What is it like to go through life as a man, build a successful career, get married and have kids – and then come out as a woman in your late 40’s? What is it like to experience life from a different gender vantage point? How is your culture creating an environment where diverse people of all backgrounds, such as trans individuals, can do their best work?
These are the questions we tackle today with my guest, culture and leadership consultant Cori Lovejoy. In October of 2020, Cori came out as a transgender woman and took a sabbatical to focus on her transition. Now, she is dedicating the next phase of her work to helping leaders create organizational cultures that are inclusive, diverse, equitable, welcoming, and ultimately more compassionate. She is motivated by a deep conviction that workplace cultures can contribute to employee well-being while achieving maximum organizational effectiveness and impact.
Today Cori shares her personal journey to coming out as trans, how it has impacted her life, and what she learned about white male privilege and how differently men and women are treated. We also share the important work your leaders and organization can do to create a more inclusive culture where smart, talented people in underrepresented groups can contribute fully to your success.
Take a listen but first a trigger warning: We discuss the topics of suicide, addiction, and eating disorders in this episode. If you’re facing mental health issues or thoughts of suicide, please dial 988 in the US or reach out for mental health services in your country. Please take care of yourself.
To access this episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Key Takeaways:
- Everybody has their own story, their own journey, and their own challenges. It is not for us to judge what others are going through, regardless of their stage of life.
- The way men and women are perceived in society is different. With the same behavior, men are perceived as assertive, women are perceived as aggressive. In most cases, this is unconscious bias, but it is happening every day.
- Respect is the key. Use people’s correct pronouns, affirm their gender identity, and trust that they know who they are.
- Learning to love yourself unconditionally, whether trans or cis, is a common human experience.
“Proximity, perspective taking, and personal work will unearth these biases, and make the unconscious biases conscious. And that takes a lot of introspection and personal work.”
— Cori Lovejoy
About Cori Lovejoy , Culture and Leadership Consultant
In October of 2020, Cori came out as a transgender woman and took a sabbatical to focus on her transition. Now, she is dedicating the next phase of her work to helping leaders create organizational cultures that are inclusive, diverse, equitable, welcoming, and ultimately more compassionate. She is motivated by a deep conviction that workplace cultures can contribute to employee well-being while achieving maximum organizational effectiveness and impact.
As Director of Compassion for Brighton Jones, a wealth management company based in the Pacific Northwest of the US, Cori designed and led the company’s Mindfulness-based Emotional and Social Intelligence (MESI) program, established to support employees in becoming more compassionate through training in mindfulness, self-awareness, empathy, and compassion. Cori also led MESI workshops for other companies, local non-profits, as well as Brighton Jones clients. In addition, she co-founded and organized the Compassionate Leadership Summit, an annual conference centered on compassion and mindfulness that grew to over 500 participants and 50 presenters in less than two years, and she taught a course in Compassionate Leadership at Washington State University as a Teaching Associate Professor.
Before joining Brighton Jones in 2015, Cori spent over 15 years in various leadership roles within the wealth management industry and then several years as an independent leadership coach and organizational development consultant. She holds an MBA in wealth management and an MA in organizational leadership.
Connect with Cori Lovejoy:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/corilovejoy
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cory.custer.75
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cori.lovejoy/
Resources Mentioned:
The Empathy Edge podcast, Cori’s past interview (as Cory Custer) How a Compassionate Culture Leads to Success
Paula Stone Williams, TEDx talk: I’ve Lived as a Man and Woman. Here’s What I’ve Learned
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Connect with Maria:
Get the podcast and book: TheEmpathyEdge.com
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FULL TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
What is it like to go through life as a man, build a successful career, get married and have kids and then come out as a woman in your late 40s? What is it like to experience life from different gender vantage points? How is your organizational culture, creating an environment where diverse people of all backgrounds such as trans individuals can do their best work? These are the questions we tackle today with my guest culture and leadership consultant Cori Lovejoy. Cori first joined us back in episode eight of the podcast nearly two years ago, when she was the director of compassionate Brighton Jones, a Seattle based wealth management company, and I featured the company and quarry in the book. Back then she went by Cory Custer, and presented as male. As director of compassion. She designed and led the company’s Mindfulness Based emotional and social intelligence or messy program, established to support employees and becoming more compassionate through training and mindfulness, self-awareness, empathy and compassion. Cori also led messy workshops for other companies, local nonprofits as well as clients. In addition, she co-founded and organized the Compassionate Leadership Summit, an annual conference centered on compassion and mindfulness that grew to over 500 participants and 50 presenters in less than two years. And she taught a course in Compassionate Leadership at Washington State University as a teaching associate professor in October of 2020. Cori came out as a transgender woman, and took a sabbatical to focus on her transition. Now she’s dedicating the next phase of her work to helping leaders create organizational cultures that are inclusive, diverse, equitable, welcoming and ultimately more compassionate. She’s motivated by a deep conviction that workplace cultures can contribute to employee well-being while achieving maximum organizational effectiveness and impact. Today, Cori shares her personal journey to coming out as trans, how it has impacted her life, and what she learned about white male privilege and how differently men and women are treated. We also share the important work your leaders and organization can do to create a more inclusive culture, where smart, talented people and underrepresented groups can contribute fully to your success. Take a listen. But first, a trigger warning. We discuss the topics of suicide, addiction and eating disorders in this episode. If you’re facing mental health issues or thoughts of suicide, please dial 988 in the US or reach out for mental health services in your own country. Please take care of yourself. Enjoy.
