Liza Adams

As a petite woman of Asian descent named Liza Adams, living in Denver, working as a marketing executive in Silicon Valley, with an Electrical Engineering background, a mother of two, an immigrant with an American accent, I’ve seen my share of unconscious bias throughout my career.

My list of examples is long, as many of yours likely are as well. Regardless of our gender, skin color, name, age, disability, physical stature, schools attended, country of birth, marital and parental status, etc., we all encounter unconscious bias. In fact, we all have unconscious bias because we have a functional brain. It helps us protect ourselves, find our tribe, and make decisions quickly. It’s our reflexive reaction to some basic inputs and we don’t realize that we’re doing it.

It’s one thing to be aware of unconscious bias – from others as well as our own – but it’s a whole other dimension to think proactively, plan, and execute to overcome that bias.

We have to be deliberate to show/believe something contrary to the initial evidence or leverage a bias to achieve what we want. It’s important to manage unconscious bias as it can have dramatic impacts on diversity and inclusion, employee recruiting and retention, career path and growth, innovation, brand, customer relations, morale and culture, financial performance, and so much more. Many articles, like these CIPHR and Forbes articles, discuss these benefits and what companies can do to minimize unconscious bias.

I’ve written this article to share examples of unconscious bias I’ve encountered and tidbits for how we, as individuals and employees, can recognize and proactively address them to minimize the impact or reinforce the bias.

Comedic, Surprising, and Run-of-the-Mill Examples

It’s been quite comical at times as I’ve navigated the range of unconscious bias, from “You must not be technical because you’re in Marketing” to “You’re Asian, so you must be technical.” Go figure.

Some people who have not met me but know my name, have said, “Oh, I envisioned a tall, Caucasian woman before I met you.” Even in my country of birth, the Philippines, when I conducted a workshop (in the late 90s) for a group of product managers and marketers, I heard whispers in Filipino (which I understand and speak) as I entered the room: “I thought Ms. Adams is American with US-based knowledge and experience. I didn’t realize we were getting a local.” The implication was that the workshop would not be as valuable to them because the goal was to learn from what worked and what didn’t work in the US.

Then there’s the physical bias. One of my former colleagues, who is well over a foot taller than me, and I were speaking with a client at a tradeshow (standing, not sitting). The client made eye contact with my colleague most of the time, even though I was the one answering his questions. There’s also the classic, “You’re so little.” Not exactly the presence I want to project going into a challenging alignment meeting or tense negotiation process.

And of course, I’ve experienced the unconscious gender bias that is all too familiar to so many women, particularly in male dominated industries like technology: automatically assumed to be the executive assistant, a junior employee, or not as knowledgeable or credible.

Ways to Overcome and Harness Unconscious Bias

I’ve outlined five ways to overcome or harness unconscious bias below.

The great news for us is that we live in a digital world with a lot of ways to build our personal brand. It’s not just in how we’re seen and perceived in person. It’s also how we portray ourselves digitally.

In today’s digital world, we can better control our brand and minimize the bias.

Also remember that we can’t underestimate the power of our human network—the people who know us beyond the superficial—in managing bias.

Our reputation precedes us. It is the result of what we do, what we say, and what other people say about us on and offline. If we take care of our human network, it will take care of us.

1. Be Aware of Our Own Biases and Choose to be Kind

One of my favorite quotes is Mahatma Gandhi’s “Be the change that you wish to see in the world.” Change starts with you and me, us. When we’re meeting people for the first time, let’s try letting our guard down when we sense unconscious bias creeping in, feeling the need to protect ourselves from someone who has a certain “look” or “demeanor.”

Although we can’t control the filters that others choose when they look at us, we can control the filters that we use on others. When we break down our biases, we have a better shot at helping others break down theirs.

When we allow ourselves to not fear and look at people as equals, we free ourselves to consider differing points of view, debate openly, collaborate and solve problems together, and innovate better than we ever had before. Moreover, it allows us to lead generously–abundantly giving ourselves so that others may be and do their best.

2. Give Voice to Who We Are and Our Passions

In the business world, when someone asks, “Tell me about yourself,” I bet many, including myself, are guilty of sounding like a resume or a traditional LinkedIn profile. On rare occasions, we might divulge our hometown, how many kids we have, and a couple of hobbies. We almost feel uncomfortable telling people something personal about us, fearing that they might not be interested or that we might have to contend with a different set of biases.

All valid concerns. But ironically, the most successful teams in which I’ve been blessed to be a part are those where we had insights into what each other was all about, beyond what could be seen. We knew a little bit about each other’s life story and journey, families, hobbies, and passions that influence who we are today. We learned to leverage each other’s perspectives, experience, strengths, and differences in our work. And we figured out how to best work (and have fun) together. Note, while this strategy can be effective in places like the US, use it with caution in cultures where the long-seeded norm is to keep business and personal lives separate.

It’s a process. I’m not suggesting that we be an open book. It’s a fine line between sharing enough and too much. Why not start with our LinkedIn profiles? I don’t have the best LinkedIn profile by any stretch of the imagination but you’ll see facets of Liza Adams’ personal side in the summary, volunteer experience, and articles I’ve written. In the office, personalize our workspaces with photos and things that energize us.

The things we do and are passionate about in our personal lives depict competitiveness, drive, fun, balance, courage, generosity, strength, and more. They create conversation starters and common threads to build relationships. Let it be known and get in front of the bias.

3. Share Our Knowledge and Engage with Others

Have you ever had a job title that didn’t exactly reflect what you do and what you do best? Marketing Manager? Business Analyst? Director of Strategy? Chief of Staff? Project Manager? The list of all-encompassing and ambiguous job titles goes on. Everyone has their own bias about roles and titles. People may unintentionally box us into a role that isn’t right for us. So we end up with a mismatch in expectations, not an ideal situation in our careers.

We have an opportunity to proactively change the perception and build credibility in our areas of interest. Pick key topics then write articles and blogs, create a podcast, do a webcast, etc. with the intent to share and be helpful. Then post and tweet. Include in our LinkedIn profiles and other sites work that we’ve done that showcases our expertise (e.g., SlideShare, thought leadership white papers, video testimonials, etc.)

Actively engage with others as they consume our content. Consume other people’s content. Like, comment, share, retweet, and follow. Build and engage regularly with the network. In a meeting or on a call, say something. Then walk the talk.

