Webinar Replay — Emotional Intelligence in Diverse Business Environments
· Well, Hello, everyone! I am Rachel Sampson, National Director of Key for Women and Head of Community banking here at Keybank, and I'm excited to welcome you to our program today.
· It's an honor to be here today as we celebrate Hispanic Heritage month. Hispanic Heritage month is an annual celebration of the history and the culture of the Us. Latino and Hispanic communities
· as one of the fastest growing segments in the Us. Latinos and Hispanics represent 20% of the population, making it the nation's largest racial or ethnic minority, and that growth has carried over to the workforce with more than 14% of the Hispanic Latino women professionals, and over 2 million women owned businesses
· and owned and operated by Hispanic and Latino women, many of which face the same barriers as similar to women in general that we know all too well, such as barriers to advancement.
· earning potential and access to capital. They also face unique challenges to their peers and offer new perspectives and experiences to the business world.
· In today's diverse workforce, emotional intelligence is a central leadership skill necessary to connect, understand, and build, trusting strong relationships with colleagues from diverse cultures, ethnicities and backgrounds.
· improving self-awareness while welcoming varying perspectives and experiences will help build trusting relationships and drive better business results.
· Today I am joined with Natasha toes who will share her insights on how to develop emotional intelligence and navigate cultural differences, to build stronger relationships within diverse teams.
· Natasha is an accomplished corporate entertainment executive, turned entrepreneur, passionate about individual empowerment.
· boasting, vast global experience in the consumer, packaged goods, industry
· development branding and strategic partnerships. As principal coach of Iglat. She molds mid career leaders for executive roles, excelling in communications and emotional intelligence. Natasha is multicultural and multilingual born in Venezuela to a Cuban father and a Colombian mother.
· Natasha arrived in the Us. At the tender age of 7, and throughout her life she's lived in 7 countries, including a 6 year stint as an expat. Living in Hong Kong. She is trilingual, speaking English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Her family and friends would describe her as creative, outspoken, and a leader.
· I'm pleased to welcome Natasha to our key for one program. Thank you so much for being here today with us and sharing us your information, and turn the floor over to you to take it away.
·
Natasha Tous
03:01
Thank you, Rachel, and welcome everybody. It's so exciting to be here
· with all of you. I'm doing my tech as I am speaking.
· so please let me know if you can see my presentation on the chat.
· I have my chat open
· because I love chats. Looks great, Jess. Thank you so much. We have a very, very vast group of people from all over the States. Thank you so much for being here.
· and thank you, Keybank, and the key for women program for inviting me here today.
· I am grateful that
· they are giving all of us the platform to share our voices. A special thank you to
· vanity, Bryant, Colleen, Dugarte, and Rachel Sampson
· for your guidance throughout this entire process
· this is going to be a highly interactive presentation. So if something calls to you. Drop in the chat. Tell me what you're thinking. If you want to take a screenshot, please go ahead if you want to, then put it up on social media and tag me. Go ahead. I have some of my information here, as you can see at Natasha toes.
· so I will be asking you to follow along and share your thoughts
· on the chat, so please go ahead and do so as soon as I am talking to you, so let's get started.
· I'm I'm often reminded of the journey that led me to to where I am today.
· moving from corporate to building my own business. But what truly has shaped me wasn't just those professional experiences? It was my cultural heritage.
· my Cuban and Colombian roots, and everything else that I have from Venezuela and Puerto Rico and Mexico, and all of the different places that I've had the fortune to live
· all of that instilled in me the ability to lead with empathy and resilience.
· Today I'll share 4 insights on how emotional intelligence and cultural empathy
· have driven my success, and how you can use them to elevate your leadership.
· These tools are powerful because they allow you to blend who you are
· with, how you lead, and that is key. As we are entering this new, this new, not new. But we're cementing ourselves in this digital world
· by the end of our time together. I hope you'll feel empowered to use both your culture
· and emotional intelligence as your superpower. I've truly found that both my emotional intelligence and my cultural intelligence have made me
· make my genius make my make my way of communication
· a lot better. And I call that now my superpower.
· Hello! From Cleveland, Ohio. So before we dive into the components of emotional intelligence.
· I'd like to start with a quick exercise.
· As I said, this was going to be very interactive. I want you to take 45 seconds.
· and list as many emotions as you can
· write them down. Anything that comes to mind
· can be the simplest emotion to the most complex emotion.
· Once you have your number, go ahead and drop it in the chat, and I'm gonna pause now and give you 45 seconds to come up with all of those emotions.
· Hi, Juliana!
· Thank you for coming!
· Tiara, saying, tranquil and Graciella, lonely.
· surprised, tired, exhausted.
· Yes, I exhausted.
· uncertain, excited overwhelmed playful, captivating all emotions that I am sure we feel on a daily daily basis. Great, so most people can name between 5 and 8 emotions. Once asked or prompted, as I just did.
· The least I've seen
· is 3
· happy.
· sad.
· and neutral.
