Podcast appearances and mentions of zach what

We have an interesting two-part question today. Our first part of the show is about making drone battery voltage appear on the main screen. And the second part is about getting a clean feed when recording on the DJI Crystalsky. Our caller, Zach flies a Mavic Air and is bugged by the fact that he cannot see battery voltage on the main screen. Can Zach hack the Mavic Air to address this issue? Additionally, the feed on his DJI Crystal Sky is pretty choppy. Is it normal for drone pilots to get a choppy feed when recording in 2.7K 30 fps? Interesting questions, Zach. If you are a professional drone pilot or training to be one, listening to this show will help you understand the importance of safe drone flight. Also, if, like Zach, you are unable to get a clean transmission, Paul has some great tips to help you out. Tune in now. Fly Safe! Hone your drone skills by signing up for one of our webinars or online classes - and make the most of this downtime! - https://www.thedroneu.com/droneu-events/ Recently crashed your drone? Unable to find trained technicians who can repair your drone quickly and at a reasonable rate? Don’t fret. The cool folks at Fortress UAV can help you get your drone back up in the air in as little as 7 days! Use Promo Code “DroneU” to get 25% off. Drone U Members get an extra 5% off on total repair costs. Check them out now! Get Your Biggest and Most Common Drone Certificate Questions Answered by Downloading this FREE Part 107 PDF Make sure to get yourself the all-new Drone U landing pad! Get your questions answered: https://thedroneu.com/. If you enjoy the show, the #1 thing you can do to help us out is to subscribe to it on iTunes. Can we ask you to do that for us real quick? While you're there, leave us a 5-star review, if you're inclined to do so. Thanks! https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/ask-drone-u/id967352832. Become a Drone U Member. Access to over 30 courses, great resources, and our incredible community.Follow us:Site - https://thedroneu.com/Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/droneuInstagram - https://instagram.com/thedroneu/Twitter - https://twitter.com/thedroneuYouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/droneu Timestamps Today's question is about the Mavic Air Keeping a tab on battery voltage for safe drone flight Is it possible to hack the Mavic Air so that the battery voltage is visible on screen? How recording your footage can help you become a better pilot Can you get a clean feed when you are shooting in 2.7K 30 fps with your Mavic Air? Can you get telemetry data if you are recording to your SD card? Any creative solution for Zach? What about screen-recording on an iPad? What are some of the main benefits of using a DJI Crystalsky? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghd_icCZr70

Zach sits down with Ken Miller, CEO of Nasco Healthcare, and they talk about being an executive while Black, COVID-19, and advice around navigating corporate America on this special Monday episode.Connect with Ken on LinkedIn.Donate to the Justice for Breonna Taylor GoFundMe by clicking here.Find out how the CDC suggests you wash your hands by clicking here.Help food banks respond to COVID-19. Learn more at FeedingAmerica.org.Check out our website.TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and wow. You know, I'm recording this on May 27th, and it's challenging times, right? You know, we talk about Living Corporate being a platform that amplifies and centers marginalized voices at work, and one thing about--I'm gonna just speak from a Black perspective--is that we say that being Black is exhausting, like, that's a common phrase you'll hear, like, on Twitter and stuff. Black people say it, and we'll say it also in conversation, like, "Being Black is exhausting," but the reality is being Black is incredible. It's the systems of oppression, and that's cultural, that's political, that's legal, that's legislative, that's economic, that's judicial, that's... like, these systems come together and make being Black exhausting, and so I come to you today, you know, I'm excited, I'm thankful to be here, and I'm thankful wherever you are. I see you. I appreciate you. You're loved and you're supported. You know, we exist to really be a space, a digital oasis if you will, of encouragement and affirmation, and so we do that on this platform by having real talk in a corporate world. We interview CEOs. We interview executives and entrepreneurs and authors and activists, scholars, authors, all types of folks, really tackling perspectives from marginalized experiences and marginalized identities, marginalized meaning underestimated, underrepresented, under-supported, and we do that every week, and today is no different, y'all. We have Ken Miller. Ken Miller is, man, one of the few CEOs we've had on the platform. I just want to actually get right into it. Ken, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Ken: I'm doing fantastic, Zach. Thank you so much for having me.Zach: Oh, man. I have to ask, you know, how are you and your family doing during this time?Ken: As you said, these are very, very difficult times, challenging for all of us. In fact, you know, this COVID-19 crisis has truly impacted my family. Unfortunately I lost my grandmother to COVID-19. I lost my uncle to COVID-19. My mother-in-law tested positive and is now in the hospital. So this pandemic is truly impacting all of us, in particular my family and moreover people of color around the world, and we gotta do everything we can to try to get this thing under control, Zach.Zach: Absolutely. You know, I want to get right into it, right? Every now and then, like, I'll read this huge bio for folks, right, but I really want to give you space to talk to us a little bit about yourself, talk about your company, your background, and just what you want folks to know about you.Ken: Yeah, for sure. I come from very humble beginnings. I grew up in Westchester County in New York City in a very small town called Greenberg, New York, and growing up in Greenberg, we all grew up like family, and I was fortunate enough to have a very tight network of family and friends that really supported me in my development, made sure that I did everything I had to do academically as well as build some decent athletic skills. And I was fortunate enough to go to college. In fact, I was the first member of my family to go to a four-year university and actually graduate, and fortunately enough I was able to get into school via football, but while there I grew a passion for academics and ultimately wanting to make a difference. You know, I was fortunate enough to jump into the healthcare industry shortly after undergrad where I just continued to progress, be given more and more responsibility. I had a network of leaders that supported me along the way in my development, continued to challenge me and give me new opportunities, and throughout this journey that's been over 30 years I've been fortunate enough to lead organizations here in the U.S. for major Fortune 100 companies like Pharmacia Pfizer, like Roche Labs, like Novo Nordisk. I even had the opportunity to serve as an ex-patriot in Basel, Switzerland for about two and a half years while with Roche Labs, and I believe that that journey, those experiences, actually prepared me to take on more of a leadership role in healthcare, and currently I am the president and CEO of Nasco Healthcare. We are a healthcare company focused on the development of simulation training solutions for first responders, such as folks who are in the frontlines right now fighting COVID-19, nurses and doctors, to ensure that they build the skills so that they are ready to meet the needs of patients however they present themselves, and so I'm very happy and excited to be on this podcast with you, talk to you a little bit about my background and my journey, but the long and short of it is, Zach, that I come from humble beginnings and I feel very fortunate and thankful to be in this role today to try to make a difference in healthcare. Zach: You know, let's talk about your role. You're the second Black male CEO we've had on the show. I'm curious to get your perspective on what you would say are the biggest factors that have led you to the seat that you're at in Nasco today.Ken: Yeah, absolutely. I would say that it is 1. my faith, as well as my support network, that has led me here. You know, trusting in God, trying to be the best person that I can be, living my life with integrity I think has positioned me well to take on this opportunity. And then having a strong support network. My wife, she's my #1 champion. She's always in my corner. She always helps me make good decisions, as well as my broader network of family members and friends who coach me along the way. I think those two elements have prepared me to be here as CEO and president. Don't get me wrong - I was very fortunate to go to a four-year school, get my undergrad education. I went and got my MBA from the University of Chicago, one of the best business schools in the world. I've worked all around the globe, so I've had great experiences, and I think that those things coupled with the first two points that I made have absolutely prepared me to take on this type of leadership role, Zach.Zach: I'm curious, especially during times like these, and we're coming up right after this whole Amy Cooper situation and the continual just brutalization of Black bodies that continues to be broadcasted on, like, major media platforms... I'm just a manager, but even I as a manager, I feel like my safety net has gotten smaller and smaller as I've progressed in my career. Am I overstating the pressure to succeed as a Black male CEO and, like, the small degree or the lack of grace that you may have the higher up you get? Am I overstating that?Ken: No, not at all, Zach. I do believe that our circles are getting smaller, and the challenges of assuming these leadership roles for men of color are even more and more difficult.Zach: So let's talk about that. How do you manage that stress for you? Like, how do you manage the stress of having to constantly be on your Ps and Qs? What does that look like for you? Ken: Yeah, absolutely. Let me come to the stress element second. Let me start with how to get there, okay? One is you've got to have to an unwavering belief in yourself. This makes me reflect back when I was in third grade, and my third grade teacher seeing me as a Black boy in class tried to put me in a remedial reading group, and my mom was not having it, Zach. My mom marched up to the school and she told that teacher, "There's absolutely nothing wrong with him. He has all of the capabilities as any other kid. All you've got to do is put him in the position and challenge him and hold him accountable." From that moment on, I committed myself to being my absolute best, to having a commitment to excellence in everything in which I do, and so that brings me back to this unwavering confidence and belief in yourself and never giving up, Zach, and I think that if you do that you will achieve your greatest opportunities. You will fulfill your greatest opportunities. Now let me get to your question about the stress, right? You know, listen, obviously being president and CEO comes with a number of pressures. It's a 24 hours a day, 7 day a week job. You're never off. There's always a flood or a fire that you've got to deal with. There's always a great opportunity that needs your input to lean on, to pursue. So it's 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I think that early on when I assumed this role it was far more challenging and far more stressful because I didn't have the experiences and I reacted to each individual situation with everything. I think that what I've learned, Zach, is to treat triumph and disaster as the true impostor of which it is. I try not to get too high when things are going great. I try not to get too low when things are going poorly. Second aspect of it is that I realize through my career to be successful it's going to take a team, therefore I try to gain organizational alignment and input and have strong trust and agreement among my team, because I know what it's gonna take to win is that it's gonna take the collective effort of all of us working together to achieve our aim or overcome any individual challenge. As a result of that, I think that I'm managing the stress much, much better. Because I don't get too high or too low, as well as because I lean on the capabilities and strengths of my teammates, recognizing that I don't have to take it on all on my own, that there are others that are in this with me to help me solve these challenges.Zach: What does it look like for you to navigate white fragility and build relationships and coalitions of trust with folks that don't look like you, considering where you sit as an executive?Ken: Hey, that's tough, right? You know, it's much easier for us to connect and bond with those that look like us, talk like us, walk like us. It's far easier. But at the same time, that's not the world or the environment in which I work in, right? It never has been, from the minute I walked into corporate America. I've always been surrounded by predominantly Caucasian males and to some degree Caucasian females, very few minorities. And so what I've learned to do throughout my career is find my authentic self, Zach. Be me. Be the best Kenny that Kenny can be and always present that to others, and I think that with me being authentic and genuine I connect better with others, as well as I can have more candid, open and honest conversations about things that are working and things which are not working. Sometimes, you know, my culture--listen, I'm a little direct, you know? I'm a little forward, but I want to make sure that we're having the real conversation and we're not sweeping any issues or concerns under the rug. And so with doing that I think that I've built really strong, long-lasting, trusting relationships with those which I've worked with. If you ever look on my Twitter or LinkedIn or Facebook page, you'll see all of my colleagues throughout my 30-year career who are still my friends, who still recognize me for having a contribution in their development and helping them to progress and get to where they are today, and many of them are my Caucasian counterparts.Zach: Let's talk a little bit about Nasco and your journey in healthcare and, like, why this industry specifically.Ken: You know, it's very interesting. Zach, when I came out of undergrad graduating from the University of Albana in 1990, I just wanted to get a high-paying job, you know? So I wanted to get paid, so I jumped out and accepted a role down on Wall Street with Morgan Stanley. You know, I could see my future. I thought I'd be living the high life like The Wolf on Wall Street, but I quickly realized after a short six months in that industry that, although I was succeeding, I was growing, I was learning, I wasn't being fulfilled or personally rewarded, and so I got recruited by a pharmaceutical company and ultimately accepted that role, and I immediately began to flourish, and what I found was that I was able to do good while doing good, and what I mean by that is I was able to grow professionally, be successful, achieve my professional goals and aims, but at the same time I was able to bring healthcare solutions to physicians and nurses that were ultimately on the frontlines of impacting and saving people's lives, and from that I was tremendously rewarded. So throughout my 30-year career I have, with all of my passion, jumped into the deep end with these communities, whether it be the diabetes community, whether it be the psychiatric community, whether it be the simulation and training community of frontline healthcare workers, because I truly believe that the work in which I've done over my 30-year plus career and even to this day is really making a difference in helping to ultimately save lives and make our communities even better.Zach: So we're in extraordinary times. Can we talk a little bit about how Nasco's business is adapting to the market and challenges presented by COVID-19?Ken: Yeah, this is a very challenging time, Zach, and for us we've tried to modify and adjust our business to these times. First and foremost, the number one thing is to keep everyone safe, both the associates that work within Nasco Healthcare as well as their family and friends and the communities in which they live. So what we've first done is that we've enabled as many associates within the organization that have the ability to work from home to work from home. For all of those who are essential and critical to maintaining our business on a day-to-day basis within the building, we've instituted all of the normal social distancing measures, staying 6 feet apart, having mask requirements, limiting vendors into the corporate facilities, putting our manufacturing associates on staggered shifts to limit the bringing together in common areas like lunch rooms and break areas. We disinfect the entire facility from top to bottom four times a day, as well as we've put extra care into disinfecting all of our products as they are being shipped out of the building and ultimately arriving at our customers. So safety is the #1 priority. In terms of meeting the demands and the needs of the markets in this changing time, we've created more remote learning solutions. So we've partnered with universities, healthcare systems and governments around the world to create simulation training solutions that can be delivered digitally online so that healthcare professionals can continue to get certified and trained so that they are ready and prepared to meet the challenges of this pandemic. The last thing that we've done is that we've ramped up the production of our life-saving solutions, specifically our CPR solutions, our intubation heads, as well as our patient communication simulators that aid healthcare professionals in diagnosing COVID-19 during this crisis. Zach: And, you know, I'm hearing the parameters and the measures that you're taking. I'm curious, with that in mind, and as we look at--you know, folks are saying that this may be going on until, like, next year. You know, when you look at the next 18 months, what are you most excited about with Nasco?Ken: Yeah. I'm really excited about our ability to be able to take training from the classroom and take it into the home. With our digital remote learning solutions, I think that we have the ability to really help healthcare and first responders to be ready to 1. navigate through this crisis as well as be better prepared in the future. As well, we are ramping up our production of COVID-19 simulation solutions so that... and I shouldn't say just COVID-19 simulation solutions, Zach, but pandemic response simulation solutions so that once we conquer this pandemic and we use these solutions, we'll be much better prepared for those in the future. I think if there's one thing that we learned from the COVID-19 crisis is that we were not ready. We were not prepared as a nation or as a globe, and so I believe that our local, state and federal government leaders have clearly identified how woefully unprepared we were. So at Nasco Healthcare, our aim and our goal is to ensure that everyone be ready, and so we are building those life-saving solutions that help first responders and healthcare professionals be ready when the time comes. So whether it be to diagnose a patient during this crisis, whether it be to train a respiratory specialist on how to put someone on a ventilator, or to be able to resuscitate a patient that's in cardiac arrest that's right by the bedside or on the side of a car accident. All of these solutions we believe we will be coming forward with over the next 12-18 months that show a very bright future for Nasco Healthcare, and we ultimately hope to help the community be better prepared in the future. Zach: So before we let you go, what advice do you have to the marginalized professionals, especially now, in the workplace?Ken: Yeah. Well, I'm one of those marginalized professionals in the workplace, and so the first thing I would recommend is to believe in yourself. Never allow anyone to steal your confidence. That's #1. Have an unwavering belief in yourself. Two, commit yourself to excellence. Do the absolute best you can do at whatever you are doing. My mom taught me at a very young age that if you're gonna clean a bathtub or clean a toilet, scrub it until it shines, you know? Give it your best. Give it your all. Third is to build your network, right? Find individuals that you believe that you can learn from and ask questions. Be inquisitive. And last but not least is you've got to get up every day, right? You've got to get up every day and commit yourself to doing all that you can to grow. I think that there's one thing that I want the marginalized associate to remember, and one of my leaders taught me this a few years back in my career, Linda [?], one of my fondest leaders in my career, and what Linda told me was, "Ken, you might feel like you've got your back against the wall and there's only one way out of this situation, but remember, there are hundreds of options. You just have to down-select to the option that you think is most attractive for you." So Zach, for that marginalized associate, the last thing I'd want them to remember is that you've got many, many options to succeed. Don't believe there's only one path to your success. But choose a path and then get on that road, and if you find yourself deviating, course-correct, but stay focused, stay committed, continue to believe in yourself and I'm confident that you will achieve your goals and your aims. Chase your dreams. Never give up.Zach: You know, Ken, I gotta tell you, I appreciate your energy, man. Before we let you go, any shout-outs?Ken: I would just like to thank you, Zach, for allowing me the opportunity to be a part of this podcast. I'd like to thank Tina Chang and the pioneering collective for the work in which they do on my behalf, and I would just like to thank all of my friends and family who have supported me throughout my career that have allowed me to get to where I am now. I would just pray that everyone stay safe and stay healthy, and I'm wishing all of you and your families, you know, positivity as you navigate through this COVID-19 pandemic.Zach: All right, Ken. Thank you so much. Y'all, this has been Zach. You've been listening to the Living Corporate podcast. We do this every single Tuesday. Make sure you check us out. We're all over Barack Obama's internet, okay? So if you type in Living Corporate we will pop up, okay? Make sure you check us out on Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod and on Instagram @LivingCorporate. Until next time, you've been talking to Ken Miller, CEO of Nasco--CEO and president of Nasco Healthcare. Peace.

If you haven't listened to the Mind Pump podcast yet... get on it after this! These guys are leaders in the fitness space and have some of the highest quality content out there. They're also like distant mentors to us, so it was a cool experience chatting with Adam. We cover a lot of tips on how to become a great personal trainer but these tips can be useful for pretty much anyone in any career. On top of that, we discuss the Mind Pump philosophies behind fitness and get you some actionable tips you can use! IN THIS EPISODE WE ASK: Mitch- What are the steps you’d recommend to become a great personal trainer? What is the best path for a personal trainer coming up? Should they focus on just getting reps and volume at first or start with really quality reps and less volume of clients? Zach - Looking back on your personal training career, what would you have done differently? What can others learn from your career that they should avoid? Mitch- In your experience what were the keys to getting clients results? Zach - What are some of your programming/ periodization philosophies at Mind Pump? Mitch- How do you keep growing your knowledge and what are some of the best resources you’ve found? Zach- We were just watching the episode on whether COVID is the death of the gym industry. Give us your thoughts and predictions on what this will look like going forward and how gyms will need to pivot. More from Adam: @mindpumpadam www.mindpumpfree.com

Episode Sponsored by Primal Kitchen- enter code "HIDEF" for 10% off at https://www.primalkitchen.com/ The legendary Prehab Guys! This week we sit down with Arash from @theprehabguys Arash is a Dr. of Physical Therapy and 1 of 3 owners of the Prehab Guys. A group that is revolutionizing the space. With some of the best content online, we were pumped to chat about what they have in store for the future and get some quick tips for you guys as well. Zach- Tell us about the inception of Prehab Guys. You guys were early to Instagram , you started this while still in school. How did it happen? What was the vision that allowed you guys to play ahead of the curve? Mitch- Let's talk about the concept of Prehab. So much of what PT has been about has been reactive medicine. What is the benefit of doing prehab and how can you help someone who isn't injured? Zach- Do you guys have any particular treatment philosophies or methods to treatment? I know that you guys train people on BFR. I get a lot of questions on that specifically. Can you tell us about the benefits of BFR and how you guys are using it? Any downsides to BFR? Mitch- You are a lifter. You are a built guy. What things have you taken from the world of weight lifting and brought them into the PT clinic? Zach- You guys get a lot of branding as a group, what's something you want people to know about you personally? Mitch- You guys have been blazing a path in the PT world, where are you guys hoping to end up? Zach- What are 3 things you can leave our audience that will help them to avoid injury and stay healthy? More from Arash: www.theprehabguys.com Check out our FREE nutrition course and get your customized macros: www.thehidefmethod.com/freenutrition

Zach has the honor of sitting down to chat with God-is Rivera, Twitter's first ever global director of culture and community, about recognizing power in digital communities. She talks about how her passion for journalism and storytelling led her to her role at Twitter and shares the ways she sees people creating a sense of community on the platform today. She also comments on the trends she sees happening in digital community building over the next year or so. Check the links in the show notes to connect with God-is!Connect with God-is on Twitter. She's also on LinkedIn and Instagram.Find out how the CDC suggests you wash your hands by clicking here.Help food banks respond to COVID-19. Learn more at FeedingAmerica.org.Visit our website.TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and okay, so look. We know Ms. Rona is out here. Not to minimize or, you know, de-emphasize the stark reality and grievous nature of this global pandemic, but we want to make sure that we're keeping our spirits and attitudes high, and so we know that it's wild out here. We know that folks whole lives are changing. We're adjusting to different types of normal, re-identifying what normal means, and, you know, you can rest assured that in the midst of all of this stuff going on that Living Corporate is gonna be here, you know what I mean? So, you know, it's interesting. I've had people, you know, send me messages and be like, you know, "This diversity and inclusion stuff, like, you shouldn't expect that your podcast, this platform, y'all's blog, the learning platform that y'all are trying to build and whatever, for that to really take precedent when we're in the middle of a pandemic," and what I've constantly had to remind people is that, look, folks on the margins will always be on the margins. Folks were on the margin before this pandemic, and they're on the margins now, and so, like, Living Corporate and the work that we're doing and the work that all equity, community, culture, belonging professionals are doing is all the more important now. And so it's with that that I'm really excited about the guest that we have today, you know? I'm not even going to read this long ol' bio. I'ma just get into it. We have God-is Rivera. God-is, welcome to the show.God-is: Hey, guys. What's up? Thanks for having me.Zach: What's up? How are you and your loved ones doing during this time?God-is: You know, we are so blessed. I am in New York, in New York City, and my immediate family, my husband, my daughter, and my mom and aunt, who kind of--we all live in Westchester County--we're okay. Everyone's been healthy. I've got grandparents between Atlanta and South Carolina and, you know, thank God they have been adhering to staying at home. I had to do a little nudging in the beginning, but, you know, them old folks is trying to get to the buffet. [laughs]Zach: We gotta have a conversation about that, right? [laughs] And it's interesting because I've talked to other black folks, right, who have these parents who have lived through all types of stuff, so they're not really concerned about some invisible illness, right? You know what I mean? They'll just take some castor oil and they'll be fine, you know?God-is: Some tussin. [both laugh] For sure.Zach: They've seen much worse. But you're right though, it's a blessing to have family members who will listen. I know my dad--you know, my dad, he and I are very similar, so I told him--and my dad is 55--so I was like, "Hey, Dad. You know, y'all staying inside, right?" He's "Oh, son. No, no, no. You ain't gotta worry about me. I'm right at the house." I said, "Okay, good." [laughs]God-is: [laughs] That's so crazy. My mom's the same exact age as your dad, and, like, she was good. She was like, "Oh, I've been in the house." Like, my mom works remote anyway, you know, normally, and so it was the grandparents I was kind of like, "Come on, now, y'all," but they got it early and they're okay.Zach: Yeah, it's definitely the grandparents. Okay, so now look, I have a lot of questions for you, but first I gotta get into your name. Can we talk about God-is?God-is: [laughs] Yes, I can. You know, it's really kind of a simple story. I know it's a different name, but the story is kind of simple. So my mom, she was a teenage mom, you know, just trying to figure it out, from the Bronx, New York. Shout-out BX. Zach: What's up? Yerp.God-is: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yerp. [both laugh] And, you know, she was trying to figure it out at the time, and she had this dream when she was about 7 months pregnant she told me, and it was just her great-grandmother who was speaking to her and kind of was like, "You have to name this child God-is," and so--actually in the dream I think she said it was "God-is-love," and she was like, "I don't know. This is so different." You know, my mom's name is Melissa, so. And she just felt like it was such a strong feeling that she just--she was like, "I have to follow this," so she went ahead and did it, and it's so interesting that, you know, having this name for over 30 years, I could never imagine my name being anything else. I never was ridiculed for it. You know, I've had a lot of conversations and great conversation starters, but it is--I've always felt so comfortable in it, and I think for me it really reminds me every day to just continue to step into my power and the amazing kind of gift that I was given just through my namesake. So it's not kind of a crazy story, but, you know, an interesting one I guess.Zach: Nah, nah. It's not crazy at all, but it is very interesting 'cause I saw it and, you know, it's also really--so I'm from the South, right, so, like, my family is, like, very churched. So I was talking to my mom about--[both laugh]--I was talking to my mom about this interview that I was going to be doing. I said, "Look, I finally got this, like, global leader. She has this incredible, like, huge profile, and I'm just really excited to interview her," and she was like, "What's her name?" I said, "Her name is God-is." She said, "God--Goddess?" I said, "No, no, not Goddess. No, God-is," and she said, "God-is?" And so I'm like, "Momma, just hold on." And so it's funny, 'cause I was like, "I gotta make sure I ask. For the culture. I need to know." Okay, so let's talk about your journey getting to Twitter. Like, how did your passion for journalism and storytelling lead you here?God-is: Hm. Okay. So that's a great question. It's really interesting to me when I think about, you know, being at Twitter now. My whole career was shaped by social media, and, you know, when I was trying to figure out, you know, Young God-is back in, you know, high school or, you know, trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life, this didn't exist, you know? I think MySpace, it kind of sort of started when I got to school, and it was just one of those things that I knew that I wanted to be a journalist. I love writing, I love editorial writing, but what I wanted to do more than just, you know, kind of general journalism is I knew I wanted to work in black media. I wanted to work as a writer or an editor. I wanted to make sure that I was elevating stories and spreading awareness for the people that I felt, you know, had been silenced, which was my community, the black community, and then others. So I think just through that kind of passion I went into journalism, and I also am part of those millennials who's like, "Shout-out to the second economic recession we're coming up on!" [laughs] Because it was like, "Yo, I thought we had one in a lifetime, but oh, we doing two? Oh, okay." So, you know, getting out of school for me was right around that time, and it was just like, "Yo, I'm just trying to make my mom proud and not be unemployed," and I kind of found my way into marketing. Even though I wanted to do journalism and I continued to moonlight and really try to make that happen, I started to really become into marketing, and it was just like, "Let me just get a job." But in doing that I think, you know, I realized that marketing also tells those stories, and there's a chance to represent people and really elevate people who aren't always seen, and that's kind of what led me on that journey. And I will also say, you know, mid-2000s, 2006, 2007, when I started my career, it was always like--when it comes to social media it was like, "Who's the 23-year-old in the office?" Like, "I don't know about that Facebook," you know what I mean? "I don't know about that Twitter. I don't know about that, you know? Just tell her to do it," and that kind of attitude that of course over time become much more--brands and companies began to take it much more seriously, but that was kind of how I got my start, you know? I was a writer who could craft posts or ideas for these platforms, and I also knew how to actually post them, not like many other people in the office who were a little older than me. So that was kind of how I started my journey. So it was a little bit of serendipity, but also still me chasing this kind of passion to tell the story and represent for people who were not always able to do that.Zach: You know, and I really want to understand, like, you know, your experience in social strategy, because you're right. Like, there was a time when it was like, you know, we'd look at Facebook or we'd look at Twitter and we'd--like, we'd scoff at that. Like, I remember I had an internship where I created essentially, like, a social media--like, an ambassador program for this recruitment company, and everyone had a social media profile, and you were supposed to essentially, like, build your brand on social media, which would then drive, you know, business to the startup or whatever, right? But you're essentially building presence on Twitter. And this was, like, in 2010--God-is: Hm, those early days. [laughs]Zach: Yeah, so people were like, "What is this?" They were like, "Oh, this is cute, but this doesn't mean anything," and so I'm curious as to, like, what did it look like to take your experience in the social strategy work and, like, help it inform what you do for Twitter today? Like, can we talk a little bit about that?God-is: Yes. You know, I'm so grateful to the years that I spent really learning content strategy, learning social strategy, and I think it goes back to kind of that point about knowing that I wanted to kind of help elevate stories, and so what happened was that I really started to understand that there was a lot of power--you know how you think about in the court system it's like the prosecutor has all the power, right? In advertising creators have a lot of that power, but the story is sold and the plan comes from strategy, and I really took a liking to that. I realized that, you know, for me, what thrills me about strategy was that I have a chance to really kind of help build that story. I have a chance to figure out "Who is the people that we want to see that story? Where does it show up? How does it show up, and who is in that?" So I think for me, like, I really started to understand that there was a power in that, and then at the same time other brands realized that there is a return in this medium that was kind of a throwaway, right? There is something coming from when we post and then people around the world are talking about this instantly. And I think it was kind of two things happening at once. You had also more access to, you know, phones and technology that could help people kind of see things in an instant and, you know, thinking about campaigns that you were gonna through display or print long ago and then posting something in 90 seconds, you have, you know, celebrities in the public answering you about your product. You know, that's something that's just invaluable. So I think that's kind of what really started to help me understand that even more, and so I really became a planner, and I got to do it for, you know, both large and small brands, but what I think really kind of intrigued me the most is that what I realized about strategy is that there's always a target, right? Who do you want to see this message? Who do we want to respond to this? And also who is in this message? How does it look? How does it show up? What experience is it detailing? And I think that that, as I worked more in advertising, that was very homogeneous, you know? It was kind of the same target, the same people, over and over again, and so even me working in those positions, my own experience was left out, so I started to be really, really interested in, you know, "How are we gonna stop making this mistake? How can we stop ignoring communities that are actually shifting the culture but we're not even including them in who we're speaking to, nor their experience in what we're putting out into the world?" So I knew that through strategic direction that I could try and maybe shed a light on that, and that's really kind of where I focused. So just in thinking through audiences that matter, audiences that have been left out, as a true strategist I need that full story. I can't actually do that job well only looking at one small piece of an audience or a compelling story, and so I use kind of just that literal sense, taking the emotion out, because I'm a black woman who wanted to see that experience and I wanted to see other people's experiences as well, but you can't deny that you need a holistic kind of view to do your job well if you're speaking to the world and you're saying that's what you're doing. So that kind of interest in better understanding communities and what matters to them and how they want to be seen is kind of how I started along this path of informing the work that I do today, which is really working to connect with marginalized communities and make sure that they're amplified.Zach: So, you know, that leads me really well into the next question. So, like, I want to talk a bit about position and power, right? You sit in a global role in one of the biggest brands on the planet. God-is: Ooh, you're making me sound cool. I like it.Zach: I mean, your name is God-is. So how do you manage the responsibility that you have as a leader? Because I would imagine you have internal pressures to, like--like you said, there are things that you want to see realized and there are things that you want to achieve. There's a legacy and part of a longer term roadway that you're riding on, but then there's also external pressures I would imagine because of the intersectionality of your own identity, right? Like, you think about who you represent and what people maybe project onto you. And it's like, what does it look like to manage both sets of pressures while being one of the few in these spaces?God-is: Wow. I really appreciate that question. It often doesn't come in that way [laughs] that acknowledges some of those internal and external pressures, but I think what I love the most about that question is that--I just appreciate you using the word power. I think power is extremely important. I think that, you know, as they continue on in their career that, you know, positions can sometimes be a dime a dozen. They can come along and come and go, but they don't always include power, and I think that power affords this kind of real chance to create something new, to affect change and really challenge systems that aren't working and to actually be truly heard while you do it. So I very much am appreciative, but also just very thoughtful about how I utilize the power that I'm grateful that I've been able to have at Twitter. I really feel like a leader that is heard who's able to challenge and create in a way that is something that's supported, which I know is not always the case specifically for some of us that are kind of, like you said, one of the onlys. I'm not at Twitter, but, you know, in this industry, absolutely. So I think that that's important, and I think about the word pressure too. I don't know that I--it can get overwhelming, but I don't know that I would call it pressure as much as I would call it maybe an expectation or a commitment. So I think sometimes I get overwhelmed because just I--there's so much I want to do and get done, you know, for the communities I serve, but the way that I kind of balance myself and stay that way is that I just have to know that every single day I am working towards what I promised, right? Every day, and that my mission, my overall mission, my integrity, it stays intact every step of the way and that I know I'm not letting up any time soon, and I try and live that externally and internally so that I can say, "Look, I am continuing on this road. I know that it's important to me. There has been nothing that has, you know, taken me off course," whether it be your own ego or just kind of getting lazy. I know that I must continue on this mission, and so that's kind of the responsibility that I feel being in these spaces, that I have to continue to do this work to make things better and that I have to hold the door open for other people to do this work with me as well.Zach: You know, and let's talk about the work, right? So you're Twitter's first ever global director of culture and community. Now, let me just tell you, when I heard the title I said, "Ayo." [laughs]God-is: [laughs] I was trying to do big things. I'm trying to do big things.Zach: I said, "Yo, wait a second!" I was like... I mean, I don't know. It just--that sounds like a big title with a big, big, big bag. I was like, "Man." I mean, I was praising Him for you. I was over here [blessings come in sfx]. I was like--[both laughing]God-is: I love it, I love it. I appreciate you. Thank you.Zach: No, no, let's talk about what this means and what your responsibility is and what your team's responsibility is.God-is: Yeah, you know, and I think--you know, I would have to say, like I said before, giving some credit to Twitter, well, the credit to Twitter, for noticing that this was something that was a gap for them and that they wanted to fill. I would like to just maybe talk a little bit about how I got this job at Twitter. It wasn't the traditional kind of application way, I guess I'll say, because I think that how I got the job also speaks to literally the work that I'm doing now. And so, just as we mentioned before, my work in social strategy, I had really started to try and find examples of how I could explain and display communities that were shifting culture, that were forming together across social platforms, and then how those kind of phenomenons could be completely missed, you know, at agencies or with huge brands and how these things were formulating and happening, but because there was almost this cultural blind spot, nobody even knew what was going on. And one of the communities that I was particularly fascinated by was Black Twitter. I think that to me it was just such an incredible just example of how a historically marginalized community kind of uses their own cultural and shared experience to come together through technology and then literally shift culture, shift the narrative in a way that's very democratized, which is kind of what Twitter offers with this kind of space. And so I had started just a small presentation about that in the ad world, and it kind of made its rounds. I had done it at a couple conferences, and I had also made sure that I formed a pretty decent relationship with Twitter comms. I didn't want to get no C&D. [laughs] Like, "Who this girl think she is out here [?] telling me how to--" You know, and I want to make sure that, you know, I didn't know if they had something. I didn't want to step on any toes. And we developed a very nice working relationship, and, you know, from there they had started thinking about their first kind of all hands on deck, all-employee conference, which is called OneTeam. The first one they did was in 2018. And they actually invited me to speak about Black Twitter and do my presentation at their conference, and I was like, "Wow, you want me to do it? Okay," and so when I went I said--you know, I kind of was like, "Well, normally I do this presentation for the ad world, and at the end of my presentation I say, "And these are the people you need to be hiring. These are the people you need to be partnering with. Do not miss groups like this,"" and this is just one example of so many groups, you know, that we need to be making sure that we better pay attention to, but at Twitter, you know, I said, "Well, I want to kind of challenge them a little differently," and my challenge at the end of that presentation was how was Twitter better connecting with the voices from these groups, you know? Do they have plans for a cultural department or something that focuses on these communities in this way? And lo and behold. [laughs] So after getting off stage I was just so, you know, again, just incredibly blessed to be approached by some of the leadership there--shout-out to Jack, Leslie Berland, Lara Cohen, Nola Weinstein, who really set things in motion for me to come to the company. They just felt like, "This clicks. You get it, you get us, and this is absolutely something that we need to focus on." So again, I think just that acknowledgement of the importance of understanding these communities, the fact that it birthed literally this work and this role and this practice now, my team at Twitter, is just something I'm proud of and I think the community should be proud of as well, because I'm not talking about myself in my presentation. I'm talking about these collective voices who have literally shifted history and brought joy and accountability in ways that are just incredible. So I think that's kind of part of the story I think is important to put in context. Not everyone knows that story. I think it's important. But, you know, thinking through my own challenge now--I didn't realize at the time I was challenging myself. [laughs] It was very meta if you think about it, but I came in to solve that problem and kind of figure out what that looks like, so my team specifically focuses on building kind of these real world relationships with the voices from these marginalized communities who are active and who love and are loud on Twitter. So I wanted a team, you know, who really could help to continue to recognize the incredible power of these voices. Like I talked about before, they drive conversation, and they really shape culture on Twitter. The other piece of that is that as we look at how they use the platform, how they use their service and what they speak about, we have consistent learnings and insights. So what my team does is really kind of help our partners across the business understand how these communities both embrace and experience our service, good, bad and ugly, and so by doing that what we really hope to do is build a bridge between the service of Twitter and the people that it serves, and that's something that I think was really important to me, that we started to become this sort of connective tissue, and the goal in that is to really help empower Twitter to build the best product, but the best product that reflects the richness of the people who use it. [laughs] And so, you know, we can start to evolve how we amplify the conversations that are most important to these groups. So just really making sure that these people's experience, their conversations, what's happening, how they use it, use Twitter, that it's on the map, that it's a part of how we think about building our product, that it's a part of how we think about our marketing. It's embedded in every piece and fabric across our organization. I hope that makes sense. [laughs]Zach: It does make sense. In fact, let me go ahead and just drop this real quick. [Flex bomb sfx] A quick Flex bomb. That's how I felt as you were sharing--God-is: [laughing, imitating air horns]Zach: Oh, yeah. No, we got that--no, we got that too. [air horns sfx] For sure.God-is: Ayyy.Zach: Ayyy. So--[both laugh] No, no, it makes a lot of sense, and I 100% agree with you that--first of all, like, I wish we could just take a step back, and what I love about the work that you're doing and what you're highlighting is the meta narrative of black influence, like, just in culture period, right? Like, before Twitter we was already, like, shaking the globe. Like, we've influenced art, fashion, language, dance. Everything.God-is: Yep. We been 'bout that life.Zach: About it, and so we just so happen to be on this--anything that we jump on, like, we make it better, you know what I mean? God-is: Right, right.Zach: And so when I think about, like, Black Twitter, and I think about, you know, you're absolutely right that there's something about this community that is able to hop on, like, a platform and then suddenly, like, change narratives or, like, shift attention, and Twitter is a phenomenal tool for that. I think it's--like, it's gonna go down... this is not an ad for Twitter. Like, it's just the truth. Like, and you think about--[both laugh] But, like, when you look back... like, so my daughter is 5 weeks old. God-is: Oh, congrats. Zach: Thank you very much, yeah. She is adorable, and, like, as I've just kind of come to the reality of her being here, like, I think about the things that she's gonna learn in school, and I think about, like, "She's probably going to--" Like, when they study, like, technology that influenced generations or just different seasons of life or activism or whatever the case is, like, they're going to look at--Twitter is gonna be one of the technologies that they talk about, because it is one of the first times that we've seen, like, large-scale democratization of access and data and information and conversation and just general communication, like, across--and, like, for free. Like, relatively for free, right? You have to have Wi-Fi and stuff, but there's no direct cost to get on Twitter. Like, you just jump on it. And so I want to talk a little bit about how you see people today create a sense of community on Twitter. Like, what does that look like from your perspective?God-is: Yeah, and that's what's just been so fascinating. I share that kind of sentiment with you, and sometimes it's almost just incredible to think about, when we're kind of heads down in the office working we're like, "Oh, my God." Like, you know, "This is gonna be in the history books." Like, the work that we're doing right now, just because of where we are and what we're focused on, will be in history. I used to always say--I have an 8-year-old daughter. A little older than 5 weeks. But I always think about, "I just want to be in her history book for doing something that mattered," you know? And I think that, you know, the work that we can do here, it can be that important and impactful, and it keeps me grounded and it keeps me humble and it keeps me fighting even on days that are frustrating. And so I think also the thing that I love to see is how people create community on Twitter. I love that you said that one of our tenets is always to keep the platform free so that there can be that access for people to have these kinds of conversations and this public discourse, and so we kind of see people create community on our platform--there are kind of a couple different lenses. So, you know, there's obviously some interest-based communities where, you know, NBA Twitter is definitely out here. I mean, it's a lot going on every Sunday now with this Jordan doc, and you kind of see that happen, but that's a hugely active community, and that's around a shared passion. An interest, right?Zach: The Homecoming Twitter. Remember?God-is: Yes! Yes. Beychella Twitter. [laughs] Yeah, so we see that. We even see things that people may not even realize. Like, Plant Twitter is huge. Like, people share all types of, you know, just tips and tricks and beautiful photos of plants and flowers and so forth in their homes and gardens, and then we see--you know, there's obviously some professions that come. Academic Twitter is huge. I've learned a lot just about Education Twitter, Finance, and then there's also locations of course, and then of course we get into kind of those affinities and the allyship and the movements, and those are the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo, and we see a huge coalescence around those kind of moments. And then of course, you know, kind of where we get into my work is around those identity-based communities, and that's when we think about Black Twitter, Native Twitter, you know, Differently-abled Twitter, you know, Latinx--Zach: So educational.God-is: Yeah, you know? And Latinx, LGBTQ+ Twitter, you know, there's tons of intersections and sub-communities within there, and I think that is what's so fascinating. You know, just thinking about even just those groups that I just named, they don't have equal footing, you know? Even of each other, in society, to be able to tell their stories in their voices, but on Twitter, you know, that is democratized. It was somewhat of an equal playing field when it comes to people being able to share what matters to them or their experiences. So that's kind of exactly where my team focuses. I focus the most on those--I am here to serve specifically those identity-based communities, and, you know, again, this is not something that--no one ticks a box obviously and says what they are or what community they ascribe to when they sign up for Twitter, but through inferences and understanding that there is an allyship or an affinity there or an identity through conversation is what's really important to us, and so that's why I dig into how these communities have kind of leveraged Twitter in unique ways, and what we're seeing is kind of people who have shared experiences or shared kind of identities, we're seeing them kind of just corral around subjects in different ways, and I think it's great that we're able to see even people shape when they're challenging discourse, you know? Mainstream media may report on something--I don't know, something as simple as, like, gentrification, right, where it's an article and it's about, "Oh, look at the new grocery store that's in Brooklyn, and it's great, right?" It is nice that there is a new grocery store in Brooklyn, but then we're able to also see that that displaces people who lived there for 30 years. You know, is it construction in a playground area or something? And so I think it allows people to have this kind of 360 degree conversation that they've been craving but was only kind of relegated to the way that these groups could physically meet up in spaces, in physical spaces, and now we're seeing that kind of much more decentralized. Zach: God-is, it's almost as if you talk to people all the time, 'cause you're helping me--[both laughing] you're helping me segue really well into my next question, because, and I talked about it at the top, I'm talking about it again. So the rona, or as some folks say "that rona," is actively outside, and finding meaningful connection is more important now than ever. What are trends you see happening in digital community building over the next year or so?God-is: Wow. You know, I mean, this is--I'm so tired of people saying "unprecedented." Like, Lord, we need another word, right? Like, what is another word we could use? But I think, you know, it's been so interesting. Again, as a strategist, the study of human behavior--and I often think about the work that I do is more of almost a digital anthropology, because you get to watch how behavior shifts around different ideas, different events, and of course different just huge, I guess, news stories or health crises that are affecting us like the rona. So I think one of the things that I've really seen is that I think that we're gonna continue to see people really trying to create space and find opportunity for these really important inter-community discussions around mental wellbeing and wholeness. I've seen a lot of discussions between several communities about the idea that this is the first time many people have had in most working lives to slow down, and so they're able to kind of foster these deeper connections through technology, you know? We're looking at a lot of screens now, but we're trying to make the most of it and really focus on that wellness, and so now that we have that chance to kind of slow down, it's helping more of us stay balanced, more empathetic, more connected. I hope that we see kind of how important taking a moment is and that that continues. The other thing I think--oh, boy. Rona done--it done started a lot of stuff, right? [both laugh] Zach: It has, or exposed a lot of things too.God-is: Yeah. Oh, yeah, exposed. I think, in terms of technology too, I think that this will continue. I mean, we've already seen just the type of connective creativity that's come out of people just being in the house, right? People just being relegated to having to shelter in place, and so I think that we'll see more of this kind of agile, nimble creativity, and then also amplifying and uplifting those people who are leaning into that. So I think we were kind of in this space before where we were sort of fortunate. We never had to really think about being immediately without certain spoils of society, and now we kind of all know that that can shift drastically in a nanosecond and that it also can be out of our control too. So I think that, you know, industries, companies, brands, governments and individuals will really start to think about how they can better stay agile and quickly adapt for moments like this since it's just in our psyche now and it's not leaving. So I think thinking through what are the tools--you know, even myself, I'm sitting here right now, I've got my microphone, I've got my speakers. I ordered a new desk, you know what I mean? Like, [?]--and I'm fortunate to even be able to do that, but I think people are really thinking through however best in their capability, how can they be sure that they're able to stay connected and be creative and pursue during times that are just uncertain.Zach: You know, as we think about--to your point around, like, privilege, and I'm in the same position as well. Like, my job allows me to work remotely. I'm on paternity leave. When I come back, like, there's gonna be, like, a phased return, and then--you know, like, I'm in a position where I'm being handled relatively gingerly because of just the benefits that my job provides, like, absent of this pandemic but that are particularly beneficial and helpful to me right now. I think about though the folks who don't have the same amount of access I do, right, who look like us, and I'm curious about, you know, can we think about technology and marginalized communities having a more mutually beneficial relationship, and in what ways do you think that we can help drive more access and accessibility for these communities so that they can actually be on platforms where they can be heard?God-is: Right. I mean, that's--I think about it too, you know? I saw an article recently about some people having literally, like, class guilt, you know, almost, over this shelter-in-place, because it just affects so many of us differently. I myself as well can work remotely where so many people can't, so many of the front line workers, essential workers, who have to go out and make sure that we can continue to live, even at the risk of their own health and the health of their families. I do think, you know, again, just going back to that love of strategy, like, the first thing I always do and I always say should be done is listening. I think that so many people jump into trying to figure out what to do before they actually listen to what people need, and that's why I'm really proud of kind of the structure and program that we've built at Twitter, which is the Twitter Voices program, which my team created and runs, and that's kind of just literally a program that allows to try and identify some of these powerful voices coming out of these communities and then set up a sustained kind of relationship with them. How do we check in on them? How do we even have, like, a quick meeting or a lunch? Now a virtual lunch. But creating that kind of ongoing dialogue between the people who need to be heard so that we're aware of what can be done, and I think that's really important to do, because I think that it's important for us to listen to people who need to be heard, and then they can not only get the help that they [?] but also hold us accountable as well. But I think that what's important is that we continue to give these people kind of a microphone and a podium, you know? We need to make sure that they're not being ignored, especially during a time like now. You know, I think back, maybe the early '90s--let's just say this pandemic was 1992 or something. You know, the people who were most affected, the people who are not getting those loans or the PPE, the people who are being forced to go back to work or grapple with losing unemployment even if they feel it's unsafe, we would have no mechanism to really hear them writ large, you know? We would have no mechanism to hear them, you know, their conversations and how they're affected across the country, across the world, and so I think now it's important for technology to make sure that we continue to provide that space, provide that microphone, provide that podium so that these people can be heard, and for people like myself who work in these groups, we need to continue to focus on continuing this momentum of amplifying those conversations, helping to spread awareness on why it's important to listen to these groups, and that will enable us to build better products, you know, create better systems, and honestly overall a better society that should be inclusive to all, and it also allows us to tear down what's not working, and I think that maybe if there is any small silver lining to what's happening is we're seeing so many systems just almost buckle because they were not built to truly serve everyone, and that's something I think that, while that's happening, we need to be sure that we're in partnership, we're listening to and we're rallying behind the people that need us the most.Zach: God-is, this has been an incredible conversation. God-is: Aw, thanks. This is great.Zach: No, this is super dope, and before we let you go, I just want to give you space. Where can people find you? Where can people connect with you at? And then any parting words or shout-outs?God-is: Oh, wow. So thank you so much for having me. This was awesome. This was a nice just break from the rona, [laughs] to get to wrap with you, so thank you again. Everybody can find me on Twitter of course @GodisRivera, G-O-D-I-S-R-I-V-E-R-A. I am terrible at email, so I won't even do that to y'all. [laughs] But if you hit on me Twitter I promise I'll hit you back. Also don't be afraid to slide in the DMs. And then lastly just--Zach: She does respond too. Like, not to cut you off.God-is: I do! See? [laughs]Zach: So y'all, like, months ago I tried to get God-is on the pod, and I think she was actually pretty new to the role. I didn't care, 'cause I was just like, "Yo, this is crazy!" So I slid in the DMs, and then she hit me back, and then, like, we weren't able to make it work, and I was like, "Dang, okay," and I felt like she curved me, and so I said, "Dang, okay," so then I DM'd you and I said, "Hey, you know, I'm sad that we weren't able to make it work, but hopefully we can stay in touch," and she hit me back, y'all. She said, "Yep. 'Sho will," and I said, "Oh, my gosh. Okay," and so then--and now here we are. So look, y'all. 'Cause some of y'all are [churched?] or spiritual. This is not a message to y'all to keep on. [?] So this is not me encouraging you to pester people. This is just me saying that God-is responds to DMs. All right, my bad. Please continue.God-is: No, I appreciate that. Thank you, because I know you probably cannot get me really any other way. Twitter is just where I'm at. This is even before I worked there, so it's very true. And also I think, you know, just one more shout-out to my team at Twitter. I wouldn't be able to delve into this work this way if it wasn't for the support and the consistent support that I get there, from leadership all the way down to my team. Shout-out to Culture & Community. Love you guys. Nola, an incredible leader, Leslie Berland, Jack Dorsey. You know, it's an incredible culture that allows us to be able to dig in and really do what we can to try and make a difference in the world, even if it means we make mistakes along the way. It's a really great, supportive environment, and I'm grateful for it. And just also a shout-out to the home team at home. My husband Jay, my daughter Jordan, my mom, my aunt. That's my home team that allows me to do this work the way that I do and try and serve as many people as I can. And I hope everybody out there stays safe. Thank you to all the front-line workers, the health care workers. Thank you guys so much for doing what you can for us. I hope to hold you guys down as much as you are holding us down.Zach: Wow. [round of applause sfx] Y'all, this has been Living Corporate. Look, you know what we do, right? 200+ episodes in. We're having conversations with executives, entrepreneurs, thought leaders, professors, activists, public servants, elected officials, all about what? Real talk in a corporate world. We center and amplify marginalized voices, underrepresented, underestimated, unaccounted voices in the workplace, and we do this for you every single week. Make sure you check us out. Just Google us, okay? We're all over Barack Obama's internet, right? You just Google Living Corporate, okay? So it's Living Corporate. Not Corporate Living. Corporate Living is the inverse of what I said. So you want to do Living Corporate, and, you know, if you're, like, old school and you gotta type it in the bar, you can do www.living-corporate--please say the dash--dot com. You can do livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.tv, livingcorporate.net, livingcorporate.us. We have all the livingcorporates, God-is, we just don't have livingcorporate.com. Australia owns livingcorporate.com. It's some--God-is: Dang it. [laughs]Zach: I know, right? But one day, one day the brand will be brolic enough that we will actually go and get livingcorporate.com. I'm just going to speak that. God-is: Yes, manifest it.Zach: I will manifest it, but today the vibrations and chakras are just not there. So look, y'all. Make sure you check us out. Shout-out to God-is. Shout-out to Twitter. Shout-out to your team. And then let's make sure that y'all check out all the links in the show notes. Y'all check out God-is. Please do not bombard her with DMs, okay? I can't imagine what her DMs look like, but she has offered. She has let you know that that's the way to reach her, but I'm just asking as a courtesy. Just think about what it is that you have to say, maybe share it with--you know, maybe write it down, you know, then send it, you know? Just help her help you help us, you know what I mean? 'Cause I can't imagine the nonsense you get in there. Anyway, all right, y'all. 'Til next time. This has been Zach. Peace.

Zach sits down to chat with Dr. Richard Orbé-Austin, a psychologist and a partner of Dynamic Transitions Psychological Consulting, LLP, about the psychology of impostor syndrome. Dr. Orbé-Austin breaks down the concept of impostor syndrome itself and talks a bit about how gaslighting can tie into and even exacerbate it. He also shares several practical ways impostor syndrome manifests in the workplace. Listen to the full show to learn a handful of methods to combat it on a personal level.Connect with Dr. Orbé-Austin on LinkedIn and Twitter.Check out DTPC's website by clicking here.Follow DTPC on social media. They're on LinkedIn and Facebook.Interested in Lisa and Richard's book? Find out more about it on Amazon.Find out how the CDC suggests you wash your hands by clicking here.Help food banks respond to COVID-19. Learn more at FeedingAmerica.org.Visit our website.TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and look, man, you know what it is. And I always start with "Look, man, you know what it is," and I apologize for being gendered in my introduction, so let me start over. What's up, y'all? Y'all know what it is. It's Zach with Living Corporate, and we have real talk with real people in a corporate world, and this real talk is doing what? Centering and amplifying underrepresented voices at work, and man, we have a great guest. We have a great guest, really excited to have Dr. Richard Orbe-Austin. Now, is that right? Is it Orbe?Dr. Orbé-Austin: Yes. Yes, like sorbet.Zach: Aye. Haha. "Smooth Like Sorbet" Orbe, what's up? Bars. Dr. Orbe-Austin is a psychologist--I don't know why I started off like that. Dr. Richard Orbé-Austin is a psychologist and a partner of Dynamic Transitions Psychological Consulting, a career and executive coaching consultancy in New York City. Dr. Orbé-Austin has worked in the field of career and executive coaching for over 15 years, and was the founding director of NYU’s Graduate Student Career Development Center. In this capacity, he developed the strategic vision and led a team responsible for managing the career needs of over 14,000 graduate students in over 100 different disciplines. Prior to his tenure at NYU, Dr. Orbé-Austin served in a variety of leadership roles, including as the chief diversity officer at Baruch College-City University of New York and as president of the NY Association of Black Psychologists. Okay, so he's certified. Again, see, people come on this--you know what I'm saying, people, you know, will subversely kind of ask me, like, "Well, who do you even have on your podcast?" Y'all be trying to talk to me--you know, it's really a function of colonialist white supremacy, but we ain't gonna talk about it right now, how y'all try to come and challenge the credos of this show, but, you know what I'm saying, we have real ones over here, so don't test us, okay? Do not test us, mess around and, you know what I'm saying, pull your card. Don't play. [ow sfx] Dr. Orbé-Austin’s opinions and writings have appeared in a variety of publications, including Forbes, Fast Company, Diversity Executive, and ThriveGlobal. He earned his PhD in counseling psychology from Fordham University’s Graduate School of Education and his BA in psychology from NYU. His book, Own Your Greatness: Overcome Impostor Syndrome, Beat Self-Doubt, and Succeed in Life, published by Ulysses Press [and] co-authored by his partner Dr. Lisa Orbe-Austin, will be released in April 2020. The goal of this book is to provide a systematic way to eradicate impostor syndrome and help readers find their power so they can utilize it for their own goals and lead a more balanced life. What a bio. I feel like I gotta drop some air horns just for the fact that that was very, very dense and all very substantive and impressive. What's up? Come on. Drop 'em right here. [Flex bomb, then air horn sfx] Come on, let's go. How are you doing, Dr. Austin? Dr. Orbe-Austin, excuse me.Dr. Orbé-Austin: I am wonderful, Zach. It's a pleasure to meet with you and your wonderful audience, so I'm thrilled to be chatting with you today.Zach: Now, look, I don't want to spill too much tea, but I know your cousin, right, and his name is not Orbe-Austin, it's just Austin. Can you talk a little bit about the last name?Dr. Orbé-Austin: So yes, I want to always tell the story about--any time my wife and I go and present anywhere and we introduce ourselves people kind of give a look, and then I have to start by saying, "Look, just to get it out of the way, we're not brother and sister. We're actually husband and wife." So when we got married I actually took my wife's name. So her name was Lisa Orbe and my name was Richard Austin, and as we joined our families we joined our names. And so I think it's not traditional, I think, for a lot of people in society to see a man do that, so I think it throws people off, so I'm always kind of thrilled to talk about, you know, equity and equality and really being able to join families in that way.Zach: You know what? And shout-out to you, you knwo what I mean? Because, you know, you're rejecting patriarchy one bold move at a time. It's interesting how we normalize the idea that women's last names are just erased, you know what I mean? You know, it's not really cool, you knwo what I'm saying? Now, look, did my wife take my last name? Yes, okay? Would I hyphenate? Probably not because I'm not really that strong. I'm pretty insecure as a man, you know what I'm saying? But look, it takes a real man to, you know, admit that. Because it's funny, you know, I can come on this podcast and I can talk about rejecting patriarchal systems and all these kinds of things, but then if you ask me, you know, to supplant any privilege that I may have, I'm over here like, [hold on a minute there playa sfx]. You know, wait a second. We ain't gonna just--you know, I'm not giving up. Nah, but all jokes aside, that's awesome. I love that, and I was very curious about it from the beginning, and yes, definitely shout-out to Mrs. Orbe-Austin, your partner in crime and business and life, what's up? Let's talk about your journey though and why you got into psychology. Like, what was the path there?Dr. Orbé-Austin: The first reason I got into psychology is a pretty simplistic notion of psychology. So about eighth grade I always remember developing this advice column for my classmates called Ask Dr. Rich. So at the time I thought being a psychologist meant telling people what to do, and so, you know, as an eighth-grader with all the knowledge that I had at that time--Zach: All the answers.Dr. Orbé-Austin: Right, so why not, you know, do that? So I really enjoyed being able--and, you know, at that time it was usually relationship issues that people were writing in about, and I had my little column, and again, not that I had that great of experience in relationships, but I felt like I could provide something enough for people to seek my assistance. And then as I got a better understanding of what it meant to be a psychologist I came to realize that I could make a contribution down that path in terms of really being able to help people be their best selves. And so the background that I typically give is I'm a son of Haitian immigrants, so that automatically means that I was destined to be a medical doctor, right? [laughs] So for a long time I thought I was gonna be a psychiatrist, right, 'cause that fills both the medical doctor side and then my desire to work on behavior. Thankfully enough my sister became a pediatrician, my oldest sister, so I think she gave me some room to navigate and negotiate the reality that "Hm, maybe I'm not actually gonna go down that path of medicine but continue to pursue my dream of going into psychology." And so through college I was pre-med. I thought I was going down that path. I [?] all the things to really shape the direction of going into medical school, but then I began to know and understand when I took an internship after my junior year at Columbia University and I had the good fortune to work with a black male psychologist, who at the time to me was, like, a unicorn. So I had never actually met a psychologist in person, let alone a black male psychologist, and began to really know and understand that 1. it's possible to go down that route, 2. that I would have mentorship to really be able to know and understand how to navigate that path and negotiate it. So I had to have that hard conversation one day with my parents that I was not going to pursue medicine, but I was still gonna be a doctor, and it was just going to be a psychologist. So ultimately that's the path I took. I pursued, you know, my counseling psychology degree and really along the way understood that that was the best fit for me.Zach: Can we talk a little bit about--so you talked about it, you know, that seeing yourself represented is what then gave you the gumption to then pursue it yourself, but can we talk a little bit more about black representation in mental health and, recognizing that you are a child of immigrants, Haitian immigrants, but I'm curious about what have you seen in your presence as a black man make with your black and brown patients and students in perspective or hopeful psychologists and psychiatrists?Dr. Orbé-Austin: One of the particular missions that I've always had is to really increase the representation of black mental health practitioners, I'll say, in general in the field. So when we look at the numbers right now they're abysmal. Less than 4% of psychologists are black, and I'd say less than 2% of psychologists are black males. And it's typically across the board you see those similar numbers in psychiatry and social work, so the people that tend to engage clinically with our folks are not the people that look like them, right? And so over 86% for instance of psychologists in the U.S. are white. So what I was able to know and recognize as I said before 1. is to be able to see individuals who look like me pursuing the same profession as I wanted to pursue was very inspirational to me, but they also were able to provide me guidance and a home to talk about some of the challenges of being the only one in a lot of these spaces. So when I started my doctorate program I was the only black male there. I often times was primarily the only male in a lot of these rooms, and so, you know, the running joke in my program is that they would have one black male, like, every four, five years, and so I would meet--you know, I met the person who came on before me who was the black male for that time, and subsequently I knew I needed to join organizations and connect with professionals in the field, so I was able to be exposed to the Association of Black Psychologists very early on in my career, so I felt like I had an opportunity to engage with other folks doing this work. And then I saw it full center when I was able to do some of my training. One of the stories that I always talk about when we talk about things coming full circle as a child of Haitian immigrants, I had an opportunity to do an internship at King's County Hospital out in Brooklyn, New York, and I had the opportunity to actually work with this Haitian psychiatrist who had created a special clinic for Haitian patients, Haitian-American patients, and one of the things that he did as a psychiatrist primarily was to provide medication, but he recognized that a lot of these folks needed some more support, and so he was able to collaborate with me to start, like, a psychology clinic where I would do therapy with some of these folks, and the fact that I could speak their language, the fact that I knew their culture, the fact that, again, I looked like them, I think was so helpful in 1. helping them to not be afraid of the journey that they were taking through the mental health landscape, and then 2. it really enabled them to feel like they were being heard, understood, respected, and seen in ways that they probably may have never felt that they had been seen before, especially as many of them had recently immigrated to the U.S. and were trying to find their way.Zach: And so, you know, it's interesting to your earliest point around, like, the representation in the space being abysmal, like, it's challenging too, like, as someone who has, at various points in their life, like, pursued psychiatry or therapy or, like, just talking to somebody, right, it's not only, like, finding somebody, but, like, that small pool then limits some of the flexibility that I've heard my white counterparts have where it's like, "Okay, I have this psychiatrist, but we don't really click, so I'm gonna go and try to find somebody else, right?" Like, they'll shop around. Like, for me, you know, it's kind of like, "Well, dang. I mean, he and I don't really vibe on this level," or "She and I don't really agree about this," or whatever the case may be, but "She looks at me, and she at least empathizes with the bulk reality of my experience. So don't let me be picky. I'm just gonna stay here."Dr. Orbé-Austin: Yeah, and it becomes a challenge, especially when folks reach out to me and say that they're looking for some level of support and they say, "Hey, I want an African-American therapist." And typically, you know, I do say to shop around to find a fit, right? And so I want to give them as many options as possible. I end up being able to give, hopefully on the better end, three to four options, and then if they go to the first one and they feel like, "Okay, there's not a connection there," they may or may not actually then move forward on it, right? So I know that by the time someone gets to a point of really wanting to go to therapy, it's a major step for them to make that call, right? And so I always want to honor that and honor that, you know, effort to really make sure that they link with someone as soon as possible, and someone that they can vibe with, right? 'Cause yes, someone can look like you, but if you don't feel comfortable enough to be open and vulnerable to them, then it's just not gonna work, right? So that's the thing that I talk about, 'cause, you know, we can all feel like, "Hey, you know, they look like us," but if we don't connect, whether it's a co-worker or, you know, other person, we're like, "Yeah, they're black, but, you know, I'm not really feeling 'em in that way."Zach: All skinfolk ain't kinfolk.Dr. Orbé-Austin: Right? So it is a dilemma in helping people to feel like they have options and, you know, it's all right to kind of go to one or two to get the best fit.Zach: So you're a black man. You are in a highly--like, a very white academic space, and I'm really curious about what--like, what do micro-aggressions and just straight on aggressions look like for you, right? And I'm looking at your profile picture. I would imagine, you know, you're not catfishing anybody. You probably look a lot like your profile picture. So you look--like, you present... you don't present, like, a child, but you don't, like, present a very old man. Like, you present moderately young, right? And so I'm really curious as to, like, what does it look like just being you in these spaces, and, like, what do micro-aggressions look like, what do actual aggressions look like, how do you navigate that? What are some maybe patterns of behavior that you see operating as who you are in these spaces?Dr. Orbé-Austin: Sure. So I'm glad that you raised my picture, right, and how young I look. I appreciate the compliment. [both laugh] But that was one of the big ones, right, when I started out in either doing clinical work or in teaching - for a while I used to teach at the collegiate level, and I would get always, "Well, you look really young to be a professor," or "You look really young to be a therapist," right? And sure, on one hand it could be about age, but I think after a while if you still keep getting that same thing--and my white colleagues who were just as young as me were not getting that--then it made me begin to think about, "Well, what does that necessarily mean in terms of credibility, being authentic? How do I then recognize how to be seen for who I am?" So that was one, and then the other piece of it, you know, often times that would come up is the typical "Wow, you're very articulate," right? Whether it's, you know, giving a speech to a group of faculty members, whether it's, you know, being able to do a case presentation at a [?] conference. So often times there would be these underlying micro-aggressions that were really racially and, you know, gender-based. So if, for instance, you know, sometimes people would say, "Oh, you know, don't dress in a particular manner because, you know, it might be intimidating to the students. Just dress down," right? So for me it's like--you know, I wear a suit to work, right? That's my style. But to be told--I'll never forget this--to be told by a supervisor, "Well, you know, like, you may not want to do that. It might just be intimidating," and again, in that moment I didn't necessarily feel like, "Oh, okay. Well, this is clearly a micro-aggression," and that's the nature of micro-aggressions, right? That in the moment it kind of catches you a little off-guard. It's not so direct, but then when you sit and think about it for a little bit, then you recognize that, "Okay, my white male colleague wears a suit and a tie every day and is a little older than me, and I'm not imagining, you know, he was told the same thing," right? So it's managing and navigating that path. And then on the other path, you know, some of the work that I do as a consultant going into these different spaces, corporate spaces or, you know, academic institutions and people being surprised, right, they may not necessarily see my picture. They may have a conversation with me, but then when I show up in the room, you know, you get that sense of "Oh." You know, my name sounds a little bit generic, you know, especially when it was Richard Austin, right? So sometimes they're not expecting me to show up as the person that I am, and so they do a little double-take, right, and then they catch themselves, right? And so I get that, right? But now I've always said, to be quite honest, that my PhD has provided me access to many spaces that I otherwise wouldn't have had because of who I am, right? That those three little letters enable me to step into rooms that otherwise I'd be shut out of, and when I'm in those rooms I can then [?] my power, even though there is some level of pushback against it.Zach: And so, you know, it's interesting, 'cause I've spoken with folks--we have some mutual connections, and some of them also have, like, some really prestigious degrees, and so the conversation that I'll have with some of those folks is something like, you know, "My education and my profile can, like, preemptively trigger fragility and insecurity with my peers because they see the additional letters after my name," but I'm curious, like, have you ever experienced that yourself, or do you think that that's a bit more masked because of the fact that you're in, like, more formal academic spaces?Dr. Orbé-Austin: Well, not always am I in these spaces, right? So for instance, one of the types of consulting I do is diversity, equity and inclusion work, and in those spaces, particularly when I'm in corporate rooms where, yes, they can get that, you know, I have those three letters, but there is pushback, you know, against some of the things that I may have to offer, I think, because of, you know, who I am and what I may represent, right? And so we, you know, go into some of these spaces knowing that people might talk about wanting to do the work, but when it's time to do the work and when the work that's being guided by a black male is not what you want, then there can be a particular level of backlash or, you know, aggressive pushback that needs to be navigated and negotiated. Zach: And so then, you know, I think that leads us well into--you know what? No, I'ma pause on this actually, because, like, we have not formally talked about this on the podcast, but I think it leads well into, like, the main topic that we're gonna get into today, which is impostor syndrome. Can we talk a little bit about, like, gaslighting, and, like, what that is? And then perhaps how gaslighting can tie into impostor syndrome or exacerbating impostor syndrome.Dr. Orbé-Austin: Mm-hmm, yeah. I mean, I think that that's a great segue, because when we talk about gaslighting, in essence it's trying to convince you that what you're experiencing, seeing, listening to, is not your experience, right? That if someone makes a clearly racist, sexist, homophobic comment, clearly has done something offensive and they say to you, "Well, you know, you're reading too much into that," right? Or, you know, "I don't really understand how you came to that conclusion," right? And in the workspace, again, it's very difficult, especially one if there's a power disparity, right? Like, if the person doing the gaslighting is a supervisor or a senior peer, it's difficult to feel confident and comfortable enough to push back. And then two it's ultimately hard to then feel like you can win, right? Because if someone is in their particular stance, it's very difficult to argue with unless you have, you know, video recordings and you play it back and you're like, "Yeah," because they can say, "Well, I don't remember saying that," or "No, that's not what I said," right, and then you're left to kind of say, "No, this is my experience. This is what I heard," and if you don't have the "data," so to speak, they may just dismiss it, right? Say that you're just being sensitive or you're playing the race card or you're doing this, and then you're left totally powerless to really be able to make your argument stick.Zach: Or situations where they say, "Well, you know," to the point around race cards, like, "Maybe it's the fact that you're just not good enough, and so now you're leaning back on this as an excuse." Dr. Orbé-Austin: Mm-hmm, yeah.Zach: Well, let's talk about this. Let's talk about the concept of impostor syndrome. Like, in Season 1, it was, like, one of our first episodes actually, we were talking about impostor syndrome, but we really didn't get into, like, the science of it. We more so talked about, like, believing in yourself and, you know, knowing who you are and not trying to be fake, right, being authentic, but we didn't get into the neuroscience and, like, the genuine psychology of impostor syndrome and how it relates specifically to black and brown people. Can we talk a little bit just about what impostor syndrome is as a concept and how you would define it medically?Dr. Orbé-Austin: Sure. So first off I will say that impostor syndrome is not a diagnosable disorder, right? So it was first coined by two psychologists, Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes, in actually 1978, and at the time they were studying very successful female students and faculty members at an academic institution, and what they noticed was that these women, who seemingly were high achievers, did not feel as such, right? They felt that they were frauds. They felt that they were going to be exposed as not smart enough, not good enough. They, again, thought that they were impostors, so they coined that term to really speak about this phenomenon when people have difficulty internalizing their accomplishments, their skills and their experiences. They're constantly in fear of being exposed as a fraud, and as a result of that they tend to overwork to compensate for their perceived lack of ability. So when we talk about impostor syndrome, it's really that experience that someone may have that isn't necessarily a medical or mental health, you know, disorder, but it tends to be something that impacts people who, again, 70% of the population have talked about experiencing impostor feelings, and so it often though impacts people who are high achievers, because that level of success they do not attribute to their own smarts or intelligence. They attribute it to luck. They attribute it to, you know, key relationships, and so they're constantly haunted by this feeling of being a fraud.Zach: And so then, you know, what are some practical ways that impostor syndrome shows up at work?Dr. Orbé-Austin: So when we talk about impostor syndrome in general, we can talk about the fact that a lot of what we call impostor-triggering workplaces exist nowadays where in people are always feeling like they need to prove themselves over and over again, that they're never good enough, and when we talk about black and brown folks especially, they have a double burden to bear. So on the external end they're actually dealing with lies and discrimination and people and systems that are telling them that they're not good enough, that they don't belong, that somehow or another they did not earn their spot, and then they're dealing with their own internal voices that also tell them that and make them feel like, "All right, well, maybe I shouldn't be here. Maybe they are right. Maybe I was lucky. Maybe they made a mistake," and it leaves you then feeling like you don't necessarily deserve more. So at work it means you might not ask for a raise. You might not take on a key project because you fear that you'll finally be exposed if you take up that key project, which could actually give you more visibility and access, but you're concerned that it will be a house of cards and you'll finally be found out. It makes you feel often times stuck in trying to really look for a better position, either within or outside the organization, because again of this notion of "Well, I'm just lucky to be here. I shouldn't ask for too much." And it comes up when your boss or peers will say to you, "Oh, well, you made a mistake on that one thing," or "Oh, that didn't go that well," or you beat yourself up as well, because one of the key elements that goes hand in hand with impostor syndrome is perfectionism, right? Because if you feel that the only way you deserve to be anywhere is to be perfect and to overwork to strive for that perfection, then you can work yourself to the levels of burnout, and if you make any simple mistake you will beat yourself up over it and not allow yourself to really grow, learn from it and move forward.Zach: And so then what are ways that you think that organizations--'cause you talked about organizations that exacerbate impostor syndrome, right? What do you think are some ways that organizations exacerbate impostor syndrome for everybody, and then what are ways that you believe that organizations exacerbate impostor syndrome particularly for black and brown folks?Dr. Orbé-Austin: Sure. So I talk about some of the triggers in today's work culture. One of them is this notion of performance, right? When I talk to [?] organizations and ask them what their performance is and some of them will give me blank looks or they'll report back that "Oh, you know, it changes, and, you know, it's constantly shifting." If people don't have an understanding of what good performance is, right, like, what they're striving to do, then they'll feel like they're not hitting their targets and they feel, again, that they have to keep proving themselves. And so on the organization's end they may feel like "Well, that's great 'cause it's gonna drive productivity," right? But ultimately it may drive people out of the organization. It may drive people to burnout, as seen through absenteeism, as seen through, you know, different ways of not necessarily being at the level of production that people want. So the first thing I tell organizations to do is to really make sure that you have a legitimate performance process, typically not just once a year, because again, if someone doesn't know either that she's doing well or that there's room for improvement, she's just gonna keep working working working until burnout, right? So that's the first way that organizations can really address and reduce impostor syndrome. The other thing is the manager is one of the key people to deliver the message for the organization. So, you know, management needs to be trained to know and understand how to provide appropriate feedback. So you have some managers who feel like "Well, I don't give praise at all. I don't give positive feedback because people don't really deserve it. They'd have to do something great, and no one really does anything great. You know, by me giving negative feedback, it helps them to keep moving forward and get better," and that has not proven to be the case. Research does not support that notion, that the more negative feedback that you give without any positive feedback the better people will perform. So it's helping people to really understand what constructive feedback is. Again, often times people who rise to the level of manager were great individual contributors, so they don't know and haven't mastered the skill sets needed to be a good manager. To be a good manager is to really develop people, to help people grow and learn, and if you don't have that lens you will continue to make some of the same mistakes that drive impostor syndrome and sustain it, especially when we talk about black and brown folk. It's helping them to feel that they actually belong, that they're not given the projects that nobody else wants, that if they're on the team they're given some the lower level types of projects, that you actually help them to know and understand that "You deserve to be here, we respect and value your skill sets, your expertise and your experience, and we're invested in keeping you and helping you to grow," right? So often times, you know, these notions of belonging and psychological safety that I talk about tend to be overlooked by organizations because, again, for them it's just about their bottom line. They want to make sure that people are producing at the levels that they need them to, but they don't necessarily think about the cost to those individuals, and so they end up marginalizing certain people, and when those people leave, then it's this self-fulfilling prophecy of "Oh. Well, yeah, they didn't belong here anyway," and they don't really learn and understand that, well, maybe it was the organization that didn't create a welcoming enough space for them to actually excel.Zach: You know, and it's interesting when you talk about, like, performance and, like, being really clear with, like, you know, what does good look like, I think it's challenging as work continues to become less transactional, and, like, high-paying jobs become more quote-unquote "strategic" and "qualitative" and "subjective." I think, like, with that comes a danger, or at least more opportunity, to have ambiguity in terms of what good performance looks like, and it gives managers space, unconsciously, consciously, maliciously or otherwise, to create hierarchies in their mind, like, outside of whatever system you want to use to grade something. Because if work is super subjective--like, one thing about consulting, right, like, so much of consulting has to do with relationships and, like, the work itself, because you're not making X amount of widgets a day. You're putting together a PowerPoint or you're writing a paragraph, and so much of those things are again, like, just inherently subjective. Like, PowerPoint design, I mean--and I know there's plenty of folks who hate PowerPoint, but, you know, there's some PowerPoints that look great to some folks and look terrible to others. There's some people who love the way that you run a meeting and there's people who think it's the worst thing in the world, right? So it's like--I guess my question to you, as we continue to think about the future of work and we think about the more [soft?] skills are gonna be needed to do the type of work that's gonna be left when you think about what automation is gonna pick up and kind of, like, what we're going to pick up after automation digs through the rubble of work. What are ways do you think that we can still create some norms, some performance standard or expectation norms, that don't exacerbate or create, like, impostor organizations?Dr. Orbé-Austin: I think that's a great question. One of the things that immediately comes to mind is 1. being able to acknowledge just the level of inherent bias in the process as a whole, right, that we as humans, and we as machines, tend to have bias, right? So a lot of organizations are really all about technology and AI, and AI ultimately will reduce bias and discrimination, and then when we look at, you know, some of these apps that, you know, when you take a picture they can't recognize black faces or they recognize them as monkeys. We know that people make these particular programs and artificial intelligences, so being able to constantly understand, be on the lookout, for the level of bias that exists in performance reviews. So one of the things that my wife and I talk about, we do some work around gender bias, and one of the presentations we talk about is that women tend to get more vague feedback, feedback that does not allow them to, again, think about ways to improve. So, you know, you said this term "strategic" before, and that's something I will say to you that comes up a lot, that women will be like, "Well, you need to be more strategic," and I always say to my female clients, "Ask them what that means," right? What does that look like, right? Men tend to get much more tangible, concrete feedback about how to improve, so it enables them to clearly know and understand what they're striving for, right? And, you know, I think it's some of the same type of challenges with professionals of color where if they get any feedback it may not necessarily be substantial or substantive enough to help them understand how to grow. It may just be punitive. You know, I was reading this article the other day about a hiring process where different black candidates were coming in to the process, and one of the, you know, committee members kept asking and talking about, you know, dress and timeliness to the black candidates, but to the white candidates that never came up. And thankfully there was someone else on the committee who noticed that and said, "You know, I have a question for you. Like, why is it that you're asking questions about timeliness and dress to, you know, certain candidates and not others, and why is it that the candidates that you're asking it about are the black candidates?" And the woman, you know, was able to [?] enough say, "Well, you know, I used to supervise this black woman, and she used to come in late all the time, and, you know, I wasn't really happy about that, so I really wanted to kind of, you know, make sure that that was talked about," right? And so you see that she was able to even pinpoint it, right, that this was not even unconscious bias. It was a conscious bias of saying, "Hey, this is something that is not acceptable," and then we have the issues related to, like, hair discrimination now, which is a big thing that, you know, in 2020 we're still talking about how people wear their hair as a means of, you know, determining whether or not they belong is just unfathomable to me. So organizations have to be honest with the bias in their processes and in the leadership norms and culture and continue to attack it, that it's a life-long learning process, that it's not this "Okay, we're good now. We did some diversity, equity and inclusion work, and we got our certificate, so we're good to go for the next fifty years," right? It's really institutionalizing that process. It's really saying "How are we enabling all of the different people who come into our organization to feel that they belong, that they're psychologically safe, that there is room for them here?"Zach: So you said a phrase and I'm gonna follow up on that, but before I get there, you know, you talk about--and again, I'm excited because I have someone in the space, so I want to--and I've continued to say when it comes to diversity, equity and inclusion work, I wish that--if there was a way I could've still got the bag, Richard, if I could have still gotten the bag and gotten into psychology, but I just couldn't see myself, like, getting the bag, not getting into that whatever, but I really am intrigued by the why behind the things that people do, right? So when you talk about giving feedback to black and brown employees, to people of color, do you think there's any role that, like, self-preservation or fragility plays into not giving into the type of feedback that black and brown folks receive? Like, in the ambiguity of the feedback as well as, like, the subjectivity of the feedback, and maybe even, like, the lack of substance in the feedback itself. Like, do you think that fragility or self-preservation plays into that?Dr. Orbe-Austin: Yes, definitely, because giving feedback is a very difficult, uncomfortable thing to do, and you can be called out when you're giving the feedback as to the things you're lacking and doing, right? So if you are a manager who doesn't feel secure in managing, right, 1. you tend to not give any kind of feedback until you have to in that year-end review, that one-time process, and there's some level of fear and anxiety, especially if you find black and brown folks more threatening, that if you give them feedback that may be upsetting that it may either come back to you in the form of them saying, "Hey, well, I also want to be able to give you some constructive feedback," and 2. if you believe that "Oh, well, they're just gonna be angry," then you will refrain from doing anything until, you know, again, you have to, and then ultimately if you don't feel that they actually belong in the organization consciously or unconsciously, it is a way for you to facilitate an exit, right? So I had another opportunity with an organization to talk about some of their challenges within their retention process, and one of the things that they raised was the reality that when they looked at the individuals who were on tips, they were consistently black employees, and the HR person, you know, thankfully said to the managers, well, "Why is that? I noticed this, and what does this mean?" Right? And it's the same way I used to talk about in schools that black males and suspended and expelled at higher rates than their white counterparts even though they may have the same levels and types of infractions, right, that some of the danger, you know, due to the fragility is "Okay, black and brown bodies are threatening to me, so therefore I have to find ways to protect myself and to punish them, either in the professional space or the academic space." So there was a case the other day where a young black male had the police called on him in his collegiate classroom because he refused to move his seat, and his white male professor decided that the way he was going to negotiate it was through punishment and to call the police to remove the young man rather than 1. recognizing that, you know, the reason he didn't want to move his seat is he had already come in, he had sat down, but the professor was trying to tell him he needed to come to the front, right? And again, like, would he have done that with a white student? Probably not.Zach: Well, you know, it's interesting too. I think that also speaks to, like, just the bizarre ways that, like, punishment for black and brown bodies, like, escalates so fast. It's like, "Wait, I went from not talking to anybody, there not being any issue, to now I'm talking to, like, someone with a huge difference in power than I have. Where did this come from? Like, how did we get here so fast?"Dr. Orbe-Austin: Yeah, it escalates. And I will say to you, you know, we talk about this issue of micro-aggressions and straight up aggressions. I remember one of the first jobs that I had, you know, while I was in graduate school was working in this college office, and again, only black male, primarily white women working in the space. It was a job to actually help, you know, primarily black and Latino students who had gotten kicked out of a four-year college--this was a community college--helping them to get back academically to a space to be able to return. So it was an advising position. I was focused on doing the work relative to helping these students. So I come in, go to my office, close my door, see my students and go, and that was not acceptable to my white female supervisor. So she decided that she needed to watch me or kind of know and understand what it was that I was doing, and chance would have it, you know, that this is where I actually met my wife, the other Dr. Orbe-Austin. She came on board, and when she came on board this woman said to her, "Well, can you watch him?" Like, you know, "'Cause you're another person of color. Can you watch him and see, like, what he's up to?" Now, mind you, this woman and her other colleagues, all her other direct reports, were white women, would go out to these long lunches, go to Lohman's, go shopping and do all these other things. I was in, you know, my office seeing these students, but I was the one who was suspect, and it got to a turning point where, you know, again I was able to connect with my wife [?], and she told me, "Yeah, I was sent to kind of surveil you," right? And it's unbelievable, right? At that stage of my life and my career that, you know, that level of micro-aggression is like, "Okay, he's doing his work, but I can't see him 'cause his door's closed." Well, my door's closed 'cause I'm talking to students and I'm dealing with them in that way, right? So that's some of the hidden ways, 'cause had my wife and I not connected and she then was like, "Oh, yeah. I'm gonna watch him and report back," then it would just be "Oh, he's lazy. He's not doing his job."Zach: Yeah. "I don't know what he's really doing. He says he's doing this, but I don't see that."Dr. Orbe-Austin: Right, and so when we talk about this issue of privilege, you know, I often talk about the fact that white privilege means that you're given the benefit of the doubt relative to competence, relative to innocence, and you just have a higher trust point, right, that people will tend to believe you and give you the benefit of the doubt even if you're not doing anything right. So that's the heavier burder that we carry, and it's not--you know, it's not playing the race card. It's not an excuse. It's the reality. It's what the data shows. It's what time and again the numbers show from a wide variety of vantage points.Zach: It's interesting, like, your point around being at work and you're a credentialed professional, right? You're doing your job, and yet there are these informal hierarchies, right, that are forming around you. You know, I've experienced that myself. Like, I've been in situations where, you know, I have people who are supposed to be junior to me or at peer level to me, but again, people are typically not as slick as they think they are, right? Like, the reality is black and brown people have to be extraordinarily vigilant in just paying attention, which we're gonna get into psychological safety in a minute, but it's just interesting because I've been in those situations more than a few times where I'll be, you know, on paper supposed to be this title, but then there's folks around and, like, I'm noticing they're kind of checking on me or they're asking a bunch of questions or they're--they feel empowered to try to coach me or tell me what I'm not doing or ask me what I'm doing or, you know, say, "Well, I talked to So-and-so, and we think you should be doing--" And it's like, "Well, who is we? You're not my boss." Okay, so again, what we're talking about and what I'm hearing, frankly I'm getting stressed just, like, re-thinking about those things and hearing you describe your experience. What are ways that leaders can create higher degrees of psychological safety so that employees, particularly black and brown ones, can work more effectively?Dr. Orbe-Austin: So one of the things I talk about, and this comes up a good deal when I do some DEI work, is psychological safety, at the end of the day, is telling someone or someone having the feeling that they can show up at work and be their true selves without fear of negative consequence, right, that they can really talk about their experiences, kind of share their beliefs and not be silenced, and a culture has to be developed in order for someone to feel that, right? And what that means on the leadership end is being able to really allow room for differing viewpoints one, not punishing people if they don't necessarily agree with what the leaders with, two really actually listening to people instead of just waiting to talk next after someone else is talking and being able to understand and have a certain level of empathy for someone else's experience. Being able to be vulnerable yourself as a leader and sharing some of the things that you may be experiencing to let people know that you're not just superhuman or perfect, that you do make mistakes. Take accountability when you do make mistakes as well to again demonstrate that it's all right for you to not have everything in order, but that, you know, it's really adopting a growth mindset of saying that, you know, we're here to do good work." At the same time, we still are striving to learn and grow in those ways, right? So creating these spaces to be able to have people have a voice is one of the easiest ways for honestly organizations to develop psychological safety, right? So it's having access to the leadership. When I meet with people and I talk about "Well, how often do you talk to even your manager?" And they're like, "Oh, you know, we meet maybe once every two or three months," and my mouth is like totally, like, open... like, yeah, that's not good, right? Like, you have to be able to build relationships with your manager. Your manager has to be able to know who you are, not just, again, as someone filling a space and making widgets, but what are your aspirations? What are your hopes and dreams? What are your plans for being in this organization? And because so much management training is lacking or is not as in-depth as it needs to be, a good deal of managers feel ill-equipped to have some of these conversations, and so they just have very much transactional types of engagements with their direct reports where in they're just wanting to know "Okay, did you do X project? Let's do a check-off," rather than really taking the role as coach/mentor/growth agent. Zach: What can individuals do to combat impostor syndrome, right? So we talked about it at the organizational level, but what can individuals do?Dr. Orbe-Austin: So we talk about in our book this model that we created called the 3 C's model, which stands for Clarify, Choose, Create, and it starts with really clarifying your impostor origin story. So we all have origin stories, and some of us are better at really being honest with it than others, but it's being able to know and recognize "Well, what may have triggered or started this impostor journey?" Often times it might be because you were labeled in your family early on as, you know, either the super smart one who makes no mistakes and so you just feel like you have to be perfect and if you make a mistake, then that means you're an impostor, or on the other hand you were labeled as the social one and another sibling or family member was labeled as the smart one, right, so then you didn't feel like, "Oh, there's room for me to be smart and social." So recognizing that the origin. Not to again blame anyone, but to know and understand where that comes from. And then the other part of Clarify is to know what your triggers are. So for a lot of people with impostor syndrome, new experiences are a trigger point. So a new job, new project, meeting new people, may help them begin to feel increasingly anxious about being found out, that "Oh, this is gonna be the job I fall apart. This is gonna be the project where I'm exposed as a fraud. This person is gonna see right through me." So knowing and understanding that and then really being able to get support for that. So the last part of clarify is to change your narrative, right? Like, we all have a particular story that we tell ourselves, and people with impostor syndrome typically have a very negative narrative about who they are and what they've accomplished and how they've accomplished it. So being able to honestly look at and own your accomplishments, really being able to say, "I really earned that because of my effort and some of the actual skill that I have." And then we go to Choose, where it's speaking your truth. So the reason often times impostor syndrome tends to be sustained is because people suffer in silence, right? Like, they feel that they're ashamed to even raise it, right? Like, if you're a senior VP, you know, everyone around you looks like--you know, all of your family members feel like "Oh, you made it," then you might be afraid to say, "Well, I'm actually not happy, and I actually feel like I'm an impostor." So there's this fear that people will ridicule you for doing that. So being able to say it out loud can be freeing to begin the process of healing that. And a part of healing it is changing not only the narrative but some of these automatic negative thoughts you may have about what people think about you, how you label yourself and how you unfairly compare yourself to others. So being able to create what we call a positive [?] instead of these immediate when something goes wrong the automatic negative thought is "Oh, I'm a failure," or "Here we go again, I'm an impostor." And then in the midst of all this it's really taking care of yourself, really being able to make self-care a key priority for yourself in choosing, and then finally, you know, the last piece of the puzzle is trying on and creating. When we talk about Create, it's experimenting with new roles. So a lot of people with impostor syndrome tend to be the helpers, the go-to person in their friend/family network, so they don't have the room to ask for support or assistance or feel ashamed to do it, to actually taking on the role of asking for help and feeling like it doesn't expose you to being weak or not being able to do things, making sure you build your dream team of support, getting a coach, getting a mentor, you know, getting people who will support you in your impostor syndrome-defeating journey, and then finally understanding that impostor syndrome can be triggered at any point in your life. So when we talk about defeating impostor syndrome, we don't talk about it as an end-all and be-all cure. We talk about it as decreasing the frequency and intensity of those feelings and that when they do occur again understanding and identifying the conditions for your optimal performance, right, which is the self-care, which is the dream team, which is changing your narrative.Zach: Man, Dr. Orbe-Austin, this is incredible. I want to make sure I give you space to plug your book, to talk about where people can learn more about you, where they can find you, all of that.Dr. Orbe-Austin: Sure. So again, I appreciate this opportunity. It's been a pleasure to chat with you. If people want to know more about the work that I do, they can go to my website, DynamicTransitionsLLP.com. So my wife and I, our consultancy is called Dynamic Transitions Psychological Consulting, LLP, so you can go online, and it will have information about the work that we do. It will have information about the book, which will come out in April. So we're really excited about that. Again, the name of the book is Own Your Greatness: Overcome Impostor Syndrome, Beat Self-Doubt, and Succeed in Life, and, you know, one of the things we felt was important when we wrote the book was to have it be something dynamic and alive, so a part of it talks about, you know, the experience of impostor syndrome, but it also then has activities for you to do to really help in overcoming impostor syndrome. So it's not necessarily solely just an academic guide to things. It's actually some practical tips and applied types of activities that will enable you to move forward in living your best life.Zach: I love it, I love it. Man, it's just been great. I'm just so excited, because I do believe--and my goal, our collective goal at Living Corporate, is to get more psychologists and psychiatrists on our platform, because when it comes to really making sure that we are centering and amplifying black and brown voices and, like, effectively empathizing with them, I think it's important to have people on who have some of the academic background and knowledge and, like, formal understanding, not only for our own sake because a lot of us can't afford or for a variety of reasons, you know, don't have those resources, but maybe this will encourage us to go seek help that we desperately need just as an output of being a part of an oppressive capitalistic patriarchal system. But I also think it's important that we have folks like you on for the folks who are not black and brown who listen to our platform, because so often times education is used as a barrier to not listen to black people, black and brown people, or hear our stories. This, like, Euro-centric, like, demand for quantitative data and research that in itself is inherently biased, but whatever. So I'm just thankful that you're here, that's what I'm trying to say, okay? I appreciate you.Dr. Orbe-Austin: Well, I appreciate you creating this platform, because when I heard about it I was so excited to kind of engage with you, because as I've talked about many times, a lot of our folks, particularly in these corporate spaces, are suffering in silence and may feel like they're the only ones having some of these struggles, and I think you present a space for them to not feel that they need to go through it alone, and you provide a certain level of hope and strategies for them to really be able to free themselves from some of the things that may be more corrosive to their quality of life and really being able to help them believe they can live their best lives.Zach: Man, I mean... [applause sfx] You know, that's claps for both of us, you know what I mean? We're both celebrating right now. All right, y'all, look. This has been Living Corporate, okay? Really glad that y'all were able to stop by. You heard Dr. Orbe-Austin and all of the information. Make sure you check it out in the show notes. Make sure you check us out at living-corporate--please say the dash--dot com. If you want to check us on the social media, we all over the place. Just Google Living Corporate and we'll pop up. Until next time, y'all. Peace.

