57 - Johanna Småros; ‘an introvert engineer who gets stuff done on time’.

Nordic Leaders

Now here’s a conversation we can all relate to, on the nature of working life today and how to navigate people, tech, and change, gracefully.

Johanna is co-founder of RELEX Solutions, a huge success story and the world's coolest provider of retail planning solutions!

Johanna describes what it’s like navigating the ‘hard skills’ world of engineering, data and tech, and at the same time sharing her experiences of collaboration and leading people and teams through change.

In our experience it’s rare to talk to somebody who is equally skilled at both the so called ‘hard and soft’ side of working life. Enjoy a warm-hearted conversation from someone ‘on top of their game’. Topics include

1. How to work with humans, ‘the enigma for everyone’. You can never know other people fully and perhaps not even yourself completely’

2. How to:

• apply your Intuition to identify what’s urgent/ important, and ‘fake emergencies’
• think about things, (‘thinking is so underrated’)
• use notifications effectively

3. Defining success for yourself, without peer pressure. When you get an impulse to do something, step back and ask, ‘Is this something I really want to do? & how is this gonna make me happier?’

4. In a world that’s never done, Johanna describes how she creates ‘progress’ everyday

5. Competing is ‘kind of irrelevant’, ‘but I am ambitious’

6. On leading people, ‘you should never fall into that trap of assuming that you kind of understand things. It's better to be explicit and ask. That's one lesson I've learned.

7. Confidence and public speaking, ‘A big change for me was finding an area where what I'm saying actually adds to the knowledge of the world.’

Enjoy this conversation with Johanna! J