Prepare, Don’t Predict: Eloiza Domingo on Crisis Playbooks That Work

Athena Koutsonikolas: Hi, and welcome to a brand new Aspire to Inspire Podcast episode. My name is Athena Koutsonikolas, and I'm the Vice President of Marketing in North America. Today's guest is a powerhouse in leadership, culture, and communication. Eloiza Domingo is the founder and CEO of Eloiza Consulting. She is also a culture innovator and crisis leadership expert, and she partners with forward-thinking companies to transform cultural challenges into opportunities for business growth. Her leadership journey spans industries with previous roles as Chief Inclusive Diversity and Equity Officer at Allstate, Vice President of DEI at Astellas Pharma, and Chief Diversity Officer at Johns Hopkins Medicine. Eloiza is known for her fearless, future-focused approach to workplace inclusion, especially in moments of crisis and change. She's helped some of the world's most complex organizations navigate with authenticity to align culture with business strategy and build trust from the inside out. Her leadership style isn't just smart, it's deeply human. And in this episode, we'll dig into how Eloiza helps leaders confront hard truths, communicate with heart, and embed inclusive practices into the DNA of an organization. If you've ever wondered how to align your internal narrative with your external values, or how to lead when the world won't slow down, this episode is definitely for you. Eloiza, welcome to Aspire to Inspire. We are super excited to have you here today. And I know I'm really looking forward to diving in to learn more about your career journey, but first off, let's hear a little bit about who you are as a person.

Eloiza Domingo: Absolutely. Thank you so much, Athena, and thank you for everybody who's listening to the podcast, and of course, Athena, your team. It's been a real joy to work with everybody to get to today. Yeah, so Athena, you and I are about to talk about some hard topics. You talk about crisis and you talk about the world falling apart, which unfortunately, it is in a variety of ways, but I think it's really important to remind people that the work that we're doing is coming from human beings. So, I'll share a little bit about my journey here in a second, but I'm much more proud of me being a single mom. I got divorced about five and a half years ago. And that is an important part of my journey because it allowed me to understand how to take the bull by the horns, make some decisions on my own. I am the daughter of immigrants from the Philippines that moved here. They moved here in the 1970s for what they really believed was the American Dream. And they're physicians, I am the second of three kids. I'm actually the only one who didn't go into medicine. My brother is a trauma surgeon. My sister went into therapy. I was like, "I'll just do diversity stuff." But I love the work that I do. Like you said, I come from a lot of industries, including healthcare, pharmaceuticals. I have five dogs, which is insane. If I wasn't doing this work, I would actually be a vet. And our five dogs are taken care of by myself and my four boys. I have two sets of twins. I have 17-year-old twin boys who are seniors in high school, and they're looking to go into college. My gosh. Then I've got 12-year-old twin boys who are in seventh grade. So, doing this work as a DEI person, and doing the work in crisis, and doing this work in strategic communications, when you're single parenting biracial boys, when you're doing this work and making sure that you're reaching a lot of audiences, it does help to think about me on the personal side, but also on the professional side. And quite frankly, I also think it allows the work to be better. So, I appreciate, Athena, you giving me a little bit of space to bring that part into the conversation today.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Thank you so much for sharing. And I can't even imagine how busy your household is. You've got 10 occupants between two sets of twins, yourself, and the dogs.

Eloiza Domingo: It's a lot.

Athena Koutsonikolas: A lot going on. And yeah, definitely identify with your story as a daughter of immigrants. I'm also a daughter of immigrants. So, power to you. I know you know the certain dynamics that comes with being part of an immigrant family, and what our parents go through in order to give us an opportunity in life. So, thank you again for sharing that.

Eloiza Domingo: Absolutely.

Athena Koutsonikolas: I would love to get right in. So, I want to start off with crisis because it's something that communicators can dread. So, when something is urgent, emotional, or socially-charged, leaders just feel this intense pressure to respond fast, but we know that one misstep can completely erode trust. You've coached leaders through these emotionally-charged events, layoffs are an example of that. So, when a crisis erupts, how do you guide executives through the immediate decision-making process? Like what to say, when to say it, and who should deliver the message?

