Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Opinions expressed in this episode are personal. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this streaming platform.
[00:00:08] Speaker B: Good day, everyone, and welcome to another edition of let's Be Diverse. I am your host, Andrew Stout. This episode is dedicated to all my loved ones who supported me through this journey. Those who have left us will always be in our hearts and will never be forgotten. Today our topic is soft skills for hardcore results. I am so honored and flattered to have this amazing individual as our guest today. Her name is Kirsten Wilkinson. Kristen, thank you so much for coming on today and having a chat with us.
[00:00:38] Speaker A: Absolutely. Andrew, I feel like this is such a long time coming. I remember meeting you, I think almost two years ago when you started your podcast and it's incredible to see what you've done with it. How many episodes have come out, the following that it's cultivating. I'm just so honored to be here with you today and so excited to jump in the conversation.
[00:00:56] Speaker B: I appreciate your kind word, Kristen. Thank you. How are things with you? What's going on with you? Give me the tea, the deets. Give us it all. What's going on?
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Gosh, I think I. I have been so busy this year so far, which is such a blessing and I keep reminding myself of that, but it's been, it's been great. I have two young ones, they're growing up so quickly and so being able to be a part of their lives and be present with them has been beautiful. Work wise. Things have been busy. It's exciting. I love seeing how many, just how many people are focused on bringing the human element into.
I think in our world right now, there's a lot of chaos. There's a lot of stuff happening, a lot of polarization and we spend so much time at work and so seeing how many people really care about their peers, their teams and how they really show up as a leader is. Is so incredible. And I just, I love being a part of it.
[00:01:49] Speaker B: It is. I love when you're saying bringing a human element back to the workplace. It is. You're absolutely right. I am noticing it too. I still think we have a ways to go on it, but it is getting up there. It's getting.
I think people are having a little bit of understanding. So it is promising. And topics like this, conversations like this definitely help to develop that a little bit more for sure. So. But yes, I am absolutely excited.
[00:02:13] Speaker A: Yes, I totally agree. We've got a long ways to go, but it's wonderful to see it happening in these little small pockets. It gives me Lots of hope.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: Me too. Well, I'm looking forward. I'm so pumped to get into this conversation. But before we do, I always have a fun, thought provoking question that I asked my guests to get things going. Are you ready for your yours today?
[00:02:34] Speaker A: Oh man, as ready as I'll ever be. Yes, I'm here for it. It hit me.
[00:02:39] Speaker B: So my question to you is, what is the most hilarious fact that you know.
[00:02:44] Speaker A: Gosh, let's see. The most hilarious fact that I know. I feel like there's got to be something.
I know a lot of facts, but I don't know very many hilarious ones.
[00:02:56] Speaker B: Well, give us a, give us a fact and whatever, whatever comes to mind.
[00:03:00] Speaker A: You know what, as I was preparing for this conversation, I was looking back, I have a page in my notes all these different kind of statistics and I pull from that when I do workshops. And one of the studies that I love so much and I reference quite a lot, Google did a study, it was called Project Aristotle. Have you heard of that?
And so basically they did this study to figure out what creates or cultivates a high performing team. And I think this weaves really well into our topic today. But the number one thing is psychological safety, which builds upon trust, right? And so that concept of trust and how we come into the workplace and how we cultivate trust, it's an ongoing process. It's not just a checklist, right. But it's this ongoing process and relationship that you build with people.
I think it's so important for folks to realize that it's, it's the soft skills, it's the soft skills that cultivate the trust, that cultivate these super high performing teams. Not really a hilarious fact, but I think a very important one.
[00:04:02] Speaker B: It's not a hilarious fact, but it is an important one because if we're going to go to hilarious stuff, I mean, as we get more comfortable and, and we build that trust with people, well then they're going to have that comfortability and that vulnerability and where there's going to be times where you're going to be a little bit vulnerable and there's times where you're going to be able to kid and joke around with your co workers. So yes, trust, trust is definitely a key factor with you. I agree with you 100 on that.
[00:04:28] Speaker A: I, you know what came to mind just now? I do know a hilarious fact. I think it's hilarious.
[00:04:33] Speaker B: Well, let's do it.
