Latest / Inspiring Stories / Stand up and be inclusive with Celia Daniel

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Stand up and be inclusive with Celia Daniel · Inspiring Stories

0:04
Thank you for listening to de Pictures Media Radio. You rat you readything to
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me? Oh well, jus well not a bad stop alone, I just
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see you so shmashi stop along you is it dead? An welcome back to
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everybody. I'm sure that you all have heard me say this before, that
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we all should have the right to be who we want to be, be
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seen as who we truly are. And hey it's just close anyway, right,
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you've heard me all say these sort of thing that, hey, why
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not dress the way you want to dress? Dress, dress and be who
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you are so that she can be comfortable in your life and live your life.
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Well, well, I'm going to be interviewing a U trans woman.
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Her name is Cecilia Daniels, and that's exactly what she's doing. She is
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being trans her way. Uh. She she dresses the way she wants to
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dress, is known as as a woman the way she wants to be.
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And here's where she came from. Growing up as a lonely closeted trans child
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in a conservative, middle class Christian home in southern India. Cecilia writes and
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speaks passionately about her mental health, her ginger in congruence, and social challenges
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that she faced in her family, work, school community, both in the
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US and in India. As a professional, she is a management consultant with
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over twenty five plus years of demonstrated success in operations, growing and spearheading media,
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healthcare, and life science engagements for Fortune one hundred companies like amajen,
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gen Tech, United Health, Blue Cross, amer Choice. I'm sure there
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are others. As a senior regional executive with companies like Evekia, Beajeminy,
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I'm probably mispronouncing some of these names. Even Dune in Bradstreet, everybody knows
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who Done in Bradstreet is. As she has managed global cross functional teams,
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implemented enterprise strategies maximizing ROI for multi billion dollar clients. She has been consistently
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recognized for consumer status, customer satisfaction, and employee empowerment. She has a
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bachelor's and a master's degree in computer science. She also advocates for LGBTQ community
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with providers, pays, pharmaceuticals, and policymakers in the US and South Asia.
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She strives to make LGBTQ communities, particularly the trans community, feel welcome,
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accepted in all fascetus of society. From bathroom to boardroom. Let me
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tell you, after talking to Cecilia and realizing some really cool things about her,
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that she even made me feel a little more comfortable in my own skin.
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So why don't we welcome Cecilia to the show and let's hear what she
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has to say in her story about being trans and being trans her way,
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not someone else's way. Something to say. Welcome to the show. And
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it's a pleasure of meeting you again. And I said off air, you're
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a beautiful person and I love how you have found your way through life.
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And there's a story that goes along with this, and I want to give
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you an open chance to tell that story because it's actually a wonderful story of
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how a a wonderful person has has made it through life. So yeah,
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why don't we start there, tell us a little bit about your story,
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how you got to where you are now. Yeah, thank you Michael for
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this opportunity. I know we had some conversations and it's led to this beautiful
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loge where we want to really bring that accept tense. And I want to
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give you a quick idea about who Celia is now. I was, I
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am a South Asian, I am an immigrant, I'm a parent, I
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am a musician, I'm an entrepreneur, I'm a blogger, I'm a hiker.
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I love snarkling. But when I came out as trans, always that
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Celia is trans and Celia is trands and all they could do is it just
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balks me into that little thing box and said, Celia is a trans person.
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Being trans does not imagend being a human being, and how it all
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is. When I have four years of my mom back in southern part of
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India, it was a small it was a city called Chennai. I grew
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up in that city and I told my mom that I wanted to be a
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girl. My mom looked at the social constructs created by the colonial British gun
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which was so binary, and she said, you're a boy and you cannot
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wear your cousin's clothes. But she let me do that because they had had
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two kids and both of them are boys at the time, my brother,
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and they wanted a girl, and so it's part of a culture where if
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you don't have a girl in the family, they dressed the book take pictures
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just helping, you know, seeing how it looks like, and her pictures
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of myself as a child, and I also started pursuing wearing my cousin's clothes
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for a while. And there was a time when my mom told me,
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probably around seven, she told me that you're a boy, you cannot wear
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your cousin's clothes. And I threw tantrums. At the time, that's the
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time I found shame. It was you know, you cannot wear a girl's
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clothes. A girl and women were treated as secondarated citizens in India at the
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time, in the early seventies. It was a patriarchical society. It was
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more prominent for women. It was more prominent for men, and women were
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not in so many areas. My mom for a great example, though she
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grew up in in she was able to speak up and she was a working
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woman who raised us. But what she didn't understand is the child was going
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through something that my mom questioned as to why is my son different? What
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is going on with him? He has these imaginary thoughts, He has an
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imaginary girl who is called Yeah, who's this person? What was he talking
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about? Celia? And I created an iself that this feminine, feminine me
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were my identity at the time, and I and Celia was and these are
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all traumas and way of coping with your identity issues. I remember the traumas
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were layered and and there was a I want to give trigger warning few who
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are listening to this conversation. The conversations we're going to have is going to
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be difficult because the lives of trans people are not pretty. You know,
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there's a lot of moments where we cannot even share our experiences. It could
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be triggering for some of you. Nevertheless, one because it's absolutely important.
