By Insight Editor / 21 May 2024 / Topics: Culture & careers
How does personality influence the way you lead? In this episode, Z and Rich, along with special guest Lisa Borsotti, Associate General Counsel at Insight, explore the importance of identifying your own personality traits and how they can impact your approach to leading others. You’ll discover how to leverage your strengths to avoid the pitfalls and challenges that arise when divergent personalities clash. Plus, you’ll learn how to adapt your style to better align with your personality and improve overall effectiveness as a leader.
To experience this week’s episode, listen on the player above, watch the conversation below or scroll down to read a complete transcript. You can also subscribe to Leading With Insight on Apple Podcasts, Pandora and Spotify.
Audio transcript:
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Hey everybody, this is Zee Tenoko. And I'm Richard Reeves. You're listening to Leading With Insight. Join us as we explore the latest trends, insights, and strategies for people who love leadership. Get ready to unlock your full potential and take your career to the next level.
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In this episode, we'll be unpacking how your personality lends itself to your leadership skills.
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But first, before we jump into that, Zee, did you have any idea how much your personality actually influences the way you lead? I have a lot of ideas around that. Yes, no, it's 100% does, right? We are who we are. We grew up in our environment, our surroundings, and some of us are more introvert than extrovert. I consider myself an introvert extrovert. You know, there's certain surroundings, a more quiet reserve, trying to understand, you know, who's around, what can I say, what I cannot say. But once I'm comfortable, Zee, the extrovert, kicks into overdrive and I just, you know, the life of the party.
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But I think it does, right? Because what is what is comfortable for you? What is it that you're, that you know, that comes natural to you? But then at the same time, how can you also tone it down or, you know, amp it up a little bit? And, you know, I like to call how do you flex your different styles to be able to communicate effectively with your team, with other leaders, you know, when you have an important presentation or you need a persuade. I mean, the list goes on. So I would say 100%. And I think that's what we're gonna talk about today. What are some techniques, best practices, and things we need to be aware about when we're leading and leveraging our personality and the different traits that we have. So I think I said yes in a long way. Yes, I didn't know. And I already knew the answer to that because you're an amazing leader. So I set you up for that. Thank you. Yes.
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So in addition to that, what we'll be unpacking is how personality influences your leadership skills and your style. And also it's some just to keep an eye on some unconscious biases that your personality may or may not have. In addition to that, what we'll be talking about is how important it is to keep emotional intelligence in the forefront, especially when dealing with multiple personalities on the team. You know, no two people are the same. So yeah, yeah, that's a good good layout. So with that, we also have a special guest. We want to give a warm leading with insight. Welcome to this podcast. Alisa Borsetti, who is Associate General Counsel here at Insight, and about three and a half years if I'm correct, and a lot more. So with that, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much. And I'm, I'm really sorry to do this, but you did mispronounce my name. I've been practicing like 20 times in the field. Borsetti.
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I'm so sorry, but I'm like, I don't know what the final took over. And as RFS, I said it wrong, but I was gonna keep going. I'm like, I can't let it, I can't let it lie. I can't let it lie. I'm sorry. You know what, and I appreciate that. Thank you. I would want you to correct me. So yes, Borsetti, welcome. Yeah, thank you. Thank you so much, Zee. I'm so happy to be here. So for those who don't work here at Insight, or maybe haven't had the opportunity to meet you or work with you here, can you tell us a little bit about what you do for, for Insight? Yeah, absolutely. So I'm, as you said, Associate General Counsel. I manage a team of amazing contract managers, three of them. And together, we support all aspects of the client contracts process. So from inception of creating a contract and kind of sending that out, having clients review it, reviewing red lines, basically helping our teams close these deals and get to the finish line while minimizing as much risk to Insight as we possibly can.
