Start. So welcome everybody. Um It is absolutely fabulous to be here with you. My name is Angelique Moring and I am the CEO of a company called Gain X. Um both in Canada and the UK.I wanted to talk today about um a different lens on uh being an executive and a leader and I'm gonna interchange those a little bit as we go. Um And first and foremost, using an oxygen mask to um really to ladder up inside of your organization. So, the challenge I think that we have as leaders today is that we're stuck in what I call a reactive behavioral loop that's reinforced by optimism bias. And what I mean by that is, and you'll all probably nod towards this is that as leaders and it's been going on for almost two decades now. I think um we have this optimism bias that we're gonna be able to be strategic in our role and we're going to be able to do those things that we were hired to and that we desire to in just 2 to 3 weeks from now. But first I have to get that board report out or I have to deal with this on fire that's just come into my office or I have to deal with an employee or I have to re tweak my budget and the list goes on and those 2 to 3 weeks tend to roll on and on into um months and years.

So I want to talk about the a concept of self care and redefining what that means as a leader and an executive, most people will think that it doesn't belong in the C suite or the boardroom or that it's too soft or that it's confined to um those soft things, coaching um spa days, retreats and, and so on.

But it is a commercialized juggernaut of a theme today. And I think that actually has part of um it contributes in part to the challenge as to why it can be misunderstood. So what if self care meant something in executive leadership that could create the biggest competitive advantage you've ever given yourself and your company, meaning you self versed and your company, we're seeing more and more dialogue and openness about self care from prime ministers that are setting boundaries today to employees, asking for more support to athletes, stepping away from some key competitions, but not all competitions, I think.

However, it's slightly different for leaders, I think because you are asked to always be thinking about your employees and your teams um that you're thinking about self care with them first and not necessarily yourself. And yet there is no sort of shortage of solutions out there to help you tackle that employee focus. Um thinking about it from an executive perspective, there is a shortage of solutions and I think that means it's up to you, I think isn't always under pressure executive today.

It's really critical to think about how you can redefine and manage your own role. Ask yourself what are you doing to make sure that you get your oxygen mask to be strategic, to be the best you can be in your role. First, I've been in leadership roles now for 25 years. Plus the last, nearly 20 of them have been in executive roles and in board positions. And years ago when I began to think about self care as a leader, I didn't think coaches and retreats, although these can be really important. I thought about what game changing tools and hacks and, and um ideas are out there for me to first be the best at what I can do without having to put in herculean or heroic effort. 365 which is what I was doing until I sort of had this aha moment. And hopefully, we all understand that heroic effort today always under delivers in the long run and I mean, always and it always costs more in the long run and it is a significant contribute contributor to executive Bruno and Chn. So how can we step out of this?

Reactive cycle that we're in, in that heroic effort. So I started thinking about me and I mean, me, not my team, not my boss, not my company, but me and I'll tell you as women, that's a different approach to how we tend to manage ourselves in our work. So what's my oxygen mask? And I'm gonna give you some examples of what those can look like in just a few minutes. I know it sounds selfish, really selfish. But haven't we all been told to put on our own oxygen masks before that of our dependence? And the reason is because it actually makes sense. So think about it in terms of your role, what could be your secret edge your oxygen to be an outstanding leader? What is your oxygen mask that can enable you to create, inspire and execute all year? Every year I created several kinds of oxygen masks over my career, one of the most profound oxygen masks was to become way more tech savvy before it was cool to be tech savvy. And I'm not talking about small stuff that you would see today in terms of, for example, how to leverage more social media platforms. I'm talking about what tools can I buy or have someone build me to make my role as an executive um easier, more profound one that delivers value that's measured on a Richter scale. And I mean, I'm thinking seismic game changing value. I'm talking value creation.

That makes other people catch their breaths as they take in the enormous impact that you can now start to have and they want to keep up. They want to be a part of it. When I'm talking about seismic changes in the various leadership roles I've had from helping organizations generate tens to hundreds of millions in revenue. Save hundreds of millions in costs, create competitive, high performance organization shift to exceptionally high quality product delivery and higher customer sat scores reduce their churn actually become more agile, create new operating models and so on. I've combined the my oxygen mask first with the philosophy of leave, no human behind. I'm not saying that when you put on your oxygen mask, that you starve the rest of your team, your employees, your company of oxygen. I'm saying everyone with the exception of maybe your competitors needs to and will win your team, your boss, your company, they're all going to win. So when you're thinking about what your oxygen mask is, the number one question I would ask yourself once you start to think about what that tool, what that methodology might be, what the out of the box idea is, is will it have a systemic impact?

Does it allow you to be more strategic, more impactful outside of the direct scope of your role? Your KPIS will others win as well? And when you can answer yes to this, you're gonna start to see some genuinely profound change both for yourself and how you're managing your role moving out of that reactive behavior loop that so many are stuck into, into the proactive one. When you see this vision, this road to seismic systemic change, everyone should and gets to ladder up. So that's one heck of a powerful oxygen mask before you can effectively build and lead consistently high performing teams, engaged teams before you can support your board, your boss, your shareholders, your company, you need to know exactly what you can leverage yourself to be exceptional.

You need to be able to understand what is in your own toolbox to be able to do this. We all need a clear lens that's gonna help us with real decision intelligence and enables us to cut through that ever growing complexity in our roles at pace with our crazy market today. So today, for example, you would never catch me managing the complex programs that we manage or businesses or customers or strategies without the use of predictive analytics. They are readily available and they help me make better decisions and be more proactive. In other words, the tools I make I use today help me be a better leader and a collaborator, but there's other kinds of oxygen masks. So let me give you a couple of examples. Other tools that you can use is something like hiring an anthropologist in an operational role. Anthropology just means it's the study and realization of what's actually happening inside of an organization or a group versus what they perceive is happening. Or you a seasoned, deeply experienced UX user experience guru is a change leader or, and this one is true magic. Having all of your executives or direct reports learn 10 to 15% of every single one of their peers roles, no matter how unrelated they might seem.

I'm telling you, I think that that's that one in my toolbox made some of the biggest impacts of my entire career. So the successes have been profound and they ultimately inspired me to create my own company, Gain X to bring some of those tools to mar to market. Because I think that when you're thinking about laddering, laddering up, it's not just solitary leadership, it's about tooling up and defining success first in your role and then up empowering exception, except that exceptional leadership um beyond yourself and into the others. So again, is it systemic?

And is it seismic? Thanks for your time today.