Ruth Penfold (00:02.124)
And then I say, welcome back to Women Who Lead. And I it is a very warm welcome back because it's been a minute. But I've been cooking up something special and I think you're gonna love it because the season that we're embarking on with Morgan, thank you for being here, Morgan. is our CEO season. Right, because there are phenomenal women leading.
Morgan Fowles (00:20.984)
Thank you for having me.
Ruth Penfold (00:29.794)
as CEO of organizations, and Morgan is absolutely one of them. Morgan, I'm so happy to have you here. Thank you for saying yes.
Morgan Fowles (00:40.45)
Thank you for having me.
Ruth Penfold (00:42.498)
Thank you. And that's because Morgan has spent over a decade scaling creative and fashion businesses. And she's also just stepped out of her last CEO role with Tala. And I can't wait to hear all about all of that. But I want to dive right in with you. So I want to start kind of in the middle and then we'll hear more about your work and the kinds of, you know, kind of how you got into your
CEO role too, because that's super important. But first things first, I just want to hear from you, what does it mean to be in bloom, in work and in life?
Morgan Fowles (01:23.854)
So for me, I I love what I do. I love my work. And so being in bloom for me incorporates my work. And it's also really being in balance across my work, the things that refresh me, that bring creativity, my personal life, my fitness practice. Being in bloom is really when I have good synchronization across all of it.
Ruth Penfold (01:48.414)
Mm, I love that. I love that. And I kind of very much live in a similar way where it's it's kind of integrated, right? Everything kind of comes in together, but with the with the understanding that different seasons call for different things, right?
Morgan Fowles (01:55.17)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (02:02.443)
Yes. Certainly. Yeah, I mean and even different seasons within roles, right? I mean, even professionally you have seasons. There'll be times when you like have to put your foot on the gas very, very aggressively and it can be harder to carve out balance. And there'll be times when the system comes screaming back for balance because you haven't been achieving it. And then there'll be times when you're pretty good at
at at balancing it all together, right? So yes, there's seasons within their roles, there's seasons between roles. Absolutely.
Ruth Penfold (02:33.909)
Mm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that, that I think, even understanding that we're operating in seasons is like an epiphany for a lot of us, right? That we don't always need the same things, the same level of commitment in different areas in specific seasons. And I think it can be incredibly lim liberating for women when we realise that.
Morgan Fowles (02:57.619)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think like you really you have to create space to ask the questions, right? You have to create space to say, where am I right now? What is it that I really need to show up as the best version of myself? And as I say, sometimes, and I have definitely had times in my career where the answer was put my head down, grind through, and do the work. And then I have been other times when the body says no, right? Where where the system is saying, okay, you really need to take a break for a minute. And and
Ruth Penfold (03:02.901)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (03:16.245)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (03:20.247)
Ha
Morgan Fowles (03:26.721)
And that's not a break for the break's sake, right? It's because you will show up back to the work in a better place if you have had space for reflection, if you've had space for strategy, if you're s if you've slept, if you've eaten, if you've trained in the gym, all the things that you need to show up is the best version of yourself. And so I think
At any time, you just have to make sure that like you have enough moments of reflection where you're saying, right, where what how is what is the best version of me to show up this week? What is the best version of me to show up today? What is it that I really need to be tending to? And it's different on different days and different times.
Ruth Penfold (03:54.859)
Ruth Penfold (04:01.867)
Yeah, I love that so much. And the moment that I started to really live in in alignment with my own cyclicality, everything shifted. you know, my cyclicality from a big season, big theme, like am I in a summer, am I in a winter? But even just throughout the course of my month, right? Like, where am I right now and what do I need, really? And and and I think the focus on that area.
Morgan Fowles (04:12.012)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (04:25.441)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Ruth Penfold (04:32.009)
really help me to really feel it in the bigger picture way, right? So like being able to go, well, every month I am actually completely different at at different times, to then be able to say, wow, how does that now extend across the landscape of my life? You know, and and what season am I in right now?
Morgan Fowles (04:46.721)
Yeah.
