Good afternoon. Thanks so much for joining us at Think Tech Hawaii. Time for responsible change. We're not only going to talk about some of the things that women in leadership offer and bring to the table that are so much in need now. We have four truly exceptional women leaders to share their thoughts, experiences, insights, and perspectives on that with us. And I'm going to start today with Luiz Ng, because Luiz just received the highest honor the National Asia Pacific Power Association can offer, the Daniel K. Inouye Award. That's a lifetime achievement award. That's not an Oscar. That's a lifetime achievement award. So among women leaders, Luiz is up there with Merle Street. And that would be the equivalent in the entertainment industry. But Luiz does it in an area where women in law, women in business and women in leadership at the time when Luiz first started out just a few years ago when she was only 12, was still particularly in Hawaii, where in between the white male leadership and the Asian male leadership, there were a lot of doors that were kept firmly closed. So we also have with us Rebecca Radlev, outstanding leading insurance executive for many years now, a leading mediator and arbitrator, including for Jams, probably the largest organization of mediators and arbitrators in the world. Tina Patterson with the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, also a business coach and consultant and a lady capable of wearing and training people in many different facets of how to live in challenging societies and contexts. And Sandra Sims, a retired judge, an author, now working on another book as we hear, and we're all looking forward to that. So I'm just feeling incredibly lucky to be a companion to four of the most outstanding, inspiring, shining women any of us could get to know. How did you get here from where you started? Luiz, you want to start us out? Oh, thanks, Chuck. Well, it's thanks to people like you who helped us out instead of trying to put us in our place. I really, as a young lawyer, I really did appreciate the more senior lawyers who were supportive because, as you say, there were so many where through their subtle comments or the like made you feel like you didn't quite get here on your own merit or you just weren't as tough as they were. But how did we do it? I think for those of us who are lucky to have it, parental support, the ones that just keep you going and give you love and feeling like you are loved and able to go forward. And I also have to say that having a good partner at home who helps share the duties and supports your career and your family is really important too.  It's all of those pillars that help us. And I have to say the sisterhood of women, the sisterhood of women lawyers has been valuable as well. Wow. Anne, you've got a daughter who is carrying that torch forward with quite a light of her own. Can you tell us a little bit about her? Well, sure. I'm always happy to talk about my daughter, especially because it probably embarrasses her. She's in a totally different field. So she is more in the creative side. She's a dancer. She's also getting joy these days out of teaching English as a second language. But what I was really happy about with that my kids did during the Trump years and during this whole period of the past year of seeing rising incidents of anti-Asian and hate incidents against just minorities in general is that they took it to heart and they took action in their own way as well. So my daughter made donations to groups that supported Asian-Americans of the community. She taught classes and raised money for Asian-Americans advancing justice as well as a New York Chinatown group. And then my son, I should give him a shout out too because he's been with the Red Sox front office and for the first time he got involved with their diversity committee because they did not have Asian-American representation. And even though he's Hapa, he's been able to reconnect with his Chinese-American roots. Wow. And Rebecca, you've got some bragging rights as well, yeah? Cameron, we've met and just an outstanding young man. Yes, Uncle Chuck, I'm just as proud of my son as I am, which I love and appreciate you for. But much of what Louise has said, I had a mother who just always got behind us and pushed and never told us what we couldn't do. It was always, there was always encouragement. And I had, my dad was much older than my mom and he was actually born in 1918, which people are shocked to hear. So he would be 103 had he lived, but I just had amazing, parents, I'm the daughter of a pastor and a nurse. So community servants, people who believed in serving people and servant leaders, but they kept us grounded. I came from Humboldt beginnings in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois. I grew up and I tell people often that my oldest two siblings, there are five of us, the oldest two were born in the projects of the west side of Chicago, the high rises, but that's a doctor and a lawyer. And I'm very proud of that because my parents instilled everything that they had in us and we had everything that money couldn't buy. And it was, all the things that people want naturally, but you can't buy. And I value that upbringing very, very much and the morals. And I'm with Louise, a family that is supportive. My siblings, my husband, that partnership has enabled us to raise a great son who is, he's just a great human being. So surrounding myself with positive people, Louise, like you said, I consider you all part of that. Sandra and Tina and Chuck, we're all family and I value that because when you surround yourself with positive people who are going places, then you too can continue to be inspired. And so that's what I attributed to my faith. I need to make sure I mentioned that as well. And Sandra, I'm guessing that register is pretty close to home for you as well, yeah? Absolutely, absolutely. I think having that initial family support when you're young and you're just starting out and