· No other emotions that's that's the most they could name. The most I've seen is 10.
· Usually people that have their emotional intelligence. They've worked with coaches or or or have, you know, been part of a program.
· have a tendency to be able to identify more of those emotions that that happen
· in their lives.
· This exercise I see some eights and some nines. Yes, thank you. Thank you.
· This exercise shows us something important. We don't often stop and think about the full range of emotions we experience.
· and recognizing those emotions is the foundation of
· what coaches and studious people call emotional intelligence. And so, in order for us to really understand
· what is emotional intelligence, I want to start with a quick overview of
· Eq. Of emotional intelligence
· at its core. Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize recognition is key.
· Understand what I'm recognizing. But I'm understanding also that emotion and manage your emotions. But it's also the ability to recognize.
· understand and influence others emotions. And in leadership emotional intelligence is essential.
· and it consists of 5 critical components that I've summarized using what I call the cares framework
· C for considering others or empathy. Right? Encouraging leaders have a tendency could to consider how their decisions are going to impact others.
· A is for awareness, awareness of self, self awareness, all right.
· and self-awareness involves understanding your own emotions. As we said.
· your own strengths, your weaknesses, and how all of that influences
· your decisions, and how that influences your leadership and your interaction with other people, how you build relationships.
· Our start stands for regulating emotions or self regulation. Right? How do I learn how to go from? I'm feeling ecstatic. And I'm gonna react to let me moderate and respond right? So regulating emotions is essential for maintaining that composure and making thoughtful decisions, especially as you are experiencing high pressure situations.
· E stands for energize with purpose. So how do you self motivate? What is your motivation level? And as all of us, most of us are business owners, that self motivation is key. The leaders who energize
· with purpose inspire themselves first, st and then they're able to inspire others by staying, driven by staying, focused by setting achievable milestones incredibly important, especially for us entrepreneurs as we are going and experiencing through emotional intelligence. And the S. Start stands for social skills. How do you connect. And how do you lead effectively
· your meetings, your client meetings? Even even your family meetings. Right? This is not just for the for the professional professional in us. This is also for the person inside of us. So effective social skills help leaders build strong relationships. And all of this together is what encompasses emotional intelligence.
· I always feel it's easier to create a little framework that is going to help me. Remember, because, you know, if I have to think, what are the 5 areas of pillars of emotional intelligence? Just I I completely forget. So these cares framework has really helped me in
· in articulating properly what emotional intelligence is.
· So now that we've covered emotional intelligence, I want to share with you a process, a process that I call the tap process all right, and that's the fundamental of you know, the cares is a cares. Framework is the fundamental of emotional intelligence. But this tool that I have for you today. So we're doing part webinar. But part workshop a little bit. This tool is going to help you apply these concepts in real life situations.
· And so over the next few minutes I'm going to be sharing my insights, as I promised, from my own journey. But I also want to give you a practical decision making framework that along with that emotional intelligence is going to be able to help you grow your business and your leadership skills. And this 3 step process is called the tap process.
· and the tap process has helped me in very practical ways to approach challenges and opportunities that I face as I am growing my business, and that I used to face as I was in my corporate years, using my own emotional intelligence.
· It helps me slow down. It. It can help you as well slow down and make decisions that are going to align with your values. And I want to say that again. It's going to align these decisions that you're making help. You align with your values if we are not in alignment with our values.
· probably you know, 10 times and 9 times out of 10 you're gonna make the the the decision in a in a rash way, in a rushed manner. And and then then you're gonna have to go back and rethink it through. We wanna avoid as that as much
· as possible.
· So what does tap stand for stand for? Tap is very simple. It stands for. Think, pause, and reflect. All right. So sorry. Think, assess, proceed all right. Think so. What? What you do in the think phase. You're pausing, and you're reflecting, where am I emotionally? What are the key dynamics in this situation that I'm experiencing right now
· in the assess phase or this the second stage, which is the which is the assess? You weigh your choices.
· What are the risks? What are the benefits of each of the various paths that I have in front of me.
· and then the last one once once you've been able to do that is, proceed. Now you make a thoughtful decision that aligns with your values and your long term goals.
· Now this is just like a muscle.
· Right? You go to the gym, you work your arms. I went to the gym this morning I worked my arms. I worked my legs that it was leg day, and that was kind of hard, but the more I do it the better I get at it. So the more you get familiar with this process, the better you will get at it, and it will become second nature, just like going to the gym every day walking through the doors. And this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to lift legs right?
· You'll see how tap can help you through real life scenarios as we go through each of my insights. And so I'll teach you how exactly is the the process has been broken. How I've broken it down, and how these insights are deeply rooted in emotional intelligence and and the power of
· cultural empathy.
