Finding Your Voice as a Female Asian Leader with Lina La

Welcome. Dear listeners to the speak in flow. Podcast. I'm so glad you're here today. Today, we're going to dive into empowering leaders.

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Melinda Lee: female leaders, and even more specifically Asian leaders. But it all of this goes to all leaders. But we just want to empower you to take steps of courage even when things are scary, unknown, and I have an amazing leader to to have this wonderful conversation with. Her name is Lena Law. She's program

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Melinda Lee: manager at the Palo Alto University. Hi! Lena!

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Lina La: Hi, Melinda, thank you so much for having me here. I'm so glad.

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Melinda Lee: I

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Melinda Lee: me, too. I'm excited. I we met at some conferences and ascend conference specifically, which is known to empower Asian leaders. And so I'm really glad that you're here. You're doing some amazing things at the University of Palo Alto. So can you share with the audience what some of those things are.

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Lina La: Yes, so Apollo Alto University. I'm program manager for the counseling department.

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Lina La: So we train the next generation of mental health counselors and clinicians.

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Lina La: and one of the big things I'm doing there is trying to incorporate more communication, flow and strategies into my work.

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Lina La: In universities. And I'm sure in many other workplaces. You have different departments.

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Lina La: but they don't talk to each other.

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Lina La: Why is that? We're all part of one organization.

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Lina La: but it's so hard to just talk to someone from another department. So we're pretty much in all these silos within the same organization.

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Lina La: And I found that

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Lina La: we're missing out on a lot of important information by being in these silos where we don't understand each other. We don't know what each other is doing.

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Lina La: but everything integrates in an organization. You really need to know what other people, what other departments are doing in order to not just be informed, but to do your best work.

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Lina La: So I have an example.

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Lina La: I found out that I wasn't getting a lot of the newsletters that I was previously getting. These newsletters are sent to students from time to time, and I found out that, hey? Why am I not getting them anymore for the last few months?

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Lina La: And it turns out that staff members were not getting these messagings anymore. And that is because

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Lina La: someone decided that

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Lina La: it's not useful for Staff to know what's being sent off to students.

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Lina La: which is doing us a disservice, because if I'm not knowing what is being sent to my students, I can't tell if they're getting the right messaging or the right picture or the full information. And I'm not getting the full information.

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Lina La: So this whole lack of communication, or

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Lina La: in this sense it's a disbursement of information, is making me realize there's a gap

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Lina La: in my workflow like if I don't know what my students are receiving, how could I be informed to do my work.

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Lina La: Or maybe I'm sending another repeat message that students are getting, and they're being inundated with so many messages that they probably don't read it.

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Lina La: So that's a huge piece that I'm trying to connect and reform in my department and outside, my department is

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Lina La: just working with these different department managers and program managers

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Lina La: to try to improve our communications to students, because that's really what we're doing here in my work. And that's to serve students the best we can.

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Lina La: And one big thing is to improve communications.

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Melinda Lee: Kudos for you to do that. I mean, obviously, someone didn't think that communication is important. So they cut you off, and then for you to take that leadership skill to say, Hey, no, this is so important. This is what's going to help our students when we have a cohesive team in the department and communicate effectively, and to take on that project. That's huge. That's a huge undertaking.

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Lina La: Thank you. And communication I really value because

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Lina La: there's just so much

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Lina La: under it. Right? Many people might think communication is just speaking or just writing words in an email. But really, I take a lot of heart and consideration into it. I really value what tone I'm setting in my messages.

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Lina La: or if

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Lina La: via zoom or in person, I'm really mindful of my body language, and my gestures, and even the volume of how I'm speaking to someone, I take all that into consideration, because it really sets the mood, I guess, for how you want your message to come across.

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Melinda Lee: Okay.

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Lina La: And I, I really envy some people who can really just type a message or type an email and just shoot it out really quickly.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: For me. I

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Lina La: maybe that's why my workflow tends to be a little longer than others. But I really look into like, am I using the right word.

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Lina La: Does this word convey a positive connotation or a negative one?

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Lina La: You see the background, like Esl teacher language in me from my previous experience come out when I do write these messages.

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Lina La: but yes, I really take a lot of care in drafting my messages to others.

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Lina La: And one thing I've been shifting to in my communications with email is

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Lina La: using different tools to help me make my messaging more engaging.

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Melinda Lee: Oh, okay.

