When everything feels loud, how do leaders decide what truly matters?
In this episode of Success in Chaos, Dr. Kernesha Weatherly, Vice President of Imaging at Ochsner Health, joins Angela and Kandice to explore what it means to lead with clarity, humility, and calm in times of rapid change. From growing up and buildng her career in Alabama to guiding one of the nation’s most advanced imaging programs, Dr. Weatherly shares how travel shaped her worldview, why she believes in “connection before correction,” and how to tell the difference between what’s loud and what’s important.
“Find the connection before the correction.”
– Dr. Kernesha Weatherly
Listeners will learn how to ground teams in purpose, navigate uncertainty, and lead transformation without losing sight of what matters most.
Episode Chapter Guide:
04:41 Kernesha’s Journey in Healthcare
07:07 The Impact of Travel on Leadership
12:51 Navigating Chaos in Healthcare
15:51 Integrating AI in Healthcare Leadership
21:39 Empowering Teams Through Chaos
28:29 Recommended Reads for Leaders
Kernesh’a book recommendations:
- Executive Presence: The Missing Link Between Merit and Success by Sylvia Ann Hewlett
- The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
- Own the Room: Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence by Amy Jen Su and Muriel M. Wilkins
Full Transcript
AI-generated transcript. Accuracy may vary; please excuse any transcription errors.
Kernesha Weatherly, DHA
and the way that I have the conversation is, we talk about, is it a classic ball or is it glass ball?
Plastic balls, we can let drop. It will absolutely be loud. It will absolutely make a lot of noise, but you can eventually pick it back up. The glass things aren’t the things that you want to drop because there’s so much more trouble trying to navigate that. And so when you’re thinking about rapid change, it is, is it loud or is it important?
Angela Adams, RN
Welcome to Success in Chaos, a healthcare podcast where each episode is dedicated to unlocking success amid rapid change and uncertainty. I’m Angela Adams, the CEO at Inflo Health.
Kandice Garcia, RN
I’m Kandice Garcia, of Tungsten QI Partners and Quality Improvement Director for the American College of Radiology Learning Network.
Our guest today is Dr. Kernesha Weatherly, Vice President of Imaging at Osher Health in New Orleans. With a background that bridges clinical expertise and administrative leadership, she leads one of the nation’s most advanced imaging programs across a multi-state health system. Dr. Weatherly is known for using data-driven strategies to improve access, reduce costs, and enhance quality of care.
Her leadership has delivered millions in savings through strategic planning and operational innovation while expanding imaging services and patient access. She has been recognized with Osher Health’s Executive Leadership Award for Clinical Leader of the Year and was recently named to Modern Health Care’s 40 Under 40 Class of 2025. Dr. Weatherly’s work reflects a deep commitment to excellence, collaboration, and equity in healthcare delivery. Welcome, Kernesha. Thank you for joining us today.
Kernesha
Thank
you guys for having me, hi.
Angela
Hi, we have been so excited about this episode. ⁓ Kernesha is one of those people that when she walks into a room, all of the energy and all of the light comes to her. And it is phenomenal to watch and see. It’s been so fun to get to see you with your team and how much your team enjoys, respects, and loves your leadership style.
Kandice
Hey.
Angela
Thank you for being on and thank you for just being the person that you are today.
Kernesha
Absolutely, appreciate it. Thank you guys so much.
Kandice
Thank
Angela
We love to start this off with a fun little game. It’s called Two Truths and a Lie. So you’re gonna try to trick us and you’re gonna tell us your two truths and a lie. And then Candice and I are gonna try to guess.
Kernesha
Okay, let’s see here.
Okay, here we go. have, so these are my three things and you tell me which one. I’ve traveled to over 60 countries before I turned 40. ⁓ I single-handedly have a backyard garden that is enough to supply a full farmer’s market on the weekends. And I went to the state championship four years a row, every year in high school in Classics A in shop, put, disc, and java.
Kandice
Thanks.
Mm.
Angela
man, man,
Kandice
I mean,
all of us sound very plausible.
You know, you know, think our last podcast, I doubted the gardener and I’m to go the same thing. Like who I don’t know. Where do you guys find the time? I’m going to say gardening is not for one.
