Humility Isn’t Weakness: Listening and Leading with Empathy

Summary

In this conversation, Dr. Nashay Lowe and Dr. Joel Pérez explore the concept of cultural humility in leadership, emphasizing the importance of asking the right questions and fostering genuine connections. They discuss the challenges leaders face in practicing humility, the significance of understanding microaggressions, and the need for open dialogue in diverse environments. Through personal anecdotes and practical examples, they highlight how humility and empathy can lead to more effective leadership and healthier relationships across various contexts. In this conversation, Dr. Joel Pérez discusses the importance of creating safe spaces for feedback, leading with empathy, and understanding the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). He emphasizes the need for self-awareness and cultural humility in leadership, and the significance of genuine efforts towards organizational change. The discussion highlights that real change requires a commitment to listening and understanding the experiences of others, and that leadership is about fostering connection and growth rather than merely performance.

Key Takeaways

• Leadership is about asking the right questions, not just having answers.
• Cultural humility involves recognizing and addressing power imbalances.
• Empathy is essential for effective leadership, not a sign of weakness.
• Microaggressions can occur unintentionally but have significant impacts.
• Creating a safe space for feedback is crucial for growth.
• Diversity, equity, and inclusion must be practiced, not just checked off.
• Self-awareness and curiosity are foundational to cultural humility.
• Real change requires intentionality and a framework for action.
• Listening deeply is a key skill for leaders.
• Hope lies in the genuine desire for improvement among leaders.

Chapters

• 0:00 The Essence of Leadership: Asking the Right Questions
• 2:14 Understanding Humility in Leadership
• 4:38 Defining Cultural Humility
• 6:59 Cultural Humility in Everyday Conflicts
• 10:36 Creating Safe Spaces for Tough Conversations
• 13:37 Shifting from Fear to Curiosity
• 19:56 Understanding Microaggressions and Their Impact
• 23:21 Creating Safe Spaces for Feedback
• 27:01 Leading with Empathy
• 33:43 Understanding DEI: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
• 39:49 Tangible Practices for Cultural Humility
• 41:21 Hope in Leadership and Growth

Transcript

Intro: 0:01

intro music

Dr. Shay: 0:19

Welcome back to The Resolution Room, where we turn tension into transformation through clarity, connection, and consistency. I'm your host, Dr. Nashay Lowe, and this is a space where we explore what's really underneath the moments that challenge us and how they can lead to something more honest, more human, and more whole. So let's get into it. We often think leadership is about having the answers, but what if it's more about asking the right questions? In this episode, I'm joined by executive coach and DEI strategist, Dr. Pérez, to talk about what cultural humility really looks like in practice, not just for executives, but for anyone navigating relationships across lines of identity, power, or experience. From family dynamics to workplace leadership, this conversation explores how ego and tension and fear of getting it wrong can hold us back and how letting go of being the expert can actually bring us closer to real connection, equity, and lasting change. Joel, can you please introduce yourself?

Dr. Pérez : 1:22

Thank you for having me on the podcast. My name is Joel Pérez, and I'm an executive and leadership coach. And I wrote a book called Dear White Leader, How to Achieve Organizational Excellence Through Cultural Humility, mainly because of the work I was doing with my clients who identify as white, who are trying to navigate how do I lead diverse teams, particularly at a time when organizations were in volatile spaces because of the murder of George Floyd, wanting to become more inclusive. And in that process, I realized, I think I have a book here. And so that led to the project of writing a book. I'm based in Los Angeles. I have four biracial children, ages 13 to 21. They all live at home. And my spouse and I have been married almost 29 years. And she and I met in college. And yeah, and so my background is higher education. I've worked in higher education over 20 years. And then in 2019, left higher education and started my coaching and consulting practice.

Dr. Shay: 2:28

Amazing. And again, thank you for being here. So let's start here. We live in a culture that teaches us to perform confidence, but you help leaders practice humility. So why do you think humility feels so hard for people in power.