Maria Ross 03:17
Welcome Cori Lovejoy to the empathy edge again, to the show you were one of my first guests. But you joined me as Cory Custer, Director of compassion at Brighton Jones. And now you are here as Cori Lovejoy a very different place in your life. Welcome to the show.
Cori Lovejoy 04:26
Well, thank you so much. It’s It’s really exciting to be back. For me, it’s exciting. It’s a little bit nerve wracking, frankly, because I haven’t been really out in a in a professional context, very much. So, this all feels new in a way. And but it’s I love being on on this review. So, thank you for the invitation to come back.
Maria Ross 05:12
Well, and I know you and I could probably talk for hours about empathy and emotional intelligence, especially with your work around culture and creating inclusive environments. The great work you’ve done in over your career around really enabling people to be their best selves at work. And so that’s why I’m so interested in your story and your journey of your transition from being a man, you know, going through life as a man and now going through life as a woman. So, I want to just start with, when did you realize that this was who you really are, because you hear so many different stories from transgender individuals? I’m curious what your journey was like?
Cori Lovejoy 05:52
Yeah, it’s a little bit complicated. Because in my story, is a little bit different than a lot of what I’ve understood a lot of transgender people saying. But throughout, the only thing I was conscious of through my entire life, and this goes back to. You know, my very earliest memories, is wanting to be a woman. I didn’t feel like a lot of trans women will say, I feel like I felt like a woman in a man’s body. Or they, you know, were they, they had this sort of feminine aspect to themselves. I didn’t have either of that all I had was this really strange kind of desire or attraction to the feminine and to women. And it just and for me, it, it always felt just because of the time and place, and family and my my family of origin. It just, it didn’t feel safe to ever say anything, it felt very shameful. So, I went through my life for 48 years living as a man thinking that I was a mentally ill cisgender heterosexual man, because I didn’t know I’ve never heard of anything like this where somebody who just like, wants to be a woman. I just felt like I just got dealt the wrong hand. And I really wish that had been born a woman. But that’s kind of, you know, that’s kind of all I was conscious of, until the summer of 2020. Right around the time, we probably first recorded the episode. I know, it came out in September, but but it and I talked about these other places, but I’ve been doing a lot of like deep personal work. And in the, in the span of about three weeks, it sort of dawned on me that I was a woman, I got my core. And that’s in that, that shifted everything because now I can actually really sort of sci fi in a way because when I Well, as soon as I kind of got my mind around that and just begin to accept that. That my, my past my history started to make sense. Memory started to fill in all these things that had happened suddenly made sense. It provided a context. And so, it’s like, rather than thinking I’m a mentally ill cisgender heterosexual man, I’m perfectly normal transgender woman. But that kind of awakening where I first started to accept myself as trans, to the time of coming out was was very tumultuous. It’s not like, I came out and I said, Oh, goody, I’m trans. I mean, it was very inconvenient truth.
Maria Ross 08:42
And are married and have children,
Cori Lovejoy 08:43
Married, children in you know, in a, in a, I didn’t I knew one other trans person. That’s it in my entire network. I knew I had my own biases about trans people. I I just felt stuck because I no longer could, there was just this huge dissonance I kind of knew what I now accepted as the truth, but also the thought of actually coming out. And living as a woman, presenting as a woman transitioning was just inconceivable to me at the time and it actually was really led to a lot of inner turmoil. And and then I got actually, frankly, really, really depressed and and we probably should put some trigger warnings on the episode but you know, got fairly suicidal at the time. And this was, you know, this was December of 2020. And so, but I finally, I had I had this kind of awakening this moment, this I call it an epiphany, or download or whatever. Then the night that I was my thinking had shifted from if I was going to kill myself to how I was going to kill my So, I had this epiphany and it said, you know, I heard it as like Cory, you’re, you’re clearly not afraid to die, which I didn’t feel afraid of. Why are you afraid to live? And that just kind of, like, busted me open. It’s like, that’s exactly what’s happening here. I’m afraid to live in my truth. And, and I’ve always kind of counted myself as sort of courageous and, and wanting to be out in the world, in my truth and, and authentically. And so, I kind of accepted the challenge, if you will, I slowly started to come out to friends to some close friends. And at that time, I didn’t say, Oh, I was a Trans. I’m a transgender woman. It was like, I didn’t know what I was. I mean, I didn’t I just I knew that something was going on. I didn’t, you know, I didn’t. I didn’t know what this was. But I started to I started to work with a therapist, and just slowly started to step into my feminine self. And it just each step of the way. It just felt, right. That’s the only way I’ve been able to describe it. People are like, how can you just, you know, what does it feel like to be out as trans or on hormones? Or I had I had bottom surgery at a vaginal plasti. Last November, like, what does it feel like in the I just can say, it feels just feels right? It feels like coming home?
