Welcome to the FOCUS St. Louis Leadership Podcast. Today we are recording from Missouri Athletic Club in downtown St. Louis and I am super excited about our guest today. I've been wanting to have her on a podcast for roughly about ten years now and so but I think we're arriving just on time. We just concluded earlier on today our Women's History Month Breakfast, and she was one of our panelists.
If you haven't met this woman, you need to meet her because she has had a very fascinating and very educational, very reflective experience in terms of your leadership journal, leadership journey. But without further ado, please join me in welcoming Ruth Kim, who is the chief legal officer. She knows it all at none other than FleishmanHillard, Inc., which is a global, global institution. So thank you for joining us today. Thank you for having me. So where do where do I start?
You know, I was I was trying to figure out what are some of the questions that I can ask you that would be fascinating based on your LinkedIn post. If you do not follow her. Check her out on LinkedIn. As you always write book chapters. And they're very they read like a prose and I'm like, my goodness, if I could have written that. But the lesson there you are, a champion of our region. You're always seeking to highlight small businesses.
You're seeking to also highlight the great work that corporations, organizations and a lot of nonprofit institutions are doing in town. But I'm going to start out with an easy question. Okay. What brings you Joy? Just about everything. I, I love my job. I love my family. I love my dogs. I love the city. I love my friends. I think that you can always find something not good in any situation. But I think if you look for the joy, you will always find it.
If you look for the moment or the pop of joy, you will always find it. That is a great approach. You know, when people look at failures, they oftentimes might think it's the end of the road for them. But it sounds like what you're saying is, you know, fail forward. It's a lesson. Well, actually, you put that way more eloquently than I would have. But yes, I think that you can cry and you can beat yourself up a little bit for failing because we all are ambitious. We all want to do better.
But if you don't learn something from it and you don't take something away from it, then the failure was just a full failure. That is so true. So you mentioned in our earlier discussion here before we started recording about the fact that you have been in this field for quite some time now and we shall not talk about how many years that has been. Okay. Decades. Yes. But can you share with us maybe one or two pivotal moments in your leadership journey? Yeah, as I mentioned in the breakfast talk.
So many of us go into our practice feeling the imposter syndrome, and we're not imposters. We are just learning. And we don't realize that it's okay not to know everything. One of the most pivotal moments I had was when I took a job moving from private practice into in-house counsel, and I was going to go in as the assistant general counsel, and within six months of my starting, the then general counsel left the company.
So the president, chairman of the company, met with me and he said, I would like to think about promoting you to general counsel, but I don't know you. You're not ready. So let's give it two years. And in the interim, we'll call you chief counsel and we'll see whether you have what it takes. And I had never done this before, but this time I decided to do this. And it made all the difference, I said in a very shaky, nervous voice to him. Right.
I understand that you're my boss and I have to follow your instruction and you get to boss me around and tell me what to do. And then my voice really started to shake when I said, But there's also a second part to that. You also as my boss have to support me, and if I fail - you own part of that, if I succeed, you own part of that. And because I need you to help guide me in terms of excuse me when we're meeting, when I'm doing things, if I'm not doing that well, I need to know from you.
And so it made me really nervous to tell him that he owned part of my failure. And he got really quiet and he looked at me and he said, You know, I guess you're right. And so we made a pact where we would meet regularly after meetings and so forth to talk about how I was doing. And one of the things that happened that was really a teaching moment for me or learning moment was I was in a meeting and he was talking and I thought the meeting was going a little bit off the rails.
And so I spoke up and I said what I thought should happen. And the meeting ended. And after the meeting he called me into his office so that we would do a postmortem to talk about how I did. And he said, You did something in that meeting that I don't want you ever to do again. And I said, oh my gosh, What? And he said, You contradicted me in front of our management team. Wow. And you and I need to look aligned.