Dr. Pérez : 2:44

That's a good question. So I think three years ago, I did a LinkedIn poll. It wasn't a validated study or anything like that. But I put a poll like, do you all, do you, my network, do you believe that humility is a central aspect to leadership? And most people said yes. One person said no. And the one person said no because they feel like at times humility can get in the way of having to make hard decisions. Okay. And that it was a sign of weakness. And so now the people that said yes, I didn't dig further, right? There was no qualitative follow-up. I'm guessing... Well, as a follow-up I did, do you all believe that cultural humility is an important aspect of leadership? And I got more no's during that time, again, because of this idea that the term humility, although it's something we all aspire to when it comes to leadership, there's this belief that it can limit you in making the hard decisions and or impact the Right. That empathy is not good for leaders to have because empathetic leaders can't make hard decisions. And again, I don't believe that. I think empathy is a very strong piece or a characteristic of exceptional leadership. But clearly there is a belief by some that empathy and humility are actually obstacles to becoming a strong leader.

Dr. Shay: 5:07

Yes. And actually, let's back up for a second. And can you define what we're talking about when we say humility and cultural

Dr. Pérez : 5:16

humility? is taking that further, particularly when it comes to working with people that have different salient identities than yourself and recognizing that there are stories that other people have that need to be listened to, particularly around their identities, that should influence the way you lead, particularly those that are in your sphere of influence, whether that is organizationally, family, faith, community, volunteer organization. And so the way cultural humility is defined is there's three characteristics, self-awareness and self-critique. Redressing power imbalances. And that's where the difference is. Culture humility is you as you begin to listen to others, you recognize that things may need to change so that others can be successful in organizations that whether it's retention, whether it's promotion rates, whether it's pay equity. And then as you begin to recognize that there's things that need to be addressed or redressed, you begin to recognize that there's a need to change. address those power balances that ultimately leads to systemic change. So cultural humility is not just about you. It's about the people you lead and the organization you serve in. So it moves beyond just the individual where I think humility, in my view, is more about personal, where cultural humility is more about organizationally and or and or societal.

Dr. Shay: 7:25

Right. And can you provide like any examples of how cultural humility shows up in everyday conflicts, like whether that be family disagreements, tense team meetings or identity based

Dr. Pérez : 7:36

misunderstandings? Yeah. So the way I example would be at the dinner table, we have said there are six of us. We all live at home. My kids all have varying perspectives politically, about life. We have hard conversations. The example I share with you is two of my kids were having an argument and it was clearly they were raising their voice and they were getting agitated at each other. The conversation ended and I said, okay, are you all willing to walk away still loving each other? And the answer was yes. I said, that's good. That's an aspect of cultural humility, meaning that even though you may disagree with someone, you're able to walk away with a better understanding of that person's point of view, as opposed to feeling like I should have convinced them that I was right and they were wrong. So it's having this posture of curiosity. So the three things that I tell when I do workshops that you need to develop in order to develop a posture of cultural humility are having a growth mindset, developing deep curiosity and deep listening because you have to be able to understand where other people are coming from so that you can leave a conversation better it's not about convincing the other person that they're wrong or they're right or that they're wrong you're right and vice versa the problem is now in society and because we're in a polarized world is that we don't have conversations like that it's about me convincing you by laying out my talking points without really being curious and asking questions. That doesn't mean we're going to ultimately agree, but I contend that we would leave conversations in better places. And we may change our minds on some things, but we may not. But I still love you and respect you and see you as a colleague and a friend. Absolutely. So that's the piece of the culture of humility that's really important. And I think it allows for space in the middle. So I think it's important that we develop this podcast Because I think what the other thing that cultural humility does is it creates space for people to be in the middle because they don't have this fear of being labeled by one extreme or the other extreme, which causes people to shut down and isolate themselves and not ask questions for fear of being labeled and misinterpreted, misconstrued. And that is leading to the polarization that exists because people in the middle feel like they cannot ask questions because they have a fear of being labeled. You know, if you're going to use political terms, progressive or conservative, right? And that gets in the way of having really deep, meaningful conversation and dialogue that needs to happen.

