The Invisible Mentor

Posts Tagged ‘Carrie Katz’

Think of the questions below while you are reading the blog post.

1. How does the information relate to your work and life?
2. What are five takeaways?
3. What qualities do you have that are similar to the interviewees?
4. How will those qualities aid your success?

Tell me a little bit about yourself.

Kevin Shea

I was born in Montreal, and my family moved to Los Angeles when I was nine months old, and I’d like to say it was because I was having difficulty with two languages. My parents moved back to Canada, to Toronto when I was about 10. I grew up in Toronto and was involved as an actor when I was a kid and was always connected to the broadcasting television business. I knew that was the business that I wanted to get into. I went to York University and studied history, I’m not sure why I did that. After university I started my career in the cable industry.

Many years later I am now running my own company SheaChez Communications, have been for the past five years. I get involved in various start-up companies where I assist them with CRTC licensing applications, which is a role I did with Sirius Satellite Radio. And I sit on a variety of different boards of private companies and I am chairman of what’s called the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

Carrie Katz

When I lived in Montreal I was always involved in community affairs. From when I was a child my mother would take me when she went from door-to-door under the heading of UJA requesting money for the poor. My mother has three children, and for some reason, I’m the one that that resonated with. So from a young child I was always involved in something in the community. As a young mother I started the Montreal Career Women’s Network in 1984. At the time, there weren’t any similar services of its kind. In Quebec it was more difficult to get it going because of the line between French Quebecois and the Anglophones, so that was a lot of work, but it was fantastic how we brought the two groups together. The Network is still operating today so I am very proud of that.

I also started a successful business with a friend called Origami Plus which operated for 19 years until it closed in 2009. Origami Plus was synonymous with people who were interested in paper. It was the first paper store that people could come in and do creative things, like make invitations, anything that had to do with paper.

I moved to Toronto and once again became involved in community work. For me, I think it’s my essence, it helps me to feel like I’m participating in the world.

How did mentors influence your life?

Kevin Shea

In many ways and I seek out mentors and they continue to advise me. Somebody told me when I was young that you cannot be an expert in everything, you just can’t, and to concentrate more on your strength than your weaknesses and fill the gaps with people around you that actually complement your areas of weakness. I know where I am good and not so good so I’m always conscious of this advice. I say that presidents of companies should be kicked out every five years or changed because we are only good in one or two areas not five or six or the full breadth of what a CEO does and I continue to believe that. There should be far more turnover of leadership in companies than there is today because people get stale.

Carrie Katz

Bluma Appel influenced my life in so many ways. She was very savvy and passionate about giving back to the world. She had the ability to learn from other people, and that’s what I learned from her. One day she called me and said she needed to talk to me about something. I said yeah and she said that we needed to talk about my self-worth because I didn’t get it, “you don’t get how great you are,” and that put me into a whole new realm of thinking. It was a new paradigm for me, those words coming from her.

Lois Fallis

I guess a lot. I remember some of the teachers in high school that I just loved. I was in the Glee Club, and the teacher encouraged me to focus on music. Aunt Lily, a relative of Fred who was a missionary in China, was one of those people who was absolutely wonderful and did not judge anyone. She accepted you just as you were. I always appreciated that. She was just a wonderful woman.

What’s one core message you received from your mentors?

Kevin Shea

Make sure that one of your capacities is the capacity to listen because most times people do not listen to what you’re trying to advance because the only thing they have on their mind is what they are trying to advance. You can tell that there are certain people who are not listening. And it’s almost as if you have to say, ‘hang on a second, I want to make sure that it’s not that you just understand this, but I want to make sure that you are hearing it.’ That’s been valuable personal advice in terms of dealing with people because at the end of the day a company is only as good as the people are.

Carrie Katz

Listen to others and pay attention to what they are saying, and do not have a preconceived idea about what is and who they are. And always give yourself space before you make decisions.

Lois Fallis

That I was okay and a good person. I was encouraged to go on and develop confidence in myself.

As an Invisible Mentor, what is one piece of advice that you would give to readers?

Kevin Shea

Keep an eye out for, and try to follow the capacity in which the individual has been able to implement change. I come back to where we started this conversation, and that is unless you can adapt really quickly in this day and age to change, and fully understand that change is happening all around you, so today’s best leaders are those who can actually implement change and that’s not easy because to implement change you have to have buy in, understanding and a collective will and good folks are the ones that today have that capacity and that`s something we all need.