Yeah, and it's really about attunement at the end of the day, right? It's really about checking in. And and and it happens this weeks, seasons, big picture. It also happens day to day. I mean, sometimes I can be on my laptop at 11 p.m. and I need to say to myself, actually, what do you really need to do right now? Do you need to keep grinding out this spreadsheet or do you need to go to bed? Right? We really have to tune in with yourself because sometimes when you're pushing really hard, there's so much momentum that's pulling you forward. And one of the things that I've had to learn about myself is that.
Ruth Penfold (04:51.607)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (05:08.981)
Right.
Ruth Penfold (05:14.998)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (05:19.279)
That you know, I never thought that I got burnout because I thought of burnout as something, it's like you can't get out of bed. You're just done, right? Like you, you, you quit your job and you go on holiday for two months or whatever. That's never been me. None of those things have ever happened to me in the course of my life. So I didn't know that I was capable of burnout. Actually, for me, because I am so growth driven, because I'm so performance driven, burnout for me looks like speeding up.
Ruth Penfold (05:28.237)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (05:47.052)
It's one of the first signs that I'm achieving burnout. So when I have a hundred things on my plate and I decide that I need to take on more, that's when the flag that goes up that, this is you're this is this is actually burnout approaching now. And so it manifests even as I say, 11 p.m. I'll be on a spreadsheet. There's one more thing to do, one more email to send. Just keep going, just keep going. And then I actually have to take a minute and say, wait a minute, where are you really right now? Like, do you really need to send one more email or do you just need to go to bed?
Ruth Penfold (06:17.723)
my gosh, thank you for saying this because I have been banging on about this for ages. The fact that most women I see live from a state of burnout for great big chat. Like my 20s, I was operating in burnout for like a decade, a whole decade, right? It wasn't even, right? And like we just keep and and that woman who is
Morgan Fowles (06:30.125)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (06:33.604)
Mm.
Mm-hmm. Ditto, yes. Yes.
Ruth Penfold (06:46.189)
Actually really deeply burnt out. We'll be the woman that will never forget somebody's birthday, has cooked something for the thing that sh do you know what mean? And and then d d double delivered on the projects at work and shown up early and been there late. I honestly think those are the pe those are the biggest red flags, I think, for loads of us.
Morgan Fowles (06:55.617)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (07:08.191)
Yeah. Yeah. It's like they say, if you want something done, ask a busy person, right? And and fair enough, busy people are very good at organizing their time. That doesn't mean they're not pushing too hard. And so as I say, it was just, it was a really interesting learning for me. Like burnout didn't look how I thought burnout looked. And so I didn't recognize it in myself.
Ruth Penfold (07:12.311)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (07:19.041)
Right.
Ruth Penfold (07:25.313)
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And there is a really big link between the the overachiever, the overperformer, and the the not quite enough, right? You know, like the not not enough is almost the biggest fuel to that fire. And it's something that you've spoken about quite a bit, right? like that whether I'm doing enough, whether
Morgan Fowles (07:40.105)
Mm,
Morgan Fowles (07:50.026)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (07:53.452)
You know, and and so I I want to hear from you about that. And from that not enough, what gave you the, where did you find the audacity to become a CEO? Like, I want to hear about the audacity. so st take us through the enough to the like, heck yes, I'm this.
Morgan Fowles (07:57.142)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (08:05.29)
Yeah. my gosh.
Morgan Fowles (08:13.486)
Yeah. Well, actually, you know, it's a terrific question. And I'm so passionate about this topic, generally speaking, but I they sort of sit in different parts of my brain. So, so on the one hand, and I think this is true for a lot of CEOs and founders, I'm not unique in this regard. I love growth. I love building. I love pushing myself. I am most comfortable when I am a little bit uncomfortable, right? But what comes along with that is one, yes, as you say, this sort of subtle little voice that says, it's not enough yet.
And therefore, I'm not enough yet, right? And so, so there's this kind of quiet deterioration of self-esteem that you allow to exist in the background, but you just sort of live with because you're so inspired by the growth. And I think that is what has always pushed me to take on roles, to become a CEO. But any new role that I took on in the course of my career was passion for the project. I was so interested in building, I was so interested in scaling, I was so excited about what I could learn and what I could offer.
That I quieted that voice, but that voice was still there, right? And the other thing that happens when you build a lot, you push yourself to your limits all the time. And when that kind of work excites you, is you fail somewhat by definition, because you're doing things you've never done before. And you know, I have the privilege of having a wonderful network of friends and people I work with who are other founders and other CEOs, and to a person, especially the ones that I respect the most.
