frankly… Episode 89: Empathy is Not a Weakness

In this episode of frankly…

The transcript below is AI-generated and may contain minor inaccuracies. Tune in to the episode audio to hear the full conversation! 

Transcript

Dan

Hello and welcome to Frankly. Today I am joined by two CMOs. Well, one our guest host today is Nikki Little. who is Franco’s Chief Marketing Officer. And then our guest today is Vijay Iyer, who is the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer with the Cranbrook Educational Community, which you’ll hear is much more than a K-12 school, but also includes a lot of different programming across the arts and sciences, which will we will link in the description below. So Vice has a very interesting career path that brought him from General Motors in the automotive industry across Europe and the US before making the move over to agency work with a Sonic branding agency, which is a bit of an interesting, different type of group that we dig into a little bit there, before making the jump over to the education and nonprofit profession. So Really interesting conversation. I think you’ll enjoy it. And with that, I’ll turn it over to Vijay. Hi, Vijay. Welcome to Frankly. Thanks for coming on.

Vijay

Thanks for having me, Dan and Nikki. I’m very excited.

Dan

Yes, So we always like to start out with just kind of a general overview. Tell us a little bit about your career path and how you got to your current role with Cranbrook?

Vijay

Where do I start? When I was 13, I started working in a pizzeria.

Nikki

We can go that far back.

Vijay

It’s actually interesting because it has helped me a lot in guest services. You think about those things and it was an incredible experience because I got to work with lots of people. different people of different backgrounds and learned a lot of Italian swear words.

Dan

Yep.

Vijay

Which maybe now come in, particularly when you’re watching soccer or soco.

Nikki

Oh, right.

Dan

Yep, comes in handy.

Vijay

I, so a little bit of background. First off, I’m not the famous jazz musician. I wish I was, but I can recommend. He’s a great guy. I met him once. If you ever get to see the Vijayaya Trio, please do that. I did play the piano for a little bit, but background on me, grew up in Germany, so it was my mom, my brother, and I, and went to college there as well, business, and worked in the agencies a little bit along the way to get extra money. So there was a PR agency, coincidentally, which I didn’t know was going to be my path afterwards. and then worked in an experience agency, and that actually led to getting into GM. So worked out there for Opel Vauxhall, which was the original, one of their original European subsidiaries, and started as a product marketing manager, junior product marketing manager working on car lines and looking at how we promote in the German market certain things, then got a really cool job after that. I think 24, I was the head of sports marketing.

Dan

Very cool.

Vijay

And so this was at the time when we still had FC Bayern Munich and AC Milan and we’re getting into basketball and triathlon and we’re doing motor racing and imagine the 24th.

Dan

That’s a huge program.

Vijay

What was great about the job though, and I know we’re going to get maybe into it in some other capacity too later, but when you were in the sports marketing realm, while before that I was product marketing, some advertising, working on advertising campaigns. This one was really all-encompassing. So I had to think about all aspects of marketing. How do we do SRM? How do we do advertising? How do we target certain audiences? So I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a good school, working with the PR team at the time already. Really, really good school and thinking about more holistically about marketing, even though I didn’t realize it at the point, leading a little team. And then just getting to travel everywhere was amazing. From that, I got an opportunity to join the more European realms and do advertising campaigns and some sponsorship activities, working with Disneys and Disney, we had a partnership with Disney at the time. And through that program and working on launch campaigns, the PR team got aware of me and we worked on a large launch campaign for a small vehicle that was super successful across Europe, got to work with many different team members across the region. And the PR team was like, hey, we need somebody like you on the team. It would be great if you could come over. So I got to switch over, ran PR for the design team at GM in Europe, which was also my first time coming to Detroit. So 2008, I came here for the auto show.

Nikki

Oh wow.