Angela
Yeah, I’m going say that too because I’ve been down to New Orleans several times. You’ve never offered me a tomato or anything from your garden. so I’m going to say that too.
Kandice
Yeah
Kernesha
Okay, well you both are wrong. I started out at the beginning of the year with a little garden and it has literally taken over. It has fully consumed me and I do it all myself. To your point, I do not know where I find the time. ⁓ The one that I am, that isn’t correct is I went to state in shot putting discus. I did not do javelin. So javelin is what I picked up my senior year in high school, but for four years, Class 6A, I went to state in shot putting discus.
Kandice
my gosh.
Kernesha
So they were almost the truth, but I had an extra piece of where just to add to it.
Angela
That was great.
Kandice
next.
Angela
Hey, those are the perfect lies. They’re
embedded in truth. So that is incredible. ⁓ So I have kind of a unique, I guess, history with Kernesha. We’ve known each other for a few years now and your story has always stuck with me, ⁓ impressed me. And can you just tell the audience like where you started?
how you got to where you are today. think it’s such an inspirational story. And I think there’s a lot of people on this podcast that will be inspired by it.
Kernesha
Okay, yeah, so I am originally from Alabama, born and raised. I knew from a very young age I always wanted to be in healthcare. I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted to do, but I knew I wanted to do something in healthcare. When I went to undergraduate, my grandmother was a nurse and growing up she was like, did not go into nursing. But I didn’t realize what that meant as a child. I would say realizing that she too born in the 1930s in Alabama had a different perspective of what a nurse looked like at that time.
And so for me, it was, I want to go into healthcare, but not nursing, got it. ⁓ I went to undergraduate at University of Alabama at Birmingham at UAB, and they had a really good allied health program to expose us to all the different things out there. And I was exposed to radiology very early in my career. And so when I got that exposure and kind of learned through that, I fell in love with it.
investigative report of it and just going from that aspect of it. So I finished my schooling, got a degree in nuclear medicine, I’ve learned a few other modalities and started working. And then just began to progress from there. I literally started out as a student. I’ve literally worked in every single role that you can think of in health care. I was a student tech, I was a volunteer, I was frontline staff, then I went into administration, was in education, regulatory.
as a manager, director, senior director. And the interesting thing about it is I did not go the track of fellowship. So most people that you see their executives or in leadership or administrators have some type of fellowship that they went or had a mentor or a sponsor or someone to help them navigate that. I did not have that. so it’s two different things. And I’m not saying one is better than the other, but you realize that you have a completely different pathway when you don’t have an executive sponsor to help you navigate.
Kandice
Mm-hmm.
Kernesha
the different aspects of it. And so I will say I learned a lot along that journey. It has got me to where I am now as the vice president of the service line. you know, it was challenging on some days, but I would not trade it. If I had the choice, I would absolutely do it all over again because the amount of knowledge and things that I have access to, I would not have gotten if I had a shorter route.
Angela
That’s amazing, incredible. ⁓ Candice, did you want to start with one of your questions?
Kandice
Thank
Kernesha
you
Kandice
I did. You know, we do know a little bit about Kernesha and her love of travel. I think we heard that in True Truth of the Lie, that 60 countries, you know, in your lifetime, over 60 countries, you know, we got to hear a couple really great stories about you traveling in Bosnia and Turkey. You know, you’re clearly an adventurer. You’re clearly somebody who can navigate difficult situations. How does that translate to your leadership?
Kernesha
16.
Angela
you
Kandice
Like, are you the same person when you’re traveling as when you’re running your department?
Kernesha
In a lot of ways, yes. You know, I’ll tell you, when I started down the road of travel, I did not realize how impactful it would be to my leadership in navigating those places. But, you know, one of the biggest thing when you sit down and you think about it, travel really teaches you that everyone is the same. You know, we’re just seen from a different lens. And the best way that I can describe it is when you’re out deep sea fishing, you you wear a certain type of lens in order to navigate that space, right? Which is a completely different lens that you would wear if you’re going skiing.
