Latest / Chatting with The Experts with Paula Okonneh / Emotional Intelligence and Cultural Communication

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Emotional Intelligence and Cultural Communication · Chatting with The Experts with Paula Okonneh

• 0:36
  Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of chatting with the experts TV
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  show with me, your host, Paula Okonneh.
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  Every week I bring to you amazing, incredibly smart women from Africa
• 0:52
  and the Caribbean and the Diaspora.
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  And the mission is that at the end of this show, you, our audience, would
• 1:01
  have left having learned something new or, been inspired by what you hear.
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  Today, I'm going to be talking with my guest about Clear Communication
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  and how it cuts culture.
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  My guest is Monique Russell and she's the global communication skill
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  advisor that you want on your team.
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  She teaches leaders and teams how to upscale and keep top talent
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  engaged through strategic leadership development and has worked with
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  big names like Amazon, Microsoft, Google, who hasn't heard about them?
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  And the Centers for Disease Control.
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  And with that said, why don't I have Monique introduce herself?
• 2:00
  Welcome.
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  Hi, Paula.
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  It's so good to be back on the Chatting with Experts show.
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  Oh my goodness.
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  I grew up in the beautiful islands of the Bahamas and my dad is from Nigeria
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  and just being in this space just gives me so much joy and so much honor
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  because I know we get to talk about things we don't normally talk about.
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  But yes, I am the founder and CEO of Clear Communication Solutions.
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  It's a global training, coaching and consulting firm where we help keep top
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  talent engaged so they don't walk out the door and take the customers and
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  all the knowledge and skills with them.
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  And it's a beautiful experience to have because when I grew up in the
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  islands, I grew up with my mom, my stepdad and my two brothers.
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  And there were many times I felt like there were two families in the one home.
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  You know, it was my mom and myself and then the others.
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  And so when I met my dad at eight, my biological dad at eight years old, I had
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  to learn how to get into his culture.
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  He's from Nigeria.
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  I had to learn how to engage with protocol and it took me a while.
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  So literally my whole journey of communications, studying communications
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  when I went off to college, has been driven by this need to unite families.
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  And I thought to myself, if the people that I love the most in my families
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  had the communication tools to foster unity and understanding and connection
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  amongst each other, the entire game would be changed differently.
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  So what I do today is help people to communicate effectively, develop the
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  leader within themselves so that their workplaces and also their home lives are
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  places that they feel proud of and enjoy.
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  I love it.
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  I love it.
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  How can you use communication, as you said, to cut across culture, whether
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  it's within the home or in the workplace?
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  Yeah, at the core of communication, it's really being flexible and being
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  open to understand, like stepping outside of the rigid view of one
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  way is right, the other is wrong.
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  You know, having that moral superiority of feeling like
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  you're better than someone else.
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  It's really about cutting through the noise to the core of the human
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  being and seeing every single person and their true element as humans.
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  We all want to eat.
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  We all smile.
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  We all want to laugh at the core.
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  We have the same needs, but what gets in the way sometimes is the cultural noise.
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  And I say noise because culture, we love it.
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  It's part of who we are.
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  It's part of what makes us unique as.
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  individuals and communities, but when it becomes noisy it disrupts, distracts,
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  and it disconnects us from each other.
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  So communication, cutting across the noise, cutting across cultures is really
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  having an appreciation for your own culture, but having an appreciation
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  for other cultures, knowing that the most consistent thing that you
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  will experience is miscommunication.
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  Even amongst the same culture, the same family, same friend circle, when you're
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  communicating or working on communicating effectively, one of the outcomes that
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  you're going to have is miscommunication.
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  Now you add the cultural piece to that, and you for sure know that
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  miscommunication is going to happen, but it's how you choose to respond to it.
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  Yeah.
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  And that's a good point when you say how you choose to respond to it because
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  I've been talking with a lot of people and sometimes when we talk about culture
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  is not really as we say culture in the sense like I'm from the Caribbean or
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  you're from Africa, India, wherever.
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  Sometimes it's just differences in thought, and so culturally,
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  we may be in the same workplace and from the same country, but
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  thinking completely differently.
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  So a question I have for you is that, does emotional intelligence
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  have a part to play in this?
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  Absolutely.
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  100 percent emotional intelligence is the core.
