141: Leadership with Heart, with Nada Nasserdeen

Discover why emotional intelligence might be the missing puzzle piece in your leadership strategy. 

Nada Nasserdeen, founder and CEO of Rise Up For You, unpacks the critical balance between compassion and maintaining high standards in today's workplace.

She reveals the startling truth that 80% of business success depends not on technical prowess but on emotional intelligence, despite the fact that most companies continue investing primarily in technical training. She challenges the quick-fix mindset pervading leadership development, explaining why one-day retreats simply don't create lasting change. 

We explore the business impact of emotional intelligence--reduced turnover, increased engagement, higher sales performance, and solving costly people problems before they escalate. Nada shares practical insights on creating transparent company cultures where values are living principles guiding every aspect, from hiring to performance reviews.

Perhaps most eye-opening is Gallup's consistent finding that 76% of North American workers remain disengaged while collecting paychecks. They are essentially being paid to underperform. This hidden productivity drain represents an enormous opportunity for companies willing to invest in meaningful emotional intelligence development.

Whether you're struggling with high turnover, disengaged team members, or leadership effectiveness, this episode provides actionable strategies to transform your organization's approach to people development. 

Nada Nasserdeen is a speaker and the Founder and CEO of Rise Up For You, a global leader in soft skills and leadership development and author of Rise Up For You and Emotional Intelligence: The Path to Fulfillment, Influence, and Lasting Success. Her third book, Self-Confidence: How to Overcome the I’m Not Enough Mindset, is due out soon.

Website: Riseupforyou.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/riseupforyou/

Emotional Intelligence quiz: https://www.riseupforyou.com/eqquiz

Go to https://betterhelp.com/resilience or click Notes on Resilience during sign up for 10% off your first month of therapy with my sponsor BetterHelp.

Chapters

• 0:00 Compassion in Leadership and EQ
• 6:47 Building EQ Like a Muscle
• 12:03 Creating Systems for Compassionate Workplaces
• 17:11 Why Leadership Development Programs Fail
• 23:05 Measuring ROI of Emotional Intelligence
• 28:58 Finding Hope in People Development

Transcript

Nada Nasserdeen: 1:14

People are obsessed with quick fixes and we know that it's not sustainable right, and so I understand from a business perspective, because I'm a business owner, that CEOs want to see results fast.

Manya Chylinski: 1:29

Hello and welcome to Notes on Resilience. I'm your host, manya Chylinski. My guest today is Nada Nasserdeen. My guest today is Nada Nasserdeen. She is the founder and CEO of Rise Up For you, a global leader in soft skills and leadership development. We talked about emotional intelligence, compassion and those soft skills that aren't really that soft. They're really important for managing a business and paying attention to our people. I think you're really going to enjoy this episode, neva. I am so happy to be talking to you today. Thank you for being here.

Nada Nasserdeen: 2:08

Thank you for having me.

Manya Chylinski: 2:09

It's an honor to be here First question out of the box is what's one thing that you've done in any area of your life that you never thought you would do?

Nada Nasserdeen: 2:21

Okay, the one thing I've done that I never thought I would do is climb Mount Fuji in a typhoon.

Manya Chylinski: 2:26

Okay, there's a lot to unpack there. Yeah, are you a mountain climber in general?

Nada Nasserdeen: 2:33

Nope, not at all. I just I've spent time in Japan. I've been there multiple times when I used to be a performer, and Mount Fuji was just the thing that I don't know. I just wanted to climb it. And so my younger brother and I, we we decided to go on the excursion and the typhoon was by accident, like we were climbing Mount Fuji. It takes two days, and after the first day, that's when the typhoon hit and it was really, really bad and it was scary, but we survived and we did it.

Manya Chylinski: 3:05

Wow, that's amazing, that's really cool, and I would imagine that the typhoon was the accident, right? That's, you didn't plan. Let's wait for the next typhoon. Not at all, not at all. Next typhoon.

Nada Nasserdeen: 3:15

Not at all.

Manya Chylinski: 3:16

Not at all, oh, my goodness. Well, thank you for sharing that and I'm envious. I love Japan, would love to climb Mount Fuji, but today we're talking about compassion and leadership and emotional intelligence. And just to get us started, what do you think about the concept of compassion and leadership in our organizations?

