Co-host Jim H. Lee joined Aaron to discuss their experiences growing up in the United States and the cultural differences they encountered.
Jim is Korean-American, Aaron is white. They delve into the importance of recognizing biases and fostering allyship in the modern world. Jim reflects on the challenges of navigating cultural differences as a Korean-American, while Aaron shares his limited exposure to Asian culture.
They also discuss the importance of understanding and representing their culture accurately. We need dialogue and reflection to build cultural bridges, and we encourage you to share their own experiences.
Show Outline
Growing up with Asian and Western Biases (00:28) Jim and Aaron discuss the cultural differences they experienced growing up as Asians in America and the importance of recognizing biases.
Jim’s Background and Cultural Transition (02:23) Jim shares his personal background as a Korean immigrant in the United States and reflects on the cultural differences he had to navigate as a child and throughout his life.
Navigating Cultural Identity (10:58) Jim discusses his journey of navigating cultural identity and the challenges he faced growing up as a Korean-American.
Cultural Differences in Western and Asian Cultures (12:04) Jim explains the differences between how Western and Asian cultures approach territory, expansion, and conquering.
Shift in Asian Community and Personal Experiences (15:41) Aaron reflects on his personal experiences growing up and how his perspective has shifted as he moved from childhood through school and into his career.
Growing up in a multicultural school (20:32) Jim discusses his experiences in a multicultural school where he didn’t fully identify with either the recent immigrant Asian students or the non-Asian students.
Challenges in the workplace (21:53) Jim talks about the challenges he faced as one of the few Asians in his office and the need to intentionally communicate his identity and capabilities to his colleagues.
Building bridges across cultures (25:24) Aaron emphasizes the importance of intentional communication and understanding different perspectives to build bridges across cultures and foster allyship.
Building Bridges through Understanding (31:27) The importance of understanding and learning about different stories and cultures to build bridges of empathy and allyship.
Expanding Our Perspectives (31:45) The significance of embracing new experiences, such as trying different foods, and seeking to learn and understand stories that are different from our own.
Quotes
- “If we’re to rewind the tape and understand what are some of the things that we might do in our Asian culture very well unconsciously, but realize it collides with Western culture in a way that isn’t reflected in how we ought to be, that unconscious competency actually is unconscious incompetence translated into Western culture.” – Jim @ 9:54
- “Different cultures can help bring out opportunities for better leaders and highlight areas that we have challenges, things that we can improve upon.” – Jim @ 30:42
- “Our hope for each of you is that there is some part of your story and some part of someone else’s story that you will begin to hear, you will truly understand and seek to learn and know about. That’s not a story you would have heard or understood or asked questions about earlier in your career or in your life.” – Aaron @ 31:45
Our Podcast Partners
- Clay – the best contact management tool we’ve found. Maximize your relationships with Clay, the AI-powered app to drive your communication and outreach.
- This episode presented by Sandler Partners – find your technology broker and save $$$
Connect with Jim + Aaron
Watch the Full Episode
Episode 52 – Full transcript
Jim H. Lee (00:00:00) – Hi, my name is Jim Lee. I grew up in the Los Angeles area with parents that immigrated to the United States in the early 70s. I was born in Korea, but came when I was three months old, and I’ve lived in California my whole life.
Aaron Lee (00:00:11) – My name is Aaron Lee. I grew up in the Mid-Atlantic in Richmond, Virginia. When I was a child, I only knew two Asians, one on my little league team and one at school. It wasn’t until I met Jim later in my career that I began to understand those distinctions in real life.
Jim H. Lee (00:00:28) – One of the things that was hard for me to do is to take my personal experiences and see them objectively. As a Korean that grew up in America, my whole life is full of Asian and Western biases that have created cultural differences that are hard for me to identify by recognizing where those lines are. We hope to navigate through them intentionally and with less conflict and more collaboration.
Aaron Lee (00:00:49) – We know our stories and our biases aren’t unique, and throughout our years of coaching, we found it quite liberating for ourselves and many others to see those biases more explicitly so that we can move more intentionally towards the goals we want to achieve.
