Podcast Transcript: Power Bite - Holly Ransom

Holly Ransom
I love that you've asked that question, because it's one of the things I most admire about my grandmother. And I think if there's any trait I hope to emulate of hers, it's this. It didn't matter who she was talking to, the guy that was coming to pick the garbage bin up, whether she was talking to the librarian at the local library, anyone in between, the mayor of the town, you name it. Every time she spoke to someone, she had the ability to make them feel like they are so important, they matter so much, and the world is so lucky that they are doing what they're doing. And I always thought, what a gift to give people, you know, this ability to feel seen, to feel heard, to feel appreciated. And I just remember how important that was, particularly growing up, to have someone who those people who believe in you before you believe in yourself. That's my grandmother. And that's not just my grandmother for me. That's my grandmother for everyone she ever meets. And I just think that's such an incredible leadership trait to me. She is an embodiment of what I think leadership needs to look like.

Holly Ransom
My grandmother was someone who always embraced that sense of, well, yeah, actually, you're leading. You have a responsibility in every interaction you have with everyone you meet. Your energy, your curiosity, your attitude. That's an opportunity to shape the world for the better.

Jenelle McMaster
What an incredible human being. She is such a special attribute, and good for you for recognizing that at such an early age.

Holly Ransom
I often think there's an enormous importance in our earliest memories, one where my grandmother and I were out shopping in a supermarket, and this guy who was in front of us in the queue, who I would have been four or five at the time, this man looked like a goliath. He was yelling at the poor young girl on the checkout who had evidently given him the wrong change, and he was making a real song and dance about it. He was being quite aggressive, and before I even blinked, my five foot tall grandmother, Dorothy, had inserted herself between goliath and this will be the one on the checkout said, how dare you talk to that young woman like that. You apologize. And it was this moment, this man who had obviously never been told by anyone to kind of check his behavior. And then he sort of went right red in the cheeks and mumbled sorry and grabbed his things and ran out of the store. And my grandmother sort of proceeded like nothing unusual had happened? And went off we went. And then I just said, Grandma, that was so brave. And she said, honey if you walk past it, you tell the world it's okay.

Holly Ransom
Now I think about it, and I go. I reckon it took me two decades to work out what that meant, maybe longer in terms of actually understanding what my grandmother meant and what that phrase meant, what that idea meant. But the power of what my grandmother did there, she didn't say it, she did it. And I think that for me, was one of the earliest lessons in leadership. Right? It's about what you do, not what you say.

Jenelle McMaster
It's funny you said it took you a couple of decades to be able to narrate what you experienced. That intuitive leadership on her part. But there's so many words that have come into our lexicon now. Crucible moments, understanding, empathy, being an upstander leadership without authority that your grandmother just demonstrated as a manner of course without even thinking about it. The language came afterwards for not just you, but I think for the rest of us in the world, she just obviously embodied that so intuitively.

Holly Ransom
100% I think it's great that we're starting to see the shift in trying to change up the narrative of who we're role modeling as examples of leaders we're still not admiring and lionizing leaders of empathy, we're still not talking about a diverse set of archetypes for what leadership can look like. And I think it's really, really important because if we don't do that, we risk too many people looking at the terminology, the discussion, the conversation around leadership and going, oh, well, that's obviously not about me. I'm obviously not involved in that mix because I don't look like those leaders, I don't lead in that way. That's not my context. And as you and I both know Jenelle, like, particularly the problems that are facing the world right now. We need everyone to understand their role as a leader, and everyone has a role to play as a leader. Whether you're leading, for better or worse, you're leading every day. You know, any influence you've got in your immediate relationships, whether that's your household, your team, your community, you name it.