Shelley E. Kohan (00:02.232)
Haley, I am so excited to have you here with me today on Lead Like Her. And what’s interesting is you have a very dynamic background, writer, speaker, advisor, coach. So I’d like to jump right in and first ask you, I wanna go back to your early years in your leadership journey. And I know you worked for L Brands for 16 years. And so when I look at those 16 years,

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (00:03.489)
you

Shelley E. Kohan (00:31.96)
can’t even imagine what you experienced in shifts in leadership and consumer behavior. So tell us a little bit about those, that journey at the beginning of your career.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (00:42.667)
Thanks. was such an amazing time to be at L Brands or Limited Brands. can’t, looking back, I can’t imagine other than those early days in kind of the sixties and the seventies, I can’t imagine a more interesting time to be at that enterprise. So I was very, very fortunate. I do not have a retail background. I do not have a business background. I had a communications background and a background in storytelling, great books and theater.

So how I ended up at All Brands is anyone’s guess. I can make it make sense in hindsight, but really it was just incredible stroke of luck that I ended up there. And that was back in 1997. So I was a young person. I’d never worked in a corporate environment before. And I was completely and totally unprepared for the job that I was there to do. So that meant, I think, that I entered the job with a lot of curiosity.

And a beginner’s mindset because I was a beginner and and in way that served me really well. Over the time I was there. So.

Shelley E. Kohan (01:49.176)
That’s amazing. back during that time in the late 90s, That was like limited brands was the company to be working at. That was back in their like tremendous heyday, right?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (02:00.833)
Yeah, it was. Yeah, when I joined the company in 1997, they were just coming off of a period that I’ll refer to as the growth through growth period. So, you know, for probably 10 to 15 years before I arrived, it was opening more stores, opening more stores, thousands and thousands and thousands of stores. I think at the height of the time that I was at L Brands, I want to say we were writing something into the tune of, and I might get this wrong, but

let’s say like 400,000 to 500,000 W2s a year. Just because of the incredible number of employees that were in the stores, that were in the distribution centers for holiday. It was just this unbelievably large retail machine. But growth was coming through growth. So when I started at Elbrans, I was actually on the public relations side doing media relations. And it was so long ago, we were using fax machines to do this. So that just gives you a sense of,

Shelley E. Kohan (02:56.823)
Hahaha.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (02:59.009)
of time frame here. But around that time, the business was beginning to shift and the board and Les, the founder, were beginning to move into what we all think of referred to as the family of brands era of the business. So this recognition that growth wasn’t necessarily going to come through growth, but it was going to come through brand and through branding. And that campaign

of creating a family of mega brands was really the era that I grew up in inside L Brands. And what coincided with that was a recognition that while you were building large mega brands, that there was a home office support team that could be established to serve all of those brands. So up until that point, every single brand operated as its own business.

with its own finance team, its own HR team, its own communications team, really running very, very independently under this holding company of the limited or the limited ink. So limited brands that move into mega brands was a major organizational shift as much as it was an externally facing brand shift for the organization.

Shelley E. Kohan (04:15.917)
That’s amazing, Haley. And just tell me, I’m just very curious, and a lot of our listeners are young executives or students that are wanting to pursue in the industry these leadership. So here’s this young executive, you come in, you say you have no experience and you just kind of got learned by fire, but what leadership skills did you learn and take away from that experience at Limited Brands?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (04:40.865)
That’s a question. Some of them I think were lessons that I learned and understood to be insights in the moment. And then some of them I only really in hindsight were able to see the lessons that I was learning. one of them I was thinking, was remembering this very early moment, one of my first roles on the external communications team before I moved into the internal and strategic team was to help write the monthly sales press release.

So this is a very important thing. It went out every month. It was reporting to the street and to all of our shareholders and to the public what the business was doing. So I mentioned earlier my caveat that I had no background in retail and no background in business. A thing I’ve also recently learned about myself is I’m a little neuro spicy and I’m a little neuro spicy in that I have dyscalculia, which is almost dyslexia, but for numbers.

