298. Leading with Empathy and Inclusion with Stephanie Chung

What if the most powerful thing you did as a leader was to stop talking? Stephanie Chung—trailblazing aviation executive and author of Ally Leadership—joins us to show how silence, better questions, and intentional design turn diversity into decisions people own.

We start with the hard truth: diverse teams win, but only when every voice is heard. Stephanie shares how she navigated a male-dominated industry and distilled what works into the EARN system: establish psychological safety, assure alignment, rally the troops with a compelling vision, and navigate the narrows when turbulence hits. We get specific about meeting design—who speaks, who gets cut off, and what to do in the micro-moments when someone says, “I see it differently.” You’ll learn how to prep quiet voices before they walk into the room, use silence as a thinking tool, and move from leader-led solutions to team-generated plans that build real ownership.

We also tackle the generational shift reshaping work. Younger teammates aren’t anti-work; they’re anti-waste. Stephanie challenges us to prioritize outcomes over optics, encourage healthy debate, and treat “Why do we do it this way?” as a design question, not a threat. The conversation stretches into sales leadership and customer value: teach your team how the business makes money, understand your customer’s economics, and stop discounting—start unlocking value. Along the way, practical tactics like cross-department “walk a mile,” Amazon-style six-page memos, and three alignment questions make inclusion tangible and repeatable.

🌐 Connect with Stephanie:
• Website: https://stephaniechung.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thestephaniechung/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thestephaniechung/

📚 You can purchase Stephanie's book on Amazon:
• Ally Leadership: How to Lead People Who Are Not Like You: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1961801442

Chapters

• 0:00 Setting The Stage: Why Ally Leadership
• 1:19 Stephanie’s Journey In A Male-Dominated Industry
• 3:34 Six Generations And Today’s Diversity Reality
• 6:20 The Business Case For Diverse Teams
• 9:15 Moving From Sameness To Healthy Debate
• 12:35 Meeting Basics: Who Speaks, Who’s Cut Off
• 16:19 Micro-Moments And How Leaders Respond
• 19:42 Prepping Quiet Voices Before Meetings
• 22:55 Silence As A Leadership Tool
• 26:05 Idea Generation To Ownership And Execution
• 30:10 Avoiding The Sea Of Sameness
• 33:08 Reframing Work For Younger Generations
• 36:30 Focus On Outcomes Over Optics
• 40:10 Engagement, Meaning, And Feeling Valued
• 43:12 The EARN System Explained
• 47:00 Assure Alignment With Three Questions
• 50:10 Walk A Mile Across Departments
• 54:05 Systems Thinking: Macro And Micro Purpose
• 57:10 Teaching Sales How Money Is Made
• 1:00:15 From Seller To Strategic Partner
• 1:04:30 Summary, Rapid Round, And Resources
• 1:07:30 Closing Reflections And Call To Action

Transcript

Mick Spiers: 0:01

Have you ever looked around your team and realized no two people think alike? Have you ever wondered why some people thrive under your leadership while others hold back, stay quiet or disengage, and what does it really mean to lead people who are not like you today, I'm joined by the incredible Stephanie Chung, author of Ally Leadership, How to Lead People Who are Not Like You. In this episode, Stephanie shares how to move from diversity to true inclusion, how to create psychological safety, where every voice is heard, and how to ask better questions and listen deeply to draw out diverse perspectives. Hey everyone, and welcome back to The Leadership Project. I've got a special treat for you today. I'm greatly honored to be joined by Stephanie Chung. Stephanie's had a decorated career in her own right, becoming the first African American president of a private aviation company, and she's now the number one international best selling author of a book called Ally Leadership, How to Lead People Who are Not Like You. And we all work in multicultural workplaces, and this is something that we all need to lean into. Some of us might even be challenged with this right now. What does it mean to be a ladder, an ally. What does it mean to lead multi generational teams, multicultural teams? These are things that you may be facing as a leader every day, and we're going to dig deep into that today. So without any further ado, I'm dying to hear from Stephanie. So Stephanie, will you please say hello to the audience, and I'd love to know from you what inspired this book?

Stephanie Chung: 1:45

Sounds good. First of all, thanks for having me, Mick, I appreciate it. I am very excited about our conversation today, and in regards to what inspired the book. So the book itself, there's a couple different things I come from, as you mentioned earlier, the private jet industry. And our industry is amazing in so many different ways, but it's an industry that is very we're working to get better at, you know, making sure it's an industry that is much more inclusive. So I came up through the ranks in an industry that was primarily male and primarily specifically white, male dominated and and so I had to learn, you know, a lot of different techniques and into how to maneuver within the industry, because so many people didn't i i was the lonely only for so often as I was coming up through the ranks. And so what I wanted to do, because when I started to look for books that would be helpful for me as well, I find that a lot of the books were really geared towards, you know, white men, telling them, Hey, here's how you lead women and people of color. But as you and I both know, the world is global. The world is changing. And so though that is important to be able to share with gentlemen, you know, how do you lead women and people of color? It's equally as important to share with people like me. How do I lead somebody who's not like me? Or if you're a woman, how do you lead, you know, a team that perhaps isn't like you? And so I felt like we needed to go deeper and wider in the conversation, because we have a global world. And so yes, it's important for white men, but it's important for all of us leaders to know how to lead people who are not like us. So that's what was inspiring me to write the book. So that's the first thing. It was just a personal need, right? The second part of that, though, Mick, is the fact that, you know, when you look at today's workforce, here's the reality, right? Now we've got six generations at work that's unheard of. That's the first time in history. And when you think about just the generational differences, right? A Boomer doesn't think like a Zoomer does, for an example, and everything in between. So every single generation has a different expectation, different work, you know, perspective, how they see work. So that's the first thing. Generationally, all leaders are being challenged, because, you know, you're leading people who may not even have the same generation as you. Second part of that is that the fact that women are the majority of the population right now in most countries, so I'm here in the US, it's definitely true for the US, and it's also true for many other countries as well. So that changes the dynamics that work. Mick, because women we think differently, or we communicate differently, so that's a different dynamic as well. Then you've got the LGBTQ plus community, so that there's a lot of differences there. You may have people as well who are from different cultures, that are on your team, who have a different world view. You may have people who have neuro diversities, or maybe they have disabilities. And so the list goes on and on and on and on. So if we're being intellectually honest, as leaders, we're trying to lead a group of people who are not like each other, and they're not like us, right? And so really that's why I wrote the book, because I come from an industry where people were not like me, but I was able to still get to the highest level. And so this is really a book for leaders to say, Listen, let's not over complicate this, right? This is how I did it, in hopes that there's some helpful hints that can make them be able to do it in a much easier, you know, way as well. That's really why I wrote the book.

Mick Spiers: 5:09

Yeah, great Stephanie, and 100% right? This is exactly what I see in every workplace around the world. It's a very diverse set of groups now, which is wonderful. It wasn't always the case. We've seen so much growth in this area. The generational thing is very interesting. But it can be gender it can be sexual preference, all kinds of things are coming into the workplace, and it's bringing that diversity that can be something that we can really tap into. But for a leader, you are struggling with this. You're looking at your team, and you might have seven people that are not like you, and in the past, you might have defaulted I'm going to say you might have defaulted to I'm going to treat other people the way I want to be treated, but that's not that's not going to work, because they're not like you. So how does one start with the realization of looking around you and go, I've got a team of seven, and there's seven very individual creatures with different backgrounds, different experiences, different perspectives. How do I start?

