Elena Armijo Pt 1 - Founder and CEO of the C Suite Collective, Executive Coach, Certified Dare to Lead™ Facilitator, Dog Mom

Elena joins the podcast for the first in a two part conversation where she shares her journey from the world of professional opera to coaching and founding her own business.  Elena and Jason talk about the power of inclusion and the impact that it has on all of us.

"The goal is to see what you in this seat can bring to the table."

Elena Armijo, Master Certified Coach (MCC), Founder and CEO of The C-Suite Collective, and Certified Dare to Lead™ Facilitator has a strong track record of supporting clients and organizations in creating impact, culture shifts and leadership development. Her unique ability to identify common patterns while generating new awareness and re-invention leaves clients with the ability to make stronger choices, clearer decisions and powerful steps toward their desired outcomes. Elena offers in-depth and customized executive programs for high performers who are at the top of their respective fields – from CEOs of leading businesses to professional athletes, policy-focused individuals, entertainers, and artists, and more. Partnering with Elena, these clients have created and achieved the professional and personal impact in the world they once perceived unattainable. As a former leader and trainer with Accomplishment Coaching©, and a CHIEF Core Guide Facilitator, Elena continues to expand her work with teams across the world.  Elena also hosts the podcast The Collective Corner.

Elena Armijo was inspired to become an Executive and Leadership Coach through her work as a professional opera singer. Drawn to work with ambitious top performers like herself, she realized she could bring unique insight to the coaching business after spending many years “on the other side of the table.” Elena’s ten-year career in opera spanned across the globe and included work with many prestigious opera companies as well as performances at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. Elena holds a B.M. of Music Education from New Mexico State University and an M.M. in Vocal Performance from the University of Washington.

When not traveling domestically and internationally for speaking engagements and workshops she lives in Los Angeles, CA with her partner Aaron and their sweet pups Nalle and Bailey.

htttp://www.Elenaarmijo.com
https://www.thec-suitecollective.com/ 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/elena-armijo/
https://www.facebook.com/coachingwithelena
https://www.instagram.com/elena.armijo/?hl=en

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Transcript

Jason Frazell: 0:11

Hey everybody, my guest on the show today is the amazing Elena Armijo. Elena, she has already had a brilliant smile and it's early where you are. She's already smiling. So for those who are just listening, which would be all of you because this is a podcast, Elena is an executive coach. She is a three time business owner. She's an opera singer. I think it might be the first opera singer I've had on here. And you're also a certified Dared to Lead facilitator. We might talk a little bit about that today. So Elena is an all encompassing. She does a whole bunch of things. In other words, business badass, executive coach and artist. Elena, welcome. Good morning.

Elena Armijo: 0:46

Thank you. Thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Jason Frazell: 0:50

Yeah, I'm excited to have you on, Elena. Elena, first things first. I was like, where are you joining us from today?

Elena Armijo: 0:56

I am joining you from my home office in Los Angeles, California.

Jason Frazell: 1:00

Yeah. And we're recording this at 1115 Eastern time. So thanks for being up. I don't know if the dogs woke you up or this is just your normal time, but yeah. Morning. Yeah. She's got her morning coffee. So Elena, we've got a lot to talk about today, so let's kick off and let's talk a little bit about your journey and you have, you are a professional opera singer. I mean, like you perform, you get paid to do it, something that not many people do. And. Well, I'd love to hear a little bit about that and then how you transitioned from that work into Owning businesses, owning coaching businesses. And we're going to talk about the C suite collective and how you became a coach, because that to me, that's a really interesting transition.