[00:04:34] Speaker A: Okay. So a caterpillar creates its chrysalis, right? It's a little home that it lives in. And it transforms into a butterfly. Before it transforms into a butterfly, it quite literally turns into goo. It's caterpillar goo inside of a chrysalis. So if a chrysalis is broken before it turns into a butterfly, it's just goo. Like, it literally dissolves into goo before it can transform into a butterfly, which I just think is kind of hilarious, because what other animal does that? I don't know if there are any other animals that really. I mean, I'm sure moths and stuff similar, you know, to butterflies. But I also think it's such a lovely reminder that when we're in that growth process, that transformative process of becoming, sometimes it feels like we're goo. You know, it's. Sometimes we're just waiting through the goo before we actually transform. So, anyway, that was what came to mind. So one somewhat hilarious one and one serious one for you.
[00:05:27] Speaker B: That is awesome. And it. I talk a lot about parent leadership, which is basically forming your family and, you know, leading your children into the individuals that you'd like them to grow up to be. And I'd say animals are the same way. Like, they are maybe not molding them, they're teaching them a lot of stuff, but they also have their.
Their ways and their structures of bringing life in into the world. And it's so different for each animal. So it is. It is interesting, for sure.
[00:05:54] Speaker A: Absolutely. I love what you just said about leadership in the family. I talk a lot in my work about leadership not being about your title so much as it is about your presence and your impact. And you can be a leader in so many different areas of your life, right? With your friend group, with your family, with your community, of course, at work as well. From any level, you can lead, and it really is about your presence and how you show up. And so I love that. I love that so much.
[00:06:21] Speaker B: Well, listen, let's get this thing going here. Why don't you tell us about yourself and of course, let's find out a little bit about your why.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: Yeah, thank you for asking. So I am an executive leadership coach and facilitator. I'm the founder of Thrive Mind Collaborative, and I've spent about 15 years in learning and development and leadership development. Ten of those years almost was spent at Airbnb.
And now I help leaders build confidence and clarity and their capacity. I'm really passionate about making work more human. And so I get to infuse that through my work because I really believe that when we center that human element at work, it cultivates that Connection. It helps people not just survive at work, but actually thrive in it. We spend so much time in the workplace and so, so I feel like when we're thriving at work, it cultivates this really positive ripple effect not only in the workplace, for the people that are around you, your peers, your managers, your cross functional partners, your team, but it also creates this beautiful ripple effect in your home, in your family life, in your friend life and in your community.
And that's, I think, why I do what I do and why I find it so fulfilling. And then on a, on a big scale and on a smaller scale, it's just so fun to walk alongside people in their journeys and see their growth. It's so motivating, it's so inspirational. It helps me grow. I think I've learned more in the past four years of coaching than I did, you know, in my corporate career and really about myself and how I show up and, you know, keeping myself accountable to the type of person that I want to be and how I want to show up in the world. So, yeah, that's what I do, why I do it.
[00:08:05] Speaker B: When you talk about being human or making workplace more human, as individuals we try to be. We want to be ourselves, which allows us to be more comfortable and more willing to be trusting. We mentioned that word trust before. More trusting with the people around us. And when we can be like that and we can be more human, then all amazing things can happen because you're able to be yourself around and amongst others. And if you can't be human, then it's holds us back a little bit. And I get that we talk about our home life and our work life and yes, in some capacities it is a little bit different. I get it. But when we can be ourselves in both realms, it just makes it so much easier because then it's not as much that you have to turn on and off in each scenario.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: Yes, it takes so much energy just to context switch. Even if you are being yourself, context switching takes so much internal, internal energy to do. And so if you layer on top of that this concept of masking showing up how I think I should show up versus showing up real and authentic. And it doesn't have to be perfect either. I think there's this, you know, this thought that as a leader I have to have all the answers and I have to show up in a very specific way to receive respect or to be seen as a leader.
It's so much more about showing up in a genuine, authentic way with integrity and being open with, with your team and your peers and. Yeah, bringing in that human element. And I do think it, it there's coming from someone who found out I was ADHD about 5 years ago I got that diagnosis and I'm very neurospicy. Now that I look back on my life, it all makes sense. But I spent so much time masking in the workplace and it cultivated this chronic burnout cycle for me.
And it was really hard to get out of. And it wasn't until I really, really identified my own core values and how I wanted to show up what was important to me and then started practicing showing up in that really authentic way. It wasn't perfect. That was when I started to see everything kind of level out and I was no longer feeling like I was in this burnout space that I couldn't claw my way out of. So I think you're absolutely right. I think it takes way less energy to show up as yourself, but it does require some vulnerability and it requires trust and it requires you to show up and be willing to make mistakes and try take two and learn and gain that self awareness along the way.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: So, Kristin, how do soft skills produce results?