Stephanie Chung: 6:15

Yeah, the very first thing is definitely, and I love how you just set that up. Definitely realize that everybody's got that's a good thing, right? Because here are some statistics that I want to kind of level set us with when we think about diverse teams. And you're right. Mick, it is diversity in every shape, form and fashion, right? The statistics are cleared. I want your listeners not just to take my word. I want them to google it on their own, but so you can find stuff from Deloitte, from Mackenzie, from Harvard. The stats are clear. Diverse teams are 35% more productive. Diverse teams are 70% more likely to capture new markets. Diverse teams are 70% more innovative. Diverse teams are 36% more profitable, right? So if we get to the core of it all, they're actually a much more profitable team. So there's a lot of statistics. There's, I'm just giving off a couple, there's a lot more statistics that anybody can go and Google. So the fact of the matter is, diverse teams simply outperform traditional teams. And you're right. Once upon a time, leadership was all about managing a couple of tasks, you know, and then hiring people who looked and thought and worked exactly like you, right? That's exactly who you were hiring. But now that's no longer the case. You actually don't want people who look think and work exactly like you, because that's going to give you not the competitive advantage you could have if you had a group of people who were very different in thought, different in communication, different in gender, generation, etc. So our job as a leader, where we want to start is with the basics. And the basics is to really realize that your way of doing something is simply your way of doing it. It doesn't mean it's the best way, it doesn't mean it's the only way. It's just your way, right? So you have to, you have to, you have to have an honest conversation with yourself to realize that I have one way of doing it, but it's not the only way to do it. And how can I use all of these seven people in your example that have all the differences? How can I use that to my advantage in a good way, so that the team is actually more innovative, you know, quicker to speed, so on and so forth. All the things that we as leader are responsible for, and how you do that is to one acknowledge they're not all the same. That's good, and to acknowledge that my way is just one way. So the real challenge for us leaders is, how do I as a leader bring out the best in every single one of my team members that's leadership today, right? It's no longer sitting around just barking off orders. It's really how do I tap into every single person's gift and talent and make sure that I can pull out for them what they bring to the table that's going to help this team be better? So something simple to do, and I share this with leaders all the time. I'm like, don't over. I'm not one that you need an MIT degree to figure out. Do this, right? We got to keep this simple. Very first thing I want leaders to do is just look at your meetings. Just like, just start with the basics. Every meeting you're in this week. Just pay attention. Literally, pay attention to where your attention is. So in these meetings are all different types of voices represented. If not, why not? When people that are in the meetings may have a different perspective? Well, first of all, do people in the meetings have a different perspective? Because, if not, why not? Right? You don't need a bunch of people telling saying yes and saying what you want to hear if you really want to maximize the efficiency of what diverse teams bring to the table, then you actually want healthy confrontation. You want healthy debate. You want someone saying, You know what? Yeah, Steph, I hear you, but I think that another way we could look at it is this way, and here's why, that's what you actually want, right within your team. So pay attention to the team dynamic. It's what voices are missing when people who are there say something that it perhaps is opposite of the team. What then happens? Do people laugh? Do people listen to people give respect? Like, ha, I never thought about it that way. Or is it or is it a no, that's not going to work. Right? Pay attention. Leaders to your attention. What is happening within the meetings that you're in. You're the leader. So if you're seeing the sea of sameness, same people in the meeting all the time, you know, everybody's shaking and nodding and being polite, but nobody's challenging what's being said in a you know, certainly in a way that's respectable, if none of the if nothing is changing and nothing dynamic is different. Then instead of thinking like, oh, well, they must all be in agreement, so therefore I'm going in the right the right direction, I want to challenge leaders to think, Well, wait a minute, if everybody's smiling and nodding and everybody's got the same yep, yep, sounds good to me. Is that a good thing? I would challenge you and say, No, it isn't right. And so now what I want leaders to do is just week one, pay attention to your attention. What's in your meetings, who's not in the meetings, what voices are being said? How do people respond to voices that are not agreeing necessarily with the status quo? Are they encouraged or are they shut down once you see that? Mick again, keeping it simple, you don't need 10 Steps. What do I do next? You're the leader. You build strategies all day, 10, 10, ways till Sunday. What now you can do is pay attention and go, geez, I never noticed that. I never noticed that I have all men in this meeting. I need to, you know, ask a couple of women that should be at the table. What, you know, have them come into the meeting? Or maybe I do have a couple of women at the meeting, but when they speak, are they cut off? Do people agree? Do people listen? Do people challenge? Like, what happens when I have some of the females speak? Because let's say, for an example, keeping it simple, let's say you're like, Okay, I do have one woman in the meeting, and I noticed she doesn't say anything. Or I noticed that when she does say something that you know, people tend to just cut her off, like, oh, okay, and then they keep going. Well, now what can I do as a leader? So as a leader, simple thing I could do is, if I see that this one woman you know, had enough courage to speak up, and then somebody cut her off as a leader, I may say, Well, you know what? Actually hold that thought for just a second. Pete, I do want to hear what you have to say, but I want Stephanie to finish what she was saying, right? So there's ways that you as a leader, once you pay attention, then you'll know what to do naturally. From there, what some of the challenges that I that I have, Mick, is a lot of times the reason why leaders don't usually move forward in this area is we've made it so incredibly complex for them, and then all of a sudden they're afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing, and therefore they do or say nothing. And so the cycle just keeps repeating itself. Where I want leaders to be encouraged is to say I got total confidence in you. You're a leader. You may not, you may be running around a lot like your hair is on fire, because there's a lot to leadership these days, but what I would encourage you to do is slow your roll a little bit, sit in your meetings that you're in, and you pay attention to the attention that's being done in your meetings. Because I have confidence that when you do the basics, you'll start to pay attention. You'll start to see some trends that you probably won't be happy with, but you have the authority and the ability to change it. A lot of times, things don't get changed because people simply are just not paying attention.

Mick Spiers: 13:33

Really good. Steph, I want, I want to share some reflections of what I'm hearing there, and please never hesitate to correct me. If I, if I go on a tangent, I'll share a personal experience and say that the first multinational company I ever worked for the executive committee at when I joined it, were 12 middle aged white men. And not only were they middle aged white men, they all went to the same university, that same university, and all I could think of is, whenever a problem was hitting the company, I imagined them sitting around the boardroom, and I was very junior at this point, but I imagine them sitting around the boarding room, all nodding and patting each other on the back here, going, Oh yeah, yeah, that's best, right? They've all been trained by the same professors. They're going to come up with very similar answers to same problems, and there's no diversity of thought right there whatsoever, so that so getting the diversity around the table is our step. But the most important step I'm hearing Steph is the leader's job there is to then draw out those perspectives, those different viewpoints, particularly if they're contrary viewpoints, healthy conflict to go, what are we missing here? And I think the power of listening to you is going to be in what questions you ask and how you ask those questions, but also the micro moments of how you react when someone says, oh, actually, I don't think that's quite right. I think we're missing something here. If you shut that down, they're never going to speak up again. If you encourage it and you reward it, and go, Oh, tell me more. Now we've got healthy debate, and now we can create something much greater from the some of the strengths that are in that room, and the strengths are the diverse backgrounds, experiences and perspectives. If we embrace that, all of a sudden, we can make much better decisions based on all of those perspectives being brought out. And if someone's sitting in the corner not saying anything, it's your job to give them the courage to speak up and say, well, actually, I got a different idea here. How does that sit with you?