Nada Nasserdeen: 3:41

Well, I think that there a lot has happened in the last three to four years that I think has made like compassion and empathy more of a buzzword, and, if I'm being completely honest, I think that leaders have a hard time I don't want to say balancing both, but being able to display compassion and empathy whilst, at the same time, maintaining expectation and standards, and so my initial thoughts are that it's super important to have. That's how we build strong relationships and trust with the team. That's how we show the team that we're human and that we care about them beyond the job, and, at the same time, we have to be wise enough to also maintain expectations and standards in the face of compassion and empathy.

Manya Chylinski: 4:29

Right, and what do you think is the challenge? Why is it difficult to maintain those standards and meet those goals and also be empathetic and compassionate?

Nada Nasserdeen: 4:40

Well, we see the extremes. So we either see a leader that is so metric driven that they're not people focused right, so it doesn't matter what you say, they're going to tell you hey, at the end of the day, we still need A, B and C to get done, and they displayed zero compassion or zero empathy. Or we see the other extreme side of it, which is leaders that unfortunately, struggle with self-confidence and people pleasing and they want their team to like them, so then they have a hard time having critical conversations. They struggle with setting standards and expectations because they don't want to rock the boat with their team. So those are the two extremes that we see, which is why it's important to really marry the two.

Manya Chylinski: 5:24

Right and what's the? Is there a secret or a trick to finding that balance? Never.

Nada Nasserdeen: 5:33

Because it's never. It's never like a let's just you know one thing it's it's building soft skills, it's building the emotional and social intelligence. It's um understanding how to display empathy and active listening and compassion, and also being able to communicate standards and expectations. And all of those are strategies and tools and exercises that you have to practice. It's not like just do this and it works right. So the emote, I mean I would say that the hack, which is actually a lot of work, is to build the social, emotional intelligence around your leadership. Right.

Manya Chylinski: 6:09

And you mentioned that word that so many people don't like. So often when you talk about business, people don't like the concept of compassion. That feels like it doesn't have a place in business. And you mentioned, mentioned soft skills, which also I think sometimes leaders think that's not, that doesn't have a place in business, as if business is somehow separate from us being human. And you know you mentioned social and emotional intelligence. How do we train leaders to have that? How do we help them recognize the skills they already have and build on them?

Nada Nasserdeen: 6:43

Yeah Well, I would say first to start with is that if any business owner or leader out there thinks that emotional intelligence doesn't have a place in their business, then they are very misinformed about what emotional intelligence is and the ROI that it provides to a business.

Nada Nasserdeen: 6:59

Because 80% of your success as an organization and as an individual is dependent not on the technical skills but the emotional intelligence. So you can have all of the best strategy, you can have all of the best systems in place, but if you don't have people that know how to build relationships, that know how to take action, that are motivated, that are confident to make the sale, that are influential to drive stakeholders to say yes, your business plan, your strategy and the scalability of your company will not last, it's not sustainable, nor will it scale. So that's the first thing. Now, when it comes to building emotional and social intelligence, the challenge that we see today is that there's still not enough leaders that understand the ROI, and so they want to package leadership and emotional intelligence in like a 90 minute training or one day retreat?

Nada Nasserdeen: 7:55

And the truth is, is that emotional intelligence and these soft skills are just like going to the gym? If I go to the gym for eight hours in one day of retreat? And the truth is, is that emotional intelligence and these soft skills are just like going to the gym? If I go to the gym for eight hours in one day, I'm going to be drenched in sweat, my body's going to be sore and I would have earned the day. It'd be like wow, that was a really hard accomplished day, but I'm not going to lose weight, I'm not going to see any results, and like there's not going to be any toning or anything that happens. It's just that day would have been a well-earned day.

Nada Nasserdeen: 8:50

The exact same with soft skills. You got to be able to practice these skills strategically, not only from a conceptual standpoint, but also from an experiential standpoint, and you need to do it on a consistent cadence until you build the muscle. So typically, in order to really see success when it comes to emotional intelligence and transformational leadership, you need at least three to four months. Ideally, you want six months to a year. So, like all of our coaching programs and all of our training programs with teams are six months to two, three years right, or a year or two years, and when we do it that way, then you now built the muscle memory so that when you are in times that are stressful, or when you are in triggering meetings or hot debates, you know exactly which muscle to use, which emotional intelligence tool to use in the moment, so that it's successful for both you and the person that's sitting across from you, right.