Carrie Katz

What I hear a great deal about is what someone does that is not right to another person. It could be in the workplace or somewhere else. Instead of being annoyed or angry, I think you need to take a step back and just say, “What can I do to make this situation better?” and ask yourself, “How can I speak to this person so that they understand what I’m saying?” rather that attacking because attacking doesn’t work for anyone, and nobody hears what you’re saying anyway. Working on interpersonal relationships in the workplace is important because the stories that I hear sometimes are hair raising and it’s important to learn how to be in that place with people who you do not know or may not even like. For you to learn to do something with someone you do not like is taking 20 steps up the ladder.

Lois Fallis

Be yourself, develop your skills and do not take no for an answer. There is always a way. I have had quite a privileged life and I realize that some people don’t, so it’s important to embrace others and encourage them. I have always been supportive of my children and grandchildren and encouraged them in what they did and I believe that I still do that.

Lois Fallis

We had quite a large family, and this was after the Second World War (World War II), and many people were having large families at that point. I was one of two children, and my brother was killed in the Second World War so I became an only child in a way. I had a great deal of music instruction in my life because my mom was an organist and choir leader, and I had singing and piano lessons from her. As I became older I developed that, and one of my major jobs in life was being a musician. I have six children, three boys and three girls.

What are the steps you took to succeed in your field?

Kevin Shea

I think one thing is to network and make sure that you are out there and know people and not just specific to your sector. I got involved in all sorts of different things, charitable organization work to other boards of directors, even way back just to broaden my network. It’s really funny because at some point in time you may need someone or need an affiliation, so building a series of contacts that are real is necessary.

Carrie Katz

We started off Origami Plus in a room and we ended up in a big store and it was the passion that we felt for what we were doing. We often worked 10 to 13 hours each day, and the joy we felt every time we had a little success, translated into something bigger and bigger until we got there. It’s a constant dayness, and I do think success comes when you do what you love. It’s very difficult when someone lives in a space where they constantly think that I have to do this. There is that line when you get to a place where you are working on something that you connect with, but this is a luxury because not everyone has the ability and opportunity to do something that they love. Some people just have to do something to eat, so it’s another dimension how to do that. Don’t we often hear stories about someone who has become very successful and you ask them how they started and they say,” I swept the floors.” They didn’t like doing that, but how did they go from sweeping the floors to where they are now? I would love to speak to someone who did that, they’d have a lot to teach us.

Lois Fallis

As a teacher, to succeed I always seemed to take a lot of courses. I was teaching in Toronto schools before I went to Teachers’ College so I had a lot of music experience, which was what they wanted. I had been married and had all these children and grandchildren, so I was part of the scene and really enjoyed that type of scene. So part of it was being prepared. I did a lot of work reading books about children, studied children and sang in the schools. I used to go and tell stories, and sing songs in the schools even before I became a teacher. I was really well prepared to be a teacher because of my experience, and because of the fact that when I started teaching at fifty years old, I was a grandmother, and in fact some of the kids used to call me grandma.

What are 5 takeaways? What ideas can you adapt immediately? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

I have taken the answers to specific questions from Kevin Shea’s, Carrie Katz’s and Lois Fallis’ interview and presented them so you can compare and contrast. I will do this today and tomorrow and next week I will present another Invisible Mentor interview. Think of the questions below while you are reading the blog post.

1. How does the information relate to your work and life?
2. What are five takeaways?
3. What qualities do you have that are similar to the interviewees?
4. How will those qualities aid your success?

Tell me a little bit about yourself.

Kevin Shea

I was born in Montreal, and my family moved to Los Angeles when I was nine months old, and I’d like to say it was because I was having difficulty with two languages. My parents moved back to Canada, to Toronto when I was about 10. I grew up in Toronto and was involved as an actor when I was a kid and was always connected to the broadcasting television business. I knew that was the business that I wanted to get into. I went to York University and studied history, I’m not sure why I did that. After university I started my career in the cable industry.

Many years later I am now running my own company SheaChez Communications, have been for the past five years. I get involved in various start-up companies where I assist them with CRTC licensing applications, which is a role I did with Sirius Satellite Radio. And I sit on a variety of different boards of private companies and I am chairman of what’s called the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

Carrie Katz

When I lived in Montreal I was always involved in community affairs. From when I was a child my mother would take me when she went from door-to-door under the heading of UJA requesting money for the poor. My mother has three children, and for some reason, I’m the one that that resonated with. So from a young child I was always involved in something in the community. As a young mother I started the Montreal Career Women’s Network in 1984. At the time, there weren’t any similar services of its kind. In Quebec it was more difficult to get it going because of the line between French Quebecois and the Anglophones, so that was a lot of work, but it was fantastic how we brought the two groups together. The Network is still operating today so I am very proud of that.

