Emotionally intelligent leaders kick off new year of LocLife™
Emotional intelligence can get you through the worst of times and help you enjoy the best of times. These words from LocLife host Javi Diaz launched us into the first session of 2022, with a panel of esteemed localization leaders and hundreds in attendance.
So, how does emotional intelligence—or the ability to identify, understand and manage emotions—contribute to successful leadership? Our experts gathered together to find out, exploring ways to leverage this soft skill to improve team performance, partnerships and organizations overall. Along with some surprise guest speakers, the panel included:
- Salvatore Giammarresi, head of localization at Airbnb
- Anna N. Schlegel, VP product, international and globalization at Procore
- Ora Solomon, VP international product at 1stDibs
- Sophie Solomon, director at Accenture
If you missed this session, watch it on-demand here!
Memorable takeaways
Noting that emotional intelligence is rooted in empathy, Javi started the conversation by asking the panel how they work toward empathetic leadership.
“It’s not about me,” said Sophie Solomon. “It’s about the experience, feelings and needs of my community and how I can bring them together.”
Ora Solomon agreed, adding, “For me, it’s really about understanding people and reading the subtext. There’s a lot to be understood in what people aren’t telling you.”
When the idea of creating emotionally safe environments for teams came up, Salvo Giammarresi shared, “I remind my team that my door is open, that they can come to me for anything, and that they come first. Work always comes after.”
According to Anna Schlegel, “The job of a leader is like the coach of a soccer team. You’re watching who is playing well together. If I see something I don’t like, it’s immediate feedback that day. And my team knows this.”
Sophie Solomon added, “We need to embrace and accommodate the environment and realities of the people that are working on our teams. Then they have a great opportunity to contribute in a way that makes sense to them and to give more of themselves.”
So much insight and inspiration were packed into this one discussion, but we’ll wrap up with a sage piece of advice from Anna Schlegel.
“If you can be the ray of sunshine and still meet your objectives, that is very powerful.”
Be sure to continue the conversation with the LocLife™ LinkedIn Community and stay tuned for updates about our next session of LocLife.