Stephanie Chung: 15:43

Oh my gosh. I love it, that that's perfect. And, you know, when I was listening to you talk, one of the things that jumped out for me was about drawing out, because sometimes what happens is leaders may not know how to draw out, like, you know, they may sit there and go, Okay, so, yes, I have, you know, lots of different people in the in the room and but I noticed some people don't say anything. So as a leader, then that's a sign, right? That's it doesn't it doesn't mean that's a bad thing. It just means like, Okay, if I have people in the in the in the meeting, and, you know, I always notice, you know, whoever doesn't ever speak up or tends to grab me after the meeting and tell me, Hey, here's what I'm thinking. You know, here's what I observed. All of that. So one way that a leader can make the meetings much more productive is to if you know this, you have someone that maybe they're just a little reluctant or shy to say their thoughts in the middle of the meeting, but they tend to save it till after. Is to prep them on the front end before you bring them in. So two things, right? Prep them on the front end if they've never been to the meeting. So you definitely want to do that, or prep them on the front end if they tend to come to meetings, but not say much. So a way that you could do that for an example, Mick, would be, let's say you were a person who, you know, I can use that as example. I would say. Mick, hey, listen, before we get into this meeting, I wanted to just pull you aside and let you know that I'm actually really excited that you're going to be in the meeting, because I think that I know how you work. I know the excellence that you tend to bring to the table, and I want other people to be able to hear your thought process. So if you're in this meeting and you hear something that is you know, makes sense, or even if it doesn't make sense, or you want to challenge it, I would love to have you be able to share your thoughts, because that's why I have you here. I think very highly of your work, and I think that's important for everybody to be able to hear each other's thoughts, thought processes. So I don't want you to rob us of you know where you may think something differently. This meeting is where I want you to bring that out so that we can all have a, you know, good discussion about which way we should go, right? So that's an example of how you can prep them on the front end to know that they've got, you know, your confidence, so that they can actually feel free to speak in the meeting right now, of course, if they speak in the meeting, sometimes, if they're not used to speaking in the meeting, they may fumble around a little bit, and that's okay, right? Because we're going to groom them and get them trained up to do it. But really, what I want leaders to realize, you know, is that having a meeting where there's good, robust discussion, that's the best, the type of meeting you're actually looking for. One of the best CEOs I ever worked for. He was a genius at this when he first came over, there was about 14 of us on the executive team, and we had worked together for so long that we had almost like a brother, sibling, brother, sister, sibling kind of relationship, right? And so what you would think that that would be good, because we could get to decisions quickly, yes and no. What this CEO realized is that we lacked healthy confrontation. We lacked it and kind of like there your situation that you said, with all your executives who went to the same school, you know, were trained by the same professor and definitely have the same demographics, that is a horrible it's very common, but it's a horrible place to be, right from a business. And so one of the things I loved about this particular CEO is he spotted it as soon as he got to the company, and then he would do things, and almost, I would say he would like, kind of drop a drop a bomb in the middle of the room, and then, you know, leave us to kind of figure it all out, right? Because what he realized, what he was trying to do is to get us to stop smiling and nodding and all being in agreement, and get us to be a much more healthy leadership team where we could have a good, robust discussion, still keep everybody's dignity intact, but all thoughts and ideas were put on the table to be debated, right and To be discussed and to be flushed out so that we could figure out how best to move the organization forward. And so that's what I would encourage for all of the listeners, is, you know, you don't want a meeting that every single time you're in it, it's just people aren't saying anything and people are nodding, or they're doing exactly what you tell them to do.That's not good because your idea is a idea. It's not the only idea, and usually not the best idea, because you're usually not closest to the situation, right? It's usually the people who are actually doing the job that tend to be closest to the situation. And so, yeah, so I love it. I again, it would just encourage leaders to, you know, just know that it's not a good thing when everybody's in agreement to get comfortable with the uncomfortable.

Mick Spiers: 20:26

Really good Steph, there's two things I'm picking up there. First of all, the thing about Prep. If you did that with me, if you pre prepped me, I would feel valued even before the meeting started. And if I feel valued. I'm going to add value. I am going to find my voice, okay? And the second I'm hearing is intentionality before the meeting, really thinking about, how am I going to set the environment where people can find their voice and bring their perspectives? And one of the things that you said there, the interesting one was drop the bomb on the table and then leave the room and let people find the voice. Now, you may or may not need to leave the room, but, but what I'm hearing here is one of the mistakes I hear a lot is a leader will come in and go team. This is this is the idea. This is what I think we should do. But what do you think? And at that point they're all going to go, Yeah, that's a good idea. That'll do. Let's get on with it. Whereas if we don't start with a solution, if we start with a Hey team, we've got a problem here. Let's articulate the problem. First of all, do we all have a common understanding and agreement that it is a problem? What do we know about the problem? All of a sudden, you're already drawing in perspectives about what people think about the problem, and then, okay, what do you think we need to do? What's our first step here? And then say nothing and leave the vacuum. A lot of you know, people get conscious about these uncomfortable silences, but I think the gold is at the end of that uncomfortable silence, if you just zip it and let people find their voice. How does that sit with you?

