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Intro - Enrico E. Manalo 00:00
This is Enrico E. Manalo, DEI Consultant, Conflict Management Practitioner, DiVerity PBCs Community Engagement Lead and host of The “DEI is:” Podcast, a podcast about DEI practitioners, by DEI practitioners, for DEI practitioners AND the organizations that hire them, where we dive deep on issues related to the DEI industry from an insider's point of view. This podcast is produced by DiVerity PBC, which matches independent people and culture experts (like DEI consultants) with the organizations that seek them out.
In this episode we’re talking to Kristina Smith, President & Executive Culture Leader of D&I Strategists, who has worked with government agencies, for-profit, and non-profit organizations ranging in scale from the local to the national. Her forte is coaching leaders, helping teams work better together, and facilitating conversations about race and/or diversity.
If you like this episode, please subscribe, like, and share. If you really love it, leave us a review. Don’t forget to follow us on social media by heading to our linktree, that’s linktr.ee/diverity, l-i-n-k-t-r-dot-e-e-slash-d-i-v-e-r-i-t-y
Ready? “DEI is: Understanding Why Diversity Programs Fail w/Kristina Smith” starts in 3, 2 . . .
[Intro Music]
Enrico E. Manalo 01:31
Hello and welcome everybody. This is Enrico E. Manalo here once again with another episode of "DEI is:" today with me I've got Kristina Smith. So to introduce her a little bit over the course of your career, Kristina Smith has amassed a wealth of insight and experience which she brings to bear as President and Executive Leader of D&I Strategists. Kristina has worked with government agencies for-profit and nonprofit organizations ranging in scale from the local to the national. She is certified in conversational intelligence that's "C-IQ" as a facilitator of culture, as well as diversity and belonging. And she is also DiSC certified. Kristina is also an alumnus of both Johns Hopkins University and Emerson College, which is also my undergraduate alma mater. Kristina, how are you?
Kristina Smith 02:21
I am doing great, Enrico, I'm really excited about being here! How are you?
Enrico E. Manalo 02:26
I'm doing great. And you know, I'm so, so pleased, but you're already getting some love in the comments. So Carolyn says Hi, Kristina Smith. Can't wait.
Kristina Smith 02:37
Yeah, hi Carolyn!
Enrico E. Manalo 02:40
Also got Cicely or Cecily, I'm not sure how to say that. Exactly. But super excited. And yeah, we got somebody else. Michelle Dotson, as well. So wow! A very warm reception right out of the gate. How are you doing today? In general?
Kristina Smith 02:59
Well, you know, I actually feel torn. I am so saddened by the things that are happening in our country today. It's just, it, it can be really overwhelming at times. And at the same time, I just feel like things are bubbling to the surface that we need to address and deal with. And so we have to . . . not wait, I have to remain optimistic. I have to figure out where can I plug in and make a difference. So that's where I try to keep my energy is on "what can I do TODAY?", "who can I serve today?" and that seems to serve me well.
Enrico E. Manalo 03:36
Yeah. So what I'm hearing you say is not an unreasoning or "naive" kind of optimism at all, like a very grounded in reality, and very much grounded in what we can actually have a direct impact ourselves, today is, is that right?
Kristina Smith 03:55
Absolutely. Because sometimes people become sort of so "overwhelmed" that it's hard to function. And I just believe we don't have time for that. Yes, I mourn with everyone else at the tragedies that are happening and then I redirect my focus to "what do I need to do?"
Enrico E. Manalo 04:16
Yeah, and thank you so much for bringing this to the surface, because it is both very timely and very deeply intertwined with what you and I both do professionally. I think what I would like to invite people to consider is, we cannot legislate through protest. Right? So showing up is great. But there's a real difference to showing up one time to an event, and showing up every day to do just a little bit, right? And if we all do that, you'll be shocked at how much progress we can make. Right? So I think one of the lessons that I pulled from my friends and unions is "organize, organize, organize." And if you don't know exactly how to do that, then perhaps we can kind of break some of that off for people who are not always in that space in our conversation today.