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Lina La: So an example I have is I recently started using Mailchimp

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Lina La: and canva to draft

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Lina La: these beautiful email messagings, because in my role,

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Lina La: I have to send out almost every quarter

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Lina La: long messages to my students.

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Lina La: With a lot of information. So it could be about registration. It could be about book lists. It could be about happenings within our department or events.

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Lina La: and that could get pretty long if someone was reading it and receiving it. And just a whole list of words.

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Lina La: That's not very engaging, right. I'm not sure if they're even gonna read it. Read the whole thing.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Lina La: So what I've been using is Mailchimp, because.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: There. I work with graduate students. A lot of them are the younger population.

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Lina La: They love emojis.

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Lina La: They love graphics. They love short videos and memes. So I've been trying to input that into my messagings.

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Lina La: And I could see, you know, on Mailchim you could see that engagement increases. You could see how many.

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Lina La: We read through it how many people click through it? So that's also been very helpful for me to use the data and to help to improve my communications, and also, you know, I can't take all the credit for this. I learned this from someone else, from another department in my university.

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Melinda Lee: Okay.

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Lina La: Her role is

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Lina La: she's director of Communications. So this is her jam right? And.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Lina La: I hadn't reached out, or if I hadn't already been working with her on some other event.

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Lina La: I wouldn't have known that.

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Melinda Lee: And to think.

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Lina La: Like. Wow! I could have I missed out on this whole other aspect

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Lina La: to help me improve my communication like how sad it would have been if I just

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Lina La: kept working in my own little silo.

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Melinda Lee: Little silo. Yeah.

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Lina La: Department and not care about anyone else.

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Lina La: I just think about all the missed opportunities that I'm also missing out on, like, if I'm not working with other people from other various.

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Melinda Lee: Good for you to like. Know how communication to cater to your audience is very entrepreneurial, like you're taking a new innovation, something new, integrating it to reach your audience in a more engaging way. And so that is amazing and wonderful. Such a leadership, skill and and thinking about everything that you're doing.

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Melinda Lee: I know that it didn't come out of, you know just you were born with this leadership skill. Tell us about your story the past, like, you know, when you're growing up, what that was like for you.

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Lina La: Yeah, sure, I don't know anyone who was born with a leadership skill, but

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Lina La: but they were.

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Melinda Lee: No, I wish I had it.

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Lina La: Yeah, I'm trying to develop that myself, and it's been a long journey.

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Lina La: But starting from my childhood, I grew up in an immigrant family.

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Melinda Lee: Oh!

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Lina La: My parents immigrated from Vietnam. They were refugees, so that really had a big impact on how I.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: Raised, and I remember them always telling me to. Don't rock the boat, you know. Keep quiet. Just focus on your work. Work hard. Don't cause trouble. Don't speak up, don't cause noise. Be quiet.

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Melinda Lee: More your mom, your dad, or both.

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Lina La: It was for my mom, my mom, yeah.

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Melinda Lee: Interesting right? Because the moms where she was taught that.

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Lina La: Stereotype. Yes.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah, yeah.

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Lina La: That's correct.

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Lina La: So that really had an impact on me. And and growing up, I was like that right? I just stayed quiet. I just put my head down, did my work worked hard.

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Lina La: But I realize that doing that, especially in a Western society that we live in.

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Lina La: it really hindered me from a lot of opportunities. Missed promotions because I'm not seen as a leader, right? I'm just seen as a common worker.

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Lina La: and what I realize also is

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Lina La: I don't want to fit into. I don't want to keep on perpetuating that stereotype that Asians are seen as meek. They're submissive Asian women, specifically and just shy

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Lina La: like, why do we have to be that way? I don't want to be that way like I want to share my story. I want to speak out. I don't want to have any hesitation

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Lina La: to speak what's really in my heart.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Lina La: Because I feel like what a lot of

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Lina La: people who grew up in Asian families.

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Lina La: they're afraid right? They're like, if I say this. I'm going to hurt the other people's feelings

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Lina La: or you know, if I say this, it's gonna cause a lot of trouble, and I don't want to do that right. But

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Lina La: I think in today's world like you have to do that in order to make anything.

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Melinda Lee: Yep.

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Lina La: Here to

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Lina La: not miss out on those opportunities, and in order for other people to really see the strength in you, I don't.

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Melinda Lee: I mean.

