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Leading Well is a short, impactful podcast for executive women, and the men who support them, who want to lead with purpose and show up well in every part of their lives.
Through 10–15 minute solo episodes, leadership coach and speaker Gretchen Schott shares insights, practical tools, and personal reflections that help you navigate people problems, lead with authenticity, and grow your confidence from the inside out.
Rooted in faith and designed to inspire, each episode ends with a brief prayer—an invitation to pause, reflect, and reconnect.
If you’re ready to build trust, clarity, and connection in your work and life, Leading Well is your weekly dose of encouragement and strategy.
[00:00:00] Gretchen Schott: Hope and optimism are not the same thing. Optimism depends on outcomes and certainty. Hope survives even in uncertainty. Hope allows wisdom to emerge.
[00:00:17] Gretchen Schott: You're listening to Leading Well, the podcast for executive women and the men who support them, who are ready to lead with clarity. Confidence and compassion.
[00:00:26] Gretchen Schott: I'm your host, Gretchen Schott. Let's dive in.
[00:00:35] Gretchen Schott: Hi friends. Welcome back. This is the episode you've been waiting for to hear what my one word for 2026 is. Now my last episode, I talked about this leadership practice that I have done for over a decade. I choose one word to be my life theme for the year. And with that word, I also choose a scripture verse to follow me along with it.
[00:00:59] Gretchen Schott: And I find it helps me to be intentional and thoughtful in my growth as a leader, as well as just as a good human. Um, and so my process for coming up with my one word is one that comes over actually several weeks. I journal about the year and what I've been proud of and what I've been disappointed in, and.
[00:01:20] Gretchen Schott: Where I've seen growth in myself and where I want to continue to see growth and I just, I pray a lot with all of those thoughts and I wait for a word to kind of bubble up. Now, usually I sit down, I'm like, okay, God, I'm ready today. I'd like to have that word. And it never happens that way in all the years I've done this.
[00:01:39] Gretchen Schott: It just never has happened that way, but. Uh, generally I, I start thinking about different words that I think might resonate. I even might write them down as I'm kind of like, maybe it's this word, maybe it's that word. And then every single time. The word that is supposed to be my word for the year continues to like bubble up.
[00:01:58] Gretchen Schott: It'll come forward in songs that I'm suddenly like listening to and a word that I'm thinking of it like just comes forward. I'm like, okay, that's kind of interesting. Or it'll show up in a reel, like on my Instagram. Like people be talking about that. Topic and that subject matter or a TV show or a movie that I'm watching, like suddenly it's like, oh my gosh, that's like standing out.
[00:02:17] Gretchen Schott: It's kinda like when you go buy a car and you're like, I'm looking for a red jeep, and you never saw a red jeep. But now that you've got that word in your head or that that red jeep in your mind, all you see is the red Jeep. Well, for me, that word came through a lot of prayer last year. I learned a lot about love and love through sorrow and suffering.
[00:02:40] Gretchen Schott: And quite honestly, a lot of last year I felt really hopeless for a number of reasons, and it is because of that that the word hope really resonated with me for this year and that I'm choosing hope as my word for 2026. So when we think about our word, and when I think specifically about my word hope this year, there's a lot of different ways in which you can define that, right?
[00:03:08] Gretchen Schott: Psychology defines it as. A belief that the future can be better and that I have agency to help create that, that future. So psychology looks at it that way. In leadership, we look at hope as the belief or an ability to hold a compelling vision of what's possible and remaining honest about that vision.
[00:03:32] Gretchen Schott: Even when it's hard, spiritually hope is confident Expectation. Now, I know for many people when we think about hope, a lot of people say, oh, hope is just really about being optimistic. Hope and optimism are not the same thing. Optimism depends on outcomes and uncertainty. Hope survives even in uncertainty.
[00:03:59] Gretchen Schott: Hope allows wisdom to emerge. Optimism says, I think that this will work out. Hope says, even if it's hard, I am not without direction, meaning, or support. And true leadership needs hope, especially in this crazy world that we're living in right now. So I'm building hope with intention in three ways.
[00:04:29] Gretchen Schott: Receiving hope, choosing hope, and extending hope. Receiving hope through prayer. Stillness rest, meditation, choosing hope by really paying attention to those false beliefs that I have about myself and questioning and using logic in those moments to really ask myself is that true? And extending hope through my words, my decisions, and quite frankly, my intentional presence with other people.
[00:05:07] Gretchen Schott: I am a person that's wired for achievement, for progress, for movement, and hope often asks me to wait to trust, to let go of control and surrender. But I'm learning that stillness is not stagnation. Waiting is not weakness and hope. It is not passive. So hope is an intentional act of leadership, and that's why I am choosing that to be my word and to help me with that in corporation or in reflection, I guess.
[00:05:52] Gretchen Schott: I am journaling with a couple questions this year that I wanna share with you, and I encourage you to journal with these throughout the year as well. And that first question is. Where have I quietly stopped expecting things to improve? Where have I quietly stopped expecting things to improve? And then the second question, where in my leadership am I being invited to hope Again, not because it's easy, but because it's necessary.
[00:06:24] Gretchen Schott: Where am I being invited to hope again, not because it's easy, but because it's necessary. And with my one word, as I mentioned in the beginning, is I, I choose a verse to pray with throughout the year. I love a practice of Lectio Divina where you sit with a scripture and you read it three times and then you sit quietly.
[00:06:51] Gretchen Schott: And pay attention to what word kind of shimmers or bubbles up or makes you kind of pause or gives notice and then invite God to kind of inform you as to what is the invitation for you there. And so the verse that I've chosen to go with, my word of hope this year is from Romans 15:13, and it goes like this, may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing.
[00:07:20] Gretchen Schott: So that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. It's my hope that by the end of this year, I feel as though I am joyful and I have peace in believing, and I'm abounded in hope by the Holy Spirit. If this episode resonated with you, I invite you to sit with the word hope this week. Not to fix anything, not to gain clarity, but rather notice where you feel hope depleted.
[00:07:58] Gretchen Schott: Notice where it's present, notice where it gets recharged. I would love to hear what your word for the year is and how I can support you. I'd love to learn what those words are and even highlight some of my future shows and episodes, digging into that word and how it relates to leadership. And if you'd like support and clarity and confidence leading this year, I would love to work with you.
[00:08:31] Gretchen Schott: But until then, be sure that you are Leading Well.
[00:08:38] Gretchen Schott: Ready to lead well or need some coaching and encouragement? Sign up for my newsletter or reach out for a personal consultation. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe and leave a review.