I also started a successful business with a friend called Origami Plus which operated for 19 years until it closed in 2009. Origami Plus was synonymous with people who were interested in paper. It was the first paper store that people could come in and do creative things, like make invitations, anything that had to do with paper.

I moved to Toronto and once again became involved in community work. For me, I think it’s my essence, it helps me to feel like I’m participating in the world.

Lois Fallis

We had quite a large family, and this was after the Second World War (World War II), and many people were having large families at that point. I was one of two children, and my brother was killed in the Second World War so I became an only child in a way. I had a great deal of music instruction in my life because my mom was an organist and choir leader, and I had singing and piano lessons from her. As I became older I developed that, and one of my major jobs in life was being a musician. I have six children, three boys and three girls.

Tell me about your big break and who gave you.

Kevin Shea

My big break came when Phil Lind at Rogers hired me to operate Cable Satellite Network way back when, and put me into Rogers a much bigger company than I was with in a leadership role. He remains both a close business associate and key mentor of mine. When I moved around in Rogers, Colin Watson who was my boss was an incredibly supportive and smart guy, so I would say it was a big break getting into Rogers at that time.

Carrie Katz

Bluma Appel gave me my biggest break, in being my mentor and offering me a position to work with her in 1976, The Year of the Woman. She was the Liaison of Women and Industry and I became her assistant. That was definitely a turning point in my life.

Lois Fallis

The big break is probably in the musical world. I decided that I wanted to do something different so I joined the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir led by conductor Elmer Iseler . By then I had done a lot of singing, and I was asked to be a part of a small professional group that Elmer had that was called the Festival Singers so I was with them for four or five years, then I went into teaching. I had an opportunity to teach Orff music in Toronto schools and I did that half time. I had some help come into the home at that point.

Note: Orff music is a type of music with xylophones and glockenspiels. It was started in Europe and then we brought it to Canada. Orff is named after Carl Orff and is sometimes called Music for Young Children.

What are five life lessons that you have learned so far?

Kevin Shea

1. Patience is huge
2. Work with great teams
3. Respect your work mates
4. Make change quickly

Carrie Katz

1. Family is the most important thing
2. Be kind to others
3. Listen when someone speaks
4. Like yourself
5. Have laughter in your life

Lois Fallis

1. Make it work, that is a phrase that we had in our family. If things weren’t going right you negotiated or talked it through. No one walked away not speaking to each other. I think that’s so important, you don’t walk away from the problem, you face it with whomever.

1. Take risks and do not worry about what other people think. Try to make decisions on your own, and do not have everybody try to tell you what to do.

1. Listening is very important and I wish I would have listened more and I would have loved to spend more time with friends. As I’ve said, I’m all over the place.

1. I have always been interested in the church, religion and spirituality and have taken many courses in that, and I have continued because it’s important and it is not necessarily any one religion, it’s what you believe in, and try to figure that out. It doesn’t matter how old you are, you are always questioning, and you should, because for each generation you change and you aren’t the same.

1. Tell people that you love and care for them, and don’t be afraid to do that. Don’t be afraid to phone somebody, and don’t wait for someone to say, “I haven’t heard from….” I always think that’s a two-way street. You should telephone people and you should be interested in them and don’t be afraid to show love and affection.

What process do you use to generate great ideas?

Kevin Shea

I don’t think that I have a specific process. Ideas come to me then I bounce them off people. I mean ideas can land at any time, it’s more what you are doing with your ideas opposed to having them. How can you move on them? I just joined the Idea Council for a major ad agency that I can’t name. Big ad agencies are struggling today and they are trying to figure out how to respond to the market. The ad agency has brought together five of us from completely different walks of life. We meet once a month for three hours with the entire management, and we are basically charged with coming up with ideas. Ideas in terms of new kinds of partnerships, things they should be looking at, these are the emerging technologies, how to win particular clients, and it’s kind of fun. We are given nothing in advance, they make a presentation as soon as we get there, and it creates a very interesting environment because the single purpose is to share ideas.

Carrie Katz

I have a friend in HR who I’ve been friends with for over 35 years. She conducted a series of test and the thing that keeps coming through is that I’m an idea person. I’m always idea generating about whatever, it could be about making dinner for friends. It’s part of my DNA, it’s an every day process for me.

I write down what I’d like to get across and bring in more than one idea at a time. I do this by email, then I come back and let’s say there were five ideas, I narrow it down to one, then start generating the concept.

