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Speech Transcript

Unknown Speaker  0:00  

Hi there, this is CJ with train extra. And if you really want to learn how to level up your life you should be listening to the time to shine today podcast with my awesome Rockstar friend Scott Ferguson

Unknown Speaker  0:11  

time to shine today podcast varsity squad it is Scott Ferguson we’re Episode 186 with my really good friends Sejal, Thacker from train extra. Sejal really wants to level up your office and community environments with her echo better term tactics and exercises so you can build a congruency within your team to where everyone can level up together. She’s a good friend of mine she was introduced to me by another great friend Jason Holzer. So just make sure you sit back relax, break out your notebooks, because here comes my really good friend Sejal Thacker from train extra. Let’s level up. Time to shine today varsity squad into Scott Ferguson. And I have my long awaited interview with my good friend from the left coast. Say Jill Bakker. She is an attorney. But she’s not your average employment law attorney for more than 15 years of experience advising clients human resources, personnel and legal counsel regarding sound standard employment practices, uncovered a need a personal passion for bringing more proactive, relevant and impactful workplace training programs to our clients and their teams for highly experiential, customized workshops tailored to executives, managers and individual contributors bring the courtroom to the training room in an interactive engaging environment that favors human stories over compliance checklist. And my lady, good friend here, say gel and she has the best eyes in the world. So I always compliment her on her eyes and also that awesome smile. But trust me I don’t think I’d want to go head to head with her in any courtroom. Because not only does she’s very lack of better term, ruthless, I’m taking care of her clients and she does everything she can. She’s an epitome of a go giver. And I’m so blessed that she carved the time out to come on the time to shine today. So Sage up thank you so much for coming on. Introduce yourself the time to shine today varsity squad. But first, what’s your favorite color? And why?

Unknown Speaker  2:17  

Oh my god, I love green just because it matches my eye. It’s been a blessing. But yeah, that’s my favorite color.

Unknown Speaker  2:23  

If it’s in your color wheel, you know, close your eyes and whatnot. So let’s get into the origins of say jelen, like you’re from the time maybe of law school, or if there’s any other story that came before please share with our squad.

Unknown Speaker  2:35  

Yeah. Well, thank you. First of all, thank you so much for having me here. And wonderful compliments. I really appreciate it. Yeah. So you know, everything you said right there. I was born and raised in Chicago. My parents actually moved from India to Chicago in 1974. So I grew up there. I, my parents were the only when we grew up, we were the only Indian family and an all Italian neighborhood. So when I think back to my childhood, Scott, I remember just asking why a lot. A lot of times I was asking, why is this happening? Or why are they saying this to me? Or why is that happening? And I think it was around nine years old when my dad said she’s going to be an attorney, she’s going to be a lawyer, because she’s asking why way too much. So he was right. I followed my passion and then went to law school, I graduated, and I found that you know, I really have a passion for helping people see different perspectives. And so that’s what led to me starting my company train extra three years ago. And luckily, I got past COVID, I’m still standing and I and I love what I do. So that’s just a quick nutshell about what I’m doing out there.

Unknown Speaker  3:38  

I love it. And so when you say that the perspectives, is it from different backgrounds, or different situations or what? Let’s elaborate a little bit on that.

Unknown Speaker  3:47  

Yeah, all of that. You know, I think as an attorney, what I saw was that a lot of times these cases were ending up in court, because there were differences between people and they didn’t know how to navigate through those differences. There might have been some conflict, and they didn’t know how to resolve that conflict, or there was some breakdown in communication. And what I found is being an attorney, that I really wasn’t a litigator, you know, I found myself helping resolve conflict, and helping people see that there’s more to the story than maybe what meets our eye or what we immediately think when we see someone or a situation. And so, you know, having developed those skills throughout my career, I found that way, when you give people new information, you show them the factual information that it actually expands their awareness, and it helps you in resolving conflicts. So I take that all now into the training room. And I teach people these skills so that they can navigate through some of these situations that we just can’t avoid anymore.