Vijay

We did a program here. Interestingly enough, also, I know we’re going to talk about Cranbrook, but a connection to Cranbrook was that I sat in the design center in Warren, and it’s designed by one of the Saarinens. And so the team was, hey, you need to go to Cranbrook and see the origin of where it all started and where the Saarinens were. And so in the wintertime, I drove over there, saw it for the first time, never knew I was going to come back. But just an incredible connection that now has all come to fruition here. But So got to do that. And then my wife and I, who was actually the rock star in our relationship also at GM, we got an opportunity 15 years ago to come here to Detroit and work out of Detroit. So she ran digital marketing and social for Chevy, and I was the head of communications, or VP of communications for OnStar, and lots of the connected vehicle work that we were doing. And so that was really cool. We got to come here 15 years ago, then they sent us back to Europe into Zurich, where we had our GM Europe operations. And we had gone, I kind of skipped over a part that I didn’t mention, which was obviously there was bankruptcy. Yes, that day that happened, right? And within that context, actually, this was before we came here, within that context, there was also a time where we almost sold the Opel Vauxhall business to Magna. And so I was part of the team that was the crisis comms team. I ran social and digital at the time on the PR side at Opel Vauxhall. And so I was really deeply involved in all of our crisis comms. We had moments that were crazy where we were winning car of the year on the same day that our leadership was flying to Berlin, or driving to Berlin actually, asking for a bridge loan from the chancellor. We had moments where we’re sitting, this was the same week, we’re sitting on a Sunday at the headquarters. Lights were out. We were waiting for a fax to come in to know if we’re going to be open the next day. It’s just crazy times. But luckily, knock on wood, and thank you to everybody that supported. Went past that. Opel Vauxhall continued to stay at that point a part of GM. And we got the opportunity to come here, work here. Then they sent us back home. We lived in Zurich for three years. working at General Motors Europe, which was the Chevrolet and Cadillac Europe business at the time. And so I was initially the chief communications officer for the business and then became the CMO. So running both, we had to close part of the Chevy business in Europe, unfortunately, which was both a really interesting thing to do from a communications perspective, but also very humbling as a leader. And then we got an opportunity, my wife was already working in a US role, but from Zurich. And we got an opportunity to come back 10 years ago. So I came back, spent the next three or four years at GM. I came back to my old role, actually. I was the VP of comms or in the comms role for connected cars, customer experience. This was the time when we invested in Lyft, our investment in Cruise, launched Maven. My team was part of the team that launched the car sharing service. So an incredible time to be part of launching a startup inside the company, but then also being part of the other startup that had been in existence for 20 years, OnStar. So lots of really interesting work in the connected vehicle realms. And GM was always ahead of its time in that space and doing a lot of really interesting work. Then I was the VP of Comms, or SVP of Comms, chief, what do you call it? Chief of Staff, so to say. So got an opportunity to do that. And that was at the time when we were then. I was about, it was 19 years in when we were going through the first round of executive leave packages and lots of changes. And there was changes on the comms team. I had helped work on what the future structure of the team should be. And one of these packages came around. We were moving a lot of things around. And then I said, what? This is an opportunity to do something else. And it also fit kind of in the structure that we were building. My role wasn’t supposed to be an executive level role. I think it was supposed to be somebody who was an emerging leader. And so this all kind of came together and we ended up, I ended up leaving after 19 years and incredible time. My wife’s still there. I incredible learnings. And then I did a little bit of consulting. So I ended up starting, working with startups, doing some consulting for a few months for inclusive leadership and things that I was passionate about. And then a friend of mine called from Germany and said, hey, there’s this agency startup in Munich, and they’re looking for somebody to help grow their business in the US. I’m not really sure what they’re doing, but it has to do with sound and audio. And I think you would be a great fit. So I flew home, visited my mom, got on the train, went to meet this team. And there were 11 people in a small office. And you know how this goes.

Nikki

Oh yeah.

Vijay

And they were actually doing their morning meeting and all of them sitting around the table. I walked in there all of them, what are you doing? And it was an incredible journey. So we, this is, the agency is called AMP. They still exist today. They’re one of the leading sonic branding agencies in the world. So they did all of the sounds that you hear and sound branding for MasterCard, all the work that you hear, all the music you hear for St. Jude. Incredible. We got to work with some other incredible brands in the Kraft Heinz realms, Mercedes-Benz, Deloitte. We won a bunch of accounts. Uber is one of the accounts that we won. And so some of the sonic branding that you see for them. But the interesting thing with this agency was it wasn’t just about the Sonic logo at the end of an ad. It was really an integrated approach to what does a brand sound like across all of its touch points. A great example is DocuSign.

