Leadership Seminar Series: Lori & Ann Teranishi

Aloha everyone, my name is Brennan Morioka. I'm the dean for the College of Engineering here at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. We welcome everybody to our monthly leadership seminar series sponsored by the Hayashida Ohana, Ken and Donna Hayashida. I believe I even see Ken in the audience today, so mahalo Ken for your support for this leadership seminar series. It's really meant to give our students and college ohana a different perspective on things, especially when it comes to leadership as they embark on their next phase once they leave the university. Learning about the challenges and experiences of some of our community's top leaders. We are extremely grateful to have a couple of our friends here today – Laurie and Ann Teranishi. They will be joining us. I'm going to kick it off to our two engineering student ambassadors to take it over from here. Thank you everybody and enjoy today's seminar.

Hello everyone, my name is Mia and today with me is Adam again. We'd like to welcome everyone to our third leadership seminar series of the spring semester presented by the Hayashida family. Let's get started. We have two great speakers here today: Lori and Ann Taranishi. We'll start off by introducing the two. All right, so Lori Taranishi is the founder and CEO of IQ 360, a woman and minority owned business communications consultancy that develops and executes strategies to help organizations manage major change initiatives. IQ 360 is comprised of a diverse group of consultants headquartered in Honolulu with teams in San Francisco, New York, and Washington D.C. Lori has 25 years experience providing award-winning strategic communications counsel to global corporations, innovative startups, non-profits, and government agencies. She combines her operating experience managing large-scale P&Ls with her track record of launching communications campaigns that advance her clients' business goals. Before establishing IQ 360, Laurie was Vice President of Product Development at Visa where she also served as Chief of Staff to the Chief Operating Officer and worked in a variety of communication roles. Now Ann Taranishi is President and Chief Executive Officer of American Savings Bank and is a member of the ASB Board of Directors and has been a part of ASB since 2007. She previously served as Executive Vice President of Operations and was responsible for delivering operational improvements to enhance the overall customer experience. She played a key role in transitioning ASB from more traditional branch-centric operations to online and other self-service options that have become increasingly popular. She has received numerous recognitions for her business leadership and community contributions, including from Pacific Business News, Women Who Mean Business, Hawaii Business Magazine 20 for the Next 20, and Girl Scouts Women of Distinction. Ann is an Omidyar Fellow. She serves on the boards of the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii, Island Insurance Company, Hawaii Cellular Therapy and Transplant Center, and U.S. Japan Council. Now we'll have Laurie and Ann begin with any opening remarks they'd like to share.