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I remember and my fourth grade uncle molested me and I did not know how
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to cope up with that as a child. Two years later, I just
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discarded it because I thought, you know this mouncle, I don't think he
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meant that. Two years later, my cousin did that to me. That's
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when I felt like, why are these people doing doing such things to a
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boy? And I'm a girl inside? But why are they doing it?
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Is it because I'm trans? I had a lot of questions and I just
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took that shame and I just embraced it because I felt like I didn't want
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to tell my mom it was so shameful. And India, I went to
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talk about all these the abuse that you're going through. I just let go
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of it, but the trauma never It was always taunting me for a very
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long time. I also felt like I wanted to be myself, and in
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my ninth grade, I picked up the courage and I said, I'm going
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to go out and be Celia. I wore a skirt, I stitched a
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skirt. Actually I wore that skirt and I wore a top and I was
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walking out, I put a scarf around my head. I was walking out.
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I didn't go very well. The security guard at a construction site and
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they publicly humiliated me. They said all kines of derogatory words in the Indian
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dictionary. I was made to stand and they mocked at me, almost fifteen
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to twenty adults. That was a day I decided that I won't be able
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to come out or I felt like people like me suchless scums in the society.
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And that's how they called me. They said, you're such a disgrace
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to the community. Who is your dad? Your dad, and let him
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know that their son is I've been walking around like a woman, like a
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little girl. It's absolutely disgusting. I spoken another and ran away from that
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site. Didn't follow me because I was very quick. I came back home.
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This a couple of days and next couple of weeks, I was contemplating
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suicide. Self harm was week in my life. I was always chosing myself
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and it was really really hard and I wanted to kill myself. Out did
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this femininity in me? Being trans is not a lifestyle choice. It's who
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we are. We are born this way. But people don't realize that.
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I didn't want to be trans and I was trying to do everything in my
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if pausible avoid being a transper person. Growing up in India, it wasn't
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easy being trans because you're always marginalized as a hidgrack community. When you look
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at the Hiderra community in India, it's a fourthear Old culture where I was
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just in the community they were. They were considered as sex workers, performers,
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and beggars, and when I looked at them, I felt like,
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I am you, but I'm I don't. I could relate to them,
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but I didn't want to do what they were doing. I wanted to be
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successful. I wanted to really have a family. I wanted to do something,
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but I still felt like I had a femininity in me. I was
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always to women. I was never attracted to men. That's another confusion that
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always crept in me because I didn't know the difference between sexual orientation and gender
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identity. I always confused both of them, and I felt like, if
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I'm attracted to a girl, why am I wanting to be a girl.
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And that's the part I didn't understand. So I went through lots of cycles.
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Yeah, I got married. I got married to a beautiful woman,
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and I was attracted to her, and at the same time, I felt
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like I wanted to tell her about what was going on. And I seriously
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assumed in some crazy way that if I marry assistant a girl, my transness
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would go away. So I married her and I came to this country.
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I was an entrepreneur. I was doing a lot of business development and brad
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Street at the time, it was one of the reputed companies and I worked
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for. I came here for an assignment with JP Morgan Chase in New York.
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I was very successful in my and my business. In my education,
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I didn't know my master's in computer science. I was a person who was
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able to really do well in my corporate life, but my personal life was
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such a wreck I was. I didn't know what to do. I didn't
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I prolled my emotions. I was always said I was angry. I was.
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I was anxious. Sometimes I felt like I was not the person I
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am. I felt like I was leading a dual life. And four years
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after I told my wife about my life, and I had a baby and
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she was two years old, so we were struggling as a family to understand
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what would happen. My wife was absolutely worried because she knew I wasn't gay,
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but at the same time, she didn't know that my identity hidden.
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So I did work with some therapists were Christian therapists at the time, and
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they told me I was a feminine gay. I didn't feel a lot,
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and what is feminine gay? But anyway, I told him I'm not attracted
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to men, and that gay word gay doesn't mean. It doesn't make sense
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to me. And then they said, you know, you're probably a transsexual.
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You need to be a transsexual so that you can that's the way to
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go and your wife life as a cross stresser. I was confused at the
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time because the only choice I had was a cross stresser or a transexual.