Dan

Okay, yeah.

Vijay

The team developed not just the Sonic mnemonic at the end of the ad, but now when you sign the DocuSign.

Dan

Oh, so like the in-app?

Vijay

So it’s an in-app sound. And really it’s all about how sound builds trust and engagement. And really, really cool project. And we actually scaled the agency to about, globally, to about 60, 70 people, and then got bought by WPP.

Dan

Okay.

Vijay

Oh, that’s awesome. And that was, go ahead. Sorry, you were.

Dan

No, I just wanted to, I guess, maybe dig into that a little bit further, like sonic branding. You don’t necessarily, or at least I don’t necessarily think of that as a… separate entity, but talk a little bit about that. So it’s kind of the in-app experience for some things. It’s some of the logo sounds maybe, but what else does that look like?

Vijay

Yeah, I think exactly it’s what you described. We looked at it as a core component of the larger branding context that you have as a brand. And we were fortunate, right? I joined the team right before the pandemic. And so in the pandemic, there was lots of brands that were trying to figure out if we don’t have physical experiences, how do we connect with people and how do we build trusted people? And so looking at the full portfolio of all of the tools that are available to you, all of the touch points that you have, particularly in the digital realm, and I had worked on some of those things at GM, luckily. We looked at what does the customer experience will look like and where do we touch customers in all of the different places and how does the brand show up in that. And so the concept really is, think James Bond. So the way that the agency structures their sonic work is they create a composition that is the brand composition, the brand sound. and it has all these different musical elements. And then you take the different elements, a riff, a chord, and you reinterpret it in different styles, culturally or in different sounds for certain things. And the best example I think I can give is think about Mastercard. So one of the things we worked on with them is both the Sinatonic mnemonic that you see here at the end of an ad. But they’ve interpreted their brand composition into all different types of musical genres, all different types of styles around the world. So everything from Latin to hip-hop to all the things that you can think about, orchestral, to fit to their different storytelling needs. And then it’s also the sound that you hear when you pay with the card. And so what happens is you build these recognition moments, but then particularly when you pay with the card, that’s a moment of trust. You want to feel that the brand that you’re paying with is trusted and everything worked well. And so we were able to look at research in that space to say that when you hear that sound, you’re more likely to trust the brand when it’s just a visual mnemonic. And so it’s a really, really interesting space. It is a great addition to the larger branding landscape that you have for a brand.

Nikki

Yeah, that’s really interesting because we talk a lot about brand trust. It’s something that I personally have been thinking a lot about, talking a lot about too, but I wouldn’t think about sound, audio as being a component of brand trust. But now that you say that, makes so much sense. And it’s definitely something that any brand should be thinking about. And it’s not going to be relevant for everyone, right? Like not every brand will have an audio sound component, but the ones that can, creating that alignment of sound across the different channels does build that brand trust.

Vijay

And what you typically see is brands will buy a song or try and do it through a song or certain types of things in that space, but ultimately really creating something that is a core component of the toolset that you have is really important. Then being able to interpret that, not just into advertising or the digital space, but particularly also then thinking about application, particularly for brands that have some type of customer experience that lives in other places.

Nikki

Wow.

Dan

Very neat.

Nikki

So cool. I know we interrupted your background a little bit, but so you have the really robust automotive agency. Now you’re in the education nonprofit space. What are some of the common threads that you have carried through those different roles and industries?