So there I was responsible for writing the helping to draft the press release on the numbers of the business. And I’m going to admit to you and admit to all of your listeners that for the first six months of my employment at L Brands, I thought comps and likes were two different numbers. It took me a few months to realize that they were the same number each month. Isn’t that funny that the comps number and the likes number seem to be the same? So that just gives you an idea of the baseline that I was working with for knowledge. So I think what

Shelley E. Kohan (05:53.613)
I

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (06:07.829)
What served me well unintentionally was that I had to be curious because I knew absolutely nothing. So when I was courageous, I asked really stupid questions. Sometimes I asked them in the room and sometimes I asked them outside of the room, but I had to ask. Otherwise I would think Thompson likes were the same thing. So that curiosity, I think served me well. The other thing that served me well, but frankly, I’m not sure I would have been able to do in any other environment.

was because I was wholly unprepared for the jobs that I was being asked to do, I think I went into them with an entrepreneurial mindset. And the business, even though it had the longest serving founder, chairman, CEO in the Fortune 500 at that time, even though it was a Fortune 500 company, there was an entrepreneurial mindset in that business that appreciated other entrepreneurial mindsets.

Shelley E. Kohan (06:45.036)
Interesting.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (07:03.595)
there really wasn’t a rule book for how you could advance as a leader and what you could do. So I was very fortunate. I got to make up my jobs and see opportunities and create jobs around them. So I think in the 16 years I was there, none of the jobs that I had actually existed before I was in.

Shelley E. Kohan (07:24.557)
That’s crazy. Well, that’s a great inspiration for our listeners. So you have this great experience at this well-established company. You’re kind of being very successful. You were there for 16 years, and then you decide, I’m going to open up my own business. So tell us a little bit about what prepared you to open your business, and what does the leadership skills look like going from limited brands, very established, structured business, to what I would say a very unstructured business model.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (07:54.635)
Yeah, it’s a great question. When I left L Brands, I had an opportunity to continue to do exactly what I’ve been doing at L Brands in another business. So there were two or three other businesses that were remaining and retail businesses that were recruiting for similar communications leadership roles as to the one I had. So I went on those interviews and I’m glad that I did because it helped me realize

that that’s not what I wanted to do. And I can tell stories about that later, but that recognition that there was something after L Brands that maybe I could take these 16 years of experience scaling, doing things that are very, very large scale. And perhaps there were some things that I learned to do that I could share with others. That was kind of the first insight for me. And then the second was, I think I took from

that experience in corporate America that, and this was one of the big insights I had was that the shareholder primacy model, which existed at L Brands and within a lot of businesses at that time, didn’t feel completely congruent with my values. I knew there was something bigger than that.

And I was fortunate to find it around the time that I left L Brands in this model of more conscious business and a stakeholder oriented business that recognizes that shareholders are one stakeholder in the business and that all of those stakeholders need to be need to be concerned. The leaders need to be concerned with all those stakeholders and find win win win opportunities for all of them. That was another big insight and now I’ve forgotten what the initial question was.

Can you repeat it?

Shelley E. Kohan (09:46.492)
No, just what so first of all, let me just comment on the stakeholders So you were had you were thinking about the stakeholder approach before it became very I don’t want to say trendy but very important for companies to look at a stakeholder You were above you were ahead of everybody else in that regard So I applaud you for that thinking about you know a bigger consciousness of And we’re gonna get into some of the other work that you’re doing that exemplifies that but the question was so the leadership skills required

your first 16 years in a structured company versus owning your own business, which is, in my opinion, very unstructured, at least at the beginning as a startup.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (10:24.543)
Yeah, that’s great. So thank you. Thank you for that for getting me back on track. So I think that I mentioned before that, you L Brands had this entrepreneurial spirit, somewhere at the heart of it. And I was very fortunate that because of the role that I played, not because I was the smartest person in room, not because I was a leader in the business in any of the retail businesses, I just got to be in the room a lot because I was the person holding the notebook and the pen. So as a result of that, I got to

really unintentionally absorbed 16 years of amazing business lessons and insights from some of the smartest people I’ve ever worked with. So from less down to all of the different leaders of the retail brands and just listen and absorb. it was a little bit entrepreneurial spirit by Osmosis. So recognizing customer intimacy, the importance of really knowing your customer.

like you would know a best friend. That is certainly something that I’ve taken into the business. The insight that inclusion makes us stronger, that if we include more voices and more people and more thinking styles, the results that we produce will be better than if we are narrow in our thinking. So those things I think served me really well. What didn’t serve me well was a corporate environment.

So to be honest, I had to unlearn a lot of things, just from the very simple, which is, there’s an IT department who takes care of that, or we can send that to finance to realizing that I was the IT department and I was finance. So just from the simple practical aspects of it, but also unlearning a lot of the not necessarily healthy ways of thinking about work and thinking about leadership.

Shelley E. Kohan (11:44.736)
Wow.

Shelley E. Kohan (12:01.087)
you

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (12:13.118)
that I just needed to strip away as I was building my own business.

