Kellye (00:35)
Hello and welcome to Unmuted, a podcast for service driven leaders. I'm here today to tell you a little bit about this podcast that we have been working really hard to create. And we wanted to let you know why we're even doing the Unmuted Podcast.
It's, I will start, I will say there were so many times in my local government management career, my city management career, where I felt quite alone in my thoughts and my feelings. And I had wonderful colleagues and I had people that I called who advised me and I had mentors. But there were just some days where I felt like I am the only person who is struggling with this thing as it relates to leadership and as it relates to city management. So when Charisse and I started talking about doing this podcast, I was like, yes.
Because I wish I didn't feel so alone about some of these personal things that I believe feed right into our professional lives in city management specifically.
Charisse Deschenes (01:39)
Kellye, I would agree that that is one reason that I'm also doing podcasts and would add that there are situations again that you're in as a local government leader and you feel alone again, as you mentioned, but taking those external experiences that we've both had and trying to turn, some of them may be positive and some of them may be an opportunity for growth, but knowing that because we went through them,
it made us stronger and we're looking for growth in our work as supporters of local government leaders. And I think that when we start breaking it down and we think about what does that unmuted, this podcast that we're doing mean for others, you can relate to us through our experiences and
It offers an opportunity for maybe you to grow a little bit or to poke fun of us or to laugh with us or, you know, just sometimes you'll feel the anxiety coming through in some of the topics that we offer.
Kellye (02:46)
Yeah, I mean, I listen to a lot of podcasts, especially whenever I had my almost two hour each way commute to work. And so it was a lot of audiobooks, a lot of podcasts, pretty much all of them were focused around professional development and personal development.
But what I found with all of those is that I kept thinking, was like, they don't understand what I'm going through in city management. They were focused on other industries or just no industry at all, just kind of general. And so whenever I think about like, why would we do this podcast? Because I think what we deal with in city government is special. There are a lot of things that you can learn from other podcasts, but
I feel like I wish I had somebody that I could have learned the personal side of professional city management from I wish I would have had that to listen to every day. And whenever I did find a podcast that was focused on city management, it was always focused on the very professional side of things. So maybe like what's going on in a community specifically.
⁓ Or maybe it was like tackling like how to talk with your police chief or something about economic development or planning. And while those were really interesting and I did get some out of them, they never really dove into the real personal topics of leadership and the personal topics of city management. And and so that's part of why I wanted to do this podcast was that ultimately I was looking at.
I want to help leaders be better leaders, both professionally but also personally.
Charisse Deschenes (04:30)
Yes. I believe that like putting on your own cape is important. And you reflected just recently, about, you know, your podcast and driving and what you're listening to on the way in. And when I was in situations where I listened to podcasts quite often, and most of them were health related for me to take care of myself because I felt like I was losing my health. And I know so many people are feeling the same way.
I think that hopefully we can connect with our audience with you on that level to provide some just some wellness support and, you know, to be your virtual supporter in that way.
Kellye (05:13)
Yeah, yeah, I think the health of the individual leader is so important and taken for granted, especially in public service. So this is one of those things that's very specific to us where we are focused on serving others. We're focused on serving the community. We're focused on serving our councils. We're focused on serving the organization, our teams, our families, even, you know, whenever we go home and all the things that we do for them. And
Charisse Deschenes (05:40)
Yes.
Kellye (05:40)
I think that's really what drives us as local government and public service driven leaders. But at the same time, it's very easy for us to forego the individual personal health part. ⁓ The putting on the cape, putting on your own cape before you help somebody put on theirs. And I think that we neglect that a lot. ⁓ I know that I caught myself doing that and had to seek out those ways.
And so I'm hoping that this just makes it that much easier to have this conversation around what is really necessary for a service driven leader to move forward in a very happy, healthy, positive way, even in a job where there's a lot of ups and downs. It's a roller coaster. Some days are really, really great. Some are just really, really tough. And you never know which day that's going to be.
You never know when that crisis is going to happen. You never know when you're going to get that call as a city manager or as a local government employee. And you have to be ready for it all the time, but you can't live in that state all the time of constant stress and crises. I just love that you're bringing in the health aspect and you're going to bring in the health coaching aspect to this podcast for each individual leader.
And I'm going to bring in the coaching and the life coaching and city manager coaching to the podcast. One of the things I wanted to talk about too is what is unmuted mean to us? Like, why did we pick that as the name of our podcast? you know, for me, was really about talking about those things that we don't always put words to.
and finally coming off mute and finally talking about them. I will say one of the reasons I'm doing this podcast is because it scares me. And I constantly seek out ways to improve myself, to be better, to grow. And being a beginner and having, I have no experience doing a podcast. You have no experience doing a podcast like.
Charisse Deschenes (07:35)
Right, yeah.
