Episode 65 - Yamilette Cano

Today’s guest is Yamilette Cano, president of the Mexican Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong. Yamilette reflects on her life journey: achieving her dream of becoming a professional ballerina, studying international relations at university and then relocating to Hong Kong, where she champions entrepreneurship, innovation and public speaking. She speaks with our Senior Partner Colin Cohen. Stay tuned. 

00:47 Welcome and Introduction
01:52 Growing Up in Mexico
03:00 Ballet Dreams and Discipline
04:13 Canada Ballet Crossroads
05:24 University and International Relations
07:01 Falling for Hong Kong
07:48 Breaking Into Events
10:01 Founding Louder Global
11:29 Confidence and Speaking Tips
15:43 Women Empowerment Focus
16:43 Leading the Mexican Chamber
19:25 Books and Finding Your Voice
20:38 Mexico Travel and Safety
22:41 Learning Five Languages
23:48 Hong Kong Home and Future Plans
25:47 Closing Thanks and Farewell 

Host: Colin Cohen
Director: Niall Donnelly
Producer and VO: Thomas Latter      

Established in 1985, Boase Cohen & Collins is an independent law firm equipped with Hong Kong knowledge and global reach. Please visit our website. 

Transcript

[00:48:00] Colin: Hello everyone. After more than 60 episodes of this podcast. Today, I am delighted to welcome my first guest from Mexico, Yamilette Cano is a entrepreneur, MC, speaker, coach, events professional and founder of a communications firm, Louder Global. She speaks five languages, is a former professional ballerina and is currently president of the Mexican Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong.

She radiates energy, innovation, and confidence, and I'm very much looking forward to our chat. Yamilette, welcome to Law & More and as I always ask my guests, what's been keeping you busy recently?

[00:48:50] Yamilette: Hello Colin, thank you so much for having me here and what's keeping me busy recently, this podcast, I woke up this morning with lots of energy deciding what I was gonna wear and getting ready for this conversation.

[00:49:04] Colin: Excellent. Now, I think our listeners will be very interested in your early days before we go on to all the things that are happening at the moment. So tell us a little bit about your upbringing in Mexico. Family school days. Little introductions to how you, your background. I'm interested.

[00:49:21] Yamilette: I love you asked that because I love my country.

Mexico is such a wonderful, creative, colorful place to be born in. And also I was born in a family that was already very entrepreneurial and very creative. I'm an only child, which is not very common in Mexico. Obviously back in the days people would have more than one children. So starting from that, I was different. And my parents always pushed me to pursue that creativity and color. Both my parents do arts. My mom danced 20 years, polynesian dances, Hawaiian, Tahiti, Rapa Nui. And my dad, he's an entrepreneur himself too, with a family of entrepreneurs. So creativity and looking for different angles and different opportunities was always in the conversation.

[00:50:12] Colin: Yeah. And you always dreamed of being a ballerina. Was that 'cause of your mom or you wanted to do it or what you just said off to the classes?

[00:50:20] Yamilette: I think I was born with that, 'cause my mom asked me if I wanted to dance Hawaiian, and I did say right away, no, that's not a type of dance. I wanna do, classical ballet. Classical ballet was in my vein since I was born. And at three, I asked my mom to take me to the classes She told me she couldn't back then because I was too young, and then I needed to wait until I was five. So next we know I'm blowing my cake candles, and I went off to dancing class.

[00:50:49] Colin: And that. And that was the start of your ballerina career.

[00:50:52] Yamilette: Correct? I could never look back. 

[00:50:54] Colin: Yeah. It's very tough being a ballerina. I had another friend of mine who's a ballerina, and it really is hard work.

[00:51:01] Yamilette: It is, it's literally, as people say, blood, sweat, and tears. We do have blood in our feet and we sweat and we cry for the movement to get there for us to get the role for any injuries you may have along the way.

But if you have the heart and the passion for it, it feels like it's something you can always get around it. 

[00:51:26] Colin: And you were successful in getting into a school in Canada, the Quinte Ballet School.

How old were you there when you went to that?

[00:51:35] Yamilette: I was 17. 

[00:51:36] Colin: How long were you with them for?

[00:51:38] Yamilette: I was there for a summit program, which was supposed to be an audition for them to decide if I could stay later on for their full program or not, and this was one of the most complicated choices I had to make because I was accepted in the full program. However, I did not finish high school yet.

I was only 17. I still had one year to go. And there were crossroads was between do I stay and perhaps not finish high school, but pursue my ballerina career in a foreign country or go back to Mexico and still dance, but finish high school and I decided to go back. 

