“Who is saying you need to do all of this?” – in conversation with Eilish Jamieson.

In 2015, Eilish Jamieson was flying high in her professional services career, when she had a health scare which took her completely by surprise. She was in a job she loved, with a team she loved, doing work she loved; she was excited about what the future might hold. At the same time, she had three children under the age of six, and one of which had recently been diagnosed with autism. Life was busy, and becoming increasingly complex; for the first time, she came to the realisation that she couldn’t do everything. If she continued in the same way, something was going to give, and it would probably be her.

Eilish found a coach to help navigate her next steps, and ultimately move on from a career which had taken her in as a graduate, given her international opportunities and leadership roles at the heart of global finance. During an early coaching conversation, she recalls breathlessly describing her life and work, before pausing for breath. Her coach then asked her: “Who is saying you need to do all of this?” The question floored her… for a whole minute. “It’s me, right?” she eventually replied. “It’s not my family, it’s not my employer. I’ve set this expectation of myself.” Eilish realised she was the only one who could change course.

“These experiences ultimately led me to change direction,” she says. “While I look back on that time as one of the most challenging periods in my working life, it saved me from myself in many ways; it allowed me to think about what I did and the work I wanted to do.”

From coastal Ireland to global horizons

Eilish grew up in a small village on the west coast of Ireland. Her father worked in construction in a local economy where business was done within a tightly knit group and wealth moved between families. But coming off-the-back of the 1980s recession, he spotted an opportunity to relocate the family to London and find work in a city which was experiencing a mini economic boom. The contrast with village life was mind blowing; for Eilish, it was like an amusement park: from the number of people to the building work and businesses starting up; every time she walked down the street there was a new shop opening its doors. Until the 1990s, that is, when another recession took hold.

The backdrop of boom and bust, of an economy expanding and contracting every ten years, influenced Eilish’s young and curious mind. She wanted to understand the economic roller-coaster and became interested in financial cause and effect. In London, she was at the centre of the story, and she had questions: what makes an economy better? What makes it worse? She decided to try and answer them, applying for a degree in accounting and finance at the London School of Economics, before training to become a chartered accountant.

Over the next six years, she worked in London and Sydney, with clients from investment banks to car leasing companies. In the early 2000s, one of her clients suggested that financial derivatives might be interesting. She was still early in her career, and at the time, this part of the financial market was seen as a bit of a boys’ club. Access to the new and novel was exciting, and her curiosity once again opened a door. She remembers working in a small team, mapping and understanding complex financial products on whiteboards. When she became good at that, she was promoted, and given leadership and board positions across Europe.

Eilish describes her career as three chapters: professional, portfolio, and entrepreneurial. Her health scare and coaching experience helped her to move from the first to the second, but also to her boardroom experience. In 2016, she began developing a series of non-executive roles. But her personal experiences had also awoken something else within her; about how humans make decisions, and not always in their best interests.

Eilish had more questions, so she went back to university, enrolling on a postgraduate course in coaching psychology at Birkbeck. During her studies, she came to love coaching. It had always been part of her leadership style, but she hadn’t given those conversations a name. She set up her own leadership development practice four years ago, working with financial services firms and high-growth companies on their diversity, equity and inclusion ambitions. Chapters two and three have certainly given her chance to help others.

How do you manage your work-life balance?

“It took me time to realise that work is endless. It continues to grow because we are busy, ambitious and often want to do more. It wasn’t unusual, at the early stages of my career, to be working 12- to 14-hour days. But nowadays, I think about priorities and impact. Every year, I start by looking at the biggest three priorities for my business, for my family and for me. I then schedule the time required for these in my planner, before anything else. If I don’t have that frame of reference, it’s easy for me to do too much less important stuff.”

How can people get better at understanding themselves, and their priorities?

“Know your blind spots. It feels good to get stuff done, but if you are just doing a lot of busy work and not having the impact you want, you are likely working with blind spots. Ninety-five per cent of what we do is unconscious, which means we spend most of our day going through the motions. But it’s important to consciously be thinking about what we do and why, and ask questions, such as: is this the best way for me to use my time? What is my intention for doing this? Small regular check-ins like these create more conscious choices with our time. It gets easier with practice, but it’s a work in progress for all of us, including me!”

Looking back, what would you have done differently?

“I would have asked for support early on from a sponsor, mentor or coach. Women often do more to prove themselves and sometimes that means they don’t ask for help. When I started my practice, I was surprised by the number of people who didn’t access that kind of support. But asking for help is the most natural thing in the world; to understand our experiences in the context of professional relationships, organisational cultures, and personal values, for example. People in the workplace are more self-aware than they were, say, ten years ago; but senior leaders need support to navigate an increasingly complex agenda.”

What’s your advice for others starting out and developing their career?

“Get to know what you are really great at. Early on, that usually means taking on many different opportunities, which feels counter to what I’ve said about prioritising. But you can’t know what you are great at unless you have tried things. So, take the opportunities. Once you know what you are great at, make sure other people know. When you know what you are great at, and other people know, the likelihood of doing work in that area becomes exponentially higher.

“Also, prioritise relationships, and stay open and curious. The working world is small, and some of my previous clients and colleagues continue to be clients, today. Staying curious brings humility, since you can’t ever know everything. Openness and humility also allow you to nurture more powerful relationships with others; they make you more willing to consider opportunities when they arise, even if at first, they don’t seem like a good fit.

“Finally, the more we can hear real stories from real women, the more they will help others. Our working lives might not be perfect, with lots of ups and downs, but honesty and openness about these journeys will increase the chances of others choosing to do things their way – and hopefully change the experience of those coming behind, for the better.”

iGROWW is Protiviti’s internal women’s network group and stands for ‘Initiative for Growth and Retention of Women at Work’. It has a strong voluntary membership which tackles women’s professional issues through forums. It also facilitates networking events and community service activities. For more information, please contact Rhianne Williams [email protected].