· Alright. So in diverse business environments, understanding the cultural dynamics at play
· is as important as understanding your own emotions. And again, this tap process, the cares. Framework, coupled with the tap process, can really help you
· in making those decisions with high emotional intelligence. Each of the insights will that I'll share with you are going to reflect how both emotional intelligence and cultural empathy combined have helped me. Navigate challenges, build stronger relationships and lead with confidence, and you'll also see how the tap process can help you apply these lessons
· to your own leadership so that you can lead with authenticity, with resilience, and a deeper understanding of cultural differences again. The more you do it the better you're going to be at doing it faster, quicker, and in a moment's notice. All right. So
· let's get started with the 1st
· insight, leveraging emotional intelligence for business growth and confidence.
· When I left corporate to build my own business 2 years ago, I quickly realized that
· being an entrepreneur meant building myself up every single day and choosing to build myself up
· every single day
· in corporate. I had systems, I had teams. I had structures
· right all of that that provided validation for the decision making decision making that I was doing
· with my team and with my superiors, but in entrepreneurship.
· especially in the early stages. It's just you right. Give me a 1. Drop me a 1 on the chat. If you're an entrepreneur, and sometimes it's just
· there's nobody else there but you.
· I see one. Yes, yes, I see a lot of ones coming through right sometimes it can get lonely and and and sometimes making decisions in what I what I call a vacuum, right like. Sometimes I just get up and I go talk to my husband. I'm like, I'm thinking about this decision. What do you think? Right? He's become my teammate in a way.
· because it can be a little bit lonely. Yes, yes, Doris, absolutely. It can be lonely.
· So
· we've all heard of the fixed mindset and the growth mindset. Right? This is something that you know. If you're in coaching. If you're any type of program, or you've read about leadership.
· we often see fixed mindset versus growth mindset. And without a doubt the growth mindset is extremely important when you're building a legacy right when you're building your business. But, more importantly, when you are building that legacy.
· But I found that each phase of the entrepreneurial journey, especially in the last 2 years, requires a little bit something different than just having a growth mindset.
· Early on adopting a growth mindset can actually, and it did to me cause a bit of anxiety.
· Okay? Why?
· Because I remember laying the foundation of my company. Yet I could already see the penthouse and the view from the top, and I just wanted to build it so that I could actually stand on the penthouse and on the top and see everything that you know, everything that I've built. And this caused that anxiety because I wanted to be the end goal
· right away. Impatient me. You know this is a process I am. I am an executive coach, and I and I do teach emotional intelligence, but also to myself, right? Because I also get
· impatient. But as a cloud continues to grow, I've realized that what I've needed most is to shift
· from a growth mindset to a building mindset right? And at some point I know I'm gonna make that leap. And I'm gonna change and shift to a growth mindset. But right now, what serves me is a building mindset, and this shift has allowed me to be more vulnerable.
· right? More authentic. I'm embracing the process of creation right? I'm building floor by floor, and I'm defining how each floor is going to look like. I'm not decorating yet, but I'm I'm literally creating the plan right of what this each of these floors is going to look like all the way until I get to the top.
· And I'm focusing, not just on the final result. I'm embracing the process of creation.
· And it's not about reaching success overnight anymore. Right? With a building mind. Mindset is about laying a strong foundation.
· I'm laying the foundation that is going to help me
· continue building and eventually get to the penthouse. I don't know when that's going to happen, but I am enjoying the process. And when I left corporate, that was the one thing that I wanted to make sure. As I'm building this business, I want to enjoy what I'm doing. I want joy to be part an emotion that is part of my day to day
· now, not every time. Right. I'm going to be realistic. Not every decision that I have to make around my business, or every client meeting is going to bring joy. Sometimes I get a little bit anxious, but I remind myself of this building mindset, and I know that every small effort today is building towards something bigger in my future.
· My cultural background also plays a huge role in this building mindset. Right? So it's not just what I experienced, but it's exactly what I have lived, my lived experiences and those that came before me.
· growing up in a Cuban family, and, like Rachel, said, I am multicultural, but my Cuban heritage is very strong.
· I learned early on about the power of resilience
· and long-term vision.
· In latino culture we often talk about, and if I have any Latinas in the house, please drop it in the chat. If I'm saying this and it's resonating in latino culture, we often talk about building for the future.
· The sacrifice we do today is for the future, whether that's for our families, whether that's for our communities. Hi, Taisha! Yes, that's for our careers. Yeah, Jenna. Yes, Saila, absolutely thank you for the beautiful picture. Thank you. This is my Cuban. This is the Cuban side of my
· family, and and those are my grandparents all the way to my my left. So maybe you're right. And and there's this deep rooted belief in the importance of patience and perseverance right? Coupled with that sacrifice comes with patience and perseverance. And it's not just about reaching the goal quickly. It's about doing it
· in a way that honors your values and your people right. My grandparents, for example, fled Cuba with nothing nothing but pride and hope, that's all they had. They had to rebuild from the ground up.
· and their resilience, which I know for our Latino community. Sometimes the word resilience is a little bit touchy-feely.
· but that resilience has become my guiding principle.
· I've taken the lesson
· into my business
· building something meaningful
· that will stand the test of time, just like they did in their chance and their opportunities in the sixties when they left. Now it's my time, and I'm taking all of that, making sure that I'm bringing that as I'm building my business.