Dr. Shay: 10:41

And thank you for using the example of like family, because I think, again, that kind of brought more nuance to the definition of culture, because I think most people wouldn't expect there to be multi culture in the same

Dr. Pérez : 10:52

family yeah yeah and particularly like for me you know faith is really important to me and I want to have deep conversations about of faith without fear or creating fear in other people to share who they their beliefs because they if they share beliefs that are different than mine that they're going to get ostracized or asked to leave the congregation and that's and that's where that's where Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. strip culture humility, you can enter into conversations with really being curious and asking open-ended questions. So that's important. And the growth mindset's important because we all make mistakes. In the book, I share my own mistakes, but it's what I do with those mistakes, right? I could very easily like shut down after I make mistakes, but having a growth mindset means what can I do to learn from this? So I'm better even in my mid 50s or in midlife, mid 50s and not mid 50s. I'm going to be close to mid 50s. It doesn't mean that I can't learn new things just because I'm older or I'm a boomer. I have to have this posture of, I have to have this posture of being open to learning more so that I can get better.

Dr. Shay: 12:41

Right. Absolutely. Okay. Okay. So one thing you brought up, I want to revisit was again, entering conversations, not with the intent of trying to be right, but again, trying to bridge understanding. Right. And I guess on the other end of that, there's some people, many well-meaning people stay quiet because they're afraid of messing up. So how do we show shift from fear of failure to curiosity and tough conversations. I think that builds on what you're talking about with the growth mindset.

Dr. Pérez : 13:13

Yeah, having a growth mindset, but also feeling like you can have a, if you, so if I'm coaching someone and I have coached people who have experienced a microaggression or something that's happened in the workplace they disagree with, my first question's always, one, are you okay with that? Generally, it's no, right? And I said, is this something you want to address? So if the answer is yes, okay. What are some things that you believe you can do to address the particular scenario you've just described, right? A boss said something. And then my next question is, do you feel in your organization's culture, do you feel like you can ask a question or address the area without fear of losing your job. If there is fear that you're going to lose your job, then I will never advise someone that you got to go ahead and go forward. What I would say is... Two things, right? If you feel like the organizational culture doesn't allow for that kind of conversation, then it's a different conversation in the sense of, is this the right, does this organization have the values that are in alignment with your values? Okay, so there's that. There's a career coaching aspect. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. But for me, I always put this caveat, and I do this too, not only with coaching, but when I do workshops, safe space does not mean comfortable, right? There's going to be some discomfort because this conversation can be hard, right? Now, when I coach leaders who've perpetrated a microaggression, then the conversation is that someone might say, not someone, someone has said to me, I really messed up. I committed a microaggression. I said, okay. So tell me a little bit about why you think you need to address it. So I want to make sure it's coming from a genuine place, right? And in their book, Did That Just Happen? It's called Did That Just Happen? The authors walk through for leaders and organizations how to recover and address when microaggressions happen. And what I've learned from that and have used is the first thing is you apologize, right? But you apologize not expecting anything in return. Okay, so an example, I was doing a, I was a keynote speaker for a virtual event. I used an example, I talked about nostalgia and the problems that sometimes nostalgia can create in moving forward because we want everything to go back to the way it was, right? And the example I used did not land well with a particular person. So they gave me some feedback Thank you. I was like, oh, all right, how do I do this? Practice what I preach. So I sent them an email. I said, first of all, I am so sorry that this happened. I do not expect you to reply to me, but if you are open to having a conversation so I can learn exactly how it landed, why it landed the way it is, I'm open to that. But I don't expect you to respond to this email. If you choose not to respond, great. Have a great rest of your If you do, here's how we can meet and connect. Right. I tried not to make it about me getting defensive, which a lot of people do. Right. Like, oh, I'm so sorry. That's not what I meant. Or you misconstrued something that I said. And that is not good. Particularly with people from, I'm not using the term underestimated groups. People from underestimated groups, we, people, when we experience a micro, I identify as a When I experience a microaggression and the person on the other end is apologizing, sometimes it becomes more about them and how, you know, or like, well, tell me what I need to do better. Well, are you asking me to help you? And I may not feel comfortable helping you, but I don't have permission to just say no. So if you're perpetrating it to get people permission, like here's one, I'm sorry. I really do want to get better. Are you open to help me get better? And if you're not, that's okay. And just walk away. But we have a hard time doing that because we want to fix it right away, right?

