EP 47: Beyond the Ladder- Burnout, Identity & Building a Life That Fits with Khara Williams
Guest: Khara Williams — former banking executive; founder of Herde, a platform for women in the “messy middle” of reinvention; newly based in Abu Dhabi.Khara shares the honest, unvarnished story of selling everything, leaving a high-status banking career, and rebuilding on her own terms—trading hustle for presence, identity for integrity, and performance for true wellbeing.The whisper before the leap: recognising the “tap on the shoulder” and why it often takes a forced change to actGrief after quitting: uncoupling identity from title, team and status—and why it’s normal to miss the old lifeStillness as a superpower: Khara’s “Mozart time” walks, silent mornings, and how doing less led to feeling moreSleep as recovery: learning to rest without guilt after years of fight-mode cortisolHealthy high performance (for real): micro resets, walk-and-talks, not checking results on Sundays, and moving from visibility to valueWork–life separation > balance: presence at home, device boundaries, and the quality-of-life shift in Abu DhabiGenerational change at work: adapting leadership to a five-generation workforce (and why ‘just be in the office’ no longer cuts it)Herd—Khara’s new venture: the four pillars (Career, Relationships, Money, Life) and self-leadership over cookie-cutter adviceUnlearning: releasing the belief that your value only exists inside corporate walls“Consistency used to mean hours in the office. Now it means being present.”“You can be with your kids, or you can be present with your kids—those are different.”“Sleep showed me how burnt out I actually was.”“Lead yourself first. Everything else is downstream of that.”TRY THISNo-Sunday-Metrics Rule: don’t check dashboards/results the night before the week starts.10 minutes of stillness: hand on heart, no phone, notice what you actually need.Walk-and-talk meeting: take one 1:1 outside. Movement > meeting room.Presence cue at home: one boundary that signals “I’m here now” (e.g., phone in a drawer 6–8pm).Identity audit: write the sentence “I’m valuable because…” and finish it without referencing a title.Launching January, Herde supports women navigating reinvention with practical education across four pillars—Career, Relationships, Money, Life—centred on self-leadership, clarity and kindness.If you’re in the messy middle of a career or life pivot, share this episode with one woman who needs permission to choose presence over performance.
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