· And oops skipped a little bit too fast.
· so self motivation, as I said earlier, wasn't about ignoring the fear, right? They didn't ignore the fear. They taught me not to ignore the fear. I lean into the fear it was about staying focused on the bigger picture. Right? I know I want to get to the penthouse, and that's my bigger picture. But I'm not going to do it, sacrificing my values
· right. Even when I face rejection or slow progress, I remind myself that I am building something meaningful, and that's what I set out to do from the beginning.
· The building mindset, along with my cultural values, give me the space to enjoy the process right? It's about being open to the challenges
· and embracing growth in a way that's both vulnerable and authentic, and always going back to vulnerability and authentic. Those are 2 words that I think in the last couple of years have become more popular in the in the Instagram story world. Right? But it's about that vulnerability and that authenticity that allows us
· to really experience growth.
· This mindset shift has allowed me to reframe. That's another big one. Right? I'm reframing the conversations that I'm having with my strategic partners.
· I can bring them along in my journey and say, Hey, I'm not. I'm not not at the penthouse yet, but this is what I'm going to bring to to this relationship because I'm building a legacy. And I want you to be part of that legacy with me.
· focusing on the relationship side of things right? And the trust we're building trust here. This is what I'm doing as I'm building my business. And those are all corner cornerstone emotions and and values that my Latino culture has has brought me right. That's those are our cornerstones of our Latino culture.
· And so in the moment where I'm feeling down, and I know I need to keep going. I use quick wins to build momentum right like I'm finishing a task. Yay, I celebrated. I finished the task.
· Or I've landed a new client. Let's celebrate. It doesn't matter if it's a 5, 4, 5, 6 figure client. I've landed the client
· and and it's it's celebrating those small achievements that help me continue to go through
· every win matters because it keeps me motivated. We can go back to the cares in a in a little in a little bit
· as we are finishing up.
· and and I also have a resource that I can share. As you're getting your
· video, I can share that resource with you as well.
· Alright. So it's during this moment that I tap into the
· tap into the tap process.
· and I and I go through it, and I think all right. I pause, and I acknowledge my feelings of doubt and uncertainty. Right? I'm building this business. I'm feeling a little bit of doubt.
· and I'm feeling a little bit uncertain.
· So then I think I go through, and I assess, I ask myself, do I pivot and chase another opportunity? Or do I refine my approach and try again? And let me tell you
· I have not encountered a situation where I've said I'm gonna pivot. I usually say, you know what that's and it's just my personality.
· I go at it again. I'm going to do it again, and I'm going to make it better. Okay, I'm going to refine what I've done, and I'm going to go at it again. And until I prove to myself that this is definitely not working, I'm not going to walk away from it.
· and then I proceed right. I choose the path that allowed me to stay aligned with my long term vision.
· building my business brick by brick, right little, you know. Salt droplet by salt droplet.
· just as my grandparents built their lives again from scratch.
· So for you as we're we're wrapping up this 1st insight when you face a setback
· doubt
· right. Remember, think, take stock, assess what are my options, and then proceed in a way that is going to honor your long term goals.
· The building mindset is about finding resilience and staying motivated even when the road ahead isn't clear, and and as again as entrepreneurs.
· there's times many times where the road ahead is just not clear. We don't have
· that, you know, beautifully strategically built roadmap that sometimes our corporate counterparts do have all right, and those of us with rich cultural backgrounds, we can tap into our cultural intelligence to build with a sense of purpose right? Honoring where we come from while creating something for the future.
· This brings me to the second insight.
· which is
· using cultural empathy to strengthen relationships
· early on in my career
· and drop me once if you feel this way, if you're if you started a business just starting a business in your career.
· They I faced countless countless situations where I received a note.
· and early on.
· It was easy to take those rejections very, very personally
· to the point where I actually stopped asking myself and asking people because I was afraid of hearing. No.
· I was afraid of the feeling
· of hurt based on the outcome of the no.
· all right or worse.
· I felt that I was, you know, going into the that demotivation state, and I didn't want that.
· And it wasn't until later on that I learned that that I I you know I see no, as a not right now.
· Instead of a never
· one of the biggest lessons I learned was about cultural empathy and understanding, the dynamics.
· values and the emotions of others. Okay, especially when working with diverse clients or diverse teams.
· Now I approach situations with an open mind, and my intent is to find out as much information as I can.
· I I walk into conversations, and I walk into meetings, not expecting to hear a yes or a no. I'm expecting to ask questions.
· stay in the question, okay?
· And then
· make decisions. But I wanna get as much information as I can.
· And in Latino culture
· relationships come first.st Right.
· We put family and loyalty above anything else. Sometimes, and sometimes in our corporate right, the corporate counterparts in the corporate world.