Elena Armijo: 1:42

Yeah. A lot of people ask me about this, so I love speaking about it. I was, am a professional singer, but really was training to be a singer and on stage for about 22 years. When you are a singer in the classical space, you start training really, really young. So my first voice lesson I can remember having in middle school, and that's sort of the growth in the trajectory that you need to be an opera singer, you know, in your thirties or even your twenties. So I fell in love with music from a very young age. It was always something that I was curious about and spending a lot of time in when I was young. I had some incredible parents who nurtured that talent and put money behind it with lessons Piano lessons and singing lessons. And what I love about that is that wasn't comfortable or easy for them because they never had that growing up, but also it was a stretch for us to be doing things like that. In New Mexico where I grew up, so all roads lead eventually to New York, which is where my journey led me. And singing and doing the path that opera singers do. So for those who don't know, there's a little bit of a system and a path that you follow, although that's not so true these days, but back then in 2007, when I moved to New York, there was a series of steps you could take to try to get to sing to the bigger houses. So I was on that journey and I remember at one point I was singing. Four years straight on the road. I was gone 10 months out of the year from New York. So I would literally just come back to New York to change my clothes for the season and go wherever I needed to go. And that grind, that lifestyle, it seems pretty foreign now after everything we've all been through, but. It was a hustle and I loved it. I loved being all over the world and meeting different people and cultures and singing with different people from walks of life. And I was exhausted. I was burned out. I was lonely. I was missing a lot of things with my friends and family, like birthday parties and weddings and sometimes funerals. And it was very much a system where if you were on a contract, you were on a contract. If you didn't sing and show up, you didn't get paid. And so for me, it started to feel a bit constricting to be in a system like that. And then you add in all the things on top of it that were hard back then. The industry is very, Slow in terms of inclusion and belonging and diversity of thought. And back then it was not so easy to be a biracial woman singing in certain arenas. So there was a lot of misogyny. There was a lot of control or power over dynamics in the system. And I was just not about that. I was, I was a disruptor even back then, sometimes. And, and I just remember thinking, man, I don't think I can do this for the next 30 years. I don't know that I can dedicate my life to this. So I hired a coach myself and on a recommendation from a friend and got to work. And within six months, I realized I had built my entire performing career from proving my worth in the world. And it was fascinating to me that I could build a whole career that way. And so so yeah, I worked with the coach and then I decided to do a coach training program to become a coach, but really I didn't want to become a coach. I just thought in my head, well, if I can learn the methodology, then I can fix myself the quickest and it'll be done. And I'll have a tool, which is like a very high performance thing to say. Yeah, normal hyperpersonality. But it's also a huge joke, right? Because so much like ego in that, but also This is the

Jason Frazell: 5:30

edge. This is the edge that's gonna get you. I can do it.

Elena Armijo: 5:33

I can fix my life forever.

Jason Frazell: 5:35

Elena, I do have a, before we go in, this is fascinating, and, I didn't know this, but you and I have a fairly similar path. Minus the singing. That's not happening. Nobody wants to hear that. They love it,

Elena Armijo: 5:47

they love it.

Jason Frazell: 5:48

Yeah, when, so yeah. I hear this a lot. So you got recommended a coach and you hired the coach. What did you think you were hiring them for? What were your, what was your initial thought of what am I looking to get outta this? Probably not to join the coach training program.

Elena Armijo: 6:02

Yeah. no, definitely not to join the coach training program when I hired the coach, you know, I, I wish I had a beautiful answer, like, I think I can look at my goals, or I can, you know, do some deep inner work. The real answer is I was desperate. I was at the end of my rope. I didn't know where to turn. And I had so many judgments about coaches back then. I probably still do if I'm honest. But you know, like I, I didn't understand life coaching. I didn't understand executive coaching. I, where I come from, that was like, you know, people laughed at those industries.

Jason Frazell: 6:38

Yeah. You figured it out yourself.

Elena Armijo: 6:40

Yeah. You figured it out yourself. You just it was, it was the mentality of work harder, stop complaining. Get through it. And so I was desperate and I really was like, well, I've tried everything else because I had tried talking to friends. I tried talking to family. I tried talking to other singers. I tried exercise. I tried changing my diet. I tried all the things. And I thought, well, why not try this? Because I, I literally did not know what to do next. And I was, you know, when people say you hit rock bottom, I don't know that I hit rock bottom, although financially I was hitting rock bottom. And there were some very big red flags for my life then relationship wise, I was rock bottom, but it was a moment in life where it was like, look. You ain't got nothing else to do. So this is it. Try this, you know, like you've tried everything else. So what are you going to

Jason Frazell: 7:30

do now? Very empowered. Very empowered.

Elena Armijo: 7:33

It wasn't, but, but it was like a Hail Mary. That's actually the perfect way to describe it. It was a Hail Mary.

Jason Frazell: 7:40

I marked that. Are you, did you, did you cut out for a second?

Elena Armijo: 7:43

I, I think, I don't know if it was you or me, so I'll just say it again. It was definitely. Yeah, it's all good. I just, I

Jason Frazell: 7:47

marked it. Yeah.

Elena Armijo: 7:49

Yeah, it was just a Hail Mary. When I think of football games and like the very last hope in the world, it was a Hail Mary.

Jason Frazell: 7:56

You're, I, I, I wish I could tell you that this story doesn't resonate for me or many other people I know. They're like, coaching's so empowered. You're like, and many people do it because they're like, I don't have anything else to go after. Like, well, the thing I hear in all of that, Alayna, is All the advice in the world and courses and reading books and my first coach called them shelf help books. All the being told what to do doesn't really work if you're not open to it.

Elena Armijo: 8:22

No. It doesn't work. It does not.

Jason Frazell: 8:26

I would say, I would say to Clyde said if, if we all knew intellectually what we should be doing, we'd all be super in shape and billionaires.

Elena Armijo: 8:34

Yeah, really, really. I mean, really.