Aaron Lee (00:01:05) – This is the new Generation Leader Allyship channel.
Jay Smack, Voice of the Podcast (00:01:10) – Welcome to the new Generation Leader podcast. We’re giving you the tools you need to lead in the digital world, ready to reach your true potential. This is the new Generation Leader podcast.
Aaron Lee (00:02:05) – Welcome to our ally channel. This is Jim Lee. I’m Aaron Lee. We are here to have a conversation on building bridges and what allyship means in our 21st century world. Jim, give us a little bit of your background, your story. Who are you?
Jim H. Lee (00:02:23) – Yeah, so I was born in the mid 70s, 1970s with my parents that came to the US in the early 70s. And there’s a lot of people that I know that kind of resonate with the story and thought it was kind of fascinating to be able to do this podcast together, to kind of help those that might have felt alone in this journey that they’re living in. Because I felt alone. I was one of like three Asians in my early elementary school class. And I remember, like I was in Chinese, I was in Japanese and Korean people and then had parents that like owned, eventually owned a small business.
Jim H. Lee (00:02:58) – But early on they came to the States and they couldn’t get the same caliber type of job. So they had to reflecting on their education in Korea. So my dad worked at a warehouse or a Volkswagen distribution or the parts and supplies, and then my mom was working as a bank teller, and just a lot of the common things of just trying to figure out how to live life in America. I remember a lot of the struggles that they had. And reflecting back, I can see a lot more of the cultural differences that I had to kind of transition to when it comes to being a kid in America, and as well as just the impact that it had in terms of not only my career, but as well as the type of friends that are God and the type of life that I’ve lived.
Aaron Lee (00:03:41) – And at what point did you move to the States?
Jim H. Lee (00:03:44) – Oh, I came 100 days old. In fact, my parents were already married in the States. And then because of Korean tradition, the mom usually has her mom and her sister help them out in the early days of after postpartum, I guess.
Jim H. Lee (00:03:58) – And so there’s a rule that the first 100 days you stay at home, you don’t go out. And so those were the 100 days that I spent in Korea when I was born. So my mom, right before her last trimester went to Korea, had me. And then on the hundredth day when they were allowed to leave, is what came to it.
Aaron Lee (00:04:18) – I grew up in a similar kind of community where I can only recall two Asian classmates. One was adopted by two Caucasian parents, the other was a good friend in my school. Carl went on to fight in the Marines in the Iraqi war and gave up his life defending the country. At that point in my childhood years, in terms of classmates, they were the only Asians I knew directly. There weren’t other Asians in school. There weren’t Asian families in our community, in our neighborhood. I didn’t have a lot of that multicultural, intercultural experience or understanding until we had a Japanese college student spend the holiday winter break with us one year, rather than flying all the way back to Japan for the break.
Aaron Lee (00:05:10) – She spent a couple of weeks in our house, had Christmas cookies, spent the whole holiday with us, and that started to open our eyes because she became almost like a family member, and she would send us notes and cards and gifts periodically. A few years later, she and her husband got married, came to North America for their honeymoon, and she brought him by to meet us because she considered us part of her extended family. And we saw them again about ten years later when their daughter was born, they came back on another trip. But even in all of those experiences, I don’t think I truly understood the cross-cultural dynamics. And that’s probably something being from a family who had been, at least in this region of the country for 3 or 4 generations, there wasn’t a lot of need for me to pay attention to any other cultural dynamics, because this was our family going back generations. This was our community, our region. And so we just were I.
Jim H. Lee (00:06:10) – Think it’s interesting. I don’t think you shared, though, but like, you’re in the East Coast in Virginia and I grew up in Los Angeles, so a lot of people find it very interesting that there weren’t other Koreans when I was growing up.