And he said, Don't get me wrong, you are right to tell me when you think I'm off the rails, but I don't want you to do it in a public meeting. I want you to do it. You can always come in and tell me. You can always tell me your thoughts. I am never telling you not to do that, but please don't do it in front of the other team members because it looks like you and I are not aligned and we need to go out to the world aligned. And I was I told him, I'm so sorry. I didn't even think.
And he said, Ruth, we hired you because you're smart. We know you're smart. You don't have to worry about proving that you're smart in a meeting. And I thought about that and his advice about not always trying to be the smartest person in the room has spared me so many career setbacks and challenges and difficulties, and I never did it again. I always went in after the meeting and talked to him about what I thought.
And at the end of the first year, he called me into his office and said, Well, you know, I think we should do a review. I said, It's early. We we're going to do this two years into my chance. And he said, You know, you have been the easily the most challenging direct report I've ever had. And I thought, this is not going well. And he said, But you've also been the most rewarding and satisfying. I've learned a lot back, not only about my own style, but about managing, too.
And so I'm going to promote you to general counsel a year early. Oh my gosh. So the lesson in that is to have that courageous conversation, right? Yes. And the fact that your boss pulled you aside, didn't fire you, although that was the expectation that you probably had, but used it as a learning opportunity not just for you, but also for your boss at that time as well. And I think the fact that we had talked about how we wanted to I had never reported to a corporate person.
He hadn't had a general counsel lawyer report to him because the last general counsel reported to the parent company. So it was a new experience for both of us. And when I had the upfront conversation to say, I'm going to make mistakes, I need your support, I need you to give me feedback along the way. Because if I don't succeed, it will be because I didn't know that and it's shared. Consequently you own part of that. Yes.
And when he was quiet for a second after I said, You own part of my failure, if I fail, I thought I really went too far. I should not have said that. But he was wonderful. Wow. So I know family is very important to you and have been very instrumental to you in your leadership journey. What can you share with us about the basic foundations that was imparted on you from when you were yea high?
I think what is really interesting and we heard Barack Obama say this, is that when a child feels unconditional love, they can go out and do anything. It is when they feel that the love is conditional or situational or has to be worked at, that they have insecurity in the world. And I always felt through growing up unconditional love from my parents. Interestingly, in the Korean culture, you don't say, I love you, I love you a lot.
Well, I would see my American friends when their parents would drop them off at school. The parents would say, I love you, and the kids would say, I love you back. My parents and I never said that, but I never doubted it. My mom said things like, you know, if you kids are ever in trouble and you've done something really, really bad, no matter how bad, come home to me because I will hide you. Right. And so I knew from that that there was nothing I could do to unearn my mother's love.
And I and my parents love. And I never tried to. But the other thing that does for you, is you see them working so hard, you see them giving you unconditional love and you don't want to let them down. So when you don't care about yourself and you're doing things that are maybe personally reckless or personally thoughtless, you stop and think, Will this break my parents heart? Will this embarrass them? Will this mar the family name? And it causes you to self-correct.
So I think everything really springs from unconditional love. That is so true. And I would just say now that you have truly characterized how the relationship of myself and my parents were, It just wasn't when I was growing up to say, I love you, but you knew deep down implicitly that they loved you and they did everything for you to make sure that you had opportunity and exposure and experience. So I'm going to turn the question on you.
What do you do with your daughter to because you have a little one. Yes, I do. What are you doing as you see her form? And it's a big responsibility. And it is. It is. It's very scary because she is an independent little three and a half year old and she's talking now and just the way in which she's, you know, giving directives to mommy and daddy. And we know a directive is coming when we hear you guys. I'm thinking, where did that come from? But she is - - adorable. Yes.
She is fiercely independent and very complimentary of folks. And she looks at - - Did she learn that from you guys? Where did she pick that up? I would say yes. And so she looked at my mom yesterday and she says, Grandma, you look beautiful. And that just made my mom just beam. And it made your heart explode a little, right? It made my heart explode. Absolutely. That wow, she's watching our behavior and modeling it. Although there are some times when we say you don't listen. So guess what?