Vijay

I think there’s a few different ones. One thing I have to say that’s a little personal, but I think sometimes helpful for people when I share this is when I left GM, I had a little bit of imposter syndrome because I’ve been in this organization for 19 years. I’ve worked in incredible roles, met incredible people. I met my wife there, some of my best friends. And just an incredible training ground, right? You get to do, particularly in communications, you get to do all the different spaces from crisis to brand to, and then the marketing piece included. But I didn’t really know, am I good at this? So the work at the agency was really helpful because I suddenly got to work with so many different types of brands and leaders. great, incredible leaders in the marketing realms that I could get a feel for. Can I actually apply this for different types of industries? And so that was really interesting for me to be able to understand how does the work that I’ve done at GM translate into other spaces. Also understanding, it’s actually funny, there’s something that happened there. And that’s kind of the people and culture component, where it all intersects as people and culture. You meet incredible people, you get to work with incredible people. The team at AMP was incredible, just super interesting group of people because they all had different entry points into the sound space. And the same is true for Cranbrook now, just as I look at all of the different leaders that we have in the community and their entry point into arts and science. And that’s something that I’ve always been interested in also at GM. getting to work with interesting people, getting to know their stories, and then being able to tell those stories. The thing that happened at AMP that was interesting is the consideration around, I’m learning to navigate these different spaces, I’m learning to understand different cultures, organizational cultures, and then also learning from those. And there was one that happened that was funny. I was about a week or two into my job, And MasterCard at the time was our biggest client. And so the head of brand that we were working with at the time sent me an e-mail and said, hey, can we talk about this later? I looked at the e-mail and I sent back one PowerPoint chart, just a slide that said, here’s why we’re doing this, and sent it back to him. I said, just answer with that slide. You called me after, how did you know? I said, what’s interesting is whether you’re in the automotive industry, the credit card industry, any place, that e-mail thread could have been exactly a conversation at GM. And so I didn’t need to know the specifics of who all the people are, but looking at just that, and that’s what’s interesting, what’s common, right? There’s at the end of the day, we’re all people, culture, learning a culture, understanding how cultures work, but at the same time, there are some commonalities in our space and comms and marketing of how certain things operate. And so finding, again, I think the thing that is a common thread for me and somebody who always, over the years and also wanted to be a leader, is figuring out how I can help build cultures, be in culture, learn learn a culture. So that’s, and that’s been, I think, consistent throughout. And then just, again, appreciating all the incredible talent that you meet over the years. And also, I think appreciating all, I often talk about the positive things. I think the other piece is a big learning also in all of these. What are the things that you don’t want the culture to be like. What are, you’re learning from both mentors, but then also leaders that do certain things in a certain way that you wouldn’t do. And so I think it has helped me grow as a leader to learn both from mentors, learn from my team members, learn from leaders that maybe did things in a way that I wouldn’t do them now. And I think that’s hopefully made me a better leader and a better person.

Dan

Yeah, we talk about that or we hear that a lot also in terms of the type of job that you have. you work across agency, corporate, nonprofit, whatever it might be. I think you more quickly learn the things that you don’t like than the things that you do in a lot of cases. And it’s kind of, it’s easier both in type of work, but also in type of leadership to kind of work by process of elimination and kind of build your own style by that route.

Vijay

I will tell you part of my one of my biggest learnings, people always talk about what do you want your legacy to be of, and I don’t know if there’s ever, if there’s a gravestone. So he tried.

Nikki

I love that. That’s great.

Vijay

I hope it actually says he cared, because I think that’s one of the things that’s important, I think, in any, both personally as well as professionally. But one of the things that I What happened to me recently, fairly recently, is I had a conversation with a former team member of mine. And in the conversations that I have with teams, and knowing that I’m nothing without a good team, there are certain things that you do, right? As a leader, there’s like 5 things that you do. And I always tell people, hey, here’s five things how I do things. And one day, if you come back and tell me, there was, out of the five things, there were four that really annoyed me, but you did that one thing, and I’m doing that with my team right now, and it’s incredible, and it’s working. And I had that type of conversation with somebody recently. And I think that’s the best thing that can happen to you, the fact that somebody says, hey, those two things that you did, I do this with my team now. And it’s working, and it’s great, and it’s building an inclusive way of how we work together. Right. You’re like, maybe one day you’ll have an appreciation for those.

Nikki

But if you don’t, I at least left this lasting impression on you. That’s great.