Zach sits down with former StubHub and Facebook alum Bärí A. Williams to chat about intersectional identities. Bärí also talks about her upcoming book "Diversity in the Workplace: Eye-Opening Interviews to Jumpstart Conversations about Identity, Privilege, and Bias" dropping March 31st. She shares what inspired her to write it and talks a bit about the challenge she faced in efficiently categorizing so many intersectional identities when it came to the 25 people she interviewed for the book.Pre-order Bärí's book on Amazon.Connect with Bärí on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram. Check out her personal website by clicking here.Find out how the CDC suggests you wash your hands by clicking here.Help food banks respond to COVID-19. Learn more at FeedingAmerica.org.TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? This is Zach with Living Corporate, and, you know, you know what we do, right? It's a Tuesday. Hopefully you're bunkered in somewhere, not panicked--what's the word? Oh, using an abundance of caution and, you know, keeping away from folks that don't wash they hands. You already--okay, anyway, we're not gonna talk about that. The point is you're taking care of yourself. Maybe you're listening to some smooth jazz and you realize, "Oh, snap, I need to listen to the Living Corporate podcast," and here we are, so what's up? You know that we are centereing black and brown voices at work, and we do that by having authentic conversations with folks across a wide array of industries, okay? I'm talking about energy to transportation to telecommunications. I'm talking about lawyers and doctors and professors and, shoot, hourly employees, activists, influencers. I mean, anybody really, as long as they're willing and ready to really talk about the folks that are most impacted, most marginalized, in this world that we live in, and today is no different. We have Bärí Williams on the show. Bärí Williams, you know, she's a lot of different things to a lot of different people. You know, for me to try to, you know, wrap that up in a quick little intro would be inappropriate, so we're gonna get to know Bärí in this conversation and talk a little bit about what she has going on, and we hope you enjoy it. And with that being said, Bärí, what's up? Bärí: How are you doing?Zach: I'm doing really good, I'm doing really good. I know we were talking off-mic about, you know, staying rona free. Bärí: Man... that rona.Zach: That rona. [both laugh] It's not playing doe. They said Chuck got the rona?Bärí: Yeah. Yeah.Zach: Chuck got that rona... When Tom Hanks--Bärí: Tom Hanks got the rona.Zach: When Tom Hanks--when Tom Ladarius Hanks got the rona I said, "Okay, we need to slow down."Bärí: Fire yourself. [both laugh] Tom Ladarius. But also yes, because he's from Oakland.Zach: He's from Oakland. And this is the thing, when he called [?] I said, "Oh, okay."Bärí: Oh, no. So here's the thing. The funny part about that is Tom Hanks was in my uncle's graduating class, in the same high school and all that. So that's a real thing. Like, Tom Hanks knew about [?].Zach: Man. Well, see, I knew--so, you know, the apple don't fall far from the tree.Bärí: That doesn't explain Chet Hanks though.Zach: We not gonna talk about Chet? [laughs]Bärí: I don't have anything for Chet.Zach: Man. Boy, that blackness went away when he realized his parents was sick doe.Bärí: Right. That patois was gone.Zach: That patois was--I didn't hear--no patois ting--[laughs]Bärí: "Mom and Dad are sick, guys. Thanks for your prayers."Zach: Snap. He was tatted up doe. But yeah, [laughs]--Bärí: He tried.Zach: He did, he did. But yeah, okay, okay, okay. Look, there's a variety of things we could talk about, right? Like, a lot of stuff is going on. This is not typically a current events podcast. I do want to talk a little bit about the book that you have.Bärí: Yeah, yeah. Out March 31st. Diversity in the Workplace: Eye-Opening Interviews to Get Your Conversations Poppin'. I interviewed 25 different people, and what was super interesting about it was it was 25 people that I picked, and I got probably five or six interviews deep and I told the editor, "Hey, I know we want to segment these into five different categories, but all of these people are intersectional. So you can figure out where you want to put 'em. I'm not gonna make that determination." Because who am I to say that somebody being LGBTQ and Christian outweighs, you know, maybe how they're genderfluid or express themselves? I'm not gonna--Zach: Yeah, you're not gonna rank that.Bärí: Yeah, or how when I talk to two black women in the spirits industry I'm not gonna rank whether they feel that they're black first or a woman first. "So you put them where you want them, but here they are."Zach: You're absolutely right. I mean, I think when you force--I think about, like, Feminista Jones. Like, she talks about this from time to time. It's, like, this idea that you make black women choose between their femininity, their womanhood or their blackness, and, like, that's violence, right? Like, you need to let people be all of who they are.Bärí: I totally agree. I would say what's hard for me with that though is that I can only speak for my experience, but I have always been black first, and the reason being is that all of the experiences in my life would not be different if I were still black and a man, and that's, like, wow.Zach: Let's talk about that. Break down that down a little bit for me.Bärí: Child, we can talk about it. My mama literally just texted me and said "I feel asleep reading your book. This is really good. I didn't know people were out here living like this." [both laugh] But yeah, I feel like--and I've been told this before, and it probably isn't a secret to you. I can have a bit of a dominant personality. [laughs] And that is--but I feel like that is not abnormal for black women. Period. Zach: It's not. My mom is like that.Bärí: Exactly, and my mom was like that, and my son's mom is like that. Which means me. [both laugh] So... I mean, if you're used to it you know how to deal with it, but the harder part, at least for me, is working within that framework in a corporate environment. What does that mean, to be a strong black woman in a white, predominantly male, sort of passive aggressive environment? And the answer is I still don't know, 'cause they say they want one thing, and then when they get it they're like, "Ooh... this is a little-- This is more than I thought."Zach: Well, I think a lot of folks do say that they want certain things, but it's like--you know, when you finally experience this, particularly when it comes to--you know, people say they want diversity, they want inclusion, and it's like, "Yeah, but until you're--"Bärí: Until it makes you uncomfortable.Zach: "You're in a room and you're doing a presentation and then three people who don't look like you raise their hand asking you a bunch of questions that you weren't prepared for. Then all of a sudden you ain't really like that," right?Bärí: Yeah, that's exactly it. And, like, I touch on that a lot in the book. So, in the book, it's segmented into five different categories. So it's Race, Gender, Age and Ability, Religion and Culture, and LGBTQ. And when I say that there were only--I interviewed 25 people. I actually interviewed more than 25 and let the editor decide what she thought--the editor was also a black woman, which was, like, fantastic. So, like, she got me, and that's very rare, particularly in publishing. And she read it and she was like, "Yeah, these are really, really good, and this is hard to figure out where to put folks," because you have people who are, you know, dealing with issues around culture and race, and then you have issues dealing with, you know, sexuality and race, and then you have people dealing with gender and religion, and so yeah, where do you put them? So out of the 25 people that we ended up selecting, in the end, only two sit cleanly in one bucket, and what was interesting about that is they were both Asian men. Zach: Okay, yeah. Bärí: Everyone else, you know, fit into multiple categories, and that's one thing we talk about is, like, how do you navigate being in multiple categories and fitting into a predominantly straight white male able-bodied world?Zach: And, you know, I think also, like, it pushes up against this narrative of, or just this binary mindset that we have about everything, right? You're either this or you're that or it's this or it's that, and it's like, that's just not the way the world works, and, like, people are really complex, but I think, like, part of, like, this decentering of whiteness, particularly white male straight able-bodiedness, is forcing people to realize that not only--like, these concepts are not new. It's just that certain things are happening now where you can't ignore those non-white male groups anymore.Bärí: Yeah, and I think people are very, very uncomfortable with that, very, and so part of it is in the book there are takeaways from each chapter. There are key--it starts with definitions in terms of, like, what are some things you're gonna see in here that people have said in their interviews that's gonna be prevalent and super relevant? Like white saviors, okay? And I didn't feel afraid to go there. Like, I know some people are gonna be like, "Ooh, white savior? So you're insulting--" No, I'm not, but you also think you're wearing a cape and you can save us all, and that's now what we're asking you to do, and also, like, you need to know that you're doing this. It's white saviors, it's understanding the difference between, you know, being cis and--like, people just--just terms and things that people may not be familiar with and to get them comfortable with the idea of that terminology and then how to use it.Zach: I think that's really important too, right? So, you know, we talk about white fragility. There are different types of fragility too. Black men can exhibit a certain level of fragility. I think, like, people who are in any position of relative privilege--relative privilege, now. Relative privilege. Have a potential to exhibit fragility, and I think folks don't necessarily like being educated when they're wrong. So, like, having something, a resource... and, like, Google is free, y'all, so don't... but anyway.Bärí: Child, I tell people that all the time.Zach: [laughs] Even if, like, getting corrected in public or by another human makes you uncomfortable, I mean, you could at least--I mean, you could engage with your own fragility in prviate. But anyway, the point is, having a book--Bärí: I will tell you, my husband is a product manager for Google, and he works on the Android wearables team, so he doesn't even actually work for the search engine, but when I ask him a question and he thinks it's dumb, he'll just send me the link--I'm trying to remember the acronym, but basically the acronym stands for "Let me Google that for you." Zach: Yeah, somebody sent that to me one time and--like, but this is the thing about that... and that's cute, and that's your husband and stuff, but let me tell you something. I remember one time I was at work and I asked somebody a legitimate question--Bärí: If somebody did that to me at work though I would want to fight.Zach: I said, "Wait a second. Let me tell you what it's not gonna be. You gonna answer my question, okay?" Don't play. Don't play with me. [laughs] Bärí: Like, there is a whole song out here in the Bay that was made that's called "What You Ain't Gon' Do," so... [Zach laughs]Zach: That's 'cause if I didn't have to talk to you I wouldn't, so don't--Bärí: Go YouTube that, and you might want to make that the outro music, 'cause--[laughs] 'Cause yeah, it's fine for Jamie to do that to me, but if somebody else did that to me I would probably roll up on your desk. Zach: [laughs] "So explain this. Why did you send this?"Bärí: Right? "So let's talk, Bob. Let me tell you what you ain't gon' do."Zach: And what ain't gon' be. Okay, so no, that's--let me ask you this. So, like, what was the inspiration to write the book?Bärí: Many things. I think--and this is gonna be long-winded and, but I remember being five years old--and my mom is a retired teacher from the Oakland [Unified?] School District, and she and a couple of colleagues sat around our dining room table in our apartment and they created what ended up being the oratorical festival, which to our surprise was made into a documentary on HBO last month. And she didn't know and I didn't know, and she was like, "Oh, look at this!" And I was like, "Yeah! Also, why are you not in it?" But I let that go. I let that go. I'ma let that go and let God. [both laugh] And she actually--what's funny about it is she was like, "I don't care." Like, if somebody's talking about this and it still exists, like, that's enough. Like, that was her goal. And so I remember sitting there looking at that, and I remember participating in the first year, and I won in the first grade for, like, my category, and I was like, "Did you rig this?" And she was like, "No," but what it did was it gave me a voice, and she cultivated that throughout my entire life when I wasn't, you know, doing debate time in high school and junior UN League. Like, all of that. So I always felt like I had something to say and, you know, everything doesn't deserve a response. I mean, I'm still learning that at 40. [laughs] But she taught me, like, when something does deserve a response, make sure you have a very calculated thing to say about it, and so I started to do that, and then I decided to write, and it was writing articles and op-eds in New York Times and Fast Company and Fortune and Forbes, and it made me think, "There's a [?] there, and there are things that people are not discussing in these tech companies that I see because I'm in them, and we can't fix it if more people don't know it's a problem." So that's what led to it, but it was more than that. It was like, there are other people going through different struggles and different departments in other companies, in other industries, and what does that look like? And that's why I ended up talking to, you know, two black women in the spirits industry. The spirits industry is dominated by older white men. And these are two, you know, 30-something-year-old black women with their own spirits, and they're Christian, and so that was one of the things where I told the editor, "I don't know where you want to put them. Do you want to put them in race or gender or religion?" But yeah, they've had people ask them in their church, like, "What are you doing? This is wrong" They've had people talk to them in the spirits industry, like, "Hey, girl, do you know what you're doing?" You know, they get it on all levels, and then I was talking to [Rabya?]. She's fantastic. She's the woman who did the defense for [?] in... what is the name of the podcast? I'm blanking now. That's terrible. Serial, and she talked about being, you know, a woman, being Muslim, wearing a hijab, and people--she knows she's a good attorney, but people would want her to write the briefs and do the background work but not show up in court. Zach: It's interesting, 'cause that's the kind of stuff--there's a pattern of that, right? Of exploiting black labor or using black folks' thought capital, wringing them dry for it, only for you to then take center strage and publicity and really interface, right? like, you see it--I'm sure that you've--'cause you've [?] in tech. Like, you've been with StubHub and Facebook. Like, you've been all over the place, right? Like, you've seen where, like, a lot of times black folks will come from, like, these HBCUs or, like, with these engineering degrees and then, like, work in the back in security. Security, y'all, is not--like, not tech security. Securing the building. Anyway. [?, both laugh]Bärí: I will tell you the funniest thing to me when I got to Facebook was it was 2014--Facebook started in 2004, so it was 10 years afterward. I was the first black woman in legal. There weren't black people in legal, so I was the first black person and the first black woman. There were no AKAs at all in the company, so I was the first AKA in the company. They had no Links in the company. I was the first Link in the company. Like, what are you doing? Like, if you want a highly qualified workforce, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated will get that done for you, The Links, Incorporated will get that done for you. And there were only, like, three Deltas in the entire company.Zach: Shout-out to my sorority sisters. What's up, y'all? You know, and my mom is also an AKA, but you're really repping. Like, you really got on this podcast and, like, inserted that plug. I respect that. I like that a lot. Bärí: You know, plug plug plug, but that's the thing that I wanted people to understand too was, like, if you want a highly qualified workforce--and yes, they may not have direct, on-point experience, but we all have analogous experience from doing this non-profit work, and that's the thing that people discount or don't see. So, like, you want to hire Brad in accounting and he, like, did an internship for two months at his dad's firm. Like, what do you value?Zach: Right? Well, when you start holding them accountable--so when you hold them accountable to the standards that they give you, right? So if you say, well, "You know, you don't really have X, Y and Z. Show me somebody else who does have X, Y and Z experience." Bärí: Yeah, show me what's comparable. Zach: Yeah, and they pull 'em up and it's like, "Yo, this person was... he was, like, a DJ, or he worked at a GNC. Like, what are you talking about?" And so then things just crumble because it's like, "This is not about this." Like, you're creating rules--Bärí: Yeah. Like, that's not really what you want, and that's fine, but, like, let's call a thing a thing.Zach: I think, again, it just fits the meta narrative of white people, like, creating new rules for marginalized people. Bärí: Well, it's something that I actually told a long bost and said, like, every time I hit the benchmark, you move the goal posts. Are you aware of that? And he was like, "What are you saying?" And I said, "What I'm saying is what I said." Zach: I just said it, first of all.Bärí: Yeah. Like, child, when I tell--and that's the thing, like, my mom should've never told me I should advocate, because I literally said, I was like, "No. I hit this benchmark, and you told me if I did this it would be that. If I did X, it would be Y, but now you're saying, "Hm, but in order to get to Y you really need to do--" And I was like, "Nah, bruh. You said this, and I have it in writing." And I did that. So now what are we doing? And he was like, "Why are you so angry?"Zach: What do you mean?Bärí: I was like, "What do you mean? I'm not angry. I'm just telling you this is what you said and now you're going back on it," and he's like, "But you're angry," and I said, "I'm not angry. I'm just holding you accountable, and maybe you're not used to that, but that's also not my job. Like, that, you should go home and talk to your mom or your wife about that."Zach: But you know what though? Like, just as a thought exercise, let's just say I am angry. Okay. Bärí: Then what?Zach: Then what? I am angry, because you said you were gonna do something and you didn't, or you said it was gonna be one way and it isn't, or I have written documentation and you're gaslighting me by acting like this isn't real. So yeah, maybe I am angry. Does that make my point less valid?Bärí: And it doesn't. Like, these are stories that people go through in the book about how people gaslight them in the same way, whether it's about them being a woman or about them being black or about them being LGBTQ. There is such a powerful story in there from a woman who's Asian who talks about, like, how her family essentialy made her feel like she had to whitewash herself to be successful, and then when she got to college it was like, "I don't know how to relate to Asian people now." And then when she got in the workplace she's like, "Now I have to relate to both, and how does that work?" I mean, that's real. Like, you know, how you're socialized is how you end up projecting yourself to the world.Zach: That's right, unknowingly or unknowingly, and that's the scary part, right? Like, you end up doing this thing, like, where you're raised. You're just growing up. Like, you're raised a certain way, and then you hit the real world and you realize like, "Dang, I have a lot of internalized depression and, like, I didn't even know that." Bärí: Mm-hmm, and that is--that honestly is one of the--it's funny, 'cause my son, he's now 9-and-a-half, but when I had to finish this book towards the middle of October, I was so tired. When I tell you, child, on the last day before I had to hit the bit I was like, "Ugh." I stopped to watch, like, a Real Housewives marathon, and he came to me. He was like, "What are you doing?" And I was like, "Excuse you?" And he said, "Mommy, what are you doing?" And I said, "I'm taking a break." And he's like, "Are you done yet?" And I said, "Do you understand what break means?" And he was like, "Well, you let me take a break, but you give me a time. Like, you've been watching this for, like, three hours. Have you hit Send?" And I was like, "No, I haven't," and he's like, "Okay, so then you get one more hour and then you need to finish." But to me, what I took that as was, like, he wasn't being defiant, he was actually imposing the rules that I put on him, which I was like, "Oh, so my parenting isn't totally failing."Zach: No, he has internalized that level of accountability and he is giving you that same energy back.Bärí: Yeah, but the same energy I had to give him was, like--I listen to so many stories about, you know, marginalized communities, interviewing these folks, particularly black men and their experiences, and you don't get to mess up, and I've told him that, and so he's like, "Why are you sitting here watching a Real Housewives marathon for three hours? You haven't pressed Send. Like, girl, get it done." And I was like, "Okay, yeah. You're right." But it's that same energy. Like, you have to be twice as good to get half as far, and that story was all of these people in the book, which was crazy, because it cuts across everything. It cuts across disability. It cuts across sexuality. It's like you have to make up for who you are by doing more work.Zach: You know, I think about a conversation we just had with Ruchika Tulshyan, and we were talking about how black men are often times left ot of the corporate D&I initiatives, right? So now, sometimes people think they're being really radical when they talk about "the angry black man." It's like, okay, I get it. That is a thing, and that's real, but, like, just the larger conversation about how black men are treated, and like you said, we don't have opportunities to mess up, and the same thing could be said for black women of course, for sure. It's just this idea of labor and, like, having to do more just to--Bärí: And you're not getting farther. It's just--Zach: Oh, my gosh. Thank you. It's like, "I'm not doing more to get further or to get farther ahead. I'm doing more just to be equal. I'm doing more just to receive what I've earned," right?Bärí: I can tell you, my husband, he interviewed at a former employer of mine. My husband is 6'6" and, like, 235 pounds on a good day.Zach: Oh, he's lean lean.Bärí: Eh... I said on a good day. [laughs] But the way that he's built though is, like, very Michael Phelps. So he's broad. So he looks bigger than he is, and the feedback that they had is--and also, because of his size and because he is black, he has been socialized--and also he's light as hell. Like, I've had people ask me multiple times, "Oh, so your husband's biracial?" No, he isn't, but people just assume that he is. And so based off of his profile, he's very light-skinned, he's 6'6", he's built like a swimmer, and people--so he has been socially conditioned to basically... I don't want to say tamp down who he would be, but he's more docile. Super reserved, which is why our dynamic works, because I'll be, like, the person in your face, and he'll--Zach: Yeah, it's tough to be big when--yeah, I've learned that in a variety of different ways, but yeah. I keep that--I would say I'm probably more like you, Bärí. I'm like, "Ayo," but I'm like, 6'2", like, 280, so I'm like, a big dude. [laughs]Bärí: And you know that scares people.Zach: And I'm not that--and I'm lighter-skinned, but I'm not, like, light-skinned, right? So it's like, you know.Bärí: And that is so scary for me with our son, because our son is--he is darker than I am, and I'm brown-skinned, and he's already 5 feet and he's 9. Zach: Yeah, he's gonna be a big boy.Bärí: Yeah, he will be. And I believe he'll be taller than his dad, and even if he isn't, it's like, if you are 6'6" and you're a brown-skinned boy and you're in Oakland, I have to keep you safe. And so everything I do is about "How do we keep you safe?" And that sucks, 'cause, like, I wish you could just be free, but--Zach: And it's not... and not even to be a super downer, but I say this as someone who, shoot, maybe by the time of this podcast my daughter's gonna be here, but, like, I think about having black kids in this world and, like, there's the physical safety, but then there's a certain level of, like, psychological safety that you really can't protect them from, and, like, there's certain things they're gonna just have to--again, I'm not trying to be fatalist or, like, super down or whatever, but they just have to go. They're just going to have to experience. And it's, like, the feeling of being isolated or alone or otherized or not quite fitting in spaces. Like, that's a thing, right? That's a thing, and somebody that I really admire--like, there are a bunch of folks I really admire, but I think about, like, Bomani Jones, right? Like, he's somebody I see, like, in these spaces, and he never, like--on his platforms, like, ever talks about being one of the onlys or whatever. And some people are just built like that. He's just like, "I don't really whatever." He doesn't come across, like, really vulnerable in that way, and I don't know--and this is not about Bo specifically, but I think about, like, other black men in media or, like, in these really big profile spaces, and I wonder, like, to be successful in these hyper-white spaces, do you just have to have, like, a certain level of just, like armor, and just almost be really calloused?Bärí: I think you do. That's one of the things also that I learned from doing interviews in the book, and that's not even unique to us. Like, the folks who are dealing with LGBTQ gender issues and gender expression, they had to deal with that in terms of, like, people questioning them and, like, what are you doing? Why are you doing that? Like, all of that stuff. And full discretion, like, I know Bo. Like, Bo and I are cool, and we've had that conversation, and part of it is like--to your point, it's not intentional. He doesn't mean to not say that. He just is like, "I am who I am, and you're gonna take it or you're not." And honestly, I've talked to him and have said, like, I want that energy for my son. I don't want him to feel like you have to have the burden of all black people ever on your back. Like, [?] does Bo, but he still reps us, and that's what I want, and that's what I want. Even, like, that I see with my husband. It's funny because I look at him--we're very, very different. He has had probably every advantage you can have in life. Like, he has gone to private school since he was born until he graduated. Like, he literally went to private pre-school, then he went to a private elementary school, private high school, he went to Harvard and then he went to Stanford, and I was like, "Bruh. You do not know, like, what it's like to live in, like, a real dorm." But he still came to--like, and he's from here too. He's from Oakland and came back and, like, tried to get in the valley and couldn't beat down the door. [Zach: Hm.] Right. And this is what everybody says that they want, right? These credentials. [Zach: Yeah, you know, he's checked every box.] And also, this is a light-skinned dude, right? So he's less-threatening. Zach: Right, and I'm sure he talks very proper. He enunciates his words well.Bärí: Child, I call him MC Carlton.Zach: So, like, literally his only knock is that he's black, and light black at that. Diet. [laughs]Bärí: Well, not even that. Also that was one of the things--so when I said my former... I had an employer who interviewed him. He got to the end of the round, and they decided that they didn't want him. They cut him. Like, they were hiring between him and one other person. They cut him because they said, "Oh, he didn't show enough passion. He wasn't willing to bang on tables." So when they gave me that--no, no, no, when they gave ME that feedback, I said, "Okay, so let's stop and envision this. Do you want a 6'6" 235-pound black man banging on tables? You're gonna be comfortable with that?" [Zach: And they said what?] They were like, "Well, what are you implying?" And I said, "I said what I said."Zach: Yeah, don't play with me. I'm not implying anything.Bärí: I said what I said. I didn't imply anything, I just said what I said. So if you saw that, you would feel safe? You would be cool? Zach: I mean, real talk. Would you? Answer the question.Bärí: They were like, "I mean, he just didn't show passion," and I was like, "That's not what I asked. What I asked was that if you saw a 6'6" bald black man banging a table to motivate engineers, you're cool with that?" And nobody could answer it definitively, and I was like, "And that's why you didn't hire him, so thank you, and I'ma go catch the shuttle." Like, I'm not gonna participate in this. This is bull. Zach: Yeah, this is ridiculous. It's super ridiculous.Bärí: 'Cause he's super reserved, and he's super reserved because he knows that he is a large black man and he can't do that. Zach: I remember I applied to--this is when I was first getting into consulting and it was between a few different firms, and one of the firms--and they were all, like, Big 4, right? So one of the firms I applied to, I went through the process and they said, "Oh, he was too passionate. He was too excited about the job. He smiled too much." So I'm just laughing at you, laughing at this situation, because it's like, okay, so you can't win for losing, right? I literally was the one smiling talking about how excited I was, and they said, "Well, he looked like he knew what he was doing, but he just seemed a little too smiley, a little too excited. He was a little too passionate for us." Bärí: But if he had been extra excited y'all would have been like, "Oh, my god. The black guy scared me because he's so big." [Zach: Exactly. [laughs]] And what I hate about this is, like, having to teach my son these rules of the road, because it's different in certain ways. He has my complex--actually he's darker than my complexion and he has his daddy's stature, and so you're gonna be extra targeted because you are a super brown boy and you're gonna be very tall, so you have to be on your P's and Q's at all times. Zach: Yeah, you're not wrong.Bärí: And he's so mad, because he does Kumon in addition to his regular schoolwork, and he's like, "Ugh, Mommy, I'm tired all the time," and I was like, "What do you think my life is? What do you think your daddy's life is? What do you think brown people's life is? Like, that's what it is, and like, I hate to tell you that, but you have to do more and do it faster and do it better, and you're gonna have to do it even faster and even better than your dad, because your dad gets some sort of benefit from having been, you know, a Harvard legacy, and he's light-skinned. Like, when you're light-skinned--light-skinnned [?] go farther, I'm sorry. It's true.Zach: We have yet to talk about colorism on the podcast, like, explicitly, but we need to talk about it because--Bärí: Let's talk about it. We can do it right now. [both laugh]Zach: I want to respect your time 'cause we went over, but nah, it's a global phenomenon, right? And I think, like, it goes beyond just, like, the African diaspora.Bärí: That's true. That's so true for our Indian comrades. That is very true for our Latinx comrades. Like, that's just the truth.Zach: I was in the HEB. HEB, for the folks who are not in Houston, is a huge grocer. So I was in HEB and I was getting some different, like, sauces and stuff, and I was in, like, the cultural food aisle and walked right on by some lightening cream. You know what I mean? So it's super common, and I think, like, even when you look at, like, these corporatized D&I groups, the Latinx folks are typically European--like, white-presenting, you know what I mean? Like, they're not, like--you don't see a lot of... again, it's common, but because it's so pervasive and--I don't want to say subtle, 'cause it's not subtle if you're paying attention, but it's just common, right? Like, the lighter-skinned people... it's hard to be dark and in power, you know? Bärí: Yeah, and that is for me just a personal thing that I want my son to embrace, and the reason being is, like, you know, everybody--my mom is light-skinned, and my dad was not, and they got divorced when I was three, so I don't even remember--like, I have no memory of living with them together, and so it was really my mom and her family, and everybody in her family is light-skinned and I'm the only brown person, and I was like, "What's going on here?" Yeah. But what's interesting here is my husband is light-skinned and I'm brown. Our daughter is lighter than my husband and our son is darker than me, so it's like... they don't match at all. [laughs] Zach: I love that y'all have, like, a whole kaleidoscope going though. Bärí: We do, and we actually have shirts. I have a whole shirt. Like, I need to send you one. It's real--it's ghetto. [laughs] It's a unicorn throwing money [?], and there are different shades of the unicorn, and I picked the different shades off the people in our family. So yeah, but I mean, like, get this money. Do this work. You can do it whatever shade you are. That's my point. But for him, I want him to understand there's gonna be different restrictions for you, because you're likely to walk out of here one day when you're sixteen and you're gonna be 6'6" and you're gonna be super brown, and you're really fine, and people need, you need, to be aware of the danger. And then opposite is like, "Your sister is light-skinned. She has very loose, curly hair, and so people are gonna treat her in a completely different manner and think she's fine even though she may not be, and--" Not that I'm saying she's not cute, she is, but I'm like, "You know, people--" Zach: Yeah, there's biases that come with being [?]. Yeah, there's a certain aesthetic that she could fit into that then makes it easier.Bärí: And she does, and I want to make sure that she doesn't buy into that and, you know, that's what we're dealing with her, and that's what I deal with in the book, like, how do you handle this? You have people in multiple categories. What are the proper terms? What are the issues that are around them? How do you deal with it? Like, even something as simple as the fact that I literally have never had braids or crochets or anything in my entire life, and I decided to get it last summer because I was tired of doing my hair and then my daughter's hair. And my daughter has a looser curl than I do, but her hair is thick. Like, I'm not spending three hours on a Sunday doing this, so I took her to the salon so that they could do it, and then I started getting crochets, but now she's like, "I want to go to the salon!" So now it's like, okay, now we have to reset in terms of privilege, right? Because everybody doesn't get to go to the salon. Like, my momma did my hair until I was 13, so holla at Grandma. [both laugh]Zach: So let's get back to this book, right? It's coming out March 31st. Eye-opening interviews. The goal is to help jumpstart conversations about identity, privilege and bias, y'all. The book is called Diversity in the Workplace. Listen, y'all, make sure you check it out. Right now, maybe because of that rona we might be having these conversations on Zoom or Skype. I don't--Bärí: Now, I think you're gonna be quarantined 'cause of that rona anyway, so you might as well read this while--Zach: You definitely should. You know what, why don't you challenge yourself?Bärí: And there's an audiobook version too if you don't even want to read it. Somebody can just read it to you. Zach: Come on, now. Like, challenge yourself to read the group, and then that way when you go back to work--Lord say the same, the rona won't be here forever, okay? So you eventually will have to go see people, right?Bärí: I mean, the rona won't. It will be replaced by something else.Zach: Oh, goodness. You're right though.Bärí: I mean... it's Trump, so...Zach: Yeah, that's true. [laughs] Bärí: Something else might kill us in the meantime, I don't know.Zach: Who knows? I don't know. They said they got all these locusts over in Africa. There's, like, hundreds of billions of them over there. I don't know.Bärí: I saw that too, and I was like, "What disease are they carrying?"Zach: Listen. Bärí: Okay, I'ma let that go. Zach: Shutter the thought. [laughs] So look, y'all, this has been Living Corporate. We do this, right? We have conversations. We're really excited and we're thankful--you know, all jokes aside, please make sure you're washing your hands, okay? We have information from the CDC in the show notes. You know, hopefully you're washing your hands as you listen to this podcast. Like, wash your hands, okay? Soap is important also. Now--Bärí: Very. Water is not--Zach: Water is not soap. I want to--hold on. Sound Man, put that little record scratch in here. [record scratch] Water is not soap, okay? So you want to use some--you know, use the hard, industrial stuff. Use that Irish Spring if you need to. I personally use [?] because I am bougie, but you can use--Bärí: I use Olay, but, you know, whatever.Zach: Use something that is frankly a little abrasive, okay? Get that first, like, half-layer off your skin. Like, wash your hands, y'all. And then, you know, just take care of yourself, you know? Fist bumps and head nods only. You know, this would actually be a good opportunity for allyship and learning.Bärí: Well, here's the thing. So even with the fist bumps... so with the social distancing blah-blah-blah, it's supposed to be six feet. If you bump into someone, no, you're not within the six feet.Zach: You know what, you're right, no fist bumps. So this would be a good time actually for those--Bärí: Head nod at people and wave.Zach: So we all know how to do a head nod, but this may be the time for my less-melanated folks, my aspiring allies, to learn how to effectively head nod. Don't throw your neck out of your body when you do it. Bärí: Oh, I didn't know that was a thing.Zach: Just nodding too hard, right? Like, the head nod is supposed to be subtle, nuanced. Right? Like, maybe it's a cultural thing. I feel like in the South, like, our head nod is different, and I definitely believe, between the various melanin levels, head nods can be various levels of aggression. That's all. That's all I mean. Maybe a little salute also, with two fingers at the head. Just "Hello, I see you over there." But just be careful. Take care of yourselves, and we'll get through this together. In the meantime, make sure y'all check out the links in the show notes as well for Diversity in the Workplace: Eye-Opening Interviews to Jumpstart Conversations about Identity, Privilege and Bias written by Bärí A. Williams. Until next time, y'all, this has been Zach. Peace.

Ade and Zach sit down and have an entertaining discussion geared around Black History Month, and they both share their experiences in being frustrated by an employer's mismanagement of the celebration. Ade also talks a little bit about the body butter company she started, and she and Zach spend some time reflecting on how far Living Corporate has come since its launch in early 2018. Thank you all so much for your support! We owe it to you.Ade's body butter company soft-launches soon, so make sure to follow them on Twitter and Instagram. Congratulations, Ade!Visit our website!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. And it's not just Zach. Ade: Ayyyye. It's Ade.Zach: It's Ade alsooo, yo, and we here, man. Look, it's Black History Month. It's 2020. You know, January was big trash, so we're just gonna start over. We're gonna count February as January--nah, just... 2020 is gonna have 11 months, that's all.Ade: Yeah, let's do that. I like that idea.Zach: Yeah, we're just gonna start over. So yeah, you know, it's Black History Month. Whole fresh new decade, and, you know, a few episodes have dropped. Downloads are popping, by the way. Like, they're really good, Ade. The numbers look good.Ade: Yay, that's awesome.Zach: Yeah, pretty good. So we both have a lot of stuff going on. What's up in your world?Ade: God, what isn't up? No, [laughs] I'm just really enjoying the ride. I got--you know, my first bit of code at my job was deployed successfully, went really well. I panicked a little bit near the end of the sprint there, but I got it all the way through, so I'm excited about that. I started my butter company, and my soft launch is February 10th, so I'm also really excited about that, just getting the opportunity--Zach: Hold on. Butter company? Like, what's up? Like, you making animal butter? Or, like, cooking butter? Or--Ade: [laughs] No, although somebody gave me the idea to do that. You know I love cooking and I love experimenting in the kitchen, so that was an idea that hadn't occurred to me. But this is the year of action, so I took action. [laughs] So now I have a company--obviously besides, like, this one--but I'm really excited. I've been connected with a bunch of really great folks within the, like, creative community, and I'm excited to see where this goes. What about you, Zach?Zach: Well, first of all, hold on. We don't have to rush over to my stuff. Excited for you, congratulations on moving in action, moving in intentionality, you know what I'm saying? [air horns sfx] That's great, you know? But anyway, you asked me about myself. Yeah, so look, things are going great. Really focused on getting ready for my wife and I's first child coming in, like... I mean, if she doesn't come early--if she doesn't come early it will be in, like, 6 weeks.Ade: Whoo!Zach: Right?Ade: Oh, my gosh. You're so close to the finish line. And I would like to reiterate here that Ade makes a fantastic first time. I'm just saying.Zach: It's great. I love that, 'cause I'd like to reiterate... [haha sfx] You know? [both laughing] Ade: You are so wildly disrespectful.Zach: Not at all, not at all. I just stay ready, you know? I just stay ready. I think for me it's, like, focusing on, like, the radical change that's about to happen in our family, in our lives, then, like, just doing, like, a reassessment of just everything else around me, right? Because, like, I think initially--and I'm sure most people who are preparing for children, they go through this too--you're kind of like, "Oh," you know, they'll just kind of fit into your plans, and I'm like--as I, like, kind of pause and think about all of the things I have going on, I'm like, "Dang, wait. Certain things are gonna have to shift and change." Like, it's not gonna just be like, "Oh, I'm picking up a new hobby," or starting a new podcast, like, this is a whole new person, a whole person that's about to be, like, active, actively involved and will have active present needs from myself and my partner for at least the next 18 years, right? If not the rest of their lives. So it's like, what does it look like? So y'all, this is not me alluding to the fact that the podcast is about to stop or anything like that, it's just more about life. Like, you know, talking to other fathers who had to make career decisions and think about, like, what did it look like for them to make adjustments, how do you communicate with your teams about being a dad and, like, the new responsibilities as a parent? Those are things I'm really excited to, like, explore and, like, really discover over the next few--you know, over the next months and stuff like that as I get ready for paternity leave and all that kind of stuff. Like, really just, like, being really clear with, like, what does it look like to, like, live in this new world? 'Cause, like, I don't know. Like, I'm 30 years old, so it's not like I'm--I'm not old, so I still have things--Ade: [whispering] Yes, you are.Zach: That's jacked up.Ade: [laughs] I too got shots in my pocket.Zach: That's crazy. I see you. But the thing about it is, like, I still have a few decades more of career to have, and so it's like I don't want to just, like, kind of sit on my laurels because I have kids. Like, what does it look like to still progress and have a career and, like, develop and do all these things while at the same time being a very present and attentive and engaged father? So normal stuff. Like, I think it's a challenge. It's a good problem to have. It's something that is--it's a problem created by growth, so to me that's a--I count that as a good problem. So that's, like, the main--the big, big thing, then the second thing is just, like, continuing to slow down and focus on, like, mental health. Like, my own personal mental health and, like, my mental wellness, right? I think the more and more people I--especially black men--that I talk to who are transitioning out of their twenties, you know, it's like--I've talked to more and more folks who are, black men, who, like, this is the time when they go to counseling, right? Like, if you haven't gone already. And I've gone at certain points in time. We did pre-martial counseling. I've done, like, personal counseling as I got ready to get married, but I haven't really ever gone to, like, see someone, like, a true therapist, right? Like, a true, like, psychiatrist. I think that there's a certain stigma around mental health, right, for black people, and I would say particularly for black men, and so it's, like, getting comfortable with talking to people and, like, really getting help and just talking through things. Like, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I think, like, the road of life has all of these different bumps and potholes. You're gonna have mileage and just damage and disalignment that you just need help with just because of the reality of life and the trauma that life brings, especially in the context of white supremacy and patriarchy. So shoot... and then the last thing, y'all, I think I'm just really excited about, again, like, Living Corporate. Like, yo, we got featured on Forbes, man.Ade: Oh, my God. I just--Zach: What is it? So be honest. When you saw it, what did you--Ade: Okay, I just want to put some context. I am not--I don't scream very often.Zach: Did you scream for real?Ade: At the top of my lungs.Zach: Did you really?Ade: I really did. [Zach laughs] And here's why. Like, it genuinely is a life goal for me to make it on Forbes' 30 Under 30, so when you sent that link to me, I was like, "Surely he is just sharing a link of podcasts that we should emulate or, you know, link up with these people and get a sense of what they do, how they do it, how well they're do--" Nope, there's our name. I was like, "Holy--" I was on top of the Moon. It was a moment for me, okay, personally.Zach: I was curious. Well, 'cause I texted you and we didn't, like--'cause we didn't, like, really react in the moment. Like, I reacted. I texted you. I was happy. But you were in the middle of your work day and, like, I had some time in my day, so I was able to step away and, like, actually hit you, right? And so when you--[laughs] But you didn't, like, react, so I was like, "I wonder if she really cared about that." Like, not that you didn't care, but did it do anything for you. But for me I was like, "Oh, my gosh." Like, I was shocked. Ade: Absolutely. No, I need you to--I just want to, again, reiterate the fact that I don't scream on a regular basis. It's not my personality type to just be out here in these streets wildin'--at least in that way, 'cause I do be wildin'. I'ma just be honest.Zach: Right, you do. That's true.Ade: [laughs] You didn't need to agree with me. I was just--Zach: You know, you put it out there. It's on Twitter.Ade: Okay. All right, this is fine. But really, it was such an honor, and it was something that I would not in the--I mean, if we, like, rewind a year and a half or whatever--it was actually about this time two years ago. Are we two years [?]? Wait a minute.Zach: Yeah, it's been, like, two years.Ade: Holy [bleep?]Zach: Right? It's been nuts.Ade: [laughs] I really need you to understand that I'm literally just coming to the realization that Living Corporate is almost two years old. That's wild. That's so wild to me. We need sweatshirts and hoodies.Zach: We need merch, man. We need merch. We should really drop, like, little collections. Like Popeye's.Ade: We should. We should, like, go through and figure out what our favorites from our guests and from our hosts are and then, like, make some sweatshirts, 'cause I would wear my sayings. That's all I'm saying.Zach: You would wear your own sayings?Ade: Absolutely. What? Absolutely.Zach: Nah, that's the definition of a narcissist. You'd put your own quotes on clothing and walk around in them?Ade: Uh-huh, I would.Zach: Wow.Ade: I would. You know why? Because I have some fire, fire sayings. Zach: [laughs] That's crazy. You do, but it's like... you can't say that though. Like, that's crazy.Ade: What? No. 2020 is the year of big upping yourself.Zach: Wow. You know what though? I respect it, 'cause, you know what I'm saying, if no one else is gonna wear your sayings, you may as well.Ade: Exactly. Precisely. Kobe was a fan of big upping myself, and so am I.Zach: He was. That's true though. You know what? That's a good point.Ade: And the way that I do see it is, like--being a little bit more serious about the subject, 'cause I was kind of making fun of the entire concept, but sincerely, like, we preach that you have to be your own best advocate, right? And we preach that you have to kind of take stock and make sure that you are keeping records of your good deeds when you do them so that you can be able to speak to your managers, your peers and your supervisors, all of these things, but when you are an entrepreneur or you are an individual contributor or anything of the sort, you have to do the same, right? Like, you have to be too, and this was something that I had to get comfortable with. And I'm still not comfortable with it, to be frank. Like, I handed people an 8-ounce jar of my product, and they were like, "Well, how much is this?" And I'm, like, waffling around, like, "I kind of don't want to ask anybody for money for this," but it's a product, right? But being able to, like, stand on your two feet and be like, "No, this is a thing that I've done, and I'm worth the time and the investment that you're going to make in my product or in me as a person." It's all a part of being confident in all of the work that you've done. You're not asking people to buy into a single thing. You're asking them to buy into you as an idea, and if you're not willing to, you know, kind of say it with your chest, as Africans will say. [laughs] If you're not willing to say it with your chest, then who's supposed to be willing to stand behind you and say it with their chest? You see what I'm saying?Zach: Yeah, straight up. Like, you have to be willing to advocate for yourself and, like, promote yourself, because--I mean, the Internet is such a big and busy place and, like, the world is so big and busy that, like, yeah, there--and I was just having a conversation with a guest that I will not reveal yet because I like guests being a surprise week-to-week, but a guest I was having a conversation with, we were talking about networking and how, like, the world is connected, but it's connected via a series of, like, closed loops. So it's not like you can just, like--the world is connected, but you still have to, like, be in certain circles for things to even get started, right? And so, like, the idea of like, "Oh, I'ma just do this thing over here in this corner, and then if it's good it will eventually get seen." It's like that's not really true. Like, you have to really actively promote whatever it is that you got going on. Like, period. That's just the way it is. But yeah, to your earlier point about, you know, it being two years and Living Corporate being around almost two years, right? So, like, April will make two years--or is it June? Golly, I can't remember. Anyway, some time--Ade: I think it was April, but we definitely had, like, our inaugural Skype or, what was it, Google chat in February.Zach: There it is. You're right, we did. We did have our inaugural Google chat in February just to talk about things, and then, you know, we kicked everything off a couple months later, but it's crazy 'cause, like--and shout-out to Dr. Gassam, who wrote the piece for us, the article for us, and shouted us out and, like, you know, put us up as #1. I don't know what those little numbers mean, you know what I'm saying? Like, 'cause I really--what I was really shocked about was everybody else on that list, everybody on that list are huge. Like, shout-out to Side Hustle Pro. Shout-out to Code Switch, dawg. Shout-out to Myleik. I was like, "Yo, we're up here with Code Switch? Myleik?"Ade: Code Switch.Zach: Code Switch! And yo, shout-out to NPR and Code Switch, because I remember when we first started thinking about, like, Living Corporate, like, as a podcast, we were like, "What are the ones that really inspire us?" And me and at least one other person was like, "Code Switch," 'cause, like, the format is so fire. Like, shout-out to y'all, man. So, like, even if anybody--for anybody to think about us in the same vein as them, like, I feel like that's a win on its own, 'cause that lets me know--that affirms me that, like, we're achieving [against?] the vision that we had initially set out, but it's crazy 'cause there's been, like, a lot of ups and downs and, like, a lot of stuff going on, but, you know, [Paul Rudd look at us sfx, Ade laughs].Ade: I'm just over here, like, giddy and over the Moon. Yeah, no, and it's funny because you're not the only person who sent me that link, and that's, like, the other thing that [?].Zach: Oh, you didn't tell me that.Ade: No, like, sincerely, you weren't the only one that sent me that link. My friend sent me that link, and I actually encountered someone--shout-out to you, you know who you are--who I literally had just, like, been talking to him. He's transitioning into tech. I just, like, try to make sure I'm giving people advice and help and checking in with people that I know are making the same transition, and I reached out to him, and he was like, "Wait, are you Ade from Living Corporate?" Zach: What?Ade: 'Cause he literally met me from an entirely separate context. And so to be able to encounter someone who, you know, knows of us and knows me in my best light, not, you know--clears throat--anyway. Zach: Dawg, I'ma tell you something. One day--one day, y'all... hey, listen, y'all. Some of y'all are, like, listening to this with a confused face. Trust me, I'm confused too, but one day we're gonna come on this podcast and we're gonna have a real conversation about the crazy life that Ade lives, 'cause why would you come on here and say, "Yeah, this Forbes article, and someone who knew me, and not in my best--" And then this awkward pause. I hear you audibly gulp in the mic. Like, what? [laughs] Y'all, y'all understand the type of work--like, y'all understand the team I have, right? Like, that's crazy. Y'all, don't treat me like--yeah, now y'all know what I'm doing with. What kind of weirdness is that? Go ahead. This person who hasn't seen you at your best and sent you the Forbes link. What?Ade: [sighs] I'ma just move forward. [Zach laughs] No, no, no.Zach: I wonder, is Ade the Mal of this podcast? 'Cause I'm certainly Joe Budden. I realize that. But Ade might--Ade might be the Mal. She might be the Mal of this podcast. She's, like, a little too cool to pod, but then she'll say [?] things.Ade: I demand we move forward. [both laugh]Zach: Goodness, gracious. Go ahead. Keep going.Ade: Anyway, so I'm just really grateful for, you know, where we are, and--first of all I want to give Zach and our writing team and our production team and our social team all the props, like, every single prop that exists, because you have been put in blood, sweat, tears, money, effort, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseum into this, and it shows in the quality of our partners, our work, our podcast, our newsletters. Like, everything. Like, you've been really intentional about the direction that Living Corporate would take, and I really respect that, and you are by far one of the most aggressive--but you're not gonna beat me up though--type energies [?].Zach: [laughs] It's true though. It's true. [both laughing]Ade: And Living Corporate has enjoyed that energy, enjoyed the fruits of that energy.Zach: I do have "but you're not gonna beat me up though" type energy, and I've come to peace with that. It's true.Ade: It's my favorite thing about you, and also, like, simultaneously your worst quality when you turn it on me, [both laugh] but--[to this day sfx]Zach: [laughing] Oh, my gosh. It's true. But this is the thing, you gotta have "you ain't gonna beat me up though" energy, because boy, the world will beat you up, boy. The world out here tryna come--it coming for your neck, dude. I mean, every day I'm over here like [Cardi B blatblat sfx] with these haters, man. I'm trying to, like, stay alive out here. I gotta fight every day. Every day. All my life, literally trying to fight and then at the same time avoid--[Law and Order sfx]--like, at the same time. [both laugh] I be so aggravated, man. Do you know the fine line you have to walk as a black man? Man, I'm telling you, being black is so exhausting. Being black and conscious, like--James Baldwin, man. He was not lying, dawg. Not lying at all, because you are in a rage all of the time, and you're over here trying to, like, stand up and just speak to the fact that you're worth something. Listen... eugh. You're over here trying to literally raise your voice loud enough to be heard and respected, but not too loud, right?Ade: 'Cause [?], and here y'all come.Zach: Here y'all come, without at the same time going to jail. So it's, like, this fine line that you have to walk. It's just nuts. Anyway, nah, I appreciate that, Ade. And, you know, I appreciate you as well. You know, you're here. The biggest--Ade: Finally.Zach: Finally, that's true. But look, you was gone for a little minute, but you back in town. You know? It's okay. I think the biggest thing--what do they say, "the biggest ability is availability?" It's corny. It's kind of a coach's--coaches say that, but it's a true statement. Like, just be present, you know? I know one thing, and shout-out to Rod from The Black Guy Who Tips and Karen, his lovely co-host and partner, but one of the things he said, like, from the jump--like, he jumped on our podcast early. He was like, "Yo, being consistent--" He's like, "'Cause people come and leave, like, jump on these podcasts and leave all of the time." He's like, "So having some longevity is hard over time," and if it wasn't for our team - Aaron, Sheneisha, Amy, Latesha, Tristan... like, we have a great, great team, and we put out a lot of content. Like, we're posting three episodes a week every single week, and, like, that doesn't happen without a huge team--or, I'm sorry, relatively huge and a consistently dedicated team. So, like, really proud of them, really proud of, like, just what we've been able to do, and just, like, really thankful for Dr. Gassam, 'cause, like, there's plenty of other platforms that are trying to make content. I really still stay that, like, it's us, Trill MBA and, like... that's kind of it right now that's out here really talking about other in majority-white spaces. Anyway, so look, it's Black History Month. Have you seen any--I'm just gonna ask the question. I don't know why I'm trying to, like, play it safe. Have you been on a job where your employer has annoyed you by how they've handled Black History Month?Ade: Let me count the ways. I--[laughs] Whoo, let me take a breath. All right. I have been aggravated by several firms, actually, simply because--Zach: [laughs] Yes, shout-out "firms." Consulting, we're talking about y'all. [laughs]Ade: Looking right at you, friends. Zach: Looking right at y'all, professional services. Yes. [laughing]Ade: No, I just--there's nothing I hate more than double-talk, and by that I mean firms, corporations, whatever it is that y'all would like to call yourselves--active participants in capitalism--who pay lip service, either through, like, their mission statements, their values, their creed, or even their stated employee resource groups that they care about diversity and somehow consistently fail to make a statement or support or do anything of value, particularly during Black History Month. I noticed this during my employment at a firm I will not name in the past where, you know, July 4th came around, Veteran's Day came around. You know, all of those things were celebrated or commemorated by words from the leadership of the firm going out, but when Black History Month came and went there was nary a bleep, and it was so noticeable because, you know, the firm had something to say on MLK Day, but, you know, when ostensibly there would be time for--and to their credit, the employee resource group put on one... ONE program for the entire month of February. I understand that, you know, funding is a thing. It's difficult to organize sometimes around different people's schedules, but, you know, one event over the course of the entire Black History Month? I cannot tell you how deeply bothersome I found that, simply because you have a body of people who are, whether they consciously or not notice these things, are essentially being utilized as resources by this firm. I mean, you are essentially selling our time to all of these contracts, you're making millions off of us, and you can't take the time during Black History Month to care about Black History, but you can, on July 4th, take time to commemorate these things? Or you can during Veteran's Day or Memorial Day or Labor Day and all of these other things. So it feels like a very intentional slight, because, I mean, I know that your calendar functions the same way that my calendar does, and I know that your Google functions the same way that my Google functions, so it's not like you're missing out on the reminders that these things exist. So when there's an intentional exclusion, or what feels like an intentional exclusion, of black people from, you know, your commemorative messages, it's like, "Heard you. We see where your priorities are." And an even further extension of that logic is that when--you know, during these programming sessions there are no, like, leadership in the room to attend these programs or there's no support, you know? People have to come out of pocket for things, to pay for things. It just feels very ugly. I'ma use that word, ugly. Dusty. Musty.Zach: Raggly.Ade: Raggedy.Zach: And there's a difference now, and this is where--so, you know, you and I, I love the diversity just in our pairing, right? But, like, you know, you're an East Coast black and I'm a Southern black, right?Ade: Precisely.Zach: It's interesting, 'cause you said raggedy, and see, what I said was raggly.Ade: Raggley, mm-hmm.Zach: Raggly. Not raggley, raggly. Now, look, I want--'cause every now and then I teach--and if you're listening to this you know who you are, but for the white folks that I trust, the Buckys out there, the allies, or the aspirational allies, that I trust, every now and then I'll teach y'all a phrase called "fifty-'leven," right? You know who you are. If you're listening to this and you actually, you know, rock with me and you listen to this, I've taught you this. [both laughing] I've taught you all these phrases, and this is another one for y'all to take in. So look, it's not raggedy, nor is it raggley. It's raggly. It's two syllables, and that is often times a descriptor for how companies manage Black History Month.Ade: I will make an amendment to that statement, 'cause I don't necessarily agree. There are, uh, regional differences to dialects, you see. [Zach laughing] So while Zach is correct for his particular region of the Souf--notice I said Souf--Zach: That's true. Souf. That's true. That's fair, 'cause Southern is--'cause we live in America. Southern is a huge region. That's true. That's fair.Ade: Take his advice lightly, you know? Do with that what you will. Zach: [laughs] Be careful.Ade: And, uh, if you get run up on, please don't quote us.Zach: Don't quote me.Ade: 'Cause we will not be popping up [?].Zach: Uh-uh, uh-uh. Don't. And honestly, maybe don't say fifty-'leven around everybody. They'll be like, "Who taught you that?" And don't tell 'em it was me. [laughs] Nah, but no, I'm right there with you when it comes to, like--I've been in situations where, you know, either we don't celebrate Black History Month at all, we don't recognize it in any way, or employee resource groups will get, like, the black people to huddle together and they'll go do something, right? It's like, "Um..." Black history is American history. This should be something company-wide. And I'm not saying we gotta do something every single day, but can we do at least one thing? Can we recognize some of the black pioneers in our own firm, in our own companies? Like, we have our own historical marks that we've made, but I think--I don't know. It's tough, it's tough because--and honestly, like, even I say this, like, I get--like, I'm hearing... 'cause there's some executive leaders and folks who listen to Living Corporate, right? And they listen to it for different points of insight or whatever, and so there's a part of me who--and they're like, "Well, dang, I can't even win for losing," 'cause, like, the other part of me is gonna say, "And even if you are doing something for Black History Month, what are you doing for the rest of the year?" Right? 'Cause it can just be, like, an acknowledgement. Like, what are you doing? What are you doing to, like, actually advance having a more equitable and inclusive culture that drives belonging in your place of work? But I do think, like, at just the--I mean, I'm talking, like, floor level, if we could just start with some acknowledgement, you know? Like, you don't have to always quote Martin Luther King. You could actually, like, integrate and be intersectional with your Black History Month if you wanted. [Ade laughs] You can! Like, you can actually, like, quote trans rights, trans activists who happen to be black, and you can tie that in with, like, your LGBTQ ERGs. You could quote, like, Afro-Latinx civil rights activists and, like, historical people, and, like, integrate them. Like, there's all types of ways. You know there's ways that you can actually--you could use Black History Month to drive intersectional conversations and activities for your whole firm, 'cause black people are not just black. Black people are black and gay, black and Latinx. They're black and straight. They're black and female. They're black and disabled. Like, it could actually be something that could be--you know, you could use Black History Month similarly to how you use black and brown people anyway, which is really kind of like just the glue that holds everybody together. You could just use us if you want. You could use the month how you use black and brown people. Like, let me just be super cynical, right? You could actually--like, from a programming perspective, from, like, a networking and engagement perspective, from, like, even leveraging--like, getting more thought leadership, like, you could do all types of things with that month. You have a whole month, and this month you have a whole extra day. So it's like--Ade: No excuses.Zach: No excuses, right? Like, you could do something. And, like, if you need any help with ideas, then, I mean, you could talk to your own leadership. You could talk to--I don't know. There's just so much out there now. There's just so much--maybe we just need to drop an article on ideas for your Black History Month. Maybe that's what we do, 'cause, like, I don't--Ade: You know what? That's a good idea.Zach: I mean, maybe that's what we do, 'cause, like, I'm over here just thinking about it more and more. It's like, "I don't know if I've been a part of any company that I have walked away and felt like, "Wow, I really feel seen this Black History Month." I don't think that's ever happened to me. In fact, I remember last year I tried to quote a--like, I was on a project and there was a quote board, okay? So you put a little quote up there, and I was like, "Oh, it's Black History Month," and I tried to quote--I think I quoted, like, Oprah Winfrey or something like that, and, like, they literally erased it and put up some white man's quote and they were like, "This is more relevant." I said, "But I thought it was a quote board." Ade: Right?Zach: Like, what? What are you talking about? What do you mean it's more relev--okay... and again, that's where I had to make a choice between, like, okay, am I about to die on this hill? Am I gonna go to jail? Like, what am I gonna do? 'Cause, like, I just--I don't--nope. So I had to make a decision, but anyway. So okay, what else do we have going on? So what's the name of the company though? The body butter company. I'm jumping all around now. What's--'cause we didn't talk about that before.Ade: [laughs] Right. So my company is called Solari, S-O-L-A-R-I. It is a portmanteau of my name, or a part of my name, and my mom's name. And on Instagram and on Twitter I'm pretty sure our handle is @SolariBody, so it's S-O-L-A-R-I-B-O-D-Y. And yeah, I'm really excited. I'm kind of blushing right now. [laughs] I'm really excited about just getting started and just being able to expand my reach. So I've been doing a lot of kind of, like, self-care stuff for a very long time, like making my own body butters and making my own, like, lip balm, conditioner, and all these other things--and scrubs--and just the idea of being able to... and this is another thing that happened, but I'll finish my sentence. Just the idea of being able to utilize all of the things that I put into practice because I want to take care of myself and take better care of myself. So, for example, I would, like, make my own hair oils, but when I realized that other people wanted these things and don't necessarily want to go through the process of experimentation to figure out all of the ideal things--and I've already been doing these things for over a decade--I was just kind of like, "You know what? I'm gonna do this, and it's gonna be fun," and the reception has been fantastic.Zach: Well, I'm really proud of you. I'm happy for you, you know? I think--you talked about this a little bit on the last, when we did our season kickoff episode, but it's easy to, like, get in your own way and to like, you know what I'm saying, just let anxieties and different challenges, like, just hamper you or kind of put you in a stalemate, but it's really exciting, like to see you continue forward and build something. Ade: Thank you.Zach: You're absolutely welcome. Man, so, you know, my cadence as I was pausing there, it reminded me of my own Barack Obama impression that I do at the house for fun with Candis just to get on her nerves, 'cause I was almost like... [impersonating Barack] "Uh, Ade, it is, uh... impressive how you have taken the time," you know what I mean? I almost--and then I go into, [continuing] "Every day, there are Americans who get up, they have their challenges--" [Ade sighs, Zach laughs] "If there was any doubt, uh, that you could not do what it is that you're doing today, uh, you have nowhere else to look but in the mirror. Uh, you get up. You put that butter on your dry skin. Uh, you hydrate yourself, and you face a world that is not ready for someone like you."Ade: I'm about to hang up on you, sir. [both laugh] I am so done.Zach: [laughs] Goodness, gracious. So all right, y'all. Well, look, this was just a fun episode, you know, letting you know what we've got going on. Thank you so much. Shout-out to everyone who listens to this podcast. Shout-out to--shoot, I ain't gonna get into all the shout-outs, but just shout-out to y'all. Make sure that you share this with your people. Continue to share it. The numbers are showing that y'all are sharing it, and I look at our stats every single day 'cause that's just kind of the person I am, the obsessive person that I am, but [laughs] we're really appreciative. And then, shoot, I guess we'll see y'all next time. Make sure you follow--Ade: Wait, one last thing before we go. We kind of vaguely talked about it, but I do want to insert a moment of silence here for Kobe Bryant and his daughter and all of the passengers of the helicopter that went down. We actually weren't able to get on this podcast to discuss it because we were just so emotional. I tried, and it's about 7 minutes worth of just sobs and sniffles on that, but I think this is a pretty good time to do it. So if everyone listening could just join us in a moment of silence. [a moment of silence] Thank you. Zach: Nah, for sure. Yeah, we could talk about--we're gonna have to have an episode about trauma and, like, the ways that trauma impacts black and brown people at work every day, and how we're still expected to just, like, show up and perform two or three times better than our counterparts just so that we can keep our jobs. So... but yeah.Ade: And I just also actually--I think we should have a black heroes episode.Zach: I love that.Ade: I think that in an episode coming up soon we're gonna discuss, you know, some of our heroes, and Kobe's one of mine. People who have just shown you how to get through life with dignity and with grit, and that's a term that I didn't used to use so frequently and so intensely until now. But again, it's a topic that we'll be covering later, but suffice to say that was a shock to my system, and I didn't expect that it would be so shocking. I didn't expect just how strongly I would react, and I suspect that so many others found themselves reeling in the aftermath of that news. Our prayers and our thoughts of those affected. And another topic I think we should also explore is, you know, how to disconnect in times of trauma and to kind of reassess and to find your balance in those times as well. That's it for me.Zach: Nah, I love that, and I super agree. And y'all, on that super, you know, emotional, heavy note, we're gonna catch y'all next time, okay?Ade: For sure.Zach: Now, look, you make sure you check us out. We're @LivingCorporate on Instagram, @LivingCorp_Pod on Twitter. We have all the different domains. One day, man, we're gonna get that livingcorporate.com domain, man. Right now we have all the livingcorporate dot everything but com, and then we got living-corporate.com, but shoot, until next time. This has been Zach.Ade: This is Ade.Zach: Peace, y'all.Ade: Peace.