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And I said, I can't identify myself in either of these categories. I
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think I belonged somewhere, and because something to do internally, it's not about
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externally. A dress and walking around wasn't thing. Though I expressed myself my
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femininity through dressing up, I was expressing something that was internal to me.
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I read so many articles and I started discovering as to why I'm what is
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mean and I just stood by that. At the time, I just thought
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I was a gender flow er. I didn't have terms. This was like
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I was an age two. There was not much a vocabulary around the trans
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community. I knew I was somewhere in that spectrum within the gender identity,
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but I didn't know between the both binaries. But I don't know where I
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was. And I remember talking to a lot of people and one of them
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said, you know, Celia, you need to transition. You have to
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medically transition, because that's the way to go. And we have transition,
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we have alas. I've lost my job, but we're still happy. And
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to me it was important. Family was important the same my personal well being
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was important to me. I didn't know that. That's when I started thinking
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about how can I keep all this at the same time still live my life
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authentically? And I remember in my community those days when Kaitlyn Jinner came out.
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This was, you know, there's a big news, and he felt
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like I was already out there and I will live a couple of it.
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It's a shield if I can identify within this. But a lot of children
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they started coming out and they started speaking up because the parents could relate,
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to relay to what Kaitlyn Engina had done, and they told their dads and
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the parents that hey, if you can relate to why Kitlyn Jenner transition.
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I'm always been likedles. So there was change within our support groups that we
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had, and I had to go to a support group and there were a
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lot of trans kids or parents who came in and I started thinking about what
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do and how it changed, what is going on? And I knew that
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my story will because there were times when I was abused at a in a
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bar. Whenever I go out, I was always called names, and I
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was discriminated at work too, So I could not after I came out,
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I could not work in the corporate industry. After twenty five years, I
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decided I need to come out, and I did come out, and that
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was a professional suicide. I had such great and I had a great position,
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but I was struggling even and said I could not even. I woke
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up every morning thinking I don't want to go to work to be someone else.
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I don't want to wear that suit and do this business conversations with people
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like everything is okay, not okay. And I started coming out and I
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started applying for jobs, but nothing worked out. You know, they didn't
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want to people at trans folks at a senior level. They're willing to hire
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trans people as just to check box, but they are not wilt to hire
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trans people to really empower them. And that I felt like I was fifty
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panees. I walked in and out and repeated. Almost a year, I
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was a job. My savings was depleting, and I didn't know how to
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manage my life. And that's when my wife told me that, you know,
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you need to start thinking about starting. And I started my own company.
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And I went to these company's leading off with jobs and I said,
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hey, I can consult with you because I have so much of experience in
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healthcare and life sciences. And they brought me I started consulting with them.
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Of course, during in the workplace, I went through a lot of discrimination,
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not just as a trans person or a gender diverse person, but more
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as an Asian, as an immigrant, and there's always this fear of someone
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taking away their jobs. And look at this trans lady from India who's an
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immigrant, She's taking away my job. That's the way they started looking at
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me, not just the fear of being a transperson in the workplace. And
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that's when I started playing up my intersectionalities. I said, being trans is
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important to me, but being an Asian, a person of cup in the
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workplace and fighting against these this discrimination is absolutely important. And that's when I
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started speaking up and later in my life that I was neurodivergent. I had
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interacted with some of my friends and they told, why didn't you really check
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what's going on in your life? And I found that I was a person
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I could check all the three categories in those four categories that people have for
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employment in a Asian I'm a gender non binary, and then I am a
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divisibility invisible, but I'm not a veteran. I wish I could check that
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box to it. So I found that there's so much that's going on and
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we need to speak up and how can we change? And I became an
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advocate. I started speaking up, and he started going bold politically, corporate
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life, and also within my faith being a Christian. To me, as
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a trans person, it was absolutely important. I don't want to compromise on
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told me that God hates you, I didn't care. I have read the
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Bible in and out and I know that God has created me this way.
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He has a purpose in my life and that you too. Speak up in
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the faith community, speak up for children, speak up for folks who are
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marginalist the workplace, speak up in health equity in the you know when it
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comes to healthcare. And I am here today and if you ask me,
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you know, Celia, what would you like to do the next twenty years
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or you know, as as long as you live, I would say I
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will do exactly what I'm doing today. I want to empower trans folks and
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I want to see them become the leaders. I want to see them as
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astronauts. I want to see them as entrepreneurs in the world where we are
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struggling today. So that's my story in an show. Well, I have
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a question about I like how you in that you want to see trans people
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become astronauts as in all these other wonderful things, right. And I do
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remember that there was a TV show, well we're going to quote it a
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TV show. It actually appeared on Netflix only where they had a And I'm
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not exactly sure how I feel about the term non binary because it it adds
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restrictions and it adds stereotypes that aren't necessarily there. But there was a non
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binary actor in it, and I'm like thinking, it's like, Hey,
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there's somebody who's who's not not just strictly male or female, and distant story
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is taking place in space. We could do this right. And it's like,
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my my thing is is do you do you say you feel great?
