A Portfolio Career In Organizational Psychology With Hayley Lewis

As a chartered coaching psychologist and a registered occupational psychologist, it has been Dr. Hayley Lewis’ passion to build relationships and share her talents to help others succeed. Her expertise in the psychology of organizations is the main anchor of HALO Psychology, where she leads a team to guide public sector managers through the most difficult challenges in the workplace. She joins J.R. Lowry to talk about the hardest problems she has helped teams solve, how she guides women into their transition to entrepreneurial activities, and why she offers free access to most of her books and other relevant works. Dr. Hayley also shares her own career transition from corporate and into entrepreneurship, as well as the management lessons she has learned working in the local government.

Check out the full series of “Career Sessions, Career Lessons” podcasts here or visit pathwise.io/podcast/. A full written transcript of this episode is also available at https://pathwise.io/podcasts/hayley-lewis

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A Portfolio Career In Organizational Psychology With Hayley Lewis

Founder Of HALO Psychology

In this episode, my guest is Dr. Hayley Lewis. Hayley is a chartered coaching psychologist and a registered occupational psychologist. Her expertise and day-to-day work are in the psychology of work and organizations, in particular, how leadership and management behavior impacts culture and performance. Hayley leads HALO Psychology, which focuses on helping public sector managers with difficult problems in the workplace.

She is also a Program Director for the Master of Research Program at Birkbeck, which is part of the University of London. She’s an honorary lecturer at City, University of London and a Dissertation Supervisor at Arden University. Her prior experience includes work with Kingston and Coventry Universities, Croton Council and the BBC. Hayley earned a Bachelor’s degree in Social Sciences from the University of Leicester, a Master’s degree in Organizational Behavior from City University of London and her Doctorate in Organizational Psychology from Birkbeck.

She is also a volunteer with the British Psychological Society. Hayley has been shortlisted for and has won several awards for her work, both as a psychologist and a public sector leader. She’s been awarded Associate Fellowship with the British Psychological Society and become a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. She lives in the Greater London area. Welcome. It’s great to have you on the show. I appreciate your time.

Thank you for having me.

Let’s start with what you’re doing with HALO. Why don’t you talk a little bit about that first?

It is one of the many hats that I wear. HALO Psychology is my business. It’s a consultancy. The work that I do through HALO is split into a number of camps. Around 50% of my work is executive coaching, everyone from that first-time manager who never managed or led before up to the chief exec managing director level.

The other 50% of work is split between leadership and management development programs, either designing full programs or delivering parts. I do team building, often leadership team building and team development within that 50% and then the odd smattering of strategy work. When I worked in corporate roles, I often had strategy roles. I’ve taken that with me but I don’t do huge amounts of that because I like to be there on the ground with people affecting change in real time.

How much overall does that translate in terms of how much of the work you do is with companies and how much of it is with individuals?

At the moment, I would say around 85% is with the organization. I might work with individuals but it’s the organization that’s come to me. In terms of individuals who approach me directly, as a private client are either paying for themselves. That’s increased particularly over the last few years on the back of my research so that’s around 15%. I’m increasing the number of business coaching, particularly with women who are either wanting to set up their first business or they’re in that early startup phase like the first couple of years.

Your LinkedIn profile talks about how you help your clients, managers, and organizations overcome seemingly impossible problems. What are some of the seemingly impossible problems that they come to you with?

I work across all sectors with companies from around the world. Although a big focus for me is UK-based companies, my heart is with the public sector. It speaks to my values. I ended up in the public sector for longer than I intended. A large part of my work is with the public sector. Often, when I’m working with managers through to senior leaders, particularly in local government, for example, in seemingly insurmountable problem is we need to find more savings, but we still need to do the work because politicians, residents, and service users need us to do the work but we don’t have any money or we’re not going to get more funding.

We’re creating spaces and helping decision-makers think things through in more evidence-based ways, giving them that space to work through the problem and all the way through to individual level, things like for you and I, J.R, that day-to-day stuff. I don’t like calling myself an expert, but I suppose compared to some, I’ve got a bit more experience. For that first-time manager or even an experienced manager, sometimes an insurmountable problem for them might be a difficult relationship with the member of staff. They can’t see a way back from it because it’s got to such a bad place.

There’s always a way back. My job is to help them think a little bit differently about it, try stuff out and try to get the relationship back on track. From my vantage point, that’s not an insurmountable problem, but for the person involved, when they’re right in it, it can feel like there’s no way out or forward. That’s what I mean. That gives two different examples across the spectrum.

