Developing Your Leadership Skills as a Woman

I was tired and I was ready to walk away from our marriage. Abby's husband serves in the military, which means a lot of family moves and a huge strain on their relationship. But through our podcast, Abby found hope for her marriage.

I don't believe that we would be where we are today without focus. I'm Jim Daly. Working together, we can bring real hope to more marriages like Abby's. Give today at focusonthefamily.com slash real families. So I challenge women who are already in the culture, who are already excelling, don't let the culture dictate your values and your priorities.

You can have a career, you can have it all, but I say all that God wants. Well, that's Deborah Pagay and she's with us again on Focus on the Family. Thanks for joining us. Your host is Focus President and author Jim Daly. And I'm John Fuller. You know, John, as president of Focus on the Family, leadership is a topic that is close to my heart. It's so important. And hopefully the strategies that I've learned and studied and deployed are things that I can use not only in running Focus on the Family, but also at home.

Maybe not exactly the same, but similar. For women, leadership is a key narrative right now, whether it's in the workplace or in the home. And over the last few decades, we've seen a rise of women leaders in the culture. There's more women in the workforce than ever before. And over the last few decades, we've seen a rise of women leaders in our culture.

And there's no doubt that their influence is having a lifelong impact, right? Here at Focus, we cherish and honor the special innate qualities God has gifted all individuals. And if he's called you into leadership of any kind, you'll want to stay with us today as Deborah Pagay examines some of those traits that make an effective leader, whether you're male or female.

And I would lean into that. If you're a man, you're going to learn some good things too. Yeah, there are some great principles here for all of us. Deborah Pagay continues to be one of our most popular guests. She has spent many years as a leader in the corporate world. She's a CPA.

She's written a number of books, including Lead Like a Woman, Gain Confidence, Navigate Obstacles, Empower Others. And we'll encourage you to stop by FocusOnTheFamily.com slash broadcast for your copy. Deborah, welcome back to Focus. Thank you so much. I'm so delighted to be here, guys.

We're still doing this remotely, and I'm hopeful that sometime in the near future, we'll have you back in person, but we'll do what we need to do in the moment. Let me start with your experience in various corporations. I mean, you have worked at the top of corporate America and I'm sure learned many of the things we're talking about. You've coached a variety of women to do well in the workplace in their leadership roles. What have you observed when it comes to the differences in leadership styles between men and women? Jim, I've just seen women, some of them have decided that leadership is a man's domain. They listen to the culture, but there are leadership differences, and I believe that God has given women some specific female traits that position them to excel in leadership, and I'm delighted to talk about those today.

Yeah, that's great, and that's a good place to start, those traits and characteristics that strong leaders possess, and specifically what women bring to the leadership skill set. Let's start with a couple of those, collaboration and resourcefulness. Yes, I love the fact that we like collaboration. Even that word means to work together, and that's what we do. We like the concept of team, and we bring that to the table.

We don't have a superego that tries to drive in like the Lone Ranger. I can do it all by myself. We know that none of us is as smart as all of us, and so we like that, and we need to bring that to the table and not have to try to lead like a man, and that's the whole concept. Don't try to be a man. Don't try to emulate men.

Bring your entire womanhood to the table. Now, you know, right at the onset here, we got to differentiate because some will misunderstand what you're saying. They think you're man bashing. That's not what you're saying, right? Women just bring different elements because they're wired differently.

That one right there is a great example. Men tend to be loners. We do lead somewhat isolated at times. We got to make decisions that also can make a man a good decision maker because they get so many inputs, and then they're ready to go, but women are collaborative and lead in that collaborative sense. That's your point, correct? That is exactly my point.

I absolutely am against male bashing. I just believe, according to the scriptures, that God gave us equal authority in the garden. When he said to go and populate the earth, I can't imagine one of them saying, I'll do it my way, and the other saying, I'll do it my way. There's kind of only one way to do that, but no, I so appreciate that. Together, together.