Kristina Smith 05:03
Absolutely. You know, one of the things I want to say Enrico is the idea that of course, post-George Floyd, so many companies have been opening up and asking the question, "what do we do? How do we do this work?" And I actually think that at work, it's a great place to do this work, this diversity work, this "understanding differences" because at work for some companies or a lot of places, it is more diverse than, say, being in your community, your church, your neighborhood. Being at work has great possibility.
Enrico E. Manalo 05:50
Yeah, absolutely. And that's really where my thinking is, as well. Like there are few spaces where people—I wouldn't say "forced", but where they are required to interact with people who are different from them. To get a lot of our work done, we necessarily have to convene a diversity of skills, backgrounds and thinking and that extends to our demographic diversity and identity-based differences as well. Absolutely. Okay, so to kind of jump into things and set the scene In a little bit, why are we talking about diversity training fails in 2022? And haven't others already kind of asked this question?
Kristina Smith 06:32
Yeah, absolutely. And I think what the challenge is, is that people have not figured out yet why people do what they do. People have not figured out why people do what they do. Stop and think about it Enrico, in the weight loss industry, people spend billions of dollars, because there's not a really good understanding about what drives people, what motivates people, why people make the decisions that they make. And so part of the challenge with diversity training is people think that if you get trained, that you will change your behavior
Enrico E. Manalo 07:17
Right.
Kristina Smith 07:18
That is not true.
Enrico E. Manalo 07:19
No! [laughs]
Kristina Smith 07:20
Because you get information. So basically, it breaks down to their three areas of the potential for change. One is a training class where you come in, and you might learn a definition of unconscious bias or micro aggressions, you know, things along that line. But that does not—and 99% of the time, that doesn't change behavior. The second thing is "experiential" training. So you come in to learn how to do something. So maybe like Driver's Education, when you get in the car, that's sort of experiential. But the work that diversity professionals in most cases are trying to do is "transformational" work. And transformational work requires something totally different than just training, or even experiential, like having conversations. It really requires some training, some work on yourself (that's where the biggest part of it is), some consistency over a length of time, and some accountability. And so either with an accountability partner, or coming back together as a group and asking, "what have you done?", it's like, this is what it requires over time. And so many times people—organizations think, you know, "we can bring somebody in once a year, have a class, we're good", right? And that's VERY performative. And so you're not going to see the change in results, unless it's ongoing and DEEPLY rooted.
Enrico E. Manalo 09:07
Yeah, and, you know, thank you so much for listing out the "ingredients [of transformational work]" there. Because I think it's—on paper, it's easy to see that and say, "yeah, okay", but in practice, it's very "slippery", right? Because a lot of these things are intangible, right? I don't have a dashboard for how I'm doing internally, right? I have to kind of do that inventory myself manually and, you know, I know that when I jump into my reflective practice, there's often a moment of "wait, how do I even know what I'm feeling?" Right? And then I kind of realized, no, "I know how to do this", I slip deeper into it. But, you know, these days, we're very enamored of Big Data and "measurables", and things like that. And of course, those do help us to make progress in many areas. But we can apply that exactly to diversity and personal transformation, right? Because it's gonna look different for everybody in every context, and it's not going to be a consistent advancement of progression. We're gonna backslide, we're gonna have bad days, we're gonna have GREAT days, we're gonna have all these many factors. But the point is, like, if we have those accountability structures, and we can, we can kind of get a sense of where we are, and how others are doing as well. Yeah?
Kristina Smith 10:25
Yeah, I love that. You know, when I was at Hopkins, I took a course in managing change in organizations. And it was so funny, because this was a three-month, no, it was a nine-month long cohort. And we had three instructors. And on the very first day, the very first instructor said, "if you want to know how to manage change in organizations, you have to know how to manage change in yourself."
