The Path to Leadership: Career Pivots, Potholes & Priorities

Join a captivating panel discussion that showcases esteemed 2024 honorees as they share their personal journeys towards leadership and unveil the crucial elements of effective leadership within their organizations.


Transcription:

Veena Ram (00:08):
Thanks for the introduction, Patty. It's great to be here. I'm thrilled to be part of what should be a very engaging conversation. So on behalf of DXC technology, thanks for letting us join you today. I'm proud to work for a company that brings innovation to the industry, while also valuing the perspectives that women can bring to the insurance industry, especially in such a male dominated field. While many organizations create that inclusive and collaborative culture where women and men alike can thrive, it's no secret that we face some different challenges with in the workplace, different realities. As a woman, I know what it takes, what key leadership competencies it takes to overcome those challenges to be successful. So I'm really looking forward today to hear from these ladies on our panel about your career journey and what worked, what didn't and what could have been done differently. So let's start with you Tracey. What inspired you to choose insurance as a career and how did you get to where you are today?

Tracey Cournoyer (01:30):

Well, I don't think a lot of us actually wake up and say, Hey, when I get older, I'm going to be in insurance. So for me it was pretty easy. I was a computer major in the 1980s and when I got out of college, I went into a program called Data Processing and where possibly would you see more data in the world, even back in the eighties and nineties insurance. So started my first job at the Travelers, actually, I've been there for about 22 years and just have been amazed at all the different opportunities I've had in my time at the Travelers, I probably had 10 different roles, all in insurance, multiple segments right now in the specialty segment where we've got things like cyber and kidnapping, ransom coverage, and it is so fascinating.

Veena Ram (02:21):
Thank you. What about you, Amy?

Amy McNeece (02:25):
I would have to say that insurance chose me. I was recruited off of my college campus and the Chubb recruiter said, when you're an underwriter, you're like the CEO of your book of business. And that sounded really exciting to a young 22-year-old who is incredibly ambitious. And I thought, I'll do this job for two years, I'll check it out, and I'll probably find something a lot more glamorous than the insurance industry. Fast forward 24 years, I'm still at Chubb and loving the insurance industry and I honestly can't imagine working anywhere else. So over my career, I spent about 20 years in our high net worth personal insurance practice, which ended up being really fun and glamorous. By the way. We worked with independent agents and brokers who sold tailored personal insurance products for high net worth successful individuals and families. And over the past five years, I started dabbling in a new way to expand our distribution through digital insurance. Had an opportunity to work with a unique online jewelry retailer who came to us and said, we want to get into the insurance business. And I said, really? And it turned out that we figured out a way to solve pain points and reduce friction for their customers, and we created our first embedded insurance partnership, and I haven't looked back since then. And I now run our digital consumer and small business partnerships for our embedded insurance practice, which are actively building today.

Veena Ram (03:53):
Wow. What about you, Megan?

Megan Sharpe (03:56):
I would say somewhere in the middle. I have two siblings that had sturdy and long careers in insurance, and when I graduated college as a marketing major, I never said I want to lead marketing for a life insurance carrier, but that's where I am. 17 years in the industry and having different roles, digital insurance as well, an industry ripe for transformation. So I think a sturdy and strong industry that is really important products that people need. I think part of it is insurance is something you never want to need, but you actually really need to have it. So I think there's a lot of value in the products that we sell, and I'm proud to bring those to market for people.

Veena Ram (04:41):
Thank you. So guys, we've all faced challenges in our career. Amy, what was one significant challenge you faced and how did you overcome it?

Amy McNeece (04:52):
It was originally hard to pick just one challenge that everyone in this room, including the honorees, can list a number of them and you could have just a session for an entire week on it. But by far the biggest challenge is exactly the one that I'm in today, which is the new role that I just took on two years ago where I'm running a brand new practice inside of Chubb. And we're not only innovating inside of a massive organization, we're innovating just like the honorees here in the industry itself, which is ripe for new ideas. And so just consider this for one second. I was a brand new mom. I had a five month old son. I was coming back from maternity leave and I was stepping in on the first day into a new job with a new boss, with a new team that was reporting to me with new colleagues, with new technology that I was not familiar with, with new partnerships, which I had relatively little experience with because I had spent 20 years in the high net worth insurance business and with a team that was literally trying to reimagine how we would digitally distribute insurance and how we would partner with affinity partnerships.