Stephanie Chung: 22:03

Oh, I love it. I love i To me the most powerful words spoken or unspoken. And so I am a very advocate. I agree 100% with everything you said, because I'm a big advocate of let the silence be okay. And what tends to happen is a lot of times leaders actually don't like the silence, or they mistake the silence for everybody's in agreement, we're good to go forward, right? So, so one of the best things, you know, when I before I started running companies and serving boards and all that stuff, I came up through the ranks in sales and anybody who's ever sold anything, the best thing you can do is to use silence ask the question. Stop talking, right? Silence, it's a powerful thing. So now, if we think about leaders, that same silence is really powerful as well. So I'll give you an example, talking about leading sales teams. So this would happen to me all the time. Let's say it's the beginning of the year or the end of, you know, q4 and so now we've got to get ready for the new year. And so I, you know, talked to my CEO, we had time with the board, and it's like, okay, stuff, here's the new numbers for next year. And let's just say it's a billion dollars. Team's got to bring in a billion dollars. Got it Now, what's interesting about that is that conversation, as far as he and I, or she and I are concerned if, if it's she or he or the CEO, that part's over, right? Nowhere along the line does he or she say stuff you're quoting for your team is a billion dollars, and here's how you're going to do it. That because he's trusting me, or she's trusting me to come up with the plan. That's my job, right? So, evidence number one, evidence number two. Now what I would do, Mick, to your point, is now bring my sales team in, and now, as a sales team, say, Listen, guys, so a billion dollars is our quota this year, and that's a 20% increase of what we did last year. I could really use your help on how you think we should do that. So right now, there's no bad ideas. We're going to spend some time, and I want everybody to share their best thoughts of how we are to make this billion dollars happen. Silence, right? I stopped talking at that point. Now people are throwing out ideas every every idea is a good idea. At that point, what tends to happen, Mick, right? Is when leaders say that. Then if somebody says an idea that is not really maybe a good idea. The leader will shut it down right then and there. That's not the time to shut it down. If I've asked for I could use your help. Then every idea you throw out is a good idea. So there is no me shutting it down at this moment, right? So you let the ideas, because what I'm trying to do is create psychological safety, which is what you and I are talking about. Psychological safety for the listeners is really just a way that everybody feels comfortable enough to share their thoughts and their ideas without any fear of retribution. That's all psychological safety is. And so if I say I could use your help on you know what we could make happen here? Everybody starts throwing out ideas. That's good. Now let's say I get 100 ideas. Is right? And I know I can't do 100 ideas, nor can they. Then what I'm going to say is, guys, listen, I got to tell you, thank you so much for all the different ideas. I mean, there's a lot of good stuff up here. Now, clearly we can't do all, you know, 50 of these ideas, but what we can do is probably do two per quarter. So how do we narrow these down to the top eight? And then you stop talking again. Mick, right? And let them now defend their ideas, right? So now that whole discussion happens. This can go on and on. I'm not saying anything. I'm just facilitating this meeting, you know? Then they narrow it down, because some people are going to think, well, that's a really good idea. I hadn't thought about it that way. Some people may think, you know what? Actually, I don't know that that's going to work. And here's why, let them have that uncomfortable, healthy debate, then afterwards. Mick, I'm going to say, okay, great. So now we've got eight ideas. Thank you guys really love the healthy discussion that was taking place, and I love, more importantly, the respect and the dignity that you had and such. Now what I'd like for you to do is you all have your quotas for next year. You've got the eight ideas. What I want you to do is come back to me with a plan of how you're going to incorporate that in these eight ideas you came up with into your territory so that you can ensure that your quota gets hit. How does that sound? Right? So that's how we really want to lead today, where they're the ones coming up with the ideas, defending the ideas, challenging the ideas. And then, you know, come putting pen to paper to figure out how we're going to get the ROI on the idea right. That is so much easier than the way that you and I may have been brought up in leadership, which was, we sit there and go, billion dollars. Okay, let me come up with a plan on how we're going to do this, and then I give it to the team, and then the team executes those days are dead. That is just not how leadership is done. These days, leadership is now reversed. And so the way that I just tracked it out for the listeners is the best way to pull out the best talent of your best people who are hopefully do not think alike, look alike, communicate alike or share the same generation.

Mick Spiers: 27:01

To me, it's It feels very engaging like to me, I feel like I'm part of the process here. Like I feel like, if I've been architecting the solution, my fingerprints are on it, I'm going to take a lot more ownership of this than I went to a meeting today and the boss told us what to do. And I'm not really sure if this is the right way to do it or not, but the boss told me, so I kind of I'm going to sorry to swear for a second, I'm going to half ass it, because not really committed to this. It was someone else's idea, but if it was my idea, or if I felt like my thoughts are some somewhere in that idea, I'm going to take so much more pride and ownership of the outcome. The other thing that I like there Steph is we mentioned before about the micro moments, that if someone does come up with a stupid idea, and you tell them, that's the stupidest idea I've ever heard, they're never going to speak up again. But everyone else is watching too, and now that person that was just about to on the tip of the tongue, they had a gem of an idea. They're going to back off and go, Well, I'm not going to speak. What if Steph tells me that I'm the stupidest person in the room, right? So, so those micro moments are really important. And then what I loved is, even after they you've got the 50 ideas, what I loved is that you didn't then go, okay, great ideas. People like, like this one, let's do that one. You then invited them to go, Okay, how are we going to how we going to prioritize this idea? And you invited that debate of defending the idea. And what jumped into my head when you said, defend the idea was, now we're going to see if there's substance to the idea. Because if they can, if they can defend it, if they can defend it, why should we do this? If they can defend any objections to doing this, it's a good idea. If, under debate the first 30 seconds, the idea falls to water. Well, it wasn't a great idea. Let's move to the next one. How does that sit with you?