Dr. Shay: 18:20

Right. And you want the validation from the other person that they accept your apology.

Dr. Pérez : 18:27

Yeah. So the example I gave is something that I did as a speaker that I knew that I needed to model. Let's say I offended someone and I needed to apologize. And then as I've done these workshops, we talk about it. I communicate with people how it is you recover, but also making it not a about you, but we're all gonna make mistakes. Growth mindset. Curiosity. learning how to listen deeply, because we all say we're better listeners than we actually are. I'm guilty of that. My guess is you may be guilty of that. My spouse reminds me that I'm guilty of that, right? And so being able to prepare to have conversations in a way where I am centered and fully present.

Dr. Shay: 19:15

Absolutely. And actually, can we go back a little bit, just because I want to clarify too, can you define what we're talking about when we say microaggressions and you know I feel like it might be misconstrued as something just oversensitive people take jokes too seriously and things like that so

Dr. Pérez : 19:32

what do we mean well microaggressions when you so an example would be when I was in college I was working for someone who identifies a white male and I'll use a pseudonym we'll say Larry Larry said Larry was trying to get to know me and so I said hey you know Larry I'm a son of immigrants Spanish is my first language He said, wow, you're so articulate. I had no idea. I could tell you were son of immigrants. Okay. So it's when you say something that singles out someone's a particular aspect of someone, your intent may have been, you know, you may have intended not to be offensive, but the impact was clearly felt by that other person. Right. So one of the examples, particularly my colleagues of color, who are doctorate you know doctorate like I have a PhD and and you have a you know you have a doctorate and something that sometimes happens to me is like oh man you're so articulate like okay so what are you trying to communicate to me right let's have a conversation of why that was and that may not be offensive to everyone right there's some things that some are offensive to others and not not offensive to you and not others so it's when you offend someone in a way that initially your intention is to be positive like to give a compliment but it's really not a compliment and it's not received as a compliment right or it's just outright rude right um and and it's not like overt racism or overt offensiveness it's the little bit you know backhanded comment right and it may not just be around race it could be around gender socioeconomic It could be just around interacting with family. So one of the things about being curious is to remembering to remember to be curious. That's important. So back to your point around the microaggression, that's how I describe it and define it. I know there's an actual academic definition, which I don't have in front of me, and I don't have it memorized. But what I try to help people with is how do you recover from it?

Dr. Shay: 21:57

Yes. start that conversation with someone who commits one without also making them defensive because they weren't intentionally trying to be rude how do you even start that conversation without blaming and then second I sort of feel like When we talk about stuff like this, my girl, I feel like everything has become sort of like kind of taboo to talk about because it's like, oh, here we go again with the sensitivity police, blah, blah, blah. But the reality is we've been doing a lot of wrong things socially for a long time and we're just not kind of speaking up to what we should have been doing all along. So it's kind of like, how do we even get people to realize just sort of bad habits we've been doing for a long time are no longer publicly okay? I

