Cross‑Cultural Leadership Principles: How To Build Resilience and Thrive No Matter What Setting You Work In with Sylvia Liu
Resilience is often framed as the ability to push through anything. But not every challenge is worth pushing through. Many professionals - especially those who’ve navigated different cultures, career pivots, or complex environments - have learned to default to endurance. Over time, that comes at a cost. Some experiences build you but others can deplete you.
Real resilience isn’t about handling everything. It’s built by knowing yourself well enough to grow through the right challenges, and having the clarity to let go of the rest. This is especially true for cross-cultural and non-linear professionals. The ones who thrive across environments aren’t the ones who can adapt to anything... they’re the ones who know what they carry with them, no matter where they go.
In this session, we’ll explore a more practical definition of resilience: one rooted in self-knowledge.
We’ll cover:
Why resilience is about discernment, not endurance
How to identify what you rely on when things are uncertain
The “Portable Identity” framework: what you carry across roles and environments
How to reflect on past transitions to understand what’s consistently true about you
You’ll leave with a clearer sense of your own “portable identity” and one concrete step to build from.
Meet Sylvia
Sylvia Liu is a strategist and entrepreneur who has built her career across two continents and two very different professional worlds. Starting in data and analytics at Groupon and Meta, she went on to lead strategy, operations, and analytics at Snap — before leaving big tech to found her own company in China, and is now back in the US. She is currently Chief Strategy Officer and a founding member of Lovart AI, an early-stage AI startup. Sylvia speaks on cross-cultural leadership, resilience, and building a professional identity that travels — no matter what environment you're in.