(06:03):
So to say that I was completely overwhelmed and uncomfortable is an understatement. I don't know if any of you have ever been there when I first started, I would highly not recommend it, but today I highly actually recommend stepping out of your comfort zone and getting into something brand new. In terms of how I approached this challenge, I leaned into what had brought me success over the past 20 odd years. I went on a listening tour, I met with all of our internal partners, and I found out what made their business tick, who are their target customers, and how what we were doing from an innovation perspective was going to help them actually grow and accelerate their business in the future. When I could, I spent time meeting with people one-on-one because I truly believe that that's how you ultimately build trust and credibility with your peers and with your partners.

(06:52):
And when I met with our partners, I made sure that I really dove deep into understanding their business, their motivations, their customer pain points, and really what their strategic initiatives were, and then figured out how we could build solutions together with them from an embedded insurance perspective that would not only create value creation for them, would help solve customer pain points, but then also help them align with their strategic goals. And then finally, I leaned into a general positive attitude. I think you can't underestimate optimism, enthusiasm. You have to bring that every day, particularly in a space where you're trying to innovate and try new things and really go against the grain. And so I leaned into all of those and I'm here today to say that I've survived. We have an incredible team. We have incredible partners who are already in place. We just launched several. We have many that were workshopping today. And I am more bullish than ever about the opportunity to continue to innovate in this space and to grow and scale this business together with Chubb and our partners.

Tracey Cournoyer (07:55):
Oh, you sound like Superwoman.

Veena Ram (07:58):
She'll be flying around later.

Amy McNeece (07:59):
You should see my living room.

Veena Ram (08:02):
So Tracey, who's inspired you to be a leader, and what about them resonates with you in your own life and career?

Tracey Cournoyer (08:13):

Well, one of the things that was so important to me was looking up at my mom, who's in this stage with me today or here in the audience. And she and I, we were a single mom and a single daughter for a long time and she wanted to make sure that when I grew up, if I ever was alone, I could take care of myself, go to college, take care of yourself, and just watched her really lead through her life. And it really made something a big impression on me. I knew I didn't want to be a teacher mom. I knew I wanted to go in a very non-traditional female profession. My father is a retired biochemist, so I took a career in STEM and it never really hit me through college. And even in my early days of I was always the one or two women in the room.

(09:06):
And as I've continued to grow in my career, it surprised me how there was less and less women. And so one of the things that I knew that I needed to do was give back. I'm very, very active, not only in my company and helping lead what we call Empower plus, which is our women's professional network with allies. And I've got three of my allies here today. Really, really important. But also looking at the community, there's a small slate of women in STEM and in insurance around the junior high timeframe is when they start to really lose interest in these types of fields. So bringing different women, white women, black women, Hispanic women, so all the young girls can see us as role models is so important. I like to think about every day and my team knows this. I love to twirl into work. You talked about positivity. That's exactly what I've done. When my first granddaughter was born five weeks ago, Bob, I actually twirled that morning. I was so excited. But literally being a leader is all about giving back and being a servant to the people that you work with. And I'm so excited that I've got travelers and I love travelers and Tre on the stage together, don't you?

Amy McNeece (10:22):
It's fantastic. I love it.

Tracey Cournoyer (10:24):
So many commonalities. Yes.

Veena Ram (10:27):
Megan, what about you?

Megan Sharpe (10:30):
I spoke earlier about my siblings, I think hardworking family. I love the story about your mother. I learned from my siblings to lean in. And in addition to that, I worked at several companies with female CEOs. So at a IG prior, I had a female CEO female leader who really encouraged everyone sharing and everyone having a seat at the table. Even at that time being a very junior level, I do collect mentors and specifically female mentors throughout my life. I have several in the room, and I think that learning from them as you go and making sure that there's not a singular voice. You mentioned diversity. Diversity in gender and how everyone at the table looks. So I think inspired by all of those individuals.

Veena Ram (11:22):
Thank you. So Amy, how do you find balance in your career, personal life and hobbies? And what are some secrets to successfully managing the different priorities we all face?

