Within a year of launching Foundry Communications, Zahra Al Harazi’s award-winning marketing and communications firm landed on the W100 as one of Canada’s most profitable companies run by a woman. As its CEO, Zahra was selected as Chatelaine’s Top Female Entrepreneur, named one of Canada’s 100 most powerful women by the Women’s Executive Network, and chosen by RBC as one of Canada’s 25 most influential immigrants.
While on the outside, Zahra’s company was thriving, on the inside, Zahra was struggling. Foundry Communications was a lesson in leadership. As John Maxwell says, “Leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking care of those in your charge.” A lesson Zahra had to learn on the go running her first company.
In her compelling keynote presentations, Zahra not only shares her inspirational entrepreneurial journey — from a new immigrant to Canada with no understanding of the culture or business world and no higher education to one of Calgary’s Top 40 Under 40 — but also hard-earned lessons learned on building and leading a skilled and engaged multi-generational workforce and the important role purpose plays in sustaining employee engagement and long-term success.
Purpose-Driven Leadership
Zahra understands firsthand that the key to building great companies lies in a leader’s ability to cultivate a culture of growth and resilience; to enable learning, skills, opportunity, and connection.
As one of the featured speakers at The Art of Leadership for Women’s 2024 event, Zahra contributed an article to their exclusive magazine where she shared seven skills to help people transform into more purposeful leaders. These skills are essential to engaging and motivating teams as well as leading your business to the forefront of your industry.
Seven Skills of a Purposeful Leader
The point of being a purposeful leader is to embody the change you want to see in your organization and help your company — and all it employs — to reach new heights with integrity, resilience, creativity, openness, honesty, and a sense of service. Here are Zahra’s recommendations to become that kind of leader, skills she herself developed and honed while leading her companies:
1. Know Yourself: Be Clear about Your Purpose
Why do you do what you do? Reflect on your values, passions, and strengths. Success happens at the margins where nobody else is standing, Zahra writes. “Understanding yourself and what you do different allows you to hone your skills to lead others towards a future of possibility, positivity, growth, and hope.”
2. Identify What Drives Those Around You
Learn what motivates your colleagues and employees and connect those motivations to the organizational purpose. “The goal is to establish momentum and ultimately lead the organization towards innovating and taking risks to achieve great things,” Zahra writes.
3. Know Whom You Serve
Service to others should be a forefront of your actions as leader. Take the time to mentor others and equip them with the skills they need to be successful. This is the foundation of purpose-driven leadership. “Those who understand this, are successful not just as leaders but as human beings as well,” Zahra writes.
4. Roll with the Punches
A leader’s key roll is to create energy and momentum even in difficult times. With resilience being a learned trait, you can train yourself to see challenges as opportunities. While you can’t control what happens to you, you can control how you respond.
“When we wear our challenges with dignity and sit with even our most difficult experiences, we gain insight and empowerment from that process,” writes Zahra. “This not only transforms us but also inspires others in very meaningful ways.”
5. Be Open and Honest, Especially When You Fall Short
Connection is essential to cultivating a sense of belonging in the workplace — which is proving more and more essential to employee engagement. Today’s employees expect their leaders to be human, so it’s important to share your emotions and struggles with integrity and humility, Zahra writes.
“This starts with the integrity to acknowledge what we do not know and to accept when we make mistakes,” Zahra says. Quoting Brené Brown, Zahra writes, “vulnerability is at the heart of social connection, and social connection, in turn, is at the heart of business.”
6. Allow Creativity to Flourish
Creativity is key to problem-solving, encouraging solutions and allowing for adaptability. It boosts productivity, fosters growth, creates opportunities, and broadens perspectives by helping leaders and their teams overcome prejudices that limit possibilities. Encourage creative thinking and brainstorming throughout your organization, Zahra writes.
7. Treat Yourself with Flourish
Ensure you continuously apply the wonderful leadership skills you possess towards yourself to foster personal growth and well-being. Practice self-compassion in good times, bad times, and everything in between, Zahra says.
“If you don’t take care of you, then you will not be able to effectively take care of what you need to…,” Zahra writes. “We cannot be of service to others without first tending to our own well-being.”
The more human we allow ourselves to be as leaders, the deeper our connections and our ability to influence others to change and innovate become. This is the crucial foundation to sustained success in a world defined by change and uncertainty.
Driving Entrepreneurial Success with Zahra Al-Harazi
The road to real leadership is rarely a straight one. Among Canada’s most successful entrepreneurs, few have faced more obstacles than Zahra Al-Harazi. With a no-holds-barred attitude, Zahra helps people and organizations realize their potential for success through finding their purpose. She draws on her experience as a pioneering woman in the business world with a unique approach to attitude, leadership, and success, as well as her experience as a refugee, immigrant, entrepreneur, and community-builder.
A popular speaker for Small Business Week and International Women’s Day, Zahra has spoken to audiences in more than 20 countries, inspiring leading institutions such as Fortune 500 companies, entrepreneurs, government agencies, and professional organizations. Her clients have included The Royal Bank of Canada, Entrepreneurs’ Organization, Ernst & Young, Young Presidents Organization, WXN, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Great West Life, Telus, University of Toronto, and the Government of Canada, among many others.
Contact us to learn more about Zahra and how to book her to speak at your next event.