Michele Rigby Assad

Michele uses stories from her CIA experience to illustrate the power of grit, the power of perseverance and determination to learn and grow—no matter what. Instead of focusing on the challenges and negativity presented to her, Michele demonstrates how focusing on mastering a skill, learning new material, and pushing to grow is what transformed her life and career.

• Your mindset is the most important thing.
• Grit trumps natural talent.
• What worked before may not work when the storms of life sweep in. Stay flexible to respond to the challenge.
• That which is unexpected and unwelcome could turn out to be your biggest blessing.

One thing you learn planning and carrying out operations in war zones is that no matter how hard you try, you can’t prepare for every contingency. You have to get good at pivoting in the moment and making decisions on the fly. Such is the new world thrust on us in 2020 and 2021. Strong leadership understands that now is not the time to maintain continuity of operations—it is time to rethink everything.

• Learn how to harness fear to cultivate optimism and resiliency.
• Understand how to promote an environment in which your team members’ unique experiences, outlook, and creativity can be harnessed to solve operational challenges.
• Develop new strategies for tapping into your diverse workforce to navigate changing realities and requirements. (You will be surprised how many amazing ideas come from staff that, up until now, hasn’t had the opportunity or encouragement to share fresh ideas that can breathe new life into operations.)

I’m used to assumptions. I’ve dealt with them my entire life. It is hard for people to merge the two seemingly different versions of me: an outgoing and kind person who cares very much about others-with the counterterrorism and Middle East expert. Most human beings are conditioned to associate a leader with someone who wields power in a more forceful manner. Those with sunny dispositions are often relegated to the second tier or the back row. This cognitive dissonance is a product of an Unconscious bias that sets our expectations of people’s strengths, weaknesses, personality and interests. Our assumptions are based on a lifetime’s worth of input, so this happens without our cognizance. We are not aware that this process is occurring.

In the workplace, subconscious bias affects internal processes such as hiring, promotions, leadership development, training decisions, and project management. In terms of operations, subconscious bias affects our marketing and sales strategies, product design, prioritization of projects, and so much more.

Learn the first steps to knocking down the walls to unconscious bias and creating a culture of strong leaders:

• acknowledge that we can do a better job
• dig deeper and get to know others better
• ask more questions
• determine whether unconscious bias has affected the way you’ve done business and identify one way to start rectifying that

Michele uses her experience as a female in the male-dominated intelligence sector to show how your unique personality and perspective are key to being a stand-out in the workplace. Despite being told that she could not carry out successful counterterrorism operations because she would never be accepted as a female by the terrorist sources she would have to work with, Michele turned this assumption on its head. She explains how she triumphed by turning her perceived disadvantages to her advantage in the debriefing room, acquiring intelligence others could not.

Key Takeaways:

• Understand why diversity is critical to creativity and success
• Develop strategies for disrupting the status quo and reframing other’s perception of your capabilities
• Discover how your “disadvantages” can actually enable you to shine in the workplace

In this program you will learn:

• How to build rapport using intelligence profiling secrets
• How to read body language to learn how others are experiencing you or the environment
• Learn to leverage a technique called “framing” to avoid confrontation and find ways to exploit areas of commonality

In this program you will learn:

• Use in-the-field techniques to turn challenging situations around so that you leave conversations in a positive way
• Leverage women’s intuition to gain an “unfair” advantage in high-stakes negotiations
• Ninja strategies to engage women and minorities in important conversations for collaboration and growth

In this program you will learn:

• Secrets for escaping an attack or surviving an ambush that you can apply to pushing out of your comfort zone
• How “going to war” teaches you to manage fear and elevates your game to elite levels
• The role of faith in dealing with terrorists — and overcoming in life