Jim H. Lee (00:06:24) – And even just the Asian population was so small at the time. And if you look at the Los Angeles area today, I mean, it is quite large, you know, I don’t know the statistics. Shame on me. But I know where I live, which had moved out into more of a suburb or only 10% of the population out there, but even that is quite larger than like what I had. So my daughter just entered kindergarten this fall, and she didn’t really have a lot of other Asian friends in preschool. But in her kindergarten class alone, there are four other Korean friends that she was actually able to meet for the first time and think it’s interesting that just. How much of that culture is more even accepted. Think today in those younger generations. But I think from what I’m experiencing, still not so much so today with the older generation.
Aaron Lee (00:07:16) – You know, it’s interesting. I know your love for the green Bay Packers for some reason, as many times as I’ve heard you say, you grew up in Los Angeles.
Aaron Lee (00:07:24) – When you talk about growing up, I still picture in my mind for some reason, Detroit. I don’t know why that’s not even the same state as green Bay, but for some reason, it’s always interesting trying to reframe those stories, reframe those experiences, or reframe what we’re picturing in our minds when we hear somebody from another background with another life experience relaying part of their own story.
Jim H. Lee (00:07:52) – Yeah. You know, it’s interesting. My best friend is actually from Detroit and he’s Korean-American to very rare. And we’ll swap stories, but very similar just because Asians were such a minority back then. And think one of the differences that I would say he was better at than I did, which is more of a Western cultural reflection, was he had more of some of the maybe it might be just for the Midwest hospitality type of culture that he was accustomed to, that it is not as much in the area just in general comparison, but it was kind of interesting to see how much of just the Western culture, the different versions of the variety of Western culture that’s out there, a deeper insight into our relationship and friendship as well.
Aaron Lee (00:08:37) – Part of what this series is about is for us to dive into those stories, and I know for me, many of the stories that we hear from other people or the stories we reflect on from ourselves and our own experience, they start to take on a slightly different. We bring a slightly different view to them at this point in our lives than we did in the moment. And so we want to walk through those stories, both your experience and my experience tell some of those stories, reflect on them. See how our story has changed throughout the years as we’ve gone through decades at a time. But then looking back, what have we learned? How has that changed our life perspective? Our view on what’s happening around us? Then also take a look at what would we do different? Or how can we bring our kids along to have a more aware viewpoint in where they are and what they’re seeing in a new generation?
Jim H. Lee (00:09:37) – I think that’s very powerful for us to take them all in and process through the things that we did, maybe unconsciously, you know, say there’s a double blind spot that I’ve seen with, like specifically Asian culture and those that are more of the traditional Western culture in America.
Jim H. Lee (00:09:54) – And they both tend to intersect in the areas of unconscious behavior where it’s unconscious competency, like they do things very well because it’s how they ought to do it. And it’s just natural for them, but also the areas that they tend to struggle in and not realize that that may be due to the areas or where these two cultures are starting to intersect as well. And so, like, you know, as we kind of go through in this podcast and reflect back, I think it’s really powerful for me to not only reprocess some of the things that I’ve done, like understand why had certain challenges and why Asians continue to statistically have the challenge of getting promoted. That’s a big one. And see, okay, if we’re to rewind the tape and understand what are some of the things that we might do in our Asian culture very well, unconsciously, but realize it collides with Western culture in a way that isn’t reflected in how we ought to be, that that unconscious competency actually is unconscious in competency translated into Western culture.
Jim H. Lee (00:10:58) – And how I can be more intentional about how I not only lead myself, but also how I can make sure that my daughter doesn’t learn some of these unconscious habits that I would just do because it was passed on to me that doesn’t necessarily think accurately reflect the rich culture Asians have. So I’m not trying to say like, I want to eliminate my Asian culture, which I think is very important to understand, but I want to perform my culture in a way that’s intentional and informed that way. You know, just because I’m Korean-American doesn’t mean that I reflect all the Asians out there because there’s like thousands of different cultures. There’s 27 countries. And even within each country, so many different type of cultures. If you look at just how Asian cultures in general and how Asia was formed, it’s quite different in terms of the practices of Western culture. Asian culture was not necessarily very imperialistic outside of their territories, so to speak. I mean, sure, there were like China and Mongol that they were like battling each other to create huge statuses and areas, but they tended to be really.
