As the leader walks into the room, people were greeting him with handshakes and smiles. You could feel his amazing presence the second he walked into the room. Everyone was anticipating what he was going to discuss. As I glanced around the room, I noted the dynamics of the different pairs and people on the team. Everyone was very cordial as they spoke together.

The ornate conference room was set up meticulously for the 24-member team. They were meeting together for the first time since several new individuals were hired. Team members started to arrive, and I could hear people greeting each other and mentioning their excitement that the whole team will be at the retreat. Mostly, they were excited to hear from their leader about their progress and looking forward to working together into the future.

The leader proceeded to kick-off the meeting with a brief story about himself – how he grew up and how he got started in the business many years ago. He had a PowerPoint deck prepared with numbers and statistics to back up his story.  However, the very inspiring moment came when he started to articulate his past, present, and future vision for this team and the organization. He then told the story of how this team consisted of only 3 people jotting down ideas of how to expand on his very ambitious long-term goal in the industry. He took his idea and consistently prodded the stakeholders to invest in his idea and him. It took several years for the stakeholders to finally buy in, but he was relentless.  The stakeholders finally accepted his challenge, and the team of 3 grew to the 24 individuals in the room.

One of the activities of the day was to share journey lines. They each discussed 8-10 life events made up of personal and professional events that have now shaped them into who they are today. You could feel the excitement around the room as the leader discussed his own life events. The theme was that of tenacity and perseverance. He set the tone for the rest of the team as they illustrated and spoke of their own journey lines. This was the “past” portion of the meeting.

He then proceeded to talk about the journey line of the business.  He honored the past, spoke of the challenges they have endured along the way, and shared what it took to become the strong business they are today. Lastly, he shared his own vision and articulated what he sees for the future of the work and his team. He discussed how every single person fit into the bigger picture, what they needed to accomplish, and why the work is important. Looking around the room, I saw people taking notes and listening in awe to this leader’s words.  It was inspiring.

The day progressed with some strategic milestone benchmarks and ended with an exercise of how the team is expected to collaborate and break down silos in order to achieve this ambitious goal that had been laid at their feet. A month later, and the update following the retreat is amazing. The 24 individuals have reported improved collaboration and productivity in addition to reaching one of their benchmarks goals within one month after meeting. It’s incredible!  Everyone knows the vision and why they do what they do. It is clearly engraved into their own vision of how they need to work together to achieve this common goal. They walked in cordial to each other and walked out as if they were old friends.

Remember, leaders bring the weather! Clearly articulating the vision and core purpose of the team enables everyone to understand their role and provides guidelines of expected behavior to achieve the larger goal. This leader started his team on their individual and collective journeys.  By sharing his own story, they were able to follow the signs he had clearly posted along the way that allowed them to gain alignment and ensure a clear path forward.

What is your story? Steople consultants are ready to begin the work of articulating your vision through storytelling. Will you accept the challenge?

Standing outside on the balcony, feeling the hot rays of sun on my face, and catching the breeze coming from the north, I could see the Pacific Ocean just a block away. As each wave rolled in, I saw figures bobbing in the water – easily flowing back and forth. I realized they were surfers out to catch a wave before they started their day. It was at that moment that I gained clarity on my North Star. “Why am I doing what I am do every day?”  It’s because one day I want to be on the water with my kids trying to catch the perfect morning wave!

The Steople team gathered in sunny California to enjoy time together and gain alignment on our goals and rallying cry moving into the end of the fiscal year. Our annual strategic planning offsite event was booked several months ago, and we were all excited to spend time together. We started out the day with air travel. Not surprising to say that everyone’s travel was eventful with cancellations and delays. Nonetheless, we all got to Los Angeles in one piece and met for a late lunch at a restaurant on the beach. We enjoyed a team building activity that night talking about what drives us and what drains us as individuals and as a team. This provided much needed insight to the team and how to work better together. Even though most of us have worked together for a while, this activity helped us realign on each individual value. Apparently, my drainer is “enjoyment.”  Of course, the team found this revelation quite funny!  However, it wasn’t a big surprise to me. When I am tasked with work, all I want to do is put my head down and get it done. Go ahead and think it… Layla’s the buzz killer (smile)!

We spent the entire next day aligning around goals and reviewing Steople’s core ideology consisting of our core purpose, core values, mission/vision statement, and SWOT analysis. In reviewing our core values, we provided examples of how we “walk the talk” every day in our behaviors and work product with our clients and our own team members. These core values provide guidelines for us of how we want to behave in our own Steople culture. By knowing your core values, it allows you to get you through challenging times because the strong foundation is set and clear for all. This sets the culture in an organization. Talking about our vision statement enables each of us to see how our roles guide us collectively into the envisioned future.  We asked ourselves, “Why are we doing what we do?”  Client meetings often take us away from our families and, sometimes, we even have to face the challenges of working across global time zones.  Indeed… why do we do this kind of work? Simply put – we love our team, the work we do, and the clients with whom we do it!

