Reading the Room – CX, Communication, and the Role of Chief of Staff with Lindsay Comeau

Gillian: I'm Gillian, and today it's just me. Michelle is not with us today, but we're with someone that I have known from a past life. And so it feels right. And it's just a pleasure to sit down with someone who is such an empathetic leader and probably better than anyone I know at reading the room. It's her job. Lindsey Como has held nearly every role you can imagine at a startup, from customer experience to marketing, influencer partnerships, user research.

Now she's chief of staff at Sunday. It's a direct to consumer brand that has incredible values around protecting the environment and avoiding toxic chemicals when it comes to caring for your lawn. Full disclosure I was one of the early employees there when they launched, and that's how Lindsey and I know each other. Her true value is very clear.

She understands how people communicate and how they need to show up, whether it's a frustrated customer they're working with, resolving conflict with a teammate or a founder who needs a mirror. Lindsey has made a career out of helping people get unstuck through better, more human connection. This conversation is about navigating growth, scaling teams, and leading with emotional intelligence.

Let's get into it. Lindsey, hi. So happy to have you here. Long time no see.

Lindsey: I'm happy to be here. I know it's been a minute. I'm very glad to see your face again.

Gillian: Lindsey and I had the pleasure of working together in very early stage startup world with a consumer product, a direct to consumer product with heavily, like, heavy component and physical component. And so I'll stop being mysterious, and I'll let Lindsey quickly explain kind of who she works for, what you all do, and we can get started.

Lindsey: Yeah, that sounds great. And fun fact Gillian interviewed me for this job and talked our bosses into hiring me, so. Thanks, Gillian. Yeah. But, I work for Sunday. It's a nontoxic yard care brand. It was started about six years ago by two brothers, Colter and Trent. They were looking for a better way to take care of their outdoor home. And couldn't find what they were looking for, so they went out and made it. We make custom solution and products that differ, effective and safe for your house.

What that means is, we make better products like fertilizers, weed control, grass seed. We are also in the pest and garden space as well. But we deliver right to your door, and we can also be purchased in retailers as well.

Gillian: Amazing. And your role with Sunday is wait for it.

Lindsey: I'm a chief of staff at Sunday.

Gillian: It's just always my favorite job title. It's so powerful yet. I don't know if everyone knows what you do. And one thing I've learned is that it's almost seemingly becomes a role that is quite custom to the environment that you're in and the people that you're working for and the needs at hand. So yeah. And, and we'll, we'll unpack that a little bit more.

I guess one thing I do want to ask you, like, what do people say to you when you say that you're Chief of staff, like in a social environment? Do they know what you do?

Lindsey: No. Everyone's like, oh, what do you do? That's always like the first thing. And they're like, oh, that's cool, because I think they hear Chief. I am not a C-level employee. I am a chief of staff, but I am not. I've sit alongside the executive team to facilitate those meetings and, I am behind the scenes, if you will.

But I the way by like short explain is I help with internal operations and I fill the gaps of what the company needs. And a chief of staff. The title right now is, It's super sexy, if you will. Like, I went to a, conference recently, and anyone who saw my title had so many questions for me because, it's it's definitely a up and coming title, that people really are whether they're wanting to hire for it or they're wanting to, take on that role themselves.

They just have a lot of questions. But it really comes down to what the company needs. And who you call your principal. It's, it's really contingent on that partnership and what they need and who you're working for. And, that's kind of really how the role evolves from there.

Gillian: So even the principal concept, did you learn that from somebody? Did you did you like did you do a course? Did you look it up online? Did I I tell you?

Lindsey: I joined a few networks. So when, Jay, our VP of ops, Jay Lesko, kind of helped me formulate this job description. He was like, join everything you can. Here are some of the ones that I found. I joined a network, called chief of Staff Network. And I would sit in on webinars and they do a lot of sharing of documentation, a lot of Q and A's.

