Heidi Saucier

Habits – make them or break them!

It’s time for another question! This time, the focus is on habits.

What habit, if you did it more consistently, would have a positive effect on your life?

Habits are something that we hear about all the time. There are articles and advice everywhere about the importance of developing good habits as well as how to stop following bad habits. James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, emphasizes the importance of incremental methods to establish positive habits and remove negative ones. Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit, shares research and stories of why habits even exist and how this knowledge will make a difference in what we do.

For me, there are habits that already have a positive effect on my life. One that I’ve shared before is keeping journals. The gratitude journal as some of you know is one where every night before bed, I write down five successes and three things I am thankful for from that day. I do my best not to repeat, but at times it does happen as it may be something that’s tied to a specific goal. I also have a second journal, One Question a Day: A Five-Year Journal, that allows me to answer questions each night and see if the answer changes year over year. Some questions are annually focused such as “What goal would you like to accomplish this year?”, while others may stay the same such as “What is your favorite restaurant?” I’ve had this journal just over two years and enjoy looking at past entries to see what answers have changed and which are identical. The habit of journalling has helped me keep a positive perspective, even on the hardest days, and take time to reflect on where I’m at in the moment.

Looking at habits that I would like to establish as a leader that have a positive effect tie back to Franklin Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. First, I have realized that I need to read this book as it includes critical areas that will bring improvement to my personal and professional life. Reviewing the summary of the habits, I see where I demonstrate elements of each. At the same time, I would like to cultivate some areas to bring further growth. This includes using more proactive language, a deeper review of how I manage my time, and becoming more of an empathic listener. These can bring a positive and supportive approach to those you lead and help focus on the important things that help teams be successful in their purpose.

Habits are a way of life that we continue to make, break, and maintain throughout the years. They can help expand your horizons, make you healthier, or go in the opposite direction and set you back in your goals. Take some time to reflect and ask yourself:

  • Which habits are serving me well that I should maintain or cultivate?
  • Which habits are holding me back from my personal and professional goals? What is needed to break these habits?
  • Which habits do I want to form to help me grow personally and professionally?

What did you discover? Share in the comments!

Heidi Saucier

Doing the impossible

I hope that the questions in the past posts have allowed you to reflect on your life journey and given you some new insights. On to the next question!

What was something that seemed impossible – but you did it anyway?

For most of us, we’ve had times in our life where we faced the decision to move forward with something we didn’t think we were capable of or thought would be an uphill battle to reach the finish line. At that moment, we could have decided that it was ok not to move in that direction. We had every right to do so. Instead we chose to slay the dragon, overcome the giant – whatever you want to call it – and do what it took to achieve that goal.

I recall a few of these moments. Some changed my perspective. Others taught me the importance of perseverance and resilience. Not all were major events. One instance was making a simple choice to stop eating food after 9 p.m. I had a habit of wanting just one more snack before bed, which is not a healthy practice. As I’ve been exploring ways to make better choices and lose weight, I saw repeatedly that late night eating has a significant impact on our metabolism. I made the decision to put this into practice at the first of the year. I was sure I’d cave and convince myself that I needed just one more thing to eat, and that hunger pangs would constantly taunt me. Even still, I put reminders on my phone and made a conscious effort to make 9 p.m. the cutoff point. I’m happy to share that I have only had one moment where I ate something past that time and overall have not had any major cravings. While it was a small decision, I know it will have positive effects on my overall health goals.

Another example is on a professional level. Recently, I needed to support the design of a microlearning course to address a learning gap. While I am skilled to lead an amazing team that produces quality training courses, I will be the first to admit that I am not a rockstar instructional designer. At the same time, I can create simple courses and navigate through key instructional design tools. I was nervous to take on this project but knew it was necessary to help reduce the errors that our core audience was making in a particular area. The pre-work was the easier part, identifying the objectives and creating the storyboard and script for the lesson. Once I completed that and received approval from stakeholders and subject matter experts, I started the challenging part for me – using the design software. It was a combination of Vyond and Adobe Captivate, two tools that I was familiar with. I consider myself to be between an advanced beginner and competent user, having created videos in the past. I began putting the work together then asked my employee, who uses the tool regularly, for guidance on complex tasks. He was happy to help and gave honest feedback that helped me make key revisions and learn new ways to use Vyond. This led to a successfully designed course that was published on training site for our learning audience to access.

