I’ve always been a writer.
Sometimes that writing has appeared in leadership articles, newsletters, workshop guides, or website copy. Sometimes it has shown up in notebooks, journals, and half-finished manuscripts scattered across my desktop.
These days, I’m spending much of my writing time following the stories that won’t leave me alone.
Do-Gooder
Field Notes from a Lifelong
Change-the-World Type
Lianne Picot
Current Book Project
Do-Gooder
Field Notes from a Lifelong Change-the-World Type
- Seeking representation
For more than thirty years, I worked in places where people were trying to survive: prisons, homeless shelters, schools, youth services, community organisations, and leadership roles.
Along the way, I collected stories that have stayed with me for decades.
Stories of prisoners preparing for release, homeless teenagers, exhausted frontline workers, lonely widows, damaged leaders, and countless people trying to find their place in the world.
For a long time, I thought this book was about them.
It turns out it is also about me and the stories I told myself about helping, belonging, usefulness, and worth.
Part memoir and part social observation, Do-Gooder explores a question that has followed me for most of my life:
What happens when helping others becomes who you are?
If you’re an agent or publisher who enjoys thoughtful books about people, purpose, stories, and the beautifully messy business of being human, I’d love to have a conversation!
Get in touch →
Newsletter
The Wondering Life
The Wondering Life is where I explore the questions, stories, and ideas that catch my attention and refuse to let go. Part essay, part reflection, part wandering conversation, it is a place for curiosity in all its forms.
Some pieces begin with a story. Others begin with a walk, a book, a chance encounter, a research paper, or a question that arrives unexpectedly and refuses to leave.
Together, they explore how we make meaning of our lives, our work, our relationships, and the world around us.
At heart, The Wondering Life is an invitation to pay attention—to the stories we inherit, the assumptions we carry, the questions we avoid, and the possibilities we have yet to imagine.
The common thread is wondering.
Because I believe a thoughtful life starts with wondering...
Wondering
“The questions that refuse to leave me alone.”
Stories
“Following the stories we inherit, the stories we tell ourselves, and the stories hiding in plain sight."”
Wandering
“A walk, a book, a conversation, a chance encounter. You never know where a question might lead.”
Essay Series & Future Book
Unlearning Leadership
For years, I taught leadership. I designed leadership programmes. I coached leaders. I researched leadership. And somewhere along the way, I started wondering whether some of the stories we tell about leadership deserve a second look.
Unlearning Leadership began as a series of essays and reflections shared on LinkedIn. It explores the narratives, assumptions, and myths that shape how we think about leadership — and what becomes possible when we question them.
It asks questions such as:
- → Where did our ideas about leadership come from?
- → Which leadership stories serve us well — and which no longer do?
- →What happens when we challenge the myths we’ve accepted as truth?
- → How might leadership look different if we started with curiosity, compassion, and connection?
This work is gradually evolving into a future book project. So yes, this is another gentle nudge to any agents or publishers who may have wandered onto this page. Apparently, I have more than one manuscript trying to make its way into the world!
Work in progress
“What becomes possible when we question the stories we’ve accepted as truth about leadership?”
Also seeking
Agents and publishers with an appetite for books that ask hard questions about how we lead.