Have experienced enormous failures. And I've sat ringside while they've gone through it, really deeply painful experiences. So if you're gonna be a growth person, if you're gonna be a builder, you have to get comfortable with failure. It's part of the process. And you also have to figure out how to deal with it in an integrated way. That doesn't mean that you're sitting around saying, I'm not enough, I need more all the time.
And the answer to that is really a complicated soup around like one, making sure you're rested, making sure you have an incredible support network, making sure you're feeding yourself, that you're training, that you're strong for the fight. It's also about figuring out how to build a sense of self-esteem. So the work isn't motivated by that little voice that says, I'm not enough, I need to keep going.
Morgan Fowles (10:23.34)
And there's a whole school of thought around that that I've become obsessed with. because self-esteem is one of these things that it sounds easy, right? Like we're we're told we have to love ourselves. We're told love yourself first. That's the most important thing, and so on and so on. But I've never been somebody that walks around all day just like thinking I'm amazing. Like it doesn't come naturally to me. I don't like walk down the street thinking like you're so great. Like that's just not that's not my energy.
And so intellectually I knew that self-esteem was an important thing, but I was like, I don't know, that's just not how I roll. Like my energy is you're not enough yet, you know? But then I had a great conversation with somebody not that long ago where they helped me think about self-esteem in a really different way.
And the way that they put it to me was rather than willing it into being, just saying, I will like myself, I will think I'm enough, because we all know willpower is a finite resource and we're trying to use it for all sorts of things during the day. The way instead to think about it is to really in the course of the day, in the course of take a couple weeks and just sit in reflection around the moments when you feel good, you with you, when you're proud of how you showed up.
When you're proud of how you handled an interaction, when you're proud of how you invested your time, when you're proud of the work, not because you are doing it for someone else, but because you're proud of the way you did it, just you for you. And if you reflect on those moments over a couple of weeks, and then you think about how to stack them, like who were you in those moments? What were you doing? What made you feel good? And you build your life with those kinds of moments stacked.
It's just maths. At the end of the day, you're gonna scale your self-esteem because you're filling your day with the moments that feel good in integrity with your values. And anything we can turn into a math problem, I can get my head around. I was like, okay, that that I can get. So yes, yes. And
Ruth Penfold (11:59.638)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (12:07.231)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (12:11.199)
Yes. Yes. Yes. It compounds. I love it. I love it. But you're right. It is a process, not an event. And it it has to become this daily practice of like constantly seeing yourself, right? Recognizing the truth of who you are versus the kind of misunderstandings that we made. You know, like that somehow, I mean, gosh, in my case, Morgan, I was
Morgan Fowles (12:19.948)
Right. It's yeah.
Morgan Fowles (12:27.693)
Right.
Morgan Fowles (12:35.042)
Yes.
Ruth Penfold (12:39.021)
definitely stupid, not beautiful, not didn't bring any value to anything. Like at my lowest, there was zero self-esteem here, right? Like nothing. And so and I think so many of us, and I think some of that may be down to our own experiences, but I do think there's also something that gets, you know, layered onto us as women in the current context, where it's like, it's almost like a good, you know, like good girls are
Morgan Fowles (12:49.238)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (13:08.193)
humble and are slightly i i that kind of subserviency that almost gets taught into us. And I don't I don't know. I don't know if any if you felt any of that coming through in your own journey there, but anything else you want to share on self-esteem in particular, I know that our listeners will find valuable.
Morgan Fowles (13:09.174)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (13:16.663)
Mm-hmm.
Morgan Fowles (13:28.73)
Mm. Well, I think I think that it is certainly a humility is valuable.
Ruth Penfold (13:34.613)
Hmm.
Morgan Fowles (13:34.739)
And and certainly some of the people that I admire most have humility. But I think there's a difference between having humility and having low self-esteem. And as I say, I think a big part of low self-esteem is sort of dealing with it, is really knowing yourself, knowing what your values are, and then stacking moments in the day when you're living in accordance with your values. Because then no matter what the outcome, you know you showed up as the best version.
