[Music]
anyway
i'm going to start with a cliche
introduction to better explain mental
models i have two truths and one lie
i grew up in a 99 caucasian country and
made up the other one percent of the
population
when i was running my company in asia
every business meeting started with
people assuming i was my co-founder's
assistant
my co-founder was a white male american
when i was living in the u.s people
asked me if the czech republic was in
euro asia or if it was chechnya or china
and now i just lied to you because all
three stories are true there's no lie
let's define mental models
a mental model is simply a
representation of how something works it
is based on beliefs not facts we cannot
keep all of the world's information in
our brain so we use models to help us
simplify the complex into understandable
chunks
studies have shown that we make a
decision on someone in the first few
seconds after we meet them our brains
are wired to identify threats and to
help us determine whether the person we
just met poses any danger to us
snap decisions are important because we
have to categorize in order to be able
to move on to make other more important
decisions
imagine if we never categorized we would
never be able to get through the day we
especially move on fast when we see
things that are familiar things that
we've seen before
so if my best friend is italian i'm
probably going to like the next italian
person that i meet
if i've been to china i'm
probably going to like the next chinese
person that i meet and i'm probably
going to walk up to them and say hey i
was just in china last summer i love
your food
if it's someone that reminds me of me i
tend to like them more
but what about the opposite
mental models are not useful when they
result in damaging consequences
especially when it comes to college
acceptance job interviewing or housing
when we move too fast and judge based on
familiarity
and are less willing to accept things
that don't fit our mental model
discrimination and lack of diversity
occurs
so how was i going to explain to anyone
that i'm from europe
my mother tongue is czech i dream and
curse and check my english is fluent not
because it's the country's official
language but because i went to a british
school
my vietnamese parents speak some broken
check don't speak any english and did
not go to college but i graduated from a
top us university and i can have a
pretty decent conversation with you
about u.s politics and why thanksgiving
is so important to americans
i couldn't do the same with vietnamese
or czech current affairs
i'm familiar with vietnamese culture
thanks to my parents but i probably
could not name vietnamese dishes at
least probably like five of them
when i eat asian noodles on a plate i
always use a fork
i get a little disappointed when people
look at me and automatically just assume
i am just asian
they don't take into consideration that
i'm also a really proud born and raised
european who has spent the majority of
her adult life living in the u.s
and by the way when i first meet someone
i don't really want to be talking to you
about those things
i want to talk about my interest or your
interest
in other words you are not complimenting
me when you tell me that you like
vietnamese people and vietnamese food
over the years i learned to tailor my
behavior based on the person that i
would be speaking to
was it going to be someone who hasn't
interacted with many international
people if so i would be asked where are
you from i would say the czech republic
and they then they would ask where are
you really from
we all know this extremely annoying
question right
or was it going to be an older asian
traditional male
who believes in hierarchy and in a
male-dominated culture and in women
being submissive
i would secretly tell myself to not show
my real side too much the side that is
assertive and dominant and a little
rebellious i would tell myself to just
keep it quiet
or was it going to be someone who would
be willing to see me for who i was
was she or he willing to look at
my work my thoughts or how nicely i just
treated them
before she or he defaults to their
mental model
were they willing to change their
existing mental model after meeting
me some extent i understand
i am not the majority in almost any
environment
i probably don't fit your mental model
it is not humanly possible for anyone
including myself to approach every new
thing without any preconceived notion
so i want to be
understanding and adapt to you too i
think it's extremely important to be
understanding of other people by the
same time
i want to encourage you to consider
these four tips the next time you're
talking
to a stranger like me
ask questions other than where are you
from
i don't think there's anything
inherently wrong with that question i
just think that there are better
questions you can ask
like where did you grow up
accept the answer they give you if you
decide to ask where are you from
accept it
don't go further don't try to figure out
who the parents are what the heritage is
what is the ethnicity let the person
answer the question the way they want to
enter
and then respect it if they decide not
to disclose their entire family tree
with you
do not assume do not assume that because
i am asian i have a lot of asian friends
that because i am a woman i like to get
my nails done that because
you are older only you have something to
teach me
i can't believe i'm saying this
should be obvious
let people reveal themselves to you
ask them questions and then let them
guide you
people love talking about themselves
so if
it's someone who loves to talk about
their country of birth and their
ethnicity you will find out pretty
quickly
in that case you should ask more
but sometimes
there are people who are tired of having
to explain themselves
if you see no indication
that that's what the person wants to
talk about
telling them that you also know someone
from their country
or the country of their parents
isn't going to break the ice
the greatest gift we can give to anyone
is to let them be who they are not who
we want them to be
thank you
you