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Yeah, wow. Again, all these different roles that we don't even like think about, right? How important that is. I mean, your team is a, you know, is a big part of what we do and making sure that we have the right documents, the right content, everything is right there for us to make sure that we have a good relationship with our clients and everything is done, you know, without any hiccups. Yeah, absolutely. I sometimes tell people that the best experience I had for this role was actually working in customer service and restaurant back in college because we are in customer service for our Insight clients, the sales teams, the pre-sales teams. We are their support when they are needing to work with clients, work out these thorny issues. We are there, so I take great pride in what we do. So I did do some stocking. I was like, okay, let me see if I can find anything on Lisa. Yeah.
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One of the things that's on your LinkedIn is that you were a speaker for like, I think it was a WIC, a 2023 event for ESGs or something. Yeah. How did that go? Yeah, it was great, you know, and I was so pleased to be involved because one of the things that I love about the building, the headquarters building that I work in, is when it was all going up. I remember reading stories just about the partnership and the community and what leadership wanted to do in terms of sustainability and outreach. And it made me so proud. And when I walked into the building on the first day, I kind of had this, you know, first day of school situation where I'm like, I can't believe I go here, you know, it was very exciting.
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But then in the back of my mind thinking, this place is such a powerhouse and working for a company that is actually concerned about being a responsible corporate citizen and our role in the community that really resonates with me. And so I was just all too happy to kind of preach the gospel of insight, so to speak. So yeah, very happy to be involved. And you're doing it today at this podcast. So look at that. You just like all over. Amen. Another thing I did, I was like, came across, I'm like, what else is that? What else do I don't I know about Lisa?
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I came across some voiceover you did and it was like, oh my gosh, she's got a great voice. It should be perfect for this podcast. Actually, we have it now. Go ahead and roll it. No, I'm just kidding. Just kidding. I'm like, you can find that on Percipio.
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Hello, welcome. Yes. But let's go into today's topic about personality and how that plays into our leadership style.
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So we'll start off with that. How can somebody as a leader understand or have that self-awareness of like, hey, what's my style? Like, how do I know what my personality, my communication style is?
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So we'll start with that. What's your experience? What have you done or what have you,
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what do you recommend for leaders to do if they're curious? Sure. I think a big starting point can just be good old fashioned self-reflection and kind of looking into yourself and even maybe combining with observing others. What about the leaders that we admire resonates with us? What about the leaders that we admire makes us feel like they are effective?
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Things that speak to us in the way we also do things or the similarities in the way we approach things.
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There's also some really fun tools out there. So you can do these assessments. Big Five is one that a lot of people know about.
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Myers Briggs has been around forever and the DISC assessment, which I actually did for the first time at Insight a couple of years ago. And that was really, really interesting because I feel like maybe it's a rarity where people have very consistent, it's like this bar chart. And most people that we shared it in our group and most people had a bar that was really high on one aspect. And it's like, oh, how do I break this down? Especially when somebody brings back a big dominance one. They're like, I don't even feel like I'm like that. It's just a category that you can break down into these sort of component parts. And that can help guide you in your understanding of who you are as a leader and how you approach problems, things like that. Yeah. And again, those are really good right there, right? Off the bat. I love that. Self-reflecting, just be observant, be present. I think that's a big difficult for a lot of us leaders as we are running 100 miles an hour. We were just talking beforehand like, oh my gosh, I was so looking for this because I kind of get a break.
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But the thing about it is that, yeah, we need to be present and kind of make those observations. And we'll talk about one of the tools that I use is called speed reading when I'm trying to adjust to others.
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Because honestly, people are giving us clues all the time. Like if you really pay attention, they're telling us, whoa, slow down, you're going too fast. Or, you know, can you speak up a little? Whatever. You can just tell by these different cues are giving you, but we just need to be present.
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So I love that. Self-awareness, self-assessment, taking the time and a lot of trainings. If you ever done leadership training, isn't there a lot of self-reflecting that happens in trainings? Like, what's your why? What are your values?
