This is the Leadership Journey series on the Choosing Leadership Podcast. I believe we all have a lot to learn from each other’s stories, of where we started, where we are now, and our successes and struggles on the way. With this series of interviews, I attempt to give leaders an opportunity to share their stories and for all of us to learn from their generous sharing. If you know a leader whom you would like to see celebrated on the show, please send me a message on LinkedIn with their name.
What if soft skills were as natural as riding a bike?
Brigitta Lops owns two behavior-change companies (Job Training, founded in 1991, and Hello New You), is a mother of two, and bought into the company through a management buyout. In this conversation she talks about the hardest leadership lesson she has learned: knowing when to let go, whether of a child, an employee or your own role as the person who fixes everything.
We talk about why ownership is easy to speak about and hard to practice, how her company pivoted its whole classroom business to virtual in 10 days when COVID hit, why she hired a managing director (and why she wishes she had done it sooner), what it was like to lead as a young female entrepreneur, and why an AI coach in your pocket can only help if you connect the practice to real life.
Brigitta ends with the mission she wants to own for the next decade, the challenge of listening instead of spreading the word, and a simple rule she lives by: choose growth over comfort.
You can find Brigitta at the links below
In the interview, Brigitta shares
- “I really want to make soft skills as natural as riding a bike.”
- “When you build a company, it’s linked to your identity, to your ego.”
- “Ownership is easy to talk about, but when the going gets tough, that’s when you can really show what ownership means.”
- “You can be assertive and strong and opinionated, and be kind as well.”
- “You don’t have to edit yourself to fit in.”
- “You can practice until your face gets blue.”
- “We really need the struggle of live interaction to learn about that live interaction.”
- “I try to choose growth over comfort.”
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