Enrico E. Manalo 10:51
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 10:52
And he's, the instructor said, his name was Charlie Seashore. I've just loved he and his wife [Edie] taught this class. And they said, "we used to call this class 'change management'. But everyone was coming here trying to figure out how to change MANAGEMENT." And I raised my hand and said, "Yes, that's why I'm here! I'm trying to figure out how to change those people!" And they said, "No, it comes down to you." And every time we had class Enrico, it was hilarious. I would come in and say "what if you have a sexist boss? What if you have a racist one," like, "can't we get rid of that person", and he would come back every time and say, "No, this is about YOU and YOUR change." I'm telling you, it took me the longest time, because I kept saying "I'm not the problem, I am not the problem!"
Enrico E. Manalo 11:37
I mean, that is just so, so human and I've been there too, I still under stress will revert back to that sometimes. But yeah, I think it's hard to remember in the moment that we cannot change other people. And even if we could, that would be an imposition of our will, on another person's way of being. That's oppression right? By definition.
Kristina Smith 12:02
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So it's not easy. And it's very different than any other kind of work that people go to work to do. This is heart, H-E-A-R-T work. It is HARD work. And it takes CONSISTENCY. But it CAN be done. I'm seeing it done in some organizations really well, because the leaders get it and they're really working hard to help create the environment for change.
Enrico E. Manalo 12:34
Definitely. So before we dive into that, I want to ask our audience here, so you know, lots of companies have diversity efforts these days and so what I love to hear from our audience is "what screams this diversity effort isn't working in an organizational setting?" So if you got something to share, please do share that with us in the comments. And we'll be working that into our conversation a little bit later. But for now, so if we're trying to answer the question of why hasn't diversity training worked? Where exactly does that conversation begin? Like, how can we know that we've transformed ourselves "enough"? We've mentioned that it's slippery, it's kind of hard. But, you know, let's try to break it down for people, how can they get a sense of how they're doing?
Kristina Smith 13:21
So, it's really interesting. I'm reflecting on a client that I just—our team just finished working with. And it was VERY fascinating to work with a cross-functional group of people. And people in the "dominant community" in the organization did not realize that they were causing harm on an almost-everyday basis. And we, after doing some deep diving, deep conversations, we created a brave, safe space for people to really talk and dig deep. And what we surfaced was that people—inside believed, people in the dominant culture believe that they are "better than". Now, they don't say this consciously. They don't think this necessarily consciously but unconsciously, the way some people were being treated some Black and Brown folks were being treated was, "I am better than you." But this is part of the systemic nature of what we're all dealing with. And the Black and Brown folks were so used to being feeling oppressed, that they just took it as "this is the way it is. This is this is the way it is", because it's been indoctrinated in both communities for such a long time.
Enrico E. Manalo 14:59
I tend to refer to that as like, "the negative side of resilience."
Kristina Smith 15:03
Yes, exactly. And so literally, we had to peel back the onion and really talk about the Black and Brown folks had to surface, "What does it [oppression] look like? What does it [oppression] feel like?" So to answer your question, when the people in the organizations or the communities can FEEL like they're being treated equitably, they're being treated differently. That's when you know, it's REALLY working. Yeah, doesn't matter how many diversity ERGs you put together, it doesn't matter how many trainings you—but the people have to FEEL like things are changing, and have to see it not just feel it, it's not just a feeling, "am I being paid the same thing that somebody else in an in another job is being paid and we're doing the same work, and I'm a woman versus what a man is being paid?" Or "I'm a Black woman being paid less than my white counterpart." So it's not just a feeling it is definitely making sure that the systems are equitable.
Enrico E. Manalo 16:16
Yeah, yeah, definitely. We've got a couple comments coming in, and maybe we can address them. So A John Monaghan, good friend of mine. He says, "When the dominant culture is unaware that they're defining what diversity is and then getting uncomfortable when the non-dominant group speaks up," Yes.
Kristina Smith 16:36
Oh, yes.
Enrico E. Manalo 16:37
So that's how we know that it's not working for sure.