Together, right. Do you want to touch on resourcefulness as another quality trait? How does that work differently with women and men in leadership? Because we don't mind looking for different ways to do things. We don't get stuck in it in one way to do it, and what I like about it is that we are very prone to just not looking to just what we know. When we look for other people to help us, we'll reach out.

What do you know? How can you bring what you have to the table and empower me as well? Most of all, I think, and I'm not saying women do this exclusively and men do not. I want to preface everything I say with that.

These are traits that are uniquely feminine in some regard, predominantly feminine. We don't mind asking for help. You know that. You know we don't mind asking. I'm laughing because the old men never ask for directions problem, right? We won't stop and ask, hey, how do we get there? That's not the way we want to do it.

We're going to find our way. Let's move to another essential skill for strong leadership, and that's communication. I think especially when you're working in an organization, a company, et cetera, communication is probably always the weakest link because people want to know more than typically management shares or may be able to share.

I don't know. So speak to the communication leadership style. Women are great communicators because that's what we do and we like to talk, but communicating is more than just talking. It's informing people as to what's going on. I worked at a job once where I kept my accounting department informed on the company's status.

It was a nonprofit and I wanted people to know where we stood. When I left, I got so many calls there saying everything's a secret now. We like when you told us where we were because that's important. I always say nothing grows in the dark.

Well, but mushrooms and misunderstandings. Oh, that's good. I like that. And so that's what we do. We keep people informed. We know how to do that and we don't feel like we need to keep it a secret because it's empowering to know something that nobody else knows. That's not good.

Yeah. Sometimes we think of good communication as being, you know, people listen to the top or people listen to management in a, in a corporate context. But the idea of good communication also involves the other direction, listening well when you're leading. And how do you differentiate that with men and women and the skill set there? Well, the ability to listen and you might think this is a challenge for a woman, but it isn't because we love to understand people.

I always like to say the same letters that spell silence, spell listen. And that's important that we learned to tell our stories. We learned to be vulnerable like that, encourage feedback. And there's nothing wrong with encouraging feedback. With any endeavor I do, I'd like to know, I, I lead my family and I'd like to know how's this working?

How can we do it better? I want to be open to that kind of communication. That's communication as well when we solicit that kind of feedback.

Yeah. The other attribute with women that I think, and there's more, we're going to cover them throughout the time here, but another one is this idea of nurturing. And I think, you know, politically incorrect statements, you know, bound in the culture. But I think this idea that women are bent toward nurture is so true. It's in a woman's character to be nurturing. Now, is that every woman?

Of course not. You're going to be some people that fall outside that norm, but women generally are nurturing people. I mean, that's something that they learn as a, as a wife, as a parent, et cetera. Speak to that nurturing concept in a, in a corporate endeavor and leadership.

Yes. And when we nurtured the development of the people and their skills and their ambitions and their dreams and listen, people are much more engaged when they know that you're concerned about their personal development. I've had people that I've seen who were, had great skills but needed some development in another area.

And I would say, listen, why don't you read this book? Let's take this class so that you can develop that skill. Maybe it's more people skills, even if it's just more technical skills that would get them on a different track or a different track of advancement.

And those are the kinds of things that's nurturing. A lot of women shy away from that. Look, I don't want, I want to be seen as tough and strong like the guys that won't work for a woman. And I'm here to tell you, we're not trying to be like a man in any way.

We're not trying to bash them. We want to learn from them cause there's a time when you know, hard decisions have to be made and we know how to make those too. But we need to learn that developing someone is a good trait. In fact, you had an experience with Carl who kind of illustrates the point. What happened with Carl?

Some of us may have fired Carl, but what did you do? Well, he interviewed for the job and then he, he really didn't have the skills, but that's it. Let me just take a quick rabbit trail because most women won't apply for a job if they don't have 99% of the qualifications.

This is what the studies show. A man will apply if he has 50% because when they see the word required, they read desired. But Carl applied and said that he had the skills. Well, he actually didn't. And on the first day of the job, he says, let me have the manual for the accounting system. I said, do you need that already? He said, Oh, well, it couldn't be that hard.