[00:52:12] Colin: But you did spend some time in Belleville, yeah?

[00:52:15] Yamilette: Yes.

[00:52:16] Colin: Now my daughter went to school in Belleville. So I remember many times dropping her off in the boarding school in Belleville. Not the most interesting place in Canada, but it is quite close to Toronto as well. So a bit of context there. So very few people have been to Bellville, the highway coming in, the big trucks and all the rest.

Got a couple of good friends of mine in Bellville as well. So University. Tell us about that. 

[00:52:38] Yamilette: When I finished high school, again, another crossroads, I only wanted to dance, and my mom's always been one of my biggest mentors, and both my mom and my dad. When my mom is a little bit more objective, when I need to be dreamy, I go to my dad.

When I need to be objective, I go to my mom, and my mom said to me, you are a beautiful dancer. You love your craft, but if you don't have any thing else than this. What are you gonna do? Are you just going to teach? Are you going to have a studio? Yes. So she confronted me with the reality and I decided that my passion wasn't performing, not so much in teaching, so I needed something else.

Hence I decided to go to university and study international relations. But I was also very lucky to be at a university where they also had a dancing company. So I did both at the same time.

[00:53:27] Colin: Where was that?

[00:53:28] Yamilette: That was in the north of Mexico, in Monterey.

[00:53:30] Colin: Oh, so you went back from Bellville to Monterey. Yeah.

And in Mexico as well. Enjoy your time at University? 

[00:53:36] Yamilette: I loved it. Loved it. 

[00:53:39] Colin: Was it the friendship? Was it the classes? Was it just the uniqueness just being away from home.

[00:53:43] Yamilette: It was a combination because my parents were in another state called Queretaro and I went all the way to the north of Mexico to study. And this university, the Tech de Monteres, one of the most entrepreneurial universities.

So we also were taught about entrepreneurship and creativity. So it was the combination of that plus my friends that were also from everywhere in Mexico and the campus was beautiful, and what I was studying was very interesting. I was really delighted to start international relations.

[00:54:13] Colin: Fantastic. And then Hong Kong. Now 2011 you came to Hong Kong, you relocated. 

How did that happen?

[00:54:22] Yamilette: It all happened backwards because in 2008, during university I had one professor that taught me Asia Pacific scenario. So we were learning all about Asia Pacific and growing up in Mexico, people would ask me if I was Chinese. Don't ask me why it just happened and you know how kids are and they will greet me like Yami-san and all of these things.

So I did have that in the back of my brain. So when I had the opportunity to come to the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2008 as an exchange student. I was in love with the city, so I decided to come back in 2011. At the first moment I could, I came back and established myself here.

[00:55:01] Colin: So you came into Hong Kong and by establishing yourself here, tell me a bit of a story.

It's coming to Hong Kong, isn't that easy or that straightforward. What did you do when you first came here?

[00:55:11] Yamilette: It was always an open book for me because what I experienced during the university exchange, it was one side of Hong Kong, and then I had the objective, I'm gonna go back with a suitcase, and what's gonna happen, what could go wrong?

Whatever goes wrong is not gonna be the worst. So I'm gonna give myself, three months. I give myself three months to find a job. And if not, I would go back to Mexico. And Hong Kong Colin, is so open with networking and people helping each other like us. We are now having this wonderful conversation and I met a Canadian called Andrew Work, which maybe you know of.

[00:55:53] Colin: The name rings Bell. Yes.

[00:55:55] Yamilette: At a university soiree and he told me, what are you doing here? He connected me. He's one of the super connectors and eventually I matched with another Mexican that was already in Hong Kong and she had an events company. So we partner and started working together and grew the company.

[00:56:14] Colin: So to help our listeners, I would know events organizer. Just give us a bird's eye view. Explain to everyone who doesn't really know what does that mean? What did you do exactly?

[00:56:26] Yamilette: Everything. When you wanna have a good time to showcase your brand or just get together for a specific objective, an event organizer can do from creating the theme, the concept of the event.

Would be the colors, the logos, the mood to producing the hardcore materials for the event. We're talking about light, sound, backdrops, getting together, the entertainers and all the logistics behind the experience of an event is managed by a team of event organizers, and then you have the experts, some experts in light, some experts in the production materials and whatnot.

[00:57:02] Colin: So let's say I'm a company, you would put everything together for a production, or we want to do a big, let's say, conference in Hong Kong to promote, financials or whatever you would do. Yeah. Correct. Good. Now you event organizer and then you Louder Global, that's your company and it led to you founding it. Tell us a little bit more about that. I'm interested.

