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This is the very first episode of the Series – Bridging the Age Gap – where we explore how women from different generations come together to reframe what it means to lead. In this episode, Julia is joined by Mieke Verloo and Mariel Mia Haug, a professor and her former student who connected at a conference on democracy and gender equality in Europe. What began as a formal introduction quickly evolved into a collaborative dynamic grounded in shared roots, values, and feminist ideals.

Mia reflects on how she had to shed learned notions of deference and excessive politeness to form a meaningful connection. Mieke, the professor, in turn, shares how intentional presence, deep listening, and care are at the heart of how she holds space and how that is, in itself, a way of leading.

They explore how age difference can create assumptions about what each person brings to the table, and how those assumptions can be challenged through honest dialogue and mutual respect.

Listen to dive into a conversation between two women at different life stages, choosing curiosity over hierarchy as that’s where the magic in leading resides.

About the Guests

Mieke Verloo & Mia Haug

Mieke Verloo is Professor of Comparative Politics and Inequality Issues at Radboud University in the Netherlands, and Non-Residential Permanent Fellow at the IWM, Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. She has extensive publications on gender equality policymaking in Europe, on gender mainstreaming and intersectionality, on gendered body politics, gendered knowledge politics, and on opposition to gender equality in Europe. For 2022-2036, she is coordinating the CCINDLE project. Since 2020, she is also chair of the FLAX Foundation

Mia Haug is a political science graduate from Estonia with a strong background in student politics. She’s also the Operations Manager at Women Emerging. As cofounder and former board member of 020 – a student political party at the University of Amsterdam – she led key initiatives aimed at improving student representation and passed policies that addressed key issues affecting the community. Later, as Chair of LEF, a youth-oriented party in the Netherlands, she worked on radical policy ideas like universal basic income, better access to mental health care, and just climate action.

About the Host

Julia Middleton

Julia Middleton is the host of the Women Emerging podcast and a best-selling author of “If that’s leading, I’m in” as well as two previous books: “Leading beyond Authority” and “Cultural Intelligence”. She is deeply committed to helping people from all backgrounds to find their own approach to leading.

In 2020, Julia launched Women Emerging and in 2022 she lead an expedition of 24 women to find ‘an approach to leading that resonates with women’. She now leads expeditions with women all over the world based on 4Es methodology, discovered in the first expedition.

Prior to that, Julia was founder and, for over thirty years, Chief Executive of Common Purpose, which grew to become one of the biggest leadership development organisations in the world.
Julia is also an Ambassador for the Aurora Prize based in Armenia, on the boards of Alfanar Venture Philanthropy in the Arab World and Equality Now, which operates globally, and on the Advisory Councils of Fundacao Dom Cabral in Brazil and Synapse in Pakistan.

Born in London and brought up in New York, Julia was educated at French Lycées and graduated from the London School of Economics. She is married, with five children and lots of grandchildren.