But here was the point. He knew that I had a high expectation and he kept giving me a wrong answer. He would just answer it cause he knew I demanded an answer. And I said, why do you do that? I said, why don't you just stop and think about what you're saying? He said, I said, where did that come from?

I really want to hear, hear about it. And he said, my father was very critical and you had to have an answer. So I said, listen, I want you to think about it.

If you don't know the answer, I'm giving you permission to say, I don't know. That's good. What a great example of what needs to be done. Motivation seems to fall in line with nurturing, but there's a fine line between motivation and manipulation. And now we might be talking about another aspect of the genders, but speak to that motivation versus manipulation and how a woman leader needs to be careful about manipulation. Motivation is about the other person. What do I need to get you so that you feel inspired? You feel moved to follow the track that I've set out, but manipulation is based on what I want.

It's really about me focused. And sometimes I'll use fear. Maybe I'm going to, you know, maybe I have to fire you or I'm not going to be able to have you to do this job or we'll use even sympathy.

You know, I'm just, I've been sick and I really need somebody to do this. We have to watch that manipulation. We have to watch that kind of Delilah syndrome, I call it where we're actually moving people to act, but not in a way that's good for them. It's all about us. And women are known sometimes for doing that, but we don't have to do that. We know how to motivate and I've seen it in the scriptures. I've seen it in my own life that sometimes you find out what does that person need? Does that person need more responsibility? Is that what motivates you? So we need to learn to discern that. And that's what we do as women. And you know, another great example where both men and women need to be biblical in their leadership, Christians particularly, obviously you don't want to manipulate away from a characteristic of God. That's a, that's a foundational principle for everyone.

Yeah. Along those lines, Deborah, I'm wondering if there is somebody in scripture that you see that really motivated well out of a good, a good heart with some good outcomes. I love the story, how Deborah motivated her army captain to said, listen, God has called you to do this. I'll go with you. He said, we've got to go with me.

She said, I'll go with you. And the point is that I want to get you to move and keep that in mind. I'm trying to get people to move from one place to another. And a lot of times I need to inspire something in you to do that. And so that's where it really comes in. You're using that intuition, that thing in me that says, this is what that person's needs.

That's what that person needs. I'm looking beyond what he's doing now. And I see here that this is something that could cause him to want to move in the direction I'm trying to lead them to. Deborah, in your book, Lead Like a Woman, you share a story of a time when you, I can't believe you did this job, but it was an aerospace budget director. As a marketing person, can I just say, oh my goodness. But why was that such a challenge for you and how did your intuition and you know, God's grace in that regard serve you in that role other than the patience to do it? I want to tell you that I was an affirmative action hire back in the day when they needed a black person in a high visibility position. I had skills, but I didn't know that industry. And so there were times when I just, I just didn't know they hired a mentor or they assigned me a mentor.

She didn't really like that idea of mentoring me. But at any rate, there were times I would just say, God helped me with this job. And he would many times just lead me to prepare a report, just a certain analysis. And I mean, invariably, it just became almost scary at the frequency in which it happened.

They would ask for a report and it would just be the very report we had done. And that's where I learned that you don't show up in your own skills and your own education. You bring that to the table, but you depend on God to reveal what you really need. No, that is so good. And don't write me.

I love all the budget people out there, the aerospace industry. So I'm just teasing. Some people are wired for that. Some people aren't like me. Deborah, what's the difference between intuition and discernment? Because I think that that's critical for everybody. I think intuition is that sixth sense that God gives us. We just kind of know we can suspect a person's motivation. We can understand what they're thinking. I've been on calls where I knew somebody felt like they wanted to say something and the leader wasn't being sensitive to that.

And I'll send her a note and say, oh, so-and-so wants to say something. But so it's that inner knowing that comes from the Holy Spirit. But so does discernment.

That's where you kind of know the decision to make, discerning between this path or that path. We have that. We can think about it. We can stop and think about it.