Of yourself. But I think the other thing that's really important again is coming back to this concept of failure. Because if you are somebody who is driven to build, if you are somebody who's driven to lead, who wants to push yourself outside of your comfort zone, by definition, you're going to encounter failure. And
A lot of us want to avoid failure. It's deeply uncomfortable. I mean, first of all, we're worried it's embarrassing. It's also deeply uncomfortable in the moment. And there's no getting around that. It just is. And you have to sit with that discomfort. But at the same time, failure is really where growth comes from.
Ruth Penfold (14:30.349)
Mm-hmm.
Ruth Penfold (14:42.925)
Mm, yes.
Morgan Fowles (14:43.788)
Because not only do we pause in our failures to reflect on what we've learned in a way that we never do with our successes, because we just kind of keep going and keep pushing through and we're excited. What's the next thing? Let's replicate, right? With failures, we have to take a minute and we're just saying, wait a minute, what happened here? And really sit in it. So we learn so much more from them.
And also the thing about failure is that you're pushing up against your limits, right? That's really where growth is coming from. And as to say, I've never encountered another founder, CEO, anyone I respected who hadn't who hasn't encountered really huge failures. Even if we look at public figures, the Elon Musk, the Steve Jobs, and so on, their failures have been incredibly incredibly public. But in some ways, they also build it into the system. Because the thing about failure.
Ruth Penfold (15:31.895)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (15:34.119)
Is not only is it pushing your limits and learning where your limits are, but you also get the confidence and this the self-esteem that comes from watching yourself recover. So the strength isn't necessarily in failing over and over, it's the recovery from the failure. And that's why actually the more times you fail, the better off you are. Because
Ruth Penfold (15:46.205)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (15:52.599)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (15:56.864)
my gosh, yes.
Morgan Fowles (15:57.973)
If you fail once, you probably didn't learn the lesson. But if you fail over and over and every time you watch yourself climb back up, then suddenly you have the courage to take on so much more because you think, do you know what? No matter what happens, I'm gonna get on my feet again. I've seen it happen in the past. I know that I can. And that's the power, that's the power of failure. And so it's interesting because yeah, it's uncomfortable. We hate it when it happens. No question, you can't get around that. It's gonna hurt. You're gonna hate it.
Ruth Penfold (16:17.324)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (16:25.003)
You're gonna hate it, yeah.
Morgan Fowles (16:27.33)
But there is so much to learn on the other side of it. And and one of the things that there are reasons I become so obsessed with this concept of recovery is it applies across multiple disciplines. So as I say, I work out a lot, I take my fitness, it's a big part of my life.
One of the things, one of the main ways you build muscle is the process of hyper hypertrophy, right? It's taking the muscles to failure and then the muscles recovering from the body physically gets stronger through the process of failure. It's the same thing with relationships. A lot of the experts say that one of the best predictors of long-term outcomes in an in relationship is not how much a couple fights or how they fight, it's how the couple repairs.
Ruth Penfold (17:05.421)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (17:05.676)
And so the concept translates across mind, body, heart. Recovery is where growth comes from. And you don't get recovery without failure.
Ruth Penfold (17:14.433)
There is so much goodness in this. my gosh. Because one of the things that's actually toxic for us humans is that we're so bad at conflict, we're so bad at this notion of failure in everything that we avoid it. Whereas we're missing the opportunity. Like if you come across people who never have conflict in their relationship or in their leadership teams.
Morgan Fowles (17:31.586)
Mm. Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (17:42.528)
I'm like, honey, are you being honest? Because if you were really being honest with each other, there would be conflict. But it would be conflict that was that was strategically evolved over time to become healthy conflict, whereby the repair process then becomes something that's more ordinary, right? but failure is huge. And I tell you what, my biggest failures or failures.
The version of me that was born through those, my gosh, right? Like, my gosh. There's nothing I can regret about my second marriage and the divorce that came out of it, because literally the version I get to me be because of that is like beyond my wildest dreams of the woman I was before, right?
Morgan Fowles (18:14.004)
Ooh. Yes.