And I just kept seeing this word world, word principal thing and talk this word principal. And I was like, what does this mean? Talking about like a principal I was thinking like a teacher. Principal. But that is what what they call their bosses, they call them a principal.

Gillian: So that's a really interesting. Okay.

Lindsey: I call culture my boss.

Gillian: Well, it's just a great example of just rolling up your sleeves and stepping into the unknown and figuring out what it is you're doing.

Lindsey: All day, every day and all day. That whether it's, a network, a colleague, I, Google I'm I'm constantly in research mode to figure out what I'm doing.

Gillian: Yeah. You always got to be. You always got to be. Are you are you a ChatGPT gal?

Lindsey: I am a huge ChatGPT gal, both personally and professionally. I mean, our latest life hack in this household is we have a meal plan. A meal plan? Not even like, meal plan. Like, it's like 4:00 or like, what are we going to feed the kids? We put in the ingredients that we have and bam! ChatGPT.

Gillian: I'm just impressed that you don't just feed your kids. Mac and cheese, grilled cheese and pizza.

Lindsey: You just listed their entire menu items. That was really more for what are we going to feed ourselves? Yeah, I try to get my four year old to eat what we're eating, but.

Gillian: It's hard.

Lindsey: Choosing my battles.

Gillian: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Okay, let's, take a step back. Obviously, we have another incredible working mom here on the pod. Michelle couldn't join us today. So kids might come up, but that's just part of our life. And the struggle and the juggle that we are dealing with in our careers. But speaking of careers, you've had a non-linear career path, so I'd love to just talk about how you got from where you began, which I believe was on a dude ranch to this really fancy title Chief of Staff.

Lindsey: Yeah. So yes, after college, I was like, why would I go get a big kid job when I can go play with horses all day? So, I worked on a guest ranch for about three years. And then I was kind of like, okay, it's probably time to grow up. Move to Denver. I was lucky enough to get a marketing internship at a company called Artifact Uprising.

Very quickly, I learned that marketing was not my passion. And at the time, a customer service role, a full time customer service role came, open. And that was very much more my speed. I done customer service, you know, certain forms of customer service and all the jobs that I had had before. So moved over there.

And I was very eager and very curious and was able to really rise in the ranks, at artifact and wound up, running the customer service team. And then at the end, I was able to, launch new business line for them, design services. So I, owned a PNL, hired a contract team, and, we tested it and it was successful.

And they still do it today, which is really cool. That was about the end of my four years. And I was looking for something else I wanted, you know, kind of different experience, a little bit of mentorship. And right around that time, again, Jay Velasco slid into my LinkedIn DMs and was like, hey, we have this role.

Would you be interested? And it was a perfect match. Jillian wooed me with her charm.

Gillian: Yeah. I tried really hard.

Lindsey: And, I came in, ran the customer service team. There was a full customer service team there at the time, but I. I put in process, and luckily I had somebody on the team who was really eager to rise in ranks. So I really put in a lot of time and effort into coaching her, into becoming a manager and owner.

Of customer service, because at the time, I didn't really know if I wanted to keep going down in customer service. But it also allowed me some freedom to start kind of tapping into other places in the business at Sunday where they needed help. So I did everything from email marketing, product user research. You know, back to a focus on, Sunday as a subscription business.

So we do renewals. And so I touched a little bit of everything. I had worked with everybody at this time. And I worked really closely with the executive team at the time to say, hey, I see a need where I can really see kind of where challenges are arising. And I'm naturally already fixing some of these challenges, whether it be process or people oriented, and was able to kind of craft a role for myself and fill a need for the company.

And it worked out.

Gillian: Yeah. That's amazing. That's amazing. It was clearly the right time for Sunday to invest in a resource like you. So I'm curious, you started as the—for context, you started as the 12th employee at Sunday. How many team members do you think there were by the time you brought that up?