We're not so facts driven that we don't understand that something beyond what we're seeing is going on. You know, I'm thinking of the very first house we ever bought together. My wife and I looked through this house and I was ready to buy it.

I mean, the facts were clear. We can afford this. It meets our needs. And she just said, I would not buy a house from that realtor for anything. She was bringing that level of intuition to the table that I would have totally missed. And I was so grateful for that. We're talking today with Deborah Piguet on Focus on the Family, and she's got a great book.

It's called Lead Like a Woman. And we'll encourage you to get a copy when you get in touch. Our number is 800-AFAMILY or stop by the episode notes.

The link will be right there for you. Hey, Deborah. Again, to reset this, there are people I'm sure just joining us, but touch again on this idea of in the workplace, female leadership, et cetera. It's part of the culture. It's where we live today and may have been different in biblical times with the gender roles and what took place. But speak to that concept of leadership and really God's perspective on that. I'm not necessarily directing this at the church hierarchy, but I'm talking about in the workplace.

Yes. God has called women to lead. He's given us careers and callings. And it's a matter of understanding that, embracing the traits that he's given us. And so we're talking about the fact that I identify, I identify 12 traits that women have of being collaborative and communicative and nurturing and all of those things and being servant hearted or whatever. But these are things that God has given us and we have to manage them.

And that's important. But we also don't want to abandon them because they're not traits that are normally associated with men. But I'm encouraging women to work together with men because that's God's order.

So I don't want women bashing men, bemoaning the fact that men have advanced faster than men. But if that's your reality, that's our reality. Let's go forward.

It's a new day. But we also want to do this in a God honoring way. And so that's the whole goal of this conversation.

Well, excellent. And the great book, Lead Like a Woman. Deborah, as a leader, you want to present strength and confidence as key resources. Again, I think you think of men and strength and confidence. That tends to be an attribute there.

Women can do that as well, but it might be a little outside of their core. Again, we're stereotyping to a degree because of the conversation. But why is strength and confidence so critical? Because you need them for leadership. And it's interesting, Jim, that when Harvard and other universities who have done studies, they study the competencies of women, leadership competencies of women and men. Women excel men in eight out of the 10. But the two that they don't excel in is confidence and risk taking.

And what is that about? Women have been challenged in developing confidence because a lot of times we've been told that that's not our role and we apologize if God has called us to a role. And so we have to understand that confidence means with trust. And when we come to the table, not just relying on our own strength.

I have to tell you that I was speaking somewhere and the lady came up to me and she says, I'm going to be taking the CPA exam and I have a nervous wreck. I said, why? She said, I just don't know. I said, listen, I don't show up in my own skills and abilities.

I want to show up knowing that God has empowered me. If he has called me to do this work, I don't worry about whether or not I have the ability to do it. I just every day depend on him. And I learned that in a job where I didn't have all of the qualifications.

Yeah. And that leads to the next part, which is resilience. I think, you know, resilience is probably the greatest leadership trait because you have to get through difficulty, et cetera. How do women stack up with resilience in their leadership roles? We have the ability to keep bouncing back because emotionally we don't really get that devastated.

But a lot of us tend to sulk. And so that's why we're going to manage that thing, that that ability to just bounce back, to keep moving forward. If you if you're discriminated against because you're a woman, don't just give up your throw up your hands and say it's not for me. Just keep going forward. Just keep pushing forward.

I'm loving reading the stories of women who are entering politics or who will be joined in the White House staff or in Congress. A lot of these women have stories of having to just keep pushing back. You lose. But each time you push back, you develop more muscle. That's how it works in the gym. And that's how it works in leadership. You develop that by resisting pressure. You get stronger.

Interesting. Yeah, that's a great analogy. Deborah, you mentioned a trio of truths when it comes to problems. What are those and what are the strategies for handling adversity? Well, I always say there's the I call it the IRS of trouble. And you're going to have to know that adversity is commonplace and we just have to get a mindset. We don't look for things always go well. So I call it the IRS of trouble.

The I is for inevitable trouble. Adversity is inevitable. So don't expect things not to happen. Things are going to happen. You develop strength by resisting pressure.