I gained the most clarity during our talks of core ideology, metrics, feedback/recognition session, and strategy discussion.  As a team, we strategized around how we will achieve our BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) during our session on our one big commitment. Before I reported out on my own One Big Commitment to the team, I walked back to the balcony, looked out to the ocean, and asked myself again, “Why do I get up every day and get excited about the work that I do?” Because one day, my kids and I will be on the beach at sunrise to “catch the perfect wave.” How do I achieve that? I need to be aligned with my teammates and on the same page with my vision for the upcoming year.  Getting alignment may require difficult conversations; this is where the turning point was for our team. Being able to have healthy conflict on a team enables the team to gain trust and become more open to innovation and creativity instead of being reactive to a situation or person.

As we faced the last day in sunny California, we packed our bags and piled into a Jeep laughing about funny moments from our time here.  We broke bread together one more time at a restaurant on the pier before heading back to the airport. As a reminder of the clarity I achieved, my mentor – who happens to by the CEO of Steople – gave me a ”Surfing the Wave” sticker that I have in front my computer as a daily reminder of my WHY.

Remember to invest in your business and your people by ensuring your strategic planning offsite happens so you can realign around your core ideology.  Make it a priority as this will help guide individual team members through challenging times and help them find the focus and desire to work as one team.  Allow Steople to be your compass as you find your North Star.

By Layla Bokhari | Consultant

During my early professional career as a manager in a fortune 500 company, I remember the day I was promoted to regional district manager. This meant I would manage 2 offices in the region. I was excited and ready to take on the responsibility. I convened a town hall of all the managers in the region for a meet and greet and expectations meeting. The district had a community that was about 75% Hispanic, so I was expecting several bilingual Hispanic managers. To my surprise, there was only one bilingual manager and two staff members that identified as Hispanic. I decided to meet with all the managers to get to know them and ask them what they like about working in the district and what they though could improve. Everyone had various items they discussed, but when It came to the one manager who identified as a person of color, she expressed that she was thinking about resigning her position. She stated that she felt many of the staff and leadership did not respect her. So during my usual check-in at the office, I probed with the staff and some stated that her family came to visit often, she spoke too fast and loud, and they felt uncomfortable when she spoke to her Spanish speaking clients in Spanish. I discovered that this was a classic case of an organization that lacked cultural competence internally. Inside the organization, leadership and staff needed training because they were driving away their best employees. It was a process, but over some time of incorporating DE&I into the regular leadership training, it made the organization became more inclusive. So now it was time to work on the external factors of DEI for the organization.

I saw a missed opportunity in the Hispanic community, so I started recruiting several bilingual Hispanic managers and staff members. The next season, new client sales increased by 30%, mostly Spanish speaking new clients. I still receive periodic updates from the manager who wanted to leave the organization. She is now a regional district manager and has recruited many other individuals into the organization. This was a proud moment for me. I love hearing how she has flourished in her career and how the organization is growing clientele as well as increasing a diverse staff.

Many times, I receive calls and urgent emails from organizations asking for support with DE&I. They are usually looking to hire more diverse candidates or appeal to more diverse clientele. I first tell them that they need to get their house in order and ensure everyone feels included and that they belong in the organization. Then they can move onto the higher levels of structural and systemic issues.  I have been helping organizations implement (DE&I) practices for the past 7 years. Driving organizational change can never be accomplished in a one-time training. Below are 4 levels to becoming an inclusive organization and some best practices, resources and case studies that I utilize in my DE&I work: level 1- Personal, level 2- Interpersonal, level 3- institutional, and level 4- Structural.

Level 1 | PERSONAL:  Are your people aware of their personal culture bias?

This level is the foundation for diversity, equity, and inclusiveness (DE&I). One must know the history of race and class oppression and resistance in the U.S. and communicates where they work. Individuals should understand their own identity, power, privilege, and they affect their work, relationships, and impact. Lastly, they should believe in the potential of other individuals to grow and develop in DE&I.

Knowledge. Individuals understand the history of colonialism, race, gender and class oppression, and resistance in the U.S. and their local communities. The sources of systematic and institutional inequities are important to understand, as well as the basic terminology and concepts of diversity, equity, inclusiveness, and justice. A historical foundation grounds us in the present.

Self-Awareness.  Understanding one’s own identity, power, privilege, and access, and how they affect one’s work and relationships creates critical consciousness. Having a clear sense of one’s own unique value, potential impact and limitations is essential for understanding the value of cultures different from one’s own. Multicultural competence is the ability to differentiate your own culture from others and to accept differences without judgement.

                    Action Item: Read DiAngelo’s work on white fragility for a deeper understand of power and privilege.  

Learning/Continuous Exploration.  Organizations promote the potential of their individuals to grow and develop in inclusive leadership by promoting continuous learning and exploration. If the tools and resources are present in an organization, and leadership encourages growth in diversity, equity and inclusiveness, then individuals will take ownership in their own growth in the organization and personally.

                   Action Item: Have resources available for employees in your newsletter or in your weekly email. Promote these resources internally and externally. This will build the psychological safety in your organization and diverse talent. The Circle Way is one such tool to facilitate group exploration, and Layla F. Saad’s book “Me and White Supremacy” is a guide to self-awareness exploration.