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Like you're a great human being? Mm hm. I won't say I'm a
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perfect human being, but I look great not perfect. Yeah, I'm a
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I'm a being. I wouldn't use word great. I'm a human being and
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I would love to see the greatness in people and that's what makes us all
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great. In one of the things when you mentioned about gender, non binary
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and binary, I just wanted to also explain to the audiences to within the
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transgender spectrum. There are two categories. One is binary and gender non binary.
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Binary are transition from male to female, female to male, social or
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medical, and sometimes legal. But non binaries are folks who identify who neither
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identifies male or female identifies the spectrum. For me instance, I use the
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pronouns day because identifier, and when I use she and day, that means
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that I'm more feminine presentment in the general binary s. And if someone uses
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she and they, that means they are more leaning towards the masculine side of
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the gender, not a binary spectrum. If someone uses they and them,
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that means that they belong want to identify in either feminine skial inside. They
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want to create their own identity, but they don't want to just lean towards
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the binaries that the society has created. Binaries were created as the way to
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reproduce and so to bring both children into the world. But it's not the
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norm that has to for that has to strictly followed in every aspect of life.
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And that's where I think people misunderstand and they have never given thought to
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this percentage of people who are probably like one point eight million in this in
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you you know, this is a very small population. And when people say
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when someone says I don't identify, it means they don't relate to it.
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They don't feel like they are feminine now, and they just feel like they
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are a human being. And that's what I think people identify when they say
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they are yeah, yeah, because because I I just prefer to see people
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just simply put as as a human as a human being the way they are.
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And as far as I keep going back to the example of space,
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because I love space, it's it's it's such a great example of how of
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the physics are of of of of our universe. So you're a computer expert
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and hey, the next uh space cript out there, they could use your
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particular scent of Should it matter if you're the If you're the expert and you're
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the one they can get the job done? Should it matter that you're siciliah
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Right, It's like it shouldn't matter. It should just matter that you're the
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person to get job done. Right. It's a it's a social construct on
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Earth. Let's say, you know, being on the topic of sci fi,
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if anything comes down to Earth and looks at us, what would be
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the first question. Let's say the alien you what would the alien call you?
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They won't call you a male or female. They'll call you as an
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earthling. They will call you as a human being. Hey, are you
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a human being? They won't call you male or female? The earthlinks,
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you know, those aliens won't know because they may populate their own planet in
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a different way. A clone will be different, and they could be having
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various ways of propagating their own population and their own their own human you know,
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their own being. So we take that. I always think about it
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and think about, you know what we saw certain it as even in the
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computer science comes to AI, when it comes to and comes to space.
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Why are we so hell bent on male and female? Which is important?
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I think it's important, but we have to go beyond the binaries and think
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about we are sending a human being to Mars. We and that's how it
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should be. You know, it's not like sending a man to Mars.
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We're sending a woman, which is good. But we more than anything,
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we are actually sending a human being to a planet that's completely ail us as
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human beings. It's not about man stepping foot there. You know. Neil
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Armstrong is great. There's so many women who went to space after that.
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I don't even see those records of those, you know, just they don't
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talk about so many women who are our space. And so I think it's
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important for us to slowly think about gender neutral ways of obtaining in the future.
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And that's the future. It's not all about being you know, male
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or female, but it's you know, that's important. But I'm saying that
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we need to go beyond that because times they hey, you cannot deny that
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it's always binary male and female. I get, I know, but we
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have to move beyond that too, because there are beings out there. We
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may probably be fascinated next twenty years if you find somebody, some a creature
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who you know who look at it and saying, you guys are so primitive
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in your productive methodology. Yeah, I like what you said about. If
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somebody was to come from outside of Earth and say, well, you're a
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human being first, aren't you? It would they would eliminate color, They
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would eliminate uh because that's not what they would see first. They would see
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all of us being the same as human beings. Mm hmm, and uh
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it. And I've always thought about that and it's like sci fi set aside
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and everything, because I think Geene Rottenberry and a whole lot of other wonderful
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sci fi writers out there writing about this and how we should all be equal.