Eloiza Domingo: Yeah, so, first of all, let me . . . Crisis is a really big word, Athena, so at least for the conversation that we're having or the way that I approach crisis, let's just define it a little bit. I may be doing myself kind of a disservice by saying this, but a crisis to me is anything that takes your business away from business as usual. The BAU of it, business as usual. Every organization strives to get to that plateau, where every day you're coming in, you can predict, I know how everything is going to go, and it's all going to go great. That actually is why people start companies, and they think that's going to be the pinnacle.What unfortunately companies do not do is they don't build in this idea that crisis is inevitable. There will be things that will take you off of business as usual and then create an . . . To me, there is opportunity in crisis. Everybody says, especially strategic communicators, your field, I've heard it actually from you all, "Don't let a good crisis go to waste." And in order to do that, Athena, the biggest thing, and you noted it, most of the time when crisis happens, leaders, communicators, whatever, it's very easy for us to jump because that's human. "Oh my gosh, my kid broke their arm." Or, "Oh my gosh, I'm negative in my bank account." So you have to rightsize the ship very quickly, that is totally normal. The thing is though, is that how have you safeguarded your organization so that you're not in that space? So, let's pretend that you're in an organization and you haven't had some of these discussions. The number one thing that I would think about is the before, during, and after. If you don't have the before of the crisis, that during and after is going to be horrible. And then you're going to find yourself, like you said, Athena, in those spaces where you're like, "Just say something." Or, "Do we say something? I don't know."And that's a really, really bad place because you have about 24 to 48 hours, honestly, in a big crisis, to decide if you're going to say something, not going to say something, who is it? How are you going to say? What pronouns do I use? Is it I or we? Those are big decisions. So, take time, for the people out there that are thinking about strategy, comms, PR. Take the time, and there is merit in taking the time to sitting and thinking, "Okay, what are the predictive pitfalls that are going to happen to our organization?" RIFs, going to happen at some point. Reduction in force, going to happen. Economic downturns, having a leader go off script happen, product recall, social crises, like . . . And again, crisis isn't always bad. Black Lives Matter movement, Me Too movement, reverse of affirmative action. Anything can happen. How are you going to handle it so that you're actually using as an opportunity? So that's your before.And then that actually helps you, honestly, Athena, to have kind of a roadmap to say, "Well, you know what? We don't really, we didn't . . ." For example, I worked for a pharmaceutical company, and one of their top products was within prostate cancer. And prostate cancer, the number one health equity population for prostate cancer is African-American males that are over 40. Okay? So, more African American males over 40 do not get screened for prostate cancer and therefore, actually, die quicker from prostate cancer than their peers. So, as a result of that, that organization leaned in to Black support, Black community, African American medical support, African American health equity. There was a business case to support the Black population, and Black education, and Black health. Okay? So then, when Black Lives Matter happened, it was a clear, like, of course. Of course we're going to do that. Of course we're going to say that. This organization also, however, did not do a lot in Hispanic because again, there was no business case. It doesn't mean that this organization was racist against Hispanic. It wasn't that. It was that there was not necessarily a business case.That's also working, and we'll talk about that here, I am not going to sit here and say you have to respond to every crisis that has to do with a demographic background. No, you do not, and you better not. That is a slippery, slippery slope. So, once you've established that before, the during then allows you to say, "Okay, so take out the playbook then. What are the values that we said that we have? What is the business imperative?"And then from there, it actually helps you to determine all of those who, what, when, where, how questions that you asked earlier, Athena. And then always do what I call an RCA, the root cause analysis or the debrief at the end. So, how did we do? Because if you didn't say anything, and that's fine, maybe in your root cause, you would say, "We probably should have, so maybe we should revisit that." Those are some of the, just kind of strategic things you really want to think about because crisis will occur. It is inevitable. It will take you off of business as usual, so how do you prepare?

Athena Koutsonikolas: Right. Super helpful. I want to pull the thread on something that you noted earlier, and that is around leaders going off script. So, you talk about delivery style as being critical to brand reputation. In your experience, what does getting it right actually look like, and how do you help execs move past the fear of maybe saying the wrong thing, while still leaning into their sense of integrity?