Level 2 | INTERPERSONAL: Are our personal relationships equitable?
Once an individual has the foundational knowledge and history of DE&I, then it is time to work on how they are relating and communicating in their relationships.

Relating. Relating means building trustful, meaningful relationship across levels and groups and adapting to work collaboratively with all teammates. This is especially important for inclusive leadership. Leaders should build authentic manager-report relationships with all direct reports and listen to different experiences at the workplace.

                  Action Item: We are all so busy at work that we don’t stop and listen sometimes. Having Friday coffee with the leaders in the lobby or lounge area at work can provide a space where the team can relax for an hour and talk about anything other than work. This builds relationships and may even clear up misunderstandings in communication and acknowledge patterns of privilege.

Communicating. Communication is at the forefront of an inclusive culture. Through identity work, leaders should have a good grasp on their own triggers and effectively manage their own triggers to engage productively in dialogue and race and class discourse or simply bring up any conflict. Engaging in conflict productively, without avoiding or prematurely shutting down the interaction builds trust and illustrates that all voices are heard.

                   Action Item: Listening to others experiences helps to mitigate microaggressions in the workplace. Simply having a conversation about what surprised or resonated with the individual about the list of microaggressions and common patterns of privilege and oppression can spark great conversation.

Level 3 | INSTITUTIONAL: Are institutional policies and norms within your organization equitable?
The third level recognized that cultural bias and oppressive assumptions become embedded in the policies and procedures of an organization.

Acting on Equity.  Includes identifying cultural breaches and taking active steps with appropriate urgency to address the challenge. Leadership should be able to identity inequities on their team and systems and take action-steps to drive positive change at an institutional and systemic level. Communication and transparency are especially important when working for equity in the processes and systems of an organization.

                   Action Step:  Creating leadership and decision-making structures that invest and give voice and power to marginalized groups and ensures budget, talent and management systems and all policies further inclusiveness. Take a look at the equity lens decision-making tool that Multnomah County utilizes to drive equity in its decision-making process in order to avoid cultural bias an “unnatural” process of reflection can drive better decision-making.  

Valuing and Staffing for Diversity. Organizations value diversity by being open to different ways of being and thinking and by understanding that this change can achieve better outcomes and results. Maintaining curiosity about others’ perspectives, experiences, and motivations will endorse a culture of diversity. The organization and hiring managers should actively seek out and hire a diverse staff at all levels. Although women in senior positions are increasing, there is still a lag on marginalized individuals assuming higher level positions.

                    Action step: A full policy and procedure audit can hold leadership accountable of inclusive policies that affect all staff. The more inclusive the system and rules, the more feeling of belonging. Mellody Hobson on staffing diversity at the top levels of the organization.

Leveraging Diversity.  Leadership should actively seek out and ensure multiple voices are heard on key issues, particularly marginalized voices of the communities we partner with or serve. Lifting all voices either in a board room where a decision is being made or providing a space where everyone can add input or suggestions is a simple step towards leveraging diversity.

                    Action step: Check out this Harvard Business Review article for more information on action steps to ending systemic and structural racism.

Level 4 | STRUCTURAL: Does your organizational structure promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice?

Acting for Inclusiveness. Distinguishing cultural differences and differing work styles from true performance challenges will help leaders seek out and leverage skills, traits and characteristics that may be unrecognized or undervalued in the dominant culture. This is where cultural competence comes into play. Seek out articles on culture or resources to help you understand different cultures and experiences.

                   Action step: This clip of Teach Us All illustrates an organization living true to the core values of DE&I.      

Leadership commitment. One of our favorite saying here at Steople is that “leaders bring the weather”. Culture is set and modeled by the leaders at the top. Thus, leadership commitment is essential, so it trickles down to the staff level.

                  Action step: To understand the what systemic and structural racism is, check out 13^th on Netflix.  

Case Study #1: Teach For America lives out the core values of diversity, equity and inclusiveness in everyday life as well as at the structural level. They implement inclusive leadership identity development to senior leaders all the way to incoming corps members. TFA conducts quarterly power analysis and equity tools at the leadership level, and perform communication audits even at the board level.

Case Study #2: Johnson & Johnson is an organization that values DE&I initiatives and incorporates this work into daily activities for the employees and leadership. DE&I is at the forefront of every training, coaching, and meeting.
Tracking and implementing these 4 themes in your organization will ensure an inclusive organization. But remember, leaders in the organization should endorse and model these themes for inclusiveness to resonate throughout the organization. Diversity, equity, and inclusiveness should be at the forefront of decision-making and conversations. Organizations may want to move fast on DE&I initiatives, but changing corporate culture is not an overnight fix. It is a process, and a habit that takes time to flourish. Working on an inclusive leadership identity at the top will in turn trickle down to the staff level, then the organization can work on the institutional and structural implementation of filling the pipeline with diverse talent and filter DE&I as a norm in the organizational culture.