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All that set aside that I've always thought of, Well, are we
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all just human beings? First? It's like and then this, so if
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we're all just human beings, we all be seen equally. Absolutely, Yeah,
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I think they see quality when they look at human race travel and look
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out as a small planet, and it's fascinating because it's such a stiny p
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and yet there's so much of the city, and there's so much that's going
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on within this tiny planet. That's how they this is a planet, and
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they seem to be some intelligence in lifeform in this planet. And then they
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look at us, and they look at people. When they really go through
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the lens, when they really fly into the continents and into the land,
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and they realize that human beings are fighting against each other, They're going to
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be fascinated as to why are you fighting against each other? You know you're
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the same race. They won't even look at they will not color, they
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will not look at cars, then gender, sexual identity, anything, none
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of that is going to matter, and we are so silly, We look
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so silly in their eyes as to why are you guys fighting? You know,
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why can't you just focus on something important, save your planet? Don't
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you want to save your planet instead of fighting with each other? And there's
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so much going on world that we have focused in just building monuments for ourselves.
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We don't build pathways that are important for our younger generation. And that's
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the biggest problem today. Yeah, yeah, see has answered. My next
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question is like, and because because I think that that is our biggest problem
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is we can't see each other as equals first, and once you finally finally
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see each other as equals, you know, there's a whole lot of other
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things that have just fall in the place, you know. And Okay,
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so so with that being said, that's one of the things that I do
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when you started telling me about your company and how you help other companies,
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that is that it was more about let's help human beings first. That was
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the number one agenda, Let's help human beings. So one, I mean,
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because it your business is wrapped around how to how to be inclusive?
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So how do you how do you start to help companies become inclusive in changing
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maybe those corporate policies that were as as we've been going binary and making them
33:14
so that they're inclusive and include everyone at all levels. Absolutely a very good
33:21
point. And I love this question because this is I can talk about this
33:25
question for an hour. I'm going to keep it as impossible. A lot
33:30
of companies today are very profound. Yeah. The reason I say that is
33:35
because they just treat the genera. They just treat ethnicities, they treat people.
33:43
You know, you come and work in the company and leave, but
33:46
there is no sense of belonging in the companies because they don't have the right
33:51
policies in place. They want to recruit people, like thirty four percent of
33:54
the LGBT good community, they leave because they find companies are not as in
34:00
as they had branded earlier, and they love recruiting, but they don't know
34:06
how to retain people. So what happens is they don't have the right policies,
34:09
the right eergy groups, program mentorships, right procedures. How do you
34:15
what are kind of benefits? They don't think about a lot of that.
34:17
They just hire people and they want you to exist in the company, but
34:22
they don't want you to belong in that company, and a lot of them
34:24
don't feel psychologically safe. And the leadership team always just outsources. I would
34:30
say I'm using the word outsource very loosely because they just leave the HR to
34:36
care of all the people issues. The CEO says, it's for me to
34:39
focus on money, you know, showing the investors how good they are,
34:45
but it doesn't really click down to the inclusivity. What the leadership team shows
34:52
is does lad down to the every level within the company. So what is
34:58
don't trust the leadership today? That's the biggest problem I seeing. Don't trust
35:02
their leadership. And the reason they don't trust leadership is because it doesn't exhibit
35:07
those kind of allyship that absolutely important. You have good examples of Butterweys,
35:14
a Target, Starbucks, a lot of just flaking because there's so much news
35:20
around. Hey, you guys supporting the LGBT community, not be because you're
35:23
destroying our and all this noise. The noise is the CEOs don't stand up
35:30
and they's just flick and completely giving away to all these conversations. And it's
35:37
so appalling to me that you know, when you listen to these type of
35:40
conversations and companies where the companies are not really mindful of their employees. Their
35:46
employees are watching. You see target and you see the products are not taken
35:52
away from the shelf. Their employee in the company are watching, and they
35:58
know what happens to the Lgibi community open to their employees or Asians who are
36:02
black, who are minorities in that company, and unrecognized par folks in that
36:08
company. It can happen to anyone. It happened to a you know,
36:13
a Black History Month or a Hispanic History Month where they bring in certain things
36:17
and then people can come Indo Smadlin and say, hey, why are you
36:20
focusing on it? And that's the problem we have today. It's because the
36:23
leaders are not good examples. They are not good stewards of their own products.
36:30
They are not good stewards within their own companies. They are not thats
36:35
and that needs to change. When you when your leadership is you know,
36:38
when you're trust in your leadership, when you're transparent, fountable, and you
36:43
will change your IT groups, you will change the way in which you're doing
36:47
business. Because it has been proved all the time that companies that are diverse
36:53
are much more product they're much more innovative, they're much more comp to that
37:00
people they really do well. And twenty thirty, almost seventy to seventy five
37:07
percent of the workforce are going to be millennials and gen zis. If companies
37:10
don't ship up, don't sorry. If the companies don't shape up, they're
37:15
going to be shipped out. And that's the problem we have today. If
37:19
they need to start thinking about the younger generation, they need to start thinking
37:22
about why and how they can make these changes so that they can be relevant.