Okay, great. Thank you so much for those introductions. Since I'm the older sister, I guess I will go first. And likes to always remind me of that. It used to be a good thing and now it's not. But we do have a series of slides to share. But before I go into it, what we want to talk about today we're calling our presentation 'The Real World and Eight Things That They Didn't Tell Me in School.' So what we hope to do is have you think about your career a little differently. When you leave this hour presentation – thank you so much for giving us an hour of your valuable time, I know you could be studying or sleeping – when you leave this discussion, I hope that we will have convinced you that there is a more fulsome way to look at your career, one that I didn't realize until I had been out of school for some time. So that's what I hope you feel when you leave this call. As I think about all of you on this call today, I'm going to go out on a limb and hope I don't get in trouble with Dean Morioka, but if I were to give all of you a Myers-Briggs personality test – most of you have heard about this, it's a personality test when you go into the corporate world a lot of times you have to do these kinds of things and it puts you into a category – I would think 90% of you are probably more left-brained thinkers. The first thing I want to share with you is that you represent a pretty small minority of the world. Most people, a lot of people, are not left-brain thinkers. I myself am not one. Right now the world is experiencing such great shifts, transformation brought about by climate change, by political upheaval, the war on Ukraine, sea changes in technology transformation. That requires leaders who don't think exclusively with their left brains. You have to understand human behavior. There are facts and science and process, but leaders who don't bump up against the Peter principle – leaders that are truly able to lead in this world have both left and right brains. So a lot of what Ann and I are going to talk about today will be encouraging you to step outside maybe the left-brain world. Even if you're a right-brain person, a lot of these things are really hard to do too. So it's for anyone new in their career. I am hoping that you can apply all of these things throughout your career. So let me share some slides here. I hope this works. Okay. All right. So eight things they didn't tell me in school. And by the way, as we're going through these eight, I hope all of you feel uncomfortable. Because when you feel uncomfortable, that means you're growing. I'm actually uncomfortable right now. People think that I speak a lot in public and she's a communications person, she's right brain, she likes to talk – which Ann will tell you it's kind of true – but I'm a little uncomfortable right now. I didn't know there were going to be this many people dialing in. So when you're uncomfortable, you're growing. Remember that. So the first thing they didn't tell me in school was that I will remain a student for the rest of my career and love it, and that's only if you have the right mindset. So when you leave University of Hawaii engineering school, you may think 'yay, I'll be done.' Please don't think that. The leaders that end up – see when you're in your 20s, everybody's kind of the same. You're all in engineering firms or entry-level jobs, everybody's doing the same thing. Then when you start to pull into your 30s, you start to see some people pulling ahead, getting different kinds of assignments. Then your 40s and 50s, there's only a few that make it to the top positions. Those people generally have done the things we're going to talk about today. So I talked earlier about the huge changes we're seeing because of political change, technology transformation, social media. I believe this change is only going to accelerate in the next two years. Look at the huge changes we saw in the workplace in the last two years, how people are viewing social justice issues. People are now questioning their entire lives and the meaning of life. They don't want to work for companies that are just companies; they want to work for companies that have a higher purpose. The world is changing. If you are going to operate as a leader in this world of change, you will advantage yourself if you look at being a student for the rest of your life. What does that mean? Read voraciously: read the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal. Soak up information in areas that aren't familiar to you. Seek out new experiences. For example, when I was new in my career, I was on the communications/PR track and I stayed in that lane. But I was selected at different times to lead different initiatives. I led Visa's first diversity initiative in the late 90s. I didn't really want to do it because it was scary – I had to work with people much higher level, and I was uncomfortable because I was working in a fairly homogeneous corporate environment and thought 'am I just being picked because I'm a minority?' But I changed my thinking and said this is an opportunity. That experience led to me meeting a lot more people in the company beyond my narrow communications group. Leading an initiative where there wasn't a lot of structure taught me how to lead in a murky area. So that's one example of stepping outside the narrow confines of your job and experiencing new things. That takes me to the second point: one of the best ways to continuously learn is to network. I don't have to tell you that relationships are crucial wherever you go. Sometimes it's hard to make the time to carve out time to relationship build because you will work like a dog in an entry-level job – I hope you will. Entry-level jobs are not fun. My daughter started her first entry-level job a few years ago and she was like 'oh my gosh, I have to work all these weekends and nights.' Yes, it's an entry-level job and you're not valuable to your company until you've been there for a year, so don't complain and keep working. But I will argue that cultivating these relationships is well worth your time. If you have the mindset that you're going to devote time to this, it's helpful because every day you'll have to make a trade-off: should I devote one more hour to this important project or take the time to go have a cup of coffee with someone? I believe all of this makes a difference. You never know who you're going to connect with. Networking is not a selfish endeavor. If you look at networking as 'I might learn something new, I might meet someone new,' a great surprise is that ten years down the road, a person that you invested time in and they invested time in you – beautiful things can happen. They can become a client, or someone who hires you. Did you have anything to add?

Yeah, I love that thought. Networking – I guess that's a bad term. I wish I could think of a better term. It's relationship building, and that can come in many forms like Ann said. It's not quantity necessarily. It can be your neighbor, your uncle, a childhood friend. The more connections you make – I know I'm contradicting myself – but when you make some of these connections, you add to the richness of your life. It's not just about advancing your agenda but really adding to the richness of your life. So thank you. And so now I'm going to go to the third point of things they didn't tell me in school. With sufficient self-awareness, drive, and discipline, you too can do the kind of work and be the kind of person you dream of becoming. I know what you're thinking: 'What is she talking about? It sounds so pie in the sky.' But it is good to have a vision of where you want to go, and it doesn't have to materialize. What kind of career do you want to have? It's nice to have an end state in mind. For me, I didn't do that right away; I just wanted to get a job and I graduated in the middle of a recession. It took me a few years to envision what I wanted. But the reason I think it's worthwhile is that seven times out of ten, what manifests itself isn't what your vision was, but if you have a vision, it encourages you to adopt the behaviors we're telling you about that will get you to an end state. Even if it's not exactly how you envisioned, you'll get to a leadership position. For myself, eventually – not immediately because nobody told me when I was in school I should do this – I wanted to be the head of a corporate communication function for a major Fortune 500 company before I was 50. That didn't happen. I ended up leaving Visa and starting a company, IQ 360. But because I was for many years developing skill sets that I needed to be the head of that corporate function, all of those skills help me today in my job. I believe I have a level of confidence to counsel my clients. I've learned how to take risks, how to be persuasive in my arguments. All of those things come from putting myself in uncomfortable growth positions. The other thing about self-awareness: drive and discipline are given if you want to be successful, but self-awareness is a little harder to understand or act on. We have to look at ourselves in an unbiased way and realize our shortcomings. It's fine – you can see where you need to grow. As an Asian woman, I had to figure out how to bust through some cultural norms to be successful in a rough and tumble corporate environment on the mainland. I had to learn to pound my fist on the table a little bit, not apologize as much. Self-awareness: I started realizing people didn't really listen to me because I wasn't making my arguments forcefully enough. Once you determine your path and where you want to be, study the path of other people who have become successful. If you notice, a lot of doctors' kids become doctors, lawyers' kids become lawyers – they've been exposed to the path. It might be true with engineers too. You need to talk to people and observe the path. It doesn't mean you'll end up there, but it helps funnel your thinking.

