This is the leader AI cannot replace

Thank you, McFred. Thanks for having me.

Ha ha well, we'll we're gonna go back a couple decades if you want the origin story. I started my first business at the age of 19, and it was not very successful, you can imagine, but I learned a lot. ran that business for three years before getting into advertising and marketing. from advertising and marketing, I moved overseas. I transitioned into a little bit of media production where I got into the gaming industry. So sports bedding, casino, poker, and on the media side. And I had to travel a lot for my role at that time. And then I had children and I could no longer travel. So I went back and did my coach training to become an executive and leadership coach. And I kind of did that naturally because my father is considered one of the pioneers of the coaching industry. So in the early 1980s, he's known to have pioneered a little bit of this concept of taking sports coaching and psychology and bringing it into business. So I like to joke that I come by this work honestly. So when I was pregnant with my second child, I went and did my coach training as a little bit of soul searching and wondering, you know, what should I do with my life? That was in 2013. And I've been coaching, training and public speaking ever since. So something hit. I started my company Soroka four years ago, which was a transition from more personal coaching into more business to business operations. And now I work with tech companies around the world to support their leadership development, their, you know, optimization of humanity in the workplace. I do a lot of keynote speaking, public speaking, and of course one on one coaching.

I think it's still looks like it's still recording.

You'll have to edit that part. A little or do a little blooper reel. I know I'm not sure where I was. you asked me what's the main problem that I'm working with my clients to solve. you know, it varies. It's some level of, you know, optimizing human performance and communication, I think is the essence. But everything that we do with our clients is customized based on their objectives. So their objectives might be leadership development for top talent. It could be, you know, refining. How a C-suite or a senior leadership team is working together. it could be stress and burnout awareness for maybe, you know, very intense you know, international environments where people are potentially sometimes working around the clock. the one-on-one work is always varies and different, different. You know, I work with a lot of senior executives, CEOs, founders, just in terms of what they're navigating when it comes to scaling their business. And Endeavoring to obtain more market share within the sectors that they're operating. I did a very cool project recently with a scientific research institute out of Seattle where they had a half a million dollar budget that they wanted to award to support some cross-scientific synergies within their institute. And so we did a two-day with 90 of their top leaders where everyone got to bring their idea to the table. And through a democratic process called open space, we were able to narrow down I think over thirty or forty ideas down to one half a million dollar budget got awarded. And now we're off to the races bringing that project to fruition.

Yeah, I think there's a lot of ways that you can do that and diagnose what's happening. But first you need to understand where the breakdowns are. So hopefully any of the players involved are willing to have transparent communications around what might not be working. And then we've got to look at expediting repair in those areas. So one of the tools that I use is really looking at the level of trust on a team. And but I look at trust through six different domains. Because we often treat trust as very binary, like either I trust you or I don't. And it can be much more helpful, especially if you're endeavoring to identify a breakdown. what domain of trust might be broken? So we look at trust through the domain of authenticity. Do you trust me to be myself? Do I trust you to be yourself? We look at trust through the domain of empathy. You know, are we in this collectively? Is this about a we mentality as opposed to a me mentality? We look at trust through the the domain of capability. So this is all about the knowledge, the competence, and the skill set to actually get the job done. Do I trust you that you can actually do what you say you're gonna do? We look at trust through the domain of logic. So this is all about people's ability to communicate their ideas in a way that makes sense. especially innovative and creative ideas have to land in some form of logic for people to be able to understand them, to enroll in them, and you know. And then bring them to fruition. And we look at reliability, doing what you say you're gonna do. And finally, trust in the domain of capacity, which is your time management, you know, your bandwidth and and your level of an ability to prioritize. So usually within six of those domains, people can often spot the breakdown with a stakeholder or another department or a team. And if we can more like rapidly and specifically identify where there's a breakdown. Now we can rapidly create what repair looks like within that domain, as opposed to just a blanket, I don't trust you, or they don't know what they're doing, you know. second to that, I would say having a unified vision, you know, all every organization needs a a mission a a vision, a mission, a North Star, whatever works for you. But there's gotta be the thing that we're all coming home to that we're committed to bringing to fruition. And that's why we're here. It's not my agenda, it's not your agenda, it's the organization's agenda, and that we should all feel passionate and excited about the role we play to bring that vision to fruition.

