From Supporting Others to Supporting Yourself: How Women in HR Can get unstuck

As a senior HR leader, the weight of supporting an entire organization's workforce can leave you feeling stuck and burned out, caught between strategic demands and daily people challenges. These three simple yet powerful practices can help you reconnect and reclaim your professional spark.

Brag file

Do you have a brag file? A brag file is an ad-hoc record of all of the good feedback you receive as well as the things that you achieved over a period of time. I keep mine in a OneNote folder and any time I receive positive feedback from a client (via an email or a feedback survey), I copy and paste it there. You can also save links to files or projects you are particularly proud of, photos from events, social media posts that went viral or metrics that you exceeded.

As an HR leader, your brag file might include those company-wide initiatives you successfully rolled out, the difficult employee relations case you navigated, or the data showing reduced turnover after your mentorship program launched. Perhaps it's that email from the CEO thanking you for your strategic input during a difficult reorganization. When I have my bad days, I can pull up the brag file and remind myself that it is only temporary.

There are other ways a brag file can be useful. During year-end performance reviews, you often forget all that you have achieved and all of the informal, ad-hoc feedback you have received throughout the year. If you keep track, it makes it much easier to write your self-review and even advocate for a promotion! This is especially important for women in senior HR roles who often shoulder the emotional labor of supporting everyone else's career development while neglecting their own advancement. Your brag file becomes concrete evidence of your strategic value to the organization beyond the traditional "HR support" narrative.

Brag files are practically a mandatory tool when you are switching careers or applying for new roles. Bringing a concrete list of your achievements with you into the job search process is guaranteed to start you off on the right foot as you update your resume, optimize your LinkedIn profile and prepare for interviews.

Although bragging tends to have a negative connotation, interestingly, research shows that we get a dopamine hit when we share information about ourselves. The Cambridge dictionary defines bragging as “to speak too proudly about what you have done or what you own.” Underlying this definition is the word pride, which relates to feelings of self-respect and personal worth. In response to this negative connotation, I say, if we don’t own our accomplishments and shout our stories from the rooftops, who will do it for us?

If we don’t own our accomplishments and shout our stories from the rooftops, who will do it for us?

This is particularly relevant for women leaders who have often been socialized to downplay achievements and prioritize team recognition over personal accomplishment. As a senior HR leader, be confident to own your strategic contributions.

Joy Spotting

“Where are you finding your joy?” This is one of my favorite questions, especially for my clients who are stuck, at the end of their rope or unable to find a way forward. It may seem counterintuitive to ask someone how they are finding joy when all they can do is keep their head above water to get through the day. But this question invites a different perspective. Is there anything in my life right now that brings me joy? 99% of the time, there is. This can be even the smallest thing, such as:

·       A sunny day

·       A hot cup of coffee

·       Catching the train just before the doors closed

·       Going to bed on time

·       A discount at your favorite store 

The joy doesn’t have to be monumental. Too often, the happy moments we think about are the big-ticket items—an amazing trip, getting promoted, the birth of a child. But looking out for, recognizing and celebrating the small things can make us realize that maybe everything isn’t so bad or unbearable after all. This is a form of joy spotting. 

For HR leaders constantly navigating organizational challenges and carrying the emotional weight of the entire company culture, joy spotting becomes not just a personal practice but a professional necessity. It can help prevent the compassion fatigue that often comes with supporting others through their workplace challenges day after day.

Joy spotting has a big following. The idea was coined by Ingrid Fetell Lee in 2009 and culminated in her book, Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness as well as a Ted Talk that has been viewed almost 3 million times. The beauty of joy spotting is that it is free. It is personal. There is no right or wrong.  You can even download her handy guide here to help you spark some ideas to get started.

According to Lee, research shows that managers who exhibit more joy had teams complete their work with less effort and do so in a more coordinated way. She also cites research that shows that joy influences our working memory (the function that enables us to complete work and tasks), meaning we are 12% more productive in a state of joy. Imagine if you could be 12% more productive at work by making a small change to focus on joy! The idea is so simple. The more you practice spotting joy, the more it will impact your mindset and have a snowball effect, getting you unstuck and propelling you forward.

Gratitude Journal

Keeping a gratitude journal is another useful tool. Similar to joy spotting, gratitude journaling involves writing down three things at the end of every day that you are grateful for. Slightly different to joy spotting, keeping a gratitude journal asks you to be more intentional and reflect back on the things that really made a difference to you that day. It has its roots in positive psychology – the scientific study of happiness. Perhaps it was your husband making you breakfast or you child getting dressed by themselves in the morning. Or it could be a bigger realization, like “I am grateful for my partner,” or “I am grateful to have an understanding boss.”

Intentionally writing down three things each day makes us realize that there are many things to be grateful for (likely many more than three!). For a senior HR leader, your gratitude entries might include appreciation for your team's resilience during a challenging organizational change, recognition of your team member for staying late to help an employee, or acknowledging the executive who sponsored your latest HR initiative.

I currently use the 6-minute journal and love it! Similar to a brag file, the medium is not important. It can be a physical notebook, an electronic file, or even a voice file you record with your phone each evening. The important piece is the ritual, the act and the intention.

When you are feeling stuck, pull out your brag file, your joy spotting list or your gratitude journal. These three approaches can help you to focus on the positive, pinpoint what you have control over and summon your strength to get unstuck and move forward. 

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I work with female senior leaders in Human Resources who feel stuck to help them love their work or find work they love. I write about:

👂 Executive & career coaching

📄 Career development and career transition

🎯 Job search strategy

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