Tracey Cournoyer (11:33):
You've got to tell us because I want to learn.

Amy McNeece (11:36):
I don't have the secret. I try every day to be my authentic self. I thought that was a great message from the keynote. I try to just be the best person, mother, wife, employee, boss, et cetera, that I can be, and I know that I'm not perfect. I think one of the things that I've learned in the past two years is to give myself grace. Like many of you, and I'm sure the honorees here on the panel, you have very high ambitions and high expectations for yourself. And when you hold yourself up that high and expect to be perfect for everyone, you're ultimately probably going to let yourself down. And so what I did over the past two years was I tried to get back to things that brought me joy. So I happened to be a college athlete, and so I started running and cycling again.

(12:29):
I started doing yoga to calm my mind. Sometimes I don't know about you guys, but I get some of my best ideas during my hot yoga class and really making sure I think in this current environment, and we're in a fast pace, you have to be mobile and agile and everybody's always on. I don't know if any of you feel that way. You have to be able to have some rules of the road and some demarcation between your work and your personal life. And sometimes you have to recognize that that is going to blend and it's going to interfere. But if you can be as consistent as possible to have that break where when I'm with my son and my husband, I try to put my phone down, I try to be absolutely present. That is where I find some of my greatest joy. And I try to also make sure that I embed that with our team because everyone is looking to you as a leader.

(13:24):
And if you're working until 11 o'clock at night or you're calling somebody when they're sitting down to have dinner with their family, that's not sending the right message. And so I've worked really hard at trying to figure out how to make it all work. Again, not perfect, haven't figured it out, don't have the right formula, but I've tried to inject ways to bring joy and spend time with my family and my friends. And by the way, I also spend a lot of time with my mom, and I'm sitting here thinking, I wish I had invited her. That was a great idea because she's ultimately my hero and my inspiration as well.

Veena Ram (13:57):
Tracey, what about you?

Tracey Cournoyer (14:01):
Can you repeat the question? I lost my train of thought.

Veena Ram (14:05):
How do you balance work your personal life? Hobbies?

Tracey Cournoyer (14:11):
I don't think I'm ever in balance. And what I've learned is it's okay. I have a ton of energy. I get up first thing in the morning full of energy, but by about nine 11 at night, I'm ready to go to bed. And what I think is it's over time, what are the things that you can do similar to you? I took a new role in February of 2023, and I was doing a lot of different things across the company for women, and I knew I had to step back. It was really important for me to be able to do something like that because I need to focus on what I call my full-time job. And it's really looking at yourself and saying, what's the right thing for you? Earlier in my career, I was 100% travel. I was going from Connecticut to San Francisco on a weekly basis.

(14:56):
I did it for three and a half years every Monday morning, seven 30 through Chicago into San Francisco at 1:00 PM worked all day and then took the red eye home all the way back. And at one point I wasn't married and I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm living on one coast. I'm working on another coast. I really want a family. And I literally stopped and said, I've got to change my job. The job I was in was 100% travel. So that's how I found myself back to the travelers and nobody told me to do it. I just knew that I had to. And now I'm very happily married. I've got two kids, I've got three grandchildren, and if I didn't make that choice, I don't know where I'd be today. Yeah.

Veena Ram (15:36):
So Megan, how can organizations within the insurance industry better attract and retain women?

Megan Sharpe (15:44):
I think we hearing a bit of these stories, just understanding that everyone is seeking balance. And women specifically, I have two young children, five and 10. My husband is also a huge source of support for me, but for companies I mentioned earlier, seeing women at the table, being able to support them and know the things that they're going through. We don't have just our life in the boardroom. We have our life in the boardroom, we have our life at home as parents just supporting that. I think the shutoff that you mentioned earlier, sort of understanding that there's part work, there's part home, and being able to really support that across and being able to see people in your position across the organization that have been in the rising roles as female leaders, that being able to model that for the rest of people, we need to do a better job. There's tons of women in the crowd that are obviously leaders in various insurance companies, but we need to do better. So I think as we continue to model that and support women through insurance companies in the insurance industry can help foster more leadership there.

Veena Ram (16:57):
Thank you for that. Tracey. What are some of the benefits that women bring to leadership roles?