[00:57:24] Yamilette: When I was working with the events company, my previous partner, we sold the company in 2016, and through the transition of the acquisition we had to work with this company that acquired us. And I learned a lot about corporations and the insights of a big company and decided that once the time was up with the acquisition, I wanted to go back to entrepreneurship.

And that's when Louder Global was born. It was from the necessity of me needing to do something different than events because I had an NDA for a year. And also with the pinpointing, the fact that a lot of the people that we are organized events for had to present in some shape or form, and a lot of them were great, but some of them needed a little push.

So then with the background of movement, with my ballet time and the international relations, understanding that I had. I put together a coaching program so I could help anyone, women, male, young people, entrepreneurs, founders that want to fine tune their voice and elavate it. 

[00:58:36] Colin: So really a coach on presenting yourself, helping out your public speaking really.

[00:58:41] Yamilette: Correct.

[00:58:42] Colin: Where do you get your confidence from? You're very confident person or is having natural or it something you've been taught?

[00:58:48] Yamilette: I think it's a combination. Again, I was always very upfront when I was an entertainer, a ballerina, but also the guidance from my mentors, my parents having courses here and there.

My mom used to have also a radio program in Mexico, so she used to take me there and watch what the VJs were doing, and we had these little tricks of putting the pencil in the mouth so you can enunciate better. And all of these things, I believe, elevated at the end my understanding of who I wanted to be and how did I want it to showcase it to the world.

And then eventually also life. Life pushing you to different situations, to other opportunities and saying, you have to pivot. And with that experience, I believe I earned more courage and the courage build up the confidence. 

And 

[00:59:36] Colin: do you ever get nervous?

[00:59:37] Yamilette: I do all the time, but that for me, it means that I really care about what I'm doing.

[00:59:41] Colin: Can you share some tips on being a successful public speaker? Help me out. I'm gotta give a little speech, what tips are you gonna give me or anyone else, or someone who hasn't really spoken before.

[00:59:52] Yamilette: I would say that the first thing is to understand yourself. So self-awareness is key.

I can give you the most wonderful suit, but if you don't know how to wear it for yourself, then it doesn't matter how fancy, how expensive the suit is. But if we have self-awareness of the strengths that we have, of the weaknesses or challenges that we may face, and what can we do around them, then it's not easy for anybody.

So have a very good self-awareness and understanding of. Your strengths, first and foremost, and how can you channel those strengths to undermine the weaknesses? And from there, the page is open, it's wide because then you can learn enunciation tricks. If your enunciation is not better, you can learn how to move, how to utilize the stage.

But without the self-awareness, it's not possible. And second would be. Work on your body language, because body language is the most important communication channel we can have. We can say something, we can have perfect tune, we can have incredible content. But if your body language doesn't support what you're saying, nobody's going to be believe you.

So be aware of your body language and the capacity that it has to create impact.

[01:01:09] Colin: Yeah. And many people are, how could I say, a little bit nervous or terrified of speaking in public.

I know many people, even many lawyers are very nervous before, the minute they get up, the words flow out and you can express yourself and you put forward the argument, which you're prepared for beforehand. So how can we overcome that? Being a little bit terrified?

[01:01:31] Yamilette: But you used that word already, calling preparation is key and not like I'm gonna wing it. Yes, we can improvise, but if we set up the stage, I call life a stage because, we present ourselves every single day.

It doesn't have to be in a big actual physical stage. If you set up your stage with most of the things that you can control, then whenever you have any uncertainty, it's going to be easier to pivot. Second, you can use breathing exercises. Just before your presentation, you can box breathing, which is inhale four times, and then keep it four times there and exhale in counting of four and keeping it there.

That's box breathing. Or even panting like a dog. That helps a lot to push the air into your brain. And you actually feel a little dizzy, a little light, but that's what you want. You want to help your body to feel lighter and feel more relaxed before your presentation.

[01:02:27] Colin: That's very good because recently I used to teach law here, and I participate in what's called mooting, where practice, where the young lawyers practice, running an argument before a panel of judges based on a problem that has been put forward to them.

And many of them are really nervous and we have everything all written down. And when I say speak, don't look at your notes. And it's getting them to really, express themselves. But in the end of the day, it does come down to knowing your facts, knowing your arguments, and being able to put that forward.

Now you are a great believer in helping female entrepreneurs and promoting women's empowerment, Correct.

No. How do you go about that? Tell me a little bit about that. 