Lindsey: There were about 100 people. We had already closed our series C in funding. In terms of the executive team, it was a large executive team at the time and probably too large, but there were about 8 to 9 people on it. You know, Sunday has also been exposed to the elements, if you will.

And we've had to do layoffs in the past. So our team is smaller now. We have 70 people with a five person executive team. But we grew really quickly after our series C, and we almost made the mistake of growing too fast without having a clear plan, which, you know, startups do. And it did allow me to kind of jump into that space to kind of help facilitate some of the breakdowns in different parts of the organization.

Gillian: That's awesome. Curious, what did you learn in your role within customer service that still shapes how you show up today? And I'm curious because there are two roles that are not desirable to me because they just seem stressful and scary. And one is customer service—leading customer service, and one is leading operations for a tangible product. But the reason leading customer service teams is intimidating is because there's just so many personalities.

There's so many balls in the air, there's a lot of fires getting put out, especially when you're dealing with a consumer product that's being marketed heavily. I just want to hear from you. Like, what did you learn in that role in multiple companies now that shows up every day for you?

Lindsey: Yeah. So, you know, the reality is when someone calls into customer service, they're usually calling because something is wrong. I have been yelled at a ton in my career, whether that is by a customer or by an employee. I don't think I've ever been yelled at by a manager, so that's good. But I've been yelled at a lot, but I quickly learned, like it wasn't about me.

It was about whether it was the thing that went wrong or something else was going wrong in their life. But it really taught me empathy, and it taught me seeking to understand. And if I could understand truly what the problem was, then I could really make sure I was solving the right problem for them. And I think that is kind of a foundation of what I try to do now.

A lot of my role, which has kind of happened organically, is helping people communicate, helping people have challenging conversations, helping solve conflict. And the core of that is understanding where the other person is coming from. And customer service really set that foundation for me. And I don't think I realized it at the time, but that's my jam.

Like, I like solving problems for people, whether it's a fire on the product side and we all get into a war room and solve this problem, or I get to make somebody's day because I fix their problem—like that's a happy endorphin for me. I really enjoy that.

Gillian: That's awesome. And I mean, one thing you haven't admitted is you are clearly a very good listener because that's probably a huge part of your job. And that's obviously a huge part of customer service, right? Is listening and responding literally. So I'm curious if you are helping people figure out how to communicate. Do you find yourself having to teach people to be better listeners, and if so, what does that look like?

Well, how would you guide them?

Yeah. So, you know, when I go to kind of coach somebody on that when they're having a challenge, you know, I really start with just asking them a ton of questions about themselves. You know, what are you trying to solve? What are your frustrations in the room? Why do you feel like you're not being effective? And they usually make it about the other person. That's like, you know, no, no, no, let's focus on you.

Lindsey: And then we make it about the other person and, you know, a lot of what I do and something I'm really passionate about is, I like solving people's tells. I like cracking the code on people. And so when I've cracked, you know, when I think I've cracked the code on somebody, I don't. I don't know if I always get it right.

I try to coach that person on it. It's like, you know, watch how they enter the room, watch their mannerisms, watch the vocabulary, watch the tone. And I try to educate them on observing. So it's not necessarily just about listening. It's truly being an observer to how people show up and and what they say. I do work with some folks on our executive team, and I also work with just employees across the business.

Because I've been lucky enough to work with a lot of people in the company, I've built this relationship and this rapport with them. And so they'll come to me with different challenges. Or they said, like, hey, Lindsey, I want to work on this thing, and I'm almost there. Accountability partner. Whether it's they're having a tough go with a counterpart or an employee, and we really work through that together.

Gillian: What does that look like? Is it anybody on the team, any level can come to you with something like that. And how are they coming to you? Like is it a slack message?

Lindsey: It's a slack message. It says like, hey, I'd really love to grab five minutes with you, ten minutes with you. They are usually like, I'd love to get your thoughts on something. I set the stage very early with anybody that I work with, any stand up that I have. I always say I'm an open door, my calendar is open to you.