Kandice
⁓
Kernesha
which is a completely different lens that you would wear if you’re doing underwater cave spunking. And I’ve done them all and I have never worn that same type of glasses. But when you realize it, like, you know, context builds the behavior. You know, what looks like resistance is often typically a misunderstanding. Travel has truly allowed me, when you think about it, forces you to adapt without ego, right? You learn how to observe, you learn how to listen. You respect the traditions before trying to fix things. And when you equate that to leadership, when I enter into a room,
Kandice
Yeah.
Mm.
Kernesha
or space or into a situation, I don’t come in asking questions. I come in listening. I come in trying to understand what current state is
because I will say that travel truly reinforces the humility of it all. No matter how much you think you know, you’re always a guest in someone’s space. so with that, leadership works the same way. And I’ve been able to apply that over and over and over again, no matter how interesting the circumstance I’ve been in, in both leadership and in travel.
Angela
my
gosh, so many things to unpack right there. I love what looks like resistance is often misunderstanding. is, boom, truth bomb right there. And then I come in listening. ⁓ I feel like it takes leaders so many years to learn some of those things.
Kandice
Yes.
Kernesha
It really does because when you go to when you are taught, you’re taught to solve the problem. You’re taught to go in and address the situation and get it rectified as quickly as possible. And oftentimes people do that without a level of empathy as they’re navigating that. Right. Right. One of the things that travel has taught me is to find the connection before the correction. Like, OK.
Kandice
Yeah.
Kernesha
Let me understand what’s going on. Let me get to the foundation and let me hear through the noise of it all. And again, I didn’t realize that as I traveled, but then when you realize the different situations that you’re put in and how you navigate them differently, you realize it pretty quickly.
Kandice
Thank you.
Angela
You are just, I just connection before correction. That’s another truth bomb. ⁓ One thing, one story that you told me and you can completely shut me down on this Kernesha story, it, was the story where you accidentally ended up over a border that you maybe shouldn’t have been. And somebody tapped you. Can you tell that story?
Kandice
my God, I mean that one right there. I need that on a pillow.
Yeah.
Kernesha
I think I know where you’re going.
So a couple of friends and I, we were in India celebrating Holi for the first time. And I’m the only friend in the group who can drive a stick. so oftentimes cars are part of the US, our manual shifts. And so I am always the person that drives the group.
Kandice
you
Kernesha
And we ended up across the border and we were at a market enjoying the market, like having a good time. It was learning the places that would have you, the smells, the things of that nature. And we’d look up and we were just enjoying ourselves. And someone comes and taps us on the shoulder and said, hey, you’re not supposed to be here and you should leave. And of course, at first thought you were like, oh my goodness, what is going on? And the person spoke perfect English. And we were in area that English was not, was clearly not the first language.
Kandice
So that’s
No, I’m going to stay.
Kernesha
I was tapping my
friends like, hey, we gotta go. We’ve got to leave immediately. she said, what? What’s going on? I’ll explain later. Let’s get in the car. And I kid you not, I’ve been driving a stick shift for well over 20 years. And in that day, I could not get that car into reverse. It just took a minute for me to realize that we got there. And I explained it to her when we got in the car. And I will never forget that because one, we showed up in a space.
Angela
Yeah, thanks, though.
Kandice
Slick.
Kernesha
We were attempting to acclimate. Clearly we were not. And someone saw something in us to say, hey, this isn’t the space you should be in. And they helped guide us to get out. And we did that without making a big fuss about it. But I will tell you, it’s one of those things. And she and I, we still talk to this day. And she kind of reminds do you remember when you had me across the border? Yeah. I did. That’s what we did. And it’s like, well, would you go again? That’s not the point. But yes. Yes. Yes.
Kandice
Yeah, I would. Yes, yes I would.
Kernesha
And we have had more
instances because you don’t intentionally end up there. You just kind of look up, ⁓ OK, how do we pivot from here?
Angela
Well, you know you’re on the perfect podcast then. I mean, this is a success in chaos podcast. So if we translate that story and your kind of experiential nature, ⁓ I’ve got a good thought here on how do you handle the challenges and the transformation in the healthcare system? It’s like, you need.
balance, cost, quality, compassion, all at once, leading transformation, you’ve got constant chaos hitting the healthcare system. How do you stay grounded in all of that when it just constantly feels like turmoil?
