The Secret Skill We Should All Be Talking About: A Leadership Masterclass with Dr Selina Neri #15

After all, all art is experience. Hello and welcome to The Company Doctor. This episode, Dr. Selina Neri, the Dean and Executive Director of HULT International Business School in Dubai, delivers what can only be described as a masterclass in business leadership, zoning in on the one specific characteristic all good leaders need to succeed and why good leadership must be practiced rather than simply taught. What is that specific skill? How does one practice good leadership? And how have Selena's views on the experiences of women in business changed over the past 20 years? Buckle up and listen on to find out. Gary, over to you. Say the analogy of, say, a painter.

Well, hi Selena, welcome to this episode. We're really pleased to have you with us.

Good morning, Gary. My pleasure. My pleasure. How are you today?

I'm great. And to be honest, I've been really, really looking forward to this episode. You've got such a great background. I can't wait to share that with people. And maybe a good place to start, Selina, is just a quicker intro. Who are you? What's your background? It'd be really useful to know just a quickie.

Yes. So my name is Dr. Selina Neri, something that I've worked really hard to have in front of my name. And I am currently the Dean and Executive Director of the Dubai campus of Hult International Business School. I am in charge of campus strategy, operations, outreach, and the lives of hundreds of students. So I'm here to change people's lives. That's my mission.

That's such a great mission. And yeah, one of the reasons I was really keen to have you on is that you spent a lot of time in business and in different countries with different cultures, and now you're doing this great activity, which is, which is inspirational and fantastic. And my first question, I guess, is to kind of find out so people know you What makes Selena, Selena? Doctor, sorry, Selena.

What makes—

you know, it's important. What makes you, you? You know, what are you famous for?

I think what makes me and what I think I'm famous for is number one, personality, number two, passion, and number three, competence. I can add a fourth one, which is one of my favorite English words, and that's grit. G-R-I-T. Those four attributes, I think, make me who I am and also map out what I've become, given my origins.

Yeah.

And I think we should share that because you're a great mix of everything. You're Italian. You've lived and worked in Germany.

Yeah.

I think America, or you work for American companies anyway. Did you live in America as well?

Yes, yes, absolutely. America, France, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, and now the United Arab Emirates. Emirates. This is where I have lived and worked. Worked also in many other countries, but where I physically spent years. So yes, I'm originally Italian, although I don't allow my origins to define me. I don't see myself as Italian anymore. As you know, I've been over 30 years away from Italy. My accent maybe still has some Italian roots.

A little bit, a little bit.

And my passport. But yes, so I I was born in 1968, right? The year of activism, let's call it. And I have that spirit inside of me. So somehow as a baby, I think the context influenced me. And I was also born with a severe disability because my right eye couldn't see anything. So that defined pretty much the first 15 years of my life and how I learned to read, write, and, you know, go to school and the rest of it while my eye was being trained and surgically supported to get me to a level where I could see like every kid and every teenager.

So I didn't, I didn't think I knew that. And you know what's interesting, because my next question is about now, I think as a person, you said you use the word grit, which I think is interesting. You're, you're a very driven and determined person in a good way. And I was going to ask you what makes you, what's made you like that?

I think quite frankly, stuff that has happened in my life, a lot of bad stuff. So Setbacks, physical problems, the family background that I have, which wasn't an easy one. These battles, you know, but I use the, I use a sentence of Goethe, the German philosopher, who says, character is formed by taking part in the stream of the world, in the battle of life. And I have been through, and I still go through the battle of life, like every human being who doesn't sheepwalk his or her way through life. And I think that is the reason why I developed this grit and this, you know, being able to be tenacious with the stuff I believe in and for the people I love and I care for. That's very defining of me.

Yeah, it is. And actually is really important in the role that you're in now, and it really comes through in that. And I want to switch gears a bit. I wanted to share with people with your background because I think people now have a sense of Selena, Dr. Selena, but looking— because the topic's women in business and a great example of that. Thinking back, what pleases you? And over the last, I don't know, 20 years, let's say, what pleases you about what's happened over the last 20 years for women in business, and what disappoints you? Very high level.