[01:03:07] Yamilette: I wouldn't say I'm a feminist because I'm a big believer that we need both female and male to thrive, but I am a feminist towards having women showcase their voice and coming from Mexico, and a culture that it's a little bit more towards male power.

And, but having a family that is very female orientated and a mother that is very strong, I learned very early age that's what I wanted to do and that's what I wanted to support. And now more so because I have a baby daughter, wonderful. Sienna Kai. So she's the light of my energy.

[01:03:47] Colin: That's fantastic. And also in Mexico, you got a female president. 

[01:03:50] Yamilette: First female president in North america. 

[01:03:52] Colin: And a tough lady. Needs to be to deal with a person up north. Now let's talk about the Mexican Chamber of Commerce. You are the president, congratulations. Tell our listeners all about it. What do you do? 

[01:04:05] Yamilette: I'm very proud of our community because Hong Kong is a great space for chambers of commerce and the international community in general and we have great relationships with the government. And having a platform like this both helps community like the Mexican Chamber to get together to support each other, but to also be part of a greater picture, which is Hong Kong's wellbeing. And in the Chamber we've also been focused nowadays in the past three years, we've been focusing, creating a community. Further than just the Mexicans because we believe that if we only focus on the Mexicans, it's great because we have so much energy. But number wise, we're not that many.

But if we open our doors to all the Latin Americans, then we can make more noise and be stronger. So one of the objectives of the Mexican Chamber of Commerce is to open doors to the Latin American community to thrive in their businesses and to connect in our community.

[01:05:04] Colin: Is there a large community of Mexicans here? 

[01:05:05] Yamilette: Consulate says that around 500.

[01:05:08] Colin: Oh that's quite a large one. And what type of events are you organizing at the moment?

 I know you have lunches and outreaches as such. Yeah.

[01:05:14] Yamilette: Correct. We have formal events, educational events. And, we also have the social events.

And recently from 2024, we launched the Latin Kaleidoscope. Which it's a combination of all the Latin American members that we have to come together and showcase their products, their brands, their craft. So we have food, beverage, entertainment, and all the families come down to the event, which we recently had in January 16, 2018 at the Harbor front.

And it's just a celebration of Latin America. So that's one of our biggest projects. And as I said, we have educational projects, we have social projects and commercial projects where perhaps if a company comes to us and it's looking for an outlet to Mexico, we connect them or vice versa.

If a Mexican company wants to establish here in Hong Kong, we point them to invest Hong Kong and then. They would help them right away. So it's a collaboration between other chambers, the community, and the government.

[01:06:16] Colin: Interesting. And I think it must take a bit of your time being chairperson the chamber of the Yes. I know how it does that 'cause one of my colleagues at my firm is involved in the Irish Chamber of Commerce, but, we'll part that for one moment as well.

[01:06:30] Yamilette: We love collaborating with the Irish. We had last year an event called The imex. Yeah. And we got together. 

[01:06:36] Colin: The Irish enjoy themselves like the Mexicans do as well. Now you've been involved in publishing a couple of books recently. Tell us a little bit more about that. 

[01:06:43] Yamilette: Oh, thank you. You're very kind. It wasn't that recent. I believe it was before COVID. I was part of a collection of 20 authors in one book called My Voice. Yeah. And it's been so successful that they have already over 10 volumes. I was part of volume two. And it's a collection of stories of success or challenge, entrepreneurship, anything that women would want to voice out, which I find it very dear to my heart.

And it was really humbling to be able to publish along them. And, the process was also very humbling because it took me back to my dancing times. My chapter is about how I started from the little steps of being a ballerina to now being here in Hong Kong. So it was really nice to go back in time and then think about all the steps 

[01:07:32] Colin: Any books in your mind in the future or all your time spent A, doing all the work and B, looking after your daughter. 

[01:07:38] Yamilette: I would love to write. I actually love writing a lot and I'm thinking about many ideas at once, but then the trouble, as you may know, it's about just deciding where to go, which direction to go.

[01:07:50] Colin: That's interesting. Now, Mexico, great Place, attracts some negative headlines recently in international media, narcotics, relationship with the US. Tell us your thoughts on all of this. At the moment now you got the World Cup coming up. We got the Formula One in Mexico City and I have got my tickets. I've been to Mexico before, I've been to Acapulco, I've been through the airport, but that's all. But I'm gonna spend a week in Mexico for my first time for the Formula One. Everyone is worried that I'm gonna be kidnapped or getting from A to B to C to D. I don't think so. I think it must be a good place.

[01:08:26] Yamilette: It is. It is a wonderful place.