Jason Frazell: 8:38

Yeah, everybody'd have it handled and we know that that's quite the opposite of humanity Amazing. So really cool really cool and really interesting journey. It's so fascinating to me Just want to make a comment on that as I look as I think about somebody who's not an artist I don't relate to myself as an artist never got paid to do anything to do with art in, in like a singing or performing type of thing. It's so interesting because I look at those, I look at folks like you and I go, wow, that must be really fulfilling because you're doing what you think you should be doing. But then you see, well, then mark that again. I don't know what's going on. I'll switch to my hotspot if we need to be marked that I said, it's really fascinating to me as somebody who I don't relate to myself as an artist. I've never been paid to do any sort of what I would say is pure art. Music or or any sort of visual arts. I find it really interesting And I think you see this a lot with actors and musicians as well as from the outside looking You're like, oh, wow, they're kind of doing what they should be doing. It's their natural talent. You're on the road You're traveling but man, it's just so many people. I know it's so dark

Elena Armijo: 9:42

Yeah, I really, and, and, you know, now on the flip side, I don't support a ton of artists. I would say most of my work is in C suites with executives who are in lots of different industries, but I do have a soft spot still for my, my artists. And so I have a small piece of my business that I save for them because I really do believe, and I talk about this all the time with them, that if you don't have the internal foundation or tools to be good with you, then the dark side of that business will get to you. So I always tell people, if I know, if I knew now. Like what I know now, if I knew then it would have gone much differently for me and I probably would still be singing, but I didn't have any of that knowledge or grounding or foundation in myself that would support me. In being the artist I want to be in the face of some of that stuff in that industry. And and, and the people that take the time to get it, man, they really sore, but they get to also experience themselves instead of giving up so much of themselves for their art, which is often what we're taught. And that's just not true. You know, it doesn't have to go

Jason Frazell: 10:53

that. So thanks for sharing that. That, you know, I didn't know that story and I think that's really fascinating. So you come out, you graduate coach training program, you go out, you become an executive coach, as they say in Seinfeld, yada, yada, yada. You're working with executives and artists and all sorts of folks around the world. And I know one of a couple of things you're really focused on. Are that is the concept of innovative leadership. That's one thing that you, you, you talk a lot about. I look, could you define that for us and what that means to Elena? And then let's talk about innovative leadership because that's, I love that terminology and it's not, it's something that I think gets thrown around in the marketplace. Somewhat.

Elena Armijo: 11:33

Yeah. But

Jason Frazell: 11:33

I don't think it's well defined or it feels like marketing speak without some meat behind it. I know you have a lot of meat behind it. So yeah, I'm just curious. What does that, what does that mean for everybody listening?

Elena Armijo: 11:43

What it means to me is a new style of leadership that is pushing the edges and is pioneering into the future. And a lot of it requires creativity, thinking outside the box, being willing to be in the unknown, being in the mess, a lot of what I do in my style of leadership and the companies that I've built have been creation. I think of myself as like a scientist in a science lab where we're doing a bunch of experimentation and not being attached to the right way learning from the old ways. But really incorporating a new frontier and to me, the innovative leadership has to include anything about culture, community, belonging, inclusivity, diversity of thought. So what I've had a lot of fun playing with the last three or four years in experimentation has been. Really stepping into conversations that raise everybody up into the next level of growth. And, you know, even when we talk about DEIB, especially in America, I think it's a very politicized terms. When you hear DEIB in America right now, everybody kind of itches and twitches and goes, Okay, I'm getting ready to enter a conversation now that has been, you know, Around for a long time. And a lot of people have a lot of thoughts and feelings about that. And even in that conversation, it's like, no, this is innovation requires thinking about all areas and all conversations at once. And so to me, that is exciting. It, there's so much possibility and what people can create when we have a holistic view, a wholehearted view of.

Jason Frazell: 13:33

Yeah, thanks, Alina. That, that clarified it for me. I was just talking yesterday to a new client. He's a mid level manager at a big company. And this came up, he said he's moving into a new role. It's a lateral lateral move for him. And one of the things that he was working on his development plan with his boss who's quite high up was that he needs to be more forward thinking. He's really good at the doing. He's good. He's actually quite good at the people, the day to day, the people things, but he needs to be more forward thinking in order to grow his career further because he's been at, he's been at a director level for about five years now at a big company. It's a good job. And one of the things he said, and I really would love to get your take on this, and I'm sure you've heard this a million times as he goes, I'd love to do more of that. And then what happens is we're on a quarterly, we're, you know, we're, we're a publicly traded company. And we like to think. And I like to think in the long term, I like to start to practice those and flex those muscles or want to be more innovative. And then I do a few things and they go, thanks for trying. Go back to doing how you're doing it because we have these business results that hit every month or every quarter. And I would guess you hear this from most of your clients as well. You're working with. So what, what would, what do you say, or how do you coach folks that want more of this, but are inside of a system, which I would argue that most corporations are They say they're for this, but they're kind of against this, especially if they're publicly traded. How do you, how do you work with somebody like that around being more innovative in their leadership?