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Yeah, so much. And if you're a person who maybe tends towards excessive self-reflection or occasionally has a bout of imposter syndrome or anxiety, you look back at those times and you're like, did I really say and or do that? But it can be helpful because despite maybe the abject horror that you feel that that's actually what happened, you can learn from it and you can move on and you can you can really have that growth come from within because you lived it, you, you know, uncomfortably maybe confronted it. And you can let it kind of guide your path going forward. 100%. Yeah. And when it comes to assessments, you definitely call it out several. There's so many out there, right? The question is, you know, again, leverage them. I mean, I don't think there's any there's not a better or worse one. It's just, you know, an opportunity for you to look and see and then be curious and ask questions. And then I would just confirm with your your team, your peers, you know, how do you see me when I communicate? And usually, I mean, they usually align spot on. I think whenever I do those trainings, you'll be like, that is so me.
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Oh, my God. It's like reading a fortune cookie, isn't it? Your hardcore. Right. Exactly. How do you know me so well?
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But one quick question I do have for you, Lisa, what would you say are some characteristic traits of your personality that you can kind of that would impact your leadership style? Yeah, I think that's a great question.
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And I think when I think of, you know, answering that kind of question, I actually feel like the big five is really helpful in this in this situation. So, for example,
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and I think you mentioned it before, whether you're more naturally extroverted or more naturally introverted, that is going to impact how presenting and talking to a large group of people, right? Does that exhaust you? Do you find that to be overwhelming? Or are you better kind of one on one or kind of working behind the scenes? Or does that make you feel energized? And that and you feel like you're at your best self, right? So that's going to necessarily impact, you know, the way you want to hold your meetings, the way you want to communicate with your team, right?
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Your openness to experience. Are you more of a risk taker? Right? Do you feel more comfortable trying new things? Or are you a little bit more cautious? And then depending on the people on your team, if you are not matched up with them, right, then there may be some work to do in order to get through to those people so that you can all be kind of rowing in the same canoe, so to speak. Yeah, that was two great examples. They're like, you know, when as a leader, there's gonna be moments where you have to be extroverted to lead a meeting or you go to a conference or whatever the case may be, where you have to be more, you know, have to be out there speaking constantly in front of an audience, right? But, you know, that is definitely not your go to style naturally when you're exhausted at the end of it. And I think a lot of us can maybe, you know, can can sense that I mean, for me, it's more when I'm not around people. So if I'm in my desk all day on spreadsheets or working on programs or projects, I'm like, dude, I need to go. I need to get out. Like, I need to hang out with people. I need to go, you know, go to go and go to a restaurant. I could, you know, give me somebody, anybody, let's go hang out. But it's that energy draining, but also it's the opposite when you are in your in your in your behavior personality style. It's that energize afterwards, you just feel like, wow, that was fun.
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Right. So pay attention to that. So that's a great one, right? To go in that self-reflecting kind of pay attention when those energy is being given or drained.
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Yeah, so good question.
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So regarding like pitfalls, though, you know,
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it's interesting when I do some of the trainings like disk, let's break that let's break that down. This is not a personality assessment. It's a communication behavior assessment.
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So it's how you communicate, right?
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What are some, you know, pitfalls when it comes to leadership and like looking at those assessments where it can backfire or you can like maybe see that and it might not be helpful if you look at it of a certain way. Does that make sense? Like, if you're looking at as a leader and going, oh, that's my report, and they can you can see it as a negative instead of a positive. Yeah, I think I think I understand what you're getting at Z. I think I've actually been thinking about this a lot. I think it's very easy to get a result and
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think to yourself, that's my whole story, right? And sort of giving over a little bit too much, I don't know, power or influence to,
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I mean, it was like a series of a couple questions, right? I mean, maybe it's more than a couple, but you answered some questions and here's what it came out to.
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And so, you know, I think in the context of leadership as well, where there's so many books about it, there's so much discourse about it, sometimes it feels like there's so much external pressure on like, here's how to be a good leader, right? And that piece of paper is just another part of that external puzzle kind of acting on you. And so, you know, I think in a way, if you rely too much on it, it can kind of take away some of your agency as a leader, because you're just, "Yeah, okay, well, that's me and, you know, I don't, whatever."