Kellye (07:49)
You know, mean, sure, there's plenty of things out on the internet to watch and read and learn, and we've been doing those things. But ultimately, like sitting down, recording these, I feel very vulnerable. But I'm also excited because in that discomfort, I tell my clients this all the time. If you're feeling uncomfortable, it's because you're in a growth zone. You're in an arena where you actually can grow.
If you're comfortable, you're not growing. I'm actually intentionally putting myself in an area where I'm uncomfortable in hopes that I will get better at this sort of thing.
Charisse Deschenes (08:25)
I would agree. ⁓ I'm hoping that we gain that sense of exploring something new, as you mentioned. Also, creativity is important to me, and learning something new as well is amazing. And I also think that gaining a perspective from being away from the profession for just a little bit of time will help us maybe interpret or identify or see something from a different perspective and share that with our listeners as we. ⁓
jump into the topic. So I'm really excited to do the unmuted podcast with you as green as we both are. And we are hoping everyone will support us and also hug us or give us a big hug because we are, we are new, you know, we are so new.
Kellye (09:01)
You
I think we need to be asking for thumbs ups and subscribes or
something along those lines, but hey.
Charisse Deschenes (09:15)
some like and subscribe. Yeah, yeah. Support us, like, and subscribe. Maybe there isn't the hug button. You're right. There's no hug button.
Kellye (09:20)
Something like that, yeah. No hugs.
If we see you in person. So I love that you brought up too is that, you know, we sort of have had this time to step away. And for people who know my story, I stepped away mid 2021 and I got certified as a coach and I've been coaching city managers and building my own business ever since as a solo entrepreneur. So a lot of discomfort and a lot of growth is definitely different.
than what I had ever experienced in my 16 years in the city manager's office. But having said that, yes, I stepped away from that role, but I did not step away from the profession and have stayed fully engaged in all the ways possible, attending conferences, giving presentations to leadership groups related to city management and women's leadership.
and just keeping up on the profession as well as I keep up with it through my clients and the things that they're going through on a day-to-day basis in those coaching sessions. yes, stepped away, perhaps have a different perspective, have a different schedule. I'm not in the thick of it, in the middle of things, but yet I am surrounded by it and learning and growing from my clients too and what they're going through and helping and supporting them through that.
Thanks for bringing that up. Yes, we have a little bit of a different perspective having stepped away, which I'm hoping helps us to open up and use our voice.
Charisse Deschenes (10:45)
Yeah.
Yes, I love that. A little bit about my background is I can share with you that, you know, I stepped away from local government about a year ago and I took a sabbatical and I really reflected on the things that I love about the profession and the things that became challenging. And again,
I really wanted to focus on health and so I started this health coaching program and I'm set to finish it here in the next month and I'm in the process of building a business around health coaching and really want to serve local government professionals is my main goal. When I even entered the program, I thought people like us need support from health coaching and life coaching and.
you know, executive coaching, all the different kinds of coaching that you can possibly do. is nice to have options out there. And so that's where I really felt a draw in a pool to engage with our fellow professionals in local government. And I did step away for a while. I'm re-engaging with my networks and hopefully reaching out and just, this is one way to really get to know you all again and for you to.
Know who Kellye and I are too, so that's why I'm here.
Kellye (12:07)
Yeah, and yeah, show you just how connected we really are to the profession and that passion that we have. So I just want to end this little snippet that we're doing for our listeners by talking about what our promise is to them or what it is that we're going to offer them. And so I guess we'll just start with like we're going to come to you every Monday.
with an episode. So that's our offer to you. And we are going to address topics that we think are relevant, that we wish had been talked about whenever we were sitting in the seat. And we want to help you personally be better professionally from the inside out.
And so I think the promise here is that sometimes we promise we'll make you laugh and with our lame jokes and sometimes we'll make you think and sometimes our conversations will inspire you and jazz up your day. And sometimes I hope that you will even disagree with us. And I imagine along the way that Charisse and I will disagree on topics as we go along.
But I think all of this is really important. It's all these pieces that help us be complete leaders, ⁓ complete humans, and it helps us all grow and we can do this together. So my offer here is that we're gonna show up every week for you, at least through the end of this year. And we're gonna try to have some conversations and we promise we will be growing.
because we're beginners here, but we won't always be beginners and we'll get better and better. And we hope that you will enjoy our show and that we'll grow together.
Charisse Deschenes (13:52)
And hopefully, yeah, and then hopefully we can move from topics that are currently muted to some of them becoming unmuted where we really desire to speak about the person, the whole person in this industry. yeah, that's just a wonderful experience for us all. So thank you. Thank you, Kellye. This is awesome.
Kellye (14:12)
Love it. Thanks for being a beginner with me, Charisse. This is gonna be fun. Let's go.
Charisse Deschenes (14:17)
I love it.
