Navigating The Rise

In this episode, we evaluated how Asians work and perceived in the professional environment both from the US and from the UK. Initially, I spoke with Jatin Anand from the Asian Professional Facebook Group in the UK, and he noticed these couple of things among the professional Asians in the workplace. Asians do not take initiatives at workspace -> perceived lack of leadership skills The Asian culture can describe the perceived lack of taking initiatives in not trying to disrupt harmony in a group setting. By taking actions, it creates conflicts. Asians, for most, are known to be some of the most passive-aggressive people in the world. For example, they would be super friendly to you, but once you leave, they would start to complain about you to their close confidants. However, that is not wrong from their perspectives as is expected. They have the understanding that is what will not be surprised if that ever comes up. However, that can create problems. Because there is a perception that someone who can conf

This episode is a bit different as I have taken the top 10 things that people have experienced and put it down into a sequential story.  Girik Sehgal from Subtle Asian Travel gave us a brief breakdown in the top 10 cities that people should visit to better understand the cultural phenomenon within Asia. In the first part, we explore where are the best cities that give a good representation of the top cities.  For those who are interested in exploring those cities to better understand Asian cultures, we recommend the following cities: Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei, Kuala Lumpur, Busan, Seoul, and Manila.  Why not other cities?  Well actually there are, but they give you an easy way to interact in a safe environment.  Heck if you want to venture out, go to the countryside, but most first-time visitors might have an issue with no English, no toilets...(Asian squats), among others.  In the podcast, we go a bit deeper into each of the locations...location

Explore why languages cause you to look at the world differently. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

Greetings around the world:   How are you? = Did you eat yet? --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

Evaluating the positive vs. negative reinforcements in leading others. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

Everything in your life can be reused.  I mentioned three examples: -Learning languages -Career pivots -Travel --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week, I had the opportunity to speak to William Hung, the viral American Idol who looks adversity in the face and charges through with unwavering conviction.  After his American Idol audition, William Hung’s rendition of “She Bangs” became famous for all the wrong reasons. Despite the harsh criticism he endured, William persevered—having gone on to attract a cult following, release three albums, and even perform live with Ricky Martin in Las Vegas.  A strategic storyteller and professional optimist, William is proof that the underdog can succeed when you rise above the haters and choose to be happy.  William has appeared on media outlets like FOX, ABC, CNN, and NBC and in such publications as Rolling Stone, TIME, and USA Today. He was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Born in Hong Kong, William now resides in Los Angeles. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week, I had the opportunity to speak to Chirag Sagar, the Co-founder of Money Matters Top Tips, a media, entertainment, and book-publishing company dedicated to the needs of business owners, entrepreneurs, and executives. Chirag is also the Co-Founder of Digital Luxury Agency, where the team has collectively worked with over 3000 small and large companies, Fortune 500s, governments, non-profits, and investment firms. Their roster of clients includes Richard Branson and Virgin, the country of Panama, SBE Group, Bank of America, Cadillac, and Qatar Airways. Before that, he served as the COO of Destination Luxury, a luxury lifestyle media outlet that reaches over 5 million people every month through their various channels. He spearheaded the team that built the website presence to reach 500,000 monthly unique visitors and grew its social media properties to reach millions from scratch. Before that, he helped scale a White House-recognized start-up non-profit called Moneythink, where they’ve taught their fin

This short episode describes why face to face meetings are so important to Asian countries --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

These objects signify death...or bad luck --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week we have the opportunity to speak with Jerry Liu.  Jerry is a full time digital content creator and currently have more than 130K subscribers on YouTube, 181k subscribers on Facebook. Having spent time in journalism, PR, and more than 10,000 hours in the digital media space, Jerry carry unique communications experience in traditional and digital media and offer a unique blend of passion, energy, and focus to his works and to clients and employers. Jerry started his first YouTube channel (called JerryLiuFilms) for fun, but it developed into multiple brands. Since 2011, He gained more than 30 Million views and partnered with Multi-Channel Networks like Fullscreen and BBTV. Besides YouTube, he also experimented with other digital media platforms.  He also put videos on YouKu and Bilibili, two of China's biggest video content sites, and gained more than half-a-million views on those Chinese site. I've also tested Vine, Twitter, and Instagram. Jerry mentioned that he learned how to use metrics t

This week we explored with Heather Havenwood on how to to be a successful influencer.  We talked about the foundation of what it takes to be an influencer as well as how to leverage that foundation and tie that to Asian culture and upbringings.  She explored how growing up as a Baptist, she faced many limitations in terms of self-promotion, as that was not how she was brought up.  That is similar to the Asian culture of being in harmony with the group where self-promotion is not passively accepted.  We explored the steps needed from taking a skill to using that skill to being an influencer.  However, that is not enough.  We explored the missing steps in-between having the right skillset and being a successful influencer.  One of the core pieces is the mindset, and we explored how to adopt that mindset to become a successful influencer.  When it comes to becoming a successful influencer, it doesn't mean to have a considerable following but just influencing the community

