EP227: Leadership Lessons from a Weekend with a Paintbrush
Listen Here:
(The notes below are only a brief bullet point summary of what is discussed in the podcast. Be sure to listen to get all of the goodness! If you would like a full transcription of the episode, please send an email to angie@angie-robinson.com.
I painted my guest bathroom this past weekend. This is relevant - I promise! Stick with me.
It had been on my to-do list for two years — not because I've never painted before (I have), and not because I didn't know what color I wanted (I'd been on Pinterest, Claude, and every paint website known to humankind). It just kept not happening.
What finally got me to do it? An arbitrary deadline. My daughter is graduating from high school, and I added "paint the bathroom" to the grad party prep list. That was enough. Sometimes that's all it takes — not a perfect reason, just a reason.
As I stood on a very unstable wooden ladder with paint on my hands, a thought kept breaking through: this is a podcast episode. Because every phase of that project maps directly onto what happens when we go after hard goals, make real changes, or finally have the conversations we've been putting off.
So let me walk you through it — the whole project — alongside a leadership example. I'm calling the leader in this story Judy. (Yes, as in Judy Hopps from Zootopia. My brain works in Disney.) Judy is a composite — built from real leaders I've worked with over the years. Everything about her story is true to its bones.
Step One: Clear the Room
Before I could paint, I had to take everything down. The towel racks. The light fixture. The shower curtain rod. Every accessory that made that bathroom feel like a bathroom came off the walls first.
The room looked worse before it looked better. That's what clearing does.
But here's the part I love: at the end of the project, I got to decide what went back up. Some things stayed. Some got upgraded — new towels, a new shower curtain. The clearing itself created space for intentional choices.
Judy's version: Before Judy could have the conversation with Nick — her talented but struggling direct report — she had to clear out the stories she'd been carrying. The story that having this conversation made her the bad guy. The one that said caring about Nick meant never saying anything hard. She'd been holding those stories for four months, and they'd been getting in the way.
She also had to clear her schedule — not a five-minute hallway check-in, but a real conversation with real space. And she had to set aside the version of the conversation she'd been dreading in her head — the one where Nick got defensive, where everything went sideways, where she said the wrong thing. That version wasn't real yet. But it had been living rent-free in her head.
Clearing doesn't mean losing something permanently. It means creating space to decide what stays, what goes, and what gets upgraded.
Step Two: The Tape
Taping is miserable. I say this as someone who has painted before and blocked this part out. It's slow. It's detailed. It's not the pretty part.
There I was — on my hands and knees along the baseboard, up on a ladder above the mirror — and my brain started talking. I hate this. Maybe the bathroom wasn't that bad. What if I just hang a new picture?
My brain was fully prepared to negotiate me out of the entire project.
And that's not surprising. I knew going in that taping would be hard. I knew it would bring up this kind of chatter. And my brain still tried to get me to stop.
Here's the move: you have two choices. You can listen to your brain, put the tape down, and walk away. Or you can say, yep, I hear you, this part is not fun — and then do it anyway. That's it. Acknowledge the thought. Don't fight it. Don't argue with it. Just note it, and keep going.
Judy's version: Judy sat down to write out what she wanted to say to Nick. And her brain started talking too. What if he gets upset? What if this makes things worse? Maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe it's not that bad.
That last one is especially sneaky — it sounds like good perspective. But it's just the tape. It's the uncomfortable part of the process, and it's the brain's way of getting you to stop before you even start.
Judy had to do the same thing: acknowledge the thought, don't fight it, and keep going anyway. Getting past the brain chatter doesn't mean silencing it. It means choosing your action in spite of it.
Step Three: Take the Walk
After I finished the taping, every instinct said push through, you have momentum, keep going. But I also knew I was already in my head. So instead, I put on my shoes and went for a walk.
This is the key: I liked my reasons. I wasn't walking away because I was quitting. I was making a strategic choice to come back in a more grounded space. That's a completely different thing.
Judy's version: Judy had drafted her opening for the conversation. She read it back and realized the words felt clunky. She was tangled up. So she closed her laptop and gave herself permission to come back tomorrow. She came back clear.
The difference between a strategic pause and avoidance lives in your reasons. If you're pausing to come back stronger, that's wise. If you're pausing because you're hoping the situation disappears on its own — that's avoidance. Only you know which one is true.
Step Four: The Trim
I had built up the trim work in my head as this terrible, painstaking process. And honestly? Once I got into it, it wasn't as bad as I'd imagined. Meticulous, yes. Slower than I wanted, absolutely. But there was something deeply satisfying about watching a clean line emerge where there wasn't one before.
I kept thinking: I almost talked myself out of starting this. I almost let the story in my head stop me from finding out I could do it.
Judy's version: Judy had the conversation with Nick. She'd spent months dreading a version where everything went wrong. The actual conversation was hard. There were uncomfortable silences. But Nick didn't get defensive. He got quiet — and then he said something she never expected:
"I've been struggling lately. I haven't told you because I didn't know how to bring it up."
The conversation Judy had been avoiding for months turned out to be the conversation Nick needed her to start.
Not every hard conversation ends this way. Sometimes they are messy. But more often than we expect, the thing we've been dreading is not nearly as bad as the version we've been running on repeat in our heads. You won't know until you do it.
Step Five: The Rolling
This part I love. There's something satisfying about rolling paint onto a wall — visible progress in real time. The rhythm of it. Every phase of a project has its own texture. Some parts are grueling. Some are tedious. And some just feel like flow.
The trick is not letting the hard parts convince you that you'll never get to the good ones.