Unknown Speaker  4:44  

Well, so what do you think is the biggest culprit in the breakdown in communication?

Unknown Speaker  4:49  

I think it’s just their differences. Scott, you know, we’re all raised differently. We’ve gone through different things. We look at the world differently. And that’s it. It’s it’s really that basic and so in my world I really bring it back down to the basics. It’s like we were throwing people together in these communities in these work environments in these schools, but we’re not giving them the skills on how to navigate through our differences. You know, we can’t just assume everybody knows how to get along. We have to teach people and train people and give people those skills.

Unknown Speaker  5:18  

I love it. And you know, I never go political on this show. But there’s a lot of that going on nationwide. Right now. It’s a country, I defended country with the war for 1991. And I really wished there kind of marrying the two and so we can kind of come to a resolution and I’m praying every single day to my God, that happens. So when you got may ask where you went to law school? Yeah, I

Unknown Speaker  5:41  

went to Northern Illinois in DeKalb. Illinois,

Unknown Speaker  5:44  

Huskies right. Okay. Very cool. I’m from Detroit. So I’m from the Midwest. Chicago is where I’d love to go visit and it’s It was fun. So with did you go to school for like that kind of attorney? I’m making up a word here. But like that kind of law?

Unknown Speaker  6:01  

No, you know, actually, when I went to law school, I didn’t even take a class in employment law. I always saw myself as doing something as social justice. So I took a lot of civil litigation, I took constitutional law, I was taking things like evidence, I was thinking more general civil litigation, I didn’t know and end up in this niche, it kind of just fell into my lap. And what I found was I actually started off by doing Workers Compensation Law. And in there, I knew that wasn’t the right fit. But I dealt with some cases that dealt with employees who were discriminated against, because they filed a complaint. And they’re the light bulb started to go off. And I was like, what’s not necessarily workers compensation, that’s my area, it’s the fact that when people are treated differently, or discriminated against or harassed, that’s what I was drawn to. And, and I wanted to go more in that direction. So that’s why I went into employment law.

Unknown Speaker  6:52  

So if someone comes and says, you know, so and so treated me in an inappropriate way, and then that person is discriminated against, because they try to go against the hierarchy, you they’d maybe bring you in to maybe get back to the basics of communication to help maybe work things out.

Unknown Speaker  7:10  

Well, so far, when I was litigating in court, I was actually representing leaders and supervisors who were accused or allegedly engaging in these behaviors. So I was a defense attorney. Now all I’m doing, Scott is I’m doing 100% training, I’m focusing all my efforts on proactively addressing these issues, because as an attorney, you know, once the lawsuit is filed, nobody wins. everybody loses in that situation. And I really wanted to get in front of people and help give them those skills beforehand. So when there are these things going on, at work, that they know how to resolve those, or how to communicate or how to speak up about those situations, so that we can address them early on before it gets to that point where somebody feels like the only choice they have is to file a lawsuit.

Unknown Speaker  7:55  

So who are you training? Then? Are you training the HR personnel or the in house, I guess we local or in house attorney or like who are you setting up these trainings for say,

Unknown Speaker  8:07  

john, everybody, I’m training leaders, I’m teaching HR, anybody see the culture of the organization is made up of its people. So if you are part of an organization, then really my focus is is providing training to the deals with how do we deal with these differences. And the I would I call it incivility that happens in the workplace. And so my, my focus is let’s create a culture around where everyone is treated with dignity and respect, where there’s diversity, and everyone feels included, and there’s belonging. So I’m kind of my training is really a combination of your anti harassment training, plus your diversity inclusion training, because I think those are separate issues. But they all contribute to a lot of the incivility that happens at work. So I’m addressing both of those in my trainings.

Unknown Speaker  8:55  

I love it, because you’re actually almost forming leaders in a sense with what you’re doing. So, in your opinion, say, Joe, what do you think makes a great leader?