· We see that that is not necessarily in alignment, right? Because in the corporate world we don't necessarily put family and loyalty 1st of all, certainly, loyalty. But it's all about. You know the the I in in and and getting ahead. So
· give me some love
· the chats. If you know this to be true right. If family relationships always coming first.st
· you know, putting family putting loyalty above all. S. Yes, yes, Virginia and Jenna. Yes, Saila Taylor, 100%
· right? We do that. We have a tendency to do that. And I've taken the same approach as I'm building my business right? I'm building relationships
· before asking for anything in return. I'm putting family, you know, the idea of family and the idea of loyalty, and I'm giving right before I'm putting
· You know anything that our expectation, putting my expectation that I'm going to get something in return
· for you
· absolutely, says Lisa.
· Empathy allows you to listen carefully
· and understand what's beneath the surface of a conversation.
· Right? It's about creating trust and showing genuine interest in people's values and needs. And we do that when we put family first.st
· So
· sometimes family hurts. Yes, Doris.
· sometimes family does hurt.
· So when it comes to relationships, how can we use the tap process? Remember, I said we were going to use this. This is insight. 2 of 4. You're going to hear it all over again and insight 3 and 4, because the more we do it the more we're going to get used to it. When it comes to relationships, the tap process helps us ensure you are leading with empathy. So how does the process go? Think
· right? 1st to face, think, reflect on cultural dynamics. And when I say cultural, it doesn't just need to be family culture, right? It can be
· organizational culture. It can be country culture, right? Culture really represents all of the various interactions that we have with
· people and organizations in our family. So reflect on the cultural dynamics or needs of the specific situation that you're facing what's really going on in that specific relationship. What is it right?
· You move on to the next phase, assess. How can you approach this situation to create a win win outcome? What is what does success look like for me. How am I going to
· how am I going to make sure that the outcome is is a win win for me and for them, and then you proceed. You build trust through actions, actions speak louder than words, right? You build trust through actions that reflect
· that long term commitment.
· Not just the short term gain. Remember, we're going. We we see the future. We're going for the long run.
· So by using that cultural empathy.
· You can build long, lasting relationships that go beyond business transactions alright.
· So listen deeply.
· honor people's values and approach each each relationship with care.
· Our 3rd insight for today
· is emotional intelligence. As a tool.
· I love tools right? As a tool for navigating uncertainty and change.
· When I 1st launched my business I had 3 clear verticals. I wanted to do executive coaching, which I am doing. I wanted to do soft skills, facilitation. One of my favorite parts of of my business. I'm doing that. And I wanted to build a community for the individuals I was coaching, and for the companies that I coach, for I was excited about all 3 of them again. That that look from the top right like that look from the penthouse.
· But I quickly realized that trying to build them all at once would stretch me way too thin, would stretch my resources way too thin, and I needed to be smart about how I'm spending my time and my resources, so
· it would also compromise my joy, my joy, and the quality of my work. And again going back to what I was saying, as I was making that transition, joy was very present in everything that I do right that needs to be.
· It's a key value, not only an emotion, but a key value for me.
· And this realization was hard because I had always been someone that I wanted to do it all again. You know I have I had all of these. I've been used to all of these various components and and self validation, tools and systems.
· And so I wanted to do it all. But in that moment self-regulation became crucial.
· Right. Do I really need to go and do build it all at once, or can I look at it from a you know.
· phase by face. Can I? Can I take a face by face approach?
· I had to ask myself, what's the best? What's best for the long term.
· Health of my business. What's best for the long term? Health of
· the business owner?
· And what is my, you know? Where? Where does my family well-being fit into all of this? That's when I made a decision to delay the community aspect of what I'm building
· and focus on the 1st 2, because the community I'm building as I go.
· And so, you know, making a decision while I was, you know, heart wrenching. I know that it was the right decision.
· So self regulation is about knowing when to slow down, right
· to reflect, and to make thoughtful decisions.
· that had I not delayed that 3rd vertical, I perhaps wouldn't have been able to focus as much as I've been able to focus, to get gain the relationships that I've been able to gain 2 short years, and deliver with excellence in the 1st 2 verticals, which are very important to me as well, because everything that I do in my business and my life. I want to make sure that I provide. I give excellence back right? That's a value for me as well.
· So I wanted to make sure that that was always present. And it wasn't easy, like, I said, but it was the right decision. If I want sustainable growth.
· So now it's your turn.
· Consider a time. You had to pause.
· and I'd like to invite you again to reflect on your own experience. Okay, and if you feel comfortable, and only if you feel comfortable, share it, share it in the chat, or just reflect on it for a moment. Okay.
· so
· think about a time in your business or in your personal life, when you had to pause before making a decision.
· Maybe you are tempted to react right away.
· But you stopped and took a moment to consider your options right. You you went through the tap process without knowing you were doing the tap process.
· How did that pause, shape the decision you eventually made. Tell me in the chat
· I want to read you.
· It made me think of fact versus feeling.
· Thank you, Jenna, to think differently, and not to answer right away.
· Love that Millie a better thought out response that if I had jumped on it yes, Elizabeth, and that's really what we want to make right? We wanna make sure
· that that we are
· not reacting.