Jim H. Lee (00:12:04) – Region lies within their area, whereas in Western culture, you’ll see a lot of European history of just trying to take over the whole western area. In fact, America was founded on imperialism and the colonization of North America. And just that desire to kind of land and expand is a very Western mindset. Whereas in Asian culture it was more like, this is our territory, this is our home, and this is what we try to have. But that could see a lot of those different type of areas that are different, as well as thinking in other cultures, like the black culture and Hispanic culture like those are also similarities in Asian culture that you didn’t come up with an area that kind of is more about Latin and expand and conquering. And so with that think just seeing again, there are historical cultures that originate from different areas, and how they reflect on our activities is pretty important to see.
Aaron Lee (00:12:58) – If you’re anything like me, keeping up with all the people you know is hard. I forgot Tom’s birthday.
Aaron Lee (00:13:03) – I had a meeting in town and forgot Jamie lives here now. Who was that strategic planner I met last year? Clay is a game changer for me. It puts all of my connections, contacts, text messages, LinkedIn connections all in one place reminding me about what and who is most important. Then every morning, Clay’s AI engine reminds me birthdays, who I should reconnect with and lets me take notes so I remember important details. Safe, secure and thoughtful. Clay. The AI powered system for cultivating amazing personal and professional relationships. Try Clay for free today at new generation leader.fm/clay. You use a broker for your health insurance and benefits? Why not use a broker for your technology? Keeping up with the latest advances in technology can be a challenge. It frustrates me so much trying to keep up. Then you pick the technology and now you have the headache of working with a pushy salesperson from multiple companies trying to compare the available features. Who’s going to give you the best deal? It’s maddening. But what if you could add a trusted technology advisor to your team? The power of a 12 time Inc 5000 honoree, and leverage their purchasing power to get the best possible deal on your video conferencing, your phones, internet access, network security, and every other technology need you have.
Aaron Lee (00:14:24) – That’s the power of Sandler Partners. Our friends at Sandler are offering our listeners a 15 minute conversation. No pressure. Explore your needs and see if it’s a good match. If they can’t add value to your technology spending after 15 minutes, they’ll let you know. Explore your tech spending at new generation leader.fm/sandler. One of the ways that I’ve seen Asian culture and understanding differences in culture has been in our own community here and families. We’ve gotten to know who are Asian from multiple regions. And so as you were just talking about different regions of Asia, have different tendencies in and of themselves. And for us getting to know these families, walking alongside these families, watching my girls play and be in class with Asian classmates, a different experience than you had in that I had. Now I merge that together with the work we do in corporate life, in the workplace. And then I trace that all the way back through my life and see, as I look back, the coworkers my dad had in corporate America who had come here on short term visas as contractors working in corporate life.
Aaron Lee (00:15:41) – At that point in my life, 20, 30 years ago, I had a very different perspective. It was a different part of the city. It was a different community. My dad didn’t work in the neighborhood. And so those families lived ironically, in this community where we’re sitting right now, where I’m living now as an adult, raising my kids. But I was on the other side of the city in a very different kind of community. So now as I look back and see, okay, it’s the Asians today who are just contractors but are full time employees, permanent residents here in the States are now working for the very same company my dad was working for 20 or 30 years ago. Now I’m walking alongside them and I’m seeing a whole life cycle in myself reflected in multiple seasons of my own life. So talk a little bit from your perspective, how has your story, your experience shifted as you moved from childhood through school into your career? And now at this point where you are in your career?
Jim H. Lee (00:16:47) – Yeah, think a big part of that has been navigating through those unconscious behaviors that I was doing, because I don’t think I really had anyone competent to help me navigate that journey, so to speak.