Morgan Fowles (18:30.136)
Completely, completely. And so there's certainly a part of failure and learning the lessons that requires sitting in it. And that can look different for different people. People process in different kinds of ways and you know, there's different types of minds and so on. But certainly there's a sitting in it and learning the lessons that is a prerequisite to getting the benefit from it. Avoidance is probably not the answer. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ruth Penfold (18:37.517)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (18:52.141)
Mmm, mm-mm. No, you got a face right into it. And always, you know, in these, you have to sit with what was my role in this. What was my role in this? Even if it looks like there was, you know, an antagonist or whatever, whatever. Like it doesn't matter where you sit, what was my role in this, and what am I called, what am I being called to learn through this, right? It's so important, so important. But let's come back to that audacity.
Morgan Fowles (19:00.699)
yeah.
Morgan Fowles (19:17.266)
yeah. Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (19:21.387)
Right? Because it's something that I just want women to be more. So tell me where where and how did you find yours to to then do the work that you've that you've gone on to do?
Morgan Fowles (19:21.816)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (19:35.383)
You know, it's funny because again, I don't really think of it as audacity for me. It just comes from organic passion. I love, I love the work that I do. I've always chosen my roles and what I do because of passion. You know, when I first started out in uni, I studied economics and political science. And then I went into fashion. I went into fashion not because it was a logical thing to do, not because I knew a ton of people who did it. It was because I loved it. And so it guided my first choice. And every choice since then has really been driven by passion.
Ruth Penfold (19:41.237)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (20:05.296)
passion. And for me, like the desire to move forward, the desire to progress, the desire to like do the work really overrides any kind of fear. So again, it's not a question of willpower. It's not a question of me having to like quiet the voices. It's just that I I lead with excitement. And that is that's what drives me forward.
Ruth Penfold (20:26.797)
Mmm, yeah, I love that so much. I love that. and and for where you're kind of at now, because obviously, you know, tell me, for your for anybody the listening that let me start somewhere else with this. Inside this little body of mine, Morgan, I always had this feeling like Ruth, you're here to do something. You're here to, you're here to
You're here to do something. And at first I was like, you must be crazy. and then I've started to kind of like grow in my career a little bit and be like, maybe, maybe, right? But it took me until my 40s to be like, Ruth, what are we really here to do? Right? Like, what's and and I guess I want to speak to that little voice that's in, I think, many of our listeners, right? That's like, actually, I have something to bring here. I have something to be here, right?
Morgan Fowles (21:21.772)
Yeah, yeah.
Ruth Penfold (21:22.707)
and really about how your how you f cultivate that voice and lean into it and whether you too felt like you had that or, you know, where that yeah, how much of that resonates for you, for yourself?
Morgan Fowles (21:40.065)
Yeah, massively. So I mean the the first thing to say is that I have become really obsessed with the work of Dr. James Hollis, who is a Jungian psychoanalyst. And so though it's really a lot of sort of Youngin principles around growth and
Ruth Penfold (21:49.229)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (21:58.497)
And and the calling of the soul and who we're meant to be in life. And, you know, he's got so many, I would recommend his books enormously. I've read virtually all of them start to finish, but he's got and he's got so many beautiful metaphors about sort of, you know, crossing
in taking the leap off the edge and the bravery that it takes to fulfill our journey and the process of individuation, you know, and really accepting that no one's here to save us and that actually by hiding in somebody else, we can never really true l truly live our full selves. And that each of us has a unique gift to offer the world. And so as painful as it is to recognize no one's here to save you, it is only
Ruth Penfold (22:33.133)
Oof.
Morgan Fowles (22:41.73)
By through the process of true individuation, that we get to realize our full selves. And the calling to do that is within each of us. And it requires an enormous amount of bravery. But you get one shot. And and really, most of us spend our lives walking in shoes that are too small for us. Like that is one of that is one of sort of the big tenets of his philosophy. And I find I find that kind of thinking so important and so.
Ruth Penfold (22:54.445)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (23:10.018)
There are absolutely days where I have self-doubt. And what I say, when I say, you know, how dare I? And can I really? And but they're already doing it, you know, and so on. But again, I think this calling within that says, I get one shot to show up as the fullest version of myself. What does that person look like? That inspires me more than sitting it out.