Has the pandemic and the environment since the pandemic changed the kinds of things that you’re doing with your clients?

I imagine this for you and many people who work as consultants or coaches. Huge numbers of people are asking me to deliver workshops or give keynote talks on resilience and well-being. As a qualified psychologist, in terms of workplace psychology, that’s bread and butter for me but it wasn’t always the thing that I would typically be asked for pre-pandemic. It was often around workshops on giving feedback or coaching skills. Now, 9 times out of 10, I will be contacted and asked to give a webinar and run a workshop on developing resilience or different aspects of well-being, which I find interesting.

There’s so much discussion. I’m using it broadly speaking, but I wonder whether well-being and mental health-related topics would be getting so much prominence if we hadn’t had the pandemic.

I think that’s the question, you’re right.

It’s hard to know. Certainly, you could feel the tides starting to turn in terms of the way that people talked about mental health topics and the willingness to, but it feels like the pandemic was a massive accelerant on that. It’s brought it to the forefront. It’s much more prominent. We’re doing this discussion during mental health awareness month. It’s timely in that respect.

The pandemic acted as the catalyst for a lot of things. It makes me wonder if we would see the nurse’s strikes, the junior doctor strikes, and the NHS that we’re seeing at the moment if we hadn’t had the pandemic. It makes me wonder a lot of things. Some of the understandable unrest and the questioning of systems and decisions make me wonder if we would be as challenging as those if the pandemic hadn’t happened. I’m pondering the same things as you, J.R.

Here in the UK, it’s been worsened by the fact that inflation was over 10% at one point. You start feeling the pinch of that if you were living close to paycheck to paycheck. That’s certainly precipitated a lot of the strikes that we’re seeing as well. There’s certainly been a lot of social changes that have happened that the pandemic at least played some role in either instigating or catalyzing in whatever way.

One of the things that you focus on is helping women transition into entrepreneurial activities and out of the corporate world. That was the subject of your doctoral research. What are some of the challenges that women face as entrepreneurs that men don’t or that men don’t face to the same degree that are the basis of the work that you do with your clients on that topic?

My study didn’t compare men and women. That’s a difficult question to answer, but broadly women – and it doesn’t matter if they’re setting up their business or working in a leadership position in a corporate role. We know that still in many countries around the world, and if I take the UK because that’s where I’m from and where I’m based, we know that women tend to take on what we call emotional labor. They take on the additional work and the second work in many households as well.

If there are children involved, often they’ll be the primary carer as well as trying to hold down a big job or trying to set up their business. I’m not saying that’s the case in all partnerships, but it’s broadly the norm. There might be some outliers. What was interesting to me was one of the studies that I conducted. I spoke to a number of women at various points in the first three years of setting up and running their businesses.

Only half of them were parents or carers. More than half were in their late 40s and early 50s. I found that interesting. We’re seeing stuff in the press about almost the new lease of life that being a woman in your 50s can be. There’s a beautiful phrase. Davina talks about it in her menopause book, but the idea is that it’s not the final act. It’s a time of renewal. As a woman, I found that interesting because some of them who were parents or carers no longer have that responsibility.

They’re a bit freer to take the risks and put in the work that you need to when you set up on your own. To answer your original question, it’s a difficult one for me to answer because I didn’t do a comparative study but some of it is systemic so having these additional labor roles such as being a carer. Some of it is psychological. Although, I deliberately wanted to look at the strengths women have.

I didn’t want to look at what they didn’t have because there are countless studies that do that already. That perpetuates this myth. The idea is that women lack confidence. They don’t have this skill or this, that and the other. I wanted to turn that on its head. Mine is a strengths-based piece of research that looks at these women are succeeding. What are they doing that’s enabling them to succeed?

What are some of the other strengths? You’ve highlighted a few, but what are some of the other ones that stood out in your research?

It is an interesting thing. One of the studies that I conducted was what we call a systematic review, where I looked at the previous research that had gone before over the 21st century. Quite a lot of the research suggested that women business owners tended to not be very good and lack skills around some of the harder technical competence around business planning and all that stuff, financial management, and marketing.