[00:10:50] Speaker A: This is my favorite question.
I think soft skills. Soft skills, I think are really the difference between leading effectively and simply managing tasks. I think they're what make the hard skills, shall we say, or the technical skills. I think that soft skills are what make those hard skills actually work, work well. And I think soft skills, sometimes we, we use words and people are like, what does that actually mean? So soft skills, I think it's how we communicate, not just what we're saying, but how we're saying it, how we're showing up, how we're collaborating with others. So I think there's in collaboration, there's this participation while also being able to observe what's going on in the room around you, how you resolve conflict and then how you navigate change. So leaders do all of these things, right? Leaders communicate, they collaborate, they resolve conflict, and they navig.
But how they do it is how they're showing their soft skills. And I think soft skills ultimately reduce friction, they mitigate conflict, they promote clarity.
And I think most importantly, like we talked about at the beginning, it increases trust in these relationships in the workplace. And I think for company soft skills to drive things, those soft skills drive things like retention, right? They lower turnover, they drive retention, it drives creativity and innovation, the culture. I think so often companies think that, oh, we have our core values or our ethos and our mission statement. Written down. And that's our culture. No, the culture is how people are actually showing up on a day to day, hour to hour basis. And so when you're bringing in those soft skills, you can really drive the culture that you want to drive, that you want to create. And ultimately I think it really supports engagement and performance, which for a company really comes down to the bottom line as well. And this is oftentimes where I talk about that concept of Project Aristotle that Google did. Right? Because if we know that soft skills build trust, good soft skill build trust, and we know that trust is the foundation of psychological safety, and we know that psychological safety is the foundation and the most the number one predictor of high performing teams according to this study, then we can tie it to the results within the company. It's directly tied to how that company performs, how sustainable their success is. For sure, you can have a company that is lacking in soft skills and they have that hockey stick growth and it looks great and then at some point it's either going to level off or it's most likely going to start dropping. That success is not going to be sustainable because you'll start having attrition, you're going to have people burning out. And so while yes, you can have success without soft skills, it's not going to be sustainable.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: I've been smiling the whole time as you were speaking because what you were talking about, it makes me think so when I, I study a lot of job postings, I've been doing this for probably about five years now. And what I find is missing is a lot of the stuff that you're mentioning here. And yes, we want to know what can do to tasks, whatever, what have you, we get that, but we also want to know what they can do as far as soft skills as well. And these are super important that you've mentioned communication. So the ability to communicate. I can navigate change, you know, someone can drive innovation. These are things that are super important. Driving culture or creating a workplace culture, you know, that increases engagement. Like these are things that are super important.
And I really firmly believe that these things should be put in a job description. Because if you're looking for a particular type of individual for that team or to fit your team, you can't find that unless you put that in there. Because people are going to read that and are going to say, okay, yeah, I'm, I am like that, I can that. And they're going to put that in their cover letter or they're going to put that, or they're going to mention that in any job interview. I, I, I'm good at, I'm good at all those things. And then they'll be able to see that, yes, I can do the task, but I'm also going to be of the ability to fit into any team dynamic as well.
[00:15:01] Speaker A: Yes, I totally agree. I've seen there was one job wreck that I had seen recently and unfortunately I can't remember what it was, what company it was for, but the way that they wrote it, it was what will you be doing in this role? And that was all the technical stuff, right? All those technical skills, all the project management stuff they'd be doing, right? It was all that technical stuff. And then it was like how we expect you to show up in this role. And that whole section was about soft skills. It was about how you show up. It was almost like culture, fit, information.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: Right.
[00:15:34] Speaker A: And I think this is so important on both sides, right? Because if I'm an individual and I look at a job posting and I don't necessarily know to ask questions like, hey, what's the culture really like, what happens if there's a dispute in your, in your workplace? How is that typically resolved? You know, how do the core values show up in the workplace in real life? Right. Not just on paper. If I'm not asking those questions oftentimes I might get into a job that doesn't actually fit and it's not a good fit and there's going to be attrition. Right. And I think there's a talk about statistics and facts. There's another fact out there that is that costs nearly double a person's annual salary to replace them. And so when you think about that, that's, that's tying it to direct results for companies. And if we're not being clear about both the technical and the soft skills, we risk potentially bringing someone in that is going to cause friction in an, in a not good way, in a not healthy way. And ultimately we're going to lose people, which means the company will be losing money overall. And so I couldn't agree more with you. I think companies should really have that as a required section. Kind of like now how folks require, most companies require kind of the pay scale that they're working with for that role. So you have some insight into what they're hoping to pay someone. I think it should be a requirement, a soft skills section. How are you going to show up at work and how do, what do we expect for you to show up at work and come into this space?