Manya Chylinski: 9:56

Now, you mentioned that muscle building over time, and I think that's really important that it become a habit and it becomes something that you can build into your life. In business, however, I see a lot of focus on short term results. And what can you? What can you prove to us in the next three months that's going to show a return on my investment? So how can you prove to us in the next three months that's going to show a return on my investment? So how can you help?

Nada Nasserdeen: 10:23

leaders understand the value of this. Yeah, so the first thing that we ask is where are they losing money? And because that's the direct correlation, so I want to know what's your employee turnover right? How much project run do you have, meaning that you overspend on various projects? How many meetings are you having a week and are they productive? Because all of that equates to finances. How many HR complaints do you have, like all that stuff? And so when we can understand that, then we can directly correlate. Well, if your team builds emotional and social intelligence, or if you teach your team how to lead and communicate, this is the potential ROI that can come from it. But again, the reality is is that if they want to return on investment, they have to be willing to play the long game, which is at least three to four months.

Manya Chylinski: 11:12

Yes, absolutely, and you know, I know we're talking about emotional intelligence, social intelligence, so these are things that we as individuals need to work on for ourselves, whether we're managers or employees or executive leadership. But what kind of policies or structures, agreements or understandings do you think are really necessary within the organization to support leaders making compassionate decisions and building a compassionate workplace?

Nada Nasserdeen: 11:45

From an organizational standpoint.

Manya Chylinski: 11:47

Yes.

Nada Nasserdeen: 11:48

I think, first thing is that a company has to know what the mission and the vision are and the values inside and out. And I know that sounds very elementary to say, but the reality is is that most organizations they have a mission statement, a vision statement, and they have values, and nobody knows what it means, right, or? Or nobody nobody's in a line with it, right? And so your mission, your vision, your vision and your values should be a part of your day-to-day job and execution. Your performance reviews should be based off of your values. The people you hire should be based off of your values. So that's the first thing, because if you have a value, for example, that is not cohesive with like compassion, it's like, at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what the values and the vision are, but they should be consistent.

Nada Nasserdeen: 12:38

And what I mean by that? Like, for example, there are some companies that are like we don't want BS, we're not here to play with your feelings, we just want you to be on pace, we want you to be fast paced, we want you to be innovative, and that's fine as long as you're upfront about it, right? And then you, you attract the people that are like that, that are like, yeah, I don't have time for emotions, like I just want to crush it and make sales and that's fine, but the problem is is that that doesn't happen, and so I think the first thing, from a system standpoint, is that the company needs to know what kind of culture they want, and then they need to infuse it in every aspect of the company, from the onboarding, the hiring, the recruiting, all the way to offboarding the onboarding, the hiring, the recruiting, all the way to off-boarding, right and what you said is so important to hire for those values and can make the values whatever you want them to be, as long as you're hiring people and you understand.

Nada Nasserdeen: 13:29

And you're clear and you're clear on it.

Manya Chylinski: 13:31

Now I would argue, as someone who thinks about compassion and thinks about supporting people as they go through difficult times, that if your value is, hustle and Grind grit. Yeah, and not really paying attention to emotions or things like that. You still need to find space for that, for sure, because even a go-getter can experience something difficult in life and need support.

Nada Nasserdeen: 13:57

Yeah, 100%, and it's just a matter of what kind of culture you want to create around that. So some companies, for example, we never want to lose the human element. Of course it's. You know, you're going to have compassion if somebody loses a loved one, for example, right, or if they're going through a hard time. But some companies decide that they want to lead with that as the forefront, and so they might say, like take a year off, take three months off, don't worry about anything, just go. And there's other companies that are like we're compassionate, we're here for you, but let us know if we need to replace you from the time being, because there's still things we got to get done and you just got to decide what kind of company you want to be, and then you have to be radically transparent about that so that your team can decide is this the right company for me?