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You know, you're relinquishing too much of your power, you're giving it too much space. Instead of using it as just another kind of tool in your bag of tricks,
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you know, you don't want to let it dictate how you approach things. Because, let's be honest, that's never going to be a complete picture, right? It's not situational. It's not taking into account, you know, days where things are going on in your personal life, things are happening in the world, you're stressed out, right? You are going to respond differently to this kind of different stimuli and no battery of, you know, of tests or assessment is going to, it's just not going to adequately capture that. And on the other hand, it's not going to capture those times when you've completely risen to the occasion, when people needed you, you supported them. It's, you know, it's just one piece of the puzzle that is you as a leader. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, a lot of that whole self-reflection, I really like how you touched on that. And that kind of leads itself into our next topic about just recognizing the unconscious biases that we have, you know, every individual has them, right? You know, from the way we grew up to, you know, the schools we went to, to geography, where we're where we're from, where we're raised, things like that. But are there, can you explain a little bit about how you can kind of identify those unconscious biases and, you know, make sure we mitigate those, you know, in our leadership styles? Yeah, absolutely. I think number one is you just keep it real and get yourself educated, like know that these biases are there within you.
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You're not a bad person. It's the brain has to take shortcuts. We are tasking our brains every day with just an impossible load, you know, and so because of that, our brains are constantly making shortcuts in order to identify what needs to be done, who's going to do this, who's going to do that, right? I mean, we're, we're always doing that. So in terms of, you know, making yourself aware, educating yourself, there's actually tests for unconscious bias. I've taken them before and yeah, you, it's incredible. And yeah, you don't want to think that about yourself. You don't, but it's eye opening and you're like, yes, this is, it's in all of us. And that is the first step. You, you just have to get, I guess, comfortable being uncomfortable with that truth. Right. Yeah. I think you make a big call out, right? People tend to see like, Oh my gosh, no, I don't have any or whatever. It's like, once we get to the point where we're like, Hey, this is part of the human nature, it's our brain. It takes shortcuts. We have to, you know, have to, it has to decipher things really quickly. But then I love your, what you just said, which one answer the question I was going to ask is how can you work on this? And I think right off the bat, just educate yourself, you know, read books, podcasts, you know, take trainings. There's so much out there.
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But for me, I would say is start to learn to be curious, just be curious. And I think that applies even to earlier, what you said about your results too, is when you get the results, don't take it so literal or take it like, okay, so this is me. Oh, great. I don't like it. Right.
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Or, okay, this is mine, but I really like yours. I want to be like you. Right. It's like, Hey, be yourself, but be, just be curious with it. Ask questions. You know, is this really reflecting? Where do I, where do I see these traits or these behaviors in the real world when I'm talking to people, when I'm reflecting and you'll probably find out more than more than likely that you actually, it does reflect pretty, pretty accurate if you did the assessment, right.
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But yeah, just be curious. I think that's another layer, right? So educate yourself. And then not only that, then be curious to just ask questions and understand.
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Because if you go into right away, like, Oh, that's wrong, or there's a right or wrong, or whatever that will get you in trouble. Absolutely. Well, and in terms of curiosity,
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being a bridge to kind of crossover these barriers that bias creates. So when you are curious about other people that are different than you, you are inviting those diverse perspectives into your life. And that's what you need. That's what we all need to do in order to kind of cultivate, you know, an environment that is full of diverse perspectives and, you know, managing bias in an appropriate way. So here, I was gonna think about quickly on that.
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Let's talk about personality. So how what are some bias unconscious biases that could happen? Well, I'll share mine, you know, being vulnerable.
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I think we tend to gravitate with people that have similar communication or styles as us, right?
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You're easy to talk to, I don't have to really flex or adjust my style, because I'm like, I totally get you. I love being loud and throwing ideas and all that. But this one, you talk to others that are more reserved or quiet, you're just like, you know, why are they so quiet? Are they not paying attention? Do they not really want to be? And it's again, that's not being curious, that's being more judgmental and kind of already labeling them as somebody who is not collaborating, whatever. So they got to be mindful of that. And that's because they're not the same personality of communication doesn't mean that, you know, they're not cooperative or whatever comes to your mind. You got to stop that before it before it starts becoming something. Were you gonna say something on that? No, I thought you were talking about me like, yeah, I'm on doing all the talking. No, you totally describe me as evil.