Shelley E. Kohan (12:16.976)
that’s amazing and you’re right. You become everybody and that’s such a different skill set. So I want to ask you, can you give us an example of a very difficult decision you had to make and maybe the thought process behind that?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (12:31.393)
That’s a good question. It’s funny that the decision that I think of immediately is the decision to leave the corporate retail world. And I’m thinking back to one of those interviews. So was on an interview for another VP role within another large retailer based in New York. was going to be everything I’d always said I wanted, being in New York and doing this job that I’d done.

And in one of the final interviews, the HR leader said, I want to ask you a question. How do you feel about checking your phone first thing in the morning as soon as you wake up to see if there’s anything that needs to be addressed and checking it the last thing before you go to bed? How do you feel about that? And I was struck by the honesty of the question and I appreciate the transparency. And my first thought was, well,

Shelley E. Kohan (13:20.022)
Wow.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (13:29.929)
I’ve been doing that for 16 years as soon as I got a mobile phone. And I don’t want to do that anymore because I don’t think it’s healthy. I don’t think I’m my best self under those conditions. And that decision, I think it was walking away from that interview, know, walking through the streets of New York, the city that I wanted to return to and I hadn’t been in for 16 years and realizing that I needed to decide to take myself out of that process because it wasn’t

right for me. wasn’t congruent with my values and it wasn’t where I wanted to go. It was a hard decision.

Shelley E. Kohan (14:05.772)
Haley, that’s an amazing, first of all, Haley, I’ve never heard of an interview question like that. So that’s a real game changer. Good for you for being honest about, you know, being self-reflective at that moment.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (14:19.061)
Well, and frankly, good for them. We need more businesses to be more honest about the culture. There’s a lot of lip service paid to culture. And the more honest we are about who we are and what our culture and behaviors are that we’re expecting, the more we get a right fit from the people that we’re hiring. So it’s better for everybody.

Shelley E. Kohan (14:21.44)
Hahaha.

Shelley E. Kohan (14:25.249)
It’s

Shelley E. Kohan (14:40.864)
Yeah, totally. OK, so tell me about your mentors, role models, anyone who you really kind of reflect back on and think they really influenced your leadership journey.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (14:52.964)
Well, the obvious choice are the people that I reported to along the way. So, know, Bruce, Jane and Sandy and giving shout outs to all of them for being such great mentors for me. But, you know, one of the first people that I reported to within that structure, actually there are two. One was an anti-role model and one was a role model. And I think they’re both important.

So when you are a young person in business, it’s almost as important to have the boss that shows you how you do not want to lead.

Shelley E. Kohan (15:28.52)
Absolutely.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (15:29.961)
So I won’t say any more about that, only to say I hope that I demonstrate a different kind of leadership than what I experienced in my early years of being an employee. And then the second thing I’ll say is there was a gentleman by the name of Kurt Mudd who led the team when I was leading the internal communications team, he was our mentor. And he taught me the power of and.

He used to say, don’t give into the tyranny of or, know, look for the power of the and in that situation. And that, the insight, it took me a while to really learn it, but that unlocked so much for me. And later, I think was connected to these insights around conscious capitalism and stakeholder orientation. This idea that in every situation, whether it’s a really big business decision or it’s a small decision on your team,

that if you can find the win, win, win, win situation where everyone benefits from the decision, that’s where you’ve really unlocked something powerful. So I thank Kurt for that insight.

Shelley E. Kohan (16:39.87)
that’s excellent, Haley, I love that. So the other thing that has been really important and it’s grown more and more important over the years is making sure that you have diverse perspectives and that those diverse perspectives are valued and really integrated into the decisions you’re making. So how do you make sure that happens?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (17:02.529)
It’s really, really important and increasingly more important, think, especially in this world where we are physically disconnected from each other more than we ever have been. So I think the first step is to ask, who are we serving in this particular situation? Who are our stakeholders? And are they in the room? How are they in the room? So the best thing is to actually have them in the room.

Do you have people representing all the different perspectives that you need? Do you have people who have the, excuse me, do you have people who have the different experiences that you’re looking for, the different, have played the different roles that you need to be weighing in on the decision that you’re making? So first, create the map and then figure out how to bring them in. And sometimes that’s physically bringing them into the room. And sometimes it’s going out and collecting those insights that you need.

before you come together to make a decision, to make sure that you have that in your framework for thinking.