These two examples helped strengthen my leadership skills. How? First, making healthier choices brings me the energy I need to lead. If I’m fatigued or am dealing with health conditions that take me away from work, I risk not being an effective leader. In the second example, I was willing to jump in and ask for help to ensure I was supporting the needs of our team. Leaders should not be afraid to ask others, including their own team members, for their expertise to help them with decisions or key tasks. Your employees can be critical resources that help you build stronger teams. With that in mind, there’s no shame in leaders to ask their employees for support. What are things that seemed impossible for you, but you moved forward in completing the task or goal? Share in the comments!

Heidi Saucier

Energy Givers and Drainers

We’re on to the next of the reflection questions I’ve been sharing.

What gives you energy – and what drains it? This has been a discovery over time that continues to help me find balance not only as a leader, but in all aspects of life. I’ve found for myself that some of my energy givers and drainers have slight similarities and have factors that are key to when certain things bring energy and when they take it away.

One area has to do with interactions with others. When I am involved in small group and one on one conversations, I gain energy during the interaction. I enjoy learning about others and hearing their experiences and insights on various topics. When it’s all done, I have to regroup and reenergize. At the same time, being in large groups and engaging in crowd events will quickly drain energy from me (unless it’s a Foo Fighters concert – that’s one of the rare times I find a balance of energy!). I’ve learned to focus much of my time on smaller interactions. When I am in larger groups, I prepare for the experience then decompress at home as soon as I can!

Learning also brings me a lot of energy. I am truly a learning nerd, always looking for new topics and experiences that bring growth. Whether it’s discovering a new recipe, watching a video on nutrition, looking up steps to use a particular software program, reading an insightful book, or exploring a variety of subjects, I come out excited and encouraged about what I have learned.

On the other hand, an area that is known to drain energy in my world is struggling with change. While able to adapt to change in many scenarios, there are times when I am hesitant to move forward with something new. If faced with a situation that I do not have experience with or feel that there’s not a reason to change because the current circumstances are working fine, my stubborn Taurus nature may flare up and I may first dig my heels in the ground. When this happens, I become exhausted fighting to keep things the way that they are while knowing the change is beneficial to my life. This has occurred in personal, professional, family, and other areas. How have I handled this? In many cases, I take the time to pause and review the whole picture related to the change. From there, as a friend and coworker recently coined, I become comfortable with being uncomfortable. When I take this approach, it may not always be easy but at the same time I persevere and keep moving in the direction necessary to navigate through that change.

Coming to learn some of these contributors to gaining or losing energy, I’ve realized an important lesson. Being intentional to invest my time in the energy givers and being mindful when energy drainers are creeping into my life allows me to change course and point myself back to what energizes me. Where do you find you gain the most energy? What tries to take that energy away from you? Share in the comments!

Heidi Saucier

Looking back 14 years – part 3

Over the last few posts, I’ve been reflecting on the lessons learned over my 14-year career at the company I currently work at. I’m wrapping up that series today by sharing with you the last two that have made a difference and helped me continue down the path of growth as a leader and all-around as a person.