Eloiza Domingo: Yes. I'm going to keep going back to this before, during, and after. I've worked with a lot of communicators, and one of the things that I really, I don't envy you on is you're honestly chasing a lot of executives who are like, "I'm going to say this. I'm good. I'll write it." It's like, "Are you?" So, I don't envy that part. Number one, and you all know this better than I do, having a relationship with your executive or your principal, whoever that person is, whoever your principal is, is really critical. Knowing that they can trust you. And again, I don't envy that because that is very, very difficult, depending on who your principal is. So, that's number one. Number two, and you already do this, but these media packets are really critical. I've worked a lot with leaders who guffaw at these media preps and say, "I've been on magazines before. I know how to handle this," but I've actually found that the people who, A, have a trusting relationship with their comms people, then can actually set up practice opportunities.Even for me, I've been on the media a long time, I've been a public speaker for a long time, but every time I get into a company, I always have them prepare me. I always have them say, "Give me a question, and I'm going to answer it." And sometimes they'll say, "Eloiza, don't sit back like that when you answer the question." I'm like, "Oh, okay," because it messages. I mean, me sitting back, I'm sitting, and you know that, this message is something different than me doing like this, right? And leaning in.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Yeah, body language telegraphs so many things.

Eloiza Domingo: 100%. It is really critical to match whatever brand you're trying to do. So, A, it's, again, it's that before. The during, one thing, an example, there was a . . .  One of the healthcare organizations that I worked for, they were having a crisis around the Jewish population in that particular city. It was like 13 years ago, so I really cannot remember for the life of me, but it was tied to some world issues. And our president contacted us and said, "Hey, I want to say something. I'm a little bit worried. We have a very large Jewish population in the city and a very large Jewish population that is our market."And of course, we agreed. Yes, it's aligned to our business imperative, so that's a check. So, what do you want to say? And because he had a really good relationship with us, this was on a Sunday, he called, and we just had an emergency meeting. And we went back and forth, and back and forth, and back and forth. One of our communicators said, "You know what, do you want to just write a letter to the organization? Do you just want to write something?" And it was one of those things where we literally were like, no one knew what to say. And this communicator bravely just said, "We've never done it before, but what if you just write a letter?" Athena, he said, and I said earlier about pronouns, everything he wrote was I. The first sentence was, "I'm sitting on my couch and I'm watching CNN," and he just described what he was seeing. "And I'm so hurt by what I'm seeing, not because I identify . . . I understand what it means to be Jewish or Jewish American, but because, dah-dah-dah, I, I, I." And it literally was like three paragraphs of just him as a human. And then at the end, it was like, institution name, as the president of institution name, I really believe, insert values, and we insert discriminatory statement, dah-dah-dah, insert dah-dah-dah. The comms, we put that in there, and he was like, "I stand with you. I don't believe in this. I'm sitting on my couch and I can imagine that probably you're doing the same." Mark. And it was like, "What?" People were floored.

Athena Koutsonikolas: The humility of that . . .

Eloiza Domingo: That was one of the things, but again, I don't think that that would've happened had he not had a very clear and distinct relationship with the strategic communications team, the diversity team at the time. And then we all decided, "I don't really know what you're going to say about the institution, but I can tell, you just want to say something human. We're going to go with that, but let's do something that . . . " Again, it's an opportunity, and man, his sentiment numbers, I mean, it was like through the roof. People were actually downloading the letter, and people shared it with other people. We were actually seeing it kind of go viral. People were taking it and putting it on their Facebook like, "Our president said this." Like, "Yes, I was on my couch, too." It was like this social movement before Facebook existed, really. So, again, the before, during, and after is really critical. Having that relationship and having even playing out like what would happen if, is also really helpful.

Athena Koutsonikolas: I absolutely love that story in leadership authenticity. It's such a good one. You mentioned the sentiment associated with this leader, so I want to turn now to employee sentiment.

Eloiza Domingo: Sure.

Athena Koutsonikolas: I know that you've seen employee sentiment actually improve after a major restructuring. What are some of those strategies that helped turn a really tough moment for an organization into something that was actually trust-building?