Season 3 officially kicks off with a special premiere episode! Our incredible hosts Zach and Ade spend some time catching up and talking about what they did over the holidays, and they also chat about a few things to get excited for in the upcoming season. More features, more profiles, more highlights - there's a lot to look forward to in the future! This show's a two-in-one, so be sure to listen to the whole episode. Ade graciously shares some very impactful content that she recorded themed around her career journey and eventual job offer, so you don't want to miss it.Click here to read the piece Zach mentioned titled "Democracy Grief is Real."TRANSCRIPTZach: Yearrrrrp. What's going on, everybody? It's Season--oh, my gosh. 1, 2... Season 3.A ghost: Sure is.Zach: More fire for your head top, and welcome back. Is that a ghost? Is that--A ghost: [whispering] "From the past, from the past, from the past..."Zach: From the past? Oh, my gosh. Y'all, welcome back Ade.[kids applause, then our hosts imitate air horns]Zach: Man, wow. Listen, it is 2020. It's 2020. Isn't that nuts? It's 2020. You know, I definitely want to say though, you know, I've missed you. Y'all know. Y'all have probably noticed that Ade has not been in the podcast regularly, hasn't been around, you know. Breaking my heart quite frankly, you know what I'm saying? I cried. You know? I was sad.Ade: [laughing] Like... okay. All right, sir. Zach: I'm just thankful. I'm happy that you're here, you know? Season 3 is gonna be crazy, right? We have a lot of stuff going on. We have, you know, More profiles and highlights from, you know, different companies. You know, we've had Accenture on, we've had the Coalition of Black Excellence on. We got some other conversations and things that we're cooking up, but nothing to share just yet, you know? We are working on a book. That's right, that's right. More to come on that later, but I'm just kind of throwing some teasers out there. We've got some other media that we're gonna be experimenting with this year. I'm really excited about that. And then, you know, we've got--what else, man? We've got, you know, Ade's--I'm not gonna step on Ade. So she has some content that we're gonna get into that she recorded as she gets into the next stage of her professional career and journey, but I'ma give her space to talk about that in a second. Before we go there though, let's talk about the holiday season. What did you do?Ade: Oh, God. What did I do? I--uh, I slept.Zach: Turn up.Ade: I ate.Zach: Yeah.Ade: And I twisted my ankle.Zach: How?Ade: I don't even want to get into it. [both laugh]Zach: Oh, no. [laughing] Okay. Um...Ade: The point remains. I survived. I survived the holiday season. I spent some time with my loved ones. I don't know if I've mentioned my nephews on here before, but I have two nephews, one who loves me and one [who] hates me. But, you know, thanks be to God. The one who hates me now loves me and he wants to spend time with me on a regular basis now. Zach: Children are a fickle beast, man.Ade: They are so terrible. They are unruly, and they are tyrants. [both laughing] But we love them anyway.Zach: Man, we do. I have a nephew. He is adorable. Goodness, gracious. He's adorable, but it's like--and I just realized I guess I should go ahead and drop the news. Sheesh, I'm talking about kids. Well, first of all, let me say this first. So I have a nephew. He is adorable. But he's a boy, right? And if I just--he's just gonna get away with everything if I babysit him 'cause he's just too cute, but he's mischievious. Like, he's a cute little mischievious kid, but I'm just not--and I'm just not tough enough, 'cause he's too cute. He's too cute, you know? Now, if y'all have ugly kids, like, bring 'em over. I'll be a great disciplinarian. But if your kid's cute--Ade: What?![record scratch sfx]Zach: [laughing] Nah, ain't no such thing as ugly kids. Children are a blessing, and it's awesome, and actually it's with that in mind, you know, I actually have some news, you know what I'm saying, I'd like to share. You know, if anybody follows me on Instagram--which y'all don't, 'cause my follower count is not that booming like that and I haven't posted on Living Corporate, but my wife and I are expecting our first child.Ade: Ayeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.Zach: A little girl. Very excited, you know what I'm saying? [ow sfx]Ade: You know, I just wanted to say that Ade makes a really great first name for baby girls. I'm just saying. Putting it out there.Zach: [inhales, then plays a laughing sound effect]Ade: Whoa! [both laughing] Whoa, what's with the personal attacks? Like...Zach: Oh, my gosh. Shout-out to my wife, my spouse, my queen, my rib, you know what I'm saying, Candis. Doing all the hard work, you know? I--you know, listen... I put in the work, you know what I mean, but I'm not really carrying the load, you know what I'm saying? So air horns for her. [air horns sfx] You know what I'm saying? Just really appreciate her. You said you ate, but you talked about some food--so what did you eat? Like, what was your favorite thing?Ade: God, that's a good question. I absolutely could go back in, like, my memory bank and take a look at these photos that I took of my [?] plates.Zach: All right. Pull those up, 'cause I know for me--like, and shout-out to my grandmother-in-law. She made all types of vittles. They were delicious. [Ade laughs, making Zach laugh] And shout-out to my wife--Ade: Did you just say vittles?Zach: I did say vittles. I'm trying to bring vittles back in 2020. Ade: Why are you so old?Zach: Think about the last time--like, we have not, our parents have not, perhaps our grandparents are the last generation that use the word vittles casually.Ade: Right, and I think that's for good reason and we should leave that term there.Zach: It's SO old. Vittles, dawg? It's so, so, so, SO old. Ade: Kind of like you. We know.Zach: Kind of like me, that's right. I'm a whole 30 out here.Ade: That's wild.Zach: I know, right? 'Cause you just turned, like, 19.Ade: ...Um, first of all, 16, thank you very much.Zach: [laughs] No, not 16. Nope, nope, nope. There's no creep life around here. Nope, you are 24, right? Or 25?Ade: I am 25.Zach: Congratulations on turning 25.Ade: 25.Zach: I was gonna say--I was in the middle of my shout-outs and my thanks before you rudely called me old. So my grandmother-in-law and then my wife made some incredible bread pudding. She made bread pudding with crossiants and then didn't use buttermilk for the cream, instead used--what'd she use? Egg nog just because she ran out of butter and was like, "Eh, it's kind of the same." That egg nog was HITTING. I said, "Yo, what is this?" I mean, it got ate up. Shout-out to my sister-in-law Holly. She made some incredible mac 'n cheese. And Holly--listen, man, shout-out to Holly, man. She is cool people. Sister-in-law, you know? I definitely consider her a Bucky, you know what I'm saying, in this space of allyship and war and fighting for equity and justice for underrepresented people. And you know how I know Holly is an ally? And I haven't told her this, so if she listens to this podcast it'll be her first time hearing this. [Ade laughs] I knew that she was an ally--first of all she's an ally off top, 'cause, I mean, come on. She's been down. She's been doing this. But a reminder of her allyship--'cause this is not the determinant, 'cause she's be an ally off of a bunch of other stuff--a reminder of her allyship, she was making macaroni and cheese, and she baked the macaroni and cheese, and I said, "I knew it, dawg. I knew it." Ade: [laughs] I...Zach: No, let me tell you something. She has never--she has yet to let me down. She holds it down, bro. She holds it down. Ade: You are so incredibly canceled. I can't.Zach: [laughing] Shout-out to Holly, my sister-in-law. Shout-out to all of my allies out there. And if you call yourself an ally and you're not baking your macaroni and cheese, you are not an ally, dawg.Ade: We don't know you in these streets.Zach: We do not know you in these streets if you do not bake your macaroni and cheese. Bake it. It is not done until it's baked.Ade: Because I don't--what are you doing? You are serving undercooked food.Zach: What are you doing here? What are you doing here? You're giving me these wet, hot noodles? Bake it.Ade: That don't even sound right.Zach: It don't. How something wet hot--come on, relax. So anyway, but man, let me tell you something. The highlight, from a cuisine perspective, was when my uncle Marvin brought in these pecan candies. My goodness. Listen, I said [blessings come in sfx]. Boy, the bless--boy, ooh. Too good.Ade: [laughing] What is your problem? Man.Zach: Bro. Man, let me tell you something. And everybody got their own little bag. Handed me that bag, I said [Kawhi what it do baby sfx, laughing]Ade: All right. So you are just starting 2020 off on all types of foolishness. All right, heard you.Zach: Listen, man, I'm over here--I'm so excited, 'cause you ain't been around for a while, but see, since you've been gone, we've been using this soundboard. And I'ma share the soundboard--Ade: I can tell.Zach: Oh, listen. The soundboard is heat rock. [owww sfx] You know? I just really enjoy it quite a bit. So let me think about this. You still haven't talked about the food that you ate.Ade: Oh, yeah. I have been really on, like, a smoky kick lately, so I had, like--I made macaroni and cheese but with all smoked cheeses, and it was just--Zach: 'Cause you like cheese like that. We talked about this. Like, were you just introduced to cheese recently?Ade: Yes, I was very, very recently, like a year ago, introduced to cheese. I have discovered that I'm still quite lactose intolerant. Like, my ancestors were not with the lactose tip, but you know what? I'ma take my chances. I had my smoked mac 'n cheese, and I had it with the best collard greens I've ever made in all of my life. When I drizzled that little bit of just maple syrup right on it with that smoked turkey stock, I was just kind of like...Zach: Goodness, gracious!Ade: God loves me.Zach: Oh, He does. That's true.Ade: Like, this is--this is proof of the existence of the divine, and that dude loves me--or dudette, you know? Non-binary--Zach: Yes. You know, it's funny because, you know, you and I are sitting here, right? It was a crazy year. A lot of stuff going on. You know, things that we can share in time throughout Season 3. We're talking about physical health, mental health, emotional health, financial health, right? Career personal or professional development. It's interesting because, like--I don't know, man, and I'm kind of jumping all around 'cause I'm so excited. I'm excited for you to be here, but I'm excited just to, like, kick off this season, and so, like, this is, like, a loosey--like, we don't have a formatted, you know, interview or anything like that. We're just chopping it up, welcoming Ade back all the way, but I don't know, man. It's just been a lot, and it's just interesting because we were creating content for Living Corporate, and at the same time we were--you know, it was helping us while we were helping other people, you know what I'm saying? So let's do this. Like we said before, you have something that you already had, like, created and recorded that I think would be really helpful for us to put in on this episode, so why don't we talk a little bit about that and then we'll transition to that?Ade: Awesome.Zach: So talk to me about, like, what was it? Like, I know we talked about--like, your journey, you've had some updates in your life and what you've been doing professionally and personally. Like, what was it that we're gonna be listening to in a minute?Ade: Yep. I'm just gonna take a sip of my mimosa, because I just feel really good about where I am right now spiritually, so...Zach: There you go.Ade: [clears throat] La la la la. All right, y'all. So your girl is officially a junior software engineer. [champagne popping sfx] Pop! [laughs] Yeah, no. I started my new position as a junior software engineer, and it's honestly been surreal, my entire experience. I applied for a job, got a call back almost instantaneously. So I made it through the first call, the phone screening with the recruiter, and then I had a technical interview, and then I had an in-person interview that was also sort of technical, and then I had a job offer. And all of that took the span of a week and a half. I literally applied to the job on a Wednesday. The Friday after that--like, the week after that, on Friday, I had the job offer in my hand, and I actually had a competing job offer to move to Boston at the time. So it was--it honestly was an incredibly surreal experience. I went from there were days I would literally wake up to, like, five, six, seven, eight letters of rejection in my email first thing in the morning, and I would like to kind of explore a little bit further the toll that job searching takes on your mental health, because there's--there were certainly days when I would literally just feel dejected. In a society where you are kind of graded--not just graded, your worth is judged off of, you know, in relation to you and relation to your humanity, how much are you worth within a capitalistic system? And my job at the time was incredibly toxic. I felt dejected pretty much every single day waking up, but that wasn't the end of it, and I am so glad it wasn't. And it was, you know, thanks to people like you, people like my best friend Kendall, people like Liz, who really, like, affirmed me, because I have a tendency to internalize situations and, you know, look for ways in which these things were my fault. And I remember even having a conversation with Liz where she literally said, "These are all symptoms of an emotionally abusive relationship," and I'm like, "How do you have an emotionally abusive relationship with your job?" [laughs] But that's entirely real. It's a real thing, and just being able to step back from all of that and literally, like, wash my hands off at the end of the year and never have to speak to those people again or never have to be in a situation in which I feel as though I'm compromising my mental health for the sake of I have to take care of my family and I have to protect what's mine... yeah, you guys are gonna hear a whole lot more of that as the episode continues, but I'm nothing short of eternally grateful for the fact that 2019 is over, but it's over and I took it like a G. Zach: Yo, and shout-out to you for that. [both laugh] Yo, 2019 was hard.Ade: 2019 whooped my ass, okay? But you know what? I whooped it back.Zach: Listen, 2019 was--2019 was coming from your boy's neck, okay? It was like, "We're coming for you, sucka." It's like, "My gosh, leave me alone, 2019. What y'all doing?" But you're right though, and you know what? Look, it's a new year.Ade: Yep. New me.Zach: Yeah, it's a new year. New spaces, new mindsets. You know, new opportunities and just space to reset and really get bcak on it, right? Like, I'm hoping that most of us were able to take some time away for the holidays so we could come back at least somewhat refreshed for a new year, a new decade. You know, a lot of people have been saying new decade and stuff, but let's just take every day as a blessing that it's a new day, right? Like, you may not see 2030, right? But you have--if you're listening to this right now, you have this day today. And so just being excited about that. Let's see here. We're gonna transition over there. Before we do that, Ade, is there anything else that we need to talk about?Ade: I do want to make a quick note about--so we're currently in a time of upheaval. I'm not gonna make too much reference to that, I just want to kind of make the point--well, two points, one that we don't lose sight of humanity as a whole in trying to protect our daily reality, and two that you don't let whatever's happening in the news cycle sway you off of the intentions that you've set for this year. You set those intentions for a reason. You set those goals, whatever that you did, for a reason, and hopefully you are recognizing all the ways in which the news cycle could be causing any number of anxious or negative thoughts or anything like that, but I do want you to be able to step back, and by you I mean the entire Living Corporate family. Be able to recognize when you are stuck in a feedback loop of negative thoughts, negative news, negative content, and kind of find your way back to your center, because as long as there is a world out there, there is always going to be negativity to feed into, but don't let your 2020 start off with that. We literally just kicked 2019's butt. 2020, let's focus more on our communities. Let's focus on our mental health and smashing our goals.Zach: Yo, amen to that, you know what I'm saying? Like, I super agree. [Ade snapping in the background, laughing] And, you know, I think what you're speaking to also is, like--so you talked about upheaval. That reminds me of two things. One, I just read this article--and I'll put it in the show notes--called Democracy Grief is Real, and it's an opinion piece from the New York Times, which is, like--we can talk about the New York Times at a separate time, but this particular piece was very good, and just talking about the toll, the mental and emotional toll, that the world's events has taken on you. Like, just being more and more aware of, like, systemic injustices, oppression and, like, blatant unethical behaviors, like, just the impact that it has on you just living, right? Just you seeing that, what does it do to you? And I think, you know, to that point, like, I'm really excited because this season, we're gonna be talking about real structural inequity. We're gonna be talking about--like, we're really gonna be calling out white supremacy and patriarchy and privilege and access and holding people, institutions of power, to account when it comes to how they can better support and create more equitable places for black and brown folks, for underrrepresented folks, for non- straight white able-bodied men to work and to exist and to live, you know? I think 2020 is gonna be a really interesting decade in that you have, like--I think that there's a certain level of consciousness that, like, people are waking up to. I don't think there's gonna be some great revival or anything like that, so don't misquote me, but I do think that, like, certain things are coming to a head. I do think that, like, when you talk about diversity, equity and inclusion work, there just is gonna be less and less space for, like, the corporatized, white-washed talk tracks that we typically hear. I think that--I just don't see those things surviving. I think that, like, technology and just access is changing for black and brown folks to the point where--and this generation, like, they're just not gonna stay. Like, they're just not gonna stay and put up with being mistreated. And we've seen it already. Like, we've seen it. First of all, this is not a new phenomenon. We've seen this since--we've seen this from the jump, for black folks at least, but just for all oppressed groups in America, eventually there's going to be resistance, and I just think that that's bubbling up into these very, like, corporate spaces too, and so I'm excited because some of the guests that we have this season are really gonna be getting into that, really giving, like, really honest and approachable at the same time advice on what leaders can be doing to either disrupt or dismantle systems that have historically disadvantaged black and brown folks, underrepresented folks, and I'm just really excited about that. Like, we had a few people hit me up last season, Ade, like, kind of salty about, like, the content.Ade: Really?Zach: Yeah, just a little bit. Like, just a little.Ade: Why though?Zach: Why? Well, they were like--they just felt like some of it was a little too--a little too honest, a little too black, you know what I'm saying? But--Ade: May I address that real quick?Zach: Go ahead. [laughing] Ade: Ah, let me lubricate my throat. [clears throat] ~Kick rocks.~Zach: [laughs] There are folks who want to do diversity, equity and inclusion, but they're trying to figure out a way to do it without, like, offending white folks or offending the people in the majority, so--Ade: Which I don't understand. I don't believe your sincerity as someone who professes that--and I recently saw a tweet, and I wish I could quote my source, but I saw someone say "Switch the D in DE&I from Diversity to Decolonization."Zach: Oooooooh! Ade: Fire.Zach: That--wait, hold--what? Yo, that is--Ade: Fire. Fire.Zach: No, that is--[Flex bomb sfx] That is fiiiiiiiireeeee. Are you kidding me? [air horns sfx] Switch the D from diversity to decolonization?Ade: Bro, it literally changed for me the entire framework of DE&I, because if you were taking a liberation stance within the context of what a workplace environment needs to be, you are approaching that from the context of not only do we not care about your discomfort, we're actually actively pursuing your discomfort because your discomfort is where your decolonization lies. Like, that's where you're going to address all of the biases you have that you've had the privilege thus far of not having to confront. And not even your biases, but we're, like, actively taking back space from you and giving voice to the people that have been deliberately silenced in these spaces. So again, the reason I say kick rocks is because, I mean, we're decolonizing this space. This is a decolonized space, my accent aside, so we're really not--[both laughing] Inside joke. So as far as I'm concerned, like, there's no such thing as prioritizing the feelings of the oppressor over the oppressed. And yes, by default, if you are not the oppressed, you are the oppressor. That's--Zach: And this is a binary that we actually accept on Living Corporate, you know what I'm saying? You know, we affirm LGBTQIA+ identity, right? You know what I'm saying? We had content last season about being non-binary. Yo, that's great though. I'm trying to find this tweet that you said. If you just made that up it's still fire, but--Ade: I swear I saw it on Twitter.Zach: It's just a great quote. I love that. I love that. But no, you're absolutely right, and I think it's interesting because when you hear some of the episodes--when y'all hear some of the episodes that, like, we have this upcoming season, it's all about, like--like, these are people who are CEOs of, like, diversity, equity and inclusion firms. Like, they're consultants. They're executives. And I'm noticing there are certain, like, benchmarks around, like--you can kind of tell, like, kind of just where people are, but most people tie the diversity--they tie equity to justice, right? Like, when you talk about the true DE&I work in this space, it's all about justice, and it's interesting because I've seen, like, executives of, like, major corporations talk about--there was a recent article from Harvard Business Review about creating, like, black equity at work, and I was like, "Look, y'all are retweeting that. Consider what this means before y'all start saying you want equity at work." Equity at work means, like, a certain level of, like, right-sizing (?) and really, like, restorative behaviors that, like, America hasn't even, like, grasped onto yet. So, like, the concept of equity when it's truly driven to, like, its--like, when it's really grasped is, like, radical. Like, that's a radical thing to propose, and it would disrupt and disassemble so many things that have been longstanding, that have been comforting, to those in the majority, and so anyway... my whole point is that, like, I'm looking forward to, like, scaring myself with the content that we're putting out this season. I don't want to make--I don't want to pull any punches. I'm just excited about this season. So if you're listening to this and you're passionate about being seen, being heard, you're underrepresented, or you're an advocate, an ally of the underrepresented at work, and you'd like to journey with us, you'd like to be on the show with us, just contact us through the website. I guess that's it, you know? What we're gonna do now is we'll pivot over to Ade's recording that she had, and this was last year, so if you hear any references that's what that's about, but we're really excited for y'all to check that out. Ade, any parting words before we transition up out of here?Ade: No, let's just, in 2020, resolve to live our best lives, and I mean that in, like, the healthiest way possible. I've been guilty of using that phrase to justify the worst of my excesses [?] in the past, and no promises that I won't do so again in 2020, but let's resolve to, you know, prioritize our health, and our mental health in particular, and, you know, check in on your friends, because many, many, many of your friends are having a difficult time and don't know how to say it, but I believe in the power of community, and I believe that we as a whole are capable of holding each other accountable, yes, but also really uplifting each other in ways that are awesome to behold. And I do mean that in the old school awesome--shout-out to Zach, you know, reviving the meanings of old words, but... [both laughing] Old school awesome in that, like, awe-inspiring [way]. But yeah, you're listening to Living Corporate, y'all. [both laughing] Peace.Zach: All right, y'all. Welcome to Season 3. Hope y'all stay around. Excited for y'all to come on this audio adventure with us this year, and we'll catch y'all, shoot, next week. Peace.Ade: What's up, y'all? This is Ade. I just wanted to pop my head back in. It's been a very, very long time since I've been around, and it's been intentional. It was an intentional break. I had to--this has been a very difficult year for me, but also one of the best years of my life. I had to take a step back from a lot of things and really reassess, you know, my journey, my progress, and really where I'm trying to go with my life. That sounds like a lot. Good news, bad news. Bad news is, you know, I turned 25 and I still don't know what I'm doing. [laughs] I still don't truly know the meaning of life, my life, but, you know, it's cool. I'm still defining that, building my parachute on the way down. Good news. Remember when I said I wanted to be an engineer? I did it! I got an official offer, and I will be starting in my role very, very soon. Your girl is officially a full stock software engineer - junior software engineer, but a software engineer nonetheless, and I just kind of wanted to share what went into all of this. It's been nearly two years. Actually, it's been two years since I decided that I was gonna do this, and it's been I think the hardest thing I've ever done, and this episode is all about telling you how and why. This is Ade, and you're listening to Living Corporate. In order to be successful, I have distilled all of the things that I've learned down to three key ingredients - grit, faith, and humor. So many of you have been following this podcast for a while, and you might not know, me, since I've been gone for such a long time, you may not know why I am where I am and what led me to deciding that I was gonna become a software engineer, and the story I always tell is that, you know, on the eve of my 23rd birthday I wrote 23 promises to myself, and the very first one was that I was gonna learn a new skill and I'd learn how to code. What a lot of you don't know is that the reason I even got there in the first place is because I went through a really, really bad break-up--and this is gonna be, like, super vulnerable, and I am not gonna make eye contact with anybody who listens to this for, like, a solid year, because I don't bare my soul this often. [laughs] Yeah, so I went through a really bad break-up, and it had me questioning, you know, myself, my self-worth, whether I was a good person, and it really, like, shook me to my core, and in the midst of this break-up, right before my birthday, I had gone to a workshop called Hear Me Code. It's an organization now semi-defunct, but it's led by a lady named Shannon Turner, who takes an afternoon and just teaches a whole bunch of women the basics of Python. And there are three levels. There's Level 1, which is what I found myself in, and then you have Level 2, who are people who have already been to Level 1 who have the fundamentals and are trying to get a little bit better, and then you have Level 3, which is people who have been to both Level 1 and 2 or are more intermediate programmers and are, like, [?] projects and all of that, all of the other fun stuff. Now, into this little story is where I find myself. I went to this thing. I had dropped out of grad school. I was, again, in the middle of this, like, super toxic break-up, and I just needed to feel good about myself, and so I decided, "You know what? I'm gonna be spontaneous and I'm gonna do this thing." And I had this old rinky-dink laptop. It took, like, 15 minutes to get started. And I didn't know a thing about anything. My whole life up until this point had been political science and sociology and philosophy, and I consider myself a relatively cerebral person, but, like, not smart. Like, I was not--I didn't consider myself in any way technical. I avoided math like my life depended on not knowing what, like, algebra was. It really--I defined myself as a person who was incapable of doing certain things, and programming would be one of those things, and so in this time when I found myself and my definition of myself unraveling, I needed to know that I was still capable of finding joy in the little things. So I went to this workshop, and I loved it. Like, my computer couldn't, like, do anything, so I actually found myself on a website called Repl.it, and it's basically, like, an online environment where you can write code and run it and see it work, and you don't necessarily need to have, like, mastery over your terminal, you don't need to concern yourself with anything that's going on on the backend. You can literally just, like, print "hello world," and it'll print hello world, and it is a magical, magical place. And this was important because first it showed me the value of creating. Never considered myself a creative, but being able to be in a space where I was literally, like, forming whole things and commanding the computer to do something and it did it, I felt powerful. I felt like a magician. I thought, "You know what? I'm gonna learn how to code," but then my computer died and I packed that up, and I didn't really pick up programming again for several months after and then came the end of October. I had, you know, moved out of my apartment at the time. Again, this, like, really, really scary thing had happened to me with my ex, and I had moved home, and I felt like a failure, and I was, like, laying in a sleeping bag next to my mom's bed, and I was up all night just, like, writing these promises to myself. I had sourced promises from other people, but the very first thing I could recall thinking was, like, "I want to be better. I want to be a better version of myself, and the gap between who I am now and the best version of myself can be bridged. I know it." So I thought "You know what? I'm gonna challenge myself. I'm gonna make these promises, and I'm going to keep t hem, and I'm going to find 24-year-old Ade to be a better version than 23-year-old Ade, period. No questions about it. I'm not doing this again." So I wrote those promises and I asked the people I love to hold me to them, and in the next year I moved out--like, I think three weeks after that I found another apartment, moved out to Alexandria, found a job that I really liked, and it all seemed to be coming together, but then my computer, the old rinky-dink computer, just died, and I didn't have a whole lot of, like, personal time, so programming just kind of went by the wayside. Like, I would pick it up every once in a while, and I would complete a couple of sessions or a couple of lessons, and that'd be that, but then I applied for this Udacity scholership and I got it, which, if you know anything about me it's that, like, I really don't win things very often, which goes into the narrative that you tell yourself about yourself, right? About whether or not you're a winner or whether or not you're deserving, whether or not, like, this life thing is a thing that you can succeed at. And, like, as a side-bar, negative self-talk has been a thing for me as long as I can remember. I have never been the sort of person who wakes up in the morning and is like, "You can do this. You're amazing. You're awesome. You can take anything that life throws at you," etc. A. I'm not a morning person, so, like, don't talk to me until 11:00 a.m., and B. I just never had the voices in my head that were, like, super positive. Like, all the voices in my head were kind of assholes. Sorry to whoever's listening to this and doesn't like bad words, but they were, and so throughout this process I've actually learned that, like, affirmations are a huge, huge, huge thing for your mental health, and it's something that I incorporate now into, like, my life. Like, affirmations. You need to hear yourself speaking well of yourself to yourself, and if you take nothing else from this podcast, take that. So we're back in, what is this, 2018? Yeah. Is it 2018? I don't think it's 2018. What is this, 2019? The years melt together. Yeah, it is 2018 actually. So in 2018 I have this fantastic job, friends, and I meet somebody new, and everything is going swimmingly, but I'm not truly, like, learning at the pace that I should be, so I'm going to tell you about the very first mistake that I think I made out of--the biggest mistake I made, not the very first one, because whoo, there were many. There were many, they were varied, and they were huge. Now the very first mistake I made was that I let myself get distracted. Life is not a distraction. Joy is not a distraction. Being social, letting yourself love and be love is not a distraction. What is a distraction is when you create a goal for yourself and you do not take the necessary steps in order to get there. Now, there were times throughout this journey--and anybody who knows me can attest to this--where I'd work a full work day and I'd come home and work until 2, 3, 4, 5:00 a.m. in the morning even studying, or I'd wake up at 2:00 a.m. and study all the way through, get dressed, go to work, come back home, continue studying. And I'm not saying that that's something that you have to do, I'm just saying that it's what I did. Then there were days where for, like, weeks at a time, I would not pick up a book. I would not open my Udacity course. None of those things. And allowing yourself to be distracted in that way is doing yourself a disservice, not only because your brain relies on consistency--like, you literally need consistency in order to get anywhere, right? Like, sometimes we have this fantasy in our heads that, like, we're smart, so all it'll take is, like, the movie montage of, like, a week of studying something, then you'll be perfect at it. But if you've ever heard of the tale of 10,000 hours, like... Lebron James and Gordon Ramsey and Insert Person Who Has A Mastery Of Their Art Here didn't get where they got because they put in a week of work. It required constant effort and practice to attain perfection, and allowing myself to get distracted was so much more detrimental than the times in which I would go at something for hours at a time, simply because during the distractions are where your negative self-talk becomes the loudest, right? Like, when the voices in your head that are telling you you're not capable of doing it, in that lull, that's when they seem right, right? Like, you don't do something correctly and you say, "Oh, my God. I'm never gonna amount to this lofty goal that I set for myself," right? Then you procrastinate and then you walk away, and now you have one more goal unfulfilled. So if you take, yet again, nothing else from this podcast, consistency is key. So if you remember at the beginning of this conversation I said "grit, faith, and humor." So grit is the concept that you are persistent, that you allow yourself to fail and you pick yourself up and you keep going. Actually, over the course of my studies I developed a mantra for myself because it got to be almost crippling, this fear that I had of failing, so I'm gonna read it to you guys. I hope it's helpful. I hope you guys like it. So here's my mantra: "This is why I'm here. I like succeeding at the difficult things. I like the win. I like the burning in my lungs and the adrenaline in my veins. I like the view from the top of the mountain and knowing I conquered. I am not a quitter. I do not lose. I will not be defeated by the gaps in my knowledge. I will not be defined by what I cannot do. I believe in my ability to make sense and wholeness out of the things that are new and scary. I will not be ruled by fear. Ever." There were days where I would write that mantra out to myself over and over and over again on a pen and a pad of paper. I would type that out before I got started sometimes on my lessons. I would read it over and over and over at myself in the mirror. Because fundamentally, this thing that I'm doing where I'm trying to, like, shift the course of my life--and it felt like the weight of my whole family was on my shoulders--that's scary. It's intimidating. If you don't have grit, it might crush you. And that goes for literally anything. For those of us who are underrepresented minorities, who are first-gen, who are the first in our families to attain a certain level of success, you know how scary that success is and the bare-knuckled grit that you have on everything to make sure that nothing falls and nothing fails. You have to let go of that. That fear is only keeping you from being the best version of yourself. By the way, this whole process didn't turn me into, like, a motivational speaker either. So [laughs] if you want to, like, skip through half of this, that's totally okay. I'm not taking offense. All right, so I told you why you need grit. Now why do you need faith? Faith got me through the worst of what grit couldn't. After I got to a place where, you know, I had done all of the things that people say that you need to do--you learn the fundamentals, and then you learn the framework, then you build projects, build more projects, build a portfolio, build more projects--after I did all that I started applying. I applied to internships. I applied to externships. I applied to jobs in Poland. I applied to jobs in Iceland. I applied to jobs that would require me to live in places where it's -20 degrees on a regular-degular-schmegular day, and I don't know if you know me, but I'm African, and we don't do that. [laughs] And every single time I got, like, a "No, thank you. Sorry, but no thank you. We have decided to move on to other candidates at this time. Best of luck." One that actually really shattered me--I got all the way through a lot of the screening questions, and this company that shall not be named sent me a link to a personality quiz. And I took it. I was like, "Okay, cool. Whatever." And then they sent me an email back like, "Sorry, your personality is not best-suited for my company." I'm like, "Wow. My whole personality, fam? My whole personality is not best-suited to be a software engineer? Bet." But I had faith, right? Like, you reach a plateau once you have done the work and you've put in the effort and you've put in your blood, sweat, and tears--I actually bled once. Long story. Don't want to talk about it. [laughs]--and yes, there were lots and lots of tears, but once you get there there's a certain faith that you have, right? And it helps when you have people around you who keep you keeping the faith. For me, I had my best friend. My best friend is also a self-taught developer, and it's really uncanny, but we're the same person. He has, like, 8 years on me, but we are genuinely, like, the same person. It is so odd. We have the exact same reactions to things, the same mentality, but he's a better version, right? Like, he's had 8 years to hone his craft. And the level of dedication and will that he showed, I had to level up. I had to match that level of intensity, and when I ever felt like I couldn't do it, he always came through with a pep talk. Before my very last interview where I got this position, I will never forget. I was on my way to my interview, and he literally said, "You're not looking for a job to be a developer. You are a developer. You're just looking for a chance to prove it." And that confidence I think showed up in my interview, because I have never spoken so confidently about MPC controllers. [laughs] I've never spoken so confidently about use-state hooks in my life. And that faith that I had that everything was gonna work out, I keep that still, right? Like, ever since I got the position, I've had the recurring thoughts of "What if I get there and I flame out? What if they rescind their offer three days before I get there?" You know, any number of, like, worst-case scenarios, and I now have this new voice--super quiet, but it's there--that's saying, "Bro, you'll be okay. The same way you got that job is the same way that if anything happens to that job you'll get another, because you've done the work. You've done the work and you've gotten this far. Doesn't matter what anybody else says now." So last thing you'll need is a sense of humor. You may have heard me chuckling a few times, and that's because I remember the number of days where I literally would have to get up in the middle of my studies and have a dance break. I would reward myself with dance breaks, whether or not my code was actually working, because I felt that because all of this was so heavy and because I needed to tap into my, like, inner wells of grit and strength that I did not have before I started this process--trust me, I was a wilting flower in the sun before any of this got started, and I'm still a wilting flower in the sun in a lot of ways, but--levity and humor are so underrated, because it literally lightens your spirit, right? Like, finding a way to find a way to laugh will take you far, not only because it shows that, like, you're still here, like, the core of your personality has not changed, it also shows that, like, there's a light at the end of the tunnel. You might feel like you're going through the crucible of your life at this point, but at the end of it life is still what you make it, right? And I just laugh through things. I choose to find the levity and find the joy and find the light and hold onto it, and that's all I'm gonna say about that. In whatever ways you find humor and find joy, I encourage you to hold onto that. So now some actionable tips, because I've just been giving you the feels. [laughs] Some real things that you can actually do if you want to be a developer. #1: Set a goal. That was the very first mistake that I made. I said, "I want to learn how to code." I didn't say, "I want to learn how to be a front-end developer or a back-end developer or a full-stack developer or a DevOps engineer." If you don't know what any of those things are, good. Go look them up. Anybody these days who asks me how they can break into tech, how they can learn how to code, how any of those things, the very first thing you need to do is define your goal, set it, and then develop your roadmap, because otherwise you are literally going to be twisting in the wind because you have no idea where you're going. There's nothing worse than a nebulous understanding of what you want. If you start a journey, you have to know where you're going. I mean, sure, you can do what I did and, like, get in the car and say, "I want to go somewhere," and, like, find yourself stranded in the middle of Oklahoma... but, like, I wouldn't advise that. Don't do that. Do it the smart way. Define what you actually want to do. Sometimes you might, like, look up what front-end developers do and be like, "Yeaaaaaaaah, no. How about I go into cybersecurity?" Like, it's an entire about-face, which is why you need to--it's a good thing to do to define the parameters. It also helps you know when you have succeeded, right? A lot of the fear that I had when I first started to apply to positions was that, like, I don't know that I'm a developer yet, right? I don't know that I'm good enough to apply to places, and that's because I never defined for myself what it means to be good enough to apply to places, right? There are places that will take you when you are, like, an unformed ball of Play-Do and fashion a developer out of you, and then there are places that want you to show up as Michelangelo's David and then, and only then, will they give you a position in the company, and then there are places that are vastly varied in-between and you have to figure out what it means to, like, throw your dart at one of those places in-between or, you know, whatever end of the spectrum you want to live in, and know that you're able to get into those doors. Set a goal. #2: It is okay to reassess or change your mind. When I first got started, I said, "I'm gonna be a front-end developer." Actually, no, I said, "I'm gonna be a full-stack developer," and then I said, "I want to be a blockchain engineer." And then I said, "I don't want to do this at all actually. Never mind. I change my mind." And then I said, "You know what? Being a full-stack engineer sounds good. How about I do that?" You can do that, just make sure it all goes back to #1. Make sure that once you've changed your mind, once you've reassessed, once you've course-corrected, you still set a goal and define for yourself what it means to have reached it. Cool. #3: Learn from others. I cannot stress this enough. Learn from others. Learn. Learn from others. Quick ASMR for your head top. Learn from others. It's important. A. This is an industry, tech in general, that is far more collaborative than you might think it is. If the idea you have of hackers in your head is the person who's, like, in a basement somewhere and frantically, like, typing on their keyboard and I don't understand how they haven't broken their keyboard, but they're frantically typing and you see a whole bunch of, like, green letters and numbers on their screen, and it's great, and then, like, five seconds after they stop typing--[Ade types frantically]--"Got it! I'm in." Yeah, no. That's... no. If I'm typing that furiously, it's because I'm looking around on StackOverflow trying to figure out where I went wrong. There are whole communities on Reddit, StackOverflow, Free Code Camp, which are geared towards helping you not sit and look for six hours for an answer to a question that 100 million people have also spent six hours searching for an answer to. Like, you literally can go to StackOverflow or, like, type out whatever your error is, and then at the end of your error type "StackOverflow," and I can almost guarantee you--like, you're not the first person to break whatever it is that you broke. There is nothing new under the sun. Maybe a new language, maybe a new framework, maybe a new whatever, but there is something that is so new that somebody else hasn't thought about it, asked that question and probably solved it. So yeah, allow the successes and failures of others to help inform you. Learning from others is not just about being online. Part of the thing that helped me, I went to meet-ups. I actually briefly served as an organizer for Black Code Collective, which, like, will forever have my heart. Women Who Code, [?]. There's so many different meet-ups. And, you know, D.C.'s not unique in having those organizations. They're all over. Go to meetup.com, as long as it exists, and look for those communities near you, and be intentional about the workshops that you go to, the people that you meet, because those networks are also important. You do not have the luxury, if you're a self-taught developer, of sitting back and waiting for the universe to, like, drop knowledge or networks or contacts or jobs into your lap. You have to do the legwork of developing and building those communities for yourself, which brings me to my final point. Standing on the shoulders of giants still requires you to do the work. I'm gonna repeat that because I kind of said it fast. Standing on the shoulders of giants still requires you to do the work. One more time for those in the back. Standing on the shoulders of giants still requires you to do the work. You have to do the work. There are no shortcuts through it. I'm not one of those people that, like, tells you, "You have to work 50, 60 hour weeks in order to get where I am." I'm telling you what I did. But there's something universal about what anybody else has done. You have to do the work. We all have done the work. We're going to continue doing the work, because this is not an industry that stagnates. I'm sure whatever I learned back in 2018--I mean, literally, what I learned in 2018 about React has changed because of React Hooks. So I don't know what to tell you. You have to do the work. There's nobody who's gonna, like, come and crack your skull open and dump all that there is to know about programming in your head or whatever it is that you want to study, whether you want to be, like, in cybersecurity, you want to be a PIN tester, you want to be a cloud engineer, cloud architect. None of those things are going to happen unless you do the work. You have to do the work, and for those of us--this is a part that I hate having to say, but for those of us who are underrepresented minorities, you will hear people say "Take shots that mediocre white men will take," because, you know, "They're a mediocre white man and they'll take it, so why can't you?" I'm not saying you can't. I'm saying that you have to pull up to those rooms as the person that you are because they will check you in ways that they won't check the mediocre white man. If there are gaps in your knowledge, that's something that a weekend of studying can fix. You cannot allow there to be gaps in your will. You cannot allow there to be gaps in your faith in yourself. Well, yeah, that comes right back to the very first thing that I mentioned - grit, faith, and humor. You cannot allow there to be gaps in any of those things. I hope this helped. I am also gonna be writing a thread about this later on. There's a thread out there, it's called #30DaysOfThreads, and I'm probably gonna be contributing to that hashtag just to share more concretely some of the tools, some of the resources that I've used, so I look forward to sharing some of that information with y'all. I really hoped that this helped and I wasn't just, like, ranting for no reason. [laughs] Which I've been known to do, and I hope that, for those of you who are going on a similar journey--and this has been pretty tech-specific thus far, but people do career pivots in any sort of direction, right? Like, there are people who are pivoting from having a 9-to-5 to being an entrepreneur, and I think there's some things that are universal. If you are pivoting from being a banker to being a teacher, there's some things that are universal. You are going to need grit. You are going to need faith. You are going to need humor. Maybe that should be the title of the show, I don't know. [laughs] All right, that's it from me. Thank you for listening. The Living Corporate family has been incredibly supportive. I want to thank Zach in particular for not giving up on me, because somewhere between all of those months--I think there were months at a time that I gave up on myself, and it showed, [laughs] but we're here now. I also want to give a quick shout-out to my grandma, who died I think two weeks before--was it two weeks? Yeah, two weeks before I actually got this position, and now I'm gonna be a little teary on the mic. Like I said, 2019 was a hard one, but... I come from a very long line of powerful, intelligent, capable women, and she was one of those, and the world is a slightly dimmer place without her, but... I gained an angel, and there's nothing more empowering than knowing that you did this thing, turned everything around for yourself, and being able to, like, look up and say, "I did it, and I know that she saw it." Okay, I'm gonna stop now. I've been, like, more vulnerable in this I want to say 40+ minutes than I've been in, like, a year, so this is my dose of vulnerability and realness. I'm gonna go back to masking my vulnerability with many, many things that I'm not gonna be discussing on this podcast. [laughs] All right, I'm gonna go. Thank you so much for listening, for your support, for your guidance, for your prayers. This has been Ade. You've been listening to Living Corporate. Peace!

Zach welcomes Angela L. Shaw back to the podcast to talk about what it looks like to both create opportunities for yourself and model inclusive behaviors as a leader and more. She also offers people of color three points of advice on how they can navigate the process of creating your own opportunities.Connect with Angela on LinkedIn!Visit our website!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. Now look, we have great guests on the show. Y'all should know this, right? And every now and then we get folks who come back to the show because, you know, we had such a great conversation. And look, I don't want people--if you came here one time, don't get in your feelings, okay? You can also come back, okay? These people just happened to come back, and we love the fact that they came back. If you're listening to this and you were only on the show one time and you're like "Dang, well, what's that supposed to mean about me?" Listen, hit us up, come on back, okay? That being said, we do have a returning guest, Ms. Angela Shaw. [kids cheering sfx] Angela, how are you doing? Welcome back.Angela: Thank you, Zach. I'm doing fantastic. I am on top of the world. I love my life. And thank you so much for letting me come back. I'm super excited to talk today.Zach: Oh, nah, nah, nah. You know what I'm saying? I mean, you know, when we found out, you know, you could come back, I was just over here like [that ain't no problem sfx]. You know, it's not a problem at all. Like, I'm excited that you're here, you know what I mean? Now look, the last time we spoke you were--you know, we were talking about professional reinvention and how you really, like, created an HR career for yourself, and really--you're also the president-elect of [?] Austin, right?Angela: That is correct.Zach: Right? So you were appointed, you know what I'm saying, as president, but you were not yet, you know, anointed as president, you know what I'm saying? So what have you been up to since then?Angela: Well, Zach, I'm president this year all year. [what it do baby Kawhi sfx, both laugh] And I'm making it count. And I want to say the reinvention continues. Like, it doesn't stop. It is a continuous thing. I am continuously trying to reinvent myself and stay relevant. This year as president has been so humbling, but it has been so successful and so wonderful. My platform as president is #PushForProgress related to diversity and inclusion, so I really in my chapter try to model the behavior that I think everybody else should have when it comes to being inclusive. The board, my board, they've gotten on board with that. They are also modeling that behavior. Our meetings have been successful. We're having great attendance. We just had our annual conference, and Zach, let me tell you, we had not one but two inclusion keynotes, and they were fire. They were fire. I feel like it's something that my organization had not seen before, and it was successful, and it was uplifting, and it was allied behavior, and it was just--it was wonderful. I'm just--I'm so blessed and, you know, just living life. I mean, I'm fortunate to love what I get to do every day.Zach: So let's take it a couple steps back. You talked about--'cause again, you kind of gave me, like, an overview, right, but I gotta slow it down. So you talked about folks practicing and you modeling inclusive behaviors and then people practicing inclusive behaviors. What does that mean to model inclusive behaviors as a leader?Angela: We all have bias. I know a lot of diversity and inclusion people talk about the bias that everybody else has, but I think as a leader in the space you break down your own bias first. So I know I have bias. I've had them, you know, just growing up with my experiences. It is difficult to not be hardened by your experiences, but I had to unpack my own boxes first. So I had to look at what my bias was, and how do I go into an organization like AHRMA in a city like Austin with long history--you know, 69 years this organization has been in Austin. How do I go in and unpack my boxes and be the leader that everybody wants to follow? And so I speak to everybody. I say hello to everybody. I give before I get. I make connections, you know? I model the behavior that I want everybody else on the board and in my organization to have, because for me diversity and inclusion is grassroots. That's how I think about it. So every person that I can touch and make them want to activate their power--power is dormant until you activate it, and not activating it is the same as doing something negative with it. You're complicit. So I encourage everybody to activate their power for inclusion, and I model that behavior first.Zach: I got you. Okay, so what I'm hearing is you're coming in, you are engaging people groups that you may have implicit biases or even, like, conscious bias of, in the effort of making sure that they are--that they feel included and that they're a part of the organization, and then your board members, be they white men, black women, Latinx, trans folks, like, whoever, they are also engaging and reaching out across their cohort [?] to make sure that they too are being inclusive and that they too are, like, making sure that people feel as if they have a voice and that they are empowered to speak up and things of that nature.Angela: Absolutely, and we do actual things, like have greeters that greet everybody who comes to a meeting, that introduce themselves, that take them into the room to a seat and introduce them to other people. We have a new member orientation that I attend, every single one, so that I can stand up and tell everybody welcome and how grateful we are that they're there and that they support our organization. You know, this is actual behavior that we all have in activating our power for inclusion.Zach: Really helpful, and I love that. So when we talk about inclusion, a large part of inclusion really is all about, like, redistributing power or ensuring that other folks who have been historically disempowered have a voice and have some type of authority to make actual decisions, right? It's not just that they sit at the table. You have to have a voice at that table, right? What does it look like for you in your chapter to support folks actually have a voice and having power?Angela: Yeah. So our actual board is diverse, so whenever I was thinking about adding people to the board or talking to people about coming onto our board, I was very intentional in my outreach. So I didn't want the board to just look like one thing. I wanted people to see males and females. I wanted people to see different ethnic groups. And we have a diverse board, so that was the first thing. And then it was, you know, selling my vision to everybody for them to understand where I was trying to go with that and make sure that they were on board with it, and they've all been on board with it. The result has been that people who attend our meetings and who attended our conference have also been diverse. So there had been historically underrepresented people who did not always feel welcome for whatever reason, right? They didn't feel welcome. You know, that's no longer the case, so I know for sure that [HR&P?] are talking about the Austin Human Resources Management Association and probably a little bit around the state and nationally. We are inclusive. We are saying it and we are walking the talk too, so this is not just talk. It is we're having behavior, and you can see it and you can feel it.Zach: [to this day sfx]. I'm listening to you. I hear you. [both laugh]Angela: Zach, it's the truth. I'm telling you the truth.Zach: I'm--hey, what you want me to do? I already got the soundboard for you. I mean, [straight up sfx]. I mean, okay, I heard you. Hey, you're preaching. I'm just here. I'm listening. I receive it. You talked about unpacking your boxes, right? So for you to unpack your boxes and really, like, be honest and open about your biases, that takes a certain level of trust, right? Like, you can't just come in here--so let me just give you an example, right? [laughs] So, like, if you was at work, right, and I'm not--this is not your job. Let's just say--let's put the heat on me, okay? So let's say I'm at my job and, like, my boss, who's a white man, you know, is trying to be honest about his biases, right, and all of a sudden he says, "You know, Zach, I just have to tell you, I just never really liked the blacks." I'd be like [record scratch sfx]. Right? Like, I'd be like, "What do you mean? You can't just say that." What does it look like to safely communicate and share your biases in a way that facilitates conversation and trust? Angela: Yeah. So I think if we talk about your boss making that statement to you, obviously there is, on your part, needs to be some understanding. So one, they felt safe enough to even say that, so you've created a safe space to have a conversation. So we're gonna give cool points for that. So it's not a situation where you attack, it's a situation where you listen. So you ask questions about "Where do you think that comes from? Is it about how you grew up? Is it about experiences you've had?" I mean, helping that person unpack their boxes. If it's the other way around, like, "How do I feel safe to go into a situation and, you know, say something about my bias?" For me it took a lot of practice to be able to do that. So just as a public speaker who talks about diversity and inclusion and a lot of different situations and circumstances, I've been blessed to be in a lot of different places, to be able to have these conversations. I've gotten a lot better at being able to say the words. And they don't always come out right, but I think you get back up and you keep moving. If you need to apologize you do, and you keep moving. I mean, that's the only way we will have real action. So as a speaker I'm actually very vulnerable. I do that on purpose, because I want to connect on an emotional level. I want to be seen as a real person. These are real situations and issues that happen. I'm a real person with real feelings. Everybody else that you encounter who is an underrepresented group are not. Everybody has real feelings, and so I always want to connect on that emotional level. So, you know, I'm okay with being vulnerable using my real experiences, talking to people about what has happened to me, but not just what has happened to me, but how it made me feel. And then I think the rest of that though is that what do I do about it afterwards? Zach: What do you mean? Like, what do you mean when you say "What do I do about it afterwards?" What does that mean? Angela: Right. So I've had situations where I feel like I didn't get opportunities for jobs, that people didn't, you know, give me an opportunity to even get in the door and have a conversation with them. So what would I do about that? Well, I created bodies of work that people couldn't deny. So people will ask for recommendations, right? So in Austin, if somebody asked for a recommendation for an HR person, whether it's hiring or they need a connection or whatever, that's what I'm saying. I put in work to be on that list of people that somebody's gonna say, "You should talk to her." You know, for me, I think I'm to a place where I'm not gonna apply into a black hole anymore and hope that somebody's gonna give me an opportunity.Zach: Hm. You're gonna have a real conversation.Angela: Yes. I have created bodies of work that will get me in the room to have the right conversations.Zach: That's real talk.Angela: That's what I mean. What did I do afterwards? I created bodies of work afterwards.Zach: I love it. You know what, this is incredible. If you had three points of advice, right, for people of color who are at a job, they're seeking to, you know, create--they're looking for something else, but they feel stuck, and they don't understand what it really looks like for them to, like, create a new opportunity for themselves. It's easy to be like, "Hey, create your own opportunity," or da-da-da, but what does it look like to get beyond, like--'cause on its face, right, it seems kind of self-helpish. Like, "Just do it," but there's an actual science and process behind it. What advice would you give to the folks who are looking for, like, that practical advice on how they can navigate forward?Angela: The first thing I would say is dream big, so know where you want to go. So whatever your biggest, best, brightest dreams are, write them down. Make them real. That would be the first thing. So know where you're trying to go and make it big. [coin sfx] The second thing I would say is to connect with other people. So inside your organization, outside of your organization, people not in your department. Just connect with people. So you take the first step to get to know people, to hear their story, to make those emotional connections, so that when opportunities come up you're in the conversation. People need to know who you are. You know, I've been saying a lot lately, "It's not who you know, it's who knows you." [coin sfx] So how are you creating those opportunities where people know you? And then the third thing I would say is to take on any project that you have the opportunity to be on. So instead of whining or saying no or having an attitude or "I need more money," take on projects. Expand your skills, you know? Expand your skill set. Do different things. Have lots of different skills in your toolbox. [coin sfx] And those would be the three things that I would say that anybody can do to get to that next step.Zach: All right, y'all. Now, look, y'all heard Angela give y'all these points of wisdom. I even put the coin sound effect after the fact so y'all pay attention, so don't be--okay, you know, you're sitting around looking and trying to figure out what's going on, and I'm looking back at you like [haha sfx]. You need to pay attention, okay? Angela, she's giving you the wisdom, okay? Look, this has been a great conversation, Angela. Any shout-outs or parting words before we let you go?Angela: Absolutely. I have to shout out AHRMA, my board, all of our members and volunteers who have helped make this a very, very successful year, and like last time, Zach, I have to shout you out, because you are giving people opportunities to tell their story and to touch people and to help and support people, and I think that that is fantastic, so thank you so much for that. You are lifting up people, and I want you to know that. Zach: Oh, my goodness. Well, look here, thank you so much, Angela, and thank y'all for listening to the Living Corporate podcast. Y'all know where we at. Google us, okay? Living Corporate. We out here. We're really out here though, so, like, just check us out. Just Google Living Corporate. 'Til next time. Catch y'all later.

Zach has the pleasure of speaking with storyteller and strategist Deidre Wright about effectively building a leadership profile. Deidre shares what her leadership journey is looking like so far and talks about how staying true to her values helped her become the leader she is today. She also offers her thoughts about what some black and brown folks are doing that could be hindering them in their leadership development journey.Connect with Deidre on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Instagram!Check out her website!Visit Living-Corporate.com!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. Now, look, you know what we do, okay? We come on the show and we have real talk about real things. These real things are actually fairly benign on their face, right? But we take these fairly real topics, and they're real, or rather we make them real, 'cause we're centering black and brown experiences. So today we're talking about building a leadership profile. Now, in building a leadership profile--you know what? I'm not even gonna do that. I'm just gonna go ahead and get into it with our guest, Deidre Wright.Deidre: Yes, that's right. [laughs] Hi.Zach: All right, come on now. Welcome to the show. How are you doing?Deidre: [laughing] I'm good, Zach. Thank you for having me. I'm really happy to be here. I've lived a corporate life for most of my career, so it's exciting to talk to you.Zach: No, thank you very much. I'm excited to have you on the show. And see, you know what I did is--those are bars, Deidre. So I said, "Deidre Wright," and you said, "That's right." See, I knew--Deidre: [laughs]Zach: Right? So I'm like--anyway, it's wordplay is all I'm saying. Okay, so for those of us who don't know you, would you mind sharing a little bit about yourself?Deidre: Yeah. So everyone, I'm Deidre Wright. I'm a Bay Area native, and I call myself a storyteller and a strategist because I worked across industries, but mostly what I do is empower clients to effectively tell their stories and create strategies, execute goals, and so I say this because I worked in public health, marketing, and risk management, and with all of those fields I can kind of used that skill set and my--that's my passion. So I graduated from Spelman College with a sociology and anthropology degree with the goal to make the world a better place. Graduated during the recession. It was a little challenging, but I was able to help kind of do that. And so I worked for Kaiser Permanente in public health research, working on a study, learning why girls start childhood puberty earlier. So why puberty is starting earlier and long-term [who?] gets breast cancer, and communicating findings with the public, and then I transitioned to marketing because I found that without a clear call to action people don't really make changes. So I was doing internal marketing for McKesson, helping employees sell their services, and then I landed on insurance, really at first advising [?] companies on their risk management and how to improve that for their companies and later now be, you know, an award-winning director of diversity and inclusion helping companies in insurance promote and advance diversity and inclusion.Zach: You know what? You just had so many just Flex bomb moments in there. First of all, you talked about the fact that you graduated from Spelman. Shout-out to all the Spelmanites, the Spelman Women. Deidre: Woo-woo!Zach: Come on, now. Don't--like, let's not play. [ow sfx] Okay? We gotta shout y'all out. [laughs] And then you had some big names in there. McKesson, Kaiser Permanente. That's incredible. So, you know, you talked about--you're talking a little about just kind of your journey. Again, you named some huge brands in there. I'm looking at your profile, and I'm just gonna look at, like, just the last year and a half, okay? So 2018 you got the NAAIA Emerging Leaders co-chair, your 2018 Dive In Festival San Francisco co-chair, and then you were the 2018 Water Street Club Insurance Rising Star and then the 2019 Insurance Careers Month Emerging Leader. Okay? And that's just, again, the last year and change, but it's relevant because like I said, today we're talking about building your leadership profile. I have a theory, right? And I could be--I could be crazy, 'cause I'm--I'm just looking at the field, Deidre. I don't--you know, I'm not a sociologist or any type of scientist. I'm just kind of looking at the space, right? And I have a theory that black and brown folks in corporate America spend a lot of time trying to make sure that we're just strong individual contributors because, you know, we're conditioned and taught to just do that and for a lot of us, like, the first generation of our families being in corporate America, right? But I believe as time continues forward and the millennial workforce increases and, like, its representation increases within the workplace and we age up in the workplace that there's gonna be a continued demand and opportunity for us to continue to really take on leadership positions. So can you talk a little bit about your journey in becoming a leader and, like, what has that looked like for you?Deidre: Yes, mm-hmm. And I'll have to have a little bit more Flex bomb. So, like I said, I work in the risk management and insurance field, but using my platform and my leader standpoint I've done a lot of fun things, including speaking at events where Barack Obama, Colin Powell, and America [Ferrera?] were on the line-up. Zach: Whoa, whoa, whoa--Deidre: Yeah. [laughs, record scratch sfx]Zach: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on. Let me just pause you so I can do this. [Flex bomb sfx] Okay, continue.Deidre: Thank you. Then having viral LinkedIn, you know, posts, where I have one that has 23,000 views and the other one has 37,000 views, and I say this because no matter what industry or skill set, you can be a leader and use your influence to call attention to the cause that you care about. So what's my leadership journey looking like? I guess no matter what I always focus on setting goals, investing in myself, and taking strategic risks. And, you know, you heard my kind of bio. I've done a lot of different things in different fields, but I always stay true to my values, which was, you know, being strategic and storytelling. And so I say that because what happened was I was, like I said, a contractor for McKesson, and so my contract ended and I had my son the month afterwards. So my vision was take a couple months off, go back to McKesson, do my thing, but they had laid off a bunch of marketing people so I had no job to go back to, and that's when I was like, "Okay, I have a baby. I need to make money. Let me figure this out," and so that's when I kind of got back to my values and my goals, and I was like, "Okay, let me check out insurance and risk management--my mom was in the field, she is doing great--and really think, like, what do I want out of a career and start attacking that." So I started with informational interviews with leaders in the space, because I want to say, like, if you have the secret sauce, I want that recipe, and figuring that out for me. And then taking strategic risks to start and break in myself in the industry of taking jobs, and then once I got the position making the position my own and being a thought leader. The key thing to being a leader I would say that everyone is--figure out your craft and promote it on different channels to help people, whether it's, like, Living Corporate, you know, having this experience and teach people skills, but mostly make strategic moves to always figure out how to promote your expertise and level up by seeing or asking, "What experience in my career is gonna give me the highest ROI for career time?" So if I'm spending three years of my time on this project or 30 minutes speaking on a stage, what is the ROI for this? And that's kind of helped me navigate these different changes in marketing to, you know, insurance, being a broker, from a broker to diversity and inclusion. Having those key processes of assessing goals, being strategic, and, you know, seeing what's worth my time or not.Zach: Let's take a step back though, right? So everything you're saying, 100%. I get it. It makes sense to me. But what would you say to the person who's like, "Look, I don't really know what my focus or passion is. I'm just here. I'm just happy to be here." Like, what advice would you give to that person?Deidre: I would tell them to shift their mindset. Just being happy to be here is--I mean, what are you living a life of, scarcity or abundance? Like, yes, I understand--like I told you, I had a baby and no money. I was thinking like, "Dang," but I had to--I don't know if it was just my maternal instincts or just my hustle, I mean, I was like, "I've got to figure out how to make this work," and so I would just say level up your mindset and think about "Okay, if I'm here, yeah, I'm happy for the situation, but what do I want to do with it? Where do I want to be in three years? How much money do I want to make then? What kind of impact do I want to leave on this platform?" For example, when I was a broker, I always wanted to empower my clients and, like--let me be clear on what I mean by risk management. My clients were Airbnb and Lyft and Starbucks and UPS. Like, big, you know, global clients, and I say that because just like you and me, we want to protect ourselves, [and] we also want to reach goals. And so I would say manage your career like you're managing your risk in yourself and think about, "Okay, if I invest X amount of time in this place, what's the return gonna be for me in reaching my goals?" So I guess I would just say change your mindset to just be more than just happy to be there. Like, think "How am I gonna make this work to be happy and earn my worth?"Zach: I love that. You're absolutely right. You know, it's scary though, and I say this as someone who--I'm trying to put myself in, like, the other person's shoes, 'cause you and I, we vibe on that level because we both are like, "Look, I gotta go get it." I don't have any kids yet, but--[both laugh]--but I get it, right? I am married. It's like, "Okay, look, I gotta--" Like, this can't stop. Like, I gotta keep going, right? At the same time, I ask myself, "Okay, so for the folks who are not necessarily naturally as industrious," right, like, what are some of the, like, just kind of starting steps? And I hear you, right? What I'm hearing is it's about identifying "Okay, what do I want the next 18 months to look like? What do I want the next three years to look like?" And then, like, thinking with the end in mind, then kind of working backwards from there and then asking yourself and kind of asking perhaps a scary question of "Okay, well, then is what I'm doing getting me to that point? Yes or no?"Deidre: Mm-hmm.Zach: Okay. No, that's great. So, you know, it's interesting, what are some of the biggest lessons that you've learned in becoming a leader? And then if I could kind of take a step, like, a little bit below that, as you've been continuing to grow and navigate these spaces, what are things that you see, you know, our black and brown folks doing out there that can hinder them in their leadership development journey?Deidre: Yes. What I learned as a leader--which, it's funny, you know? It's probably like you, Zach. It's like you just do your job and you do it well, and I say that because I consider myself, like, a mentor or a helper, and it's great that I'm a leader, and I'll say that. You know, I take that role, but I just think ultimately it's figuring out what your purpose is and how you can live to that higher calling, but, you know, the real thing is 1. invest in yourself, whether that is taking the time to do the work--for example, like, when I was a broker, I would spend time, hours, reading insurance policies. Now, I don't know, Zach, if that's what you do for fun, but most people don't do that. But I was taking the time so I knew what the heck I was talking about, and I had that confidence in front of my client when I am the only millennial, only black person, only woman in the room. And so you've gotta take time to invest yourself. You know, I had an executive coach who was helping me, you know, through the program and to really figure out what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do and when I was investing that time. Going to conferences, meeting people, networking. You have to do these things if you want to get far, and for us, you know, black and brown people, two things I would kind of say is 1. be strategic and understand no one is gonna invest time in you as much as you. So if you're waiting for your company to tap you on the shoulder saying, "I know you're gonna be a leader," yeah, that might happen passively, but only you can really give all of your effort into doing that. And then two, part of my job is that I organize events and plan them for the industry to I guess really just bond people and give them tools and resources for D&I through events and stuff. So for example, I'm planning a national diversity and inclusion conference that's coming up, and I say that because I look for speakers. I want speakers. I also judge a national woman in insurance award, [?], and so I assess and judge women leaders and their profiles to see who are worthy of these awards. Now, rarely do I see at our events people volunteering who are people of color or whoever to be speakers at events from a technical standpoint, you know? And rarely do I see people nominate themselves for awards. So the biggest thing is advocate for yourself and put yourself out there, because if you don't do that, then who will? So I think that's the biggest missed opportunity. Working hard's not enough. You've got to really advocate and promote your brand, because people want to help you. People want diverse leaders more than ever. I will tell you right now. Companies are investing in diversity and inclusion, and they want leaders. We just had a diversity survey, my company Business Insurance, studying diversity in our industry. We had over 800 people do it, and one fo the questions were what is the biggest barrier to increasing diversity in our industry, and for the second time around it was "we can't find minorities with the right skill set." And I don't necessarily believe that is my case. I just think it's perception. If people don't perceive there are leaders there, then they're not gonna tap you in for opportunities. So speak out and promote yourself to be that leader they see. Zach: No, 100%, and let me double-click on one thing you just said. I'm not gonna lie to you. What a huge pet peeve is, like, the whole "we don't have the pipeline, we don't see [them]." Like, so much of that is, like... if you just open your eyes, like, in today's era, right? So some of it is perception, how you present yourself, and there's a certain level of accountability that we have to take in terms of how we show up. At the same time--and I don't want to speak to insurance, 'cause that is a space that I'm not wholly familiar with, but I will speak to, like, technology, right? So okay, like, Facebook and other, like, larger technology firms will say, "Well, we have this diversity problem because we don't really have the pipeline," but the reality is there are tons of pockets of people, like Black Girls Who Code, Black Code Collective. There's all types of, like, groups out there and pockets, and there's black folks at these PWIs and HBCUs. There's organizations out there that do have the talent. I think the challenge is that what I'm not seeing, like, across the board is, like, a truly, like, intersectional and inclusive talent sourcing strategy when it comes to actually identifying that talent and then making sure that those folks are actually represented in terms of what does it look like for you to go out to those schools or engage these different groups or partner with these various organizations. Like, if you look in the same places for this diverse talent, then yeah, you may not find it, but if you actually just kind of broaden your scope a bit you may actually find the folks you're looking for, you know?Deidre: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. I truly believe it, and that's one of the things I help, you know, my clients with is figure out where do you find this diverse talent. And diversity means so many different things to so many different people, and I know all industries are different, but I will say for us it's typically--they go to the same colleges because they typically want someone with a risk management degree. Risk management degrees are very--you know, they're not that often you find them. There's only a certain amount of schools, and those schools are not necessarily diverse. And mind you, the majority of people that come into our industry don't have interest in insurance or a risk management background. Like, I had sociology, right? But I did my job really well. So I'm like, knowing the statistics that the majority of people come in without this, I'm like, "Why would you narrow the focus?" So I think the first thing is find transferrable skills, companies, you know, and then people, be open to other industries besides your own that could be promising, because insurance is a couple trillion dollar industry. There's really a lot of interesting things going on right now. There's InsureTech, which is infusing technology with insurance. There's all these new risks out there, like with Bitcoin, and, you know, you have, you know, a shared economy and all kinds of fun stuff. So it's a lot of great things. So whether you're a company, find people with transferrable skills. Go to professional organizations, whether it is, like, you know, Ascent, Prospanica, National Black [?], and find people with the skill sets who obviously are leaders in their space but might not be leaders in your space. Also, look and see where else people are at, because--I don't know, maybe technology is a better judge [?] of this, but I'm like, "Are companies really leveraging social media and new forms of communication to find people?" A lot of times no, so that's what you gotta do.Zach: No, straight up. In fact, let me just go ahead and [straight up sfx, both laugh]. Yeah, I agree. Straight up. Man, that's a wonderful soundbite. So you talk a lot about inclusion and diversity within the context of leadership, and these are my questions, right? Can you 1. explain why I&D is important to you and then practical ways you reinforce and you would encourage other leaders to reinforce inclusive behaviors?Deidre: Yes. Why does it matter to me? Straight up I will just say it's because [both laughing] I was working in the industry, and my [?] a generation, so I quote-unquote belong here. We're very--I would say the industry typically is a lot of second-generation or multi-generation people in the industry, but I didn't actually feel like I belonged because, like I said, I didn't really see many people who looked like me. So just having that self-awareness, I'm like--and I was complaining, and someone was like, "Deidre, stop complaining." Like, "Do something." I got really involved in diversity and inclusion work, whether it was from volunteering or being part of organizations. So that was kind of--I had skin in the game, and I had to be the change I wanted to see, and I spoke at a lot of events about that. That's actually how I got my job, because I was on stage speaking at this event for my current company, and the CEO saw me and was like, "Deidre, I like your ideas," and that's why I promote people. If you have great ideas and solutions, go and speak and do that so you can find the right opportunities to be poached for those opportunities. But what are practical and tactical ways to be more inclusive? I would say diversify your network to the point you said of poaching talent or finding talent, but also who you mentor and who mentors you. So think about this. Yes, it is really important to have a person of color as your mentor in this space, but also it's good to have people who don't look like you. I try to, as much as possible, find mentors or colleagues who have different backgrounds, whether it's from they were in the military or they're male or they're white or whatever, but just different people. They give me perspective on things, and I find that very, very helpful, and also feedback on what they're receiving from me and my brand. Also I would say as a leader, if you're a manager or just anybody on a team, learn people's learning styles and how they communicate and bring out the best in them, because not everyone's extroverted, so they're not always gonna communicate how they feel, but maybe they're better in smaller groups or maybe they're great with projects and running with things, but don't assume that your way of communicating and doing things are the best. But I would just ask people, like, "Hey, what's the best to bring out your best so that we can get your A game at the office and that we can make sure you're satisfied?" And then lastly is speak up and speak out. If you're in a place of privilege in any aspect, I would address things, whether at a meeting and a woman's trying to talk and you're a man and someone's interrupting her--call that out, you know? Like, "Hey," you know, "I think Sheena wants to talk," or if you're a person in corporate--like, for me it's like, "Hey, I've been getting a lot of opportunities. How do I make sure I teach other women of color, people who are underrepresented, how to get speaking engagements so that they can have--I can see more diversity on this stage when I'm at events and not be the only one?" So I would just say speak out, diversify your network, and learn people's learning styles.Zach: I love that. And you're absolutely right, like, in terms of diversifying your network. So what I've learned--what I've been learning in my career is to have--as a black man--to have some white men in my network, right? And, like, I love it because--so I'm not trying to brag on myself. I'm just saying I really do like, enjoy, building authentic relationships, and I'm not gonna put--I'm not gonna make the block too hot for my friend so I'm not gonna drop his name, but I have a very good friend. He's a dear friend of mine, and we met at work. White guy, and, you know, a fairly conservative background, and I would just say, like, across the board, like, fairly conservative white man, and at the same time he and I met because he saw that I was being treated inequitably on a project, and he advocated for me, and that's how we became friends, and we've been friends for years now through that. But what's interesting is as I kind of talk to him about challenges I'm having or, like, "Man, I don't know how I would handle this," and I'm thinking about, like, all of these fairly, like, referential ways to do something or just, I don't know, kind of--like I'm choosing certain binaries because of--I don't want to say classically conditioned, but the way that I've been raised, I just think "Well, this is the way to do things." He's coming at it from, like, a different perspective. He's coming at it from a perspective of a privileged white man. So he's like, "Well, Zach, you don't have to do that. Just do this," and it's like, "Oh, my gosh. I would never even think to try that," right? And so it's, like, opening your eyes a bit. Something else you said now. I know you talked about, like, in meetings, right, when you said, like, if there's a woman talking, you as a man saying, "Hey, you know, I think she has something to say." Like, "Please, if you could give it a listen." I would also challenge that, if you're a white woman in those positions and you have, like, a black man or a [?] of color, use that privilege too, Cassandra. Becky. Charlotte. You know, just help us out, please, because we need it as well. I think there's some intersectionality that should be considered--Karen. There's another name. I was just trying to think of some other names. Anyway, so as we continue forward, right, and we talk a little bit about, like, relationships and networking, can we talk about, like, coalition building? You kind of alluded to it already, but its role in developing a leadership profile. So you talked about building this network, but, like, what does it look like for you historically to build mutually beneficial relationships? And do you have any examples of when those relationships have come into play to benefit you?Deidre: Yeah, that's a great question. I would say I always wanted to make things mutually beneficial. I just come from a standpoint--I don't like moochers, and I don't want to be a moocher. I just--I just think that it's kind of tacky, honestly.Zach: It is tacky.Deidre: It just turns me off, and it's bad for my brain to be like, "She's always asking for something but not returning it." So I've always kind of been that way. I will say my trick is--and it's not even a trick, it's really just what I do--I always end a conversation, meeting or whatever, asking people how can I be of service to them, because 1. it helps me know, like, how I can actually help them, and 2. it makes me think of who in my network can also help them. So I've connected a lot of people for business opportunities, job opportunities, just personal opportunities through having this network. "Oh, you want A? I know someone over there who can connect you with that," or "You want this," and so I would just say ask the question. It doesn't cost you a thing, but you might make an impact in how--it's always come back to help me. Like, I've never had a situation where it hasn't. 1. Either I made a new friend or had goodwill or 2. people reached out to me--like, I get a lot of referrals for business, whether it's for my job or for speaking opportunities or just leadership opportunities. I got an award for I guess being myself and being helpful to people and always leveling them up. I find that I'm stronger when I have a stronger circle around me, so I'm always trying to find who those people are, so I build it by--[coin sfx, Deidre laughs]--by, you know, being out there and publicly speaking. A lot of people I meet through Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, you know, just the interwebs, because I put myself out there or I comment on what they're saying because it's compelling to me. And so there's different ways to have mutually beneficial relationships. I just think 1. you gotta be open to them, 2. you actually gotta follow up and do what you say you're gonna do, but when it comes to--like, I come from an abundance mindset. I don't ever think that it can't be more than one leader. It can't be more than one of us. So I think we all have to get out of the mindset of that "I can't help somebody else because I lose something." [and i oop sfx] You only have something to gain by helping somebody else out.Zach: Come on, now. I 100% agree. And you know what? And that's another point--you're absolutely right, like, about following up. Look, [both laugh] people send--Deidre: You know.Zach: I do know. Listen, look, I look at my little emails, and thank God--you know what? This is not an ad. Shout-out to y'all, Gmail, 'cause y'all do the whole thing. "You received this three days ago. Follow up?" That has helped me so much. I be in that inbox--I'm in that inbox like [bratbratbrat sfx]. I'm like--[both laugh].Deidre: Yeah, you're in there.Zach: I be following up. Like, "Hey, we had this conversation. I just wanted to circle back and make sure we're good." Deidre, you did that with me!Deidre: Yeah. [laughs]Zach: You gotta. Hey, you gotta do it. Life is crazy. Life is just so busy. It's important. Okay, so let's pivot a little bit. In your article "Why Strategic Companies Must Manage Diversity & Inclusion As A Business Risk"--it was recently published in Savoy Magazine--can we talk a little bit about the piece and what inspired that?Deidre: Yeah. So, you know, risk management is my background. It's always on my brain, whether it's from personal risk management to, like, company, and I say that because people think of risk always as a bad thing, but risk is--you know, based on the [?]--it talks about, you know, the possibility of a loss, no gain, or a gain. So you can have different levels of risk, and so with diversity and inclusion, it can--if you do it right, it can help you gain [?]. If you do it wrong, it can be harmful. And let's be clear, we see all of these things in the news, all of these headlines, and people are failing with diversity and inclusion, and I just want to help educate the consumer and companies and people about why this has to be a strategic risk and opportunity. So let's look at, you know, the news. So Papa John's, he's going over here saying the N word, you know, during conference calls, had to step down as a leader, and from that incident, you know, within a month their store sales fell 10%. You know, Dolce and Gabbana, they had a situation where they had a model, you know, who was Asian looking like she was eating, like, pizza with chopsticks, and, like, it was inappropriate, and then calling, like--and then what happened was they had to cancel a fashion show. Consumers were, like, destroying their products, and then their products were removed from different platforms in China. Like, Chinese magazines, Alibaba, whatever, and then another case is, you know, the Conrad Miami, a hotel out there, they discriminated--a manager discriminated against a woman. She asked to have Sundays off when she started the job because of her religious reasons. They ended up having to pay her punitive damages of $21 million, you know, and others for lost wages because she was fired as a retaliation for wanting to go to church, and she asked for tha ttime off. And so I say this because when it goes wrong, it costs companies money.Zach: You're 100% right, right? Like, you think about, like, Angry Orchard. So they just recently had a situation where they interrupted this couple trying to get married. This man was trying to propose to his girlfriend. They accused them of stealing merchandise and eventually kicked them out of there. So no, I'm 100% with you. So of course that then draws boycotts and all types of negative press [?]. Now, look, I don't personally drink Angry Orchard. This also is not an ad, but, you know--Deidre: That's some Angry Orchard right there. [laughs]Zach: [?]. People angry at the Orchard, okay? For the wrong and right reasons, mm-hmm. Okay, please continue though.Deidre: No, but that's where I'm coming from. Obviously I know--so when I say I'm hosting and organizing a diversity and inclusion conference, we are concentrating as a risk management community, talking about how we can help the risk management community get a hold on this from a strategic standpoint of either making insurance companies money or saving them through talent acquisition and getting the right talent, because we know if you lose employees you lose a certain amount of money trying to rehire people. We know what these--so think about this. When these companies have lawsuits, how are they getting paid? Typically through insurance. When it's a lawsuit and a claim. Unless it's--Zach: That's right.Deidre: Yeah, so it's really important to my industry strategically, from whether it's their internal practices or what they're paying out, especially if they're million-dollar claims or lawsuits, what's going on. So it's a strategic risk to think about how do we leverage it to grow our revenue and our brands, and also how do we minimize issues so that we're not losing money or losing top talent?Zach: I love it. I think that, you know, it's just interesting because--and I keep saying it's interesting, right? So you know--you know, Deidre, how when you talk to people you have certain things that you say as your pivot word? "It's interesting" is, like, my pivot word slash phrase, but I'm going to work on that. I'm gonna work on that after this interview, because I won't stop right now, but--Deidre: Can't stop, won't stop.Zach: Well, I will stop eventually.Deidre: [laughs] Not today, but you will tomorrow.Zach: Not today. It's about being introspective in the moment. I think that, you know, live introspection can help you actually move forward as opposed to--'cause you may not think about it again, so I'm calling it out right now in the middle of this interview awkwardly. So as I get older and I just pay attention, you know--and I'm bringing this up based off what you just talked about with the business imperative and the strategic imperative of inclusion and diversity--I realize though how much of the world I navigate is catered to white experiences, expectations, and comfort, and that doesn't really--that's not exclusive to--it's inclusive of corporate America as well, and when I think about the work that you're doing, in some way or another simply even bringing up otherness pushes up against some of those levels of comfort. So how do you navigate the fragility that comes with discussing non-whiteness in majority-white spaces?Deidre: You know... maybe that's my pivot word, "you know." [Zach laughs] I've been trained for this job and position--all my life I've been trained for this, because growing up, you know, from kindergarten to half of college I was in majority-white spaces. Like, my elementary school K through 8, my sister and I and maybe three other kids were black. Like, it was just mostly white. So I guess to me--the thing about this is with any idea or concept you're selling people on, you've gotta tell 'em what's in it for them, and I think that's a clear thing. And also don't make people feel ashamed for learning and uncovering bad habits. Like, for ex--and I don't know, think about this. If somebody, you know, for example, like you said, if you're saying a trigger word to pivot things, right? "Oh, you know, Zach, like, every time you transition you keep on saying "interesting." That's horrible." You're gonna be like, "Dang, that hurt me," right? It's just the same thing as saying, "Hey, you know, you always interrupt women." Like, "Why are you doing that?" That would not be my tactic when it, you know, comes to whether it's women issues, people of color, or whatever. So I always try to think of, you know, how to come out of a situation, whether it's for a person or a company or whatever, of how to tell them what's in it for them. So for example, "Hey, Acme Company, you're doing great when it comes to business practices, when it comes to just, like, in general." Like, "You're making money. Have you thought about the strategic risk of not having diverse talent and not really investing that?" "Oh, we have diverse talent." "Yeah, yeah, but do you understand the demographics are changing?" And companies are having either corporate social responsibility plans or diversity and inclusion initiatives that require or ask for diversity and what you're strategically doing. "Let me help you with that. Let me help you formulate a plan, 'cause I want you to succeed," or "Hey, I want you to be a good leader. Do you know about, you know, people are being evaluated now on how they are inclusive leaders? I have tools and resources if you want my help," and then they gotta ask for the help or say, "Yes, I want the help," you know? But at least make people aware of things in a way that you're helping them and less from a point of accusation or you're doing something wrong, because we all make mistakes, but until we're made aware of in a way that's safe and safe to admit--I have people tell me, "Deidre, like, you know, you put these things out there with diversity and inclusion that makes me rethink things, and you say it in a safe way so I don't feel threatened," and I'm like, "Thank you for saying that, because that is very uncomfortable, to say that you feel uncomfortable and threatened by things because you don't know what you're doing, so I'm happy to help you." Now, everyone doesn't have to be that. It doesn't have to be the burden of a minority to educate the majority on their pain or frustration. That is a lot of--it's just a lot of work, but I'm choosing this work, so I'm using my power and my platform to do that. So it's a choice involved, but you've gotta either step up and be open to changing and pivoting your messaging to make real impact.Zach: I love that, and you're absolutely right that it is a choice, and there are different methods to do that. I do love the fact that you said, you know, black and brown folks and just non-white cisgendered folks, non-white male cisgendered folks, we're not obligated to carry the burden of educating people, so I'ma just go ahead and give you this right here. [applause sfx] Just so people--'cause, you know, there's also this narrative of like, "Well, how can they know if you don't teach 'em?" Like, 'cause they got Google. Like, people learn how to code.Deidre: That is what I--I'm like, "You can Google or YouTube anything."Zach: [laughing] You can Google so much.Deidre: Now, Zach, the thing about--I won't deal with ignorance to the point where people, like, trolls and stuff like that, like, I don't have time for Trolls. I'm not a troll collector. I don't really like those dolls or people, so I don't play with them. I don't play with Trolls. Okay, but people who are really open to learning, yeah.Zach: Right, that's the qualifier. They gotta be open to learning, but I like the fact that from the jump you said, you know, you've been--basically you've been molded for this, you know what I'm saying? Like, you've been, you know what I'm saying, like--[to this day sfx]--right? Like, you're doing it, right? [both laugh]Deidre: And I don't know about your background. For me, I also--that's why I strategically chose to go to Spelman College. I went to Atlanta. I visited out there for homecoming. My cousin went to Clark and I was like, "This is poppin'." I transferred in the middle of my college experience. And so I--1. I wanted the experience, but I've never been a majority in an all mostly black woman environment, and it was kind of a reality shock. So I also say on the flip side, if you've always been other, you might want to try to be in the majority because it really is a way to reframe your identity, because on one side, yeah, it's a lot of issues and stress being other and always trying to, like, reinforce what you're doing, but sometimes it's also a platform to make you stick out and people look up to you and whatever versus you blend in. I mean, no one realized I was new for a while. I had to tell people, "Hey, I'm a new girl. I don't know where I'm going," because I was camouflaged. And so I say that because, you know, there's no real perfect spectrum on this and what you can do, so I would just say use your platform no matter what you're doing to help things out. And I also say this because I had a mentor, and she was like, "Deidre--" I was young, this was my first job. She said, "You are a young, attractive black woman in this space, and no one looks like you. You're gonna get people's attention no matter what. Make sure when you do it's for a reason." So minorities people, you stand out, you know, whatever it is that you--if you stand out in your space, actually leverage that as a tool to stand out for a reason and get your agenda across or, you know, use your thought leadership, because, I mean, it is a gift and a curse, so why not use it to your benefit?Zach: No, you're absolutely right. And, you know, for me, 'cause I typically do stand out, right? So I'm a black man--I'm, like, 6'1". I'm a pretty big dude, right? I'm, like, 270, 280. Like, I'm a big guy, right? And so, you know, I know that I'm gonna stick out, and then plus I have this weird, like, Southern/Connecticut accent because my mother was an English teacher, but I'm also very country at the same time, and so I have--it's a unique profile, so when I show up I'm just--look, I'm trying to--I'm trying to make a show, right? And not, like, in a Bojangles kind of way, but I mean make an impact, you know what I mean? I show up like--I show up, I'm like [what it do baby sfx]. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm out here, okay? And, like, you know, I'll bring you in with the jokes and stuff, but then if you're actually trying to challenge me, like, I actually have some--you know, I have some intellectual rigor behind what I'm saying, right? I might hit you with some multi-syllabic words, you know? Whatever. So I hear you is my point. Okay, this has been a great conversation. Any parting words or shout-outs before we let you go?Deidre: Yeah, shout-out to myself. I'm Deidre Wright. I'm here--Zach: Ayo, she said shout-out to myself. Oh, my gosh. Yo, wait a second. [air horns sfx, both laughing]Deidre: Because if there's nothing else you learn this session, it's that you gotta advocate for yourself. You've gotta be your best cheerleader. Man, shout yourself out. There's a way to do it, but do it, 'cause if we don't do it, who will? And I say this because there are so many people I meet, young people, and they're like, "I would never think you work in insurance. You don't look like that," and I give them a different alternative reality and role model. So by advocating for yourself--I tell people it's selfish not to share your expertise. It's selfish not to say who you are and what you're doing, because you could be motivating so many different people by just sharing and promoting yourself and inspiring generations. [chaching sfx] So advocate for yourself, you know? Find me at DeidreWright.com. Also I'm on LinkedIn and Instagram. So at Instagram I'm @DeidreWrite, like I'm writing, you know, my life story, and just holler at me if I can help you with either personal branding, diversity and inclusion, and uplifting our people of all kinds to advance and promote diversity and inclusion.Zach: My goodness, gracious. You know, over 100 episodes we have never had a guest say, "Shout-out to me, yo." Not "shout-out to my mom," not "shout-out to my people." "Shout-out to me." I love it. No, no, 100%, and Deidre, we'll make sure we have all of your links and stuff in the show notes, so no pressure there. Okay. Well, thank y'all for joining the Living Corporate podcast. You know where we're at. Look, just Google Living Corporate at this point. That's right. It's a slight flex, but it's a true flex, okay? You Google--if you go to Google--shout-out to Google, 'cause this is not an ad--Google, Yahoo, Bing... what's another search engine, Deidre?Deidre: AskJeeves I guess is no longer here.Zach: AskJeeves? Yo. [both laugh]Deidre: Ask him. [both laugh]Zach: What you gonna say next, BlackPlanet? Xanga? AskJeeves? [both laugh]Deidre: MySpace. I mean, I still can't get into my old MySpace page. Forgot my passwords, but you can probably find me there too.Zach: My MySpace was fire back in the day. Anyway, the point is we're out here, okay? And we're really enjoying the fact that y'all are listening to this podcast, so shout-out to y'all. If you want to subscribe to the newsletter, again, just Google Living Corporate, you click the link, and there's a subscribe button right there, right when you click on the website, okay? We have new content. Of course we got this dope content right here. We got new blogs. Make sure you just check us out, okay? This has been Zach, and you've been listening to Deidre Wright right now - right on time - she's just right.Deidre: You know that's right.Zach: You know it's right. Not white, right?Deidre: But Deidre's right.Zach: Deidre's right. [both laugh] Deidre: Thanks, Zach, man. I appreciate it, and let me know if I can ever be of service to you.Zach: All right, we'll talk soon. Peace.