Kernesha
Yeah, so oftentimes, you when you’re a leader, you get hit with something in your there’s this analogy like you’re building the plane while it’s flying, right? And that happens so often and you don’t realize it when you’re going through it. But the biggest thing that’s worked for me is understanding that clarity isn’t about knowing everything. It’s about making sure that the team knows that what matters in that moment. Oftentimes when you get hit with different things and people end up spiraling in worst case scenario and
Angela
Yes.
Kandice
Mm-hmm.
Kernesha
A lot of times that is their nervous system trying to protect them. Like, you know, it’s them trying
to help them out with focus. And my job for them is to hear through the noise and to allow them to give me the information and however they can get it out. But I need to be able to hear through the noise and focus and start building clarity around the facts. You kind of mentioned earlier with me, data is extremely important.
Kandice
Thanks for listening.
Kernesha
And so with that, it is what is the facts versus what is the noise? And a lot of times I have the conversations with people to the fact of, is it important or is it loud? And a lot of times we put importance on things that are just loud and the reality is that it can be loud, but we have to be able to hear beyond that. And that’s difficult. is not, that’s something that I started doing from day one, right? But it’s, it is,
Kandice
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Kernesha
and the way that I have the conversation is, we talk about, is it a classic ball or is it glass ball?
Plastic balls, we can let drop. It will absolutely be loud. It will absolutely make a lot of noise, but you can eventually pick it back up. The glass things aren’t the things that you want to drop because there’s so much more trouble trying to navigate that. And so when you’re thinking about rapid change, it is, is it loud or is it important?
And how do you figure out and go from there? And typically when I have that conversation with them and you stop the person to allow them, it gives them a moment to recalibrate, to think through, okay, wait, this is either noise or it’s important. And based on their response,
that we can build on that.
Angela
love that. I’ve heard it
Kandice
I love it.
Angela
said like the other way where it’s like it’s one way door or is this a two way door like the two way you walk through but then you could come back through and it’s like the depending on the decision the one way door it’s like once you go through it’s locked you can’t come back through so it’s like that glass glass ball versus plastic ball but yeah man that that’s incredible.
Kernesha
I said, no.
Kandice
Yeah, you know, I’m just thinking about this in the context of where we are right now in healthcare. And we try to, you know, we try to discuss this with our leaders on each of our podcasts, but you know, we’re going into the age of technology where AI is no longer an option. Like it now.
You know, we have to integrate these things. How are you taking your skills and leading your team through this level of uncertainty? Because I mean, it’s a world we actually don’t even know where we’re going. ⁓ How are you using these principles to guide you through this?
Kernesha
You know, it’s interesting. My sector is radiology and AI has been the conversation for probably the last five to 10 years, right? When AI first came out and people were talking about it, there were…
Kandice
Yeah.
Kernesha
several ideas and conversations around is it going to take away jobs? What does that look like? Will you need radiologists and things like that? So I feel like I have a leg up because AI isn’t something that we just started talking about in 25 or in 24, right? This is something that we’ve been navigating for the longest. And what I will say is that we know this because people are integrating AI in a number of ways and it can help process and it can provide you with data, but it can’t help you navigate doubt. It can’t help you navigate fear or burnout. It can help
Kandice
Yeah.
Kernesha
you with navigating the situations that make you more efficient, but you’ve got to truly still be able to lead it and navigate people through that those pieces of it. And so I would say for us, the biggest piece or for me, it has been understanding what can this product do? What can’t it do? And what where do you where you need it to help reach the gap?
Kandice
I love that perspective so much. think it’s something that leaders or even just anybody in healthcare forget is that technology is there to support your process. It’s not there to fix your process. It’s not there to replace your process and really understanding what technology can do, organization, ⁓ communication, spreading information.
accounting, managing, like tallying information with data collection. But yeah, it can’t be the navigator. can’t, you know, interact with those patients in a caring way. It cannot do the nuanced art of medicine and understanding what it can do as a leader, I think is the biggest skill that we can have moving forward.
Kernesha
Yeah, and I think the biggest piece of that is
identifying where are you trying to solve? Again, I cannot tell you the number of times I get requests from people who say we have this new platform, this new software that will just make your life amazing. And I’m like, okay, well, this currently isn’t something that I’m to solve, but thank you for your time, right? And so it is identify where you need something to be solved or you need it to be more efficient and then identify who can support you with that.