You don't even have to ask. Just put time on my calendar. Let's chat. And at Sunday we also do like, coffee chats. Still, I ask a lot of clarifying questions. Again, back to going to that. Seek to understand element, understanding what they're trying to solve and who the other person in the room is if they're trying to solve it with.

I try to bring my Intel saying, like, hey, sometimes it helps with real people. We'll talk when you're having a problem with your friend Luke here. And, you know, you have you're trying to work on this project together, and you and Luke just have such differing opinions. I'll come in and I'll say, Jillian, like, what are you trying to get across?

Like what? At the end goal. What does success look like for you? Okay, why do you think you're having troubles with Luke? Where is Luke falling short on this when we really break it down? I was like, you know, when I worked with Luke in the past, I know that these are the three things he really cares about.

And I know that if I, you know, put him on the defense, he shuts down. So let's make sure we're not using language that puts him on the defense. Let's really critique, how we're showing up, how we're presenting something based on what we know about the other person. And I really try to help them figure out how do they adjust what they're saying and how they're saying it based on the person they're presenting it to.

And then at the end of it, I say, let's practice. Like whether you want to practice with me, you want to practice in the shower, practice, practice, practice, practice hard conversations. And then lastly, because I know I'm long winded, be vulnerable in these conversations too. Maybe you say something in that meeting and you're like, oh, that's not how I wanted to say it.

You say, oh, Luke, that's not how I wanted to come off. Let me try that again. Like call yourself out in the meeting, be vulnerable because it shows that you care. And when you show up in a caring way, people are going to put their guard down and be like, okay, they're not trying to be an asshole. They're just trying to like, figure this out.

And like, we both are here to, you know, achieve the similar goal and and help the company win. Really.

Gillian: Okay. Lindsay's a lot. Sorry. No I am, I love this you're... you have major job security right now. I feel like this is such important work that you're doing. It's the glue that holds things together. I mean, there's no denying it doesn't matter if Sunday's been around for six years or five years. I don't remember, Six, six.

Gillian: Okay. That's what I thought. And that it has 70 employees now. It's still, it's, a VC backed, like, consumer or good product, probably dealing with a lot of stress and a lot of personalities. So I can see where, you know, your value is needed here. And it's really interesting to see you peel back the curtain for people, creating just perspective on how they're showing up.

I'm managing a lot of people over here with my role, and I do put a lot of pride in putting my best foot forward as a manager, but there's just not enough time to show up on that level as like a director level manager. So I just hope that anyone listening who's maybe building organizations and considering chief of staff role really can understand, the void that you feel.

Lindsey: In managing people is a lot. And I, you know, they always say like, manage people the way you want to be managed. I disagree with that so wholeheartedly because you need to manage people the way that is going to bring the best out in them. And so like, you have to manage people to meet their needs, which if you're managing eight people, that's a ton at a ton of personalities to have to get right and understand and level up and level out and, you know, yeah, managers have their work cut out for them right now.

Gillian: They do, they do. I like what you said. I come from a very similar school of thought. I think it came from working with designers, especially at an agency where under very high pressure circumstances, you know, quick deadlines, very high creative expectations. And it was knowing my designers inside and out, like down to like what their communication style is, what they love, what they hate, their quirks, their sensitivities was my absolute superpower to getting the work done.

And so I, I so hear you on that. I, I love that tactic. I don't think enough people take that and run with it. But because it's—

Lindsey: Hard, it's hard and it's—

Gillian: Takes time. Yeah. You have to. I know, like, what you said hits for me because no one on one with, report is the same. Because you you should be meeting them where they need to be met. Some people need to walk and talk. Some people want to sit. Sit down and see your face. And if they're not getting face time with you, that that's not a good morale booster.