Zach speaks with the founder and CEO of MINWO, Melanie Akwule, about effectively supporting women, specifically black and brown women, in the workplace. Melanie shares her experience as a black woman in corporate America and talks about MINWO's origin and its vision. She also offers up three points of advice for women of color who are looking to get into entrepreneurship and a whole lot more.Check out MINWO and connect with them on social media! LinkedIn, Twitter, IG, FacebookVisit Melanie's personal page and network with her on LinkedIn!Stop by our website!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and yes, you're listening to a what? Not a C-Side, not a D-Side, but a B-Side. Now listen, it's 2019, so some of y'all don't even know, like, the reference of a B-Side, but, like, there was a point in time where, like, you know, musical content was on tapes and records, right? And you would, like--you know, you would flip it over. You would flip the record over, and that would be, like, the B-Side, right? And so the B-Sides were, like, the songs that weren't, like, the chart toppers, but they were still good songs, right? So, you know, that's really what we're trying to do here with B-Sides. But see, the thing about Living Corporate B-Sides is the B-Sides'll be hits too. It's kind of like when you think about Beyonce, right? Like, when you think about, like, a B-Side from Beyonce, like, it's still a hit, you know what I'm saying? Like, that's what we're trying to do with Living Corporate, you know what I'm saying? I'm not saying we're Beyonce. I'm just saying we're making hits doe. ["ow" sfx] That's all. Now, look, we've introduced, you know, plenty of guests, movers and shakers, business people, and, you know, today's no different. We have a great guest, Melanie Akwule. Melanie: Hello, hello.Zach: What's up? CEO and founder of MINWO, LLC, a company focused on building black wealth and black business. Melanie describes herself as living at the intersections of business and technology, black and female, African and American, introvert and extrovert, leading and supporting, and the trees and the forest, with a background in data science, product management, business administration, and diversity and inclusion. Come on, now. [kids applause sfx] So impressive. Melanie, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Melanie: I'm good. I'm great. What a time to be alive. Just living each day.Zach: No, I 100% agree. [straight up sfx]Melanie: Thanks so much for having me.Zach: No, thank you for being here. Now, look, I know I did a little bit of a short intro, but would you mind telling us a little bit about yourself?Melanie: Yeah. When you say it all like that I kind of sound like somebody, don't I? [laughs]Zach: [jokingly] Just a little bit though.Melanie: [laughs] Where do I start? Well, first off, I just finished up my MBA, so I am a free woman. You could not pay me to go back to class. [air horn sfx] Thank you. Yeah, I just finished my MBA from Berkeley Haas, so I'm still living out here in the Oakland area. Born and raised in Burke, Virginia. Wanted to shout out the 703 right quick. Like I mentioned, or like you mentioned, Nigerian-American, and really just out here trying to leave a legacy through my company.Zach: I love it, I love it. You know, there's so much there. We gotta talk about MINWO, right? Like, let's talk about the organization. Let's talk about the origin. Let's talk about the vision.Melanie: Yeah. So MINWO was something that was kind of birthed out of a necessity. I was one of those people that did not want to start a business. It was kind of like how in Atlanta every rapper has a mixtape. Well, in the Bay Area it's like everyone's an entrepreneur, everyone's a founder, so I was like, "No, that's not gonna be me," but, you know, life takes you in directions that you don't really--you can't really plan for. So in 2015 the George Zimmerman verdict came out, and I was livid, as was most of our community, and it really just pushed me to do something, and for me it's--I've always been about economic development, economic empowerment within our community, and I feel like it's the--it's really the way that we'll be able to make the changes that we want to see in this country, because you can't play in the political game if you don't have financial backing. So that's really how it came about.Zach: Those are facts.Melanie: Yeah. That's really how it came about. Zach: So you're absolutely right, and I think--you know, when I look at MINWO and I think about, like, just the importance of community, right? When you talk about, like, black and brown economic empowerment, that doesn't happen on an island, and it never has. Like, no group has ever built any type of economic power base or political structure on their own, right? So, you know, we're talking about effectively supporting women, specifically black women, in the workplace, and we've talked about that a few times, and really, you know, we really can't talk about it enough. You know, what has been your experience as a black woman in corporate America?Melanie: You know, it's a unicorn kind of situation sometimes, right? Like, sometimes you look around and you're like, "Man, I'm blessed to be the only person in this room from my community, like, to represent and to show them just how bad--- we can be, but also on the flip side it can be extremely stressful. I was working for a Fortune 10 company, one of the largest in the world, and it was just amazing to me how I can go so many places and still be the only black woman in the room. And so it really just--it drove me to want to 1. build community that much more, so I was a part of their African-American ERG at work, even led it for a little bit, but then also 2. making sure that the knowledge that I'm getting in those rooms, so at work and then also at B school, taking that knowledge and bringing it back to my community, 'cause if I'm the only person in that room, that means there are many, many others that's not getting that same type of wealth of knowledge. And so I took it upon me to make sure that I was doing my best to kind of package that information up and bring it back to my community. Zach: That's super dope. And, you know, it's interesting because, you know, experiences, our experiences, they shape the things that we eventually do, right? So how have your experiences in corporate America shaped the culture that you're trying to build within MINWO?Melanie: Yeah. So for me, my thing with corporate America is I would go into the office and I didn't know whether I was battling the fact that I was black, the fact that I was female, or the fact that I was young and in a leadership position, and so it was constantly like, "I'm not sure which weapon I need to use today," and who I was trying to fight today, and so in building MINWO I'm really just focusing on--you know, all of the superficial stuff does not matter, right? Like, who are the people that are working with me? Who are the people that I'm working with? And how can we work most optimally together? And so I very much designed the company to not necessarily worry about working hours or not necessarily worry about how people work. As long as they're getting their stuff done, as long as they're, you know, working as a team, that's really all that matters to me, and then also just being able to pour into them as a mentor, as someone that barely knows what she's doing, but, you know, again, sharing the few gems that I do have, that's also been important to me, just realizing that we can all win. It doesn't necessarily have to be a zero-sum kind of game.Zach: [cha-ching sfx] No, you're absolutely right. [both laugh] You know, so you talked about mentorship. Can you talk a little bit about, you know--like, let's say you had three points. Like, what would your three points of advice be for women of color who are looking to get into entrepreneurship?Melanie: Ooh, that's--just three? [laughs] It's hard because the community that I work with is primarily black women, and just to see the way that we have so much--we give so much to others and we are very afraid of giving to ourselves. So I think the first point would be making sure that you don't forget to prioritize yourself, right? So, like, even as a business owner, your job is to, you know, work with your clients, work with your customers, making sure that you're providing a product or service for them that makes them happy, but also you need to take care of your own business, right? So do you have your business processes lined up? Do you have your business strategy outlined? Do you have all of the fundamental things that you need to be able to grow your business? So that's definitely number one. Number two is don't be afraid to support your fellow sister. I'm all about the retweeting and the sharing and the, you know, posting on my stories of everybody and anybody's business that I know about, because it doesn't take any food off of my plate, right? Like, just being able to support and promote the people that I know that are out here hustling as well. It's amazing to me how many people talk about supporting and how the community needs to support more, but they don't press that Share button or they don't press that Like button or they--you know? And so it's just, you know, work on building up that habit of sharing and leaving reviews and all that kind of stuff, 'cause those are the ways that you can support black-owned businesses for free. And then I think last is don't be afraid to ask for help. I think that is one of the things that, you know, for me especially, I had to learn to ask for help, right? So even--and that's as small or as big as building a team. If you have people that can support you in building your business, then you're able to run faster, then you're able to do more, but if you cannot even bring yourself to say, "Okay, I need help," and figure out the areas that you need help with and then be able to close your eyes and let go of it and let them actually help you, you just create a lot of stress and strain for yourself. And so I think those would be my three points.Zach: [Flex bomb sfx] Just a small Flex bomb. Nothing too crazy, you know what I'm saying? Just a little bit of something, you know what I'm saying? Just a little 10-piece for 'em, you know what I'm saying? Anyway, I definitely agree, [laughs] and I--you're spot on, especially when you talked about, like, just sharing, retweeting, you know what I'm saying, giving 5 stars. What's up? What's up, listeners? Melanie: Nudge nudge. [laughs]Zach: Nudge nudge, you know what I'm saying? Y'all see me. You hear me. If you're listening to this right now, you know you have to be giving me 5 stars. Okay. All right, back to this.Melanie: [laughs] And then [you come back?] Come back every time. [laughs]Zach: Right, right. Download numbers going up. 5 stars staying the same. What's going on? Come on. We've got a disconnect. [laughs] Nah, but you're absolutely right, and I just love the advice. So, you know, what I like about MINWO is the fact that y'all are building a true community of black and brown women entrepreneurs, right? And this type of thing requires trust, and so what strategies have you implemented to build and maintain that? 'Cause you talked about asking for help and supporting one another and kind of having your stuff in order. I mean, again, it takes a certain level of vulnerability. So what does it look like to create and maintain that?Melanie: Yeah, that's been a lot of what we've been learning over the last year. So the community you're referring to is Rialto. It's basically a platform for not only black business owners but black professional service providers to work together, connect, so that we're--you know, they're building each other's businesses essentially, and what I've found just in the last year of, you know, having a Slack team of these business owners is that it requires a lot of listening. Even though, you know, I know the things that I've learned in school and I'm like, "Hey, these are topics or things that you should know for your business," you can't necessarily start with, like, throwing scripture at them, right? You have to understand where they are, and you have to understand the walk that they've walked so far and meet them where they are, and for me that's been the most rewarding part. And what's also helped with that is that now what we do are monthly challenges. So this last month we just did a lean business model canvas challenge where everyone in the community worked together to work on their own individual lean business model canvasses, and then we had monthly meet-ups, which were virtual--which is a chance for anyone that wants to join, to get together, talk through, you know, their high points, their low points, what it was like for them to go through that experience, and then we also have a last little session where it's an open brainstorming session. So as a business owner, you don't often know too many other business owners, so to have that community of people that are living the same life that you are, that are making the same sacrifices that you are to bring about a vision, I think that's the part where you really start to build that trust in that community. It's from knowing that "Okay, they're not just talking for talking's sake," right? Like, "They're actually going through it too."Zach: No, that's real. And, you know, you're right. You can know everything in the world, but if people don't trust you, they don't really believe, you know, that you're really listening to them, they're just--it's gonna go in one ear and out the other. So look, where can folks learn more about MINWO?Melanie: Yeah. So we have a company website, minwo.co. That's M-I-N-W-O dot co, and that's where you can learn more about Rialto, the community that I mentioned, and then also Financial Formation, which is the personal finance consulting that I also do. Or you can go to my personal website, melanuschi.com, and that's where you can find more about personal finance consulting, business consulting, and anything else that you're interested in that's related to black wealth or black business.Zach: [coin sfx] And there it is, you know what I'm saying? [both laugh]Melanie: I'm loving these. [laughs]Zach: I'm saying, right? I'm trying to tell you. It's like Living Corporate--so you remember that Salt Bae meme? But we're, like, sprinkling, like, sound effects on the jaunt, you know what I'm saying? Like, we're really out here, you know? It's really fun. [both laugh] This has been a really great discussion, and I want to thank you for coming on the show. Before we go though, do you have any shout-outs? Anybody you're working with? Any other projects you want to mention?Melanie: Yeah. No, I really just want to shout-out the ladies that I've been working with on MINWO and Rialto for the last--I have business owners that are with me from literally Day 1, before we had a website, before we had any kind of anything. So Sydney [?] with Part and Parcel, Alexis Coates from LOTUS Creations, Teddy Renee [?] from TeddyRenee.com [?]. Those ladies have really supported me literally from Day 1, and so I just want to shout them out and say thank you.Zach: Man, I know they're thanking you too. [both laugh] We appreciate you again, and yeah, look, y'all, that does it for us. Thank you for joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. Make sure you follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate, Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through living-corporate.com. Living DASH corporate dot com, you know what I'm saying? Or livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.tv, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.net. You know what I'm saying? We're out here, okay? We just don't have, you know, livingcorporate.com 'cause Australia got the domain, you know? We've got all the domains. Australia has the main livingcorporate.com domain looking at us like [haha sfx], and I'm just like--I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do at this point, but, you know, one day, mark my words--y'all, join me in prayer. We're gonna be big enough. The brand will be brolic enough one day to get that domain. Okay, if you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com, and that does it for us on the show. You've been listening to Melanie Akwule, founder of MINWO. Peace.

Zach welcomes Cognizant's Maureen Greene James to the show, and she shares what she thinks are the biggest frustrations in the diversity and inclusion space today. In addition to speaking about her unique role as an inclusion leader who's jointly focused on leadership development, she also offers up three points of advice for executives looking to create an inclusive workforce.Connect with Maureen on LinkedIn and Twitter, and check out Cognizant's website, Twitter, and Instagram!Check out our website by clicking here: Living CorporateTRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. Now, look, you know what we do, right? I come on here, I say, "What's up, y'all?" And I say it in this smooth way, right? And then I say we're a platform that amplifies the voices of black and brown people at work, but just for those of you who don't know, we are a platform that amplifies the voices of black and brown people at work. Now, if you're new to the space you may say, "Well, how do you actually do that?" Let me tell you how we do that. We do that by having pointed, accessible, and real, authentic interviews with black and brown executives, leaders, movers and shakers, influencers, public servants, educators, activists, creatives, artists, you know what I'm saying? With everybody. And we also interview non-black and brown folks too, for those who are fragile and feel not involved. We got y'all too. You're welcome as long as you are an advocate for black and brown people. And so, look, we do this, and today is no different. We actually have a great guest like we do every episode, but I'm saying this episode really for real. 'Cause sometimes I have a guest and y'all send me messages like, "Okay," but no, but really, this time a super, super dope guest. Our guest is Maureen Greene James. What's up? Sound Man, give me some air horns right here. [air horns sfx] Okay, thank you. Now, look, Maureen, she is an HR professional whose background, experiences and expertise include HR leadership, talent development, diversity & inclusion, employee engagement, communications AND change management. Maureen serves by bringing expertise and experiences in HR leadership, diversity & inclusion, talent and leadership development, employee engagement and change management to Cognizant, serving as the leader--y'all, check it out. Whoa, whoa, whoa. The leader of Diversity & Leadership Development for North America. So all of the states, right? Including the little states on the side. For those of y'all who weren't too good at geography, Alaska and Hawaii. Those spots too, right? She is in charge of all of that, right? Now, to further enhance Cognizant’s commitment to diversity, she plays a key role in the company’s efforts around executive talent & leadership development while staying focused on building a diverse, high performing pipeline of strong women leaders. Maureen has been recognized for her professional accomplishments in Black Enterprise magazine--come on, Black Enterprise--and in 2014 received the “Most Powerful and Influential Woman Award” by the National Diversity Council. I mean, come on. I mean, what can we really say here? I gotta drop at least one Flex bomb. [Flex bomb sfx] Maureen, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Maureen: I am great, Zachary. How are you?Zach: I am really, really well. So, you know, a little bit of behind-the-scenes tea, I'm really glad we're able to sit down. We've been so busy.Maureen: We have. There's been a lot of stuff going on. I've been doing some travel for work. But, you know, it's all good. I'm staying busy, staying focused on all things inclusion and diversity within my organization, as well as, you know, within other organizations that I have the opportunity to be in front of and share my knowledge and expertise [with].Zach: Okay. Well, hold on. So you say you've been traveling, you know, and again, you said your organization as well as, you know, other organizations, so... ["ow" sfx] You know, can you talk a little bit about some of the other organizations that you've been able to share your knowledge and expertise with?Maureen: Sure. So I often have the opportunity to really utilize my platform and my voice to speak with other organizations at conferences and inclusion summits. I've had the opportunity to be in front of MetLife as an organization just to talk about diversity and inclusion. I actually hosted a panel around inclusion not too long ago. I also had the opportunity to work with PwC, which is an organization that obviously I'm familiar with because that's where I was for the past I would say about 11.5 years. So I do spend a lot of time really focusing on diversity and inclusion, obviously within Cognizant, but also making sure that I am sharing the knowledge and expertise as well as learning from other organizations too around what we're doing, what we're all doing in this space to really build an inclusive work environment.Zach: Well, I mean, I just think it's incredible, and that's why we're so excited to have you on the show today. So, you know, I gave a bit of an introduction and we talked about--and just now you talked about some of the speaking you've been doing. I talked about your professional background. But for those of us who don't know you, is there anything else you think you'd like to share about yourself?Maureen: Yeah. So for anyone that doesn't know me, [know] that I'm a really passionate--I don't like to say HR leader, even though that's probably what it says in my bio, but I'm a people leader, you know? Like, I like to get in touch with the people. I like to know what's going on with the people within an organization and what makes them tick, what makes them get engaged with the organization that they work for, and what allows them to feel like they are working within an organization that has a very strong culture of belonging? So those are the things that are, you know, really important to me and the things that I'm passionate about professionally. I recently had the opportunity to speak at an inclusion summit for an organization called ATG - Advanced Technology Group - and, you know, one of the questions that they asked me was around, you know, "So what are the things that people don't know about you?" And I said, "Well, you know, there's some things you don't know about me. I like to kayak. I like to read. I like to learn. I like to hang with my family." And of course my favorite thing in the world is I like to spend time on the beach. But I try to mix all of that, the business and the pleasure together, so taht I have what I like to call work-life--like, some kind of work-life equality. Not necessarily balance, because there's no such thing as work-life balance.Zach: Listen. Now, we could have a whole 'nother podcast about that. I sometimes--[both laugh]--'cause it's not true, right? I think--ugh, anyway... no, no, I'm gonna go ahead and say it! [both laugh] So I sometimes talk about, like, work-life blend, right? And I've even had, like--this was back when I was, like, 23, 23 or 24. I wrote an article on LinkedIn about--I said work-life balance is a myth, 'cause it is, right? Like, we live in a capitalistic society, and the rate of pay has not gone up with the rate of work. So whether you want to accept it or not, right, like, you are--people are now working more than they ever have before and not getting paid commensurate with just the hours. Not even talking about, like, the thought leadership or the quality, just the hours of work that you put in. People at large are not getting paid for/in direct with that, right? So this idea of work-life balance, like, I know the workforce of the future is this whole new topic around, like, just how people are gonna be working differently, because this cannot continue at the rate that it is, and so this whole idea of work-life balance, like you said, I just--I don't think it's real either. So that's awesome though.Maureen: It doesn't exist. Yeah, doesn't exist.Zach: It doesn't exist. And, you know, people will call you pessimistic or whatever, but it's not. It's like, it doesn't--that's not necessarily good or bad, it's just like--but you want to be honest, that way you can actually start creating some boundaries and kind of, like, just start determining what your atmosphere is gonna be. Maureen: Exactly.Zach: Yes, ma'am. So look, let's just get into it, okay? Now, with Trump as president, I'd say we have a stronger focus on diversity and inclusion than ever before, but I'd argue that we've seen a sort of colonization of space where discussions around race are dismissed as elementary, right? Like, gender is amplified and diversity of thought is a north star. So what, if anything, do you think can be done to include more black and brown folks, particularly black and brown women, in these spaces?Maureen: Yeah. So that's a great question, Zachary, and one of the things I see is that when we're talking about diversity and inclusion, we have to really be thinking more broadly around "What does the diversity lens look like?" Right? So there was a point in time when the diversity lens looked like it was all about race and ethnicity, right? And so now women are a bigger and much larger part of the conversation, as it should be, but then there's also the opportunity for us to really be thinking more broadly around, like you say, black and brown folks and black and brown women. So we know that at leadership levels within organizations we don't see enough of us, but there are some things I think that can be done to ensure that we really have a bigger seat at that table. For example, I'd love to see black and brown women really put themselves in positions to be front and center, to be leaders, and that sometimes means for us stepping a little bit out of our comfort zone, right, and putting ourselves in places and in opportunities and on projects where we may not necessarily have every single requirement that let's say is in the quote-unquote job description, but we have a good percentage of it, and so then why wouldn't we go for it? And that's typically something that women on a whole don't necessarily do. And so just think about it from a black and brown perspective. We do it even less because we feel like we shouldn't be doing that, we shouldn't put ourselves front and center for some of those things. So I think that we need to make sure that we're putting ourselves front and center. I also think that we need to be seeking out mentors and sponsors, and the reason I mention both is because there's a difference, right? So a mentor is somebody who's going--you're going to go to for advice and counsel on your career and is it going the right direction and that kind of thing, and people need that. Everybody needs that, especially if you're an emerging manager within an organization, but then if you're at a higher--a little bit of a higher level but not necessarily at that C-Suite level, then you need a sponsor. You need somebody who is going to talk about you when you leave the room in a really good way. You know, not dishing all your business, but talk about you in a really good way to say, "I know that Maureen can do this because I have seen her do XYZ. I know that she can win that client over because she has the skills to do this based on the work that she's done with a similar client, and I have been privy to that." So you really need to have that sponsor who's going to pound the table for you and say, "Hey, this is the woman that you need front and center." So I don't want to spend a ton of time on it, I mean, 'cause I could go on for days, but those are some of the things that I think are really critical for black and brown women to focus on. Zach: So let's do this then, right? And it's interesting 'cause I was just--you know, you see a lot of these thinkpieces out lately, but I was just actually listening in on Dr. Janice, right, and she was talking about how leaning in doesn't always work, right, because, like, what do you do--so, like, we just had you, Maureen Greene James, inclusion and diversity extraordinaire, leader of people, speaker, snatcher of edges, you know what I'm saying? You out here. You just gave us great wisdom and insight on what should happen and what we should do, but what happens when--first of all, how do we do that? How do we have those conversations and put ourselves out there? And then what advice then would you give to the people who are in power, right, which is basically white men and women, on how they can be effective sponsors. Like, how does that happen?Maureen: That's a really good question. So advice I would give to people who are looking for sponsors, what I would say is that you look for someone who doesn't even remotely look like you or sound like you, walk or talk like you, and that's a hard thing to say, right? That's a hard thing for somebody to get their mind wrapped around. So I'll give you a quick story. So when I was working for PwC, there was a point in time where I was looking for someone to really--I wasn't looking for a mentor. I was truly looking for a sponsor, right? Somebody that I knew was going to give it to me straight, that was gonna tell me "Yeah, Maureen, you're not doing a really good job at this," or "Yeah, you're doing great at this, and here's what else you can do to improve in that particular area." And I was also looking for somebody to talk about me behind closed doors when I wasn't in the room. And so I really decided to put myself completely outside of my comfort zone, and I went and had a conversation with somebody who I previously did not necessarily get along with, and I had the conversation for two reasons: one, I wanted to understand what it was about this individual that, for whatever reason, we just rubbed edges. So I needed to understand that just for my own personal understanding, and two, I wanted to understand it from the standpoint of saying, "Okay, so now that I have an understanding of what that is, is this the person that could really be my sponsor?" And so I invited him out to lunch, and we had a great conversation. We talked about that one moment where we bumped heads. It was a few years before, but he remembered it very well and I definitely did not forget it, and at the end of that conversation I simply said to him, "Here's what I'm looking for, and I would like you to be this person to help move me along in my career, to be that person who is going to step in and really be that person pounding the table for me," and he was completely taken aback and surprised but elated at the same time that I asked. And when I tell you, Zachary, that he was probably one of the best individuals that I have had work with me in my career. He was straightforward with me when he needed to be, and he was at the table, you know, singing my praises one, but two really talking about what it was that I could do, how I deliver, how he's seen me deliver. So I really think it's important that we step outside of our comfort zones and we don't look for people who look like us or think like us or who have worked in the same organizations or even in the same industry and sector. This person didn't work in HR. Did work for the company, but didn't work in HR, didn't have an HR understanding, didn't necessarily want it, and that's why they were so critical, because they can give you a different perspective, something that you don't yourself necessarily see because you're in that space all of the time. So that's one of the things I would definitely say is critical. Step outside your comfort zone and look for somebody different.Zach: I love that. And so then on the other side, right, so when you put yourself out there, what advice would you give to your non-melanated, right, counterparts, on how they can make themselves available to be sponsors?Maureen: [laughs] I love "non-melanated." [both laugh] Zach: You like that, huh?Maureen: I love that. I love that. So one of the things I would say is--so I'm going to, you know, really try and step into their shoes for a second, even though that's not necessarily an easy thing to do. I would say it's very difficult for them to feel as though they can put themselves out there. And so the one piece of advice I would give them is just get to know someone. At the end of the day, Zachary, we're all human beings, you know what I'm saying? I mean, we do a lot of stuff alike, okay? We're really not that different, and I really think it's important that we are encouraging our non-melanated counterparts to feel like they can have a conversation with us, but to make them feel like that we have to treat them the way we want to be treated. So in other words, we can't necessarily roll up on them with any kind of, you know, negative thinking around how we think they're going to treat us or how we think they're going to approach us. Just have a conversation with them like you would anybody else. And honestly, you'd be surprised at how open and willing they are to really working with you, but sometimes they feel like they need to be given permission to know you. And I want to go back to something that you said earlier with Trump as president. I think that has created a lot of friction in terms of the way that people just approach each other on a daily basis, right? You know, non-melanated people may think that they can't approach black and brown people, right, or that they shouldn't, but before Trump did we really think that? Did we really have that going on, or were we comfortable just kind of saying, you know, "What's up? Can we talk?" Zach: I wasn't, but, you know, I do believe that it's definitely been more heightened now, right? Like, I think it all depends, right, on your background, right, on your story, kind of where you came from. I know just based on--so my family, coming from the South and, like, horrific experiences that they had, you know, they've really been comfortable, like, in certain situations, and in experiences I've had as well and just in my life. Not even just singing my parents' song. There's always been a bit of hesitation. I definitely believe though--to your point I believe is that it's definitely been--like, it's way more pointed now than it's been in a while, yeah.Maureen: Yeah, which is very unfortunate, because I think people--you know, most people are inherently good and really want to help and want to engage, you know, but I think that, you know, they don't necessarily feel like they can or they should, and so they don't, and so it's almost like they want permission from us. And I think we, black and brown people, need to give a little permission. And it's hard. In this day and time, that's a really hard thing to do. Zach: It is, right? 'Cause, like, there's so much emotional labor, and I think--I know that you know this, but I think it's a huge blind spot, and I think it actually goes into our next question, which is around, like, D&I programs and organizations when they think about diversity and inclusion. I don't think that organizations are effectively factoring in, like, just the emotional labor that goes into being other in majority-white spaces, nor do I think that people really understand--so, like, just black tax, right? Like, we're recording this on the day of Amber Guyger's sentencing, right? And, like, black and brown folks who have been looking at the trials, specifically black people, looking at the trial and, like, seeing this person who was convicted of murder, so... so okay, she did murder this person. [She was] crying, like, crying fake tears--crying what many people felt were fake tears, and, like, that could be triggering to a lot of different folks, the body cam footage being released and, like--so, like, just dealing with all of that and the PTSD-like symptoms that just seeing black death or constant coversage of black death causes. Like, those people still have to go to work, right? Those people still have to interact with people who may shrug their shoulders at that stuff. So I just think, like--to your point about it being hard, I think that it's really easy to undermine or dismiss--I don't think that you can overstate how hard it is to make yourself available. I'm not saying that you shouldn't or that you can't, but I'm just saying, like, I wish that--for me, right, so I know I'm interviewing you, but this is me just talking to you as someone who is in a position, right, as an executive, I wish that organizations would be more thoughtful to that, right? And I think there's just so much work to do. I'm curious to know though what you believe organizations could still be--are still missing when they talk about diversity and inclusion and you have these conversations on the big stages and also in the smaller rooms. Like, what are some themes that you're seeing around organizations and kind of what they still could be developing when it comes to their programming?Maureen: Yeah. So that's a great question. I think some organizations are doing a fairly good job, and then there's some organizations that are, you know--they're trying to get there. They're doing--I'll say they're doing the best they can, right? So one of the things I think is very commendable and courageous is having those bold and courageous conversations, right? I think that that is something that is innovative, it's fresh. It invites everyone to the table to have the deep discussion. At times, they can get really real and dig deeper than anyone wants to go, and they can create emotions out of people that no one expected, but that's necessary to have an understanding of what everyone on all sides of the coin across the entire spectrum of diversity is thinking and feeling. I think where organizations fail--so organizations that do that, I think they're doing great, but I think where those same organizations fail is that after they do that work, what happens next? So what are you supposed to do with those conversations? What are the expectations for the people that are sitting in as a part of those conversations? "Okay, great. We got it." "Okay, I understand how you feel," because this woman was just, you know, convicted of murder. She's gotten 10 years. And yeah, I understand that, but what am I supposed to do with this? There needs to be an afterwards. There needs to be an understanding of "Okay, so here's the way I feel, but here's the reason why I feel this way." And then there should be opportunities for people to bring that into the thinking around how we work, how we hire people in organizations, right? So are we thinking about talent of all colors, or are we thinking about talent of just one color? So in other words, you have to take the conversation from just, you know, engaging people and saying, "Yeah, here's what we did. We brought everybody together. We had a really good conversation, and now the organization is better for it." The organization is okay, but it's not better for it unless the people--unless everybody in that conversation walks away with, "Okay, what can we do next?" And that's the thing I think is missing.Zach: No, I agree with that, right? And I think--so when you talk about D&I programming as a whole, like, it's just not restorative. It's not restorative, and it's also not policy-driven. It's not data-driven, and it's not results-oriented by means of policies being updated. So, like, all of the things you just said--so okay, we had the conversation. Cool. "This is how we feel." Okay. "Now this is what we're gonna do about it, and this is how we, as an organization, are gonna change, and this is what accountability is gonna look like, in light of the conversation and the insights that we gathered." Like, that then makes the emotional labor worth something, but, like, if you're putting in emotional labor and not getting anything in return, like, not only is that, like, exhausting on the inset, but then it's defeating on the outset, right? So that's huge, and again, it really leads us into the next question. Okay, so you're the first--so we've interviewed some folks, right? I'm not a name-dropper. You can go on Living Corporate's podcast--ow--y'all check it out. Y'all can see the people that we've talked to. And we've talked to folks who have been in, like, these global or national positions around inclusion and diversity, but I think that you're the first person we've spoken too who is, like, in their title integrating inclusion with leadership. And so can we talk about--yeah, so that's pretty cool, and I believe that's, like, the next--I really believe that's the next level or the next phase when you talk about kind of reclaiming D&I. I do see, like, more black women and black and brown people being in these positions of inclusion and diversity much more than I have in the past, I don't know, seven or eight years, right? I've seen an uptick. So when I was talking about, like, kind of decolonizing D&I and [I] talked about, like, reclaiming the space, that's part of what I mean. So can we talk a little bit about how you've led the strategy for Cognizant to drive the intersection of those two spaces, and then also what you're continuing to do?Maureen: Sure. So at Cognizant I've had the opportunity to, as you've mentioned, be on both sides, right? So diversity and inclusion as well as leadership development. So within Cognizant, the global leadership development team is really focused on growing leaders at the director and above level, and within doing that it's also focused on making sure that our people at those levels are very diverse across the board. What I would say, Zachary, is that we have a long way to go, right? I don't think we're different from many other organizations out there. We do have a very long way to go in terms of "How do we continue to build this inclusive strategy specifically for our directors and above?" And so while I am focused on everybody across the organization regardless of level, obviously, my leadership development role is only focused on our directors and above, but I make sure to keep a diversity and inclusion lens on that population of people because when individuals see diversity at the higher levels of the organization, it attracts more people, it allows us to retain more diverse people, because now they're able to see levels and opportunities and projects and roles that they can aspire to, and it helps us to grow and develop that population. So it helps to grow the diversity that we do have at the manager and below level into those leadership levels. So it's--we like to say it's a cyclical win-win, right? The attract, retain, and develop pillars, but what I will say to you is that our focus, primarily for the past year and a half or since I've been there, has been around gender diversity. And so I bring a different lens to it, because I'm not thinking about just, you know, "Let's just bring any women in." I'm thinking about "What do the women look like? Where do they come from? Where have they been? What industries? What sectors?" All of those things, but I'm really also making sure that we're building into this diverse lens. So we have some black and brown people, you know, at the higher levels, so we make sure that we're incorporating individuals with disabilities at those levels, right? All of those things. So we're incorporating our LGBTQ+ community. We need to be able to have people at those levels who are going to be th epeople that other individuals in the organization aspire to or other individuals outside of the organization see and now say to themselves "Well, if So-and-so can be a leader in this organization, there's an opportunity for me here. There's an opportunity for me to start somewhere." So that's what the strategy has really been built around, you know? Making sure that 1. we're focused on gender diversity, but we're looking at it across a lens of all of the components of inclusion.Zach: You're bringing intersectionality to the table.Maureen: Absolutely. All day every day. All day every day.Zach: And I think, Maureen, like, for me--everything you said, of course, 100% spot on - I think what organizations don't realize is, for me anyways, right--when I come into organizations, and I've been in a few different places, so I've seen a lot. Like, I've seen a variety of cultures, but I always--when I come in--I consider myself about, like, an A- employee, okay? I feel like I'm great. I'm not, like, the best, but I'm very, very, very good. 'Cause I have other things going on. I've got Living Corporate. I ain't got time... like, I got other stuff, but with all that being said--[both laugh]Maureen: I hear you.Zach: You know what I'm saying. You know, I'ma keep that extra plus for me, but my point is I'm a very strong employee, so when I come into organizations, you know, I have aspirations, I have goals. I typically, without even, like, actively trying to do it, I just end up kind of zooming in on, like, the senior-most black people, and I look and see how they're treated, and I use that as a gauge to feel like "Okay, let me just think. Okay, so this person has a doctorate and an MBA, international experience, interned with the UN, can speak three languages, two more than me, and they're still being treated like this." So what does that then mean for my prospects as someone who's looking to build a five, six, seven-year roadmap here, right? So 100% right in that the treatment--how you treat... I mean, people see those things, right? So let's pause for a second though, 'cause I want to go back to something you said. You talked about the director level, director and up. Have you noticed a pattern of black and brown folks kind of, like, climbing a ladder and getting to the director level or, like, senior manager level even, and just kind of stalling out?Maureen: Yes.Zach: What's the reason behind that?Maureen: Yeah, I wouldn't say--and that's an every organization thing. It's definitely not, you know, a Cognizant thing or--Zach: Exclusive, yeah.Maureen: Yeah, yeah. No, definitely not. What I would say the issue behind that is that people in those roles tend to stall out because the higher you go within the organization, a lot of times you don't see people who look like you, so the people who have the power--Zach: And social capital.Maureen: Yes, to make the decisions to therefore promote a black or brown person into those high level roles aren't necessarily there, so they're looking through one lens, and their lens is typically people they know, people they've worked on projects with before, people they went to school with, people that they're in the same social circles with, those kinds of things, and black and brown people aren't necessarily always in those places. And so I think that that is part of the problem. I think the other problem is we, as black and brown people, sometimes tend to hurt ourselves because we don't necessarily put ourselves in those positions. I can speak from experience. I did it to myself and, you know, almost derailed my career years ago when I decided I didn't want to attend an event that I was invited too. But I responded and said I would, and then at the last minute [I] said, "You know what? No one is going to notice if I don't show up," and so I declined it at the last minute, and sure enough next day I walk into the office and the person who invited me says, "Maureen, we missed you last night." Now, this was not someone who looked me. It was somebody who I thought really wasn't even paying attention to me, but obviously he was, and I made the really poor executive decision to not go because, and you heard me say it, I thought I was not going to be missed. "No one is going to notice if I'm not there." And this man--I don't even know if he even remembers this story, and I always say one of these days I need to remind him, but this individual, when he invited me, he invited me for a reason. So that's why I say we can derail ourselves. You know, if you get an invitation like that--and this was a senior leader--take advantage of that, you know? Absolutely. Don't ever think--and that's the other thing. Don't ever think that people aren't paying attention to you. They are. They are, especially if you are doing great work. Like you said about yourself, you're an A- employee, which I'm sure you're an A++. Even if you remotely think you're an A- player, somebody is paying attention to you, you know? So I think we need to do a better job of putting ourselves in places where we can be seen, but that all goes back to the point of being on those high-visibiliity projects and how do we get there. There has to be somebody at the top that's pounding the table for us to get there. So it's kind of cyclical. It's kind of like you're almost, like, stuck in a...Zach: A loop.Maureen: Yes. Yeah. It's a challenge.Zach: No, it is. It is. Now, you know, we've talked a little bit about programming. We kind of had a meta discussion about D&I, but then, like, I'm curious, right, from a leadership perspective, if you were to give, like, five key traits of inclusive leaders, like, five key behaviors, like, what would they be?Maureen: That's a good question. I would say definitely someone who--an inclusive leader is someone who's a good listener, and I don't mean someone who's just gonna kind of listen and say, "Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. Okay, next," but someone who's really going to listen to what you have to say, someone who's able to replay that back to you, right? Recap that and say, "Okay, I understand. So tell me, what would you like me to do next? How would you like me to proceed?" So not just listen, but then understand. Get to understand what needs to happen next. Second thing is be a great giver of feedback. It's really, really important to give feedback, because feedback really, truly is a gift, but it's also important to get feedback. So I always encourage leaders that I work with not to feel like they're--because they're in a quote-unquote "leadership role" that they're just supposed to be the people that give feedback. No, it has to be reciprocal, and they have to not only ask for feedback, but then they have to ask follow-up questions so that they can understand what is it that they're doing well or not doing so well so that they themselves can change and evolve their own behaviors. The third thing I would say is an inclusive leader should be somebody who's able to pay it forward. So be able to reach back, reach to the sides, reach wherever and pull somebody along, take somebody along for the journey that they're on, because it helps that individual learn and grow in their own respect, and, you know, I always tell leaders, "You didn't get here by yourself." Let's just be real about some things. You took the same journey that now this individual behind you is also trying to take. So do the right thing, and if you've got somebody that you know wants to move in the same career path or maybe they want to do something different but could use your guidance and expertise, pull them along with you. The fourth thing I would say is an inclusive leader should be somebody who is able to truly bring a team together, and, you know, bring them together--I'm not saying bring them together for lunch. I'm talking about bring them together so that they have a good understanding of who they are as a team, what are the team goals, what are they striving for, and most importantly, as a team, understand what each of them individually are able to contribute and bring to the table, because it is the individual nuances that we all bring to an organization or a team that helps us to be a successful team. That's how we create inclusive products, inclusive services for our clients, is by bringing those innovative and inclusive voices to the table. So an inclusive leader should definitely be somebody who is able to bring a team together. And then the last thing I would say is that an inclusive leader needs to be very mindful of the fact that they are the ones who have the ear of the C-Suite, and so they need to be individuals who can listen and hear what's going on on the ground--so across their teams and other teams--and be able to articulate that and bubble that up to the top so that any issues or concerns that may be rising are things that they're able to squash before it becomes a bigger issue. They've got to listen in on what's happening at the ground level and be able to help manage, to help do some kind of change management or navigate the conversation so that it doesn't become a bigger issue. But if it's getting there, they should be the ones who are able to bubble it up to the top and then say, "Okay, so what can we do to mitigate this?" I think that's really it. Zach: Wow. Yeah, no, absolutely. Thank you so much. You know, you're just dropping bombs, dropping coins, as it were. Maureen: [laughs] Coins, yep. Mm-hmm.Zach: It's really helpful. I was trying not to cut you off 'cause I had, like, a couple of these... [Mario coin sfx] But I was like, "Let me just let her finish." [both laugh]Maureen: I'm sorry, I'm just going on forever.Zach: No, no, no. It's great. No, it's absolutely great. This has been a wonderful conversation, and thank you so much for hanging out with us. I know we went a little bit long. Before we let you go, any parting words, shout-outs?Maureen: Parting words and shout-outs? Parting words are, you know, just be the best human being that you can truly be, you know? Never take for granted where you are, because again, you didn't get here on your own. Really, really important to reach back and help others. And then any shout-outs I would give are simply to all of the people who are in the position, as you are, Zachary, to help get these kinds of messages out. Kudos to you, because this is not easy, you know? Doing what you do is not easy. Having these kinds of deep and courageous conversations isn't easy, so kudos to you, and then shout-outs to all of the people who are driving diversity and inclusion within their organizations, because, you know, we've got some work to do. People love to say to me, you know, "Well, you know, in your role, you're gonna have a job forever. It's job security." Here's the thing - I'm not sure I want to live in a world where the need to have a diversity and inclusion leader is job security, because that means that we are--that means two things. One, the world's continuing to evolve and, you know, the components of diversity continue to change. That's good. But two, it means that we're not doing everything that we could and should be doing to make this a more inclusive and global environment, and so I don't know if I want that job security. I want it to be where it's just very organic, you know? That we're not thinking about, "Well, you know, how do we hire black and brown people? Where do we go to get them?" No! It shouldn't be that way, and I know I've probably gone on way too long, but shout-outs to you, shout-outs to my peeps who are doing this day in and day out and are leading the charge right along with me, so.Zach: Come on, now. Let me get these air horns right here for that. [air horns sfx, both laugh]Maureen: Love that. Love it.Zach: Man, this has just been great, Maureen. Thank you so much. And listen, y'all, that does it for us on the Living Corporate podcast. You make sure you check us out on Twitter at @LivingCorp_Pod, Instagram at @LivingCorporate, and then, you know, you've got our website living-corporate--please say the dash--dot com. We also have livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.tv, livingcorporate.net. Maureen, we have all of the Living Corporates except livingcorporate.com. We have all of 'em, you know? You know, it's market dissemination. We're really out here. We're trying to make sure we get them SEO clicks.Maureen: Do your thing.Zach: Come on, now. We're trying to. Now, listen, y'all, y'all hear these conversations that we have. If y'all ever have questions y'all want to send in and, like, have us, us being the hosts or our guests, answer them, just send 'em on in. YOu know, DM us, email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com, you know, and we can just get it poppin' like that. Now, look, if you can't remember all of the different places I just said or where we are and where we're at and what we're doing, just Google Living Corporate. We out here like that. It's been, like, 130 something odd episodes, so we're now at the point where if you just Google Living Corporate, we'll pop up, okay? So you check us out, and until next time, this has been Zach, and you've been listening to Maureen Greene James, D&I leader for North America at Cognizant. Until next time, y'all. Peace.

Zach speaks with Lionel Lee, Zillow Group's Head of Diversity Engagement, and they discuss his unique personal career journey up to this point. Lionel details what influence and coalition-building look like in his position, and he also shares some of the things that he's been able to do at Zillow that he believes have helped to improve the sense of belonging and inclusiveness for black and brown folks in the workplace.Connect with Lionel on LinkedIn!TRANSCRIPTSheneisha: Hey, y'all. Sheneisha here with Living Corporate. As you know, we're about having real talk in a corporate world. With that in mind, before we get into this amazing discussion with Lionel Lee, we want to let you know this content makes mention of violence, which may be upsetting, so if you're listening with some little ones, discretion is advised. Zach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with the Living Corporate podcast, and of course you know what we do. We have interviews, conversations, right, that serve to amplify the voices of black and brown folks at work. And what do I mean by that? I mean we typically have black and brown folks, leaders, executives, creatives, entrepreneurs, you name it, on the show, having real conversations about real topics, and today is no different. We actually have with us today a very special guest. I'm very excited to speak with this person. I've been in contact with him for a little while, and I'm excited just to, like, get him on the show, 'cause, like, we've been texting, and then we talk on LinkedIn, and then, you know, we've been trying to coordinate. Even today we were coordinating back and forth. Lionel Lee. Lionel Lee is the head of diversity engagement at Zillow Group. He provides career development support to underrepresented employees and works with executives to develop equity and belonging policies to improve employee experiences. He also serves as a connecter between employees and community organizations. Prior to joining Zillow Group, he worked in talent acquisition, sourcing candidates across technology and banking industries. Okay, so really quick y'all, all of that to say he's by the people, for the people, you see what I'm saying? Okay. Helping communities has always been a constant throughout his life. Lionel has created and developed community groups that promote health and wellness. He's worked with HIV/AIDS education groups, substance abuse/addiction organizations, as well as health groups for youth. Lionel immigrated to the United States from Korea at age 5. His experiences growing up in south-central Los Angeles and later in the projects of Honolulu, Hawaii--I'm gonna ask a question about that in a little bit--helped nurture his passion for community building. With all that being said, Lionel, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Lionel: I'm doing well, man. Thank you. Appreciate it.Zach: Now, look, you know, of course I've got all of these questions for you and everything, but the first thing I gotta ask - you talked about the projects of Honolulu. Hawaii has projects?Lionel: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, Honolulu has projects, and growing up there in the '70s and partial '80s, yeah, it was kind of rough, 'cause most people don't know about that, 'cause what they see about Honolulu and hear about Honolulu is it's just a paradise, but it's not really a paradise for all. You know, the level of poverty there, still to this day, is [amazing?], but back then it was like--where I grew up, in Kalihi--Kalihi is a town right outside of Waikiki, and it's--the projects are called Kuhio Park Terrace. We call it KPT, or Killer Park Terrace. Kill People Today. That's what it was, and I lived on the 16th floor, and I had to actually walk up the stairs to get to my apartment because there was a young lady that got her head cut off in the elevator, so the parents and kids, you know, catch the elevator. And then, you know, you have the same stuff that you have in a lot of different projects. You know, you have a lot of drug abuse, and, you know, you have people defecating in the stairwells. So that was the smell you walked into every single day. The crazy thing is that the dude that cut off the woman's head lived two doors down from me. And he kept it. Kept the head. Zach: What?!?!!!!!!????????????Lionel: He kept the head. But, um...Zach: Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm sorry. Wait, wait, wait. You said he kept the head?Lionel: He kept the head. He was--he was a Cambodian dude, and he was just mentally disturbed, you know? He just had some serious stuff going on, and he kept the head, and we found out, like, you know, two weeks after it had happened, you know? That was--it was a very different kind of place. Very violent. You can still look up--actually, you can go on YouTube and look up videos from Kuhio Park Terrace, and they'll show you videos of what it's like at KPT to this day.Zach: To this day. That is--that is--wow, that is shocking. I'ma tell you, you know, Lionel, in your short 3 minutes of being on the Living Corporate podcast, you have given us the most gangsta introduction we've ever had. And I'm not making light of anything. I'm just taken--I'm very taken aback by this. Wow.Lionel: Yeah, I don't have the typical--you know, I don't have the pedigree of someone that's in my position, definitely. I'm not--you know, I just wasn't raised like that. I wasn't--you know, I didn't think I was gonna go to college. I didn't go to college. I didn't get a degree. You know, I had to work and do all of that kind of stuff. It's just I was given certain opportunities and took advantage of every single one, you know? Made the very best that I could, and I've always had a tremendous work ethic, you know? Just, you know, been out of my house since I was 17 years old. I've lived in my car for, like, three days, just so I can be out here, you know, just doing my thing. You know, just doing my thing and just trying to keep it moving.Zach: Wow. Well, kind of to start there, let's talk a little bit about that. So you've started on that path, but kind of talk to us about your journey from Hawaii to the head of diversity and engagement at Zillow. What did that look like?Lionel: I was a gogo dancer at one time. That was pretty weird. I've done everything, man. Like, I can do stuff around my house--like, right now I'm remodeling my house, and my kids will be like, "Where'd you learn how to do that?" And I'm like, "Man, it wasn't nothing about learning. I just had to survive." Zach: Wait, wait, wait. So let's take a step back. You said you were--you were a what dancer?Lionel: I was a gogo dancer for a little bit. [Zach laughs] Yeah, when I was, like, young, you know, and that kind of stuff. So I was raised extremely religious. My grandfather is a Baptist minister, and I was raised in the church, so we didn't go out and do that kind of stuff a lot, you know? And I went to, like, school dances every once in a while, and I always liked to dance, so as soon as I got out of my house and, you know, I didn't have nobody telling me what I could and could not do, you know, I got caught up in the dance club scene for a while, and I was going there a lot, and the dude that owned the club, you know, he asked me one day if, you know, I'd want to just come in and, you know, get paid for it, right? But it was like--I don't know if you remember. I don't know how old you are, but--Zach: 29.Lionel: There was this one dance that I was really good at. It was The Prep. I don't know if you remember what The Prep is.Zach: Nah, what's The Prep?Lionel: It's just a dance that, you know, like, a lot of black folks did, you know, back then. You know, I'd have to show it to you in order for you to know what it was, but people around my age group, they know what that dance is, and I was really good at it. You can be extremely creative with it, you know? So the dude just kind of, you know--and I didn't paid, like, a lot. It was--like, that was my part-time gig. My full-time gig was, you know, managing the Church's Fried Chicken, which was down the street from the club, right? So after work at Church's Fried Chicken I would shoot over there, and back then they would throw some, you know, neon sweater or some shit on me, and then I'd get on there and, you know, do my thing. [both laugh] So yeah, that's a snippet of my background, but the way that I got into where I'm at now is--the funny thing is I met a dude on a basketball court, right, like, when I was in my late twenties, and it was one of those stereotypical things, you know? I got into a fight with this dude on the basketball court, you know? Like, you know, you get into a fight on the basketball court, they find out you can fight, and then all of a sudden everybody wants to be your friend, right? So dude wanted to be my friend. He was a white dude, and I had never had too much interaction with white people honestly, and definitely not on a personal, you know, like, friendship level. That just wasn't the way I was raised. So I was kind of cautious, and at that time I worked for an organization called Street Outreach Services, and it was an HIV/AIDS prevention organization. It was led by this amazing sister from Brooklyn. Her name was Amani Wood. She recently passed, like, a couple years ago, and I consider her one of the strongest individuals I've ever met and was lucky enough to have her as a mentor for a very large portion of my life. But anyway, she and I were working together, and then I came up with this crazy idea that what we should be doing is we should be documenting, you know, crack addicts and crack dealers under the age of 18, 'cause that's a group that we were not capturing. So the city of Seattle liked the idea. My organization liked the idea. So I ended up doing that for about 2.5 years. So I was going into crack houses and stuff, like, you know, at 3:00 a.m., you know, 4:00 a.m., and dealing with a whole bunch of kids, and I dealt with the kids--I mean, I had one sister, her name was Beautiful, literally, and she was 13 years old, you know? She was 13 years old with a baby and she was a crack addict, and she was a crack dealer. So, you know, I had to deal with that, and that kind of stuff is emotionally extremely taxing, and the--I just couldn't do it as--I couldn't put as much of myself into it as I was, so I was starting to get burnt out, and dude--you know, he was a recruiter, this white dude that I had met, right? He was like, "Hey, you ever thought about, like, recruiting?" And I was like, "I don't even know what that is, man." And he brought me up to his office to show me what he did, and, like, a lot of young black men and young black women and kids that come from, you know, lesser economic areas, you know, when I saw a computer I thought, "Nah, I can't do that," you know? 'Cause, you know, "Computers are magic, right?" They're not meant for me. They're meant for, like, geniuses, right? You know, "Black kids can't do math." You know, "Black kids can't do this kind of stuff," and I bought into a lot of that. I bought into a lot of that kind of stuff. But I had a two-year-old child, so I had to do something, you know? 'Cause I wasn't making enough money, and I wanted him to have a better lifestyle than I did growing up. So I took him up on it, and, you know, I shot across the bridge over into Bellevue from Seattle, and then--I don't know if you know Seattle, but in Seattle you have east side and west side, and when you go across that bridge, man, it's completely different. Extremely affluent. Very, very white. You know, as a brother back in the, you know, '90s, you couldn't be on that side if you weren't an athlete, right, or somebody else, you know, that they recognized, because if you were a black person that they didn't recognize, the cops would give you a hard time. Like, literally. They would follow you around and stuff, right? But I went over there and I interviewed, and I interviewed with, like, nine blonde-haired, blue-eyed women, man, sitting around the table. I was like, "Man, I don't know if I want to do this," and they offered me the job, you know? And I was like, "Whoa, what do I do now?" And at that same time I was actually interviewing with the fire department, and walking out of that office--I drove, like, this beat up 1984 Volvo, you know? And when I say it was beat up, I mean it was *beat up*. There was 100 and something thousand miles on it. The paint was peeling, you know? That kind of stuff, you know? I put on the best clothes that I had at that time.Zach: That was a bucket.Lionel: It was a bucket. Man, it was a buck-et. And I'm walking out, and every car in the parking lot was like Mercedes, Audis, BMWs, you know, that kind of stuff, and I was like, "I don't know, maybe I can do this." And so I accepted and started there, and struggled, man--I struggled a lot. I mean, I struggled so bad the first three months. There's a very large organization. It's called EDP Contract Services. Now I think they're called TAC Worldwide, and it's one of the largest recruiting organizations in the world. At that time, I forget exactly how many people they had, but I know that at one time I was ranked, like, something like 2000th or something out of the company of recruiters, and by the time--I had to make a decision at one point because--you know, because I was basically told that I could be pretty successful in this if I got the street out of my voice, right? So I started [?]--you know, I went home and was, like, frustrated over it, you know? And my girl at that time, she was pretty hood too, so she was like, "[BLEEP] them. You know, we can sue them. Blah, blah, blah, blah," you know? But I went to bed with my two-year-old son, you know, and I was like, "Man, I've got to do something." So I made up my mind. You know, I made up my mind that okay, well, this is what I'm gonna do, and I walked into the office the next day--I got there at 6:00 in the morning. Nobody was there. And I didn't leave until, like, 8:00 at night, and then I did that for, like, a whole year, and I became #2 in the company, and my income went up something like 300% in a year. Zach: Goodness gracious.Lionel: Mm-hmm. And so I figured out that yeah, I can do this. And then I went to--excuse me, sorry. I went to San Francisco right after that. I got recruited by a staffing firm there. I didn't like them too much, so I started my own staffing firm. We did $2.5 million in our second year of business, and that was just, like, you know, three of us, right? And then we added some people on and that kind of stuff. Then I came back to Seattle and, again, you know, got recruited by another company and became the manager for recruiting for a startup during the dot-com era. I was killing it there, then the dot-com bubble burst, and then I went to Washington Mutual as their diverse executive recruiter, and that was probably one of the worst work experiences I've ever had, 'cause what happened--what happened was they wanted this person, but one of the head people in this department didn't want this person. They didn't feel the need for a diversity executive recruiter. So they waited for her to go on maternity leave and then, behind her back, hired me, right? So my first day of work I'm walking down the hall and this woman walks up to me and she goes, "Who are you?" And I said, "Oh, I'm Lionel Lee." And she goes, "Well, what do you do?" And I said, "Well, you know, I run diversity executive recruitment here," and she just looked at me, and I got this, like--it was chilling. Like, this look was crazy, and then the next thing I know, man, like, seven months later or eight months later, you know, maybe close to a year later, you know, the whole group was disbanded and we all had to leave and, you know, go do our own thing. And it was kind of crazy too. The way that they told you was, you know, they asked you to come in for an early morning meeting. I went in for an early morning meeting and they had HR there, and they said it's disbanded.Zach: So where does Zillow come into play?Lionel: 2007 hit, man. 2007, 2008, 2009, you know, and I went through all of my money, and I had to get back to work, you know? So I joined a really small recruiting firm that was, you know, bullshit. They didn't know what they were doing. [both laugh] But then there was this other recruiting firm that I really wanted and I went and joined them, and they were amazing, and--that's one of the crazy things too, the dude that hired me--he's, like, this really young--comparatively. I think he's, like, you know, close to 40 now--Republican white dude, right? And he hired me on to the company, and I go in there and I'm on the phone the first day, and he said "Hey, Lionel, can I [?] you for a second?" And I was like, "Yeah, what's up?" And he goes, "Man, who the hell is that on the phone?" And I was like, "What are you talking about?" He goes, "Do you know you sound white?" And I was like, "What?" He goes, "Yeah. When you talk to me normally, you know, we're fine, but whenever you get on the phone you sound white," and it's because of what I learned in the earlier part of my career.Zach: Code switching, man. Yeah.Lionel: I was code switching. And I told him, "Well, you know, that's how--" And he goes, "Nah, man. I don't think that's why you're successful. I would really love to see you be you. I got enough white dudes in my office. That's why I hired you." [Zach laughs] And I was like, "Oh, okay," and then I started really, like, trying to understand what just happened, and the reason I ended up here at Zillow Group--I stayed there for, like, five years, six years, right? And I ended up killing it there. I was always either #1 or #2. And the reason I ended up here is that the person who had hired me on at Washington Mutual, she became the vice president of talent acquisition here at Zillow, and she--I started my own company after a while, again, right, and she was one of my clients, and she asked me to come in, and she said, "Lionel," you know--this was, like, 2016. "Lionel, we're really trying to do this diversity thing, man, but we don't know what we're doing." You know, "Would you want to help us?" And I said, "Well, I can put something together." You know, I talked about it with them a little bit. They wanted me to do it. I couldn't dedicate time to it 'cause I had my own staffing firm at that time and my staffing firm was doing extremely well, but what happened was that it kind of grabbed a part of me that I didn't know really existed. My experience in tech as a black man was horrible. I mean, it was horrible, so I decided that, you know, by doing this I would be given an opportunity to better the experiences of other people that are underrepresented in the tech space, right? 'Cause when I was starting out, you know, there was no other. You know, there was me. There was me, and I was probably the only one that I knew with the exception of, like, one or two that worked in other agencies. But it was me, right? And it was horrible. I hated it. I mean, I couldn't--there was no way that I could tell somebody that "Yeah, this is a good day." I woke up every single day begrudging going to work, and eventually I was able to push down to the point where I didn't realize that, you know, there was a part of me that was always anxious, right? And that's when I got a chance to change, you know, within this organization, and then what I'm hoping for is that this organization will be--you know, will be, like, a beacon for others to take a look at, right? Like, "What did they do to make a difference?" Right? 'Cause we did. We changed how we are as a company. We've changed the way that we're perceived. You know, people want to come to work here, you know? That kind of thing, and, you know, the brown and black folks here are much happier now than they were. We know that because I'm very data-driven, and we took some surveys and things like that that let us know that the things we're doing are working. But that's how I ended up in this position. And I was a consultant at first, and they--you know, we talked about 20 hours a week. 20 became 40. It became 60. It became an obsession, you know? Because I--you know, I was like, "Ooh, I get a chance to--"Zach: Really move the needle in some way, yeah.Lionel: Yeah. Not just move the needle, but, you know, just--you know, we talk a lot in those kind of terms, right? Like, "move the needle," you know, that kind of stuff, and the way that I looked at it was never really like that, you know? The way that I was looking at it was, you know, "Improve the day-to-day experience of the underrepresented worker going into the tech space." That was my--that's my driver, right? The way that I describe what I do is that my job is to make sure that everybody that comes to work is happy and feels like they belong. That's my job. That is my job, and I--I don't like to say I love my job, because I don't think in that way, but I'm extremely proud of what we've done here at Zillow Group. I'm extremely proud, and I'm hoping to continue on this path and, you know, continue to make us an employer of choice.Zach: [applause sfx] I mean, what can I say? I mean, I hear you. This is incredible. Look, I have another question, but I want to get into this really quick though. You talked about some of the things that y'all are doing here and, like, they've been serving well. What are some of those things that you've been able to do at Zillow that you believe have helped to improve the sense of belonging and inclusiveness for black and brown folks? Lionel: Well, that was the thing, right? 'Cause one of the things that they had asked me to do was go out and find best practices, and the crazy thing is that there were no best practices 'cause nobody was really killing it. Nobody's numbers said that they were killing it, right? So I had to come up with my own stuff, but what that gave me was green fields. So I could do a couple things. So one of the first things that I did is I was walking through the office one day--and we had this wall of speakers, right? And the speakers--I looked at that wall, and it's a pretty big wall of all of these, you know, headshots of all of these speakers that we've had come into the office, and I was like, "Damn, every single person on there is white." Like, literally. Like, every single person on there is white except for one brother that we had, and of course he was a football player, right?Zach: Of course. Of course.Lionel: Right? And I was like, "Come on, man." You know? So I changed that immediately. That was one of my goals, to change that, and I did that. You know, we brought in people like Van Jones. We brought in people that were from the Islamic community. We brought in people from the Latinx community. Totally changed that whole landscape, right? And then we started talking about, like, just simple things like events, you know? Because that's one of the things that tech companies are known for, right? We have these crazy-ass parties where everybody has a good time, but not everybody gets down like that, you know what I mean? Like, I didn't grow up that way, you know? I don't go out and--you know, I'm not one of those people that like to [imbibe?] in that way and that's how I party. That's not how I do. I like the music. I like to dance. I like that kind of stuff, you know? And I'm not saying that we're all the same, but there are certain foundational pieces that make us a little bit the same. [?], right? And so we started throwing, like, parties, but I would tell the dudes that came in--I started going out and creating relationships with external organizations that were representative of underrepresented groups within our company. So we had professional organizations that I went and made agreements with, and then they would come in and they would throw the parties. And they asked me, they said, "Well, how black do you want this to be?" [both laugh] And I was like, "I want it to be as black as you want to make it."Zach: Right. It needs to be black black, with a Q.Lionel: It needs to be, 'cause you have people here from, you know, predominantly black areas, right? You've got a kid that grew up in a predominantly black area. He goes to an HBCU, you know, does really well there, and then all of a sudden he's thrown into this, right, where he's one of--I think we're at, like, 9% or something like that, right? We're still improving in that area, right? And then he's just got to, like, hang out and do what these guys do? You know, why don't we give him some of what he had back home? You know, why don't we create a sense of community for him, you know what I mean? And we did that, and then we started taking a look at some of the things--and it's all from my own experience, right? One of the things that really bothered me is, like, when all of the brothers was getting shot, you know, I felt completely alone in the office, and I had nobody to talk to about it, right? And what we did is we started--we created a forum here where people can--when things like that happen, for example when the El Paso shooting happened recently, you know, we had a forum here inside the office where people from the Latinx community could get together, along with people that were not from that community but allies that were in positions of power and strength here at the company, we all got together and we had a conversation, and we, you know, basically video-taped everybody in from all the other offices, and we had this, you know, straight up conversation about what this feels like, and that made a difference in people's experience, right? And then we talked about "How do we do our recruiting?" We started taking a look at--I started taking a look at how we do the recruiting in the first place, right? Many of our people that come on board come on from internships, so how do we effect that? Well, we start creating more relationships with organizations that are representative of us. So we started a relationship with NSBE, the National Society of Black Engineers. We started a relationship with SHPE, Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, right? And then we put into practice talking to the CTO, the chief technology officer, who is just--you know, he's cool, he's just really cool, and I gave him an a-ha moment when I took him to AfroTech, like, two years ago.Zach: Oh, yeah. Shout-out AfroTech. Shout-out Blavity. Yeah, yeah, yeah.Lionel: Yeah, by Blavity, right? And I took him--he was one of the only white dudes there, and I was like, "Look, you know, I'm gonna introduce you to some people. You're gonna have some good conversations, and then we're gonna talk about it afterwards," and he was like, "Cool," but he walks in and there's THOUSANDS of black people, man. Where people were telling him, "Oh," we can't be found, which is bullshit. Zach: It is, man. No, it is. It is so annoying, Lionel. Well, it's annoying and it's insulting and it's racist, right? So you said, "Well, we can't find this talent"--like, we're all over, and, like, look, AfroTech is an obvious one, but man, there are also, like, a lot of, like, local, like, groups, right? Like, there's all--if you go to any major city, there's some grassroots coding group that is black and brown, right? And honestly, even if you just take the time and look in the PWIs that you're recruiting, if you just look one more time, they're there too. Like, we're here. Lionel: Right, right. So what we did--he saw that, and we came back and he was like, "What do we do?" And I said, "Well, let's figure out some strategies," and what we started doing is we started making--'cause Boeing has doing been this forever, but Boeing's been going to NSBE and making offers on the spot, right? And so it was like, "Okay, well, let's do that," and we started doing that, and we started increasing our numbers because of that, right? And then those kids that were coming in as interns, we started converting them to full-time, and then on top of it their experience as workers here is real cool because, like, I'll walk by, you know, and I'll talk to 'em and be like, "Hey, what's happening, brother?" You know? "How you doing?" And they'll look at me like--Zach: Even that alone, which is small, right? It's huge to them.Lionel: It's small. It's really, really small, but it's so important, right? People gotta feel like they feel belong. People gotta feel like they're appreciated, right? That's what has to happen, and that's what we started doing. That's one of the things. I could go on and on, man. We've done--when I say I'm proud of the work that we've done here, I'm extremely proud of the work that we've done here.Zach: Rightfully so.Lionel: Yeah. The executives have been fully on board. You know, we also do this other thing where we understand the C-level, the C-Suite, has to be on board. So we do a thing called the MB Learning Series, which is twice a month. You know, we get together, myself, the senior VP of community and culture, and some other key individuals that are well-versed in this space. We'll get together with a bunch of people from the C-Suite, and we'll sit down and we'll talk for about an hour, an hour and a half, about whatever it is, right? It could be a current event that has impacted an underrepresented group, or it could be about something that they've encountered themselves, right, that they want to know more about, right? So we work with them, and they get to learn, they get to learn what's happening, and it changes their perspective and it changes the way that they go out and approach things and make decisions, right? We have our CEO--our CEO is, like, one of the only CEOs where, you know, in his signature file, you know, he has his pronouns, right? Because that's important, you know, to understand that not everybody identifies in that way. Understanding that people identify differently is extremely important, 'cause it puts you in a different place in your learning, in your journey, and that's how we got here. I mean, there's--you know, I could go on and on, but that would take up your whole segment.Zach: No, no, no. This is great, and look, Lionel, we'll just have you back. It's not a problem, man. We'll just have you--[both laugh] You'll just come on back. But it's interesting, really quickly, about the pronoun point, right? So, you know, some research that Living Corporate has been doing, you know what I'm saying, on our whitepaper--if you check us out on the website, you know, you'll see us on there, and we talk about the fact that, you know, 14% of millennials identify as trans or non-binary, right? So it's a real statistic.Lionel: Oh, it's a real statistic. It's real. And, you know, there's so many different groups of other people that do not feel like they belong. You know, they just--you know, especially with the current climate in our country today. That kind of stuff, the divisiveness of our country today, and, you know, we just--we want to make sure, in our company--and we've been voted, like, one of the best places to work forever, right? ["ow" sfx] Forever. But what was not being considered was that not everybody felt that way. It was not the best place to work for everyone. We found that out through our data, you know? We pulled some data that showed us that. So our goal is to make this the best place to work for everyone, and we don't--I mean, we look at everyone and make sure that they're taken care of. And we started our ERGs here two years ago. We dedicated a lot of resources to it. It has its own program manager that manages everything. That's his full-time gig. That's what he does to make sure that, you know, they're good. You know, we have all of the infrastructure in place for that. They're fully capitalized. Yeah. We do--you know, we do a lot of stuff here that a lot of companies don't do, and I think a lot of it just has to do with the fact that we've been following best practices. 'Cause, like I said, we didn't find any, so we had to create our own.Zach: No, that's incredible, and you're absolutely--this is the thing. It's so interesting because as commercialized and, I'm gonna say it, colonized as diversity and inclusion has become, right, like, as a space, when it comes to actually delivering and doing the work, we're still very much so in our infancy, right? Like, there's not a blueprint for anything.Lionel: No. No, there isn't, and that's--yeah, I would agree with you that there is a lot of stuff in our space that, you know, I kind of, like, look at three or four times too, you know? Like, "Really? That's what we're gonna do now?" [Zach laughs] But that's the thing, you know? Let's be creative, you know? Let's figure it out, and for me it was very personal, you know? That's why, you know, a lot of the stuff that we did here was me imagining me, you know, sitting there at work. You know, what would I want? You know, when I first started in this stuff, what would I want? I'd want to be able to come into work and feel like I can be the best me possible, right? But I don't have to, like, play by nobody else's rules about how I talk, how I walk, and all of those kinds of things. I don't believe that people should or can bring their whole selves to work. I don't believe in that. I think that, you know, there's some shit you need to leave at home, right? [both laugh] I don't believe--you know, like, my grandmother used to tell me, you know, "Tell some. Keep a lot." You know what I mean? You don't need people knowing everything, right?Zach: Yeah, keep going.Lionel: You should be able to be comfortable when you go to work. You shouldn't have to code switch as much. You shouldn't, you know, have to wonder about your place there as much, you know what I mean?Zach: I do. You're 100% right, yeah. Lionel: Yeah, that's what we did. Zach: You said, "Share a little bit. Keep a lot." But you're right though, and some of that, Lionel, is cultural, right? So, like, I would say black and brown folks--and I'll just speak for my experience. Like, I was raised, you know, you keep your business to yourself, right? Like, there's certain things, where as then, you know, there's stereotypes that white folks love to just tell everything they got going on. They'll talk about the medication they're taking, if they're depressed, you know? They'll share everything. But you're right, like, I'm not tripping on--I don't necessarily--my quote-unquote "whole self," like, I don't have to do that, but I should feel comfortable--right, I should not feel uncomfortable and dread going to work or feel like, man, just so otherized to the point where I can't even function.Lionel: Exactly, and being othered is real, and it's difficult for people to see that, you know? Like, "Oh, we're paying you," you know? "I don't know why you don't feel appreciated," you know? It's that kind of stuff, and it's like, "Man." You know, if I'm coming into work and I can't wait to get home--not because, you know, I just don't want to be at work for whatever reason, but just because I don't feel comfortable and when I get home is when I feel comfortable? Or I'm dreading going to a company event because I don't feel comfortable? You know, that's a problem. That's a problem. That's why there's more brothers and sisters that are consultants than full-time employees in the tech space.Zach: Man... listen. Oh, my goodness. So look, Lionel, you gonna have to come back, because I've got, like, four more topics we can talk about, [laughs] but you're 100% right, right? Like, you think about, like, it's these temporary, transient roles, right, that give you space, but then also, like--they give you space to kind of move around and not get too uncomfortable in these environments. Man, not to mention the pattern where I'm seeing a lot of black and brown folks are in these, like, non-client-facing positions. Like, they'll typically in, like, the security tech roles, but let me not even--let me not step on too many toes today. Let's keep going though. I want to respect your time. Let's get into how you and I connected. So of course, you know, I'm on LinkedIn. I'm active active on there, but I seen you on there, and you sent me a link about a project you're working on, which really got my attention, and I'd love to--I'd love for you to talk a little bit about that as well as--and just kind of your passion and interest as to why you're doing the work that you're doing on it.Lionel: Yeah. I think you're referring to the microaggressions survey that we sent out.Zach: That's right. Lionel: So Rebekah Bastian is the VP of Community and Culture here. She's my boss, right? I have a direct line to her and then a [?] line to the chief people officer. She and I sit right next to each other. It's an open kind of space. And she's a contributing writer for Forbes. So she was writing this thing on microaggressions, and I was like, "Let me read that," and I read it, and it talked about microaggressions towards women, right, and more microaggressions towards women, and I was like, "Man, that's crazy," you know? Because we suffer from microaggressions. And she was like, "You do, I know that." And I was like, "Yeah, I know you know that, but, you know, there's no data around it. Why don't we do our own survey?" You know, 'cause we couldn't find no data, right? We did the research and whatever, and she was like, "Yeah, I would love to write something on that, but, you know, I can't find any data," and I said, "Well, let's create our own data, you know?" So she put a survey together, and I sent it out to my network, which is pretty broad, and then many of my--that's one thing I want to thank everybody for, including yourself, you know? Many of them sent them out to their networks too. Like, "Hey, you know, this is happening. Let's talk about this." Right? And yeah, I came back and--I think we're gonna try and do this, like, yearly, and try to go even deeper, 'cause I think that it was a great introduction, but I think that we could have covered a couple areas that, you know, people really don't want to cover. But it's important, right? 'Cause I know that I suffer for them still today on a daily basis. I have to check somebody in a meeting or, you know, I also have to be mindful about certain things, right, you know, that they don't have to, you know? When I say them, I mean, like, white folks that are in my same position or at the same level that I'm at, right? And yeah, we still go through it, and it's difficult. You know, it's difficult, and we had to put that information together ourselves 'cause we couldn't find any.Zach: Well, to that point though, why do you think that I&D programs--so I have a bevy of my own theories, right, but why do you think, when we talk about diversity, equity, and inclusion, we don't zoom in on black male or brown male experiences specifically?Lionel: I don't think people really want that wake-up call yet, you know what I mean? I think that people want to imagine that "Hey," you know, they got to this particular spot in their career, you know, they're making this particular amount of money, you know, they should be happy, right? But they don't know that for a lot of us--I mean a lot of us, man, a lot of us--you know, we have to deal with [BLEEP] on a daily basis that they never have to deal with, they never have to deal with. But nobody really wants to put light on that, you know? 'Cause then that would mean that we have to do some more work, and I think people don't want to do that, you know? I think that, you know, people try and find the easiest and fastest way to get to a certain point, right? But when we're talking about something that's this complicated and this nuanced, it's gonna take some work. It's gonna take some serious work, and--what is it--the implicit bias trainings and all of those kinds of things, you know, that's, like, the tip of the iceberg. Nobody wants to.Zach: No, they don't. And it's aggravating too, because even--so I've talked to--so in my current job, and then at previous jobs too, but, like, I have mentors here, and I've [?]--you know, what I find frustrating about us always running into implicit bias is that it makes the presumption that all bias is accidental or unconscious, right? And it's like, "No." Some of y'all actively don't want black and brown people here. Like, come on. It is 20--it is the age of our Beyonce, 2019. We know the deal. [both laugh] We know where people align politically. Like, more than ever we have direct insight into political idealogies, beliefs, and points of view on race, gender, sex, religion, sexuality. Like, we know all these things, so, like, let's not act like everything is "Oh, I stumbled across this racist thing." Like, come on. That's not the reality. So let me ask you this as we kind of wrap up. What are some of the challenges that you've come across as a black executive leader within an I&D space? 'Cause you're the second person. You're only the second person in one of these positions that I've met that is a black man. So you're in this position, right? Typically I see folks in this position are white women and maybe even white women who identiy as LGBTQ, right? As a black man, what does influence and coalition-building look like in your position?Lionel: Influence and coalition-building in my position? Well, one is--you know, one, you've got to have allies. I don't believe that we're in a position right now, that we have the power right now, to be able to make the change that we need to make without powerful allies, right? But at the same time, those powerful allies are working with biases themselves, so you need to make sure that you're training them up, mentoring up with them, to make sure that when they are supporting you that they're supporting you effectively and they know where it's coming from. I agree with you in many ways that, yeah, I don't necessarily think--well, let me change that. I don't believe that bias is a strong enough word for one thing. Two, I don't believe that it is all implicit. I do think that some people are just that way, and they just believe, you know, all of the propaganda and rhetoric that has been going on in the United States forever about us, right? And coalition-building really means getting rid of some of that, you know? Doing the, you know, behavioral change and thought change is important, you know? That kind of thing has to happen before people can really try to support you, because they have to understand that they are being affected, and their actions are being affected, by things that they've been taught for most of their lives in the United States, you know? The United States, man, we're--this is a country built on racism. This is a country that's, you know, built on the backs of us, you know? Whether you're Asian, Latino, Native-American, you know, that's what this country is built on. [to this day sfx]Zach: Straight up.Lionel: To this day.Zach: To this day!Lionel: To this day, right? To this day, and we have to get to a place where we recognize that. We have to get to a place where we're not okay with it. It is something that we're ashamed of, but it's something that we're gonna admit, right? That this is what's going on with us, and we need to move forward from here. That's coalition-building, you know? Getting people to really understand the mistakes that were made. Fess up to them. Own up to them. Make some changes, right? [?]Zach: [Flex bomb sfx] Man, I love it. And, you know, this is the thing--you're the first person who I've had a conversation with who talks about the fact that coalition-building is not only bringing things in but also pushing things away, right? It's both. I love that. I love that. Well, look, let's do this. If you had three points of advice for any leader seeking to specifically recruit and engage black men, what would they be?Lionel: Make sure that what you want to invite them to is welcoming of black men. Do that, right? I mean, don't ask me to come to your house if your house is falling apart. Don't do that. Like, make sure your outline's right first, right? Make sure that you work with recruiting to help them to understand that, yes, they are out there, you're just gonna have to work a little bit harder. Make sure that you work with your executive staff to make sure that they're on board with whatever programs that you put in place so that you can make sure that you keep people once they get there. Zach: I love it. Just like that. And listen, y'all, you heard Lionel's advice, so we looking at you now. So you're gonna come around trying to invite black and brown men to your organizations, and we're looking back at you like [haha sfx]. Look, don't play yourself. Pay attention. This has been great, Lionel. Before we get out of here, any parting words or shout-outs?Lionel: No, man. Thank you for having me. You know, we've got a lot of work to do. You know, we're nowhere near where we could be, and a lot of this is about the economic divide, the wealth gap, and it's just gonna get wider and wider and wider. We've got to get on, you know, our bikes, man. We've got to get to work, you know, 'cause--we've got to get to work. We've got to get to work.Zach: Well, they're projecting that the median wealth of black families from a household perspective will be zero dollars, like, by 2050 or so, so you're absolutely right. We gotta--man, Lionel, this has been--like, no shade to everybody else, y'all, this has been top two dopest conversations we've had on Living Corporate. Thank you so much for being a guest. We very much so want to have you back. We'll talk about that offline. Until next time, y'all, this has been Zach. You've been listening to Lionel Lee at the Zillow Group. Make sure you check out all of his information. Links in the show notes. Catch y'all next time. Peace.