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  It's the foundation because it's funny you say this, Paula, because you know what?
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  I have been delivering a masterclass on Intentional Motherhood.
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  Who said it would be easy?
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  My book.
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  I've been delivering this masterclass series and one of the topics that we
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  talk about is self awareness, the whole identity of the role of motherhood.
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  But I want to focus on what you talked about, just that emotional intelligence
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  and self awareness piece, because when we are not aware, we are just living out
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  by the default patterns that we observed when we were younger and patterns that
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  we absorbed and then we tend to pass that down to our children too unconsciously.
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  So when it comes to the whole emotional intelligence piece and
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  understanding culture, you have to start understanding why you do what
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  you do, you know, why you communicate or process things the way that you do.
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  You start to investigate yourself.
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  How did you communicate when you were growing up?
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  Who made decisions in the home, where'd you go for vacation,
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  what was play like, what was love like, what was achievement like.
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  There was this topic around rest and work, hard work and rest.
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  So let's just play with that for a little bit.
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  So in our society, there's this cultural phenomenon that people who don't do hard
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  work or who are not engaged in hard work or productivity all the time are lazy.
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  And there's an article that came out on Goop about the
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  laziness lie, the laziness myth.
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  And it's about the fact that people who are constantly productive
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  are morally superior than those who are not productive, but
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  this is a societal conditioning.
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  It's a societal belief.
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  And if you don't know where it comes from or how it generates in you, you'll just
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  find yourself saying, I want to rest, but I can't, I find it so hard to slow down.
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  Or when I'm resting, I feel like I'm lazy or I feel like I should be doing more.
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  We hear the outcome of these beliefs, I should be doing more, I feel lazy,
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  but we don't, when we don't understand where it generates, how it generates or
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  how it shows up for us, then we're just basically operating from the default.
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  And the same thing applies when you look at a cultural aspect and one environment,
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  one corporate environment, there might be an expectation that if you're not
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  there from 9 to 7 p m., you're not productive, you're not working hard.
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  Whereas someone else in another organization may feel like,
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  I don't need to see you.
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  I don't need to see you.
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  I just need to see your deliverables.
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  So you see how this.
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  This belief or this mindset, it not only shows up in your individual life, it
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  shows up in your work life and your team life and how you lead your team and the
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  expectations that you have for your team.
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  But if you don't even know where it's coming from, then you
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  don't know how to address it.
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  If it's causing you challenges with connection and communication
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  with the people that you work with and the people that you live with.
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  You know, that's a very good point because I know myself personally.
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  I grew up in a house where we were encouraged to be busy and
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  rest was for people who were lazy.
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  It took me years before I figured out that's not exactly true.
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  I do so much better when I'm rested.
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  As compared to when I'm so exhausted because I'm feeling well, if I sit down
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  now, it means I haven't produced anything.
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  I haven't been able to check off all the boxes.
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  And so that was very interesting that you mentioned that culture of
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  thinking, where does it come from?
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  Because for me, I know it came from my formative years.
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  Yeah.
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  But, you know, I thought, you know, I heard you talk about that
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  and some corporations, that's even part of their culture.
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  I was thinking that with COVID, after COVID, during COVID, we had, you know,
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  most of us were working from home.
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  Wasn't that theory or that myth debunked?
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  You would think that it was debunked, but I mean, just look at all the
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  requests and demands and requirements for in office presence because I
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  don't know if they're productive.
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  You see what I'm saying?
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  So this is so powerful, Paula.
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  I'm so glad that you're bringing this up because it's like COVID already
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  demonstrated that people can do their work from home and get their deliverables
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  done without being in the office.
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  But when that emotional intelligence and that awareness isn't present, it's so easy
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  to go back to the default, even if you had evidence that belief and that thinking
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  is counterproductive or it's otherwise.
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  You've already had proof.
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  You've already had evidence, but what is it that's causing you now to go
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  back to that thinking to say, no, even if the data is showing me that
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  numbers are up and productivity is up, I need people to be in the office.
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  I need them to be able to come in the office in order to produce their work
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  or in order to connect with others.
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  Because that gap in awareness is missing.
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  Instead, we could look at Okay, what do you really want?
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  What is it that you really want?
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  Like peeling back the layers.
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  And why are you feeling as though your team members can't be trusted?
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  Why do you feel you need to have people in the office?