My main study found the opposite. The women that I spoke to, ironically, the strongest things they looked at the table were the hard technical competencies. They all were brilliant at business planning. They had clear business plans. They were on top of it. They were set to their context doing their research. They were clear on their competitors. They’d done their benchmarking. They had clear marketing plans. My study flew in the face of what previous research was suggesting and then a big focus on relationships.

You made this transition out of the corporate world into becoming your own boss. What prompted you to make the transition?

Sad life events. I’d thought about it for quite a number of years. I ended up in a tough leadership role in local government, and it was hard. It was brutal, physically and mentally. I’ve been an occupational psychologist for 25 years. I started at the BBC, went into local government, and ended up moving further away from my original professional training into big strategic leadership roles around IT, customer services and so on.

Whilst they were stretching and great opportunities career-wise, it’s taken me further away from my first love and what I like to think I’m good at anyway. I had this little voice back in 2013. I’d go on holiday with my husband, take a notepad and be like, “One day, I’ll work for myself.” I’d write down all these ideas and it would come to nothing. It became like the boy who cried wolf. I said, “I’m going to do it and leave.” My husband, family, and friends would be like, “Yeah, yeah.” That went on for a few years.

In February 2016, my dad died unexpectedly on the week before his 70th birthday out of nowhere. It knocked me and my family because it was so unexpected. I was blindsided by that. The little voice started to get louder, but I ignored it. The month after my dad’s funeral, my mom got diagnosed with terminal cancer. I thought, “The universe is trying to tell me something.” I was 42 at that point.

When we’re in our early 30s, 40s, 50s or 60s, they’re quite almost natural transition points, the points where we ponder, “Do I want to carry on doing what I’ve been doing?” I was on holiday with my husband not long after my mom’s diagnosis. I said, “I’m going to do it this time.” He’s brilliant. He’s my biggest cheerleader. I’m the main wage earner in my family. It was not an easy decision. I’ve got a mortgage to pay and he said, “I’ll support you whatever.” We came back from holiday and I gave my resignation letter to my boss.

For me, it took some of the worst things that we can ever face as humans to be the catalyst. Fast forward all those years later, I was doing my research. It made me curious because of what I was finding in coaching sessions with many of the women that I coach, who are in leadership positions in organizations, these amazingly talented women who’ve worked their way up to these big positions but in a one-to-one environment. It was almost like a conspiratorial behind the hand.

I don’t think I want to step up into the chief exec role or go into the chairperson role. I’ve always wanted to set up my yoga business, or I want to be a coach, but I don’t think I can. It got me curious about what’s that about. What is it? Why do we talk ourselves out of this? Why does, for so many of us, it have to be these monumentally catalytic, often catastrophic events that then give us the launchpad?

That’s why I wanted to look at the women who hadn’t been in a catastrophic event and had gone on and set out their business after having very successful corporate careers. Conscious have gone all around the houses, but that tells you why and how I made the decision. Also, what it’s made me curious about as a woman in business.

You went and did your PhD. You made that decision as well along the way.

I did. Pre-pandemic, I started it. For me, it was the right time. One of my other roles is I teach at several universities but I’m a Program Director at Birkbeck. I’m the co-program director for the first part of the professional doctorate. What’s always interesting to me is our students are so impatient. They want it all now. I sometimes get contacted on LinkedIn by young up-and-coming psychologists. They’ve just finished their MSc. They’re in their twenties, and they want a Doctorate now. They’re hungry for it.

I always give myself as an example. I give one of my colleagues as an example. I did mine in my late 40s. One of my cohorts did hers in her early 60s. It’s about doing it at the right time for you rather than some arbitrary timetable. To do doctoral-level research, you’ve got to love it because there will be the inevitable, as Shakespeare says, “Dark night of the soul.” Where you’re like, “I can’t do this. I’m leaving.”

If you love your subject and you are passionate that what you are doing is going to help and be good in the world, it keeps you going, and that’s what it was for me. I started mine in my mid-40s, pre-pandemic and then the pandemic hit. My mom was starting to die at that point as well. I was trying to look after her from afar. It was a lot.

As a business owner and I’m sure lots of us found this, I was on track to have my best-ever financial quarter in March 2020, like the biggest ever. It blew my mind. I see every single bit of work come out on the 26th of March 2020, when everybody panicked but the resilient part of me turned it up. We had savings and I turned it on its head. I thought, “I’m going to use this time to dig into my research,” and that’s all I did.

