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Reconnect with Yourself After Burnout

By Nicki Sanders | Jul 9, 2025 | Comments Off on Reconnect with Yourself After Burnout

  If you know my career story, you know that I experienced both compassion fatigue and professional burnout.  But for us high-performing Women if Color in leadership, sometimes what we call burnout is identity loss. Here’s how it may be showing up: ✅ You’ve been over-functioning for years, silence can feel unfamiliar or even scary. […]

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Soft Is Strong: Why Women of Color Need a New Leadership Playbook

By Nicki Sanders | Jul 2, 2025 | Comments Off on Soft Is Strong: Why Women of Color Need a New Leadership Playbook

  We were taught that to lead well; we had to be twice as good. Twice as fast. Twice as composed. All while carrying the unspoken burden of holding it all together. But what if leadership didn’t have to be that way? What if leading with softness isn’t a liability, but a leadership superpower? Soft […]

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This Isn’t a Social Work Pivot, It’s a Reclamation of My Full Identity

By Nicki Sanders | Jun 25, 2025 | Comments Off on This Isn’t a Social Work Pivot, It’s a Reclamation of My Full Identity

  After two decades of teaching, training, hiring, supervising, and leading multigenerational, multidisciplinary teams, I’ve come to a simple but powerful truth: You can’t separate you from your work. Leadership is not just a professional responsibility, it’s a deep personal relationship with how you live, lead, and love yourself. I’ve told my truth about burnout […]

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Leadership Isn’t Just About Performance, It’s About Preservation

By Nicki Sanders | Jun 18, 2025 | Comments Off on Leadership Isn’t Just About Performance, It’s About Preservation

  Here’s Why Women of Color Leaders Must Choose Sustainable Success For as long as many of us can remember, leadership has been synonymous with performance. We’ve been praised for our productivity, our resilience, and our ability to get things done – at all costs. Especially for Women of Color leaders, this expectation has become […]

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You’ve Mastered the Hustle — Now It’s Time to Lead from Wholeness

By Nicki Sanders | Jun 10, 2025 | Comments Off on You’ve Mastered the Hustle — Now It’s Time to Lead from Wholeness

  There comes a moment when even the strongest women ask: “Is this all there is?” You’ve followed the rules. Met the deadlines. Held the team together. Poured into everyone else while putting your own needs on pause. On paper, it looks like success — but inside, it feels like you’re stuck in survival mode. […]

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Journey to Licensure Podcast Interview with Shara Ruffin

By Nicki Sanders | Jun 4, 2025 | Comments Off on Journey to Licensure Podcast Interview with Shara Ruffin

  I am grateful for the opportunity to be a guest on the Journey to Licensure ® podcast hosted by Shara Ruffin. From Shara Ruffin on LinkedIn: “Social work doesn’t have to mean burnout, low pay, or narrow options. It can mean freedom, leadership, and legacy and Nicki Sanders, MSW is living proof. Nicki is […]

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Honor Your Whole Self

By Nicki Sanders | May 28, 2025 | Comments Off on Honor Your Whole Self

  QUESTION: What does wholeness look and feel like for you? Sometimes when we don’t show up fully in professional spaces it isn’t because we’re fearful, code-switching or battling imposter syndrome. Sometimes we don’t show up fully in professional spaces because we realize they don’t deserve access to all parts of us. Real Talk! What […]

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Supporting the Wholeness of Women and Girls

By Nicki Sanders | May 21, 2025 | Comments Off on Supporting the Wholeness of Women and Girls

  My truth: I am multi-passionate and often struggle with narrowing my business focus for extended periods of time. It would feel like I had to choose between authentic parts of myself, or I was being forced leave a part of me out…but no longer. I am fully embracing all of me! You know me […]

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Do You Lead with Your Core Values?

By Nicki Sanders | May 14, 2025 | Comments Off on Do You Lead with Your Core Values?

  I want to take the time today to recap my leadership philosophy: 1. Leadership is a privilege 2. Leadership is about impact and influence, not a title 3. Leadership is earned, not demanded 4. Leadership is about transformation, not transactions 5. Great leaders create more great leaders Have you confirmed your leadership core values […]

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