Elena Armijo: 15:00

Yeah, it's a really beautiful question. I I have this, this scenario all the time in my practice. And the place that I get curious about first with each leader, because each leader is different, right? Their innovation is very specific to them, is what is the, the legacy, the dream. The purpose that you want to experience in your life first as a leader. Cause at the end of the day, if you're in the system, just like we're all in systems, you get to choose when you're out of that system to some extent, right? I mean, not, not everybody gets that choice, but you get to decide. If you're in a leadership role in the system, what's this ride going to be? It's almost like a roller coaster ride. I think of roller coasters where you're on this roller coaster, you get to determine this one. So what are you going to do with it? Right? So there's a, there's a flavor in my coaching of bringing people to the edge of what they're here to pioneer and do and reminding them that that's going to create a lot of mess. It's going to create mass disruption, uncomfortability people being uncomfortable and, and really looking at, are you willing to make that mess in service of your experience of yourself as a leader and seeing what you can do in this position? Because at the end of the day, the company is going to still keep going whether you're there or not. And you got this time, like, let's say you're a CEO, right? You get this, these next five to 10 years in this seat to make it yours. So what will you play with? Because the goal isn't to fix the system, to never have it be broken again, to have it be perfect forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. The goal is to see what you in this seat can bring to the table. So in the face of all of that feedback, can you actually be with the feedback and still have your purpose and your voice front and center and see what happens? Because regardless, the seat's not there forever.

Jason Frazell: 16:59

Yeah. And you're replaceable no matter who you are. As you know. Everyone's replaceable,

Elena Armijo: 17:03

right?

Jason Frazell: 17:04

Everybody's replaceable, yeah. So,

Elena Armijo: 17:05

instead of trying to play a game where you make it perfect for the system, what if you're actually choosing an experience for you that will then support your purpose or the business growth or the ROI for that year or any way you want to frame it?

Jason Frazell: 17:21

That's beautiful. We need more of those conversations. I, I have two questions. The first one here, and I'm just going to ask you one at a time because I'm, that's what we do in interviewing. Mostly, it's not perfect. The first question I have is, let's start with this one. You have somebody younger earlier in their career. They, that sounds great, Elena, but I'm an individual contributor and I'm pretty much told what to do. And I work at a company that's pretty like operationally efficient is my, the positive way to say it. And I'd love to be more innovative, but quite frankly, my boss doesn't support it or my job. It doesn't feel like my job has that ability. What, like what kind of, you know, where would you go with somebody like that? I understand with CEO, CEOs can set the vision.

Elena Armijo: 18:11

Yeah. A lot of folks

Jason Frazell: 18:12

don't have that capability in their current roles.

Elena Armijo: 18:16

One hundred percent. My young leaders, some of my favorite conversations to have with my young leaders include looking at, again, where do you want to be in 10 to 20 years, five years, three years, you can put a year you want, the year doesn't actually matter, right? But

Jason Frazell: 18:33

where

Elena Armijo: 18:33

are you growing to? And also with young leaders, these are the people where we're still developing leadership mindset, right? So innovation can come in that, but you got still building to do in young leaders. So where we start is looking at What are the gaps in your leadership that you need to expand in to have a different experience of yourself? So oftentimes we'll look at young leaders have usually one way of leading cause that's where we all start. Right. My way. And then if you're looking to expand that, how do you look at having different levels of communication, speak different languages, be with different types of people. And this is where I think like my opera training comes in really handy because I had to learn that fast. There's nothing like being in a donor party in the middle of Europe where you don't speak the language. You got to figure out how to connect to people. Right.

Jason Frazell: 19:25

Yeah.

Elena Armijo: 19:26

So for me, that is the, that's a really great place to start is what would expand you and what would expand your, your leadership in the world to see what you like. And then the second piece of this conversation with young leaders that I really love is you got a lot of play time. So if you know your values with them and you're clear on who you are, which is some of the work to do when you're starting as a leader, once you know your values and what you stand for in the world, then you get to go find the companies that align with them because you got time, you got time to experiment, you got time to grow and there are 8 billion people in the world. So when a leader, a young leader is telling me I'm stuck here and I don't have anywhere to go. I'm like, Whoa, let's, let's slow down that conversation for a second, all the companies in the world, we've forgotten that there's a whole world out there. And so those are, those are some of the places I start with young leaders.