4. Build Initial Credibility Non-Visually

Have you ever watched the singing contest on TV called The Voice? The show is known for its blind auditions where the judges have their backs turned to the contestant singing. It’s a perfect example of minimizing unconscious bias. The contestants are being judged primarily based on their voice and singing ability. Also take a look at this article on how blind auditions help orchestras to eliminate gender bias.

Increasingly, we will make our first impressions digitally. Prior to meetings and events, people often search online about the person they will be meeting. If we do a good job with our brand digitally (like using some of the approaches mentioned above), then that helps manage the bias. Furthermore, if we know that there might be an unconscious bias based on how we look, then a face-to-face meeting may not be the best way to make an initial impression.

Instead, meet initially via an audio call. When we meet with them next time in person, the impact of any unconscious bias would be much less because of the credibility built from the call. Although it may seem counter-intuitive to prefer an audio call over an in-person meeting, sometimes, it actually works in our favor to save face-to-face for later in the process.

5. Harness the Bias to Support Our Cause

While unconscious bias might be annoying at times, we can learn to embrace it when it accurately reflects who we are and/or helps advance our cause. Unconscious bias isn’t always bad. There are inherent strengths and goodness in bias. Even the element of shock or pleasant surprises in reversing a traditional belief can be goodness and, occasionally, entertaining.

Imagine being the only woman or person of color in a room full of executives. Bias abounds in peoples’ heads, words, and actions. Own this opportunity to stand out even more with provocative insights, probing questions, and resolve to align towards a new way of thinking among traditionalists. Use the bias as a platform.

Some people purposely use their initials or gender-neutral nicknames like Pat, Chris, Alex, Val, Drew, and Sam to minimize gender bias. We’d like to believe that it’s a meritocracy from Day 1 but, sometimes, it is what it takes to get in the door and get a fair shot. As an example, anticipating that the target audience of young boys might not want to read a book written by a woman, J. K. Rowling’s publishers asked that she use two initials rather than her full name. Similarly, my husband who’s a published author of science fiction novels for young adults (YA) uses M. L. Adams because the majority of YA science fiction authors were female when he started writing. Plus he feels that Mike Adams is the most boring name for an author. I agree.

On the other hand, making the gender obvious might bode well in situations like in companies highlighting the hiring of a female C-level executive. Welcome Patricia Reyes, not Pat Reyes. In communicating how her experience and expertise create advantages for the business, it also shows diversity at the C level, inspires other women and minorities, and promotes a culture of diversity and inclusion.

There’s pride and joy in reinforcing certain biases like the cultural traits of countries and companies, as well as academic reputation of schools. For example, Germany is known for engineering, Japan is known for quality, and Italy is known for craftsmanship. Some companies are recognized for great corporate cultures and some universities are known for being skilled at preparing students for the workplace. If and when appropriate, let’s use these to our advantage.

Lastly, our human network of relationships should be a source of pride. Our networks of people with proven track records, valued expertise, and amazing character are a gem. There’s natural bias from sheer association. As they say, birds of the same feather, flock together.

The human network with its expansive and powerful tentacles can break down or support biases about us, oftentimes, better than we can! We need to constantly build, nurture, and protect it.

Unconscious bias is everywhere and everyone has it. We can seek to be aware of it in ourselves and others. We can minimize, overcome, reinforce, or embrace it. But we cannot remove it. In fact, we will create new biases. Managing bias is not about deceiving others. It’s about being thoughtful and proactive about minimizing things that introduce bias or highlighting important parts of who we are that people might not readily see and infer.

What matters are how we manage our own bias in engaging with others to bring out the best in everyone and how we proactively plan, build, and project our personal brand to overcome or harness the bias to achieve what we desire.

If you found this article helpful, please feel free to share it with others or click the thumbs up icon below and let me know! Share in the comments section your thoughts, your experiences with unconscious bias, how you overcame or reinforced it, and any advice you might have.

Customers are empowered more than ever with information at their fingertips, literally, with access to content online on various devices plus traditional offline means (e.g., tradeshows, peer networking, print, etc.) It’s different sorts of information from many sources, available any time they want. In parallel, they may talk with sales people about their problems, what they’re trying to achieve, and ideas for how to solve them. There are many research results that suggest that the customer’s own research process starts well before they engage with Sales. But what’s important to note is that there are two parallel, non-linear processes that Sales and Marketing need to intercept to influence decision making.

Empowered customers create an environment where marketing technology and data science coupled with the content creation designed to evoke human emotions and strengthen relationships needs to co-exist harmoniously throughout the customer lifecycle.

Given this customer-empowered, parallel processing dynamic, as marketers, we need to plan and execute demand generation campaigns with intentionality—intent to align with the company’s go-to-market (GTM) strategy, intent to engage with customers and potential customers, and intent to drive and influence revenues. These translate into three parts of an effective demand generation strategy and execution, as discussed below.

1. Demand Generation Strategy Aligned to GTM Strategy

The foundation for a solid demand generation strategy has always been the alignment to a well-thought out GTM (Go-To-Market) strategy. For illustration purposes, the classic pyramid depicts the GTM strategy with GTM organizations aligned with the goals for each segment and what each group needs to do to help achieve those goals. On the marketing front, this will give us insight into knowing what kind of fish we want, where we need to fish, why we want to fish there, how we need to fish, and how much fish we need to catch.

For more information about this GTM alignment model, refer to my article on Grids, Quads, and Pyramids: Saving Your Organization from Strategic Misalignment.

2. Demand Generation – Engagement

Today’s empowered customers are driving many of us marketers to think about demand generation in a non-linear way. Remember when the funnel formula was: build awareness and credibility with some ads and thought leadership content, offer case studies and competitive comparisons in the consideration phase, serve up demos and data sheets in the purchase phase, and deliver good/hot leads to Sales.

No one engages this way anymore. It’s a much more complex, multi-faceted, multi-channel, and fluid process. Instead of a linear funnel, as many have suggested, the process looks more like an infinity loop. There are various infinity loop models. IDC’s Customer Experience Loop is just one and shown below, as an example.

Awareness starts as a result of a search which is reinforced with brand identity and customer reviews. The research phase is non-linear and multichannel, and sales influence must complement information found on-line. And advocacy starts before the buying process begins, goes through the buying and implementation phases, and is amplified by social media, positively and negatively. 