Dan

So we touched on it a little bit at the end when you were talking about your career path there, but we didn’t quite get into your current role now. So talk a little bit about that, what does your role at Chromebook look like? I know it’s a school, but it’s so much more that.

Vijay

It is, I maybe taking one step back because it explains maybe how I got into the educational realm, so there is, and I think I’m not the only one. I’ve met a bunch of people now that have had good careers and long careers in marketing and communications that then at some point get to the place where, oh, I want to work in a non-profit or I want to do something good. I just don’t want to sell sheet metal.

Dan

Right. Of course.

And all of those things are important, by the way. One of the things that I did at GM and was incredibly fortunate to do is I was part of an exercise that we did in communications around diversity, equity, and belonging. And one of the things I realized working through that, and it’s a space that I’m personally really interested in for a number of different reasons, being maybe an immigrant to Germany, personal history, all of those things. One of the things I realized in the corporate realms was that we spend a lot of money on trying to teach leaders how to be better leaders, particularly when they’re at already established leaders. And I was sitting there and thinking to myself, Shouldn’t that happen earlier, right?

Nikki

Yes.

Vijay

You bring talent in. And we should build this idea of inclusive leadership, and it should be part of the fabric as you grow as a leader and also help us figure out who are the right leaders, who are the people that should be people, leaders who are not, who are individual contributors, which is also great. And as I was going backwards, I’m also thinking to myself, okay, Isn’t there something that we could do that even starts earlier? So when you’re in college, or then you go back all the way, and it maybe was influenced by the fact that we had a little girl at the time. And I was thinking, okay, what does that look like at the elementary school level or the early childhood level? And how do we continue to teach? kids to be critical thinkers, to ask questions. There’s a point, I think, I don’t know if you’ve experienced this, but as you think back, when was the point where somebody started telling you asking questions is not a good thing? Asking questions is the most important thing in the world, even as a grown-up. And that’s how you learn about people. That’s how you learn about a business.

Nikki

That’s curiosity.

Vijay

And so it kind of led me to a path of I would love to do something in that space. And then this opportunity came around. It was really, it could have been anything else. But what happened is, again, totally coincidentally, friend called, says, hey, I have this recruiter. They’re looking for a CMO, CCO at Cranbrook. Would you be interested? And I had told the team at AMP at the point, because that was the path, as we wanted to get investment into the organization, as once that happens. I’m going to do something else. The WPP team was great to us, and I enjoyed working with them for a little bit as well. But ultimately, I said, okay, I’m going to do something else. Interviewed for this role, and it just clicked. There was great, there’s an incredible leadership group there that I got to engage within during the interview process. And ultimately, for me, it was how often do you get a chance to help shape the culture of a community that has been so influential in culture here in Michigan, but then also at a national and global level. And such a great opportunity. And as you said, it’s also, so as chief marketing and communications officer of the community, I get to work across all of the elements of the community and all the programs. So we’re one of the top 30 private school, K-12 private schools in the country. We’re one of the most recognized for the last 90 years. art programs, Master of Fine Art Programs. We have an incredible program that works with Detroit Public School kids for the last 60 years called Horizons Upward Bound. So lots of really incredible academic prowess in the community, but then also we’re at the same time a public destination with historic homes, everything from a 1908 Albert Kahn English Tutor home to A Frank Lloyd Wright Smith House that is part of the Saarinen Design Campus, which is one of the most interesting architectural places you can visit in Michigan and actually in the nation. A contemporary art museum, which is incredible. A science institute, which has one of the first observatories that were in Michigan. And that all nestled in a more than 100-year-old National Historic Landmark campus. that is absolutely beautiful, that people just go to and walk around and enjoy the gardens and the historic homes and just for respite. And I think, how often do you get a chance to do this, to work in a community like that? So I am incredibly fortunate that I get to do this in such a gem. And I sometimes tell people, Cranbrook is a little bit, it’s 300 and 300 plus acres, 2020. It’s almost a little bit like the the Getty of the Midwest. The only difference is that we are 96% of all of our buildings are still being used for their original purpose. We have students run through these buildings. They learn in those classrooms that Saarinen and the family designed. They sit on those chairs. They get to eat in a space that is of historic architectural relevance. They get to cross these campuses. And That’s an incredible experience we invite. I think we have about 300,000 guests that come and visit us every year, 20,000 students from around Cranbrook that come and visit us every day for day trips, and then about 2,000 students that we serve on a regular basis.