Ruth Penfold (23:37.07)
Mmm, I love that so much. I love that so much. And and so where does that where does give us bring us more into the picture of where you are right now? So how are like what kind of season are you in at the moment? You've obviously just stepped out of something, but stepped out of something at a moment where I believe the business was doing phenomenally well, right? Like this was a like
Morgan Fowles (23:50.572)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (23:58.775)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tala's Tala's an amazing space and it was it was an incredible five years there. but I'm back in a building stage. I think, you know, when you talk about sort of what is meant to be your life work, for me, I love I love building. I love the process of growth. I'm absolutely obsessed with personal growth, with the growth of companies, with helping founders realize their dreams, with building companies and so on. And so the work I'm doing now is really I'm
Ruth Penfold (24:02.859)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (24:28.874)
on a number of different projects. I'm doing advisory work helping scale a number of businesses, creative businesses, a lot in the wellness space. So across supplements, hardware, software, fashion, and and also building a couple projects is sort of
on the side. but it's really all about growth and building. And, you know, and and when you talk about sort of like what is it that like your soul is asking of you, for me, that is definitely where I get most excited is in building.
Ruth Penfold (24:48.245)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (25:01.921)
Yeah.
that I love that and I I feel similar actually it's like figuring it out it's in the figuring that I'm like ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh this this this this this
Morgan Fowles (25:17.366)
Yeah. And it's the energy towards up and out, right? You know, it's like we we're gonna keep going and we're gonna we're gonna be creative about how we think about solving problems. You know, I think, you know, founders are so brave. And when we think about much of the innovation over our lifetimes, it has been about companies that we couldn't even have imagined existed years before, right? And so having the courage to be innovative, to do something that people haven't done before.
Ruth Penfold (25:20.854)
Yeah, yeah.
Ruth Penfold (25:38.421)
Mm. Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (25:46.067)
on limited resources and tough markets and all the rest of it. It's work that just makes me very excited, that I have a ton of respect for. and as I say, you know, and I've done it mostly in fashion over the course of my career. I'm still working in fashion to some extent, but I've also kind of developed a big focus around the wellness space in particular. And as I say, it ranges from physical products to hardware, software, really across the board.
Ruth Penfold (25:52.545)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (26:04.173)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (26:10.124)
Definitely a lot is happening with AI at the moment, changing the way we can build the speed at which we can do it. And I and and and that's a big part of the theses of a number of the companies that I'm working with. But a lot of it shares an energy, which is how do we think creatively, how do we look upwards and outwards?
Ruth Penfold (26:27.901)
Mm. Yeah, I love that. I love that. And so tell me, because I mean, like, CEO for a lot of women feels like you know, some of us maybe we're like are like, actually that's where I'm headed. But I think a lot of the time women are looking at those leadership roles and thinking, you know, you know, you see the
Women are if women find ourselves in the double bind. We're damned if we do, we're damned if we don't. Many of the time, much of the time, women are brought in for roles where something's gone horribly wrong and we're there to clear it up, or and and and and and right. The the the amount of leeway we get to be successful in roles is a lot smaller. And so, but I would love to hear from you what hit different about operating at that level?
Like for good and for bad, like from the inside, you obviously have worked at at different levels within organizations. And what felt different about it for you?
Morgan Fowles (27:31.094)
Yeah, I mean, look, it's an incredible privilege to be a CEO, certainly, right? And because, you know, top billing and all of that, and and and it's a leadership position, you have a lot of flexibility to execute your own vision and your own strategy. And that is an incredible privilege. And so it feels like pretty ungrateful to complain about any aspects of it.
But there are also, you know, they're unique considerations to the CEO role. And it depends a little bit on how your company is structured and so on. But it's often described as quite a lonely role, which can be very true. you don't have a peer group day to day, which is why for me,
developing relationships in a network of other CEOs was hugely valuable to me because then I felt like I had a peer group, even if it wasn't within my own company. We could bounce ideas off of each other and relate to things that were going on.
You also sort of often sit in the middle between a team that you're leading and investors that you are communic or a board that you're communicating back to. And those two things are not really connected. In a lot of cases, you're generally the glue that holds together the the board and the leadership team. They have di access to different sets of information.
And so you're managing the dynamics of all of that. and then, you know, and I would say the other thing is as the CEO, there is a certain amount of like warrior and leader energy that you need to bring to the role. Your board and investors need to know the company is safe with you, that you've got this. And the team also needs to not see you flinch. Now, that doesn't mean that you can never be vulnerable, but for the most part, you need to be a warrior.