As it has been, we need to deeply understand buyers and influencers, their problems and challenges, different ways to address them, and various topics of interest. However, on top of these, we now need to consider the following:

No Beginning or End

Think about the process not just from research to buy, but the entire lifecycle journey customers go through–research, buy, use, and advocate. There could be other steps in between but that’s the general flow. Then the process repeats itself. There is no beginning or end, as in an infinity loop. There’s a constant opportunity to engage, help, add value, and impact the customer’s business while we reap the benefit of increasing share of wallet as well as customer testimonials and references.

Be There, Be Useful

We need to engage to build a relationship and continue to deepen that relationship throughout the cycle. We need to offer up insights and content that address the customer’s need at any point during the process, even before they think they have something to buy from us or after they have bought. Being helpful might mean articulating a clear vision for an end goal with actionable steps for how to get there, talking about provocative insights, sharing potential use cases and best practices, discussing case studies that highlight pitfalls to avoid and key successes, communicating key considerations and evaluation criteria, defining an ecosystem of partners and their roles, providing access to deployment guides, as well as imparting product-related information. It is also at these times when companies can stand out from competitors more easily because they are seen as being helpful and useful, rather than simply selling. Furthermore, less companies engage with potential customers so there are better opportunities to capture attention and strengthen the relationship.

Engaging and Snackable Content

It’s all about small pieces of content that people can consume to change and shape their thinking about a problem, about their options, and about the best ways and partners to solve them. Content needs to go beyond providing information and educating. Content nowadays also needs to be shareable, interactive, engaging, and entertaining with the ultimate goal to amaze and inspire people to action (e.g., consider us, buy from us, advocate for us, etc.)

Level of engagement is the leading indicator of interest, buyer intent, and future revenue.

So marketers need to get used to mapping and creating snackable content along the infinity loop. As examples: market trends, research/analyst reports, and thought leadership content to build awareness; white papers, solutions kits, and case studies in the buy phase; deployment guides, best practices, and optimization approaches for the use phase; and customer testimonials, peer networking, and user reviews for advocacy. We need to become good content publishers. Generic content doesn’t cut it, we have to understand the audience and the context. All of this takes time, but time is the last thing anyone has, and the industry is moving quickly. Processes, tools, and the content itself has to be redesigned.

Quite interestingly, many companies tend to focus on the left side of the infinity loop designed to create new opportunities vs the right side which is designed to improve loyalty. Ironically, the right side often offers the lowest hanging fruit with lower acquisition cost, best opportunities to create stickiness, as well as potential beachhead and viral effect with advocacy. Let’s ensure we execute a balanced approached as each half of the infinity loops feeds off and builds on each other.

Multiple Touch Points, Conversation, and Personalization

Having multiple touch points and delivering personalized content further reinforces the notions of “be there, be useful” and “engaging and snackable content.” Think about digitally surrounding customers from search, to website and microsites, to social media, to re-targeting, to email campaigns, to online events, etc. and offering personalized or customized content, leveraging various marketing technologies available today.

Give customers and potential customers the ability to have a conversation with us and get answers from us whenever and however they want using the messaging apps and channels that they already use every day to communicate with friends and family including SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Apple Messages and more. These can be powered by artificial intelligence (e.g., with chatbots) and/or humans. This conversational marketing approach helps further pique the potential customer’s interest, build a relationship, better qualify the prospect, and lead them further into the sales cycle more elegantly and efficiently. In some situations, this can be an ideal solution to less effective form-fill tactics to set up meetings and nurturing.

Additionally, we need to ensure a consistent and integrated customer experience across digital and traditional touchpoints (e.g. print, live events, phone calls, etc.)

Encourage Advocacy

Encouraging advocacy now extends beyond existing customers, into influencers and potential customers. Customer stories, recommendations, social media posts, comments, and shares that advocate for companies, thought-leading insights, products, leadership teams, and more can come from anyone. Step 1 is building/evolving a company, a team, and products for which people want to truly advocate. Step 2 is encouraging and providing the mechanisms for people to openly provide feedback and voice their advocacy (or even opposition). And Step 3 is consistently engaging with others authentically throughout this process, particularly in social media.

But most importantly, especially with how customers engage digitally, engagement becomes a leading indicator for revenue. The primary measurement for marketing success is customer engagement all along the infinity loop. In the case of a complex sale, as an example, highly integrated and synchronized account-based or segment-based sales and marketing is the best way to get maximum impact from limited resources. This means the metric for success is:

# of Target Accounts x # of Contacts per Account x Number of Engagements per Contact per Year = # of Chances per Year to Influence and Drive Revenue

An engagement is defined as any time a customer interacts with content that we produced, or attends an event or activity that we designed or sponsored (e.g., downloads, shares and reshares on social media, use of ROI calculators, participation in webinars, chats and messages, schedule a meeting or demo, sign up for trial or try-and-buy, etc.)

Here are a two of examples for how to measure success and engagement, one at the account level at the top tier of the GTM pyramid and one at the segment or vertical level in the middle tier:

At Company ABC, the company identified 250 top named accounts, combination of existing and potential customers. The goal was to build a database of contacts desired to engage and influence, with not less than 5 per account, and in some cases it could be hundreds. For each of the top 250 accounts, the company wrote and agreed upon engagement plans that include: Sales, Channel, Product Management, Marketing, and Operations. And then, topic-oriented engagement and content flows that both Sales and Marketing could use to engage in conversation were created.

The company achieved better engagement with personalization and by digitally surrounding the contacts at these top accounts. So for the top 200 accounts, success was:

250 customers x 20 contacts x 20 engagements per person per year = 100,000 chances per year to influence and drive revenue

Similarly, the approach applies to the middle section of the pyramid. The biggest difference is that personalization of the content and outreach/engagement tactics can be leveraged across targets customers in the same verticals. At company XYZ, the mid-tier represents about 1000 customers. Success was measured as such:

1000 customers x 4 contacts x 15 engagements per person per year = 60,000 chances per year to influence and drive revenue

The mid-tier had three verticals with each vertical having roughly 1/3 of the 1000 customers in the tier. The company had weekly demand generation calls with the Sales and Marketing leadership teams to inspect leads and lead quality. In these meetings, they spent time looking at what marketing tactics and assets were being consumed by whom and the level of interaction with those. This process gave them invaluable insights into preference and purchase behaviors (e.g., having support issues with current provider, willingness to consider alternate vendors, investing in new technologies, forward thinking in deployments, etc.) that could not be directly correlated to or inferred from demographic profiles.