Dr. Pérez : 23:14

think there's two aspects to it. I mean, there's two things I would say to your question. One is, are you one to recognize if you're in a position of power, if you supervise people, right? To you modeling that it's okay for people to come to you, right? Or letting people know that, hey, if I say, and not just say it, but actually, you know, demonstrate it, right? So if I ever commit a microaggression or offend you, Um, I really want to know about those things because I want to get better before it happens. So you as a leader level set, right? If it's happened to you, are you, again, back to the safety piece, are you able to confront your boss, your peer, your colleague, right? Do you feel like you can do that? If you feel like you can do, one is to get ready to have the conversation. And it could be as easy, like for me in the book, I describe a person who identifies as a white woman came to me and said, can I give you some feedback? And I was like, sure. I knew it wasn't going to be a quick conversation, even though for me it was towards the end of the day I wanted to get home. But she shared with me like, hey, do you recognize that you tend to call on mostly the men in the room? And you also tend to call on the people who are more vocal about their opinions, which for me, there was some bias against introverts, bias against women, right? she felt safe enough or I had created a space where she felt now this person's also very very courageous and not afraid to mix it up with you but I had created a space where she didn't feel like I was going to like you know get over it move on whatever so you as a leader have to create that space for the feedback to happen you as the person who feel you have to feel like you can but it generally it's more of like do I feel like Joel is going to receive it. Right? If you feel like someone's not going to receive it, but you still want to say it, then I think the approach is... So I just want you to know, Joel, your comment right now, I know you may have intended it a certain way, but here's how it impacted me. As a person from a minoritized community, underrepresented community, underestimated community, and I want to make you aware because I don't want you to do it again to someone else. And here's what you said, and here's how it impacted me. Now, hopefully the person receives it well, but if they don't, you, the person, have to be ready for it. for what may ensue, right? The defensiveness. And I know right now with the way we're so polarized and particularly our current political environment, there's probably going to be more trepidation. And that fear is real. And so I want to name it for people that it's okay to be afraid of the conversation, but you need to determine if it's something you want to move forward with and develop a strategy before you engage. in that conversation.

Dr. Shay: 26:35

Absolutely. And I want to go back again to something you said earlier. It was the quote from Elon Musk. So you work with executive teams and nonprofits, but your work isn't just strategic, it's deeply relational. So what does it really mean then to lead with empathy?

Dr. Pérez : 26:53

Yeah, that's good. One is, so I also coach people who don't consider themselves very empathetic. So what it looks like is Acknowledging people's feelings and hurt. blog post not too long ago on the power of proximity, meaning sometimes people just want you to be present. They don't want you to solve their problems. And this is an extreme example, right? Someone comes in crying and there's clearly something has happened. To just ask, do you want to talk about it or do you just want me to sit here and listen? So that's one piece. To lead with empathy means I am learning to listen to people's stories and their lived experiences in a way that seeking to understand and recognizing that we bring whatever's happening in our world into the workplace, if it's a work situation. If it's with your spouse or your partner, it's looking at them directly and just went again. So like, I'm so sorry this is happening. So the other example I'll share is I had a friend, I have a friend that I had, he's still a friend, who his son developed a really just, well, his son passed away at a very, very young age. Like, I think they were two or three. Yeah. contracted genetically had this disease that was just i mean it was really it just wrecked him right because he was watching his child deteriorate mentally before his eyes it hurt right it was hurting me clearly because it was hurting him i was living in oregon at the time I said, hey, give him a pseudonym. Hey, Victor, are you okay if I just fly down and be with you? I just want to sit with you. I'm not asking for anything in return. I just want to be with you. That is leading with empathy, right? And hearing people, particularly people like are having problems with decisions or the direction the organization is going is acknowledging that there's some pain, right? You're restructuring the organization. You're letting people go You can still be empathetic. Empathy does not mean weakness or you don't hold people accountable, but you truly, you have a posture of listening where you are absorbing what's happening and just acknowledging that there's hurt, not just acknowledging. When acknowledging that there's hurt, it's like, okay, what can we do to get better? So we treat you with dignity and we help people just feel like we're, we feel like humans and not just Exactly,

Dr. Shay: 30:33

exactly. And those two things, that personal and professional, should be separated. What do you say to those

