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Tired of being talked over? Sick of having your ideas dismissed? Looking for ways to speak up and ask for the opportunities you desire? Today's guest has mastered these skills and is on a mission to reduce unconcious bias and help facilitate increased diversity, equity, and inclusivity in and out of the workplace. Join host Ellie Shefi as she sits down with Emmy® award-winning TV news anchor, best-selling author, keynote speaker, strategist, consultant, entrepreneur, and mentor, Michele Ruiz, to discuss ways you can establish and enforce healthy boundaries at work, mitigate any bias you may be experiencing, eliminate your own unconscious bias, and create opportunities for yourself. Full of practical tips, tools, and strategies you can use right away, this is definitely one episode you do not want to miss!

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Michele Ruiz On Embracing An Inclusive And Purpose-Filled Life

Today's guest is a three-time serial entrepreneur, prominent keynote speaker, Emmy Award-winning TV news anchor, mom, and best-selling author. She has been interviewed and quoted by major news outlets including The New York Times, CNN, and others. She is an expert on unconscious bias, entrepreneurship, and utilizing business communication strategies that empower and affect meaningful change, and foster diversity and inclusion. She is actively and deeply immersed in mitigating unconscious bias using scientifically validated methodologies, exploring leading-edge technologies, and undertaking new business ventures.

Her business ventures include co-founding BiasSync, a science-based technology company designed to help organizations effectively assess and manage unconscious bias in the work environment. She is also the Founder and CEO of Ruiz Strategies, a certified minority-owned and woman-owned consulting firm that develops and executes transformational communication strategies for Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, and major professional services organizations around the world.

Her deep entrepreneurial experience has been foundational in her quest to educate, inspire, and empower business owners. Committed to helping people and changing lives, her online mentoring program, Possibility Architect, serves female entrepreneurs determined to scale their businesses to over $1 million in annual revenue with corporate and government clients. She is also a dedicated philanthropist, advisor, and advocate.

Please welcome, Michele Ruiz. 

Thank you for having me. It’s a pleasure to join you here.

What an appropriate day for us to come together. As we're filming, it’s International Women's Day. I cannot think of a more appropriate, incredible and aligned guest to have today!

Thank you.

You have amassed quite a collection of accolades, but it hasn't always been that way. Talk to us a little bit about your journey.

I live a very purpose-driven life. Much of what I am involved in and what I focus on accomplishing and achieving for others is around my desire to live intentionally and with purpose. I had very challenging circumstances when I grew up. I was raised by a single parent who didn't have a college education herself. Unfortunately, we had a very financially unstable situation, being evicted, without food, lights being turned off, and all this kind of stuff.

There were some other traumatic experiences. I grew into my early adulthood becoming very self-reliant. I had no choice. I know that with your story, you understand the lessons and the value of becoming self-reliant. That led me or propelled me into my early profession which was in television news. I was a news anchor and reporter here in Los Angeles for the Tribune company, KTLA, and then after that, for NBC.

When I decided to leave and start a business, it was because I was focused on starting a business that had an impact on Latinos in the United States. My first company was a media company in the how-to aspirational space. I had gotten to that point in my television professional career where I was questioning what I wanted to do moving forward. Part of what prompted me to do that self-reflection is because sadly, I lost a son. That reoriented my perspective on what was important in life and what was not important in life. That changed so much about how I think about things, what I value, and what I feel isn't so important any longer.

When I decided to leave broadcasting and start my first company, I knew nothing about running a business or entrepreneurship, but I raised $1 million in seed capital over lunch without a business plan, just by talking through the story of this vision that I saw. I say to people that I became an entrepreneur because I raised money too easily, but it works.

Fast forward, I have several companies, including my science-based HR technology company that's focused on measuring, assessing, and ultimately, disrupting the impact of unconscious bias in organizations. In 2022, there's a lot of interest and focus on that, not just in terms of race and gender, but also as it pertains to members of the LGBTQIA+ community and others. I also have my consulting company.