Dan

That’s so cool. And yeah, it is nice that, you know, it’s beyond the intended purposes of the buildings, just that public space is so important. And I think, you know, one of the questions we wanted to ask is, you know, we’re just at the start of spring right now, but as you look ahead to the summer and beyond kind of the regular class schedule, what are some of the things on your mind that you’re excited about as the weather turns around here, hopefully soon?

Vijay

I think there’s something to do at Cranbrook every day. It’s really interesting. You get to, whether you’re somebody who loves art lectures or science lectures, we have those. As we get into the next few weeks and next few months, Something that I can really recommend is our second years at the Art Academy have their final presentation of their work. So we call it the graduate degree exhibit. So it opens on April 11th and it’ll run for into May. Incredible work from all of the different programs that we have, the 10 programs that we have. So everything from architecture to sculpture. So definitely worth seeing. In that window, there’s also a day where you can come to Cranbrook, I think it’s April 18^th, where you can come to Cranbrook and visit the, see the studios, walk through the studios and bring your family and be in all of the other spaces that we have open. So go and visit the art museum, go and visit the Science Institute. And then as we get into summer, there’s a bunch of things. If you want to come with your family, we have our our artist-inspired mini golf. So there’s lots of little spaces at the art museum. Definitely worthwhile. It’s 9 holes. Actually, we added two, so like the 11. Then there is, on the art side, what I would really recommend is we’ve been putting together, the team at the art museum has been putting together a collection of Detroit artists. So faculty from the Art Academy, alumni of the art community, and leaders in the art community here. And we’re actually, for the first time, we’ll start putting it in as a permanent exhibit. So that’s definitely something that I would recommend. Something that is incredible to see, because how often do you get a chance to see that? And we’re pairing it actually with a exhibit for one of our more recent alums, Akir Brion. who will be displaying her interdisciplinary work. So definitely worth seeing. Detroit artist. So that’s something on the art side. If you’re interested in anything that happens in the sky, 12th and 13th of August, I think, is where we’re expecting one of the big meteor showers. So our observatory will actually be. And then I think there’s also partial sun Eclipse. So something that you can come and be with us and go look at through the observatory and there’s going to be programming around that, which is really cool. And then if you’re somebody who loves historic homes, what I can really recommend at the summer is the three house tour. So you get to tour Saarinen House, Granbrook House, and the Frank Lloyd Wright Smith House. And so you can book that and do that. And then finally, if you have kids, camps, we’re running camps all summer, science, art, sports. So if you go to crownbrook.edu, you can actually find out all about our camps and some incredible camps.

Dan

Oh yeah, we’ll make sure to include that in the description so folks can take a look. But yeah, that is a, I guess the work for you doesn’t really stop with the school year.

Nikki

No

Vijay

I’m incredibly fortunate to have a team that’s just incredible on how they manage through all of the different programming and all the things that we do, really both from a perspective of what we do in academics and then as a destination that you should visit.

Dan

Very cool.

Nikki

One thing I wanted to ask you, because I think it’s important because you mentioned imposter syndrome. And I think if everyone was being honest, we could all say at some point in our lives and our careers that we felt that. I know I definitely can. What would you say to someone who might be experiencing that right now or somebody who might have been or is in a similar situation to you? They’ve been at their company or their same industry for many years. They know it’s time to make a change. They’re afraid because change is hard and the unknown is scary. But what advice would you give to somebody who’s kind of standing at that opportunity and not sure whether they should take the leap?