Eloiza Domingo: One of the hardest parts about transformation, and we use that term so much these days. Unfortunately, it's been tied to transformation equals RIFs, or AI coming in, or both, or whatever like that. I think that there is a . . . I liken it to when I got my divorce, and my ex-husband and I were just back and forth and back and forth. Often people say, "Oh, we're staying for the kids." And I remember when we finally decided it's just time to split. The older twins, I think they were like 12-ish at the time, and I spoke with them like a year later and I said, "Daddy and I still love you. How do you feel about everything?" And they were like, "Mom, we knew the whole time."My point is this, we often underestimate our audience. We often underestimate that like, "No, we're keeping it from them." They're good. They're totally into this. And when we drop these comms, it's, I have found that there is definitely a balance between being as transparent as possible, while at the same time, there is still risk mitigation and there is still kind of the managing of the message. The best ways that I've seen it is leaning more towards transparency, number one. Number two, don't use corporate verbiage when you're . . . It is really hard because there is such a thing as corporate speak. I could close my eyes and write a paragraph in corporate speak and not even know I did it because I did it. I've just lived in that world for so long. What I found is that when we had,  as I mentioned this one, the healthcare example. When it was simple and it was just like, we're going through a hard time. I acknowledge that. This is hard for me, too, and I know it's going to be hard, but I'm asking you to allow me to be here with you as a leader. That means so much different like, "Hey, everybody. Listen, our culture here is critical, and we really like Eloiza consulting culture, and you are part of this. That's why it's critical for you to understand . . . " Are you kidding? Come on. So, what we found is that slowing down the pace, slowing down the tonality, reteaching leaders how to speak, it's the same message, it's the same objective. You're going to get to the same place, out of the trees. There's just a different way to say it. So, finding that balance and being able to rewrite that script a little bit.I will tell you that there are moments when I've coached an executive. We all live in these rectangles. Like me and you right now, Athena, we're doing this whole thing on a rectangle. I've coached leaders, and I encourage you all as communicators, coach them on even the personal space. Like, if you're going to do this, coach them on the lighting, coach them on everything. Even the demonstratives, you know like this, all of this actually makes a difference when you're talking about crisis, change, transformation. Everyone's going to fall off a cliff here in a second. It actually makes a difference because what happens is then, that's what I found, is the sentiment numbers are like, "That news really sucked, but I really felt like he was being honest. That she was being real. It didn't feel like a script she was just talking. And she actually took time to look at us and to say . . ." Because again, just don't underestimate your audience. They already know. So, those are some of the things that I've noticed that, again, it's not the message that changes. It's the way that you deliver it. And the sentiment numbers, ironically, go up. It's actually the trust. It's not the sentiment. It's the trust that goes up. Like get this, "I may or may not lose my job, but my gosh, why do I all of a sudden feel like you see me as a human being, like we're here together? This is a part of the culture." So, I've seen it over and over and over again. It is those non-verbals and paraverbals. It's not the verbal, it's the everything else that surrounds that message.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Yeah, that is such helpful advice. I remember one of the best pieces of advice I ever received from a former CMO and CCO was use plain speaking language-

Eloiza Domingo: Oh my gosh, yes.

Athena Koutsonikolas: -because it's way more resonant, but you're right, there's also the non-verbal cues. Also the things that we're wearing as well. There's certain colors, and color palettes, and patterns that you want to avoid when you're making certain announcements.

Eloiza Domingo: Yes, 100%. We had a leader, it was really interesting, and whenever he would give messages, he would stand. He would actually get rid of the chair. We could always tell when he was standing. And so what was interesting is he would move. It was amazing. He would actually get people to log in to his presentations and watch them afterwards. And I thought, "I wonder why is that?" And we started asking questions. It just felt like you were in the room with him. Like he was mobile. He was moving. It felt very free. It didn't feel like kind of restricted. So, that was also really, really interesting. I actually, subsequently have used that. If I'll do main stage presentations, this is obviously almost like a fireside, but I have stood. I've actually gotten people to say like, "Is she standing? That's cool. Wow." Again, Athena, like you said, the little things really do matter.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Yes, and that's so incredibly humanizing. What a great tactic. I want to shift gears now to leading with values in a divided world because that is honestly the state that we find ourselves in these days. And you know better than anyone that being silent can seem complicit, but then, speaking up can also be a little risky.

Eloiza Domingo: Yeah.

Athena Koutsonikolas: So, I'd love to talk about what it means to lead with values, especially when public perception is on the line. We know that today's consumers and employees are incredibly perceptive, as you've noted. They can smell the BS, right? So, how do you help companies communicate with authenticity when that public scrutiny is really high?

