Yemi Penn is a fearless businesswoman, thought leader, and rebel. An Engineer by profession and an entrepreneur by passion, Yemi fuses analytical thinking with creativity to create magic. Transformation is the theme across Yemi’s contributions, whether it’s opening an F45 gym in London or a café in Sydney’s South-West Suburbs, authoring a book, managing complex projects such as Crossrail and Sydney Metro, or even producing impactful documentaries on healing collective trauma.

In episode seven of "Experts Unleashed," Atlassian's Dom Price chats with Yemi about finding your identity, eliminating the fictitious box we place ourselves in, and unlocking creativity through play. They discuss how only when you’re able to be your authentic self can you avoid the exhaustion and burnout that come with having multiple identities, as well as how to trade in the box we find ourselves in for a lane of our choosing. The stories in this episode from both Yemi and Dom will pull you in!

They also discuss the "My User Manual" Play from Atlassian's Team Playbook. It's an exercise designed to help leaders share with their teams and teammates HOW they work. Think of it like this: when you buy a TV, it comes with a User Manual. But when you hire a human, there's no such helpful guidance. Yemi takes us through her User Manual and shares three unfiltered things that are true about her.

More about Experts Unleashed

The world feels full of thought leadership and frameworks, when we’re actually hungry for lived experience, science, and pragmatic insights. Experts Unleashed seeks out amazing minds from their specialty fields and brings them to you, to unleash their wisdom in a way that will help you put it in action. Each episode aims to educate, provoke, inspire, and then activate… to give you the confidence to try someone new.

In this episode:

My User Manual Play: https://www.atlassian.com/team-playbook/plays/my-user-manual

4L’s Play: https://www.atlassian.com/team-playbook/plays/4-ls-retrospective-technique

More about Yemi Penn: https://yemipenn.com/

Charity: https://www.whatwereyouwearingaus.org/

Chapters:

00:00 – Introduction

01:50 – Welcome the triple threat…Yemi Penn!

02:50 – My user manual…3 unfiltered truths

08:15 – Sitting down with ourselves and the 5Ls

13:28 – What is identity and the crises we all have

18:30 – Transformation and shifting perspective

23:16 – Exhaustion and burnout from having multiple identities

26:44 – Welcome to country and land

27:40 – How to tap into your identify

30:34 – Thinking outside the fictitious box

33:40 – Survivor guilt, leaving your box, and owning your lane

39:41 – Navigating life experiences with kids

42:21 – How to leave your box, and help others leave it too

47:25 – Redefining creativity

51:38 – Unlock creativity with play

55:42 – What Were You Wearing NFP