3. Demand Generation – Leads and Revenue

Leads, as traditionally defined, are a natural by-product of marketing. Level of engagement allows us to determine lead quality. The higher the engagement, the better the lead score, the higher quality the lead. Marketing and Sales need to jointly create effective and efficient process for dispositioning any high quality leads that came out of this process. There needs to be an ongoing and closed-loop feedback mechanism to continuously optimize the process.

At ACME company, there was complete alignment and support across the leadership team about the importance of generating good leads and lead followup. The Sales and Marketing teams jointly dispositioned each and every lead generated on a weekly basis. They discussed each high quality marketing lead and why they were high quality (based on the customer’s engagement quantity and quality, lead scoring, plus inside sales pre-qualification results). Then Sales accepted or rejected the lead.

This interaction allowed Marketing to modify the criteria for high quality leads as they got feedback and learned. Similarly, the teams also inspected how Sales followed up on the previous week’s sales accepted leads and identified next steps in the process. Some of those leads progressed into the sales process and some returned to Marketing for further nurturing.

Lastly, the teams reviewed the pipeline of opportunities and discussed how the various groups can help improve the overall size and quality of the pipeline, as well as accelerate, expand, or jumpstart individual opportunities in the pipeline. It was a total closed-loop feedback mechanism where both Sales and Marketing were truly accountable for the customer lifecycle outcomes and ultimately revenue.

As buyers and influencers evolve, so must Sales and Marketing. For the most part, the empowered buyers and influencers have forced us to go back to the basics of human emotion and relationships: deeply understand them and their needs; personalize accordingly; be there where ever they are and be useful throughout their lifecycle with engaging and snackable content; engage to build an ongoing relationship, not just sell; be authentic and encourage advocacy, even from those who are not (yet) customers; and lastly, educate, amaze, and inspire them to action.

As with life, when we invest time and effort to help others, as they say, it comes back to us tenfold (sometimes in unexpected ways). It’s time to put this life lesson into practice with demand generation.

If you found this article helpful, please feel free to share it with others or click the thumbs up icon below and let me know! Share in the comments section your thoughts, examples of how your demand generation efforts have evolved, challenges you’ve encountered, how you overcame them, and results. We’re all in it together. We can all learn from failures and successes.

Kindness is teachable. Kindness is contagious. Kindness increases lifespan. Kindness decreases pain. If all of these are true, why wait to catch it? Be a kindness carrier and pass it on!

Ever had someone believe in you more than you believe in yourself? Ever had a manager push you to do and be your best? How about a mentor who said something that profoundly changed your career direction? A friend who encouraged you to get back up and try again? Or a co-worker who you thought did something rather insignificant or even harmful initially but you, later on, realized how it was truly an act of kindness? Or that one person who inspired you to be a better human being? Or even a stranger who stopped to jump start your car as you were running late for your kid’s school recital?

This week (February 11-17, 2018) is RAK (Random Act of Kindness) week. To commemorate the week, the principal at my daughter and son’s school wrote about the importance of teaching kindness at school and how the teachers are reinforcing the lessons at each grade. I’m sharing with you an excerpt from the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation that he included in his note as it is relevant to us in our professional and personal lives, as it is with the children’s.

Kindness is Teachable

“It’s kind of like weight training, we found that people can actually build up their compassion ‘muscle’ and respond to others’ suffering with care and a desire to help.” – Dr. Ritchie Davidson, University of Wisconsin

Kindness is Contagious

The positive effects of kindness are experienced in the brain of everyone who witnessed the act, improving their mood and making them significantly more likely to “pay it forward.” This means one good deed in a crowded area can create a domino effect and improve the day of dozens of people! (Check out this wall of kindness notes. The kids wrote kind words to describe each of their classmates.)

Kindness Increases:

• The Love Hormone. Witnessing acts of kindness produces oxytocin, occasionally referred to as the ‘love hormone’ which aids in lowering blood pressure and improving our overall heart-health. Oxytocin also increases our self-esteem and optimism, which is extra helpful when we’re in anxious or shy in a social situation.
• Energy. “About half of participants in one study reported that they feel stronger and more energetic after helping others; many also reported feeling calmer and less depressed, with increased feelings of self-worth.” – Christine Carter, University of California at Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center
• Happiness. A 2010 Harvard Business School survey of happiness in 136 countries found that people who are altruistic—in this case, people who were generous financially, such as with charitable donations—were happiest overall.
• Lifespan. “People who volunteer tend to experience fewer aches and pains. Giving help to others protects overall health twice as much as aspirin protects against heart disease. People 55 and older who volunteer for two or more organizations have an impressive 44% lower likelihood of dying early, and that’s after sifting out every other contributing factor, including physical health, exercise, gender, habits like smoking, marital status and many more. This is a stronger effect than exercising four times a week or going to church.” – Christine Carter, UC Berkeley
• Pleasure. According to research from Emory University, when you are kind to another person, your brain’s pleasure and reward centers light up, as if you were the recipient of the good deed—not the giver. This phenomenon is called the “helper’s high.”
• Seratonin. Like most medical antidepressants, kindness stimulates the production of serotonin. This feel-good chemical heals your wounds, calms you down, and makes you happy!

Kindness Decreases:

• Pain. Engaging in acts of kindness produces endorphins—the brain’s natural painkiller!
• Stress. Perpetually kind people have 23% less cortisol (the stress hormone) and age slower than the average population!
• Anxiety. A group of highly anxious individuals performed at least six acts of kindness a week. After one month, there was a significant increase in positive moods, relationship satisfaction and a decrease in social avoidance in socially anxious individuals. (University of British Columbia)
• Depression. Stephen Post of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine found that when we give of ourselves, everything from life satisfaction to self-realization and physical health is significantly improved. Mortality is delayed, depression is reduced and well-being and good fortune are increased.
• Blood pressure. Committing acts of kindness lowers blood pressure. According to Dr. David R. Hamilton, acts of kindness create emotional warmth, which releases a hormone known as oxytocin. Oxytocin causes the release of a chemical called nitric oxide, which dilates the blood vessels. This reduces blood pressure and, therefore, oxytocin is known as a “cardioprotective” hormone. It protects the heart by lowering blood pressure.