Stephanie Chung: 28:59

Absolutely, and it makes me think of, you know, one of the leadership teams that I was on the executive team of, we had a few there's, I don't know, there's probably about 14 of us on this team, and we had all taken this company public. And on there was, you know, as you're as you're trying to go public, you're pulling in executives with different specialties, right? So everybody came in with their own pedigree and strong resume, if you will. And I remember, there is a few people on this team that had come from being executives at Amazon, and so they would challenge how we thought in Amazon, you know, I mean, listen, there's a lot of things that they do very, very well from just a shared business perspective. But one of the things that's really interesting about Amazon, and I know it's out there. People can Google this, and I had to live through it, right? Which is because we incorporated this particular philosophy is, whenever you have an idea, so you're having an executive meeting, then whoever the executives is that's pitching this new, whether it's product, process, whatever, whatever is new you have. To do a six page report on what it is that you were pitching and why. And so what happens is the six pages. Now, it's not three pages, it's not five pages, six pages, because usually it's easy to write out your first three thoughts. You know, three pages worth of thoughts. It's it gets a little harder. Pages four, five and six, right? Without just rambling. And so let's say you're launching a new product. So if I think that you know what, I think this would be a great product for us, and why, got to lay out what the product is, why I think it's going to be great. What you know? What does the numbers look like? The concept everything. And you give it at the you don't send it in advance, because we leaders, we get stuff in advance, and then we're just so busy, we never actually look at the stuff, right? So now you sit in the meeting and you're asking questions because you really hadn't spent the time reading the paperwork that you got in advance. So one of the things that they did at Amazon, which we also did in our company, was now it's the executive meeting. You're sitting there, and let's say today was the day I'm pitching a new product or a concept of a product, then I give everybody the six page report, and now we're going to spend a half an hour in silence reading this six page report. That way you guarantee that people are reading it right, and you're asking, you're writing out your questions. And so now, after the 30 minutes, people now have all read it. Now you have questions, and now you have a healthy discussion or debate, or whatever, that is so much more efficient. And the reason why I bring that up is because you know when you think about now and as leaders having that same discussion. Yes, it could be. Most leaders would have said, these are great ideas. Let's do this one, and then everybody falls in line, and then what you create is a sea of sameness, right? Which is not in today's day and age. Sea of sameness is not going to give you a competitive advantage, you're not going to be innovative, you're not going to be first to market, you're just you're just not and so when you think about today's leadership challenge, is good or bad, what's really great about that is you really are trying to utilize the gifts and talents of everybody that's in the room or in the company. I'm a firm believer, if you've hired them, it's then it's worth training them, and then it's also worth making sure that you position them to be able to pull out the gifts and talents that are unique to them, because what we're trying to do is create that really great competitive advantage, best product, best process, best process, best customer experience. You know, whatever it is for each company, but you're not going to get that in the sea of sameness. So as a leader, today's leadership really module is all about, how do I become destructive? And how you do that is to tap into the talents and the gifts of everybody that's sitting around the table. So that takes a different type of leadership, because how most of us were brought up, especially those of us in the older and some of the reasons why we are challenged with the younger generation is because we were brought up where you actually didn't question leadership, right? Leadership said we're going this way, and you're like, all right, let me get on board and go this way. And what has happened over the years, Mick, is when you think about employee engagement, for an example, it's horrible, right? Most people are not engaged at work. And so that's that. And I was just talking from the States, it may be a little bit different, and I'll show you employee the numbers I looked at last time is 30% of employees are actually engaged at work. That's a horrible statistic. Another statistic that I saw is that this younger generation, which is the majority of the workforce, by the way, they're really not having a desire to become leaders. Now that's really bad for those of us in leadership. We've made it so that you actually don't want our job. When we were growing up coming through the ranks, we actually wanted a leader's job, right? We wanted to, one day become a leader. Now what unfortunately is happening is that a lot of the generations are like, either A, I'm not engaged, I'm quietly quitting, or I'm just resigning, or I'm starting my own thing, or B, I'm just going to float this thing out. I'm going to, yeah, I just don't want any of that leadership stuff. So we have some, we have, we have some reckoning to do as as leaders that are in the boomer generation, Gen X generation, as we get prepared for the millennials and the Gen Z, and, of course, the alphas that are coming in as well. And so really, what that means is leadership is now different. And those of us that want to remain relevant, we've got a real we've got a reality check, and we have to be intellectually honest that if we want to be a leader that is relevant, then we're going to have to change. But if we don't want to change, that's okay too. Just know that you will be irrelevant and the train has will leave you. Like those are your options, get on the train, or get out the way, because you're gonna be run over by the train, right? Like, those are the options now. And so it's sometimes a little tough love for leaders to hear the older ones, not the younger ones. And when I say that we're getting stretched with the different generations, a lot of times the younger generation is like, they want to actually ask questions. Why are we doing it that way? Right? And so the last thing they want to hear is because it's always been done that way. And that's like a death sentence for any company anyway, but a lot of times what they're looking at, you know, I always encourage leaders that I know that sometimes we can feel like the younger generation, they don't want to work that hard, they don't want to come in the office and, you know, they don't work in anymore. But let's think about, let's reverse that. It's not that they don't want to work for that hard, they just don't want to work the way you're working, right? And so what that may mean is that it, you know, I always tell the leaders, think about it this way. We're paying for a job to get done. We're not paying for how long it takes for the job to get done, unless it's an hourly employee. So let's put those aside for a second. My job is to make sure that the job gets done. If I'm a department head or a leader ahead of the company. How you do it? I don't care. Just get it done, right? How long it takes you to do it? Probably don't really care either. Just get it done in the timeframe, dates and deliverables that I expect it to be done. We're starting to pay attention to the things that our leaders who groomed us paid attention to, right? Are you in office at eight o'clock? Are you here till eight o'clock at night? You know, now you're a good worker. This generation grew up on computers. So, like, do I need to take 12 hours to do this when I can just, like, punch it in, ai do it this way and, you know? Poof, now we're done it too, right? Job got done. Job got done in the time frame I needed it. Does it? Like, I just want us leaders to refocus what we're focused on, right? So that we realize I just want the best job and I want the best people in the best position to do the best work. That's my job as a leader. How I get us there may be different ways and how we get there as a team, may be different ways and how I would have done it, or how I envisioned it. But does that matter? No, I just need the best job, but the best people to get the best result. So I may have to step out of my own comfort zone to figure out how to do that, and and that will require me to, you know, have different levels of conversation, different communication styles, because I've got to meet people where they're at. They may not all communicate the way I would communicate. They may, you know, I may. I may work best eight to five, but they may work better two to 10, right? You know, does it matter as long as the job gets done? Now, if it matters, some jobs, it does matter, right? So if it matters, then you know, you need to hire for that. But if it really doesn't matter, and we just need the job done the best way possible, the fastest way, most innovative way possible, then we really need to rethink how we've done leadership over the past several decades. And this new generation is really challenging us to think differently. And instead of being upset with them, let's actually try to step back and go, You know what? Maybe there's some good things here that I could take away from this.

Mick Spiers: 37:40

Really good, Steph. So, two things there, two bookends. The first one is the engagement stats are the same in Australia, by the way, and I'm going to just challenge the audience and say, why would someone be engaged if they don't feel seen, if they don't feel heard, if they don't feel valued, if none of their ideas are ever listened to. Why would they be engaged? They're just going to turn up do the bare minimum, get their paycheck, go home to their families, or their sport activities, whatever brings them joy. And now, now work becomes that thing that they do between nine and five and the rest of their life is is more important to them than their work. Whereas if they feel seen, they feel heard, they feel valued, they feel like their ideas are listened to and implemented, all of a sudden, actually, I kind of enjoy my work. I have an impact. It gives me meaning. It brings me joy. I feel proud when I do something. Can it? And it turns out good. That was, that was number one. Number two, that question of, why do we do it like that? I think this is a key moment, and I'm going to there's a little bit of bias in what I'm about to say, but I'm aware of it. This is where some of the generational gap comes in, because I'm a bit older, so people of my generation, I see it all the time. Sometimes I fall into the trap myself. If a young person comes into the workplace and goes, Why don't we do it like that? And they might even say it with a cynical tone, we get defensive and go, Oh, that, that upstart, what they coming in, and they think they know better, whereas if we have a reaction where we stop and reflect and go hang on a second. Why do we do it like that? Is there a better way? All of a sudden we can have better ways of doing things? I'll give an example. Recently in the workplace, a person newly promoted enroll, and this person was actually a, I'm going to call it a diagonal move. They came from a different department altogether and came into a job. They came into a job because we knew that they were going to have different ideas of doing things. And just last week, they took a task that used to take on average, 77 minutes, and it's now done in two minutes. And that would never have happened if the person didn't say, scratch their head and go. Why do we do it like that? It would never have happened. So we need to invite these conversations.