Kristina Smith 16:38
Yes.
Enrico E. Manalo 16:39
Quinten mentions "What screams this isn't working: culture related turnover and leaders consistently causing harm." Right. So, so many parallels to what you were just talking about. "Outside the organization," John again, says "thinking the work is outside the organization by taking a stand or a statement rather than creating space for people's experiences to be heard." Oh, yeah.
Kristina Smith 15:41
Absolutely. Wow. Yeah. All—both of those are hitting the nail on the head. Hi, Quinten! That's my buddy [laughs]!
Enrico E. Manalo 17:04
We have another comment that's come in from an anonymous user. "If every workplaces DEI efforts are successful, I'm still not convinced that Jayland Walker would still be alive today, that the white supremacist shooting in Buffalo wouldn't have happened. I'm pessimistic." So LinkedIn User, yeah, I hear that frustration. Kristina, would you like to take this one on?
Kristina Smith 17:33
Yeah. You might be right. You know, you, you literally might be right. Working with another colleague, we actually worked with a police department in a small town. And I have to tell you, I'm not easily traumatized, I'm not by the work that I do. I really go in with a focus and a determination, but I left there really discouraged. I left there really discouraged based on the comments that the police officers were making, and I just thought, "I'm not ready to do THAT work." I can go in probably almost any other space. But they are so entrenched with this "superiority". And I'm not saying this about all police officers, I know PERSONALLY know, some really good police officers that I love. And some of them I just know, that I'm following on Facebook or LinkedIn or whatever. So I know it's not all police officers, but those police officers that have this feeling of, "we're going to go get the bad guys, and the bad guys all happen to be Black and Brown."
Enrico E. Manalo 18:47
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 18:48
I don't know whether you saw this article Enrico, but just recently there was an article that some Boy Scout troops—a Boy Scout troop was going through a police training facility—and I really—I'm sorry that I can't tell you the article, because I don't usually like to quote things unless I can say "this is the source", but what they saw were target shooting where Black men with guns. This is where they were doing their target shooting. So when you train people like this, and, and I know we're, you know, going in a slightly different direction here, but so many people—I've heard so many people say "why doesn't the Black man just surrender?", a Black man that's being chased by the police. And it's because historically, even when Black men are being told, "do this," and they're doing exactly what they're told, they're still shot and killed.
Enrico E. Manalo 19:57
Yeah, it's a lose/lose and the data bears that out.
Kristina Smith 20:01
Right, exactly. So I don't know, it is . . . it is discouraging.
Enrico E. Manalo 20:08
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, so I think you and I have talked about this, we both see work as a great entry point [to change attitudes around difference]. But it is not the ONLY entry point.
Kristina Smith 20:20
No.
Enrico E. Manalo 20:21
Right? And so people have this idea that change is "top down", it's "bottom up", But in reality, real change—broad social change often comes from many directions all at once. Right?
Kristina Smith 20:33
Yes.
Enrico E. Manalo 20:34
If we only solve issues kind of procedurally and linearly—sequentially. We will never, never, never, never, never get to the kind of change that we want to see, because it's just too slow, too limited. And it ignores the fact that things are very interrelated and complex.
Kristina Smith 20:54
Yeah, I—thank you, that's such a great point Enrico because whenever our team is working in an organization, we are telling people "we're pushing levers from many different places. We're pushing at the top we're pushing in—if there is such a thing as a bottom, we're pushing in the middle, we're pushing so many different levers, because we know it takes a lot of different things happening all at the same time to bring about change." And one of the things that we're really focusing on is—helping to make sure that when folks who are on the frontlines, begin to speak up and say, "hey, you know, you may not have intended that, but the way this impacted me is 'this way'", you know, maybe it's a microaggression that their supervisor inflicted on them that they were not aware of. But we're really trying to make sure that SYSTEMICALLY, that that boss then doesn't go and write them up or, you know, put them in a position that's uncompromising or difficult. So we're working on that level and working on people speaking up, because—I felt so bad for one white female who I, I believe, she was saying—I know what she was saying,. she was saying, "you know, I think I'm causing harm every day. And I may not know it. I need somebody to tell me, hey, when you say this, or you do this, this inflicts harm on me."
