Featuring: Elaine Lin Hering

Elaine Lin Hering takes us on a journey that begins with dreaming of being a lawyer, taking some risks and writing her own escape hatch. Check out her journey line here and pick up a copy of Unlearning Silence here.

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Hello and welcome to Journey Lines. I'm your host Kim Minick and this is the podcast answering the question, how did they get there? With me today is Elaine Lynn Herring. Elaine, how are you? I'm good. I'm so thrilled to be here with you. It's herring. No like the fish. You got it right. You got it right. got it right the first time and then doubted myself. um Welcome, what's going on? That's a message for life right there. You got it. Wait, no, ah! constantly. That's the insight to the lemurs that run the theme park in my brain. um How are you today? Thank you for joining. I am thrilled to be here and I don't say that lightly, right? In a world where there's so much noise and so much movement to pause and reflect and ask that question, how did we get here? Genuinely. Like sometimes you look back and you're like, was that my life or a different person? I mean, I feel like you just summed up my life story right there. Well, before we dive in, let me ask you the very famous question at the top of the hour. What do you got going on personally, professionally, holistically? Give us a little preview. I need to figure out what to make for dinner. Ugh. What are you? to fit that in before my kids swim lessons and how to finish reviewing the contract that I just landed. the legal doc, you know, you're working with procurement instant pot, not product placement, not product placement, but it's this like, how do you get it all done while staying sane and doing the things that matter the most to you? So actually instant pot is a big. hack of how do I make semi-nutritious or like as nutritious of meals as I can make that my kid will eat while being hands-off. the pickiness of the kid? It depends, right? It depends what your metrics are. I grew up in a family where you ate whatever was put before you and you did not complain because you were just grateful. And so in comparison, my kid is very picky or has sensitivities. And we have come a long way. We eat chard, we eat Brussels sprouts, like very California kid. Mm-hmm. You know, I think it's actually a California thing. I grew up in Florida and thought kale was a plate decoration, and then I moved here, and now I crave kale. Yes, and as my spouse likes to remind me, it was not just a plate decoration. It was what decorated the salad buffet at like whatever the pizza at Pizza Ranch Ranch Pizza. OK. Totally, totally. my gosh. Well, I am so excited to dive into your journey line and distract from the impending chores and dinners. For our listeners, you can check it out in the link at the comment below, but start us off. I see we are starting off in college, Berkeley, go Bears. Go Bears! You have been California indoctrinated. Bay area indoctrinated. We went down to Berkeley to watch a water polo game. Go Bears. They were like in the, the women's team was in the championship. So I have been there. It's a gorgeous campus. I'm sure you enjoyed it. Tell me all about it. Did I enjoy college? That's a really good question. um I lived at home during college because it was the practical thing to do. I went to UC Berkeley because it was the local college. I didn't realize until later that it was a world-class institution. I remember first being introduced to Berkeley on a Saved by the Bell episode when I was like a chitlin because they were trying to get Jesse to go there and they called it the Stanford of the West. So funny, like it really is a very well known international university to be your college town. I'm sorry, this is, whatever it was, that was my bad. Yes, yes, yes. Thank you, appreciate that. rivalry runs deep. So on behalf of the Stanfordites out there, just wanted to clarify that Stanford is the Stanford of the West. Yeah, you know, it was just school. And at the time, in-state tuition was in-state tuition, meaning like, I don't know, $3,000 a semester or a year. was amazing. And so was a way to graduate. without debt because you can make $3,000 in a semester working part-time. I also knew that I wanted to go to law school. was one of those precocious kids who said when I was 11, I want to be a lawyer. And so the strategy was go in state public institution for undergrad, save money for law school. And I grew up in the Bay area around Berkeley. And so my life was still in San Francisco, in Walnut Creek, sort of in the surrounding areas. I did not have a classic college experience. It wasn't until I went to law school that I lived in the dorms, you know, sort of staying up late, ordering pizza. I have a friend, Cami Crockenberg, who added unofficially an umlaut to her name in order to recognize and observe the first time that I ever ordered pizza by phone, because, you know, apps didn't exist yet. So that. Yeah, that's real friendship. College was sort of this weird time of feeling really adult and yet not realizing how much life was still ahead of me. Yeah. And did you have like maybe a group of friends that were going through a similar experience, grew up here, went to... No. No, I was the odd person out, right? Like you have friends who even if they're coming from different