37:27
They can be they can make a meaningful difference in the community. So
37:32
there's a lot of work to be done. And I thinks first thing is
37:37
their leaders, employees, and change that you bring in should be transforming with
37:42
both internally and externally to your employee and your consumers time. You want to
37:49
bring in this change not as a performative thing, but very intentional, very
37:53
meaningful, And that's the way companies can change and be relevant. They can
38:00
that's the only way they can make a change not only within their on within
38:04
their own industry, but also in the in the community that they are in,
38:08
in the in the they are in, especially across the Globe when they
38:14
said an example, I think that that needs to happen. Yeah. Yeah,
38:21
it was something that you said back in in in in your story that
38:29
I remember being hired by this by It was my very first job as as
38:34
as as an analytical chemist, right, And it finally came out, this
38:43
story came out about how I got hired, and I got hired because well,
38:50
he sounds like a by name. I sounded like a good fit.
38:54
And then when they hired me, they realized that they were getting something different
38:58
than what the name represent it. But they kept me because I was the
39:06
token black person. And if you're the token, it doesn't matter if you're
39:15
the token black person, you're the token South Asian person, the token transgender
39:21
person, the token gay person, it doesn't matter the fact of the word
39:28
token right there means that you don't really fit there, that you don't really
39:30
belong You just kept there because you're you're eye candy. You look good on
39:37
on on somebody's number sheet. And is that really belonging or do we need
39:45
something more? Right? Yeah, I think that's the problem we have today.
39:50
And as I mentioned earlier, it's the tokenism and pink washing is very
39:54
common in the industries, they just brand people, you like a commodity.
40:00
And if they start investing in the lives of people, start giving them a
40:05
psychologically safe environment. If they start thinking about or so much percentage of folks
40:09
with disabilities, so many Algeras folks in the company, so many folks with
40:14
different ethnicities and race, and how do you really make sure they feel like
40:17
they belong in the company, they will make some this tokenism has become so
40:23
common. And now with all that's going on in this country, especially with
40:28
close to one hundred and five multiplus anti trans bills on anti LGBTQ bills across
40:35
different states today, what we see is companies and people who are really who
40:40
really want to make a change, are the ones stand up, They speak
40:45
up, and they show up, and then they literally stand up against these
40:51
bullies who keep saying that you cannot say gay, you cannot have this book,
40:54
you cannot be a trance, you cannot use my bathroom. You that's
40:59
one. And it's so, you know, haven't we learned anything from our
41:04
history. Didn't we have issues for colored people in the bathrooms. Didn't we
41:09
go through all that just a couple of decades back, and have you learned
41:15
anything. You can't go and tell me to use a men's bathroom because I
41:22
will get harris there. I don't feel if even traveling today too flor And
41:30
this is happening in twenty twenty three, where I cannot go to a bathroom,
41:35
I cannot this bathroom. If I go the bathroom, I'll get reported.
41:37
If I go to the men's bathroom, I'm gonna get harassed and they
41:40
will beat me up. Then they're not gonna like me walking into their bathrooms
41:45
and saying, you know, I'm actually and I'm outing myself. When I
41:47
do that, and when I out myself, what happens is it's not good
41:52
for my safety. And they're gonna follow me in a somebody if they're not
41:54
interested in if they hate trans people, they are going to target me.
42:00
It's like having a target on your back when you tell people and my idea
42:02
says something different, it's like having a target on your back. Going to
42:07
the doctor's office and sitting there and telling them that I am Celia. There's
42:12
my authentic gender. They say, oh, only call you birth. That's
42:15
what the medical community wants. Actually, that's complete bs. It doesn't so
42:21
there's so much change that needs to happen in our eCos and today, within
42:24
the medical side, within the community, within the workplace, faith places,
42:29
faith communities. There's a lot of issues that are around today which we need
42:34
to start changing. This tokenism has to end. You cannot tell even in
42:38
some places they say you welcome here, actually welcome here, but it's inclusivity
42:44
has become like, you know, you're all welcome to the party, but
42:47
don't keep the coaster here and Celia or you there is a bathroom downstairs,
42:51
and can you not come in this stretch or and that's not being wellcarded.
42:59
You need to the inclusivety, integrat to the procedures and policies and the framework
43:05
and the culture of the company. If it's not, then you're only being
43:08
performative. They're just touching the surface. And companies that are just at the
43:14
surface will not last for a long time. They will have issues in the
43:20
longer run because a younger generation when they come into these companies, the way
43:24
they view companies, the way they look at companies, the way they look
43:29
at the financials, the way they look at the corporate which the company is
43:34
interacting with the community. Ament of how relevant they are in a community matters
43:39
to them and if that doesn't exist, they don't want to join these companies.