Jim H. Lee (00:17:01) – And so, like, for example, I remember growing up as a kid, there were a lot of things that I was not Korean enough, like my parents would often say, like, that’s all Koreans do, because I’m picking up a lot of behaviors that like friends from school and I don’t know, like, I didn’t grow up in Korea. I don’t know what Koreans do, but I would get a lot of critique of it. But that’s okay. We don’t do it that way like that. You’re supposed to do it this way. I’m like, okay, so you’re kind of learning through critique, which is not always the best way because you’re told what not to do, but you don’t know what to do. But then I go to school and I felt like, well, I’m not Chinese or Japanese, which were the only two other Asians that were there in my school. And on the other side of things, like, I just did it today because I didn’t know a lot of things that were doing that their parents were doing.
Jim H. Lee (00:17:51) – And a lot of times I felt like I was ostracized in a lot of ways. And so I didn’t feel like I was American. And my whole childhood journey was this ability to learn who I am. There was that term like, I’m Korean American, so I’ve mixed sub two, but then even that is not something you could put your finger on and say like, oh, this is what a clean American is supposed to be. I just had these elements that my parents were telling me to be like, which they only knew how to be Korean, and then eight hours a day and spending at school trying to be like everybody else, which was deemed us American. But I remember in elementary school, like a lot of my day to day life, was getting beat up at school because I don’t think other people knew who I was and think because I was awkward, I was different, I was vulnerable. I think there were a lot of people that. Like took advantage of that. In a way.
Jim H. Lee (00:18:47) – I did have some good friends and think they were the allies in my life that were willing to understand they needed. They thought a lot of things that were different were kind of cool. But think in junior high school was when a lot of that started to maybe not get more clear in terms of what that identity look like. But there are a lot more Asians, like the change between the early 80s to the mid 80s, where I was growing up, was in West Los Angeles, shifted dramatically. Part of it was also like, you have the different elementary schools got together. I think there were about 5 or 6. All those schools that got together. And in middle school there were like all these other Asians. So it’s kind of cool that, oh, wow, there’s more people like me. And so that was kind of fun to say. Like, I don’t have to be like anybody else could just be me, because there are other people that are like me, and they understood some of those boundaries.
Jim H. Lee (00:19:39) – Things later stood like, why don’t you take your shoes off? Or you come across and go to their house and we would be able to do those things. And so in those areas that were unconsciously and those that were doing that, those great to like be able to practice some unconscious competence. So like, you could just be myself and I could feel normal and not had to rig this type of a high anxiety type of culture around me because that was always your try. It fitted it in. And then I remember in high school things shifted even more because think in the early 90s there’s a huge immigration wave that kind of preceded if people started finding out where they want to live. And they think West away at the time was an area that white Asians came in. But what was, in retrospect, what I thought was interesting was because I had finally found my friends, not just Asian, that were like grew up in America their whole lives, but had a lot of non-Asian friends. So it was really close to as well.
Jim H. Lee (00:20:32) – And I went to a school that was very multicultural in a way, and I would say probably was like about 10% Asian, 20% Hispanic, like black and about 50% white. I’m just spitballing that there’s anything that’s what the kids look like. And of the Asian crowd, though, there was a lot of recent immigrants where they spoke their native Asian language as much as they spoke English in kind. And so I didn’t identify with them, which is kind of interesting, right? Because didn’t identify with those that were not Asian and identify with those that were like, probably the more I would say more pure Asian in terms of the culture and how they lived. And what I found was that, like in my attempts to kind of go back and forth and back and forth like what my identity was, I realized that I am very Korean-American and equal parts green as equal part American, but I was picking and choosing what part I wanted to do based on what was comfortable to me. And it wasn’t until like college where there again, more Asians kind of helping you to kind of feel more comfortable on both extremes of that paradigm and then going into the workforce where I think there’s a lot more standardization that starts to happen, because I worked for a large telecom company that was very institutionalized.
Jim H. Lee (00:21:53) – I was probably again, it kind of threw me back to my old days of elementary school, where I was again back to like the 1 or 2 Asian in the whole office. Maybe. It was very challenging to me again, and I think felt more consciously as an adult. I would rethink a lot of the struggles that I had, and it wasn’t until probably later in my career, probably about ten years in that I realized in order for me to do this well, I had to do this intentionally. Like couldn’t just it can choose what part of my culture or my experiences that I want to have, because one people saw me as just being Asian, and they didn’t know what part of that paradigm or that spectrum that I was living in. And so I had to be more intentional in how I showed up and be more deliberate to let them know that I am an Asian that can fully speak English very well, lived here my whole life, and I am very apt in doing the work that you want me to do.