Vijay

I tap into your network. One of the things. I did something during the pandemic, which was both helpful for myself, but also hopefully for others. I opened up my LinkedIn and basically said, hey, if you need to talk to somebody just to figure out those things and learn from others how they’ve managed through that, that’s been incredibly helpful for me. It’s just really, whether it’s mentors or somebody who isn’t directly connected to me, but being able to have these conversations to understand, okay, how have you managed through this? And what’s the structure? One of the things that’s really helped me, one of my mentors shared this with me, and might be something for another podcast because it’s a longer conversation, but is how to think about your career and life and things that are important. It’s almost, we sometimes are in a space when we’re in that moment, and there’s an audio example again. I think about it like a mixing board. So one of the things that happens while you’re mixing a song, if all of the levels are at 10, it just sounds And so figuring out, as I look at the little mixing board that’s sitting in front of us, figuring out, like putting the little markers on the bottom and looking at, okay, so what are the things that are important for you, whether it’s family, in my case, it’s my wife and my daughter. Our daughter obviously will decide how important we are in this country. But then you look at things like location in our case, right? Because we moved from Germany, we came here, you think about, is money important? Is learning important? Is it about leading versus maybe leading people or a certain type of space? In my case, I was always asked to look at, you need to do pick PR or marketing because we don’t have this in our organization. So I’m fortunate that I get to do both now. But all of those things, if you have built yourself a structure where you can have a look and then figure out, okay, what of those are higher up? which are a little lower, and they might change. As you go to the next track and mix the album, they might change along the way, and they typically do, but that’s been really helpful for me to find a place where I can help myself, and then in those conversations, others to say, okay, what are those little labels? And where are they for you right now? And I think that’s a good starting point. And the other thing I remind people of often is if you were to reach out, particularly leaders, and have led teams. In most cases, I don’t think if it’s true. But reach out to those people and remind yourself that you’ve done a lot of really good work. And when you leave a place, I didn’t realize it until I left GM. I got incredible, wonderful notes from people of how I helped them, how I impacted their career. And it was really heartening. And I’m not saying this because I want to pat myself on the back, but really because I didn’t think about it that way. And then when you see it, it’s incredible. So I think give yourself grace. and take the time to work through it and get some external perspective. Those are all things, I don’t know if this is helpful, but this is all things that have helped me a lot. And anybody, I’ll offer this, I mean this, anybody who’s listening to this, if you want to reach out on LinkedIn and you want to connect and have a conversation with somebody who might not be as close to what you’re currently going through but has gone through it, I’m always here. I’m always happy to help. I think it’s the best thing that can happen, that we can do to pay it forward to this. to have those conversations.

Nikki

Well, I think that ties back to something you said earlier, too. It’s like, what would you want on your tombstone? A little morbid, right? But you said, I cared, right? And then that is definitely coming through in what you’re sharing today, what you’re saying, the generous offer of, hey, you might not know me, but reach out to me. I’m happy to help. And I think we think about that too a lot in our work with the clients that we work with and with each other. It’s that care. That’s what differentiates a person. That’s what goes back to just like the deep just foundational element of just being a good person, a good human, care, care about the people you work with, care about what you do, and that reflects in your work.

Vijay

It goes back to your question earlier, what is the common thread?

Nikki

Yes.

Vijay

And as I mentioned, Somewhere along the way, I decided, and it’s not for me to decide, but I understood I want to be a leader and a leader of people and leader of culture. And that comes with responsibility and having to learn. And I don’t know if I’m good at it and you need to ask other people if I am. But I learned to this day in this role at Cranbrook where I’ve never run a school or an art museum or a natural historic landmark. So I learned from all of these incredible people And they teach me how to be a better leader in this context, and hopefully I can give back in that context. And so that’s really what it’s about. I think at the end of the day, I’ve done incredible projects. I’ve flown cars, I’ve been with helicopters over the Thames River. We’ve done, I worked with the NBA, I did all of this stuff, but at the end of the day, those are just, they’re great projects, but it’s the people that you meet along the way that are really Yes, I agree.

Dan

Yeah. And I think that that’s a good segue into something that we always like to close with. It’s a simple question, and you’ve already, I think, answered it in some ways here. But what’s one thing that you would tell yourself just getting into your career, if you could go back to 21 and think about a lesson that you’ve learned along the way?