43:44
But only is twenty four years on now and she has done energy and
43:46
sustainability. She's very picky on which company she wants to work with. She
43:52
doesn't want to work for big oils. She is very clear about certain companies
43:55
because she says, I don't want to work with this company because it's token.
44:00
Uh, you know, they talk about environment and climate change, but
44:02
they're really not there. They're gonna they're lobbying for their own thing. And
44:07
she knows and to me how it is going to be. If the companies
44:13
don't really transform, they are going to become less relevant in the their own
44:20
industry. Yeah, it's a challenge for these companies, for the CEOs.
44:25
Yeah, it's a lot, but it's good. It's a good thing.
44:29
It's a good thing. Yeah, And it does sound like a good thing.
44:34
It sounds like a quota book, a brave New world. But yeah,
44:43
yeah, So if you you started your company with the with inclusiveness involved,
44:59
it was one the basis of it is that something do you advise any
45:02
as a startups that you that you might encounter to start with inclusiveness first.
45:08
I think when I started my company, I don't know if I answered your
45:14
previous question on that. When I a company, I choose to make sure
45:20
that I learned in the industry first and also help in what I'm doing,
45:25
Like I educate the employers. I started thinking about my own so it's not
45:32
about a theoretical concept of LGBTQ how you inclusive, but my stories were absolutely
45:38
relevant the employers. So I started educating companies as to how you hire trans
45:45
and gender diverse folks. I literally walked them through the people processes and technology
45:50
changes they need to make, an organizational change management that's really important in order
45:53
for them to hire trans folks and in them them and show how to do
46:00
it. And I also ran those projects for them and the same That's what
46:02
I did as a company. It wasn't just a one hour conversation a theoretical
46:07
conversation and telling them this is what you do or it's not an app you
46:09
go and pick and choose some survey, but literally showing them every bit of
46:14
walking them through it. It's a thirteen ninety day kind of process and then
46:17
walking them through it, helping them and handholding them because a lot of times
46:22
companies are wanting to do the right thing, but they don't know how,
46:25
so you need to show them how to do it. So that's what I
46:29
do with the companies. I just don't tell them. I just don't throw
46:31
them under the bus because a lot of companies really want to do the good
46:34
thing. And when I saw the startups, startups are much more easier because
46:37
they can adopt these changes at a much early stage within their framework of the
46:43
company. The culture of the company. Startups are more open. But I
46:46
found it more difficult companies that are big, that are large, that are
46:50
global, It's very difficult to implement even a self ID within those companies.
46:53
You know, it's difficult come od as strands in certain parts of the world.
46:58
So there are a lot of mind fullness when it comes into how you
47:01
can adopt or how companies can be accepting to the algebraic K community. And
47:07
another thing that I also found was especially when you're working and what I do
47:12
with my company is I took my own industry that I was working with.
47:15
You know, this is health care, and I thought, this is the
47:20
industry that I spent twenty five years and what can I do within this industry?
47:23
How can attraction like me create a change within my own industry? And
47:29
when I started looking, it was spinning because I found that the industry's functions,
47:36
But when the pats happened to be, when they happen to be trans
47:40
or trans men who are black, or trans women who are Asian, they
47:45
are they don't know how to treat them. They don't know how to retain
47:50
the patients when they have a clinical trial, They don't know how to take
47:52
care of those questions. When they have an adversary event and they want to
47:55
report a case, they don't know how to take care of them when they
48:00
have a medical data, the hip regulations that are there and the data that
48:05
is stored for the tensits absolutely I'm looking at it from a people process and
48:10
a technology standpoint within the healthcare industry and thinking about how can you really help
48:15
a patient if you don't really understand the patient. I understand these demographics,
48:21
if you don't really understand them, your consumer isn't the ID your consumers,
48:24
they are your customers. But if you don't understand your patients, how can
48:28
you take care of them? You're just making these medicines. But do you
48:30
know that how these medicines are going to react to a patient who is already
48:34
going through hormones because you only consider the sex and birth and that's what they
48:38
even call today. But if I have taking medicines, if I'm already going
48:44
through testosterons or there's already another change going on in my body and the medicines
48:50
can interact with it could cause some adverts. So they don't keep that in
48:53
mind. They don't know about them. Osteoprocess is a drug. One of
48:58
the clients making no, no, this is good to affect transmen and also
49:02
trans women, and they didn't know that because and paps mayer can affect you
49:07
know, we need we need all If a trans woman is going if a
49:12
transman is going for perps mayor and you know, how are they being treated.