Dr. Pérez : 31:06

people? Well, I think we're beyond the point where people are now being impacted outside of work that it's not coming into the workplace. So one, that's the reality. And given the generations that are coming into the workplace, they want to be themselves and be truly authentic to themselves. So if you want to retain those people, you have to learn to listen with empathy. and be okay. I mean, you can create some boundaries and parameters. I think that's fair, right? I believe that's fair to do. But you can still do it in a way that acknowledges people's, affirms their identities and their experiences that they're bringing into the workplace. The other piece I would say is what is the organization doing to prepare leaders? Yeah, you're not therapists. So if a therapy situation comes up how do you feel support as a leader from your organization to be able to say clearly there's some things going on and I want we want to provide some resources for you as an organization and Also, I've been trained on what to say and help you so that if clearly there's some therapeutic stuff that needs to happen, and people know that I can say, thank you for sharing, what support do you need in order to get the help you need? Because I cannot provide you with counseling and therapy. So what's the organization doing to train people? to be a resources for people.

Dr. Shay: 32:52

Yeah. Training people to be resources for people. I like that. So, you know, in high experiences and some of my work too, that can be a bit frustrating as someone who deeply cares about a lot of these issues. And we're talking about DEI now. And actually, before we even jump in there, can you define what we're meaning by DEI when we say this? I want to define everything.

Dr. Pérez : 33:15

Yeah. So DEI to me means diversity, equity, and inclusion, right? So diversity to me is for me, the aesthetic piece. We want people that look different, have different cultural backgrounds. The equity piece for me is what are we doing to create an equitable organization? The example I generally share is pay equity, right? That men get paid more than women. And if we want there to be equity, we need to start leveling the playing field. or redressing the power imbalance that may exist. And some organizations are doing this. The inclusion is, are we creating space for people with different perspectives that bring different perspectives to come together and not only feel, but truly create an organization where they feel included at the table? So diversity is, I would say, Historically, what a lot of organizations were doing, right? It's more checking the boxes. We have so much percentage. Still important. Representation is important, but it's more than just representation. It's how are we creating organizations that are inclusive and then also equitable so that we can be the best organization we can be.

Dr. Shay: 34:45

Yeah. And that hits the nail on the head on my next question, because DEI isn't just a box to check, right? It's a practice. It's a continuous effort. And given our political climate, I think there's a lot of institutions that are making effort, but I know that people who work for them might disclaim that they feel more performative than sincere. So how do you help clients move from theoretical application to real change?

Dr. Pérez : 35:20

So I always stress the importance of having a framework. If you're going to truly create change in an organization, a framework to guide your efforts, because you can't just take a, let's throw a up on the wall and see what sticks. It has to be intentional because you want to embed the change into the organization so it becomes part of the ethos of the organization. And that's where the heavy lifting needs to happen. But the way you do that is you start with gathering data, right? Because I believe data is important because it shows us where our gaps exist and But I also believe that you have to anchor your work in mission, vision, and values. Now, I know some organizations are changing their mission, vision, and values because of pressure. But I believe if you're truly going to remain true to your values as an organization and you say you value diversity, equity, inclusion, or inclusion, then you need to own it. But you can't just say it. You have to... identify is it actually happening and that's where the pulling the data and then once you see where you are from a baseline perspective and then okay we want to get better how do we get better and then there's that framework that's really helpful in guiding you as opposed to you can't just hire someone you can't just start a program which a lot of organizations have done right in response that hasn't led to change it's been performative right that doesn't mean that perform it that you don't need to be That doesn't mean you don't need to perform, but it means it's one thing to say and just do it, but are you measuring the impact in a way that's going to continually allow you to assess progress? And not very many organizations do that.

Dr. Shay: 37:20

Yeah. And so what are some finds that an organization is ready for real change?