Clearly, this is one of your superpowers. Like reading the room and getting to know these people. How are you getting to know these people? Somebody starts at at the company. And it's somebody that you really do need to figure out to put them to work, to put them in the mix.

Lindsey: If I'm a part of an interview panel, it starts there. One of my favorite questions that I will ask is how do you handle high stress? Like what's your what's your tell when you are in a stressful situation? I'm very curious how people show up in that in that way because it, you know, I think in any company, but especially, a startup with a lot of trade offs, stress is a part of what we do.

But I, I do try to get to know our new employees. I have, you know, sometimes it's hard for me for every single new employee, but, I try to at least introduce myself, say that I'm here if they need anything. We do coffee chats at Sunday, so I just. I get to know them on a personal level, like, that's like number one.

And that's hard in a virtual world. Like, let me be the one to tell you watercooler talk, like I miss it. But I try so that I can always have this, like, connection with them. But then, because of my role, I do get to be in a lot of different meetings. And that's where I observe.

I observe like, who has their camera on, who does it, who's constantly raising their hand, who's constantly asking certain types of questions. What, you know, who's who's actually engaged, who's, you know, maybe obviously doing work in the background. And then especially if I know it's going to be a tense meeting, that's when I really, like, perk my ears up and I watch the room.

Depending on the role that I'm playing in the meeting, I'll try to help facilitate that. I. I know someone has an opinion or I know that someone's going to be frustrated or not. I'll I'll stop and be like, Jillian, I know you had some thoughts here. Why don't we. Why don't you share what you were thinking?

Lindsey: And then I try to garner alignment, like, okay, this is what I heard Jillian say. Is everyone on the same page of X, Y, and Z thing? Okay, here are our next steps. So I try to play a role of facilitation as well when I, I know there's going to be tough conversations based on who's going to be in that meeting and what I know about them.

But I try to put myself in as many rooms as possible that that's like how I do it. I try to put myself in there and then I, I observe.

Gillian: Do you get fatigued from this level of involvement, working so closely with people?

Lindsey: No, I my fatigue comes when I feel like I'm being ineffective. You know, if I'm working on the same problem with somebody and, you know, I can can only control myself, I can't control somebody else. And if somebody has come to me for help or advice and change isn't happening, that's where I get fatigued. I feel like I'm, like, spinning my wheels.

And then it makes more. I'm not. I'm not being effective. How do I change what I do to help them? You know, I'm going through a little bit of that right now at work, and it's it's been, you know, it's been tough. Yeah. That's hard. I like the people side. I do, we have a full time where, like, everybody comes to, Boulder once a year for, our all company event.

And, like, I tell myself, like, I'm the chief of staff. Like, I have to know everybody and shake hands with everybody. So I feel like I'm at a wedding every time, and I, like, truly make a point to say hi to every single person. Shake their hand. I'm glad you've come. That is like by the last day.

Like, everyone always goes out late. I want to go out late, but I'm so tired by the end of it. But that that the like in person people can can wear me down.

Gillian: Like, okay. Are you are you, introvert and extrovert?

Lindsey: I would combo I'm an extroverted introvert because I yeah, I get my energy by reading my book in my bed with no one around me.

Gillian: For an hour, my.

Lindsey: Or my trashy shows. But other than that, you know I like people.

Gillian: Do you watch Real Housewives like me?

Lindsey: I wish I'm a cutter. I'm a Kardashian. Oh.

Gillian: Me too. I'm crash. I'm Kardashian for sure, and love our secret lives.

Lindsey: I didn't get on the violent I have. I have trouble with love shows. I'm a people connection person. Those are not real connections. I can't.

Gillian: Yes, okay, that's actually really true. And, but I did. Yes. To real, Mormon wives, secret lives.

Lindsey: Mormon wives can't get enough most of it.

Gillian: So that I think you've done a really good job of kind of orienting us in terms of what a chief of staff does at a company like Sunday. I'm curious of from where you sit, you could tell us, how you've seen, especially in your network of chief of staff, other people in these roles and conversations you've had, what are what are ways that other companies might benefit from a role?