your parents that encourage you, I was the first of my family to go and complete college. I'm gonna start it, but she didn't finish. And my dad was one of those folks who valued education, but he grew up in the community in Illinois where even though he had graduated from the high school in Bloomington, Illinois at a very high level, because the universities did not accept blacks in those days in college, he could not go. There was just, he couldn't because they didn't accept him. And so he chose to do another career. He, so when I came along, he was the biggest supporter. Go for it, go for it. My parents really sacrificed a lot for me to finish college. And then of course they told me when I got to law school it's like, okay, we got you this far. I think you better pick it up from here. But they were always supportive. And I think that was, I agree with Louise and Rebecca. Having that is absolutely critical. So now when I see women who come out of really difficult situations, I work with a number of organizations, including the links and suroptimists and so forth who really work with women who are having to come through issues like domestic violence and drug abuse. And they still get to that place of accomplishing something. I am just, I am enamored and it is inspiring to see that. And I'm glad to be a part of those groups that do that. I know all of you are doing that as well. Louise has always been involved with the organizations in Hawaii that support women who are working to get here. So that's kind of, I think that's our back. And of course my father was a, you know, Deacon in the church role. There was very involved in church. And our church was also one of those ones that was in the Chicago community very involved in civil rights movement. And so I saw that. I remember the first time that, you know, Dr. King came to our church to speak. It was just an electrifying moment. I was a teenager at that time. As an hourly billing, I'm quite older than most of you, but nonetheless, it was an electrifying moment to just see him come and to the presence that he had and the ability that he had to bring people in that community in Chicago together to move forward. And that's how we've been inspired.   This comes along, go for it, go for it. And really tremendous support even here in Hawaii. I had the, I had the fortune of getting a law clerk position with the late Justice Hayashi. And he was just such a tremendous inspiring resource. Now, Louise has pointed out there, you know, the men in our profession who've encouraged and supported women, he was certainly among those. So certainly a mentor for me. And, you know, I've always, you know, we, I value that relationship I was able to establish with him and the encouragement that he gave in my career going on to the bench, he was there. So I, you know, it's important. And I am grateful for the support that I've had all these years. Yeah. Tina, you've opened some doors that I think people who didn't know you might find really surprising that a black professional woman could achieve these things in areas where those doors were shut pretty tightly. What influences or people have been part of that becoming possible for you? Much like everyone else, I would say my family of origin, but I also want to talk about family of choice and the women and you Chuck that are here for the part of that circle, family of choice. It's the, but much like Sandra, I'm the first in my family to complete college. And most recently I obtained my master's degree. So that literally pushed me a little bit further forward. But I would say it's both those individuals in the immediate family, my mother and my father who were advocates of education growing up in the deep South. It wasn't always available to them. And so they were very much, it was very much a part of their dialogue with us. We were going to get education. We were going to graduate from high school. We were going to college, which college we went to was a matter of discussion, but we were going to college. And my father would frequently say, education is something that no one can take away from you. You need to have an education. But the doors opening beyond that, and this is where the circles begin, the family of choice. Those people, as was mentioned earlier, the men and women who said, I see something in you. I want you to take this opportunity. And I think about Bernice Bastemartinas. She is with the University of California system and how I received an email from a colleague saying, you should apply for this women's leadership program. It was called Leadership America. It's now formed as Leadership Women. And my first response was, no. And I got an email saying, you think about it. And my response again was, no. 10 o'clock on a, don't remember what weeknight was, I received a phone call and it was Bernice. And she wanted to talk to me. And she said, you don't see it, but others do. I want you to take the chance. I want you to go ahead and fill out that application. I was silent for about 15 minutes. She said, I know you're there, because I hear you do this. So you need to go ahead and complete this application and let's see what happens. And it's a journey. I think we talk about the wonderful side of women's leadership, but there's also, and I think I've talked about it here and people may say, why are you talking about this? Because there's the imposter syndrome, there's the introvert syndrome as well. You're in a room and I clearly recall getting my results back from the strength finder. And the woman who was talking was saying, everybody in here has this except for one person. And she actually called my name and I could feel myself slowly sinking in my chair because my number one strength was not the extraversion that everyone else had. It was collaboration. And I went up later to talk to her about it and I said, why did you call my name in this room of 68 people? And she said, well, I wanted to point this out because not every leader has the same path and we need