November 28, 2025 • 48 mins
Fluency isn’t a streak; it’s a human connection. Jay sits down with Stacy Richter, CEO of Live Lingua, to unpack why real progress happens when we move beyond vocabulary drills and into immersive, person-to-person learning that mirrors how we actually speak, negotiate, and care for others. From a Minnesota medical center reducing interpreter delays to a manufacturing team winning trust across the border, Stacy shows how learning a language shifts teams from transactional messages to transformational relationships.
We get candid about brain science, too. That “rusty” Spanish you think you lost? It’s still there. Neuroplasticity means pathways reactivate under pressure and context, whether you’re navigating signs in Guadalajara or opening a meeting in German to change the tone in the room. Apps and AI are great gateways—low-friction ways to spark curiosity—but they can’t teach timing, tone, or the cultural rituals that make a joke land or a deal feel respectful. Native, trained tutors can, especially when they tailor your learning to your real world: intake questions for nurses, technical terms for engineers, or the phrases you’ll use on the factory floor.
Ready to build skills that travel with you and bring people closer? Listen now, then subscribe, share with a colleague who works across borders, and leave a review with the language you’re tackling next.
Meet the Host
Jay Johnson works with people and organizations to empower teams, grow profits, and elevate leadership. He is a Co-Founder of Behavioral Elements®, a two-time TEDx speaker, and a designated Master Trainer by the Association for Talent Development. With a focus on behavioral intelligence, Jay has delivered transformational workshops to accelerate high-performance teams and cultures in more than 30 countries across four continents. For inquiries, contact jay@behavioralelements.com or connect below!
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayjohnsonccg/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jayjohnsonccg/
Speaker Website - https://jayjohnsonspeaks.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jay Johnson (01:16):
Welcome to this episode of the Talent Forge,
where together we are shapingworkforce behaviors.
Today, my guest is StacyRichter, who is from a company
called Live Lingua.
Now, language is an absoluteimportant aspect of any
globalized business or anybusiness that's dealing with
customers.
And oftentimes we findourselves in a situation where
(01:38):
English may be the secondlanguage for some of the
participants.
And Live Lingua is a solutionthat helps to develop language
skills.
And I'd like to say, welcome tothe show, Stacy.
Stacy Richter (01:49):
Awesome.
Thanks, Jay.
It's great to be here with youand the Talent Forge.
Jay Johnson (01:52):
So this is such a fascinating thing to me.
And I'm gonna share right outof the gate uh a little bit of
embarrassment.
I have had probably six yearsof Spanish language training,
but I don't get to utilize itvery often.
I most certainly wouldn't feelcomfortable giving a keynote in
it.
Uh, but it is something thathas always fascinated me.
(02:14):
It was never a priority when Iwas growing up in the education
system in the US.
But you have made thisopportunity for people to
essentially develop one of whatI see as one of the most
important skills, um, importantskills that we could actually
develop.
So let me ask this question.
How did you get to making thisyour passion, making this your
(02:37):
career trajectory?
And, you know, how important islearning another language, in
your opinion?
Stacy Richter (02:44):
Yeah, yeah, that's a loaded question, Jay.
I really fell bass backwardsinto it, literally.
Uh you know, one of my favoritequotes, and I think it's often
quoted to Seneca.
I'm not sure if it's misquotedor not, but you know, uh, luck
is when opportunity meetspreparation.
And I joined Live Lingua alittle over two and a half years
ago as a CEO, but it took me 25years to even get to this
(03:06):
point, long before I ever knewwho Live Lingua was.
And, you know, to give you theshort version of my story, I
grew up like a lot of us did,you know, and our parents are
teaching us to go to school, getgood grades, come out, get a
good job, and you know,eventually pay a free mortgage,
and you might be able to affordto retire.
And that's exactly what I did.
You know, went to school, gotgood grades, came out with an
(03:29):
undergraduate degree, and wentstarted my first corporate job
at a Fortune uh 1000 company,international company.
Um, but I'll tell you what,those two years were absolutely
miserable.
And uh I knew that's not what Iwanted to do.
I always wanted to be the CEOof a large multinational
company, but I knew I was nevergoing to be the top of this
company.
So uh I decided to leave and Idid the only thing that I knew
(03:51):
how to do, and that was go to goget more schooling.
And uh so I ended up getting anMBA and you know, and I did it
in a condensed uh timeline, butone of my professors said to me,
He's like, Stacey, he's like,this MBA program, he's like,
There's some technical thingsyou're gonna learn and retain
and some skills you build.
He's like, But there's twothings you're gonna take away
from this the most.
(04:11):
One is you're definitely gonnaoutgrow the position you're in.
And two, you might even outgrowthe company.
And that's exactly whathappened to me.
It was, you know, we finishedup our program March 31st, and I
knew, man, what I'm doing now Iwas in sales and marketing for
a small oil and gasmanufacturing company.
I said, this isn't it.
This is not my career for thenext 20 plus years.
(04:32):
And I literally drove threehours north to Emmonton and met
with my sales manager, and Igave him my resignation on April
1st.
And he looks at me, he's like,Stacey, this is a long way to go
for an April Fool's joke, andit's not very funny.
Like, this is not an AprilFool's joke.
I said, No, no qualms, no,yeah, we can keep a
relationship.
(04:52):
There's no bad, hard feelingshere.
I just, this is not what I wantto do.
And I didn't know where I wasgonna go, Jay.
And when um I resigned, Ididn't know what I was gonna do,
and I was stressed and worried,of course.
So you know what, but again,opportunity comes when you know
preparation uh is lucky.
So a good friend of mine hadapproached me, and that's where
(05:13):
we started our very firstmarketing agency and uh had my
first venture as anentrepreneur.
Long story short, to shortenthis up, 20 plus years of
acquiring businesses, using mymarketing skills to grow and
scale and exit them, um, I foundmyself in Live Lingua.
And the co-founders at the timewere looking for an exit.
I was involved with anotherventure company who uh actually
(05:35):
bought them out.
And I was in place to re uhexit the co-founders, hire
another CEO, build a marketingsystem so we could scale this
business.
And as it turns out, um, overthe first uh couple of months of
working with the team andseeing what we do and how we
serve people, I fell in lovewith the company.
And I approached a venturecompany and the co-founder said,
(05:58):
hey guys, I understand thecompany and the business model.
Um, I think I am the bestperson to be the CEO of this
organization.
Everybody agreed, and here I amtwo and a half years later.
But talking about the languagepart is I had an understanding
of learning a second languageand its challenges long before I
ever knew about live lingua.
Because part of my degree Ispent uh studying in Germany.
(06:22):
Now, similar to maybe part ofyour education experience, I
spent two and a half yearsstudying German in university
from Calgary.
And I learned more German inthe three to six months I was in
Germany than I did over two anda half years of studying.
And that was my first clue intowhat the power of language can
do.
My confidence went up, right?
(06:44):
My it was a skill nobody couldever take away from me.
And um, I was able tocommunicate with people around
the world um who also spoke someGerman and some English.
Now I wasn't great at German,but come full circle 360
degrees.
I literally was on a in ameeting with an MA company of
Austria.
I was able to open theconversation in German, and I'll
(07:07):
tell you what, the dynamic ofthat meeting changed a hundred
percent.
It was way more collaborativeand participatory from both
sides because I could bridgethat gap between our languages.
Now we didn't host the meetingin German, they spoke very good
English, but the effort and umand connection we made because
we had that in common wasamazing.
(07:28):
So that's kind of my story intoLive Lingua and why we're here
today.
Jay Johnson (07:32):
Well, that's incredible.
And you know, what what anawesome way to kind of like just
take that leap and have thecourage to be like, all right,
this isn't it.
Let's go to the next.
I don't know what the next is,but I'm gonna know that this is
not it.
And I I wish people wouldactually do that more often.
So that's that's reallypowerful, Stacey.
(07:53):
Thank you.
Yeah, for me, and this was aninteresting, this was an
interesting aspect.
Um I thought I had forgotteneverything that I'd been trained
in Spanish, and then uh wasworking with an international
client where I traveled toGuadalajara, Mexico, and within
three days, I did.
(08:14):
I felt like I had I Iremembered a ton of what I
thought was gone.
Um can you talk to me aboutthat?
So, like, what is it that'shappening when we learn
something and then you know,don't use it?
Obviously, it gets a littlerusty, and then that sort of
comes back.
It seems that language is oneof those key aspects that does
(08:37):
that often.
And between your and my sharedstory, it just it's it's
interesting to me.
Stacy Richter (08:43):
There's definitely something there, and
and I'm gonna go on a limb,because I'm not a neuroscientist
by any stretch.
I just maybe a little morewell-read than than a lot of
people on the topic.
But when you think about whatlearning any new skill does, is
the neuroplasticity of thebrain, it rewires your neurons,
make different connections, andit creates these pathways for
(09:04):
that skill to take hold.
So a lot like when you werelearning Spanish, I was learning
German, we were maybe notknowing it at the time, but
we're creating those neuralpathways.
And that has muscles havememory as a result of that.
So if we don't use something,it doesn't 100% atrophy,
eventually does come back,sometimes more quickly in
others, depending on the skill.
(09:25):
So the benefit of that languagelearning is that skill that
nobody can take away from usbecause it will always be there.
Those pathways in our brain arealways going to be there.
We just have to light them up,like going to Guadalajara or
meeting on, you know, getting onan MA meeting with an uh, you
know, an Austrian broker.
Um, we just have to light thosepathways up again.
(09:46):
And it does come back veryquickly.
Not unlike a physical workout,right?
If we go and we have we have askill in a sport, whether it's
hockey, baseball, basketball,whatever it happens to be, or
just working out the gym, whenwe take some time off and we go
back to it, yeah, it might be alittle wobbly at first, but then
the muscles come back, theyhave the memory of all of the
training that we've done.
(10:06):
And language skill is nodifferent.
It just resides in the braininstead of in our biceps and in
our thighs, for example.
Jay Johnson (10:14):
Well, and I love that.
So I as a as a behavioralscientist, I do study
neuroscience and and you're spoton.
And one of the cool things iswhen I was when I was in school,
when I was younger in school,they always said, well, learn a
language as a child because youknow that's the easiest place to
learn.
And and that seems to be true.
(10:34):
And we do know from cognitiveneuroscience that our
neuroplasticity is at itshighest peaks up to the age of
about 23 to 25 years old, giveor take, obviously.