Kandice
Mm-hmm.
Kernesha
And that’s how we’ve approached integration with AI, as opposed to them coming and telling us the problems that we never articulated. We know what our problems are. We know what our gaps are. And then we’ll say, hey, let’s identify who we can partner with to help solve these problems.
Angela
I love that because you wouldn’t believe, I mean, you make it sound so simple right there, but you would not believe the amount of organizations that Candace and I walk into that, you know, they don’t really know what their top priorities or what their problems are to solve. And so every little shiny toy that comes by their window, they’re like, Ooh, ooh, what is that? And so I, whenever I’m speaking at these CEO, like advisory groups,
Kandice
Yeah.
Kernesha
Yeah.
Angela
I always say that exact point, Kernesha, it’s like, hey guys, why don’t you establish what you feel like your core top five are, then go out there and look for solutions to help you guys solve this without having to throw humans at it? Because the world of healthcare, where we just threw humans or more manpower at a problem, those days are kind of over. And so you have to integrate, you have to adopt technologies. The other thing, I was at health, ⁓
Was it last week? Gosh, this time has
Kandice
You
Angela
Vegas and every single booth I walked by, Kernesha was like, we do AI, we do AI. do. like, can we please talk about the problem that you’re solving and that you’re using a tool that absolutely has AI components to it. But like being AI is not anything to brag about. It’s like, what problem are you solving and what efficiencies or.
Kandice
Thank
Angela
Are you giving back the clinician time? Are you helping
the health of a patient? Like what are you doing with AI, not just advertising that we are AI.
Kernesha
also helps when you know what you’re trying to solve, helps you ask better questions. So to your point, if people are coming to you and telling you that we can do these things and showing it off, then you’re right. It does look like a shiny new toy and it does all the amazing things. But if I tell you what I’m looking for or what I need, and then can you solve these problems, if they say no, then thank you for your time.
Kandice
Yeah, I think project identification, framing problems, that’s actually the hardest part of problem solving is actually just identifying and defining a problem in a way that you can actually solve it. ⁓ That is most of the work we end up doing in quality improvement is once you define it and you frame it and you scope it, it’s like, okay, we’ll just walk through the steps. But that’s the real hard work right there.
Kernesha
I’ll tell you, that’s one of the things that when I’m mentoring people or when I’m talking to them with my team, one of the biggest things that I try to help them on, because you’re right, problem solving is something that people struggle with a lot. And I didn’t realize it until you get into different situations and I’m like, guys, what is the problem? What are we trying to solve here? No one could articulate it. And that’s with me helping them to like hear through the noise of, okay, this person is upset or they’re yelling or you’re getting a whole bunch of running around in circles, but go through the noise, remove the emotion. And what is the answer there?
Kandice
No.
Kernesha
And it’s helped my team get to that point. And it’s been so beautiful to see the evolution of them. Because a few of them will come back and say, hey, I removed all emotion, and this is what I got out of the conversation. they’re like, yes, great. We’re moving where we’re supposed to be.
Kandice
She did it!
Angela
That’s huge. That’s huge. Tell us something that you feel like has been a success with your team that you had to lead through a lot of chaos and change to get through.
Kandice
What?
Kernesha
Where do we want to start? Yes, every day, every week, every month, there is something. Now it’s on different levels, right? Some may be level one, some may be level 10, but there is always something that pops up along the way. Right? And so I feel like the biggest things with my team is helping them understand into being, what I like to tell them is that people…
Kandice
It’s like every day.
Angela
I know, right? ⁓
Kernesha
reflect off of how you respond to the situation. And so I’m not in every single thing that pops up. My teammates say, hey, this is a situation and I addressed it. And one of the things that we work through is how do you stay grounded as you’re navigating that? And so with that, when things pop up, it is, OK, let’s make sure that we’re all clear on what the problem is and let’s make sure we’re all clear on what the end result we want it to be.