Work started to come back in, which then I got annoyed about because I was like, “I’m doing my research.” I often get asked by people who are curious about doing doctoral research, Was the pandemic a terrible time to do it? For me, it was a brilliant time because it was so quiet work-wise. It was hard trying to do all the things and look after my mom.

You had this little voice in your head going back to your decision to jump into the entrepreneurial fold. How have you found the experience of being a business owner?

I love it. Don’t get me wrong, I made some real cock ups at the start, which I’ve shared on other shows. I talk to business coaching clients and my students about it but I love it. I love the freedom, the autonomy and being responsible just for me. I often get asked if I’m going to grow and have employees like I’ve never thought about. I get very well-meaning often patronizing people who slide into my DMs’ LinkedIn. I’ll say it’s a very deliberate decision. I don’t want employees.

I’ve had employees. I ran big services and it’s a headache. I’d like to be responsible for myself. I use associates. Although sometimes my clients don’t want the associates. Part of the issue is when your name is your brand. I love it. It’s interesting because somebody asked me, “Would you ever go back into full-time employment?” I said, “Never say never but I like the freedom.” I’ve tentatively put a semi-foot back in. I have this part-time role at Birkbeck and I love the role. It reminded me of working in a corporate environment and the bureaucracy and the rules. I’m grateful I only have to do that a couple of half days then I get my freedom back with HALO. I love it.

How does that work complement what you do in your business, the teaching that you do, and the program director role that you have?

I’ve been teaching for a long time, even when I worked in local government. That was a very deliberate career move. I was getting bigger corporate leadership roles, which were taking me further away from pure workplace psychology. I knew that I wanted to go back at some point and keep my hand in. I love teaching.

I got my first lecturing gig at City University, which was my Alum, where I did my MSA back in 2009. I’ve had lots of guests and visiting lecturer work even when I was in local government. I was already doing that. I’m very used to having to balance things. In terms of now, I’m super organized. I’m very boundaries and unapologetic about the boundaries and unapologetic about boundaries to my time so Monday afternoon and Wednesday morning for me is my Birkbeck. The rest of the time is HALO.

I don’t tend to work Fridays. I certainly don’t do client delivery on Friday, and it works. I’m super strict about it. I’ve not had an issue. I make it work because I’m very clear in my communication. I’m very boundaried. I pride myself on communicating to people where I’m at, what’s up, how they can get hold of me and the boundaries around that.

It seems like in general, entrepreneurs go 1 of 2 ways. They go the way of, “I’m going to keep my boundaries, keep the scope limit and keep things more fully in my control.” There are people who “go, go, go” and it turns out to be a difficult lifestyle for them because they’re constantly working and thinking about their business. It’s a credit to you that you can make it all work, keep your boundaries and be clear about that.

The two complement each other as well. Even before I took on the Birkbeck role, I was module convener at Kingston on their Master’s program. Clients like the fact that I’m an evidence-based practitioner. I always get feedback in workshops or even in coaching sessions. People feel a sense of confidence and reassurance that I know what I’m talking about because it’s grounded in good research. Conversely, students like the fact that I’ve got practice.

I’m not spouting a load of theories and concepts. I talk to them about, “This one’s a difficult one to apply, and you might need to bend it or this is what it means in this context.” I feel really lucky… It’s not lucky. It’s hard work, and I’m diligent, but there is an element of luck, I suppose. The bulk of my client base is I don’t have to do any of those sleazy, salesy, sliding into people’s messages. My work is either word of mouth to somebody who mentions me or repeats business, where people come back to work with me again.

The majority of clients say they like the fact that what they see is a unique blend of deep understanding and insight into the psychology of humans in the workplace and real-world experience. I’ve lived and breathed it. I’m very proud of the battle scars that I’ve got. I’m not spouting a load of stuff at people in hard jobs, and I’ve got no idea of what that feels like. They like that. What they see is a very unique blend.

There are a lot of people out there who will call themselves coaches or weigh in on something without necessarily the level of practical experience, training, or research basis that sounds like you go into your work with. It has to make a difference. You’ve got a lot more that you can draw on. One of the things that also interested me about your background was particularly your time with local government. You were working on things that weren’t as directly psychology related, like customer experience, innovation and strategy, marketing, PR, and communications. That’s a pretty broad array of things. I’m curious, how did that play into your strengths? How did it push your comfort zone?