Jason Frazell: 20:22

Yeah. I wish I would have had somebody asked me those questions earlier in my career. Cause I came from, you know, I started up right out of college and did some things and I was never really that what's the word? Yeah. I kind of just made it happen through whatever, but I never had anybody ask me those things. Other than the standard interview question, where do you want to see yourself in five years? Like, I'll, you know, nobody's paying, probably paying attention to that.

Elena Armijo: 20:50

Yeah.

Jason Frazell: 20:50

The second question I have is. Would you be willing to share an example of something that you see as really innovative in leadership? Keeping confidentiality, of course, we can keep it anonymous. We don't need to know product services, just something that, like, if you speak at high level, what's something that you either worked with somebody on or just an example, or maybe if you want to not keep it confidential, a public example of something that you're seeing in the world today. Let's keep it to the U. S. U S business marketplace that you find like innovative leadership and either one, either, you know, choose something from your practice, it's confidential, or we could break it public and talk about what's something that we all know about.

Elena Armijo: 21:29

I think the one, well, I think the one that I can talk about just openly and transparently is actually the C suite collective. You know, when we built this company, What I loved about it is there were a couple of places that I looked. There there's all kinds of reasons why I launched it and built it. But for this question specifically, what I would say is I wanted to experiment building a company from the ground up that had humanity culture, belonging. People first mentality from the ground up. So before there was even a product to sell or before there was even clients to serve, if we could start a company from that lens, what would happen? That was like my experimental question. Number one. And what I love we, we just entered our third year and what I love on the C suite collective is that we have spent two solid years and look, we've worked with clients. We still build. 500, 000, both the first year and the second year. Which isn't like not great, but it's also like for, for people that weren't really having a product or, or clear on what we were doing yet, pretty good.

Jason Frazell: 22:39

Yeah.

Elena Armijo: 22:39

You know, for walking in the door and everybody got served at a very high level, but, but what we were focused on was our foundation and if we could get our foundation to a place. Where everybody's viewpoints were heard. Everybody is clear why they're there. Everybody's clear on what they have to contribute to the world from superpowers and how that all works towards our mission and vision in the world. What's emerged after two years is such a community of trust. Everybody's fully enrolled or in right for the cause and the mission. Yeah. Nobody feels discounted. a number that their productivity is more important than their humanity, that our business is more important than humanity. Like everybody is on the same page. And to me, that is like, whoa, it's so cool. And look, we had to do some stuff that some traditional businesses might not have the luxury of doing, right? Like we each, each CEO on our platform has their own business. So this business wasn't created for people to eat and pay their bills off of, right? Like it literally is a think tank business where everything here feels like it's, you know, Innovation and creativity and experimentation. And I don't know, I mean, I know some companies that are doing it that way, but I still see companies, especially in the U S centering it on metrics that are all that are number one, first and foremost about revenue, which is not our, our methods, first and foremost. And they're, they're looking at their products as the most important thing, which isn't wrong, but I wonder how powerful it could be if your people were your most important thing and the products were second and they support each other in a really big way for any industry.

Jason Frazell: 24:32

Yeah. That would be, that would be interesting. That would be interesting. Wouldn't it? It would be. Because a lot of companies, a lot of companies talk about this as a concept, but their actions say otherwise.

Elena Armijo: 24:44

Yes.

Jason Frazell: 24:45

Your actions say otherwise.

Elena Armijo: 24:47

And look, I want to own, we, we were in a very privileged conversation to be able to even experiment with this. Right? Yeah. And starting point. And again, I get not all businesses start that way. So it is looking at the model and seeing what works and then going in and implementing it with organizations who maybe didn't have a chance to start that way and want to either change course or redirect, or even start something new from this lens with their industries. That's, that's kind of where we're at now.

Jason Frazell: 25:18

My, I have a, I have a challenge question for you, Elena. And let's clarify for the audience, the C Suite Collective, you're the CEO, you're the founder and CEO of the C Suite Collective, which is everything you just described. So you're the person who, like I said, it's your brainchild, you came up with it. The challenge for you, the challenge question I have is, You just mentioned a lot of things that sound amazing as somebody who's part of this collective. How do you actually know that those things are true, that they're empowered, they're enrolled, that they're, that they're liking it? And I'm, I'm not really challenging you cause I know you actually know the answer to this, but this is the thing that as coaches, we hear all the time from people that we coach that work in other companies. Oh my gosh, the company thinks everybody's so happy, but we know they're like, it's like with the late stats, like 42 percent of all people in the job market are looking at any given time or something like that.