Tracey Cournoyer (17:05):
I think everyone in the room, whether for men or women, we all have iq, but I do think women bring a unique EQ to the table. I think about we all come from different backgrounds, we all have different experiences. Some of us have been at multiple companies, and I think having more people around the table to challenge each other is really important. The other thing is we women, we need to pull each other up. We talked about there's a lot of, we just finished our PGA golf tournament this past weekend. A lot of the men go on to the golf course and do a lot of golfing, but guess what? We're not always there. So what are we doing for ourselves? I remember February 13th, 2023, I walked into my office for the first time in my first role as a chief information and operations officer, and I met two really special women.

(17:58):
Rookie, you're in the audience today and you came to meet me and greet me. Lauren King, you also did. And these are the faces that said to me, okay, yes, Tracey, you can do this. That imposter syndrome was real. I had a lot of people come up to me and say, why did they choose you? Or why Tracey? She's just a data person. How could she be a CIO? And I think it was those people that supported me, especially the women, of course, my allies as well. We need each other. And that's why I ask all of you women, if you see women in your organization, Emily, you're in my organization. Think about what you do. Think about what an opportunity it is to meet all these amazing women here today. So bring up the women that are below you and make them into leaders and be a role model for them.

Veena Ram (18:46):
Thank you. Megan, what would you say?

Megan Sharpe (18:52):
I think similar. I think being your authentic self and bringing others along the way is really important. Making sure that you're not, I took a course, a women in insurance course at Columbia recently, or not women insurance, sorry, women in leadership. And an important exercise in the course at the end was amplifying each other. So we need to amplify ourselves, but also just pick other people. And it was mentioned in the keynote earlier, something that you think is not that unique, make sure you're amplifying and telling others about it because who else will do it? So I think that's also something that's really important.

Amy McNeece (19:30):
Can I just add with another idea? I have somebody on my team who is incredible at this, and to the EQ comment recognizes exactly when somebody on the team needs to be lifted up and just sends them a note and says, I see you and I see what you're doing, and you are making a difference every day. Thank you. And oftentimes, sometimes she sends it to me and I'm like, wow, how did you know I needed that? And so as a leader, I think we also, from a female perspective, I think it's more intuitive and thoughtful, and I think that that's something that we have to continue to embrace and spread amongst all of our teams and across our colleagues as well.

Veena Ram (20:13):
Thank you for that. And my next question is for you, by the way, how have you personally grown over your career and what tools, courses, learning opportunities did you find most valuable?

Amy McNeece (20:25):
Missed the beginning of the question.

Veena Ram (20:27):
How have you personally grown over your career?

Amy McNeece (20:30):
How have I grown? Oh, okay. I have had the unbelievable opportunity to get tons of professional development through Chubb as an organization for many, many years. Since the early two thousands. They had organizations that were geared towards women's empowerment and women's development, and I was able to join many of those, which helped me get onto the path that I am today. That's how I built friendships and mentorships. And now I mentor as well. I had an opportunity to go to one of the most memorable leadership consortiums at Smith College, which was just the best experience I had ever been to. I don't know if anybody's ever been to it. It's called the Smith Women's Leadership Consortium. And there I met with so many different women in different industries talking about how to build your network. That was actually the most powerful part for me. And what I learned was there was a trick about write down all the people and then in the column left to it, look at the people who introduced you to those folks. And then when you look to see what might often happen is that a name will get repeated multiple times and you realize that that person is a connector. And so I took that trick and I learned sort of who my connectors were, and then I started figuring out how I could be a connector for others. And that became something really critical sort of in my business because I'm in the business development relationship world. And so that was really critical. And then I've just self-study learning, and frankly, a little bit of trial by error.

Veena Ram (22:10):
Thank you. Megan, what would you say?

Megan Sharpe (22:12):
Similar. I think lifelong learning, right? So never just saying I know enough. Going back to business school, I recently completed a CMO course at Columbia, but it doesn't matter the course. I think just being amongst others that are really seeking to learn is part of what really empowers you. So in those programs, you're amongst people that are also seeking aspiring to do more very ambitious individuals. And I think you can create an energy being amongst those people, creating a bigger network. We did a similar exercise of mapping your social network and who's interrelated. And I think being a connector for yourself, for your own career as well as helping others is truly important. But being a lifelong learner, just being interested, inquiring about new things, whether it's ai, new technology, and not being just stuck in what you know today, just really embracing what's new.