I am at this stage in my life where I'm really about impact. All the good things that I want and have wanted have materialized and will continue to materialize. I worry less about that and focus more on being very intentional about how I lead my life and spend my time, and who I spend it with.

 

Unconscious biases are really about stereotyping.

 

Leaning into this passion for impact, particularly the impact focusing on the unconscious biases that exist, what was the genesis of that?

For my company, BiasSync, I was challenged to come up with a solution to be a disruptor in the marketplace. What happened was one of my co-founders (who has been a business mentor of mine for many years) called me up one day. He said, “I've been looking to purchase some kind of diversity and inclusion training and everything I see online is terrible. You know some stuff about this. Go out and let's figure out a disruptor to this space and bring something better to the marketplace.”

If you knew my co-founder, he is a very successful tech entrepreneur. BiasSync is probably the 13th or 14th company that he initially seeded and got up off the ground. He knows a fair amount about disrupting markets. Long story short, drawing on my journalism background, I started to research what the solutions were out in the marketplace and why objectives still weren't being met as it pertains to more diversity, inclusion, and equity even though the concept has been around since the Civil Rights era and has continued to evolve since then. It started with racial equity and then evolved to gender equity.

When he challenged me to go out, figure it out, and come back, that's what I did. I then realized that the reason why many companies are not achieving these objectives is because the root cause is unconscious bias. Companies either do not know that and are therefore not focused on it or do not have the right kinds of solutions to address it. That started the journey for me to focus on addressing and disrupting the impact of unconscious bias. When we talk about helping to mitigate the impact in workplaces, we're talking about mitigating the negative impact for typically underrepresented groups like minorities, women, people who are disabled, people who are members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and other categories.

In particular, as it pertains to women, I often talk about how when we can disrupt the impact of unconscious bias, we’re changing people's equity outcomes in the workplace. When we change their equity outcomes in the workplace, we're changing their family equity outcomes. When we change that financial piece on the family side, then we're impacting the generations that come after. It's significant work. It's not just about mitigating the impact of unconscious bias. It's much bigger and broader than that. To your question about leaning in, I couldn't be more pleased, happier, and proud that we're focused on this because of the bigger and broader impact. We live in this world in 2022 where the world is focused on diversity, inclusion, and equity in particular.

Your work couldn't be more timely and significant. To your point, it creates a ripple effect not only in this generation with the families and the communities, but intergenerationally, and it impacts the family wealth, family perspectives, and family lifestyles that get passed down from generation to generation. What you're doing is really important work.

I'm just going to add that I clearly have experienced bias certainly in broadcasting. I can only hope it's gotten better since then. I’ll give some simple examples. When I was in television news, it was not uncommon for women news anchors to be paid less than male news anchors. The system perpetuated that. Contractually, you couldn't even talk about wages. That's one way to keep inequities in pay. By the way, it's not just the pay piece. The research shows that people who watch television news will make a decision about watching or not watching based on the female anchor, not so much on the male anchor. What I mean by that is women news anchors play a very important role in terms of viewers watching, yet from an equity perspective, the male anchors are paid significantly more.

 

 

I knew that but it was the state of the business. There wasn't much that you could say. I'm assuming that there has been a lot of progress in that regard.

The other piece to that is I've also experienced racial bias. I've experienced that in business and in different cases, but now I'm much more aware and alert to it because of having started BiasSync. For the most part, I figured out how to recognize it when it's happening and how to address it.

Let’s talk about some practical tips. You're not alone. There are people who are experiencing gender bias or bias based on their religion, sexual orientation, cultural background, or nationality. Let's talk about some ways that people can recognize and navigate that, and also some ways that people can find their voice and step into asking for what they need, reporting bias they're experiencing, or that type of thing.

I'm going to focus my comments mostly on interacting not internally with family members or friends but externally based on our jobs and businesses. Research is ample about both racial bias and gender bias as it pertains to women. For example, generally speaking, women are not given as many opportunities as men. There are myriad reasons for that and some of them are well-intentioned, but unfortunately, they are missing the mark.

