Beyond Imposter Syndrome: Forge Your Unbreakable Path Through Adversity

Welcome to the Built by People podcast, where we share the stories and insights of the world's top HR leaders. Join us as we dive deep into the minds of HR executives, uncovering their strategies, challenges, and triumphs in shaping today's workforce. I'm excited to welcome Doretta to the Built By People Podcast. Doretta, thank you so much for joining us. And as a starting question, I always love to ask if you could share a little bit more about your career journey.

Absolutely. And thank you so much for having me. I'm glad to be here. It's interesting when I talk about my journey, it has had a lot of different organizations that I've had the opportunity to be a part of. I actually started my career on the PepsiCo side in the restaurants. Surprisingly, I tell people I have an undergraduate degree in hotel restaurant management. I started on the restaurant side first with Taco Bell, then Pizza Hut. At the time that I was there, they split off and became Yum!

Brands.

And then I've had the opportunity after that to just work with some amazing organizations. And each time it provided me growth and development from an HR professional. So I worked for ADP for a while, and I was an HR director there. I had the opportunity to go then work for EY, Ernst Young, where I had the opportunity to then actually do inclusiveness work. That's what we called it at the time, and it was specifically focused on diversity. I then went from there to Turner Broadcasting, which was again, another amazing opportunity and had lots of growth there. From different departments that I had the opportunity to work with and support. And then from there, First Data, where I talk about this in terms of just the relationships I've had. I worked with an amazing leader there who was very developing. And then from there, YMC of Metro Atlanta, and to here, the Atlanta Braves, as a chief culture officer. I talk a little bit about the story about the Atlanta Braves because it actually was a result of the relationships I had and what I did at Turner Broadcasting that got me to the Atlanta Braves. Because when I started with the Atlanta Braves, They had been sold to Liberty Media. And so I knew a lot of the leaders because they had been there at Turner Broadcasting at the time. So that's my journey. And then the different opportunities that I've had in the different roles in HR was all through that kind of tapestry I like to call of my journey.

Sharetta, I understand that you pursued your doctorate and, uh, did. When you did that, professors expressed some doubt in your ability to complete that program. How did you navigate those challenges and what motivated you to persist?

It's so funny. I tell people all the time, I did not go back to get my doctorate so you could call me Dr. Rhodes. I went back to get my doctorate because it was really important for me to have credibility when I sit in the room. My doctorate is in adult education, and a lot of the focus that I had when I was there was around oriental design. It was around power and power struggles within organizations. It was an interesting time for me because the time that I was doing it, I had— my sons were small. I was also going through, interestingly, at that time, a divorce as well. I was taking classes, I was going back and forth, and I remember two specific professors that said that I didn't seem committed to the program, and it was because I wasn't doing it full-time. I had to work. So I was doing it at the same time that I was working full-time and trying to also navigate my career. And so that was the first thing that I heard, that it didn't seem like I was committed to the program. The next thing I heard, and I remembered this vividly, it was specifically with the professor, and we were working on part of our chapter that you have to do for your dissertation, Chapter 3. And that chapter specifically talks about bringing all of the research together and how you do that. And he said to me that he had anticipated I would become all but dissertation. And I think that was the hardest message for me to hear because of the fact that I was— there was no way I felt like anyone could determine my commitment. And to hear that can be a very discouraging thought process because it is very hard to get through a doctoral process. And I think the thing that lifted me— so I will tell you this. I went home that night and probably was under my bed with a cover. Came to really understand how I was going to figure out how I do my next journey with this. But I realized as I was going through that, that this was something that was a personal goal for me. And it was something that was poured into me. I grew up from educators and the thought process that I would in some type of way fail my grandmother or fail my parents or even my sons at that point in time was heavy for me. And that's how I made the decision that I needed to move forward. And now I will tell you, it did take me 7 years to complete it, but I was able to complete my doctorate.

I wanna talk about the topic of emotional intelligence now.

Yeah.

And how have microaggressions and direct challenges influenced your experience with imposter syndrome, and what strategies have you developed to confidently take up space and command rooms?

I get this question a lot, and I tell people all the time, I probably suffer from imposter syndrome probably 3 times a week. It can be an email that I've received. It could be a meeting that I'm sitting in and something has occurred. I think the biggest thing for me that has been important for me, that I created, like my board of not only mentors, but supporters. And that's something that we always have to think about doing, because you're going to have those individuals for whatever reason that are not going to necessarily pour into you. So you have to find those that will.. And so for me, that has been the encouraging piece. And I have those individuals that decided that they felt like I was viable to be a leader. They poured into me on those particular things. They talked me through different circumstances. I think for me, the one thing, emotion intelligence is really critical to have is that one of the things that my leaders always taught me is that you can have a reaction, but you need to think about what that reaction is going to be before you do it. And so, It has made me very conscious around how I do that, not only for people that I report into, but people that I also have that report into me. I think it is so critically important to understand that anything you say has impact and the way you say it has impact as well. And because of those individuals, as I just spoke about with two professors that I had that were not necessarily encouraging. I think about that for individuals that I support now and those that came to me. Challenges that I've had with microaggressions, if I had not had like my suite of people that would support and come to me that I can call at any given time when something is going on, and that to me has been the one thing that has been the most impactful is that those relationships have carried me through, not only for me professionally, but personally as well, as I've gone from role to role and have had the opportunity that I've had with so many different organizations.