Enrico E. Manalo 22:32
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 22:33
And some people want to know, and we'll take steps to address their issues. Other people know, and just use that as an excuse. I'm just gonna be real.
Enrico E. Manalo 22:44
Yeah, no, that is real. And we've got some more comments coming in with the source. So your buddy Quinten with this link to the Guardian. Oh, to Debra. And then Clarissa Fuselier a DiVerity PBC Network Consultant has an alternate source as well, so thank you all so much for that. Really appreciate it!
Kristina Smith 23:08
Yeah. I appreciate that. Because I knew I had seen it, but I didn't—you know, sometimes people don't believe you. Unless you can say—what's the source,
Enrico E. Manalo 23:18
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 23:19
so I appreciate you all putting those links in the in the chat.
Enrico E. Manalo 23:25
So if I can kind of collect where we are right now, I feel like to answer our titular question, right? So "why diversity trainings fail?" right? I think what we're saying in this conversation is it fails, because it is not the—it is only one way of addressing one part of our issues around diversity, right? So training is one thing, but changing the hearts and minds as we're saying, it takes A LOT. And a lot of people don't really understand behaviors, as you said earlier. But one of the most shocking things that I learned as a young teacher was, in fact, nobody has taught most people how to learn, we just throw them into a school or an educational setting and say, "go, you'll learn you'll pick it up." This is absolutely absurd. You know, like, I didn't really learn how to learn until I was after a teacher. That was after I BECAME a teacher, excuse me, which is not a great state of affairs. And so I feel like yeah, for diversity—for us to recreate, or to change our hearts and minds such that diversity is a given—not only a given but an ACCEPTED given in everyday life, it's going to take a lot, right, it's going to take more than just telling police not to use certain people as target practice, right? As ridiculous as that is, but there's a lot of low-hanging fruit, it's true, but I think that's often a distraction, right? So we get so caught up in all the low-hanging fruit because there is so much that we end up kind of "missing the mark." And it's hard when we don't have perhaps as great communication structures between organizations, or between efforts. So I don't know, I know, this wasn't exactly where we planned for the conversation to go. But I'm just curious, like, what are your thoughts around that?
Kristina Smith 25:29
You know, I think—I read a really good book when I was at Hopkins, and it was called "Learning in Relationship." And what I loved about that book, it was probably one of the first times that I realized how complicated just regular communication is. And I have a great graphic—I don't have it with me, but there's a great graphic that was done by Veritas Culture organization. And it's a picture of the brain. And over the top, it says "sifting". And it talks about the fact that we're all exposed by—exposed to 11 million bits of information in a few seconds, like 11 million hits. And so—
Enrico E. Manalo 26:17
Oh, that's an actual number that they found? 11 million?!
Kristina Smith 26:19
Oh Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Enrico E. Manalo 26:22
Wow!
Kristina Smith 26:22
And what happens is, we begin to sift out information like, we can't take it all in. So based on how we were raised, the family culture, what we saw on television, how we were treated in school, who we played with in, you know, in school, our beliefs, all of those things, take the data, the information we were—that's coming in to us, and it sifts it very quickly and then we either say or do something based on how we sifted that data.
Enrico E. Manalo 27:07
Right.
Kristina Smith 28:08
So what's so interesting is that I was talking to a client yesterday and she was saying that when she talks to a person that she supervises, she frequently has to say, "what did you hear me say?"
Enrico E. Manalo 27:26
Mhmm, yeah
Kristina Smith 27:28
And she would say, probably 65% of the time, what they repeated back to her was NOT what she said.