parts of California are living their college experience, gaining your freshman 15 by living in the dorms and eating dorm food, staying up late at night, know, like doing all these activities. And I was mentoring junior high people. I was part of a board of the girls chorus that I grew up in. So I was fundraising. I was teaching piano to pay for college. We had family dynamics going on. was, I mean, it was a weighty time for the time. And now I look back and I was like, oh, I trade life now for that because it was way simpler. And I think you sort of get what you get in the different seasons of your life. So I've come to say, well, that was my college experience. And it doesn't much like the rest of life look like anyone else's and that's okay. Because it was mine. Oh, I love that. What does a pre-law sort of call it? Like, what was your degree? I, too, was the precocious kid. I printed out a Yellow Pages ad from the phone book and pasted my photo onto the lawyer and did like, uh this will be my law firm when I grow up. Wow. So I'm curious, I did not go that route whatsoever, but I'm curious, like what did that path look like for you? What was your degree? Yeah, I studied both political science and music. So my degrees are I did a dual degree sort of accidentally. I grew up singing uh in this course that I was later fundraising for and doing, you know, teaching classical piano um and was doing the music minor. And if you took one more class, you could declare the major and get free lessons, free quote unquote. because it was involved in tuition, but um I declare I was a vocal performance major in college as well as a political science major. And the political science was the pre-law route, but it was maybe an immigrant mentality of like, the most bang for your buck. If I can get two degrees out of this and some free music lessons, why not? Why not? How cool. I'm just thinking of worlds where those two things could collide, and I'm sure it exists. know, what has been really fun is that there are a lot of lawyer or like right brain heavy analytical paired with music. So as I have journeyed, I have met other people who are in med school, but did music, who did law school, did music. Um, and that's just an interesting observation. I'm sure there's research about it, but there's something about that balance. And my experience was. Well, both departments have very distinct personalities and people who are very into their thing. And I was never enough of a musical nerd, right? Like the people who can pick out the theme of a song and then transcribe it and then jazzify it, like that was not my skill set. And so I knew I wasn't gonna do music professionally. that the cards weren't there for me to do it, but it was this lovely part of my life that really exposed me to cross-cultural interactions. You have a choir or chorus assembling. My 21st birthday was in Sao Paulo, Brazil, singing the Bach Saint Matthew Passion with a group of musicians from all over the United States because they wanted to premiere it. We had just sung it. Yeah. Like when else in your life do you have that experience also of people of all different backgrounds coming together for a common purpose and having to work together? Right. That actually has served me really well in life and is one of those things that I wouldn't have anticipated when I was a five-year-old being like, I like to sing or, let me play music. Yeah. shout out to that. How cool. But you eventually, like you said, you decide music is not what I will do professionally. I'm assuming from your journey line you do graduate from Berkeley and you literally go up to let's be a lawyer. Okay, I'm in. I mean, yes, let's be a lawyer. took the, what is it called? The LSAT? That must've been the exam and thought, let me apply. Let me just shoot for the stars because my numbers seem like I've got a shot. And I remember getting the notice when I was interning at a local law firm. that I had been accepted to Harvard Law School. So off we go, of living the dream. interning at a law firm before... Let's be clear, I was doing like filing. But still, I think that is quite, that's probably an attractive addition in a law school application. who knows what is attractive in a law school application, let's be honest. And of course, it's been decades now. But I, yeah, you know, I was living the dream that I had from when I was 11, although I go to law school and I figure out what it actually means to be a lawyer. well, I found myself a summer associate at a big law firm, as you do, um working 13 hour days staring at a screen. all day, not interacting with any other human beings and it was sort of deadening to my soul. In contrast, as a law student, I came across getting to yes, classic negotiation, interest-based negotiation theory and pedagogy. uh This idea that you can talk about things, that emotions matter in our data and light bulb moment, mind blown emoji, because that's not what I learned in my family of origin or growing up. I grew up very much in a... Let's sweep any issues under the rug and then things are fine because on the surface they're fine. If we just ignore it, it'll go away. Yeah, that doesn't work. fine. Yes. Yes. So then I learned this very extensive lesson in law school that you can actually talk about things. who says college can't teach you anything? oh I don't know what college