to identify and feel comfortable with that uniqueness, this concept that everybody is going to be cookie cutter in terms of their behavior, their actions and how they work through problems is something that we have to literally let go of. And for women in particular, it's the balance that you've heard from every person, the balance of family, job, and also where they are on their individual personal journey, trying to balance that. And we often don't talk about that. So for me, it's that sister circle. It's that family of choice. It's the family of birth. And sometimes there are people who I've never met who I literally look up to. I think about a documentary. I saw that for me was very both affirming but also a reminder to me that I'm not the only one. And I'm talking specifically about the Toni Morrison document, The Pieces I Am, where she talks about the doubt and the some moments of angst where she literally had to make a decision about who she was in the face of what the world thought she was. And could she reconcile that? And that's something that I think all of us at some point go through. Who we are, our personal persona and the public persona. The public oftentimes, and I'm a public official in my community, the public wants to know everything about you. And sometimes we have to say, you know what? That's enough. That's enough. So I'm gonna stop because this is not my evening. This is about all of us. Go ahead and do your work. Yeah, we could be here for hours easily. Except Eric's gonna want his channel back before. Exactly. So maybe ask each of you, think of a woman whose life has influenced yours in ways that have made things possible that might not otherwise have been possible. Louise, wanna start us off? Oh, I was gonna go last. There have been so many, you know, and it's older and both older and younger woman. I look at, you know, many of the younger women have been coming and thinking, man, I was clueless compared to them. So, you know, we have a lot to learn from them as well. You know, maybe they're just not as afraid or they don't have that same imposter syndrome, but Godly, you know, who made it possible? Well, I have to go back to my mother and grandmother, I guess. You know, my grandmother seemed to have a kind of an unusual family background of the sense that her mom, my great-grandmother was a doctor and she studied medicine in China and she was in an orphanage and studied medicine, managed to meet my great-grandfather and 10 days after they got married, they were on a ship to Hawaii. And then even after that, they could not get licensed right away because there was racism about, you know, licensing these doctors from China. But it was, you know, some of the missionary families, the Daemon family that helped them in some way, whether it was, you know, convincing them to be able to be examined within Chinese or whatever. But, you know, because that was a working-parent family, I think my grandmother and others had to kind of raise themselves. And as a result, they had some very, very strong women in that family, you know, maybe unusual, but strong. And I think she carried that on to her kids. She taught cooking at YWCA in downtown. And so at that time, she was a working woman outside of the house and although it was kind of a domestic job, it was, you know, she influenced and touched a lot of people who still talk about the cookbook that she wrote that they have. So I think it was that. And then I think it's, you know, some of my classmates, I have to give a shout out to Connie Lau, who is the, you know, what our first Asian-American public company CEO, at least in Hawaii, you know, and a very, you know, maybe the first Asian-American woman heading a utility company or conglomerate. But we were the same, I actually, we've kind of been together since kindergarten and college and all that, but she has always been just such a positive, you know, successful role model. And I say, she's just set it up perfectly because not only is she just a mouth to retirement and created a, you know, where the board helps us a succession plan that puts two women in CEO positions in that family of companies and Taranissi at American Savings and I think Shelly Kimura at Hawaii Electric, the utility company, but she has put a, you know, Asian-Native Hawaiian CEO who's going to take her place at the public company. Not only that, but she got her kids to come back or her daughter to come back and, you know, with a baby and then had a baby here and her husband and finance factors has set up a succession plan for that family. And so she gets to be a grandma and have her kids here too. So, you know, she's got, she's got it set up on the succession planning. She's been so positive and smart. Wow. Rebecca? I love that. I almost feel like Louise is in my notes or in my head. I'll have to kind of match that. My, I'll go back to my mom and dad, my parents, but in particular, my maternal grandparents, they, my mother had a college degree from Wheaton College, which is still very well known in Illinois. I grew up in the suburbs of Illinois and Maywood and went to the famous Proviso East High School. People don't know where Maywood, Illinois is, but they know if you're a basketball fan, Doc Rivers. Exactly. Yeah, I'm from Maywood. And the upborn and raised, but my mom had an opportunity, had opportunities and all of her siblings were college educated as well because their parents were a maid and butler. And so that, you know, domestic work and the people that my grandparents worked for made sure that their kids got college degrees.  And so it started a pattern of, you know, for education. And it's just incredible. And then I had amazing teachers. I actually coming up through, I know I don't look old enough, but coming up in the 70s in elementary school had a black principal.  