Veena Ram (23:12):
Thank you, ma'am. Tracey, women leaders continue to be a minority in insurance and other industries. Is there benefits in creating initiatives for both women and men in raising awareness?

Tracey Cournoyer (23:28):
Absolutely. My current global chief technology officer, MOJ Gun Lafe, when she walked in the door in 2018, November, her first question, I was meeting with her, she goes, do we have anything for women across the tech and ops organization? And I'm like, we don't. And she's like, we've got to do this. And literally we built from the ground up an organization that is now part of 7,000 individuals. We've done things like allyship, mentorship, we need to do more of sponsorship. And I think what you were talking earlier, talking about mentors, but I think about sponsors as well. But the other thing that was so different about Mojang was she's like, allies need to be at the table because Tracey, someday you and I are going to be the only women in the room and all the other men need to be there to support us.

(24:16):
So for those of you who are in organizations where maybe you don't have this today, please think about building something in your organization. And for the men in the room, and I know there's very few of you, but we're glad you're here, I want you to be sponsors and at the table. So we always have at least one male ally on the leadership team because it makes it so much easier for us to understand what is the male point of view when maybe we're talking about women's issues and work-life balance. But you know what, a lot of men do that too. Every morning I get up and my husband makes me breakfast and he cooks dinner in the evening because I have a really busy job. And I think being allies are important and then figuring out what does your company do in the industry or in the community? Excuse me. Like I said, I'm very active in high schools. We do a lot in technology. There's a national center of women in technology and just finding the time. So it's your full-time job, but to me it's your part-time job and being out so people can see how important it is for these great careers. Insurance is everything. Marketing, business development, technology, underwriting, architecture, finance, geo. I mean, there's a lot of things that we can do. It's an amazing industry.

Veena Ram (25:34):
It really is. Megan, how can organizations within the insurance industry better attract and retain women leaders?

Megan Sharpe (25:43):
I think just modeling it, and I think organizations that make people aware. I think reaching out to new students, we engage with a few marketing organizations. It's not specific to insurance, but bringing on interns, introducing people early, and not just women, but all individuals, really introducing them to insurance might sound boring, but it could be very exciting if you're driving transformation and using new technologies. We still, there's finance and marketing and business development, and it is a sturdy and needed sector. So I think continuing to support not only women, but bringing new people into the industry is truly important.

Veena Ram (26:27):
So our last question is for Amy, if you could give one piece of advice to a younger you just starting your career journey, what would that be?

Amy McNeece (26:37):
So many pieces of advice, but if have to pick one, I would say take chances. You heard me give you my story of how I stayed sort of in one vertical and built deep expertise for 20 years, and that served me very well. And I have incredible partnerships and friendships from that and a lot of success stories. But to my younger self, I would say take more chances earlier in your career. Be willing to step out of your comfort zone even if you don't have the most expertise, even if you don't have the most experience compared to either others who are going for a job or just in general, you say, this is something that I think I want to get into, but I'm not sure if I'm qualified for it, right? A lot of women think that. I don't think a lot of men think that, by the way.

(27:30):
And so for me, when it took me 22 years to step out of my comfort zone into the role that I'm in now, and I can tell you honestly that I have seen in the past two of 24 the greatest personal and professional growth that I've had in my entire career. Because when you step out of your comfort zone, not only are you learning more, but ultimately from a leadership lens, it means that less essentially, which means that then you have to lean in to your peers, to your colleagues, and to your own team for their expertise. And that allows you to think about how you coach people to step into their greatness. And when people are operating in their zone of genius and you see these teams gel and come together, everybody operating at their optimal capability, that's where the magic happens. That's where the excitement happens. That's where the innovation happens, and that's what I think ultimately helps teams come together and achieve their goals.

Veena Ram (28:31):
Thank you. I mean, I've learned a lot just being up here with you ladies, so thank you. I did want to give an opportunity if anyone has any questions you'd like to ask the panel. We have a couple minutes. Somebody can, I'll repeat your question if you have one and we have a mic.

