Leadership Unfiltered: Stop Pushing Through Ask Better Questions Instead

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In this Leadership Unfiltered episode, I’m talking about the power of asking better questions and why pushing through is not a leadership strategy.

I’ve learned over years of leadership experience: the questions we ask determine whether we adapt to pressure or redesign what’s creating it.

In this episode, I explore how survival questions keep leaders stuck in overwhelm and how reframing helps create clarity, capacity, and leadership that lasts. I also share why this matters even more for small business owners, especially when data shows that 72 percent of small business owners report feeling stressed about their business at least once a month.

This conversation is for leaders who are tired of carrying everything and ready to lead in a way that protects their health, focus, and long-term capacity.

Ready to close the gap between goals and results?

For a clear and consistent way to lead your business, download the free GAP Guide.
Grab the download 👉🏾 https://go.cignalpartners.com/gap

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Let me be honest.

(00:01):
Recently I found out that I havean autoimmune disorder.
And this is not a story.
Just let me just say this.
This is not a story about fearor diagnosis details or anything
like that.
It is about what happened afterI took a moment to sit with this

(00:24):
new information.
Once the initial shock passed,one thing became very clear.
I could not manage this bypushing through.
The same way many leaders try tomanage overwhelmed stress and
burnout by pushing through.

(00:44):
Welcome to LeadershipUnfiltered, the space where we
tell the truth.
Leaders do not always say outloud or even want to hear.
This episode is not polished andit's not motivational stuff.
It's a real conversation aboutwhat happens when life forces
you to stop adapting to pressureand start asking better

(01:09):
questions.
Here's what hit me.
For years, just like many ofyou, I was trained to power
through deadlines, pressure,responsibilities, expected to
hold it all together at workwith family.
But an autoimmune condition doesnot respond to grit.

(01:33):
So you can you can get out ofhere with that.

(01:54):
That realization reminded me ofsomething because the same is
true for leadership.
What I realized in that momentis that this was not the first
time better questions changed mydirection.

(02:14):
I started this journey of askingbetter better questions years
ago, more than a decade ago.
I was working in a toxicorganization and I was moving to
another organization.
What I knew was I knew I did notwant to repeat the same
experience.

(02:36):
But I also knew that simplychanging jobs would not
automatically change theoutcome.
There had to be something else.
So instead of asking what wentwrong, I asked a different
question.
And my question was, what do Ineed to do so that I do not end

(02:58):
up in a similar situation again?
And that question forced me tolook at me, to look at my
boundaries, the environmentsthat I tolerated, boundaries
that I let slide, red flags thatI ignored, and the choices that

(03:19):
I made in the name of pushingthrough.
That moment was the beginning oflearning how powerful the right
questions can be.
I just want to share with youhow important this is.
Some information for you.

(03:39):
The World Health Organizationdefines burnout as a result of
chronic unmanaged stress, not alack of resilience.
Has nothing to do with that.
Gala reports that managersexperience higher levels of
daily stress than the employeesthat they lead.
And for my small businessowners, I don't want you to

(04:01):
think I forgot you at all,according to Bank of America
Small Business Owner Reports.
They report that 72% of smallbusiness owners report feeling
stressed about their business atleast once a month, with many
experiencing stress weekly oreven daily.

(04:24):
That's a lot that we're takingon.
And for me, I learned thatchronic stress is also linked to
inflammation and long-termhealth consequences.
So one of the things that Italked with my doctor about and
learning how to manage this,right?

(04:44):
Trying different things,managing this disorder.
One of the things she said, andshe said it more than once, she
talked about managing my stressbecause she said that stress is
a trigger and it could triggerflare-ups.
And it just sent me into thisspace where I'm like, how do I

(05:08):
manage it?
I'm not trying to plow through,I'm not trying to push through,
I'm trying to be moreintentional and how important
that is, not just in my personallife, but in professional life.
So after sitting with mydiagnosis and deciding this

(05:29):
wasn't a push-through moment, Iasked, what has to change so my
body and my life are not underconstant stress?
Like I said earlier.
And this just opened the door toall of the possibilities, all of
the things that I could do.
And the same question applies toleadership.

(05:52):
If the pressure keeps repeating,it's not luck, it's a signal.
And we have to understand that.

(06:17):
But we ask questions like, howdo I, how am I going to get
through this quarter, or how amI going to get through this
year, or how do I hold ittogether longer?
Um, how do I make it work?
And these questions keep youfunctioning, but they do not
keep you well.
They really don't.
So we have to learn how to startreframing.

(06:40):
And reframing shifts the focusfrom endurance, like how do I
just endure it and get throughit to design.
How do I change things?
How do I how do I look at thisdifferently so that I am
designing the outcome that Iwant?
I'm not just getting through it.

(07:02):
And so better questions soundslike, what am I tolerating that
is quietly draining me?
This is something that I workwith.
I work with my leaders on it101s.
I'm like, what's draining you?
You know, and we have to pullback the onion and get to what
it is.
What systems or lack of systemsare creating this pressure?

(07:24):
What boundaries, and this is abig one, what boundaries am I
avoiding because they feeluncomfortable?
Which usually, when we startimplementing boundaries, they do
feel a little uncomfortable forus and sometimes for the people
around us.
But I want you to think aboutwhat would leadership look like

(07:45):
if burnout or overwhelm were notthe cost of success?
If leadership were sustainable.
And these are strategicquestions that we want to make
sure that we are askingourselves.
So we have to move from survivalquestions to questions that's

(08:07):
going to help us design thechange or the outcome that we
want to see.
And this matters even more forsmall business owners because
when you are the business, yourstress becomes a risk, your
exhaustion usually becomes thebottleneck, and your health

(08:27):
becomes a leadership issue.
And research shows thatprolonged cognitive overload
reduces strategic thinking andincreases reactive decision
making.
And this isn't the place that wewant to be.
So you don't need more hustle,you need clearer questions

(08:49):
guiding your structure, yourexpectations, your workload.
Um, so this is something that Ijust really wanted to share, you
know.
So this is the unfiltered truth.
If you do not pause to askbetter questions, your body,

(09:10):
your team, your customers, yourbusiness will eventually force
the pause for you.
But that's not fear-based.
That's reality.
Leadership that ignoressustainability always sends the
bill later.

(09:30):
You're gonna get the bill later.
When we do not pause to askbetter questions, everything
around us starts to suffer.
So let me leave you with this.
And this is one of my shorterepisodes, but I really wanted to
share this, especially, youknow, it's the end of the year.

(09:52):
So I think it's always a I thinkit's always a great time to
reflect.
But if you are in the year typeof person, this is a great time
to really think about whatquestions you've been asking
yourself, what questions youneed to ask yourself so that you
don't go into a new year withthe same things from this year.

(10:15):
Let me leave you with this.
What is your current level ofstress trying to tell you that
you keep explaining away?
And this could be stress,overwhelm, whatever it is.
What is it trying to tell youthat you keep explaining away?

(10:38):
And what needs to change so thisdoes not become your norm.
Sit with that, take your time,don't rush to fix it.
This right here, my friends,this right here is where clarity
starts.
All right.

(10:58):
This was Leadership Unfiltered.
If this episode resonated, shareit with the leader who is caring
too much or leave a review sothese conversations reach the
leaders who need them most.
Strong leadership isn't aboutplowing through or pushing
through, it's about knowing whenand how to change the question

(11:21):
so that you can change thedesign.