148. Why You're Afraid of Getting Fired (Even Though You're the Best Performer)

**Anna Wojtowicz** (0:00)
I know what it's like to have ambition and also see success from the other side of it too.
And there is another side of it. There's a way to build success in a really big life that's not built on self abandonment and self betrayal. So you're already powerful. Everybody listening to this podcast who's really ambitious, you know you're powerful. You don't need me to confirm that for you. So traditional strategy, the way I see it, starts with the goal, and it's very external, and asks, how do I push myself to get there? Like, what do I need to do? What's the strategy? Just tell me what to do, and I'll kind of do it, right? Versus intuitive strategy says, like, let me make sure I'm resourced, I'm regulated, and I'm really honest about what I want before I build the plan. So it doesn't cost me my body, my joy, my fulfillment, when I achieve that thing. Cause I already know I'm gonna achieve the thing, but I want a different experience with it. So the goals stay big, the standards stay high, but you're no longer at war with yourself when you're building this really big career, this really big life, or a really big business. So it's alignment and you essentially first, and then strategy second, and it's the integration of both.

**Kendall Berg** (1:15)
Corporate life is a game, but no one hands you the rule book. Here on Secrets of the Career Game, we break down the unspoken norms and behind the scenes dynamics shaping your career today. I'm Kendall Berg, that career coach, and I guide professionals to grow, advance and lead with clarity.
Each week, we explore the tools, habits and conversations that build confidence, presence and long-term momentum. Welcome back to today's fabulous episode. I cannot tell you how excited I am about our guests today. Anna is joining us and she is going to talk about how to shift away from ambition, over-performing and too much success, potentially, arguably, to something that is a little bit more whole and more intuitive and more aligned. Anna, thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm so excited to chat with you.

**Anna Wojtowicz** (2:08)
I am so excited to be here. By the way, there's no such thing as too much success. Not, but there's a way to have success that actually feels like you.

**Kendall Berg** (2:19)
Love that. Why don't you tell listeners a little bit about you and about your background because you've had an interesting journey to this point, and then maybe a little bit about the clients that you help now because I think it's going to resonate a lot with people who are tuning in.

**Anna Wojtowicz** (2:32)
Yeah.
I'm Anna and my whole movement is a new paradigm of ambition and success, one that is rooted in wholeness, not just performance. We'll get into what that actually is. The way I see it is I really help powerhouse women, whether they're in corporate, like Fortune 500 companies or mid-management, or even business owners, who've built success in survival mode, now shift and rise into leadership and really living life in every area that's intuitive, rooted, and whole. So you're leading from all of you, not just the pressure and the performance and the metrics, that may look really impressive, but might not feel that impressive on a day-to-day basis.

**Kendall Berg** (3:19)
Anna, this is so timely, just selfishly.
As I think about the way that the corporate world works today, a lot of the shifting dynamics we're seeing in corporate culture, this big push towards the side hustle, but then the side hustle becomes your main hustle and you're still working and all of these overlaps. So you talk a lot about this ambition rooted in wholeness, not performance. So how does that intuitive strategy differ from the traditional goal setting, performance measuring type approach to building your life?

**Anna Wojtowicz** (3:53)
Yeah. So I feel like the way that I approach this is not from a mindset or like you just need to manage your stress better, that just never works. Also, I forgot to mention this, but I spent 10 years, I spent over a decade in corporate marketing in New York City, and I worked for really big brands. I've worked for Martha Stewart, I've worked for Teen Vogue, Vogue. So I understand the ambition, hustle, grind mentality. So I already bring that to the table, but then I know what it's like to have ambition and also see success from the other side of it too.
There is another side of it, and that's just the part that people don't see, but I know how to integrate them all. So that's basically what intuitive strategy is. But when I talk about ambition rooted in wholeness, I not saying we're gonna get rid of ambition and you should want less, absolutely not. You should want whatever you want, that is not what I'm saying. What I'm trying to get across is there's a way to build success in a really big life that's not built on self abandonment and self betrayal.