Audience Member Mina  (28:59):
Hello. Hey, my name is Mina and I'm from IBM. So I had this question for you. How can women improve their financial acumen at work? As many men who are your peers or your colleagues are very focused and good at it, so you may be good at your job, but how do you get that and how do you hone your acument?

Tracey Cournoyer (29:22):
I can take that to start. So as part of our Empower Plus, we at Travelers recognize that we probably didn't understand what our financial statements were doing. So we literally sponsor on a quarterly basis an earnings conversation with different CFOs across travelers. It all started with our one female CFO, Deb Strong, and we actually started with just a small room of people of 20, and now we're in our large auditorium and globally having those conversations. So we recognized it as a company. So in your company, start something like that. Talk to your CFO, talk to your financial leaders and ask them to really explain it. I think they're really excited to talk about their craft as well.

Amy McNeece (30:13):
Chubb did something very similarly. There's so many similarities between our companies. I wonder why that is.

Tracey Cournoyer (30:17):
Yes.

Amy McNeece (30:20):
And I think that that's made a really big difference because in a way it sort of democratizes financial acumen and it lets everybody feel like you don't have to walk in and feel like, well, I don't know something that somebody else knows. And so I think that that's a great way to do it. Personally for myself, I got interested in investing in stocks. I think it's, my dad would've loved to have been a day trader, even though he was a phys ed teacher for 35 years. And he got me into that. And so I run my own personal investments. I took a little bit of my own money. That is just fine that I invest for myself. I do all of my own research. And I think if you find something also that you love about the finance business that again brings you joy, brings you interest, and at the same time build your acumen around it, that's another way to go about it.

Megan Sharpe (31:13):
The thing I'll add is don't be afraid to ask questions. So we have a chief actuary in our organization that we call the professor, and I think it does kind of lessen the bar when he's teaching. This is how pricing works and whatnot. Understanding that not everybody's an actuary, that's a complicated role. But being comfortable asking and being comfortable trying to figure it out on your own and asking some key people to help take you along the way, because I think showing that interest, I work in marketing, but I know our p and l very, you shouldn't just be limited to your area of responsibility. So in marketing, understanding the pricing, understanding what actuary is doing, understanding the whole financial plan just kind of gives you a different ability to speak to the marketing plans. But how does that drive the rest of the business?

Audience Member 2 (32:15):
Thank you for your insightful comments. My one question for you is in the insurance industry, 25% of executive board and leadership are women, so 75% are men. So can you talk about the lessons that you have unlearn to help you get to where you are today?

Veena Ram (32:40):
That's a great question ladies.

Megan Sharpe (32:45):
So Palin is my mentor. So I know that she was looking right at me when she asked that question. Palin and I worked together for 10 years, and I kind of knew where she was going with that. One thing just to answer her question is we talked about women are empathetic leaders, they have eq. We're often thinking about what others feel. And I think that that's good and that could be helpful. But I think unlike men who just kind of act and know what the next move is, I think you mentioned what we need to unlearn. Maybe we need to, I'm a very people oriented leader, but maybe unlearning some of that courtesy and kindness, not to be unkind, but kind of how would a man behave because we kind of keep ourselves back a bit by trying to play the nice person at the table. That's at least been something I've had to unlearn, and Palin has helped me do that.

Amy McNeece (33:46):
It's funny that you say that because I've been told that I'm too nice sometimes. And then when I come out with something that's not nice, but not meant to be ill-intentioned, right? But just a statement of fact direct that's direct or assertive. People are like, whoa, where did that come from? Where's your nicey? Nice. And so I think it's a difficult balance that women are asked. What they're asked to exude in business is tough because we just listened earlier about being your authentic self. And if your authentic self is to be nice and kind and empathetic, but to get to the top, maybe you have to change that. That's a mixed message. And I think that that's really challenging. The way that I've gone about it, at least in my career, is I adapt to my audience. And so I really learned the person across the table from me.