But uh the good thing is iswithin the last several years,
neuroscience has definitelydemonstrated that
neuroplasticity lasts throughoutour entire lives.
(10:56):
So if you have an audience, ifyou have not learned a language
and you want to, don't bediscouraged.
You can teach your dogs newtricks.
But let's talk a little bitabout live lingua because I
think it's important how welearn different things.
And we all have different, say,learning styles or approaches,
um, different learning stylesand approaches.
(11:17):
And a lot of people probablyassume a live language is going
to be something like uh, youknow, Rosetta Stone, where
you're gonna sit behind acomputer and you're gonna learn,
or it's gonna be something likeuh Duolingo, where you sit and
you know do some kind ofapp-based whatever.
But live ling was a little bitdifferent, uh, hence the name.
But go ahead and let's talk alittle bit about that approach.
Stacy Richter (11:38):
Yeah, um, great point, Jay.
When we talk about tech theinflux of technology for
language learning versusconventional language learning,
is um what is the best way orthe fastest way to learn a
language?
And I think it's universallyaccepted that full immersion is
the number one way to learn alanguage.
Pick up, move to a countrywhere that's all they speak.
(12:00):
If it's Spanish, go somewherein Latin America where they
speak very little English ifthat's your first language, and
you will you will learn Spanishvery, very quickly.
You're forced to adapt thatway, and you will learn very
quick.
It's full immersion.
That's not possible for most ofus.
Most of us just can't pick upfor six months, leave our the
comfort of our homes uh inCalgary or you know, otherwise,
(12:23):
and live in the country and justto learn the language.
So the second best way is tosimulate full immersion.
Now, thankfully, theco-founders of Live Lingua had
figured this out many, manyyears before it was even ever
popular.
One of the very first companiesto do an online lesson, and
this is long before Zoom, uh,where we were doing Skype
(12:44):
lessons online, but it was fullimmersion.
So when you're working with anative Spanish-speaking tutor or
a native German-speaking tutor,and all they're talking to you
is in that language, it's a wayto simulate full immersion, but
from the comfort of your homeand your desk.
So when we're talking aboutlive tutoring, that's the second
(13:05):
best way to learn a language isonline immersion with a
native-speaking live tutor whois professionally trained in
teaching, right?
It's not just a matter offinding somebody who knows how
to speak Spanish and can try andteach me Spanish to anybody off
the street.
Because as we mentioned, we allhave different learning styles,
whether it's kinesthetic,auditory, visual.
(13:25):
I'm a very visual person thatit's very important we have a
tutor who's professionallytrained in teaching a second
language, as well as being anative speaker of that.
So that's where we are a lotdifferent than the technologies
that are emerging.
And some of them you've alreadymentioned.
Those are great supplementaltools, but we get more students
who have gone on a 400, 500-daySpanish streak and then realize
(13:50):
when they traveled to LatinAmerica they didn't really know
how to speak Spanish.
And so they come to us say, Ineed help because that didn't
work the way I thought it was.
Uh, so I need help.
And they generally need fullonline immersion to do that.
Jay Johnson (14:04):
Oh, and and that's that's really funny because
yeah, learning from a textbookand then real-world application.
I I'll share a quick story thatI did find funny because not
all Spanish language is thesame.
And in the very, very shorttime that the US was permitted
to travel to Cuba.
Uh, this was a number of yearsago.
(14:25):
My dad had always wanted to go,so I took him to Cuba.
And we had uh we had a homestay with uh a place that you
know had multiple rooms andeverything else like that.
It was an incredibleexperience.
And the the house mother thatwas there, I will never forget,
she was messing with me so badbecause Cuban Spanish is very
fast.
(14:45):
It is very fast.
It's a dialect, there's adifferent, you know, intonation
on specific words.
And I had sort of practicedgeared up, utilizing one of the
apps to try to help me likerecall some of this before I
traveled to Cuba.
And it was just so fascinatingbecause I I was like, if you
slow down, I can actuallyunderstand more of what you're
(15:06):
saying.
And she just sped up on me andjust she was laughing.
She was like, get faster, getfaster.
But I think it's justinteresting that the immersion
aspect of it really brings itout in us.
And I I don't know this forcertain, but you know, as part
of as part of learning and aspart of language, one of the
ways in which our brain learnsis when there's a release of
(15:29):
adrenaline and actuallycortisol.
We think of them as the stresschemicals.
But when we're stressed, isactually when our brain says,
oh, this is important.
We need to retain it, we needto do this.
So the immersion and being in aspace of, hey, I am I'm out of
sorts here.
I I don't know what to do.
I can't read these signs, Ican't do this, puts a little bit
(15:49):
of stress brain and probablycertainly you know intensifies
how quickly we end upremembering, oh, that means
stop, or oh, peligroso, thatmeans danger.
Don't go down that way.
So exactly.
Let's take this to thecorporate side because I I I did
see, you know, and and an afterreview, I think this is where
(16:09):
it becomes really important forour audience, right?
When we're thinking aboutworkplace behaviors, our
workplace is expandingconsistently, whether it's our
customers, our clientele,whether it's our vendors, our
suppliers, or even whether it'sthe coworkers there.
Um, you know, while English hasbecome more universal, there is
still an advantage to speakingin uh multiple different
(16:32):
languages.
So let's talk about that.
What have you seen as CEO ofLive Lingua?
What have you seen across thecorporate landscape and the
importance of uh learning newlanguages or implementing new
languages in the workplace?
Stacy Richter (16:47):
You know, Jay, I've seen a division on two
sides of the same coin.
One is the transactional sideof languages and communicating,
right?
Do you understand the wordsthat I'm saying and the meaning
that I'm giving?
Okay.
That's the transactional side.
And that's generally wheretechnology has really supplanted
live tutoring and generalstudy, because we can handle the
(17:10):
transactional side.
Anybody can jump on GoogleTranslate, right?
Type in what they want to sayin their language and have it
translate into another language.
That's the transactional sideand it has its place.
But when we're talking aboutbusiness at the corporate level,
whether it's small tomedium-sized business that, you
know, I'm workinginternationally with a VA firm
(17:32):
to, you know, for someassistance, or I'm a Fortune 500
and I'm dealing with thousandsof employees all around the
world, is the transformationalside of language learning.
And when I first startedworking with Live Lingua two and
a half years ago, I wasthinking almost initially of the
transactional side at thecorporate level, because right,
we have to deal with peoplecross-border, whether it's US to
(17:55):
Mexico, throughout Europe,Asia, whatever it happened to
be, that there are someemployees that are going to need
to speak the language to beable to communicate.
But that was still reallytransactional.
And when we started workingwith a lot of US firms and
training their teams to speakSpanish or some of their
international teams to improvetheir English, for example, um,
(18:17):
there was an entirely unintendedbenefit that I didn't foresee.
And that was what it did to theteams and the cohesion of those
teams.
I'll give you one example.
We worked with the MedicalServices Center out of
Minnesota, and they strangelyenough have a large influx of
Latin Americans uh in Minnesota,which I would we I would never
(18:38):
have predicted.
Jay Johnson (18:39):
Yeah, I know Scandinavian population because
they like the cold too.
Uh I would not have guessedLatin American population.
Stacy Richter (18:49):
Uh, me neither.
So again, you know, a newsurprise to me, but as a welcome
surprise.
And what they found was thatthey were having difficulty
treating a lot of their patientsbecause of language barrier.
Um, and they relied veryheavily on interpreters where
they'd uh it would take up to anhour, maybe two hours to get an
(19:10):
interpreter on phone.
It was very expensive to do.
And it's and what they werebecause it's such a high-touch
industry in the medicalservices, they were not making a
connection with their patients,right?
They these are people who arecoming from countries where they
generally don't trustinstitutions, whether it's
government or medical.
So to use a languagetransactionally, they weren't
(19:30):
making that connection withtheir patients, and it wasn't
serving anybody.
So we started working with themin Spanish, and of course, they
became better at serving theirpatients because now they're
speaking Spanish, they don'thave to find interpreters and
they're um moving on.
But the unintended benefit thatI never saw coming, Jay, was
when we trained a team of 10 or12 people in a cohort, was now
(19:53):
they found a common mission andthey started practicing on their
own outside of their theirprivate and group classes.
They started using Spanish inthe lunchroom with each other so
they could practice amongsteach other.
And the the uh what's the wordI'm looking for?
The connection the team madejust changed their entire team
(20:15):
dynamic outside of what thetransactional side was doing.
So to be able to offer that toa group of people in a corporate
environment, um, you can onlyimagine how that makes a
corporation uh you know muchmore productive, right?
Their employee retention andengagement is going to go up as
a result because now they havetaught their people or enabled
(20:36):
their people to learn the skillnobody can take away from them
that also happen to actuallyapply to their job.
So there's the two sides of thecoin.
It was the transactional sidethat everybody could see coming,
but it was the transformationalside that like, ah, there's the
magic moment we're all lookingfor.
And and and that's what we tendto focus on when we're working
with small and medium-sizedbusinesses or you know, as as
(20:58):
big as Fortune 500.
Jay Johnson (21:00):
Well, I love that.
And I'll I'll dip into a littleof the behavioral science
behind it.
When a team undergoes a sharedstruggle with a common goal, it
is something that actually canmassively improve motivation,
performance, productivity acrossa number of different sectors.
So now you've created uh, youknow, that opportunity for them
(21:23):
to say, hey, not this isn't thisisn't uh, you know, this isn't
natural for all of us.
We were all started at at sortof zero.
Now it's on us to overcomethis.
And they're doing it not justbecause of their own
self-learning, but they're doingit to create a better positive
impact on the people thatthey're serving.
So that's such a sweet spot ofhuman transformation.
(21:47):
That's that's really powerful.
I I wanted to mention somethingelse that I think is really
fascinating.
So um, I and I I didn't evenmention this to you beforehand.
I didn't think about it untilyou brought it up.
One of my very first focalpoints was cultural
adaptability.
And it was working with umstudents, students who had come
(22:07):
from international, you know,literally how I became a trainer
was students that were comingfrom international to our
university here in Detroit,Michigan, and helping our
university faculty have betterrelationships and interactions
with those student populations.
I translated that to thehealthcare space.
(22:28):
And I've I've probably trainedcultural adaptability with about
six or seven thousand differentworkers in the healthcare
space.
But exactly what you said is sotrue.
We have an entire section onthat designated to how do you
address gaps or languagebarriers?
