Inspiring individual or organizational change is one of the hardest things for any leader or manager to accomplish.

According to Shalini Verma, a high-energy leader at Google who practices trauma-informed management, it's not about the process or the tools. That’s the easy stuff. In her opinion, the ability to drive individual and organizational change starts with a single thread: self-awareness.

In this episode, Dart and Shalini discuss the fundamentals of trauma research and how it lends itself to management. They discuss practical ways to implement trauma-informed management, how to deal with automatic responses that stem from trauma, why empathy is the key to inclusive product design, trauma as a path of evolutionary development, and much more.

Topics Include:
- Defining trauma
- How trauma shows up in the workplace
- Trauma-informed management
- Practical applications of trauma-informed management
- How to become more self-aware
- How to heal from trauma
- The connection between awareness of the body and anxiety
- How to make better decisions
- Inclusive product design
- And other topics...

Shalini Verma is the ​​Global Lead of Technical Program Management at Google, helping to improve all of Google's products through global developer tools and frameworks. Named to Crain Magazine's Tech 50 - Top Technology talent, her career has transitioned from roles in process, to product, to leadership development. She is an MIT and Harvard Business School graduate.

Whether leading non-profit or for-profit organizations, her passion is to inspire leaders to transform themselves and the world. She has spent the last ten years discovering and developing tools through cross-pollination, collaboration, and experimentation across industries, age groups, and methodologies.

Resources Mentioned:
Listening to your heart might be the key to conquering anxiety: https://www.wired.co.uk/article/sarah-garfinkel-interocept
The Enneagram Prison Project: https://enneagramprisonproject.org/