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  Now, if it's a case where you've already paid for this commercial
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  building lease, and you need people to be present, then say that, right?
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  Again, emotional intelligence, transparency, interpersonal communication,
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  trust, integrity, and honesty say that be open with your people.
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  You know what I mean?
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  So I think that lack of awareness and not just the lack of awareness, but the
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  lack of the awareness and the inability.
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  To cement the new pattern or thinking or thought consistently to move
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  forward prevents that person from adopting that new pattern or thought.
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  They just automatically go back.
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  It's like you start training for a marathon and you lose weight
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  and you're like, Okay, I already lost five pounds, so I good.
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  Let me stop fasting.
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  Let me stop You know, eating healthy, let me add some, a little bit more chips.
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  And so you go back, you know, to those previous behaviors
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  and those previous habits.
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  You need to be able to integrate them into your day to day consistent practice.
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  I so agree with it because this was a conversation I had with a friend of
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  mine for the same thing about, you know, this call to go back to the office.
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  This call that, you know, you must clock in knowing fully well
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  that data, the data shows that you don't need to be in a physical
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  building and a traditional culture.
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  I mean, the traditional workplace in order to produce, in order
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  for there to be deliverables.
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  And we, you know, wondered if it's, of course, a generational thing, and
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  thought it would be wonderful to see how this plays out with the Gen Zs and
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  the millennials first, to see how, you know, in some years to come because a
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  lot of resistance is coming from them.
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  It's coming from the millennials.
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  It's coming from the Gen Zs and I understand why.
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  Yeah, definitely.
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  I mean, I have nieces and nephews who are in the multiple generational category.
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  In fact, I mean, even in my own home, I have four different
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  generations and I'll say
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  One of my sons, you know, he's in his early 20s, and he said,
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  I prefer to be in the office.
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  So I think especially for those in their first or second job, maybe
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  it's harder for them to Build that connection or do onboarding
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  or even for themselves as they're establishing discipline for themselves.
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  It depends.
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  Some say they don't want to, some say they do.
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  I know for me, if I'm in that scenario surely I don't see why there's anything
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  that requires, unless you are doing tasks that require your physical presence.
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  You know, you're,
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  Mm-Hmm,
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  , you're hosting an in-person meeting.
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  You're hosting a in-person presentation.
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  Unless there are specific things that require that I really don't see why there
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  is that effort and then you can also I've heard this conversation where people
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  are saying they're looking at the days that are being required for the office.
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  So, when the days that are being required for the office, or, for example, like
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  a Monday and Wednesday, Friday it's a different communication that you're
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  telling your potential employees and your current employees, which you feel
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  about a longer weekend, for example, or a longer stretch of time at home.
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  No, you're not going nowhere.
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  You got to get in here Monday, Wednesday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
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  Yeah, like anchor in these, you know.
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  Correct.
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  So yeah.
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  Oh, wow.
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  That brings me to another question about cultural agility.
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  What exactly is that I heard you talk about that, but I said, this
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  is an opportunity for you to teach more of us about what that is.
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  You know, what I believe in is being able to understand, develop and understanding
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  cultural agility and cultural flexibility.
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  Really, that's what it is.
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  It's about being able to have a mindset where you are.
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  approaching and embracing difference.
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  So instead of just being passive and receptive to different environments,
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  different change, different culture, it's like you, you are taking on
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  reverse mentorship roles, for example.
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  So sometimes you might have a mentor who, let's say it's in a project management
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  environment, and it's very clear about the skill set that you want to learn.
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  But you might be working with people in multiple time zones and
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  in different countries, and you don't even really understand or
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  know much about their culture.
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  So you can take on a cultural mentor where you're learning and your intention is to
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  get curious about, you know, what they're beliefs are, what their practices are,
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  how do they handle these common scenarios?
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  It doesn't have to be something that is just, you know, very deep, but you start
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  that process of curiosity and you start that process of thinking, even in your
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  interaction, you may have one way that you want this outcome to be achieved.
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  But dealing with someone in another culture, you might now realize that
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  there are multiple factors involved.
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  And so being flexible in your approach and flexible in your conversation, it
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  first starts with that curiosity and that openness to say, well, let me kind
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  of find out what's going on with them.
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  What's going on in their country, because whatever it is at the end of the day, we
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  want to care about what they care about.