Judy's version: After that first conversation with Nick, Judy started to find her footing. They set up regular check-ins. She got clear on what support looked like. And the weight she'd been carrying — that thing she'd been avoiding — started to lift.
There is a version of leadership that feels like flow. It happens when you're connected to your people, when hard things don't feel as heavy because you're moving through them instead of around them. It comes after the tape. It always does.
Step Six: The Ladder (a.k.a. the Bruises)
We have had this wooden ladder for years — since I met my husband, probably. It's unstable. I don't like it. I knew I didn't like it going in, and I used it anyway because I didn't have time to go buy a new one.
I came out of this project with bruises on my legs from pressing myself against the top rung to reach the ceiling. And I had to ask my husband for help getting the light fixture down. Could I have done it alone? Maybe. But why would I?
Growth comes at a cost. Maybe not dramatic costs — but bruises. Moments of discomfort. And sometimes, the smartest move is asking for help.
Judy's version: Her relationship with Nick didn't become easy after one conversation. There were more conversations. Weeks where progress felt slow. A moment where she delivered feedback that stung — and she felt it too. She reached out to HR. She talked to a trusted mentor. She didn't carry it alone.
Asking for help is not a weakness. I haven't always been good at that, because of what I thought it said about me. But asking for help is courage. It's strength. It's a smart strategy.
Step Seven: The Second Coat
Going from a very dark gray to an almost-white? One coat was never going to do it. You could see the gray underneath. It looked patchy, uneven. I knew this would happen — but in the moment, tired and not quite there yet, it still feels discouraging.
Here's what I noticed though: the second coat went faster. Easier. With each pass, less of that old color came through.
Judy's version: Old patterns don't disappear after one conversation. Judy had to keep showing up, revisiting the feedback, checking in with Nick. And she had to keep noticing when some of his old habits started creeping back through.
Mindset work is the same way. You don't have one insight and suddenly everything changes. You go back. You put on another coat. Gradually, the old way of thinking shows up less and less.
This is something I talk about in coaching all the time. One great session does not equal done. It takes multiple coats to get to the results you're actually looking for.
Step Eight: The Color That Wasn't What I Pictured
When it was all said and done, the color wasn't quite what I'd envisioned. Too light. Almost white. Not exactly the vibe I'd had in my head after all that planning.
In that moment, I had a choice: call it a failure and start over, or look honestly at what I'd actually accomplished. My original goal had been to brighten the room. And it was bright. The space felt completely different. I'd met my intention — even if it didn't match my vision exactly.
I kept the color. And I liked my reasons.
If you can't get to a place of genuinely embracing a result, but you give up anyway — you'll walk past it every day and feel it. That's not helpful. The distinction matters: staying the course because it's the right call, versus because it's easier than starting over. Both can look the same from the outside. One will serve you. One will haunt you.
Judy's version: Nick eventually moved into a different role. A better fit. That wasn't the outcome Judy had hoped for — she'd been hoping for a turnaround. What she got instead was clarity. For both of them.
Was that a failure? She had the conversation. She did the work. She helped someone find the right fit, even when it wasn't on her team anymore. I say that's exactly what a good leader does.
Step Nine: Pull the Tape — and Touch Up
Pulling the tape is my favorite part. That's when the clean lines appear, the color pops, and the room that was only in your head starts to exist in real life.
I pulled it all off, stood back — and immediately noticed all the spots that needed touching up. Places where the tape had pulled new paint off. Corners that needed another pass. Some gray still peeking through around the trim.
That's not failure. That's just the truth of anything worth doing. You finish, and then you adjust.
Judy's version: She stood back too. She saw a team that trusted her more because they'd watched her handle something hard with integrity. She had a clearer sense of her own leadership — what she was capable of, and where she still wanted to grow.
And of course, there were touch-ups. Some relationships on the team had been affected by Nick's situation and needed attention. Her own communication patterns had surfaced in new ways that were worth examining.
We don't graduate from growth. We do the work, we stand back, and we notice what's next. That's not a problem. That's evolution.
The Three Keys: They Were Here the Whole Time
Let me bring it home with the Three Keys to Leadership Magic, because they showed up in every single step.
Character — who you are, your values, the beliefs that drive your behavior — showed up every time there was a decision to make. Do the easy thing, or do the right thing? Skim the second coat because I'm tired, or remember why I started?
Confidence — belief in yourself, your voice, your willingness to face a challenge — showed up every single moment the brain started negotiating. And then kept going anyway. Confidence isn't the absence of the chatter. It's moving forward while the chatter is still talking.
Connection — relationships, trust, safety — showed up in Judy's entire arc. The conversation she'd been avoiding was the very thing that could deepen trust if she was willing to have it. And when Nick said, "I've been struggling more than I've let on" — that was connection doing exactly what it's supposed to do. Creating space where the truth could finally be spoken.
All three keys. Always showing up together. Always, always, always.
Here's Where I'll Leave You
Whatever you've been putting off — the conversation, the goal, the change you know you need to make — think about my bathroom.
You know how to do this. You have done hard things before. The paint was never the problem. The tape was never the problem. It's our brains, doing exactly what brains do.
And you get to decide what to do with that.
Clear the room. Do the taping. Take the walk if you need to. Go back for the second coat. And when it's done — stand back and look at what you built.
You've got this. You are the magic. ✨
What Do You Think?
What have you been putting off? Are you ready to get started?
Links
Discover Your Personality Style Quiz [download]
Please leave a review in Apple Podcasts + share with a friend
It will help others find the podcast - the more leaders we can impact - the better our workplaces and lives will be!
Schedule a FREE Discovery Call
Click here to schedule some time - let’s talk about how we can work together through one-on-one coaching, Insights Discovery workshops or other leadership development work!