Maria Ross 11:26
I love that. Yeah. Now as you as you were going on this journey of trying to figure out what was going on? Was that was that a solitary journey? You mentioned that you reached out to some friends? Did you confide in your family at all?
Cori Lovejoy 11:38
Yeah, I did. I did. It wasn’t a solitary journey, I have a very remarkable and amazing friend group, very supportive. And that was that was actually turned out to be life saving. But yeah, just started to come out to them kind of individually. And in that process, that in having those conversations and coming out, it helped me kind of like reach reached this conclusion of kind of what I was. And I did come out to my family, and at least my immediate family, my, my wife and my two children. And but you have to understand Maria at this time, it’s like it was it was really tumultuous on top of like, mental health issues, you know, depression, which I’ve always kind of struggled with, I’m dealing with this, you know, had professional challenges. And, and, and to bring this out in at the time just really created a lot of turmoil in in my family. And in my life. It was it was really, really messy. I don’t think that I I managed the transition very elegantly. Is much I would do now in hindsight differently. Knowing, you know, hindsight.
Maria Ross 13:05
Hindsight, is 2020 2020.
Cori Lovejoy 13:07
So, but but it is what it is, and and I, you know, I damaged a lot of relationships and friendships along the way, but but also at the same time, I felt a lot of support and love from some key individuals, including my wife and children.
Maria Ross 13:24
Right, which you are all still very close. Yes, yes. So much. So absolutely. Wow. Well, I can you know, again, I can only imagine how hard that is. And I think we don’t appreciate enough, the period before someone, not even the period before someone decides to come out. But the period when they’re trying to determine who they are. I think we have this image in our mind that people know who they are before they come out and they’re just hiding it. And we don’t really understand the journey that that you go through. Like you said, where you were just trying to figure out what is this? Am I mentally ill? Why doesn’t this feel right? Like there was a whole there was a whole pre almost coming out to yourself process. It sounds like.
Cori Lovejoy 14:11
Yeah, I mean, I would say that’s exactly what it is, is coming out to was coming out to myself. And yeah, it’s really hard to sort of separate that kind of process with you know, I think being being trans and then growing up, sort of closeted and not being able to talk about this, it. It also creates a lot of other kind of psychological problems. So it’s I think it’s, I mean, I want to try to just speak from my own experience as much as I can because every trans person every every story is different, right? I don’t I don’t want to give any illusion or pretense that I’m speaking for all trans people.
Maria Ross 15:01
No, everybody’s story is so personal. And you even said to me before we started recording, you know, you identify as trans, but you also identify as queer and you identify as lesbian. And there’s lots of different permutations of how, you know, there’s not just one identity of transgender.
Cori Lovejoy 15:19
Yeah, yeah. I do think, though, that it is not uncommon, you know, that being said, I don’t think it’s uncommon for there to be other underlying or coincident mental health issues that right occur with this, I mean, gender dysphoria, I don’t you know, it, at least for me, wasn’t just, it wasn’t just gender dysphoria. There’s, you know, there’s body dysmorphia, you know, it’s like I had I had this, you know, kind of, you know, eating disorders and sort of like, lots of lots of different things that just kind of came along with it two, that I needed to sort out that were also, you know, not necessarily directly related being trans but definitely related.
Maria Ross 16:07
Right? Well, I mean, I would imagine that, when you’re trying to figure out, what does it feel right, you’re turning to all these different things, is it? Is it my body? Is it my mental health? It’s, you know, when you’re trying to figure out what’s misaligned for you, it leads you it sounds like it leads you in all these different directions. How does it? How does it feel, now that you have made this transition? When you hear about the laws being passed in other states, obviously, that must worry you about the mental health of young people, but also of adults, too, who have taken a long time to come to this journey?