Very high level. I think what pleases me is the fact that there is momentum that we never had before, and this momentum is a combination of women who have started to be vocal about what they are doing, what they want, what they deserve. And there's a conscience that we didn't have before. So women in business is an interesting topic because when I look back and when I started in 1994 and I've worked in industries that are still primarily male dominated, dominated. I was, you know, maybe the token woman, the one woman in a large group of people which happened to be male. But I never allowed that to be used against me, or I never saw it as a disadvantage. I saw it as a wonderful advantage to show what I was capable of. And I see more women doing that. That pleases me. There are more women who are not waiting for stuff to happen to them or on the receiver side of things, but they are driving. Where they want to go and how they want to be treated. What disappoints me, especially having served on a board of a listed company, is the fact that we are still struggling. We are still struggling. And I think it's a combination of two things. One is getting in every girl and every woman mindset this idea that everybody wants to be a diamond, but not everybody's willing to be cut. And if we want to be diamonds, we need to be willing to be cut. That's part of the process and just be cut and get up and get on with it because it happens all the time to male, by the way, colleagues as well. So it's coming out of this corner type of mentality. And also the fact that we are still, you know, we're still making comments when a CEO is a female. Why should we comment about it? It should be very normal. Yeah, we need to get to a stage where these type of situations are normal., and I don't think we are there yet. So that, I don't like that. I want to change that.

And I think you will, Selena, knowing Dr. Selena, knowing you as I do. Here's, uh, the interesting thing for me is you've been in quite a few corporate jobs. So for people listening, our audience is a business-to-business audience, and you know, you've worked in the telecoms business and you've had a, you've been a CEO of a fashion house and you've been a member of the board for Kironi. So You've had a wide experience and then you've worked with all sorts of students around the world, either mature students, people are already in business or new students are looking to get on the ladder. Do you see, is there any difference with those different cultures and those different environments in what you see?

In terms of women in business, in terms of the topic of today's conversation? Yeah. Definitely, definitely. I mean, there are differences that are industry related, there are difference that are very cultural related, and then And also the timing, you know, 20 years ago or 30 years ago was another time. Today, many— this topic is a mainstream topic, is no longer a niche topic. For instance, I teach personally, I teach leadership courses and I do a lot of work with the domain of leadership. And leadership cannot be taught, first of all, has to be practiced, has to be understood as a behavior and a responsibility, not a hierarchical title or a role. And, but then you need to bring it down to the, to the, to the culture and the context in which someone operates and how women are raised, with what sort of ambition they are allowed to develop. And, uh, and also, quite frankly, how the system supports or doesn't support them. I don't think we have, at least not in the countries in which I lived and operate, there is anything that is an obstacle to women. I think it's more about The cultural change that has to happen, I always say one of the best decisions a woman, any man can make for their careers is the choice of their partner in life, in whatever form or fashion that partner happens to be, because that is your core support and it's a trampoline, it's a springboard for becoming what we want to become or having battles all the time at home.

That's interesting. And therefore, does it make it hard if someone's single? Does that make it harder then because of that support structure is different? Would you say?

It's an interesting question because many people I know who are single think, well, I'm in charge of my decisions, nobody depends on me and all the rest of it. So I'm sort of like in control of my destiny. But then there are other problems because when you are single and the work environment knows about it, there is an expectation that you can be the one who picks up projects last minute, flies around the globe or zooms around the globe at different times because there isn't an obligation type of system around you, and that's wrong. I suffer from them. You know, I've been single for many years before I eventually started to find some form of love and then the real one. And there was this expectation of the companies I was working for that I would be always willing to go the extra mile just because you have no life. Being single doesn't mean I have no life. It simply It's a different setup of a life, right?

It's a good point. But then, so if someone is single, what can they do to enhance their support network then?

Then I would say, first of all, they need to be very clear with themselves and then with the people with whom they work that they have a life. They just live a different life, that the setup is different, but they have obligations. First of all, vis-à-vis themselves, whether it is sport, meditation, listening to music, doing whatever one needs to do to be off work. And then I'm sure single people exist also with the, you know, people they care for and they are connected with and they want to dedicate part of their lives to them. So it's this setting the stage that nobody can assume you are a slave to work because those days are over and they should have never been actually part of humanity in the first place, but they have happened. I've been through that myself.

Okay. And one of the many things you've done is you've been a mentor for the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women. Absolutely. I'm just interested to know your learnings. As a mentor, did you see any kind of common threads from the people that you're mentoring? And I'm only asking because for people listening, they may benefit from some of that kind of commonality that you found.