Unknown Speaker  9:05  

Yes, I am forming leaders. And that’s it. And every person in the organization has to be a part of that solution. So what my trainings are all about is how do we empower people and we empower them by giving them the skills and the tools and helping them see that they are part of the solution. You know, a lot of times you’ll have people saying, Well, my company is doing this, or they’re not doing this. And I might my question is, well, you play a part in that. And so let’s help you see what your part is and give you the skills so that you can also contribute to making sure that the decisions that you’re making or the actions you’re taking line up with your organization’s values. Everybody

Unknown Speaker  9:43  

has a role and they Yeah, they can play to the best of their ability. I love that. So if I’m at a networking event, whether I’m pressing flesh in person or virtually, what is someone saying to me that would make them a good prospect contact or connection for you?

Unknown Speaker  10:00  

anybody that has any employees, you know, if you’ve got one employee, you need to start focusing in on your culture, a lot of these places wait till it’s there, you know, I’ve heard this all the time, we don’t have enough employees, or we’re a small place, and we don’t have those issues. And that’s not true. If you’ve got one employee, you need to figure out what are your core values for your company, and then make sure that everyone’s behaviors, including your own, are lining up with your core values as you grow, or as you interact with customers, or clients or vendors. If you’re interacting with people, you know, you want to make sure that you’re treating them in that way that they want to be treated. But also making sure that you’re clear on what those behaviors are a lot of times, you know, people don’t know, because of their culture, and they think that maybe they think they’re joking, or they think it’s okay, but it’s not okay for the person that they’re interacting.

Unknown Speaker  10:52  

It’s not you’re right, because everybody kind of, like you says, cut from a different sheet. And that diversity is what makes my opinion this country. Great. You know, we just got to learn how to communicate with that diversity. That’s fantastic. So then you’re bringing somebody in to be your clients? What is some of the secret sauce that you might have you don’t mind sharing to help them find their blind spots within their, within their company?

Unknown Speaker  11:21  

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think you have to look at it both from an individual perspective, as well as an organizational perspective. So looking at, you know, how can we empower our people so that they can do the work, like you said, to recognize their own blind spots, which we all have, right, because of our own lens that we look at sure we view the world differently. But within there, we have these biases and biases, not, in and of itself a negative thing, right. But that just means we have a preference for one thing over another. And all, you know, as of now, there have been over 200, different cognitive biases identified. So, you know, it’s just the way our brain works. And so once you figure out what those are, then there are strategies to help you mitigate those from impacting important decisions that you make that are going to impact those around you.

Unknown Speaker  12:11  

Wow.

Unknown Speaker  12:12  

So organizations need to invest in their people, to teach them how to do that, as well as from an organizational standpoint, looking at all of your systems, your policies, your procedures to make sure that if there’s systemic bias, or racism within those structures, that they root those issues out and create new processes and new systems. And it’s, it’s doable, it takes effort. It’s not a one time thing. It’s ongoing. But I don’t think we have a choice right now, Scott, I think we all need to do the inner work, as well as organizations need to really do that work,

Unknown Speaker  12:46  

right? And we’re all human beings, including yourself. And all of us have our thoughts, like what helps you keep an even keel for lack of better term. So your bias doesn’t get involved in the conversation while you’re trying to coach, you know, what I’m saying? What do you do? What’s your secret sauce for that?

Unknown Speaker  13:03  

I’m continuing, I’m a work in progress. I am doing the work as I’m doing this, and I’m learning more about myself. It’s really getting to know you’re

Unknown Speaker  13:11  

in the you’re you’re learning on the job, even though you’re the professional, you’re picking up stuff. And you’re so humble to admit that and thank you, thank you so much. So when you’re starting to work with companies, is there any good question that you wish they would ask you, but never do?

Unknown Speaker  13:32  

They would ask me That’s a good one. But they never do.