Like many, I’ve been fortunate in my career to be surrounded by kind people, as I’ve discussed in my article, The Best Gifts are Priceless and Should be ReGifted… Really. It behooves us to get out of quarantine and pass on the kindness bug! Who wouldn’t want a worldwide kindness epidemic?

Also, check out this short and fun video on How to Change the World With Kindness. It’s easy, simple, and can make a big impact. So let’s do it!

”If we all do one random act of kindness daily, we just might set the world in the right direction.” – Marti Kornfield

If you enjoyed this article or found it helpful, click the thumbs up icon below or share (Be a carrier!). Feel free to write in the comments your thoughts, other examples of acts of kindness that have made an indelible impact on your career, or ways you’ve paid it forward.

If we’re not changing, we’re not growing. If we’re not growing, we’re dying.

We are the people we are because of our experiences, small or big, tough or easy, fleeting or lasting. It is with these experiences that we change and grow. And those experiences that take us beyond our comfort zone, like situations we deeply fear, create our biggest growth opportunities. It could be fear of being judged, alienated, rejected, disappointed; fear of making a mistake, losing your job, destroying your reputation, failing, dying; and all sorts of other fears.

Ironically, fear paralyzes us to the point where we end up not doing anything or doing what we’ve always done and known.

Not doing anything or simply doing the same old thing can become a self-fulfilling prophecy of our fears.

Particularly in this age of digital transformation, our biggest risk is doing nothing. We can’t innovate in our comfort zone. As they say, “Innovate or die.” And when we need people and the business to evolve, how we led people to get us to where we are today won’t get us to where we need to be tomorrow. (Also check out my related article on Leading a Digital Business: What Wasn’t OK is now a Must!)

We need to lead fearlessly to inspire others to follow and become leaders themselves.

We can conquer fear consciously or subconsciously. We each have our own examples of how we’ve done that and how we’ve changed as a result. I’d like to share with you a story of what was an adventure of a lifetime for me. What I got out of it was far greater than what I expected, making an indelible impact on me personally and professionally.

My Journey in Africa

For a month in 1999, I traveled solo in Africa and then later joined a small Tusker Trail safari group with other solo travelers and couples from all over the US. We mostly roughed it in the bush, camped in tents, dug and used latrines, boiled water to purify it, washed clothes in the river, doused in DEET, and popped our daily dose of malaria pills.

I spent just as much time engaging with the locals as I did enjoying the wilderness and its wondrous creatures, sleeping under the stars and waking up with the sun, without a watch or mobile phone (certainly no smartphone yet in those days).

By design, I wanted a solo adventure to push my boundaries. Back then, I was young and better equipped to conquer my fears. In other words, naive and stupid, in some cases 😉 So it wasn’t until later, as I’ve become more introspective in my older age, that I came to appreciate it for more than just a thrilling adventure.

Ask, Listen, and Learn

I loved traveling solo in countries where people speak different languages. It took me beyond my comfort zone but I learned most about myself and the locals. It’s amazing how far one can go with hand gestures, facial expressions, sounds, and a small translation dictionary.

I was forced to interact with the people all the time–to eat, find the nearest bathroom, get recommendations for things to see and do, work my way around the city, and make friends. Again, no Waze, Google Maps, Yelp, or Google Translate yet, just me and the African people.

In a black township in Cape Town, South Africa, the locals graciously gave me a tour of their neighborhood, shared stories about key historical places and moments during apartheid, and showed me how they make natural medicine using herbs, dried rats, and the all-powerful baboon skeleton at a makeshift pharmacy. They even let me taste homemade beer.

Reminders of apartheid still abound as I felt immediate sharp contrasts going from a white neighborhood with opulent homes to tin shacks where blacks lived just across the street.

Everyone had a story and I learned, saw, and experienced so much more talking with the people. The children were funny. The easiest way to make them smile was to take their photo. Oh, how they posed and flashed those pearly whites for the camera!

How often have we found it more comfortable to do things ourselves, relying on our own knowledge and perspectives rather than asking, listening, and learning from others, particularly those who have different opinions from ours? We fear that we might be wrong and be judged by others for being wrong.

In the business world, disagreements and misalignment often stem from the lack of understanding of each other’s unique perspectives and motivations. As many of us know, when we make ourselves vulnerable and reach out to others, more often than not, others show genuine appreciation for our efforts, richer ideas flourish, collaboration and alignment come naturally, and better execution ensues. In a previous article that I wrote, I discussed in more detail how we can save organizations from strategic misalignment.

Appreciate Differences and the Unknown

I met men, women and children of the Maasai tribe in the Great Rift Valley in Tanzania. Before this meeting, I had only seen pictures of them in their bright red robes against their deep black skin, colorful ornate jewelry, and long fighting sticks on National Geographic. So I was a bit awestruck and, at the same time, apprehensive to interact with them.

The children curiously touched my skin and asked me, “Mzungu (white person)?” They had never seen an Asian person before. They had only seen black and white and I am neither. I remember the children and me looking at each other in wonder and amazement as if we had just seen purple beings from another planet. Without saying a single intelligible word, we all smiled and laughed at the situation in which we found ourselves!

In Zanzibar, I laughed with adorable preschoolers as we tried to understand each other. I taught them some English words and they taught me how to count in Swahili. They giggled when I said, “Hakuna matata!” Thanks to The Lion King, as you can tell, I used everything in my arsenal to break the ice and keep the conversation fun for the kids.

I conquered my fear of the unknown and my fear that they would reject me because I’m different. Instead, I replaced fear of the unknown with curiosity. I found myself enjoying their company and truly immersing myself in the experience.

In business, think about what we could be missing and passing up because we fear the unknown. As Sydney Brenner (South African biologist and Nobel prize winner for physiology or medicine) said, “Innovation comes only from the assault of the unknown.” With every single innovation, from the design of ancient architectures and engineering feats to the integration of artificial intelligence in various industries, we can thank the many innovators who conquered their fear of the unknown.

Innovation comes only from the assault of the unknown.

In this day and age, we should be less fearful of the unknown because there’s greater tolerance for failure, especially fast failure in this age of digital transformation. The faster we fail, the faster we uncover the unknown. The faster we learn, the faster we succeed.

The Journey is Just as Important as the Destination

Two things you should know about me: I can’t swim and I’m petrified of heights.