Cori Lovejoy 16:48
Yeah, yeah. It was, it’s actually very upsetting to me. I feel, I mean, I had so many, I’ve had so much privilege and coming out, I had amazing friends, I had a supportive family, I had the financial resources, I had this life living as a man that shaped me and gave me I think, some con, you know, there’s a certain amount of confidence I had I, I felt like I was, you know, successful professionally. So, I had a lot going for me, and I feel like I barely made it. And then I start to think about, you know, younger kids or people without those resources, financial, in places, you know, and this was in Seattle, where I came out to, so I felt relatively safe. And I just think about if any of those variables weren’t there, what I’ve made it I think about the kids and it’s, it’s it’s, it’s life and death. I mean, it’s, it’s it is life and death. For trans people. There’s some really interesting statistics about suicide rates and attempted suicide rates among trans people, and particularly trans youth. And they’re extraordinarily high. For ordinarily high. And and it’s, it’s just so sad to me, and it just, it makes me angry. And I think so much of it is just I’ll say ignorance. Yeah,
Maria Ross 18:25
It is ignorance. And that’s, you know, this is part of my mission with this show is to open people’s apertures of who they come in proximity to. And that’s why I’m so grateful that you’re here. Because if you are a person who has never known someone who’s transgender, or you just don’t understand, which is okay not to understand, but you have to seek understanding, and to seek understanding, you have to open a dialogue with people. And so that’s why again, I’m so grateful that you’re here. Just sharing your personal journey. I wanted to ask, you know, it’s so interesting years ago, I caught a TED talk online by a woman named Paula Stone Williams and the talk was called, I’ve lived as a man and a woman. Here’s what I learned. And it was a transgender woman who had transitioned very similar to after a very successful corporate career. And I think in her case, she’d even been CEO of a, I think, kind of a Christian angled organization, a larger organization. And her talk was so enlightening, and so she was funny, but she was truthful. And the biggest thing I took away from the talk was just the eye-opening experience that she had had of living as a man for so long and reaping the success living as a white privileged man for so long. And now being a woman and what she noticed about how she was treated differently, and not just for being transgender, but for people who just believed she had, you know, she was had always identified as a woman. Can you tell us a little bit about what you’ve noticed in terms of the treatment you get or the experience you have going through the world? As a man? And now as a woman? What have you learned about that?
Cori Lovejoy 20:19
Yeah, I want to, I want to answer that. But I also just want to kind of put a exclamation point behind what you said about proximity. And that’s I’ve made a commitment to, to speak as much as I can and, and be out in and open and transparent about my experiences, because I’ve found that that proximity is so important, and sharing my story, and I’m in the feedback I get is, confirms that it’s just it’s so important in building empathy, proximity, and into perspective taking. And yeah, it’s very difficult to understand is, you know, living as a man, I don’t I mean, I don’t understand it. I mean, I, it’s very difficult to explain, it’s very, very difficult to understand. And I don’t expect anyone who’s not trans to really be able to understand it, but it does go to like, you know, people being curious, genuinely curious. And then also just, like, respecting, but yeah, some of the, like, interesting things, I guess, the first time that I really felt a loss of privilege was the the very first time I, I went out of my house, presenting as a woman dressed as a woman. And I remember closing the front door, locking it and walking out and then being scared. And I’m like, wow, this for the first time in my life, I am out. And I actually am scared. I mean, violence against trans people, trans women, particularly and trans women of color, it’s a real thing. And it just was, it was a very visceral thing to like, suddenly realize that I can’t take my physical safety for granted anymore. And now I have to pay attention. You know, I started carrying pepper spray. I, you know, I was careful about where I went and how I went and how I looked and how I presented myself. It was, it happened in the matter of like, a very short amount of time. So that contrast was was really, really stark. For me. And then I also remember the first time I got mansplain to I didn’t know what was happening. Yeah. And can you tell us about it? Yeah, it was a perfect, it was in a professional context. It was actually a nurse, a male nurse. And I swear, I’m like, this person, it just felt weird the way the person was talking to me, kind of slow and like really go into like, a lot of depth to explain, like basic concepts and things like that. Like, is this just the way this person is? And then it dawned on me now I’m getting mansplain to. And I’m not the least intelligent person around I don’t think and so it was just, it was so bizarre to me, because I felt that I felt helpless, like it was happening. Yeah, but I also didn’t feel like I could say anything about it. I don’t know how I would like, address that I still don’t know how to address that to, to this day. And it’s occurred, it keeps occurring to me. In a in a professional context, after I came out, I moved to Salt Lake City and kind of as a man, just to kind of keep myself busy. And in the flow of things. I took a job at Nordstrom, in the fragrance and beauty department, which for me was just like a fun and interesting way to be out as trans and get up the, what I call the girl school learning curve really quickly. But in that context, I had a I had a manager who called me aggressive and I had a manager call me combative. And I really, I really, really reflected upon that. And I can’t say for certain but I’m I’m nearly 100% certain that I was showing up exactly the way I showed up in a professional context. Yeah, the way you’ve always man. Yeah. And, and, you know, you know, as a man, you’re assertive, as a woman you’re aggressive. You know? And, you know, someone once told me, you know, what do you call a successful man? Successful? What do you call a successful woman? A bitch, right that. That’s really real. It’s really real. Yeah. And I don’t think it happens consciously in most cases, right? It’s unconscious bias. But it’s, it’s very hard to pinpoint. I was telling a friend as yesterday, it’s like, you know, I can share some of these anecdotes, but when it’s happening, or it’s you can’t always point to a specific phrase or specific behavior. It’s, it’s more of a felt sense of, of how you’re being treated. And yeah, whether or not there’s respect, and, and it’s very hard, isn’t it? No, it’s just thinking about this in organizational context. If you were going to, like, go to HR and say, hey, this is what’s happening, it would be very, very difficult to, like, make a case for it based.