Zach speaks with Kori Hale, CEO of CultureBanx, about CultureBanx itself and her personal career journey. They also discuss the concept of producing content, particularly while other, and Kori offers some great advice for professionals who are afraid to make a jump or do something new in their career.Connect with CultureBanx through their website, Instagram, and Twitter - and check out their content on Spotify!Connect with Kori on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and we are here again. More fire for your head top, more content, more real discussions with black and brown people or people that affirm the identities and experiences of black and brown people to center--that's right--black and brown people. And today is no different, 'cause, you know, we're coming to y'all with really good conversations, often times with a special guest, and we have such a guest today - Kori Hale. Kori, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Kori: Hi, Zach. I'm great. How are you?Zach: I'm doing really, really well. I appreciate the fact that you were able to take the time to be on the show. For those of us who don't know you, could you talk a little bit about yourself?Kori: Yes, I can, but before I do, I noticed in the opening you said this show is also for people who affirm the identities of black and brown people, and I was wondering if that included Rachel Dolezal. [laughs]Zach: Oh, goodness. You know what? If Rachel wants to--here's the thing about Rachel. I--it's so confusing, 'cause she could have done so much more as an actual white woman and, you know, given and used her privilege as--you know, and given it away. Instead she chose to, I don't know, handicap herself, but then also take a bunch of, like, praise? I don't know. Maybe. I don't know. What do you think? You tell me.Kori: Yeah, I don't know. It is a tough one. However, homegirl can definitely braid some hair based on that Netflix documentary that I saw, 'cause I'm like, "Yo." I mean, normally white people just have less-textured hair, so it's much harder to actually, you know, braid in extensions, and I ain't ever even seen anyone iron some hair like that before. [both laugh] She was teaching me some stuff! So I was like, "Oh, girl, I didn't even know you could do all that."Zach: That's so funny. But you know what? I think this is a really good segue into what you do and your platform, but I'd love to hear more about your journey and kind of--so let's just get it out there. You're the CEO and founder of CultureBanx, which is a media platform for black folks, for black and brown--I'm gonna say black folks, and I'll let you kind of get into it, but let's talk a little bit about your journey and kind of how you got there and then really more about what CultureBanx is.Kori: Yes. So my journey is--well, as I like to say, the path that we're all on in life is not easy, nor is it paved in gold, and that's a lot like my story. I started out as an investment banker, first internationally at a Swiss bank in London, and then I moved back to the States and I was with Goldman Sachs for several years and just really realized, right, that there wasn't anyone that looked like me delivering high-level business financial news in a way that really would resonate with my community, with my core values, and so I was like, you know, "If I can't figure this out, let me maybe try and go work at some of the big networks," specifically business news networks, right, and figure out how can I maybe inject some diversity, because I think that a lot of us, when you work in corporate America, the main thing that you want to do is feel like--and I really actually hate when people use the word "safe places" or "safe space." Like, there's no safe space when you get up and you go to work for somebody else every day, right? Because it's their company. So, like, that doesn't exist, even if they want to create some employee resource group or whatever. Like, the head of the employee resource group still reports to somebody that doesn't look like them, [?] like, up to the CEO of the company. And so I thought I was gonna be able to inject diversity at networks like Bloomberg and CNBC, and even when I was a news anchor down on the floor of the Stock Exchange and actually didn't even know until I was down there that I was the first African-American woman to ever anchor a daily news show from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in its 200+-year history, and I thought, "Well, that's odd." Like, "What's going on here? Why has that never been a thing until I worked at this media startup?" But through that transition of investment banking to then getting into media, what I really realized was that there was no outlet, broadcast, print, or digital, that was gonna deliver the type of content that I was looking for. So if a former investment banker journalist can't create this sort of company for communities that need it the most, then no one else is gonna go out there and do it, and that really brings us more to the present day and CultureBanx, the media company, and what we do is create business news for hip hop culture, and essentially all of our articles have music attached to it that then spins out into different curated Spotify playlists. So it's pretty dope if I do say so myself, because I--Zach: Aye. [laughs]Kori: I mean, it is. I look at music as that sort of underlying theme throughout all communities. It's an easy way to engage, an easy way to see a reflection of yourself, and what if we took that same approach to information and content and not keep pushing just entertainment and sports and celebrity and that sort of stuff to minority communities? Because we think--and by we, the people that are actually even pushing the content towards these communities aren't even from those communities, but they're trying to say, "Oh, this is what they want. This is the only thing they care about," but that's not true. It's just that you're putting it in a, as I like to say, razzle-dazzle sort of way. If you did the same thing but you talked about stocks and mergers and acquisitions, what a difference you might see in those communities.Zach: No, you're absolutely. And I mean, I think the other piece is, like, also acknowledging the work that those communities are already doing, right? So there's more and more black tech spaces that are coming up organically, right? Like, you think about--there's multiple of these types of pods, like, within the coastal cities, the DMV, LA, Oakland, Houston, the Midwest and Chicago. Like, there's all types of just organic things happening. Healthy living co-ops. There's all types of activities that are happening in these--again, like, in these black and brown communities, but there are larger, I think, like--I don't know, just larger narratives and systems in place that minimize those stories. And also there's a lack of funding, right, and marketing awareness for those organizations that are already in place. What I think I hear you talking about is really exciting because you're pushing more content, and then I also believe CultureBanx provides opportunities, or at least opens up a lens to what is actually happening today in those spaces, right?Kori: Yes. We definitely provide people with what we call the culturally-attuned perspective in those spaces. I mean, it's easy to see a headline--to your point--about minority maybe co-working spaces or different companies or organizations, institutions, that are focusing in the STEM fields as it relates to minorities. What we really try to push over at CultureBanx are the everyday stories though. So not just [whatever?] falls in the minority bucket 'cause it mentioned something about the Latinx or Asian or black community, but this story is the headline on all of these platforms, and this is information you need to know, but they're not gonna tell you exactly why it's relevant to your community, why you should personally care about something like that. And Zach, can I go ahead and give your listeners a quick example here?Zach: Come on.Kori: So last year, Michael Kors--the company, the retail brand--bought Versace, a very famous Italian luxury retail brand, for $3 billion. You would think on the surface, "Okay, well, that's interesting I guess, if you're into fashion," or even if you're not into fashion, but no one is telling you why that deal is really a play on urban culture. And the reason that Michael Kors really wants a bigger stake in Versace is because of Versace's long-standing love affair with hip-hop, hip-hop and the community, and hip-hop of course being the #1 genre of music for the past decade.Zach: In the world.Kori: Right. Hip-hop leads these trends, and the majority of hip-hop artists are African-American. We've seen a huge rise, right, with Latinx performers in the hip-hop community as well, but still all in that, you know, minority category, and just that spending power alone of African-Americans is currently at $1.3 trillion, making the spending power of this community larger than the economy of Mexico.Zach: Come on, now. [Flex bomb sfx]Kori: Y'all gotta feel me when I say we have more spending power than the entire country of Mexico just as an African-American community, a subset of the bigger U.S. population, but it's more powerful than entire countries. And so to get in front of that audience, right, is something that most brands want, and no one is gonna talk about that the way we're gonna tell you "This is why this is important," right? This market move by Michael Kors to acquire Versace is much bigger than them trying to perhaps get into more of the luxury business and much bigger than Versace trying to figure out how it can get into more stores. It's like, "Hey, we know their main audience, the people that are spending money." I mean, think of all of the free advertisement that Versace gets in hip hop songs?Zach: Oh, no, 100%. 'Cause part of me--I was talking to my wife about this. I was like, "Dang, I wonder if any of these rappers--like, do they have deals that they don't talk about?" Right? Like, when Migos made that song "Versace," right, like, did they have some secret deal, like, a marketing agreement, and, like, did Drake get a piece of that? 'Cause, like, it's just wild that--like, we do that though. Like, we'll talk about Polo, Versace, Gucci. Like, we love high-end brands. We talk about Pateks. Like, we talk about--anything that's, like, European and very expensive, like, they end up in rap songs, and I just ask myself--and maybe I'm a little bit more conspiratorial than I should be. I'm always thinking about, like, there's just some grander scheme here--like, I just wonder, like, is there some, like, larger agreement that maybe even some of these record labels have with these European brands to then create this content? 'Cause you're absolutely right. Like, we promote it at crazy levels. Like, I wouldn't have wore Polos when I was in middle school like I did if it wasn't for Kanye, and I wouldn't have wore--like, there's just a bunch of clothes that I just wouldn't have purchased without--like, without rap influence, you know what I mean?Kori: No, I completely understand what you're saying. I think that that's what makes this so fascinating and so interesting, that other businesses, industries, sectors, they really value, right, the trendsetting and the taste-makers that come from minority communities moreso than we will value our own, you know, power, and that's the problem, because sometimes I don't think that we really immensely understand the power that we have. So when things are not going right, let's say on the negative side--racism, sexism, those sort of things--like, how valuable withholding your dollars from certain brands can be to move the needle.Zach: Yes, you're absolutely right. And, you know, it's interesting because, you know, these insights that you're having around media production--like, the business insights that you're having and that you're bringing to this space, I mean, I think it comes from your business journey, right? Like, you've had a few different jobs, and you don't really give the impression of someone who's afraid to change. So, like, can we talk a little bit about where you started, and then, you know, what advice you would give to professionals who are wherever they are for whatever reason and they're afraid to make a jump and to do something new? Kori: Yes. I actually really love kind of telling this particular part of my journey, but I'ma take it back a little bit before I actually started working and shout-out my undergrad university, Hampton University, out there in the Hampton Roads area right outside of Virginia Beach. And going to an HBCU is a very great experience, but for me personally, growing up in Houston, Texas, I grew up knowing and being around affluent African-Americans, so that wasn't, like, a stretch for me, to see black people that had real money, not the--you know, the kind of clout money as they say. That wasn't really a stretch for me, but going to Hampton University and really getting a full scope and breadth of black people from across the country, like, that was very eye-opening for me, and what it instilled was really the value of appreciating what we can do as a community and, you know, us being a part of that talented [?] and what that would mean for the future of our community. And after Hampton, when I moved to London and started investment banking at the Swiss bank UBS, I was like, "Huh. Well, this is also odd, because now I'm back in this super minority--" I call it a double-minority status, because I'm not just, like, a black person living abroad--I'm a black person and I'm also an American, so it was just a lot of things to have to work through. But coming back to the States from London and working at Goldman, I kind of got a better sense of the way that corporate America worked, and I wanted--at the time I thought the ultimate goal was to become a partner, right? That's what you kind of train for, that's what you kind of work up--"what you should be," as the company will tell you, should be aspiring towards. [cha-ching sfx] And I'm like, "Okay, so let me sort out this path." And I figured out what that path was about two years after I started at Goldman. I stayed another couple of years, but after those first two years when I figured it out, I also got into the mindset of "Okay, I pretty much know what it's gonna take and how long it's gonna take me to get there." Like, "That can't be the mountaintop," so to speak, because there's got to be more to life than this. And I really just took those next two years where I was at the firm to kind of navigate what I wanted to do. Like, if you would have told me at the time that I started at Goldman that I would one day be running my own media company, like, I would have laughed at you, because I had no aspirations to be in media. I didn't know anything about journalism. Matter of fact, the day I left Goldman Sachs, I did not know one person that worked in media. I'm talking about not even an assistant, even a doorman at a building, security officer at a news room, nothing. Like, I literally knew no one that actually worked in any news corporation, but I felt like God spoke to me when I was at Goldman and said that this is what I should be doing. I just kind of decided to stick with it, and some of the partners that were mentors and sponsors for me, I ran this idea by them, that I, you know, was gonna leave Goldman and go to journalism school and try and become a business news journalist--they were very supportive, and they told me basically, like, you're young--I was around 26 at the time--and if it doesn't work out, you can always come back here. Like, "You can always come back to GS if it doesn't work out," but a lot of them were basically like, "Don't be like us." Like, "Don't buy into," essentially drinking the company corporate Kool-Aid, so to speak, and stay here because you've figured out the path and it seems safe and secure, because you'll always look back and say, "But if I would have given this other thing a shot, even if I failed, at least I would have known I tried." And going back to a respectable organization like GS isn't a terrible fallback plan for anyone. Luckily I haven't had to tap into that fallback plan, but you never know what the future holds. [laughs] So we can always see, but that's kind of how that transition happened.Zach: You know, it's just incredible because--I'll speak for myself, right? Like, you know, I didn't think that I would get here, where I am, in my job, you know? I didn't think that I would be--I didn't think I'd be working here. Like, I remember when I was in high school I said, "I think I want to be a consultant one day," and my high school counselor said, "You're not gonna be a consultant," right? You know? And then after that, before I became a consultant I was trying to pursue a career in HR. I had folks who look like me saying, "You're not gonna be an HR manager," right? So, you know, for me, because of that and not having a lot of people that look like me in these spaces, getting to one of these jobs seemed to be the mountaintop, right? But the reality is that there's more to life than just working for somebody else. And, you know, no shame to anybody who wants--like, who wants to be a career... career person, but there's more than that. You know, how did you navigate some of the--like, the fear and anxiety that came with, like, making that jump? So you came--I'm not gonna get into your pockets, but I would presume, I could be wrong, that perhaps your career at Goldman Sachs gave you a little bit more financial flexibility to, like, make certain moves and take certain risks that other people couldn't take. Is that a wrong assumption, or is that--you know, did any of that come into play in terms of, like--do you feel like, because of your job, you were able to--you had more space to kind of take that leap?Kori: I think my job gave me--and, like, the money I made while I was there, it definitely gave me the flexibility to be able to go to Syracuse's Newhouse School of Communication and figure out, like, "Could I make this journalism career a thing?" I think it definitely gave me that because I had the confidence to know that if, for whatever reason, it didn't work out, I would be able to go back and have, you know, a very good-paying job, but also, like, enough money, for the most part, to help me at least get through, like, the schooling part.Zach: So then--so let's talk a little bit about the concept of producing, right? So you're a content creator. You're a producer. It's a term though that's thrown around quite a bit, right? Especially, like, in today's digital age. What does it really mean in your mind to be a producer in the media space today?Kori: I look at content producers in general as people that are creating new original, authentic shows, articles, media content in general. So not the companies that are aggregators of information. Like, there are a lot of companies out there that are basically just pulling stuff from other people's websites, but they're not actually holistically creating something that was not there before, and that's really a major differentiator in the space, because--to your point about a lot of different, like, black and brown minority-based concepts popping up, you've got to be able to stand out on your own and be creating in a space that no one else is already creating in. I think that we definitely need minority spaces, but we shouldn't divide and conquer, right? We're stronger together. We don't necessarily need 50 different versions of co-working spaces for people of color. I'm not saying that we only need one, but would it make more sense to pool our efforts together in order to create something bigger? Zach: No, you're absolutely right. It's interesting though because it's--like, so kind of going on the co-working space thing and, like, other ideas, one, because, like, our networks--I don't know, our networks are just different, and also, like, because sometimes we come into spaces late, or we--and when I say come into spaces, I mean we don't have the same amount of support to, like, be early adopters in the spaces that we may see our white counterparts do. So, like, we'll come into a space, and we'll come into the space at the same time, and so it looks oversaturated, right? But I actually--like, I don't know. So talk to me more about--so you zoomed in on co-working spaces twice now. Like, talk to me a little bit more about what you're seeing in that space and why--like, what's your point of view on it? 'Cause, like, I think they're really cool. I'm a consultant, so I have a co-working space all of the time because of, like, just the nature of my job. Like, I can just go to any home office, like, through the firm that I work at, but I think that they're a pretty cool idea, and they seem to be used, but, like, I'm not really as plugged in. So, like, I'd be open to you educating me on it.Kori: Yeah. So, I mean, I don't--I have a co-working space as well, but I don't really use it that much, and it's not a co-working space at a place for people of color, but specifically on that front, like, I do know a couple of founders that are trying to launch their own versions of, like, specifically of women of color, others specifically for founders of color in a particular sector, like, that sort of thing. I actually feel like that is a very fragmented marketplace, almost much in the way of The Wing, which is a very popular all-female co-working space that WeWork has actually invested in, and I definitely think there's a space where, you know, women want to be, but one of the main issues with the WeWork is that there are no men allowed, which, if you're a smaller business--which most people that use co-working spaces tend to be--you don't always want to have to go outside of your co-working space for a meeting. And I think that there are other ones that have popped up along the way. Like, there's one for women executives, right, where it's also fragmenting the market, but it's fragmenting the market in a way that makes people feel like they're being part of an elite club, if you know what I mean. Like, "Oh, you have to be at a certain level at whatever your organization is to be invited to be a member here." I think that sort of way of strategically planning out how you roll out different co-working spaces for people of color is a better strategic roadmap to success than just saying, "We're opening up a place for people of color."Zach: What is the--what would you recommend as the approach to, like, unify and desegment that space?Kori: Right. I think the best way to look at it is like, "This is the community that we're trying to get in front of," or that we're trying to help, and really pinpointing "What are the most important things to those people?" And I can actually liken that back to CultureBanx, like, and going into roadmapping out how do you deliver content to this so-called new woke generation in a way that they can actually identify with and see a reflection of themselves and their community with? And when you think of co-working spaces, like, what is it that's most important to the community of potential co-working clients and users that makes the most sense? And back to CultureBanx, for us it was everything that tends to be pushed that does really well in front of minority audiences has something to do around entertainment, music, celebrity. So it's how do we bring that to what we do so that it doesn't seem like it's such a far off leap for people to be interested?Zach: So then what does it look like--you know, let's talk about, like, the professional who--maybe they're not looking to start their own company, they're not looking to--they're just trying to survive at their job, right? Let's talk about, like, the concept of producing and, like, bringing these--and, like, the principles that you're talking about with CultureBanx, and how do you think those principles can be applied to a black and brown professional at work? Because ultimately there seems to be a certain level of purposefulness and intentionality. That's the better word. A certain level of intentionality and strategy that it comes to really producing effectively and really kind of managing brand. Do you think any of that could be effectively leveraged, utilized, for folks in their 9-to-5 jobs? Kori: Yes, but I think it always starts with figuring out--like, knowing your end goal and working backwards. So as I mentioned earlier, when I thought my end goal was to become a partner at Goldman, it was "Okay, well, I want to become a partner. I'm only a senior analyst now." Like, "Let's scale back from partner and work our way backwards and see what it takes to get there," to your point, like, your own self brand management at work every day. And funny enough, this is something that a lot of people don't know about me, I actually left Goldman about two months after I got promoted, which is--but I had already been--but this is when I talk about the planning. I had already been planning, like, my strategic, like, exit. As you all know, I'm sure, that are listening right now, you know, you apply to a school, you have to wait to get in, that sort of thing. You know, take the tests or whatever tests you need to be admitted to these universities. So, like, I had already been strategically planning that, but I had also still been working on that plan of "If I do stay and try to navigate my way to someday becoming partner--" I was still working that plan too and, you know, just came to that crossroads of "Huh, do I--" Even after I got promoted I almost decided that I was gonna stay and not even pursue this whole journalism path. I'm like, "Oh, this happened sooner than expected." So, you know, I was on the high-performing track as they call it at some companies, the fast track to moving up. Like, there was no real reason for me to want to leave other than I felt like my life's purpose and calling was greater than what I was currently doing. And when you are constantly in this strategic mode of planning out "What does it look like in my 9-to-5 every day to be able to push to the next level?" Everything about what you do has to be very heavily managed, as a person of color especially, and I know that in corporate America people try to heavily, like, push this whole concept of mentorship and sponsorship. I will tell you I'm not a huge fan of mentors, and every time I say that people will, like, give me their pushback, which is fine. You're entitled to your own opinion. But especially in corporate America, sponsorship is significantly more powerful than mentors, because mentors, they can also be sponsors, but you know how much more effective it is if you come to somebody with a game plan already and say, "Would you be willing to help me navigate executing this plan or this strategy?" As opposed to going to a mentor and being like, "You know, I'm really trying to figure out what role I want," or "I'm moving to the next department and thinking through--" Like, show up with some skin in the game already. Like, "I've already done X, Y, and Z, and it would be great if you could help facilitate." Now, obviously most people don't want to--I shouldn't say they don't want to. Most people want to feel like they're imparting their wisdom and knowledge on you, but if you're in a position where you can make that person look good by helping them or by them getting you to the next level, that only sets you up for more success.Zach: No, you're absolutely right. I also do think that there's a certain level--I don't know. I'm not trying to, like, pathologize nobody, and I'm not a psychologist, [but] I do believe that there is a meta-narrative of, like, non-minorities paternalistically trying to tell black and brown folks what to do, and they kind of revel in, you know, putting people in their place or just raising them in some way. [laughs] So I 100% agree with you. I think a lot of that stuff is often, like, self-aggrandizing and ego-centric. To your point around--like, I think it's more about the relationships you can build and what value you can directly say that you helped somebody else with to help them be successful. That's the way that I've seen people really climb up, right? It's not necessarily being like, "Oh, this person pulls me aside and gives me things to work on, and that's how I got promoted so fast." That's not really the case, 'cause you and I both have seen folks, you know, in an industry who have no business being in the position that they're in, and yet, you know, they're there, you know?Kori: Yeah. I mean, I think we all see that in this country, starting at the very top at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.Zach: Oh, wait a minute. Hold on now. [and i oop sfx]Kori: Not getting deeply into politics, but just saying, like it or hate it, if you agree with his politics or not--'cause people could say the same thing about 44, President Obama. Like him or hate him, you could argue one way or another and say maybe he didn't deserve--purely based on a resume, not basing on anything else. Purely basing it on so-called skills and qualifications for the role, you could make a case that he wasn't necessarily qualified, and it could be justified. You could make the same case for the current president, that he is not qualified for some of the same on the opposite end of the spectrum. I look at Barack and I say--excuse me, let me put some respect on that man's name. I look at President Obama--Zach: Come on, now.Kori: [laughs] And say that--it would be easier for people to say, you know, he doesn't actually have any business experience. He hasn't been serving in public office for any lengthy amount of time. Like, things that you would call into question for someone who would be taking the office of president. And on the other end of the spectrum you have president Trump, and you can say, "Yeah, he's run some corporations." They, on the outside, seem successful, but as we all know, when you dig in there are lots of question marks and, you know, missing documents, but you would say, "But he's never served in public office. What does he know about actually serving people essentially that aren't, you know, paying customers in that way?" Outside of the taxes that we pay. And you would question whether or not that someone is fit for that position. So yes, to your point, we all find that. "Why is this person in this position?" Well, most of the time it comes down to a likability factor. It doesn't come down to skill sets. And that's really my point, is that it's proven at the highest level. Like, something that my mom would always say to my older brother Kenan and I--primarily it started when we were in college--she would tell us, "You can either network or not work." Like, you going into work every day and doing your job that you're hired for, that's only 50% of your job. The other 50% needs to be you networking with people, because you don't know where your next opportunity is gonna come from, and your next opportunity, the likelihood that it comes from what you're doing sitting at your desk every day is very slim. It mostly comes from that person that you got coffee with once every two or three months.Zach: And I think this is the--so I don't know. I feel like you and I should actually have, like, another conversation. This isn't, like--you know, we don't typically do, like, in-depth conversations about different points of view on, like, whiteness or just, like, privilege, but, like, I'm curious to get your point of view on, like, even that. Like, that right there, the idea that you're building relationships off of the people that you're getting coffee with. Like, there are barriers to making sure that you even get that coffee, you know what I mean? Like, there are certain people that get invited to get coffee and then some people who don't, right? And then there's--and then as you even get to, like, the executive levels, you know, so many sales relationships are built on historical relationship equity that black and brown people just don't have 'cause they haven't been in these spaces. And so, like, I'm curious as to, like, your point of view on what does it look like--when you talk about relationships, when you talk about, like, navigating--and we kind of strayed away from the concept of producing, but I still think we're there. Like, what does it look like to use those tools to then, like, create those connections as much as you can?Kori: Yeah, getting invited to coffee versus, you know, kind of pushing your way in, I think that as a minority myself and other minorities especially working in corporate America need to take that ownership of organizing, of basically being like, "I'm gonna set up this sort of coffee situation." And I can give you all an example of my own personal story. So I worked at a media startup called Cheddar before I launched CultureBanx, and I actually knew the founder of Cheddar for a year or so before he ever even launched that company because he used to be the president of BuzzFeed, and then after that he was the CEO of The Daily Mail, and I knew him because I would book him as a guest to come on this show I used to produce for called Squawk Alley on CNBC. [owww sfx] And I used to just, you know, book him, and you kind of just build relationships, right, from being a producer, with different people, and that is essentially how I got that next role. So it had nothing to do with the fact of what I got up and went into work to do every day. Zach: Right. And again, what I continue to hear is just the willingness to put yourself out there. It's just so interesting, because, like, with non-whiteness I believe comes a certain level of unfamiliarity, right? So, like, you have the--if you don't look like somebody, even if--so let's just say there's two white people, right? They may have completely different backgrounds. Like, they may have completely different religious, socio-economic, even, like, cultural backgrounds, but that, like--the benefit of looking like somebody, there's certain grace that's given and space that's made to, like, more easily build relationships, where as if you're a person of color, like, what I'm hearing a lot--even though you're not saying it explicitly, Kori--is, like, you had to put yourself out there. You had to be enterprising. You had to connect the dots. You had to be much more strategic and intentional with your time and with, like, even how you present yourself and the things that you're doing and what you offer, right? Like, you had to really come--you had to really be thinking of a position of value creation, and that's great for you. Like, you're clearly a beast, right? Like, you've been--you've made moves moves, but what does it look like for--like, teaching that to somebody who isn't wired that way. Right? That could be challenging.Kori: It definitely is, and I am in no way a master of teaching it to other people. I know I have personal friends that say, "Kori, you're really great at public speaking," or "You're really great at going in and selling yourself or whatever it is that you're doing to other people." This is what I will say - it's a learned skill. Like, I didn't come out of the womb, like, doing this. There's definitely certain personality traits that are more akin to being able to just pick up these sort of things and these sort of characteristics, but it's a learned skill day in and day out, and it can start very basic. Going back to the coffee thing. Like, getting comfortable--which I know this is overused--with the uncomfortable, with making yourself uncomfortable. And if you're not the type who's gonna send a random email--which I love when people say to me, "Well, I mean, what am I gonna say?" I'm like--to your point about it kind of being a bit narcissistic with mentorship and that, people do love to talk about themselves. So just put it out there that, "Hey, you know, I'd like to talk to you. I'd like to learn more about what you do." And make it more about them. Normally, like, if you're in a relationship and you break up with somebody, you give them the "It's not you, it's me" speech. In business, give them the "It's not about me, it's all about you" speech. Like, when you send the email, like, "Hey, this whole thing is about you," right, "'cause you're so great, you're so fantastic. I just want to know about what you're doing." As a way to soften the introduction or the awkwardness that you think lies there, because you might not really know someone, even though that's something that you eventually might want to do or an area that you might want to move into. You have to do more, because you didn't go to boarding school with So-and-so, you know what I mean? You probably didn't go to all of the right Ivys, and even black people that have gone to Ivys, like--Zach: Listen, I've heard. Yeah, I've heard the experiences are different.Kori: Yeah. Like, if you didn't grow up in that world, like, you're still not necessarily accepted. So I think it's just you have to put yourself out there because they're not gonna know to contact you. Like, your parents, you know what I'm saying, y'all don't go sell off, you know, Martha's vineyard [?]. You didn't grow up going to summer camp for two months after you left boarding school, so basically you only saw your parents on holidays, and you're not even in college. You're only in the seventh grade. Zach: Right. You didn't go to Vermont to make artisanal pickles, you know what I'm saying?Kori: No, you didn't do any of that. So they already have 10--and that's just, like, at your level. Now you've got to think about how connected these parents are. Like, you're fighting a major uphill battle, and you can't go in every day and say, "I'm heads down. I'm gonna do a great job," which is something that they try to preach to you, right? Like, "Just go in. Work hard. Excel at your role." Like, "That's how you're gonna see opportunities."Zach: That's not true. Like--[laughs]Kori: You know why you're not gonna see any opportunities? Because your head is down at your desk or on the computer screen.Zach: And meanwhile we're upset. We're over here like [what more do you want from me? sfx] You know? It's just like--we're doing everything we can. So I 100% hear you and I agree with you, right? And not that I need to agree with you - this is a space of open ideas, you know? So diversity of thought is not real, but we do appreciate diversity of thought as it pertains or intersects with lived experiences of black and brown folks. So this has been super cool. Look, we've talked about CultureBanx, we've talked around CultureBanx. One thing we haven't done is talk about where people can learn more about CultureBanx, so please drop the info in here. We'll make sure to put it in the podcast notes and everything, but please let us know.Kori: Yes. Check us out at CultureBanx.com. You can find all of the content on our website. Sign up for our newsletter, daily newsletter, bringing you the latest, greatest, most important business news for the culture, as we say, every single day. You can also listen to the CultureBanx daily news briefing on any smart speaker device and also on Spotify. Everything is @CultureBanx on social media. Luckily we got in. There's no other company called CultureBanx, so it's the same--Zach: Aye. People underestimate how powerful that is. If you have the only name and you've got the domains--'cause let me tell you something. I've got--no, keep going. I'm messing your plug up. Keep going.Kori: [laughs] No, you're not, but it is important. Like, everything is literally just @CultureBanx. With an X, people. Don't forget.Zach: Please say the X, you know what I'm saying? Hold on. [Flex bomb sfx, both laugh] Oh, my goodness. Well, look, this has been super dope, and, you know, we just really appreciate you. Before we let you go, any parting words or shout-outs?Kori: Parting words? I think the main parting words I would have is something that we say on our show, which is just keep building for the culture. Zach: Come on, now.Kori: We gotta do it for each other.Zach: [straight up sfx] You're absolutely right. Now, look, this has been a dope conversation. Thank you all for listening to the Living Corporate podcast. Now, look, y'all know--I wasn't trying to mess up Kori's plug, but y'all know we got all the Living Corporates, okay? We got livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.net, livingcorporate.us. We don't have livingcorporate.com. We have living-corporate--please say the dash--dot com, but we don't have livingcorporate.com. Australia has livingcorporate.com. Believe it or not, Kori, Australia, and they're selling corporate stuff. But see, the SEO looking kind of brolic out here, 'cause now when you type in Living Corporate--they used to be at the top. Now they're like, you know, in 8th or 9th. You know what I'm saying? Like, we applying pressure, you feel me? One day the brand will be brolic enough where we're gonna go to Australia and we will politely, respectfully, yank that domain right on back, and we're gonna have all the livingcorporates, and we're gonna just sit on a mountain of domains, you know what I'm saying?Kori: Which is not a bad idea. I'm actually helping out this other startup that's trying to modernize central banks, and the name of the company--which I won't throw out there right now--is so generic, and the person, the founder, has been using, like, different versions of the name of the company to try and set up, you know, different social accounts, and they have--even the website's name is not what she calls the actual name of the company, and I'm like, "This is too confusing. Like, people don't know where to go."Zach: 100%. People be having, like, the dopest ideas and be like, "Oh, we're gonna launch Bread.com." Like, yo, fam, you gotta figure out something else. Like--Kori: Right. You had to launch Bread.com when the internet first started. Like, the late '80s, mid-to-late '80s. Like, that's when you needed to launch that, but at this point no.Zach: Straight up. Man, this is funny. This is, like, the first, like, interrupted outro we've done, but it's really good. I like it, and we might have to start doing this moving forward. All right, y'all. Look, you can check us out. We're everywhere. In fact, just Google Living Corporate at this point. That's right. Stunt. That's right. Lowkey flex, but it's an honest flex. So Google Living Corporate. We out here. If you have questions you want to email us, check us out at LivingCorporatePodcast@gmail.com. Hit us up on the DMs. Twitter is @LivingCorp_Pod, Instagram is @LivingCorporate, and until next time, this has been Zach, and you have been talking to Kori Hale, CEO and founder of CultureBanx. Peace.

Zach speaks with the founders of Dipper, Jacinta Mathis and Netta Jenkins, about the value of your personal voice. They also share their journeys that led them to create Dipper and talk about their plans for the platform in 2020.Connect with Jacinta and Netta on LinkedIn!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and you know how we do, right? We come on, I say something like "What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate," and then I maybe remind y'all that we're a platform that amplifies the voices of black and brown people at work, right? You should get the drift now. We're at, like, episode a hundred and something. Now, as you also should know by now, I'm bringing to y'all some more fire for ya head top, some dope guests. Now, this is really only the second time in the history of Living Corporate that we've interviewed two people at the same time, so, you know what I'm saying, shout-out to us for that, and I'm just really excited 'cause we're getting--I don't want to say two for the price of one 'cause that's kind of cheesy, right? But I'm saying we have two incredible guests, Netta Jenkins and Jacinta Mathis. Jacinta: Hey.Netta: Woo-hoo!Zach: What's up, y'all? Now, look, we're just gonna get straight into it. I'm not even gonna go through the whole intros 'cause y'alls bios, if I was to try to do it, you know what I'm saying, I'ma take up all the time. [Jacinta and Netta laugh] So for those of us who don't know y'all, please share a little bit about yourselves.Netta: Yeah. Jacinta, would you like me to start off? Or--Jacinta: Go for it, girl. Go for it.Netta: Okay. Well, I guess I'll start off with something fun. So I'm an Afrobeats living room dancer. Love Afrobeats.Zach: Oh, turn up. Come on, Afrobeats.Netta: [laughs] But aside from that, I'm the author of Self-Advocacy & Confidence for a Fearless Career, a Liberian-American woman. I'm a wife, a mom to a four-month-old baby boy and a six-year-old, and I'm also co-founder of Dipper. You know, by night, and vice president of global inclusion for Mosaic Group and Ask Applications by day in a full-time capacity. And I'd say, you know, in my full-time role I focus heavily on breaking systemic gaps and publicly challenging the notion of simply adding diversity doesn't equate to an inclusive and equitable work environment. And I'm just really excited about our Dipper platform that, you know, helps guide professionals to a better workplace, whether good, bad, or indifferent, and we're really, you know, giving people of color a voice, and we're holding companies accountable and helping them to be improved at the same time.Zach: Well, come on now, Mrs. Jenkins. I appreciate you.Netta: Hey, hey, hey. [laughs]Zach: Come on, now. Wait a minute, now. Let me give us this Flex bomb. [Flex bomb sfx] You know what I'm saying? That was incredible.Jacinta: That was well-deserved. Well-deserved.Zach: Well-earned, absolutely. Okay, now go on, Jacinta. You got it.Jacinta: Yeah, so I am Jacinta Mathis. I am a Floridian who's stuck in New York. I've been here for about 11 years, and I don't think I'm leaving any time soon. I'm a data-driven performance marketer. I also focus on product growth and really feel like that's my specialty. And, you know, I'm working on building amazing products and then telling people about them. That's a lot of what I do. I'm also an evolving executive at an amazing tech company and co-founder of Dipper with Netta that we feel is revolutionary in providing this digital safe space for people of color that we have, you know, formed ourselves, with our own network. We're just making it something that can exist at scale and reach millions of people. And also I am, you know, a life partner and a mother to my amazing little family.Zach: Wait a minute, now. [Cardi B "ow" sfx] You know what I'm saying? [all laugh] So let's do this, let's do this. You talked a bit about who you are, but what's been y'all's journey, right, in becoming the entrepreneurs, public speakers, educators, corporate leaders, you know, and advocates that y'all are today? Like, how did y'all get to this place where y'all came together to really create Dipper? 'Cause I want to talk about Dipper as we talk about really, like, the value of your personal voice, but, like, how did we get here?Jacinta: Yeah. I think this is how Netta and I connected, because we were both raised--like, somebody nurtured us, watered us, so that we could become the sisters we are today, and really I think our legacy and what has happened before we even existed really helped mold the journey that we live today. And so, you know, I moved to New York to be a writer, and I ended up working at interning--when you could intern for free and it was legal--at PR agencies. I also worked in a restaurant, and I also had a gig at Target, and through working in a restaurant I met someone who was a media seller and kind of told me how ad agencies in the city work and really helped mentor me into a role at an ad agency, and that was kind of how my media buying, kind of advertising and marketing career really kicked off. And then when everything became digital I kind of literally fell into a tech company that ended up not being successful, but then I ended up at a really successful one where I met Netta and really helped build my career. And I think from there I realized, you know, tech would be a big part of everything that I did, and really this kind of experience and providing a safe place was something that I looked for everywhere I worked, and so when--just talking to Netta, it was like, "We have to make this a thing." Like, "It's something we have to do together."Netta: Yeah, absolutely. I think for me, when I start thinking of the journey, it dates back to when I was much younger, and so, you know, my African parents, they really stressed the importance of education and confidence at a very young age. So while kids were on their summer vacation or playing outside, I was the one reading books and creating goals. And I read a lot. I asked a lot of questions. Sometimes teachers were a little overwhelmed. Like, "Damn, she's asking too many questions." And then also being able to hear my parents tell me, "Listen, you have the ability to create change," really gave me the confidence to do anything that I had set my mind to. And so it started off by me becoming president of the freshmen class, where I was one of only three black people in the school at that time, to heading off to college, graduating in three years instead of four. Just, like, really being ambitious in all of my goals and then starting a casting company in college, and really that was to create a safe space for women to model and act in the entertainment industry. Because obviously it's very--it's, like, predominantly male-driven when it comes to, you know, the clients. And then business led me to Boston, where I completed my MBA, and off I was after that to New York, because predominantly a large amount of my clients were located in New York. But unfortunately there came a point where, you know, my business that I had grown in college and had expanded was no longer sustainable, and so I started looking at technology recruiting contract opportunities because I just couldn't see myself in a full-time opportunity immediately after owning my own business. I'm like, "How am I gonna be able to report to somebody?" So that whole concept in my head, I just couldn't wrap my head around that, but I've always been passionate about technology like Jacinta, and data, and specifically providing opportunities for people. Love seeing people win, and that led me into my contract recruiter role with the current company that I'm with today. That turned into a full-time opportunity, and I was able to jump from level to level in a matter of four years, and now at a VP level--[cha-ching sfx]--uh-oh. Cha-ching. [both laugh] But, you know, I think what it is is there's a lot of people that ask me, like, "Netta, how were you able to get to the level that you're at so quickly?" And it's really about building meaningful relationships. I think executives were able to trust me. Executives saw that the employees trusted me. They liked the boldness, sort of the non-sugarcoating attitude in "We're not gonna have quotas here." You know, "We really have to dig deep and deal with some of these systemic gaps." And then just simply the ability to empower employees to create change, and I always say that the key to success has been persistence, working smart, and really never quitting, and I'm really, really excited that I'm working alongside with Jacinta. We worked together at the same organization for many years, and she's phenomenal. So to be able to have, you know, a teammate that you can learn from every single day is truly inspiring, and so I'm happy that we're in this place where we're at now.Zach: Well, come on, then. You know, I just--this is dope, and you've already kind of touched on it a little bit, but you said earlier about, like, using technology to help people. I'm really curious about, you know, your passion around that, because there's been multiple studies shown that even though the world is becoming more and more technically advanced and we're seeing--like, we're seeing opportunities open up within these tech spaces, [but] we're not necessarily seeing opportunities for black and brown people growing at an equal rate, right? Like, we're still seeing a bit of like, "Hm." I don't want to say segregation. We're not seeing, like, any type of uptick when it comes to opportunities and employment and progression and succession, and so I think that's really awesome that we have people in these spaces who are advocating for those voices and those people. So check this out. Today we're talking about--I said all of that as a digression in this mug. Okay, so now, today we're talking about the value of your personal voice. So, like, when did each of you realize that your voices mattered, especially within the workplace? Like, was there ever a moment where you were like, "Man, wait a minute. I can actually speak up and it mean something."Jacinta: Netta, do you want to go first? Or do you want me to? [both laugh]Netta: No, you go for it.Jacinta: I think--I feel like it's fortunate and unfortunate it took other people recognizing it before I really recognized it. I think Netta kind of touched on this a little bit too. Like, people will talk about you when you're not in the room, right? And hopefully those people are sponsors and will advocate for you, and I think it really became a point where it was like, "Oh, Jacinta should be here." Like, literally getting grabbed and brought into a meeting, you know? Or someone saying, "Oh, we think we should run with this product change. What does Jacinta think?" Or, you know, really wanting to understand your input and value, and then when you present something seeing people jump into action or, you know, really seeing change happen. I think that's when I realized--I was like, "Oh, wait. People hear me. Like, they're really listening to me, and they're really taking what comes out of my mouth as word and that it's something that we should do," and I think sometimes, especially as a black woman in a corporate space, you may tell yourself to, like, mute your voice a little bit, but I was finding that what is kind of the stereotype was what people wanted me to embrace in my own way, especially--'cause sometimes you're in a room and nobody's saying "This is wrong." So they're like, "Oh, we know Jacinta will call it a spade," you know? [both laugh] So it's really having people around me that helped empower me to realize, like, my voice mattered and that people were hearing me, and then I just got more--you get more comfortable in that, and then having your network--like, I had Netta, and sometimes we would talk to each other, and I would bounce an idea off of her or show her a presentation before it went before the executive team or the board, just because I was like, "Well, what do you think about this?" And that helped me strengthen my voice too in the workplace.Netta: Yeah, absolutely. I think Jacinta's spot on with that. It's really about, you know, being able to lean on those people within the organization that you trust that empower you to have that voice, you know, to be bold, to speak up for yourself, to advocate for yourself and advocate for others. And so, you know, Jacinta was definitely that sounding block for me, and she still is even as business partners. We're always bouncing ideas off of each other, work-related situations like, "Hey, how should we get through this? How should we handle this?" And it's easier that way, right? It's harder when you're alone, and that's how come I think Jacinta and I both use the line "It really takes a village to create change and to get things moving." And Jacinta is my village, [laughs] so I'm thankful for that. I also feel early on as well I started noticing that I had a little voice and my voice mattered somewhat. Like I mentioned before, I was one of three in high school, and in middle school I was, like, one of two black people, and I remember just, you know, a whole bunch of racial slurs said. We were the only black family in that neighborhood at the time. It was a pretty, like, affluent neighborhood, and I remember going home to my mom and crying about some of the things that were said to me, and the one pivotal thing that my mom said to me is, "I didn't bring you on this earth to cry. I brought you here to create change." And I kid you not, that has been the most powerful line for me throughout my life, 'cause I always think about that. I'm like, "Wait, hold on. My mom brought me on this earth to create change." You know? And so when I got into high school, that's the reason why I ran for president of the freshmen class, because I wanted to create change. I knew of, you know, the inequities and the challenges that were going on. I was tired of them just putting up a picture of Martin Luther King and thinking like, "All right, we're done with Black History Month!" And then that's it, you know? I was really ready to challenge that, and I did, and I think that really prepared me for the work that I do now.Zach: So then let's talk a little bit about the work, right, that y'all are doing now, and about Dipper, right? And, like, by the way, the website is super fire. I very much so enjoyed the layout. I liked it a lot. But, like, how did this passion that y'all have and this realization, this self-realization of your voice and it mattering, play into the creation of Dipper?Jacinta: Yeah. It's so weird. I feel like every answer we're gonna be talking about our parents, right? [both laugh]Zach: That's fine.Jacinta: Yeah. So my dad was a chief diversity and inclusion officer for--I would say in the early '90s, before, like, diversity and inclusion was a thing--Zach: Your dad?Jacinta: Yeah, my father.Zach: Wait a minute. Wait, wait, wait. So you said your father was a chief inclusion and diversity officer in the '90s? [record scratch sfx, all laugh]Jacinta: You're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa." Yeah. And so, like, before it was really a thing. He was a Fortune 500 company and pushing them to make strides to create these more inclusive workplaces, not only for their employees but also for their vendors, and just seeing a lot of those, like, conversations happen at our dinner table--my mother was an attorney at a law firm, and I think she was one of the only black attorneys, and she was also a female. And so just kind of--these are the conversations that you would come home to for dinner, and just hearing about the things that they were dealing with and how, you know, how they would get through it and how they would grow and maybe even how they decided to exit, you know? And then working with Netta and really seeing how we built this village and this corporate space to talk to each other about raises, promotions, breastfeeding advice, whatever, you know? We were leaning--although it's important to lean in, sometimes you also have to lean on somebody, [and i oop sfx] and so we had to lean on each other, you know? So we met--I think it was lunch. I don't want to be cliche and say it was brunch. And we were just, you know, articulating how this needed to become something that other people could participate in, and with our backgrounds in tech it just seemed like the right path. It seemed like the thing that we should do. And I think in my heart I wanted Netta to be like, "That was a horrible idea," [laughs] but she was like, "Girl, yes. We have to do this," and, you know, immediately we connected with a company that we knew--he actually went to college with me and is an alpha, and [I'm an AK?], and so I reached out to him immediately and was like, "We need a dope website," and they were able to work with us to create that. And I really feel like it's been, like, this catalyst that has helped us launch and helped us reach so many people. Zach: Well, shout-out to the Divine Nine, you know what I'm saying? [they laugh] I respect how you slipped that in there. You know, I'm a [?], but I always respect my--Jacinta: [laughing] It was not intentional.Zach: No, no, no, but it just comes out, you know?Jacinta: This is true. It just leaps out, yes. [laughs]Zach: Can you--I know we're gonna get to Netta's side, but I just want to pause really fast. I'm gonna respectfully ask that you tell your sister, Kamala Harris, to promote this episode when it comes out. We won't use any type of logos, so don't sue us please. But if you could just--[all laughing]Jacinta: I will [?] her right now. I will slide in her DMs. [laughs]Zach: Please. If you could. We'll even--I was about to joke and say we'll even put, like, some [?]--but I don't want any type of [Law and Order sfx], you know? No issues.Jacinta: Yes, I respect that.Zach: Okay. Well, cool, I appreciate the answer. Netta, please go ahead.Netta: Yeah, no, I--oh, my gosh. I don't have much to add other than Jacinta was definitely spot on. That's exactly how it happened, and we're really excited about this--you know, overall excited about this platform because it gives people a chance to really share their experiences, and also it gives us a chance to hold companies accountable if they are not doing it right. It gives us a chance to guide professionals of color in the right direction. It's funny - I'm a part of, you know, many different Slack channels. One in particular, Black Tech Women, and just today there were a couple of people that were just talking about, "Hey, I wish I could gain insight on this particular company," or "Do you guys know what's happening to this technology company?" You know, "How's the culture there for people of color?" And I'm like, "Listen, head to ourdipper.com, because we definitely provide that type of insight." So there's a lot more people that's looking for that. They don't want to waste their time in organizations that aren't going to value them, and we're really excited to be, you know, launching something like this that can push professionals of color in the right direction.Zach: I know we're kind of talking, like, around it. Like, we're saying, like, you know, at a high level what it is, but, like, from what we talked about, Netta, in our conversation--like, help me understand. If we were to, like, kind of compare it to something, is it almost like Glassdoor but, like, for the black people? And brown people?Netta: I don't want to say Glassdoor, right? We could say maybe, like, if Glassdoor, Yelp, and Black Lives Matter had a baby. Zach: Oh, snap. Okay, got you. I got you.Jacinta: That was good.Netta: Can I get a boom or a bang?Zach: Oh, hold on. Hold on, I apologize. Hold on, hold on, hold on. [Flex bomb sfx] You know what I'm saying? Hold on. [kids applause sfx] You know what I'm saying? Hold on. [kids applause sfx] You know what I'm saying? I got y'all. I got y'all. I was gonna make, like, a really bad joke and say, like, "Is it like Vibraniumdoor?" Jacinta: [laughs] And it's really focused--I think Netta and I--and this is all based on the type of people you have in your network, but, like, I know with my girls, like, you can complain--we can complain to each other. We can vent, but after you're done talking, they're gonna be like, "So what are you doing?" Like, "What are you doing? What are we doing? What are you doing different?" Like, "Are you gonna make a move?" And I think that's where we saw the gap. It's like, "Yes, we want you to vent, we want you to have a safe space," but we also think it is time and there needs to be a space for someone to ask an organization, "What are you doing? "What are you doing to fix it?" "What are you doing to make this better?" "What are you doing to retain these talented people who are exiting, and they all happen to be brown?" You know, just really addressing critical issues and making that information, you know, accessible to them but within reason. Accessible and actionable, you know? 'Cause this is a safe place, and it is an anonymous platform, you know? And that is the key. We want people to feel protected, because they are, and I think a lot of times we don't speak out. And Netta often talks to me about this, like, "People aren't speaking out because they don't feel safe." And so that was very important to us, that this community is our top priority, and, like, that is where we want our goal to be.Zach: So it kind of sounds--again, while keeping people safe, it's like you really got receipts on people. So let's just say, like, if--I don't know, I ain't tryna mess up my sponsorship dollars so I'm not gonna say a company, but let's just say Insert Company Here was like, "We're mad inclusive," and y'all come back with the receipts looking like [haha sfx]. Like, "No, you're not," you know what I'm saying? We got all these people saying there's some issues you need to shape up. But we also talked about the fact that, like, it's not just for airing organizations out. It also can be a place where people are also giving positive feedback and stories, right?Netta: Right.Jacinta: Absolutely.Netta: And overall, we want these companies improved, you know? If they're not doing well, we want to be able to provide them with the solutions to solve that issue. We're not leaving them high and dry, and, you know, I think that's the difference with other platforms or a Glassdoor or a Yelp. ["stupid" sfx plays in the background] We're looking to improve these companies. Jacinta: Mm-hmm. And you want to know where--like, you want to know if some place is a good place for you to go to, and we get--just as many bad reviews as we get we get good ones, and, you know, we get people who are like, "I've had a great experience here. I've been able to grow. I've been developed. I have an amazing mentor. I want more people who are brown and more people of color to come here. I don't want to be the only one." You know? So I want to see them here more and know about the opportunities here. Zach: No, it's really cool, and I do hear your point around, like, you're not just gathering the data just to gather the data. Like, there's a consulting play to it too, right? Where you then say, "Look, this is what people are saying good and bad. Here are our recommendations," and then you're able to actually come alongside them to your point and actually, like, be a partner. And I think it's interesting because there's so many organizations out there, even as we have these group meetings and Slacks and folks are venting and stuff, [and] there really has yet to be one central location where we'll be like, "Mm-mm. Dawg, don't go over there. Mm-mm." You know what I'm saying? But it should be like that. Like, you know, the Lion King remake came out. People want to act like the Lion King remake wasn't fire. I thought it was great, but whatever. So remember, like, when Mufasa was, like, looking over the cliff, right, and he was talking to Simba, and he was like, "Everything the light touches is your kingdom," and Simba was like, "Oh, snap. What about over there?" He said, "That is the elephant graveyard. You don't ever go over there. Relax." That's pretty much like--you know, that's an opportunity for Dipper too, but, like, we don't really have that. We don't have a collective, you know, Pride Land overview of the workplace as it were.Netta: Yeah, and companies--I believe it was last year, McKinsey and Company did a study, and, like, companies are spending more than $8 billion on diversity and inclusion efforts. And we're like, "Who is that benefiting?" Zach: It ain't benefiting nobody. We've still got blackface on company pencils.Jacinta: Exactly. We're not on your board of directors. Few and far between of us are CEOs of the Fortune 500, 1000 companies, and, you know, we get pings--Netta and I get pings all of the time, especially in, like, the VC world, of people saying, "Do you know somebody who could be my chief of operations? Do you know somebody who could be my chief of people?" And we're like, "Absolutely." Like, I will respond to people with a list, LinkedIn profiles connected, you know? Because we feel we are here, we exist, and there just really needs to be this space for us. And there are people also who have done this before us, you know? There are people who may have been peers to my father [kids applause sfx] and they have a lot of insights to share, but they don't have a place to share them, you know? So it's kind of like we can't all go to the conference, we can't all go to the talk, but you could participate in our website and go to ourdipper.com.Netta: Right, and I think companies definitely have this warped perception of that "Okay, well, if we have a few black and brown faces, we've won," you know? "Let's put out the PR," and obviously it's much deeper than that like Jacinta was saying. There's the equity piece. Are we giving people the access and the exposure to not only move up but to have a voice and are able to lead, you know, in their own way? A lot of the times, when we hear about black and brown folks' experiences that are in high-level positions, they're still kind of oppressed, right? They really don't have that power to lead and that confidence. So, you know, those are key data points that we definitely want to bring out and share, again so that these companies are improved.Zach: Man, you said a lot right there, you know what I'm saying? I'm not trying to, like, wear out the Flex bomb, so I'ma just give it a little break. [all laugh] And you know--this is the thing, right? There is a--I don't know. I feel like sometimes, you know, these companies, they think they've just done SO much when they put, like, two black people in charge, you know what I'm saying? And we're like, "Yeah, but there's nobody else." And then these two--like you just said, these two black people, like, they're not really doing anything, or you just kind of shuffle 'em out there and they just kind of say some canned message that you wanted them to say. They're not really moving the needle in no kind of way. You talk to 'em and they're looking back at you--you know, they're looking back at you like that blank face on Get Out, you know what I'm saying? You go in for the dap, they grab your fist. You're like, "What happened?" Like, what's going on, you know what I'm saying? So--Jacinta: Or they sometimes don't have the support. They really don't have that support, so they're feeling alone, you know? Even if there's just two, two of you, it's like you may not have that guidance that you need to feel confident to really make those moves that you may want to make, and I think that happens with a lot of people.Zach: No, you're absolutely right. 'Cause I'ma tell you for me, like, you know, I'm in a position--and often times I'm one of the only ones in these spaces, but if I see one--if I see somebody that looks like me but maybe is, like, I don't know, my dad's age, I'm like, "Oh, snap, what's going on?" And they don't say anything back to me or they kind of give me some, you know, guarded response, I go--now, outside I'm smiling, but on the inside I'm like [damn, damn, damn sfx] You know what I'm saying? Just, like, what's going on?Jacinta: Yeah, and that's--and I wonder too, like, how many times are we, in these leadership roles and scared, you know, to--'cause I know I've walked in meetings, and this is me jokingly, like, you know, if there are more than three of us gathered, I'm gonna make an announcement. [laughs]Zach: What you gonna announce?Jacinta: Like, if we're at work and I walk in a meeting and there's three of us, I'm like, "Oh, we're meeting." You know, "This is happening." You know, I'm excited about it, but I do think there's definitely a category of people who are kind of working in fear, but part of that is just--like we were talking about earlier, knowing your voice, feeling confident and being able to use your voice, and that's part of it. Like, you're just at a place where you don't feel like it's safe enough for you to even have a voice.Netta: Right. I mean, I've even had people say to me they've been nervous to connect with, you know, another black or brown person in the workspace because they didn't want others to feel like they were trying to take over, right? So it would be--like, they would do a little silent text, like, "Meet me outside," and I'm like, "What?" You know? And so that happens a lot too. Zach: No, it does, and I think--how much of that, I wonder, is, like, also generational though? 'Cause, like, it gets to a certain point--and what excites me about Dipper and what I'm hearing is it kind of, like, removes the excuse of white gaze, right? Like, I'm not--white GAZE. G-A-Z-E, y'all. Gaze, you know what I'm saying? White gaze. Yeah, so just the idea of, you know, you needing to kind of, like, be performative in some way or hide a part of who you are, right? Because, you know, come on. Like, really? I mean, you know, we was kings and stuff, but I'm saying, like, two of us can't take over an entire Fortune 50 company. Like, come on now. Like, I should be able to have a conversation with you in the elevator without, you know, y'all thinking we plotting the revolution, right? Stokely Carmichael is not in here. Huey P. Newton is not here.Jacinta: I'm also like, "So what if we are?" [all laugh]Zach: I'm saying. I'm looking back at them like [Cardi B hehe sfx], you know what I'm saying?Jacinta: Because some of it is part--you know, what I think I have kind of lived by in the workplace is if I'm exceeding my performance metrics, if I am busting my tail to, like, meet goals, is there really a boundary? I mean, if I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, is there a boundary? Now, sometimes there are hurdles for you being able to successfully do what you're doing, and that needs to be addressed, but, you know, I think if you have a team full of people who are brown, but they're the top team in the company, nobody--people see green, you know? And nobody is going to say anything. I think the problem is when there's a board seat available, people see their friends in their immediate network, and those people all look alike, and so it's like, "How do we get into that flow?" And really we have to do it working together, you know? It can't just be the one person. It really is going to take a lot of us working together. 'Cause who's gonna tell you--like, wh's gonna give you the heads up that, like, "Oh, I know that's your salary, but every other president in the company is making five times that." [laughs] You know? Like, you're going to need those types of insights, and sometimes you're not going to know that if you don't have [?]--Netta: [? drive that?].Jacinta: Yeah, exactly. Zach: So let's talk a little about 2020, right? Like, what are y'all most excited about that Dipper is gonna be doing, like, in 2020? Like, what has y'all, like, really going?Jacinta: Mm-hmm. For me, because I love tech and I love data, that's what I think about almost every night, and I think in 2020 our product is really going to evolve. You know, right now we have the ability to go onto our site, write a review, share their experience, and in 2020 it'll be even so much greater and so much more, and that is something that really excites me about what's to come. You know, the more people who are joining our community, the more in-depth we can make that community experience, and the things that we want to do to provide people with insights on, you know, like we said, salary, available jobs, are just really exciting to me, and all of that data and information that people will have at their fingertips just makes me really looking forward to the new year.Zach: So this has been a dope conversation and we appreciate both of y'all being here. Again, you know what I'm saying, shout-out to everything that y'all are doing. Shout-out to Dipper, you know what I'm saying? I really enjoyed this conversation. I've enjoyed the soundbites. Have y'all enjoyed the soundbites? I've enjoyed my own soundbites - have y'all enjoyed the soundbites?Netta: Yes.Jacinta: Absolutely.Zach: Okay, great. You know what we haven't done, you know what I'm saying, we have not really given y'all the respect of, you know, these air horns, so Sound Man, go ahead and put these air horns right HERE. [air horns sfx] You know, it's just a compliment. It's a thing that we do. It's customary, you know what I mean? It's been over--it's almost, like, two years, and we've been playing these air horns for the good guests. Now, we haven't had any bad guests, but I'm just saying, sometimes we play the air horns just a little bit louder, you know what I mean? And y'all are on the louder side, so we appreciate y'all. Before we go, any shout-outs or parting words?Netta: Yeah. Well, first and foremost, thank you so much for having us on this platform. This was awesome. We're really excited about, you know, the partnerships, the meaningful relationships that we're creating, you know, with different organizations, and we're really excited about our full dynamic platform that's gonna be revealed to the world. This is truly gonna be game-changing and helpful for people of color that are really looking to be guided in the right direction.Jacinta: Absolutely, and I mirror that sentiment exactly. We're so thankful for this opportunity and to be able to speak with you and your audience, and, you know, really just shout-out everybody, all of you who have left a review, who have sent us your feedback and cheering us on, patting us on the back, and even those of you that have challenged us--and maybe even shaded us a little bit--you know, it's all fuel.Zach: Big up to our haters one time.Jacinta: [laughs] We love it, yeah. You can't live without 'em, and, you know, it's been an amazing ride, and it's just the beginning, and, you know, we're just incredibly thankful.Zach: Well, first of all, look, we appreciate y'all. And look, y'all, if you're listening to this--I want everybody to stop, okay? If you're in your car, you know what I'm saying, pull over to the side of the road, okay? Put your hazards on and go to ourdipper.com. This is not even an ad. It's just for the love, you know what I mean? Like, y'all didn't pay us nothing, you know what I mean? It's just off the muscle. So go to ourdipper.com. And you go ahead and just scroll down, you know what I mean, and at the bottom what you're gonna see is--it's gonna say "Need advice? Please take a few moments to provide some insights about your current workplace and experience." Now, look, some of y'all know that Kathy in accounting has been getting on your nerves, okay? Some of y'all know y'all ain't been getting that raise that you need, and some of y'all know you're not having a great experience. Take the time. Go on ourdipper.com. Provide the input. You're not only helping yourself, you're helping everybody that looks like you. And maybe some folks that don't look like you, you know what I'm saying? But lift as you climb. Okay, now, look, this has been a dope episode. Y'all know you've been listening to the Living Corporate podcast. You can check us out anywhere on LivingCorporate--we're on all the platforms. iHeartRadio, Spotify, Soundcloud, YouTube, you know, Pandora. What's another streaming--Google Play, you know what I'm saying? We out here is my point. We active, you know what I mean? Jacinta, 'cause you said you were an [fraternity/sorority], right? [all laugh] We active, you know what I'm saying? You know, we ain't just show up on Homecoming Week, you know what I'm saying, giving people problems. Like, we actually--Jacinta: No t-shirt wearing. [laughs]Zach: Exactly. We're not no [?], you know what I'm saying? We earned ours, you know what I'm saying? We went through the [?]. Don't play with us. [both laugh] So the point is, you know, we appreciate y'all. Check us out on Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, Instagram @LivingCorporate. If you have any questions you want to email us, you know what I'm saying, livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. You can also just DM us if you have any questions and you want to shout us out. If you want us to shout somebody out for y'all, hit us up. Let's see. Website? Living-corporate--please say the dash--dot com. Now, you also could do livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.tv, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.net. We've got all of the livingcorporates, y'all... we don't have livingcorporate.com, though. Not yet. Not yet.Jacinta: Soon come.Zach: Soon come, hey. [both laugh] Let's see here. That's it. You've been listening to Zach, and of course you've been listening to Netta and Jacinta, co-founders and movers and shakers of Dipper and Edge Snatchers. Peace.