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Melinda Lee: I resonate with that so much because I had so many. There was a new hire that got promoted before me. I was in the company already 10 years, and he got promoted, and I knew he was making the right connections. And this also brings me to my point of like you said. You don't want to miss opportunities. You don't want to. You want to be seen as that leader. People are going to see you as

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Melinda Lee: even though you're not weak. But they might see you as just not a leader. I mean, this is a great example, and I have to say this right now, whatever you know, political fence you're on. But, like Kamala Harris, I was so disappointed when she wasn't during her Vice Presidency, not she was not in the limelight. She didn't really say anything. And so now people are like, who are you

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Melinda Lee: who are? And then she's hiding behind like now she has to like Redo, her reputation, try to separate herself from Biden and it's just very interesting now and then. Now I feel, I think, that it was a little bit challenging for her to be in the spotlight. She had to actually adjust really quickly, and she did a pretty good job. But I mean. What I'm saying is that she just didn't do that during her Vice Presidency, for whatever reason, there's probably a reason.

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Melinda Lee: But it just showed that it didn't really show her as a leader. She could have already been seen as such to the American people for 4 years.

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Lina La: Yes, you're right.

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Melinda Lee: And so that's what happens when we're in corporate and we we don't speak up. We don't say we think that our work is enough.

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Lina La: no.

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Melinda Lee: We think our work shows it. No, you really got to promote it. You got to say it over and over and over again, because people are not going to hear. People don't remember people, you know. So we think, oh, we say it once, they know.

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Melinda Lee: wow, yeah. So.

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Lina La: And I truly resonate with that right now as well, because that was my mindset in the past. Right? Like, yeah, I'm gonna let my work show for it, because I work so hard.

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Melinda Lee: Exactly.

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Lina La: Like it's gonna speak for itself. But.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: Really does like. Yes, kudos, you did all this work. That's great. But does it? Did anyone know? Did anyone hear you? Anyone see that

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Lina La: so? Yes, self promotion is a big thing like you.

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Melinda Lee: Being.

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Lina La: Say it loud and proud. Tell everyone what you did, even if.

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Melinda Lee: Yes.

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Lina La: Finer. You really have to be consistent, and just keep

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Lina La: putting your good work out there by saying.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: By communicating it.

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Melinda Lee: And how do you deal with the loud and proud cause we're that's so, not me, I mean, I know it's hard. It was hard like. How? What do you think about that.

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Lina La: Definitely a big mindset shift right?

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Melinda Lee: Yes.

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Lina La: You can't just rely on someone else to do that for you.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: To do it yourself.

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Lina La: And

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Lina La: one acronym I really learned early on in my career is Q-tip.

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Melinda Lee: Oh, okay.

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Lina La: It stands for quit taking it personally.

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Lina La: That has really helped in me.

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Lina La: shifting my mindset to be more loud and proud rather than like meek and shy.

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Lina La: And that's because before. I would, I would, you know, coming from an Eastern family society. It's more collective rather than individualistic.

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Lina La: I think if I grew up in a more individualistic family. I would be more loud and proud. Right? Because I'm like, focus on me. What my needs are, what my wants are. But in a collectivist society, you're more focused on others, and how other people feel.

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Lina La: So for the Q-tip acronym. If I were to take things personally, I think that would have a huge effect on me, emotionally and mentally, simply because I'm always going to be worried like, Oh, my God, I'm going to hurt their feelings! How are they going to feel about this

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Lina La: and totally ignore what I'm feeling right? Because I'm second to them.

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Lina La: And I'm trying to shift this mindset into this loud and proud mindset where it's like.

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Lina La: Yes, I do care about other feelings, other people's feelings. But what about mine?

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Lina La: You know I don't want to seem selfish about it, but really

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Lina La: you kind of have to be.

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Lina La: Put yourself first.st Right. What are you doing? What are you proud of?

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Lina La: And we also talked about this earlier. You just have to put yourself out there. Be bold, be brave.

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Lina La: and that way. You're not missing out on these opportunities

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Lina La: right? Other people will see that, and they will follow suit.

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Lina La: Kind of like.

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Melinda Lee: You're you're you're walking the talk because I know that you coming on to here was not, you know, something that you're like. Okay, I'm not sure but you're doing it. You're here loud and proud and and and there's moments where have there been moments where you just had a light bulb where I'm just gonna do this.

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Melinda Lee: You know. Yeah, what was that.