taught me, but law school taught me something. And sent me down a path of professional and personal inquiry, really of, wait, we can talk about things. What does that look like? How do you do that? So I became a teaching assistant in the executive education program, teaching negotiation skills to execs that flew in from around the world because they all wanted to get their certificate from Harvard Law School. And so I was doing that in parallel over the summer between my first and second year of law school. And it was another 13 hour day, but it was invigorating and exhausting. And so I had this moment of, oh, I wonder if you can do this full time and get paid for it, which and executive learning and. apparently, you know, there's the thing called leadership development and corporate education. And that was not something I knew of as a career option. And also looking around in here and people say, well, you can't actually do that unless you have a head of gray hair or are an older white man or have 10 years of experience. And so I sort of resigned myself upon graduating law school. Okay, let me go to the law firm. I'll move back to California to be close to family. I'll teach adjunct at the Berkeley School of Law because I have a connection there. I'll continue to keep one foot in this facilitation leadership development world, and then I'll figure it out. So you go through Harvard Law, you graduate, you are holding multiple roles, and then you land a job, continue teaching on this side, so you're continuing to kind of live life in these two worlds. line goes to the bottom and says, are you throwing your life away? Are you throwing your life away? Because I never made it to the law firm. While I was studying to take the bar over the summer, I checked my email one day and I had an email from a firm in Australia that said you're shortlisted for this job in Australia teaching negotiation and mediation at Monash Law School and to do consulting work in the Asia Pac region. Are you interested? I'm on the plane already. Like, are you kidding me? Yeah, so it's like, well, yeah, I'm interested. And how do I make that happen? And so I negotiated with the law firm that I was supposed to join saying, you you let people defer all the time for clerkships. I have this opportunity. Let me defer my offer for a year to go test a couple of hypotheses because I had the hypothesis that I might be good at this, that I might like it, and that I might be able to make a living off of it. But I've only done that in theory because no one's hired me yet and I haven't had the opportunity to do it broadly. Which involves some difficult conversations with my mother who said, you've graduated from Harvard Law School. You have this incredible, secure, safe job at a big law firm that pays more money than we've ever made in our lives per year. How could you throw it away? I that's a, I think you mentioned you came from an immigrant family or that is a valid question. valid question and it's all a little bit of a blur because I was studying for the bar and I was flying to Ireland to do this conflict management facilitation and negotiating this conversation with Australia on Skype because Zoom didn't exist yet. Ah, RIP Skype. Yeah, I know. It was good for the time. And there were some difficult conversations like, look, I don't think I'm throwing my life away. I think I'm taking a calculated risk because the job in Australia is full time with benefits with housing with like, retirement stuff, right? It actually seems responsible. And it's a little bit of, me get it out of my system, right? I'm testing a hypothesis and it's a one-year contract. So if it doesn't turn out to be anything that I really want to do, I'm just going to come back and sort of get back on track. I'll go back to the law firm, right? Like. like the professional version of a gap year. Like, I'm just gonna go explore this opportunity. I love that you're calling it an experiment. I love that you're like, it's a calculated risk, but like, let me try. I love that approach. It's English speaking, even though as I was there, I learned that we speak slightly different versions of English. uh Why not? Totally. I mean, it was such a lovely, special time, especially going from the intensity of Cambridge, Massachusetts and that Harvard law school world or sort of the northeastern corridor, right? New York, Boston, DC. There's an intensity there in these circles that Melbourne, Australia was a beautiful reprieve from, right? Where it's like, let's actually sit and have a coffee. Let's not work crazy hours. What a novel, and let's have friendships and relationships. What a novel idea. What a novel. Before we dive into that reprieve, I'm curious, like, how did you get your family on board? How did you, like, or was it just like, uh maybe you're not fully on board, bye. I mean, I think it felt more like the second, like the, you know, I'm making this decision. I'm in my twenties at this point. And I feel like I can afford to make this decision because I've got a Harvard Law degree under my belt and an open job at a reputable law firm that I can go back to. I mean, backup plan. Right? I mean, it's like, we'll talk about risk. It doesn't feel that big of a risk to me. I think there was some shock because they were expecting me to come back and live nearby and marry someone nice that they