When she's talking to us and we don't pay attention to her, she'll say, mommy or no, she'll say, Mom, dad, which means pay attention to me. You're not listening. And we're now into the why phase. Why? And so it's interesting. Well wait until you get into the teenager phase phase, which is the one monosyllabic grunt answer or just the What are you doing today? I don't know. Who are you going out with? I don't care. What do you want for dinner? Whatever. Yeah. Who did you see today? No one.
What did you learn in school today? No, nothing. But they outgrow that, too. Because, again, the lesson of just being constant, you don't give in. You don't let them feel like you're. You've given up on them because they're being jerky. It's an amazing ride. And it's amazing trip. But I think when you look at someone like Barack Obama and see where he ended up and his telling, part of the reason he is there is because of the unconditional love
he felt, whether it was from his mother or grandparents. Yes. And it doesn't just have to be from a parent. So I think that is really part of what informs me and what informs the way I move about in this world, too. That is that is so true. Every day I look at her and I go, Wow, you are growing up pretty quickly. And she's like a mini me.
And in her, she went to a birthday party not too long ago and she was trying to corral all the other attendees there to take photos because she knows how Mom loves to take photos and she's like, kids gather around. And I said, Kids gather. Okay. And all the parents were just like, Who is she? She is a mini you. Yes. And I said, That is my daughter and I am proud of her. So let's talk about how you navigate work life balance because you work for a global company.
And I'm sure there are times that there is that travel involved. There is travel. There are long hours. It's interesting because I think when people say I need a balanced life, to think that you're going to get 8 hours of work, 8 hours of play, 8 hours of sleep is just misguided. I really throw myself into my work when I'm there. And the satisfying thing about my job is every night when I go home, I feel like I put in a good day's work. I feel like I earned my paycheck.
There's nothing worse than going through the movements and feeling like you didn't deserve to get paid for what you did. Right. But the way I navigate is I don't do it in hour segments. I do it sort of in buckets. If I spent two weeks really slamming on a project at work and I’ve sort of neglected or not given enough time and attention to my home and family, I make sure that I focus on that when I can.
Because the thing about my job being the chief legal officer of a global company is there are times when it's 7:00 at night and I just want to be offline and done. And I see a call come in from Asia and it's seven in the morning there and they really need help. So you can't just say, see ya, I'm it's my night time. Sure. So sometimes you stay on and you work, but part of which is our personalities is that we want to help. And so if somebody has a problem and comes to us, we want to help. Right?
And we have to make the conscious effort to turn off the switch. So I had a night where I worked through the night with Hong Kong until three in the morning, and it was three in the afternoon in Hong Kong. So I went offline and I saw something come on and it was London who was 6 hours ahead. So it was 9 a.m. in the morning there and they needed something. So they kept me online until three in the afternoon and I said, I am really not good for anything anymore. I'm so tired, I need to be done.
But then a call came in from New York. Wow. And so in a span of working 24 hours and then into the next day, at the end of that day, I said, I'm done. I have to go home. I have to get rest. I'm not useful to anybody in this state of mind. And I went home. And so you manage your time. And I think a lot of it is attitude that you don't let it get to you, that if you get mad about it, you're just that that's going to compound the frustration and the angst and the irritation about it.
So you kind of take it for what it is. And I also understand I'm the chief legal officer of a global company, so a lot comes with that territory. You're always on call. Yeah, but you know when to set those boundaries and let them know that you have for that day reached the end of productivity. Yep. And it's wonderful to have a great partner. I have a spouse who is a lawyer also, so he gets it, but he also gets me. He knows that I am a very type-A person. He is not.
He is calm and I am more excitable. But the thing that we both have in common is when we're under crises or really big demand, we just draw it in. And I might get excitable about something small. That doesn't matter. But if it is really a big deal, I have watched him and I have also become that person that sort of coalesces everything, drills down focuses and just gets it done.