Morgan Fowles (29:17.218)
And so you put all of those things together, and it can be kind of a lonely role. You need to have places where you seek refuge, where you've places that you get to lay your head sometimes, because it's just not inherent to the built of the structure. But as I say, it comes with enormous perks too. I think you know, one of the things that's interesting is like we tend to have this reverence for the word CEO as a society, right? And and and you can kind of fall prey to it to a certain extent.
Ruth Penfold (29:39.722)
Mm.
Ruth Penfold (29:44.801)
Mm-hmm.
Morgan Fowles (29:45.071)
It's wild how much more sort of credibility we associate to the word CEO than we do to managing director, even or managing partner. You know, there's just something about it that adds this sort of like halo. But in reality, it's a title, it's a word like anything else. What you really are responsible for is doing a good job of of being a leader.
Ruth Penfold (29:57.742)
Mm-hmm.
Morgan Fowles (30:07.518)
Of leading the vision of the company, of making sure everybody is aligned and knowing what they need to do, that you're hiring a great team, that you're communicating well. And so I've always tried to focus more on the work than like the title or the role, regardless of the roles that I've had. And it's interesting because as I've evolved my role now into an advisory capacity, I have companies that I'm working with as a fractional CEO.
Ruth Penfold (30:18.733)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (30:31.852)
I have companies that I'm working with as an advisor. I have companies that I'm working with as a founder, as of companies I'm working with as a board director. I spend very, very little time thinking about the title and the specific hat that I'm wearing in that context. My focus is really always about how to do good work, to understand what my stakeholders need and to deliver the value that I can deliver.
Ruth Penfold (30:49.215)
Ruth Penfold (30:54.121)
Yeah, I almost wonder whether certainly in the construct of our society right now, it's almost like a rite of passage, right? Like you have to you kind of work your way, and maybe this is you, this was me for sure, Morgan, right? Work my way up through the matrix, became I and in my case it was a chief people officer. And as I started to sit in those rooms, and I sat on a couple of executive teams in in for for organizations, and I looked around the table and I realized that everybody was just like.
me but different. And that like suddenly it was almost like I call it like the great leveling for myself, where it was like, you don't really know either. You're just figuring it out too.
Morgan Fowles (31:25.454)
Hm.
Morgan Fowles (31:30.645)
Mm. Mm.
Ruth Penfold (31:38.606)
I'm like, and in my case, I'm meant to be different to the people in the room. That was my great big epiphany. You know, like, whoa, I'm here because I'm different. I'm not here because I am supposed to be putting on some mask and acting more like the other people in the room. I'm actually, my value is in my difference. That was a huge epiphany for me. And I'm wondering, were there any big epiphany moments for you like that as you sat in those rooms?
Morgan Fowles (31:46.348)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (31:55.448)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (32:06.466)
think a related sort of epiphany moment for me has been really because on the one hand like yes you're showing up as yourself as an individual and it's so important to do that but I think
one of the things that I've also learned is as you become a leader in whatever your title is, a CEO or what have you, it's also about setting an example. And I think something that is become very, very important to me is being able to kind of publicly show a style of leadership and some transparency around what it looks like to be a CEO scaling companies, particularly for young women. I mean, across the board, but particularly for young women. Because one of the things that happens even in fashion.
Is that while companies may be filled with women, you do see a smaller percentage in leadership roles. And I was ambitious from a young age. I knew that I wanted to continue in my career and that I wanted to continue progressing. And I just didn't have that many examples of female leadership to look at and say, okay, this is what it looks like to show up as a leader. Now, on the one hand, like I would love to reject that notion altogether and say, what does it matter to be a woman leader versus a male leader? And there's certainly like a good conversation to have.
Have around that. But we also know, like the science and the literature says that we expect different things from our female leaders than we do from our male leaders. We judge them in very, very different ways. And so I think it's really important to be able to give women an example of leadership that they can observe, they can reject it, they can dislike it, they can say, I would do it differently. But just by virtue of having an example,
Ruth Penfold (33:29.173)
Mm.