· We want to make sure that we are responding. Thank you. Very yeah. Made me review financials more.
· I was not so reactive. Yes, Donita. Yes, yes. Then that's the idea. Right? That's the idea. That's that's where I wanted to to bring you all today.
· So how does the tap process guide this decision making? Or how did the tap process guide my decision making right. I've broken this down.
· and what I when I you know, when I break it down, I think in a, in the, in the think face, I reflect on my desire to launch all 3 verticals. Right? I I go through the pros and cons. Yes, I want to do this. I want to do that
· and I recognize right that it's just not sustainable. Right? There's more cons to pros as I'm launching all 3 at the same time, instead of just taking a little bit of a step back.
· I assess I consider the risks of moving forward versus delaying one aspect of the business.
· I proceed right. 3rd step I choose to delay the community building aspect. I'm not launching it, probably launching it next year, which I'm also excited about, because now I'm year 3 like, how am I growing? What am I doing? Right? But
· I know that that you know at that point in time, as I'm proceeding, and I'm saying, you know what we're gonna put this in the in the in the drawer for, you know, next year, or maybe the year after that.
· But it's gonna come in due time. I know that that's part of how what I want to build. And that's gonna come in due time.
· And so, as I'm reflecting. And I'm thinking about my latino culture we raised. We're raised with stories of sacrifice. We talked about it, and you know earlier.
· and that sacrifice that the sacrifices that our parents in my place, parents and grandparents made for my generation, right for me, for my cousins, for my sisters, for all my siblings, everybody. My own grandparents, as I said, fled Cuba, giving up everything.
· and they had to create a better future for their children and their grandchildren.
· That value of sacrificing short-term comfort
· for long-term success has always been a part of my decision making.
· It taught me that sometimes we need to delay gratification and make sacrifices in the present
· for the sake of the greater future.
· just like my grandparents, made sacrifices to build a better life for our family. Right back in the 60 s.
· I had to recognize that delaying that 3rd vertical was a necessary sacrifice that I had to do to ensure the strength of my business, and this ability to delay and prioritize comes from my cultural understanding of resilience
· and long term success. It's not about having it all right now. I want it all now. Yes, the the you know. I do want to get impatient, because that drives me, and I do want to get all the way to the penthouse. But for me right now it's about building something sustainable.
· So in moments of uncertainty, use self regulation to stay grounded
· and make decisions that align with your long term. Goals always think about what is that long term goal?
· Proceed mindfully, sometimes delaying a decision is the best way to ensure that joy and success come in the long run. Okay? And our cultural intelligence specifically for us. Latinos teaches us the value of sacrifice, letting go of short term gains to build something better and stronger for the future.
· It's it's a lesson of resilience that is going to allow us to prioritize what truly matters. And and there's that word again. Resilience!
· It's it truly has shaped me as I'm building this, but it truly has shaped me because of all of the the sacrifices that my
· my family and my people have have had to make.
· So that brings us to our last insight.
· And it's all about blending culture and emotional intelligence. Right? It's it's, how do we create a unique leadership style and a unique leadership experience
· through our emotional intelligence and our in our cultural intelligence.
· And
· my grandparents story doesn't end when they flee
· Cuba. That is just the beginning, right? When they arrive in the Us. Despite being highly educated professionals in Cuba.
· they literally start from scratch.
· My my grandfather, who owned a very successful business in Cuba, finds himself working at a car wash and in farm stores, doing whatever it takes to provide for the family, because that was the most important thing at that point in time.
· and
· it was a very humbling experience, but they embraced it with pride because it was about survival for them, and they know that
· this is just part of the journey.
· It's part of their journey right.
· and throughout this period my grandfather's positive resilience stands out. Now. I've reframed it into positive resilience. Right? It's not just about enduring that hardship. It's about rebuilding with purpose.
· And he had the ability to manage his emotions and stay focused on the long term goal and adapt to this completely new reality with patients, with self regulation, and slowly he rebuilt his career career and eventually becomes an executive again at a national cash register.
· restoring his career right, but his legacy that that was the most important thing for him. It's how do he? How do I restore my legacy?
· Thank you, Crystal. Sorry you had to jump off. Thank you for for joining us today.
· He goes on to become general manager and country manager in Latin America, and, as you can now see, the entrepreneurship vein run runs deep in in our family, so he retires, and he becomes an entrepreneur
· and he creates his own business. So.
· growing up and hearing all of these stories of my grandparents. Resilience
· is a constant source of strength for me.
· Hearing about how my grandfather rebuilt, and my grandparents in general. Both of them rebuilt their life after losing everything.
· gives me a deep sense of what it means to persevere.
· It teaches me that resilience isn't just about pushing through
· right. We all have hard times, and we all have resilience in us, and we all push through. But it's about strategically rebuilding when everything feels uncertain.
· So these stories of cultural heritage become a blueprint. For how I approach my own journey as an entrepreneur.
· I know that no matter how hard things get.