Unknown Speaker  13:37  

You think about

Unknown Speaker  13:41  

because you’re coming to me. And like sometimes when you’re going into organization or like shit, here comes a civil rights leader, or something like that. Someone might think that right? And like you. I know that when I go into an organization to coach Yeah, you know, in the CEO, the highest that usually brings me in because I’m referred to them, and then you have that one Captain that’s underneath there is like, if I was that captain, I’d probably be okay. So tell me about what your families say, just give me a fail of yours. You know, that’s like a question that I might ask you. But, you know, that’s what I hope that they asked me because I’m second. That’s why I defuse every situation. I talk about my failures and the situation that I’m doing. So I’m sure that they’re hesitant to ask you. I mean, they’re like, Oh, she’s an attorney. He’s coming in. And

Unknown Speaker  14:27  

I don’t know, though, because I’m very open. I’m like, if you look at my podcasts that I’ve done, and my all of the stuff that I’ve talked about, I’m very open about my experiences. I think as leaders, we need to be vulnerable. We need to share with the lessons that we’re learning. I do that very openly. I even talk about what I’m learning along the way as a as a tool to let people know that I’m not just standing here preaching, telling you this stuff. I am going through it, I’m living it myself. I am experiencing this with you and we’re humans, we’re gonna make mistakes. We have to be humble about it. We know we’re gonna you know, No, we’re not going to make the right decisions. I mean, I do this for a living. And sometimes I’m doing a training and I’ll catch myself, you know, I’m still working on that, you know, but I guess the thing is that it’s we have to just work at it.

Unknown Speaker  15:10  

So sales are what keeps you up at night.

Unknown Speaker  15:15  

You know, this last year was really tough Scott, it was really, really tough. I mean, COVID really almost knocked me out my business completely, because prior to that, I had put all my eggs into the I’m going to do live training, because I really like being in front of people. And when COVID we couldn’t, we had all these restrictions placed, my business literally went away. And that was very challenging. And, you know, I had to really dig deep and figure out is this what I really want to do? Why am I doing this, but you know, it all clicked into place. I got I took one step in front of the other, I pivoted like everybody else. But I, I took the leap of faith and faith in myself, I really did. And I’ve come out resilient. I’ve learned some hard lessons. But I feel so proud of myself for really just taking one step at a time and not letting my mental state and all just all my anxiety and all the lack of sleep and all of that keep me from moving forward. And I love it. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker  16:14  

I love it. So you’ve seen the movie Back to the Future. Okay, let’s get in that DeLorean with Marty McFly. Let’s go back to the 2223 year old said Joe sajo. What kind of knowledge nuggets? Are you dropping on her to maybe shorten your learning curve level or up blaster?

Unknown Speaker  16:31  

Yeah, I would definitely say you know, I when I think back to when I was in law school, after I got out of law school, my career up to this point. I was too fixated on a plan. I had this idea of where I wanted to go in my career, I was going to get get through law school, I was going to work at a big law firm. And now that I look back on it, I would tell my younger self, you know, have a plan because it’s good to drive your motivation and get you towards your goals. But don’t be too fixated on a plan. Because honestly, I stayed in the law firm setting way too long. I knew it wasn’t the right fit for me. It wasn’t in alignment with what I wanted to do. But I stayed in there way too long. So I would tell myself be more flexible. Give yourself room to grow and, and do something that lines up with what you’re sort of core, your inner you know, your passion, your core values.

Unknown Speaker  17:19  

love that. I love that you mentioned core values a lot. That’s fantastic. And I hope that you wouldn’t. That’s awesome. So how do you want your dash remembered that little line in between your incarnation date and your expiration date your life and death date? How do you want to say Joe’s dash remember?

Unknown Speaker  17:36  

I just you know, I’m just look I you mentioned go give her at the beginning of the of the podcast, you know, as that I was a go giver, I would just that’s what I’m, that’s what I’m out there doing is I am really trying to create positive impact. I want to be remembered as that person that did. Did did that. You know, I truly believe that each one of us is you know, can be a good person. And sometimes we just need to work through that stuff. And, and I’m just trying to inspire some positive change in this world. I think we got you for doing the stuff that you’re doing. You know, you’re amazing. You’re creating such a wonderful platform. Thank you again.

Unknown Speaker  18:12  

Thank you. I appreciate you love. So what’s one thing said on those for sure.