Enrico E. Manalo 27:35
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 27:35
So those people are sifting the data based on their own experiences. So you can take one person, and they can communicate to three people at the same time with the same facial expression with the same tone of voice
Enrico E. Manalo 27:49
Yeah
Kristina Smith 27:49
giving everyone equal eye contact, and people will perceive something different.
Enrico E. Manalo 27:54
Yeah, I mean, I often say that people answer the questions that they WISH that they were asked, right? You ask anybody—I mean, how many times have you done a survey or questionnaire and you get all kinds of responses and you're like, "I have a degree. I should be getting a narrower, narrower band of responses."
Kristina Smith 28:14
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. It's fascinating. So, you know, it goes back to the question of "why is this so difficult?"
Enrico E. Manalo 28:22
Yeah.
Kristina Smith 28:22
Because we're very complex human beings. All of us are very complex, and have very different lived experiences. But I think part of the other reason why things haven't worked as well, is because oftentimes, oftentimes, like, I see people coming to our organization and saying, "we want this done, this done, this done, and this done,"
Enrico E. Manalo 28:54
Right.
Kristina Smith 28:55
And it's fascinating to me, because oftentimes, we'll say, "okay, we'll do that." But once we go in and do our own assessment, it's like, they're not starting in the right place.
Enrico E. Manalo 29:09
Yeah, like "you didn't tell me about— you told me A, B, and C, but there's a whole ALPHABET here!"
Kristina Smith 29:15
Yes, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. It's, it's really interesting. But it's okay.
Enrico E. Manalo 29:20
Yeah,
Kristina Smith 29:21
we go where we have to go.
Enrico E. Manalo 29:23
I mean, you know,
Kristina Smith 29:25
we go [unclear]—where no man has been before! [Kristina laughs]
Enrico E. Manalo 29:28
Yeah. Where nobody WANTS to go, often
Kristina Smith 29:30
Right, exactly!
Enrico E. Manalo 28:32
You know, I remember I was learning quite a bit about behavioral economics at one point, right, because I was also trying to understand more about human behavior. And one of the fascinating things that I learned was, we have this idea—and it's pounded into us, right? "Think before you speak, think before you act." This is not how the human brain works. We act and THEN we think, right, often to justify what the action was. We're very, very emotionally driven creatures. And you know, some of the comments are kind of in support of this. Let me let me just—where to start? Oh, yeah. So this is back to something we're talking about earlier, John, weighing in again, saying "intent versus impact broadly addressed by helping people understand objectivity as a characteristic of white supremacy culture, thinking other people are experienced in seeing the world the way that you do." Yes, yes. Yeah, Quinten. I think he's talking here about, you know, DEI training, so "it's only the very, very start of the process and the work". Like yeah, absolutely. This is the stuff that you got to do to lay the foundation so that you can BEGIN to do the work in the first place, which is frustrating. I know. But another anonymous LinkedIn user says "research suggests that white Americans are turned off by the term 'white privilege.' Do we continue to center their comfort to be successful in advancing DEI? Can we succeed that way?" That's a fascinating question.
Kristina Smith 31:01
Yeah. You know, and it's one that I know every DEI practitioner I talk to wrestles with, because of the fact that—I don't know. I mean, I wrestle with it all the time. It's not—I want people to get in the room so we can have the conversation and I have seen and have heard from other practitioners, that some white men walked into a workshop and heard that, that one of the things that was going to be discussed was white privilege and they got up and walked out.
Enrico E. Manalo 31:39
Yeah, I mean, for me,
Kristina Smith 31:42
It's like, "oh, my God, oh, my god, please." You know. And so, so that's a it's a great question, because do we get people in the room and do we talk about the concept [of white privilege] without using the words that trigger people?
Enrico E. Manalo 31:58
Yeah. Yeah.
Kristina Smith 32:00
I mean, that's one of the things, one of the strategies I use. But I have to say this Enrico, I think what would gives me a great excitement is the idea that people are at different ends of the spectrum—
Enrico E. Manalo 30:51
True.
