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Episode 02: Meet Sherri Show Notes
- nstraza
- Feb 10
- 5 min read
Episode Title: Meet Sherri
Podcast: Dissonance Disrupted
Hosts: Nicki Straza & Sherri Dockree
Episode Length:~30 minutes
Episode Description:
In this episode of Dissonance Disrupted, Nicki Straza sits down with co-host Sherri Dockree to explore the leadership journey that shaped her work as an executive coach and neurodiversity advocate. Through honest reflection, Sherri shares lived experience from senior leadership roles where power dynamics, exclusion, and misaligned systems eroded psychological safety and confidence. Together, Nicki and Sherri unpack what these moments reveal about workplace culture, neurodivergent leadership, and the quiet ways organizations either support or squeeze out capable leaders. This conversation invites leaders to rethink what empowerment, trust, and human-centred leadership truly require in today’s workplaces.
Key Themes Covered:
Sherri’s Leadership Lens and Background
Sherri introduces her work as an executive coach specializing in ADHD, neurodivergent leaders, and wellbeing. She shares how applied neuroscience, mental health knowledge, and lived experience inform her approach to leadership and culture.
When Systems Undermine Leaders
A pivotal leadership experience reveals how hierarchical decision-making, exclusion from key conversations, and power-over systems erode trust, autonomy, and confidence. Sherri reflects on the impact of being sidelined as both a neurodivergent leader and the only woman at the executive table.
Psychological Safety and Moral Injury
The conversation explores how repeated misalignment between values and organizational behaviour can lead to moral injury, self-doubt, and a sense of belonging loss, even for highly capable leaders.
Neurodiversity as a Leadership Strength
Sherri highlights how neurodivergent leaders often bring big-picture thinking, justice-oriented values, and creative problem-solving, and what organizations lose when these perspectives are dismissed.
Curiosity as a Leadership Practice
Rather than assuming intent or capability, Sherri emphasizes curiosity, empathy, and adaptive leadership as foundations for trust, engagement, and sustainable performance.
Empowerment Through Support, Not Control
Practical leadership strategies are shared, including progressive autonomy, clear expectations, coaching conversations, and creating space for learning through failure without punishment.
Why This Work Matters
Nicki and Sherri examine the broader implications of neglecting human-centred leadership, including declining wellbeing, eroded trust, reduced innovation, chronic stress, and disengagement across teams.
Human Connection as a Dissonance Disruptor
The episode closes with a powerful reflection on connection as the catalyst for effective leadership. Vulnerability, curiosity, and shared humanity are positioned not as “soft skills,” but as essential leadership capacities.
Listener Reflection Questions:
Where might your systems unintentionally undermine trust or autonomy?
How do you respond when someone brings a different perspective or challenges the norm?
What would change if curiosity replaced assumption in your leadership approach?
How do you create safety for learning, growth, and failure on your team?
Closing Invitation:
This episode invites leaders to pause and reflect on how culture is shaped in everyday decisions, conversations, and moments of inclusion or exclusion. As Sherri reminds us, leadership is not just about getting the job done. It is about how we honour the humans doing the work.
Resources & Mentions
Website: www.dissonancedisrupted.ca
View PDF of Transcript below
About our Guest:
Sherri's Bio:
Sherri is an executive coach and leadership consultant specializing in ADHD, neurodiversity, and well-being. As an ICF-trained coach, I bring a strong foundation in applied neuroscience, mental health and addictions, and ADHD, and she continues to expand her knowledge through ongoing professional development.
She often refers to herself as a reformed corporate executive, drawing on her own experiences in leadership that challenged her values, her ADHD traits, and her leadership skills. I integrate facilitation, mindfulness, and psychological health and well-being practices to promote excellence in both business and non-profit leadership—focusing on strengthening unbreakable connections, not the labels that separate us.
She currently serve as Chair of the Board of Directors for Woodview Mental Health & Autism Services and as Chair of the Board of Governors for the Brantford Brant Norfolk Ontario Health Team, supporting collaborative governance across 19 partner agencies. She's held leadership roles in health care, developmental services, and mental health organizations, and she continues to work with the Canadian Mental Health Association, Ontario Division, delivering mental health training across the province. She also coaches and mentors executives and leaders through her private practice of 11 years.
Keep Learning
If this episode sparked reflection around neurodiversity, psychological safety, and human-centred leadership, these resources offer deeper insight and practical grounding:
Emotional Agility by Susan David Explores how leaders can build resilience, self-awareness, and flexibility when navigating complexity, uncertainty, and emotion at work.
NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman A foundational exploration of neurodiversity that reframes difference as a strength rather than a deficit, with important implications for workplaces and leadership.
The Fearless Organization by Amy C. Edmondson A practical and research-informed look at psychological safety, learning cultures, and why trust is essential for performance and innovation.
Driven to Distraction by Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey A classic resource for understanding ADHD in adults, including strengths, challenges, and how environments can either support or suppress potential.
Dare to Lead by Brené Brown Examines vulnerability, courage, and connection as essential leadership capacities, reinforcing many of the relational themes discussed in this episode.
About the Dissonance Disrupted Podcast
In a world where DEI feels lost and inclusion is becoming a bad word, Dissonance Disrupted creates space for real conversations about leadership through the lenses of diverse voices. As generational and neurodiversity advocates, hosts Sherri Dockree and Nicki Straza disrupt dissonance and navigate a path toward personal empowerment, conscious leadership, and organizational success. By leveraging evidence-based practices rooted in neuroscience, the podcast explores how to nurture flourishing workplace cultures where every diversity can thrive.
Citations
At 23:40 reference to Maslow's Hierarchy:
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4), 370–396. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0054346
At 24:45 reference to Gilbreth & Gilbreth:
Gilbreth, F. B., & Gilbreth, L. M. (1915). What scientific management means to America’s industrial position. The American Journal of Sociology, 21(4). https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/000271621506100127
Summary: One of the original serialized articles co-authored by Frank & Lillian that appeared in academic journals during the era when Lillian was integrating psychological insights into management.
Gilbreth, F. B., & Gilbreth, L. M. (1916). The effect of motion study upon the workers. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 64(1). https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/000271621606500130
Summary: Reports on Fatigue Study and how the Gilbreths’ motion studies aimed to reduce unnecessary motions and fatigue—an early blend of human psychology and efficiency engineering.
Gilbreth, F. B., & Gilbreth, L. M. (1917). Measurement of the human factor in industry. In Proceedings of the National Conference of the Western Efficiency Society. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/15533506251362370
Summary: Although technically conference proceedings, this is historically one of the earliest formal published presentations where they explicitly treat “human factor” measurement within industry.
Book Recommendation:
Gilbreth, L. M. (1914). The psychology of management: The function of the mind in determining, teaching, and installing methods of least waste. Sturgis & Walton. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16256
Summary: Lillian’s landmark text, serialized in management journals in 1912–1913 before becoming a book—explicitly integrating psychology with work/system design.
PDF Transcript of Episode:
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