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  People are people, and once you care about what they care about, you're able
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  to accelerate connection and you're able to enhance your communication.
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  That's a good explanation, really good.
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  Once you care about what they care about, you're able to enhance your production.
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  Yeah.
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  It's true.
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  You know, for years companies and lots of organizations didn't
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  know that a healthy worker...
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  when you start from the home, a happy worker means a happy office environment,
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  which means better productivity in every aspect, you know, it's so good to
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  see how you know there's so much more knowledge now about, you know, that leads
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  me on to like mental health, and how even that how that transcends culture.
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  Because the younger generation and I specifically say younger
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  generation because my sister has been saying, please stop saying the
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  young people we are still young.
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  They're just younger.
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  So, I mean, we're not mental health experts here, but the younger generation
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  has embraced mental health in a way that gradually they're chipping away
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  the stigma that goes along that's associated with that, you know, and
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  that is making such a difference in, you know, work-life balance.
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  In understanding that, you know, if you are healthy, spirit, soul and body,
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  mind and body, you can do so much more.
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  But as I said, culturally, that's taken a while in some places to be accepted.
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  Oh my goodness.
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  I was just talking about this just the other night with a friend.
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  And we were talking about the same thing.
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  And it's basically how we can use words to accelerate the embracing
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  and the understanding of it.
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  Everybody knows that mental health is important, but especially in certain
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  cultures there's still a lot of shame and stigma and embarrassment.
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  And, you know, there are trigger words, you know, psychologists,
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  psychiatrists, depression, anxiety.
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  No.
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  I don't have any of that.
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  I don't, right.
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  It's no.
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  Well that's the way we were raised and we turned out just fine.
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  No, you didn't.
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  You didn't turn out just fine because you have people who you
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  don't talk to in your family.
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  You have estrangement that's going on and there are people who
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  are waiting for honest, genuine apology, or to be acknowledged or
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  understood and you feel lonely, you don't feel valued and appreciated.
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  So it didn't work out.
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  It didn't work out.
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  So I think that mental health is taking a while in some places to
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  catch on in terms of being embraced.
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  But if we just talk about it in language or use terms that
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  doesn't make them feel so afraid.
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  The goal is always to remove any type of shame or embarrassment or
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  guilt because those emotions stifle.
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  They kill.
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  They disrupt productivity.
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  They don't help you to move forward.
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  They just hold you back.
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  Like you're a prisoner.
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  You're a prisoner of your own mind.
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  So if we can find ways to remove any connections to shame, okay, you don't
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  want to be affiliated or connected with the word psychologist or psychiatrist.
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  What about counselor?
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  Is that okay?
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  You know what I mean?
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  So we have to find ways, I think, to still get the work done,
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  but just change the approach.
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  And that's also where the cultural agility comes in too.
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  If you know that going into this environment, certain terms are
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  going to be a quick shutdown.
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  Find other ways to connect, find other ways to explain, find
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  other ways to to support, right?
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  And that way the communication and the connection will continue.
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  Some people may say, I don't have time for that.
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  I just need to say it how I want to say it.
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  Why do I have to think about the other side?
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  Why do I have to, you know, make adjustments?
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  But the truth is, you become more flexible, you become more
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  adaptable, you become more valuable and marketable in the marketplace.
• 22:08
  People are really wanting to have well being and wellness considered
• 22:13
  in the workplace right now.
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  So teams and organizations and leaders that aren't really taking
• 22:19
  this to the forefront, they're missing out on an opportunity to truly be
• 22:24
  employee-centered and customer-centered because the customers are also on the
• 22:30
  receiving end of those employees who feel like I'm just a number, you know?
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  True.
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  You have said it right.
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  We talked about, you know, employees are people too.
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  And, you know, your podcast, which I love it's called Bridge To You.
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  Are there any trends you are seeing in bridging those, you know,
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  bringing those cultures together?
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  I know the bridge to you particularly was with looking at the three black cultures
• 23:07
  of the world, Africa, the Caribbean and the African-American, but I know that
• 23:13
  you work outside of those three cultures.
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  But I'm wondering, are there any trends you're seeing now in the communication
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  between, you know, now the global boundaries are down, we know that we live
• 23:25
  in a non, well, the world is still global, but because of technology like what we're
• 23:29
  using, global boundaries are more fluid.