Maria Ross 24:47
Right? Right, right.
Cori Lovejoy 25:49
Specific languages. But you know, I mean, I know and having that contrast, and I just think about, I think about sis women that have just grown up in this context without knowing any different and differently. And I feel like a lot of what I do now with my girlfriends, and I just love my, we can talk about that too. But my relationship with women, and my girlfriends, it’s so remarkable. And something that I’ve really missed out that I really didn’t realize I was missing out, as a man that girlfriend relationships are remarkable. So remarkable. It’s been the that piece of coming out has been the least expected. And the most beneficial and best part about coming out. But it’s, it’s just, it’s hard to sort of explain what it’s like. And I think, again, think of sis women who, who have never really realized this, and there’s something around, like personal power, I feel like a lot of what I’m doing in my relationships with my girlfriends is like, helping them to step into their power and be more assertive. I, you know, in full disclosure, I, a year ago, I checked myself in to rehab, inpatient rehab, because my, my coming out was also coincident with, you know, these underlying mental health issues. But also, which started as very intentional self-medication. Turned into addiction. And so, by, you know, by early August last year, I was like, I can’t stop. I mean, I’m, I’m, I’m an I’m a full-on addict here, I can’t stop if I wanted to. And so, but you know, and I went into rehab, it was impatient, and I was living in the women’s area and with women and fully accepted as a woman. And I just, I, it was so interesting to me, because I would see, it was very, very strict in terms of rules. But I would see men get exceptions to the rules. And, and merely because they asked, and then I would go to the, you know, the women and you know, they’d come to me, like, oh, I can’t do that. Or women. I’m like, can you ask, can you advocate for yourself? Like, I just, I was doing a lot of coaching of these women to just really be more assertive and advocate for themselves. Something that came very, very naturally, to me as a man that is, I think, seems to be very hard for a lot of sis women.
Maria Ross 28:20
It does. And I’d want to get back to your point about why it’s, it’s hard to put your finger on it. And that’s why, you know, and I can speak to my own experience, why it’s hard to go to HR, why it’s hard to to report somebody because it feels so squishy. It’s like you know it, but there’s no like, people don’t just come out and blatantly say I am sexually harassing you, or whatever it is, or I am mansplaining. You it’s not, it’s not that black and white. It’s really that feeling. And we were joking before we started recording that if only you know, every man could live as a woman and go to work as a woman for just a little while and come back. They would get it right it because it’s you say that and it sounds so squishy and nebulous, and but you you know it when you’re in it. And so, I really appreciate you sharing, that that’s something that you’re starting to realize too, as you as you move through life as as the woman you were meant to be. So, I would love to kind of continue that vein and talk about you know what, now that you I mean, I know you’re not still you’re still on your journey, but with your work around culture with your work around emotional intelligence with organizations, and helping them build an inclusive culture. What can colleagues do or say? What can leaders do or say, to help transgender individuals be their best selves at work and be able to, to thrive in the workplace? It is And I know there’s not like a laundry list. But if you sort of had some, some top tips for us, of what you found helpful, now that you know, you’ve been on both sides of this, like what, what are some ways that people can? If they don’t realize they’re doing something maybe stop? Or if they don’t realize they should be doing something start?
Cori Lovejoy 30:22
Yeah, I think it starts with proximity. I think it it, it it, you know, to to be genuinely curious about and whether it’s trans or LGBTQ, LGBTQ plus, or you know, someone with a disability, any underrepresented group. I think it’s, I think it’s proximity. I think it’s genuine curiosity so that you can, as best you can take that perspective, perspective taking. So, it’s it’s proximity and perspective taking. I also think it requires a lot of personal work. We’re not always I mean, it’s unconscious bias, we’re not aware of our, our biases. I wasn’t I mean, I on Earth, my own biases about women that I had to work through on on Earth, my own biases about trans people and queer people that I, I had internalized these biases, then and I actually had, you know, and still do, and a lot of cases like have to overcome them. Myself, and I just learned this term, meta stereotype, which is, you know, not as like, we know, all know what stereotype means. But a meta stereotype is me thinking that people are thinking about me, stereotypically.