Because in many, and it's notjust and it's not just Latin
(22:49):
America, in a number ofdifferent um uh uh cultural
minorities in the United States,we do find there's a little
hesitation, and and rightfullyso, a little hesitation towards
uh the healthcare system.
So the fact that you're able tobridge that by um supporting a
team and being able tocommunicate in that native
(23:10):
language is is so powerful.
So uh let's let's take a lookat something else because you
know, if if I'm in the audienceand I'm listening, one of the
things that I'm gonna bethinking to myself is, oh, AI.
AI is gonna help us solve theselanguage issues.
You know, eventually I'm gonnahave a little bug in my ear.
And there already are sometechnologies, albeit I have
(23:32):
tried, I've I've tried at leastone.
It was not effective.
Not effective.
I was actually speaking with aJapanese counterpart and I said
something, and the look on hisface was absolutely surprised.
We discovered uh through aprocess of scientific rigor, we
discovered that I, you know, uhthat I said something that was
(23:54):
probably inappropriate to at thevery least, and we had a great
laugh about it.
Um but I I I won't be uh Iwon't be crude on the podcast,
but uh we do know that there's alot of technological solutions
that are coming that aresupposed to be ideally uh
creating the conditions forreal-time communication.
(24:15):
Do you think that that'll evertake away the need for us to
learn languages or for us to bemore uh global in our
communication patterns?
Stacy Richter (24:26):
I'm so glad you asked that question because Jay,
this is something I'vestruggled with over the last two
and a half years and evenbefore, is the technology
pendulum, which ways of swingingand how far does it go?
You know, the short answer tothe question is no, I don't
think it will decrease or takeaway from our need uh for
actually learning a language.
Uh, and if anything, it's goingto increase the need.
(24:48):
Because the technology pendulumhas flung so far to the right
that AI was the exclusivesolution, whether it's some of
the apps you talked about orsome of the you know evergreen
programs you could take forself-study.
And the pendulum swung so farthat way that people lost, and
and COVID amplified this really,lost that desire for a human
connection, right?
(25:09):
This person to person, um, eventhough we're on a screen on a
video, we still have aconnection because I'm not
talking to my phone, right?
It's even better thanteleconferencing.
But we're starting to see thependulum start to swing back to
this human connection piecebecause at the end of the day,
we are emotional creatures.
And the the phone is notemotional with us.
(25:32):
So we do need thatunderstanding and connection
from another individual and asentient being that gets it.
So I don't think that it's evergoing to replace what we do
with live tutoring or actuallanguage learning.
And I I'm gonna go out on alimb and say it's actually gonna
increase the need because whatI love about technology,
(25:52):
depending on whether or not Iwant to look at it as a threat
or an enabler in my business, isthat it has brought hundreds
and millions of people tolanguage learning that otherwise
would not have ever exploredit.
Right?
To you know, take the time tosit at your desk and jump on a
call with a live tutor once ortwice a week is a commitment,
(26:14):
not just financially, but acommitment of time and and
energy.
But to jump on an app for fiveminutes, practice some
vocabulary, the transactionalside, that's brought millions of
people thinking that I want tolearn how to speak Spanish.
I want to learn how to speakGerman.
This is just where I start.
Otherwise, they would neverhave started.
And it lights that languagelearning fire, they start to get
(26:37):
a the taste of what it is tolearn some of the language.
Maybe they also, you know, arewatching their favorite movie,
and there's a little excerpt inthere where they're speaking
German, like I'm a big diehardfan.
So there's I love when theGerman parts come up because
like I know exactly what hesaid, right?
Maybe they get they get thattaste of, oh my God, I
understood that one sentencebecause I practice the
(26:59):
vocabulary, I want more of that.
And then they start to findavenues in their life to apply
it.
Now they start meeting otherpeople who speak the language,
and it's about that person toperson.
So where I think technology andum live tutoring, the way we
deliver it, um, there's anintersection or enablers for
each other, and people willeventually transition from the
(27:21):
AI, you know, self-studyprograms into jumping into uh an
immersion style program andsay, I actually want to do this.
Now it's not everybody, that'sfor sure, but it's it has opened
up for hundreds of millions ofpeople who otherwise would never
have even thought they wantedto learn another language.
Jay Johnson (27:39):
Yeah.
No, that makes total sense.
And I I I would agree withthat.
I think in many cases,technology, technology is like
the nutra suite of, I'm gonnacall it the nutra suite of
connection, right?
Like we feel like we'reconnected because of social
media, AI, whatever it is, butit's not the same as true human
interaction.
(27:59):
It doesn't, and even just froma neurobiological standpoint, it
doesn't actually trigger thesame depth of neurotransmitters
when you and I are face to faceshaking hands or you know,
sitting around a coffee table.
So I I agree with that 100%.
The other thing, as you weretalking, I thought about of, you
know, it and I'm I'm I'm tryingto think about how this
(28:23):
functions within the world oftechnology, but let's play the
play the game of I'm doingsomething in maybe one of the
apps or I'm utilizing uh ChatGPT to do some translation for
me.
I would imagine that whenworking with, and and I've had
the luxury of speaking in about40 different countries at this
point in time, many, manydifferent languages.
(28:44):
Uh body language is somethingthat's semi-universal in many
aspects, but there's a lot ofdifferent nuances in a lot of
different cultures.
And I'm thinking of my Germancolleagues, and you know, cross
your fingers here in the US islike cross your fingers that it
works.
And in Germany, it's press yourthumbs, you know, press thumbs.
And I found that to be likewhat as I was learning, but I
(29:08):
would have never gotten thatwithout immersion, without being
there, without seeing them dosomething.
Oh, we've got to press, becauseit's just not something that
you're gonna learn in an app orin a GPT or some of that sort of
cultural nuance of even thingslike sarcasm or other things.
I would imagine that livelingua does a great job having
(29:29):
it be that immersive thing ofkind of picking up on some of
those cultural aspects as well.
Can you speak to that maybe alittle bit?
Stacy Richter (29:37):
Yeah, absolutely.
Uh, talking about the culturalaspects, context means so much.
And when I first started atLive Lingua and exited, uh, the
CEO, the co-founder, and hispartner, he said to me, He's
like, Stacey, this is myphilosophy on language learning.
He's like, You truly understanda language when you can tell
somebody a joke in their nativelanguage and they get it, they
(29:59):
laugh, right?
Because there's so much contextthere.
Um, and that's exactly it.
So the with full immersion,right?
If we talk about the best wayto learn a language is to pick
yourself up and move somewherewhere they don't speak your
native language and they onlyspeak the language you want to
learn, maybe it's moving toColombia.
Um, the challenge is I can onlylearn that dialect from those
(30:21):
people with online immersion.
If I get exposure to lots ofdifferent tutors across lots of
different geographies, LatinAmerica being one, as you
mentioned, Spanish is just notSpanish.
There's Spanish in Mexico, eventhroughout Mexico, it's
different.
If you go, you know, from theYucatan to Mexico City, it is
still different.
German is the same.
Jay Johnson (30:42):
You've got high German and low German area, you
have yeah, down in uh Berlin andtotally totally.
Stacy Richter (30:49):
So we have a student who's taking online
tutoring in an immersionenvironment has the ability to
say, okay, I've met with a tutorfrom Colombia, I've taken some
classes.
What about a tutor fromArgentina?
What about a tutor from Mexico?
What about a tutor uh inBarcelona?
And we can get all of thoseaspects and context of all the
(31:10):
different types of Spanish andyou know, some of the nuances of
what they how they say.
The exact same thing.
And why, most importantly, whythey're different.
Because it's so linked to theculture and history.
It's not just that they saysomething different, right?
There's a reason why we saycross your fingers in North
America and in Germany they saypress your thumbs.
And it's nothing to do withjust being different.
(31:32):
There's a cultural developmentthere.
And by being involved with aperson who has grown up there,
which is important that they'rea native speaker, right?
They've grown up culturally,they know all the context.
They can share all of that withyou in the moment, in the
moment that matters.
Because the way one of the bestways we learn as we don't as
(31:52):
adults, and you mentioned thisearlier, children learn a
certain way, and adults canlearn just differently, is we
have to have context to be ableto embed that into our learning
style faster.
So it means using words andconversations, we we're not
naturally going to talk about.
If I'm a fan of baseball and wejust had the World Series, I
(32:13):
will learn more talking aboutbaseball topics in Spanish than
I will trying to memorize a listof related words and
conjugations of verbs.
So that is a big piece of thatis we get the context and the
practice of something thatmatters to us, we'll remember
and retain, and of course beable to retrieve a hundred times
(32:36):
faster if it has meaning forus.
So that's what online immersiondoes, that we have that level
of flexibility from multipletutors and areas, uh, as well as
giving us our own context.
Jay Johnson (32:47):
I love that because I have and I've been to a
number of different Spanishspeaking countries, and in each
of them it does.
It takes my ear at least acouple of days to be able to
kind of pick up the nuances ofdifferent things.
So being able to do that isthat's a pretty cool, that's a
pretty cool opportunity.
So let's let's kind of take itfrom here because me personally,
(33:11):
I so I have a uh a behavioralelements program.
We've got 14 guides indifferent countries.
And obviously, I could look andsay, wow, it'd be really great
if I started to learn differentlanguages that I could speak
with these different guides.
But let's take it to just therandom person that might be
listening, who's not the CEO ofa company, who's maybe their
(33:34):
interactions, they have someinteractions with a customer who
speaks Spanish.
Okay.
Uh what would you say to thatperson to say, hey, take this,
this is what it's going to dofor you as an individual, not
your company, not whatever.
This is the impact it's gonnahave on you as a person by
learning a language and maybebeing able to communicate with
(33:54):
your client, customer, whomeverit is, a little bit more in
their language.
What does that look like?
Stacy Richter (34:00):
Man, uh, as an individual, what the language
learning, and I'll use my ownpersonal example.
As I mentioned, I I'm not apolyglot, I'm not a professional
language learner.
I don't speak and learn eightdifferent languages as a
profession or career.
I learned German many, manyyears ago.
I've lost it because I wasn'table to practice and keep it up.
I am actually learning Spanishright now myself.
(34:21):
My entire team is in LatinAmerica.
I'm the only one who's notfluent in Spanish.
So I am learning just likeeverybody else at a beginner
level.
So if we want to say, what doesthis outside of my career, what
does this do for meindividually?
Um, well, my because I'mburning those neural pathways
that we talked about, my problemsolving is 10 times faster than
(34:42):
what it was six months ago.
