warrants. People tend to gravitate toward someone they believe cares about them and their well-being.
An effective leader invests time into building trust by listening openly, treating people fairly, and consistently acting in an ethical manner with integrity. They are humble, self-aware, and exhibit a servant leadership style, doing the blocking and tackling to remove the obstacles to set people up for success. These qualities build loyalty, commitment, and dedication within an organization and create a culture in which people can thrive.
Adam: How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?
Julia: In order to improve your skill set in any area, you must continually look for opportunities to learn something new, expand your thinking, and expose yourself to things beyond your comfort level. This also holds true for taking your leadership skills to the next level. Surround yourself with people you can learn something from, including people who are in an entirely different field. Interact with people who challenge you.
Seek honest, candid, developmental feedback, especially from people who report to you. The first time I requested this, people who reported to me were wary and hesitant to be honest for all the reasons you could imagine. That changed when they realized I was serious by tying a small percentage of their annual salary adjustment to sharing feedback with me that would help me improve and serve them better.
Identify some role models and spend time with them. Ask them questions. Better yet, ask them if they would be your mentor. I was surprised at how many people were willing to help me and all I had to do was ask.
Adam: What are your three best tips applicable to entrepreneurs, executives, and civic leaders?
Julia: Over the years I’ve been fortunate to have extremely talented and gifted people around me who have willingly shared their words of advice, guidance, and wisdom. These three gems have made the most positive difference in my relationships, career, and life.
Honor your commitments. Do what you say you are going to do and overdeliver whenever you can.
Be willing to take risks. Listen to contrary opinions with an open mind, thoughtfully consider their viewpoint, and then tap into yourself. Take the nuggets of truth that resonate and discard the rest. Leadership is not a popularity contest. You will have to go against the crowd to do what you know is right as you will usually be making decisions with more information than anyone advising or judging you will ever have.
No one will ever believe in you more than you believe in yourself.
Adam: What is your best advice on building, leading, and managing teams?
Julia: No matter what business you are in, how much capital or revenue you have, or the market share you have attained, success is determined by relationships. People work for people, not companies. Invest time and create opportunities for team members to build relationships by getting to know each other as human beings, not just the role they play on the team or in the organization.
Try not to pigeonhole people based on their current position, title, or formal educational background. Many times, attitude and aptitude are more valuable than past successes or skill sets presented on a resume. Each person on the team has a wealth of knowledge, background, experience, education (from the school of life), and training that might not be readily apparent in their current position or on their resume.
Allow everyone to contribute to discussions, helping them feel ownership for the success of the team. Set the team up for success by delegating authority with responsibility, establishing accountability, and being very clear about each person’s role, responsibilities, authority, deliverable(s), and timeline for deliverables. After the team goal(s) are established, I have had great success in prompting a team’s innovativeness and creativity by identifying what the team can’t do before they start to identify ways to achieve the goal(s). I call this my “sleepless nights list” which includes anything I can think of that would give the organization a sleepless night (i.e. the team’s approach can’t be unethical or illegal; decrease quality, timeliness, or service; exceed the budget; exceed the time allotted to reach the goal, etc.). All ideas that don’t violate the sleepless nights list are open for discussion. This allows each member of the team to bring everything they have to the table, to be creative, excel at what they do, and give them an opportunity to shine.
Sometimes members of a team just don’t click for any number of reasons. Be willing to make changes to the team if it appears there are people who don’t quite fit or would be better in a different role on the team. It is very likely other team members already know a change is needed and will be relieved when you make it.
Everyone likes to feel part of a winning team. Take time to celebrate the little wins and reward incremental successes. A little fun goes a long way to creating and maintaining enthusiasm and momentum.
Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?
Julia: There will be people who will try to convince you that you can’t or won’t be successful at whatever it is you want to do. They may laugh at you, discourage you, and list many reasons why it won’t work, or you’re not the person to do it. They feed into our own self-doubt and insecurities. Don’t let their beliefs become yours. Be true to yourself. Follow your dream. Never give up. Dare to try. At the very least, you will learn something, meet some new people, and have some great stories to tell!
Adam: Is there anything else you would like to share?
Julia: No matter what has happened in your life and no matter how recent or long ago, it is not nearly as important as what you decide to make happen in your future!
Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally-recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one on one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.
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