Maria Ross 31:45
Right.
Cori Lovejoy 31:45
So, me just a mat, you know. So, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s very interesting. But I think that, I think so I think though, you know, proximity perspective taking and then personal work will unearth these biases, and make the unconscious biases conscious. And that’s a lot of that’s a lot of work. And that takes a lot of like introspection and personal work. I think the, to me, the really interesting point, then becomes like, what do I do about it? Like, now I’m suddenly conscious of my bias? How do I break that bias? And this is where I think my work before is, is is, you know, emotional and social intelligence. And mindfulness comes in so handy, because I think that it takes practice, I think you I think, just just knowing intellectually about unconscious bias, and knowing you know, these things at a conceptual level, very, very different than actually changing your, your wiring and changing your heart. And that takes practice. And I think that’s the thing is, and there are there are known practices, many of which I’ve promoted in the past, and still practice myself to combat unconscious bias, unconscious bias actually change, change the way you think about people at a very deep level. And I think that, that I mean, to me, those are the steps. I mean, personally, I think what was really important for me is just people being curious people affirming the being affirmed as a as a woman in my identity. And that’s, it’s simple things that a lot of people might think ridiculous, but using someone’s correct pronouns, it just, it makes it, it makes such a big difference when I was, and I still am, in a lot of ways, very fragile, in terms of my identity, as a woman, so it’s very, very potent for me to be accepted as a woman to be treated as one. So, I think just it goes back to maybe just that kind of respect.
Maria Ross 34:06
Hmm hmm. Yeah. And I think that, you know, it always goes back to that whole, like working on yourself first. You know, we talked about that in the empathy edge is that it starts with you, practicing mindfulness, practicing presence, being able to recognize your own emotions, and your own state of mind, which is so much of the work that you did to great success with organizations of helping build that emotional intelligence muscle, so that there’s not again, there’s not just a laundry list of things you do and don’t do, but it’s when you are actually conscious. And you are present to what you are thinking and feeling. You can change your behavior. But if you’re not even conscious and present to what you’re thinking and feeling, you don’t even realize the impact that you’re having on other people. You’re very insular. And so it’s it’s such you know, it’s we we keep trying to find these ways to get around that important first step, to eliminating so many of the issues that we have in the workplace and in our world around racism, misogyny, unconscious bias, all of that. That work is so important. And then I think there’s probably also a piece, I would imagine that there’s also there also is a policy piece. So once you see things that are, we, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of leaders that try to say it’s it’s implicit bias, because they want to have that as an excuse of like, I didn’t realize that we were treating people that way. But then there’s other times where, where I had this conversation with the previous guests where it’s like, well, you, you knew you knew you were underpaying women, you knew your culture was not inclusive for transgender individuals, like you knew. So, there are their policy or ritual or other process, decisions that can be made to create that more inclusive environment, as you said, not just for transgender individuals, but for bipoc. For women for underrepresented groups.
Cori Lovejoy 36:13
Yeah, I think there there clearly are policies and procedures in those things. I think that I mean, to really create a culture that is welcoming, and where underrepresented people feel like they belong, because I think that sense, that’s what I think we’re aiming for. And any dei work is a sense of belonging. I think that that that is going to require leaders to actually change their mindsets, and do that personal work. And that’s, that’s the hard part. I do think it’s interesting. You know, I’ve often thought it’s interesting to to have gone through this experience with my kind of background, and training and sort of sort of, you know, having that lens on my own experience has been been really rich. Yeah, just I just occurred to me to, I want to say one thing about respect. And the, if you look at the root of the word, it means to look, again, relook. And so I just, I think, in terms of respect that way, I’m just like, look, again, look beyond. Beyond that initial reaction, I had a very good friend of mine say that, you know, it, you know, in meeting me, there was about 10, to 15 minutes of discomfort, she was very, very honest about that kind of discomfort. And then, and then it was fine. And then it was totally normal. And I’ve asked other people about that. And they’re like, yeah. First, it’s a little bit abrupt puts people on their heels to see, you know, male bodied person presenting as female. And I think that just the ability to kind of like, sit in that discomfort, remain curious. Recognize, like, what’s coming up in you, and being able to manage that, get beyond that, and get to the place of empathy and perspective taking. That’s not trivial for people. That’s a huge sort of developmental step for a lot of people. And I think that that’s, that’s the work that needs to happen is at the level of, you know, individual personal work, and then relating to people. One on one, one on one. So I liked the policy. I liked the the, you know, the procedures and the processes. That alone is not enough to really
Maria Ross 38:38
Exactly.