In Zambia, I got in over my head (literally, when the raft flipped over and the guide pulled me back in) when I rafted down the formidable Zambezi River. I told the guide that I can’t swim. He laughed and said, “Too late! Swimming can’t help you in these rapids anyway.”

So he sang songs and told jokes to allay my fears as he rowed giant oars and expertly navigated our raft down the raging waters with baby crocs. (I only saw baby ones. But where there were babies, I’m sure there were big ones close by.) I suppose the sight of world-class and Olympic kayakers on either side of our raft also gave me this false sense of security.

For 18 rapids including Class 5 rapids named Stairway to Heaven, Commercial Suicide, and Oblivion, I laughed, cried, screamed, baked in the sun, swallowed river water, looked like a drowned rat, and crouched down and held on for dear life when our guide yelled, “Positions!” as we approached each rapid.

I simultaneously wanted all of it to end and not end. But never did it enter my mind that I would bail and walk back, even when our guide gave us the option. I still have my Zambezi rafting t-shirt to remind me that I dominated what many consider the “wildest one-day white water rafting trip in the world” and overcame my fears!

Later that day, I honestly don’t know what compelled me to go on a microlight flight over Victoria Falls, the largest waterfall in the world, with Zambia to the north and Zimbabwe to the south. I had this burning desire to do it and even my intense fear of heights wasn’t going to stop me. I broke out into a full-body sweat as we took off in this open-air vehicle with a little engine and propeller, a few metal rods, a couple of plastic seats, and something that resembled a gigantic kite. I was sitting there with no parachute and a bike helmet.

After screaming for what felt like forever and blowing out the pilot’s eardrums as we climbed, peace and serenity overcame me as we glided across the mighty and thundering Victoria Falls and followed a migrating herd of elephants from above. No fear whatsoever, just pure exhilaration and deep appreciation for the spectacular, heaven-on-earth experience. I learned a lot about distress, perseverance, and triumph that day.

Conquering my fears didn’t stop there. We had close encounters with majestic beasts and wildlife, sometimes a little too close for comfort with only the tent cover, thin metal of the canoe, or the safari jeep’s glass window between us and a hyena, hippo, and elephant. All survival instincts including utmost patience, utter silence and stillness, incredible courage, fast thinking and action, teamwork, and enormous amounts of positive energy came into play.

There are only two things we can control in life: our attitude and our actions. As we go through the journey, despite our fears and struggles, we can choose to go through it the best way we can and with the best possible mindset. The alternative, choosing to let it bring out the worst in us, isn’t much fun so why bother with it. A positive mind sees opportunity in everything. And a positive attitude leads to positive outcomes.

A positive attitude is contagious. Don’t wait to catch it, be a carrier.

Break Down Filters and Biases

We met an African fortune teller and healer, his family, and the villagers in Malawi. He offered to do a traditional African wedding for one of the married couples in our safari group so that they could renew their vows. What an experience to be part of that ceremony with all the villagers singing, chanting, and dancing with us along the shores of Lake Malawi as the sun set!

One lovely woman even trusted me to carry her infant boy when I asked her how her baby carrier works. These people were incredibly generous, kind, and hospitable. Not one expected anything in return. No one had ulterior motives. They simply wanted to share with us their culture and a special African experience in the village.

Our increasingly divided world places a bigger spotlight on filters and biases based on differences—race, gender, age, religion, national origin, socio-economic status, political affiliation, sexual orientation, disability, and more.

These filters create fear and even hate among people. Although we can’t control the filters that others choose when they look at us, we can control the filters that we put on others. When we break down our biases, we have a better shot at helping others break down theirs.

When we allow ourselves to not fear and look at people as equals, we free ourselves to consider differing points of view, debate openly, collaborate and solve problems together, and innovate better than we’ve ever had before. Moreover, it allows us to lead generously–abundantly giving ourselves so that others may be and do their best.

Fear is nothing more than an obstacle that stands in the way of progress. There is no greater illusion than fear. Fear not and grow!

If you found this article helpful, please click the thumbs up icon below and let me know! Please feel free to share in the comments your thoughts, examples of how you have conquered fear, and how they have helped you grow.

As we spent our Christmas and New Year holidays in the Philippines visiting with family and friends, from the pristine and quiet beaches of Puerto Galera to the hustle and bustle of Metro Manila, I couldn’t help but notice how similar and, at the same time, how different the Philippine and American cultures are.

Then my next thought was how technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and deep learning need to account for similarities and differences across geographies, people, cultures, and societies. Not a trivial undertaking and if we choose to ignore or consider less important can potentially have sustained impacts on economies, morality, humanity, and more. In the martech (marketing technology) world, some have discussed the opportunity to combine data science with social science, and it requires the human element. IBM refers to this need for humans and machines to work together as augmented intelligence or intelligence augmented (IA, not to be confused with AI meaning artificial intelligence). Rather than replacing human intelligence, augmented intelligence capitalize on the combination of algorithms, machine learning, and data science to inform human decision-making abilities. In other words, the human element can’t be forgotten.

Augmenting Knowledge of Less Predictable Human Elements with AI

Throughout my marketing career, I’ve always worked for multinational companies serving customers all over the world. That, plus me being an immigrant, has made me extra sensitive and passionate about deeply understanding different target segments, especially people’s motivations, challenges, desires, fears, preferences, beliefs, biases, passions, attitudes, values, and the reasons for these differences.

Segment characteristics like firmographics (e.g., industry, revenue, number of employees, headquarters location) and demographics (e.g., age, gender, household income, years of education, race) tend to be easier to analyze and action. However, digging deep into sociographics (e.g., values, beliefs, culture) and reflecting it as an integral part of sales and marketing efforts are much more complex but I would argue are, ultimately, more interesting and have more profound impacts.

As more companies globalize their businesses and go through or enable digital transformation, the need to automate, predict, and act on-demand has become critical to ensure a fast and agile business. As they say, transform or die, right? It’s happening in all facets of the business—manufacturing, product development, engineering, inventory, e-commerce, finance, supply chain, sales and marketing, logistics, and more. However, we run the risk of compromising deep consideration of sociographic elements for speed and agility. One can imagine a much better outcome when we apply human intelligence about peoples’ values and beliefs in conjunction with AI.

