show, working out, researching your next vacation, eating ice cream! But you're not. You're reading a book on how to talk about race and diversity at work and hoping you'll get some insights and tips for making your workplace or teams better. Better for all. You are investing your time right now in learning how to talk about and address a topic that is important and uncomfortable.
HOW DID WE GET HERE?
For a while, it felt as if we were lulled into thinking we, as a society, had made some progress! After all, the U.S. had a Black president for eight years, so how bad could racism still be?
On May 25, 2020, we found out exactly how bad it could be. On that date, George Floyd died on a street in Minneapolis, pinned to the ground, as four police officers sat on him and one knelt on his carotid artery. It took eight minutes and forty-six seconds for George Floyd to die. Later, we learned this was actually even longer than we thought: Nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds. And we watched it happen.
Suddenly, the problem of racism was no longer abstract. The terrible, awful, chilling, stomach-turning death of George Floyd made us—and especially White people—realize that, despite whatever progress we think we've made, the world is not equal for everyone. Many of us responded the only way we knew how: by saying, “Enough is enough” and “Things MUST change.”
It was an historic moment. Millions of people took to the streets to march for racial equality. Thousands of companies and businesses took a hard look at their own organizations and asked, “How can we do better?” It didn't just happen in the United States; millions of people in all parts of the world marched for weeks, demanding justice and change. It happened in cities. It happened in small, rural towns where almost everyone is White. Old and young, of every color, every race, everywhere, said, “We have to do something. Now.” But what? What do we do?
THIS BOOK IS A STARTING POINT TO A MORE INCLUSIVE WORKPLACE
It's OK to be uncertain about what to do. You want to make a difference, but at some companies, the emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion has been heavy-handed. It feels like “marching orders” instead of being part of positive change. Perhaps you feel skeptical or mistrustful about diversity efforts, like you're standing on shifting ground, because at any moment, you could say the wrong thing and someone will yell, “Gotcha!”. If you're White, you may feel like anything you do may be “wrong,” misinterpreted, or misunderstood and backfire or blow up in your face. You may be nervous and conflicted because you genuinely and sincerely want to help and make a difference, but you don't know the way forward. And you're uncomfortable.
Whether you're White, Black, Indigenous, or a person of color, male or female, non-binary or trans, gay or straight, old or young, left-leaning or right-leaning, a leader or business owner or employee, this book can be helpful to you. You will learn what to do—and what not to do—to have constructive conversations about race, not from an activism standpoint, but from a business standpoint. In Chapter 10, you'll learn the STARTING Method, an eight-step framework that will show you, step-by-step, how to become a more diverse and inclusive company, department, or team.
But to begin our journey, let's start with who you, the reader, are and what this book is—and isn't.
Who This Book Is For
Readers who will benefit the most from reading this book will fall into a few specific categories:
The CEO, president, business owner, or business leader who recognizes that their company or enterprise is not very diverse and that this is a real business problem that negatively affects the organization's performance, growth, and profit.
The executive who has been tasked by their organization to lead, create, expand, or improve their DE&I (diversity, equity, and inclusion) efforts internally.
The team leader who does not have a diverse team and wants to change that in a relevant way, bringing new talent, skills, and perspective that avoids tokenism.
The team leader who does have a diverse team, but recognizes that some members of the team may not feel included or heard or perhaps have not received the same chances and opportunities for professional development and advancement as others have.
The coworker or colleague who is struggling to work alongside people who are different and is afraid to say anything that may not be “politically correct” because they fear being fired or labeled as racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, etc.
The coworker or colleague who is culturally aware and sensitive to the inequity of others (“woke”) and wants to be an effective ally to diverse team members.
The person who wants to be a better neighbor, friend, volunteer, community member, parent, teacher, partner, client, customer, civil servant, business owner, or church member—in other words, anyone who just wants to be a better person.
What This Book Is—and Isn't
Let me tell you what this book is not. This is not a book about activism. It is not a book about racial or social injustice. While the very topic of diversity must encompass the recognition that our society, and especially the workplace, is not currently racially or socially just, this book will not be dissecting root causes, nor will it be lamenting the impact and effect of such injustice.
This is a business book. This book will show you, as a businessperson, why identifying and addressing your diversity blind spots is important to your business. It is a practical road map from a business perspective, not a bunch of theory, to help you get started.
I will take you through the problems that most businesses have with diversity efforts, the most common mistakes that businesses make when trying to create a diverse and inclusive work culture, and the obstacles that can derail diversity initiatives and give diversity a bad name.
This book is titled It's Time to Talk about Race at Work, but shouldn't we have been talking about it before? Yes. Absolutely. As a society, we should have talked about race a long time ago, and this conversation is long overdue. For businesses, it's been a challenge, because while many, many companies and organizations have created diversity initiatives, programs, recruiting methods, and training, they haven't done a good job with how to really talk about race at work, how to identify and work through the obstacles, discomfort, and tension to build effective plans that tackle these thorny subjects. Our inability to talk about race was the catalyst for this book, but I believe that it's hard for us to talk about diversity and our differences in general. Throughout this book, I will use examples of different kinds of diversity that we encounter at work. Race is the anchor, but women, people of color, LGBTQ+, those who have disabilities, those of different generations and religious groups, and more will also be discussed.
In writing this book, I found myself often overwhelmed with the sheer complexity of it. There are a million facets and layers and I struggled with what to cover and what to leave out. I could fill five books on this topic and never cover it all. This book is designed to get you started—to help you have the conversations you need to have but are anxious about having. You'll become more comfortable with what is currently uncomfortable. It will provide you skills that can get us all talking to each other and maybe, just maybe, help in narrowing the huge divide we all feel.
You picked up this book for a reason. You're a good person—and you're also brave. It takes bravery to talk about