Gillian: Some having someone in that chief of staff role.

Lindsey: So I think what I've seen, whether it's looking at different job descriptions that are out there or talking to folks who are eager to get into a chief of staff role, you know, I think what's neat about a chief of staff role is that you can really play to your strengths. So there are folks who are business strategists sitting in the, in the finance org and creating panels and new lines of business and running data analytics like there are those that exist.

There are folks who sit on the people side. So, you know, I don't report into HR, but if I was at a bigger business, I'd probably sit more like a people organization. You could help with, the coaching side, org structure, helping managers level up and be managers. And then they tend to play a strategy part and be, kind of that second, second person to the CEO.

Those are like the two biggest versions that I've seen. I said it earlier, but it really does come down to like, who is your principal? Who is your boss? What do they need? What do they see as what the company needs, how they're going to, you know, be setting you up for success. And what that personality is because I saw a talk once.

And the CEO and founder of a company came in with his chief of staff, and this man was doing everything from responding to his emails to literally launching and running a complete net new business. Like that was the gambit of all the responsibilities of this chief of staff. That's very similar to what I do.

I, you know, I respond to culture emails, I schedule. I am his admin. I'm his... Yeah. But I also oversaw retention and renewals this year at the company. And had KPI metrics that I was in charge of, and I ran a cross-functional team. But I think as a chief of staff, really understanding what you're willing to do and what you want to do and finding a company that fits your needs.

And then on top of that, finding a principal, if you will, that is looking for that sort of thing.

Gillian: Where has AI come into your world, in your life, especially because you're watching how others are probably using it too? So I'm curious, what's your perspective on integrating it into workflows and leveraging it?

So we didn't really touch on this, but Sunday as a business is leaning into AI. We have created a yard AI partner. It's kind of a companion in your pocket, if you will. We feed from ChatGPT, but it is like our data, our information, our brand voice. So you can upload a photo of your lawn, and Sonny can tell you what's wrong with it and how to take care of it.

So we are really leaning hard into AI as a business. But culturally we are also really leaning into AI. We have given all of our employees a stipend to use monthly, to use an AI of their choice. And we're really encouraging them to share what they are doing so that, you know, AI makes us more efficient and it makes us more effective.

And so while we don't believe that AI will completely replace everybody, we do want to utilize it so that it makes us better at our jobs. When we started encouraging people to use it and share, some of the things I heard really surprised us. So they were using ChatGPT to help them have hard conversations, whether it was a peer or a manager who was having to put somebody on a PIP, or, you know, "I know Gillian is defensive about this topic."

"I want to send her a direct Slack message that comes off nicely," and they use it to like help them create conversation, which I wasn't expecting that at all, but I really like that they are using this tool to help them have better conversations, because it means they care and they're trying to fix their problems with it.

Gillian: Oh my gosh, that's so great.

Lindsey: I think the downside that I've seen a little bit is, a trend that I have noticed at Sunday is we don't collaborate the same way. We're using AI to collaborate and be that thought partner and help us solve the problem. And then presenting that problem to the team versus everyone coming together in a room and collaborating on solving a problem together.

We do brainstorms, we do retros. But collaboration looks different. And I think AI is a part of that. Covid and remote world is a part of that. It's a muscle I think we've all lost. You know, you don't get to get in a room and whiteboard the same way anymore. So that's something I've been thinking about, of how to really encourage true collaboration and what a framework for that looks like, and how do we encourage it back.

Gillian: That's awesome. That's really cool. I love the stipend for AI tools. Yeah. And it's just interesting because people in different stages of life who are exposed to different, you know, communities are going to just discover so many different use cases. And I just think there's so much to learn.

Lindsey: I can't take credit for that. Our VP of engineering had that idea, and we, I love that he had it. But we even had an engineer who was in the process of buying a house, and he used AI to, like, help him negotiate a price down, you know, like, I've used it for, like, car searching.