My creative thinking isprobably a hundred times better
than what it was six months ago.
And of course, my confidencehas gone up, even though I'm
barely conversational, Jay.
I'm not talking we have to gofull fluency to get the benefits
of language learning.
It's I'm barely conversational,but my confidence has gone up
(35:04):
tenfold because I can start aconversation with my entire
team, who are all Spanishtutors, by the way, so they know
their stuff.
Uh, I can feel comfortablestarting a conversation there.
So outside of just thecommunication and connection
with an individual who'sspeaking another language, it's
all of the things that it doesfor me individually because I'm
(35:27):
taking on a skill that'sdifficult to do, it's
uncomfortable, uh, it requires alittle bit of work, but it's
something nobody can ever takeaway from me.
So my problem solving isbetter, creativity is better,
and my self-confidence.
unknown (35:39):
Right?
Stacy Richter (35:40):
Not unlike going to a gym.
One of the things aboutlanguage learning that you know
I'll pass on to your audiencehere is it's a skill nobody can
take away from you, but it'salso a skill nobody can do for
you.
You can't outsource it and youcan't delegate it.
So if you want that, thebenefits of creativity and
problem solving, and of courseyou get to communicate with
(36:00):
people from another country intheir own language, um, the
language skill is absolutelyamazing.
Jay Johnson (36:06):
I love that.
And you know, it's interestingthat you say that about
curiosity or uh creativity inparticular, because one of the
things I I've got a couple offriends who are are linguists
and polyglots and speak eight,nine, ten different languages,
everything else.
And when I'd had aconversation, because I studied
communication, but it was thecommunication theory and
(36:28):
practice and science, et cetera.
Uh, but getting a betterunderstanding of like even how
specific languages shapeparticular words is because of,
you know, even the most simpleone is that there's a masculine
and a feminine version of wordsin particular languages.
Okay, well, what does thatmean?
Where did that come from?
How did that develop?
(36:49):
There's a history and anarchitecture that comes from
that that really does have likea beauty to it across different
languages, but being able tokind of switch between those
different places.
One of the others I justrecently learned, there's a word
in Japanese that is veryspecific.
And I thought this is inrelation to like emotional
intelligence.
There's a word in Japanesethat's and I couldn't tell you
(37:12):
what it is, but it's aparticular word that is the
emotion you feel when you get abad haircut.
And uh, you know, I do knowthat there's particular words in
German like Schadenfraud, uh,the feeling that you have of
excitement and glee oversomebody else's misfortune.
There's cool nuances that wecan actually even have a better
(37:36):
understanding of our ownemotional systems through
languages of others.
So that creativity, that sortof like critical thinking, super
powerful.
Thank you for that.
Let's switch gears.
What about the business, thebusiness objective?
You know, we you talked alittle bit about the healthcare
space of like, all right, you'regonna get better patient
(37:57):
satisfaction scores.
You might be able to provepatient interactions, and
ideally you're gonna end upimproving patient health
outcomes because of these bettercommunication and better
interactions and betterfostering of trust between each
other.
What about other businesses?
What would be the business casefor say, I am uh I'm the CEO of
my company and I'm gonnainvest, or maybe one of my
(38:18):
employees comes to me and says,Hey, it would be great if we
could all learn this language.
Will you invest in ourprofessional development?
What's the business case forsomething of this nature?
Stacy Richter (38:28):
Yeah, and I think where you're going with that,
Jay, is what's the straight upROI?
If I'm gonna put in X, youknow, when does Y pay off?
And that that's a big question,it always comes up because at
the end of the day, you know,we're investing in our people.
There should be a return onthat.
And some uh direct investmentshave direct returns, um, right?
Dollar in, dollar out.
(38:48):
I I can give you a couple ofdifferent examples, but I'll
focus on one.
We've we have a manufacturingassociation client out of Ohio,
and this is their story, notmine.
And uh I'll share what I canbecause you know it was in
confidence, but one of the whenI asked them why they started
working with us, the gentlemansaid, you know what?
Um, we have clients andpartners in Mexico, and they all
(39:11):
speak really good English, andwe're you know, we've been
working with them for years.
And he's like, I was downthere, down in Mexico at an
event, meeting with the CEO, andthis is what the CEO said to
him again.
I'll clean up the language fromwhat he told me.
He's like, You come down hereand expect us to know English
perfectly, but you won't evenmake an attempt to learn our
(39:31):
culture and understand us.
And it hit him, right?
Then in there, he's like,You're so right, right between
the eyes, right?
That's the polite version, andand that's why he said, Yeah, uh
I'm gonna go out and learnSpanish.
And he's he's one of our beststudents.
Um, he started with usindividually and said, My team
needs to do this too.
(39:52):
And as a result, we ended uptraining 10 or 12 of the his
team members, and the directresult of that within a year,
and and I'm not saying we arethe catalyst 100%, but they are
end up opening up distributioncenters in Mexico.
Now they've been working onthat, but I I can tell you
definitively that even justbeing somewhat conversational in
(40:15):
Spanish and showing that you'remaking this effort to
understand language and cultureum can directly be attributed to
having a better relationshipand closing a deal that it might
have eventually closed, but I'mpretty sure it closed a little
faster and that the operationsrun a little smoother.
So uh when we're talking aboutbusiness development and sales,
(40:37):
that that's uh the direct ROIfor the business case of, hey, I
need to train some of my peopleon how to speak this second
language because we're dealingin these markets.
Right?
That's that's probably thebiggest ROI factor outside of
all the soft skills and thingswe can talk about.
Jay Johnson (40:55):
Well, and it's interesting because I do a lot
of work in the manufacturingspace, and I do find it to be
interesting that you can havetwo groups, uh supplier and you
know, uh whomever and OEM thatare working together, that both
are located in Ohio andMichigan, both English as the
(41:16):
primary and native language, andstill have so many
miscommunications between themjust because of the natural, the
natural problems or flaws thatare built within the
communication systems.
So now you add the complexityof two different languages to
it, two differentinterpretations, two different
functions, et cetera.
And a lot can go wrong in thatmanufacturing space.
(41:37):
It makes a lot of sense.
And, you know, where precisionand quality are concerned, we
definitely want some precisionand quality in our
communication.
So all right.
Well, this has been afascinating discussion.
We've not actually addressedthis on this show.
Um, but you know, behavior,communication is a big aspect of
(41:58):
behavior and connection, we dotalk a lot about relationships.
We've never really addressedwhat does it look like to think
about how can we behave in a waythat would connect with people
more, especially by learningtheir language, because it seems
like such a big challenge.
So I'm gonna ask one morequestion.
How do you help people get overthe idea?
(42:19):
Because when you think aboutlike, all right, learning,
learning can be difficult byitself.
As a talent development person,as somebody who has studied
adult learning, it can be scary.
There's a lot of uncertainty,it's change, it's hard, it's
practice.
I do the first week and I'mlike, ah, I'm terrible at this.
I don't want to do it anymorebecause it's uncomfortable.
(42:40):
How do you help somebodynavigate that motivation?
Because I think a lot of peoplewould love to speak many
languages, but never take thatfirst step because they're
afraid or because it's hard.
How do you motivate them tokind of take that first step?
Stacy Richter (42:56):
The first step is is actually the easiest part.
It's the last mile that'sdifficult, right?
So the first step is everybodywants to try and is willing to
try.
And I and I'll say the firststep um, you know, is generally
for most people the biggest, butfrom our perspective, it's
generally the easiest.
So to get somebody to take thefirst step, um, it's all about
(43:20):
try, try before you buy, right?
So we do uh lots of differentoptions to try group classes for
free, take a few different umprivate classes for free, and
experience what it's like to beon a language learning class,
because that dispels all of theprejudgments most people have
about what it's like to learn alanguage with a live tutor.
(43:40):
Because what most people willfind when they think about
learning a language, it's oh,I'm gonna get a vocabulary list,
I'm gonna have to memorize 20words for my next class, the
conjugations of all the verbs,the the um the genders of all
the nines.
That's exactly it.
And we know that doesn't work,right?
(44:01):
But what people find out iswhen they can try something with
zero risk and zero expectation,and most importantly, zero
judgment, then they are so muchmore open to the experience.
Then they find out how much funit really is to start learning
a language.
Because as we talked about allyou know already today, it's the
(44:21):
context.
We're talking about topics weknow and enjoy talking about,
whether you enjoy knitting, yousports, you know, whatever you
you do for work.
And that's the emergence styleto become conversational, is
talking about things you know.
So then you learn thevocabulary of words you use
every day in your nativelanguage.
You're gonna learn those wordsand their context in the other
(44:42):
language, and that becomes fun.
And when something becomes fun,it now encourages repeat
behavior, as you you know verywell know more about behavioral
science than anybody.
So um, that's the key is trybefore you buy, and it has to be
fun when they get there, whichis why when we talk about some
of the apps you talked about,they've made language learning
(45:04):
extremely fun, right?
The the cortisol and thedopamine hits you were talking
about earlier flooded with thosetypes of emotions from playing
those games.
They're designed to do that.
What they're not designed to dois help us actually retain and
learn the language.
So if we can make it, if wemake it fun and contextual
within that that person's lifeexperience, that's the
(45:26):
difference.
That's what keeps them comingday in, day out, looking forward
to doing homework, if you canbelieve that.
Looking forward to doingexercises and practicing because
they're uh the speed of theresults goes way faster when we
get to talk about things that weknow, like, and trust.
Jay Johnson (45:43):
Love that.
Such a such a great answer.
And I'm gonna add one thing toit.
Yeah, and this is for theaudience.
Do the hard thing.
Less than 2% of the people takethe stairs.
And it's those people thatoften build up strength,
resiliency, perseverance, andall the things that make us
successful in both life and thework.
(46:05):
So even if it gets hard, do thehard thing.
It will build your resilience.
So, Stacy, that was a perfectanswer.
I love the idea of jumping inthere and just enjoying the
experience, and particularlyfrom that immersive standpoint,
I think is such a unique andnovel way to really engage and
to learn.
So uh, Stacy, if our audiencewanted to get in touch with you,
(46:29):
learn more about live lingua,how would they reach out?
Stacy Richter (46:32):
So, anybody who wants to reach me personally,
you can find me on LinkedIn.
Um, my handle is the real StacyRichter, S-T-A-C-Y.
There's no E, S T A C Y R I C HT E R.
You can find me on LinkedIn,connect with me there, send me a
DM for anything related to LiveLingua and programs.