Unknown Speaker  18:20  

I just know for sure that my son is my number one priority. Everything centers around that he is How

Unknown Speaker  18:27  

old is he now? Love. He’s eight. He’s eight. Okay. He’s coming into himself. And I bet you is really challenging during the COVID and whatnot, because you live in the west coast where it’s probably like the living is really on top of each other where you’re at right? Not gonna divulge where you’re at, but it’s on top. So I must have been a challenge. I asked you how you got through that kind of stuff.

Unknown Speaker  18:48  

You know what I mean? Honestly, the biggest gift I got last year was that time that you know those restrictions are a

Unknown Speaker  18:55  

way to look at it. I love that

Unknown Speaker  18:57  

I loved having that time with him and even homeschooling him having that opportunity. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it was challenging. And there were days where I wanted to pull my hair out for sure. I love spending time with him. And I mean, even before when he was born, I quit law firms and I stayed at home for three and a half years because I wanted to spend my time with him. So last year, that time element was a blessing for me because I got to spend that time with him. I look for every opportunity I can to be able to be around him. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker  19:23  

that’s awesome. Thank you for sharing that. So then what would your definition of a life while lippy

Unknown Speaker  19:34  

and no again, going back to just it every day? I feel like my perspective changes. You know, every day gets different. I just, I just want to continue to grow. For me. That’s my biggest thing is I just want to continue to grow.

Unknown Speaker  19:47  

I love grace, right? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  19:51  

I always say this is like my favorite line right now. I’ve spent the last how many every years learning and now I’m going to spend the rest of my life on learning

Unknown Speaker  19:59  

and relearning right?

Unknown Speaker  19:59  

Yeah you

Unknown Speaker  20:01  

know I look at it you know people I have clients I’m like listen man you have to progress even even during the COVID I would tell my clients it’s like you don’t stay the same i mean i look at pictures of me that is on the wall that back there with my mom and I look a lot different than I did at 40 almost 49 years old and then it’s just how you take care of yourself and also your brain and whatnot always progress I love that so as we love you know, wind things down here just a little bit so we have our leveling up lightning round I got five or six questions for you. And you got five seconds to answer no explanations can we agree on that?

Unknown Speaker  20:35  

You got it

Unknown Speaker  20:36  

alright counselor. Let’s level up. What is the best leveling up advice Central’s ever received?

Unknown Speaker  20:43  

It would be my dad he said life is temporary things are temporary be present. Enjoy this. Enjoy the moment to get

Unknown Speaker  20:50  

that sure one of your personal habits that contributes to your success.

Unknown Speaker  20:57  

I self audit all the time I ask people for feedback I’m always looking for how can I improve what I’m doing? love it love it so other than your own website, which is train I mean I’m gonna make sure I get trained extra and tra

Unknown Speaker  21:11  

i and letter X tra.com trade extra and of course time to shine today.com shameless plug what other website Do you like to go to the level up?

Unknown Speaker  21:21  

I you know I would say LinkedIn is where I go I do I’ve got enough all the other social

Unknown Speaker  21:26  

met there. Yes, I’m ready Berta put us together. I’d have to look that up. You know, but what about one of us put it was together with them. Okay. Yeah, got it. So I’m in my doldrums just not feeling it not feeling I’m just not motivated. You’re like Fergie read this book. What’s that book?

Unknown Speaker  21:43  

Go giver?

Unknown Speaker  21:44  

Haha. Bobby Berg. It’s funny. I’ve been with him next week. Yeah, that’s fantastic. All right. So what’s your most commonly used emoji when you text? Oh, I

Unknown Speaker  21:54  

love the one last year was the brain with the Brain exploding.