Yeah. You've got to have a level of self-awareness, right? You need to understand where you've got passion and motivation, you know, and you're inspired. And if all of those things are on point, you can keep going. You know, I also look at, you know, if you're operating in what I call your zone of genius, which is like you're good at what you do, you enjoy what you're doing, and there's a healthy dose of friction or challenge that keeps you engaged, it keeps you motivated. Ideally, most of us want to be working or at least spending a lot of our time in that zone of genius because we can withstand longer periods of stress. We can withstand, you know, longer times of discomfort because we're engaged in a way that's sparking who we are as brilliant and genius in the world. If you're operating in what we call like your zone of incompetence or competence, the stuff that you're not really good at, you don't really enjoy it, there's not a lot of challenge in engagement or engagement, you're gonna burn out faster. If you're spending your time in those areas. So we look at passion, motivation, how inspired you are, how how easily what you're doing every day taps into who you are as brilliant and genius in the world. And then we pay attention to different signs of burnout, which might sound like, I can't keep going like this even though I want to, you know, or I can't keep going like this and I don't want to. Right? Nothing I do matters. This organization only benefits, you know, is only here for the benefit of its executives. Any type of, you know, how much longer can I keep going at this pace? Those are symptoms and signs, if you're having those thoughts in your mind, that you need to start paying attention to. And what the research shows is that there are two ways that we engage in stress and anxiety management. One is through passive activities. And the passive stuff is natural, it's normal, it's human. But you've got to be responsible that the passive stuff doesn't actually reduce the level of stress that you experience after you engage in the passive activity. So it's things like doom scrolling, video gaming, you know, binging, TV, eating junk food, complaining, gossiping, you know, all fine normal, natural human human activities, but they don't actually reduce the level of stress or anxiety that you might be experiencing. So the research suggests 140 minutes a week of active anxiety or stress management. And the active stuff is the stuff you engage in where after you participate in that activity, you actually reduce your level of stress or burnout. So things like mindfulness, meditation, yoga, exercise, whatever that is for you, time in nature, breath work, journaling, and even my favorite is random acts of kindness. So it's like helping out another human being actually reduces our level of stress and burnout that we might be experiencing with ourselves. So depending on your lifestyle and how you live and you know what you have access to, there are all types of things that we can engage in that will actually reduce our level of stress and burnout. So doing this work in teams is first calling awareness to like where is everybody at? And then, you know, do we need to start engaging in a few more active anxiety management. practices if we want to reduce that level of stress and anxiety.

Yeah, thir 13 years of doing this work and I've, you know, took different things and read all kinds of books and worked with my own coaches and mentors and done different training programs. And I would say that my work is a culmination of everything I've absorbed and learned over the last 13 years. That's really what what I what I do at Soroka, what our team does is put all of that into action, you know, based on on what we've learned and who we've learned from. A lot of it comes from my father, as I mentioned as well. You know, I've been exposed to this kind of work my entire life. so there are certain distinctions and ways of being and tools and frameworks that I've been exposed to for a very long time. They feel almost ingrained in me, you know, very much sort of in my DNA, if you will.

Yeah, I knew you were gonna go there. Yeah. Sure. I mean I've got my personal opinion. Am I allowed to swear on your podcast? Hesitated. I would say AI scares the crap out of me a little bit. I, you know, I was gonna say that it sort of scares me, scares, you know, based on the environmental impacts and it creating a mind of its own. Now I can check that. That's my own sort of doomsday thinking. Where I weave it into my work and where it shows up in leadership is more of the perspective of.

We all have the opportunity to be the leader that AI cannot replace. Because if you think about it, AI is essentially like the contractor or the construction workers. Who we are as the builders of AI, we are the architects. We're designing the blueprints, right? Somebody's got to design the agents. So when I do this work in businesses, as opposed to thinking AI is gonna take my job. The reframe is how do I need to become the leader that AI cannot replace? I've got the institutional knowledge. I've got, you know, the tenure. I'm in the I'm in the conversations that AI isn't in. I understand, you know, what's needed and what the structure is. So can I be the leader that's actually going to build AI to the point where I'm irreplaceable because I'm going to be the greatest architect that can deploy the best, you know. The best bricklayer. If if AI is the bricklayer, I'm the blueprint.

That you never know who it's gonna benefit. So if you have some piece of wisdom, share it. You know, I don't, I I'm not really I I need to work on this probably more, but I'm not really that personality that's like all over social media and like, hey, look at me, and I've got a powerful message. And you know, I might need to do a little more of that for myself, but it's just not my personality. It's a growth edge for me. But I will say that when I do record, when we do publish. And we drop and share our wisdom, be it with me, my co-host, or you know, other guests. Typically, there's at least a few people where it benefits to the point where I'm hearing that back. You know, an example was I was at a family reunion with a with extended family and family friends this summer. And there's a woman that I've known since I was like since I was born. Our fathers used to be business partners. And she said to me, Emily, I listen to every episode. And I was like, What? Are you serious? And she's like, I find it so beneficial. She works in in in HR, like she's a a people and culture person. And she says that a lot of the frameworks and a lot of things we talk about are really beneficial for her and her work. And that for me was just really affirming. Like you never know who's listening and you never know what value you're providing for people. So just share yourself, share freely and you know, get it out there.

Great. Well, you our website is Siroca.co S A R O C A dot C O. You can find me, Emily.haruko on Instagram. You can follow Siroca Speaks at Instagram. and we're also pretty active on LinkedIn. So myself is Emily Haruko, or you can go ahead and follow Siroca. for all of the opportunities to support your business development, your personal development, your leadership development, your personal growth, we like to say we're, you know, coaching minds and elevating careers.

Thank you so much for having me. This was fun.