So I have dogs and I have gardening and I love going to the botanical garden and the art museum and the arch and showing friends and people around and there are wonderful restaurants and places to go in St Louis. We're a wonderful food city, so I make a point of doing all those things and I like being civically involved. So let's talk about the St Louis region. I happen to believe that you are one of the biggest, greatest ambassadors of our region. What is your hope for our region?
I feel like we may be in a renaissance right now that St. Louis has tried to do this many times and then slid back, tried and slid back. But we have so many wonderful things happening now. And St Louis was once, what, the 26th, the 27th city in the country? Yes. And it was a site of river transport. A railway, a railway hub, an airline hub. I would like us to and I think we're moving toward it. I agree.
Be viewed again as a vibrant hub and with the Nat Geo that is going on with Cortex T rex 39 North, the innovation in tech with our city being known as one of the best places for college graduates to go, one of the most welcoming cities to LGBTQ, to immigrants and refugees. I feel like we have so much opportunity and we have world class organizations like our wonderful director, Jody Sowell.
Yeah, the History Museum and Min Jung Kim of the Art Museum are bringing national and international acclaim to these treasures where they have said St Louisans We have the stuff. How did you not know, right? And so I'm hoping that we keep on this rebirth, Renaissance trajectory and we might not be the city of just baseball or which is wonderful baseball and soccer and hockey and our sports.
But we may be known for food and culture and art and startups and technology and everything that makes life sort of vibrant. I could not agree more. So my final question to you, given your illustrious career, is what advice would you give now looking back to the young Ruth Kim? Oh wow. I think it would be to give yourself a little grace. You know, I think when I was younger, I was really hard on myself. Nothing was good enough.
I had a mentor who was amazing, and I think I would advise people to find mentors, not just in your subject matter, but in life. Life, if you like. The way someone talks, the way someone moves, the way someone thinks. But this mentor was such a brilliant, brilliant lawyer, and I left private practice because I felt like he was so brilliant, putting together complicated deals that I would never get there. And he took me out to lunch on my last day and I said, he said, Why are you leaving?
And I said, Because you are like, on this mountain. You are this great of a lawyer. And I have been walking across the desert for years trying to get to where you are and, you know, like the mountains. You walk and walk and walk for days and they never get any friggin closer. And I can't bear to be this mediocre lawyer next to such greatness every single day. It just reminds me of how mediocre I am. And he said the most generous thing a mentor ever said to me.
He said, I know. I don't think I'm like that. But let's say for sake of your analogy, I am on the mountain. I would tell you to stop in your tracks, turn around and look at the distance you've come from the other horizon. And I will tell you, that distance you have traveled is so much farther than it is from where you are. To get to where I am. And I didn't have the grace at that time to give myself the grace. And I just kept saying, No, no, I'm never going to be good enough.
I can't bear being compared to and looking at such greatness and I can't do it. So I'm just going to go be a mediocre in-house lawyer somewhere. And what I realized from him is I can do those deals that he was doing. I never thought I could, but he didn't do them all. He got great team members. He got brilliant people. Yes. And so my lesson in that is thwart and avoid the imposter syndrome, Right? Give yourself grace and know that you are where you should be
in your development and it will come. Wow. Those are very powerful reflections here. I think we've just gone through the Book of Hope, the Book of Grace, and the Book of Joy. And the Book of Love. That is so true. Well, thank you. It's it's true what they say. That old adage that it's not about the destination as it is the journey.
Yes it is. Yes. So I want to thank you so much. Ten years later, But we're arriving right on time for this time spent with Ruth Kim, the chief legal officer and senior partner at FleishmanHillard for joining me today. Thank you for having me, Yemi. Yes, and we are thankful for our partners at Missouri Athletic Club, where we are recording this podcast. Have a great day.