What I’ve noticed is that people don’t always know what the end result is. They can just always tell you all the bad things that’s going on right now in this time. And then with that, is, OK, let’s write it all down and let’s go through it eventually. Maybe not today, but let’s go through the impacts of everything that someone has said with that. But I will tell you, the biggest thing that has helped me and my team is taking a moment and just pulling back, which when you’re in the midst of chaos is the last thing you want to do because you want to hurry up and be done with it. You want to hurry up and move past it.
Kandice
Mm.
And then.
Kernesha
But I have also made mistakes in my career where I was put in situations that was absolutely chaotic and I was trying to do everything that I could to stop it. And I only made it worse in doing that. So now I’m like, okay, hold on. I do the Fred Flintstone. My feet are scrubbing on the ground. And I’m like, okay, let’s see where we are. Let’s make sure that we’re all clear on that. And let’s make sure the implications are as we’re moving through this. And I can tell you that has been the biggest thing that we’ve been able to navigate stuff just because
As bad as it sounds, we slow down. I am my calmest in the midst of chaos. The more chaotic the situation is, I drop all the way down. Somebody has got to be.
Kandice
Yeah.
Yeah.
Angela
I
actually love that because even in like conflict resolution or if you, you know, go back to your nursing days, I remember there were moments in time where like everybody in the room was matching the energy of the chaos and like that is not a good mode to be in to problem solve. Like somebody needs to actually balance the energy versus like rising to the energy. And there’s people in my own life that it’s like, I’m up here, they’re up here.
Kandice
Yeah.
Angela
They’re up here, they’re up here. And so as a leader, you have to know when to drop your energy to somebody where they are in their very chaotic moment, or when to be the energy in the room when they’re down here. And I think as a leader, it like takes so much practice for you to know like, who does my team need me to be today? And where does my energy need to shift to make sure that we’re in solving and growth mode?
Kernesha
Bye.
Angela
versus just constantly reacting to the chaos.
Kernesha
I would also say adding to that is to not take it personal because oftentimes when are in the midst of their chaotic, they may become a little extra snippy, right? Have a little extra spice to them. And it’s not personally directed to you. And so having to not do that because I did not always not take things as personal, right? Because there were absolutely times in my career where I felt like that is a personal attack on me and my character as a person. And had absolutely nothing to do with me.
Kandice
I
Angela
Hmm.
Kandice
Yeah.
Kernesha
Right? And that’s a part of it, just staying calm and say, okay, let’s hear through it,
let’s talk through it. And you don’t, you can’t, and it’s just going through all of that, but it works if to your point, someone has got to be calm in the situation. And even with that, I’ve noticed that that’s a level of energy that people don’t pay, they pay attention to without being able to truly say that like what’s going on.
Kandice
Mm-hmm. I think that’s that multi- ⁓ go ahead. There you go. There you go.
Angela
Yeah. Also, creation. go ahead. So you, for me, how does this look that she does in
meetings? You know, like the look that like you would get from your mom, like in church, you have those looks and it’s like, everybody in the room is like, we are in listening mode. Here’s what’s going to happen.
Kernesha
Fighting!
Kandice
Hahaha!
Kernesha
Because
someone called me out on that again today. were like we were in this meeting and I knew exactly how you felt. I knew where we needed to adjust the meeting based on how you It’s not fair.
Angela
No,
but I think it’s a great skill. I think it’s a great skill as a leader for people to know, hey, Kernesha is gonna come beside me and she’s gonna lead and she’s gonna, you know, she’s gonna be what I need. But like when something needs to get done and this is a serious thing, like you can bring the room into your reality and zone. And that also is an amazing command that you can have that kind of presence. Like you have to have it, you have to have both things. You can’t just be like everybody’s friend every day, right?
Kandice
Mm hmm.
Angela
They gotta know like, hey, this means business. Like we deal inpatient lives. ⁓ That is the business that we are in. So I think it’s a huge skill that ⁓ you have.
Kernesha
Thank you. But I’ll tell you, one of the things that I was intentional about on my journey, staying with the idea as far as leadership and chaos, is not leading through control. It was making sure that realizing that everybody here is able-bodied humans that are here to serve a goal. And so it is, OK, guys, let’s talk through it. Let’s be transparent about the good and the bad in the situation. And I’m depending on you.