You can find us at livelingua.com, our website, and
(46:55):
live lingua across all socialmedia handles, uh including
LinkedIn.
So reach out to us on any ofthose channels.
Jay Johnson (47:02):
So this has been an awesome conversation.
Definitely something a little,I don't want to say out of my
comfort zone, but I, you know,the flashbacks of not being able
to execute language as properlyas I wish I could.
Uh, no, this is this has reallybeen wonderful, Stacy.
So thank you for coming on,sharing your expertise and
sharing your wisdom andopportunity with our audience
(47:22):
today.
Stacy Richter (47:23):
Thanks, Jay.
I had so much fun talking withyou and looking forward to
hearing from some people at theTalent Forge.
That'd be amazing.
Jay Johnson (47:30):
Awesome.
And thank you, audience, fortuning into this episode of the
Talent Forge, where together weare shaping workforce behaviors.
Welcome to this episode of the Talent Forge,
where together we are shapingworkforce behaviors.
Today, my guest is StacyRichter, who is from a company
called Live Lingua.
Now, language is an absoluteimportant aspect of any
globalized business or anybusiness that's dealing with
customers.
And oftentimes we findourselves in a situation where
(01:38):
English may be the secondlanguage for some of the
participants.
And Live Lingua is a solutionthat helps to develop language
skills.
And I'd like to say, welcome tothe show, Stacy.
Stacy Richter (01:49):
Awesome.
Thanks, Jay.
It's great to be here with youand the Talent Forge.
Jay Johnson (01:52):
So this is such a fascinating thing to me.
And I'm gonna share right outof the gate uh a little bit of
embarrassment.
I have had probably six yearsof Spanish language training,
but I don't get to utilize itvery often.
I most certainly wouldn't feelcomfortable giving a keynote in
it.
Uh, but it is something thathas always fascinated me.
(02:14):
It was never a priority when Iwas growing up in the education
system in the US.
But you have made thisopportunity for people to
essentially develop one of whatI see as one of the most
important skills, um, importantskills that we could actually
develop.
So let me ask this question.
How did you get to making thisyour passion, making this your
(02:37):
career trajectory?
And, you know, how important islearning another language, in
your opinion?
Stacy Richter (02:44):
Yeah, yeah, that's a loaded question, Jay.
I really fell bass backwardsinto it, literally.
Uh you know, one of my favoritequotes, and I think it's often
quoted to Seneca.
I'm not sure if it's misquotedor not, but you know, uh, luck
is when opportunity meetspreparation.
And I joined Live Lingua alittle over two and a half years
ago as a CEO, but it took me 25years to even get to this
(03:06):
point, long before I ever knewwho Live Lingua was.
And, you know, to give you theshort version of my story, I
grew up like a lot of us did,you know, and our parents are
teaching us to go to school, getgood grades, come out, get a
good job, and you know,eventually pay a free mortgage,
and you might be able to affordto retire.
And that's exactly what I did.
You know, went to school, gotgood grades, came out with an
(03:29):
undergraduate degree, and wentstarted my first corporate job
at a Fortune uh 1000 company,international company.
Um, but I'll tell you what,those two years were absolutely
miserable.
And uh I knew that's not what Iwanted to do.
I always wanted to be the CEOof a large multinational
company, but I knew I was nevergoing to be the top of this
company.
So uh I decided to leave and Idid the only thing that I knew
(03:51):
how to do, and that was go to goget more schooling.
And uh so I ended up getting anMBA and you know, and I did it
in a condensed uh timeline, butone of my professors said to me,
He's like, Stacey, he's like,this MBA program, he's like,
There's some technical thingsyou're gonna learn and retain
and some skills you build.
He's like, But there's twothings you're gonna take away
from this the most.
(04:11):
One is you're definitely gonnaoutgrow the position you're in.
And two, you might even outgrowthe company.
And that's exactly whathappened to me.
It was, you know, we finishedup our program March 31st, and I
knew, man, what I'm doing now Iwas in sales and marketing for
a small oil and gasmanufacturing company.
I said, this isn't it.
This is not my career for thenext 20 plus years.
(04:32):
And I literally drove threehours north to Emmonton and met
with my sales manager, and Igave him my resignation on April
1st.
And he looks at me, he's like,Stacey, this is a long way to go
for an April Fool's joke, andit's not very funny.
Like, this is not an AprilFool's joke.
I said, No, no qualms, no,yeah, we can keep a
relationship.
(04:52):
There's no bad, hard feelingshere.
I just, this is not what I wantto do.
And I didn't know where I wasgonna go, Jay.
And when um I resigned, Ididn't know what I was gonna do,
and I was stressed and worried,of course.
So you know what, but again,opportunity comes when you know
preparation uh is lucky.
So a good friend of mine hadapproached me, and that's where
(05:13):
we started our very firstmarketing agency and uh had my
first venture as anentrepreneur.
Long story short, to shortenthis up, 20 plus years of
acquiring businesses, using mymarketing skills to grow and
scale and exit them, um, I foundmyself in Live Lingua.
And the co-founders at the timewere looking for an exit.
I was involved with anotherventure company who uh actually
(05:35):
bought them out.
And I was in place to re uhexit the co-founders, hire
another CEO, build a marketingsystem so we could scale this
business.
And as it turns out, um, overthe first uh couple of months of
working with the team andseeing what we do and how we
serve people, I fell in lovewith the company.
And I approached a venturecompany and the co-founder said,
(05:58):
hey guys, I understand thecompany and the business model.
Um, I think I am the bestperson to be the CEO of this
organization.
Everybody agreed, and here I amtwo and a half years later.
But talking about the languagepart is I had an understanding
of learning a second languageand its challenges long before I
ever knew about live lingua.
Because part of my degree Ispent uh studying in Germany.
(06:22):
Now, similar to maybe part ofyour education experience, I
spent two and a half yearsstudying German in university
from Calgary.
And I learned more German inthe three to six months I was in
Germany than I did over two anda half years of studying.
And that was my first clue intowhat the power of language can
do.
My confidence went up, right?
(06:44):
My it was a skill nobody couldever take away from me.
And um, I was able tocommunicate with people around
the world um who also spoke someGerman and some English.
Now I wasn't great at German,but come full circle 360
degrees.
I literally was on a in ameeting with an MA company of
Austria.
I was able to open theconversation in German, and I'll
(07:07):
tell you what, the dynamic ofthat meeting changed a hundred
percent.
It was way more collaborativeand participatory from both
sides because I could bridgethat gap between our languages.
Now we didn't host the meetingin German, they spoke very good
English, but the effort and umand connection we made because
we had that in common wasamazing.
(07:28):
So that's kind of my story intoLive Lingua and why we're here
today.
Jay Johnson (07:32):
Well, that's incredible.
And you know, what what anawesome way to kind of like just
take that leap and have thecourage to be like, all right,
this isn't it.
Let's go to the next.
I don't know what the next is,but I'm gonna know that this is
not it.
And I I wish people wouldactually do that more often.
So that's that's reallypowerful, Stacey.
(07:53):
Thank you.
Yeah, for me, and this was aninteresting, this was an
interesting aspect.
Um I thought I had forgotteneverything that I'd been trained
in Spanish, and then uh wasworking with an international
client where I traveled toGuadalajara, Mexico, and within
three days, I did.
(08:14):
I felt like I had I Iremembered a ton of what I
thought was gone.
Um can you talk to me aboutthat?
So, like, what is it that'shappening when we learn
something and then you know,don't use it?
Obviously, it gets a littlerusty, and then that sort of
comes back.
It seems that language is oneof those key aspects that does
(08:37):
that often.
And between your and my sharedstory, it just it's it's
interesting to me.
Stacy Richter (08:43):
There's definitely something there, and
and I'm gonna go on a limb,because I'm not a neuroscientist
by any stretch.
I just maybe a little morewell-read than than a lot of
people on the topic.
But when you think about whatlearning any new skill does, is
the neuroplasticity of thebrain, it rewires your neurons,
make different connections, andit creates these pathways for
(09:04):
that skill to take hold.
So a lot like when you werelearning Spanish, I was learning
German, we were maybe notknowing it at the time, but
we're creating those neuralpathways.
And that has muscles havememory as a result of that.
So if we don't use something,it doesn't 100% atrophy,
eventually does come back,sometimes more quickly in
others, depending on the skill.
(09:25):
So the benefit of that languagelearning is that skill that
nobody can take away from usbecause it will always be there.
Those pathways in our brain arealways going to be there.
We just have to light them up,like going to Guadalajara or
meeting on, you know, getting onan MA meeting with an uh, you
know, an Austrian broker.
Um, we just have to light thosepathways up again.
(09:46):
And it does come back veryquickly.
Not unlike a physical workout,right?
If we go and we have we have askill in a sport, whether it's
hockey, baseball, basketball,whatever it happens to be, or
just working out the gym, whenwe take some time off and we go
back to it, yeah, it might be alittle wobbly at first, but then
the muscles come back, theyhave the memory of all of the
training that we've done.
(10:06):
And language skill is nodifferent.
It just resides in the braininstead of in our biceps and in
our thighs, for example.
Jay Johnson (10:14):
Well, and I love that.
So I as a as a behavioralscientist, I do study
neuroscience and and you're spoton.
And one of the cool things iswhen I was when I was in school,
when I was younger in school,they always said, well, learn a
language as a child because youknow that's the easiest place to
learn.
And and that seems to be true.
(10:34):
And we do know from cognitiveneuroscience that our
neuroplasticity is at itshighest peaks up to the age of
about 23 to 25 years old, giveor take, obviously.
But uh the good thing is iswithin the last several years,
neuroscience has definitelydemonstrated that
neuroplasticity lasts throughoutour entire lives.
(10:56):
So if you have an audience, ifyou have not learned a language
and you want to, don't bediscouraged.
You can teach your dogs newtricks.
But let's talk a little bitabout live lingua because I
think it's important how welearn different things.
And we all have different, say,learning styles or approaches,
um, different learning stylesand approaches.
(11:17):
And a lot of people probablyassume a live language is going
to be something like uh, youknow, Rosetta Stone, where
you're gonna sit behind acomputer and you're gonna learn,
or it's gonna be something likeuh Duolingo, where you sit and
you know do some kind ofapp-based whatever.
But live ling was a little bitdifferent, uh, hence the name.
But go ahead and let's talk alittle bit about that approach.
Stacy Richter (11:38):
Yeah, um, great point, Jay.