This week we have the opportunity to speak with Ricky Nguyen, who is the Co-founder of Spot Trender.  As Co-founder at Spot Trender, Rick creates and refines enterprise solutions for professional advertisers to win hearts and minds. He built Spot Trender from scratch to profitability. In his spare time, Rick enjoys various projects to promote STEM education and advanced science in the United States. Rick appreciates his situation as an immigrant from Vietnam. For him, he believes that because he immigrated, he had the perspective of Vietnamese as well as incorporating the perspective of Americans.  Rick attributes much of his success as being able to combine the two different aspects and happy to have immigrated here.  Because of the upbringing within America, Rick had a paradigm shift where he was told he was stupid in Vietnam but was told he was gifted in America.  The paradigm shift played a part in his acceptance into a top university at UC Berkeley as well as immediately starting his

This week we have the opportunity to speak with Dan Matthews. Dan is an alternative rap artist from Los Angeles, CA. His high energy performance is mirrored with lyrics about self-reflection, addiction, and identity. He draws on electic inspiration from the likes of Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park to the Neighborhoud to Odeza. He’s also a Korean Adoptee and works to speak voices to that community. He’s produced documentaries about the Adoptee and Asian experience including his journey back to Korea in meeting his biological family including an identical twin brother he never knew about. His work has been recognized around the world including the BBC, NPR. https://navigatingtherise.com/2019/07/15/s1-e14-managing-dual-cultural-identity-with-dan-matthews-partner-lead-producer-at-international-secret-agents/ --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week we have the opportunity to speak with Harrison Tang, who is now the CEO and Co-founder of Spokeo.  According to an article from Hyperlush, the company has achieved significant milestones to be where they are now.  Harrison gave us many insights on how his upbringing helped him where he is now.  He attributed much of the success to the support of his family and words of wisdom.  However, what he said made a significant mark on his life was when he immigrated here from Taiwan.  He went from the top of his class to the bottom of the class due to the language barrier.  His father also told him that going back to Taiwan is not an option.  Even if the job is washing dishes, Harrison's father said that it would be in the United States, not Taiwan.  Guess what did Harrison do?  He started to copy dictionaries to perfect his vocabulary as he realized he has no way out to go back to Taiwan.  Throughout his endeavors, he succeeded in going to one of the top uni

This week I have the opportunity to interview George (not me) since his last name is Lu.  We give a load down on what it is like to be an engineer in today's world.  Right now being in tech is as crazy as it was to be in finance about 10+ years ago. Given the added pressure from Asian parents to be an engineer, we explored what it takes to be an engineer.  We went through all the tribulation of studying and training needed to be an engineer, as well as a software engineer in modern times.  Some significant points we touched upon include the transition of traditional software engineering to data engineering because of the rise of AI technologies.  No longer will engineers be writing rules and policies, but instead, defer to structuring learning machines and data ingestions to achieve the same outcome.  Yes, that means learning machine learning will no longer be optional in the future.  Also, we analogized what recruiting is like as well as some of the issues engineers face su

This week we explored what it is like to be a doctor.  As we all know, most Asian parents want their kids to aspire to become a doctor.  Little did they know, there are many kinds of doctors, with some don't pay that well.  Heck, even being a software engineer these days will pay much more than a generic doctor.  This week, we explored the nuances of the trials and tribulations of being a doctor.  We found out that how much of a thick skin you have to be in order to undergo the trainings.  Instead of encouraging you, many people in the practice point out what is wrong with your work as a way to make you a better doctor.  That makes sense since doctors' actions can mean life and death for an individual.  Another thing we uncovered was, depending on the hospital you train at, you develop different skills, just like different companies have different processes.  After this episode, I hope the listeners have a better grasp on what it takes to be a doctor. --- Suppor

This week we explored how to overcome multi-cultural communication barriers as well as multi-cultural identity crisis.  We explored different contexts across communication styles situations where cultural norms can affect perceptions negatively or positively.  One of the ways to address those is to have successful context switching when working with different cultural norms.   Those who worked abroad or those who speak multiple languages have indirectly developed context switching that can be deployed effectively once further cultivated.  That said, having a multi-cultural identity can be a blessing in disguise given the context switching needed at a young age.   --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week I have the opportunity to interview Yoshimi Nomura where we pivoted the conversation a bit away from typical Western born Asians to Asian who had to adapt to a new culture.  The cultural conflicts still exist, and we explore the conflicting values, how do we still maintain our cultural stance.  Yoshimi demonstrated a strong sense of proudness to her heritage that a lot of questions that bothered most immigrants or Asians born outside of Asia when it comes to attacking the Asian culture, Yoshimi can maintain a calm composure to stand her ground.  Even when things are taken out of context, she assumes people are just misinformed and that it is her opportunity to educate them about the culture.  This firmness is hard to find, and we explored further in how she developed the proudness of her upbringings in a foreign environment. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support

This week I had the opportunity to interview Steven Xu, a rocket scientist, at Aerojet Rocketdyne. I have known him since high school and the grit he exhibited to get to where he is now. We explored how lack of family presence, whether physically or emotionally, has a significant impact on us. Steven went deep into how he helped himself through college application, career planning, as well as managing emotional turmoil with Asian parents. Steven mentioned how he explores his relationship with his parent’s lack of involvement and how he copes with that, including going to the therapist to overcome those his historical experiences. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/navigatingtherise/support