Manya Chylinski: 14:42

Yes, that transparency is really important.

Nada Nasserdeen: 14:46

Gotta have it. It's one of our values. So integrity is one of our values and transparency is a part of that, and I'm always very transparent with my team. I have about 20 people and I always tell, especially my core team we are fast paced, I'm driven, I'm hungry, I want to scale the company. If you don't want to work at that pace and you just want to have like a nine to five job, uh, you're not, that's not going to work for me, right. And then they get to decide like, okay, cause I very much embody entrepreneurship with the team, I want the team to also embody entrepreneurship, even if they haven't built their own business. And there's some team members that are like I just want to work nine to five and I don't really want to work fast paced, and I'm like I completely honor that. You have the right to feel that way. This is not the right company. So that transparency is really critical.

Manya Chylinski: 15:37

As you're saying that, I'm thinking of something I just recently read about the importance of hiring someone for culture fits versus technical skills. Now, of course, there are certainly some things where you need specific skills. We're not pretending that's not true. But what you're saying is you're reiterating that it is so important to hire for someone who fits the way the company works.

Nada Nasserdeen: 16:02

Yes, 100%, because if somebody believes in what you do and they match your values and they match you know where you're going as a company you can teach them. You can, you can teach them right, and that's the difference between technical skills and soft skills. I know a lot of people that are not technically qualified right now. Don't be mistaken. If you're a doctor, if you're a lawyer, obviously there's some industries where, like you can't get away with that, Right, right. But I know a lot of other industries, including my own, where they might not have that PhD. They might not have, you know, the master's in positive psychology, but they are super street smart and they know how to influence and they know how to build relationships and they know how to make people feel like they're the most important person in the world, and so then you can teach them the other skills that you need from a technical aspect. And so, again, I just think you have to decide what kind of company are you and what do you need? Right?

Manya Chylinski: 17:03

What are we missing in leadership development programs, whether it's management level or executive leadership level, where maybe some companies aren't getting this right?

Nada Nasserdeen: 17:15

The method. It's the method. So what I mean by that is exactly what I mentioned earlier about the one day leadership retreat. So I would argue that most companies have some kind of something around development. Maybe it's like a retreat once a year, or maybe they'll do like a lunch and learn.

Nada Nasserdeen: 17:34

Most companies have something of that sort, but the majority of companies do not understand that in order for it to really create an ROI and an impact, you've got to build a program with a cadence, a sequence, and it needs to be delivered in a certain format and time. And that's what most companies are missing. So here's the reality. Number one it needs to be in a cadence where it's not too fast, because then they can't implement, and it can't be too far apart, because then they lose retention, right? So like, let's say, you're going to do a training session, you don't want a training session to be like the next day, the next day, the next day, because there's not enough time for them to implement and soak in the knowledge. But you also don't want the training to be three months apart, because they're going to lose everything in that three months. So that's the first thing, is like what's the cadence? The second thing is the sequence. So I know a lot of companies that are like, oh, we do all these workshops. And I'm like, well, okay, what are the workshops? And they're like, oh, we're just kind of like, whatever we need, like that's not sustainable because from a cognitive perspective the sequence of the content doesn't make sense. So, like I recently just talked to a company and he's like, oh well, we just did accountability for the team and then the next one we're doing self-awareness. And I told him, I said, why do you have it in that order? He's like, well, it's just kind of what we kind of came up, but that's not how you learn, right? Like they're not going to be able to implement the accountability with their team if they don't have self-awareness around their own leadership behaviors. So sequence of the content is highly critical, right? So if I'm doing a series of workshops, what order is the content being put in right?

Nada Nasserdeen: 19:18

The third is the engagement and deliverability. So we have a rule here of Rise Up For you that 50% of our time with the client is concept. So like, here's the knowledge, here's what it means, and the other 50% or more 5-0, has to be execution with the participant. So experiential learning, coaching simulations, breakout reflection, walking around the room, doing various things on breakouts with Zoom, because it's not enough just to understand the concept. We have to move the knowledge to the limbic system where, like, they can feel it, and they can feel it in their stomach, right, and they can experience it right.