Zach sits down with Cedric Chambers, the founder and CEO of JUMP Recruits, to discuss the definition of the term "diversity" and the concept of diversity of thought. Cedric also offers a few recommendations to CEOs and chief HR officers who want to see their organization become more diverse.Check out JUMP Recruits and connect with Cedric on LinkedIn!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and today is another day, another dope interview. Y'all know how we do, okay? So this is not--okay, like, we're coming up on--shoot, actually, let me say this. By the time this episode drops, we might be past 100 episodes, you know what I'm saying? Might have already hit the century mark. In fact, let me go ahead and hit these air horns just--you know, just in case we hit it already by the time this one drops, you know what I'm saying? [air horns sfx] You know, for those who don't know, Living Corporate amplifies the voices of black and brown folks at work. We interview executives, influencers, creatives, movers and shakers, the next folks up. You know, the real ones, you know what I'm saying? Come on. Like, all skin folk ain't kinfolk, okay? That's another podcast from the day. Those who know know what I'm saying. But we interview the real ones, okay? And today is no different with Cedric Chambers. Cedric is dedicated to enhancing the presence of diversity and inclusion in the workplace one client at a time. As the founder and CEO of Jump Recruits, Cedric partners with talented professionals and leading employers to diversify and improve the workforce culture within leading industries and growing sectors. Sound Man, you know what? We gotta drop some more air horns for Cedric. Come on, now. [air horns sfx] And I gotta add one of these Cardi B "ow"s, you know what I'm saying? ["ow" sfx] Just because. Cedric, welcome to the show, man. How are you doing?Cedric: I'm doing wonderful, Zach. Man, you are amazing. That was the best intro I probably ever heard. [both laugh]Zach: Man, I know I gave you a little intro, but for those who don't know you, would you mind telling us a little bit about yourself?Cedric: Yes. Well, look, to give kind of the full but be quick about it--so I'm originally from Georgia. Not Atlanta, Columbus, Georgia. And so--actually a little small town about two hours southwest of Atlanta. Grew up, played football, went to college, did my undergrad playing football, graduated from Savannah State with a business degree. I did a little work, you know, in the industry for about a year or so, went back and got my master's at THE Ohio State University, majored in labor and human resources, but then immediately after I got my degree I went into corporate America, spending almost 10 years in HR in various areas in a few different industries, including aviation, medical device, life sciences, pharma. You know, I've had the--over that time I've had the pleasure of traveling all over the world, and I've had opportunities to live in a few different places across the Midwest and Northeast of the United States, and so, you know, what I do and the experiences I bring, right, I believe are one of the values that I hold. I have a wonderful family, a beautiful wife of five years and two incredible kids. And as you mentioned, I am the founder and CEO of Jump Recruits, and so just to give a brief, Jump Recruits is a full-service diversity and inclusion technology start-up, and it's dedicated to and about inclusion, opportunity, and successful career outcomes for diverse professionals and employers seeking quality diverse talent. And I've been on this journey for almost three years, actually three years, and like Charles Dickens said, "It's been the best of times, it's been the worst of times," but to be honest, through it all, I wouldn't change anything.Zach: First of all, man, you were talking about I gave one of the best intros. That was one of the best, you know what I'm saying, guest intros. It was just--it was, you know, comprehensive, right? You gave a little bit of the sensitive side with the family tip. You gave some of your vulnerable side on the journey with Jump Recruits, and then you gave a bit of, like, just the history of kind of where you're from and what you did. As a side-note, shout-out to the Georgia boys. I was actually born in Rome, Georgia.Cedric: There you go. Look there, you're country too, man. [laughs]Zach: Oh, listen, with a K. [both laugh]Cedric: And that's the one thing--look, we can talk about it as we get into it, right, but I've been in different environments and, you know, traveling across, and I have a deep Southern dialect, and when I go into different places people immediately, you know, hear that. And so we'll probably get into that a little bit later, but, you know, it's all good, right? Embrace where you come from and just be authentic.Zach: Oh, no doubt, man. And, you know, it's just interesting because for me--just because of my exposure. So I went to--I was in Georgia, and then I went to Dallas, and then I went to Minnesota. So, like, my accent kind of comes and goes, or the drawl of my Southern--like, my Southern drawl kind of will recede or kind of extend during--just depending on the situation, right? But at the same time it don't matter about that part. I tell people all the time. I say, "Listen, don't let this pocket square fool you, okay? I'm very country. Don't play with me." [both laugh] Cedric: I'm with you.Zach: Yeah, man. So look, we're talking today about diversity. It's a super common term, right? And honestly a lot of folks use the term "diversity and inclusion" in a broad swath of ways, right? So, like, for you though, what does diversity mean?Cedric: Yes, great question. So, you know, I would say that, you know, when I think about diversity and the term, right, to me, what I pull from it is uniqueness in every way. You know, whether that be race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, perspective, et cetera. You know, when I think about diversity, I think about the setting and context in which it's being applied and the term, because diversity can have different meanings in different places depending on where you're applying it, right? And so, you know, I've lived around. And so living in Atlanta, diversity can be different than living in Wisconsin, where I've lived, can be different than living in Boston, where I've lived, can be different than living in Ohio, where I've lived, but that commonality that I think of is uniqueness and what are you bringing that's unique, what are you bringing that is one yourself authentic as I said before, but I always think about that is when we want to use this word "diversity" and think about "Yes, things are different," but in a different way, you know, how are you unique, and how are you bringing that uniqueness, you know, to everything that you're doing?Zach: You know, and it's interesting, right? Because a lot of times when we talk about diversity I think, like you just said, it's, like, uniqueness in every way. In every way, right? Checking a variety of boxes, right? Just what does it look to be non-standard or non-default? And so with that being said, I'm curious, do you have any particular thoughts around the concept of diversity of thought, and have you ever gotten that pushback in your work with Jump Recruits--they'll be like, "Okay, I see you have all of these, you know--" "You know, ethnic diversity is the only diversity. [?]. Diversity of thought." Like, what do you--[both laugh] When you hear that, like, what is your response?Cedric: Oh, man. I'm not gonna make it through this interview. [both laugh]Zach: Nah, I'ma keep it a bean with you. I'ma keep it a bean with you, right? Because when people say "diversity of thought" to me--I don't know how long you've been rocking with the Living Corporate podcast, and I'm actually surprised we didn't get canceled off of this joke, [Cedric laughs] but one time--and I'ma say it again so y'all have the opportunity to cancel me again. I said that white people made diversity of thought in the same lab they made crack. [both laugh] So you know--so now you know the Living Corporate official position, and yes--look, there's nobody y'all can complain to. Y'all listening to the podcast, if y'all got a problem the emails are gonna come to me and Ade, okay? So be mad, all right? Anyway, back to this interview. So Cedric, what your thoughts on diversity of thought, man? [laughs]Cedric: Look, and perspectives, right? You know, I hear a lot of things, and perspective, right, you've got to understand people's perspective, right? And even what you said, like, you know, I can see the perspective, right, and that's the one thing. You've got to come with an open mind and an open heart into situations, but, you know, thinking about diversity of thought--so, you know, unfortunately I have heard "diversity of thought" and have, you know, seen it used as a pushback, and when I hear it it's typically used in the context of either/or, and what I mean is when I'm having these discussions, and, you know, we could be talking about, you know, diversity, we could be talking about ethnicity and these things, and they bring up diversity of thought. They're saying that either I focus on having diversity of race, gender, sexuality, or I focus on having diversity of thought, which is not the way it should be looked at, right? And so it should be viewed as an and, meaning, like, yes, you should value diversity of thought, and then addition value diversity of background," i.e. race, gender, sexuality, et cetera. But so many people take that position of, you know, "I can't value both, and so I'ma go with the safest way out and say I value diversity of thought as a whole," and depending on how long you let those people talk, right, you can get down into the rabbit holes of, you know, the common terms of "I don't see color," X, Y, and Z, right? So, you know, that's a whole podcast by itself. [both laugh] But, you know, when I've encountered it as a pushback, you know, whether it be clients, prospects, or just in general casual conversations, I usually approach it from the perspective of "Hey, look, you're right. Diversity of thought is important and critical to the success of the team, organization, and relationships," but then I always follow up in that discussion with the question of "Well, then how do you acquire diversity of thought?" Because how a person thinks is heavily based on experiences and backgrounds, and if you aren't pulling from different pools and different backgrounds which have different experiences, then how do you achieve this goal of diversity of thought you're ultimately looking for? And I typically at this point get blank stares, [both laugh] which is great for me because now the real conversation can start, and we can start on even ground to say, "Okay, now let's talk through it and work this out."Zach: Man, you know, that's a great answer, and, you know, I'll tell you what I typically say, right? So, for background, right, I'm in change management. Like, I'm a consultant, so, like, I'm having these conversations where people say "diversity of thought," I'll say something like, "Well, you're absolutely right. Diversity of thought is important, and it directly intersects or it is correlated with diversity of race, gender, sexuality, so on and so forth." Those things are not mutually exclusive, right? On the outside they're giving me the blank stares that they give you, but on the inside I know they're doing a [“and I oop” sfx], you know what I'm saying? [both laugh] They trying to figure out like, "Okay, what do I do?" You know what I'm saying? So I definitely get that. So let's do this then. What are some of the biggest excuses you've heard organizations give as to why they don't have black and brown folks in their organizations? I'm talking black and brown disabled people, black and brown LGBTQ people, black and brown immigrants, black and brown--like, just why? Why is that? What are some of the biggest excuses you've heard?Cedric: You know, I'd probably go with the biggest that I've heard, seen, and I think everybody kind of rallies around, but the biggest is that there's an issue with the pipeline and that there isn't enough qualified black and brown talent for those companies to pull from. Which is totally false, right? Zach: Yeah, man.Cedric: And it's like--I'm not gonna go into why do we keep listening to that lie, [both laugh] so--Zach: Well, I think--let me shoot you some bell, right? I think for me it's challenging because it's like--one, I don't think people, like, really examine or really have examined how offensive and insulting that is, right?Cedric: Yeah. Yeah.Zach: Like, fam, come on, man. Like, we've been here. Like, so--Cedric: It's like you're doing what you can do, you're pushing out the best, and then someone says, "Well, I still don't see you."Zach: Come on, man.Cedric: And that's where it's coming from. Like, it's like we got so many great, you know, whether it be engineers graduating, you've got so many great doctors, you've got so many great scientists, right? We're doing so many things in the news, and it's still, like, this message of "I still don't see you."Zach: And we're all over here like [what more do you want from me? sfx] [both laugh] You know what I'm saying? Like, God. Cedric: Exactly, exactly. And look, I won't be naive to think that there are as many people of color as there are non-people of color, so I won't bet that, but for instance, like, we know that, for a fact, there are less black and brown engineers that graduate for college every year than their counterparts, and the National Society of Black Engineers have done a lot of great research in this area, and they actually have campaigns going on now to increase that number of black engineers graduating every year, black and brown. But what we also know is that from having these discussions daily with corporate leaders as I do, these same organizations are not going to the places and communities where black and brown people are, and they are not effectively attracting and hiring the great talent that's already in the market today. And if I could provide an illustration for you real quick - look at it like this. If I want to go catch a fish, I can't possibly do that by casting my line on land. I must cast in the water where the fish are, and that's what is happening today. Many companies--not all, and I will say not all, but many are casting in the wrong places, and as I see this conversation over and over and I hear this excuse, the question that I often ask myself or that, you know, we must ask is "Are companies knowingly casting in the wrong places because they don't want black and brown talent, or are they misinformed on where to cast?" And honestly I think it's both.Zach: That's a--hold on, hold on. Wait a minute. [Flex bomb sfx] That's a Flex bomb. Yeah, no, you're right. I think it's both. I don't think it's one or the other, and I think really when you talk about these topics, it's often a case of both/and, right? It's rarely ever one versus the other. Because I've had conversations, and I'm--look, I have a nuanced opinion on this, right? Like, when you talk about sourcing candidates--and so, like, you know, you'll hear organizations say, "We're gonna just recruit at all HBCUs." Okay. Yes, you should definitely recruit at the HBCUs, but there's also black and brown folks at the PWIs too, man. [both laugh] Like, all of the black people--like, man all of the black people are not just flocking to HBCUs. HBCUs are expensive. Like, I love me some HBCUs. Ayo, please, y'all, do not cancel me. We love y'all. PV, I see you. Okay? Prairie View, we see you, okay? Texas Southern, we see you. Cedric: Savannah State. Let's go. [laughs]Zach: Savannah State, we see you. Morehouse. Listen, we love y'all, okay? I'm just saying I went to a PWI, and there were many black and brown folks in my space who did not know what they was doing when they graduated, right? So there's talent there. They're in the same rooms with Becky and Keith and whoever else. Like, it's both, man, and I don't know why, but when I hear, like, "pipeline strategies," I hear--I hear--when we talk about minority talent, ethnic minority talent, it's like we're not even trying to think about how we plug into the PWIs. We just say, "Oh, we're just gonna go with the HBCUs." It's like, "You can do both. You can plug into the HBCUs and then look for and look at the student programs," 'cause every PWI has one, right? Every PWI has some program where the black and brown folks have huddled together to say, "Pick us." [laughs] So, like, you just gotta plug in.Cedric: You know, that's right, and it's--the word I'm going to say, for lack of better terms, is laziness. That's what it is, and it's the--you know, being in corporate, right, I've done HBCUs, I've done the PWI. There is a stark difference between the two as far as the resources and opportunities between the two, where I was in a career fair at, you know, HBCUs to where you're talking 20 to 30 companies, a lot of 'em banks and local banks, a lot of 'em militaries--the military is trying to recruit, but then go to PWI, and, like, you're talking about 200 of the Fortune 500 companies in here vying for spots, right? So the opportunity and resources--and then on top of that, when you engage with HBCUs and HSIs and the communities--and let's say this quickly--it's that it's more than money. That's what happened. It's "Hey, let's go give scholarships. Hey, let's go out and let's see, you know, what we can do from a recruiting effort." It's just transactional the entire time, and when you think about big schools, right, to where--whether it's the PWIs, and you think about some of these big companies. One of the biggest differences--if you want to come to an HBCU or an HSI, I need you to look at this long-term, and I need you to look at this and say, "We're talking about money, but not just money, we're talking about resources," i.e. training and development, and there are many institutions--predominantly white--where large companies are staples on their campuses, teaching them the skills and knowledge needed to be successful, not only today but in the future. I mean, these companies have offices in their career development office, right, and they're talking about data analytics, A.I., machine learning. And these companies even have--some of their senior officers are subject matter experts at these campuses teaching the classes. Zach: Man, they be in there. They be hitting up--they tapping every avenue of that relationship like [Cardi B "brat" sfx]. [both laugh] You know what I'm saying? They light that thing up.Cedric: Exactly, exactly. And so when you think about all of those resources, then you turn around and say, "Well, look, let's give a scholarship to somebody," or "Let's go out and let's go to this career fair," and then they don't see you again for another 12 months. It's how d you expect to build that pipeline? How do you expect to build that relationship, that brand and all of the little things that come along with it, if you're not invested? Now, I'ma say this, that's not all, but there's definitely a lot that's [?].Zach: Man, you're 100%. So look, I'm also gonna say something else. Cedric, I don't know, man, what [it is] about this interview, but I just feel like I gotta keep it a buck today. We keep it a buck on Living Corporate generally speaking. Like, don't get me wrong. We be dropping heat on here, okay? Hold on. Wait a second. Shout-out to my team, 'cause, like, we really be doing this, you know what I'm saying? [Kawhi "what it do baby" sfx] You know what I'm saying? We out here, okay? [both laugh] But this is my biggest thing. This is another personal pain point, right, is like we gotta make sure that when black and brown folks--like, when we go out to these HBCUs and, like, we're doing this stuff, like, we have to also bring this thought leadership and take it to the folks who are in charge, right? So, like, we gotta be talking to the recruitment teams, 'cause a lot of times--I'll say in consulting, right? I'm not gonna say the firm. I've been at a few. So I was at a firm, and, like, there was this common narrative that there was an HBCU that we did not hire for, like, the client-facing stuff. We only hired them for the technical stuff, and the reason was because they don't really have the skill set, right? And, like, we would, like--I'm saying, like, the black folks, like, we would lean into that narrative, like, "Yeah, they don't have the skill set. They're just not really--" And it's like, "Okay, first of all, what are you doing? Like, why would you--don't parrot that out loud." Like, let's figure out ways we can help our people. And then two let's, like, just ask the deeper why and think critically about "Well, why don't we believe they have that skill set, and what can we do to help develop that skill set?" And all of the things that you're talking about are 100% facts, but I think it takes a--it's gonna take a joint effort, right? And I 100% agree with you. So let's do this, 'cause I know we're coming up on time. So multiple whitepapers state that before organizations can seek to diversify their organizations, they should seek to diversify leadership and build an inclusive culture. What's your point of view on that, and what does it practically look like for you to help organizations be more inclusive at the leadership level before you start bringing in, like, the campus level undergrad, direct hire talent?Cedric: Oh, man, great question. I think--let's see if I can get both of these. So when it comes to diversity and inclusion, my perspective and point of view is that they have to have it at the same time, and I think that there are different levels at which they happen at. Like, you could float heavy to inclusion but then still do diversity and recruitment and things of that nature and vice versa, but it depends on the organization in which you're in, the culture and what's going on. And I start with inclusion first just to kind of go into it and say, "Let's think this for a second and say, "How do you build an inclusive culture if you don't have any representation, i.e. diversity, from the groups in which you're aiming to affect?" And so--and without this representation, this means that there's nobody from these groups that are able to input on the design of this diversity and inclusion strategy. And so when you talk about this inclusive culture, you have less than 1% of [?] in the organization, you know, less than 20%, you know, women in your organization, how are you gonna go and effectively--and on a leadership level it's definitely not there--how are you gonna go in and actually do this if the representation is not there? And so when you think about diversity, you gotta "Okay, are we bringing leadership in at the same of building that inclusive culture and doing those things at the top and then pushing it down?" As it relates to leadership, look, I would agree, but it goes back to representation, right? How can you effectively have a diversity and inclusion strategy driven from the top down when the top has no representation from the diverse groups in which you're designing for? And so I also say this. We surveyed candidates that had been hired and had received offers from companies. 87% of those candidates that we surveyed say that one of the first things they do when researching the company they're interviewing with is go to the leadership page and see who on the page looks like them. And then--Zach: Keep going, keep going. Preach.Cedric: And of that, 60% of that group say that that was a major factor on whether they accepted the job or not. And if you'll allow me to go just a step further, one of the things we do in our consulting area looks at, like, Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, and when you think about the top of that pyramid, and we get to self-actualization, the definition of self-actualization is "the realization of one's full potential." So let's think about this. How can I realize my full potential within an organization when I go to the corporate leadership page and I see no one that looks like me? And then how can that help me see myself as rising my career aspirations when I can't see myself on the website, I can't see myself in leadership, you know? I didn't see myself in the interview process with the people that I interviewed with. How can I actually see myself thriving in this organization? I can't.Zach: [straight up sfx, both laugh] No, you can't. Cedric, man, it's so funny. So what I've been doing--'cause I'm coming up on 30, right? Like, you know what I'm saying? Whatever.Cedric: Big time.Zach: Man, listen. It's different, man. Things creaking now, you know what I'm saying? Knees be sore for no reason. It's weird.Cedric: I know. It starts raining and your knee hurts, right?Zach: Right. It's like, "What's going on?" Cedric: Yeah, it's coming. It's coming.Zach: [both laugh] But you're 100% right. Like, lately when I do--like, when I interview, right, when I have the opportunity and people reach out, whatever, I'll always ask, like, "How imperative is your inclusion and diversity strategy at your organization?" They'll say, "Oh, it's very imperative. It's super important. Blah blah blah blah," and I'm like, "Okay, cool." So then I go, you know what I'm saying, I go to the little executive page, right, and, you know, the board looks like--you know, the first, you know, seven, eight presidents like [haha sfx]. I'm like, "Come on, man. Y'all not seeing this, man? This is crazy. This looks like a bunch of dollar bills up here." Like, this is crazy.Cedric: [laughs] Exactly, but that's representation, and so that's diversity, you know, from a recruitment aspect, adding them to the mix, and then inclusion is working on the other hand, trying to make it work. And so you're trying to do both, right? It's almost like--you know, in some cases, right--I mean, I'm from the country, right? And so there's certain cases and certain things where you need to mix and you need to pour stuff in at the same time to get that evenly distributed, and that's the diversity, right, man? You pour the diversity in while you're stirring the inclusion, and you're doing it at the same time, with both hands, because you need for it to evenly get into the mix so that when you look at the cake mix and batter it's something that you can go in and move forward with, right? It's not clumped up. It's not over here. It's not--I'm not gonna say segregated or whatever the case may be, right? You know, things are mixed in together, but they still have their identity, man. So it's--you know, it's interesting.Zach: Let me go ahead and saute on that metaphor, that analogy you got right there. So it's interesting, because even when you make a cake--'cause honestly I thought you were gonna go with, like, a sweet tea analogy, but either way, with sweet tea or cake, right, you gotta make sure you add heat to that jaunt so that way it actually, like, actually comes together, because--and even though that heat might be uncomfortable or may seem uncomfortable, you've got to put on some gloves or whatever and you've got to put it in the oven. You've got to wait, but it's gonna all congeal for the cake--or you gotta turn up the dial on the stove to make sure it gets hot enough so everything can come together, so it can actually merge into one thing that you can actually consume, that you can actually enjoy. It's the same thing, man. In that mixing process, you've got to add some heat to that. That heat might be, you know, accountable conversations, you know? True planning around how we're actually gonna make all this happen, how we're gonna mobilize our inclusion strategy, what does it mean to, like, really build a culture of sponsorship for your organization, and then that creates that culture that you're talking about.Cedric: There you go, there you go. I'm with it. I'm with it. [laughs]Zach: Now, look, let me respect your time. I got one more question for you.Cedric: Go for it, man. I'm here.Zach: What recommendations would give to the average white executive/power holder who wants their organization to be more diverse but isn't getting the talent they're looking for--they're not seeing the talent, you know, at the executive level?Cedric: Oh, man. That's a loaded question. You said white executive/power holder. [both laugh] I'll say this, and I'll say this for all senior executives, not just white--and I'ma primarily speak to CEOs and chief HR officers on this one--look, if you've decided that diversity and inclusion is imperative to the success of your organization, then I think you need to take this approach. First, go out and hire you a chief diversity officer. That's step one. Step two: for the first five to seven years on this journey, that chief diversity officer needs to report directly to the CEO. Not HR, not strategy, not social responsibility or impact. Have them reporting directly to the CEO. This not only will have a visual impact, but it will solidify that just like finance, just like strategy, just like engineering, just like HR, that diversity and inclusion is imperative to the business and it has a direct line to the highest of the high. And I believe it was Steve Jobs that said this, and he said it in the context of design. It's that "If a part of your business is so important to the CEO, it must report to the CEO," because then only can that organization place the same importance on it as the CEO does, and so you're going out and you're saying, "Hey, we believe in diversity," but then the diversity officer is four layers down in the organization [train?] and doesn't have any say-so, power, or ability to go make things happen. But now when that person reports directly to the CEO, and we're talking top-down--they say, "Hey, this is the move, and this is where we're going," and that person is right there, direct communication can get things signed off, accomplished, done quick. That puts you in a better position to be able to accomplish that goal.Zach: Man, I love that. And, you know, it's interesting because I think that kind of transitions--that transitions that D&I space from being just, like, another thing that's, like, in the compliance piece into something that becomes, like, a strategy imperative for the enterprise, right? A lot of times when we think about diversity we're just thinking about ways to avoid, you know, this sound, right? [Law and Order sfx] You know, just trying to make sure you don't get in trouble, you know what I'm saying? [both laugh]Cedric: Oh, man. And also, look--so I was in HR, right? In every organization that I supported, you got the business leader, you got the HR person, you got the finance person, you got quality, you got engineers, but they're in that organization. And so HR is in every organization. Finance is in every organization, right? And so diversity is in every organization. The same way you look at diversity of people, you should be looking at diversity of suppliers. The same way you're looking at diversity of marketing, the way you're looking at diversity and how you're looking at your strategy, where you're going--like, diversity is embedded in every one of those, and if it doesn't have that same vertical as the strategy/HR/finance organization, then how can it have the horizontal piece to where it cuts across all to be able to have that impact and show up in the every day workings and doings of how people act and how they work and how they do their jobs?Zach: No, 100%, man. You know what? You've been dropping bar-bar-bars, man. Like, just [Mario coin sfx x2]. You know what I'm saying?Cedric: [laughs] I love it, man. I love it.Zach: Man, I love it. Now, this has been a dope conversation. Before we go, do you have any shout-outs or parting words?Cedric: Oh, man. Look, I would say one, you know, shout-out to Jump Recruits, right? You can go find more information at JumpRecruits.com. Look, you know, the team, shout-out to my family and my wife, and look, I would say shout-out to all of the leaders, the employees, the janitors, whoever it may be that's out there actively pushing diversity, out there actively pushing inclusion, whether it be in your small circle and you're influencing those around you or whether it's at a large, large scale. Congrats, and I thank you, and I ask you to continue, to continue to push and continue to be--you don't have to be an activist, but you do have to be active. And so, look, continue to do great things, and I just--I love it.Zach: Wow, man. Yo, shout-out--man, round of applause, man, for Cedric, man. [applause sfx] My goodness gracious, man. This has been great, man. Thank you, and thank you for joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. Make sure you follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate, Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through living-corporate.com, please say the dash, you know what I'm saying? Look, we've got livingcorporate.co, livingcorporate.tv, livingcorporate.org, livingcorporate.net, livingcorporate. all of 'em except livingcorporate.com, Cedric, believe it or not, 'cause Australia's still got livingcorporate.com, and I'm like, "Man." So I don't know what we gotta do--Cedric: All of that. We're coming to talk to you, Australia. We're gonna have a conversation. 20/20. We need that. We need that.Zach: We need that. We need that. Look, man, if you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. This has been Zach, and you've been listening to Cedric Chambers, CEO and founder of Jump Recruits. Peace.

Ade and Zach remember and honor the life and work of Nobel and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Toni Morrison, who passed away on August 5th, 2019, at the age of 88.Immerse yourself in her bibliography on Amazon.TRANSCRIPTAde: "So the literature you live and write asks and gives no quarter. When you sculpt or paint, organize or refute, manage, teach, nourish, investigate or love, you do not blink. Your gaze so lovingly, unforgivingly, stills, agitates, and stills again. Wild or serene, vulnerable or steel trap, you are the touchstone by which all that is human can be measured. Porch or horizon, your sweep is grand." That was an excerpt from Toni Morrison's letter "A Knowing So Deep." Toni Morrison can best be described as a writer for a generation, for a millennia. As a black woman, Toni Morrison did one of the most unique things I've ever seen in literature - she centered us. Rest in power. This is Ade, and you're listening to Living Corporate.Zach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach.Ade: And it's Ade.Zach: And you're listening to Living Corporate. As you know, we're not really, like, a current events podcast. We don't create content that way, right? Our content is fairly evergreen, and that's just the way we do things, but with that being said, there are instances where there are things that happen--if you recall, I think this was in Season 1, when Botham Jean was murdered by police we talked about that, you know? So there are instances that cause us pause to really do, like, something more targeted, or something more current rather, excuse me, and today is one of those times. And, you know, you heard Ade's introduction. Ade, why don't you talk a little bit more?Ade: Sure thing. So, as Zach said, we're not really a current events podcast, but when you lose someone as--and I don't want to use the term "lose." At 88, Toni Morrison lived a full, fulfilling, long life, but when someone as impactful as Toni Morrison leaves to join her ancestors, there's a significant tremor, I think, that we all feel, and I think it's important to put something like that to words. Now, at the time of this recording, Toni Morrison left this earth last night according to her reps, and I think--it shook me enough that I had to leave work and, like, have a chat, kind of talk to everyone else who might be feeling the same way, and even if you've never ever in your life picked up a single Toni Morrison book, it's never too late to start. Now, the reason that she's so significant might elude a lot of people, not necessarily because they've never read Toni Morrison and felt the weight of her words, but beyond how amazing she was as an author--which is deeply important--she was also an editor. She also contributed in a massive way to black history as it is being recorded, and it is so important that we're able to recognize and build on legacies like that. I'm gonna stop saying "um." I'm mostly just emotional. Toni Morrison had a way with words, which I think is the most singularly underwhelming statement I've made in all of 2019. You have to respect the sort of person who was able to craft an entire universe and prose, but you also have to respect the sort of person who kind of moves others to do the same. Like, there are writers and then there are leaders. I've never been a writer, but Toni Morrison charged all of us with the mantle of writers, insisted that if you have a story, tell it, take control of your own narrative in ways that I don't think we were empowered to do, told black stories from the perspective of black people in ways that I don't think it occurs to other people as necessary to do, right? Like, when you are systematically erased and made invisible in your own country, and then you dare to center your own narrative, there are a lot of questions, and some of you may remember the interview she had way back when--I think it was in the '90s or the 2000s--somebody asked her if she ever thought to write about white people meaningfully, of the lives of white people meaningfully, and that's sort of the question that we wrestle with on a regular basis, whether or not we realize it, is that as people of color, as people with marginalized identities, we are often asked to center the reality of others above our own, and what Toni Morrison did was powerful in that not only did she say "I'm not going to do that," it almost didn't even occur to her to do that, because the life you live is yours, and the life I live is mine, and the story that I choose to tell about myself is mine, and it is powerful because I own it, and the significance of that for me just speaks to authenticity. And I'm not one to wax poetic about authentic blackness, because I don't believe blackness is a monolith, therefore yada, yada, yada. I could insert all of the sociology prose here, but what I know to be true is that I don't often walk into a world that lets me just be. I am labeled and categorized and othered in a lot of different ways that really have nothing to do with who I am. It's everybody else's context of me, but reading Toni Morrison's works validated for me what I've always known in that I'm an individual and I'm allowed to be. Yes, I believe in my community, I believe in the strength of the community, I believe that we're stronger together. I ride harder for black women than anybody else in the world because we all we got, but what Toni Morrison stood for was our rights and not center other people's concerns about us, and it's the single most liberating concept, because once you stop caring what other people think about you, once you stop caring about, you know, being black in a public space where other people might not like your hair, your clothes, your skin color, your dialect, you get a lot freer, and you get a lot more mental real estate to care about the things that really matter, and that's just invaluable. I feel like I've been waxing poetic for hours. I'm sorry, Zach. Would you like to go over--Zach: No, no, no. It's all good. I relate to your feelings despite me not being--not being a black woman. Toni Morrison, like, she really carries the mantle and continues the tradition of black women really being the true North Star of human consciousness, or at least--especially American consciousness, in that she spoke the truth consistently, and she spoke the truth that wasn't just truth for black women or black folks. She spoke the truth, you know? There's a passage in--there's a passage in the Old Testament talking about wisdom, and the writer personifies wisdom as a woman, and the writer says, "Wisdom cries in the streets and lifts her voice in the square," and the imagery there is that there's wisdom in the streets and in the square speaking to be heard, crying out to be understood, and she's being ignored by fools, and Toni Morrison encapsulates that in so many different ways. For me it's just so timely, right? Like, when we talk about Toni Morrison--she did live a health--she lived a life, right? She did not die at an exceedingly young age, and we were blessed to have her for 88 years. Ade said so much. You said so much there that I'm not aiming to, like, be redundant. I know for me though, when I think about her quotes--not just her quotes and what she wrote, but, like, some of the things that--just the interviews that she had. Like, so from "Beloved"--I'm reading this one right here. "He licked his lips and said, "Well, if you want my opinion--" "I don't," she said. "I have my own."" Right? The reality of "Look, I don't--I don't need to bend my perception and my reality to yours," right? "My experience is valid because it is mine. My life is valid because it is mine, and to think my words and my truths are true," and that's powerful. We live in a day and an age, especially in corporate America--and I've had my own challenges, and I continue to have my own challenges, pains, both present, recent, and past that are really often built around not bending my knee to the fragility, to the entitlement, and to the insecurities of others, and Toni Morrison being a full-grown black woman her whole life--just lived her life without apology, and she wrote content that was without apology, and she carried herself with such matter-of-factness in her intellect and her genius. It was just incredible. It was absolutely incredible, and it's inspiring, and it's that type of attitude and it's that ethos that I believe really inspires Living Corporate, right? Like, we have--I have a mentor. I'm just gonna shout him out, Matamba. His name is Matamba Austin. Matamba Austin--and I'm also gonna shout-out Liz Sweigart. They're mentors of mine at my current job, and they encourage me with Living Corporate because--they say, "Zach," like, "Living Corporate is incredible because you're not beholden to anybody," right?" Like, "Y'all just do what y'all want," and, you know--come on. Like, Ade, we're not out here going crazy. We don't have too many gunshots on the podcast, anything like that, right?Ade: No thanks to you.Zach: No thanks to me, absolutely. You know, we have a few sound effects from time to time, but, you know, the point is we're not going all the way nuts, but we live in a world that is so built on control and, frankly, white comfort, that speaking truth in any modicum--speaking any modicum of truth rather, excuse me, is deemed as radical, and that's sad, and it's sad that we've lost someone who--or that someone has passed that embodied that so, but what I'm excited about and what I'm thankful for is that she has left a legacy of black and brown truth speakers. She has created a legacy, and she is one of the people who we can look to as one of our founders, right, of just black thought leaders, and that is incredible. And yes, she does stan. I do stan, rather. She is incredible. She is one of multiple--her, my mother, and Candis are some of the main reasons that I just--I have to stand for black women. Like I said from the top, black women are the--I do believe black women are the guiding star for human consciousness--like, for decency and consciousness in America for sure. And across the world, but I can speak to America as I live here. Any time you want to see the truth or you want to hear the truth, you just need to listen to a black woman, and Toni Morrison is a great example of that.Ade: Just a second that there's, like, a phrase--I don't know who the author was of this phrase, but I heard it a lot in my sociology class, Sociology of Education in particular because it's apropos. It's "We stand on the shoulders of giants," and it's so important that we recognize that because--I come from a very communal culture, and it's very easy to lose that in the U.S. because it's so very--we're so very, like, individualistic, but Audre Lorde, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, all belong to this genre of truth tellers, like you were saying, who, in their own way, in however medium they chose to share it, they just told the truth, and they told the truth in a way that centered the black experience, and we all are spawning from that well of wisdom. And so here's to Toni Morrison. Have a sweet journey home. Zach: So, you know, we could continue to go on and on. One quote that I really want to read, out of the thousands that we could, is that--there's one that just sticks out to me, and it's one that I think about often, so I'm gonna read it here. So it starts this way. "When you get these jobs that you've been so brilliantly trained for, just remember that your real job is that if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else," and that is so much so the foundation on which Living Corporate stands and, beyond Living Corporate, on which I stand philosophically.Ade: Yeah, yeah.Zach: You know, I think that we live in a day, right, that--so white supremacy is still alive and active, and we still work in organizations and corporations that are built around white comfort and built for and by white people. So, be it malicious or not, that is the reality of the world in which we live. At the same time--not at the same time--no, at the same time. Hm. At the same time, black and brown--Ade: Look at you discovering grammar.Zach: Look at me. Black and brown people are in more positions of relative power in these corporate spaces than ever before, and it is imperative that--it is imperative that we use our power to empower others, you know? A friend of mine, he quotes this--and I don't know if it's his quote or if he read it somewhere else, you know, but he says, like, "A candle loses none of its light by lighting another candle," right? And so this quote about, you know, your job being to empower someone else, your role is to help--to give to others, that's applicable not only to those who are in positions of authority and privilege and power and access, it's also applicable to us. There's something that all of us can do to utilize our voice, to utilize our access, to utilize our privilege, to utilize our power, to utilize our skill set to help somebody, you know? I'm not gonna go on some rant about black economics or anything like that, but I do--I believe that there are practical, every day ways that we can empower one another and that we can uplift another, that we can support one another. There are plenty of very clear ways that, again, those in the majority can help and empower underrepresented and underprivileged groups. And again, there's also ways that we can empower one another, and Living Corporate exists to empower. Living Corporate exists to amplify the voices of black and brown people in the workplace. Living Corporate exists to tell the truth without apology and without caveat. Living Corporate exists to speak truth to power and not to be beholden by anybody. So yes, we're gonna do partnerships with Accenture and these other large brands, and we're also gonna keep it a buck while we do it. That's our goal, and that's why we exist, and so I just--Ade: A buck fifty.Zach: A buck fifty, you know what I'm saying? So, you know, that--I don't have anything else to say. I have nothing else to add here. I'm just--I'm sad, but I'm thankful. I'm reflective of course, and I'm just--I'm glad that we're here. I'm glad that it was because of Toni Morrison that platforms like ours, including ours, is able to even exist and even be appreciated in any dynamic.Ade: Yeah. I think the beauty of a person like Toni Morrison is that we don't need any more words. She's said them all. And I think, on that note, thank you for listening to this B-Side. Thank you for joining us. If you know anyone who's never read a work by Toni Morrison, pick something up for them. I love "Beloved," as you should, "Sula," any of her letters, any--like, anything by Toni Morrison. Pick something up and read. It's a beautiful--it's a beautiful time to be reflective and truly start to get back to understanding what matters. And love your family. Hold them close. You've been listening to Living Corporate. I am Ade.Zach: This is Zach.Ade and Zach: Peace.

Zach sits down with Michelle Gadsden-Williams, the managing director and North American inclusion & diversity lead at Accenture, to discuss her role at work and why inclusion is placed first in her job title. They also talk about her book, Climb, and how she sees organizations shifting in the next decade to be more inclusive to trans people.Read Michelle's full bio on AIT, and check out her book on Amazon! Connect with her on Twitter!Search open positions at Accenture.com!Check out Accenture's Inclusion and Diversity Index!Connect with Accenture on the following platforms: LinkedIn, Twitter, IG, Facebook, YouTubeTRANSCRIPTZach: What’s up, y’all? It’s Zach with Living Corporate, and I’m really excited to share something with y’all, okay? Now, I shared this last week, but just in case you missed it last week I’ma share it again. Living Corporate has partnered with Accenture to feature some of their most experienced North American black and brown managing directors and share their journeys, okay? My hope is you check out this and you peep the links in the show notes to learn more about each of them, including our next guest, Michelle Gadsden-Williams. Michelle Gadsden-Williams is the managing director [and] inclusion and diversity lead for North America at Accenture. Previously, she was the co-founder and chief operating officer of women’s empowerment initiatives and diverse entertainment investments, based in New York City. Michelle Gadsden-Williams has acquired a number of community service awards and accolades for her work as a diversity practitioner. More recently, she has been recognized as a 2015 Ebony Magazine Power 100 Honoree. Over the span of her career, Gadsden-Williams has been profiled in Black Enterprise Magazine, Diversity Inc., Diversity Executive, Ebony, Essence, Fortune, History Makers, Heart & Soul, Jet, New Vision—listen, y’all. Y’all get it, right? Okay, I’ma put the whole bio in the show notes. The point is Michelle has it going on. She’s killing it, okay? Beast. Straight up. [straight up sfx] And you know what? Also put one of those “owww”. [owww sfx] Like, this is crazy. I’m just so, so impressed. Her other notable tributes include being named the 2010 recipient of the Maya Way Award for Diversity Leadership by the incomparable Dr. Maya Angelou, receiving the 2008 recipient of the Harvard Black Men’s Forum Businesswoman of the Year Award, accepting the Rainbow Push Coalition’s Bridge Builder Award by the honorable Rev Jesse L. Jackson, and being recognized with an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters Degree from Kean University for her outstanding personal and professional accomplishments in the field of diversity and inclusion. In 2013, Gadsden-Williams was appointed as a member of the Global Advisory Council on Gender Parity for the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Y’all… do y’all understand—like, come on. Give me the air horns right here. [air horns sfx] Like, this is incredible. I am just impressed. I mean, look, man, I’m over here—we grindin’. Like, like, like… [what more do you want from me?] Look, with that being said, the next thing you’re gonna hear is my interview with Michelle Gadsden-Williams. Check it out.Zach: Michelle, welcome to the show. How are you doing?Michelle: I am doing very well. How are you?Zach: [applause sfx] Doing really well, really excited to have you on the show. For those of us who don't know you, would you mind sharing a little bit about yourself?Michelle: Sure. My name is Michelle Gadsden-Williams, and I am the managing director and lead for inclusion and diversity in North America with Accenture and the author of the award-winning book "Climb."Zach: Come on, now. [both laugh] Now--I love it. I love it from the jump. We'll be talking about Climb--we're gonna get there a little bit later in this conversation. Let's talk a little bit about the first thing you said, about the fact that you're the North American lead for I&D. And your title is I&D and not D&I. Can we talk a little bit about why inclusion has been placed firstMichelle: And this is a phenomena that's been happening, I'd say, over the past few years, where a lot of organization and diversity practitioners are starting to think of this notion of diversity as being--being a standalone entity is no longer enough, that inclusion is extremely paramount as having a culture of inclusion. So diversity is the invitation to the party, and inclusion is being asked to dance, as we say. So in my view, I&D is an essential component of everything that Accenture does, and we aim to be the most inclusive organization in the world, and so we recognize that inclusion and diversity foster greater creativity and innovation. So that's one of the reasons why we've decided to reverse it and have big I and big D.Zach: I love it, I love it. You know, and it's interesting, because a piece from Take the Lead, where you were featured, starts like this. It says, quote, "When Michelle Gadsden-Williams started working in human resources in 1990, the mission in her field was called affirmative action." And, I mean, that's really interesting, right? 'Cause we talked a little bit before we started the show--we talked a little bit about your tenure, right, and the breadth and depth of your experience, and, you know--so you started in 1990. Despite it being almost 2020, there are still folks who believe I&D efforts are some version of affirmative action. So, like, how do you, as an executive leader, navigate the fears and frustrations of those who look at I&D as a zero-sum game?Michelle: Yeah, that's an interesting question, and I'm going to go back to a piece of research that Accenture conducted a short time ago. And one of the things that we've done, earlier this year, is to take a step back and think about, you know, what is this impact of I&D in the workplace, and so we conducted a survey of about 18,000 employees of companies around the world, and we asked two very important questions, one of which was "How inclusive is your culture?" The other was "How willing are you to innovate?" And so while diversity factors very much into--and has a significant impact on--the innovation mindset, a culture of equality is the multiplier, and that's what's really going to help companies maximize innovation. So when I started doing this work many years ago, and actually it was just before 1990--yes, it was called affirmative action, and the strategy was really more about "So how many individuals of difference do you have?" So it was basically a headcount exercise. It had nothing to do with culture. It had nothing to do with inclusion. It had nothing to do about what we're talking about today. So fast forward to current day. This notion of inclusion and diversity has evolved, and now many organizations are really starting to see the true power of what this work represents, that it's not just about counting heads. It's about making those heads count and ensuring that every single individual, regardless of their difference, has an opportunity to realize their potential, realize their ambition, have a seat at the table, and to reach their career aspiration, whatever that may be.Zach: That's a really powerful point, because--it's interesting. I've been having conversations with folks who talk about inclusion, and I've asked individuals and leaders of organizations, like, "Look, how do you actually define inclusion?" And people will say, "Well, making sure everybody feels included." And I was like, "Okay..." [both laugh]Michelle: Well, that's interesting.Zach: And I'm like, "Okay..." But what I think is paramount when we talk about inclusion is the fact that inclusion from my perspective--and this may sound--maybe I'm framing it radically, but there's some type of distribution of power, right, to individuals so that they actually have a true voice. Like, I don't--I don't see a voice at the table absent some level of authority or power. And so when you talk about, like, career development and making sure that they're growing and that folks are progressing and things of that nature, what I'm hearing is--and I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, so help me, keep me honest--what I'm hearing is is that part of that inclusion definition also comes with some level of--if it's, like, promotion or positioning them, positioning folks, so their voice can actually be heard in ways that make sense, right? It's not just about, you know, nodding and smiling, but making sure that they're actually empowered.Michelle: That's exactly right. We all--like, we're all sitting around a table, that it's allowing individuals the place and the space to allow their perspective or their point of view to be voiced. So we all have a responsibility to ensure that that happens, whether or not people recognize that or not. I believe that's what true inclusion is all about, ensuring that people who have a seat at that table, they believe that they matter, that their perspectives and opinions and points of view--that they matter.Zach: No, I love that. I love that, and it's so--I really do believe--and I recognize your point in that where Accenture is in their journey, in their I&D journey, but I would challenge that--as I've had multiple conversations with other leaders, HR practitioners, other folks who ascribe themselves as I&D leaders or D&I leaders--that definition of inclusion, it always falls a little bit short to me. And maybe my bar is a little too high, but I'm like, "Okay, at what point are we actually empowering these folks who have been historically disenfranchised and under-represented in these spaces with actual power and, like, authority, so that they can actually, to your point, have the space and the breadth at the table to speak and actually actualize something?"Michelle: Exactly. And I think to your point, organizations are just simply not seeing inclusion as the right thing to do anymore. It just makes all the sense in the world, especially when you're talking about creating a culture of equity and empowerment where every voice counts and all of those kinds of things. This is the action that's behind all of that.Zach: Absolutely. And speaking of action, this year marks the 50th anniversary of Pride, and our workplaces are increasingly diverse, and in that diversity, trans individuals are working in the corporate space at larger numbers than ever before, along with black and brown professionals and, of course, intersect--we can't ignore the reality of intersectionality, that we have black and brown trans professionals also in the workplace. And so how do you see organizations shifting in the next decade to be more inclusive to trans individuals, particularly trans women of color?Michelle: I believe it all goes back to culture first and for organizations to look at building cultures where every single individual feels included and where they can bring their whole selves to work. Things like the Pride celebration--we had a week-long celebration here in New York, which was amazing, and I'm still recovering from all of the celebrations--Zach: Yeah! I had some friends out there.Michelle: Exactly. I just think that it's really about focusing on the individual, their needs and wants and desires, and a lot of us have very different lived experiences outside of the workplace, and a lot of societal burdens, we bring those things into the workplace unfortunately. And so when we talk about inclusion, when we talk about intersectionality and all of those things, none of this works unless the culture is such that it encourages and fosters an environment where authenticity, where being your true, authentic self in ways that invites others to be curious about your lived experience, all of this helps an individual to be a lot more innovative, productive. They will, by nature, feel included. I just think that all of this resonates, and all of this will ensure that, you know, individuals, they will feel truly valued for their differences and to be--and feel free to be exactly who they are, that they're not just there to check a box and that they're empowered to contribute in many ways. So I just think that the underpin of all of this is around culture. It's around innovation mindset. It's about the appreciation of the differences that we all bring to the table and the understanding and awareness that we all don't experience the world, our workplaces, in the same way, and that's what intersectionality is all about.Zach: 100%. You're spot on, Michelle. It's interesting, because what your point reminds me of--we just had a conversation with Tamara, the MD out of Austin--Michelle: Oh, Tamara Fields? Yes.Zach: That's right, Tamara Fields.Michelle: [?] a friend of mine, yes.Zach: Yes, and we were talking to Tamara about the reality of emotional labor. Like, there's a level of emotional labor involved in just existing as a non-white person in a majority-white space, right? So, you know, you see something in the news--like, because we were talking about seeing whatever atrocity you want to choose from--and not to sound flippant or dismissive, but if you're looking at the border crisis or you're looking at a police shooting or whatever the case may be, absorbing that type of content and then coming into a space that is uniquely alien to you can be exhausting. And to your whole point around, like, culture, what I'm reading--and I'm not saying you're saying this. What I read that as is that organizations will--organizational culture will change as the majority allows it to change, right? Meaning that if the majority of a space are adaptive to a particular culture, then the organization will shift, but if there is collective push-back against whatever the initiative may be, then things will slow down, right? And I think we see that, not just at a macro level--or at a micro level in our working perspective, but we also see it, like--we've seen it in the history of America, and so I think that really leads me to ask, like, when you think about--when you talk about culture and culture shifting, what advice or--what are things that you've seen executives do, organizational executives do, to facilitate cultural change for more inclusive workplaces?Michelle: Well, I think there are several things that leaders must do, the first of which is they have to make I&D, inclusion and diversity, a priority. There needs to be established diversity objectives and priorities, equal pay, advancement goals. Like, all of that needs to be established in order to shift the culture to the desired state. The second thing I would say is making leaders accountable, holding individuals' feet to the fire, and we have to track progress and really have some tangible consequences where if a leader does not--is not on board, then there needs to be some sort of--and maybe it's not a consequence. Maybe that is a strong word, but there needs to be some accountability in terms of ensuring that diversity and inclusion is priority #1 if we are to create the ideal culture that we're talking about here. I also think encouraging risk taking and ensuring that employees know that they have the freedom to experiment, to ideate, to innovate, and that's what helps us all learn and grow as professionals. So I just think all of these things will help us get to that ideal state and also create a culture--you talked about the freedom to fail. I think all of this helps in that regard.Zach: No, you're absolutely right, you're absolutely right. So, you know, earlier this season we had Chris Moreland. Chris Moreland is the chief inclusion officer at Vizient, and he was on the show. He talked a bit about covering and the actions that non-majority folks in the corporate space participate in to feel safe. I think the concept of covering--I know that you're fairly, if not deeply, familiar with it, as it's been--it's a fairly established concept. We see it in a lot of whitepapers from McKinsey to Deloitte. I believe Accenture's even talked about the concept of covering within the topic of D*I or I&D. What are some of the key covering activities you believe non-majority members commit in the workplace?Michelle: Let's see--okay, so say that again. So what are some of the--Zach: What are some of the key covering activities--what are some of the key ways that you see black and brown folks covering themselves in the workplace?Michelle: Oh. I would say things like not being active or involved in workplace activities like employee resource groups and things that can be perceived as polarizing. Sometimes people of color tend to opt out of things that might look or--at least from their perception--might look [like it's] nonsensical. So for example, I'm sure you're familiar with the employee resource groups or business resource groups depending upon which company you work for, and I've had individuals not engaged because they're like, "I don't need to be a part of that. I would much rather spend my time being part of the majority population." So that's a form of covering. I've worked with Hispanic colleagues who will change their name so that it's more Anglo-Saxon-sounding versus Latino-sounding. So for example, I worked with a gentleman named Juan Guzman, and he changed his name to John Guzman, because in his view it sounded less ethnic. That's a form of covering. So, you know, the list can go on and on, but I just think that when people cover--I don't think it serves anyone well. I don't believe in pretending. I don't believe in being something that you're not. You are who you are. Be proud of who you are. We are all individuals that have a gift and talent to bring to the table, regardless of what youre last name is, regardless of if you're wearing natural hair, regardless of if you are--if you have a thick accent and you're trying to get rid of that. I just think that the more in which these environments that we're working in are receptive and appreciative of the differences that we all bring, the better off we all are and the more productive we will be.Zach: No, absolutely. I love it, I love it. And it's interesting too because I think--so I was having a conversation with--I was having a conversation, just about some strategy pieces, with a colleague, and we were talking about "How do you determine, like, the members of your D&I space?" And the conversation was around "Well, we've got to make sure they actually go to events, right? They need to go to events." And I was like--and I was trying to explain to them. I said, "Look, I would not boot people out of a group, of an ERG or whatever you call it, right, in your respective organization--I would not boot them out of something because they don't physically attend an event." I said, "Some folks genuinely don't feel safe," right?Michelle: Right. That's true. And sometimes we just have to meet people where they are, right? Because everyone is not going to be on the I&D train, majority or not. So I just think sometimes you have to meet people where they are, explain to them what the benefits are of being part of these what I think are extremely beneficial infrastructures and organizations. It's support systems. It's infrastructures. It's, you know, an informal network of individuals who look like you, and you can talk about things that are unique and specific to your lived experience. So I think the more of which we can educate the non-majority members who don't feel safe being a part of these infrastructures--we just need to continue to work on them, but some people are not gonna get on board. I mean, at the end of the day, everyone is not going to be on the I&D train.Zach: No, 100%, and, like, I think the thing is--like, my point is I've been to some--so even when I worked at Accenture, right, like, there were happy hours and things, and the events--the events were great and people showed up and things like that, but I didn't always just--maybe I had a long day, maybe I felt like it was gonna be something else I was gonna have to kind of perform at. Maybe I was just nervous. Who knows whatever reason? That doesn't mean that I didn't want to be included in the group. It's just that that is not, at that point in time, something I felt like I had the emotional bandwidth to engage in. That doesn't mean that I might still not want to talk to somebody in that group or read whatever emails y'all send out. I just--it's different, and I think it's that--I think it's really considering that--especially when you have folks who are not black or brown or whatever that, you know, depending on that diversity dimension, overseeing the group. Like, sometimes there can just be some gaps because you just have genuine blind spots, right? And just understanding, like, "Hey, this is a different space," right? You know, this is not a technology implementation where you're coming to learn about the project or coming to learn about how this software, this SAP implementation, impacts your job. This is a space that's really meant to foster empathy, authenticity, and trust, and that's a different--to me a different level of measurement, right? And you can't just be so, you know, binary with it.Michelle: Yep, fully agree.Zach: [laughs] Okay, so let's do this. Now, you already kinda--you already kinda let a little bit of the dip on the chip, but can we talk about your book Climb? I'd love to hear about the inspiration behind it and why it should be something that professionals of color--and just really anybody, frankly--should have on their reading list.Michelle: Absolutely. So the inspiration behind the book was--I've always had the intention at some point in time in my career to write a book, and it wasn't until I was at Newark Airport in the United Airlines club lounge and a young woman walked up to me and she said, "Are you Michelle Gadsden-Williams?" And I said yes, and she said, "We used to work together many years ago at Novartis, and I've followed your career and all of the wonderful things that you've done. You know, have you ever thought about writing a book like Sheryl Sandberg or Carly Fiorina or Carla Harris at Morgan Stanley?" And I said, "Yes, but I just didn't have the time to do it." And she said, "You know, you should really make the time to do it, because you have an exceptional story to tell." So it wasn't until that young woman gave me that nugget, that idea to really take the time to do it, that's when I really thought seriously about putting pen to paper and telling my story. And so the act of climbing has been defined as the act of rising, to ascend, to go upward with gradual or continuous progress, and it's a term that I've used to describe my career over the years as a woman, as a woman of color, and as a diversity practitioner, and as you and I were talking about earlier, there's some individuals who have an easy go of it and can take the proverbial elevator up to the C-Suite, and then others not so much. They have to take the stairs with a backpack and no air conditioning. There's no smooth ride to the top for any of us, and so no matter how you ascend there is a journey that we each experience which, you know, ebbs and flows and it twists and turns, but with every step you get that much closer to achieving your highest aspiration, your North Star, whatever that might be. So my book Climb speaks volumes about my professional journey, and one of the things that I'm extremely passionate about--and this hasn't changed over the years--is helping people of color to maximize their full potential in corporate America, no matter where they are, no matter what profession or industry they're in or wherever they're employed. I've used myself as the subject, the protagonist, to candidly describe my jorney, and that would be the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything else in-between. And what I wanted to do was to focus on tackling some of today's most pressing workplace issues that people of color typically run into, but more importantly I wanted to offer some pragmatic solutions. So that's why I decided to write the book. It's my version of "Lean In" through my lens, the lens of a woman of color.Zach: I love that. So you talked about some of the challenges--and again, I'm not asking you to give the sauce away for free, right, but when you talk about some of the most common challenges that you're seeing black and brown folks face in the workplace, like, can you give us an example of one of those challenges?Michelle: Oh, sure. You know, working twice--being twice as smart, twice as good, but getting half as far. You know, that's the old adage that most of us, at least those of us of color, we've heard that growing up in our households. You know, this is not, you know, just jargon that we hear on television. It's our lived reality. And so, you know, the bar is simply at a higher level for those of us of color, and most of us know that.[straight up sfx]Zach: No, you're absolutely right.Michelle: Exactly, and most people of color are over-mentored and under-sponsored.Zach: Hold on. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Whoa, whoa, whoa. [record scratch sfx] Say that again.Michelle: Most people of color are over-mentored and under-sponsored.Zach: We gotta break that down. Unpack that.Michelle: We can have mentors all day long, people to show us the lay of the land and how to navigate and all of those things. We don't need that. We have a lot of that. We have plenty of that. We need individuals who are going to have a seat at the table, who are gonna be our advocates and champions and our, you know, sports agents sitting at that table, negotiating for us, putting our names up for promotion and for those stretch assignments where it counts. That's what we need.Zach: That is--that is so true. I've never heard it framed that way, but you're 100% right, because frankly I do believe--and in my work experience this has been the case, right? So this was the case when I was at Accenture. It was the case when I went to Capgemini as well and as I've progressed onto my current firm. There are black and brown folks around me--there are minorities around me who would show me how to do something, right, or give me the real from time to time. I was blessed with that, but what I didn't always have--and I had it more than others, to be clear. ['Cause] I have gotten promoted. Like, I've been able to progress in my career a few times, but the people fighting for me, right, the people who are really advocating for me in the same way or just even in a percentage of the way that they may advocate for someone who doesn't look like me who's doing half as much as I'm doing, right? And that's just a really good point. And it's so interesting, because when I talk to--when I talk to black and brown folks, particularly black women, the conversation often comes with a point of like, "Look, I'm working this hard, and I'm doing--I'm going above and beyond every day, and the response when I'm doing all this work is "Well, that's what you're supposed to do," but then if someone who doesn't look like me is doing, like, half of that--" To the point you talked about earlier, the old adage, which is based on history and reality. They do half of what I'm doing. They're getting their praises sung from the highest rafters, right?Michelle: Exactly. And so I think most of us who have been working in corporate spaces and places, we just understand that there's just more scrutiny on our performance, and a lot of this can lead to, you know, just lower performance, you know? Our self-esteem goes down. You know, lower ratings, lower wages, and sometimes job loss, because you're just not happy. So I just say all of this to say that yeah, the bar is simply at a different level for mostly women, but moreover [more] people of color.Zach: And you know what? So that last little point of distinction you made--and I promise I'm not trying to keep you forever, but it reminds me about the fact that you also--in the book you talk about intersectionality, and I feel like that point you just made just now was kind of an example of that. Could you unpack why you broke that out and you said "women," then you paused and you said, "Well, people of color."? Like, what was the--what caused that pause?Michelle: Well, that was just in my research for the book. Women and/or people of color, we do have similar challenges. Not quite the same, and this intersectionality that we're talking about--and this is such a topic that I have a lot of passion around, you know? I was just having a conversation with a majority female colleague of mine yesterday who just happens to be a peer, and she said to me, you know, "Michelle, we as women, we have the same challenges and we have the same barriers, don't you think?" And I had to pause for a second, and I looked at her--and I can't play poker, so I probably gave her, you know, a "Are you crazy?" kind of look. You know, as a woman and as a woman of color, my lived experience is vastly different than yours. So basically [what I said] to her is that, you know, "When I stand in my drive-way in Somerset County, New Jersey--that's not diverse at all and one of the most affluent counties in the state--but I'm standing in my drive-way and I'm holding my neighbor's child, who happens to be of the majority population, and the FedEx guy pulls up and wants to deliver a package to my home, that he automatically assumes that I'm the help and that she owns the house." You know, how often does that happen to you, colleague? How often is it when I walk into an elevator that the purse clutch scenario happens? And it happens to men of color too. So I could break it down for you in a lot of different ways, but, you know, my lived experience as a woman and as a woman of color, there's the double bind. So it's an interesting dichotomy, but it's real.Zach: [Flex bomb sfx] It is an interesting dichotomy, but it is real. Absolutely, and that's why I had to give you the Flex bomb, 'cause you're dropping straight facts. [both laugh] Okay. So look, this has been a great conversation. I'm honored and just very excited about the fact that you're here and that you joined us today. Before we go, any parting words or shout-outs?Michelle: Oh. This has been a terrific conversation, so I thank you for inviting me to be a guest on your podcast. Any parting words? You know, one of the things that my father would say to my two sisters and I growing up is, you know, "You are not here on this earth to take up space. You're here to make a difference, and it's up to you to determine what that difference is. All that I've given you is the tools, the education, and the rest is up to you." So all I will say to your listeners is you have to figure out what your passion is, what your purpose is, and determining how you plan to exert your power. You know, what are some of the kinds of things that give you fulfillment? You know, what feels natural to you? What qualities or attributes do you enjoy expressing to the world? And then just go for it. Anything is possible. Anything is. We just need sponsors, mentors, and others, other allies, who are gonna help us get to that next level. And if there's anyone out there who thinks that they can do it alone, I believe that they're sadly mistaken.Zach: And that's absolutely right, 'cause if you think--if you really think that in this space, as a black or brown person, that you're gonna navigate these historically-white spaces by yourself? Hey, I'm looking at you--Michelle: Exactly. I mean, we're working in institutions that weren't historically built for us.Zach: Absolutely.Michelle: We were not welcome, so therefore we have to be twice as good, twice as smart, Ivy League-educated or whatever the case is. We know that we need to do alllll the extras in order to get to where we want to be.Zach: No doubt. And I was just trying to say that if you really think you can do it by yourself, I'm looking at you like [haha sfx].Michelle: Exactly. Exactly.Zach: Well, Michelle, I just want to thank you again, you know? At some point in the episode we typically drop some Jamaican air horns, because--[Michelle laughs, Zach laughs] Out of thanks or out of exuberance, and I'm just gonna say I'm gonna drop these out of thankful exuberance right here... [air horns sfx] because this has been a dope, dope episode, and I look forward to having you back. Thank you so much.Michelle: Absolutely. I look forward to coming back and wishing you all of the success in the world.Zach: Thank you. Peace.Michelle: Peace.

On today's episode of the Living Corporate podcast, Zach and Ade read and respond to two listener letters. They provide their unique perspectives and offer up helpful advice on how to best advocate for yourself while encouraging others to do the same.Connect with us on our website!https://www.living-corporate.com/TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach.Ade: And it's Ade.Zach: And you know what? You're listening to Living Corporate, and, you know, today--Ade: Yerp.Zach: Yerp. And today--[both laughing] we have listener letters. So for those who don't know, we encourage, at the end of every episode, to send us some listener letters. You can submit them through Instagram DMs, through Twitter DMs, through our email, through our website Contact Us section. Just hit us up. Ask us things and we will provide our perspective. We are not certified coaches. We are just--Ade: Or psychologists.Zach: Or psychologists.Ade: Or counselors.Zach: Or counselors.Ade: Let's just put all of our disclaimers out there. All of this is just from our perspectives, and we love y'all, we care about you, and we want to make sure that you succeed. However, you know, this is not a binding contract. Cool. Let's move forward.Zach: Yep, that's right. We're just two black folks out here trying to help other people of color, you know what I'm saying? That's all we're trying to do. So this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna read a couple of these listener letters. We'll talk about 'em, wax poetic, and then we'll wrap it up. Ade, what else do you think we need to add to this? Ade: Sit back, relax, grab a glass of water if you're listening, and sip with us. Take a sip. Oh, and also, just side-note - this is a thing that my mother has been making me do recently - drink some honey lemon ginger tea or honey ginger lemon or ginger lemon honey tea, whatever combination works for you, to just, like, soothe your throat while you listen.Zach: You got the--you got the recipe? Or--Ade: I mean, I'm not gonna be responsible for my mother's recipe getting out there. Look on the Internet. There's a whole bunch of different recipes. Zach: Okay, so just Google it basically. So they won't be drinking your mom's recipe, but that combination of tea would be good. Okay, I just wanted to make sure we [?]. All right, cool. Okay. Well, look, our first listener net--listener letter--Ade: Listener netter.Zach: Listener netter, which is a new type of listener letter, is coming from Raquel, and the subject is--Ade: Hi, Raquel.Zach: What's going on, Raquel? Also your phone's making noises in the background. Ade: Wasn't me.Zach: Huh?Ade: Wasn't me.Zach: Wasn't you? Was it me? Might have been me.Ade: Probably. Zach: No. Oh, it probably was me.Ade: It was totally you.Zach: Yep, it was.Ade: Narrator: It was actually me.Zach: My bad. [?] [laughs] First listener letter is coming from Raquel. Hi, Raquel. Subject line is "I need a promotion." Here we go. "Hey, guys. End-of-the-year performance reviews are coming up, and I'm really anxious about getting promoted. I've had some serious wins this year and positive feedback from my boss, and I've been bringing up my desire to get promoted. I'm not sure if it's enough though. Performance reviews start in about six weeks. What advice would you give in my final stretch? Thanks." Hm.Ade: Do you want to start, or should I go?Zach: You go.Ade: Okay. First of all, Raquel, thank you for writing in. This is a pretty big one. I think everyone in general is invested in the course of their careers, and feeling as though your review is coming up and you're not quite sure that you can advocate for yourself is a huge deal. So that said, I will give you the advice that my senior, the senior associate on my project, gave me when I first started. It was that you write down all of your wins. Like, in the next few weeks, start taking stock of all of the things that you did really well, all of the pats on the back you got, all of the shout-outs, all of the wins, and then also write down all of the not-so-great situations. All of the sit-down conversations that you had to have, all of the after-action items that you had to take down, so that you have all of the knowledge necessary to advocate for yourself once it's time for those reviews, because it's very, very easy for you to personally recall all of the times that you didn't do so well more than the times when you killed it, like you had a three-hour turnaround time for some huge deliverable or you owned that client meeting and all of the clients left looking at you like you were the second coming of the messiah. Just really take stock of all of the amazing things that you did, because 1. it makes you more confident in these conversations, 'cause you can walk into those meetings like, "Yeah, I am that person." Of course the term I'm using here is not "person," but whatever. But also it's very, very difficult for managers to miss the million, million, million things that you did that were amazing because they're overseeing a whole bunch of people, and so it's easy for some of your big wins to fall between the cracks, and that big win falling between the cracks can mean the difference between a $2,000 bonus and a $10,000 bonus. Maybe not that significant, but you get what I'm saying. What do you think, Zach?Zach: Yeah. So, you know, my experience in getting promoted is all about having more than just one advocate in those rooms, right? So one, to your--everything you said I 100% agree. You have to make sure that you're writing down and that you make it easy for people to advocate for you, and the way that you do that is what you just said. So writing down your wins, writing down your growth, like, documenting those things in something that is easy to read, like a one-pager or a couple of PowerPoint slides that you can quickly just send out and folks can, you know, review and speak to or reference. That's gonna make it easy. And then also, you know, you used the language "my final stretch." It's really important--and, like, again, recognizing where you are, but any time you're thinking about getting promoted or you know that you're looking to get promoted or you're looking for a huge raise, you're looking for--you're looking to get something out of the--you're looking to really progress, you want to--really want to treat your entire performance almost like a campaign run, right? So, like, mapping it out, thinking about who are the folks that you want to connect with, what are the things that you want to accomplish, and then like we've been saying, making sure that you document those things and that you equip the people who you want to be your promoters, your advocates in those rooms, in those spaces, give them plenty of heads-up, right? So you said you have six weeks. I would, like, look across, think about what you've done this past year, think about the people that you've worked with and say, "Hey, I'm looking to get promoted this year. This is my goal." And, like, don't be afraid, right? It's a goal, and ask, "Would you be willing to support me?" If so, if they say yes--depending on how you want to frame it, "If so, would you please review this here?" Or "Would you be willing to write something for me?" Right? So every company has something different. Some companies have kind of, like, in-time reviews. Other people have, like, informal kind of, like, write-ups and positive notes. Other people--like, there's various things, right, that you can--there are various ways you can document, but it's about gathering those points of evidence, and then that way when it's time for your review and people are looking for your--you're basically building a case for yourself, there's a variety of things people can pull from. That's really important. So, like, you said you have six weeks. I would really, like, kind of put your nose to the grindstone, reach out to the people that you know that you've had a positive impact on, have a conversation with them, make it easy for them to advocate for you, and then, again, kind of depending on who it is--if you know who's gonna be the person who's gonna, like, explicitly gonna be talking about, "Hey, this is why this person should get promoted," have a conversation with them as well. Let them know what you're doing. Give them all of that evidence, and then make sure that y'all have a conversation about what it looks like for you to be properly spoken about and advocated for. Ade: That's not to say that this process is easy, especially, Raquel, if you are feminine-of-center, it's not--you're not often taught how to advocate for yourself and how to really push for what you want. It's something that I'm personally learning how to do, and I think that there's no better place to do that than at work, because it's work, so yes, it bleeds into the rest of your life and et cetera, et cetera, but it's really just a microcosm of the greater world around you, and what it means to advocate at work is also what it means to advocate for yourself in your personal lives, in your friendships, in your relationships, and so treat this as a proving ground for--it's not just about work here, right? I would treat this as, "Okay, if I'm able to really push for what I want here, whether or not I get it"--and yes, you will, girl--"Whether or not I get it, I know that I've had the experience of what it means to advocate for myself period, regardless of where I go." So once you get this one out of the way, every successive conversation that you have that might be difficult, that might feel uncomfortable, cannot possibly be more difficult than the very first one. So either way, we got your back. Thank you for writing in.Zach: Yerp. Ade: Did you have anything else you wanted to say, Zach, before I cut this entire conversation off?Zach: Nope.Ade: [laughing] I realize that that's what I did, my bad.Zach: No, it's good. I feel like my contribution was the "yerp." I'm good.Ade: [laughs] I can't stand you.Zach: [laughs] Cool. Yeah, so all--godspeed to Raquel. Definitely excited for you. Hopefully you can give us an update and let us know how it goes.Ade: Right. Drinks on you next time around.Zach: Drinks on you next time, 'cause you ballin'. Maybe one day, you know what I'm saying, we can all work together, you know what I'm saying?Ade: Big ballin', shot callin'.Zach: Right. Right, right. So cool, cool, cool. We have another one here.Ade: Yerp.Zach: Ade, you want to take this one?Ade: Most definitely. All right, so this one, the subject says "GET ME OUT OF HERE!" In caps, so I really had to give it the respect that it was due. So Xavier writes in saying, "Hey, y'all. I am so close to just walking out of work and never coming back it's not even funny." Oh, my. "I seriously need a mental heatlh break, just go on a trip and never come back. JK." He really said that. "JK, I come back. My problem is that even though we have "unlimited PTO" at work, it feels like we're discouraged from taking PTO." Hm. "My co-worker went on a trip a few months back, and she's had to deal with jokes about her work ethic." What?! "She's been made to work really hectic schedules and just overall painted like less of a team player. I don't want to deal with this while at my job. I can't keep living like this. Please help. Frustrated and about to burn out, Xavier." [exhales] Ow.Zach: Oh, man. Xavier.Ade: You want to get started with this one, Zach?Zach: X. Yes. [laughs] Ade: Professor X.Zach: X! Ah, X. Nah, I mean, I've definitely been there, and I feel like I sadly--like, I'm closer to being there than other places, so this really resonates with me. It's tough when you don't feel like you can--you can take off work, right? But at the same time, I mean, when you start getting to the point where it's like, "Man, I'm about to quit," or "Man, I just gotta get up out of here," then I think that's when it comes to making sure that you have, like, really transparent conversations, right, with your boss, like, "Hey, I recognize we're in a really busy time, I recognize what's going on. I am--I am burnt out. I am exhausted. I am--" Just be honest, right? There's ways to phrase it in a way that does not come across like you're whining or that you're being fragile or dramatic, and these are insecurities that I deal with all of the time, 'cause, like, I'm always trying not to be the diva. And I'll say that. I'll be like, "I'm not trying to be a diva. I apologize for bringing this up." Like, there have been things that I've had to raise at work in my career that were perfectly right to raise, but I don't like being the center of that attention, right? But you gotta think about this. Xavier, he's saying--he's saying that he's, like, thinking about not coming back, and he says JK, but, I mean, like, he's not really--he's not really kidding. Like, he wrote this, right? Like, he took the time, wrote it, and sent it, so there's a certain level of seriousness to this. So I would say have a conversation with your boss, be transparent about where you're--why you're feeling this way, and then move forward and take the time off, right? If your job provides you unlimited PTO, and you have a--and you're about to burn out, then take it. I think the only thing is that make sure that whatever work that you need to get done or that you won't be tackling during that time, make sure that you're working with your boss, with your team, with whoever to make sure that those things are covered, right? That's the challenge. So, like, with your co-worker who they were saying, like, people question their work ethic and everything, it's like, some of that is cultural. Like, that might just be, like, just the culture of that space, but also if you're really proactive and you say, "Hey, look, for the next three days I'm gonna be off, 'cause I need to recharge, and these are the things that are gonna be happening in these three days." And again, like, not--I would not give them a day heads-up. I would tell them, like, you know, a couple weeks in advance and say, "Hey, look, these are the tasks. Can--who--" Like, make it very simple. Like, "Hey, these are the things that need to get done. This is the way that you're gonna have get these things done," and that way people can just kind of take it, drive it, and then close it. That way when you come back you're not staring down the barrel of a bunch of work that didn't get done. Your team isn't having to kind of pick up the--isn't having to, like, deal with the impacts of stuff, just the dependencies and anything like that that you--the things that they were depending on you for. You're able just to--you're able to kind of, like, have a clean transition, but if you do that and you're transparent with your supervisor, hey, man, you gotta take the time off and take care of yourself. Ade, what do you think?Ade: Agreed. I think my very first point was that succession plan that you were talking about earlier, creating just an Excel spreadsheet and listening the discrete tasks that are yours, that you own, and who is equipped on your team to deal with them, and then having a come-to-Jesus moment with your--with your boss, because I think of it as a sign of poor management that you would even have to justify you leaving and taking a mental health break. The reason I say that is because if you're experiencing this, like, heavy workload and this hectic schedule and you feel like you're about to burn out, then somebody has noticed. Somebody has noticed. I can say from my own personal experience, like, when it's incredibly hectic at work, my director comes up and is like, "All right, we're taking everybody. Stop what you're doing. We're going for a coffee break. We're just gonna walk and go outside and experience the sunshine on our faces," or my lead goes, "Okay, everyone has to leave at 6:00 p.m. tonight. Nobody needs to be in this building." Like, they're being proactive about caring for you as a person as much as they care for you as a co-worker or as a resource at work, because everybody knows that you are less valuable to them as an institution if you're honestly not on top of your game, and there's no way that you can be on top of your game when you are a ball of nerves and anxiety. That's one. Two, I am genuinely concerned, actually, about your co-worker having to deal with being treated poorly. So it's one thing to leave your team in the lurch and, you know, not have adequate support for all of your--all of the times in your workstream, or your co-workers feeling like you left them holding the bag on several items, but this sounds like she was just punished for--and it might just be your own current perspective based off of how you're feeling currently--but it sounds like she's being punished for having the audacity to leave. To, like, just go and take a mental health break, and I would look into--I know you say you love your job, but I would look into alternate employment, simply because--Zach: [laughs]Ade: I am so serious.Zach: [laughing] I know. I know you're not joking.Ade: I am so serious, because the same way that they find it comfortable to alienate someone just for doing what they say to do--like, a lot of these companies will go, "Yeah, we absolutely--we give you unlimited PTO because we care about you and we want to make sure that you're okay and your life continues, just because--" Yada yada yada yada yada yada. Okay, whatever, but if the truth of the matter is that when you do in fact take this time off and when you do in fact take advantage of all of the perks associated with your job you get treated a type of way for it, that doesn't sit well with me personally. It feels like you're being set up, and again, this may not be the truth of the matter. I'm just reading, inferring from what I see here, but it does feel like, or it does sound like, there is no winning, that you are either going to be working your butt off until you have, like, a sincere breakdown, or you take breaks when and forever long you need them and you're punished for it, and that just in general doesn't sit well with me personally. That seems like a bad practice. It seems retaliatory, that you would take a break and then be given all of these hectic schedules upon your arrival. So yeah, I think in general I advocate that you come up to your boss with full honesty, like Zach said, and a succession plan, and by succession plan I mean literally take every single thing that you do over the course of a week and list them, and also list the people who are able to take on those tasks, 'cause you generally--I don't know about everywhere else, but I know that I don't work in a complete silo so that if I ever have to take a break from work, there are people who know and understand enough of what I do that they're able to take--to pick up the slack in my absence, and it's just--for those of you out there who own your own companies or are senior management in companies, it is such a toxic work culture to create to say that people aren't able to take breaks when they need to, that people are punished for just living their lives. Like, people's lives don't start and end at work, and it's unfair and it's toxic and it's abusive to decide that your employee's whole world should revolve around work, and when it doesn't you punish them for it? That's jacked up.Zach: Nah, I agree, and I was laughing about you saying, you know, "I would really advise you to seek somewhere else to work," 'cause it kind of reminds me of The Read where people will be like, "Dump him." Ade: Absolutely.Zach: "Dump him" is, like, the main thing they'll say.Ade: But also, if you've ever--if you notice, like, people who write into The Read--and this is a complete sidebar, but I have felt this on my spirit for a while--people who write into The Read or the Relationships subreddit generally are, like, at the end of their rope. People don't just go seek advice from strangers for funsies. They're like, "Okay, I really can't talk to anybody else in my life about this. I need some kind of help," and it's usually just, like, a wild situation, and everybody needs to, like, scream at them, "Please leave. Please."Zach: No, that's 100%. You're not wrong. It's just funny, but ultimately, because of the capitalist society that we live in, right, like, life is becoming increasingly about work. There's an unspoken but ever increasing expectation that you're just gonna work, and work and work and work and work, your mental, physical, emotional, spiritual wellness be damned, right?Ade: Right, and you are validated only through your work, and I am here to tell you that that is not it, friends. That's not the truth of the matter. It doesn't have to be the truth of the matter. Please take breaks.Zach: Yeah. No, no doubt. So Xavier, I definitely hope that this helps. I pray that you don't burn yourself out, give yourself the break, and it's crazy because--what's really interesting rather is if you don't give yourself the break, your body will give itself a break eventually, right? Like, you'll pass out, you'll get sick, and, like, you know, that vacation, like, you'll get a different type of vacation. So make sure you--just make sure you take care of yourself.Ade: There are no beaches in hospital beds. I'll tell you that right now.Zach: That's true. [laughs] Oh, goodness. Okay. Well, cool. So we have--you know, we have a few. We try to do two or three listener letters, you know, per each of these episodes. We're not trying to inundate y'all, but we do have more, so we'll be back with more listener letters in another episode.Ade: Yep, and thank you to everyone who wrote in. We hoped this helped. Again, please seek out the advice or help of people who are even more professionaler than we are.Zach: Yes, professionaler. Who are betterer than us.Ade: Who are betterer at us than this, who are able to physically be there for you in a way that we may not be able to. We love y'all. Stay safe. Stay lifted. You have anything else you want to add, Zach? Do you have, like, a Favorite Things? I know I sprung this one on you, but you sprung it on me the--well, a few weeks ago, so.Zach: Nope, nope, fair enough. So my Favorite Thing this week--I do have a Favorite Thing, so that's gonna be crazy socks. So crazy socks are--and when I say crazy socks, I really just mean, like, socks with unique designs. So socks with unique designs, like, they've been kind of, like, in style, like, they've been normalized now, but I still really enjoy them. So I'm not gonna say the website I procure my socks from, but I've been really excited 'cause I recently just got some socks that are, like, pink with, like, little black and white puppy dogs on 'em.Ade: [scoffs] That sounds really cute actually. I was gonna make fun of you, but...Zach: Aw, look at you.Ade: I mean, I'm still gonna make fun of you, but they still sound cute.Zach: Okay. Well, I appreciate that. I respect that. So then I got some, like, lime green ones with, like, some red t-rexes on 'em, but they're, like, cartoony kind of t-rexes. So I love socks. I think it's an easy way to show a little bit of style. People laugh--so I know on my current project people laugh because--like, I'm the only person on the project that wears a blazer, but, like, from a style perspective I think blazers are cool, and so I'm gonna rock a blazer. Like, no doubt, and so--and I also have, like, a little pocket square, and then I have my crazy socks. And it's not like I'm wearing, like, high--what's the word, high-waters? I'm not flooding, so it's not like you're gonna just see my socks, but, like, if people go, "Hey, like, what's the drip looking like?" I'ma be like, "Ayo." I'll pull up the pant leg one time and let you know, like, it's dripping. I'm dripping.Ade: "What's the drip looking like."Zach: [laughs] When my boss--if my boss ever walks up and he says, "Hey, Zach, what's the drip looking like?" I'll be like--Ade: Why in the world--see...Zach: No one ever--no one ever at my job would ever say "What's the drip looking like?" No one would say that.Ade: Yeah, I just--I need--anybody from Zach's job, if y'all are listening to this, I encourage y'all to write in and please tell me the accuracy of this man's statements, not because I think this man is lying, but, like, I just want a first-hand account of his dad jokes at work.Zach: But I have taught my--I have taught my supervisor the concept of drip, and it's funny, like--Ade: On that note, we're gonna roll out of here. That's gonna be--that's gonna be it for us on today. Zach: [laughs] Oh, you're not gonna--you don't have a Favorite Thing?Ade: [whispering] Damn, I really thought I was gonna escape.Zach: [laughs] What's your Favorite Thing?Ade: So my Favorite Thing currently is Victory Lap by Nipsey Hussle. If you've heard of Nipsey Hussle--or if you haven't, Nipsey Hussle was a rapper and an entrepreneur who was murdered recently, and because it was essentially his final project--I don't know if there's anything in his vault that his family will eventually decide to release--it really was a spectacular album. It was nominated for Grammy of the Year, I think. If I recall correctly. If not, then whoops, my bad. But yeah, my Favorite Thing. I haven't been able to stop listening to it, and I encourage you all, if you are a fan of rap, of hip-hop, of storytelling in general, even if it's not a medium you've ever enjoyed, it's a worthwhile album to listen to just because it's such an incredible story. That's it. That's all I got.Zach: That's dope. Well, cool. I guess we're gonna get up on out of here. Thank y'all for listening to the Living Corporate podcast.Ade: Yeah, thanks for listening.Zach: Make sure you follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate or Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod. Ade's already talked to you about submitting listener letters, but I'm just gonna say it one more time. If you want to submit a listener letter, make sure you get at us at Instagram DMs, Twitter DMs, our email, livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com.Ade: We're also on Al Gore's Internet at living-corporate.com, because Australia refuses to let us be great.Zach: That's true, but we're also at livingcorporate.co with no dash. We own all of the domains really except for livingcorporate.com. We have livingcorporate.net, .org, you know what I'm saying? We have 'em all. We just don't have livingcorporate.com.Ade: Which is wild.Zach: Which is wild. We have everything else but that. Anyway, appreciate y'all. We'll talk to you all soon. This has been Zach.Ade: And this has been Ade.Both: Peace.