approved of. Like that was the next phase of life that they were anticipating versus, ooh, a 17,000 mile detour. And an ongoing conversation that shows up. a decade or two later of I can afford to take these risks because of the sacrifices you made. I'm starting at a different place than you have been existing in. And it feels like the way I honor the sacrifices you made are to actually swing at some of these big things. Number one, that the opportunity is even there. Number two, that I might be able to take advantage of it knowing that I've got a pretty strong BATNA, right? Backup plan. If this whole Australia consulting thing doesn't work out. And that's because we're generationally at a different place. I stand on your shoulders. I think I needed to hear that. So you take the big swing, you run the experiment, and you head to Australia. You get this reprieve in Melbourne. How was it? ah I mean, truly amazing. Yeah, I'm just like flashing back, right? Enjoy the memories. It was such a special time. It was so refreshing to get out of that Ivy League law bubble. And I had such wonderful friends and being relatively young and single at the time and being sort of sent out to teach all over Australia and New Zealand. I mean, it's like built in traveling. Right? So I'd fly to Perth and teach for a day, working with a client and then go explore or go to New Zealand and then like borrow a bike and bike and climb during the middle of a thunderstorm, which looking back doesn't seem all that responsible, but at the time was amazing. Was truly, truly amazing. It was also, if we look at their journey line, there's a simultaneous dip of I found out while I was in Australia that I did not pass the California bar exam. Bummer, understandably a low point, but not unheard of to not pass it your first time. I mean, totally not unheard of. I think there's... Yeah, yeah, devastating and I have to like do this again and I put so much energy. Also, if we think back about that time when I was studying, it's, you know, I was flying to Ireland and talking about the Australia opportunity and like maybe my complete focus wasn't there. And it's something I look back on now with gratitude, think, especially going to Harvard Law School. There are actually quite a few of us who did not pass. I mean, in the Harvard Law School world, but also broadly, like this happens to plenty of people, not because you're not smart, not because you're not capable, whatever the different circumstances. And I remember there was one other person from my Harvard Law School class that I knew of who somehow I found out that she also didn't pass. And some of it was she had been dealing with a tragedy in her family at the time. And my being able to reach out and say, hey, you and me both, me too. Same, right? Like me too. And let's regroup and get ready to do it again. And we both passed, right? She is actually a practicing attorney now. I never ended up going down that route. It wasn't until... Gosh, sometime last year that I was reminded when I was seeing other people's anxiety about bar exam results that I even remembered that I didn't pass. Right, it's such a non-issue now that I am very adamant about sharing the story because in the moment it... does feel devastating. It feels odd. It feels alienating. There is shame involved. is a, you should be able to do this or you spent so much time to do this. I don't want to tell my future employer, will people not let me work? You know, all these things, are real consequences at the time. And now with the benefit of distance and time, it's such a non-issue. Such hindsight, what a gif. Yes, and there's an in-group aspect to being able to say it genuinely will be okay. Genuinely. even though it doesn't feel like it in the moment. So you regroup, you pass the bar, congratulations. I'm assuming in the state of California. Okay. When do you come back from Australia? Did you took the bar after you came back from Australia? flew back mid-year. So this is part of my like comp package with Australia that they would pay for one flight back to see my family. And so I saw my family and took the bar exam. Check. Again, efficiency of resources. Absolutely. I'm here for that approach. found out at some point, I think if you take it in February, you find out a couple months later. Y'all, Scantrons exist? I just, that seems... Come on! There's a written component to in the defense. I know, I know, I know, I know. um Well, at that point, Australia was asking me to stay on. And I was saying, you know, I really like the work and I so appreciate the experience I've gotten here. And I'm in my mid 20s. I was young, right? and held up as the expert from Harvard. And I want to be surrounded by people who are more experienced than I am, rather than always being the one who is doing the mentoring. And That's a real, in my 20s, I was like, I'll be the expert, sure. Like, let me, I didn't have that, like, and I learned a little bit later, like, gosh, it is nice to be surrounded by knowledge of more than yours so you can learn and grow. But I was slow on the uptake. Amazing that you came to that realization and also like understood that your previous choices kind of influenced you more to be the expert. being literally on the other side of the world also helps with the sense of isolation, right? When across, it's a tricky time zone to be in