Yeah, that is really good feedback. Being open is really important – not only seeking experiences but being open to what the universe brings to you. I do yoga, so that sounds hippie-trippy, but being open to all of these things: if you open your mind, you'll be amazed at the opportunities that come to you and you'll be able to take advantage of them. Life is not linear, and that's what makes your career and the opportunity ahead so amazing. I don't know very much about engineering; I wish I did because Ann's husband Eric is the smartest one. But the field of engineering, no matter what area you're going into, is also changing so much. Being open sets you up to capitalize on those changes, to be one step ahead. That brings me to the next point, and this is my final one then I'll turn it over to Ann. You have to have business acumen if you want to reach the top of your profession or any top leadership position. You cannot just be a good communications person or a good engineer. You have to be able to see outside the narrow confines of your organization. That requires a world view – not just what's happening in Hawaii or the US, but looking at the world and outside your area. Ann talked about law school; I realized after taking on different assignments at Visa that I needed to learn more about business. I co-chaired Visa's diversity committee and other cross-functional groups. I remember being in a strategy group and there was a chart on the screen and I asked one of the heads of the consumer debit group 'what is CAGR?' (compound annual growth rate) – I didn't know that. There were all these Ivy League MBAs in the room and I felt dumb. So I decided I have to learn more about business and banking. It eventually led me to get an MBA, but you don't have to get an MBA to have business acumen. Just ask yourself: what are the business drivers for my organization, how does it make money, how does it lose money, what are the big risks? Even if you're in an entry-level job, connect what you're doing to the company's larger goals. As you advance, that mindset will serve you well and you won't top out at the Peter principle. Go outside your functional areas. If you take a job in government as an engineer in department of transportation, seek out ways to go outside your engineering division. If you're at an engineering firm, participate in the construction industry with other professionals. Ann was on the board of the chamber. That all helps build business acumen. Now I'm going to turn it over to Ann to go through the last four.

I 100% agree with what you said, except for the fact that I crowded you out with my speaking, so that's why you were quiet. I'm just kidding, that probably was true, but fortunately Anne found her voice. I am also a huge fan of Anne. They say in the best mentoring relationships, the mentee becomes the mentor. Ann is five years younger than me but she is a mentor to me. I consider it a privilege that we're also sisters. What Anne said about moving laterally is really important because corporations today are not the corporations of 50 or even 20 years ago. Hierarchies are flattening. So you can't judge your success by how many departments are under you or how many people report to you. When we are called in to manage major change initiatives – mergers, acquisitions, business model shifts – the communication is only successful if communicated by the right people at the right time. We look at who in the organization is an influencer that people listen to. Often those leaders are not only the CEO and C-suite; sometimes they are individual contributors who are high-level. Being a leader doesn't mean you need to have a team. You can be an individual contributor and lead initiatives very effectively. That's an important point to remember.