Deeper Understanding of Sociographics

Just for fun and to offer real life examples to analyze, I’d like to share with you some sociographics about the Filipino culture. I’m Filipino American. I was born and raised in Manila and have been living in the US for the past 35 years. I’ve been fortunate to have opportunities to visit friends and family for vacations (as I just did recently) and have dropped by occasionally when I’m in Asia for work.

Let’s think about how AI can help and how we may need to augment AI with human intelligence about less predictable, unique, or even irrational segment behaviors to determine the best ways to market, sell, and serve. Some of these examples might have more relevance to B2C companies and others to B2B companies. However, even B2B companies can benefit from deeply understanding the ultimate end users’ behaviors—it’s about understanding not just our customers but also our customers’ customers.

1.    Malling is Cultural. Online shopping in the Philippines can and does present some challenges, from slow or no Internet access to traffic congestion with the ever increasing number of vehicles on already crowded streets of Manila. The traffic makes executing a concept like Amazon Prime nearly impossible given that even emergency vehicles have a tough time navigating through the dense traffic. There’s no space for other vehicles to move to make way for ambulances, police cars, and fire trucks. Package delivery would probably take more like a week or more. But these aren’t necessarily the reasons why malls are flourishing and more malls are being built.

You wouldn’t think you’re in a developing nation when entering these mega malls. Some are multi-story buildings interconnected by overpasses built over busy roads, occupying five or six square blocks. And rest assured that you’ll find stores for most well-known global retail brands.

Malls are not just for shopping in the Philippines. Malls are a place for family and friends to gather. With air conditioning, they’re also a place where people escape the heat. Because of the heavy, everyday traffic in Metro Manila, malls have become a one-stop destination for literally everything. Yes, everything! (Running errands would be a full-time job and quite stressful if you had to go to different places to buy different things.) You can shop for shoes and furniture, buy drill bits, eat lunch, enjoy a movie, entertain the kids at a play zone, relax with a foot massage, grab groceries for the week, mail packages, pay bills, stroll along a rooftop garden, and watch amateur singers showcase their talents using demo karaoke machines (some of whom end up on YouTube and become YouTube sensations!). Worried about missing church on Sunday if you go to the mall? No problem, there are malls with churches complete with cry areas for the kids and multiple scheduled masses. That’s the ultimate in malling!

Think about the big data analytics at play here. We can collect so much data for different products and services plus a variety of behaviors and patterns, all in one mall complex. A marketer’s dream! It’s like shooting fish in a barrel. Think about the integrated marketing and omnichannel experience as people go from one store to another and also interact via mobile and web.

Someone who ignores or fails to recognize this cultural phenomenon can miss out and leave a lot on the table! AI can only go so far without this human intelligence.

2.    A Round-the-Clock Society. The Philippines ranks fourth in the number of English speakers with 90 million people who know how to speak English. Excluding English-speaking countries like the US and the UK, the Philippines ranks sixth (behind Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland) where professionals are most proficient in English. In fact, because of the many dialects in the Philippines, you can say that English is the currency in the country, even among the locals.

The Filipinos’ fluency in English, close affinity to western culture, more patient trait which comes in handy in dealing with irate customers, and high problem-solving skills have contributed to the rise of value-added BPO (Business Process Outsourcing), such as contact centers, in the Philippines. Although people work graveyard hours, the industry offers lucrative opportunities and is an economic lifeline for many, employing more than a million people. People also benefit from not having to deal with rush hour traffic hence improving their quality of life. (How bad is the traffic in Metro Manila? It was ranked as having the “worst traffic on Earth,” based on a global evaluation conducted by Waze, a GPS-based navigation app. Filipinos don’t talk distance when traveling, they talk time. It may take 30 mins to go 3 km in parts of Metro Manila!)

24-hour fast food places have cropped up everywhere (not just at major highway exits) to cater to this growing segment of the market. When we arrived in Manila at 2 am on December 23rd, we drove by 24-hour Jollibee and McDonald’s with long lines and wall-to-wall people. As lunchtime shifts, so does happy hour. Booze start flowing at 6 am!

All sorts of business ideas come to mind when operating in a round-the-clock society. Pretty much everything that people typically do during the day may need to be done at night—from mailing things, to buying groceries, to picking up dry cleaning, and more. Imagine the role that AI and automation can play here given less resources available at night. But first, someone needs to deeply understand this way of living which is unique to certain parts of the world.

Ironically, AI is a double-edged sword as it can potentially threaten this industry, replacing people with machines and the use of chatbots. So the country is taking steps to complement the employees’ good command of the English language with training on data mining, analytics, and machine learning. This is yet another dynamic to watch closely to determine how it may affect a round-the-clock society.

3.    Important Role of Status Symbols. Considered a third world nation, the Philippines suffers from a wide divide between the rich and the poor, with a miniscule middle class. People have gravitated towards status symbols to elevate others’ perception of their value and improve their self esteem, even for just a few fleeting moments.

As a result, preference towards wearing branded items like Nike, Gucci, Lacoste, and others abound. Starbucks is a place to see and be seen. Despite the meager wages, barely enough to feed their families, some people spend money on expensive coffee, not necessarily for great tasting coffee, but for the feeling of social acceptance and greater self worth.

People avoid extended sun exposure to keep from getting darker. On hot sunny days, you’d think that it’s raining outside because so many walk around with their umbrellas open. There’s a general perception or misconception that people with dark skin hail from poor farming families in the provinces. As a result, the popularity of skin whitening products has skyrocketed. Seeing beaches lined with sun worshipping Causasians next to locals sitting in the shade under coconut trees is quite comical. In a society that considers light skin to be more beautiful than dark, companies often feature mestizo and mestiza (part Filipino and part Caucasian) models, actors, and actresses on TV commercials, online ads, billboards, magazine covers, and movies.

It’s not easy to predict what may become a status symbol. But it starts with the realization that status symbols are an important part of the buying process and may, in fact, be the primary deciding factor.

Human intelligence about status symbols coupled with AI can create powerful brands, presence, and experiences in the market.

4.    Hospitable and Service-Oriented People. The Filipinos’ passion for providing exceptional customer service is partly cultural and partly economic. The family is the nucleus of the social structure and includes the immediate family, extended family, godparents, and close family friends. New friends instantly feel part of the family as it is common for people to welcome new friends into their homes, share meals, and enjoy each other’s company. There are words to show respect for the people within the structure like Ate (older sister) and Kuya (older brother). Even close friends are referred to as Ate or Kuya, or Tita (Aunt) or Tito (Uncle). The sign of respect extends to the business world calling customers and supervisors as Sir or Madam/Mam and are often greeted with a smile.