And that's the our IRS. And then it's seasonal. When you have a mindset that this too will pass no matter what. And sometimes even yesterday I was so overwhelmed with something I was doing and I just stopped and I said, OK, God, what's the best use of my time in the next hour?

What would you have me to do right now? And actually the answer was take a break, walk around the block. And so that's you know, we just have to have an IRS mindset towards trouble. Yeah, I think one of the great attributes of resiliency is flexibility. You had a great story in the book about the oak tree. Describe the oak tree story and how it proves flexibility wins. Well, it talks about the fact that it was just an example that we found how there was a reed and an oak and the wind, the wind as we're experiencing here in my hometown today, the wind just kept blowing the reed over and over. But it didn't break.

But the oak finally gave into the pressure and broke. You're seeing somebody say blessed are the flexible for they shall not be bit out of shape. But that's what we have to be is flexible to have a flexible mindset that says, OK, this may not be working, but maybe this will and not just get stuck because that's a good leader doesn't get stuck in my way. A good leader is available and open to a different way of doing things. And so when you have that kind of mindset, you know, you don't get I was working with someone yesterday who just stuck like this is the way it has to be.

And I thought, no, it doesn't. Deborah, values or principles define a leader. I mean, you have to have a guiding star. A lot of leadership courses will talk about the North Star and what you're aiming for and how you lead. What are some of the key values we should cling to and how do we reconcile standing firm in our principles while remaining flexible?

Back to that great word. Yeah, we got to be principle driven leaders. And, you know, the studies show that women tend to be more focused on that, not the men on principle, but we're more likely to say, no, this is what I believe. And listen, we have to be known for our integrity and our fairness and all of those things that are that that really move people forward. And so and no matter what that is, we don't compromise. We don't backstab.

Not to say other people do, but we don't play those games that try to disadvantage somebody so that we can be advantaged. We know that promotion comes from God, according to Psalm 75. It comes from God. And so while we don't always get the promotions we want, but we know that we can ask, but we don't do things that compromise our principles, because that is important for a leader to be known as that. And when you are people embrace you and want to follow you.

Let's at the end here, let's bring up the example. And that's Jesus as the servant leader. There's probably 400 books that have been written about that. But he demonstrated the concept of having that servant's heart. Of course, he washed the disciples feet at the Last Supper. He, you know, demonstrated what he wanted them to do and how he wanted them to treat people by doing it himself for them. What benefits come from servant leadership as Jesus showed us?

Well, the benefits are known. As you said, many people have written about the fact that it pays to have a servant heart, but we serve. But here's the deal we have to watch. And again, I say these are traits that we have to embrace, but manage women will overserve. And so we want to make sure that we come serving. We know we're willing to get our hands dirty. We're willing to get in the trenches and that shows a certain amount of humility. But we have to really watch how we share our time and our talent, our treasure.

Even in nonprofits or for profits or in our community, we can't overserve. And we have to watch that because I found when I went to work for a nonprofit, I kind of loved the fact that my car was the last one in the parking lot. I love the fact that they bragged that I was such a hard worker and my husband said, why are you doing that? You know, not when I peel the onion.

I like the accolades that I got from working myself to death. And you just have to be honest about that. So you got to balance that serving thing to make sure that you can say no.

And here's, I tell everybody, here's how to say no. You say, I have another commitment because whatever it is, if the commitment is to yourself, you write it on your calendar, do not book. I put that on my calendar. So when somebody asked me to do something, I'll say, oh, I'm booked.

If I'm booked, I booked it myself. That's my time. No, that's good. Deborah, women can tend to be very perfectionistic. It's not a bad trait. It can be, you know, a difficult one to want to be perfect on everything you do on the test on in your job. Speak to that woman who is striving for that perfection and everything she does. How does she balance home and work?

I mean, you're touching on it there. Book that in your appointments, but you know, there's so much going on there. It's so difficult.