Vijay

I think the most important thing I would tell myself is that empathy is not a weakness. I’m melting.

Nikki

I’m melting right now.

Vijay

You know, I prepared for the question that is, what’s your model?

Dan

Yeah.

Vijay

For me, there is an incredible Maya Angelou quote that’s become, and I think you both know where I’m going with this, that has become effectively my model. And it is the, when she says, I’ve learned that people will forget what you said or what you did. but they will never forget how you made them feel. And I’m paraphrasing. But I think that’s really, really important. And it’s been something that I’m deeply grateful. There’s a number of people that I’m deeply grateful for. Number one, my mom, because that’s something that she taught my brother and I is that you have to show empathy. You have to care for everybody in the context, whether it’s the security guard, the leader, wherever you’re working with, anybody on the team, and that caring and understanding that everybody has a role. So that I think is important. I’m deeply grateful for my wife, which I need to mention here again, because she’s amazing. But I think she’s such an important part of why I was able to be on this journey. The fact that I left GM after 19 years, worked at an agency where I did not make the money that I made at GM, but I was able to follow my passion. Doing this now in education, And it’s all because of her in many ways, and our daughter, because they give me the space to do this. And so again, the need to understand that if I get these opportunities, how can I pay back? But it’s really about empathy, understanding that, and empathy doesn’t mean being nice to everybody, right? It’s really about being respectful. And in the tough moments, you sometimes have to be tough, and you sometimes have to have the tough conversation, but have it with respect. And I will share with you, I talked about the situation earlier. Sorry if I’m going a little long, but I talked about the situation earlier with a colleague of mine and the team member and now an incredible leader that came back and said, hey, I’m doing this one or two things. One of the other conversations I remember that was maybe even more impactful was when we had to close the Chevy business. I had a team of about 60 plus people across Europe. Likely even, 60 plus people. And I almost had to have a conversation with every single person on that team, or not all of them, but many of them, about the fact that we’re closing the business. And that some of them will stay on and some of them won’t. And you’re talking multiple different European countries, but multiple different systems of how that works. And one of those team members came back to me and said, you know what? a few years later when we met and said, it was such a hard message to hear, but what I respect you for is the fact how you conveyed it to us and how you spoke to me and the way that you did it. And I know that many of us were very emotional because we were trying to figure out how, we even told you, let us down, you didn’t figure out how to do this. And Now, in hindsight, I know all the work that you put in to figure out if we can still keep this alive, but ultimately that was a wonderful conversation to have that they felt that even in such a difficult moment, we were able, and I was able to… be very respectful and even have the hard conversation with them. And I think that’s part of the empathy.

Nikki

Yeah, I love that.

Dan

I think, something you said there is, whether it’s hard or easy, celebrating or difficult conversation, like if you can respect the, if you can look back and kind of respect the process and, be proud of what you did and have others kind of respect the way that you carried it out, I think that’s a true mark of like a good leader, I suppose.

Vijay

And again, that’s why I’ve been told along the years that empathy is a weakness. And I absolutely believe that it’s not.

Nikki

Nope.

Vijay

Particularly in a time like now, I think that’s the most important thing that we can all, we should do more of and all commit to as leaders.

Dan

Well, Vijay, thank you so much for coming on. Appreciate you taking the time. And it was wonderful talking with you.

Nikki

So good to have you here.

Vijay

Thank you so much. Thank you, Nikki. Thank you, Dan. Thank you so much for having me. And Yep. Anybody who needs, ever wants to chat, find me on LinkedIn.

Dan

Great. All right. We’ll talk soon.

Vijay

Thank you.

Dan

All right. Well, thank you again so much to Vijay for coming on today and the awesome conversation. Thank you to Nikki for joining us, co-host here today. We’ll link in the description below more information about Cranbrook and what you can find there, both in terms of programming as well as just the facilities and the location. Really so much to explore out there. You should definitely take a look if you’re in the area. And with that, thank you for listening and we’ll catch you next time.