“Unleash the power in others,” Sue Schaefer Schaefer Beigie from State Farm

Meet Sue Schaefer Beigie, Marketing Executive LDA at State Farm®, where she brings her 25 years of leadership experience in marketing, sales, and operations to build scalable approaches and deliver strong business results. Sue’s national and global experience across full-scale teams, telecommunications, digital technology industries, and property and casualty insurance have shaped her to be an effective and impactful leader. While leading successful business strategies, Sue has also served in several leadership development programs such as Influence Women’s Executive Development and the Stephen Covey Leadership Experience.

Sue sat down with our own Jocelyn Hudak, Senior Director, Content and Digital Marketing at CES to discuss the power behind creative solutions, setting boundaries, and the kind of legacy she wants to leave. 

Check out the full interview below, then dive into the highlights from the conversation. 

Unleash a legacy for others.

Highlight: “I want the legacy I leave to be about how people felt about themselves. Do they feel like they were able to do more than they thought they could do? Did they have joy at work? Did they enjoy the collaboration? I like unleashing that for people so they can actually prove to themselves that they can do these things, as well as pave a path.” - Sue Schaefer Beigie

Be confident in yourself.

Highlight: “You have to be confident in yourself. That's where the humility of how we live our lives is. We tend to focus on what we're not doing well versus our gifts and our talents. Every person is unique. They have a specific set of talents, and that should give them confidence to set the boundaries they need to show up every day with confidence. You're your best when you're confident.” - Sue Schaefer Beigie

Set boundaries.

Highlight: “When I joined State Farm, it's such a familial kind of environment that it is accepted to say, ‘I'm sorry, I've got to go to my kid's game.’ And it was celebrated. And I realized I was placing those barriers on myself. I think the more we set those boundaries, we're better leaders. I think we're better employees when we're happy and not having to feel like we have to make a choice.” - Sue Schaefer Beigie

Have the courage to have tough conversations.

Highlight: “Have the courage to have the tough conversations. Whether that is with business partners about conflicting priorities or approaches, or whether it's about a performance issue—you're not doing anybody any favors, especially the higher performers, if you're not addressing a performance problem. Having the courage to have tough conversations is an obligation of leadership.” - Sue Schaefer Beigie

Be creative about solving problems.

Highlight: “I don't think there's anything we can't solve. There's limits of resources, time, and technology, and those are considerations. But you can still solve them if you can overcome those things. We sometimes stop at creative problem solving before that. Create an environment where it's okay to fail and it's okay to experiment. Be creative about how you're problem solving.” - Sue Schaefer Beigie

Confidence, boundaries, creative solutions, these are all the things that make a great leader. With Sue’s wisdom in the world, the future for executive women in the industry is shifting to bigger and better places. For more inspirational content, check out the Pass the Mic page.