Yeah, Absolutely.
[00:17:03] Speaker B: And I'll just add to that as well. If you're going to be putting that on your, on your job description or your job posting, once the person gets there, you have to make sure that your culture and your training and everything that goes on within the organization is like you've mentioned in the job posting. So when that person walks in the building, they like, oh, I saw this job posting, I applied and I've been like five days in and it is exactly what I envision. Reading that job posting.
[00:17:37] Speaker A: Yes. Oh my gosh. How many times I've read a job posting even in a company that I'm working in and I read the job posting like this is, this is not accurate, an accurate representation of what this person really will be doing, especially in a startup role. I think it's kind of, it's hard in a startup role to write a job wreck that really covers all the different hats that you might wear. And that was a lot of the experience that I had looking at job Rex. But I couldn't agree with you more. I'm over here nodding intensely because I, I totally agree. Making sure that there's alignment there and like you said, alignment with the training as well I think is so incredibly important.
[00:18:13] Speaker B: And the culture too. Right. If you're saying we, we, we, we believe in culture, we believe in, we believe in creativity and innovation, well then it's got to allow your people to be innovative, creative and you have to have that culture there. So it's, it's super important.
[00:18:29] Speaker A: Super, super important. Absolutely.
[00:18:31] Speaker B: So we kind of talked about it, but I'd like to go a little bit in depth here. Can a lack of soft skills have a negative impact on our career production?
[00:18:39] Speaker A: 100%. I do not believe that you can sustainably scale leadership without the emotional and relational intelligence that comes with soft skills. I think a lot of this comes down, boils down to a lack of self awareness for people or a lack of communication skills. Skills. We, we're never really taught how to communicate. I think oftentimes the way in which we communicate is based on our own lived experiences. And what was our family life like? What were the models in our life? How did they communicate? Did they communicate? How did they manage their own emotions? Did they react or did they cultivate that pause and have a more intentional response? I think that a lack of those self awareness skills and communication skills, it really can stall growth for companies and for individuals. And I think ultimately results suffer, whether you're talking about individual results or company results, when these skills aren't present, trust breaks down, feedback is mishandled. There's communication breakdowns and all of these things. Now there's conflict. Now they may not know how to handle conflict. Right. And so it's just like a snowball that goes downhill really quickly. And I think, you know, the quote that comes to mind here is Maya Angelou's quote. Quote, you know, people won't remember exactly what you said, but they'll remember how you made them feel. I think, especially looking back at my own experience in the corporate workplace and even my experience now as a coach, a lot of the feedback that I receive or a lot of the experiences that I had, people don't just remember the outcomes. Sure, I remember some of the things we created at Airbnb, some of the things we launched, some of the moments where we stayed up super late in the evening figuring something out the night before we were supposed to launch something.
But really, the thing that stuck with me was how the people around me made me feel. And that was really my experience at Airbnb. I think people ask me, what was it like to work at Airbnb? And usually the first thing that comes to mind is the people. The people were so incredible, and I loved. There were so many amazing humans that I got to work with at Airbnb. Super intelligent, kind, compassionate, real, authentic humans. And those are the people that I think back to that have taught me so much in my own leadership journey. And so I really do think it's. And it comes. That comes from the soft skills. Right? And so when I think back to the leaders that maybe taught me a lot about how I didn't want to show up, maybe they weren't the best leaders. Oftentimes, those are the leaders that didn't have. They didn't bring those soft skills into work. They didn't bring their full selves into work. They didn't create the deep, trusting relationships with their teams. They led through fear or through control. And so it's. It's really interesting to kind of look at that in high.
And I think as. As people start to reflect, it's like, how do I want to show up as a leader? What were those. Who were those people throughout my career that really believed in me and helped me excel and grow? Typically, if you think back to their people skills, their soft skills, which, by the way, can be learned, they're not something we're just innately born with or not. It is a skill. And so practicing those skills, I think, is so incredibly important. And. And it's part of the growth process, not only for that leader, but the ripple effect that they create for then their teams and their peers as well. And all ships rise with the tide, right? So everyone grows when we can bring our full selves to work and build those trusting relationships.