And it was a family community in Maywood, Illinois. And those teachers went on to run the district. And so I saw excellence all around me growing up in a community where everybody knew each other. And the fathers, you know, were the guardians of the blocks that we lived on. And just had such a rich, again, we didn't have a lot of money. As a matter of fact, I'm a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana. And I didn't know that we were poor till I got to college. And so some students, you know, imagine that a college student with a car, but I didn't realize that we had less material things until I got to college. And, you know, but thank goodness I was raised to be a solid individual. And I've taught my son, we've taught our son that comparison is a thief of joy.  And so just solid principles that, you know, that I grew up with is, you know, what I would have to attribute in the people who made things possible were a community. Hello, you Sandra, women who have inspired and taken you beyond what might have otherwise been possible.  I got, I have, I had a fantastic mother, Vera, Vera Knuckles. And, you know, she didn't have the college degree. She didn't go to college, but she certainly encouraged me and was supportive of me. But I want to also shout out to, shout out, shout out, but recognize that when I moved here, that was a tremendous move for me and my family, all of my families in Chicago area. And so we came here. We didn't know, well, my husband knew people because he came here with United Airlines. And I did not have that kind of connection with establishing, you know, relationships with people. One of the women that I met here in Hawaii who has had a tremendous influence on me was Naomi Campbell. She has since passed away, but she came here in the 1950s from New York. She was an attorney and headed the corporation council's family support. She was involved in working in support for child support years before it's the thing that people want to do now. She pioneered so many areas in the law with regard to supporting children. And she had this incredible commanding presence when she went into court. She was the only person I knew at that time who could go to court and wear a moot. Everyone else had to be in that suit. But I mean, you know, very fancy moves, but she would walk into it. She had this, she had this integrity and this professionalism that was just unmatched. She came here because she was in an interracial marriage and was not accepted in her own communities in New York. And so she and her husband moved here. Charles Campbell went on to become a state senator and involved, he was African-American, but she had this presence, this integrity, this grace in this field in which at that time I think when I came here, Louise, you may remember, there were probably only a handful of women who were even attorneys back in the late 70s, 80s. We're talking, you could count them on your hand. And she was one of them. And I had the good grace to work for her and to just see how that, I don't want to take about time because Tina, but anyway, she was an incredible influence on me and how I later came out to be. That's wonderful. In our last minute, Tina. Oh, gosh. I'm going to talk about my mother and grandmother, but I also want to talk about another person who was instrumental because, much like you, Rebecca, my parents provided for us in many ways, but it wasn't until I stepped foot on an Ivy League institution campus that I realized just how little we had. And it was a family friend, Ms. Thompson, who was a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. And the local chapter decided that they were giving scholarships. And we knew nothing about scholarships. She was instrumental in me getting scholarships to help pay for my books because I was completely blown away with the cost of books once I arrived on campus, even though I had worked and saved up money. But going along with that same theme, I think the other person who's really been instrumental, and this has been more of a role model from a distance, is Dr. Ruth Simmons, who was the first African-American woman to serve as president of an Ivy League institution. As a matter of fact, my alma mater. She, I had a couple of opportunities to actually chat with her. And talking to her was very similar. We're both from Louisiana. She went to schools in Louisiana, but the fact that she persevered and being, there were 13 children, and she was one of the latter-born children, her tenacity and her perseverance was something that I carried with me when I transitioned from private sector to the alternative dispute resolution field. It was one of my instructors. Her name is LaCrisia Gilbert. She's still alive. And she has been a supporter, a number one cheerleader, but also that person that I can call sometimes and say, I'm taking this class. What was I thinking? And she'll just say, you can do this. Keep at it, Tina. Let me know when you're done. So it's that circle again. And yes. As far as my corporate career, I think it was Dale Murgo, who was one of my first supervisors, who literally said, you have an aptitude for numbers. Why don't you go to graduate school? And I kind of pretended I didn't hear her. And when she moved from one bank to another, she took me with her until I moved out of the area. And she said, if you ever want to come back, let me know.  What are you doing here?  I always think about this proverb, fall down seven times, stand up eight. And sometimes that's what we need, that person who says, stand up, get back up, you can do this. That's wonderful. Wow. We're out of time for today. Wow, I'm inspired. I know. That's cool.  Thank you all. Thank you so much. Thank you, Chuck. Thank you, Chuck. Aloha, come back and see us in two weeks. We'll be back with more. Good luck.


Outworld Brewing's Winter Holiday Jazz and Funk series continues on December 22nd at 6pm with acclaimed saxophonist Rico Jones and Friday December 23rd at 6pm with renowned jazz trombonist Stafford Hunter, culminating on New Year's Eve with a jazz brunch featuring artists and residents Hugh Reagan and jazz dinner featuring Rico Jones. Tickets now available on Eventbrite.