How to Leverage Your Strengths For Career Success w/ Jess Weiner

In this episode, we talk about how to leverage our strengths & gifts to succeed professionally and create a life most true to yourself.

BACKGROUND:

For the past 26 years, Jess Weiner has been learning about cultural trends and becoming a cultural change-maker in the business of empowerment.

She is the CEO of Talk to Jess; a consultancy that has worked with fortune 500 companies in order to get them to be more culturally fluent and inclusive.

Jess was named as one of the most creative people in business in areas of diversity by the fast company. In 2006 she helped launch dove’s real beauty

campaign and started a national conversation around beauty, body esteem, and the unattainable goals promoted by industries. In 2016 she became a part

of the team at Mattel and helped change Barbie’s body with the idea of changing social norms. Clients she worked with include Disney, Aerie, Netflix, Google, and Amazon.

HIGHLIGHTS:

Jess discusses what holds people back from bringing out their best potential.

“I feel like a lot of people feel like their work is fair works. That if you’re not hustling, you’re not valuable. I think if you’re you know, and I think that’s kind of the culture that we’re living in right now.

There’s a lot of emphasis on performing you know, you’ve got your 430 lists and you’ve got all of this pressure to make it by a certain age. And the one thing I think that holds people back is their own vision of what they’re supposed to be doing.

That’s why I really encourage the good life work to be about, you know, challenging those dominant stories that say, oh my gosh, by 25 I should be xy and z and instead really saying, what’s important to me.

How do I want to live in this one precious life I have our relationships important. You know, I think having ambition is wonderful.

I don’t think you need to take your foot off the gas in your, you know, search for your career if that’s what lights you up, but make sure that you’re filling yourself up because, at the end of the day, success has so many levels and layers that you have to decide.”

Jess gives tips on how to stop comparing yourself based on social media.

I think it’s about designing a life that you love on your own terms. And what that means for me, is really deciding what matters to you. I think sometimes it’s easy to compare when we don’t have a compass of what’s important to us.

So all of a sudden, I Okay, I know I want to be successful, but I haven’t spent any time really asking myself what does that mean for me? Is that mean a certain number of dollars in the bank?

Does that mean a job title? Does that mean creative fulfillment, does that mean what does it mean for you? So when you don’t ask yourself those questions, that it’s very easy to compare and despair because it’d be like

, Oh, look, it’s yellow and the vacation she can take and this person and the awards, they’re winning, and then all of your emphasis goes out in the world.

I encourage people to bring it back to you. What lights you up what feels important to you, what brings you happiness and joy? Those are going to change over the course of your life.

IN THIS EPISODE, WE TALK ABOUT:

Jess’s role as a cultural expert and host of the podcast dominant stories
How she came a cultural expert and her two decades of a journey to help others become culturally fluent
Jess’s Courses “Welcome to the Good Life”
The best way to become successful in your career aspirations
Tips on how to create a life you love and feel confident
How to stop the comparison trap