When we talk about tech theinflux of technology for
language learning versusconventional language learning,
is um what is the best way orthe fastest way to learn a
language?
And I think it's universallyaccepted that full immersion is
the number one way to learn alanguage.
Pick up, move to a countrywhere that's all they speak.
(12:00):
If it's Spanish, go somewherein Latin America where they
speak very little English ifthat's your first language, and
you will you will learn Spanishvery, very quickly.
You're forced to adapt thatway, and you will learn very
quick.
It's full immersion.
That's not possible for most ofus.
Most of us just can't pick upfor six months, leave our the
comfort of our homes uh inCalgary or you know, otherwise,
(12:23):
and live in the country and justto learn the language.
So the second best way is tosimulate full immersion.
Now, thankfully, theco-founders of Live Lingua had
figured this out many, manyyears before it was even ever
popular.
One of the very first companiesto do an online lesson, and
this is long before Zoom, uh,where we were doing Skype
(12:44):
lessons online, but it was fullimmersion.
So when you're working with anative Spanish-speaking tutor or
a native German-speaking tutor,and all they're talking to you
is in that language, it's a wayto simulate full immersion, but
from the comfort of your homeand your desk.
So when we're talking aboutlive tutoring, that's the second
(13:05):
best way to learn a language isonline immersion with a
native-speaking live tutor whois professionally trained in
teaching, right?
It's not just a matter offinding somebody who knows how
to speak Spanish and can try andteach me Spanish to anybody off
the street.
Because as we mentioned, we allhave different learning styles,
whether it's kinesthetic,auditory, visual.
(13:25):
I'm a very visual person thatit's very important we have a
tutor who's professionallytrained in teaching a second
language, as well as being anative speaker of that.
So that's where we are a lotdifferent than the technologies
that are emerging.
And some of them you've alreadymentioned.
Those are great supplementaltools, but we get more students
who have gone on a 400, 500-daySpanish streak and then realize
(13:50):
when they traveled to LatinAmerica they didn't really know
how to speak Spanish.
And so they come to us say, Ineed help because that didn't
work the way I thought it was.
Uh, so I need help.
And they generally need fullonline immersion to do that.
Jay Johnson (14:04):
Oh, and and that's that's really funny because
yeah, learning from a textbookand then real-world application.
I I'll share a quick story thatI did find funny because not
all Spanish language is thesame.
And in the very, very shorttime that the US was permitted
to travel to Cuba.
Uh, this was a number of yearsago.
(14:25):
My dad had always wanted to go,so I took him to Cuba.
And we had uh we had a homestay with uh a place that you
know had multiple rooms andeverything else like that.
It was an incredibleexperience.
And the the house mother thatwas there, I will never forget,
she was messing with me so badbecause Cuban Spanish is very
fast.
(14:45):
It is very fast.
It's a dialect, there's adifferent, you know, intonation
on specific words.
And I had sort of practicedgeared up, utilizing one of the
apps to try to help me likerecall some of this before I
traveled to Cuba.
And it was just so fascinatingbecause I I was like, if you
slow down, I can actuallyunderstand more of what you're
(15:06):
saying.
And she just sped up on me andjust she was laughing.
She was like, get faster, getfaster.
But I think it's justinteresting that the immersion
aspect of it really brings itout in us.
And I I don't know this forcertain, but you know, as part
of as part of learning and aspart of language, one of the
ways in which our brain learnsis when there's a release of
(15:29):
adrenaline and actuallycortisol.
We think of them as the stresschemicals.
But when we're stressed, isactually when our brain says,
oh, this is important.
We need to retain it, we needto do this.
So the immersion and being in aspace of, hey, I am I'm out of
sorts here.
I I don't know what to do.
I can't read these signs, Ican't do this, puts a little bit
(15:49):
of stress brain and probablycertainly you know intensifies
how quickly we end upremembering, oh, that means
stop, or oh, peligroso, thatmeans danger.
Don't go down that way.
So exactly.
Let's take this to thecorporate side because I I I did
see, you know, and and an afterreview, I think this is where
(16:09):
it becomes really important forour audience, right?
When we're thinking aboutworkplace behaviors, our
workplace is expandingconsistently, whether it's our
customers, our clientele,whether it's our vendors, our
suppliers, or even whether it'sthe coworkers there.
Um, you know, while English hasbecome more universal, there is
still an advantage to speakingin uh multiple different
(16:32):
languages.
So let's talk about that.
What have you seen as CEO ofLive Lingua?
What have you seen across thecorporate landscape and the
importance of uh learning newlanguages or implementing new
languages in the workplace?
Stacy Richter (16:47):
You know, Jay, I've seen a division on two
sides of the same coin.
One is the transactional sideof languages and communicating,
right?
Do you understand the wordsthat I'm saying and the meaning
that I'm giving?
Okay.
That's the transactional side.
And that's generally wheretechnology has really supplanted
live tutoring and generalstudy, because we can handle the
(17:10):
transactional side.
Anybody can jump on GoogleTranslate, right?
Type in what they want to sayin their language and have it
translate into another language.
That's the transactional sideand it has its place.
But when we're talking aboutbusiness at the corporate level,
whether it's small tomedium-sized business that, you
know, I'm workinginternationally with a VA firm
(17:32):
to, you know, for someassistance, or I'm a Fortune 500
and I'm dealing with thousandsof employees all around the
world, is the transformationalside of language learning.
And when I first startedworking with Live Lingua two and
a half years ago, I wasthinking almost initially of the
transactional side at thecorporate level, because right,
we have to deal with peoplecross-border, whether it's US to
(17:55):
Mexico, throughout Europe,Asia, whatever it happened to
be, that there are someemployees that are going to need
to speak the language to beable to communicate.
But that was still reallytransactional.
And when we started workingwith a lot of US firms and
training their teams to speakSpanish or some of their
international teams to improvetheir English, for example, um,
(18:17):
there was an entirely unintendedbenefit that I didn't foresee.
And that was what it did to theteams and the cohesion of those
teams.
I'll give you one example.
We worked with the MedicalServices Center out of
Minnesota, and they strangelyenough have a large influx of
Latin Americans uh in Minnesota,which I would we I would never
(18:38):
have predicted.
Jay Johnson (18:39):
Yeah, I know Scandinavian population because
they like the cold too.
Uh I would not have guessedLatin American population.
Stacy Richter (18:49):
Uh, me neither.
So again, you know, a newsurprise to me, but as a welcome
surprise.
And what they found was thatthey were having difficulty
treating a lot of their patientsbecause of language barrier.
Um, and they relied veryheavily on interpreters where
they'd uh it would take up to anhour, maybe two hours to get an
(19:10):
interpreter on phone.
It was very expensive to do.
And it's and what they werebecause it's such a high-touch
industry in the medicalservices, they were not making a
connection with their patients,right?
They these are people who arecoming from countries where they
generally don't trustinstitutions, whether it's
government or medical.
So to use a languagetransactionally, they weren't
(19:30):
making that connection withtheir patients, and it wasn't
serving anybody.
So we started working with themin Spanish, and of course, they
became better at serving theirpatients because now they're
speaking Spanish, they don'thave to find interpreters and
they're um moving on.
But the unintended benefit thatI never saw coming, Jay, was
when we trained a team of 10 or12 people in a cohort, was now
(19:53):
they found a common mission andthey started practicing on their
own outside of their theirprivate and group classes.
They started using Spanish inthe lunchroom with each other so
they could practice amongsteach other.
And the the uh what's the wordI'm looking for?
The connection the team madejust changed their entire team
(20:15):
dynamic outside of what thetransactional side was doing.
So to be able to offer that toa group of people in a corporate
environment, um, you can onlyimagine how that makes a
corporation uh you know muchmore productive, right?
Their employee retention andengagement is going to go up as
a result because now they havetaught their people or enabled
(20:36):
their people to learn the skillnobody can take away from them
that also happen to actuallyapply to their job.
So there's the two sides of thecoin.
It was the transactional sidethat everybody could see coming,
but it was the transformationalside that like, ah, there's the
magic moment we're all lookingfor.
And and and that's what we tendto focus on when we're working
with small and medium-sizedbusinesses or you know, as as
(20:58):
big as Fortune 500.
Jay Johnson (21:00):
Well, I love that.
And I'll I'll dip into a littleof the behavioral science
behind it.
When a team undergoes a sharedstruggle with a common goal, it
is something that actually canmassively improve motivation,
performance, productivity acrossa number of different sectors.
So now you've created uh, youknow, that opportunity for them
(21:23):
to say, hey, not this isn't thisisn't uh, you know, this isn't
natural for all of us.
We were all started at at sortof zero.
Now it's on us to overcomethis.
And they're doing it not justbecause of their own
self-learning, but they're doingit to create a better positive
impact on the people thatthey're serving.
So that's such a sweet spot ofhuman transformation.
(21:47):
That's that's really powerful.
I I wanted to mention somethingelse that I think is really
fascinating.
So um, I and I I didn't evenmention this to you beforehand.
I didn't think about it untilyou brought it up.
One of my very first focalpoints was cultural
adaptability.
And it was working with umstudents, students who had come
(22:07):
from international, you know,literally how I became a trainer
was students that were comingfrom international to our
university here in Detroit,Michigan, and helping our
university faculty have betterrelationships and interactions
with those student populations.
I translated that to thehealthcare space.
(22:28):
And I've I've probably trainedcultural adaptability with about
six or seven thousand differentworkers in the healthcare
space.
But exactly what you said is sotrue.
We have an entire section onthat designated to how do you
address gaps or languagebarriers?
Because in many, and it's notjust and it's not just Latin
(22:49):
America, in a number ofdifferent um uh uh cultural
minorities in the United States,we do find there's a little
hesitation, and and rightfullyso, a little hesitation towards
uh the healthcare system.
So the fact that you're able tobridge that by um supporting a
team and being able tocommunicate in that native
(23:10):
language is is so powerful.
So uh let's let's take a lookat something else because you
know, if if I'm in the audienceand I'm listening, one of the
things that I'm gonna bethinking to myself is, oh, AI.
AI is gonna help us solve theselanguage issues.
You know, eventually I'm gonnahave a little bug in my ear.
And there already are sometechnologies, albeit I have
(23:32):
tried, I've I've tried at leastone.
It was not effective.
Not effective.
I was actually speaking with aJapanese counterpart and I said
something, and the look on hisface was absolutely surprised.