Eloiza Domingo: Yeah, so, let's talk about that word 'values' a little bit. So, organizations, whether it's not-for-profits or for-profits, we use that terminology 'values' in a very romantic way. The fact of the matter is though, is that the values are tied still to profit margins, employee numbers, employee sentiment, money, quite frankly. Everything really is tied to the bottom line. That is not unromantic for me to say, that is realistic. And so, I never want people to be like, "Oh, it's just our value." Target values diversity. People may write into your podcast and be like, "No, they don't." Yes, they do. Even though Target, I'm putting this in quotes, "closed" their DEI programming, Costco did not, and other organizations did not. And people say, "Oh, they didn't value diversity," or Disney, or Starbucks, or any of these companies that changed things. Values for a company also have to do with what are the risks, as you noted, what are the monetary risks, what are the risks politically, what are the risks with lobbyists, especially if you're a for-profit. There are so many things that you have to think about. It is very difficult for a large company, especially to say that, "I value this," and not think about all the dominoes that'll fall for people who don't believe otherwise. So, I really don't want strategic communicators or anybody to think, "Oh, we can lead with values really without thinking about the monetary risk, the political risk, those kinds of things." Because often, it's not that people don't say anything because they don't value it. Oftentimes, they don't say it because there is a risk. Again, the risk is larger than the gain. And so, that's one of the things that I know that communicators already do that, but to really fully understand what that risk is, will then allow you to also push against your leadership to say, "Well, I recognize this risk." Again, the way that I would do it is I would say, "Here's Black Lives Matter," for example. Okay, so we're aligning a business case. If you say this, here's your gain. If you say this, this is your risk. All of this is what I do is I often just give organizations a menu. So, you can choose to do whatever you want, but I'm going to be very honest with you and tell you, "This is the risk that you will assume, and this is the gain that you will assume."An organization has to make, just like the consumers do, they have to make an intelligent decision given all of the information that you as communicators give them and leaders give them. That's really what I found is you can actually help lead an organization quicker if you're able to just objectively give them, "These are the risks that are going to happen, these are the gains that are going to happen from your market, to your consumers, to your profit, to your investors, to your suppliers, everything," that's typically what we would do, "and then this is the gain to it."So, once those things are established, then, and I know many people already have this, but if you don't have what I call like a branching model, so at the top, the crisis is dropped in. Is this a crisis that aligns with a business imperative? If it's yes, great. Then, what are the risks? What are the whatever? Then you assess those. Then from there, do we say something? If the answer is yes, who says it? And so, it's constantly this branching model, but again, I think the biggest thing that I would advise everybody is don't get caught up in this word 'values' as if it's this romantic kind of thing. You can do that in your family and you can do that when you're in a relationship, but not when you're helping to run a company and you're keeping a company. You're mitigating the risk, but also gaining followership. Value is really tied to money. Again, I'm being very unromantic about the word 'value', but as a Chief Diversity Officer, as a former Chief Diversity Officer, the best way for me to lead a company is to have them understand how that was an operation of the company. It wasn't, yes, do we value diversity? Sure. So, and what? And how do we show it? What are you doing? Who are you aligned with in Congress? Who are your lobbyists? Who are you this? That's the biggest thing that I would advise is thinking about that risk-benefit analysis, making sure that you're providing everything objectively, but also understanding how value is tied to your bottom line.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Got it. And something that I want to pull the thread on, you noted this kind of decision tree or branching that you build out for leaders. So, say we have a scenario where you've provided that decision support to a leadership team and they're like, "Yes, we're going to go all in and we're going to take this company stance." How should internal messaging align or differ from what is being communicated to the public during these sensitive or high-stakes moments?