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Lina La: Every day, maybe.

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Melinda Lee: Just like, I'm I'm gonna give him this. Podcast. I'm gonna do. I'm even though it's scary. You know, like what I'm gonna just do it.

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Melinda Lee: continuing to

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Melinda Lee: be a bigger, expanded version of yourself.

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Lina La: Correct. Correct. One thing I'm trying to really achieve every day is

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Lina La: to not let my own insecurities or not let imposter syndrome get in the way of.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: Doing these things.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: One quote I heard is, you know, if you're gonna just do it scared.

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Lina La: That's the thing. I just follow. That. Just do it scared doesn't matter if you feel like ill prepared, or you feel like you're not worthy of it. Just do it scared, and see what happens.

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Lina La: And I have this moment when you mentioned not part of ascend. I'm part of the ascend Gdu chapter going to get you.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Lina La: The student chapter.

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Lina La: and when they put out a call out looking for officers for the ascent chapter you know, looking at my workload and my school load. I decided, okay, I can probably take a secretary role. I can take notes at meetings. I can do that. I have time for that.

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Lina La: And the former president said, No, Lena, you're going to be the President.

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Lina La: I think it's because no one else signed up to be President. But I decided, you know what this is, an opportunity. This is a calling. Let's do it.

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Lina La: So I signed up to be the President and one of the

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Lina La: events that's usually put on in the beginning of the academic year is something called a kickoff event.

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Lina La: and I'm no like event, Planner. I wasn't given a script to that, or what things I should do in terms of holding a kickoff event.

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Lina La: and during this event I was caught upon

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Lina La: to the stage to deliver a speech, you know. Introduce us and introduce yourself, and I totally wasn't ready for that for me in my mind. For some reason I thought a kickoff event. Okay, it's just gonna be

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Lina La: like a gathering, you know, there's gonna be food. There's going to be people mingling and talking. That's it.

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Lina La: But they're like, no, you gotta go on stage. You got to talk about a son and promote it.

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Lina La: So I totally wasn't ready for that, but I sucked it up and said, You know what I'm the president of. Ascend Ggu. This is something I have to do, and I stepped up and did it.

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Lina La: It's now a blur. Now, looking back. But you know, I introduced myself. I introduced a send. I told people why they should join.

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Lina La: develop their leadership skills, empowering Asian business people in the workplace supporting each other, building that network.

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Lina La: I think that's all, I said, but in the end I was able to deliver it. I'm not sure how I did, but I got through it scared, and in the end it worked out well, because.

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Melinda Lee: Doesn't.

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Lina La: Everyone kept saying, like you did a great job. I love your messaging. You were confident up there. But in the end, like I was. Yeah, I was really proud of myself. I was like I did that I wasn't prepared, but I stepped up and I did that.

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Lina La: and that kind of opened more doors for me, not just within Gdu, but it did another number in me in terms of

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Lina La: realizing that this is something I could do

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Lina La: that I could see myself as a leader, that other people see me as a leader.

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Lina La: So that kind of shifted me into a mindset of yes, just do it, do it! Scared.

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Lina La: Try to show confidence, even if you're not confident.

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Lina La: It's all about communicating your messaging, your worth, your confidence to other people, and

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Lina La: kind of what led me to

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Lina La: also join this podcast

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Lina La: and to be more of an inspiration to others who are

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Lina La: feeling. What I previously felt, which was scary.

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Lina La: shy or not worthy.

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Lina La: So I want to be an inspiration to them, and also improve myself along the way.

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Melinda Lee: Oh, I'm so glad you're here. I think your story resonates, and it's so amazing that you you've been taking these big steps to to big, bold steps, even though you're scared, and earlier, you and I. Before we got on this, you told me a little secret about. If you're scared

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Melinda Lee: you're about to big and take a big leap of phase, you're gonna do something that is out of your comfort zone. And if you're feeling all these butterflies

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Melinda Lee: right? You taught me through your Gdu program. You taught me. Take the butterflies, put them into a ball.

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Melinda Lee: No, acknowledge them. They're there because sometimes people will ignore them, and when you ignore them they actually manifest itself in this on the stage or somewhere in the conversation. So you wanna just take the time to say, Hey, I know the butterflies are there. Let's put them in a ball, and then set them free like send them off. Thanks for coming.

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Lina La: Correct. Yeah.