Cori Lovejoy 38:39
I was changing leaders, yeah.
Maria Ross 38:41
I was gonna say you can’t policy your way to an inclusive culture. But what it’s but if you’re doing those hand in hand, which you’ve done so well, in organizations that you’ve worked in, in the past, where you’ve, you’ve helped with individuals working on the inner work, and what can we do systemically? What how can we change our hiring processes? How can we create practices and rituals just like we talked about? So, it’s a it’s a both and you can’t start with sort by mandating inclusivity because it doesn’t happen. It’s an outcome of building your own emotional intelligence, your own empathy, your own understanding? And what I think is probably more important, even as a first step and tell me if you agree with this, is just that the leaders are modeling the behavior. Even if you have no policies in place, even if you have no procedures in place, even if you know, if you see leaders that are acting with empathy, including others, that and also that they are not tolerating disrespect. In the organization. They don’t let it slide. I feel like that speaks volumes to creating the inclusive culture that you want. Have them read really putting their money where their mouth is and saying this is, this is what we stand for. I am going to model this behavior. And I’m also going to call you out. If you’re not being inclusive if you’re not being respectful.
Cori Lovejoy 40:14
Yes, I couldn’t agree more. And it kind of brings up another issue that you mentioned hiring. You mentioned creating these cultures at a systemic level. And I think there’s a, you know, these all happened to be peas, like perspective, taking personal were proximity. But there’s another key here that I think is super important, which is proactivity, which is we can’t just I don’t think that with any underrepresented group, I don’t think just we can’t, we just can’t say, Hey, we’re, you know, in even if you are genuinely inclusive, and, and you’ve changed your culture, you, you can’t just sit back and way and hope that underrepresented people find you and make their way into the organization, I mean, underrepresented groups have been in people have been disadvantaged systemically, and it takes proactivity I mean, we got to be proactive in our recruiting, you know, changing our recruiting processes, changing our mentoring processes, being proactive. And in promoting representation is really important. As you know, as a trans person, I’m looking at organizations to work for or with, and it’s like I do, I see people like me, on the board and leadership roles, you know. So, being proactive and promoting and recruiting underrepresented people is for for leaders is really changing the way they they hire and bring people on board and promote people, I think is exactly where leaders would put their money where their mouth is. In addition to, you know, calling people out and, and, and they themselves doing their, you know, being very transparent about the personal work than they need to do and are doing.
Maria Ross 42:05
Well, I’m what I love about the work that you’ve done in the past and that you’re doing for organizations today is really helping them bring that sort of training and dialogue about the inner work to the organization on a consistent basis. I’ve talked about this in a previous hot take episode of the podcast, but you can’t just have one empathy workshop or one emotional intelligence workshop for your team. And then poof, your culture is transformed. It’s got to be a consistent curriculum, a consistent message over and over again, that you are going to help your employees with that inner work. Because it ultimately benefits the organization, I think there’s so many leaders who don’t want to spend time or money on that, quote, unquote, stuff, I’m doing air quotes, people can’t see me. But it’s so important to the actual bottom-line performance of the organization. And you’ve, you know, in your work in the past, you’ve been able to prove that you’ve been able to show that once we put these things in place, we you know, retention went up, engagement went up, loyalty went up, revenue went up. And so how do you work with leaders when you’re when you’re trying to show them that, that this inner work, and creating an environment, not just saying like you go do the inner work, where the organization actually takes responsibility and accountability for helping their employees with the inner work? How do you feel about that?
Cori Lovejoy 43:35
Yeah, it’s, it’s interesting, as you know, in is, uh, you know, when I do consulting work or work with leaders, and, you know, you get hired to, to change something in the organization, right? Magically and, and it’s a very, and, you know, it’s a very sort of a dicey conversation to have with the leader, who’s, you know, either your boss or your client to say, well, you know, like, first you got to change you. First, we got it, you know, like, that’s the, I know, it’s tempting to, you know, go out and say that, you know, we got to change this in our organization, we have these issues, and whatever in organization, it’s like, okay, we’ll get to that. But first, you got to do your work. Yeah. And, and I, you know, and I think, I think more and more leaders are getting that, and, and then when they get comfortable doing that work in their personal work in a work context, then it becomes clear how they would do that. In the organization. If they haven’t done that work themselves, then I think, you know, the thought, even the thought of doing this work at organizational level. This doesn’t doesn’t resonate with them.
Maria Ross 44:54
But you’ve seen the power of that in the work that you’ve done, where the leaders are like, I’m willing to take a look at my itself, and how that’s impacted the performance of the whole organization.