Unknown Speaker  21:58  

Love it, love it. So without divulging your age, but if you could stay one eight physically, okay. Don’t say they are now. Yeah, physically, in have the wisdom that you’ve learned and continue to grow and have the wisdom like what age could would you be for the rest of your life? If you could stay that? Oh, yeah. Physically,

Unknown Speaker  22:20  

physically, you know, I mean, I would say like 35

Unknown Speaker  22:24  

Yeah, I’m 30 I always say 32 You know, I’m coming up on 50 and I’m like, dude, I would love to have that. I have great energy I keep myself good but man that 32 year old was just like I was unstoppable you do what’s your favorite charity and organization like to give your time and or money to

Unknown Speaker  22:44  

you know, I do a lot of work for I donate a lot to salvation army. I get a lot of my stuff there. I mean, everything literally goes there. But I I did a marathon A long time ago the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society I give a lot of money to that organization just because I think it’s important.

Unknown Speaker  23:00  

Thank you so so much. And the last question, what is you can elaborate on this one a little bit? What is the best decade of music 60s 70s 80s or 90s?

Unknown Speaker  23:10  

I like the 80s There you go.

Unknown Speaker  23:12  

I know you’re gonna say that you my girl man. The big hair don’t care yes me at everything from rap to the big hair bands to the English invasion. The Irish invasion with YouTube was like the best it was the best decade so trance formation is fantastic so so how can we find you on

Unknown Speaker  23:32  

LinkedIn is the best place I would say follow me on there I like to share resources and information if I see a good article or a good resource I’m always sharing that and that would be the best way and then you always like you said My website is the place if you have fear want to find out what I’m doing or where I’m talking it that would be the other place

Unknown Speaker  23:49  

love it. I love it and so leave us with it all those will be in the show notes squad. Leave us with one last Knowledge Nugget you want us to take with us internalize and take action

Unknown Speaker  24:01  

you know I just last year I learned that it’s the little things in life that matter and so I mean we saw so much mental health issues going on and I would just tell people you know just make time to get to know yourself and take care of your physical and mental emotional well being check on people you know not just the people you know but straight you know your neighbors and check on the communities and just kind of you know people are struggling a lot right now and the more that we can support each other the better we will be together

Unknown Speaker  24:31  

I love that I love that you check on people squad. You just basically add a free masterclass Am I really good friends Sehgal Thacker from train extra.com and you know she was a young in that asked why a lot. I’m sure that her parents just loved that. She wouldn’t want to become a fantastic attorney. You know, she wants you to get back to the basics for communication, you know, and she wants to provide atmospheres in work environments where the first time is accepted and you feel included and she does just that, you know, she wants, she’s empowering with skills and tools in knowing that the skills and the tools are all part of a solution with the progress that Sehgal will help you attain. And she understands that behaviors need to line up with the core values at the workplace. And she will also remind you that are kind of coming up in life, or even if you’re kind of at a standstill to be flexible, you know, understand that you’ve got a room to grow and ask her like, we’d like to say, get your asking gear, and really ask for help when you need it. You want she wants you to enjoy the moments and lastly, what she said it’s really just blew my mind as you know that little things matter. Take time to know yourself and all the pillars of your life. Know yourself, your health, your money, your family, your relationships, and not only within your circle, she wants you to check on people that you don’t even know the world needs more people like sajo and I’m so blessed. She’s humble, yet hungry. She levels up her health levels up your wealth. She’s absolutely beautiful. Thank you so so much for coming on, said Joe. You’re intervarsity letter here. Time to shine today.

Unknown Speaker  26:08  

Thank you so much. This is awesome.

Unknown Speaker  26:10  

Awesome. Talk soon. Okay. Hey, thanks so much for listening to this episode of time to shine today podcast. Proudly brought to you by Southern Nugent real estate real estate excellence, who can be reached at 561-249-7266 and online at www dot Sutter in nugent.com. If you’re a business owner, or professional who would like to be interviewed on time to shine today, please visit time to shine today.com slash guest. If you liked this episode, please subscribe on Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, I Heart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts. There’s a link in the shownotes to our website. Also there you will see a recommended resources. We hope that you will support our show by supporting them. If you like what you’ve been listening to, it’d be great if you could just give us a five star rating and tell your friends how to subscribe while you’re at it. I’m your host, Scott Ferguson. And until next time, let’s level up. It’s our time to shine.

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