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Melinda Lee: So I really enjoyed that, and but despite you may you you got up on stage, and you spoke to at the ascend conference.

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Melinda Lee: and you did a great job. Didn't wasn't planned so kudos for you, and you got the results. You got opportunities. And you, more more importantly, you got knowing that you can do it. You had that mindset shift that I can do this. I could take big, bold steps and be that leader.

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Lina La: No.

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Melinda Lee: Thank you so much for inspiring us to share that message and to to connect with them, because many I resonate with it like a lot of things experiences you had. I feel like I had similar things. So so it's really great that we're on this journey together.

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Melinda Lee: raising other women, raising other leaders.

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Lina La: Yes.

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Melinda Lee: So so let's I'd like to end. Thank you so much for all your inspiration. I'd like to end with the one question that I ask all my guests, what is that? One leadership, golden takeaway that you want people to remember.

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Lina La: Yes, so my one leadership, golden takeaway, is actually something I learned in my personal leadership class that I took at Ggu.

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Lina La: and that is to not only look outward, but look inward to yourself in whatever you do. But we're going to apply it. This case in terms of leadership.

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Lina La: A lot of people think that. Oh, being a leader is just making these big speeches. It's just or writing. It's just leading a team.

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Lina La: And that's a lot of outward facing actions.

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Lina La: But we don't take the time to also look inward and reflect on ourselves. Reflect on what we did.

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Lina La: Reflect on what kind of leader. We want to be

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Lina La: and also more so importantly like reflecting on what your purpose.

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Lina La: what your values are, what your strengths and talents are.

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Lina La: because if we don't acknowledge that, as you mentioned, if you don't say it, if you don't pinpoint it, how can you expect other people

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Lina La: to know what that is?

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Lina La: And that goes away with, you know, if you're not taking the time to name it, as we mentioned before, if you don't take the time to name it. Other people aren't going to have the ability to name it as well.

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Lina La: Share that with people. Be loud and proud about who you are, be authentic about who you are, and not being shy to share that with the world, but you have to name it first.st

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Melinda Lee: Totally. Because I think, like with leaders, if you're not clear about your own values, your own unique strength, unique

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Melinda Lee: strengths, unique purpose, then we can get easily knocked over with all of the the technology information and people swaying you, convincing you authority figures right? You can easily get swayed. So it's like, you know. And then you you get your your leadership gets weighted and gets jaded and gets, you know, muffled

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Melinda Lee: and so like having, like you said, claim it?

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Melinda Lee: I think it's really important. And that way you're guided, you are guiding yourself. And that's true leadership.

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Lina La: Correct and to help you name it. There's, you know, you don't have to do a program and be a program like I.

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Lina La: There are other big resources out there, right.

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Melinda Lee: You know, joining.

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Lina La: Affinity. Groups like ascent as

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Lina La: them, or looking for mentors or even reaching out to you. Melinda, like to.

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Melinda Lee: Oh!

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Lina La: Help to have people help you right to develop those skills or look towards leaders like you to be an example of what you want to be in the future, so that also helps helped me along my journey right.

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Melinda Lee: Right? Yeah, cause it could get really complicated. And unclear. So having somebody to bounce ideas off of.

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Lina La: Correct

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Melinda Lee: And so thank you so much. That was amazing. And thank you so much for your work with the mental health arena and guiding leaders to help more people in this area. I think this is such a huge, huge, critical, important aspect of our lives. And

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Melinda Lee: I mean, I was just thinking the other day.

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Melinda Lee: how come? You know I'm still thinking about politics. But how come? There's not on the ballot like something around mental health, a mental health crisis that we have in our nation is not talked about at all like this is something that we really need to put on the ballot, or something.

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Melinda Lee: Work around it, but so I appreciate what you do.

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Lina La: No problem. It's been.

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Melinda Lee: My pleasure.

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Lina La: Linda.

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Melinda Lee: Thank you, Lena. It's really fun. Thank you so much for being here.

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Lina La: No problem. Happy to be here, and happy to continue the conversation.

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Melinda Lee: Yes, and thank you audience also for being here. I trust that you got your golden takeaways from today and implement them. Take the steps. Take the leap of faith toward your big, bold, scary vision for yourself.

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Melinda Lee: And until next time I'll see you on the Speak and Flow podcast thanks for joining

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Melinda Lee: bye.

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Lina La: Okay.

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Melinda Lee: Hey!