Kristina Smith 32:14
And what I mean by that, is, there are some organizations that have come and said, "can you come in and talk to our organization about racism, but please don't use the word race."
Enrico E. Manalo 32:31
[Enrico laughs] Ok!
Kristina Smith 32:31
I'm not kidding. And then there are other organizations and these in some cases, are predominantly white organizations that are saying things like, "we want to kick down the door of white supremacy, and we want you to help us do it."
Enrico E. Manalo 32:44
Yeah, now there's a—
Kristina Smith 32:45
We have people from one side of the, you know, fence to the other. And, you know
Enrico E. Manalo 32:55
Yeah, yeah, I mean, to your point, and I recognize that we're a little bit over time here. So I hope I'm not holding you up. But I just want to make sure that we can kind of close out in a strong way. You know, we talk a lot about getting people "in the room" or "a seat at the table." In the room analogy, it's great to get people in the room. But if you're busting down the door, understandably, the people who are inside the room, who closed the door, they're gonna be scared, right?
Kristina Smith 33:24
Yeah
Enrico E. Manalo 33:24
Because they shut the door for a reason, because they're scared. And if people are barging in, say, "we want to talk to you!" like, Oh, my God, like, I know I don't want to talk to anybody who has just forcibly bashed down my door. But on the other hand, this analogy of getting a seat at the table, okay, understandable framing. But what's never talked about is who OWNS the table? And what happens if they decide to take away all the chairs, because that can happen. We're seeing it start to happen. I don't think it's too late yet. But we're—there are things afoot is what I'm saying.
Kristina Smith 34:04
Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, it's such an important time in history. And I think the thing that I want people in the dominant culture to recognize; there's great value in having privilege, if you know what to do with it. Yeah, what to do with it. And I really wish people would stop being so traumatized by the word "get over it." No, Black and Brown people have had to go through SO much. You have to—and I was thinking to white people specifically—you have to strengthen your resolve to be in this fight. This is going to take ALL OF US to do this work number one, and you cannot cringe at the word "privilege." And privilege is based on you know, who you're "proximate" with.
Enrico E. Manalo 35:02
Yeah, relationships
Kristina Smith 35:03
So I'm able-bodied. I'm able-bodied. I'm cisgendered. I mean, those are privileges IN RELATION TO OTHER PEOPLE.
Enrico E. Manalo 35:11
Yep.
Kristina Smith 35:11
AND I am THRILLED that I have the privilege because I want to use the privileges I have, to serve. And so I really want white people to GET OVER hearing the word "white privilege" and "feeling bad" or whatever, we don't have time for that. We have a massive transformation coming in this country. We need every person who can contribute towards breaking down this that we can, you know.
Enrico E. Manalo 35:41
Yeah, and to draw another parallel just to really drill down on this privilege piece. My mother is very short. I'm lucky, I'm pretty tall. My whole life since I was taller than—since I grew taller than her, so since I was like 10 years old or something, she has asked me to get things off of high shelves for her, right because I'm tall. The only time where I've really kind of bristled against that was when somebody treated me as a tall person as a means to their end of getting something down, when they didn't see my humanity right? When they were just like, "oh, you just exist for me to get what I want." Yeah, I hated that. But
Kristina Smith 36:21
Right.
Enrico E. Manalo 36:22
Somebody that I have a relationship with says, "hey, can you grab this for me? I can't do it myself." I get a warm fuzzy feeling about that you know?
Kristina Smith 36:30
Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely, absolutely.
Enrico E. Manalo 36:34
Okay, so just to kind of close out on a couple other comments here, and then we'll go we got Quinten kind of weighing in again. Another piece that Quinten has noticed is that "folks don't FEEL" (all caps) "like they have any connection to the information in my 'trainings' and other events, I share my own personal stories to help people put a real life person and a face to the issues." So important. "It tends to help a lot in conjunction with the stats that we have to use, people can more intense—people care" excuse me, "more intensely when the impact is on a real person they can feel for." Quinten, thank you so much for your contributions and for this one in particular.