Lois Fallis

I have written a couple of children’s song books and they were published and were great successes and are still out in the market. They are called Seasons and Themes, and A Glass Slipper, and I wrote all these songs myself, and it was partly because of teaching. I found that it was so easy as a teacher, the songs kept coming out of my head. I’d come out of the classroom, and I’d have so many wonderful ideas because I was where the children were, and I’d write songs about whatever, the spring, whatever they were doing I would write a song. I wrote a dinosaur song, and the songs came to me quite easily. I got ideas from being around the children. I always have ideas, if someone says something I would say why don’t you think about this, it just seems to flow.

What are five takeaways? What ideas can you adapt immediately? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

Here is Part Two of Carrie Katz’s interview and once again relationships play a prominent role. After you have digested the entire interview, what are 10 takeaways?

Tell me a little bit about yourself.

When I lived in Montreal I was always involved in community affairs. From when I was a child my mother would take me when she went from door-to-door under the heading of UJA requesting money for the poor. My mother has three children, and for some reason, I’m the one that that resonated with. So from a young child I was always involved in something in the community. As a young mother I started the Montreal Career Women’s Network in 1984. At the time, there weren’t any similar services of its kind. In Quebec it was more difficult to get it going because of the line between French Quebecois and the Anglophones, so that was a lot of work, but it was fantastic how we brought the two groups together. The Network is still operating today so I am very proud of that.

I also started a successful business with a friend called Origami Plus which operated for 19 years until it closed in 2009. Origami Plus was synonymous with people who were interested in paper. It was the first paper store that people could come in and do creative things, like make invitations, anything that had to do with paper.

I moved to Toronto and once again became involved in community work. For me, I think it’s my essence, it helps me to feel like I’m participating in the world.

How do you integrate your personal and professional life?

I noticed something interesting about women, and it may be my vintage of women because we never talk about our work life when we are socializing, and it could be among very close friends. We are very matter-of-fact, whereas with men it’s most of what they discuss. I have a friend who is renowned throughout North America and when we get together we rarely ever talk about her world of work. I happen to be interested in it so I ask her lots of questions but otherwise we don’t. The way you integrate both worlds is to socialize with people you work with so they get to see another side of you, and for your friends you talk a little bit about your work so they get to see that side of you.

What’s a major regret that you’ve had in life?

I keep on coming back to the end of my marriage. I think because he passed away and we didn’t get the opportunity to complete things. We were in the midst of leaving one another and he passed away, so it left a real big dent for me. It was regretful for me to watch my children grow up not having a dad.

What are five life lessons that you have learned so far?

1. Family is the most important thing
2. Be kind to others
3. Listen when someone speaks
4. Like yourself
5. Have laughter in your life

When you have some down time, how do you spend it?

I run around a lot so my down time is a bit of a giggle. The only time I ever read is when I’m on a plane or away so my new thing is to read a chapter of something a day. I tell myself that I do not have to do the entire book just the chapter.

What process do you use to generate great ideas?

I have a friend in HR who I’ve been friends with for over 35 years. She conducted a series of test and the thing that keeps coming through is that I’m an idea person. I’m always idea generating about whatever, it could be about making dinner for friends. It’s part of my DNA, it’s an every day process for me.

I write down what I’d like to get across and bring in more than one idea at a time. I do this by email, then I come back and let’s say there were five ideas, I narrow it down to one, then start generating the concept.

What’s your favourite quotation and why?

I think at my stage in life since I’m almost 70, it would have to be “Enjoy every moment, bring laughter into your life and share lots of hugs.”

How do you define success?

I can define success very easily for other people, success for myself, if I give myself a pat on the back for what I’ve considered to have done well, it stays there for about 10 seconds then I’m on to how can I do this better. The most successful thing for me is having children and that they have a sense of understanding of living in the world. I think success has to do with the stage of life that I’m at, and I think when you have a family that functions and the children like each other and like you, that’s success. I have worked hard at this in my life.

In your opinion what’s the formula for success?

Never give up and understand that whatever you do it takes a great deal of work to become successful, it just doesn’t  happen overnight. Watching someone on the tennis court to the CEO of a big corporation, nobody gets there without a lot of input and a lot of work. If you go into a family situation and you look at kids who are doing well, it could never be because parents were not involved. The kids I know are from 28 to 50 and every one that I admire, there was so much that went into bringing up that child.

What are the steps you took to succeed in your field?