Stephanie Chung: 40:06

That's right, exactly. And you know, you're making me think of in my book highly. People are not like you. I talk about the Earn system. And earn is an acronym, so E, A, R, N, E stands for establish an environment where people feel psychologically safe enough to share their thoughts, ideas, you know, and challenge the status quo. So esta establish an environment where people feel psychologically safe, which we've talked about a means a sure alignment right the left hand has to know what the right hand is doing. The team has to know how the company wins, and equally as important how what they do contributes to that way. So you have to assure alignment. R means you've got to rally the troops, which is what made me think of this when you were talking give them something. People don't follow a to do list. They follow a vision. Give them something that they can get excited about that's bigger than their to do list, something that gets them excited to show up, speak up and deliver every single day. And then in stands for navigate right. You've got to navigate the Narrows. I always call it. I always say it's like parallel parking, a little bit up, a little bit back forward, back forward, scoot here and there. You've got to navigate that. I come from aviation. When we think of navigation, it's in our blood. A pilot will never go to an aircraft and not have any clue where they're going and why, right? So when you think about leadership, and I want leaders to think about navigating the Narrows, what that simply means is your team needs to know where's the company going and why. How are we going to get there end by when and when we hit those turbulent times, as every business does, then what's the backup plan? So the Earn system, and I outlined in my book as to this is how you lead people who are not like you. And if you do those things, it's, again, not complicated. It's just usually not the way that we tend to think. And so you and I, you know, talked a lot about psychological safety, establishing that environment. And the reason why that's number one is, if you can't get that done, the rest is a moot point, right? Because you just will continue to live in the sea of sameness. Because people like, oh, the boss told me to do it. I'm going to do it. And then come five o'clock, they're checking out not a minute after, right? Because they don't feel engaged in a part of the work. But man, oh man, if you can get them to connect the dots and see that what they do adds value and how it helps the company win overall. And a lot of times, what we as leaders do is we may talk about how the company wins, but we don't. We don't attach the dots, so the person may know. Okay, so we're trying to get to whatever. That's how the company wins. But what they don't realize is, okay, but how does the company win? How does the customer win? And how does I as an employee win? That's the stuff. We don't help connect the dots. They may know what the vision is of the company, but what does that mean to me? Just your average worker in the company. So we as leaders have to connect those dots, right? And so, yeah, the earned system. I literally break it down to make it even more digestible for leaders. Again, I don't want them to like, this is so hard and so overwhelming that they do nothing if you just break that system down. And I give examples for each one the simplest way. So let's use a because you and I have talked a lot about the establishing the environment. So let's talk about assure alignment. One of the things that I used to do when I ran companies, and I swear by this. And I think every leader do this, even if you don't run the company, you just run a department. Do this anyway. Assure alignment. The left hand has to know what the right hand is doing. Go and find people in your organization individually today and go ask them three questions. What business are we in? How does the business make money? How does what you do contribute to helping the business win? That's it, those three questions. Now, if you ask five people that individually in your organization, you'll probably get a whole slew of different answers. And that's not necessarily a bad thing. It just shows you where your gap is. And so now, instead of being upset that, how do they not know this? I, you know, I wrote it, I talked about at the all hands last year. You know, that kind of stuff, right? It's like, now use that as a guide, that you should be bringing this up all the time. They have to know those basic questions, because now it helps them realize how they fit into the equation. Because they may say, well, our mission is this, but maybe they don't know how what they do contributes to helping with the overall mission, right? And so it's your job to help fill in those blanks or connect the dots. One of the easiest ways to do that. Mick, and I swear this is the easiest way to do it. Every company I've ever led, I made sure that we did walk a miles. And what that meant is that the every department was to walk a mile in every other department's shoes a lot of times. And that's not to be confused with onboarding, right? Because a lot of times people go, Oh, yeah, I do that on our boarding, right? You go, sit in this department. You sit in that department. That's very different. Because when you're onboarding a new employee, you're having to meet with the different departments, it's so that they understand how to do their job better. That's very different than what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is you want to understand how everybody else does their job. Hopefully you know how to do your job right. But how does that interact and fit with everybody else is job as well. Because I don't want a employee base that is ignorant. I want an employee base that understands how the business works and understands and can answer that question, what business are we in? And so you're not going to understand it if you just are in your silo and you never have exposure to the other departments, right? Or, you know, and then, and so that it helps with teamwork. It helps with, you know, culture, company culture. It helps with them understanding how this whole thing works. So I'll give you an example. Since I come from aviation, one of the things I would do is, whenever the pilots were in town for their reoccurrent training for the aircraft is to make sure that they came into headquarters, and I want them to go and sit, you know, put some headphones on and sit with those people, maybe the customer service folks who are booking the trips, because, as a pilot, you know, when she get on board the aircraft, what happens and where you're going, but what you don't know is the 10,000 steps that may be needed to get us to the place that you can get on board The aircraft and fly somebody right? You don't know all the other steps. And so I don't need you to be an expert in those steps. I just need you to have an understanding that those steps take place because then, when you're standing there for an example, and you're ready to go, and you're like, I haven't gotten the paperwork, instead of thinking, Well, what's going on with customer service or what's going on in operations? Instead of, you know, pointing the finger, you now have spent time you understand all the things it takes for them in order to for them to book that trip, you're now more likely to go. Hey, you know what calling in the ops like, what can I do to help? I haven't gotten the paperwork yet. Do you need me to do something on my side? Right? That changes the team culture, right? We're all we're all going to win, or we're all going to lose. Those are our options, right? There's no superstar on this team. We're all going to win or we're all going to lose. And so how you do that to assure alignment, is to literally have people walk a mile in each other's shoes. I promise you leaders, every one of you listening, I promise it will change your team culture. It will help your team be much better, efficient, effective business people, so they understand how the business works, because that's going to be super important, not just how their job functions. How does this business work? Because once people know that, then they're part. They realize they're bigger. They're part of something bigger than themselves, and that gets them excited, or, ie, dare I say, engaged in their work, because they're working towards something much, much bigger, but it's your job as the leader to make sure those dots get connected. That's not their job to figure it out. It's your job.

Mick Spiers: 47:48

Yeah, really good. Steph, I'll tell you what I'm taking away from there feels to me like systems thinking that I'm now going to understand how the whole system works, but it starts with a macro purpose and then comes to a micro purpose. Is what I was thinking as you're talking the macro purpose is, why do we all exist? Why does this team exist? Who do we serve? What problem do we help them solve? How do we make money along the way? And profit and cash is not a dirty word. It actually keeps the doors open of the business and fuels the mission. So if you're very purpose driven, don't be afraid to make the profit and cash along the way, because it actually fuels you you towards that mission. So So what is our vision? What who do we serve? What problem do we help them solve? What needs to be true for us to help them solve that problem. So that starts becoming our ingredients. And then how does the system all work together? Which is where some of the micro purpose might come. So if I'm in the accounts department, and it might seem very boring and sometimes not connected to the bigger vision of the company, you need to think about well, by doing what I do, it enables this other team to do what they do. And it's this so that moment, so I do this, so that you can do that, so that you can do that. And then we achieve our mission as a team, and we we then can all take pride in the outcomes of the of the of what we have, what we've achieved for our customers.