[00:22:02] Speaker B: I had a leader earlier in my career when they had. We had somebody coming in that was new. They were working for a different company or a different organization, but doing a similar job. And when they came in, one of the leaders really leaned on them, or this leader leaned on them quite a bit to find out how. Not necessarily trade secrets, but stuff that they did and how they handled certain scenarios, certain situations. So he was trying to gain a little bit of feedback on some of the things that they were doing and the reason why he was doing that. In his mind, everything evolves and everything changes and we have to, to keep up with the times and we can't be stagnant.
So he was always looking for ways to keep things fresh and innovative.
So he really leaned on that person to do that. And some people didn't really were not okay with it because they were like, well, we've been here for so long, how come they were leaning on them? But what he did was that he didn't just lean on that person, he leaned on everyone and got their ideas and that. So I think, think when you talk about lived experiences, you have to find out from individuals what they've experienced in the past or some of the experiences that were positive and things that they were not so happy with that kind of got them off kilter and they lost their engagement. So it was really important why he did that. And I really respected him for doing that, for sure.
[00:23:39] Speaker A: Oh my gosh. You brought a couple other things to mind. I think there's so much benefit to leaning on the lived experiences and the ideas of all of the team members, because like you said, there's. Everyone has unique lived experiences. Everyone has different perspectives. And I think sometimes we see that as a negative because, oh gosh, we gotta align everybody and get everyone on the same page. It's not always about that. I think it's actually about mutual respect and understanding and being able to open up the conversation and allowing people to feel heard and ultimately all of those diverse ideas. If we have that trusting relationship within a team, team and folks feel like they can bring their full selves to work and they can share their opinions and their ideas that are raw, right? They're not like pre built in their head, super strategic. This is how I'm going to Say this, right? Just kind of like raw ideas. That's how we oftentimes come to more holistic or better solutions because of the diversity in a team. And so that diversity, if you can lean on that as a strategic advantage, there's going to be so much more innovation in that team. Um, and the other thing that came to mind as you were talking, there's this concept. I did not create this concept. Full disclaimer and I actually don't know who did, but I learned it at Airbnb and I still use it today with my coaching clients. But it's this concept of creating a designed alliance, whether that's with a team member, peer, your manager, cross functional partner, a vendor. And creating a designed alliance is. And it can happen at any time, right? Ideally, it happens at the beginning of the relationship, but maybe it doesn't and it comes out later in the relationship. Right? But it's really just this point where you come together and you ask questions like, how do you best communicate? What happens if I have feedback for you? First of all, I want you to know that I want to share that feedback because I want to see you grow. That's where that feedback is coming from. It's not an attack. It's really to help see, you know, help you grow. How do you best receive feedback? Would you prefer that I send it to you in writing so you have time to think about it first before we have a conversation? Would you. Would you prefer that I bring it up right away so that you can see, kind of in the moment, what you could shift, you know, when. When conflict may arise, whether it's between you and I or it's between you and someone else, what is. How do you want us to handle that together, Right? And so you're really creating a we rather than just a me and a you, and you're figuring out what are the boundaries in this relationship and how do we show up in this relationship? And I think even just having that initial conversation cultivates so much initial trust and then following through on those actions, every single. Now you have a list as a leader. Okay, well, I know that Andrew likes to receive feedback via writing so that he can have some time to process it before we have a conversation about it. Now, the next time that I have feedback for you and I send you an email and I say, hey, Andrea, I have this thing I wanted to share with you. Here was the situation. Here was the specific behavior and the impact of that. How can we move forward in this way together? Right? I'd Love to talk with you a little bit more about this in our next one on one. Now I've just followed through with an action that you specifically said or requested was your best way of communicating when it came to feedback that also is going to build that trust. So that designed alliance concept I think is such a great way to bring the soft skills into the workplace and really align on what that means. Because I think for leaders, part of the reason why sometimes we mask and we shove up, you know, in kind of an automated way, how we think we quote unquote should show up is because it's different for everyone, right? You may want feedback via email and Sally Jo may want her feedback right then. And she doesn't want it in an email because then she'll stew over it. Right. And so how do you know as a leader you gotta ask, you have to bring it into the conversation.