Kandice
Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Kernesha
to be an adult in this situation and let’s get this across the finish line. You don’t need me to manage you or to control you. We don’t need any of that because we all know what to be, what needs to be done. It’s just a matter of, I’m going to handle this section, you handle that section, and we’ll come back and meet up in a little bit to talk through where we are with that and pick up the pieces.
Kandice
Yeah, well that’s true collaboration through like empowerment of your staff, seeing them for who they are and their skills, and then enabling them to feel trusted, to actually be trusted.
to not just lead, but make mistakes because that’s really what you’re doing is you’re inviting them to try to make mistakes, to succeed. ⁓ I think that is the style of leadership that we’re seeing as the most successful in these environments is that it’s a true partnership, it’s a true collaboration, but it’s also true leadership to Angela’s point is like, there is a point to the arrow and it’s me and I will set the tone and I will like.
create the space and I will hold space for you, for you to step into your power and then together collectively I will push us into the future. It’s just so beautiful to watch.
Angela
Incredible. Well, this time always goes so incredibly quickly. ⁓ so we, we could talk.
Kandice
So
Kernesha
Are we at time already? You guys are so long-winded.
Kandice
I know.
Kernesha
I didn’t realize we’d be so much.
Angela
We could talk for hours, honestly, but we always like to close with like, hey, what are you reading? What’s a book or a resource that you feel like has been impactful for you? There’s other leaders, executives, business owners, entrepreneurs on this podcast listening group. We always like to leave them with something from ⁓ our guests. What are your thoughts on that? Anything that you would direct the audience towards?
Kernesha
So it’s funny you asked that and I’m going to answer it in two different ways. And so every time I start a new position at work or in any job that I’m in, I always go back and I read this book called Executive Presidents. And it just reminds me of where I am, what I am doing and what does that look like. It’s a good recalibration.
Kandice
And. and then.
Kernesha
I would tell you from a leadership perspective, and you guys have kind of talked about my travels, so I am really, I’ve gotten really good at turning my brain off from the current situation because my brain itself also needs a moment to recalibrate. You think about when you have a lot of things that you’re navigating and you’re being inundated back to back to back to back to back. If you don’t give your brain an opportunity to redo that,
you struggle through that. I remember when I was going through my dissertation component in my PhD.
I renovated my whole house during that time. Maybe not renovated, but it allowed me to turn my brain off. Like once I finished one chapter and while I was waiting to get back at it, it’s with that, then I will go just pull up the whole living room and do the
Angela
I love you.
Kandice
Girl.
Kernesha
whole kitchen. I don’t recommend that. the other book that I would say that has been really impactful for me, I read it earlier this year and I’ll probably be reading it again because I’ll read books annually sometimes.
Angela
Thank
Kandice
You
Kernesha
It’s the Midnight Library. I think it was a New York Times bestseller. And it is completely different from what you would expect. It had an absolutely amazing ending, but it allows you to see a different perspective of just navigating life and the impact that you have on life and what that looks like through that. And so I have my workbooks that I would read to just prepare me for it, but then I also have what I would call the ancillary support that helps you become a better person overall.
Angela
Yeah, right.
Kandice
⁓
Angela
I love
that. Yeah, that was really good. And it gives you all of these different kind of like, what if scenarios.
Kandice
My tail. Mm-mm.
Kernesha
It just gives you a perspective, right?
Angela
It’s, yeah, it’s an interesting read. We did it in my book club. But executive presence, I don’t think I’ve ever read that. So I will definitely add that to
list. Thank you.
Kandice
This was… in the room. Okay.
Kernesha
Absolutely. I say executive and then on the room. Those are my two that I read every time I had
Angela
You
Kernesha
to
change. Yeah.
Angela
definitely have got that one down.
Kandice
Hahaha.
Kernesha
Those were my favorite
that ⁓ every job and every new person, every mentor mentee that I have, and they asked, you know, what book can I read to prepare? Those are the two that I
Kandice
Okay. Well, this has been such an amazing discussion. Thank you so much for joining us, Kernesha. We could talk for hours. ⁓ So thank you so much. And thank you, audience, for joining us in success and chaos. Please be sure to like, follow, and share today’s episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. And a special thanks to the Inflow Health team for their production support.