49:15
They're not treated well because they have bias that if a trans woman goes
49:21
for prostrate exam, they have not medically transitioned. Now that's being you know,
49:27
there is a bias right there. There's so much a bias in the
49:30
health care indidistry. Even I had a hard time coming up to my doctor.
49:34
I had to educate my doctor about genders for here. So I felt
49:37
that if I'm establishing, I want to educate as a transfer soon how can
49:44
I really make a difference internally within the company and externally to the consumers about
49:49
how to be more in close. And that is the reason I established my
49:52
company. And now I'm making so much inroads that I was selected as one
49:57
of the top twenty LGBTQ leaders in the Buyofarmer industry this year. Just you
50:02
know, just last month, I was given this title, which is a
50:06
because that's what we need to do, and that's our expertise, that's my
50:09
expertise. Talking about trends is important, but how do you make a difference
50:14
in the business is also important to me. Yeah, and that's where I
50:17
think I would make some dent in those companies. Yeah, it's interesting and
50:22
I love it. Yeah, that is definitely pioneering work. Yeah. Like
50:30
you know, one of the areas I'm for right now equity and diversity in
50:34
clinical trials because that's where a lot happened. M very cool. Wow,
50:45
we are starting to run out of time. What is it? What is
50:50
the ultimate impact that you want to make on our world? And and then
50:55
if you can tell people how to get a hold of you and and and
50:59
work with you because you're valid to their industry absolutely. So the two areas
51:06
that I focus is economic empowment of the expensive community. This across in all
51:12
industries and especially within my own industry, which is healthcare and life sciences.
51:15
I want to make sure that people understand their own patients, as I was
51:20
explaining earlier, and that's one area that I focus on, like clinical trials,
51:23
how can you make it meaningful for patients because that's the vulnerable population where
51:28
they are really they're being misunderstood, they're being marginalized. So educating that industry,
51:34
I've been educating doctors, nurses, having sessions with you know, lots
51:37
of nurses, and I'm actually doing another session for a therapist group today.
51:45
So there are a lot of groups that I talk of, and I'm all
51:47
under Odyssey, which is a conference for trans community especially it's attended by all
51:52
the medical providers. So I started looking at the four pillars of healthcare and
51:57
thinking about how can I make a change not just medical orders, the providers,
52:00
the payers, the pharmaceutical companies, and the policy. How do you
52:05
really make a change in order for them to be more inclusive to the expensive
52:09
community. So when I started thinking about it, that's what I focus on
52:14
and that's where I feel like I can influence any medical community that space.
52:22
So if you want to get hold of me, you can find me on
52:23
LinkedIn. You can literally google Celia Sandia Daniels. You will find me.
52:29
But make it easy. Just go to LinkedIn and type in Celia Sandia Daniels.
52:34
You will find me. I'm also on Twitter again at Celia san Daniels,
52:39
Essay and Daniels and Facebook and other social media, you know, Instagram,
52:46
you can find me and if you have a need in your company,
52:51
you can always reach out to me because I can bring a global perspective of
52:54
how do you really make an inclusive environment. So the future I want to
53:00
look at it as I want hold plum more inclusive. That one day we
53:05
will never talk about our race on ethnicity. We will just talk about how
53:08
do we save up and you know, just think about what else coming to
53:14
It won't be a conversation a on ethnicity, but around empowering people people.
53:19
Empowering people is the future that I want to be in. Yeah, well
53:23
you're doing You're doing wonderful work. And I love that that I got the
53:29
opportunity to actually speak with you and have you on our show. And I
53:34
hope that a lot of our listeners and viewers actually start to work with you
53:42
so that we can we can trans we can transition away from all these different
53:47
categories and boxes and just click one box that says, hey, I'm a
53:53
human being. And I think that would be like the one of the most
54:00
ultimate things to have us do as the human race. So thank you for
54:07
your work and it's wonderful. Thank you everybody for listening today. Please do
54:16
find Scilia Daniels and work with her find out how, especially if you're a
54:22
startup, find out how you can actually be more inclusive with your with your
54:27
processes and how you hire people, how you work with people and everything.
54:30
So and thank you for subscribing, and we will talk to everybody later.
54:37
Thank you, Scilia, it's been wonderful and big hugs, and I love
54:42
the work you're doing. Thank Glenn. I really appreciate what you're doing.
54:45
And thank you for resonating my wife and helping people like me in your podcast.
54:52
I really appreciate that. Thank you back. So I don't know so
55:22
I would from the action so why this, he says, I reason Shad
55:47
b Cho shows we can't trust. Wait, pas y see she goes to
56:37
start stop she stuff, but now jo stream. The show has been produced
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