And so I just think that there's, there's so much benefit to that, that designed alliance and it can be a little bit more of a structured way for a leader who maybe doesn't feel like they have have the innate soft skills or they've gotten feedback in the past that they need to work on their soft skills. It gives them a very kind of tactical approach that and structure that they can utilize to start to build that trust and bring that in.
[00:27:49] Speaker B: What I wanted to ask you is why are soft skills so crucial for success in a diverse and evolving workplace? Because we talked a little bit throughout the conversation here, but I really wanted to get your opinion on this because I think that it's just ever evolving and I just wanted to see what.
[00:28:06] Speaker A: Your thoughts ever evolving. Yes, it is. I think like we said before, I think that diverse teams really need that emotional intelligence, especially in their leaders because that's how they're going to, that's how they're going to shift diversity into a strategic advantage. That's how they're going to pull these diverse ideas and create more innovative solutions. That's how they're going to be more adaptable to the changing of the times. And again, that also starts with the leaders and the and folks coming in and working on building that trust. Otherwise if you don't have people that feel like they can come in and share their opinions, you can't actually tap into that diversity as a strategic advantage. And I think soft skills are also like we talked about before, it's not what necessarily, but more the how. And so when you think about soft skills and you think about how we're communicating, especially In a diverse environment, we're communicating across differences, differences of opinions, differences of lived experience, how we navigate conflict. Conflict will arise when we have different perspectives, especially in a passionate environment, right, where folks are all coming to work and they're, they're doing something that they feel is like, for the greater good. Right. One of the companies I work with is a renewable energy company. I have never, I mean, Airbnb, we all were very passionate, but I, I haven't seen another company quite like that where everyone was, is coming to work with so much passion for what they're doing. And passion can cultivate friction. And so having emotionally intelligent leaders that can identify when there is tension or friction and be able to call it out and say, you know, hey, I'm noticing that there's some friction here. I'm noticing there's some differing opinions here. Can we sit down and have a conversation about this? And just being able to facilitate a calm, grounded conversation when there are differing opinions, opinions which there will be in a diverse environment, I just think that's so incredibly important. And I also think, you know, inclusion in general, if we're talking about diversity, inclusion oftentimes shows up as like a value. I'm using air quotes around that, like a core value. But inclusion is actually the same thing with culture, right? Like, we can write down all of our values, we can say what our culture is on paper, but inclusion and our culture, it all comes from our behavior, our actual behavior on the day to day basis. And the soft skills, I think give leaders an advantage of agility and presence, being able to be adaptable under pressure. I think there's just so much, so many advantages that can come out of building those soft skills and making that an intentional part of the learning process for leaders and for the company overall.
[00:30:44] Speaker B: I smiled again when you said behavior because we were talking before we started taping today and you were telling me about your two children and how you got to organize things at work and organize things with them. I'm not a parent myself, but when parents become parents or couples become parents, they look to or they think of the ways in many cases, and this comes with culture, they are brought up a certain way. My parents were of mixed race, so there was two different cultures. My father's culture and my mother's culture, they were brought up a certain way, so they brought myself and my siblings up the same way, same. So I think when you go into a workplace setting, you are working under certain people and whether they were a good leader or a bad leader, you're under that leader. And when you go into a leadership role, the only thing that you have is what you learned from that previous leader. So if you're not asking for any training to help you to be a better leader, or if the organization is not saying, you know, you're not, not, you don't have a lot of experience in that, in this role or this separate rule, we're going to make sure that you have all the tools to be successful. You're just going to go with what you know or what you, what you've seen. And when you talk about being in a different environment or having people of different mixed races in your organization, you have to be different and you have to understand that. You have to have a emotional intelligence like you mentioned, and understand that one person is different from the other in not all cases, but in certain areas, some things are different than others. In some ways have to be different. Because if it's not, if it's the same thing we mentioned, talk about being engaged, when you're not engaged, you're not being seen, heard, valued or understood.
And when that happens, you lose the engagement. And when that happens, you're like, well, okay, well, I'm at this table and nobody's paying attention to me or no one's taking my ideas or no one's hearing me, well, I'm gonna go to another table or I'm gonna create my own table and my own space because I'm not being valued or seen as a valuable person within the organization.