I'll give you an example. It is not uncommon to have both a male and a female employee who is being considered for a major client-facing project. Let's say it's a large consulting company or whatever the case is. The leader, manager, or executive who is making the decision about which of the two individuals to assign as the lead on this major client project could be taking into account something like, “She has children, She has a family. Her kids are younger. They probably need her. Joe can just hop on a plane and go anytime.” They think they're doing her a favor so they send Joe and assign him this big client-facing project.

Here's what happens though: down the road when it comes time to evaluate Mary for her performance review, compensation, etc., she looks worse than he does on paper because she wasn't given the opportunities. That happens a lot.

Unconscious biases are about stereotyping. When we talk about unconscious biases, this is not intentional behavior. This is our brain making snap decisions or snap judgments often based on stereotyping, and almost always not fully cognizant of the impact on either a particular individual or groups of individuals.

That's an example of where women should feel like they can be very direct in their requests. There may be a performance review. They've just been hired and they would like to say, “I want to make sure that we are focused on inclusivity and equity. I want to make sure that I’m evaluated and considered as these key opportunities or projects come up.”

In other words, we put the request out there. We let the people who are making the decision know that we want to be considered for the opportunities. That would be a suggestion.

There are also what's known as microaggressions, microinvalidations, and microinsults that happen. Microaggressions are things such as, “What would you know about that? You're Latina.” In other words, it’s making assumptions. These are these tiny little things that sting people. They're not these overtly obnoxious behaviors. Those would be explicit behaviors. Instead, they're these small little stings but they add up.

 

It’s important to speak up when we feel like we have experienced something that doesn't feel right.

 

Microinvalidation would be something like this: let’s say we’re in a meeting and there are eight people in the room. I was the only woman or one of the few women and the guys were speaking over me - which happens a lot in the workplace. Women are constantly spoken over by men. Let’s say that happened and I was quiet during the meeting, but after the meeting, I went to my manager or supervisor and said, “I wanted to bring to your attention that during the meeting, every time I felt that I wanted to contribute, I was spoken over. Since you were leading the meeting, I want to bring it to your attention so that maybe we can figure out a way for that not to happen.”

Microinvalidation is like, “Michele, you're just taking it too seriously. No one meant anything by that.” In other words, it’s invalidating my experience. We can bring these kinds of situations up. There are so many. We can write a book about navigating life and all the different biases that come up.

There are all kinds of things that can come up, but it’s about speaking up when we feel like we've experienced something that doesn't feel right.

More often than not, people don't mean it. It's often a lack of awareness. When I do notice it, I will assume that they didn't realize it. I will say, “You probably didn't realize this, but this is how I experienced that meeting or that conversation or this situation when you said that. I want you to know how it landed." You're not like, “You did this,” or “You did that.” You're opening up the possibility that they didn't realize or didn't understand. At the same time, you’re expressing your observation and making a request when appropriate.

That's powerful because so many times, if you're in a situation where you repeatedly aren't seen and heard, or you’re repeatedly invalidated or spoken over, or you're dismissed when you say something, oftentimes you feel like, “What's the point in speaking up? What's the point in bringing it to their attention because yet again, I'm going to be dismissed, unseen, unheard or invalidated.” That's an important point that you brought up. That's powerful languaging that we are equipping the audience to be able to use of assuming that the other person didn't realize and that it is an unconscious bias. To be able to frame it that way is not threatening.

I say that with a caveat. The science and the research show that women are relationship people. We value relationships statistically more so than men. It’s not that men don't value relationships, but we're very relationship-driven. We ponder, think, and stew over a dynamic that happened in a conversation or an engagement. For men, it doesn't even register. Consequently, when we're engaging with individuals, we often want to be too soft or too polite because we are concerned about how we might be perceived. There is a legitimate basis for that.

I do recommend that you assume the positive that they didn't mean it unless it was so overt or the behavior is so obnoxious. There are times when very direct, straightforward communication is important. As women, we sometimes can become too concerned about people's perception of us so we are less direct and don't get to a resolution. There are times when it does make sense to be more direct and very specific about what occurred and what you would like to see or what you would like to not see happen in the future. I say that because that also sometimes comes into play.