Dr. Pérez : 37:27

One, they have the conversation with multiple people in the room, right? People high up in the organization so they can demonstrate that this is important. Yes, that's performative. But with that posture of listening and then, okay, we got to make changes and we're going to put... We're going to allocate the resources in order for the change to happen. Human, fiscal, time, because it's going to take work. And then making sure that you're making progress or collecting data baseline, but then also to show you're making progress. And there's four areas that I talk about in the framework that I... One is... Organizational climate and intergroup relations. How are people experiencing each other? The other is what are you doing or vitality and viability? So what are you doing to sustain your work over time? training and development? So how are you building capacity for your leaders to lead cross-culturally, cross-generationally? And then what are you doing in recruitment and retention? That's not just about hiring people. It's how you, are you retaining them and are they moving through the organization at the rate you want them to move? So that's how I work with organizations is once you, so for me, organizations that's serious that isn't just being performative it's actually having a plan and then following through on the plan right and then letting people know being public about hey we're doing this work we're doing okay over here but we're not doing so great over here and we need to figure out why

Dr. Shay: 39:26

so zooming out a little bit what's one tangible practice that any anyone, regardless of their title, can begin today to lead with more culture of humility.

Dr. Pérez : 39:41

Starts with self-awareness. And there are three things that I help leaders work through. One is identifying the biases that you as a leader have, and then talking about how do you mitigate the impact of those biases. Getting clear on your salient identities, even as a white heterosexual man, that is your identity. Because then you can maybe recognize that there's some things that I'm doing that I don't know that I'm doing because I don't have to worry about it, right? Or whatever the identity is, you need to get clear on your salient identities or what I call cultural self-awareness. And the other is other awareness, right? Learning more about the people that are in your organization or the people you lead so that you can understand their stories, but letting them know that you genuinely are curious, that you're not just checking a box. And you can't just go around asking people their identity. The example I give in the book and that I share is I was working with a person identified as a white woman who wanted to get to know her team. Right. Right. Cultural self-awareness and other awareness. And that's where leaders need to start. And growth mindset, developing deep curiosity, and developing the ability to deeply listen.

Dr. Shay: 41:35

So in this work, it's easy to focus on what's broken, right? What gives you hope about how people are showing up differently? Yeah.

Dr. Pérez : 41:46

Oh, that's a good question. Well, I just innately, I'm a glass half full kind of guy. What gives me hope is that when I have conversations, one-on-one conversations with people, I can hear that there's a genuineness. of people wanting to get better at this because they recognize that they need to get better, but I've created a space for them to acknowledge that they need to get better. So that's what gives me hope and keeps me going. And that's my why is I want people to get better at this, but my why is also, I need to get better at it too, because I need to model it. All right. Yeah. And that's hard. Right. But, but it starts with you. That's why I always say it starts with you, but it doesn't, end with you

Dr. Shay: 42:39

absolutely so yeah well thank you so much for speaking with me today um can you let everyone know where to follow you and your work

Dr. Pérez : 42:48

yeah so i am on linkedin um i would encourage people you can download the first chapter of my book if you go to dear white leader.com and the first chapter is made available so if you want to read it and kind of go hey this is really interesting uh and then which may lead to you buying the book but um so but for me following linkedin is where I live, where I interact with people. And then the website is dearwhiteleader.com.

Dr. Shay: 43:17

Thank you. So in this episode, Dr. Paredes helped us rethink what it means to lead well, not with ego or fear, but with the courage to stay curious. We explored how humility isn't weakness. It's a powerful tool for connection, repair, and transformation. Whether we're navigating identity-based tension, tough conversations, or internal or our own internal biases. As we were reminded, the goal isn't to avoid mistakes. It's to stay in the room when they happen. Real change starts when we're willing to trade certainty for growth and perfectionism for presence. If you've ever felt pressured to have the right words or worried about saying the wrong thing, this episode is a gentle nudge towards something better. Honesty, listening, and the kind of leadership that centers people over performance. As always, thank you for joining me in the resolution room. If this conversation moved you, challenged you, or gave you something to carry forward, consider supporting the show. You can explore our wearable wisdom collection in our mind shop, where each piece is designed to spark reflection and dialogue. You can also join our growing community for behind-the-scenes conversations, resources, and support of your own journey through tension and transformation. And if We just want to say thank you in a simple way. You can always buy me a coffee. Every gesture helps keep the space going. All the links are in the show notes. And until next time, keep building in the quiet because that's what will carry you forward.