· I have the tools I have the mindset and I can rebuild, I can adapt, and I can create something meaningful.
· Resilience for me isn't just about survival. It's about finding the emotional intelligence to rebuild in a way that aligns with my long term vision.
· Thank you, Tiara. I appreciate that I love that story, too.
· just like my grandfather, I learned to manage my emotions. I learned to adapt to change
· and stay patient even when I want results immediately.
· Yes, we're moving into into QA.
· So when things get tough, I remind myself that resilience is about more than endurance. It's about having the emotional control and the strategic thinking
· to make the right decisions
· as leaders, we can control what happens around us. But we can control how we respond
· right the ability to tap into our emotional intelligence and resilience during
· difficult times, and that allows us to rebuild and ultimately thrive. So I want to leave you with this. Use your culture and emotional intelligence as your superpower.
· Whether you're navigating a setback starting from scratch, you have everything you need within you
· to make thoughtful strategic decisions
· at the end of the day. Leadership is about more than just achieving success.
· It's about how we build that success, how we connect with others along the way.
· and how we stay. True to
· who we are.
· So thank you. I appreciate all of you.
· Let's stay connected. We're ready to move on to our Q. And a.
· I have some details here.
·
Rachael Sampson
47:21
Well, Natasha, thank you so much. I have a page full of notes.
·
Natasha Tous
47:26
Yeah.
·
Rachael Sampson
47:27
Insightful information shared. So I'm excited to get to a name portion of the program.
· So before we do that, I do want to just take a quick minute for those of you in our audience that are not a part of our key for women program. I encourage you to join our program. As you know, it is complimentary. And we love to bring you insights, information, tools and resources and programs like this. And experts like Natasha
· to help continue to build your personal and professional career whatever that means, and looks like to you. So please continue to send those questions along the way, and we'll try to get to as many as possible and again use that QR code that's on the screen and or visit key.com forward, slash, join K. For W. Now let's get to it. So there's a lot of questions right and insights that you share.
· I would love to talk a little bit more in depth about some of the things, too. So we we looked at ethnicity and multicultural. But there's a component when we think about emotional intelligence where sometimes we could potentially, mistakenly, not realize that we have diversity within the teams and folks that we work with, that one might be neurodivergent or non parent disabilities
· like, how do we continue to build that muscle of emotional intelligence for things that may not be as we often go to is what's an ethnicity? What does someone identify or not identify as? But there's
· a huge segment of our population that also we need to build our cultural competencies around.
·
Natasha Tous
49:03
Yeah. You know, I think one of the things I mentioned in in the in the talk is the fact that I I like to stay in the question.
· I like to ask as many questions to get
· as much information as possible.
· and
· I think that that that allows me to be more empathetic, and I think empathy is the key word. There
· it's. How can we, with empathy, approach a situation where we may not have all of the answers right? But asking from an empathetic standpoint, allows us to then find out more about that other person, and, like you said, there are situations where
· it is not necessarily evident.
· People are neurodivergent. More and more people are getting diagnosed with being neurodivergent. So
· I think it's that staying in the question
· that allows us to to move forward.
·
Rachael Sampson
50:00
I love that, and I think it goes to. You know you talked a lot about tap, and I love it. I saw some comments in the chat where we talked about taking a moment to pause. I love the saying of Back! Away from the keyboard, please back away from the keyboard.
· you know, and and pausing in that moment.
· tell me about like there's a physiological effect that happens, too, right when you
· get into a point where, whether it's sad, whether it's angry, it's joyous like, how do you like physically, even self regulate to get to that point where you can pause versus like all the things.
·
Natasha Tous
50:41
Yeah, it's that that reacting right? Like not not getting ourselves to their reaction, but to their responding. I, when I work with my coaches, I usually, and I do this for myself as well. I usually have what I call an anchor, and it's a physical one, right where I think I'm like in when I'm in my thinking face. I usually do this.
· which I do. I can do it without necessarily showing anybody right that I'm I. I am trying to connect my thoughts with my body, right, my physical self. And I do this, and I'm and you know, when you're in camera, you may not be able to see it. If I'm in a in a, in a physical meeting.
· you also may not be able to see it. And so it's in that think process where your emotions are starting to rush through that you need to
· breathe in, breathe out right. Do your physical anchoring, and then
· move forward.
·
Rachael Sampson
51:35
Oh, I love that. And and I love the connection that you actually have something that you use that you use. I know we we talk a lot about that, you know, moving your feet, wiggling your toes, and just
· connecting head, mind, and body, and leading with heart, is so important. I know. Here at Key we talk a lot about making moments matter and using head heart to be a hero in someone's story. So I love the connection of all of those
· thread and through points there. So the other question that came from our audience, we talked about cares. Can we walk through that again really quickly, as what does it stand for? And how do we use it today?
·
Natasha Tous
52:12
Cares is a framework that I created to help me understand emotional intelligence. A little bit more
· And again it allows me to really break it down. And understand each of the various components of emotional intelligence. So there's 5 of them, right?