Absolutely. So, I've worked with, with, with and for the Shery Brav Foundation in a variety of regions of the world, and most recently for the Middle East. There is a common thread that is about expectation. So the expectation that something is gonna come your way, and that's not how it works, neither for men nor for women. It's about putting your foot down and starting to be clear about what we need and what we want and going for it. So flipping that sort of coin or conversation. The second one is particularly for young entrepreneurs: I have the great idea, but I don't know how to bring it to be in a business and a business that scales. And I don't think this is particular specific for women. I think it's a general problem. That's why entrepreneurship needs support and entrepreneurs need support. And then the lack of what we call role models. I don't really like the word very much, but let's say people that we are inspired to, people with gravitas, not superstars, uh, who who say the right things, but people with gravitas, people who have substance and in whose presence we can discuss openly what the problems are and find solutions, as well as people who inspire us, who have been through stuff and maybe can help us find solutions or avoid that stuff. Yeah.

And again, what advice would you give someone to take that step further so that they can move forward?

So first of all, there has to be an incredible amount of self-awareness. So we need to know ourselves at any point in time in life. I'm still searching, right? But I know myself better than I, than I used to. Because the moment we know what we bring to the table, and it could be, you know, at young age we cannot bring 20 years of experience to the table, but we bring energy, we bring competence, we bring attitude, we bring appetite, we bring this, what we call, coachability, which is the willingness and ability to learn. So that's important. The second bit is never to allow anything, whether it's a physical or a mental, let's call it disability, or just a difficult time in life we are going through, to be used as an excuse for ourselves or an excuse used by others to push us back into the corner. Because life is circles and cycles, and in today's world there are tools and things we can do to overcome adversity and overcome issues. So anybody who has an expectation of other people, or a bias as we call it in research, a bias that because I have 'physical problem' or this particular stressful situation or this family issue, then I'm not good at, for instance, flying around the world to manage projects. If we don't believe in it, then nobody will. But if we first of all allow ourselves to believe in this stuff, it mirrors and other people will pick it up really quickly.

That's really insightful. And Selina, you're, you know, if you think about your personal experience that you've had in all your, in your career and the different countries that you've worked in, plus the shared experience you've had for from your students over time. What would you advise an aspiring, you know, woman in business to do to accelerate their careers?

Exactly the word acceleration, because I do believe that makes a difference. So first of all, we need to be hungry, hungry for what we are going for, for whatever definition of success we have, which in my generation was money-making, and then has changed profoundly into working with purpose while we make money, because people need to live off something. But acceleration in, in terms of understanding that the market is competitive, understanding exactly what we are bringing to the table, whether for our own business or when we are part of a larger organization, and then accelerating the way to it. Because life is short and acceleration requires grit, requires determination, requires an understanding exactly of what we bring to the table, and this appetite, this appetite that we need to have for the next step, which can be learning. In our case, you know, I come and do a master in business administration, can be the next step in my career, can be an industry change, can be I leave corporate life to go and be my own boss and my own entrepreneur. So acceleration is a key one. The second one is we need to ask ourselves Honestly, in the mirror, to what extent am I willing to make the sacrifices? Cut, be cut. In the metaphor I used before, the diamond.

Diamonds are out there, but I can't help but think, because I know you quite well and you are a power, you're a force. You want to make things happen and you do. And you've got that grit, as you said. But some people listening to this might be thinking, well, I'm not like that. You know, I am determined in my mind, I guess, but I'm not that driven person? Can I still be successful if I, if I don't have the Dr. Selena grit?

Yes, and my answer to our listener is absolutely yes, as long as we are very clear with ourselves with what the definition of success is. Because we no longer live in a world where there is one unidimensional definition. So success could be being a specialist in a profession, never having people responsibility, earning decent living and having lots of time for other things that are important in life. That's one definition of success. For someone else, for me, for instance, in my early days, absolutely keeping and building an international profile, wanting to work abroad, learn languages, live abroad, and that was my driver. Grit, we are not born with tons of grit. We develop grit over time. And people who might feel today, well, I don't think I'm very driven. I mean, I know what I want, I'm discovering what I want, but I don't have this hunger inside of me, then the way to success is exactly to identify how the success will look like, because if I need tons of grit and I'm not willing to either have them or put them on the table, then it might be a lost battle. So it's about defining what the goal is and then what needs to be in place to get there.

Okay, that's really helpful. And then I wanted to kind of flip it a little bit and think, because you work with lots of leaders,— yes, you know, male, female, different diversity. What advice would you give them? So if I'm a leader, I'm either a male or female, I guess it doesn't really matter, but there's such a benefit in having a wide, diverse team. What advice would you give me as a leader to make sure I grow my team in a successful way by giving everyone a chance?