I’d gone into local government. Back in my early 30s, like many of us at that age, I had this grand plan that was very traditional. I’ll go into local government for two years then go to central government. I’ll go into a blue chip. It didn’t work like that. I fell headline and sinker in love with the sector and what it stood for. I started as head of organizational development, which is very much in my wheelhouse. It’s one of the aspects of workplace psychology. I did some amazing work with my team in three years.

There’ll be a theme in a minute. I then got a bit bored, and that’s dangerous. When I get bored, I start to tinker and break stuff. As it happens, one of the things that I’d done was design and implement a flagship leadership program. It is an award-winning leadership program. One of the first people that went on that program was the director of IT and transformation, Aiden. I was out for coffee with him, and he said, “I’ve got a secondment coming up. Somebody’s going on maternity leave, and I’d like you to consider going for it.” I thought, “What is it?”

He said what it was, Head of Strategy Innovation within IT. He said, “I don’t want somebody with a traditional IT background. I like your approach to organizational development and the approach that you take in terms of engaging with people. That’s what we need. We’ve got to develop and roll out an ambitious technology agenda. We’ve got to develop our five-year technology strategy and I’d like you to head it up.”

I did that initial thing that lots of women do, which is, “I don’t have all the skills so I can’t possibly.” I had a chat with some good colleagues who were like, “You can do it.” I went for it and got it. I had a blast for nine months and learned loads. As much as I bought to the table in terms of engaging with lots of different stakeholders to develop a strategy because I don’t believe in developing a strategy on your own in a little room with a cold flannel on your head, you should build it with the people.

Hayley Lewis: Do not develop a business strategy on your own inside a little room with a dark flannel on your head. Build it with other people.

I learned about contract negotiation and contract management because we had a big IT partner. It’s like a £100 million contract, and it wasn’t being managed very well. I had to rebuild the relationship with the partner. I loved that but it was stretching. I remember asking to go through the contract, naively thinking it would be like that. I remember our legal said, “No, bought three trolleys of boxes.” I nearly cried but it was brilliant. I’m still in contact with many of the people that I was lucky enough to work with. That’s the comment that started to come to an end and I thought, “I’ll go back to OD.”

The director of customer services reached out and said, “I like what you’ve done over there with Aiden. I’ve got a job coming up here. Would you like to come and work with me and apply for the job?” I said, “What is it?” “Head of the customer strategy. I saw you did this strategy work and liked what you did but you’d also be responsible for complaints.” I gave it a go. That was hard, being responsible for corporate complaints, social care complaints, having to liaise with the local government, ombudsman and all that stuff.

We were on the naughty step. We were one of the worst local authorities in the country. We’d been on the Daily Mail for our response time. We turned that around and built an amazing team. What started to happen is the chief exec would give me gifts in terms of, “You’ve done well. Let me give you the gift of being responsible for freedom of information.” Every time we did well and I turned stuff around, I’d get given more broken stuff and loved it. I met my nemesis.

I met my Everest, if you like, which was lots of restructuring and continuing in all sectors, particularly the public sector. The head of communications was leaving for another job, so the new chief exec and my boss were like, “There’s a bit of an overlap with Hayley and her team, so why don’t we merge her service with that service to create a super service?” I was made redundant, went for the job, and got it. That was hard because I had half my service who’d come with me from an amazing journey.

The other half was like, “Who is she? She’s not a journalist by background. She doesn’t have a PR background.” I started to be attacked by local bloggers. It was brutal, and then I was right in the middle of the politician. With the head of comms in any central local government, you are right in the heart of the lion’s den. That was the toughest role, but ironically, it was the longest role that I was in local government. When I left local government, I had to do a bit of rebranding because when I left local government, everyone had forgotten that I’d started as a psychologist.

Everybody was like, “Head of comms expert.” I was like, “No,” because I’ve done such a good job of convincing everybody that I knew what it was about and what I was doing. My first year was brutal, and then I put things in place to help me. I got support and became the resilient Hayley that I had been in the past. That helped me navigate. I’m good at building relationships.

Once I started to build relationships with other heads of communications and partner organizations, that was when the magic started to happen again. It took me going to a bad place in that first year, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. I do a lot of work with comms teams on resilience and well-being. That’s where I bring my experience during that time but also my psychological understanding as well.

You do some writing work as well.

I dabble here and there. It’s very nice of you to say. I do a bit of blogging. I do ghostwriting. I have done three pieces and paid pieces for people. I don’t know about you. I don’t know if you do writing but I’m not one of these people who can write. Every morning, I write for an hour but I’ve got to be in the mood for it.

