Celine Schillinger | Dare to Un-lead in a Turbulent World

In this episode of Let Go & Lead, accomplished change leader and founder and CEO of We Need Social Celine Schillinger talks with Maril about the relational leadership skills required in today's business world — and how much those differ from what we've been taught to value in leaders.

Schillinger, the author of Dare to Un-lead, sees eye-to-eye with Maril's people-first lens on change leadership. The two discuss the vulnerability and self-effacement required to create movements inside companies, the immense power of co-creating solutions with employees and how often, the best way to improve business outcomes is simply to prioritize building a community of people who care for each other.    

Learn about:

10:54 Why the typical change approach has no heart

14:18 How companies can co-create change

18:47 How "Un-leading" differs from traditional leadership

25:25 Why leaders need to evolve to "Un-lead"

36:28 Creating movements in a hybrid world

55:55 Takeaways from the episode

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A pioneering voice in Engagement Leadership, Celine has been recognized multiple times for her large-scale innovative engagement initiatives in the corporate world. Prior to her 17 years' experience in the pharma industry across Business Operations, Marketing and Industrial Quality, Celine worked with communications, defense and trading companies. Hanoi, Vietnam, Beijing, China and Boston, USA were once called home.

From Boston, Celine led a transformation movement at pharma giant Sanofi, impacting a change population of 10,000 people across Industrial Operations and Quality functions worldwide. Celine now works from France as an Engagement Leadership consultant, helping clients with new leadership strategies that mobilize internal or external stakeholders, enable corporate transformation and boost business value.  Celine's journey led her to founding We Need Social.

A TEDx speaker, Celine was made a Knight of the National Order of Merit by the French government for her workplace change efforts. Lessons from her journey in change are captured in Celine's first book, published in June 2022: Dare to Un-Lead: The Art of Relational Leadership in a Fragmented World. Celine and her husband Leo are parents to Gustave (17) and Violette (12). In her free time, Celine loves to row on the beautiful Saône River, nearby her home.

Her articles and ideas can be found in various well-respected media and podcasts.

Celine's keynotes and speeches span multiple change, organizational transformation and leadership topics.  She is featured extensively in major media articles.

Multiple outstanding book reviews to include this one: "This book SHOULD BE taught in business schools, b/c what she says is a complete flip of the typical #leadership theories we usually get in today's world of work"

ABOUT LET GO & LEAD

Let Go & Lead is a leadership community created by Maril MacDonald, founder and CEO of Gagen MacDonald. Maril brings together provocateurs, pioneers, thought leaders and those leading the conversation around culture, transformation and change. 

Over the course of the past 12 years, Let Go & Lead has existed in many forms, from video interviews to resource guides to its current iteration as a podcast. At its core, it remains a place where people can access a diversity of perspectives on interdisciplinary approaches to leadership. Maril is also working on a book incorporating these insights gathered over the past several years from global leaders and change makers.  

Maril has interviewed over 120 leaders — from business to academia and nonprofits to the arts — through the years. In each conversation, from personal anecdotes to ground-breaking scientific analysis, she has probed the lessons learned in leadership. From these conversations, the Let Go & Lead framework has emerged. It is both a personal and organizational resource that aims to serve the individual leader or leadership at scale. 

ABOUT GAGEN MACDONALD

At Gagen MacDonald, we are dedicated to helping organizations navigate the human struggle of change. We are a people-focused consulting firm and our passion is improving the employee experience — for everyone. For almost 25 years, we have been working with companies to create clarity from chaos by uniting employees across all levels around a single vision so they can achieve results and realize their future.

We have been a pioneer in bringing humanity to strategy execution, leading in areas such as organizational communication, culture, leadership, and employee engagement. Our Vision is to lift all humanity by transforming the companies that transform the world.

Full episodes also available on:  

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/let-go-lead-with-maril-macdonald/id1454869525  

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Gaf7JXOckZMtkpsMtnjAj?si=WZjZkvfLTX2T4eaeB1PO2A  

Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9sZXRnb2xlYWQubGlic3luLmNvbS9yc3M     

Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/let-go-lead  

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Gagen MacDonald is a strategy execution consulting firm that specializes in employee engagement, culture change and leadership development. Learn more at http://www.gagenmacdonald.com.