In a season of every second person you meet saying ‘I have a podcast’, you may be asking yourself why did Kylie, founder of ofkin.com and author of The Leap Stories, feel compelled to start one too? As a writer/blogger I wanted to have deeper, more spontaneous conversations that could reach an audience on the move, specifically, driving or travelling from one point to another. As a parent driving home from dropping their kids at school, or a mobile worker between locations or wandering vacationer on route, I wanted to lift words off the page and have them land with tone and texture not accessible on a digital screen while on the go. On average, we will spend around 46 years of our life ‘working’. I’m interested in who we are when we’re at work, when we’re engaged in work and how work shapes us. I’m interested in the humanity of work, how it’s celebrated and how it’s shuttered. For the last three years I’ve written about taking a leap in your working life. This podcast is an extension of that idea, and designed to go behind the work and humanise the lived experience of designing our careers. I’m keen to explore the vulnerability of showing up in our working lives and putting ourselves out there to be seen, to have impact and to be brave. I want a chance to ask deeper questions and go behind the scenes of narratives that emerge through dialogue. Mostly, I want listeners to not feel alone when they’re working, especially when they’re having days that aren’t filled with glitter crusted unicorns showering down praise and good fortune. I have days that are filled with confusion, frustration, chronic self doubt, overwhelm, procrastination and anxiety. I also have days where I crack open a new idea, make a stellar connection, contribute helpfully and turn on light bulbs for people. I want to talk about the light and dark, and how we each find our way through. Leadership expert Simon Sinek said that if you don’t understand people, you don’t understand business. And social scientist Dr Brené Brown has pointed out that: ‘The biggest barrier to effective teams is not professional development – it’s personal development. People are not doing their own work on what it is that gets in the way of them fully showing up as the kind of people we need in teams, and leaders we need. It is what makes or breaks a team, a culture or leaders.’ This podcast is a result of the conversations I’ve been having with myself about who I am in my working life, how that spills out into my whole life (or maybe visa versa). And I want to talk about these things with other humans like you. So hence, I’m one of those people starting a podcast too. Thanks for listening. For more visit ofkin.com, or follow along on Instagram at instagram.com/ofkin