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  Are there any trends?
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  That you're seeing in the communication world that we
• 23:38
  should be aware of, especially as this program is good for women.
• 23:45
  Yeah.
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  So two things I first, I want to say something about the podcast,
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  because I feel like it's applicable to what we were talking about before.
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  You're right, the podcast was intentionally designed
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  to focus on diversity and inclusion among black cultures.
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  And when my podcast producer and I were going through the words and
• 24:06
  the descriptions and, you know, just really like, cementing the positioning
• 24:13
  for the show, my initial reaction or my initial conversation was, I don't
• 24:18
  want to use anything about black.
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  I don't want to use anything about black because I want to highlight
• 24:23
  and demonstrate that we are already living an awakened way of life.
• 24:29
  But when we got down to the nitty gritty, I had to accept and embrace that if I
• 24:36
  wanted to target and attract and focus on who I wanted the message to initially
• 24:43
  before I had to use the word black.
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  So that's the whole like agility and the cultural flexibility and focus
• 24:51
  because in my mind, I'm light years away.
• 24:55
  I'm like, that's just a label.
• 24:56
  I don't even subscribe to the label I'm living in the twilight world, if you will.
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  But twilight world living doesn't get me to connect with my audience,
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  or it doesn't allow me to have a practical experience or use language
• 25:10
  that they can receive right now.
• 25:12
  So the second part around like the trends, global trends.
• 25:16
  Surely, there's a lot of talk around environmental, sustainable, and
• 25:21
  governance topic, a lot of talk around that people are focusing on how they
• 25:26
  can demonstrate that they're taking actions towards reducing climate
• 25:31
  change, pollution and being responsible in the environment and also how
• 25:36
  they are able to improve well being.
• 25:39
  I see a major trend, especially where leaders are paying more attention
• 25:46
  to the importance of having more women leaders in their teams.
• 25:50
  And they know that, listen, this is the way to go.
• 25:52
  This is definitely, the way of the future.
• 25:55
  So I see a lot of that because we've had significant decrease of women leaders
• 26:01
  just around the world in different areas.
• 26:03
  But the trend I see is focusing on how can we now even when I was in the
• 26:08
  Middle East last year, how can we now continue to the women leaders with
• 26:13
  the skills that they want to have to be developed and to lead effectively?
• 26:19
  So that would be one, one trend that I would say, you know, people
• 26:24
  are paying more attention to.
• 26:27
  The multi-generational conversation is also coming up a lot of people
• 26:32
  are thinking about how do we connect with the younger people?
• 26:38
  The younger people.
• 26:40
  Yeah.
• 26:40
  So the multicultural, multi-communication conversation is
• 26:45
  truly starting to stand out because like you said, we're borderless.
• 26:49
  So it's important for us, and then lastly there was an episode on my show, Marlon
• 26:57
  Addison did it, and we were talking about the skills for Gen Z workers, and
• 27:03
  that was around sales, IQ and EQ, and in my work, especially when we're doing
• 27:09
  coaching, group coaching and training.
• 27:12
  This topic comes up a lot.
• 27:14
  So how do you develop your Gen Z workers?
• 27:18
  What do they need to be effective in their first and second roles?
• 27:22
  And how do you help those managers to have compassion and patience
• 27:27
  while they're developing them?
• 27:30
  Love that.
• 27:31
  I love that.
• 27:32
  I think that kind of flows into, you know, how do you start training or
• 27:37
  making academia more aware of how, you know, your teaching methods have to
• 27:44
  change in order for that to impact the Gen Zs and the what's after Gen Zs?
• 27:50
  Alpha, the Alpha.
• 27:53
  Remember all these things I've been told.
• 27:55
  Mom, you need to get it, right?
• 27:58
  Yeah.
• 27:59
  I mean that comes into that's another that'll be another completely
• 28:04
  new show for me and you have that discussion of academia changing
• 28:09
  their ways of teaching in order to...
• 28:12
  please.
• 28:13
  Please let me add to that too.
• 28:17
  To the fact, yeah, what?
• 28:19
  Yeah, in order to have, I mean, the generation that we want, or we strive
• 28:24
  to have, you know, the Gen Zs look at things so differently from the
• 28:28
  Millennials and Gen Zs are pretty close.