In those moments where it's important to be direct, those would be the instances where it's like, “In the meeting, I felt unseen,” or “I don't appreciate being spoken over. We've discussed it previously. I don't feel like we're having a resolution. The situation isn't changing. The behavior is continuing to happen.” Are those the kinds of examples that you're referencing?

 

Yeah, especially if you brought it up before. You would say, “My request is that next Tuesday at our weekly meeting that you would be paying attention and aware. If you see me or another woman being interrupted, you step in and say, ‘So-and-so, let's stop. Let her finish what she has to say. I'm interested. I want to hear what she has to say. Let's not interrupt her.’” There are times when you need to be very specific and direct about your request. That would be a situation like that.

That’s a muscle that as women, it takes some development for us. Often, we don't ask for help or we don’t speak up for our needs, wants, and expectations. I love that this is something that we can practice. It is a muscle that we can develop in all areas of our life as we find our voice, stand in our power, and feel empowered to speak, ask for what we want, be clear in our communication, and set boundaries.

Even on the personal side, direct communication like, "I felt this, I feel this, or I need this," goes a long way.

No one is a mind reader, so we need to be clear with what we need and want.

You are a mentor to so many. We spoke earlier about leaning into this life of purpose and impact. You have stepped into this transformational leadership or thought leadership space, and you are there for so many women. What's the true genesis of that? Did you have mentors that you looked up to? Are you the mentor now that you wish you had?

It’s both. I certainly had individuals looking out for me outside of my immediate family in my childhood and young adulthood. A teacher stands out in particular who paid a lot of attention to me in high school, as well as a high school counselor. To your point, I didn't have the knowledge, wherewithal, or the confidence candidly to ask for support and help. I remember in my early twenties, I put myself through college. I worked and paid my way through. It was not easy. I was shouldering a lot. I didn't know where to go for help. I didn't know how to ask for help, and then because of my very unstable childhood, I certainly had a lot of confidence issues.

As I became wiser and had more life experiences - I got married, had children and lost a child - then I became clearer about asking for help. As I became an entrepreneur, then I realized I'm going to need business mentors to scale and grow. I did identify a couple of women business owners who had very thriving robust businesses at the time (and continued to have now).  That's important because as women, it's important to have women mentors, especially as business owners, because there are challenges that we face that you can't talk about with a lot of people.

You want to have people that you can talk to through the issues that are coming up or challenges that you're having, whether they are HR issues, employee issues, or whatever the case. There are things that you can't be talking to your employees about like scaling, revenue going down, or things like that.

I had men mentors as well. It’s also important to have male mentors. In other words, diversity in your mentors is good because there are also things that you can learn from them. While group constructs are important, it is also very important to get out of our various group constructs.

 

You architect all the opportunities in your life.

 

The second part of your question is if I am the mentor I wish I had. I think so too. I've had so many experiences in my life that have impacted me. I have a lot to share, which is the genesis of my program, Possibly Architect. By the way, I didn't come up with that name. I was meeting with a dear friend of mine who is also a mentor. We were talking one day and he said, “Do you know what you are? You're the possibility architect.” His name is Mark. I looked at him puzzled and he said, “You've architected all the opportunities in your life. You're the one who architected them.” I thought about it and he was right. He's a psychiatrist by training, so I'm sure there was some awareness piece there too. That’s what prompted me to zero in on how can I help and mentor women.

I get asked also by men, particularly in the entrepreneurship space. I have several businesses and one of them is investor-backed. I needed to figure out how to scale like, "How can I mentor and scale? How can I mentor as many people as possible?” I can't do it necessarily one-on-one. My investors expect that I'm focused on the growth of the company and hitting all those milestones. That's the genesis of my Possibility Architect program. There will be a book coming under that title too.

I can't wait to read it. With all the different mentors you've had, what's the best advice you have received?