Cori Lovejoy 45:04
Totally. Yeah, I mean, that’s the biggest, I mean, the most potent leverage point in system change is, is leadership, I think. And then if it within individual leaders, then it’s, it’s, you know, the leverage point is, is their personal work and then changing their views and their behaviors. Yeah, I will say one other thing, too, about what I like to say. And I think it’s important, because so much of what I think if people look beyond just kind of the, my story, as a trans person, there’s another underlying piece here that a lot of people can relate to, which is, I’ll just call itself love accepting yourself, learning to love yourself learning to get beyond shame, and these things. And so, I will often describe my journey as a journey of learning to love and accept myself unconditionally. And so many people can relate to that, whether their journey is, you know, whether it’s trans or sis, Jen, you know, what, like, that is, I think that’s sort of, like, the common human experience for most of us is, is, like, we’ve been told so much of our lives, that we’re not enough that something’s wrong with us that we don’t fit in, or we’ve just, you know, internalized that ourselves, and, and so much of this work for me has been learning to, to love myself and accept myself and get beyond the shame. And when I, when I talk at that level, about those types of things, I think people can really relate to me as as, as this coming out as trans as a, as learning to accept myself and learning for who I am. And not try to, yeah.
Maria Ross 46:59
And I love that, that point. Because I think if you look at the lot, a lot of the issues that leaders have, with you know, as, as my premise of my book was the root of many of the issues is the lack of empathy. And where does the lack of empathy come from, it often comes from you as a person being dissed, destabilized, where you don’t have enough self-acceptance or self-love, or self-confidence, or, or you’re not grounded enough to be able to try to see things from another person’s point of view, and not feel threatened by it. Because I feel like so much of the dysfunctional leadership out there, you know, it’s like the bullies become bullies type of thing, right? And why do bullies become bullies because they’re hurt inside. Because they’re, they’ve experienced something themselves. And so, if you’re, you know, if you’re having issues with your team, and performance and inclusivity, it’s worth it to at least entertain the idea that you’ve got to create a stronger foundation within you, because perhaps, you are being so defensive and unwilling to listen and unwilling to compromise. Because you have your your own insecurities, you have your own issues of self-acceptance, and self-love and self-worth. And it sounds very, like, whoo, whoo. And I know, there’s a lot of skeptics, you know, folding their arms right now, they’re probably not listening to this podcast. But, you know, we, I think, as we get older and more experienced in the workforce, we start to see that we start to recognize that, oh, I don’t know that that person’s a jerk. I just think that that person doesn’t really love themselves very much.
Cori Lovejoy 48:38
I think I think, yeah, I think you’re so right. And I think you’ve just articulated that perfectly. I don’t have anything to add. I think that’s, that’s wonderful. And that’s, that’s, that’s the personal work at the most fundamental level, is learning to know yourself, who you are. authentically finding your authentic self. Becoming aware of that authentic self, accepting that authentic self. Loving that, and you know that yourself unconditionally. Yeah, you’re, you’re you’re right.
Maria Ross 49:18
Yeah. Well, Cori, this has been so wonderful to reconnect with you. And you know, having known you before and know you now, there is a glow there is an energy you spoke about the fact that, you know, people feel like you’re a people magnet now. And it’s, I really believe it’s because you have embraced your authentic self. And it’s so beautiful to see. And it’s such a great model for all of us, no matter what it is about ourselves, whether it’s, we’re trans or we have vulnerabilities we need to accept or whatever whatever it is about us that we need to accept. You’re a great model for what can happen when you finally do, and I know it wasn’t, it’s not an easy journey. But I really appreciate you sharing it with us today. And you know, bringing that perspective and enriching your work around organizational change around culture around creating inclusive cultures, makes you such a unique consultant and leader in that area. So I’m very excited to see what you do next. But we will have all the links to stay in touch with you in the show notes. But just for people on the go, where’s the best place they can connect with you?
Cori Lovejoy 50:30
Probably LinkedIn or Instagram. Those are the two social media platforms.
Maria Ross 50:35
Wonderful.
Cori Lovejoy 50:37
But I just want to thank you, thank you so much. There were a lot of compliments back in there and I appreciate that I appreciate you and and your interest in me at a at a personal level and a professional level. And it’s just been, it’s always a pleasure to speak with you.
Maria Ross 50:52
Oh thank you.
Cori Lovejoy 50:53
Today was no exception.
Maria Ross 50:54
Thank you so much Cori Lovejoy, making the world better for culturally inclusive environments. Thank you so much, and we wish you the best of luck on your journey. And thank you everyone for listening to another great episode of the empathy edge. Hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please share it with a friend or colleague. And don’t forget to rate and review we love those on your podcast player of choice. Until next time, please remember that cash flow creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care, and be kind.