Untold Stories of Belonging, Inclusion and Diversity

Looking back at Season 1's five episodes, we had a great time talking about a few issues in diversity, inclusion and belonging. Still, we are part of a society that's undergoing dynamic changes and we have lots of ground to cover in future episodes. Add your ideas to our next season by emailing untoldstories@highightcommunication.com.

When Canada decided in 2015 to seriously increase the number of refugees it normally accepts, a lot of people wondered whether we collectively had enough resources to accommodate thousands of migrants. Now, three years later, the integration continues and appears to be unfolding fairly seamlessly. Refugee Settlement Specialist Mohammed Alsaleh visited our podcast to talk about what he's seeing as private sponsors help to welcome and accommodate the newcomers. The road to belonging includes bumps, like going through puberty in a new culture, along the way.

When you apply for a job that you perfectly match, then hear nothing in response, you wonder why. It's a competitive world, sure. Yet, fearing subtle discrimination in the form of unconscious bias is a realistic worry. This episode offers insight into the way unconscious bias works and how it can affect what happens in job search and beyond. Zahida Rahemtulla and Gwen Pawlikowski talk with Wyle Baoween of HRx Technology who's offering training and IT solutions to the unconcious bias barriers that keep organizations from more robust diversity and inclusion.

Walking around the Metro Vancouver area, you might think that we've got the whole diversity project aced. We have a multicultural populace, for one thing. We've made advancements in gender diversity, for another. You can get the sense that we've got inclusion figured out. Of course, the appearance doesn't tell the whole story. While diversity and inclusion seems to have risen in highly visible occupations like TV news announcers or transit drivers, there are important pockets where diversity has actually declined. We learn in this episode that representation of visible minorities and women has dropped in governance boards in British Columbia non-profits, agencies and commissions, corporations and libraries. Our guests are pretty clear on the very detrimental implications of under-representation. The image of the quiet board meetings behind closed doors has meant they are often ignored by many of us. But they are a much bigger deal that you think.  Join Gwen Pawlikowski and Zahida Rahemtulla to find out the implications with Dr. June Francis and Bill Walters. Dr. Francis is the Director of the Institute for Diaspora Research & Engagement at Simon Fraser University. Bill Walters is the Metro Vancouver Diversity on Board Project Lead.

In Episode 1, Two Women Walk into a Bar and No One Can Pronounce Their Last Names, Untold Stories of Belonging, Inclusion and Diversity examines ethnic names in North American life through the eyes of the podcast hosts. We introduce ourselves, share our experience with long family names and explore the impact on our sense of belonging. We've used the common format of a joke for our title because that often serves as a delivery vehicle for stereotypes and we'd like to reclaim that language and flip it around. This is a pretty mellow introduction since we're just getting to know you; we venture deeper into belonging, inclusion and diversity as we invite guests on our show in upcoming episodes. For now, this one is a quickie.