Could you elaborate on the importance of empowering other women and how you address comments suggesting that women and racial minorities should be content with their progress?

So I wish I could tell you that was always my case. I wish I could have been content, and I never was. I have a really good friend of mine that I would meet with him. I met him very early on in my career, and I would meet with him probably on a quarterly basis. And I would say, I'm ready for this next level. I'm ready for this. So going back to talking about support, I think that is such a critical part that we need to create the communities that we have for support. As I mentioned earlier in a question that you asked me, I think about the fact that when I've sat in rooms or I sat in places and spaces that I did not feel supported, That, to me, lifted me to make sure I support others in any type of way that I can. I think development is important. I think the opportunity to be on assignments and projects is important to grow. I was just telling someone that was on my team that it's not easy to grow. It's harder. I was telling her, when you are sitting in spaces and it seems soft and easy, that's not where your growth is going to come from. Your growth is going to come from the hard places. Your growth is going to come from those things that are difficult. But when you have those circumstances and those situations, ensure, again, you've got people that are around you that are helping you to build you and to develop you. And so for me, it has been very personally important to me that I take every call when someone calls me, if they're asking for support, I make sure that I am encouraging individuals because I know I've had both sides where it hasn't been so much encouragement. And where there has. And I know for me, my growth came for those individuals that truly supported me. And so I would, if there's anything that I would wanna make sure that I do is that I am always making sure I am supporting and I'm giving a hand up because there's, there are others that gave me that same hand up.

And what strategies have you found effective in uniting HR teams and how have these experiences been reflected in your book? And I'd love for you to talk a little bit more about your book, just to provide the audience a little more context around it.

Absolutely. Thank you. I published my book last July, and the name of it is Courage of Voice: Empowering Women to Open Professional Doors. It started actually with my dissertation, and it grew from there, so to speak. And it took me as long to write the book as it did for me to complete my doctorate. So I just put that out there as well. And I tell people all the time, And this is one thing that my publisher said to me, because I kept saying, who would want to read my book? And her perspective was that your story is not your own. So you really need to be able to share that. And I believe that. And I believe all of us have— we all have a story to tell. So I don't have the corner on the market of being an author. I think everybody out there should be trying to do it. And so for me, that was the encouragement for me to do so. In chapter 6 in my book, Taking the Helm as a Servant Leader, I really focus on my strategies around the importance of building a team, an HR team, and talking about the 8 traits that I think that are very critically important and expected of individuals that are part of my team and who I get the opportunity to lead. And it really is around being a consultant and a business partner. It is around making sure that you're providing guidance that is credible and people see you as a valuable, trusted advisor. Being a people champion and ensuring that happens when you're dealing with all of those things. So I talk about that in Chapter 6, and I go on to talk about one of the things that's really critical. One of the things that's really critical for me is operational excellence, and it is making sure that you're showing up consistently the same way every single time in the buckets of client engagement, team collaboration, and execution, and ensuring that there is actually, for me, there is that blueprint of operational excellence under those three pillars of how you need to show up as an HR professional. And I will say to you that I started collecting, I guess I could say, the best way of how operational excellence worked for me with working with leaders that talked to me about their expectations of HR professionals, what they wanted in their leaders that was providing them the services of human resources, the consultation of human resources. And so for me, I was able to see that as a blueprint and have been very intentional about passing that along for all of the teams that I support and in the organizations that I'm a part of. One of the reasons why I love it is because it provides expectations and it provides a way for you really to have a roadmap of what that looks like as an HR professional.

And how has your background in baseball and broadcasting influenced your perspective on leadership and HR management? Especially within sports organizations?

So I love that question as it relates to sports. It is funny. I have always loved baseball. Now, the funny part about this, I don't have any talent in my body to do sports of any kind, but I've always appreciated what sport does, how it brings people together, how it makes you make decisions about individual commitment, individual discipline. And so the funny story about that, I grew up in Kansas City, so very familiar with baseball. I used to watch and listen to baseball with my grandparents on their phone. And then as you fast forward, my sons, two of my sons played baseball from the age of 5 until they graduated from high school. So I was a baseball mom. I knew the play of baseball. When I started with the Atlanta Braves, I knew the business of baseball. And so I think having that and also Having the context of working for Turner Broadcasting and how sports was such a pivotal part of the organization, I got to see people both from a broadcast perspective, how you bring everything together. And so for me, it just became natural as I had the opportunity to come work here. I learned and understood the business of baseball just in terms of what it looks like as you're thinking about front office and how a team is fueled by an office of individuals that support in a very meaningful way, doing marketing, whether it's PR now, whether it's social media now, whether it is having analytics that's around baseball. It has been such a fascinating and rewarding way to look at business. And also the fact of the matter is that people love sports. They love to have their own hometown team and they love to have that connection. And that was something that also became critically important to me in terms of how do we impact not only our staff, but our community and also our fans that are associated with any type of sports team.

What parting advice would you like to provide to our community?

I think the parting advice that I would give is that understand and know your value. What we do as HR professionals is so needed and it is needed and it has been needed for years upon end. I think a lot of times it is easy to get discouraged because of some of the things that we have to handle. We have to have a vessel that takes everything in. And so I just remind HR professionals, empty your vessel, make sure you're available to take all of that in, but also know your value and know that you are impacting people individually, teams, leaders, and organizationally.

Thanks so much for joining us on the Built by People podcast in partnership with Transform. It was a pleasure to have you involved.

Thank you. So glad to have been here.