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No, similar personality. Similar.
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Maybe, maybe not quite to your extent. But that's one of the things you got to be mindful of. Right? Is there any other ones that you can think of unconscious bias, maybe in personalities? I would say, you know, what are what are some common challenges that you face when you, you know, maybe you're on a team and you don't address those unconscious biases? Like what kind of friction do you see? Or how do you overcome something like that? Yeah, so I think you can end up with a lack of diversity. Certainly. This can lead to poor morale.
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You can kind of get into sort of an echo chamber type situation, right? Where people, you know, people feel like they either don't want to or can't speak up.
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And that really doesn't serve the best interests of the organization whatsoever.
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Because that's, you know, you get into a real kind of communication breakdown, there's a lack of trust, there's a feeling that you're not safe. And all of these things really contribute to, you know, a team not functioning well, and people not really having a great time on the extreme end of things. If you were Miss as a lawyer, if I didn't say it can lead to legal trouble. This has been found to be, you know, some kind of discriminatory pattern, right? Or, you know, rising to the level of, yeah, discrimination, harassment,
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you know, it can really be serious if continued to, you know, kind of fester, if you will. Not address it. Yeah, and again, not educating yourself, right? And I think that's where you'd mentioned again, as teams is, you know, it's really, it's a good team builder exercise, right? When you're when you have a new team, maybe you've had a shift in teammates or what have you, it's good to come together and get to know each other. That's probably the foundation of trust is getting to know each other. And these assessments help with that, but also helps you but also then, again, helps address those challenges or why is there friction?
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You know, why can't we communicate more effectively? Well, do you understand their style and have you adjusted your style? And that is actually leads back to the even going back to that report again, it's interesting when I do these trainings, a lot of teammates, especially leaders go, okay, but what's like the ideal resolve for a leader? Like, do I need to up this? Do I need to tone this down? And I'm like, I got an answer for you. Leave it as is. You just have to understand your team style and adjust and give them what they need and return. They give you what, you know, kind of work together. But it's interesting. I get that all the time. I love that. You're like, dude, it's not a video game. You can't just like tweak the sliders, right? Like, I'm going to put a couple points over here. And I'm going to put a couple points over there. Let me, you know, let me toss a little bit of money your way. Can you adjust my results? Yeah, can you just like set me to 11 Z, but bow, okay? Yes. So I think that's the thing you got to be mindful of, right? Is that, you know, other unconscious biases, I think about, you know, when it comes to your personality, to be mindful of, I mean, think about hiring,
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think about, you know, stretch assignments, those type of things, like you just have to check yourself, you know, don't ever jump and assume that someone is not interested or capable, like bring it up to them. Hey, you know, this opened up, you know, you have you've you're competent, you've shown the skills.
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What do you think? Kind of get them involved. Don't just be like, oh, they're very quiet. I don't think they want to do this role. It's like, how do you know? Right. You never know. So, all right, emotional intelligence, or is there another? No, that's I was gonna say, that was a good segue. Okay, so so far, we talked about, hey, how can you identify what your personality is? And there's tons of assessments, or is that self, you know, self reflecting, understanding, getting that feedback, then we talked about, you know, being careful with your unconscious bias. But as we know, there is definitely going to be friction or a lot of emotions happening in meetings and conversations with colleagues. So how does emotional intelligence play when it comes to your personality styles and dealing with conflict or others?
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Yeah, I think, you know, it's really, really important as a leader to be someone who is emotionally right intelligent, right, to be kind of deeply in touch with what's going on, because I think some of the best leaders that I've worked with are people that, when they're put into a situation where everyone around them is, you know, either panicking or upset, they are the voice of calm, and they are able to speak to people, you know, whether it's their words or their body language or their style, but you just feel like this person gets it, they're here to help, and they're going to help get everybody together to be working in the same direction. So a lot of that is
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having a lot of empathy, really being able to empathize with what people are going through. People have different ways and levels at which they perform when confronted with stressors and other issues, and so being empathetic and not necessarily going in with expectations of, you know, you are going to be like, you know, you're going to deal with it in this certain exact way, right? You're going to meet people where they are, and I think an emotionally intelligent leader knows, you know, and can pick up on how to do that.