touch with people in the States from Australia. um So I talked with a former mentor of mine saying, I really love this work, but I want to come back Stateside. I don't see any clear paths and... she said, we're actually looking to hire someone. um Would you be interested? And so I had a couple of, I had a couple more Skype conversations. Now I'm realizing how important Skype was to all of this with the other business partners of the firm. And they made me an offer and I still did not move back to California, moved back to Boston and joined that firm. founded by colleagues out of the Harvard negotiation project and spent what ended up being 12 years there. um The first five or so in Boston and then because we'd always been a global firm, I moved. The deal was come to Cambridge, spend at least three years with us learning the ropes and then you can move anywhere you want, presumably back to California to be closer to your family. So mom finally gets her wish. You and benefit to the company because we'd been working globally, but everybody was actually East Coast based. So it cuts the trip to Asia down significantly better serve our West Coast clients. So then in 2015, I moved back to California become air quotes our West Coast office, which is me moving working out of our 400 square foot apartment in San Francisco. my goodness. So this is the dream job on your journey line. That's what we are. this leadership development, facilitation work around communication and conflict management. You're working with the people who are held up as the foremost experts in the world who wrote the books on how to have difficult conversations. um Working with clients around the world across industries and really just getting reps in. Yeah. of what is it like to facilitate a room? What is it like to have someone years, decades older than you challenge you or insult you or doubt you or, you know, sort of the hazing of it. Not that I wish it upon anyone else, but I often think these days when I'm in a room, part of why you're paying me the fees that you pay me is because no matter what, I'm going to make you, the organizer, look good. I'm gonna make the event look good. I'm gonna be able to find the nice bow to tie it all together. That if you are pissed at me, I can hold it and model constructive behavior and find the teaching moment. But all of those skills and abilities came from lots of dark conference rooms without windows. You know, like, yes, yes, layover flights that got snowed out. We got the reps in. a great way to learn how to navigate so many different cultures. Like even if you are, you might be delivering the same training, but not exactly, because people will respond and act differently. uh The world of development. So you're there, you, I don't want to spoil the surprise, but you make partner, hey. I make partner after eight years as promised and anticipated. Nice, sick. How is, quick check in on the family. How are they feeling now after these um risks? And I mean, now you've made partner. years out. I think they have come around, I mean, the proof is in the pudding, right? Like, oh, you seem to be able to pay your bills. Yeah, you haven't thrown your life away. Like you seem to be, so yeah, I think at this point they've come around to say, all right, you're not practicing law, but you also wouldn't have gotten into this work, but for going to Harvard Law School and meeting these people and being exposed to these networks and all of these things, the Australia opportunity came through a Harvard connection. as well. So the, and you've, you've made it, right? I became the first non-white partner in this global leadership development firm. I learned a lot in that, including what I would do differently next time. Right? Like if you're going to engage in any business partnership, do you and the people that you're engaging business partnership with have the same understanding of what it means to be a partner? of the expectations of how things are going to run. um And I was, I'd say I was, I was naive and I was sort of bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, my gosh, I've made it surrounded by people who said all the right things. And if I were to go back, I would have clarified more. So what does this actually mean? Because that all came to play out afterwards. so many times my excitement has papered over or made assumptions for me and it it'll bite ya it'll bite ya bite it and also to really look at, I don't think our assumptions are unfounded, right? They're based on representations that people have made. They're based on patterns that we've seen. They're based on, and then there's the level of assuming that because things have worked a certain way for other people that they might work that way for you. Again, I don't think it's ungrounded, but they are assumptions for us all to check. So that was a really valuable learning experience, shall we say. Mmm. And so eventually you leave the firm, kind of uh, chutes and ladders. We're going on a chute a little bit downward. What... what went into that part of your life? Mmm. I think especially these days we can look at organizations and what they say they value and then whether they continue to represent those values as their values and also to look at what do their actions actually convey about their values and really what it is. Do your actions match your