Kristina Smith 37:16
Absolutely.
Enrico E. Manalo 37:18
Okay, so we have not answered all the questions here. But hopefully, we can still engage with them in the chat. And it's great to see this energy. So how can we kind of intentionally close out here and maybe leave people with a little bit of hope?
Kristina Smith 37:33
You know, I think in most organizations, there are people that—if an organization wants to go on the journey of taking on this task of trying to make workplaces more humane for everyone, it's important to invite those people to the table, you know, it's really important that they're included in what's about to happen, if someone's just embarking on this journey, I just think it's really important that they're included in the conversation. This is not something that's happening way out in another country, this is happening right here on our workspaces, and invite those voices to the table. You know, so often when we see the faux pas that companies like Starbucks made and H&M and some other companies that made I'm pretty sure they didn't have a person of color in the mix,
Enrico E. Manalo 38:35
—at least not a good relationship with a person of color.
Kristina Smith 38:38
Right. Exactly, exactly. And while we don't want to use their labor without reward, we certainly need to check in with folks because it has a very different look and feel when it's coming from a homogenous group of people, you know? You really have to include the diversity that you have or seek outside support to pull this stuff together. So I think diversity WORK can be successful, I wouldn't leave it just on "diversity training." That is just a very small part of it. The biggest part is the transformational part. And that's where a lot of leaders don't understand they want to bring people in and say, "Okay, go work with these people." They don't realize it's about them doing the work.
Enrico E. Manalo 39:41
Yeah, fantastic point to end on. Thank you so much. Once again, Kristina Smith, do you have anything that you'd like people to kind of pay attention to or to look forward to as we're closing out here?
Kristina Smith 39:54
I just say we have to be alert. We have to—I'll tell you, I get up every morning and say, "who can I serve today?" Like "where can I show up? And who can I help." And trust me, I get opportunities every day. And I think we all have got to lean into this work, or this country is going to look very different. It's it's pointing in—not a good direction. So I think we need to step it up, do what we can do and do it now. For our children and our children's children's sake we've got to leave this world a better place than it is right now.
Enrico E. Manalo 40:30
I couldn't agree more. And if if you're out there watching or listening, and you're kind of wondering, "well, where do we begin?" I would invite you to think about the relationships that you have, the people that you're closest to, even if they kind of agree with what you're saying. It's a good idea to be explicit about these conversations so that we know where we stand with one another. And once we have those relationships, then we can leverage those to link up with one another and increase our capabilities. All right, well, that's it for today. Thank you so much for letting us go a little bit over time and we will see you in a couple of weeks. Next time we are going live with a woman named Katherine Giscombe. And we'll be very happy to have that conversation with you all. Thank you so much once again, Kristina!
Kristina Smith 41:22
Enrico, thank you, thank you, thank you!
Enrico E. Manalo 41:25
All right, thank you so much! All right thanks everybody. That's our show. Bye!
Outro - Enrico E. Manalo 41:30
Hey, Enrico here. Thanks so much for listening! If you like this episode, it would really help us if you could subscribe, like and share! And if you’ve got comments, questions, or suggestions, drop us a line at info@diverity.com with “DEI is:” in the subject line. For all our links, including our website, social media, and if you’d like to join our consultant network, OR if you’re an organization that would like to join our beta, head to our linktree, that’s linktr.ee/diverity, l-i-n-k-t-r-dot-e-e-slash-d-i-v-e-r-i-t-y. We’ll see you LIVE on July 20th for the recording of another episode of “DEI is:” on our LinkedIn page or YouTube channel, or subscribe to our podcast on anchor.fm/diverity-pbc. That’s anchor.fm-slash-d-i-v-e-r-i-t-y-dash-p-b-c where the episode will go live on Friday, July 22nd. This time we’ll be talking to Dr. Katherine Giscombe, Founder of Giscombe & Associates about issues facing organizations in the post-Roe v. Wade era. See you soon!
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