Morgan Fowles (33:47.267)
They get to learn about how they want to do it, what they like and what they don't like. And it's one of the reasons why
You know, so I started an Instagram account, for example, that is my professional Instagram account. And it's one of the reasons that I started that is because I want to provide transparency around what it looks like to be a CEO, what it looks like to be a female CEO, what my days look like, how I think about decisions, and so on. And as I say, everybody doesn't need to like it. That's not the point. The point is to have examples to then foil against or people who are watching to say, yeah, that's something I would do, or that's something I wouldn't do, or it's just a way to think about that. And that has been something that's become
Very important to me as my career has progressed.
Ruth Penfold (34:24.845)
Mmm. Yeah, I love that. I love that. And I actually do agree that sharing in that way, like otherwise, everything becomes almost like a fairy tale. You know what mean? Like, if if I don't know, like you will just become like some sort of superhuman person that I can't possibly ever relate to. Whereas if I see that you're an ordinary person like me who
You know, and also like, I mean, if we're talking about branding here, like like some goofy stuff, you know, like you know, like what's the real what's the real real behind it all, then then I'm like, okay, so that person's doing their own thing and they can still do that. And I do think that we have to be able to see that. and we also need the examples of really powerful leadership.
examples with women with women leading. because certainly in my own career I had examples of, and many of the women that I work with now have had examples of the opposite. You know, not the powerful leadership, not the, you know, not the, and certainly for me, I had to create my own version of leadership because I didn't see it role modeled around me by women. I saw women there, but I didn't see the version of leadership that I wanted to stand in.
Morgan Fowles (35:22.989)
Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (35:47.348)
Exactly, exactly. So the more that we can provide transparency, the better off people are. It's a resource, you know.
Ruth Penfold (35:53.217)
Yeah, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. I love I've loved this conversation so much. I can't believe how quickly the time's gone, literally. I just had to check my I was like, really? Where did that go? but tell me, is there one thing that you might leave us with? Like, what's one thing that you wish that you had learnt sooner in your life and career?
Morgan Fowles (36:02.999)
Ha ha ha.
Morgan Fowles (36:19.56)
gosh. I think for me, I mean, it really goes back to lately, because my obsession is really about recovery. I think that that has become the thing that I there's so honestly, there are so many. I mean, I think the call to individuation, the call to bravery, the knowing yourself, the living in balance, those are all really important. But I think that for those of us who are drawn to growth and to progress and to building in particular, and
And who therefore, you know, get some knocks along the way, but really enjoy the process of learning. I think having faith in the work that recovery does and how much that continues to bring you back to the table, that's really been my most powerful lesson.
Ruth Penfold (37:01.205)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (37:08.959)
Yeah, I love that. And I love the concept of that, right? Like it's really like the balm for everything, isn't it? Right. you know, but you're so right as well about the individuation part. Like, I really like, you know, no one's coming to save you. But that's okay. It's because you're meant to be putting your big girl pants on to be all of who you're meant to be, and that's where the bravery kicks in. And that's just beautiful.
Morgan Fowles (37:17.376)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Morgan Fowles (37:28.461)
Mm-hmm.
Morgan Fowles (37:37.514)
And and absolutely, and it's fully cyclical, right? Because it's like the the the calling to individuation requires bravery. The bravery comes from knowing that no matter what you're living within your values and no matter what happens, you can recover.
Ruth Penfold (37:41.633)
Yeah.
Ruth Penfold (37:53.001)
Yes, exactly. And the more that you're walking in alignment with that stuff, the more people just show up alongside your s alongside you who are like, you as well, me too, right? And that's the most beautiful thing of all. Yeah, I love it. Well, look, thank you so much, Morgan. This has been amazing. If people want to find you and learn more about the work that you're doing now, what's the best way for us to do that?
Morgan Fowles (38:05.686)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Morgan Fowles (38:21.974)
Yep. So I'm on LinkedIn, of course, at Morgan Fowls. and then also on Instagram, where to be transparent, I actually post a lot more and am much more likely to respond to messages. So that's at Morgan.fowls.
Ruth Penfold (38:37.677)
Okay, great. I'm about to find you there right now. well, you're amazing. And thank you so thank you so much to all of our listeners. I hope you have made as many notes as I have. And honestly, this was just such an incredible gift. Thank you.
Morgan Fowles (38:40.165)
Ha ha ha ha.
Morgan Fowles (38:45.143)
You're amazing.
Morgan Fowles (38:58.562)
Thank you.