Jim H. Lee (00:22:52) – But I also realized the way that I grew up taught me to interact with people at work differently, and how a lot of my Western friends did, and some of the things that they would do that I felt like I was taught not to do. And so I had to learn those ways and start becoming uncomfortable. The areas that were challenging me. But by deliberately growing and seeing what I had to do differently, I started to understand those were the challenges that most other Asians also felt as well. But the cultural paradigms of how Asian culture tends to similarly have a hard time challenging, maybe hierarchical structures, knocking over chat with the bosses, having watercooler talk. Those are challenges that a lot of Asian face, and they still tend to take that today because culturally we don’t do that. And so I reflect that rewinding. From back to like my early childhood was three. Some of the earliest memories of where these conflicts started to occur, and then how even today. Now I’m trying to manage some of those things that tend to pop up even now, but trying to help others that may not be able to see these wild spots that occur.
Jim H. Lee (00:24:06) – So they can predict and more intentionally and feel like it could be their selves as well as achieve the goals that they want to have.
Aaron Lee (00:24:14) – One of the words we use a lot is intentional, and there’s something about being intentional and shifting from that unconscious and making our actions conscious that for me, growing up, no one ever needed to ask me. I didn’t have to think about it. I just was in every community, in every setting, school, church. When I started working, playing Little League, I just was. I didn’t have to think about which way was acting, which way I was communicating, which way I was responding. And truly, when we think about it, we use the language with our clients nowadays that we want you to be intentional about how you communicate and how we grew up. The community, the culture we grew up from surrounded by is just a part of that. We also have some natural wiring that plays into that, but I don’t think it was until you and I started having conversations the way you would highlight certain dynamics between two people, between leaders within a team and a company we were working with.
Aaron Lee (00:25:24) – It wasn’t until I started spending time with you and having an opportunity to hear another perspective, or ask the question, or shine a light on this is what’s really happening under the surface. Have you thought about this before? And I think for me, particularly in building bridges across cultures, it’s really important for us to have this conversation so that we can walk people through. Here’s how to do this in your own life, in your own setting, in your own situation. I don’t come as the expert, I just come because I’ve spent a lot of time with you, and you’ve invited me on this journey of discovery for myself. And so that’s what we want to have in this conversation, in this podcast channel is a series of episodes talking about unpacking. Let’s ask the question. Let’s talk about it. Let’s reflect on it, both from your story and your experience and some of the challenges, some of the highlights that you’ve had. And then I can respond and reflect on what was the teacher or the coach or the coworker thinking or feeling or reflecting on.
Aaron Lee (00:26:38) – And in doing that, we can begin to build bridges. And hopefully for you who are listening and watching, you can join us in this discussion and this dialogue so that you can participate for yourself. You can begin to see yourself in somewhere in my story or in Jim’s story, and our questions will begin to give you a way that you can see yourself in this, and that you can take your own next step on this journey of discovery.
Jim H. Lee (00:27:08) – Yeah. Think it’s powerful? Just again, highlight that there’s a lot of things being white that you did have to think to. And that’s okay. Like think what’s powerful is that when you choose to think through it, think that’s the same way for us as Asians or all minorities in a way like we are the minority voice and think it’s interesting for us to believe for us here in America, that we live in a grid that is set by the people, and our vote in our voice should matter. So if, let’s say we’re to vote on something and the majority wins, that we need to do what the majority wants on that vote.