words? Because whatever you say is not nearly as true as what you do. And for anyone thinking about any organization, right, startup, Fortune 500, established, whatever it is, even your co-founder, what do you actually want to build? And how do our actions either align or not align with that? And I was in a situation where there were a lot of things said that seemed like the right things to say. And yet my pushing for change, for equity, for different policies moved much slower than I would have anticipated given what people said they cared about. And I... found myself sort of waiting my turn or implicitly being told wait my turn and then deciding actually if I'm sitting around waiting for my turn, it seems like I'm going to wait a really long time and it's not moving. It's going backwards. It's going backwards. like when you're in the grocery store, you're like, everyone else's line is moving. Yeah. Yeah, and am I going to actually look at reality or I'm going to hang on to the version that I want to believe is there because I want to give people the benefit of the doubt and I've been told to give people the benefit of the doubt. I've been told to assume positive intent, but I can't reconcile the cognitive dissonance and I can't recognize reconcile the hives on my bodies and the hair falling out with the situation I'm in. And there was a point in time, especially when my body started to pro protest revolt revolt is actually about a Yes, revolt that I said I'm taking three months of alcohol to draw a line in the sand for inequitable distribution of work and things that we've said are going to change that have not changed. at this point for years and in that time finished working on a book proposal for this book that I had wanted to write that I felt was long overdue. um And that ended up being part of the escape hatch of why I could land on my feet when the time my time at the firm ended. The escape hatch. Oh, I love it. Tell me the title of your escape hatch. that title is so... I love that. That's a rebranding right there. The title of my escape hatch is Unlearning Silence. That was always the idea. We workshopped Ward Smith, the subtitle a lot. And finally, in conjunction with my publisher Penguin, landed on Unlearning Silence, how to speak your mind, unleash talent, and live more fully. But the premise being, I spent all this time teaching people, facilitating leadership development experiences on how to negotiate, how to have difficult conversations, how to give and receive feedback, and noticed that there were still some people who wouldn't negotiate, wouldn't have the difficult conversations, wouldn't give... Kim, this is an intervention. And why is that? Right, despite these tools and frameworks out of the Harvard negotiation project that are touted as the authoritative definitive way to do it, why don't some people do it? It's uncomfortable, it's annoying. Does it really matter? yes, and where does the discomfort, the annoyance and it not mattering come from? It comes from, I would argue, silence. The silence we've learned about whether my needs, goals, hopes and concerns matter, about what my efforts to push for change matter. By the way, we're not making it up. because other people have silenced and continue to silence us such that even if we speak up, it does not matter because I'm going to silence you. So if we really want to unleash talent, we need to solve for silence. And it does not mean woman, person of color, whatever it is, you need to go fix yourself, right? It gets misdiagnosed as you need more confidence, you need more courage, you need more assertiveness, but not too much. And remember to smile. It gets misdiagnosed. And I was fed up with it being misdiagnosed and regurgitating what other people had fed to me, which is some version of go fix yourself and then maybe we'll talk, maybe we'll respect you, maybe we'll honor your dignity as a human being. And really saying, no, I think we've gotten this whole thing wrong. It's not about speaking up more, better, clearer, louder. It's about solving for silence, unlearning the silence that I might have picked up along the way, which I will own. did. youngest daughter, immigrant family, you do not ask questions, children are supposed to be seen and not heard, right? I will own that and I'm not making it up because as much as the people around me, my well-intentioned colleagues might say, we love you, we support you, we're for you, your actions do not actually send that same message. Your actions do not allow me to work, to push this work forward. So hence the book came together of just how can we unlearn the silence we've learned, really own that. How do well intentioned leaders stop silencing the very people they mostly genuinely want to support? Hence the how do you unleash someone's talent, stop silencing them. And then in what ways is silence baked into the policies and practices that are the backdrop, right, that impact all of us. So six months before I... write the book proposal, find an agent, my agent shops it. It was very much this self doubt, you you're trying to the chatter in our head that makes us doubt ourselves. was, you know what? People like me, Asian American female, don't often get book deals from traditional publishers. But what do I have to lose? Let me Hamilton style shoot my shot. Yeah, shoot your shot. um My agent goes