(34:43):
And for most of my career, I worked for men and men who by the way, were huge advocates for me. But I learned that I had to adjust. I had to talk a little bit less. I don't know if anybody in the room's ever been told you talk too much, right? Be more direct, be more succinct. I actually said that to a woman on my team recently, which was pretty funny, trying to pass it forward. And I just said, just be specific and tell me exactly what I need to know and what you want to do and what you plan to do about it, and I'll support you. And I learned that that is how a lot of executives, particularly men operate. And I've looked at their succinct in their communications. They don't send long elaborate emails. They keep it to sort of two to three bullet points, et cetera. And so I think it's just about knowing your audience. Now, if you're working with somebody else who doesn't operate that way, then you have to be able to make that adjustment.

Tracey Cournoyer (35:34):
I like to call it the velvet hammer.

(35:37):
I'm very direct. And I think sometimes when people talk to me, they're probably surprised. I am very positive and friendly, but I also need to get things done. I like to call it GSD, and I think it's really important for us to do that. So

Amy McNeece (35:54):
Why is it the velvet hammer? Because it's a gentle

Tracey Cournoyer (35:58):
Exactly. You guys can see it. It's probably covered in pink velvet. Love It.

Amy McNeece (36:03):
I love it. I'm going to steal that.

Tracey Cournoyer (36:07):
I know.

Audience Member 3 (36:10):
Good morning everyone. It's really nice to see you up there, and it's inspiring to hear your stories. One of the things I'm curious about is how do you deal with failure? We often talk about our successes and our accomplishments. We really want to focus on that. But I think it's also important to understand that failure happens and figuring out how to deal with that and maybe turn that into something positive. So I'm just curious, how do you do that?

Tracey Cournoyer (36:51):
I guess I can go, Vincent. It's hard. I've been through some things that I felt like I failed. I failed myself. I failed my team. I'll tell you this, I'll never cry at work, but I do a lot of crying at home. You can ask my husband, and some of you have heard me talk about this. I feel like all human beings were narcissists. So at the end of the day, if we did something wrong, we're just worrying about ourselves. And most likely my boss is just worrying about herself or you're worrying about yourself. So learning over time to give yourself a break. So when I get home and say, boy, I really shouldn't have said that in a meeting, most likely the people around me were worried about what they said in a meeting. And that gives myself a break because we can't be hard on ourselves. And most of the time, some of the things I've learned the hardest are from those failures and what I will never, ever repeat again.

Amy McNeece (37:48):
I tried to several experiments in the business that I was in the high net worth insurance, and it took a lot to convince leadership to let us try a couple of new things. And so I felt like I was putting myself and my career on the line, and one of the ideas failed miserably, and I was still trying to sell it really hard. And finally what I realized was, it's okay if it doesn't work. And you have to be mature enough to know when you have to cut the cord and say, you know what? This failed. It didn't work. It was an idea. We tested it out. We learned a lot in the process, and we can now move on and try something new. And so I think a big piece of it is not only recognizing the failure, but recognizing when you actually have to stop and cut the cord and then recover. Then I think that you have to lean on the people whom you work with and who trust you to know that. I don't think there's anybody in this room who can raise their hand and say, I've never had one failure in my life or in my career. In fact, a lot of times you fail forward because you are a better person, a better leader, a better business person after learning that. And if you don't experiment and if you don't try, you're never going to see innovation or advancement

Megan Sharpe (39:13):
Leading direct to consumer marketing, we do a lot of test and learn, and we try want to always win. But when we lose, we try to celebrate that equally so that we fail fast. So if something didn't work, we try to encourage our team to, it's just as courageous to say, Hey, we're doing this. It's not profitable, let's stop doing it. It's just as courageous to do that as to scale something and make it a huge success. So we've tried to agree in that within our organization, within our team, and it's still tough. I think it's better. It feels better to win, but creating that culture that it's okay to lose. We don't want to do it a hundred percent of the time, but 10 to 20 is fine.

Veena Ram (39:56):
So we're at the end of our time. I know some of you had some other questions. These ladies are going to be here throughout the day, so please come grab them and ask your questions. I mean, I would tell you it's my first opportunity to meet you ladies and hear you speak, and I've learned a lot. And you just

Megan Sharpe (40:14):
Found out this morning you were facilitating this panel. So Don, I know. Excellent job. Congratulations.

Amy McNeece (40:18):
You did an incredible job.

Veena Ram (40:19):
But thank you guys. We appreciate your time today. Thank.