Who’s Your Role Model? The 1 Answer You NEED Up Your Sleeve!
1948, Mum looking up at Grandma Hilda holding mum’s baby sister, plus A Morris Eight from 1948!
Have you got a role model up your sleeve?
The other day I was talking to my client at Deloitte and she was asking about the tricky questions that usually come up when you’re on a panel. She was talking about a conference panel, however I have come across this question whenever I have spoken at conferences, in job interviews, on the radio and to 6th formers at school. It’s one of those stock questions that, let’s face it, you to have an answer for.
My question today?
“Who’s your Role Model?”
I remember the first time I was asked this. It was part a panel discussion at a conference in London and I was one of 4 top experts.
Confession. I didn’t have a clue who my role model was and felt guilty, self-centred and ill-prepared for my panel interview. I think I came up with something vaguely acceptable. I actually can’t remember how I fudged or blagged the answer the first-time round.
The second time it came up I think I went a bit more ‘sleb’; Oprah (who’s going to argue?) or it could have been Michelle Obama, as I‘d just seen her live & ‘intimate’ interview at the O2 Arena in London, and it felt topical.
The third time, in a podcast, I had actually thought it through, and I did, this time have a genuine answer.
This is a true story!
My Grandma, Hilda, born 1912 (year of the Titanic) from Leicester, had just returned from Egypt, a widow (My mum is half Egyptian, which means, yes, I am a quarter Egyptian) in 1948.
She was working as a University lecturer and needed a car to get her to and from campus.
Not only was she the first woman (quite rare in those days) to drive a car in her street – she was the first person to own an actual vehicle. My mum tells me it was a bottle green two-tone Morris Eight and even remembers the number plate JYL 609.
Apparently, the neighbours were so excited, as a special treat they used to visit the house so they could sit in “JYL”. Not drive, just sit in the car because it was such a novelty.
Ten years later my Grandma had another first, she was one of the first EVER people to test drive the brand new M1 motorway in the UK!
When my Grandma was alive (RIP, she died in 2015 aged 98) I often found her quite old fashioned and “strict”. I never really realised the impact she had had on me. I didn’t appreciate how much of a role model she was until I sat down and thought it through.
She was an independent single mother, who brought up 2 girls post World War Two, with help from my old ‘Great Aunt Winifred’. It all sounds a bit like a Charles Dickens novel with the school-mistress-spinster-aunt – and it was!
Except my grandma was modern for her time; a botanist, she knew the name of almost every plant in the world! I wish I had taken more notice (I kill plants). She was always talking with my mum about Dave Attenborough and they were real ‘save the planet’ enthusiasts (before it became trendy).
So, here’s to my role model - Grandma Hilda, RIP, who taught me financial independence, the ability to have a career, children and be an expert at what you love! What a woman.
My question to you is – who’s your role model? Please do share.
Have you got someone in your past or present who has had a lasting impression on you?
My advice – if you can’t think of someone straight away, don’t worry, have a few people up your sleeve who you could tell a short story about next time you’re asked. Because you will be posed that question…many times in the future!
Please share your role model stories, it will inspire others to come up with a genuine answer to that question too.
Please send your role model comments to me at esther@estherstanhope.com
P.S.
If you haven’t taken the She-Boss speaker-type test to see if you’re a Plannerina Polly or a Wing-It -Wendy, you still can!
Take the She-Boss Quiz here.
Men are welcome to have a go too! You could be a Wing-It-Wonder or a Plannerina-Pete. (My brother, Dan described himself as a Plannerina Poppins!)