We started off Origami Plus in a room and we ended up in a big store and it was the passion that we felt for what we were doing. We often worked 10 to 13 hours each day, and the joy we felt every time we had a little success, translated into something bigger and bigger until we got there. It’s a constant dayness, and I do think success comes when you do what you love. It’s very difficult when someone lives in a space where they constantly think that I have to do this. There is that line when you get to a place where you are working on something that you connect with, but this is a luxury because not everyone has the ability and opportunity to do something that they love. Some people just have to do something to eat, so it’s another dimension how to do that. Don’t we often hear stories about someone who has become very successful and you ask them how they started and they say I swept the floors. They didn’t like doing that, but how did they go from sweeping the floors to where they are now? I would love to speak to someone who did that, they’d have a lot to teach us.

What advice do you have for someone just starting out in your field?

A friend who is now turning 50, graduated from Barnard in New York City and wanted to write for Time Magazine. At the time, I had a friend George Russell who worked for Time Magazine, so I asked him to see my friend Lisa. He said, “Carrie, there is no room,” and I said that he could give her some advice, so off she went to have lunch with him. He called shortly after lunch and told me that they had found room for her. What was it about her why he found room for her? It was about her attitude. He told her that she would be bringing coffee.

She graduated from Barnard, a highly recognized university and was going to serve coffee for the next year. But while serving coffee she would be learning. She didn’t have a problem doing coffee, she didn’t have a problem running to the store to pick-up an apple for someone because he wanted it at that moment. And she has excelled in whatever she has had to do, and she is brilliant at what she does. But I think that the attitude of saying it’s okay it’s my time it doesn’t matter, I’m going to get to where I want to go.

If trusted friends could introduce you to five people that you’ve always wanted to meet, who would you choose? And what would you say to them?

1. I’d like to meet John Mackey the co-founder and owner of Whole Foods, the naturalized grocery chain across North America and the United Kingdom. You look at the products on the shelves and you can see that a lot of thought was put into each item. For me, it’s like being the best at something. Whole Foods shows a sense of best. I love the idea of best, and he knows how to do best. My daughter lives in Nappa and I could be there for seven days and I’d be in Whole Foods four or five times just enjoying the best.
2. I’d want to meet the writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who recently passed away. He wrote about the transformation of Russia, what happened there and the political background. He was in the Gulag for 10 years so I’d like to talk to him about how he got there, what kind of paper he wrote on. He is someone who I admire a great deal.
3. I’d also like to meet George Soros who is responsible for giving away millions and millions of dollars.
4. I’d like to meet someone who has a passion for art, and they become art collectors and share their art with art museums. To have that passion and inquisitive nature, to start a collection and have the joy of sharing it with others speaks to me. Personal art collectors include the Lauders – Estee Lauder’s family has an impressive art collection, which I’d love to see.
5. I’d also like to meet a director of a museum

I’d want to say something specific to each person, so for instance, if I knew that I was going to meet Solzhenitsyn I’d ask him about after he went to America what was the big pull to return to Russia. I’m sure it’s obvious to him, but for me it would be interesting to hear how he came from living in Vermont then finding his way back to Russia. So for George Soros, I’d like to know when he chooses things out of the box to provide funding for, when and how did it start for him, when did this become a part of his life? With John Mackey I’d say something I admired about him and what he did. I like that whatever city there is a Whole Foods, he uses the sources of small farmers, and people who are starting out in small businesses. He gives people opportunities. For the art collector I’d like to know when his passion was created, where did it come from? For the museum director I’d like to know about his day and what it’s like.

Which one book had a profound impact on your life? What was it about this book that impacted you so deeply?

Out on a Limb by Shirley MacLaine. It was about taking a group of women to China, and all the various things that happened to them when they were there, and how their lives were transformed by being there and with each other. This was in the seventies when no one went to China.

If you were stranded on a deserted island, what are five books that you would like to have with you and why? Summarize the book in two sentences.

The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Sogyal Rinpoche

The Help, Kathryn Stockett

The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Mohsin Hamid

Zorro, Isabel Allende

The Bastard of Istanbul, Elif Shafak

What one music CD and movie would you like to have with you (on the deserted island) and why?

Beethoven Seventh Symphony and I’d like to watch the movie Here Am I by my son Douglas Naimer, a writer and film director.

What excites you about life?

People and relationships are the most important things.

How do you nurture your soul?

Giving and caring about others.

If you had a personal genie and she gave you one wish, what would you wish for? Or, if I gave you a magic wand, what would you use it for?

I wish we could have about 32 hours in a day.

What are your thoughts on this interview? What was expected and what was unexpected? What are 10 takeaways? How can you apply this information? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.