Nada Nasserdeen: 19:59

And then the final part is the actual delivery. So some people think that, hey, I can just have my HR person train on the content, or I can have this leader practice the PowerPoint and train it. But the reality is is that you can have the best content in the world, but if your facilitator isn't emotionally intelligent and they're're not engaging and they don't know how to read the room and talk off the top of their head, the program won't be as successful. So you asked me that question. It's a great question and all of those things matter, and when you can get all of those things right, then your program will be highly successful. We've mastered it here at the company. Well, we've mastered it here at the company, well, close to mastered it here at the company, we have a 95% repeat client rate, and the reason why is because those four things are non-negotiables for us.

Manya Chylinski: 20:48

Right, and your original premise of this is building the muscle and it requires repetition. At a certain pace, it's such a human feeling to want to just swallow that pill. Take that one class, go to that one retreat, do that one day at the gym and have that be the change that we're looking for. Why is it so hard sometimes to be able, or feel like we're able, to put that time in over time?

Nada Nasserdeen: 21:23

For the individual or for, like an organization, to invest in it.

Manya Chylinski: 21:26

Both actually.

Nada Nasserdeen: 21:28

People are obsessed with quick fixes and we know that it's not sustainable, right?

Nada Nasserdeen: 21:33

And so I understand from a business perspective because I'm a business owner that CEOs want to see results fast and the scorecard is typically financial, it's revenue based.

Nada Nasserdeen: 21:44

So if you were to, if they had to choose, for example, between spending time going through the CRM and the sales versus doing leadership training, most of the time they're going to pick the CRM because it's going to equate to sales, probably a lot faster. But what they don't take into account is that it's not scalable, it's not sustainable, and your people could be higher performing and more productive if you did just take the time to build the emotional and social intelligence. And so I think that, again, I think it comes back to not being informed. And so I think that, again, I think it comes back to not being informed. And also, like we don somebody that is highly technically qualified or somebody that's pretty good technically and they can learn more, but they're confident, they're motivated, they're going to work their butt off for you, who would you pick? They're going to pick person B. And so that's where we say well then, emotional intelligence is going to be your number one superpower, and if you want your team to be this. They all need to learn it.

Manya Chylinski: 23:00

Right, Okay, Very interesting. Now you've touched a little bit on this, but how? What are some metrics that an organization can use to really understand that they've built that emotional intelligence and that they they have the layer of compassion that they want and are looking for? How do you tie that to the numbers that matter? Have the layer of compassion that they want and are looking for? How do you tie that to the numbers that matter to the CEO?

Nada Nasserdeen: 23:23

So there's going to be two different things that you'll feel Okay. The first is just more of the feeling it's with our clients and companies. They tell us like things just feel a lot easier because leaders are solving their own problems. Right, and when I was an executive, most of my time went to solving people problems. Like I barely spent time on strategy and execution for the operations of the company because I'm either firing somebody team member did something that is going to cost us a lot of money, so it's like that is equates to a lot Right. So you have the bucket that's more cultural and emotional, like wow, they're solving things. There's not as much drama, there's not as much stress, people are able to have authentic, transparent conversations and that just makes the company, of course the culture, feel better, do better, perform better. And then you have the things that you can tie to a little bit more. That we never promise because it's always contingent upon the executive team and the owners of the company. Yes, right. So we say, if you do these things, there's a high probability that this can happen for you.

Nada Nasserdeen: 24:29

But again, it always comes back to did the executive team support the training? Were they in the trenches? Did they make this. You know what I mean. So there's a lot of things that play into it. But when we have a company where the C-suite team is bought in and they're doing the training, bless you and they're doing coaching, then their turnover decreases. Okay, now we know that turnover one employee sometimes can cost six figures.

Nada Nasserdeen: 24:59

Right, their engagement increases. People are starting to take more initiative. Sales increase. If we're dealing with confidence, because now if somebody's trying to influence or land, you know, close, a client or stakeholder, whatever, they're more confident in their ability to communicate. They know how to build relationships. So all of these things can tie back to dollars. But again, we always say it's contingent upon, like, the leadership team that's doing it with us. It's the same thing with business. It's like I can give you a business strategy that can take your company to the next level, but it's always going to be contingent upon the entrepreneur itself, right? If the entrepreneur is not motivated and they don't wake up in the morning and use the strategy, it's irrelevant.