Elena Armijo: 26:08

Yeah, it's really it's so good because, well, the first thing I want to say is just because we're all jamming and happy right now doesn't mean we don't have messes or issues. Of course. One of the, one of the most beautiful metrics I have is that we actually can bring tough conversations to each other, excuse me, and we all, we all stay in. So there's no Like we're pretty reliable to all bring feedback to each other and to be with the feedback and then collectively come up with an answer. Right. Or defer to people like, you know what? I don't, I don't have strong feelings about this. So I would rather this person take it, take this and run with the choice or the ball. And so I think that's instead of everybody being happy and telling me that they're happy all the time, which, you know. That's nice to hear for, for egos, you know, and, and your self worth,

Jason Frazell: 27:00

your self worth part. You must love that.

Elena Armijo: 27:02

Yeah. My self worth loves all of that. And it's not, the metric is really, can people bring what they see and not be made wrong for it and be like, feel like they're seen, heard, and valued. In the face of what they're bringing. And to me, that's a very clear metric because I would say, I mean, I hope, but to my knowledge, there isn't anybody in the collective that doesn't feel that way that they can't bring something to the table, to rumble with it or wrestle with it and get to a place where we all move forward. And that is like one on one, right? Like that's foundational for me. If we can't have those conversations, then what are we going to do when stuff gets really scary in the world? Or when we're up against challenging things. So that's one of my metrics. I'm trying to think another metric is, is every person feeling like they are growing in their life and their leadership and their businesses. If you're not growing as a person working in this collective, then. Then the organ, the organism is going to stop growing too. So really our metrics are based on spending a lot of time looking at each individual person and saying, what are they excited about? What are they expanding into? Does that, is that aligned with their values? And they tell us all of this or they tell us when we're off, right? Like, no, I don't really want to do that. That's, that's not great for me. Okay, good. Then let's find where you are, where the seat is in this organization for you. Or is it a conversation that we're not values aligned anymore? And that's okay too. Right. Then we're, then we're having authentic conversations about supporting that personnel, which is a very different feel than, You know what? You didn't meet our metrics and you said you were going to do X, Y, Z by the end of quarter one and we didn't make it. So now we're going to put you in a pip, but really we're just kind of documenting to get you out so that we're all safe.

Jason Frazell: 28:59

Yeah. Like

Elena Armijo: 29:00

those conversations don't happen in our collective because we haven't set it up that way.

Jason Frazell: 29:05

Yeah. I think the thought, thank you, Elena. The followup question I have there is. I'm sure there's lots of people listening that say, Hey, I'd like, you know, entrepreneurs, such I'd like to do that. And I can do that. I'm the CEO, I'm the founder. I have the ability to create that. What do you see as the, the opportunities and the challenges as you scale a company doing that, as you start to lose the, I don't as the CEO and founder, I don't necessarily get to talk to everybody every day or see them on calls as you start to build in layers. You, you hear this a lot in the startup world and they, it starts great and then they hit this inflection point of either a certain number of funding or certain number of employees. And then a lot of that just gets lost. So how do you, and this might be something that you coach folks on. This might be something you have just had general thoughts about or, and, or how do you maintain that as you continue to grow an organization?

Elena Armijo: 29:59

Well, I just want to own right up front that we haven't reached this point yet. Right? So in our experimentation pools, we are still small. And so we have the luxury of keeping it small right now. And the scaling conversations are on our radar, but we have always said instead of scaling, we want to have impact and make sure the product and our. Mission and vision are intact. So the way that I've approached this conversation in the very, very beginning stages is protect the integrity of the work, right? So but again, that's, that is a conversation for people that are staying small. So when you're scaling, the thing that I've noticed with other organizations that I've coached and worked in is that when money and investment to prove scalability or your impact in the world become the center of focus, You've lost the focus on the product and, and so anything that you can do to decrease dilution of your product is, is imperative in my view. And look, that's a, that's a tall order and a tall ask. When you've got a lot of people at the table, you've got a lot of mouths that are, that are looking to be sourced and fed. And board members that are talking to you about what they think is right or wrong. And founders like me, they're like, Oh, my baby, it's changing. No, like you got all that at the table. And the best shot you've got is if your people are first. And your product is, is very clear and you continue to hold that as sacred. Then I imagine that there's going to be a lot of different new innovations that could come forward. Unfortunately, the mistake I see a lot of companies make is they take investment. They're forced to grow faster than they want to grow. Products get diluted. And then all of a sudden it's like a massive. Internal issue in the organization. It's sort of like bleeding out. And then by then we're in crisis mode. Right. So so, you know, again, I don't know, we haven't gotten there. So I do want to own, like, this could be my naiveness talking at this stage, but. My intention as I move forward is to always protect the integrity of our work over anything. And I trust that it will grow organically from there. And that's, that's going to be our approach.