Eloiza Domingo: Yes, great. That's a great, great note. Overcommunicating internally is really critical. Making sure that before anything goes out, you've essentially got all of these, what we call, heads-ups, right? So making sure that you have that heads-up model. Who is it getting to? What are you saying? The other thing, to your point, is it's not just alignment, but it's also FAQs. So, we're about to release, I'm just going to say with Black Lives Matter, we're about to release Black Lives Matter, this is what it's going to say. Here's the date, here's all the facts of it. Okay, so what you're going to do is before this goes live, leader, manager of people, whatever, you're going to announce this to your staff. Here's what you're going to say, script, script, script, script and then FAQs.And that level of preparedness, again, that before is so critical. The during and after is critical as well, but the before should be much, much larger, and constantly revisited. So, empowering your leaders to own that message. It's not, "Hey, we're about to put this up. Good luck. It is empowering them because it's not that the organization put it out, it's that we put this out. You are going to know how to talk about this. It's actually nice because it's actually a managerial skill that you are actually underlining and providing to your leadership. I'm going to help you to be a strategic communicator, I'm going to help you be a leader of this organization, but I'm also going to help you script this. I would also be very clear about how it is that you're sharing this. Do not forward your FAQ to anybody. It is only for your eyes. Do not put this on writing. You know what I'm saying? Like, "You're going to have your meeting at ten o'clock Eastern. Everybody's going to go into this room." Dah-dah-dah. "If somebody is missing, you will cut . . ."Again, risk mitigation, of course, is really, really important, and you all know this more than I do, is controlling the message and controlling it. And then also making sure, I always write in, "Your approach should be comm, objective, this and this. We prefer that you not put in your personal opinion. Stick to the script, essentially. If you have any issues, we can always be there for you or with you," those kinds of things. So, a lot of it is not that there's misalignment or alignment, it's that there's a huge amount of prep on the internal end. Typically, what I've seen is external comms is like maybe four sentences. "We believe in this. We don't align with blah-blah. We will always stand for." Done. And then there should be a whole lot more over here on this back end. And again, a lot of it is empowering your people to own your organization's message. That's really, to me, the most critical part of it.

Athena Koutsonikolas: And more on that in a minute, but I have one last question on this topic. And you've already given us some answers around like preparation and the importance of preparation when it comes to crisis, but if you could summarize for us some recommendations that companies need to put in place before a crisis hits to ensure that they're completely prepared to reach and support every employee.

Eloiza Domingo: Yes, absolutely. So, number one, that before, during, and after, Athena, you need to actually have what we would always call a SWAT team or your crisis team. Typically, that engages communications, PR, so internal and external comms, PR, so anybody within that space. Typically, government relations. I'm going broad here, but government relations, legal, HR, DEI, sometimes finance. But typically, those are your end security [or: insecurity?], depending on what happens. But typically, you have a SWAT team or you have a crisis team. So, if you don't have that established, oh my gosh, then you really are going in blind. You're like, "Everything will be great." No.

Athena Koutsonikolas: You're in blind.

Eloiza Domingo: Exactly. In the same way that you have an operations team, you have a diversity team, you have your CEO team, you probably should put together your parachute team. And then they need to be getting together regularly. They do need to have this branch out model. And the number one thing, Athena, that I always say, simulation, simulation, simulation, simulation. In healthcare, simulation was a very big thing. For example, we would call a code blue. It didn't matter. We were in the hospital. They would typically have a mannequin. So, I remember I worked for this pharmaceutical company, they called a code blue. They put an adult male mannequin up against a vending machine in a pediatric institution. And you don't tell anybody that this is a sim, so everybody goes. You have a sim person standing there taking notes. Simulation person taking notes.I remember watching this. This is one of the top pediatric institutions in the world, by the way. So, the crash cart comes. They didn't have adult gauge needles. So, this patient, and it wasn't even a patient. It was a dad of a patient. The mannequin died. They couldn't find . . . You know what I'm saying? So they were like, "Oh my gosh, everybody go look at the crash carts now." So, because we were a pediatric institution, we didn't have these adult gauges around, but how could we have known that on a regular basis?So, anyway, figuring out those things, number one. But then also, number two, especially in a corporate situation, what we found is that when we had a sim or when we had the SWAT team, it typically was like the vice president of this, the vice president of this. All of a sudden, in a crisis, we pulled six vice presidents. And some of them had deputies and some of them didn't. Honestly, some of the smaller operations completely closed down when their vice president went to a crisis. So, how are you continuing to run business as usual when you're having a crisis and you're a vice president? So, again, the sims actually allow you to be like, "Oh crap, did we just shut down that part of the company? Why?" It's like, "We've got the vice president over here." It's like, oh my gosh. So, it actually exposes a lot of your risks operationally. Again, SWAT team or your crisis team, get your branching model together, run your sims on a regular basis, and be real about it. You know, that, to me, is really safeguarding. It's the same thing as if you're in a house like mine with the 10 people, good job doing the math, and I run a fire alarm at three o'clock in the morning. Who's getting the leashes? Where's the little one? We have a puppy running around here somewhere. I don't know where he is.

Athena Koutsonikolas: What's the procedure?

Eloiza Domingo: Yes, exactly. Who's grabbing the puppy? Where is the ladder? It's all of those things. It's actually really not that hard, but again, we set up these businesses because we want to plateau to success. That's what we think about. We don't think about the crisis is going to hit. That's the thing: Know that crisis is inevitable. It is going to happen, so get your team together.