We sit down with Vilissa Thompson, an activist and disability rights advocate who is also the creator of Ramp Your Voice!, a disability rights consultation and advocacy organization that promotes self-advocacy & empowerment for PwDs. She created the viral hashtag #DisabilityTooWhite, spurring people to share instances of erasure of people of color with disabilities from media to medicine. Connect with Vilissa on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vilissakthompsonlmsw/Learn more about Ramp Your Voice!:http://rampyourvoice.com/The RYV Syllabus: http://rampyourvoice.com/2016/05/05/black-disabled-woman-syllabus-compilation/TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? Now, listen, before we get into the "It's Zach and it's Ade," I just want to go ahead and say Ade, welcome back. I missed you, dawg.Ade: What's good, what's good?Zach: What's good? So listen--and, you know, our topic actually is very serious this episode, but I want to just go ahead and get the jokes out first, because once we get this interview done, I want to go ahead and wrap it right there, right? So, you know, what I love about Living Corporate is we dismantle--we seek, rather, 'cause I'm--let me not say that we dismantle anything, but we seek to at least address openly different stereotypes, challenges, and biases, you know, for people of color and how they really impact folks, especially in the workplace. And I want to talk about colorism really quick. Now, you're gonna be like, where am I going with this? Y'all probably listening to this like, "What are you talking about?" That's cool. So educational point for my non-melanated brothers and sisters out there. My non-Wakandans. My Buckys. My Winter Soldiers, if you will.Ade: Winter Soldiers... okay.Zach: In the black community we talk about colorism, and we attribute certain behaviors to certain black folks of specific hues. Ade: Here we go. Oh, here we go.Zach: A popular myth is that lighter-skinned black people do not answer their text messages. They leave--Ade: Actually, that's very true.Zach: They leave text messages on Read. Their text messages are on swole, as it were. Ade: I can't stand you.Zach: And I want to really recognize Ade.Ade: I only have 250 unread messages. You really can't play me like this.Zach: Ade is--and I'm not gonna--I hate it when people use food to describe women, but Ade is pretty chocolate, okay? She's pretty dark.Ade: You have to fight me after this.Zach: And yet she does not read her text messages.Ade: You're gonna have to run me the fade.Zach: She actually--in fact, just the other day I texted Ade, and she said, "Oh, hey," and I said, "Oh."Ade: It's on sight, I promise.Zach: You want to hit me with the "Oh?" Like, "Funny to see you here." That's what she hit me with, y'all. Like, "Oh."Ade: [sighs] Are you done?Zach: Hey, [in accent] are you done?Ade: [in accent] Are you done?Zach: [in accent] Are you done?Ade: See, you can't even--you can't pull a me on me. Zach: Man, I was so disappointed. I was like--man, I mean, if anything, based on these stereotypes, I should be the one ignoring your text messages. But you know what? For me to ignore Ade's text messages, y'all, guess what? She'd have to text me in the first doggone place.Ade: Wow.Zach: Wow. Whoa.Ade: This is a kind of rude I really did not intend on dealing with on tonight--Zach: So I want to say thank you, because last week we had--well, the last week before last, excuse me, we had Marty Rodgers. You know, it was a big deal. The dude is, like--he's like black consulting royalty in the DMV. You would think Ade would want to be on that podcast episode, you know what I mean?Ade: You're gonna have to fight me. I've decided. I've decided it's a fight to a death.Zach: [laughs] Oh, man. So I'm just thankful. I'm just so--this is me, like, publicly thanking Ade for being here and for texting me back. I don't know--Ade: I just want to say that I'm a good person and I don't deserve this.Zach: [laughs] You know what I think it was? I think it was the fact that we all got back on BlackPlanet for a couple days to check out that Solange content.Ade: Hm.Zach: I think that reset our chakras.Ade: Who is we?Zach: Or our ankhs. I don't know. We don't have--we don't have chakras.Ade: Who are we? I don't--Zach: Us as a diaspora. I feel as if that's--are you not a Solange fan? You didn't enjoy the Solange album?Ade: It has to grow on me, and I understand that that is sacrilegious, but I will say this--Zach: And you're supposed to be from the DMV too? Everybody from the DMV likes Solange.Ade: Let me tell you something. I listened--I waited until midnight. There is a screenshot on my phone of me starting to listen to this album at, like, 12:10, and I think at around 12:20 I was like, "You know what? Some things aren't for everybody." Everything, in fact, is not for everybody.Zach: That's real though.Ade: And I paused and went to sleep.Zach: Really? Wow. You know, I really enjoyed it, but I had to enjoy it 'cause she shouted out Houston a lot on the album. Like, a lot, so I enjoyed it off of that alone. And I'm also just a huge Solange fan, but, you know, I get it. It's one step at a time.Ade: Look, I too--I too am a huge Solange fan. A Seat at the Table is an everlasting bop of an album.Zach: Oh, it is. That's a classic. It's a very good album. It's, like, perfect.Ade: Yeah. This one--this one's just gonna have to pass me by and/or grow on me in 2 to 4 years. I don't know. Zach: You know, it's interesting because--it's interesting because I was used to--based on A Seat at the Table. This is not a music podcast, y'all. We're just getting our fun stuff out the way first. So it's interesting, because as a person who really enjoys Solange's words--like, A Seat at the Table, she had a lot of words. Didn't get a lot of words on this album.Ade: I'm told that it's--the experience is better if you watch the--I don't know what to call it. The visual--Zach: The visual album?Ade: Yeah, the visual album, in conjunction with it.Zach: Yeah, I'm actually gonna peep it. Fun fact. A couple weeks ago I told y'all about me playing Smash Bros., the video game, and I'm in a GroupMe, and one of the guys who I play Smash Bros. with was actually in the visual album.Ade: Oh, really?Zach: That's right, 'cause I got--those are the kind of circles I roll in.Ade: You know famous video players. Video game players.Zach: Yeah. Video game players, yeah. And as a side-note, he is very good at Super Smash Bros., so there. Maybe he'll be on an episode--on the podcast one day. Who knows? We'll see. Okay, so with that, let's do a very hard pivot.Ade: Sharp left turn.Zach: Sharp left, into our topic for the day. So we're talking about being disabled while other at work, and it's interesting because similar to how we brought up the Solange album out of nowhere, I was not really thinking about the fact that we don't really consider the experiences of just disabled people period, let alone disabled people of color at work.Ade: Right.Zach: I'm trying to think. Like, how many times have you worked with someone who was a person of color and disabled at work?Ade: So the thing to also think through here is the fact that there are lots of hidden disabilities.Zach: That's fair. That's a good call-out.Ade: Yeah, so there's a wide, wide range of conditions. Physical disabilities can also be invisible, but there are chronic illnesses, there are mental illnesses, cognitive disabilities, visual impairments, hearing impairments. According to the Census Bureau--apparently the ADA, the Americans with Disabilities Act, applies to or covers approximately 54 million Americans. Of those I'm sure many, many millions are people of color or black people in particular, and so yeah, I don't know how many people--how many people of color I've ever worked with who are disabled or who are living with a disability, but I certainly think that it's important that, as a whole, we think about how to create a more inclusive work culture that empowers people with disabilities that's not patronizing or demeaning or just outright hostile.Zach: No, I super agree with that, and just such a fair call-out to say that there's so many folks that--who do not have visible disabilities but are--who are living with a disability, and it's important that we think about that and we think--we're thoughtful about that too, so again, just my own ignorance, and it was interesting because in preparing and researching for this particular episode, it was hard to find comprehensive data, especially content that was specific to black and brown disabled experiences. I think for me--kind of taking a step back and going back to answer my own question, any [inaudible] I've worked with who have a visible disability--I have not worked with anybody in my career who has had a visible disability, visible to me anyway. And, you know, I think it's interesting. I was reading a piece. It was called "Black and Disabled: When Will Our Lives Matter?" And it was written by Eddie Ndopu. And this was back in 2017. He's the head of Amnesty International's youth engagement work for Africa, and his overall premise was historically black resistance and civil rights and things of that nature has always presented the black body as the point of resistance, right? And ultimately the image of the black form is one of strength and solidarity and able-bodiedness, right? And it's presenting this strong quote-unquote normal body as the ideal to then push up against oppression, systemic racism, and--I'm gonna present this, and I want--I'ma dare you to try to break this form, this body. And in that there's a certain level of bias, because it then automatically erases the idea of different bodies, of disabled bodies, and if that's the case then it's like, "Okay, well, then where do they fit in this narrative? Where do they fit in our story? Where do they fit in our resistance?" And so it's just really interesting to me, because I think it's just kind of calling out our own blind spots. As much as Living Corporate--we aspire to talk about and highlight the experiences and perspectives of underrepresented people in Corporate America. It's season 2 and we're just now talking about being disabled while other at work, and so, you know, it really confirmed for me how little I think about my privilege as an able-bodied person. It's a huge privilege in the fact that we're seen. We think that we're invisible, and in a variety of ways we are, but disabled people of color are even much less visible than we are. Ade: Right, and I also think that now is such a good time to start thinking through the conversations that we should be having, because we live in a time and a space where everyone's rights are sort of up for grabs, and it's especially important that we are holding space and creating a safe space for people who have less privilege than we do, and it's not enough that you give it a passing thought, because then you might as well be sending thoughts and prayers, right? And I think that if you have the ability to do something, it's--and, you know, opinions may vary, but I am firmly of the belief that if you have the ability to do something, it is your responsibility to do something, even if what you're doing is something so simple as having a conversation or amplifying the voice of those who aren't able to have that conversation.Zach: I agree with that, and that's really all the more reason why I'm excited and thankful for the guest that we have today. Her name is Vilissa Thompson. She is a disabled activist, public speaker, educator, consultant, and writer. Yeah, she's putting in the work. And we had a great conversation, and I really want y'all to hear it and check it out, so this is what I'm gonna do. We're gonna transition--wait, you know what? Ade, so I know we said we got the jokes in. We got the jokes in at the beginning 'cause I really wanted to give space for Vilissa, and we're going to. Do we want to come back and do Favorite Things?Ade: Yeah. Yeah, sure. Let's do that. Zach: All right. Cool, cool, cool. So that's what we'll do. So we'll go with our conversation with Vilissa, we'll talk about that, and then we'll get into the Favorite Things.Ade: Awesome, okay.Zach: All right, talk to y'all soon. And we're back. And as we shared before the break, we have Vilissa Thompson on the show. Vilissa, how are you doing?Vilissa: I am doing great.Zach: We're really excited for you to be here. So today we're talking about being disabled and being a person of color. Can you talk a bit about Ramp Your Voice! and where that idea came from and its mission and--just give us the origin story.Vilissa: Yes. Well, Ramp Your Voice! was founded in 2013, you know, as a way for me to discuss my experiences as a black disabled woman, as a social worker, and just the things that I've just noticed with my professional world as well as personally. When I--a year before that I started blogging more as a social worker blogger that was discussing social work through a disability lens, talking about different issues on that front. When[that wasn't really popular as a profession?] at that time, the profession had just started doing more things online, people coming up with different blogs and different platforms. So at the beginning of that, that really kind of helped me get to where I am when it comes to blogging, talking about the disabled experience from many different angles. So getting that experience [at 12?] led me to create my [inaudible] at 13, and we're 5 years now, soon to be going on 6 in 2019. You know, it has really grown into this organizational aspect to where, you know, I'm able to project myself as a voice within the community that really calls out some of the mess, you know, in a light way of saying it, that happens within the disabled community, as well as getting those who are in the broader society to understand that disability, you know, is very much a facet, you know, in the people, as well as their different identities and experiences. For me basically, I like to call myself a rightful troublemaker, because I don't feel that you're really doing good work, particularly if you're doing social justice, you know, if you're not shaking the table, if you're not ticking off somebody.Zach: Vilissa, I was agreeing with you because I think that, you know, when you're talking about topics around race and gender and really any topic around equity, right, and affirming or empowering disenfranchised groups, often ignored groups, right, like the disabled community, the disabled people of color community. If there isn't some type of discomfort there, then there probably isn't gonna be any growth, right? Like, in any other context when we talk about getting better or growing, like, there's some type of discomfort there, right? So, like, professional development or working out and getting new muscles or just growing as a person. You know, like, you have--you have pains. Having a child, there's pains associated with that. So there's just historically, and just as a matter of life, when you change and pain kind of--they go hand-in-hand, and they have historically in this nation as well. So it's just funny how we often try to avoid that, right? Like, we try to avoid discomfort while at the same time seeking to, like, enhance the platform of others, and it's like that doesn't--they can't go hand-in-hand. Vilissa: And I do want to say that sometimes, you know, changing things starts from within. I know that, particularly within the disabled community, there has been a lot of shake-ups due to, you know, the calling out of the racism that's in the disabled community when it comes to leadership, the kind of Good Ol' Boys club that really, you know, reigns true since, you know, when people think about disability, you know, what usually comes to mind is a white face, usually a white male face, and a lot of the leadership are white disabled men who have a lot of racist, sexist views, who resist the change that is needed, and I think there has been this surgance [sp] of disabled people of color to be able to ramp their voice, you know, in a sense, to talk about the issues that matter to them to bring forth a more diverse understanding of disability history that is not just white faces or white experiences. So I think that part of what I have experienced and others who do this activism work, you know, is shaking the table within to really get the change that you want outside, you know, of your own sphere.Zach: Let me ask this, and I find this--I find this genuinely interesting because, again, I don't believe that I considered the perspectives and the experiences of the disabled and disabled people of color. So, like, that entire community. So for able-bodied folks like myself, just people who aren't conscious of that experience, can you explain to me some of the different ways that unconscious bias, bias and racism, rear its head within the disabled community?Vilissa: Yes. One way is, you know, like I was saying, you know, who is disabled? You know, not really considering disabled people of color. You know, when we see the telethons and the marathons and, you know, the call for, you know, charities, it's usually, you know, white faces, and that, you know, visible erasure of representation allows communities of color to not see themselves, when communities of color, particularly black and native communities especially, have high rates of disability. So that erasure alone is very dangerous, you know, when there's certain racial groups who have a prevalence of disability, and then when you break that down further into the communities of color themselves--you know, I can only speak for the black community. You know, we do have a resistance to, you know, identifying as disabled or calling somebody's, you know, condition disabled, you know? We have these kind of cutesy words for it. "You know So-and-so?" You know, they may think like this, or, you know, "So-and-so may be a little, you know, quirky," or anything like that, and, you know, I think that for me, that has really impacted how I look at my black disabled body, you know, as somebody who's been disabled since birth. I really didn't identify as disabled until I started doing this work, because I didn't know that being disabled had its own identity and culture and pride and that there is a community of people that look like me and people that don't look like me and people who are wheelchair users like myself, people who are short of stature or little people or [inaudible], you know? So that invisibility when it comes to media, when it comes to the work that organizations do, really impacts one's ability to connect to an identity that's outside of their race and gender. So I really think that honestly both disabled and non-disabled people, you know, are both heavily disadvantaged due to that disability. I know that, you know, in coming to this space I see a lot of particularly black folks who are disabled, particularly those who have invisible or not apparent disabilities like mental illness, chronic pain. Those are all disabilities, you know? But we don't call those things that, and it can really create this disconnect in one's body and mind and what's going on within one's body and mind, as well as understanding that being disabled is just as strong of an identity as your gender and your race. So for me, connecting to particularly black disabled women [inaudible] is letting them know that it's okay to talk about your disability, you know? It's okay to talk about your mental illness. It's okay to talk about your chronic pain. It's okay to talk about the lack of medical assistance that you get because you are, you know, a [triple?] minority. You know, I really think that that type of visibility allows those open conversations, allows those community resource sharing or just tips shared or, you know, just plain support to occur. So for me I really want us to all kind of take a step back and say that "Hey, you know, disabled people are the largest minority group in the world and in the country," and we all know somebody with a disability, if it's not us ourselves who are disabled. So being disabled isn't just some identity that doesn't reach home in some way, shape, or form. It does, and I think that's the main disconnect that I see, people not understanding a community that is so vast, so diverse, and it's one where we do know somebody, and to not change the perception that we have about disabled people and the lives that we're able to live. So, you know, that's just kind of the things that I notice, you know, when it comes to non-disabled people, able-bodied people, not understanding things, and what disabled people like myself who do activism work, you know, have to kind of teach you all and also happen to bring you all into the fold for those who are actually disabled who may not at this point or for whatever reasons, usually due to stigma or shame, identify.Zach: In that you shared about being a triple minority, you talked about identity. As discussions around inclusion and diversity become more and more commonplace today, and more centered in pop culture frankly, the term "intersectionality" is used a lot. So can you talk to me about what intersectionality means for you? And I ask that because you shared that you being disabled is an entire identity to itself, and it is, right? It's a part of who you are. It shapes how you navigate and move around this world, how you see the world. At the same time, you are a woman. At the same time, you are a black woman. So I'm curious to know, how do you navigate the intersection of those--and of course those are just three. Certainly you have various other ways that you identify yourself. However, how do you navigate the various points of intersection for yourself?Vilissa: Well, I think that--you know, when I talk about intersectionality, I think what's so critical is that people cannot separate my identities because I won't let them. You know, being black is just as important to me as being a woman, as being disabled. You cannot look at me and just simply divide me into three different parts, you know? Each of my identities has interwoven into this, to me, beautiful fabric of my being, and the world reacts to me, you know, in the ways in which my identities present themselves, you know? Some people may not care that I'm black, but because I'm a woman that's a problem. Some people may not care that I'm a woman, but because I'm a wheelchair user that makes them uncomfortable. Some people may not care that I'm a wheelchair user, but because I'm black, that's the biggest issue. So when I go out into the world, I don't know at times which of these identities people are reacting to, or sometimes I can tell. It depends on, you know, if they're very open about what may make them uncomfortable or what they're, you know, I guess quote-unquote offended by, you know? By my mere existence. So for me, the world, you know, looks at me and judges me on those three primary identities that I have, and they make assumptions about my capabilities, my intellect, my social status, my educational status, you know? Just everything about me, and the one thing I always say about assumptions is, you know, the word assumption has, you know, A-S-S at the beginning of it, so you can make yourself look like an--you know, an unintentional [bleep] by making assumptions. So, you know, I really think that those assumptions have really shaped, you know, my experience, and particularly when I learned about the term "intersectionality," it just really, you know, was like a light-bulb moment. Like, "Oh, my gosh, that makes so much sense," because when I look at myself in the mirror, I see a black disabled woman, you know? I see--and I'm a Southerner. I'm from South Carolina, so, you know, I understand what it means to be in a small Southern town, you know, to live in a red state, to have the type of history that is attached to the South. As a woman I understand, you know, sexism and the ways that women are paid less and the harassment and the sexual assaults that women go through, you know, with our bodies and our mere existence, and as disabled, you know, we experience all of those things, you know? Disabled women, particularly those with intellectual disabled, have the highest rates of experience sexual violence. So in that example, you know, we have the connection of gender and disability. You know, when it comes to being a person of color, their people have the highest rates of police brutality. Over, you know, half of police brutality rates are conducted on, you know, disabled people, and there's a portion of those people who have been, you know, either the survivors or victims of police brutality have been disabled people of color. So in that example you have the race and the disability factor. So, you know, just in those type of statistics alone--and I could go on and on about the disparities when it comes to race, gender, and disability--you really cannot separate someone's experience and the disparities that they may encounter because of who they are.Zach: Let me ask this. You know, in the work that you do with your Ramp Your Voice! and of course as a professional, as an adult, can you talk to us a little bit about how to effectively support disabled people of color in the workplace?Vilissa: Mm-hmm. Well, I know that what my particular work journey has been. It's always unusual, you know, when it comes to how non-disabled people may look at it, but for disabled people it's not really unusual at all. As I said, I am, you know, as a social worker. When I got my MSW in 2012, I had wanted to look at traditional social work routes, and the one thing I found is that the requirements for social work positions, particularly those that deal with case management, DCS or CPS, you know, et cetera, requires you to either have a vehicle or be able to go out to homes, and as a wheelchair user I know that the majority of homes are not wheelchair-accessible, and as someone who did not have the ability to obtain a car because I was on SSI at the time, you know, that [inaudible] was there as well. So I quickly realized that if I wanted to make a niche for myself within social work I most likely was gonna have to do a non-traditional social work route, and lucky for me, I went from being micro-focused, which dealt with families, individuals, and groups, into a more macro focus, which is activism, community building, so on and so forth, and that's what kind of got me into writing and got me into Ramp Your Voice! So for me, many disabled people are like myself where we have these barriers. We have these systemic barriers when it comes to the job requirements. Like I mentioned, you know, being a wheelchair user, and you also have systemic barriers when it comes to government agencies as well. You know, with being on SSI, I knew that I would have to have a job that gave me insurance, because my SSI and my health care--because Medicaid--were connected. So if I was to lose the SSI, that means that I would lose the Medicaid.Zach: So let me ask this. What is--for those who don't know, and myself included, what is SSI?Vilissa: SSI is basically social security. There's two types of social security. SSI is what those who have not yet put into the system get, basically those like myself who are born with disabilities. Basically, like, younger kids whose parents make within the I guess income requirements. I was able to get them enrolled on it. And then there's SSDI, so those of us that work, we put into the SSDI system. So for me, I was on the SSI system because I hadn't put into the system yet. So for me, while I was building my brand, I was still looking for, you know, different types of employment. Luckily I lived at home with my grandmother at the time, and, you know, I was able to stay with her. You know, I had lived with her my whole life, so I was able to stay with her and build up this brand, and then when she passed at the end of 2015, I knew that I would have to get some type of employment. So I, you know, was able to get a job by the end of 2016, and that allowed me to get off of social security, 'cause I had health insurance. You know, that's the unique situation that disabled people endure. These are the systemic barriers. Now, some disabled people are not able to get off, particularly Medicaid, because they have comprehensive health care needs, and private insurance would not pay for some of those extensive health care needs that they have, like having a personal care assistant, someone coming to their home, helping them with their activities or daily living like dressing, bathing, so on and so forth, or they may need certain equipment, you know, that private insurance may not cover because it's, you know, very expensive. So some disabled people are not able to get off [inaudible] at all, and they have to be very mindful of how much income they may have to take in, how that can affect it, either their Medicaid and/or social security, particularly if they're both connected, and what does that look like. So this puts disabled people in the [inaudible] of property, because I know that when I was on social security I was getting several hundred and 30 something dollars a month, which is nothing, you know? To live off.Zach: Right. No, absolutely.Vilissa: Yeah, and that's, like, a month. So, you know, just think about that. For some people, that's their rent, you know? That's their rent payment.Zach: And that's some cheap rent too.Vilissa: Exactly. You know, so I think that what non-disabled people really don't realize is that when it comes to employment, disabled people have a lot to consider, and in some cases a lot to lose. That could put their livelihoods, and at times their lives, on the line. So when it comes to employment, you do have to be very strategic about what kind of jobs you take, what kind of money you take. If you can take money, what does that look like? And so on and so forth. I know that for me, I was willing to do some things for free while on social security because I knew the consequences of taking money while on social security, and that was my main source of income. And that's a lot to take into consideration, a lot, and when it comes to disabled people of color, we have the highest rates of unemployment within the disabled community. Disabled black folks have the highest rates of unemployment in the community. So, you know, it's not only us having these hoops to go through, but also people not being willing to hire us when it comes to looking for employment.Zach: So let's get back on Ramp Your Voice! a little bit. I love the writings and the photos and the resources. Where can people learn more about Ramp Your Voice!, and what all do you have going on in 2019?Vilissa: Well, Ramp Your Voice! is gonna be doing some very collaborative work. Right now I have a speaking agent, where I will be doing a lot of speaking gigs, signing up for universities. So if anybody wants me to come speak, you can sign me up for that. Reach out to me and I can connect you with my agent. And that has been a great experience that just occurred this year, to be able to connect with somebody who understands the vision that I have of my work and my voice and what I want to do with that through more writing. I'm in the process right now of working on my children's book, which is a picture book. This has been kind of like my baby for a very long time, and I'm now in the position to work on it the way that I desire to and bring it to life. Right now I don't have a publisher for that, but definitely looking for one. Right now I'm also looking to writing. I love writing about race, gender, and disability, to intersectionality and different things like, you know, pop media, media representation, health care, social work. So right now I'm just continuing to build the brand, continuing to talk about the experiences from a black disabled woman's perspective, and just really continuing to, you know, cause trouble. Like, one of the things I do enjoy doing is educating, you know, non-disabled folk, particularly those who are professionals in the medical field, the [inaudible] professions field like myself with social workers, therapists, really understanding disability outside of the medical model, which is basically, you know, talking about disability from a diagnosis standpoint as well as the [first-person?] language. We're saying "people with disabilities" instead of the identity-first language, which is disabled people, disabled [inaudible], disabled women, and really getting into the social model of understanding disability, which is more about, you know, disability being a, you know, identity, a culture, a community. So that's kind of what I offer for professionals who really want to ensure that if they're trying to engage with disabled people through their work, maybe through recruiting, you know, for their hiring practices, you know, whatever that they're interested in, make sure that they understand the language, because every community has its particular language that you need to know to be able to better relate and engage with those community members so you don't be out of date and, at times, unintentionally offensive by using outdated terms. So those are the things that I offer that I'm really looking forward to doing more of in 2019, as well as a couple other projects that I can't really say just yet, but just really, you know, expanding the brand, particularly since there's so many great disabled voices out there who are doing incredible work, you know, just making sure that what I'm doing is always fresh and always being welcome to reaching new audiences, reaching new professions and new worlds that, you know, disabled people live in, you know? Just because somebody doesn't self-identify as disabled doesn't mean that disabled people aren't in your organization, aren't in your community.Zach: I appreciate you educating me. I'm sure many of our listeners--and I'm curious though, before we get out of here, do you have any parting words? Any shout-outs?Vilissa: Well, I just--you know, I just really want to thank you for allowing me to be on here. Just know that disabled people are here, and we are not going anywhere, and if you don't know a disabled person, you need to step your game up and really--particularly if you are a professional--see the ways in which your organization, your body of work, is being exclusive--you know, excluding disabled people, and how you can be more inclusive of disabled people, and ensuring that if you're going to include disabled people that they represent vast, you know, gender, race, you know, sexual orientation, you know, identities, because we need more disabled people of color, disabled people of color who are LGBT, you know, in those types of spaces.Zach: Vilissa, I have to thank you for being on the show today. Thank you so much, Vilissa. We look forward to having you back on the show. We'll talk to you soon.Vilissa: Thank you.Zach: Peace. And we're back.Ade: That was an amazing interview. Beyond, I think, inspiring, which I don't think is the term that I really want to use there, but pardon my lack of or access to language at this point. I think Vilissa's story is--it's a call to action, right? It is--and I don't know if everyone has gotten the opportunity to go to Ramp Your Voice! and just take a look around, but there's actually an anthology--I was struggling with that for a second there. There's an anthology on Ramp Your Voice! where Vilissa actually did an amazing job at collecting a black disabled woman syllabus, and I did some work and went through and read some of the articles that I hadn't had access to or read before, and it's amazing. It is a body of work that I think everyone should read, not just because it gives you a really--if you can hear something crunching in the background, that's my dog Benjamin. He wanted to be featured on the--on the podcast today, so he has some thoughts.Zach: What's up, Benji? Yeah, we can definitely hear him. It's all good.Ade: Yeah. So this list has important thoughts. Like, The Stigma of Being Black and Mentally Ill, Complexities and Messiness: Race, Gender, Disability and the Carceral Mind, which was an incredibly, incredibly important read. "How I Dragged Myself Out of the Abyss That Is Depression Without A Prescription," Disabled Black People. Just very, very important works and in many, many different formats. So you have music, audio, video, poetry and fiction, books, articles. I say all that to say that there is a treasure trove of really important and interesting work, so I encourage everyone and will include the link to the syllabus, but I encourage everyone to take a look at this work. I don't even remember where I got started with singing Vilissa's praises, but yeah, amazing interview. Zach: No, super dope, and I definitely appreciate Vilissa joining the podcast. We'll definitely make sure to have all of her information in the show notes. JJ, give me some of them air horns for Vilissa. Go ahead, give 'em to me. Put 'em in here.[air horns] Aye. Thank you, thank you. Part of me wants to let off some of them blop-blops, Ade, but, you know, we're a professional podcast.Ade: Again, all I have to say is that celebratory gunshots are absolutely situationally appropriate.Zach: Man, my goodness. One day I'ma have--one day I'ma have the CEO of my current job, he's gonna be on the podcast, and we're gonna let them blop-blops go. Watch. That might be the same podcast we talk about respectability politics too, just to make some of y'all real mad.Ade: I am here for all of that action, all of it.Zach: I'm here for it. Man, so I'm definitely excited. So I have not read any of the pieces on here. I clicked the anthology, and I see--Ade: Any?Zach: I haven't. I haven't read the pieces on here. I haven't, no. Ade: Even the black feminism or the womanism category?Zach: No. I'm being honest.Ade: Oh, you have some homework.Zach: Oh, no. I have mad homework. I have mad homework. So I'm looking at the anthology. The anthology is requesting content, right? It's requesting content, but then I see right here to your point, there's a bunch of stuff on here. The Harriet Tubman Casting Cripping Up Issue, Aunt Vi, #QueenSugar, Black Women, & Our Disabled Bodies: Why We’re Still Whole, Luke Cage: The Black Disabled Superhero We Need, If I Die In Police Custody. I mean, Why Black History Matters. There's great content here, and really there's no reason for y'all not to check this out, just like there's no reason for me not to check it out further. Amen. Okay.Ade: Absolutely.Zach: Okay. Okay, okay. So let's go ahead and get into these Favorite Things. Ade, why don't you go ahead and go first?Ade: Oh, I just want to say one last thing before we move on. I think that it is incredibly important as we amplify the voices of people of color who are disabled, particularly black people, particularly black women who are disabled, I think it's important that we contextualize black history and the black experience within this paradigm, and I had to sit back and think through, for example, Harriet Tubman, who we know historically had seizures. She was injured over the course of her enslavement and had to deal with severe seizures for the rest of her life, which brought on these visions that she attributed to a religious--like, a sacred experience, but I think of how important it is to 1. contextualize these experiences and 2. fully give Harriet Tubman her due, right? Because if we lose the pieces that really and truly make up who she is, we are not truly honoring her, right? And I think that if we acknowledge that, you know, Harriet Tubman was a black woman, an enslaved woman, a disabled woman, in a time that made no space for any parts of her, I think we really and truly start to understand and give honor to who she was as opposed to having honestly a very surface-level understanding of who she was and magnifying her in a shallow way, I would say. So yeah, Harriet Tubman. Amazing woman. Disabled woman. I cannot sing her praises enough obviously. I mean, duh. Harriet Tubman. But yeah, it's so important that we talk about these things, because it's so easy to gloss over the fullness of who a person was.Zach: Okay. So with that being said, now we're ready for our Favorite Things. Ade, what you got going on? What's your Favorite Thing right now?Ade: So my one Favorite Thing right now is this guy who demanded cuddles and rubs, so he is over here face all in my lap while I try to record. I promise you, he is just big ol' face in my lap. His favorite thing--his favorite thing to do is to either jump right on top of my stomach, all 50 pounds of him, when I'm laying in bed and minding my own black business, or he likes to, when I'm sitting on the couch, literally hop on the couch and put his butt in my face. It's, like, his favorite thing. Zach: This sounds abu--oh, this is a dog. This is Benji.Ade: Yes, yes. There isn't a random man running around in my life.Zach: I was like, "Wait, why is he--he's a grown man and he weighs 50 pounds and he's jumping on your stomach? What?"Ade: I would have so, so many more problems if that were in fact the case.Zach: That is crazy. I was like, "Wait, this is too much going on." Okay, so Benji is your Favorite Thing right now?Ade: Oh, and my other Favorite Thing is the CodeNewbie podcast. I stopped listening for a little while because--Zach: What's the name? Say it again?Ade: The CodeNewbie podcast. Zach: Okay, what's that? What's the CodeNewbie podcast?Ade: It is a podcast dedicated to educating folks like me who are either transitioning into tech or even, like, if you're a CS student in college or whatever it may be, a new grad of either an undergraduate, a master's student, if you were graduating from a boot camp, all of it. It just educates an entire community of learners, and I love it so much. It's, you know, after Living Corporate, my favorite podcast to listen to.Zach: Aye. Okay, that's what's up. First of all, shout-out to Benji and to all the dogs out there. Woof woof.Ade: Not woof woof. Did you just--okay, DMX.Zach: No, DMX would be like--I can't even do it. I can't even do it now 'cause you just put me on the spot. [tries] You know what I'm saying? Like, that would be DMX.Ade: Okay, Lil' DMX.Zach: Yes. ZMX, what's up? So also, you know, we need to start doing our shout-outs, so this reminds me - shout-out to the college-aged people who listen to our podcast, shout-out to the Buckys, A.K.A. the allies, A.K.A. the Winter Soldiers out there. Ade: Oh, my God.Zach: Shout-out to the Wakandans, A.K.A. my true Africans. Shout-out to my Jamaican brethren, who allow us to get these pew-pew-pews off every episode. Thank y'all for the encouragement.Ade: Honestly, I think it's [tolerated?] at this point, but shout-out to y'all anyway.Zach: Shout-out to y'all. Shout-out to the corporate gangstas. Shout-out to Wall Street. Shout-out to the folks that don't have nothing to do, they just listen to podcasts all day. Shout-out to y'all.Ade: Shout-outs to those of you who have, in the last 3 days or so, deployed a "per my last email." I see you. I recognize your struggle, and go ahead and CC HR if necessary, [beloveds?]. It's okayZach: Amen. Shout-out to those who drink water every day. Shout-out to y'all.Ade: And if you are listening with us right now, feel free to reach over to a glass of water or a water bottle of some sort and take a sip.Zach: Shout-out to my people--shout-out to all of my black people and all of my white people, A.K.A. all of the people who know they need to wear lotion and all of those who don't really wear lotion like that. Shout-out to all of y'all, and then of course shout-out to all of my co-workers and colleagues who listen to the Living Corporate podcast. Shout-out to y'all. Who else?Ade: You know, it's funny, because I don't really tell my co-workers about our podcast just in case I need to shade them on the podcast.Zach: See? Well, that's what happens when you're not--when you don't live your truth, see? You've got to--you need to tell your co-workers about the podcast. [inaudible]--Ade: So I just need to shade them directly to their faces? Because, I mean, I'm with that energy, it's just that--Zach: You should definitely shade people to their faces, just as a principle in life. Ade: So here's the thing. I struggle with that, because I would love to shade you in person and to your face and very loudly--well, no, that's not quite shade, that's just yelling--however, I also hold the sincere belief that I just work here. It is not my job to educate you about your silliness. So I don't know. There's, like, a spectrum of behavior, and I don't know how willing I am to invest time in raising adults. So I'm gonna continue struggling with that.Zach: I mean, I feel that. I feel that. See, I genuinely love my job. Like, I'm at a very unique place in my career. I love my job. I have a great relationship with all of--everybody in my practice. Like, I love my team, so, like, shout-out to them. And so I have no issue with letting people know that I have a podcast, plus this is a professional podcast. Like, we don't be talking crazy on here. We haven't even let any blop-blops--we haven't even let any blop-blops go.Ade: I hear you. I love my job as well, although on occasion I do sincerely doubt the judgment of some folks.Zach: That's real.Ade: So I don't know. I'm gonna struggle with that a little bit longer and let you know how I feel about it and if I'm deploying a--"Here's a link to my podcast," you know, in an email all thread.Zach: It's a good--it's also good for your personal brand. I mean, I think--you know, it's almost been a year since we've been out. I feel like it's about time you let people know you're on a podcast.Ade: Very true point.Zach: You know what I'm saying? We were in the middle of these shout-outs. Oh, right, so Favorite Things. So my Favorite Thing right now has to be Desus and Mero on Showtime, okay? So, you know, there are a few things that give me inspiration and joy at the same time, and Desus and Mero happen to be one of 'em. I love their style. I love their content. It's super funny, very engaging, and it has a certain level of just comedic timing that I aspire to have. They're wonderful. So I love their show. This is not a paid promo ad. I don't even think we have enough juice to get ad space for Desus and Mero.Ade: No, no, no. Retract that energy right now. Retract it. Retract it.Zach: Yeah, right. I'm gonna take it back, I'm gonna take it back and add a "yerrrrrp" instead. [laughs]Ade: That's how you do it. Yep.Zach: Yes, but--but no, I really enjoy their content, so shout-out to them. And that really leads me to my question before we get into the wrap-up. Do you think we should have, like, some A.K.A.s on the show? Like, not the sorority. Shout-out to y'all, though. [inaudible].Ade: I really was about to be like, "Excuse me?"Zach: No, no, no. Like, A.K.A.s, like, "Zach Nunn, A.K.A. So-and-so, A.K.A. That Guy, A.K.A. Mr. Such-and-such, A.K.A.--"Ade: A.K.A. ZMX?Zach: A.K.A. ZMX, A.K.A. "per my last email," A.K.A. CC Your Boss, CC Your Manager. My wife's looking at me and saying, "No, don't do any of that."Ade: I--yes, I really was about to be like, "Hm, this could escalate very, very quickly, and the only A.K.A. that I am known for is not work-appropriate," so I'm just gonna move on.Zach: [laughs] Yeah, [inaudible] said no.Ade: I'm standing in my truth. I'm sitting. I'm sitting in my truth.Zach: My wife took her laptop, moved it off of her lap to her side, and then moved her head from the left to the right to the left again, to the right again, and then back to the left to tell me no. Okay.Ade: She's a wise woman.Zach: She is.Ade: We have been rambling for so long.Zach: We have, but, you know, this is actually part of our podcast. You know, people--y'all have been saying that we're not--you know, sometimes we come across a little too scripted. Look, we've been kicking it this episode. If y'all like--if y'all kick it with us--you know, actually, this is the last thing before we go. You know how, like, every podcast and/or, like, artist, group, they have something that they call their fans? Like, Beyonce has the Beyhive, right? Like, Rihanna--BTS has, their fans call themselves "The Army." Like, should we have--should we have any type of--Ade: An employee resource group? Sure.Zach: No, no. What we call our fans. You think we should call them an employee resource group? That'd be super funny. No, they have to give themselves an--you know, something like "our Living Corporaters," you know what I'm saying? It has to be something where you give them, like, a name. There has to be a name.Ade: I don't--Zach: Right? So, like, I'm pretty sure--Ade: Let's think through this. Y'all send us some suggestions.Zach: We've gotta think through it, right? Yeah, y'all send us some suggestions. Like, what do y'all want to be called? Y'all can't be called "the Living Corporate hive." That's mad corny. Can't be called the LCers, 'cause that's--again, it's cheesy. But I don't know. Like, we should think about something. I don't know. It'd be funny, like, if we ever had, like, a live podcast and, like, people subscribed in the middle of our podcast, if the noise was [makes noises] "Hi, who just joined?" That would be funny. [laughs]Ade: All right, it's past your bedtime.Zach: It's time to go. It's time to go, y'all. All right, thank y'all for listening to the Living Corporate podcast. You can check us out on everything. We're everywhere. Just Google us, Living Corporate. Check us out on Instagram @LivingCorporate, check us out on Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod. Make sure you check out all of our blogging content, 'cause we have blogs, and we have some new stuff coming. That'll be coming--fresh announcement, independent announcement coming soon on living-corporate.com, please state the dash, or livingcorporate.co or livingcorporate.org or livingcorporate.net. We have all the livingcorporates except livingcorporate.com. Y'all should know this by now because Australia owns livingcorporate.com. Somebody write a note to Australia. Let them know to stop hating. Ade: A strongly-worded letter.Zach: A strongly-worded letter, right? But they're not even doing the aboriginals right, so they definitely not gonna do us right, huh, Ade?Ade: I mean, no. Zach: No, they're not. Dang, we just put some aboriginal commentary in the end of a Living Corporate podcast episode. But I mean it, y'all need to do right by the aboriginals, and frankly y'all need to do right by us and give us the livingcorporate.com domain. I'm tired of it. We've talked about this for a whole 3 or 4 months. Consider this though a strongly-worded note, a message, okay? We do need the domain. I'm terrified to ask how much money it would cost. I have no idea. I have no idea how much money it would cost.Ade: I--I just--all right. Goodnight, bruh.Zach: Thank y'all for listening to the Living Corporate podcast. This has been Zach.Ade: This has been Ade.Zach: Peace.Ade: Peace.

We have the pleasure of sitting down with Role Tea CEO and co-founder Mike Johnson to discuss the topic of entrepreneurship while other and what building an effective network looks like for underrepresented communities. Connect with Mike (and Role Tea) on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikecjohnson1/https://www.linkedin.com/company/role-tea/about/Learn more about Role Tea:https://www.drinkroletea.com/https://www.instagram.com/roletea/?hl=enhttps://twitter.com/getroletea?lang=enhttps://www.facebook.com/GetRoleTea/Connect with us: https://linktr.ee/livingcorporateTRANSCRIPTZach: My grandfather was born in Mississippi and was a sharecropper on a cotton farm. With only an elementary education, he eventually moved to a small Illinois town to work for John Deere. After working for over 20 years, he established his wealth through entrepreneurship, namely real estate. "Remember," he would say to me as a child, "jobs are to pay your bills. If you want to be successful and make real money, do something else." Though he was successful, his journey was challenging and fraught with various hardship. It actually reminds me of an excerpt from a piece from Inc Magazine authored by Web Smith called "What It Really Means to Be a Black Entrepreneur in America," and I quote, "Regardless of race or ethnicity, entrepreneurs always begin at a disadvantage. However, blacks tend to need to reach levels of traction with our own money since seed money is often unavailable. This contributes to the rarity of URM entrepreneurs. Richard Kirby, vice president of Vinrock, recently compiled a list that reported a total of 23 African-American investors in the U.S. It should be of no surprise that black founders receive less than 1% of institutional capital. As important as money is the ability to realize your potential through mentorship and direction. This begins with confidence, belonging, and familiarity." End quote. Listen to that. Confidence, belonging, and familiarity. Networking is the catalyst for each of these things, but what does building such networks look like for underrepresented communities? My name is Zach, and you're listening to Living Corporate.Ade: So today we're talking about entrepreneurship and what it means to be an entrepreneur as a non-white person.Zach: I'm glad that we're dedicating an episode to this. Living Corporate isn't just about working for someone else, but also we want to explore ways in which you can work for yourself.Ade: For sure, and shout-out to your grandpa. That's an amazing story.Zach: Yeah, it's inspiring for sure, and while it's impressive--you know, he built his empire through real estate in a small Midwestern town after building up decades of social equity by being in the community, right? Like, he bought homes, like, no one else was really wise enough to invest in, then he fixed them himself, then he managed all of his own maintenance on this homes.Ade: Wow. Yeah, I mean, he weaved his own boot straps out of thin air and then pulled himself up by them. Like, he's an amazing success story, no doubt. To your point, in 2019, the world is just way more connected and social, which is cool, but it also creates more invisible hurdles and roles and just stuff to navigate in being a full-time or even moderately successful part-time entrepreneur, right? And those three things that you quoted--confidence, belonging, and familiarity--those are all needed in the hyper-connected world.Zach: It's just funny, 'cause I was telling a colleague that because of that fact that entrepreneurship success is built on access to capital, which lie in relationships, that people of color are well-benefitted by having partners and backing that don't really look like them, and I remember I had this conversation, and you would think this person, like, thought that I had said, I don't know, just something, like, really racist or, like--"What are you talking about? What are you trying to say? I mean, anybody can do anything." I was like, "OK, all right. Yes, we can do anything." And it also helps to know the right people so that we can have access to things, so that we can do the things that we want. I mean, like, let's be realistic. It frustrates me sometimes when we talk about, like, success and striving to do better and building things that we don't acknowledge, like, the very real capitalist structures that exist, right? Not even that we're fighting against, but that we have to plug into to be successful. Like, come on. Like, this is America. Everybody does not--everybody with a great idea does not wake up and then work really hard towards that idea and then somehow, like, become successful. There's plenty of people out there with great ideas who work very hard who are never successful, right?Ade: Right, and because people of color often don't have access to power or the relationships or the rooms in which these bills are being made in these countries to be movers and shakers there's a bit of a disadvantage. Let's look at the most prominent black clothing brand ever, FUBU. Long story short, FUBU popped off by having a relationship with LL Cool J, and yes, that LL Cool J. He is black, but guess who else LL Cool J had a commercial partnership with? Gap. He plugged FUBU in the middle of a Gap promotional commercial, and he did it while he was rapping, so nobody who was on set or was clearing the ad afterwards really noticed.Zach: Right, and it's a crazy story, but people just forget about that and the fact that Damon John, he had a ton of creative methods to promote FUBU, right? Like, he had a ton of different ways he was kind of getting it out on the street, but it was that Gap commercial--that's the one that really got 'em on the map and really--anyone who studies FUBU and studies, like, advertising, they know about the LL commercial, right? Like, it's common knowledge that's--that was the tipping point for that brand, and so, like, the point is entrepreneurship is changing already. Like, the majority of entrepreneurs don't make it, but being someone who doesn't have advantages built on centuries of historical inequity makes it even harder. Not to say it isn't possible. I'm not saying that it's impossible at all, it's just--it's just hard.Ade: Correct. Wouldn't it be dope if we had an entrepreneur with, let's say, over a 15-year track record of successfully launching dozens of new products or services in the food and beverage media and industrial goods industry? In fact, I would love to hear from someone who has experience maybe launching a brand from concept to the shelf of three of the top ten grocery chains in the country.Zach: Oh, you mean like our guest Mike C. Johnson?Ade and Zach: Whaaaaaat?Zach: [imitates air horns, then Sound Man supplies them] Y'all thought we weren't gonna have these air horns this season. Y'all thought. That's right. We still here with these air horns. We are here with these air horns. More fire for your head top. I'm not playing.Ade: This is really all Zach. I'm blaming it on you.Zach: Aye, drop the air horns. In fact, hold on, drop extra air horns, because we had someone who was actually from Jamaica hit us up on Instagram and say, "Please keep the air horns coming, and make them louder."Ade: Make them louder?Zach: Make them louder, so we here for y'all. We here for the people, 'cause we got it like that. We love y'all, okay?Ade: Not surprised. Not surprised in the least. All right, y'all. Keep listening for a really dope conversation.Zach: And we're back. And as we shared before the break, we have Mike Johnson with us. Welcome to the show, Mike. How are you doing?Mike: I'm doing good, man. How are you doing?Zach: I'm doing really good, man. So today we're talking about entrepreneurship. So can you tell me--where did your entrepreneurial itch come from or start with?Mike: Oh, man. I really can trace it back to my early 20s. I had a couple ventures around that time that I went after. I had a website called VirtualREGallery, which was basically a website that displayed virtual tours of real estate listings before virtual tours were pretty popular. I was a realtor for a little while, and I also did some construction on the side. So I've always kind of had that aspiration to somewhat control my own destiny, but I would say what really motivated me to start Role Tea was just as I learned more about marketing and innovation, I always just had this dream to want to turn an idea or a vision to a concept and go start to finish and pretty much have complete control over how that product will come to market. So that to me has been the most gratifying part of entrepreneurship. Even to this day when I walk into a store or restaurant and I see someone, you know, drinking Role Tea and, you know, just randomly, that to this day still makes me a little excited, 'cause I'm like, "Man, 3 years ago that product was just an idea in my head, and now people can actually purchase it and consume it in a store." So that's just probably the most gratifying thing, to have that control over the idea from start to finish.Zach: That's amazing. And, you know, you talking about your previous ventures, it reminds me of another question that--you know, in season 1 we had a guest who brought up the concept of failing forward--failing quickly and failing forward, so can you talk a little bit about that concept and perhaps what some of your biggest Ls--and we'll say Ls are lessons--that you've taken in your entrepreneurial journey?Mike: Yeah, man. That's a great question. The crazy thing for me about failure that I've learned in this experience is that--you know, I've realized that you really only fail at almost anything when you quit. Like, going into this venture, you know, sometimes your mind can play tricks on you. You start thinking about the worst things that could happen and failure and whatnot, but when you get into it you realize that, man, virtually everything that happens to a business can be resolved if you have the fortitude to try to work through it. So, I mean, you know, we're no different. Like, you know, everyone talks about the great side of entrepreneurship, but man, we've had at least four or five near-death experiences with our company in 2 years. Like, you know, from running out of cash, which a lot of startups have that issue with running out of money, to, you know, having key suppliers back out last minute, literally weeks before launching into Wegmans, which is a 95+ grocery chain from Virginia up to upstate New York, to having distributors back out the last minute. I mean, all of these things have taken out other companies, but for us we just looked at it as, you know, "Okay, here's another problem." You know, "What are our options just to get past it?" And you kind of take it on the chin and move forward. So, you know, you really only fail at almost anything when you quit or when you run out of, you know, hands to play. So once you realize that and you realize that, "Wow," you know, "what happens with me and this business is largely up to my control," it's kind of empowering once you realize that. But as far as just lessons in general around business, to me the two biggest lessons that come to mind for me is--the first one is just starting as small as you can until you can completely the validate the concept, and when I say validate the concept I mean that, you know, you have a product or a concept that people are gonna want to buy, where the economics of it will actually be able to create a business, right? There's a lot of ideas out there that you can sell, but you're never gonna get the price point that you need to actually have a business. Making sure that you actually know who the consumer is. You know how to talk to them or the channels to sell to them. Those are all the things that are required to really validate a concept, and it's best to try to do that on a very small scale to start. That's definitely been a lesson that we've learned early on, and then I think the second big lesson that I've learned in this in terms of failure as well is just trying to get the business to a point where it can be self-sustainable as quickly as possible, right? So right now we're going through some pretty, you know, dramatic changes around our operations to get a little bit more margin back in house versus giving it to a supplier or an outsourced vendor, and that's just all in an effort to get our business to a point where it can pretty much eat off of what it kills, right? We can sustain ourselves based on our own selves as opposed to relying too much on outside investments. So that's a piece of advice I would give to any aspiring entrepreneur. Even if you want to raise capital, it's just good to have financial discipline to try to get your business as self-sustainable as possible as quickly as possible. So there's many lessons, but those two stand out the most.Zach: And so, you know, you've talked--you talked a little bit about Role Tea, and we're definitely gonna get into that as we get further along in this interview. I'm curious to know about your ventures. Could you--would you mind walking us through? Typically when I meet--the reason I ask your ventures is because typically when I meet entrepreneurs, they may have, like, one big thing, but they have a few other things kind of cooking around them. So I'm curious to know, what are your ventures right now?Mike: No, yeah, that is very true. We tend to have short attention spans, so it's easy to kind of get involved with different things. You know, we launched Role Tea in December, November timeframe of 2016, so we're right at the 2 years, and to be honest, man, aside from, you know, being a new father, which I actually became a father the same year I became an entrepreneur with Role Tea, that's been my primary focus. Now that Role Tea is a little bit more established in terms of distributors and it doesn't take as much of me doing virtually everything to keep it going, I am starting to get back a little bit into consulting. That's something that I did prior to launching Role Tea, so I do like to work with other startups and help them however way I can, but aside from that, man, the bulk of my focus right now is with Role Tea.Zach: What challenges do you believe that you've had as a black entrepreneur? And I ask that because in the research that Ade and I have been doing, we've noticed that there are some challenges that are unique to being a non-white builder of businesses, and so I'm curious to know, like, if you--have you run into any challenges that you believe are unique juxtaposed to your white counterparts? And if so, what are they?Mike: Entrepreneurship, just inherent in the way it is, is already built with plenty of challenges. White, black, yellow, whatever. So sometimes it can be a challenge to understand, "Okay, is this a challenge that I'm facing because I'm simply an entrepreneur, or is this a challenge that I'm facing because I'm a black entrepreneur?" And that can be difficult sometimes to decipher, but one challenge that I think is definitely tied to us being, you know, African-American [and own a business,] especially in the food and beverage industry. It's just the fact that, you know, we are launching a beverage brand that is--our intent is to scale to 100+ million in sales and potentially exit, so we're treating our business like a true startup, not like a family-owned business where we're just, you know, looking to sell locally and et cetera, and I think that that's a very different thing in the food and beverage industry amongst a black entrepreneur that most people would expect. So I think that just simply not having a whole lot of examples to point to of black-owned food and beverage brands that have been able to do that successfully makes it hard for a lot of people to see the vision and see the potential in our concept, and I think that's especially true primarily with investors. We've actually had, you know, pretty good success with, for example, some major retailers. We've gotten our product onto the shelves of Whole Foods, of Wegmans. Those are two of the top-rated grocery chains in the country. Hy-Vee is another one. You know, but from a business standpoint, I think that's where we've seen most of the challenge in terms of, you know, working with investors and things of that nature, and I think that's largely because there's just not a whole lot of examples of African-American-owned food and beverage brands that have done it to that level, which is what we're aspiring to do. So I'm sure that there is plenty more, but that's definitely one that I can say for certain I think is unique to us.Zach: So what advice would you give to the person who thinks, you know, entrepreneurship is an all-or-nothing thing and it isn't--they're not starting their journey because they're afraid of missing a steady paycheck?Mike: Yeah, man. That's definitely something that is--I find is very common amongst a lot of people. I struggle with that myself. The first thing is you don't have to be all in to be an entrepreneur, right? Don't listen to everything that you see on Instagram and, you know, social media. There's a lot of people out here glamorizing entrepreneurship, and entrepreneurship is great, right? I spent 12+ years in the corporate world, and now I'm 2 years as an entrepreneur, so I can give you the perspective of both sides, and there's definitely a lot of advantages on the entrepreneur side, but there is nothing wrong with side-hustling it for as long as you can, right? That extra paycheck from your job is--it actually can position your business to be more successful, you know? Thankfully I have 12+ years of experience in the corporate world working for other people, learning, collecting that nice six-figure salary so that I can actually build up a savings to even have a chance to do what I'm doing now. So it's all about when is the right time for you, even if you ever want to go all in, right? All in meaning you're full-time with your entrepreneurship venture, but that's the first thing. Don't feel pressured to go all in, right? And when you go all in is another big question that I hear a lot, and it's also one that I--challenge that I dealt with, and, you know, there's no right or wrong answer. Everyone has to lok at their particular situation to know when is the right time, but I will say that there's probably about four or five things that, you know, anyone that's in that situation is looking to do, to transition, to go all in, they should be looking at. Like, the first thing is, you know, what does your business require? Like, for example, if you're gonna launch a catering business versus a restaurant, you know, they're two very different demands and requirements, right? When you're talking about a restaurant, you have to deal with a storefront, which likely comes with remodeling, et cetera. Not the typical type of thing that you can get, you know, to market on the weekends and evenings, right? Whereas a catering service, you can do that evenings, weekends. You can pretty much side-hustle that until you actually get paying customers before you even have to leave your job. So the type of business that you're looking to start a lot of times will dictate largely when you can actually go all in or if and when you can actually cut the 9-to-5 path. The other thing you've got to look at is, you know, what type of support do you have going into it, right? Do you have people, whether it's family members or friends, that can help you out early on without having to get paid, right? I mean, early on there's no cash coming in. To get it stood up, you're gonna need people to help. You're gonna need your team. What type of support do you have? If you have a pretty good support system, you may be able to go all in a little bit sooner. Also you've got to look at, you know, what are your responsibilities in terms of financially and with people, right? Are you 21 years old, no kids, no family, very low bills? You know, that gives you a whole lot more flexibility in terms of what you can do sooner and the risks that you can take, whereas if you are--like, in my situation, I started, you know, Role Tea already in my mid-30s. Like I said, I'm a father, newly father, so I have to move a lot different in that situation.Zach: Congratulations on that, by the way.Mike: Oh, I definitely appreciate it, man. Fatherhood is a lot of fun, a lot of fun. But yeah, you have to move a lot different if you have a lot of financial responsibilities and people responsibilities. Obviously you have to be a little bit more smart about when you go all in. You also might have to look at are there skills that you just don't have yet but you need to develop before you go all in, right? And then lastly, this is probably often times, you know, skipped and not really taken into consideration, but you definitely have to look at what's your appetite for risk and uncertainty, right? Once you pull the plug on that 9-to-5 and you're all in, you know, on the good side is it really motivates you to have a sense of urgency, to move forward fast, but at the same time it can also be stressful by not having that paycheck coming in every week or two or whatever it was you got paid, and that can definitely cause a lot of stress and anxiety, and if you're the type of person that doesn't deal well with that type of uncertainty and stress, #1: you're probably going to struggle as an entrepreneur, 'cause that's gonna come naturally, but that may also dictate you keeping your business as a side hustle a little bit longer. So I never tell someone exactly what to do in that situation, but I would definitely tell you that those are probably the four or five things that you should be thinking about in your situation to determine, you know, when you go all in or if you go all in at all.Zach: And so, you know--and I alluded to this earlier about some of your challenges as a black entrepreneur, but the research I was speaking to specifically had to do with the variance in acquiring capital, right? So venture capital, angel investments, and other types of non-business loan-sourced funding. I'm curious, have you had any challenges in acquiring that type of funding, and really what's been your journey in building those relationships with those with access with the capital to help your ventures?Mike: Yeah, that's a great question. It's definitely one of the bigger challenges that I'm finding with not just our business but other black-owned entrepreneurs, and it's a complex one, which I--I know that this is probably an area of business that's foreign to a lot of people, so I definitely want to make sure I kind of break this down because, you know, I have an MBA, but yet 3 years ago I didn't understand hardly anything about the idea of raising capital. I've had to learn a lot through this venture, and the challenges that are unique to African-Americans is--it's kind of a snowball effect, so let me explain it like this. So investment in startups typically happens in a progression, right? So, you know, the first step is typically money out of your own pocket, right? So that's called bootstrapping, right? Maybe you've worked in the corporate world for a number of years, you've built up some savings. Maybe you got an inheritance. Whatever the case may be, right? But you need some sort of cash to get things going very early on. That's typically the first step. Second step is you look to friends and family, right? "Who do I know in my own personal network?" Friends, family, associates, that have the means to write a $10, 20, 30, 50,000 check or more, right? That's the second step, and then once you get past that, then you get into what's called angel investors, which are typically either high net worth or high-income individuals who choose to invest in startups, right? And then lastly you get to venture capital, which essentially are, you know, funds that investors who are called limited partners, or LPs, invest in, and they then have managers of those funds look for startups to invest in, right? And they can go from $500,000 up to, you know, $100,000,000, right? They write very large checks. So that's the typical progression of a startup raising capital for their business. So let's think about that, right? Now, what we know about African-Americans is we traditionally have a lower income than non-whites. We also traditionally have a lower net worth, which is probably more significant, than whites. So going back to the very first step in that progression, right? Most of us could struggle with having the means to even bootstrap, to have that $20, 30, 50,000 just to get started, right? Because of the points that I just made, right? And if you get past that hurdle, then now you have to find friends and family that also can write that $10, 15, 20,000 check or more. Again, that's a struggle that's unique for African-Americans moreso than others because of the points that I just made. So right out the gate as an African-American entrepreneur you have some disadvantages, right? And VCs and angels, you have to get past those first couple stages typically before they're even interested in looking at your business, right? And the crazy thing about investment, the investment world, that I've learned is investors rely significantly on their personal networks to even be introduced to an entrepreneur to invest in. So they're--again, how many African-Americans have the social network, the connections that people that have that kind of means to write those checks, right? So it's a snowball effect that, collectively speaking, puts us at a disadvantage, and again, that's definitely a challenge that is well-documented. We've experienced it. Other founders that we know have experienced it, but, you know, how you deal with that is--again, I don't want to make it sound simple, but the first thing that we've tried to do is just bridge that gap in terms of relationships, right? And that's really done largely by just putting yourself out there, putting yourself in situations to meet people that can invest in your brand. So, you know, the very first angel investor that we had we met at the Black Enterprise Entrepreneurs Summit last year. We were chosen as a finalist to pitch in that competition, so, you know, we got a lot of visibility at that show down in Houston last year. We met with our first investor there, our first angel investor I should say, and, you know, months down the road after the rapport was established he decided to invest in us, right? So that was an example of where we had to kind of bridge that gap by just going out and making those connections, and then the second thing really is just--you know, you have to have the mindset that you're gonna make your startup undeniable, right? You know, if someone says no now, which we've definitely heard tons of nos, and you're gonna hear nos. Raising capital is very difficult for any startup, so you have to have the mindset that, you know, "Okay, you say no today, but we're gonna build up the traction that we need over the next 6 months to 12 months to the point where if you say no you're basically foolish," right? So you just have to make your startup--you have to make your startup undeniable, 'cause everyone likes to make money, and I think it's a little bit more of a challenge to show that we can do that, but, you know, if you can definitely demonstrate that, people will invest in your startup. It's just a little bit difficult for us for those reasons.Zach: That's just such a great point around--especially when you started--when you talked about, like, the various levels of investment, right? So I'll even use Living Corporate as an example. For us, you know, I'm one of the few people in my family even in corporate America. We don't all have money like that. I certainly would not--I don't even feel comfortable. I mean, and some of that might just be culture too, Mike. I don't feel comfortable walking to a member of my family talking about, "Hey, would you mind investing $10,000 to help us hire writers and videographers and so on, so on, and so forth," and really invest in Living Corporate. Like, what? You know what I mean? Like, just the thought of that, right? And then, you know, we had an episode again in season 1 when we were talking about family [inaudible]--like, the wealth gap. The wealth inequality gap, and there's plenty of research to show that in the next 10, 20 years, that the average value of a black home will be zero dollars, right? So you're talking about the fact that starting up and getting all this capital, for a community who has no money--like, we don't have the centuries of privilege and things of that nature to have an uncle or a second cousin who can write a check, right? And I think that's just a really good point. You know, I'm curious about Role Tea, so let's dig into that a little bit more. So first off, when can Living Corporate get a case of the tea?Mike: I'm always open to giving Role Tea to whoever wants it, so yeah, I'll let you go with the second question.Zach: [laughs] Okay, so we're good on the tea. And then why tea? Why Role Tea, and then what was the inspiration behind Role Tea?Mike: Yeah, yeah. So yeah, we definitely got you on the case. No problem there. As far as the inspiration for the tea, we always say on the--we launched the tea 2 years ago, but the idea for Role Tea really started probably in my early 20s more than 10 years ago where I had the experience of losing 100 pounds, right? So, you know, I'm like 22 years old, and I get that scale shock where I go to the doctor and--I know I'm obviously way too big, but I didn't realize I had actually gone over 300 pounds, and I'm like, "Man," like, "Okay, something's gotta change." So at that point my relationship with food changed, and I learned that, you know, a lot of the traditional foods and beverages that I had consumed, that were, you know, typically less than healthy, right, if I'm creative I can remix those recipes to be better for me, still taste good, and actually serve a purpose to either help me feel better or perform better, and so, you know, over the course of the next 2 to 3 years I lost 100 pounds just, you know, changing the way I ate and exercising more, et cetera. So fast forward to 2015. At this time I was training for a boxing match. I'm a huge boxing fan. I've boxed for several years. Anyone that knows me knows that I'm passionate about boxing just as I am about business, but I was training for a boxing match in 2015, and I noticed--again, now in my mid-30s, you know, after training, what used to take a day or two to feel normal again, not feel sore, not feel stiff, was now taking 2 or 3 days, right? So I started to research beverages that I could drink--you know, not supplements, but just every day traditional beverages--Zach: Natural.Mike: Yeah, natural beverages that I could incorporate into my diet that may help, and so, you know, that's when I learned about ingredients like tumeric and ginger and, you know, green tea and tart cherries, which all have natural anti-inflammatory properties, and so I looked for options in the store, and virtually everything I saw was $6 or $7 bottles of juice, [inaudible] sugar. So, you know, my background is in innovation, new product development and launches, so I immediately saw a business opportunity. I went to a friend of mine named Corey Benson with the idea, and he has an operations background. He was running a manufacturing plant at the time, and he said, "You know what, man? Like, I see people every day that are standing up at the job for 9, 10 hours a day. They're popping Aleves. They're, you know, popping Advils and drinking Mountain Dews to deal with the soreness from just their job," right? So he immediately saw the pain point that, you know, the concept that we were thinking about would address, but he saw it from a regular 9-to-5 job, whereas I was dealing with it from a weekend warrior boxing perspective, right? So we immediately saw, like, "Wow, this whole thing around inflammation and a functional beverage that can help with that has some legs, and it probably could impact a lot of people." So from there we were ready to go. We started to research the industry a lot more in 2015 and 2016. We worked with a development company to take our recipes that we had created with tea and juice and spices, like tumeric and ginger, to basically create a product that could be sold on a shelf. We chose tea because, you know, tea is a very popular drink, and it still is. Shout-out to Guru, even though he talked about lemonade. But tea's a very popular drink, and the great thing about it is, again, you know, a lot of the options before were juices, which is more expensive. Tea is a much less expensive catalyst to use to deliver functional spices and benefits, so we figured we would be able to create a functional drink that's also affordable, right? So we're probably one of the first functional beverages in stores like Whole Foods and Wegmans that was under $3 per bottle, and again--plus I'm a huge iced tea fan, right? So that was a natural ingredient, or product, to use. So, you know, we worked through the recipe process in 2016, and we launched a product literally the night before Thanksgiving in the D.C. Metro area in 2016, and, you know, we started off just very independent, selling out of the trunk of our cars, and, you know, now we're currently sold in over 100 locations, from Virginia up to upstate New York as well as a few states in the Midwest. So right now we're just, you know, looking to continue to grow the business, bring on more partners, bring on more investors, and just see how far it can go.Zach: Man, that's incredible, man. You know, and down the road, once, you know, we get this tea and we drink it, we'll make sure to shout y'all out on the podcast on the part of our Favorite Things.Mike: Definitely. Definitely do that.Zach: Yeah, man. Now, this has been a great conversation. I really want to know where people can learn more about Role Tea and where they can get some.Mike: Yeah, yeah. So Role Tea--and that's R-O-L-E, as in, like, play your role. Role Tea is sold online, so you can see us at RoleTea.com. R-O-L-E-T-E-A dot com. We're also sold on the East Coast, primarily in stores like Wegmans as well as some independent stores in the D.C. Metro area. So yeah, check us out online, RoleTea.com. A lot of good information there. You can order right through that website. Yeah.Zach: That's what's up, man. Now, look, before we get out of here, do you have any parting thoughts or shout-outs?Mike: Yeah, I definitely want to shout-out everyone that has tried Role Tea, everyone that will try Role Tea, including you, Zach. Yeah, everyone that's worked with the brand to help get us this far, to this point, definitely appreciate the support. I definitely want to shout-out my co-founder Corey Benson. Definitely want to shout-out, you know, again, everyone that's listening to this podcast. I didn't get a chance to say this before, man, but when I first heard about this podcast and what you guys are attempting to do as far as help educate people in how to navigate, you know, the world of corporate America, I'm like, "Man, that's definitely something that's needed." Like you mentioned yourself, you're a first-generation corporate professional, right? Did I hear that right?Zach: Right.Mike: Yep, so same here. You know, first in my family to, you know, get a bachelor's degree, master's degree, corporate world and, you know, going into the corporate world I'm thinking, "Okay, I'm ready for success based on my education," but I quickly learned that most of what determines your success in that world is the things that are not taught in the classroom, right? It's the soft skills. It's the implied cultural norms that are often times a little bit different than what we grew up with, so, you know, a lot of us learn those lessons on the job as opposed to being prepared beforehand. So this podcast is doing a great service to help educate young professionals on those waters before they get into them, so kudos to you guys, and again, I'm glad to be a part of this.Zach: Man, Mike, thank you so much for the kind words. Again, the drink, Role Tea--like know your role, R-O-L-E T-E-A, and we're excited to give it a little review. So I appreciate your time. We consider you a friend of the show. Can't wait to have you back, man.Mike: Definitely appreciate it, man.Zach: Peace.Mike: Peace.Ade: And we're back. I thoroughly enjoyed that interview, Zach. I mean, I've known Mike for a little while now. He's been a great friend and supporter. Like, he's always good, not only to listen to you for advice but just listen to his experiences, and how he's been able to grow Role Tea as a brand has been very inspiring, and I'm so glad that we got so much of that in that interview.Zach: No, for sure. In our discussion, and outside of it too, we talked about--just talked about his history and talked about the challenges of building up his brand and really, like, trying and failing at some other things too, but super happy he was on the show, and hopefully we'll get some--we'll get some tea out of this. He told me he'd actually send us a couple pallets. I don't know about pallets, but he said he'd send--Ade: Word?Zach: Yeah. Not pallets, 'cause pallets sounds like--Ade: 'Cause that tea is delicious.Zach: Yeah. No, I've heard it's--I haven't had any yet, but I'm positive that once I have it I'm gonna enjoy it.Ade: Okay. Well, I am keeping an eye out, because Role Tea is amazing. Anyway, awesome. Thank you, and shout-out again to Mike Johnson and Role Tea. I'm looking forward to that tea.Zach: Salute to Mike. Okay, so Favorite Things?Ade: Favorite Things. Let's go. All right.Zach: All right, cool. So look, my favorite thing right now has to be Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Now, some of y'all are like, "Super Smash Bros.? What's that?" But let me tell you something, those who know--Pusha T voice. "If you know, you know." So look, my favorite thing right now has to be Super Smash Bros. Ultimate on my Nintendo Switch. It's super fun. I play in the evening after a long day at work, and I love it because I can just kind of pick it up. I don't have to, like, sit down in front of a big TV, boot up the game. I can just pick up my handheld, boot it up. And for those who want to know, my favorite--my main character is Chrom. So again, for those who are kind of, like, outside of this whole video game space, Super Smash Bros. is a Nintendo game, right, but it's like you can, like, pick Nintendo characters against each other to fight, right? But, like, not in a, like, super violent Mortal Kombat way. More, like, kind of, like, a cartoonish, fun way, but it's a deep, deep game, right? So you can put Mario against Sonic. You can put Princess Peach against Captain Falcon or Fox or Falco or Ganondorf versus Kirby. You can do all kinds of crazy match-ups, right? Super fun, and so it's been cool. It's a really good stress reliever. That--you know, working out sometimes, you don't want to necessarily want to get up and work out. Forgive me. I don't want to work out all the time. Sometimes I just want to kind of veg out, and it's great. It's great for that. So that's my favorite thing.Ade: Okay, self-care. I see you.Zach: That's right.Ade: So my favorite thing lately has been a book called Cracking the Coding Interview. It's been invaluable, I think. I struggle--for those of you who are just joining us, just in case this is your very first Living Corporate episode ever, I am switching careers, or I'm in the process of switching careers. I'm becoming a software engineer, and part of that process is self-teaching both foundational concepts and computer science, but also understanding algorithms, binary trees. Just how the very technical elements of software engineering, something that you are supposed to pick up in a classroom that I did not have the luxury of doing, therefore I have to teach myself. And there are also books that exist out there that kind of help you through the process of thinking through and developing strategies for coding interviews. I'm discussing it like it's a journal or something like that, [inaudible], but yeah, it's been a really important book, and I've kind of been adding more and more base computer science books and algorithm books to my library, right next to Frantz Fanon and Audre Lorde. So yeah, those are my favorite things.Zach: That's a sick combination though. That's dope.Ade: I want you to know our library in our home consists of tax law code and regulations and vegan chef--vegan cookbooks and regular cookbooks and Sister Outsider. [laughs] And computer science books and data science books.Zach: That's dope though.Ade: Oh, and [Ola had a?] self-help book. So there's no way you can walk into my home and not have something to read.Zach: You're gonna have something. You're gonna learn about something.Ade: There will be something available to edify you. I even have, like, fiction novels, everything from John Green to Grisham to Tomi Adeyemi, which, again, shout-out to her.Zach: Shout-out to her. No, straight up. She's great.Ade: I'm looking up to the next book in the series, by the way. Okay, we have veered so far off track. Did you have--Zach: Good. It's a Favorite Things segment. We're supposed to turn up. It's cool.Ade: You know what? You're right. You're right. Sir, sir. Sir. [Not turning up. Cruise?]. I'm tired. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] [Turn me up. Cruise?]Ade: Nope, I'm tired of you.Zach: Okay. No, no, no, but that's dope. So look, you know, y'all, if it wasn't evident by our kickoff episode, as well as our Supporting Black Women at Work section, the B-Side that we had as well as the full episode, we're here, man.Ade: We outchea.Zach: We're gonna have a good time this season. Make sure you keep checking us out. Thank you for joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. Make sure to follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate, Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through living-corporate.com. Please say the dahs.Ade: The dash.Zach: If you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, just email us or hit us on DM, right? We out here. Don't forget to give us 5 stars too. Now, look, some of y'all actually been responding and gave us some stars, but not all of y'all though. That's right, I'm looking at you. That's right. We need those 5 stars, okay? Right? Am I tripping, Ade? Do we need the 5 stars or nah?Ade: We need the 5 stars.Zach: We need the 5 stars. Okay, cool. Look, y'all. That does it for us. We'll catch y'all next week. This has been Zach.Ade: And this is Ade. Free 21 Savage.Zach: Free 21 Savage. Peace.Ade: Peace.