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Yeah, that's amazing. So I have a quick question on that, and it sounds like, and maybe you're just an anomaly, or you're just very gifted at emotional intelligence. So let me ask you this, how do you, how do you, what's what are some strategies that leaders can work on their emotional intelligence? And because it's not a one and done thing, right? You don't take an emotional intelligence test, and then you're like, Oh, okay, well, that's me. I'm done. You know, how do you not fix like most personalities? I mean, you kind of, you know, develop that over time. But the cool thing about is that EQ is malleable, right? You can work on. So what are some things that we can work on? Yeah, absolutely. I think just having that kind of growth mindset, that personality, that there are aspects that are not fixed. And that if you want to be more emotionally intelligent, that there there are things you can do. And there are things you can do within yourself, either by self reflection,
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or seeking out feedback, seeking out training. Sometimes when you go to a training,
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they may be talking about things that you never really thought about, or there might be concepts that you didn't really think about in the way that they're being presented. And that can help inform you and kind of guide the way that you want to go in order to, you know, to develop those aspects of your personality and your emotional intelligence and what you want to improve on. I mean, yeah, this is the first one growth mindset, right? Is like, you know, are you somebody who is looking to, you know, just get better, right? Knowing that, you know, we're not perfect, we're gonna make mistakes. Are you open to them receiving feedback? I love that. So it's, hey, I'm open to engage in these conversations to be uncomfortable. I let you earlier said be uncomfortable with the uncomfortable when somebody is emotional in an emotional state, they're going through something. And you're like, this is so uncomfortable for me, instead of saying, all right, well, I'm out of here, instead of just like, being there, right? How are you doing? What can you know, what's going on listening and being empathetic? All that combined is definitely areas, right? It's, you know, for who, you know, who doesn't go, Oh, my gosh, I thrive in these environments where it's like being around emotional people, and, you know, just, I seek it out, like, we're whoa, so what's this inquiry or upset or enraged? I love it, you know, you're an emotion vampire. Yeah, it's uncomfortable,
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because you're dealing with people, they're hurting, they're dealing with them so many different things. But if you are able to lean in, but also being mindful, right? There's also levels not leaning in and be like, I'm here to rescue, I'm gonna take all your pain or your sorrows away like that. Now, a lot of it's also listening, giving them the time and space. And sometimes even being okay, they're not even ready for that conversation.
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I've dealt with that. I'm not I've been a little vulnerable here, right? I'm a people pleaser, I like to fix things. And when someone's going through that, I'm like, poking and poking, what can I do with them? They're like, just leave me alone. And I'm making it worse. I didn't know that. And it took time, right? It took that growth mindset, that feedback and be like, I think this is my cue to step away, give them their space and then come back later.
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So yeah, you cover so much. Like, I'm just like geeking out because it's so true that there's various different areas start working on one or the other, you know, maybe journaling. How did my day go? What worked? What worked for me? When I talked to a rich, he was really cool this day. But the next day, he was, you know, not having his best day, but I kept poking at him. And yeah, what's wrong? He was like, leave me alone.
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That didn't work so well. So next time I'll just give him a space. Right? So there's so much. Yeah. Is there anything any other tips that maybe you worked on yourself? Yeah, you know, it's, it's a lot about adapting to other people's styles. You know, as you guys both mentioned, you can't just treat everybody the same. Some people need space, some people do need that attention and a little more softer approach of like, Hey, you know, what's going on? Do you want to talk about it? Get it off your chest. And those are really things to keep at the, you know, in the forefront of your mind when you're dealing with any individual, especially a team, right? Because your teams may be all over the place in terms of personality. So yeah, as we come to as we're starting to wrap up, is there maybe if any of us have a story or example of us ever like implementing some of these techniques or styles that really helped us like in our, in our careers. So I can start off for me is just the power of empathic listening. So that right there is one of those tools as a leader that can just really help in highly emotional situations is just being quiet and allowing that individual to just let it all out on the table without offering advice, without judging, without
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probing all these things that we naturally do because we want to help them. But if you can just tone it down and just let it go and let it ride.