I've done it for - I went to go buy, like, a tool box, and I was like, compare this pricing. Like, what kind of discount am I getting? What's it on the market for second hand? How is this as a brand? And I did that all at ChatGPT right there. Like Google would have tripled my time because I'd have to click on the links and read - this was just bam right there.

So if we can do that in work - I use it. I do user research at the company. I use it to help me create usability scripts for customer interviews. I use it to help create documentation just for a tech stack that we're working on. Or I've tried to use it to help me create a slide deck.

Didn't go exactly the way I want it to. It takes effort. Yeah. To do it, but it helps.

Gillian: That's awesome. Okay, so I want to kind of wrap things up by asking some advice. You'd like to speak to the doers and the leaders of the doers - the folks that are holding up the leaders. And in the nitty gritty, in the grind, it's clear where you sit on the org chart. Managing up is probably something that you've honed in on quite a bit, and I think it is such a powerful skill to tap into early on.

What advice would you give to people early on in their careers about managing up?

Lindsey: Managing up really starts with building a good line of communication with your manager. I think having that sort of questioning of, hey, manager, if I have feedback for you, how would you like to receive that? Would you like it written? Do you prefer it to be, you know, in person? Do you want to talk about it?

Right then should I tell you the questions they asked you? You should also be asking them, be vulnerable. Say, okay, I'm a little nervous to say this, but I'm really trying to, you know, I want to have a really good rapport with you. I just - if something's not working for me, how can I deliver that to you?

Ask them how they want it. Don't just assume. And that's a scary thing. Don't get me wrong, but I think I have - I really pride myself on being direct. I really got a reputation of that at Sunday. But I have worked really hard on that. And they know that when I speak and I'm being direct, that I'm being honest.

So, putting in the foundation of clear communication lines is the best thing that you can do.

Gillian: For founders or execs when does one know that it's time to consider hiring someone in a chief of staff position? What are the signs?

Lindsey: I think the signs would be you feel that your executive team has become ineffective. And what I mean by that is like it's not just one individual - as a whole, they're not collaborating. They're not making decisions. No one's moving things forward. I think that's one clear sign. I would also say that there might be a couple of holes that need to be plugged.

Maybe it's... Yeah, maybe it's, I had this business over here that I want. It's special projects. You have this laundry list of special projects. You have the resources financially to get those special projects off the ground. But there's not one person who has the capacity to do that. I think that is where a chief of staff can really come in and help.

Gillian: That's awesome. Amazing. Okay, last question. What is something our listeners can do this week to better navigate conflict or misalignment?

Lindsey: Practice, practice, practice your hard conversations. You know, whether you have a sparring partner at work or you have somebody who ChatGPT can be your person. But if it's a counterpart at work, I use the 80/20 rule. You get 20% to vent, then 80% to be productive. But tell them, like, "Hey, I want to change how we've been showing up, and I want you to help me have this hard conversation like, I'm done bitching about it to you."

I want to solve the problem, go solve the problem together and use that person to, like, practice your hard conversation.

Gillian: That's advice that needs to be given. People aren't like, "I want to practice more." You really have to be told.

Lindsey: You have to be told. But it's hard. But like I practiced for this podcast, like I, you know, like I told my husband, I was like, "You need to go away because I have this thing that I'm practicing for," like, and I think practicing just shows that you care, like, you want to show up. You want to be confident.

I want to solve this problem and I want to solve it with you. So.

Gillian: Yeah. Amazing. Lindsay, you're definitely inspiring. This was so fun. And, now, Sunday's really lucky to have you. The team is really lucky to have you. And I feel lucky to have been a part of the journey with you in the beginning.

Lindsey: Yeah. No, I'm grateful. Thank you for asking me. This is a lot of fun.

Gillian: Thank you for being here.

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