We discovered uh through aprocess of scientific rigor, we
discovered that I, you know, uhthat I said something that was
(23:54):
probably inappropriate to at thevery least, and we had a great
laugh about it.
Um but I I I won't be uh Iwon't be crude on the podcast,
but uh we do know that there's alot of technological solutions
that are coming that aresupposed to be ideally uh
creating the conditions forreal-time communication.
(24:15):
Do you think that that'll evertake away the need for us to
learn languages or for us to bemore uh global in our
communication patterns?
Stacy Richter (24:26):
I'm so glad you asked that question because Jay,
this is something I'vestruggled with over the last two
and a half years and evenbefore, is the technology
pendulum, which ways of swingingand how far does it go?
You know, the short answer tothe question is no, I don't
think it will decrease or takeaway from our need uh for
actually learning a language.
Uh, and if anything, it's goingto increase the need.
(24:48):
Because the technology pendulumhas flung so far to the right
that AI was the exclusivesolution, whether it's some of
the apps you talked about orsome of the you know evergreen
programs you could take forself-study.
And the pendulum swung so farthat way that people lost, and
and COVID amplified this really,lost that desire for a human
connection, right?
(25:09):
This person to person, um, eventhough we're on a screen on a
video, we still have aconnection because I'm not
talking to my phone, right?
It's even better thanteleconferencing.
But we're starting to see thependulum start to swing back to
this human connection piecebecause at the end of the day,
we are emotional creatures.
And the the phone is notemotional with us.
(25:32):
So we do need thatunderstanding and connection
from another individual and asentient being that gets it.
So I don't think that it's evergoing to replace what we do
with live tutoring or actuallanguage learning.
And I I'm gonna go out on alimb and say it's actually gonna
increase the need because whatI love about technology,
(25:52):
depending on whether or not Iwant to look at it as a threat
or an enabler in my business, isthat it has brought hundreds
and millions of people tolanguage learning that otherwise
would not have ever exploredit.
Right?
To you know, take the time tosit at your desk and jump on a
call with a live tutor once ortwice a week is a commitment,
(26:14):
not just financially, but acommitment of time and and
energy.
But to jump on an app for fiveminutes, practice some
vocabulary, the transactionalside, that's brought millions of
people thinking that I want tolearn how to speak Spanish.
I want to learn how to speakGerman.
This is just where I start.
Otherwise, they would neverhave started.
And it lights that languagelearning fire, they start to get
(26:37):
a the taste of what it is tolearn some of the language.
Maybe they also, you know, arewatching their favorite movie,
and there's a little excerpt inthere where they're speaking
German, like I'm a big diehardfan.
So there's I love when theGerman parts come up because
like I know exactly what hesaid, right?
Maybe they get they get thattaste of, oh my God, I
understood that one sentencebecause I practice the
(26:59):
vocabulary, I want more of that.
And then they start to findavenues in their life to apply
it.
Now they start meeting otherpeople who speak the language,
and it's about that person toperson.
So where I think technology andum live tutoring, the way we
deliver it, um, there's anintersection or enablers for
each other, and people willeventually transition from the
(27:21):
AI, you know, self-studyprograms into jumping into uh an
immersion style program andsay, I actually want to do this.
Now it's not everybody, that'sfor sure, but it's it has opened
up for hundreds of millions ofpeople who otherwise would never
have even thought they wantedto learn another language.
Jay Johnson (27:39):
Yeah.
No, that makes total sense.
And I I I would agree withthat.
I think in many cases,technology, technology is like
the nutra suite of, I'm gonnacall it the nutra suite of
connection, right?
Like we feel like we'reconnected because of social
media, AI, whatever it is, butit's not the same as true human
interaction.
(27:59):
It doesn't, and even just froma neurobiological standpoint, it
doesn't actually trigger thesame depth of neurotransmitters
when you and I are face to faceshaking hands or you know,
sitting around a coffee table.
So I I agree with that 100%.
The other thing, as you weretalking, I thought about of, you
know, it and I'm I'm I'm tryingto think about how this
(28:23):
functions within the world oftechnology, but let's play the
play the game of I'm doingsomething in maybe one of the
apps or I'm utilizing uh ChatGPT to do some translation for
me.
I would imagine that whenworking with, and and I've had
the luxury of speaking in about40 different countries at this
point in time, many, manydifferent languages.
(28:44):
Uh body language is somethingthat's semi-universal in many
aspects, but there's a lot ofdifferent nuances in a lot of
different cultures.
And I'm thinking of my Germancolleagues, and you know, cross
your fingers here in the US islike cross your fingers that it
works.
And in Germany, it's press yourthumbs, you know, press thumbs.
And I found that to be likewhat as I was learning, but I
(29:08):
would have never gotten thatwithout immersion, without being
there, without seeing them dosomething.
Oh, we've got to press, becauseit's just not something that
you're gonna learn in an app orin a GPT or some of that sort of
cultural nuance of even thingslike sarcasm or other things.
I would imagine that livelingua does a great job having
(29:29):
it be that immersive thing ofkind of picking up on some of
those cultural aspects as well.
Can you speak to that maybe alittle bit?
Stacy Richter (29:37):
Yeah, absolutely.
Uh, talking about the culturalaspects, context means so much.
And when I first started atLive Lingua and exited, uh, the
CEO, the co-founder, and hispartner, he said to me, He's
like, Stacey, this is myphilosophy on language learning.
He's like, You truly understanda language when you can tell
somebody a joke in their nativelanguage and they get it, they
(29:59):
laugh, right?
Because there's so much contextthere.
Um, and that's exactly it.
So the with full immersion,right?
If we talk about the best wayto learn a language is to pick
yourself up and move somewherewhere they don't speak your
native language and they onlyspeak the language you want to
learn, maybe it's moving toColombia.
Um, the challenge is I can onlylearn that dialect from those
(30:21):
people with online immersion.
If I get exposure to lots ofdifferent tutors across lots of
different geographies, LatinAmerica being one, as you
mentioned, Spanish is just notSpanish.
There's Spanish in Mexico, eventhroughout Mexico, it's
different.
If you go, you know, from theYucatan to Mexico City, it is
still different.
German is the same.
Jay Johnson (30:42):
You've got high German and low German area, you
have yeah, down in uh Berlin andtotally totally.
Stacy Richter (30:49):
So we have a student who's taking online
tutoring in an immersionenvironment has the ability to
say, okay, I've met with a tutorfrom Colombia, I've taken some
classes.
What about a tutor fromArgentina?
What about a tutor from Mexico?
What about a tutor uh inBarcelona?
And we can get all of thoseaspects and context of all the
(31:10):
different types of Spanish andyou know, some of the nuances of
what they how they say.
The exact same thing.
And why, most importantly, whythey're different.
Because it's so linked to theculture and history.
It's not just that they saysomething different, right?
There's a reason why we saycross your fingers in North
America and in Germany they saypress your thumbs.
And it's nothing to do withjust being different.
(31:32):
There's a cultural developmentthere.
And by being involved with aperson who has grown up there,
which is important that they'rea native speaker, right?
They've grown up culturally,they know all the context.
They can share all of that withyou in the moment, in the
moment that matters.
Because the way one of the bestways we learn as we don't as
(31:52):
adults, and you mentioned thisearlier, children learn a
certain way, and adults canlearn just differently, is we
have to have context to be ableto embed that into our learning
style faster.
So it means using words andconversations, we we're not
naturally going to talk about.
If I'm a fan of baseball and wejust had the World Series, I
(32:13):
will learn more talking aboutbaseball topics in Spanish than
I will trying to memorize a listof related words and
conjugations of verbs.
So that is a big piece of thatis we get the context and the
practice of something thatmatters to us, we'll remember
and retain, and of course beable to retrieve a hundred times
(32:36):
faster if it has meaning forus.
So that's what online immersiondoes, that we have that level
of flexibility from multipletutors and areas, uh, as well as
giving us our own context.
Jay Johnson (32:47):
I love that because I have and I've been to a
number of different Spanishspeaking countries, and in each
of them it does.
It takes my ear at least acouple of days to be able to
kind of pick up the nuances ofdifferent things.
So being able to do that isthat's a pretty cool, that's a
pretty cool opportunity.
So let's let's kind of take itfrom here because me personally,
(33:11):
I so I have a uh a behavioralelements program.
We've got 14 guides indifferent countries.
And obviously, I could look andsay, wow, it'd be really great
if I started to learn differentlanguages that I could speak
with these different guides.
But let's take it to just therandom person that might be
listening, who's not the CEO ofa company, who's maybe their
(33:34):
interactions, they have someinteractions with a customer who
speaks Spanish.
Okay.
Uh what would you say to thatperson to say, hey, take this,
this is what it's going to dofor you as an individual, not
your company, not whatever.
This is the impact it's gonnahave on you as a person by
learning a language and maybebeing able to communicate with
(33:54):
your client, customer, whomeverit is, a little bit more in
their language.
What does that look like?
Stacy Richter (34:00):
Man, uh, as an individual, what the language
learning, and I'll use my ownpersonal example.
As I mentioned, I I'm not apolyglot, I'm not a professional
language learner.
I don't speak and learn eightdifferent languages as a
profession or career.
I learned German many, manyyears ago.
I've lost it because I wasn'table to practice and keep it up.
I am actually learning Spanishright now myself.
(34:21):
My entire team is in LatinAmerica.
I'm the only one who's notfluent in Spanish.
So I am learning just likeeverybody else at a beginner
level.
So if we want to say, what doesthis outside of my career, what
does this do for meindividually?
Um, well, my because I'mburning those neural pathways
that we talked about, my problemsolving is 10 times faster than
(34:42):
what it was six months ago.
My creative thinking isprobably a hundred times better
than what it was six months ago.
And of course, my confidencehas gone up, even though I'm
barely conversational, Jay.
I'm not talking we have to gofull fluency to get the benefits
of language learning.
It's I'm barely conversational,but my confidence has gone up
(35:04):
tenfold because I can start aconversation with my entire
team, who are all Spanishtutors, by the way, so they know
their stuff.
Uh, I can feel comfortablestarting a conversation there.
So outside of just thecommunication and connection
with an individual who'sspeaking another language, it's
all of the things that it doesfor me individually because I'm
(35:27):
taking on a skill that'sdifficult to do, it's
uncomfortable, uh, it requires alittle bit of work, but it's
something nobody can ever takeaway from me.
So my problem solving isbetter, creativity is better,
and my self-confidence.
unknown (35:39):
Right?
Stacy Richter (35:40):
Not unlike going to a gym.