Jason Frazell: 32:25

Yeah. Thanks Alina. What a wrap today. We, I mentioned earlier, you're a certified dare to lead facilitator and you, we're not going to talk specifically about dare to lead too much today for those who don't know what that is. That's Brene Brown's brand and you can watch her Netflix special and read her books and all. She's, she's amazing. And listen to a lot of podcasts. I will say one thing I love about Brene is she swears a lot on podcasts, which I really

Elena Armijo: 32:49

love.

Jason Frazell: 32:49

I find it very endearing because I'm like, Oh, you're just real. I love that. I love, I love how she cusses. It's great. I want to talk a little bit about DEIB. Because you, you mentioned it as part of your work, but I was also struck by how you mentioned that you experienced a lot of things that would be considered, like, in your career as a singer, you, you saw a lot of things that didn't feel good to you, which I guess is part of the reason that you are so passionate about it, because you personally I felt it. You know, you're looking at a middle aged white American here, male. So, you know, I have these conversations with people all the time. I don't, I don't feel that. It's just like, not something I've experienced just by who I am, just by how I was born and the color of my skin and where I'm from and everything. So I'm really curious. What kind of work do you see there? And to wrap this, I'm curious what kind of innovations you might see in that space. Because, well, yeah, sorry, go ahead. That's it.

Elena Armijo: 33:46

No, you got it. What you got?

Jason Frazell: 33:48

No, I was just going to say, you know, I think we, for those who are here in the U. S. We saw a real, with George Floyd in 2020 and the pandemic, we saw a real swing. And then it seems that there's a lot of swing back the other way, which is discouraging. For a lot of folks, like people are removing those teams from their internal, internal resources, or it's not seeing as valued as much. So I'm curious, what kind of innovations are you seeing in that space? Cause for a while it's, it felt like. It was less innovation, more let's throw a lot of resources at it. And to me, that usually follows on with, it's still important, but now we're going to innovate in the space instead of just throwing a lot of resources at it.

Elena Armijo: 34:27

Yeah. And look, I think this is what we do as humans, right? When we see a problem, we swing back and forth and fix it. We read our books. We read our books and get

Jason Frazell: 34:35

advice. Yeah.

Elena Armijo: 34:36

Exactly. We overcorrect. We swing one way, we swing the other. And what I would say specifically is look, these conversations have been happening forever and whether they get heightened or lessened usually is a direct reflection of the loudest voices and you know, they're, they're speaking at the time. And I have a lot of feelings about the politic, the politicized versions of DEIB in our country and,

Jason Frazell: 35:03

and

Elena Armijo: 35:04

how even these, these tiny little letters. They're letters, you're all D E I B. Right. Have been so coerced and used in different ways. And now people are just really confused by a lot of it. So the innovation that I see is really, and this is something I talked to a lot of people that have been doing this work forever and people that know way more about it than I do that are studied in it, researched in it, have tracked it for many, many years. Is the pieces that need to come to light first and foremost, of course, we want it to be a heart based human conversation about why we should. And that's great. That will always be at the center of my heart. And until we start proving business cases that are directly related to innovation and creation of business. Most people are not going to get this, right? So the innovation I see in the scene is now people are really doubling down on data that is ROIs that are directly attached to cultures of belonging. And the other thing I want to say that's innovative is people for a long time, I think people have seen this as a separate conversation, especially people who just want to throw money at it or put people in these positions and now people are leaving and they don't know what to do when people get there. There's skill gaps and lack of training and, you know, everybody's confused. And the thing that I love speaking about is DEIB is not a separate conversation from any conversation you're having in your world ever. It can go into the way, the kind of clients that you're working with, the products that you're developing. All of this is diversity of thought. And that's just one, one example, diversity of thought. If you have lots of thoughts that disagree at a table, imagine what innovation can come out. If you're willing to be as embedded and threaded through every conversation you have, as opposed to this separate initiative that we need to overcorrect. And what I want to say specifically around, cause you brought in the space, you know, a white male sitting here in business in America is this is something that breaks my heart as a biracial woman is that a lot of white males and I would say white females too in our country don't realize how much it's costing them and how much they're losing themselves. This is not a problem that's for, for everybody else who is diverse and that you're on the outside. Remember all means all. So I really would invite people to get curious about what it's costing them, because there's a huge cost to you. And unfortunately, in the way that we've created power dynamics in our, in our country and the people that are winning, don't actually see the cost. And that's really all that I'm interested in is can everybody see what it's costing everybody instead of who deserves who and who's winning and who's losing. Everybody's losing in this conversation. So really looking at it from that lens, I think is going to be innovative.

Jason Frazell: 38:08

Yeah. I'm going to. We're gonna, we're gonna wrap here today and later, but I feel like that's probably a part two and that'll be an hour long conversation in and of itself.

Elena Armijo: 38:16

Sorry. I lost you again. One more.