I would like to write more than I have the time and patience for at the moment maybe at some point. I haven’t cracked the code on how to fit it into my life and the way that I want to, so it tends to go in fits and starts.

If you look at my blog, there’ll be a flurry. I might have done one a month for a few months, and then there’ll be this massive gap. I got asked to be a joint author for a new book that’s coming out for occupational psychologists. I got asked to write one of the chapters. I dabbled a toe in because I get asked a lot, “Are you ever going to write a book?” I like the idea of being an author but I also know the hard graph that goes behind it. I’ve got a lot of friends who’ve written books. Writing a chapter in a book for a big publisher is a bit of a test but felt like a nice compromise. Let’s see when the edits come back. I might feel very differently, J.R.

Everybody I know who’s written a book says that the first time they sit down with their editor, it’s a brutal and massively humbling experience.

Saying that I’ve been through the Doctoral thesis where it gets ripped apart and then you have the pleasure of sitting down for 3 hours with 2 professors who then ask you in minute detail questions about every single chapter. At the end of it, if you’re not crying, you’re a blubbering mess on the floor and you think you’ve failed. They’re like, “No, you’ve passed.” I always think that’s a good trial run for writing, but if you can get through that, you can get through writing a book with a publisher and an editor.

Hayley Lewis: If you can defend your doctoral thesis, you can get through writing a book with a publisher and an editor.

You’re sketching and doing drawings. How did that come about?

I made lots of mistakes in the early stages of my business. My first few months of setting up HALO is back in 2016. There is nothing more humbling, and it made me realize how arrogant I’d become. I was in a big role. If I picked up the phone, people answered so I left 29th of July, 2016. Monday, the 1st of August, I was like, “Why is no one ringing?” Got to September, October, and November. It’s like tumbleweed. I was like, “What’s going on? Why aren’t people responding?”

I had a good talk with myself because I thought, “Something’s happening here.” Seeing your savings go down is incredibly humbling. There were a few things. I hadn’t done a proper business plan. I realized that I wasn’t marketing well enough, consistently enough, or in a focused way. I was doing random things at random. I was posting randomly. I was writing the odd random blog post. I was trying to talk to everyone, the world, and his wife, and not speaking to anyone. I thought, “Something’s got to change.”

There were two things that made the difference. I read a book called The Million Dollar Blog, a brilliant book and ultimately that’s about you’ve got a shot consistently, whatever that looks like for you because will then come to expect it. I thought, “Okay.” I happened to be scrolling on Twitter one day and came across this thing called a sketch note. I’ve never heard of it before.

It’s a brilliant sketch note by Tanmay Vora. It blew my mind because I’ve always been someone who likes to simplify what are unnecessarily complicated things. I’ve always had 360 feedback. People have always said that one of my strengths is cutting to the heart of things, simplifying stuff and helping people understand. I looked at this one page because I thought I like it. I’ve always liked drawing. I went on Google about how to sketch note. There was a free online course at that point by a guy. He doesn’t do it anymore. He’d set me little tasks and I practice.

The first one I ever did will never ever be seen, it is in a vault somewhere, like in Harry Potter, guarded by a dragon. I thought, “I like this.” I tried a couple more, and then I thought, “Do it. Put one out there.” I became overwhelmed. My first one was on group think that I put out in the public world, and the response was phenomenal. I’d gone from silence, and I hit on something.

I didn’t do them like every week the way that I do now, but I do like 1 or 2 a month and always got a good reception. I thought, “You have to read a lot of research as a psychologist. The people that you work with will never get to see that research.” They said, “How could you bridge the two?” “I know, sketch notes, blog posts or both.” That’s what spurred me on. I’ve been doing them ever since. I get commissioned to do them, which always blows my mind.

I try not to do that because I don’t always feel joyful about that. I get the most joy when I’ve chosen the one that I want to do and I’m immersed in it. It’s reignited my memory of the concept that I’m drawing about. I enjoy the ones where it’s my decision to do. I’m not being paid to do it. I’m always blown away when some of them go viral. Adam Grant asked to use one in his last book, Think Again.

I’m a bit of a fan girl of Adam. I thought it was a spoof. I genuinely thought it was a phishing scam. Thank goodness for his editorial team at Viking Penguin Random House. They kept going because I kept thinking, “It’s spam. Somebody’s having a laugh. They know that I follow Adam.” With three emails, it took them to go, “This is a real email, Hayley. We’re asking your permission, and we want to pay you.” I was like, “Maybe it’s real.”

