As the co-author of the book, “No Hard Feelings,” and senior organizational designer at IDEO, Mollie talks about over and under emoters, vulnerability as a leader, and how it is okay to talk about your feelings at work. Every few weeks as part of The Heartbeat, I ask one question to a founder, CEO, or business owner I respect about their biggest leadership lesson learned. This week, I interview Mollie West Duffy, the co-author of No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotions at Work and the Senior Organizational Designer at IDEO. Claire: Hi everyone, I’m Claire Lew and I’m the CEO of Know Your Team. I am thrilled today to have a really special guest. I have Mollie West Duffy who is the co-author of this incredible book that is called No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotions at Work, and I read it in one sitting. It’s that good. And not to mention beautifully illustrated by Liz Fosslien, her co-author. We’ll get into what the book is about, but I really wanted to have Mollie on The Heartbeat because this topic of emotions and leadership, I think are inextricable for better, for worse. So wanting to hear from Mollie herself, not only is she an author but she is an organizational designer at IDEO and has taught at Stanford, and written for publications like Fast Companies. So excited to have you on The Heartbeat today Mollie. Mollie: Thank you so much for having me. Glad to be here. Claire: Mollie, I know you’ve watched a few of these interviews. And the way that they go is I always start off by asking everyone the same question. Which is: What’s something you wish you would’ve learned earlier as a leader? Mollie: For me, I wish I would’ve learned how to be a little bit more vulnerable as a leader. I’m somebody who tends towards being an under emoter. We talk in the book about the people who are over emoters and under emoters. Under emoters tend to be a little more reserved, they think before they speak, which is a good thing, but also means that sometimes we can bury our feelings. Over emoters wear their emotions on their sleeves. They’re the people you go to if you want someone to get really excited with you. But they can also sometimes share emotions and then have regret about sharing those emotions, if they aren’t fully processed. So knowing this tendency, one of the ways to talk about that people can get their teams to trust them is to be a little bit more authentic and vulnerable. And that was something I had to learn as a leader to do. I’ve lead teams and especially with clients to do things like ask for help and to say when I’m overwhelmed. And to share some of those emotions that before I would just sort of p