Shelley E. Kohan (18:03.986)
love that. is there like do you have like a motto or quote or a mantra or something that kind of guides you through your leadership journey?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (18:12.811)
Yes, I do. I’ve had a few. would say the first one, and this is timely because my friend Linus O’Brien is just coming out with a documentary about his dad and the film that his dad put out many, years ago that you might’ve heard of called The Rocky Horror Picture Show. one of the, it was a guiding light for me as a kid who felt like she didn’t belong. And one of the,

Shelley E. Kohan (18:31.34)
I love the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (18:41.353)
One of the songs in that is don’t dream it, be it. And that as a young person, that was one of my mantras. Don’t just sit around dreaming it, actually be it. Do what you need to do to be the thing that you want to be. But the mantra that comes to mind that’s more recent is a few years ago I was asked to teach a class at Jewish Family Services in Columbus, Ohio where Storyforge is based.

And after I taught the class, I got a card, a thank you card. And on the front of the thank you card, and I still have it here on my wall. So thank you, Malka, for that card. It is a quote from Rabbi Hillel, who was a Jewish scholar. And the quote is, if I am not for me, who will be? If I am only for me, what am I? And if not now, when?

So three very simple reminders, one, that I have to take care of myself. I have to consider myself, take care of myself first. But if I am only concerned with myself, what am I?

Shelley E. Kohan (19:50.125)
Unbelievable, I love that. Thank you for sharing that. That’s amazing. Something, a mantra we all could live by. What do you think are some of the barriers specifically that hold young women back from rising to the top of their fields?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (20:08.609)
The barriers are both obvious and hidden. I think of them in the three circles of control. There are things that young women in business right now can’t control. There’s systemic racism and systemic sexism. We have to recognize that that exists in our structures and do everything we can to dismantle that.

And then I think about the two other circles, our circle of influence, the things that we have in our control to influence, and then the actual things that we can control. So when I, especially when I’m talking with young women in business who are struggling, I ask them to think about those circles. What are the things that they completely control? And one of those things is how they show up in the moment, how they react in situations, especially difficult and challenging ones.

how they are as a peer and as a leader of themselves and a leader of other people. And then what their influence is, how can they influence the cultures that they’re in? I think about the incredible effort and changes that we’ve made over the last couple of decades in making the workplace both a safer and a more supportive place for women. So I think my initial instinct is to look for the positive.

while recognizing that the negative is there and we need to find ways to dismantle.

Shelley E. Kohan (21:37.751)
Yes, we do. by the way, so you know, our mission for the podcast is really to provide inspiration for future female leaders, but also to help any existing leaders in our industry to succeed. But you have been very supportive of uplifting women, both in our industry, but also you’re the founding member of Matriots. Am I saying that correctly? Matriots. Matriots.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (22:00.501)
The matriots, yes. Like the patriots, but the matriots, yes.

Shelley E. Kohan (22:05.228)
which is Ohio’s first multi-partisan PAC dedicated to electing more women to public office. So I have to know, because I think it aligns with our Lead Like Her series, what was your inspiration for the Matriots and what motivates you to continue to help others?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (22:27.051)
Thank you. Yeah, the Matrease is an organization that’s very, very close to my heart. So I was incredibly honored to be asked to be one of the founding members of the organization. I think there are 500 men and women who during that period actually became founders and bring that organization to life. But it was really, it was founded by seven women who after the March on Washington in 2017 said,

Okay, we have to do something. And this may be an interesting correlation to your earlier question about women in the workplace. Because here was a group of women who were looking at the national and the international stage and saying, this is broken and it’s wrong. And what can we do to fix it? And it would be very easy to throw up your hands and say, well, there’s nothing I can do. And the women got together and they said, well, somebody should run for office. Well, I’m not gonna run for office. Are you gonna run for office?

I said, well, no, the national stage seems too big. So then they looked a little bit smaller and they said, well, what about the state of Ohio? This is where we live. And we know we have terrible representation of women in state government. If we can make a difference in Ohio, it can make a difference in the world. And so they really thought long and hard about how they could make a difference. Who was already making a difference and in what ways and where was that white space in the market?

where they could make a significant difference and they realized it was funding women running for office. So raising money in a pack to be able to support those women who were running for, you know, seemingly insignificant, sometimes local offices and local positions, which we know they’re not insignificant. They’re very significant. I was on board from the moment I heard about it.

and was very pleased to whenever I can kind of drop in and help them with their work. I think the way they go about their work is actually a wonderful lesson for other women in business who are looking to support women who are rising up in their organizations. One of their missions is to demystify the political arena so that women understand and can actually activate the power that they have.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (24:46.721)
So that’s great advice. If you’re a woman and you are in leadership, how can you demystify the culture, the organization, the politics, so that the younger women who report to you understand how it all works? The second thing they do is they celebrate, they support, and they endorse women who are willing to throw their hat into the ring to run for office. And that’s important. It’s hard to do. So look around in your organization. Who are the women who are?

who are ambitious and active and really want to throw their hat in the ring for higher leadership positions, support them, encourage them, give them what they need to help them grow and develop into that leadership.