out ah and these calendar invites start popping up on my Google calendar. And I ping my agent, Rachel, being like, what are these? She's like, you know, if publishers are interested, they want to meet with you, kick the tires, I think was the phrase she used, like figure out, do you know what you're actually talking about? Because it turns out there's plenty of people who don't actually write their own books. They hire ghostwriters. And so it's like, do you actually know your stuff or AI, right? um They want to know how well you take feedback because there's going to be feedback involved in this process. And so I had a couple of those conversations and then more calendar invites kept coming up. And at some point in that process, the tone changed where one of the imprints, so there's the publisher and then they have different imprints because conglomerates. essentially sent me a pitch deck saying like, we'd love to publish Unlearning Silence. Here's how we market it along Simon Sinek and Adam Grant. like, I was like, this is not how these things are supposed to go. These are great shifts in tone! great shifts in tone. Ended up meeting with 16 publishers. m Ended up getting a preempt offer, which is when they offer you a lot of money to try to take the submission off the market so other people can't bid at it. And I said to Rachel, I think we say no. I think we say no to this because there's so much other interest. And then we ended up running a two day auction for global rights, um ending up selling them to Penguin Random House, I went with Penguin Life, whose the imprint is one big idea to change the world, which Unlearning Silence felt like that. You it's not strictly a business book, it's not strictly a self-help book, because silence is both personal and professional and societal and politicized. And so then we had a pub date, publication date of March 2024, fall 2023. I am in mediation with my former business partners. My time at the firm ends. So I've got six months before the book launches and overnight I find myself a solopreneur. Ooh, forced solopreneur life. I am familiar. It's fun, isn't it? Do we see the facial expression here communicating all the nuance to that statement? is sometimes, sometimes baby birds gotta get kicked out of the nest. And, ooh, I felt that kick. Okay, so this is my thing of yes, baby birds may need to be kicked out, but how it happens? I don't disagree that my time at the firm had ended. Some might say I had outgrown it. Some might have say we were not values aligned. There's lots of different storylines there. And so I do not disagree with the outcome. I disagree with how it happened, right? So often this happens with layoffs or with endings. How do we end well with dignity, with acknowledgement that we are human beings, with real lives and real hearts? very much, I believe it's the Maya Angelou quote, like people won't remember what you said, but they'll remember how you made them feel. That is, especially when we're talking separation from an employer, like that is a life altering event, or it can be. in circumstance and in also how much therapy you need afterwards to regain a sense of self. How much I'm debating whether to use trauma because that word can be overused and clinical, also really how traumatic an experience it is. Right? in life and like that employment relationship can be a loss and it can, there can be some trauma involved. took, I had a rough separation with one of my employers and it took a lot of therapy and about six months before I could even think about going back into the workplace because of how my role operates. Mm-hmm. I'm sorry you experienced that. And how'd you land? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good thing you had a distraction. Maybe a little field of the fire in there too. I mean, it just was like survival, right? I'm, I am now betting and this is where my mom comes back into the story where she's like, even as we were negotiating the separation, she's like, you're really banking on this book. I was like, yeah, I am. It is calculated risk because I've seen what is held up as best practice. um by industries around these skill sets. And I see what's missing from this. Penguin has chosen to bet on it. That's a vote of confidence. It's a big vote of confidence. Penguin for the US edition and then nine or 10 translations in, I'm looking at the Portuguese, the Thai, the Spanish translations that are now on my desk and the South Korean, the Korean cover that I just approved. It's really cool and mind boggling, right? That I am someone who... for much of my life did not believe that I had a voice. Even this dream job that I had, that dream job was not actually about me having a voice, getting to exercise my voice. It was about getting to do a thing that I thought I might be good at, but that thing was actually amplifying someone else's voice, sharing someone else's ideas rather than learning to have my own. And so there's a ton of not self doubt, but just learning and growing in this of, you know, the first time I listened to my gut and didn't consult other people and sort of solve for what they, I thought they wanted of me was actually selecting a publisher. I knew I wanted to go with Penguin Random House. There were four publishing imprints within Penguin who had made offers on my book. The money was the same because it was