On the business side, as an entrepreneur and business owner, the best advice I've received is to hire slow and fire fast. On the business side, a bad hire can cost the company a lot. When you see signs that someone is a bad hire, you fire fast. Sometimes, you can get so committed to a path because we've invested so much in the person. We recruited them, interviewed them, hired them, and trained them, and 2, 3 or 4 months into it, or maybe even sooner, we're seeing that this isn't panning out the way we want it.

We think about everything we went through. We’re like, “Can we continue to work with the person?” Maybe it's a performance issue or a culture issue with that person. At the end of the day, as an employer, a CEO or a president of your company, it ends up costing you a lot. That's the greatest business advice I’ve received.

On the personal side, the best advice I've received ties into resiliency. I'll use the example of losing my son. The research shows that that's the greatest loss any person can experience - more so than a loss of a parent, partner, or spouse - because it's the loss of a future. No one expects to outlive your children. I’ve learned through the most traumatic experiences that there's always something there that can help you become more resilient. There's something there that can make you a better individual.

Not to dismiss or discount the traumatic experience or the terrible situation, but if you can look at it that way, there's often something good for you personally in how you evolve, develop, and see the world that can contribute to your growth as a person. It is looking at how these difficult circumstances have made me more resilient and have more capacity and empathy, and seeing those come out.

 

 

Tony Robbins likes to frame that as training yourself to know and recognize that life happens for you. My friend, Maya Comerota, builds on that. I love her take on it. She says, “Life happens for you, through you.” We can learn to find the good in a situation, find the lesson, and focus on growth and opportunity. Lisa Nichols likes to say, "Sometimes, the best gifts come wrapped in sandpaper."

That's good. I have to remember that. I agree. I would never wish the experience of losing a child on anyone. However, having had that experience, I am such a more conscious and better individual. I appreciate that.

To your point earlier, that was such a pivotal moment that allowed you to take stock, take inventory, and reprioritize your life. At that moment, your entire life shifted and it set you on this path of impact, path of purpose, path of being present, and path of reprioritizing what's truly important to you. Now, you've had all of these moments where you're present and experiencing each and everything to the fullest.

I certainly try. I have a much better attitude now than I've ever had.

We've touched on some lessons that you've learned along the way. We've also touched on these amazing things that your mentors have shared. What's something that you wish someone had told you that you had to learn the hard way?

The first thing that comes to mind is looking at situations that come up on a daily basis, and evaluating the significance of them. In other words, at that moment in time, it may be aggravating or upsetting - whatever the situation is. But will this matter five weeks, five months, or five years from now? When I learned that later in life, I thought, “If I have had that pearl of wisdom much earlier in my life, I could have saved myself a lot of grief, internal upsetness, questioning, all kinds of anger, and hurt.” It’s by putting it in that perspective and knowing that it's a temporary situation. In life, you're not going to look back and go, “That's going to be a pivotal moment.” As you look back on the time period, it frames how you can move through your days and your life, so try to put things in perspective.

That’s important, especially in the last couple of years, after so many of the twists and turns that we've experienced with what's going on in the world. That's a powerful pearl of wisdom that you are sharing with the audience - to stop and think, “Is this going to matter in a month? Is this going matter in a year? Is this going to matter in five years?” and to reframe and keep things in perspective. There are real issues going on in the world, so it’s good to be able to stop even when it feels like the walls are caving in or even when it feels like things are chaotic. Thank you for sharing that. Stop, ask yourself these questions, and keep things in perspective. That’s powerful.

 

Hire slow and fire fast. A bad hire can cost the company a lot.

 

You’re right. The world is so upside down that it makes even more sense to be able to be mindful in that regard.

What trends are you seeing in the space? There's always been unconscious bias, and here we are with the #MeTooMovement, then George Floyd, and then COVID. All of a sudden, people had to work from home; their spouse had to work from home; they had to take on the extra roll of homeschooling teacher, etc., and everything was closed. They weren't getting that facetime in front of their boss and the kids were running around in the background. Given all of that, what trends are you seeing in the space?

It’s interesting that we're having this conversation at this moment in time because as a tech entrepreneur, I'm getting ready to raise another round of capital. I have been immersed in the last few days in our story and trends. It's so front and center in my mind. What I can tell you is that the world is focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion. In 2022, I would say that there's also more focus on the inclusion and equity piece, not just diversity.