· And and their empathy.
· self awareness, self regulation, okay, motivation or self motivation and connecting and leading effectively. And so it's those 5 areas of emotional intelligence that happen immediately as your as you sharpen your emotional
· intelligence that allows you to go through the tap process and think, assess and proceed. And that's how they're both connected. And so when we're thinking about? How do we find empathy right in a moment of distress? How do you encourage
· yourself or leaders to consider how that decision that they're making is going to impact others. That's the empathy component. The awareness component comes in
· and it's it's really understanding your own emotion, like what we just said right you you need to think you need to stop your oh, my God! I'm going through this.
· I'm you know. Blood is rushing to my head. I'm getting red.
· How do I become self aware of an emotion that I'm having right? And how do I start understanding that emotion.
· that strength, that weakness that may be coming up for me, and that allows you to then self regulate
· right? That's the 3rd component. The self regulation of your emotion is essential for you to maintain that composure that's going to allow you to respond, not react, all right. And then the other 2 are are the last 2 which is self motivation. We talked about self motivation, and how, as an entrepreneur.
· we need to consistently, day after day, choose self motivation. I may have a setback. But I'm going to come. Go ahead and and self motivate, so that I can make the right decision for my business, for my for myself. And then the last one, which is social skills is all about connectivity. How do I connect with everything that I've learned right with my self regulation, awareness.
· the emotions that I'm feeling. How do I use all of that to socially react or socially respond and interact with others as a leader.
·
Rachael Sampson
54:39
I love that. And we're we're getting really good questions coming in so. And one thing that's interesting that you said I, I can't even count how many times that you have said the word self or I when you think about it. So it's so interesting as we think about emotional intelligence and relationship and conversation
· that so much of it
· has to do with our own self first.st So I got a question in from Angela. So how do you manage a difficult conversation with someone in a leadership? Potentially, when you feel like you deserve something.
· but you want to leave the emotion out of it, and but still come with your authentic self, and I'm sure a passion
· when when culture really comes out, which may or may not be felt or identified that it could be cultural right? Even if it's East Coast versus West Coast thing. That is the thing. So how do? How do we deal with something like that?
·
Natasha Tous
55:32
It is you know, I learned I learned throughout my career that it is cultural, and it in that passion comes through.
· and once I understood that facts
· are my biggest ally.
· then my passion can come through. But the facts are still there, and so bringing facts to a conversation about culture or decision making allows you to then frame it up. In a sense where it's not what's best for me.
· It's here are the facts, and it's what's best, for you know, the the wider, the bigger picture. So to me, facts and bringing those facts to any conversation, is what helps me control the passion.
·
Rachael Sampson
56:18
So well, I do have one last question. I know we are getting close to time, but it's something we've touched on a lot about family right and family resilience. And when we think about those aspiring leaders, those that are in more leadership positions and entrepreneurs
· depending on. If you're a 1st Gen. College student or some of that, we talk about prioritizing family. But how do we also create orders because we think about financial empowerment?
· You now become a resource to your broader family. So how do you leverage emotional intelligence as you think about
· difficult conversations to still, from a cultural perspective, support your family.
· but also financially. That may be challenging. How do you navigate
· that paradigm in conversation.
·
Natasha Tous
57:09
You know. I think a lot of it comes with experience. A lot of it comes with your own trial and error. And you mentioned, you know so much of emotional intelligence is about Vi. The you know, the self awareness
· and understanding. What are your own boundaries, and how to put them up is key, and so, you know, for for me and my family we're very tightly knit, but I've had to put certain boundaries in place.
· Because I now also have a family to take care of right. And so it's again thinking about me. But how do I? How do I protect me in order for the greater good to to be served. And so I think boundaries is, is that key component?
· that we we bring into the conversation. And we, you know, in a very polite way that serves us, we need to stick to those, because that's that's hard sometimes.
·
Rachael Sampson
58:08
I love it well, Natasha, thank you so much for being here. We all know, in a diverse and interconnected world that cultural and emotional intelligence is just so essential for fostering that inclusivity and driving business growth and results in creating a successful and dynamic environment. I'm going to give you the last words and tell everyone thank you for joining. Today. We appreciate all of you. Your interactive commentary and engagement has just been incredible. But, Natasha, I'll leave you with the last word.
· parting back.
·
Natasha Tous
58:37
Thank you so much. I really appreciate the opportunity. And I really, really, really hope that you all
· understood today that culture and emotional intelligence is essential in order for us as leaders to continue growing personally growing our families, but also growing our businesses. So thank you.
·
Rachael Sampson
58:57
There you have it. Have a great day. Everyone. Take care.
·
Natasha Tous
58:59
Thank you, take care!
Whether you are a business owner or a woman navigating the business world, enhancing your presence is crucial to making a meaningful impact on those you serve, lead, and influence.
Key Takeaways
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- Develop EI and cultural empathy to improve communication, foster inclusivity, and drive business growth.
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