Products, particularly imported goods, are expensive but services are cheap. Check out this promotion for a 70-minute, full body massage for 199 Philippine pesos. That’s $4!

The law of supply and demand is at work here. There are more people available to work than there are job opportunities. In the service industry (e.g., retail sales, salons and spas, entertainment, domestic helpers, etc.), people do their best to provide the best possible service to attract new customers, retain customers, and keep their jobs.

At a retail store, I had four sales ladies helping me find the right t-shirt size. You’d think I was buying hundreds of shirts. An employee at a fast food restaurant politely stopped me when I got up to put away my tray and throw trash in the bin myself. He told me his job is to do that for me. People may not be able to afford air conditioning, a washer and dryer, or a hot water heater, but they have a nanny, maid, and driver. Comfort, convenience, and time savings are achieved through cheap labor and not through machines, automation, and self-service.

One needs to carefully assess the effects of introducing automation and AI in the services industry as it can have significant economic and social implications, especially in a country already plagued with more available workers than jobs.

5.    Nomadic Creatures. Many of the things we’ve already discussed are great proof points for why Filipinos are nomadic creatures: family orientation, high literacy rates and highly educated people, desire for a much better life and increased self worth, economic struggles, and lack of work opportunities.

Education in the Philippines is of paramount importance. It’s been described as “indispensable, a national legacy passed from one generation to the next.” Everyone deeply appreciates hard work in school and academic excellence. Medals are awarded, Top 10s (list of 10 kids with the highest grades in class) start in elementary school, Summa and Magna Cum Laudes are glorified, “topnotchers” in board and bar exams with their scores are full-page news, and parents speak proudly of their children’s accomplishments.

However, many find themselves unemployed or underemployed even with a college degree. Educated individuals in this situation are among the first to emigrate to find work. Additionally, the Philippine labor cost is among the lowest in Southeast Asia which makes Filipinos easy targets for overseas work. It is not uncommon to have families supported by a parent, spouse, sibling, or close relative working overseas. This puts immense pressure on tight-knit Filipino families but it is, oftentimes, what is necessary to sustain the family. Eventually, some are able to bring their entire family with them abroad. Here’s the top 10 list of countries where Filipinos migrate permanently, led by the US with greater than 3.1 million Filipino residents.

As we stood in line at Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport to check-in for our flight back to the US, the area was packed with Filipinos going everywhere—San Francisco, Riyadh, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Abu Dhabi, Toronto, Melbourne, Tokyo, Kuwait City, London, etc. You’ll find many working in the healthcare, technology, aviation, hospitality, education, entertainment, and various service industries globally.

The impact of a highly nomadic society is far reaching, creating tentacles of brand awareness, advocacy, and loyalty (or the opposite) in more countries than originally intended, as an example. It is also a unique use case for businesses enabling real-time collaboration and communications, as well as electronic funds transfer. That human intelligence applied to assess this unique dynamic and the decision to pursue expansion then create an opportunity for AI to help introduce and scale the business in other parts of the world.

6.    Proud to be Filipino. Filipinos are proud people—proud of their people, heritage, and country. They’re especially proud of successful people recognized internationally for their accomplishments: Manny Pacquiao (world boxing champion), Arnel Pineda (lead singer of Journey), Cheryl Diaz Meyer (Pulitzer Prize winner), Dr. Eduardo San Juan (NASA engineer who designed the moon buggy used by Apollo astronauts), Lea Salonga (Tony award winner for Miss Saigon and singing voices of Princess Jasmine and Mulan), Cristeta Comerford (White House Executive Chef), Pia Wurtzbach (Miss Universe 2015), Sean Reyes (Utah Attorney General), Monique Lhuillier (Hollywood fashion designer), Peter Valdes (co-founder of Tivoli Systems Inc., an IBM company), Liz Masakayan (1988 US Olympian in volleyball), Dr. Jose Natalio Rodriguez (inventor of the leprosy control program), Robert Lopez (Tony award winner, writer of Let It Go from the movie Frozen), and so many more.

Filipinos draw inspiration from these people, giving them hope that they can be more and accomplish more. But what’s more interesting is what happens when these successful Filipinos are featured on a world stage.

The crime rate dropped to zero in Metro Manila during the 12 rounds that Manny Pacquiao fought Floyd Mayweather, Jr. in 2015. Everyone, including criminals, tuned into the heavily advertised, pay-per-view fight. The author of the article Manny Pacquaio Fights for the Filipino points out that nothing connects Filipinos worldwide like Manny Pacquiao, “For Filipino Americans, it’s a battle for recognition, for identity in a culture where, for the mainstream, Asians tend to fade into a monochromatic racialized other.” Last year, Filipinos across the country stopped their normal routine to watch the Miss Universe pageant, hosted by the Philippines after more than two decades. Many beauty salons closed for the day. Beauty pageants are a cultural obsession.

From knowing not to schedule a live webinar during these times to predicting other potential impacts (e.g., street closures for parades, declaration of a national holiday, big rallies, jammed mobile networks, major stock market fluctuations, etc.) of these proud Filipino moments requires human intelligence. Complementing that with data-driven AI can transform how business is conducted to make the most out of these important micro instances, be-there-be-useful or avert.

Key Takeaways

None of these is rocket science but it’s worth reminding ourselves of the following:

• AI is not intended to replace all human intelligence but to enhance and assist it.

• Powerful sales and marketing stem from deeply understanding firmographics, demographics, and sociographics of customer segments.

• Human intelligence can be better leveraged for knowledge of sociographic characteristics like values, beliefs, culture, biases, attitudes, particularly unpredictable, unique, and irrational behaviors.

• Marrying the human element with AI not only helps with winning business in different cultures but also creates opportunities to personalize and make products and services more relevant.

• In this digital transformation age, we can best affect change globally when humans and machines work together.

If you found this article helpful, please click the thumbs up icon below and let me know! Please feel free to share in the comments your thoughts, other examples of how machines and humans can work together, and potential impacts and implications. I also invite you to read my article on a separate but related marketing topic of telling a more human story, Humanize how we Market Technology as Technology Relies Less on Humans.