One of the things aboutlanguage learning that you know
I'll pass on to your audiencehere is it's a skill nobody can
take away from you, but it'salso a skill nobody can do for
you.
You can't outsource it and youcan't delegate it.
So if you want that, thebenefits of creativity and
problem solving, and of courseyou get to communicate with
(36:00):
people from another country intheir own language, um, the
language skill is absolutelyamazing.
Jay Johnson (36:06):
I love that.
And you know, it's interestingthat you say that about
curiosity or uh creativity inparticular, because one of the
things I I've got a couple offriends who are are linguists
and polyglots and speak eight,nine, ten different languages,
everything else.
And when I'd had aconversation, because I studied
communication, but it was thecommunication theory and
(36:28):
practice and science, et cetera.
Uh, but getting a betterunderstanding of like even how
specific languages shapeparticular words is because of,
you know, even the most simpleone is that there's a masculine
and a feminine version of wordsin particular languages.
Okay, well, what does thatmean?
Where did that come from?
How did that develop?
(36:49):
There's a history and anarchitecture that comes from
that that really does have likea beauty to it across different
languages, but being able tokind of switch between those
different places.
One of the others I justrecently learned, there's a word
in Japanese that is veryspecific.
And I thought this is inrelation to like emotional
intelligence.
There's a word in Japanesethat's and I couldn't tell you
(37:12):
what it is, but it's aparticular word that is the
emotion you feel when you get abad haircut.
And uh, you know, I do knowthat there's particular words in
German like Schadenfraud, uh,the feeling that you have of
excitement and glee oversomebody else's misfortune.
There's cool nuances that wecan actually even have a better
(37:36):
understanding of our ownemotional systems through
languages of others.
So that creativity, that sortof like critical thinking, super
powerful.
Thank you for that.
Let's switch gears.
What about the business, thebusiness objective?
You know, we you talked alittle bit about the healthcare
space of like, all right, you'regonna get better patient
(37:57):
satisfaction scores.
You might be able to provepatient interactions, and
ideally you're gonna end upimproving patient health
outcomes because of these bettercommunication and better
interactions and betterfostering of trust between each
other.
What about other businesses?
What would be the business casefor say, I am uh I'm the CEO of
my company and I'm gonnainvest, or maybe one of my
(38:18):
employees comes to me and says,Hey, it would be great if we
could all learn this language.
Will you invest in ourprofessional development?
What's the business case forsomething of this nature?
Stacy Richter (38:28):
Yeah, and I think where you're going with that,
Jay, is what's the straight upROI?
If I'm gonna put in X, youknow, when does Y pay off?
And that that's a big question,it always comes up because at
the end of the day, you know,we're investing in our people.
There should be a return onthat.
And some uh direct investmentshave direct returns, um, right?
Dollar in, dollar out.
(38:48):
I I can give you a couple ofdifferent examples, but I'll
focus on one.
We've we have a manufacturingassociation client out of Ohio,
and this is their story, notmine.
And uh I'll share what I canbecause you know it was in
confidence, but one of the whenI asked them why they started
working with us, the gentlemansaid, you know what?
Um, we have clients andpartners in Mexico, and they all
(39:11):
speak really good English, andwe're you know, we've been
working with them for years.
And he's like, I was downthere, down in Mexico at an
event, meeting with the CEO, andthis is what the CEO said to
him again.
I'll clean up the language fromwhat he told me.
He's like, You come down hereand expect us to know English
perfectly, but you won't evenmake an attempt to learn our
(39:31):
culture and understand us.
And it hit him, right?
Then in there, he's like,You're so right, right between
the eyes, right?
That's the polite version, andand that's why he said, Yeah, uh
I'm gonna go out and learnSpanish.
And he's he's one of our beststudents.
Um, he started with usindividually and said, My team
needs to do this too.
(39:52):
And as a result, we ended uptraining 10 or 12 of the his
team members, and the directresult of that within a year,
and and I'm not saying we arethe catalyst 100%, but they are
end up opening up distributioncenters in Mexico.
Now they've been working onthat, but I I can tell you
definitively that even justbeing somewhat conversational in
(40:15):
Spanish and showing that you'remaking this effort to
understand language and cultureum can directly be attributed to
having a better relationshipand closing a deal that it might
have eventually closed, but I'mpretty sure it closed a little
faster and that the operationsrun a little smoother.
So uh when we're talking aboutbusiness development and sales,
(40:37):
that that's uh the direct ROIfor the business case of, hey, I
need to train some of my peopleon how to speak this second
language because we're dealingin these markets.
Right?
That's that's probably thebiggest ROI factor outside of
all the soft skills and thingswe can talk about.
Jay Johnson (40:55):
Well, and it's interesting because I do a lot
of work in the manufacturingspace, and I do find it to be
interesting that you can havetwo groups, uh supplier and you
know, uh whomever and OEM thatare working together, that both
are located in Ohio andMichigan, both English as the
(41:16):
primary and native language, andstill have so many
miscommunications between themjust because of the natural, the
natural problems or flaws thatare built within the
communication systems.
So now you add the complexityof two different languages to
it, two differentinterpretations, two different
functions, et cetera.
And a lot can go wrong in thatmanufacturing space.
(41:37):
It makes a lot of sense.
And, you know, where precisionand quality are concerned, we
definitely want some precisionand quality in our
communication.
So all right.
Well, this has been afascinating discussion.
We've not actually addressedthis on this show.
Um, but you know, behavior,communication is a big aspect of
(41:58):
behavior and connection, we dotalk a lot about relationships.
We've never really addressedwhat does it look like to think
about how can we behave in a waythat would connect with people
more, especially by learningtheir language, because it seems
like such a big challenge.
So I'm gonna ask one morequestion.
How do you help people get overthe idea?
(42:19):
Because when you think aboutlike, all right, learning,
learning can be difficult byitself.
As a talent development person,as somebody who has studied
adult learning, it can be scary.
There's a lot of uncertainty,it's change, it's hard, it's
practice.
I do the first week and I'mlike, ah, I'm terrible at this.
I don't want to do it anymorebecause it's uncomfortable.
(42:40):
How do you help somebodynavigate that motivation?
Because I think a lot of peoplewould love to speak many
languages, but never take thatfirst step because they're
afraid or because it's hard.
How do you motivate them tokind of take that first step?
Stacy Richter (42:56):
The first step is is actually the easiest part.
It's the last mile that'sdifficult, right?
So the first step is everybodywants to try and is willing to
try.
And I and I'll say the firststep um, you know, is generally
for most people the biggest, butfrom our perspective, it's
generally the easiest.
So to get somebody to take thefirst step, um, it's all about
(43:20):
try, try before you buy, right?
So we do uh lots of differentoptions to try group classes for
free, take a few different umprivate classes for free, and
experience what it's like to beon a language learning class,
because that dispels all of theprejudgments most people have
about what it's like to learn alanguage with a live tutor.
(43:40):
Because what most people willfind when they think about
learning a language, it's oh,I'm gonna get a vocabulary list,
I'm gonna have to memorize 20words for my next class, the
conjugations of all the verbs,the the um the genders of all
the nines.
That's exactly it.
And we know that doesn't work,right?
(44:01):
But what people find out iswhen they can try something with
zero risk and zero expectation,and most importantly, zero
judgment, then they are so muchmore open to the experience.
Then they find out how much funit really is to start learning
a language.
Because as we talked about allyou know already today, it's the
(44:21):
context.
We're talking about topics weknow and enjoy talking about,
whether you enjoy knitting, yousports, you know, whatever you
you do for work.
And that's the emergence styleto become conversational, is
talking about things you know.
So then you learn thevocabulary of words you use
every day in your nativelanguage.
You're gonna learn those wordsand their context in the other
(44:42):
language, and that becomes fun.
And when something becomes fun,it now encourages repeat
behavior, as you you know verywell know more about behavioral
science than anybody.
So um, that's the key is trybefore you buy, and it has to be
fun when they get there, whichis why when we talk about some
of the apps you talked about,they've made language learning
(45:04):
extremely fun, right?
The the cortisol and thedopamine hits you were talking
about earlier flooded with thosetypes of emotions from playing
those games.
They're designed to do that.
What they're not designed to dois help us actually retain and
learn the language.
So if we can make it, if wemake it fun and contextual
within that that person's lifeexperience, that's the
(45:26):
difference.
That's what keeps them comingday in, day out, looking forward
to doing homework, if you canbelieve that.
Looking forward to doingexercises and practicing because
they're uh the speed of theresults goes way faster when we
get to talk about things that weknow, like, and trust.
Jay Johnson (45:43):
Love that.
Such a such a great answer.
And I'm gonna add one thing toit.
Yeah, and this is for theaudience.
Do the hard thing.
Less than 2% of the people takethe stairs.
And it's those people thatoften build up strength,
resiliency, perseverance, andall the things that make us
successful in both life and thework.
(46:05):
So even if it gets hard, do thehard thing.
It will build your resilience.
So, Stacy, that was a perfectanswer.
I love the idea of jumping inthere and just enjoying the
experience, and particularlyfrom that immersive standpoint,
I think is such a unique andnovel way to really engage and
to learn.
So uh, Stacy, if our audiencewanted to get in touch with you,
(46:29):
learn more about live lingua,how would they reach out?
Stacy Richter (46:32):
So, anybody who wants to reach me personally,
you can find me on LinkedIn.
Um, my handle is the real StacyRichter, S-T-A-C-Y.
There's no E, S T A C Y R I C HT E R.
You can find me on LinkedIn,connect with me there, send me a
DM for anything related to LiveLingua and programs.
You can find us at livelingua.com, our website, and
(46:55):
live lingua across all socialmedia handles, uh including
LinkedIn.
So reach out to us on any ofthose channels.
Jay Johnson (47:02):
So this has been an awesome conversation.
Definitely something a little,I don't want to say out of my
comfort zone, but I, you know,the flashbacks of not being able
to execute language as properlyas I wish I could.
Uh, no, this is this has reallybeen wonderful, Stacy.
So thank you for coming on,sharing your expertise and
sharing your wisdom andopportunity with our audience
(47:22):
today.
Stacy Richter (47:23):
Thanks, Jay.
I had so much fun talking withyou and looking forward to
hearing from some people at theTalent Forge.
That'd be amazing.
Jay Johnson (47:30):
Awesome.
And thank you, audience, fortuning into this episode of the
Talent Forge, where together weare shaping workforce behaviors.
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