Athena Koutsonikolas: I love that example, and I love that you touched on your experience in the hospital because I do want to switch over now to discuss inclusive communication. When I think about inclusive communication, I think about how we communicate to both desk workers and the front line. So, you've led in major healthcare institutions like Johns Hopkins Medicine, where many employees, they're on the front lines, right? They're medical professionals. They're not tethered to their laptops and computers the way you and I are. So, what lessons did you take from that experience about how to build trust and connection between leadership and those who are on the front line?

Eloiza Domingo: Yeah, so, a couple of things, and I should have said this earlier just in the former question that you had for me, Athena. Even though you have your SWAT team, and typically SWAT teams, you do need vice presidents or people who can make decisions because that really is how a SWAT team works. You also need to have the tentacles. And so, those people, when you're writing the comms, inclusive communications is also about who is seeing the comms before it goes out? Because typically, it's the same five people. It's lawyers, it's this, it's the DEI person, it's this. And we are a privileged few that will look at it and be like, "I'm good."I haven't worked on the front lines for probably 19 years. Even though I have a sensitivity to it, that's not my everyday. So, if I see something, I'm going to be like, "It works for me." We will oftentimes say that. What about, like you said, everyone else? So, making sure that when you have that SWAT team, you keep your tentacles and you have your trusted advisors that are looking at those things and saying, "Yes, from a front line perspective, that makes sense." Or, "No, why are you using the word photosynthesis? That doesn't even make any sense to us," so simplify, simplify, simplify. The other thing too, again, is managing crisis, leading through crisis, means constantly thinking about this. So, I'm going to go back to that example earlier where the leader of a healthcare institution, he wrote a letter using the pronoun I. One of the reasons also too, why it was so easily digestible to get that letter is because he walked around the hospital all the time. He was always around the front line staff. He would always go up and ask, "How was your day?" Or like, "How is this?" I remember he would walk up to the places and be like, and he would watch the flow of traffic, and he . . .

Athena Koutsonikolas: Like "Undercover Boss."

Eloiza Domingo: Yes. It was actually really interesting. He was like, "Why is the rug always wet? Somebody get them a new rug." Just something he probably wouldn't have noticed if he was just in his office. Yes, so in crisis, it's not . . . I really don't like the word crisis management. And that's really why I don't use it. It's crisis leadership. If you think about it that way, it is that before, during, and after. It is leading through crisis and understanding that, again, crisis is typical, but then also constantly being around your staff and your people and thinking about those things, building that type of trust and that sentiment that you and I talked about earlier. When you know what hits the fan, they'll be like, "Oh, he wrote us a nice letter. I don't like what he said, but I kind of remember him. It was good." You know, so yes, so there's a lot of leadership that needs to happen.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Some really important tips there. And I love the reminder around what I call 'who else needs to know', which can be an easy oversight in a highly-complex management organization. It's easily done. On this topic, how do you or how have you partnered with functions like HR and IT to more effectively ensure every employee, especially those on the front lines, feels important, feels informed, rather connected and valued?

Eloiza Domingo: Yeah, you know, IT is a really big one, Athena. When you were talking about how to make sure that people get some of that information, just like you said, it was very easy to put a Slack message up or whatever because we're sitting in front of our computers. but, like you said, that's also a very privileged part of the organization. Many people are either out in the field, they're working with patients. Or, not even in healthcare, in conservation. They're out in an ocean, for goodness sake. Or anything that you might be doing. So, IT did a really nice job. I have always worked with IT to say, "Okay, so give me the percentage of individuals that are sitting in front of their computer, and if this message goes out now, who am I missing?" So, this idea of accessibility, and then, how are we going to get that to them? I remember in one organization, we had a lot of people who actually, we didn't have laptops assigned to everybody. Just, sometimes they would have to go into a computer lab. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. I always thought that everybody got a laptop. Their job didn't need them to have a laptop. They had access to a laptop, but they're not going to be sitting there. And so, we did have to have a variety of ways with HR and IT. So, do they have it on their phone? Is there some sort of alert system on their phones? And then HR, we would also, similar to what we talked about earlier, Athena, in terms of this communication matrix, for some of those individuals that are not in front of a phone or not in front of a laptop, we would say, "Okay, everybody needs to call a staff meeting now. We need to get everybody in front. We're going to do a quick-quick." And especially in high turnover or high volume, high-paced healthcare situations, we would have to repeat that staff meeting, like every 45 minutes over the course of several hours, so that everybody got the information. So, you know, there are ways. It's understanding the flow of your organization, understanding who has access, not making assumptions. I know I did that. I assumed everybody had phone and email. And then working, like you said, with the key audiences like finance, communications, and HR to say, "Where are our people, and what is the timeframe in which we have to communicate this?" Because again, 24 to 48 hours to make sure everybody's on the same page, how are we going to do that? Yes, it is, I like what you're saying, make sure, again, your SWAT team should be a part of that, and your simulations can also help you.