• 28:31
  The Alpha generation is up and coming and I'm a Baby Boomer.
• 28:35
  What's between Gen Zs and baby boomers?
• 28:37
  I totally forgot.
• 28:39
  But these are all conversations that need to be had because we are living longer.
• 28:46
  Technology is enabling us to engage even longer and with more people.
• 28:51
  As you said, we are in a borderless world for the most part.
• 28:55
  And all of us have to live together.
• 28:58
  Yeah.
• 28:59
  You are right.
• 29:00
  Paula, you hitting the nail on the head.
• 29:01
  Like the nail is in the wood down.
• 29:04
  And I think this is so important because I also had a similar conversation with Dr.
• 29:10
  Les Longsworth, who had also was a guest on my show.
• 29:13
  And we talked about it recently too, about the importance of academia
• 29:18
  and industry coming together.
• 29:21
  Like there is a gap.
• 29:22
  There is a gap about what's needed in the workplace when Gen
• 29:27
  Z workers are starting and how is academia preparing them for that?
• 29:33
  I will say University of West Indies has been very progressive in how they
• 29:38
  have always been, you know, ahead of the trend and sort of like merging.
• 29:43
  those two worlds.
• 29:44
  But I see it in a way where, for example, curriculum and content like
• 29:50
  this, like your show, like my show are embedded into the academia conversation.
• 29:56
  That's the easiest and simplest way for it to start, like beginning to have those
• 30:01
  conversations and then cross pollinating.
• 30:04
  So for example, The university might be having an event, and then industry is also
• 30:12
  supporting that event with diversifying the content, diversifying the thought, and
• 30:17
  I think traditionally, what would happen is that you'd have apprenticeships or you
• 30:23
  would have like internships and placements here and there that's the traditional okay
• 30:27
  go and try do a traditional apprenticeship or an internship but there isn't really
• 30:32
  a two way symbiotic relationship.
• 30:35
  It's like we're doing that apprenticeship so you can hopefully
• 30:37
  get a job when you finish.
• 30:40
  But the two way conversation needs to be symbiotic between the industry and
• 30:44
  the academia, influencing how we are actually learning and how we are actually
• 30:50
  like building all of the new solutions in the marketplace simultaneously.
• 30:57
  So I think you, you hit the nail right on the head.
• 31:01
  I see my podcast Bridge To You as a resource for academic institutions.
• 31:08
  Because it's a great place to start with conversation.
• 31:12
  I'm talking about conversations, you know, you and I could converse for hours.
• 31:16
  Correct.
• 31:17
  Oh boy.
• 31:18
  And time.
• 31:19
  I can't believe that we've been speaking for over 30 minutes.
• 31:21
  Oh really?
• 31:23
  Yes.
• 31:24
  So we will have to continue this on another show, another episode.
• 31:29
  And the interim for those listening now and who really want to get in touch
• 31:33
  with you because you have said so many things that they are interested in,
• 31:38
  how can they find you online, my dear?
• 31:40
  Yes, everywhere online in the internet streets.
• 31:44
  clearcommunicationssolutions.
• 31:46
  com is one of my websites.
• 31:49
  moniquerussell.
• 31:49
  com.
• 31:50
  I'm on LinkedIn every week, most weeks.
• 31:53
  So you can hit me up on LinkedIn.
• 31:56
  Don't follow, hit connect, send me a message and say you heard
• 31:59
  me on chatting with the experts.
• 32:01
  I love connecting with people.
• 32:04
  So please reach out and let's continue the conversation.
• 32:08
  Absolutely.
• 32:08
  And for those, my loyal listeners, followers and viewers.
• 32:15
  Thank you so much for tuning in.
• 32:18
  You know where you can get me?
• 32:19
  Well, for those of you who don't, you can connect with me on my website,
• 32:23
  which is chattingwiththeexperts.com.
• 32:27
  I'm on LinkedIn as Paula Okonneh.
• 32:30
  I'm on Instagram as chat_experts_podcast.And I'm making
• 32:40
  an effort to be more on Facebook.
• 32:43
  We just look for Okonneh there.
• 32:46
  And as usual, I have the most amazing guest and Monique has been no different.
• 32:54
  Thank you, Monique.
• 32:56
  Thank you, Paula.
• 32:57
  Always enjoy talking with you.
• 32:59
  Same.