My first real leadership role at work came with a team that spanned disciplines I didn’t own. Suddenly, my technical expertise - the thing that had defined me, the thing that had earned me this role - wasn’t particularly useful as a compass. I needed to lead. And I really didn’t know what that meant.

So, I did what most of us do. I looked around. I watched the leaders in my workplace, in my industry, and tried to work out what leadership was supposed to look like. And then I tried to become that.

It was like wearing an ill-fitting coat. Nothing sat right. The sleeves were too long. The shoulders pulled. I kept tugging at it, trying to make it work - and it never did. Because the leadership model I was trying to inhabit wasn’t mine. It didn’t fit with the way I thought, the way I connected with people, or the values I actually held.

What made it harder was that I had no one to ask. No mentor who had walked this particular road. No one who could look at me and say: you don’t have to lead like them.

The thing that changed everything for me wasn’t a book, or a course, or a framework.

It was people.

Outside my technical world, I was volunteering in community organisations - and there, I found leaders unlike anyone I had encountered in my professional life. People who led with extraordinary humanity. Who saw their teams not as resources to be managed, but as people to be developed. Who understood, deeply, that the quality of the work is inseparable from the quality of how people feel doing it.

They took me under their wing. And slowly, I started to understand that leadership has many shapes and forms, but what it is at the heart is stewarding both projects and people. Core to that is having the courage to help your team reach their full potential.

But … I’ll be honest. At the start, if someone had said that people were at the centre of me being an effective leader, I would have rolled my eyes. People weren’t my thing. I was about technical excellence, project delivery, problem-solving, innovation. The elegant solution. The right answer.

It took me years (and those extraordinary mentors) to understand that people are the answer. That the journey starts inside: knowing who you are as a leader, what you stand for, and how to build the kind of trust and safety that lets people bring their best. That it runs through the hardest practical things - learning to delegate without losing quality, to communicate across the gap between technical precision and human messiness, to give feedback that actually lands. That it extends into the organisation itself - making sense of complexity, navigating competing priorities, thinking strategically when there’s no single right answer, leading change when people are tired or uncertain, and building teams that are resilient enough to grow with you. And that it ends, eventually, in a kind of stewardship - taking care of the people in your team, helping them become more than they thought they could be, and being accountable for both the work and the culture you leave behind.

The best technical leaders I have ever encountered aren’t just brilliant at their discipline. They are brilliant at bringing out the brilliance in others.

That’s why I’m here.

I write for the scientists, the engineers - the technical experts who are exceptional at what they do, and who have stepped (or been pulled) into leadership. The ones who are starting to feel a little overwhelmed, or are no longer certain about what to do. Who are discovering that the rules have changed, and the formulas they’ve relied on for years don’t quite work in this new terrain.

And I write for the leaders who have been at it a while - who’ve led teams well - but have now been elevated into something bigger. Who are being asked to think more strategically, to hold more complexity, to lead leaders rather than just people, and to navigate a whole new layer of competing priorities and organisational ambiguity that wasn’t part of the job before.

Whether you’re finding your feet for the first time, or finding that the ground has shifted beneath feet you thought were steady - this space is for you.

Because a leader is a steward of both people and priorities. Responsible for growing the potential in your team, delivering what the business needs, and working skilfully within the constraints and complexity of the organisation around you. That’s a big ask. None of us do it perfectly. But with the right guidance, the right reflection, and the opportunity to share the highs and lows along the way – you can do it exceptionally well.

That’s what I’m building here - a space where we figure this out together. Honest, practical, grounded in real experience rather than theory. A place that helps you become as exceptional at leading people as you already are at your discipline.

A place where you can find the mentor I wish I’d had.

If that sounds like what you’ve been looking for, I’d love for you to stay.

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I’m Natasha — geophysicist, leader, and someone who has been figuring out leadership at the edges of disciplines for about 25 years. I write to help technical experts become the leaders their teams deserve.