Then you start feeling guilty that you booked that time in the appointment at four o'clock or five o'clock. But that woman who is striving for that perfection, how does she get out of that rat trap? Yes, because it is a killer, but you have to understand that perfectionism is rooted in fear. I'm, I'm, I'm fearing being criticized. And so when you talk about the difference between being perfect and being excellent. And so we just want to really abandon that whole idea of things have to be done exactly this way and really be honest with yourself.

Why does it have to be done that way? I found that when I wanted to be perfect, I didn't want to be criticized. I didn't want anybody to ruin my reputation by messing something up. Well, that was all about me. But when I decided to pursue excellence, I want to do it well because it needs to be done well.

Then that's different. But when we come to this whole idea of guilt, ask yourself, what did I do wrong? Because guilt is that feeling you get from having done something wrong. If you haven't done something wrong, you need to abandon the guilt and stick with just priorities. I know a lot of working women feel guilty.

They have to leave home or leave their children or whatever, and yet they've been called to do things. And it's a matter of priorities. Priorities should be your priority. And we know that in God's book and in the biblical perspective, family is priority. Darnell is my priority. That's why I don't book things on Fridays.

That's my date night. But that doesn't mean I can't have a career because I have date nights. I just make sure that priority is always a priority. And I don't listen to the culture to set my priorities. I had a high paying job.

And when I decided to quit because my husband was telling me, I believe God is telling me to go in this direction. People said, but you're the first woman who ever did that. You're representing all women. No, you represent yourself. You represent your commitment to God. And so I challenge women who are already in the culture, who are already excelling.

Don't let the culture dictate your values and your priorities. You can have a career. You can have it all. But I say all that God wants. I don't want it all as society defined it. I want all that God has for me and his timing. Sometimes we can't have it all at once. That's why we have to be sensitive to what God is saying.

You can pursue this now because your children are gone or you have you have that coverage. You have good spousal support or whatever. Deborah, this has been so good. And I hope people are hearing you weave spiritual truth, biblical truth, godly truth into what we're talking about when it comes to women leading in the workplace.

Lead Like a Woman. What a great book full of biblical principle. Thank you so much once again for being with us and bringing a perspective that we just don't hear a lot about. Well done.

Thank you so much. And Jim, I so appreciate Deborah's messages. She has so much wisdom to share. And these leadership principles can be applied really to just about any situation.

I agree. And this is why Focus on the Family is here. We want to give you the tools you need to stand for God and honor him in all you do.

We have lots of resources to help you, like Deborah's great book, Lead Like a Woman, Gain Confidence, Navigate Obstacles, Empower Others. You know, real families in crisis reach out to Focus on the Family every day for help. You can offer them tangible hope, whether it's couples on the verge of divorce, parents who need biblical advice, expectant mothers considering an abortion, or families who are struggling. You can offer them practical solutions through your support of Focus on the Family. Your gift today will share the healing and hope of Jesus Christ as you support our broadcast, podcasts, counseling resources, online and print articles, life changing events like Hope Restored or life saving events like Option Ultrasound. In fact, when you donate today, a gift of any amount will send you a copy of the book by Deborah that we mentioned today, Lead Like a Woman, as our way of saying thank you for supporting the ministry of Focus on the Family. Donate and get your copy of Lead Like a Woman, Gain Confidence, Navigate Obstacles, Empower Others. It's online.

Just check the episode notes for details. We'll have a great weekend and plan to join us on Monday as we hear from a couple who were married for 60 years, Dr. David and Dr. Jan Stup about the importance of having emotional intelligence in your marriage. That's what was the problem in the beginning of our marriage. We didn't understand our emotions.

We didn't understand my instant reaction to any kind of criticism or conflict was to get angry. On behalf of Jim Daly and the entire team, thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ. Parents, are you looking for an informative, encouraging and engaging resource for your teen daughter? Check out the new and improved Brio Magazine from Focus on the Family. Almost double the original size in a book like format, this trusted biblically based magazine provides teen girls with inspiring stories, fashion advice, cultural insights and positive role skills.

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