Jason Frazell: 38:20

I did too. I just marked it. You looked very passionate. I just marked that. The good news is it's Riverside. So we got it. But did you hear me say, I feel like this is part two of a conversation that's we're going to have. That's going to be an hour in and of itself.

Elena Armijo: 38:30

Okay, cool. Yeah. No, I didn't hear that part.

Jason Frazell: 38:33

No, that's what I said, but I'll, I use Descript too, so I can, I can edit this a little bit, but I'm going to say it again. Let's turn on, let's actually turn on, I'm going to turn my camera off. I do not know what's going on because your audio is perfect and your video is extremely choppy.

Elena Armijo: 38:47

Okay. So I don't know.

Jason Frazell: 38:49

Yeah, no, it's, it's cool. It could be very well be me. I'm up in the cat skills. So, you know,

Elena Armijo: 38:55

we,

Jason Frazell: 38:55

we barely have doubt. So what I'm going to say is I'm going to say, Hey, Elena, thank you so much for all that. I'm going to give you an open invitation right now. If you'd like to come back to part two, we're just going to talk about that for an hour because there's like, that's obviously a huge, juicy topic. So I'm just going to say that, and then you say whatever you want and then we'll, we'll wrap it up. All right. I'm going to turn off my camera now. Okay. All right. Turn, try turning your camera off too. Let's see what it, what it does. It's strange because I'm looking at the uploading and the uploading is fine. Can you say something?

Elena Armijo: 39:25

It says 99 percent on mine.

Jason Frazell: 39:27

Yeah. I've. To be honest with you, it might be Riverside. I've seen Riverside be really annoying before. Yeah. Anyway. Yeah. Test, test. You sound great. You can hear me fine. Yep. Cool. All right. I'm going to mark this right here and then I'm just going to say, I'm just going to thank you and then say, have you back on part two of this? This is a really interesting conversation. You ready? Yep.

Elena Armijo: 39:49

Okay. Elena.

Jason Frazell: 39:51

Thank you so much for saying all that. You've got me thinking and I'm gonna own that I am one of those people who doesn't know the cost.

Elena Armijo: 40:01

Cool.

Jason Frazell: 40:02

And I want to know more. I actually want to know the cost because I care. So to me this feels like the first, the opening, the open, the opener of a whole separate conversation that we can have on the show. Mm hmm. And so if you're interested, we can come back on for part two and really dig in on that topic because I know you've done so much work in that and you're obviously very passionate about it and I would love to talk with you about it. So that's just an offer, you can think about it, but I really want to thank you for your passion around that and you've got me thinking over here.

Elena Armijo: 40:33

Aw, thank you. I love that, and I would be honored to come back anytime. It's so fun just talking about anything with you, Jason. So, thank you for

Jason Frazell: 40:40

having me. Yeah, thanks, Alina. Yeah, well, the other thing is, I request that you do a little cussing. I mentioned I like the cussing, so if you bring the cuss I'm kidding. You bring your authentic style.

Elena Armijo: 40:51

Yeah, that part Your authentic style. Do I cuss? You know, it's pretty rare. Actually, maybe

Jason Frazell: 40:56

I don't that don't cost. I don't want you. Yeah. Can you increase your

Elena Armijo: 40:59

practices in that? Now? I'm thinking maybe I need to just walk outside and cuss all the time. If

Jason Frazell: 41:03

anybody, if anybody, if anybody's interested in learning to increase their vulgarity, just feel free to hit me up and you can come to the show and we'll just swear it all the time. Yeah, that's great. That's great. Well, Elena, I want to thank you so much for being on before before we wrap up today. I'm sure that people listening today want to know more about you. You're talking about the C suite collective. What's the best way for people to reach out to you if they're interested in connecting with you and learning more?

Elena Armijo: 41:28

Yeah, you can reach me at coaching with Elena. At gmail. com. That's my private practice one. And then the c suitecollective. com is the company one. So feel free to reach out on those platforms.

Jason Frazell: 41:40

Yeah, LinkedIn and we'll put all of those things in the show notes. Elena. Thank you so much. This has been a long time coming. I'm really glad that we got a chance to have. The first part of a longer conversation on something more specific next time. Thank you so much. Enjoy the rest of your Friday out there in LA, and we will talk to you again very soon.

Elena Armijo: 41:59

Thank you so much. You too, Jason.

Jason Frazell: 42:01

Thanks, Lena.

42:04

Thanks for listening to another episode of Talking to Cool People with Jason Frizzell. If you enjoyed today's episode, please tell your friends, follow us on Instagram and Facebook, and give us a shout out, or take a moment to leave a review on iTunes. If something from today's episode piqued your interest and you'd like to connect, email us at podcast at jasonfrizzell. com. We love hearing from our listeners because you're cool people too.