Manya Chylinski: 25:41

Right, exactly, exactly. Okay, thank you for that. And what do you think is the biggest risk to an organization if they're not paying attention to emotional intelligence, they're not thinking about compassion.

Nada Nasserdeen: 25:55

All of the above Employee turnover, lack of engagement, people that are making a paycheck, that aren't doing diddly squat for your company, right, I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of what do we call them? Ninja warriors, right With their fingers, that are just sitting at the computer, not really invested in your company, not really performing to their ability, that are just collecting money from you and so they don't have buy-in. That's like the worst thing, and most companies have that. I mean even Gallup recently. Every year they come out with the same statistic which tells us the needle is not really moving that 76% of the workforce in North America are not engaged but they're collecting a paycheck from you, right, right, so that means that you're paying people to not be engaged and to probably just be like scrolling on the internet.

Manya Chylinski: 26:46

Right, and that should be a number that stops executives in their tracks A hundred percent. But it isn't.

Nada Nasserdeen: 26:53

No, because they're not educated enough around it. And that's why, like, when we work with companies, the first thing we do is we just we influence, we educate, right. Or we ask them, like what's, what's the number one problem that you think you see? And then we type back to soft skills, right? So they say, oh, we're not bringing enough revenue. Okay, tell me, why Do you have enough leads? No, we have plenty of leads, our sales team just aren't selling. Okay, why aren't they selling? Do they have confidence? Do they know how to influence? Do they know how to build relationships? Well, you see what I mean. So then you got to tie it back.

Nada Nasserdeen: 27:23

Most problems, most come down to the people, but they need somebody like us to help them understand and tie it back. Yeah, like we were just talking with the client and one of their problems is tariffs. So like, okay, yeah, that's, that is a very real problem. That's not necessarily correlated to performance. It's like tariffs have hit and 30% of their revenue has gone down the drain because the country that they originally got revenue from now was hit with the tariff and so they stopped buying. Okay, so that is not a people problem. I would say meeting in your organization will help you is the emotional intelligence to pivot that situation right. The change management, the adaptability. It's like, okay, we just lost 30% of our revenue overnight because of tariffs. What do we got to do? And all that, what do we got to do with soft skills?

Manya Chylinski: 28:14

Right. Well, we are very close to the end of our time and I'm curious what is giving you hope right now?

Nada Nasserdeen: 28:23

I think what gives me hope is just the work that we do. What gives me hope is seeing my team do it, because it tells me that it's not contingent upon one person. It tells me that there is a whole community of people that believe in the mission of pushing people and their growth and their team's growth, and it tells me that there's people out there that want this. And so I think every day I wake up excited and passionate and obsessed about what we do, and I feel very grateful that there's people that are searching for and want it and people that want to share it and teach it.

Manya Chylinski: 28:56

Oh wonderful. I like the sound of that. Your hope is with the people, which is an answer I've heard a few times recently, and I love that because we're leaning into each other. Before we go, can you please tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself and your work and how they can reach you?

Nada Nasserdeen: 29:15

Yeah, so I own the company Rise Up For you. You can go to rise up for youcom or even on any social media YouTube, instagram, linkedin at rise up for you, rise up for you all together and we have a ton of free resources. If you go to our website and you click on the free tab, there's a self-confidence quiz, emotional intelligence quiz, there's multiple master classes. They're all completely free. Just go in there, take it, learn from it. So that's where you can find us, and you can also find me on LinkedIn and Instagram at Natalina Nasserdine. I do my own social media, so if you send me a message, it will be me that responds. And if you think this is something that you need, we provide one-to-one coaching. And if you think it's your team that needs it, we do training. We provide one-to-one coaching, and if you think it's your team that needs it, we do training, coaching. All of the above, happy to connect with you.

Manya Chylinski: 30:01

Wonderful Nada. Thank you so much. It was so lovely to get a chance to talk with you today.

Nada Nasserdeen: 30:05

Thank you so much, I appreciate you.

Manya Chylinski: 30:08

Hey, and thanks to our listeners for checking out this episode of Notes on Resilience and we will catch you next time.