Jim H. Lee (00:27:47) – And you might not like it, but that’s what the majority rules do. Likewise, that’s how our culture has been, that the power has been given to imagery that tends to make the decision in the way. And so we need to realize that that’s the culture we’re in. It’s part of our government. It’s part of how we want. Like if all the Asians outnumbered the other people, we decided one way, then we would want that thing. That’s just a natural part of the culture of our government that we live in. But yet think, what’s more powerful, Erin, is your choice to say, I have this option, I have this power. But I realized for me to be able to lead effectively and to live intentionally in this community, I have to defer that authority and responsibility. They have to hold their people, have ownership. That’s truly what think is this powerful about the communities that we have is that we can create communities that everybody wants to be a part of and has ownership.
Jim H. Lee (00:28:45) – Because we understand that people are a little bit more and that even though that most of the people would feel comfortable in just doing things the way we want to do it, that both sides have an opportunity to grow, both sides have opportunities to empower ourselves to do things a little bit differently and see opportunities that might not have existed only because we engaged in conversations with one another. And that’s what I hope we represent in a way that, you know, even though we do this for a living and we’re probably not the foremost experts on this topic, but we’ve put in our 10,000 hours. You know, I know, Aaron, you spent way too much time, not only just your own personal life, but in the past year and a half, when I challenged you on this topic to become more of an ally and the hours that you spent online with me to have these conversations, they exceed those thousand hours that most people have done. And so, you know, for the audience, that’s where we come from, realizing we’re the best.
Jim H. Lee (00:29:40) – But we’ve done this. We work intentionally for this. And this podcast wasn’t done on a whim. There was something that we’ve thought through. We talked, we encapsulated stories from the past year that we discussed and compared notes on our lives on. And as fathers ourselves, how are we want to do this and pass this on to the new generation? So thank you for that. Thank you so much to be willing to have this conversation.
Aaron Lee (00:30:02) – Well, and thanks for inviting me along. So as you think about where our next conversations come and and it won’t just be us, we’ll have conversations with other leaders of multiple different backgrounds and cultures. Not just Asian leaders, but Latino leaders and black leaders. And from all different stories. What’s your hope and your goal for this channel on the podcast?
Jim H. Lee (00:30:28) – Yeah, I think in order for us to really, truly be intentional as leaders is we can take a look at the people that might challenge us to do things differently, how, in fact, they actually make our lives better.
Jim H. Lee (00:30:42) – And so the more the diversity we have, the more challenges we face. Even though at the time may be very uncomfortable. And I understand sometimes some people’s foods, some people mannerisms, they’re all challenging. But I don’t think that’s just an ethnic issue. You know, I know a lot of people that are just Korean that can’t deal with, you know, a lot of people that just can’t deal with other coworkers that aren’t necessarily different ethnicities. But I think sometimes different cultures can help bring out the opportunities for better leaders and help highlight the areas that we have challenges, the things that we can improve upon so that we can learn to grow and become better leaders of the generations ahead of us, and also empower other people to bring their guests the table as well.
Aaron Lee (00:31:27) – I think my hope is there are so many stories around us in the world. They don’t just fit in nice, neat little boxes, but there is so much more that we can learn, we can discover. And as you said a little while ago, it’s not our hope to make us become something we’re not.
Aaron Lee (00:31:45) – But it’s simply to build a bridge to understand the stories that are different than ours. Understand why those stories might be different. And you mentioned food. There are a number of foods that I eat now that I didn’t eat growing up, and I am so thankful for that. And so our hope for each of you is that there is some part of your story and some part of someone else’s story that you will begin to hear. You will truly understand and seek to learn and know about. That’s not a story you would have heard or understood or asked questions about earlier in your career or in your life. So we invite you to join us on this journey. Come along with us, listen to these stories, and in some way begin to share your own story and your experience with the people around you. The people who matter most to you, the people you spend the most time with. Subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcasting platform at New Generation leader.fm, and join us on our next allyship episode.
Aaron Lee (00:32:54) – Thanks for listening.
Jay Smack, Voice of the Podcast (00:32:57) – Thanks for listening to the New Generation Leader podcast. Subscribe today on your podcasting platform, download the show notes and unlock your true leadership potential at new generation leader.fm. Thanks for listening today and we look forward to seeing you next time on the new Generation Leader podcast.