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A lot of times that right there alone is all they needed. Right. And I've had tons of situations in my career where someone's like, Hey, at the end, they're like, calm down. And I'm like, is there anything I can do? They're like, honestly, we just did it. You listened.
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And for me, that's been a game changer. So I don't know if you've ever experienced any tools or anything similar. For me, well, you said all the good answers, but I will say I will tell you this first, I will tell you this. It's the same approach for myself. You know, I try to come to, you know, any situation as like a judgment for you zone, right? So so you build that trust, right? So they're they're open to giving you, you know, whatever that needs to be, right? That emotional, you know, I had a bad day, or I don't feel great, or whatever the case may be. Right. So I think a lot of that strategy has come from having kids. And obviously, there are multiple personalities and, you know, all children, so you have to deal with them individually as they are. So it's like, Okay, well, I know with, you know, maybe my son, I need to give him time. But with my daughter, you know, I'm here for you when you need it, you may not want to talk about it now. But you know, I'm here, I'm ready to listen, and I'm not going to judge you. So yeah, same, similar concept. Good for you, man. Yeah, it's, you know, that's, that's a great example as well, where you can definitely, I mean, definitely use it. Yeah,
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anything for anything on your on your end? Yeah. So I decided several years back that I was going to embrace humor.
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And, you know, I think lawyers, maybe rightfully so sometimes get a bad rap of being profoundly unfunny. And I've certainly
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nodded inside, of course, but I've certainly interacted with lawyers who completely met that description.
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And I was hesitant at first, because I think there's this feeling of, you know, being a woman in law and being a woman in tech and being a woman in legal tech, tech legal, you know, you feel this pressure of having to maybe look a certain way or sound a certain way to be taken seriously or to be thought of as competent. And, you know, a couple years ago, I just thought, well, the hell with it.
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And I've kind of just embraced the power of humor to break the ice, to make people feel at ease. I wrote it into my leadership philosophy.
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It's important for us in the work that we do. It is often very serious work, and it has critical consequences for, you know, for the business.
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We can take that seriously, but we don't necessarily have to take ourselves so seriously. And I really have noticed a marked increase in the positive encounters that we have, for example, with client counsel. Once you're able, I mean,
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it's like I can literally see it in real time, especially if we're on camera, right? You say that you get that one kind of right little thing in there, and you just you can physically see this person relax. Like I didn't, you know, I'm not here to do battle with you. Like I left the sword in the armor suit at home. Okay. And you do you can just chill out now and you can really see it just in their whole demeanor. They're like, oh, we can actually just talk like normal human people. Like, yes, we can. And we're going to sort it out and gotten some really good feedback on our approach. And it gets us off on just such a great start, you know, on a great foot, starting off and, you know, especially like a new client relationship, for example, they they remember that interaction and they're like all super charged up like, oh, this was so great. I can't wait to start the project. That's I mean, what, what a great way to end our segment, right? Well, because the whole theme is, you know, your personal brand. And I love that you just said, hey, I don't want to fit this mold. And I feel like, hey, this is something that's really not my genuine self. I want to embrace this. I want to just get out and then, you know, good for you. That's amazing. Thank you. Wish I had like a virtual clap. Cue the clap trick.
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Definitely some great takeaways in today's episode. Lisa, thank you so much for joining us. And if you enjoyed the content, please be sure to hit that like button, subscribe and also turn on your notifications. That way you get the episodes as soon as they release. Until next time. Thanks for joining us.
Host
Z Tinoco is a diversity, leadership & organization development manager who believes in building teams, inspiring minds and creating authentic connections. He helps people reach their goals and find success through humor, leadership and a diverse mindset.
Co-host
Richard is an experienced paid media specialist with a proven track record of creating and executing successful campaigns across various platforms. Richard has a passion for tackling new challenges, connecting with people and loves all things tech.
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