all going to roll up to PRH, but it was really a question of which team do I want to work with? And publishing is really homogenous and hit some issues with that. But that step of going with my gut, publishing with Penguin Random House is a decision that I will hold onto and remember probably forever because it is literally the first time that I wasn't listening to what other people wanted. It was just, right, I'm gonna make this decision, I'm gonna own it, we'll see where it goes, and we'll figure it out from there. And from there, I'll use the words on your journey line, craft a new life. How's it going? You know, it's on the upper half of this dirty line. on the up and up. Quoting Halis again, on the up and up again. Really, I just want my life to be a Hamilton musical. Same. If Lin-Manuel Miranda could just like write my life, that would be, give it a little styling. with the original cast, because it's just a special place. You know, the new life is good. The new life is not easy in that existing as a human being in this world right now is not easy. But a neighbor of mine asked the other day, know, Elaine, now you're like all in on the book. You're so you're you're solo. Do you ever feel lonely? And my response was, no, I actually feel more connected than I ever did. And I have more people that I can text or call in an SOS, like help moment that I know would have my back or hear me out or show up in a helpful way than in many other parts or in seasons of my life. I mean, talk about richness. Like how amazing is that? It has also taken a redefinition of team. If you don't have other people on an org chart around you, who is your team? And to me, team is anyone who can nudge you in the way that you want to go. The people who are aligned with your values, share some of those values, or who you aspire to, right? Who are the people in your feed? Those are the voices that influence you. That is part of my team. I mean, there's so many people who I've never met, may never have the good fortune to meet, who are literally part of my team who keep me going of, know, Elaine, a different world is possible. One in which people's voices and humanity matter is possible. And so I'm gonna continue to build toward that. I love it. I love the thought, and this is something I practice as a fellow solopreneur, building your community and figuring out who your chosen colleagues are. How nice that across the globe, I work with people that are experts, that will give me tough feedback, that will be generous with knowledge. You don't have to limit yourself to the people on the org chart, and I am, ooh. Well, Elaine, as we look ahead, we're done with your journey line. What are you looking towards? What are you hoping is next? Hmm, I am hoping that the world There's a long pause, because you've, it sounds like given me license to dream. And so I'm just going to name it without the voices in my head doing color commentary. ah When I wrote the book, the aim was always that people who had been silenced would feel seen, known and heard. And no, it wasn't them, right? It's not because you're lacking or you're deficient, you're not confident enough. It's because there's this thing called silence that has impacted all of us and has some really negative impacts. And the book was also for well-intentioned leaders, how do you close that gap between how you say you want to show up and how you're actually showing up? I'd argue that in the first half of 2025, more people are now talking about silence, right? That silence is shocking, that the silence is the thing that is most deafening at this point in time. It is what allows things that maybe people don't believe in to happen. I never wanted the world to talk about silence like that. I wish there was less damage involved in it. ah But what I am building towards and dreaming of is the unlearning silence, right? Each of us using our own voices and voices being not just the words that we say or don't say in a meeting, but how we move through the world that we... unlearn what has silenced the things that matter to us, the parts of ourselves that have not been deemed acceptable in certain spaces, and we own them and build lives full of meaning and impact, lives that we want to live, and that we stop silencing each other, because in doing so we're missing out on all of the incredible potential and talent and gifts and skills and heart that we need, frankly, to figure out a different way forward. So my work is encouraging and nourishing people with this vision of a different way, while also equipping leaders and teams to stop silencing. And that's where my work is focused in leadership development. You want to unleash the talent on your team, stop silencing people. Like it's not that complicated. Or if it is that complicated, have them give you a call. um Amazing. I will also link your book down in the comments so folks can go grab a copy. Highly recommend it. um Anything else? I still don't know how to end these. Anything else? Well, I think that's the thing about a journey, right? The thing about a journey is that it is ongoing and there's no nice, neat bow and simply just the next step in the next chapter. So thanks for sharing the journey up till now and on to the next adventure. Well, I appreciate this chapter and I will see everyone for the next one. Thank you so much, Elaine. Thanks again.