Before I answer this wonderful question, I have to say something, that the first boss I ever had was an obnoxious, sexist, toxic man who became my role model of the person I never wanted to be or become. So I learned a hell of a lot from this particular guy, and therefore I started to develop, I think, a good understanding of what advice I can give. First of all, hire character, train competence, because people of character will learn anything they need to learn.. But if they don't have character, it's gonna be a relatively short game. That's the first one. I always surround myself with people who are so much better than me, so much better than me, and not feeling threatened by having this talent around us. Because at the end of the day, leadership is also about being bigger than yourself and being bigger than your moment in time and always thinking about our legacy. Every day I write my legacy. That doesn't mean I'm going anywhere, you know, God forbid tomorrow, but I'm very conscious about the fact that what I do needs to live beyond my term or in any particular job. So leaders need to really get this understanding. All these concerns about power play and, you know, having control over people, and this is all gone. It's all old. We work with teams and ecosystems where at times your boss is, you know, very young compared to you. That happens all the time.

It's not hard for me, Selina, for them to be younger than me.

But not even about me in this particular industry, I mean. And then the other advice would be really to look at leadership as a responsibility. Leading is hard. Leading is a hard game. It's tiring, it's exhausting, and quite frankly, at times solitary because you, you, you feel the responsibility of what you do every day. And there is leadership in every job, even the entry-level person who doesn't have any people responsibility and might have been in the job for 6 months has leadership in what they do every day. And when we look at it this way, then all of a sudden the hierarchies don't matter anymore. We are anyway becoming so much flatter than we have ever been.. And this idea, when I work with executives who have been in a business for 20 to 30 years, it's really hard to change this way of thinking because you see leadership attached to a title or a role or a hierarchical position, but it isn't. So when we discover the leaders in us every day in everything we do is what I call them acts of leadership. Then all of a sudden the path of leadership behavior or a leadership role in business becomes much more human and much more manageable. Than this scary thing that, you know, I need to climb up the ladder. We don't use ladders anymore. We live in loops and circles.

That's a fair point. That's, that's brilliant. So listen, I've just got one more question, and then George is going to talk to you about your musical taste. Now, because you've got such, such history to you, if you look back again to when you were maybe even a teenager and then you started your career and all those ups and downs that you had that made you the strong person you are, and now what you know today, If someone's listening to this podcast, particularly women who want to progress in business and maybe are struggling a bit, what would be the one bit of advice? I know there isn't one thing, but what would be the one thing that stood out for you from your learnings over the years that would make the biggest difference to me if I was listening?

I would recommend our listeners, first of all, be fearless. Fear is a really bad beast. Fear is something that makes us, quite frankly, handicapped. I mean, mentally, emotionally. So be fearless. I mean, I'm a woman who has fears. You know, it's not that I am here, I am, I have arrived, so to speak. Not at all. But I have managed, I learned to manage those fears. And really, because fears are our own boundaries, our own barriers, better than boundaries. So one, be fearless. Two, be willing to get cut. And it's fine to be cut because we want to be diamonds. And just go for what you feel is right and fair, which at times also means, you know, taking on the system or reporting stuff that is not appropriate, which we live in a world of activism and transparency of everything. So these would be my 3 pieces of advice. Don't let anyone, anyone, particularly for our female listeners, tell you that being born female is a handicap because it isn't.

Dr. Selina Neri, that was absolutely awesome. Thank you so much for joining us on this episode.

Being brilliant. My pleasure. My pleasure, Gary, as usual.

Of course. And I'm going to hand you on to George to talk to you about your musical tastes.

Yeah, thanks. Thanks, Gary. Thanks so much, Selena. That was some really inspiring advice and insight in there. So yeah, we really hugely appreciate you coming on. My fun job to round off the show is to ask you what song you'd like to add to our Company Doctor playlist and why.

So I was actually thinking about this when Gary mentioned it. I would say Hot Stuff. 'Hot Stuff.' I think it's from the '70s or maybe '80s. I love the rhythm. First of all, I love the words and I think it is very appropriate to this particular episode.

Hot Stuff. Great.

Well, consider that added to the playlist. Thank you very much again, Selena, and thanks, Gary, and thanks to everybody for listening.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thanks again for listening. We have an ever-expanding back catalog of inspiring conversations with industry leaders from all corners of the business universe, which you can access by simply heading over to thecompanydoctor.com. Enjoy, and see you next time.