Do you license them out otherwise?

I give them freely. I get some very well-meaning advice. People are like, “You should monetize this, Hayley. You give away too much for free.” I’m an idiot, and I always say, “I know I could monetize, but I choose not to because as many people can afford to work with someone like me, there will be hundreds who will never be able to afford to work with someone like me or you.” I’m not cheap. I’m good value.

That doesn’t sit well with my values and ethics. How can I best serve and help them? In a limited way and my small way, I can give them free access and use of stuff. That’s why my sketch note eBooks, the other eBooks I’ve written and the tools that I’ve created will always be free. That’s my app that will never ever change. I don’t want to monetize. Thanks.

I certainly think about what to give away and the overall business mix of what I’m doing. I’m spending money on this so I want to get some money back in return at some point. One of the reasons I started down this path in the first place was to help other people with their careers because so many people are not happy or fulfilled and need help. I don’t know what it is. There’s some inertia or quicksand that keeps them from addressing these issues. I’ve thought a lot about how much is free and when you have to start paying for things.

I’m not Mother Teresa. I’m not purely altruistic. I’m a businesswoman and I’m also a working-class South London who grew up in the ‘70s in a very poor household. I like a bit of money. Gary Vaynerchuk, if you’ve heard of him, talks about generosity, and generosity should be core. If you have that naturally as part of who you are, you’ll always be a successful business person. I remember reading this years ago and thinking, “All right, Gary,” but now I get it.

Hayley Lewis: Generosity should be at the core of who you naturally are. That will make you a successful business person.

The amount of work I get as a result of the sketch notes that I put out and the free stuff, people always comment on it and say, “I downloaded your free 70-page change eBook and it helped me. There’s something else going on that I’d like to work with you on.” The reason why I keep stuff free does come from a very positive place. It might also lead to some people coming back at some point and wanting to work with me on a paid basis.

There’s an element of marketing to it as well.

Yes, the amount of times I get somebody to contact me saying, “One of your sketch notes popped up on my LinkedIn, and it resonated with me. It was like you were speaking to me is. You’ve seen into my very soul the issue that I’m working on, and I’d like your help, please.” It’s without a shadow of a doubt.

With the different things you’ve done over the years, what would you say are the strengths that you’ve been able to draw on across all of those different things?

Creativity. That’s able to shine because of the freedom that I have. My biggest strength is my ability to build and maintain genuine relationships. Also, one of my favorite things to do in the world is to connect people to other people. I love it. I’m a bit of a matchmaker. Once a year, I’ll mentor somebody doing their MSc or just starting on their psychology journey. Something might come up in a conversation where I’m like, “I’m going to introduce you to this person.” I might introduce a client to another client with their permission because there’s a real symmetry.

One of the things that I often find with many of the middle managers that I work with is they can feel lonely. They think it’s just them and they’re the only ones screwing up. They’re the only ones that are like, “I’m rubbish.” It’s like, “Let me tell you.” Every person I meet feels the same thing, and there’s somebody else facing the same thing. “Would you like me to introduce you?” I’m great at relationships but haven’t always been. I’ve got a lot better as I’ve got older and more comfortable in my skin, and I love connecting people.

What have you had to work on developing?

My husband says I live in a constant state of annoyance. I am a very impatient person.

When your husband says you live in a constant state of annoyance, how does that make you feel?

I say rotten things back to him, but he’s the nicest and kindest person ever. There is this thing where I’m like, “If you haven’t delivered it in half a second, then I can be a bit of a monster.” It holds me to account. I’m grateful that I’ve got somebody who is able to call me out on my BS because not everybody does. We don’t often see ourselves the way others see us. I can be a bit intimidating. That’s never my intention to be intimidating because I’ve got quite a quick brain and think in a certain way.

I’ve done a lot, and I know for some people who are starting, certainly in my profession, that can be intimidating. Hopefully, my ability to build relationships helps quell that, but that’s why you need people who can call your stuff out. It also used to come up in 360-degree feedback, J.R. There is something about either hearing from a loved one or seeing in black and white from your direct reports, the thing that you know about yourself that you are hoping you’ve hidden and you haven’t. They’ve seen you.