Yeah, and I mean, Anne's right. If again, going back to the first point – viewing your career as a continuous learning opportunity. I have had to really work on my listening skills because in my profession, picking up on nuance is hugely important. It can make the difference between a successful outcome and a failed one. You have to be able to pick up on those nuances. When we talk about people skills, they become more important as your work becomes more consequential. As you take on more responsibility, your decisions and actions affect greater numbers of people. There's a lot of responsibility. The way to minimize risk is to develop your people skills so that you can tell what people are saying versus what they're feeling. In Hawaii we're famous for that – I had to learn when I came back from the mainland that what people tell you is not always what they're thinking. You have to read nonverbal cues and have people in the organization you trust to tell you the truth. That all comes together. Having political savvy – knowing that different groups have hidden agendas – how to help them see why we can be successful together. That's the kind of nuance you need to be a real leader. Before I turn it over to questions, I want to wrap up by saying it's a privilege to talk to you. When I was in school, I appreciated hearing an outside perspective. I hope you feel your time was well spent today. I really hope we've convinced you to look at your entire career as a continuous learning opportunity, embrace being uncomfortable, and even embrace failure. Failure is good – it only makes you stronger and a more developed leader. Thank you very much. We're happy to take questions.

Okay, thank you very much for that insight and those life lessons. I'm definitely going to be applying them in my own life. It was very comprehensive and very important. Thank you very much. For the next few minutes of the leadership seminar, we're going to have a Q&A portion. If you have any questions for Lori and Anne, please put them in the chat. One question from the audience: what are some specific ways you suggest to develop both skills further?

Yeah, I agree. People think marketing people are all talkative right-brain creatives, but in our company at IQ, most people are actually more left-brained. I don't understand. They are less likely to speak up. We encourage people to use internal meetings to try things out and put things out there because if you fail, it doesn't matter. Developing people skills right now in school is great with your close group of friends so that if you fail, it's not as uncomfortable. Try getting out there: being on a non-profit board, volunteering where you meet different people. There are many ways to build people skills.

Yeah, I agree. Being in college, I personally stick to things I know and are more comfortable with. It's important to branch out and put yourself in uncomfortable situations to improve yourself.

Our next question from the chat: you both work with leaders who are engineers, for example Rich Walker and Governor Ige. How was that experience working with someone who was both an engineering mind and a leadership kind of mind?

Governor Ige is an engineer. He doesn't forget anything – he remembers a lot of things. Anything you tell him, he's going to remember. From working with engineers, I've learned that it's helpful to understand personality types. One reason corporations advocate personality tests is to teach you how different people absorb information and make decisions. An engineer is probably diametrically opposed to me – I'm an ENTJ. You have to understand how they think, whether it's a more linear, process-oriented way. Present your ideas in a way they can understand. That's crucial – learning how different people absorb information and how to get them to say yes, to persuade them.

Yeah, thank you for that. It's interesting. People have all different types of mindsets. If you're an engineer, you have a certain mindset; if you're a communications person, a different one. It's interesting to hear how people think differently.

For me personally, with many of your peers living on the mainland, why did you both choose to live here and make a difference in Hawaii?

Do you want me to start? I came back after being gone for over 20 years. It never got easier when I visited family once or twice a year; I would be depressed when I went back. Even though there are a lot of career opportunities on the mainland, I felt Hawaii was the best place to raise children because of the community. I admire the leaders here and want to be a leader that embodies the traits I value. I do a lot of work in ESG – environmental, social, governance – and it seems people are just cluing in to doing things in the community. But leaders here in Hawaii have been doing things for the community decades ago. You can't be Ann Teranishi, CEO of American Savings Bank, and not be volunteering on weekends, not thinking about our bank's place in the community and how to drive the future of Hawaii. That's how leaders here think. I truly believe we have some of the most amazing leaders in the state and we have something to teach the world in how we operate as leaders.

Well, thank you very much to Laurie and Ann. I also see your mother in the audience, so hi Mrs. Taranishi. I hope you did well. Thank you very much. I love talking to both Ann and Laurie and picking their brains. They are fantastic leaders in our community. It's a privilege and honor to have you join us today and share your experiences. You made the lives of Mia and Adam very easy today. For everybody else, hopefully you enjoyed the conversation. We are quickly wrapping up our leadership seminar series for the semester. We have one more on May 20th with Scott Sale from HEI. He will close out our semester, and we'll resume in the fall. Always good to have leaders like Laurie and Ann participate. Sponsored by the Hayashida family. We are proud to have Ken Hayashida with us today who asked a few questions. Thank you. Have a happy and safe weekend. Mahalo to everyone for joining. Mahalo to the Teranishis for sharing your experiences and your mana. Thank you everyone, have a great weekend.