[00:33:13] Speaker A: Absolutely. And I think for so many people too, especially in our current environment, I feel like there's so many people who are simply surviving at work. They're not thriving. They don't feel heard, they don't feel connected to people. They don't feel that sense of belonging or that sense of trust. Maybe they don't have ownership, so they're just showing up to work. Maybe not really super engaged, definitely not doing their best work because they're not set up for success. But they don't want to leave the job because then they're out trying to find a new job. Right. And so, and thinking about the knock on effects that happen from that. Right. Like I know that when, when I was surviving at work, mind you, many of my burnouts I wouldn't blame, in hindsight, I would not blame Airbnb, the company for my burnout. Yes, the environment was conducive to burning out at times because it was a fast paced, you know, environment and a lot of us didn't learn how to be a leader, we were just kind of thrown into these roles and it was like, good luck, figure it out. And I think for me, it was actually a lack of boundaries, my own boundaries, that I didn't know I needed to put up. And so I trained everybody around me. Email me at any time of day, I'll respond. We're a global company. So you're going to email me. You live in Asia, you're going to email me. I'm going to be on top of that. I'm going to get up super early in the morning or go to bed super late at night or stay up for a 3am So a lot of that was my doing. But going back to kind of what you were saying, I think in those moments where I was simply surviving, I was just surviving.
I was not the best mother I could have been. I wasn't the best partner I could have been. I definitely wasn't doing anything in my community. I didn't have the energy, the space, the bandwidth, the time. And so like I said at the beginning, I think if you're in that space of just surviving, driving or thinking, like, how can I get out of here and move to another place. Being able to advocate for yourself and being able to say, hey, I need these additional training elements. I want this type of experience. I need a coach to help me, you know, in these areas. Being able to advocate for yourself or go find those things for yourself and bringing them in. A lot of companies have support like that where it's like, oh, you get a thousand dollars a month for learning and development, development budget or something like that. I think it's so incredibly important because there aren't, you know, there are people out there that are going to be working at a company that doesn't do it for them, that doesn't have it all set up and they don't have it all figured out. And so how can you also be the change in that organization? I think that can also be a really motivating place to be in.
[00:35:41] Speaker B: In closing, what is one takeaway that you'd want our listeners to get from this episode?
[00:35:47] Speaker A: Man, only one, Andrew.
[00:35:51] Speaker B: Well, we'll say one, but if you have more than one, that's. That's totally cool.
[00:35:56] Speaker A: Oh, gosh. I think there's a couple things we talked about. I think first, leadership is more about your presence and your impact than it is about your title. I think oftentimes we feel like we can't make a difference because we don't have the title to make a difference. But it's more about your impact and your presence. I think the human stuff is often the hard stuff. It's the messy stuff. But it's worth learning because your soft skills are ultimately your power skills. And it's how you cultivate these high performing, sustainably high performing teams. And I think the final kind of big takeaway here is that it doesn't have to be perfect for anyone out there. That's like, well, man, I just listened to this podcast and now I'm reflecting on my leadership and I need to be better in these areas. It doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be intentional. Share your intentions. Come in, be honest, be open, be yourself. Because I think oftentimes how you show up as a leader, you're modeling that for everyone else. So if you're showing up as open and honest and authentic and intentional and with integrity, you're going to cultivate that and create the permission for your team to show up in that same way. And not only will you and your team members thrive, but the company will thrive.
[00:37:09] Speaker B: My call to action is to like, share and follow this episode and to check out past episodes of let's Be Diverse podcast. They're all there for you, for your enjoyment. And I truly believe that each episode is going to bring some sort of value to your career and to your development. I wanted to take the time, Kristen, to thank you for coming on today. I just admire your sense of passion, creativity and dedication. I admire your clarity and your vision, your kind demeanor.
And I just want to say that it is such a pleasure to know you and to call you a friend. Thank you so much for coming on today, Andrew.
[00:37:52] Speaker A: Thank you so much for having me. I think, you know, one of your superpowers is being able to see the human behind the role, behind the title, behind, you know, the brand.
And I feel seen. So thank you for being someone that helps me feel seen and heard. And thank you so much for having me on your platform. I'm so excited to be here today.
[00:38:11] Speaker B: You're very welcome. On behalf of myself and my guest, Kristen, I would like to thank you all for listening today. And until next time, be safe and remember everyone, that if we all work together, we can accomplish anything.
[00:38:26] Speaker A: You have been listening to let's Be Diverse with Andrew Stout to stay up to date with future content, hit Subscribe.