Athena Koutsonikolas: It's quite the production. It reminds me of like, it's kind of the undertaking of a stage producer, right?

Eloiza Domingo: Yes.

Athena Koutsonikolas: There's a lot there.

Eloiza Domingo: Yes. Well, and you know this. If you look at the way that any government runs or any major family runs, if you have all of your major crises covered, like, "I know where we're going to go if the bus is off," or "I know where you're going to go if mommy isn't home and you don't have your key." Okay, so we know all of that. We've run all of that. Why? Because I care about you, I care about our culture, family. I care about everybody being okay. I care about everybody being empowered to run your own life. Again, it makes really a lot of sense. Oftentimes, it is quite a production for a large organization, you're right. But, just think about it from that vantage point. And oftentimes, the dominoes are actually a little bit easier to understand.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Right. Again, preparation is key.

Eloiza Domingo: That's right. That's right.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Now, you've clearly lived at the intersection of leadership, comms, culture, and it sounds like you've also shepherded teams and organizations through some really tough moments. So, looking back on your leadership journey from your experience in healthcare, to pharma, to insurance, to now consulting, what is one lesson that has stayed with you?

Eloiza Domingo: It is really leading with authenticity and people don't . . . That word is often overused. But it really is to be able to say that the Eloiza that I see in front of me at times when we're celebrating and the Eloiza that shows up when we're about to RIF 800 people, if people know that you are really, really being authentic, and it is amazing how you really can do and say a lot as a leader and as a communicator if people believe and feel that you are just being authentic. And I know that that's hard, especially in a viral or digital space. It is difficult in a rectangle to know who I am. But that's also why there are so many different ways to do that. So, again, I would say, Athena, the number one thing that has served me well from . . . Because I have had to give a lot . . . A Chief Diversity Officer, we always have to give hard answers. We really do. It is not uncommon. And DEI, for me, is you're never really in a win-win. You're almost always in a lose-lose, because some people will love what you say and some people will not hate, despise what you just said and what you stand for. I mean, it is a lot. So, that's fine, but you also know who I am. You know that there's still, you've said it, I'm going to use your word, this thread. That is the number one thing that I would say, and just don't overcomplicate it. Simple, simple, simple, simple. The simpler the words, the more direct that you are, you don't get caught up, and people are like, "Come on, I know you can read. I know what you're saying." It's like, "Well," you know. Those would be, I know you asked for one, but those are really the two things that have served me well in pro situations, but also the harder situations as well.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Well, thank you so much, Eloiza. It's just been an absolute pleasure to have you share your wisdom with us today and your approach to leading with courage, clarity, authenticity. It's exactly what so many organizations in this climate need right now. Where can our listeners find out more about you and your work?

Eloiza Domingo: Yes. What we're going to do is we're going to link all of the social media platforms. Of course, I'm on LinkedIn, and I've got a lot of videos on Instagram. And I actually talk about authenticity, like how to do that in one-on-one conversations like this, one-to-group, how to take really hard conversations and do that. And then I also have my own podcast where we talk about disruption. And crisis is really a part of disruption, but how you're leading through it. So, we'll provide all of that information through you all, kindly. Yes, I do. If you're out there, please connect with me. It would be great to continue this conversation because it is, it's so important, and especially now when we're dealing with a lot of tough things.

Athena Koutsonikolas: Most definitely. Well, thank you so much again, Eloiza. It was such a pleasure. I'm Athena Koutsonikolas, and I really hope you enjoyed this episode of Aspire to Inspire. I sure did. And be sure to join us again, and definitely check out the resources that we will provide for Eloiza to learn more about what she's doing.