  1. Be willing to take risks
    • If you needed a spokesperson for being risk adverse, I’d probably be at the top of the list. Over the years, I’ve learned that risk is necessary for growth. Some of the biggest risks I have taken led to new doors and successes that I never would have known if I had avoided the risk. This included entering a doctoral program where statistics was not my forte. I was grateful for a professor that took the time and provided tools and videos to help us through analyzing quantitative data. This was a key factor in being able to successfully perform quantitative research as part of my dissertation. When I first became a manager at my company, I moved to an area that I was not as familiar with. Not only was I being stretched as a new leader and the responsibilities it entailed, but I was also being stretched to better understand the audience I was tasked with developing training for. I implemented tactics I had used on other training teams to learn about the audience and worked with stakeholders to uncover their learning needs. These are just a few examples, but ones where had I decided the risk was not worth it, I would not be where I am at in my career journey.
  2. Never stop learning
    • Those that know me shouldn’t be surprised that this is on the list. As a learning nerd, I am always looking for new knowledge. Whether it’s reading a book, watching a video, engaging in a conversation, or taking some sort of class, I crave the chance to learn more every day. There are many quotes out there that reference the importance of learning. One of my favorites is from Jack Nicholson, who said “The minute you’re not learning I believe you’re dead.” A bit dark, but he’s right. Learning should encompass every moment of our lives. In the last year, here are some things I’ve learned:
      • How to use SecureGPT
      • How to create scene changes in a video software we use for learning
      • My son is amazing at math – he most likely gets that from his dad!
      • Having mentors is important
      • Adversity is inevitable – it’s how you respond to it that determines what happens next

I hope that the lessons shared were insightful and helped you reflect on your own career journey. In the next post, I’ll share how I’ve identified goals for 2026 and new ways I’m holding myself accountable. I’d still like to hear the reflections from your journey. Share in the comments!

Heidi Saucier

Looking back 14 years – Part 2

In my last post, I began sharing lessons I’ve learned over the past 14 years of my career. Here are some more that I would like to share with you:

  1. Feedback is crucial to growth, even if it’s hard to hear
    • Some of the biggest growth spurts in my career came from feedback that was not always comfortable and that I was not always aware of. One aspect of the Johari Window shows us that we need people to reveal our blind spots that may be getting in the way of our goals. It can also help us deal with imposter syndrome, where others may see our true potential better than we can. Whether it was improvements to my professional presence, different approaches in my presentation skills, or learning not to be quick to react when someone disagrees with me, key leaders and peers shared that feedback and helped me see opportunities for improvement. It was not always great to hear the feedback at the time but looking back I see the differences those moments made in my career development.
  2. Mentoring is a gift
    • Mentoring is one of my passions. I enjoy meeting with people and learning about their goals and sharing ways that they can strive for success. Amid supporting others, I realized that I also needed mentors in my life. Some mentors happened naturally, while some were a result of my taking the risk and asking if they would be willing to mentor me. I have had a mix of short-term and long-term mentors that have shared insights on their career journeys and challenged me to set critical goals as I seek the next road on my career journey. By pushing me to think outside the box, and taking actions on personal and professional goals, I have set down a road that will take me to new experiences as well as new and cultivated skills.
  3. Be open to different perspectives
    • No one person sees things the exact same way. Additionally, people can indirectly close themselves off to new ideas when they feel change is not necessary. Part of that can include the adage “if it’s not broke, don’t fix it.” On one of the boards I served on, the majority wanted to consider a new way of appointing a role that serves as a liaison between the chapter and the national organization. I first advocated that the person continue to meet a list of requirements that had been the norm for several years. Key voices on the board challenged that, indicating that maybe it was time for us to consider additional criteria that would allow us to have a fresh voice on the board. After listening to their views and reviewing what was listed in the existing board documents, I realized that there was nothing holding us back to move in this direction and consider people that may not fit the current mold but would allow us to bring new perspectives and innovation to the role. Had I not taken a step back and considered the bigger picture, I may have dug my heels in and caused unnecessary dissention within the board. Being open to a new way of approaching a situation can often be the spark needed to increase motivation and commitment to an important goal within an organization or a group you are a part of.

In my next post, I’ll wrap up the lessons I’ve reflected on. In the meantime, I’d love to hear from you. Have you benefited from tough feedback? What about having or being a mentor? Have you gained new perspectives? Share in the comments!