Shelley E. Kohan (25:26.505)
Hailey, that’s amazing and I applaud you for the work that you are doing and helping to uplift more women in all, matriots. I think that’s great and I think you’re right. I think sometimes we think, you know, how can we get to the CEO level when we should be thinking a little smaller and just go step by step, right? That’s a great way that you looked at it from the political field.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (25:45.899)
Absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, think about, you know, when I think back on L Brands, the number of leaders who started in the stores, you know, you’re thinking, well, this person is just working the cash wrap. That person working the cash wrap might be the head of stores later. So how can you help them grow into the kind of leader that you’d want to work for? So I was very fortunate at L Brands when I became vice president of the internal communications team, I was promoted from a group of peers.

Shelley E. Kohan (26:03.477)
That’s right.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (26:18.853)
Any of my peers could have had that role and I would have been happy to work for any of them. So if you if you look at you know everybody on your team as a volunteer and if you look at everybody on your team is your potential boss you know how do you want the team to operate what kind of culture do you want to create that can be humbling.

Shelley E. Kohan (26:42.207)
So here’s one of my favorite parts of our Lead Like Her series and it’s called the rapid fire questions. So I’m gonna ask you question really quick, bang, bang, bang, and you’re just gonna give us your quick answer. Are you ready?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (26:54.273)
Yes, I’m ready.

Shelley E. Kohan (26:55.923)
Okay, here we go. What one piece of advice would you give female leaders that are currently working?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (27:04.307)
you have more agency than you think. You are the author of your story. You may not control all the plot points, but you get to control how the story is written. So whenever you find yourself in a moment thinking, is happening to me, change your mindset and think, this has happened. Now, how am I gonna write this next chapter?

Shelley E. Kohan (27:27.005)
Love it. Okay, what three tips would you give students? So these are our emerging leaders.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (27:35.073)
Good. So emerging leaders, I would say the first is to appreciate compound interest. So the first time you get, and this is like a mom thing, right? The first time you get promoted, you’re gonna get a little bit of money, is great. Go take yourself on a trip and then invest in yourself. Put that money away. Understand that the power of compound interest means that when you wanna go off and start your own business in a few years,

you might actually be able to invest in yourself. So that’s the first thing, super practical, sorry for the mom stuff. The second one is just be curious. Be as curious as you possibly can. So get out of your job, get out of your industry, get out of the day-to-day of your work and try to connect with as many people as you can outside of the office. Build those connections now, especially in a time when we’re doing most of our work.

on a video screen, we need more human connections. So the more that you can accumulate and the more curiosity with which you can take yourself into those conversations, the better return you will get later on those connections and on that network that you’re building. And there was one more thing. I would say the third thing for you to invest in is to invest in your own development as a communicator. So learning to speak.

without fear, learning to write and learning to think. Those are three legs of a stool that are absolutely essential for leadership. Leadership is communication. And so if you have a desire to be in a leadership position at some point, you can focus on nothing more important than becoming a better communicator.

Shelley E. Kohan (29:21.713)
Excellent advice. Love it. So what’s your legacy? What do you want to leave behind for the next generation?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (29:28.853)
Yes, I think I hope that I just leave behind a world that’s better than I found it. You the world needs to be repaired. The world is constantly fraying. And if the good people of the world are not constantly stitching it up, then life in the future will not be as good as it could be. So I hope that the legacy I leave is just one of love and compassion.

And our first value at Storyforge is that we’re humans first, before we’re employees or customers or clients or business owners. So I hope the legacy I leave is that I was a good human.

Shelley E. Kohan (30:07.663)
awesome. Okay this is my last question and it could be work, it could be fun, it could be whatever you want, okay? But what is your secret power?

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (30:17.857)
I can make a meal from whatever is in the fridge. I can repurpose leftovers onto crackers and call them an hors d’oeuvre. I am like, I am a master at make it up from whatever you have in the cupboards. So if you’re, if you’re ever at home and you’re stuck and you have like a can of beans and maybe some anchovies and you don’t know what to do, just call me.

Shelley E. Kohan (30:38.059)
I love it, Hailey. Thank you. my gosh, thank you so much. We learned so much from you. And I know the students and young female leaders will be very inspired by your story. So thank you for being here and thank you for sharing your story.

Haley Boehning / Storyforge (30:50.613)
Thank you, Shelly. This was a ton of fun. It’s always a joy to talk with you.