I don't wanna oversell it, but it's just like any other big place and especially Mexico City, any other big cities in the world. If you go to New York or London, you just have to take care in places that we have to take care and don't be alone at night. But everybody would do that in other places in the world.

It's not just, especially in Mexico food scene. Amazing. If you love food, there's everything in there. And not only the Mexican food is super high quality and very creative, but also any other cuisine. Japanese, Korean, there's a melting pot of cuisines in Mexico City. And then art, we have one of the biggest archeological museums, in Mexico City, the Chapultepec, which is even bigger than Central Park in terms of hectares, you have the zoo. There's lots of things to see in architecture, beautiful architecture in the city center, and you can go a little bit further, half an hour far from Mexico City. Then you're there surrounded by mountains. So there's a lot of diversity and I would say yes get acquainted to people that could guide you, that could help you to also make your stay there a little bit more enjoyable because Mexicans love having friends.

[01:09:40] Colin: Indeed they do, and I am really looking forward to my trip to Mexico. I might be there twice because I going to the World Cup and we may be playing a quarter final or a last 16 game in Mexico City, which is gonna be very interesting.

So I'm looking forward to that. You speak five languages, English and Spanish obviously. I understand a bit of French, a bit of Portuguese and Italian, fluent in all of them. 

[01:10:02] Yamilette: Correct. 

[01:10:04] Colin: How? Sorry. I like to be quite direct.

[01:10:05] Yamilette: My mother was always very conscious about saying if I'm going to give you something for the future, would be languages.

Because even though we might think we don't need that anymore because there's AI in the translations and everything. When you go to a country and you speak their language, it's just magical to see people's faces and their smile, even though you might not pronounce it properly. You have mistakes. But them knowing that you're making the effort already creates a first level connection, which is very important for me.

To connect with others. So how I started with English, then Spanish and then it just came all natural. I lived in Montreal. I went to Brazil for university. Hence the Portuguese and Italian has just happened at the end.

[01:10:49] Colin: Ever thought about becoming a lawyer? I think you'll be a very good lawyer.

[01:10:52] Yamilette: You're joking. But when I was a little kid, my mom thought I was going to be a politician or some kind of thing like that because I was always very friendly with everybody.

[01:11:00] Colin: Alright. You've been in Hong Kong for some time. You live here, your family are here, you're working here. Hong Kong, your home now?

[01:11:07] Yamilette: Yes. I'm gonna say what I say to everybody.

I have Mexico in my heart and I have Hong Kong in my mind.

[01:11:14] Colin: And you're gonna stay in Hong Kong? Hong Kong obviously, with COVID, our troubles and all the rest, it's a interesting city. Your is. Yes, Is your your home being that's great.

And 2026, what does that look like for you? You got anything on the horizon? Anything interesting coming up? 

[01:11:32] Yamilette: Oh, we're already almost in April. 

[01:11:34] Colin: Yeah, I know. I know. April tomorrow. Yeah.

[01:11:37] Yamilette: Coming up. In terms of the Mexican Chamber, we're still working hard for our members and looking forward to organizing the third edition of the Latin Kaleidoscope when it comes to Louder Global, as you mentioned about creating more content.

So we are revamping our content and trying to be more present in the social medias and also well, I'm looking forward for my daughter to going to Big Girl School, she's going in September, which is gonna be a milestone for her and for me.

[01:12:06] Colin: How old is she?

[01:12:07] Yamilette: She's four. 

[01:12:07] Colin: Oh wow. That's good. That's getting into the primary. That's fantastic. That's great.

And I'm confident with Hong Kong.

I think, you have the Chamber of Commerce. The world is not an easy place with the issues that we are all facing in the Gulf and elsewhere, but I'm positive. Are you positive of future?

[01:12:24] Yamilette: I am very positive about Hong Kong.

It's a testament. You've been here so long. I've been here so long. My husband has been here 50 years plus. So for us, this is a place to be. It is safe. It works. The networking is incredible. And Hong Kong is I don't wanna say the only, but one of the few tier one cities where you have the city.

And then in less than an hour you can have nature, the mountains, you go to the beach and then you come back to the city for dinner.

[01:12:51] Colin: I'll disagree with you. Not half an hour within five minutes because I live in Kennedy Road and within five minutes I'm up walking in everything else

[01:13:00] Yamilette: Yeah no, you're right.

[01:13:00] Colin: It really, it is It's been an honor, a pleasure chatting with you. Thank you so much for joining us on Law & More. Thank you.

[01:13:08] Yamilette: Thank you. Thank you calling for inviting me. It's been a pleasure.