Stephanie Chung: 49:22

Say that louder for the people in the black in the back. Mick, no, that's awesome. That's 100% right. And you know, it's funny when you were talking, I was thinking about like I said earlier. I came up through sales before I started running companies, and one of the things I used to do with my sales team is to have them sit down with the finance department, because if not, then sales is just, you know, what happened is, I asked them one day as a team, I was like, Hey guys, how do we make money? And they're like, well, we make money when we, you know, sell stuff, right? When I hit my quota. That's how the company makes money. Well, you and I both know that's actually not how the company makes money, right? It's, it's a, you know, it's top line. But the whole. Lot of stuff that comes in between that. And so what I realized that there was an opportunity for them to actually get more educated, because I didn't want them just being a salesperson that knew how to close a deal and hit the quota. Though that's important. I also wanted them to understand the business and how the business makes money, because when they're sitting there in front of a client or prospect, I'm counting on them to be able to make wise decisions for the organization, but if I'm not giving them all the information, it's hard for them to make wise decisions, right? Because they're only thinking I got to close this deal. Well, not every deal is a good deal. Not every customer is a good customer, right? And so. So what I what I would do is I would have my sales people sit with the finance people, because the people who know how to answer that question, how does the business make money? Is finance, right? So finance can paint the picture, because here's what was happening. Let's say my sales people would say, well, we make, you know, 20% when we sell this particular aircraft. Why is it when I say to finance, the guy needs a 5% discount to close? Finance gives me such a problem, because we're made in the salesperson said we're making 20% but when you sit with finance, finance is like, Yeah, but I still have to pay this and that and this and that, and so when it's all said and done, you think we're making 20% but we're lucky if we make 5% when it's all said and done off of that deal. So when you come to me and ask for 5% discount, and I say no, it's because, you know, here's why, and that's where, that's how leaders help connect the dots. Because if you're a salesperson, you think, Oh, we make 20% you don't know all the other details. Nobody's ever told you the details, right? And so, because people tend to be afraid of we just want them to hit the quota. Well, actually, I don't want, I don't want just a salesperson. I want to create a business executive who happens to be a salesperson by title, right? And how I the so therefore, when they're sitting in front of the customer who says, Well, I want a 5% discount. Well, if I've equipped the salesperson to realize all the nooks and crannies, back to your point, profit and loss is not a bad word, then they can sit there, and they can shut it down there. They don't have to come back to finance and go finance, can I have 5% Finance says no, and then they're upset. Finance is the sales prevention department, you know. And so like all the stuff that we leaders end up having to manage, you can avoid all that if you make sure that your people understand the business that you're in, how the business makes money. How is it that they help contribute? And so now, all of a sudden, the salesperson, if they're if they're understanding how all those the answers to those questions, when the customer says, I'd like a 5% discount, the salesperson can say, well, you know, actually, unfortunately, that's not going to be able to happen. And here's why, blah, blah, blah. But what I can do is, if this is not in your budget, then what we can do is look at the things that we've presented. What do you need us to take off the table so we can get closer to your budget? Right? There's a different conversation there than versus, well, let me go back and ask, right? You know, so there's just a lot of clunkiness that is unnecessary, but the leader has so much ability to be able to well lead so that the the the employees, can connect the dots as to what business we're in. How does the business make money? And how is it that what I do contributes to helping the company win?

Mick Spiers: 53:11

Yeah, it's really good, Steph. I want to add, add something there, so that deeper understanding of how our business works is going to be the first key, the second key for the sales people, or anyone in a customer facing role, is you need to understand your customers business as well. What

Stephanie Chung: 53:52

Yes, oh, absolutely, absolutely. And I love that. I'm so glad that you added that addition, because all of it starts with the salesperson having an are the what are the levers in there? And your job isn't to understanding of how the business works, right, you know? And then you're right. Then they can position it for they definitely should know how the business works, for their for give them a 5% discount. It's to unlock 5% value, and it's either their customer. And that's a fair point, because a lot of times sales people may not right. They're just trying to sell something, and it's like, that's not our job. Our job is not to sell stuff. Our job is we. We are problem solvers. by making an efficiency on the inputs to accrete 5% so that you That's the job, right? And so that's how you have to go about it. And so, you know, if you I always tell sauce people this, if your customer, if you can't actually articulate to the can give the discount, or it's to show the customer that it's customer why this product may or may not, you know, make the most sense for them, right? Like, that's your job. You should know, not just our business. You should know the business that accreting 5% value in their business. It's not a discount. we're in, and therefore, when you're talking to the customer, figuring out what it is that they need, hopefully it's our customer, you know us as a company or our product that can It's your job to unlock the value. How does that sit with them? help satisfy that need. But the truth of the matter is, it may not be, they may have be better served, you know, someplace else, right? Because not all customers are good customers for the product that you have. And so, you know, it means that you have to know our business. It means you have to know the industry. And yes, it means that you also have to know your customer's business so that you can be the advisor to understand, like, Okay, this is what I think would work or not work, or what have you. That's what you know. We're you and I are talking about leaders and employees. I got just as much information talk, because I speak to sales people and sales conferences as to what does the customer want these days? And interestingly enough, Mick, what customers really want these days, because they're carrying such It's so heavy out there right now to be in leadership. So what a customer wants from their sales people is they want to be able to have higher levels of conversations that connect, because their thought process is, if I can connect with you at a higher level, not just here's my product, you should buy it, but at a higher level, then that means you will now be in position to better understand the challenges I'm going through, so that you can be in a better position to then offer up a solution based on you knowing the industry and or your you know Your company, you can now help me and assist me as a partner in this, versus I'm a salesperson trying to sell something, right?

Mick Spiers: 56:09

Yeah, yeah, that's what a partner looks like. You want that relationship? Let's say that it's you and I. Steph, you want that relationship where I walk away going, you know that? Steph, she just gets me. She understands, she understands my problems, and she helps me solve my problems. I love Steph. That's what a sales partnership looks like, right so?

Stephanie Chung: 56:28

Yeah, really good.

Mick Spiers: 56:29

Look, I feel like I could talk to you for 20, 27 hours, and we wouldn't be done Steph, but I'm going to draw us to a bit of a close with a bit of a summary of some of the things that we've discussed so and some of it's an extrapolation, so bear with me. So Ally leadership. How to lead people who are not like you? I'm going to say it starts with surrounding yourself with people who are not like you so that you can encourage that diversity of experience, thoughts and perspectives. The second job is to get to know your team, so that you understand what their strengths are, what their preferences are, what they like, what they don't like, so that you're in a position where you can draw out all of those perspectives. Diversity is useless if we don't have inclusion, where those voices come to the table, those ideas that 50 ideas instead of one idea repeated 50 times, you want that richness of the ideas. And it's your job. I'm going to use your own acronym here. It's your job to establish that environment where those ideas are drawn out, where people feel safe. I'm going to go even further than safe, Steph, I'm going to say where people feel rewarded for speaking up, where they feel rewarded for speaking up. It's your job to ensure alignment. It's your job to rally the troops. It's your job to navigate those choppy waters, because not everything's going to go right every single day. And if you can do these things that Steph is talking about, you're going to have great success. You're not only just going to have great successes at success as a team. Everyone's going to feel seen, heard, valued. They're going to feel engaged, the exact opposite of what we see in so many workplaces today. They're going to take ownership of the results, because they're proud of their contribution. And I'm going home to my family going I did something that meant something today, that had meaning, and I contributed. It wasn't just I turned up and did what the boss told me to do. I felt like I did something that had some meaning to it today. Thank you so much. Steph, I absolutely love this. I'm going to take us now to our Rapid Round. These are the same four questions we ask all of our guests. So what's the one thing you know now, Stephanie Chung that you wish you knew when you were 20?

Stephanie Chung: 58:49

That's a good question. So my 20s, you know, it's funny, I was that kid that knew exactly what I wanted to do. I grew up in Air Force brat, so I knew as a little girl I wanted to be in aviation. And so everything I was focusing on was just trying to get, get that, get that accomplished. But at 20, I think what I would know now is, don't sweat the small stuff. You know, I think when you're coming up, especially after your teenage years, and like, what am I going to do? And, you know, it just all the the bigness of life starts to hit you around 20, because you're done with all the schooling and like, Okay, this just got real. I would just let myself know you're going to be fine. Stay focused, stay committed, and, you know, receive the blessing from there. And so just don't sweat the small stuff. And so everything that I talk about from a leadership perspective is very much keeping things simple, because I think life is complicated enough, and so leadership doesn't have to suck a lot of times it sucks because it's overly complicated and it's just a heavy burden to carry, but you can lighten the load if you learn how to utilize the people around you based on their gifts and their talents. So that's really what I would say as a 20 year old, you know, at one point in my career, I was very striving. And work hard and, you know, just do all the stuff that all of us, I think, at 20 we're just trying to achieve and and make, you know, make strides in our career. Now I'm at the point where it's like, Okay, not that hard work is always going to be there, but it's what doesn't have to be there. Is the the burning yourself out in the process of it, right? If you tap into all the resources that are around you, you can still get there. You'll get there faster, and you'll get there more refreshed, if you really know how to lead all the differences around you. So that's what I would tell my 20 year old self.