We have all heard about diversity. Diversity is about numbers - are there is diversity in the numbers? X percentage of our employees are A, and then X percentage of our employees are B, C, D, E and F. The real challenge becomes having diversity but not having inclusion. You can have a diverse workforce by the numbers, but employees do not feel included or certain groups of employees don't feel included, or that it's an inclusive environment.

Equity is a different piece. When we think of equity, we're always thinking of compensation equity, but there are other kinds of equity like equity in opportunities and other stages. I'll give you a couple of pieces of information on what the research has shown. There is this Great Resignation that we're hearing about. Employees are leaving the workforce in greater numbers than they've ever left - certainly during the pandemic. Even still, many of them have left because of their perception that they've worked in a toxic environment. The pandemic brought that up more so than before.

Often, the toxicity is directly correlated with the lack of inclusiveness and lack of focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion. What we're seeing in trends is that employers are much more focused on it - not because it's a good thing to do. There's a real financial and economic impact on employers who are not focused on it. When you're not focused on DE&I, and now the Federal government is adding A to diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility or ability. Some say that A is for ability, but the Federal government use it as accessibility - it impacts productivity and retention and it certainly impacts recruitment. It creates reputational issues.

The research has been around for a long time that more diverse, inclusive environments lead to greater innovation. It has a very direct correlation to profitability, bottom line, and innovation. This is no longer a nice to have or a good thing to do. The other thing is you have states that are now mandating and looking at this. By the way, we're pleased to see that as the world is focused on more diversity, equity, and inclusion, they are also more focused on the role unconscious bias plays. Unfortunately, that is something that we've been focused on even before the pandemic, George Floyd, and around the time of the #MeTooMovement.

 

 

Unconscious bias is at the root of why a lot of these challenges are occurring. Now, you have states and the Federal government mandating unconscious bias training because the headline is unconscious bias kills. What do I mean? If you look at the outcomes for people of color in the legal and judicial system, that’s not a stretch. If you look at the outcomes for women and people of color in healthcare, it's not a stretch to say unconscious bias kills. The research is there about the inequity and the poor outcomes for women in certain circumstances and people of color.

There is also a known bias called socioeconomic bias. It's not just race and gender. There are many biases that come into play. The overarching trend is that the world is focused on this. We're seeing it as part of compliance more and more. If you look at the diversity roles and the uptick in hires of companies, it has grown by 300% in the last 18 months. That's a direct result of the murder of George Floyd, the Black Lives Movement, and the growing awareness about inequity for people of color.

In those instances, we think of Black people because George Floyd was Black, and Black Lives Matter is focused on Black individuals. We cannot forget that these movements that can be attributed to African-Americans or Blacks as an example can positively impact other minority groups like Hispanics and others. That in and of itself is a good thing. With respect to gender inequity, certainly the #MeTooMovement brought a lot of attention to that. I know that more and more boards of directors are focusing on that as a risk factor when they look at company performance and want to make sure that they don't have legal risks as it pertains to gender inequity and it’s not just panned compensation.

Beyond the requirements for diversity, inclusivity, and sensitivity training, what are some other effective strategies that you're seeing to change the dialogue and move the needle?

I would put forth BiasSync. Our behavior change approach is moving the needle. I go back to how we started the conversation about looking at the marketplace and creating a market disruptor. One of the things that we identified was that the old way of doing things wasn't moving the needle and we needed a behavior change approach. We're rooted in science and research, and what we know about behavior changes and how to influence behavior changes. It is a combination of things. It's not just education as in training. The research shows that training alone do not move the needle.

There is a place for training. I'm not saying the training isn't valuable, but to rely simply on training is not enough to move the needle. We have the science-based and evidence-based approach that focus on behavior change, which is not just a one-off situation. There's a series of things that needs to occur both on the individual level for employees, but also on the broader level as companies look at their policies, practices, and procedures.

