Imagine this. Fresh out of college with a degree in Psychology, I joined Corporate America. Not just any company, a really BIG company.
When I entered into the corporate space, it’s no surprise that I’ve always had an interest in understanding how people are thinking. What is an environment like for people? I spent a lot of time observing and thinking about this idea as I navigated my new role – and, ultimately, my entire 30 years working for big companies.
One of the things that became really obvious to me is that leaders make or break the employee experience. How it feels to work somewhere is how it feels to work for the leader that you’re working for. Think about that for a second. It’s so true, isn’t it?
Paying attention to that brought me to this place of thinking about leadership development. And not in a way of teaching a bunch of techniques, but more about teaching leaders to think about how they show up.
How they show up, how they think about their work, and how they relate to others is much deeper than a collection of technical professional skills.
And that’s why I do what I do. At Slingshot25, I get to build all of the programming that I bring into the classroom, and I like to get really creative about that. I know what works and what doesn’t. I’ve had my share of boring training classes that feel like a check-the-box activity.
My mission is to create an experience that is different, relatable, and that sticks to leaders. To take all of the things that I’ve learned and figured out, how do I turn that into a story, into a classroom experience, or a program that others can relate to quickly – that’s what I love to do.
And when I see it work and realize it really connected, that’s like winning the lottery. Because the goal is always to get people to change not just how they feel about their jobs but how they work with and lead others. Because that’s when we have a domino effect – I know that it changed the lives of 10 people who work for them. That’s my favorite part by far.
~Jackie Pelland, Leadership Expert and Coach