Mick Spiers: 1:00:32

Well said, Steph, I love it. There's a lesson there for all of us. For sure, as a number one international selling, best author yourself. What is your favorite book?

Stephanie Chung: 1:00:43

Well, one, I would say the Bible not to get to, but that, you know, it just gives me really great guidance. Right now, I'm reading a Bible by my mentor, John Maxwell, and it's the Bible, but what he does is he puts leadership aspects into each of the different scriptures. So you read it more with a modern twist, you know, of like, what does this mean from a leadership perspective? So it's really, I've been really enjoying that that's one that I really like. I also my mentor who has passed away since. But when I speak to audiences or in companies, I always speak about the science of a conversation. And my mentor, the late Judith Glazer, is the author and writer of conversational intelligence, so I always go back to that book as a point of reference as to what is the brain doing during a conversation. Because we all, you know, there's a lot of books out there talking about what to do and what to say and how to say it, and mirroring people and all that stuff, which is important, but we tend to miss what is the brain actually doing. So when I'm talking to sales people, what is the brain doing when you're you know, what is your your prospect or client's brain doing when you're in a conversation, a closing conversation, or handling objections conversation, what's happening in the brain, if you're a leader, when you're having a conversation with your employee, you're trying to build that psychological safety. A lot of it's about building trust. So how do you utilize the brain to build the certain chemicals that are going to help trust get cultivated? Right? So I very much am about the science of a conversation. So the books that I like tend to help me understand people more. Thus, the Bible, right? But then also my mentor's book, conversational intelligence is just something a go to that go back to back and forth on all the time.

Mick Spiers: 1:02:16

Yeah, really good. Steph, I'm going to reflect on that. I don't normally interrupt in the middle of this part, but that's really interesting. And you know, thinking about the Bible and whether, whether you're listening to the show, whether you're religious or not, the Bible is all about how you treat other human beings. Lead, leadership is about how you treat other human beings. And John C Maxwell, like with all of his background, he saw that connection, and he draws that out. It's really good. And with conversational intelligence. That was a game changer for me, and that move from I language to we, language is the very thing that we're talking about, Steph. It's the how do you draw other people? How do we create an environment where we're stronger together, where we're the sum of our strengths? The only way we can do that is we. The only way we can do that is we, yeah, okay, really good.

Stephanie Chung: 1:03:02

Yes, that's right, yes, Judith. Judith would be glad to hear you say that blessed to sit under just icons, amazing people that pour into my life about this stuff. And yeah, and Judith was a, she was a great mentor for me. So I'm glad that you enjoyed the book. Yeah, and John's a great mentor for me now, so.

Mick Spiers: 1:03:22

Yeah, very good, very good. Okay, what's your favorite quote?

Stephanie Chung: 1:03:26

Tough times don't last. Tough people do.

Mick Spiers: 1:03:29

Oh, I like that. There's a lot of resilience in there. I love it, yeah, very good stuff. And finally, people are going to be blown away by this. And there are people out there that are challenged, right? They're challenged by this. They want to do better at leading people who are not like you. They want to do better. They want to create the psychological safety. We're talking about, the diversity, the the inclusion, all of these things. They want to do it. They don't always know how. How do they find you? If they'd like to know more. And let me say before you start, that we've barely scratched the surface of the book. There's so much more golden nuggets in the book. But how do people find you if they want to know more?

Stephanie Chung: 1:04:08

Thank you for saying that. I appreciate that. So stephaniechung.com, it's probably the easiest place, because from there you can get all my social handles. But if you're active on social I'm on all the social places, and my handle is at the Stephanie Chung, if you really I do a newsletter as well that on substack called your ally and leadership. And it's all about the neuroscience of success and leading. So I take the brain stuff that I'm fascinated with and pull it in so that it makes it, it makes it digestible for leaders to understand. Like, Oh, okay, this is, this is a natural instinct that I have, and you know, not to beat yourself up and like some stuff, is just in our brain. That's how we were created, so long as you know that now you know how to utilize that asset in a good way that will help you even progress even faster and further. But Stephanie chung.com is where you can find me, the book you can buy at any of where books are sold, and we just came with a program, because what was happening is people were loving the book and saying, I'd love to get training. So we have a training as well, and you can find that training under stephaniechung.com/earn. The Earn system that I was telling you about. Yeah, that's an online training, self paced. You can do it at your own will, and it literally breaks down the Earn process that we talked about to give leaders some, you know, time to just know how to how do I really digest this? So, lots of different ways, but I keep it simple. stephaniechung.com will send you everywhere.

Mick Spiers: 1:05:30

Brilliant, and we'll put the link in the in the show notes, for sure. But thank you so much. Steph, thank you for the gift of your time today and for sharing your wisdom and experience, and importantly, some action steps that we can all take as leaders. Thank you so much.

Stephanie Chung: 1:05:46

Thank you for having me. Mick, this was fun. I knew it would be, but thank you.

Mick Spiers: 1:05:50

What a powerful conversation with Stephanie Chung, it really makes you stop and think when you look at your team, do people truly feel seen, heard and valued? Are you creating a space where people speak up or a space where people stay silent, and when someone challenges your idea? Do you react with curiosity or with defense? Stephanie reminded us today that diversity without inclusion is just a statistic. It's what you do with it that matters, how you draw out every voice, how you reward courage and how you listen without judgment. Earn framework is simple yet deeply human. Establish psychological safety, so people feel free to speak up, assure alignment, so every person knows how their work contributes to the mission rally the troops around a vision that inspires passion and purpose and navigate the narrows when things get tough with empathy, adaptability and truth. Stephanie also challenged us to rethink engagement. If people aren't engaged, maybe it's because they don't feel valued, and if they don't feel valued, it's up to us as leaders to change that. To ask yourself this week, whose voice isn't being heard on your team, and what can you do to draw it out? Next week, I'll be reflecting on all of our incredible November guests, including Stephanie, in a special solo cast episode where we'll connect the charts on what it really means to lead with humanity in a changing world. You've been listening to The Leadership Project. If today sparked an insight, don't keep it to yourself. Share it with one other person who would benefit from listening to the show. A huge thank you to Gerald Calibo for his tireless work editing every episode, and to my amazing wife say, who does all the heavy lifting in the background to make this show possible? None of this happens without them around here. We believe leadership is a practice, not a position, that people should feel seen, heard, valued and that they matter, and that the best leaders trade ego for empathy, certainty for curiosity and control for trust. If that resonates with you, please subscribe on YouTube and on your favorite podcast app. And if you want more, follow me on LinkedIn and explore our archives for conversations that move you from knowing to doing until next time lead with curiosity, courage and care.