As we've talked a lot about how you pour into the world, how you serve, how you live this life of purpose and impact with BiasSync, with your consulting firm, with Possibility Architect, with all of the incredible people that you mentor, and with all of the lives that you change... what do you do to fill your cup so that you can go forth and serve at the level that you do?

Unconscious bias is at the root of why a lot of these challenges are occurring.

My secret weapon is sleep. I’ll put that first and foremost. My life is very high throttle. I operate in two states: full throttle or catatonic. It’s catatonic because I've been at full throttle too long and I hit the wall. Then I've got to take two or two and a half days to re-energize. So I mean sleep in the bigger context of self-care.

I used to be able to operate on 4 or 5 hours of sleep a night pretty consistently. It’s not the case anymore. It doesn't mean that I can't wake up if I've only had 4 or 5 hours of sleep. What it means is I'm much more aware of how it impacts me, my cognitive abilities, my mood, and my interactions with people. I focus on sleep and that allows me to show up more intentionally in the way I want to show up in the world and be focused on all those things.

The other piece is I continue down this mindfulness journey. I do a lot of study in mindfulness and more work along those lines. That's what fills my cup.

I love that, mindfulness and sleep. As we start to wind down, let's imagine that it is the end of your life best lived. You're coming towards the end of your journey here on this Earth and you have left it all on the table. You have served at the highest level. You have been fully present. You have done all the things you came here to do. What do you want them to say about you when you're gone?

There is a quote that I landed on some years ago which sums up my perspective on that. That is, “When you were born, you were crying and people around you were smiling. Live your life so that when you die, you're smiling and people around you are crying.” That’s it.

That’s amazing, and so it is.

Yes; and so it is.

How can people connect with you? How can they find out more about BiasSync, Possibility Architect, and the other programs and services that you offer?

Thank you. I am very findable online, Michele Ruiz. I have my website. I’m also on all the major social platforms. I have my company BiasSync because we all need to be in sync around mitigating the impact of unconscious bias. I also have my consulting company, Ruiz Strategies and Possibility Architect. We’re launching the full program over the next couple of months. At the moment, you can find some high-level information on my personal website under my name but soon, we’ll have a Possibility Architect website as well.

Wonderful! So if somebody wants to be part of Possibility Architect, they still have time to go to your website and learn more about it.

 

 

Yes! All of those are ways and prompts on how to communicate with me and send me a message. I have eight ways between LinkedIn, Twitter, etc., and all these other ways. There are a myriad of ways that people can reach out to me.

For everyone in the audience, do reach out. Michele is exceptional. Reach out to her to learn more about Possibility Architect and navigating unconscious bias. It's so important. It's something that we can all do our part to mitigate.

Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for the work that you do in the world. Thank you for the way that you show up. Thank you for the lives that you change - not only for today but for tomorrow. Thank you for your commitment to such critical work and for how you pour your heart and soul into living every single day as a force for good.

Thank you.

 

Important Links

 

About Michele Ruiz

Michele Ruiz is a three-time serial entrepreneur, prominent keynote speaker, former Emmy® Award-winning TV news anchor, mom, and best-selling author.

Interviewed and quoted by major news outlets including the New York Times, CNN, and others, she is an expert on unconscious bias, entrepreneurship, and utilizing business communication strategies that empower, effect meaningful change, and foster diversity and inclusion. She is actively and deeply immersed in mitigating unconscious bias using scientifically validated methodologies, exploring leading-edge technologies, and developing and undertaking new business ventures.

Her business ventures include co-founding BiasSync, a science-based technology company designed to help organizations effectively assess and manage unconscious bias in the work environment. She is also the founder & CEO of Ruiz Strategies, a certified minority-owned and woman-owned consulting firm that develops and executes transformational communications strategies for Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, and major professional services organizations around the world.

Her deep entrepreneurial experience has been foundational in her quest to educate, inspire, and empower business owners. Committed to helping people and changing lives, her online mentoring program, Possibility Architect, serves female entrepreneurs determined to scale their businesses over $1 million in annual revenue with corporate and government clients.