I remember one of my direct reports. I don’t know who it was. I didn’t need to know who it was. It said, “Hayley needs to understand what everybody thinks at the speed of light as she does.” I remember it word for word. “She needs to give the rest of us and the immortals at least five minutes to reflect on something.” I remember reading that. Sometimes we need that. To answer your question, I’ve got a lot better not just at being open to feedback but I’ll actively ask for it as well.

It was one of the things that I used to do a lot towards the end of my tenure in local government. I would ask my direct reports, “How have I helped you this month? How have I hindered you?” I ran a management workshop. It’s interesting. A couple of them said, “How you hindered is quite negative. You could rephrase it.” It’s like, “Don’t rephrase it. It’s meant to be that question.” Why are we so averse to asking questions like that? Sometimes we are a hindrance to our staff.

I heard somebody speak a long time ago. A guy who had enjoyed a lot of success in his career came up through the ranks at Goldman and had written a few books on leadership and development. He had a lot of credibility. One of the points he made at the time was, “I will end every meeting with, ‘How can I help you? What can I be doing better?’ I won’t let them out of the room until I get an answer.”

I bet their answer is, “How you could help us is by getting out of our way so we can get out of this room. Thanks.”

Maybe but at least it made it a two-way discussion. After a while, people get comfortable with that. They know that it’s not a setup. It’s a little bit of your Adam Grant thing. They develop trust that it is real and is coming from the right place.

What’s always been core for me is role modeling. I don’t believe in telling people to do stuff that I wouldn’t do. If I’m saying to you asking for feedback is a good thing to do, then I need to show you not only to ask for feedback but how to respond to it even when it hurts.

Here’s the last question. If you were going back to give advice to your younger self, what would it be in terms of how to think about your career journey?

It’s unintentional, but it’s a beautiful segue from what I said. I would say to my younger self, “Not everything has to be done by next year. Your career is not only a marathon, so you’ve got to have the stamina for it. It might take you to places that you didn’t even realize you could go or wanted to go. Be open to that.”

I was thinking maybe coming into work that life is short and careers are long. I’m trying to come up with a more eloquent way to say it. I feel like it’s true. Life hurdles and, at the same time, careers are long. You don’t have to have all of that success in the first few years. You can try different things, have reinventions of yourself, and all of that.

You might have more than one career. I can’t remember. It’s awful of me. I won’t be able to reference this, but I did read something that suggested that the generation that’s entering the workplace so those in their early twenties, won’t have 5 or 6 different jobs by the time they’re 40. They’ll have probably had 2 or 3 different careers.

I’m Generation X and the slacker generation, apparently, where it’s very traditional when you stick with one career and work your way up hierarchically. The creative variety-driven side of Hayley is like, “That’s brilliant.” I’ve done it myself. I dabbled in a bit of IT and PR, and comms. I became a comms expert and then came back to psychology.

Some of us do go back to our roots eventually. This has been great. Thank you. I appreciate again you making the time. It’s good to get to know you a bit.

Thank you for asking me, J.R. I’m always honored when people ask me to jump on their show.

You have a good rest of your day.

You too. Thank you.

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It was fun having Hayley on the show. We had met before and that’s always fun for me. It was good to hear her talk about her career journey and the range of different things she’s done and what she’s learned along the way. If you’re ready to take control of your career, visit PathWise.io. If you’d like more regular insights, you can become a PathWise member. It’s free. You can also sign up on the website for our newsletter and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube. Thanks. Have a great day.

Important Links

• LinkedIn – Dr. Hayley Lewis
• HALO Psychology
• British Psychological Society
• Royal Society of Arts
• The Million Dollar Blog
• Think Again
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About Hayley Lewis

Dr. Hayley Lewis is a Chartered Coaching Psychologist and a HCPC Registered Occupational Psychologist. Her expertise and day-to-day work is in the psychology of work and organizations, in particular how leadership and management behavior impacts culture and performance.

Hayley leads HALO Psychology, which focuses on helping public sector managers with difficult problems in the workplace. She is also a program director for the Master of Research program at Birkbeck, which is part of the University of London, is an honorary lecturer at City University of London, and is a dissertation supervisor at Arden University. Her prior experience includes work with Kingston and Coventry Universities, Croydon Council, and the BBC.

Hayley earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences from the University of Leicester, a Master’s Degree in Organizational Behavior from the City University of London, and her doctorate in Organizational Psychology from Birkbeck. She is also a volunteer with the British Psychological Society.