Zach and Ade officially kick off Living Corporate Season 2 by announcing new… well, just about everything! New guests and blog posts, weekly tips provided by Tristan Layfield, and even new background music! They also discuss the expansion of Favorite Things and listener letters for Season 2.Email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com or send us a DM on any of our social media platforms to submit your Favorite Things and listener letters!TRANSCRIPTZach: Ayo!Ade: What's good?Zach: We're back, we're back. What's going on, everybody? Welcome to Living Corporate Season 2.Ade: Sure is.Zach: Season 2, let's go. Look, more intentional--is it more intentional? Does more intentional--is that grammatically correct?Ade: I--I do believe so, yeah.Zach: Okay, great. More intentional. Bolder. More fun. What kind of topics do we have this season, Ade? I feel like we've got some hot stuff.Ade: We do. So this season we're gonna be talking about interesting stuff like supporting black when at work, which I personally am a fan of. Being disabled while other at work, respectability politics. I mean, the real behind the helpfulness of HR. Being Latinx at work. We have a ton more content. We got some great feedback from the blog last season as well, so we're continuing that this year. Definitely, definitely, definitely make sure you check us out. It'll be on our website, living-corporate.com, and on our Medium page.Zach: In the off-season, right, we actually made some moves, okay? So we bought more domains, right? Okay, so we got livingcorporate.tv. We got livingcorporate.co. We got livingcorporate.org. We really have every Living Corporate. We have livingcorporate.net, right? We have every Living Corporate besides livingcorporate.com, because Australia owns livingcorporate.com. Ade: Hold on. Now, this is the first I'm hearing of this. I have to fight Australia for--what?Zach: So it's a company in Australia, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they have livingcorporate.com, but we have all the other Living Corporates without the dashes, right, and the hyphens, so we're making these moves. Definitely excited about the blog. Like, that's gonna be great. Like, everybody isn't a podcast person, right? Like, we have this podcast. We love our podcast. The podcast is probably 90%, 95%, right, as we currently stand of what we have going on, but we want to better diversify our media offerings, because people engage in content in different ways, and we really believe in what we're doing. I would hate--I would hate for all the great things that we have going on to not be captured or not be absorbed rather. And speaking of more content and engaging people in different ways... some of y'all probably remember Tristan Layfield. Ade: Aye.Zach: Yes. He was a guest on the show last season on the episode--it was a B-Side for Landing the Job of Your Dreams. And he's a resume subject matter expert in terms of how to write them, and he's a career coach. Doing great stuff, right? Doing great stuff, and he's graciously offered to be a part of the Living Corporate team for Season 2 to give y'all his own nuggets of wisdom, and he's gonna put 'em on the show.Ade: Amazing. Shout-out to Tristan.Zach: To me that's crazy, right? Shout-out to Tristan Layfield and Layfield Resume, man. Like, shout-out to those folks over there. He's doing great work. In fact, can we get some applause? Can we get some applause for us right now, like, collaborating, sharing spaces?Ade: Totally.Zach: I mean, come on. Let's do that. Let's do that. Maybe even some air horns too, I don't know. That reminds me though, [inaudible] sound effects, drops and stuff like that, we're also gonna new background music this season. Now, look. We got a lot of feedback. People are really feeling the background music. I'm gonna call it blackground music, right? It's jazzy. It's soulful. It's refreshing, right? It's good. It's good. We've gotten good feedback on it. So we're excited about the fact that we're gonna have some new blackground music this season and new mixes for our SoundCloud. So look, we have a decent amount of followers on SoundCloud. Of course we have our most followers on Instagram, but look, on our SoundCloud, y'all, we drop mixes and, like, custom music. I know, I know, I know. You're like, "What? Y'all doing a lot." I know. Ade: We got the aux cord.Zach: We got the aux cord, we got the aux cord. And listen, the mixes are fire. They're not--there's no profanity or nothing on 'em, so when your colleagues at work, when they ask, "Hey, Jamal, do you have any music you'd like for us to play? We're having a late-night working session here." This actually happened to me when I was in Japan working with my colleagues. They were like, "Hey, let's get some music going on. Let's get some music going on." So one of my colleagues, I'm not gonna say who it was, wanted to play some Nickelback. I was like--Ade: Now, hold on. Hold on, hold on. What? Zach: Okay. So Nickelback, yeah. And I'm like, "Hey, uh, Brock, if you could just hand me the charger--hand me the aux and I'll handle it." And I take the aux cord, I'm playing the music, and let me tell you. Fire. We had a good time. They were like, "Ooh, what mix is this?" Then--another example and I'll stop--I had an orientation. So at my job, my new job, orientation. For some reason they were like, "Hey, our music isn't really working." Like, "Our playlist isn't working." I said, "Okay, cool." I plugged in my little--plugged in the SoundCloud, right? Work and Weekend Vibes Volume 1. Man. The guy, right? Senior guy who was coordinating the whole thing goes, "Hey, this is--hey. Hey. Hey, guy! Hey. Music's pretty good." I said, "Thank you. Thank you." It was great. It was great. We had a great time. So the point is we're gonna have more of that, okay? And it's gonna be fire, so we need y'all to check it out. Now, I talked about drops, right? Like, we talked about kind of, like, sound effects and stuff like that. Ade, what kind of drops should we have? Like, we're not a hip hop podcast, right? Like, we're not gonna have gunshots, right?Ade: I mean, you know what? I just feel like there are occasions in which something so fire was said that a gunshot or two might be appropriate. Zach: [laughing] That's so problematic.Ade: Listen, listen. I just feel as though there are some celebrations that require a *brap-brap* or two.Zach: A *brap-brap*! [laughs] Well, the funny thing is that culturally, right, culturally, like, there are different--you know, it's just--it's different. I've seen videos, man, of cats, like, just--I saw a video at a wedding. Everybody had guns, shooting them thangs off at the end, right? Like, as opposed to throwing rice they was throwing bullets in the air. It was crazy.Ade: So listen, as someone who has been to many a Jamaican function, yes. That's all I'm gonna say to that.Zach: Word? That's the wave? That's the wave? I don't know. That's--wow.Ade: I mean, a graduation, a baby shower...Zach: A baby shower? They're shooting--wait, whoa, whoa. They're letting 'em go at the baby shower?Ade: Nothing is complete--no celebration is truly complete until there's gunshots in the air.Zach: Until you let them thangs go? Wow. So this is the scary part about gunshots, right, is that when you shoot 'em up like that, I mean, just because of the way that gravity works, they're gonna fall, right? They're gonna come back.Ade: [laughing] What goes up surely must come down.Zach: [laughing] They're coming down. Can you imagine? Like, that is scary. You're in your house and you hear [sound of bullets dropping], and it's not rain? Like, "That is the smallest, fastest hail I've ever heard in my life."Ade: All I want to say is that [the sound Zach made] is not how guns sound.Zach: [laughs] When they fall. When they fall though. When they fall.Ade: You know what? I still don't feel like metal sounds like [the sound] when it falls on the ground. Feel free to correct me on this one.Zach: You don't think so? [laughs] I just think--I just think because they're so small. Like, they're bullets. They've already been fired, so they're not--Ade: I mean, that's cute and all, but metal just doesn't sound like that.Zach: It don't sound like that? That's [inaudible].Ade: No. I also know that if I ever need some on the spot sound effects you're not gonna be the guy that I go to for--Zach: Wow. My sound effects are fire.Ade: Are they though? Because thus far you've given me [the sound] and *brap-brap*.Zach: So I've asked you--so look, we've completely derailed, right? I asked you what sound effects we need. You've only--you've suggested gunshots.Ade: Okay, first of all, I didn't suggest gunshots. I said that gunshots should not be entirely out of our arsenal--see what I did there?Zach: Wow. Bars.Ade: [laughs] Should not be entirely out of our arsenal of sound effects. That's all I am saying personally.Zach: So what are we thinking? Are we thinking, like, maybe stuff from, like, a different world? Right? Like, I don't know--Ade: You know what? I don't--I feel like we should stay away from, like, sitcom-y sounds, but also just not be dead... so there is an in-between here, and we just have to walk the road and find it.Zach: We do. So yeah, more on that. We'll figure out what exactly those sounds are.Ade: See the wisdom I just applied there without saying anything at all?Zach: No, no, you did. No, no, it was good. It was good, it was good. Ade: I appreciate my roses when I get them. I'm sorry. I'm acting a fool today. All right.Zach: Okay.Ade: Back to it. Favorite Things are back.Zach: Yeah, they back.Ade: However, this year--stay with me here--we want y'all to submit some of your Favorite Things.Zach: There you go.Ade: That's right. I'm tired of being clowned for my Favorite Things. I feel as though it is only fair that we open up our space to include others, open up our horizons by sharing with us what brings you some joy or the next week or the week after that.Zach: And you know what? Speaking of, like, sharing things, like, let me just--let me just talk about what we're sharing today, okay? We're sharing space. So you may say, "Well, yes, Zach, we are sharing space in this corporate structure as non-white people in majority-white working places, and yes, we have to figure out ways to share and navigate space--" No, no, no. I'm not talking about. I'm talking about we're practically sharing space today. Ade is sharing space in a golf room of her--of her apartment. So if you hear this, like, whooshing sound in the background, those are not beheadings. That's a man swinging at a golf ball with fiber in his being. He is hitting it as hard as he possibly can. He knows--Ade: As hawrd? Zach: Hawrd. Hawrd, yes, as he--as he possibly can. He knows that we are in this room, and this is how he's choosing to share the space with us. So--Ade: I just--first of all, he's--like, this is--this is the intended purpose of the room.*SMACK*Ade: That's one. Two, let it never be said that I don't go to some extremes for Living Corporate, okay? Because I have recorded--Zach: No, you've made--this is up there with when you recorded that show with Christa in the closet with all the blankets on top of your body.Ade: I have contorted myself into some very interesting places for Living Corporate, so I just--again, I appreciate my flowers when they are given to me.Zach: No, you are--you are appreciated, it's just I don't want to be implicated in any type of murder.Ade: See? See? Why you gotta be like that? *SMACK*Zach: Because it sounds--because it sounds so scary to me, right? Like, it sounds--Ade: Imagine being the person.Zach: Man, no, no. That sounds terrifying. Okay, let's continue. So I know we talked about Favorite Things. Listener letters.Ade: All right. Listener letters. So we're taking both Favorite Things and listener letters, wherever you're choosing to submit them. So whether you want to email them, DM us on social media--preferably Instagram, but wherever we be at, you be at--submit your Favorite Things, and we will absolutely shout you out, share your Favorite Things, and maybe talk through some of the irritating things, or awesome things, that are going on in your corporate world. So if you want to talk about your coworker accusing you of stealing their lunch, drop us a line. If you want to talk about the amazing win that you've had or the proposal that you just won or the grants that you just wrote or just about the fact that you don't feel like you're getting anywhere in your career at all. Whatever it is you want to share, let us know. We're here. What else?Zach: I mean, that's a good--that's a good point. We really want--we definitely want the letters, right? And we definitely want the Favorite Things, so just submit 'em. Like, we're flexible. We're available, right? We're here for y'all. We got all these domains, right? We got all these different social media platforms. DMs open on all of 'em, you know what I'm saying? You just hit us up. Of course we prefer it in email, so who cares? Send it to us.Ade: [laughs] Who cares what our preference is?Zach: Yeah, who cares about our preference? We are here to serve y'all. That's serving leadership, you see what I mean? Because we love y'all, you hear?Ade: I see you, change manager. I see you. Zach: That's right. Look, you gotta put yourself last, okay?Ade: I don't know about all that. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] "Wait a minute. Hold on."Ade: [laughs] Hold on, now. Nah, nah.Zach: "Hold on, hold on. Not last. Maybe not first." What about second to first? All right, so what else? Okay, yeah, yeah. So look. Now, we've said this--we've said this multiple times, and I need, like, some--I need, like, some softer sentimental music, kind of like the music before you donate to those dogs and stuff with their eyes all big and the cats, and they look all sad. I need that in the background. Ade: [supplies sad music acapella style]Zach: Listen, y'all know that we need 5 stars. Y'all know that we need 5 star ratings.Ade: You know I'm not about to do this with you, right? [laughs]Zach: For a simple two seconds. A one-time donation of 2 seconds. You can actually contribute to the over-arching health and promotion of the Living Corporate podcast if you just slide over to iTunes, the podcast section. Scroll down on Living Corporate's little page on the podcast. It's gonna say, "Leave a review. Leave a rating." You're gonna take your finger, and you're gonna just press 5. 5 stars. Ade: 5 of 'em.Zach: Do you have 5 on it? 'Cause I've had 5 on it, okay? Ade: [singing] I got 5 on it.Zach: Now, we're not gonna get copy--we're not gonna sued for that because we didn't play the audio. Ade: We didn't, and also Jordan Peele has made it kind of creepy, so...Zach: Yes, he has, and so we actually probably won't even reference that again. Ade: Yeah, that's gonna be the first and the last time we do that on the sh ow.Zach: Facts. But look, really, we need 5 stars, okay? So please do us the favor of giving us these 5 stars. And look, let me just go ahead--so that was the--that's kind of like the carrot, you know?Ade: Okay. First of all--there's no stick, number one. Number two, I just want to say we also appreciate your comments that come along with those. So if you want to share any feedback, if you'd like us to bring any guests back or a rerun episode or maybe get a little bit deeper on a topic that we've discussed in the past, let us know. But yeah, give us the 5 stars.Zach: So there's no stick, so I didn't mean it that way. That was me being softer, right? But, like, let me just be practical. We have, like, thousands upon thousands of downloads on our podcast every month, and yet we only have, like, 120 reviews. Ade: It's very hurtful.Zach: Right? It hurts me, right? I'm like, "Yo." And then people will be like--and then people be on Instagram, "This podcast influences me the most every day. I love listening to this podcast," and I feel the love, I do, but I would feel it more if I could get some of these 5 star reviews. So what can we do to, like, help support 5 star reviews? Like, how can we--how can we encourage the audience to participate in 5 star reviews, Ade?Ade: I have an idea.Zach: All right, go ahead.Ade: We could do giveaways. Zach: Giveaways? Giveaways is a--okay, okay, but what are we--what are we giving away? 'Cause it's not like we have--Ade: If you send us screenshots of your review, you enter a drawing. How's that sound?Zach: Right, but what do we have though? It's not like we have any, I mean--Ade: I mean, we do have Living Corporate mugs--hold on, I'm pretty certain we do. We have mugs.Zach: So that's an announcement, right? So that's, like, a two-in-one, right? We have mugs, and we're gonna do giveaways.Ade: Aye.Zach: Okay, so we do have mugs. I agree that we should do giveaways, so let's do that. Yeah, so we have, like, these Living Corporate mugs, y'all, and they're actually pretty cute. They're really cute. They're big, so, like, you know, you can put a lot of whatever your drink of choice is.Ade: Coffee. We're drinking coffee.Zach: Coffee. Listen, let's not--Ade: Although if you're making--if you're adding a little whiskey in there, that's between you and your cup.Zach: I've seen it. It's potatoes between you and your cup. Don't ask me about what's in my cup, you know? I won't ask.Ade: I really feel like that needs to be a thing. "Don't ask me about what is in my cup."Zach: Don't ask me about what's in my cup. No, I mean, I've seen it, and, you know--like, you see it on TV a lot, right? And I don't think it's, like, crazy, but I have seen people have a little something at the bottom of their drawer for the end of the day. I've seen that before. More so in industry. I've definitely never seen it in consulting, but I have seen it in industry. So okay. Cool, cool, cool. So yes, we definitely will do the giveaways. And they're not on the website yet, right? Like, we don't have the merch on the website, but we do have mugs. And we're not popping enough, I don't think, to justify us trying to sell y'all some mugs, okay, but we do have mugs that we can give out for free to encourage y'all to support the Living Corporate team.Ade: Word. Zach: What else? What else? Okay, okay, okay. So, you know, really this season of Living Corporate--so, you know, we learned a lot, right? Like, last season, of course it just being our first season--we're not even a year old yet. You know, coming in, just trying to figure out, like, what the tone is gonna be, how we address topics. And so y'all, really though, expect more intentional, like, commentary and content and just, like, general topics. Expect more fun, right? So we're gonna try to be a little bit more laid-back. Last year was really scripted. We got that feedback a lot, but we were trying to just make sure that we were keeping things succinct and tight, and we didn't want to miss--Ade: Because as you can see, we have a tendency to stray completely off-topic and wander down alleys of distraction, but--Zach: But, you know, it is what it is. And the thing--and the thing about it is, I think--I think the other point is, like, more people than not have said, "Hey, you know, we'd really like to, like, get to know y'all more." Like, "We'd like to get know you and Ade more, understand y'all's relationship. We'd like to get to know other people on the team. You said you've got other folks around." Like, "We'd like to get to know people more," and I think there's way that we can both approachable and personable and at the same time being, you know, still--like, still stick true to what it is we really ultimately want to talk about. But yeah, I just wanted to let y'all--just say that part, because we're really excited about this season, you know? Y'all know. Y'all know it's a crazy time out here. 45 got all us messed up. Yeah, I said it. I said it. Ade: I mean, these are just facts.Zach: They're facts. They're facts. They're facts. They're Facts Kellerman, okay? They're--[laughs] Hey, side-note. So apparently somebody in the DMV--Ade told me that some people be walking around saying "factory." [laughs]Ade: Hold on, what?Zach: So, you know, people will be like, "Facts." Ade: That sounds--that sounds like something that you say in, like, Waldorf. Zach: [laughs] You said "factory." Like, "factory?" That's not--no, factory is a whole different word. That's--no, that doesn't work.Ade: Nope, nope. And I know that there is, like, a trend of saying things are true when they aren't, word to your president, but...Zach: Factory.Ade: I'm here to categorically deny any and all claims that we say that in the DMV. We just--we do not.Zach: Yeah, no. That's not gonna work. Ade: Actually, let me not--let me not do that, because the teeny-boppers might. But what do they know? They're teeny-boppers.Zach: They don't know. They don't know. "Factory" is not the way. "Factory" is a whole other word. But the point is, you know, it's just a crazy time. Like, we know it is. We see--we're seeing stories of, like, blatant inequity and inequality and oppression and just general wrong-doing every day, and, you know, there's plenty of spaces that you can engage for, like, fairly moderate, semi-safe, (rarely?) wholly-safe discussions around--dialogues around race. Or, you know, you can tune into CNN or whatever for that. You can tune into anything else for that. Like, we're trying to have, like--Ade: Tune into who?Zach: I was saying, like, CNN. You know CNN. They'll be like, "A Dialogue On Race: Part 1." "A Dialogue On Race: Part 2." You know? Like, we're not trying to have quote-unquote a dialogue. Like, we're trying to really center and respect and give credence to the perspectives of people that are not often heard, right? Irrespective of how senior they may be in the organization or what their education level is. They're not heard, they're not seen, and so, like, we're trying to drive content that centers them, that affirms that, and that really continues to encourage folks to be thoughtful and empathetic to their neighbor. And, like, that's what we're trying to do. So, you know, this season is gonna be--our hope is it's gonna be way more courageous in that way. Not to say we weren't courageous in Season 1, but, like, I want to--I want to be more courageous season-to-season, right? Ade: Right, and to add to that and not interrupt you--my bad.Zach: No, you're good. You're good.Ade: Part of centering the voices of black and brown folks in this space means we're not going to be doing the "there are good people on both sides" BS, because I'm sorry, like, you're not gonna equate my voice to that of a Nazi.Zach: Right, yeah. That's super true.Ade: That's, like--of all the things that we're gonna do, that's just not going to be one of them on this here platform. And I'm sure there are--I mean, there are plenty of spaces in which you could do that. This just is not going to be one of those, and I'm perfectly comfortable categorically saying that.Zach: Yeah, straight up. Because this is the thing, like, it's not--and I think that's the other issue, like a lot of times when we have conversations like these, we present it like, "Oh, well, you know, both sides just need to understand." Like, no, both sides don't really need to understand. Like, one side needs to be more empathetic and conscious of their behaviors, actions, and their privileges, and the other side--the other side don't need to do nothing. Like, nah. I was gonna say we should be more--you know, we could be gracious and just kind of, like, be willing to receive the help, but, I mean, nah. Like, a lot of times we don't even necessarily need help as much as we just don't need harm. You know what I mean? And so anyway, I--Ade: You're my fav, Zach.Zach: What'd you say, Ade?Ade: You're my fav.Zach: [laughs]Ade: 'Cause you got there, 'cause I really was about to be like, "What was that?" No, but the fundamental premise remains that it's actually harmful that the conversation is constantly asking those without power to be gracious and to have mercy and be kind and do all of the emotional labor for those with power, and I'm not just speaking to racial dynamics. I'm also speaking in any and all forms of--and we know that intersectionality is a thing--but speaking to any and all forms of misaligned dynamics, power dynamics, and the onus is almost always on the oppressed to coddle the oppressor, and I'm just gonna say that 2019, it's not--that's not the wave we're on. You're either catching up or you're getting left behind, and I feel like we just took a very, like, sharp revolutionary turn [inaudible], so let's dial it back and talk about our social media. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] Man, it did. I was like, "Dang, if I take that ball back and I continue with this wave, the next pivot's gonna be too aggressive." Let's transition back onto Instagram.Ade: [laughs] Right? This is the kickoff episode. Let's treat it as such.Zach: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Ade: And we've definitely been going on for a nice little while now.Zach: [laughs] Well, this is the thing, right? Historically you're absolutely right, that it's often been the oppressed's job to massage the feelings, emotions, of the people who have--who are the oppressors, who are the people with authority, who have the power, privilege and access.Ade: One more thing and I promise I'll shut up.Zach: Go ahead.Ade: I won't.Zach: No, don't shut up. Go ahead.Ade: Here's the other thing. I wonder how much more we could be doing, and by we I mean just people who fall on the wrong side of the power dynamics. I wonder how much more we could be doing if we didn't expend all of this time and effort and energy and just emotional labor on managing the emotions of others, right? I wonder how much more--I think of it as "If I spend all of this time thinking through what my words will sound like as a woman, as a black woman, as a black immigrant, as a queer woman, as a Muslim..." Like, all of these things. So I think about all of the time that I think that I spend expending time and energy on making sure that I present myself appropriately. If I just took some of that time back, do you know how much more time I would have? How much more energy I would have to expend on things like sleeping?Zach: Straight up.Ade: Right? Or...Zach: Exercising. Drinking more water.Ade: Drinking more water, which--by the way, if you're listening with us right now go ahead and grab yourself a glass of water and just sip.Zach: Take a sip.Ade: Take a sip. Anyway, but I think the fundamental point remains that--and I'm not saying that everyone goes around all of the time carrying that weight, but it is a significant amount of time, and it's almost not even a conscious thing that you do anymore, that you, as a woman, apologize for speaking in a meeting. Like, "Sorry, I just wanted to say that..." What are you apologizing for, sis? Just say what you have to say. Say it with your chest. But that's part of this, like, training that you get as being the person on the wrong side of the power dynamics. In 2019, I would just like to say "That's done." That's canceled. That is over.Zach: That is canceled. We're not doing that, and, like, we really want for people to come here and genuinely feel affirmed. Like, I'll give a really quick story. So, like, when I was in Japan--first of all, Japan is amazing. I can't wait to go back. Beautiful country. I was in Tokyo. It's a beautiful city. And I'm walking just--like, I'm walking down the street, and I see, like, another young black man, and we kind of look at each other. I give him the nod, he gives me the nod, and I'm walking, and then, like, I kind of turn over my shoulder, and he's, like, turning over his shoulder at the same time, and, like, he's looking at me. Like, we're looking at each other again, and we smiled, and I just kind of--I turned back around and I was just like, "Dang," and, like, I ain't gonna lie. Like, call it corny, call it cheesy or whatever. That made me feel really good. Like, I felt great, and I carried, like, this little awkward smile with me for, like, I don't know, maybe like a minute, right? And there were no words exchanged. There was just a certain level of just--there was a certain level of power and just love that you felt from just being acknowledged and seeing someone in a space that you did not expect to see someone that looked like you look like you, and then they see--y'all see each other. And, like, Living Corporate, I think that whatever we can do to give--I would love for everybody to feel that feeling that I had that evening, for those, like, 65, 70 seconds. It was a great feeling.Ade: That's dope.Zach: Yeah, straight up.Ade: All right, let's close this out.Zach: Oh, yeah. Social media, social media. [laughs]Ade: Yeah, so follow us on social media. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] Okay. So on Instagram we're @LivingCorporate, on Twitter we're @LivingCorp_Pod, then we got--well, Living Corporate, if you just Google us, you'll see us on LinkedIn. We're everywhere, so make sure you check us out. We're everywhere that y'all are, and I think that does it for us on the show. Remember, this is the kickoff. We have more content coming for you. [in accent] More fire for your head top. Was that a good accent? Or not really?Ade: No, sir. Please never do that again. Be blessed.Zach: [laughs]Ade: No, be best. Don't do that.Zach: Be best. [laughs] Ade: Whoo, all right.Zach: All right. Well, this has been Zach. Ade: This has been Ade.Zach and Ade: Peace.

In our Season 1 recap episode, we discuss the lessons we've learned over the course of the season, some of our favorite episodes, our Favorite Things, AND tease a little Season 2 content that's coming your way in 2019!Connect with us: https://linktr.ee/livingcorporateChris Price's new EP: https://itunes.apple.com/bz/album/good-evening-ep/1436626656TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach.Ade: And it's Ade.Zach: And you're listening to the Season 1 wrap-up. We out here.Ade: Yeah. Yeah, we sure are. So what are we gonna talk about today?Zach: Okay, so we're gonna talk about lessons learned...Ade: Aye.Zach: Some of our favorite episodes...Ade: Aye.Zach: [laughing] Okay. Favorite Things...Ade: Aye.Zach: Okay.Ade: I'm just trying to be your hype man here. Like, I really don't understand why you're taking this so hard. Let's go.Zach: It's just funny. I think maybe some of it is, like, cultural differences, right? 'Cause, like, "aye--" I don't know, "aye" is pretty common across the black diaspora.Ade: I feel like in the diaspora you say "aye," and that's, like, a cue for somebody to really--Zach: To get--to get hyper.Ade: To get hyper, yes. I wasn't--I wasn't trying to ruin the rating of our--of our show here, so.Zach: No, no, no. I mean, "aye" is cool, it's just I think--I think a southern "aye"--we can talk about this maybe another time, but I feel as if if you're in the south and you say "aye," and if you're in the--I don't know. I feel like the "ayes" mean different things. Maybe not.Ade: No, I hear you. Now that you say it, I realize that, like, "aye" can also be like, "Okay, bro. You're wilin'."Zach: Aye, yeah. Exactly. So anyway. "Aye" can also be, like, a sound of acknowledgement and appreciation, kind of like how I just did it.Ade: Right.Zach: I don't know. Black language and just--black and brown language frankly is just so deep and rich. It's really cool.Ade: I love it.Zach: Now, where were we? Oh, yes. Okay, so Favorite Things. We definitely want to give out some thank yous, right?Ade: Most definitely, most definitely.Zach: Right, right, right, and then we have a few house-cleaning administrative things that we want to talk to you about as we--as we kind of take this season break and get into season two. So with that being said, lessons learned. Ade, what are some of the--Ade: Oh, I go first?Zach: You go first. What are some of the lessons you've learned in this?Ade: Aye. Oh, they are varied, they are plenty, and some I think I'm still in the midst of learning, but I think my top three takeaways from this whole process of--you know, from ideation, which was largely you--which was mostly Zach--and coming together, building a team and growing as a collective, I think the top three things that I've learned--one is to speak up. Closed mouths do in fact never get fed. Your mouth is closed? You get no bread. See? I tried to rhyme. See? See what I did there?Zach: Bars.Ade: Something-something-something-something. But yeah, if you do not in fact speak up for yourself, and that is in every facet of your life but it's even more important in your professional spaces. If you do not speak up for yourself, if you are not your own best advocate, if you do not find yourselves in the rooms where, you know, they're making those decisions and they're making the plays that you want to be making, and if you're not actively putting yourselves in those spaces and then speaking up about what you need more to grow, what you need more to succeed, it's not--it's not gonna be a great time. A great time will not be had by all, mostly you, and the reason I think for that is because people can't read your mind. People can't help you if you are not willing to, you know, point people at the issues and the places which you could use that assistance. See what I'm saying?Zach: I so agree. I think that, you know, it's not about--and when you said, like, "Closed mouths don't get fed," it's not because there's not food there, it's just that, like, everybody else is focused on eating too. So most times, you're gonna have to open your own mouth to eat. And that whole point around just speaking up and being vocal and putting yourself into comfortable positions, putting yourself out there, is just kind of part and parcel. Like, I don't know if I've ever even seen, like, any project be successful with someone just kind of, like, waiting for everything to come to them.Ade: Right, right. What about you?Zach: I think for me the biggest--one of the biggest lessons learned is that you miss all the shots that you don't take, right? And I know that's very cliche, but it's true. We had some--we had some amazing opportunities to interview some really great guests this past season, and then also just network with a bunch of people that we didn't--that we did not interview on the show but that we shared the idea of Living Corporate with and who they were really receptive too, and we have some things coming in the future, in 2019, that we're really excited about, all because of us just putting ourselves out there. And so, you know, I'm thinking about the Lakers and, you know, LeBron, the GOAT. Yes, that's right. I said it. The GOAT.Ade: I do not disagree. At least the basketball GOAT.Zach: Okay. Yeah, no. Definitely the basketball GOAT, and he's also a super GOAT when it comes to social activism, but regardless, one of my favorite Lakers is actually Kobe, but it's not because I think he's the best Laker. I don't, but I do--what I loved about his game was the fact that he would just shoot it, man, and he would make really ill-advised shots, but his mindset was like, "Look, I'ma shoot it, and I'ma make some and I'ma miss some," and it was the--it was his lack of fear when it comes to failure, right? And I think that often times we don't really look at failure as a genuine growth and development opportunity. I think some of that is because of us as just black and brown people. Failure is not an opportunity to grow. Failure is just failure, 'cause we don't have the same privileges and access to really learn and grow from our failure. When we fail, we just fail, but I think it's important for us in this era, especially as black and brown creatives, to really embrace failing forward, and I know that Matthew Manning with Gumbo, we had him on a couple--just a couple weeks ago, he talked about that too. So yeah, that was a big one for me, and in fact--hold on. Let me not--let me not forget this. We actually got some questions in that I think would be good for us to put in our lessons in this Lessons Learned section from--Ade: Really?Zach: Yeah, from social media. We've got some people to ask us some questions.Ade: Aye.Zach: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So someone said, "What is your biggest takeaway from interviewing all of the guests on Living Corporate?" So I feel like we can kind of roll that into a Lessons Learned. What was one of your biggest takeaways from interviewing all of the guests on Living Corporate this season, Ade?Ade: Ooh. There were some amazing ones actually, and I think it's kind of like an aggregate of thoughts, but ultimately it's that you need to be intentional about your career, and I think there's a common thread that kind of ties all of these thoughts together, and I think it is that you need to be intentional. And that is not to say--well, first I want to address--before I get too distracted about answering that question I do want to address something. You were talking about the Kobe Bryant shots. We are not saying you should make ill-advised shots in your career. Don't take risks--don't let your mouth write a check that your skills cannot cash.Zach: Amen. Thank you, yes. Good cleanup on that, yes.Ade: Yeah. Like, don't get up there somewhere and be like, "Yeah, I can totally stand up this project in a week, because Living Corporate told me that I can, and I should say wild things at work." Don't do that. Do not do that, but we are saying that, especially for women, especially for black and brown women, you are so much more qualified than you give yourself credit for, and part of life is in taking the risk. If you are always prepping to be perfect, you are never, ever, ever going to take the shot. So yeah, that's take #1 in response to that. Take #2 I think is to be intentional. Part of being able to take those risks is in knowing that you've done the prep work, right? So I can't just walk in to anybody's office today and be like, "I want to be your CTO." They'll be like, "Who let this person in?" And also, "How quickly can you let her back out?" Not because they want to be cruel, but because they're being realistic.Zach: Yeah, but you're not ready.Ade: Correct, but I do know that in 20 years I am going to be somebody's CTO because I am going to be making all of the steps that I need. Or maybe CEO. We'll see.Zach: Straight up. Speak it. No, real talk.Ade: But the point is that you make all of the decisions now, you prep now, you put all of your ducks in a row essentially so that your life doesn't just happen to you, so that your career doesn't just happen to you. Many of the most successful people that I know made very intentional decisions. Like, for example--I'm gonna use my partner as an example, and I hope she doesn't get mad at me, but by our bedside table she has this framed "What do you want to be when you grow up?" sort of fill in the blanks paper, and on there she has--I think this is from when she was in fourth or fifth grade, and on there she said she wants to be a lawyer like Thurgood Marshall or Johnnie Cochran, and she ordered her steps in such a way that she ended up going to Howard University and University of Laverne, both of which were universities that both of those people attended, right? So it wasn't just that you make decisions about your life and then hope that it happens to you, it's that you work. You put in the effort. You put in all of the time and energy required to get you to those places, and yes, you will of course succeed. Well, God willing, and hopefully capitalism doesn't get in your way, but you succeed because you've thought your life through, you've thought your career through, you've thought your path through, and if what you're looking for is an escape plan, you've thought that through as well so that you're not suffering on the other side of it, if that makes any sense.Zach: No, it makes a lot of sense, and, you know, to your point, it definitely was oversimplification with the Kobe analogy and--like, that was a really, really good cleanup, Shaq. That was great because you--yes.Ade: You're totally welcome.Zach: No, it was--no, it was dope. Because it's funny, in saying that what we also dismiss or rather what we ignore or underplay in that shooting our shot with getting some of the guests that we were able to get, and we're just more than honored and excited about the guests that we have for y'all for season two, is the fact that we spent hours upon hours and weeks upon weeks as a team in really, like, clarifying our mission, our purpose, getting our branding together, our language, the logo work. Like, there was a lot, and there is a lot that goes behind this very, you know, perhaps to a lot of y'all just, like, very simple, like, straight-forward show and concept, and it took time to, like, really build those things, and so there was a lot of preparation that went into it. So before I put an email together to send to DeRay or Beto O'Rourke or J Prince or, you know, a CEO or whoever it may be, there was a lot of things that we had that we could stand on to justify why I'm in this person's inbox or why I'm in this person's DMs. Now I'm gonna sound like I'm actually a Kobe stan, and I'm really not, but really to kind of go back to my initial analogy, Kobe didn't just show up at the game and just shoot those to us seemingly crazy shots. Like, he put up thousands of shots before and after every game, and in practice he's shooting thousands of these shots. He's practicing these shots. So when it's game time, literally when it's game time, and he pulls up a fadeaway over, like, three people, like, to us it looks like he just randomly threw it up, but no, like, he's been practicing that, and so--and actually, kind of to answer the question--kind of to go back to what you were talking about and kind of answering this question that was submitted to us, one of the biggest things I learned from our guests was that a lot of times we'll see--like, we see the glory, but we don't know the story, right? So, like, we see people who are like, "Man--oh, I work with HBO." Like, we spoke with Emily Miethner, who is the CEO of FindSpark, and she was like, "Yeah, we had a partnership," and she named all of these huge brands, but, like, if you just dig, like, a second deeper, you'll find out she's been doing this for, like, a decade. Like, FindSpark is blowing up now, but it's been years in the making of her building this. The same thing like when you talk to Janet Pope, who's the leader of diversity and inclusion and social responsibility for Capgemini, which is a global consulting firm--you know, you'll talk to her. You may see her in France or see her all around the world doing some really fancy stuff, but, like, her career is 12 years in the making, right? There's a lot of work that goes behind that. So yeah, no, for sure on that. We have another question. The next question, which I think is a really good one, is...Ade: Aye.Zach: [laughs]Ade: I'm sorry. That's like my go-to. I don't even think about it. It just, like--the "aye" is from--it's from my soul. It, like, spawns directly from...Zach: [laughs] No, no, no. It's good. I like it. So "What is in store for the next season and when can we expect you back?"Ade: Oh, wow. I mean, listen to this episode. Listen all the way to the end. You'll have some answers by the time the episode ends.Zach: For sure. No, for sure. Definitely listen to this episode, listen to it all the way to the end. Don't fast forward to the end 'cause, like, we kind of need the clicks. Like, we definitely want the download data, but, I mean, if you want to fast forward to the end, I mean, I'm not mad at you, but...Ade: And also it hurts my feelings when people skip past me, so.Zach: Who skips past--who skips past you?Ade: Well--so I'm a small person. Okay, [inaudible]--Zach: Oh, I see. Go ahead.Ade: Ooh.Zach: [laughs] No, it's just that it came together quickly when you said that. You were saying literally.Ade: No, no, no. You agreed to that way too quickly. Now I kind of want to fight. What? Wow.Zach: [laughs] Go ahead with your story. Go ahead. I'm listening.Ade: Okay. So I was at a bar, and I ordered a whiskey ginger. I think I actually ordered a Manhattan. No, an old-fashioned. Whatever. A whiskey-based drink, as is my custom, and the bartender just kept giving my drink to other people. I'm, like, watching him, and he walks past me, walks past me again with my drink, 'cause I saw him make it. It was a whiskey ginger. And then he just walks to one end of the bar, gives a person my drink. The first time it happened I was like, "Hm. Maybe--I don't know. Maybe they also ordered a whiskey ginger," but it happened, like, three times. Three. So I essentially was like, "All right, look. I will climb over this bar and fight you if necessary, but I'm gonna need my drink."Zach: Goodness.Ade: So I, like, start jumping up and waving at him, and he's like, "Oh, I didn't see you there." What? What?Zach: Come on. [laughs]Ade: What?Zach: No, no, no. But, like, real talk though. Like, size privilege is a thing, right? Like, there are certain privileges that come from being tall and from being thin. There's certain privileges, you know what I mean?Ade: You know there is. Absolutely.Zach: So that's real. Like, that's super real, and I can say that, like, this is an opportunity for me to practice empathy and not sympathy, 'cause I can't really relate to that.Ade: [laughs]Zach: Right? I can't, 'cause I'm always seen, you know what I mean? Like, you're not gonna not see me. Even if you try to--let's say, you know, you're trying to practice micro-aggressions and act like I'm not there. Like, you're not--like, you can't. You'll look silly. Like, I'ma get in your way. You're gonna have to acknowledge me. So that's real, but no, I was just curious. I mean, I would say that more than a few people have pulled me aside and been like, "Hey, your co-host is great." Like, [inaudible], so I didn't know what you meant about getting passed over.Ade: Aye.Zach: [laughs] Yo, so this is what we're gonna do for season two. I'ma tell you what's coming up in season two, it's making me taking that "aye" as a sound bite and putting it on that soundboard, and we'll just play that.Ade: I am tired of [inaudible].Zach: It's ridiculous. Okay. So yeah, definitely listen. We're gonna talk a little bit about season two at the end and what's coming up just after this episode, 'cause we have some things happening after this season one wrap-up episode.Ade: Sure are.Zach: Yep, but what I--what I will say is, you know, please in season two expect--I don't know. I mean, I don't want to say a bit more personality 'cause I do feel as if we showed our personality a lot in season one, but, you know, it was our first season. Like, we're learning our platform. Ade and I did not know each other before we started Living Corporate, so we're certainly learning and growing as just friends in our relationship, so expect more of that, and also expect even more courageous and, like, really intentional content around underrepresented individuals and people groups in Corporate America. Like, I'll even give you an example.Ade: You are giving away the whole ending of the show.Zach: I know. Let me just--I'ma hold off on it, but we have some really great, like, topics that I'm really excited about because the point of this space is to have real talk in a corporate world, right? Like, corporate spaces. Even when you talk about inclusion and diversity, like, it's always masked with, like, other things, right? So, like, diversity of thought, diversity of education, diversity of--I'm like, "Can we be honest?" Like, "Can we just have an honest conversation about, like, intersectionality and how race and gender specifically play a role in shaping the entire planet," right? Like, can we just talk about it from a really honest and genuine perspective? Like, that's our goal. So just expect more of that in season two. When you can expect us back? You can expect us back--you can expect us back, man. We'll talk about that at the end of this episode, but you can expect us back. And maybe I'll drop a--maybe I'll drop a hint.Ade: Oh, we're doing hints now?Zach: I have a dream that you can expect us back soon.Ade: You can't be trusted with no secrets, man. Like, I just want you to know that right now.Zach: [laughs] Okay. All right, all right, all right. Let's see here now. We have one more question. Here we go. "How does one successfully transition out of the corporate world?" This is a good question, and I--you know, I'ma say this. I don't think it's fair for you and I to take this episode to try to walk through and, like, rehash some really great content that Matthew Manning of Gumbo Media and Nick Bailey of Black Texas Magazine have really done a great job at, like, expounding upon when it comes to starting a startup, transitioning from your full-time job and pursuing your dreams, like, wholeheartedly. And also Fenorris Pearson. Like, our first episode, right? He talked about transitioning out of the corporate world and getting into more non-profit work, right? So I think that there are some great episodes, and, like, this is not, like, an excuse, my back answer. Like, we definitely appreciate the question, but my biggest advice would be to go back and run those episodes back AND to look at the show notes because you have the contact information for those people, and I know who sent this question in, so I will actually circle back with them directly. And we'll make sure to--we'll put these questions and the answers, like, within the show notes within this episode, but there have been some really great episodes that we've had around that. What do you think about that question, Ade?Ade: I think, for one, we had so many amazing episodes that I connected to, that are literally just playing in the back of my head whenever I am in situations at work, that help essentially edify me, I think is the term that I'm trying to use. I'm not trying to go to church, but my top three though would have to be the mental health episode because, for all intents and purposes, I laughed my way through that episode and also connected really deeply with so many of the themes. Like, yes you want to hustle, yes you want to grind, but there's nothing to grind for if you lose your mental health in exchange for being in these spaces. And yes, these spaces often--these corporate spaces often do not have you in mind. They didn't have you in mind when they were formulating those spaces, and so now your existence in those spaces is very much revolutionary, and that said, you will often have to carry the burden of being the only, or even worse the only of onlys, in those corporate spaces, and so it 1. made me feel a lot less alone and 2. gave me a lot of very actionable advice, and so that was appreciated. Honorable mention goes to my conversation--it was a B-Side, not an episode, so I couldn't include it, but my conversation with Christa Clarke where we kind of built on that idea of what self-care looks like in corporate spaces. I think she's the first person that--maybe not the first person that I know, but the first person who was just so open about, "Yeah, I took a pay cut because it was what was best for me personally," and she's doing something that makes her happy. She has a creative space. She has everything essentially that you need to have a happy life without the stress, and so she's inspirational, and I'm still waiting to have cocktails with her. Last two. I think the Let Me In conversation with TJ, because--Zach: That was a good one, yeah.Ade: Yeah. You know, in real-time seeing someone who did precisely what I want to do with resources and having the conversations that I needed, and in a lot of ways he was inspirational because he decided he was gonna do this for the kids, you know? He was very much like, "I want to give back to my community, and this is the way that I've identified would benefit my community, but I'm not there yet," and so he took it upon himself to better himself because he knew--he (treated?) himself as a meaningful part of a whole, not necessarily making that career pivot just for himself, which was just a delight to hear. And I think the last one in my top three is Janet Pope. And again, we've had a lot of really amazing episodes, but these three spoke to me. Like, they met me where I was at sort of thing, and, you know, each and every single one of those conversations really came at a really pivotal time for me and a really important time because, for example, the conversation with TJ, it was at a time where I was particularly stressed and thinking, "You know what? Maybe tech isn't for me. Maybe I'm just not smart enough. Maybe I'm just not good enough." I was really struggling at my former place of employment, and it didn't feel like I was doing any meaningful work, and it felt like I was around places that were just becoming toxic for me, and so it was just really, really good to get these reminders, like, "Hey, it's not in your head, but you can do something about it." Like, these systems exist outside of your control, but here's your locus of control. Here's your internal--you can do this work, and having people who have done the work, who are able to distill the vastness of their experiences into "This is what I did. You can do it too," was priceless for me.Zach: Those were really good choices.Ade: Thank you.Zach: So yeah, you can definitely count B-Sides. Like, B-Sides, they're episodes, so let's make sure we count those. So after I finish mine, if you have some extras that you want to throw in there, please feel free. So favorite episodes. So the first one that sticks out to me has to be Preston Mitchum's B-Side, right? Because it was so unapologetic. Preston Mitchum, he was talking about LGBTQ identity, he was talking about pro-blackness and, like, what that looks like practically in the workplace and as someone who's in a highly political area. He lives in D.C. He's a lawyer. He's an educator. He's an activist. So that one--that one was great.Ade: Yep. All facts, no cap.Zach: All facts, no cap. Listen--so side note, shout out to all these new slang words. I realize that I'm old now 'cause I--my generation as millennials, like older millennials, right? So I'm saying older millennials. I'm 29. We don't come up with all of the dances anymore, and we don't come up with all of the slang, so no cap--Ade: Can I just say something real quick?Zach: Go ahead.Ade: The first time I heard "no cap" I thought they were talking about Captain America, and I was mad confused because I genuinely just didn't get why they were bringing up Captain America in a conversation that had nothing to do with Captain America. I was just kind of like, "Uh..."Zach: "What is "no cap?"" Right? No, I was confused, so I was like, "What is "no cap?"" So "no cap." "Say less" is also hot in these streets, "say less," and then also I've heard of tick. Like, "You got tick." Like, "You got juice," or sauce or influence. You have tick. So that was a new--Ade: You have what?Zach: Tick. Tick. Chance the Rapper--Ade: Like the animals?Zach: Yeah. Like the bug, yeah. It's like the pest. Tick.Ade: Oh, no. I just--there's some things I just can't get with, and that's gonna have to be one of them.Zach: Tick is--yeah, tick is hot in these Chicago and Midwestern streets supposedly, so...Ade: Well, keep them Chicago and Midwest streets [inaudible] because...Zach: Is it not popping in the DMV?Ade: Not only is it cold, y'all not--what? Tick? Nah, that don't even make no sense. Like, what?Zach: [laughs] Goodness gracious. So yeah, so "no cap." [laughing] Going back to the podcast favs. So yes, Preston, and another one was Effective Allyship with Amy C. Waninger. That one was great.Ade: Aye.Zach: Around the same thoughts, because Amy being a white woman, and very white, right? And, like, we talked about that on the episode, 'cause the topic was effective allyship, and she talks about effective--like, she is a very white woman in a very white space, and just her just unapologetic tone around the reality of race and gender and intersectionality, really important. I would have to piggyback on one of your answers though. The Janet Pope episode was very good. I really, really enjoyed that one, and I was excited because I was not on the episode, and I was able just to listen and hear about y'all's journey, hear about just perspectives that I don't--I don't consider, and the fact that it was three black women talking too, which I was really excited and thankful for. Oh, okay, and then so a B-Side was--Latricia and I did an episode on Botham Jean, the man who was murdered by the police in his own home, and I liked that episode because it was not in any way, like, in alignment with our formula at all. Like, it was a--it was very much so, like, a--I don't want to say pop culture, but it was a current events-type episode, and that was probably, like, the maddest y'all will ever hear me on this podcast. Let me not say it. Well, hopefully it will be the maddest you ever hear me, but it was just very frank, and actually, people at my current place of employment heard the episode and reached out to me about it, like, in a very positive and encouraging way, and it helped me extend my network somehow, which was, like, an affirmation that, like, speaking truth to power is, to me, always the right thing to do. Like, you'll never go wrong in that. Like, how you speak truth to power and your method may adjust, but you doing it is not wrong. So that's three. I really enjoyed--I really enjoyed the episode with Deborah Owens about the self-advocacy, strategic networking and self-advocacy, when she was like, "You don't have a career."Ade: Oh, wow. Yeah, I remember that. I remember that.Zach: [laughing] "I don't want to do anything to mess up my career." "Sis, you don't have a career here." Boy. Goodness.Ade: Oof. A drag.Zach: No, it was--it was very funny, and then my fifth spot is kind of actually a tie between two. One is an episode where you kept on saying the person was tugging on your wig, which was the Professional Reinvention episode with my dad, Edward Nunn. That was pretty good. I liked that episode. It was tied with the B-Side for Professional Reinvention with Angela Shaw, and she's an HR business partner, public speaker, and she's the Austin Human Resource Management Association president, right? And so I really enjoyed--really enjoyed those episodes, but, you know--I don't even want to say honorable mention. I have a ton of others. The J Prince episode, even though it scared the mess out of me, was great. That was terrifying.Ade: [laughing] I remember you talking about that episode. You were freaking out.Zach: I was freaking out. And listen, let me tell you something, y'all. Y'all go back and run that episode back. That was the shortest episode in Living Corporate history. It was very short. I think it was, like, nine minutes. And then of course the DeRay Mckesson episode was phenomenal. I enjoyed that, even though the signal was bad. I appreciate the fact that he took the time to join, and he was really cool, so. You know what time it is? We didn't have it on our last episode, so now we're gonna get into Favorite Things. And this is the last Favorite Things for season one. So, you know, Ade, you typically have, like, seven favorite things. Feel free to drop as many more--Ade: Wow. You are so disrespectful. I just--I want you to know that it is on sight for you.Zach: [laughing] This is the thing. We've got to stop using--we've got to stop using phrases from the early 2000s and late '90s that don't mean what they mean anymore. "On sight" don't mean--Ade: That is what it means.Zach: "On sight," but you don't see anybody anymore, right? Technology is in the way. Now "on sight" don't mean that. "On sight" means that when I see you're green, when you're available on Facebook, it's a problem, you know what I mean? [laughing] Like, we don't see each other like that no more. It's just technology.Ade: [inaudible]. I just want you to know that the way my spirit is moving...Zach: You're moving--you're moving in early 2000s "on sight," that's what you're saying.Ade: The energy that I retain is of DMX fame, and I just want you to know that the minute you step off your plane...Zach: And come to D.C.? It's on sight?Ade: And land in...Zach: And put my two feet on the--Ade: You don't even gotta put both feet.Zach: I'll put one toe, one toe on D.C. ground.Ade: A toenail.Zach: A toenail. It's on sight.Ade: In any of the surrounding zip codes where I reside.Zach: Goodness. In the D, the M, or the V.Ade: I will fight you.Zach: Understood, I appreciate that.Ade: All right, [inaudible]?Zach: All right.Ade: So glad we understand each other.Zach: Great. [laughs]Ade: You're ridiculous. I can't stand you. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] Oh, goodness gracious. So yes, please, Ade, commence with your cavalcade of Favorite Things.Ade: I--oh, my God. I can't keep saying that I want to fight you, but I do want to fight you. All right. Okay. So my Favorite Things--I actually don't want to go with books, and here's why I don't want to go with books. We have a list of books, and I would actually love to see if we could, like, get some listener feedback on their favorite books, but we said favorite THINGS, so I don't know. I feel like we should expand our repertoire a bit. So I have three, because I always have a lot. I'm very indecisive in that way. Top favorite thing is goat meat pepper soup.Zach: Oh, that sounds good.Ade: I am making some at the moment, and my house smells like peace, joy, and happiness, and so yeah. I'm partial, but goat meat pepper soup is the GOAT.Zach: Aye.Ade: You see what I did there? You see--you see what I did? You see?Zach: That was clever. Yeah, that was good. [laughs]Ade: And you should try goat meat pepper soup with some rice noodles. It's a delight. It's a delight. I just want to say that. Next favorite thing is Rent the Runway. Now, before I get any judgment from anybody, I just want to say I'm not gonna spend $8,000 on an Oscar de la Renta dress, but I do like Oscar de la Renta's dresses, so I'll spend $300 on renting one. Bloop. That's all I've got to say about that.Zach: Understood.Ade: Thank you for appreciating me, friend. And I think my final thing that I want to just shout out is contact lenses. Now, I just want to wax poetic for a second about contact lenses, 'cause I don't know if everybody knows, but my eyes are purely decorative. Without glasses or contacts, I can't see a thing. I literally see the world like those super out of light--out of focus lights that you see in the distance in Christmas. That's my life when I don't have any glasses or contacts on, and I just want to shout out to God for working way harder than Satan, because I can't tell you the number of bruises I've gotten just because, like, my eyes didn't see fit to notice that there was a corner there.Zach: [laughs] Man, that's real though.Ade: Or how many times I have just busted my whole behind because I didn't have contacts or glasses and missed, you know, the final three rows of stairs.Zach: Yo, that's the--that's the thing. When you miss, like, those steps, like, just one or two, you feel like--like, your life flashes before your eyes. Like, you feel you're about to die.Ade: Listen. Have you ever fallen up stairs?Zach: Trust--have I? Yes, most certainly.Ade: 1. I am disturbed to find that we are united in that experience...Zach: Most certainly.Ade: But also 2., and more importantly--oh, shoot. One second. Also, more importantly, how is it that we've managed to fall UP stairs? Like, I feel like we need to speak to somebody about this.Zach: I don't know. That's the thing though. It's us and, like, millions of other people. Like, plenty of people fall up the stairs. Like, honestly, the internet has brought of course a variety of great things, and one of the best things for me is that it really has helped me feel more comfortable in the fact that I'm a klutz. I'm really clumsy. That's why when I--that's why when I go out places, I don't even be moving around that much. I find, like, one little place to be and I kind of park there, because I know the minute that I move I'ma knock something over, I'ma bump into somebody, I'ma trip.Ade: You know what? That's a really good plan, because I certainly am gonna need something. Something, something. Maybe, like, you know, that bubble. Not, like, because I'm immuno-compromised but because, like, otherwise I'm gonna bump into everything and hurt myself. So yeah, things that you've learned about me today. I'm extremely clumsy.Zach: Most of my friends, close members in my family are very clumsy. Just clumsy. Just clumsy people, and I don't know what that's about. I've heard that there's some tie-in to people being clumsy and being intelligent though. Believe it or not I have, but, you know, that could just be junk science. You know, fake news. Who knows? Okay, so those are your Favorite Things. Hm. So my Favorite Things for the season, as our last entry into Favorite Things--I also will not do books. I too will do Things.Ade: Aye.Zach: Aye. So my first Favorite Thing has to be the music that my brother-in-law Chris Price has dropped. He actually dropped an EP, and actually you should be hearing that in the background right now. It's just dope music, and I enjoy it because it's just jazz. Like, it's light jazz via piano, and what I like about it is--so beyond, like, the music itself, which I definitely listen to. It's good study music. It's good just kind of relax music. What I really like about it, the reason why it's a Favorite Thing--Ade: (Aye?) I've really got to stop saying that. It's driving me nuts now.Zach: See? Exactly, but it's cool. It's cool, 'cause I'ma run this back, I'ma cut out that little A, and I'm gonna make that--'cause we have a soundboard for season two. I'm gonna be like--it's gonna be "aye-aye-aye-aye." We're gonna just play it to death.Ade: I will fight you.Zach: That and the air horns. That's gonna be season two sound effects staples. Okay, so anyway, back to this. So what excites me and why it's a Favorite Thing is not just because it's good music, it's because any time I see someone, like, pursue their dream or pursue something and, like, really execute upon something that they have been thinking about or, like, a passion of theirs or something they find really interesting--that excites me, right? So that's why it's a Favorite Thing. So the music that you're hearing, we'll have the information in the show description so you can check it out yourself. Make sure you check it out on iTunes and everywhere that streams music. So that's one. The second thing that's my Favorite Thing has to be, and I'm just gonna come out and say it. I'm gonna come out and say it, man. Vaseline. So Vasel--Ade: What?Zach: Yeah, Vaseline. Like, Vaseline, especially in the melanated community, I think is greatly underused, right? So, you know, we don't talk about it enough, but I'ma talk about it - ashy. Ashiness, okay? So ashiness being the predominance of dry skin or a lack of moisture in your skin, and I think a lot of times--I think big lotion, the big lotion industry if I may, has deluded us into thinking that these very watery lotions are satisfactory for our skin, right? But you've got to realize, like, we don't live in a world that caters to blackness or brownness or anything like that. We live in a world where we are not the default. So that watery lotion, that hotel-level lotion, is not gonna cut it for us, and so I think that Vaseline, petroleum, Vaseline, is a great thing. It's a Favorite Thing of mine. Vaseline has never let me down. It is very cold in Dallas and in Houston--Ade: All of the shea butter in the world though.Zach: Shea butter also. So let me--let me actually amend that. Shea butter, cocoa butter, and Vaseline. And I guess--so under the umbrella of thicker moisture risers and moisture retainers, and it's really--Ade: I'm here to educate you. So shea butter and Vaseline and all of those things, they're not going to moisturize your skin. They're going to lock in moisture.Zach: That's what I said--but I said that--remember when I said [inaudible]--Ade: You said moisturizes first.Zach: Okay, fine, but then I said--Ade: I heard you though.Zach: Okay, cool, but then I said retain--Ade: Okay, but I heard you though.Zach: I said retain too though.Ade: [laughs]Zach: [laughs] They retain the moisture, right? So anyway, it's just important, man. I think, you know, a lot of y'all have--you know, a few folks have come in and emailed us about career advice and how do you do this and how do you do this. Let me tell you something. One thing you can do, anybody can do right now, is be less ashy. That is gonna help you in your career, no matter what you're trying to do.Ade: Um, sir? What?Zach: And so--[laughs] Like, no, really though. Really though, name one person that you've seen on television that's a person of color who's ashy? Malala is always--Malala? She's always moisturized. Michelle Obama? She looks moisturized to death. Her everything. There's not one dry bone on her body. Barack Obama? Same way. Idris Elba? Come on. Like, come on. Like, we know this. Oprah? Oprah never goes out ashy. We need to do--we need to do better so that Nivea--that's right, I'm coming at y'all, Nivea--all these other watery, water-based lotions, they're not for us, y'all. That's right, I'm talking to us right now. That's right. So that's--and look, that's just number two. I got one more. I got one more. Oh, Murray's Hair Grease also goes in that Favorite Things. I'm talking about thick pomades and lotions.Ade: Okay. You know what, sir? I'm gonna send you some shea butter because I can't listen to you crackle and pop over there anymore.Zach: [laughs] I don't crackle and--Ade: Don't claim you're not snapping.Zach: I don't crackle and pop. I don't crackle and pop because I use cocoa butter, shea butter, Murray's, and Vaseline.Ade: In that order?Zach: No, I just those thick--they're thick agents. That's what I use.Ade: I just...Zach: What if I start off by saying my Favorite Thing is thick agents? People will be like, "What are you talking about?"Ade: Okay, almost every time you've said "thick" so far you've said "they're thick," "they're thick," "they're thick," and sir, I'm very concerned about--about you.Zach: Thick agents. I didn't say--I didn't say "they're thick," "they're thick," "they're thick."Ade: No, no, no. You're right. You're totally correct. I understand and [inaudible].Zach: Thick agents. Cool. So that's two. Shout out to thick agents of moisture retention. That is my second Favorite Thing, then my third Favorite Thing--my third Favorite Thing is actually going to have to go a GroupMe called Blacks In Consulting.Ade: Aye.Zach: Yeah, yeah.Ade: You keep that one in. Shout out to BIC.Zach: Shout out to BIC, which is thick with black consultants. How about that?Ade: [sighs]Zach: No?Ade: No.Zach: Okay. Well--JJ, keep it in. Keep it in. Don't take this out. [laughs] So no, really though, I love Blacks In Consulting GroupMe because it's--you know, the numbers, they wax and wane, but they are always well over 5 to 600 people, always, and it's all--it's what it is. It's black folks in consulting, and we share--we have venting sessions, we share knowledge, we share resources. It's a place of affirmation and familiarity, and so it's great. It's really exciting just to be in that space, and it was through Blacks In Consulting that I met the Living Corporate--the people that would eventually comprise the Living Corporate team, and so just shout out to them and shout out to my favorite--that's one of my Favorite Things. My Favorite Thing--so it is the GroupMe, but I guess from a conceptual level it's more about the idea of like-minded people grouping together, not to exclude others, not to rise up against other people or anything like that, but in the name of just being collaborative and practicing a certain level of community along very genuine lines, and I think, you know, it's--you know what I mean? Like, to me that's a beautiful thing. And yeah, we're in there. We'll joke and we'll have fun and stuff like that, but, like, there are genuine moments of collaboration and just affirmation. So those are my Favorite Things. Those are my Favorite Things. Okay, so--Ade: And just to add to loving on BIC real quick, it's been a space where I got career advice, I got--I mean, I got to meet you, Zach, but I also got to meet some really amazing people. I got interview advice, and I found some [inaudible] partners. Not only is it a well-rounded group, but it's super effective, and it's a really great way or it has been a really great way to meet young professionals like myself, and I'm very, very grateful for that space, and you guys should definitely look for Blacks In Consulting and other projects that's coming out of that group.Zach: Ooh, yeah. That's a good point too, yeah. We don't want to give away the sauce, but definitely. In 2019, keep your eyes peeled for Blacks In Consulting.Ade: Aye. Okay, I need--I need a new catchphrase. Dear God, I'm so tired of "aye."Zach: Well, the first step is awareness, right? So we can--we can workshop some new phrases in 2019. Like, we have plenty of time, and--Ade: No, no, no. Today. We're working new phrases today because every time I hear it come out of my mouth I'm just kind of like, "A what? B? Can you go with another letter? I don't know, Sis. Something." I'm dragging my own self over, like, verbal cues.Zach: [laughs] You've said it like 20 or 30 times this episode. It's okay.Ade: 20 or 30? Oh, my God.Zach: [laughs] Slight exaggeration there. Okay. Okay, okay, okay. So now we're gonna get into Thank Yous, thank yous. What thank yous do you have?Ade: Thank you, thank you. You're far too kind. Okay, tell me you know where that came from.Zach: You said, "Thank you, thank you. You're far too kind."Ade: Yes.Zach: Man, I'm drawing a blank. [inaudible].Ade: [gasps]Zach: You're gonna say it and I'm gonna be like, "Duh." Who? Not Jay-Z. Who?Ade: Yes, Jay-Z. Numb/Encore with Linkin Park.Zach: Okay, cool. My word. Yo. Man, first of all...Ade: [sighs] You disappoint me.Zach: No, no, no. It's crazy that you bring that up because I was just thinking about the Black Album yesterday. I was listening to an episode of The Evening Jones with Bomani Jones, and he was talking--somebody asked, like, "Is the Black Album a classic?" And I was like, "Yes."Ade: Uh, duh.Zach: Like, the Black Album dropped when I was 14. Man, let me tell you, [inaudible]--Ade: When you were how old?Zach: I was 14. I was in eighth grade, yeah.Ade: Oh, boy.Zach: And it's funny, right? Age is--age is not relative in that, like--I mean, come on. Like, they're distinct numbers, but what you think is old and young is relative to the person, right? So on The Right Time, most of the people there were, like, in their--they were older. They're, like, in their thirties and their, you know, maybe early forties, and they're talking about, "Yeah, I remember when I was in high school listening to the Black Album." "I remember when I was just graduating high school and getting into college listening to the Black Album," and [inaudible] I know I shared. I was like, "Man, I was, like, 13, 14 when the Black Album dropped." I think I was 13 actually. And everybody was like, "Dang, you were young," and then you're like, "Nah, I'm old." Like, 'cause how old were you? You were like, what, 9? 10?Ade: I plead the fifth.Zach: Yeah, you were mad young, right? So anyway--Ade: I plead the fifth.Zach: [laughs] Anyway, so yeah, we're getting to our Thank Yous. Ade, would you like to go first or would you like me to go first?Ade: You go first.Zach: Okay. So first off, a major thank you goes to my wife Candice, who was more than encouraging for me just to get all of this stuff going and getting it kicked off. Like, this was a big deal in just our home because this takes time and energy away from other things, and money of course, right? Just to kind of get things going and getting started. So definitely thank yous to her and just my family, just all the support. My mom, my parents of course, and then my mother and father-in-law for sure. Very encouraging, very supportive in everything that I do, and they're just--they're just great. Like, they're great. So that's just starting with just family and just close--and I'll throw close friends in there too. And then thank yous also go to all of the guests for season one. Like, people responded to us with such excitement to be on the show. Like, we did not have to really beg a lot of people. That was crazy to me. So thank yous to everybody that was a guest. Special shout outs to George Okpamen, who has been super supportive and just over the top--Ade: Sure has.Zach: Right? Very supportive. Amy C. Waninger, who always retweets things. Kyle Mosely. Rod with The Black Guy Who Tips. That was actually another favorite episode too, Rod with The Black Guy Who Tips. Super cool. Very White Guy. I mean, the list goes on and on, literally every single guest. J Prince too. Just people who are willing just to be on our platform and just be a part. Like, it's amazing. Other thank yous go of course to Sound Man, AKA JJ. JJ, man, please give yourself a round of applause real quick-like please.Ade: Seriously?Zach: 'Cause man, you've been just super instrumental in getting all of these things together. I mean, between the full episodes and the B-Sides and the--I mean, it's crazy. And another thank you goes to actually someone who's very behind the scenes but is super instrumental to everything we do is Aaron. So Aaron is our admin, and so, you know, someone--so someone pulled me aside one time and they were like, you know, "So where are the white guys? Where are the white guys?" Like, "Why are you excluding the white people?" So first of all, we do not exclude white people. We've had white people on Living Corporate, okay, as guests, and Aaron, who's on the team, is white. So there, okay?Ade: You just totally pulled the "we have a white friend" card, and I want you to know that I'm about 30 seconds away from laughing [inaudible].Zach: [laughing] But we don't just have a white friend. We have white friendS, right? We've got Drew.Ade: Plural.Zach: Plural. We have Drew. We have Amy. We have Aaron. Okay?Ade: Okay, I'm gonna need you to not list all of the white people who like us. Thank you.Zach: [laughs]Ade: I'm not doing this with you, sir. [laughs]Zach: Here's the thing. See, look. It's so funny, right? 'Cause I was about to get defensive and name, like, two more white people, but then it's--like, that's kind of proving your point. But no, in all seriousness, right, like, I just want to thank Aaron. He certainly is our forced diversity hire. The government, the radical left, came and made us hire somebody white, and so that's where we are. [laughs]Ade: [sighs] All right. When we get kicked off of Apple Podcasts, I will just point to this moment.Zach: You know that's what people think though. They think, like--they think, like, the government goes into companies like, "You have to hire--"Ade: Certainly.Zach: You know? It's just ridiculous. So of course we [inaudible]--Ade: But also just point to this second in time. Like, I'm not mad at it. You are spitting facts, however...Zach: The loony left! Nah, but in all seriousness, Aaron is great, and he's been doing wonderful work. And then last but not least, I want to thank the people who are still kind of, like, on the periph--who started off, like, really closely in Living Corporate but now they're kind of more so on the periphery or doing other things, and that's Latricia, Ade--I'm about to say Ade. Latricia, Ola, and Parin, and Hannah. So all of them have had, like, very critical and instrumental parts of Living Corporate and just getting started and us kind of, like, getting some frameworks recognized and developed, and we've been able to continue to move forward, so I want to thank them. And then lastly--I know I said lastly before, but lastly I want to thank Sheneisha White, and she's actually our researcher, and so you'll hear more about her in season two, but yeah. And I'm sure I've missed somebody, but I don't think so. So yeah, those are my Thank Yous.Ade: Those were great, and exhaustive, so I don't have too much more--Zach: Oh, okay. [laughs]Ade: Look. Listen, you did it. I appreciate you taking point on that because I know I would've forgotten somebody that was super integral, and then I'd feel bad for the rest of all my days, so thank you for sparing me the guilt. Personally, I would like to thank my partner, my friends, my family. I feel like I'm at an award show and I should've prepped a speech, but in lieu of that I do want to say my deep, heartfelt thanks to, you know, everybody who has supported this endeavor, everybody who has given us feedback, who has--I'm gonna shout out my friends [inaudible] and [inaudible] just championing and really supporting in ways that I didn't even expect. I didn't expect my friends--in a lot of ways, they were the very first to recognize, "Hey, this is a really dope thing, and you guys should keep doing it." Not only was that useful for us and helpful for us, but it was just empowering in ways that I don't think they know, and I hope that I'm only a quarter as good of a friend as you guys have been to me. Shout out to [inaudible] as well. Shout out to [inaudible] as well, but I really appreciate all of you, and I've gotten more than one comment about how beautiful my voice is, and I have never been so self-conscious about it before, but I really appreciate that people appreciate my voice, so there's that. Yeah. In all, I'm really grateful that the most expensive thing that you can be given is someone's time and that you guys have come back time and time again to spend your time with us and listen to what we have to say and the content that we are producing is just--it's a humbling thing, and I really appreciate all of you. And finally, I really want to thank you, Zach, because you've poured your heart and soul into this project, into this platform, and I think everyone who knows you knows the amount of time and effort that you put into this project. Up to 3:00 a.m. mornings when we're both up and we're like, "Why are you up?" "Living Corporate. Why are you up?" "Insomnia." So... [laughs]Zach: [laughs]Ade: Yeah. I just really want you to know that I've never met anybody with your work ethic, with your passion, with your drive, and your humility. All of those things are important because otherwise I don't think I'd be able to like you very much because I'd be like, "Who's this guy outperforming me? How dare you?" You've really defined leadership for me in a lot of ways, and I appreciate you.Zach: Man, first of all, thank you, Ade. Like, none of this was scripted at all so I wasn't expecting that, but I definitely appreciate it, and I appreciate you. One of these seasons we're gonna have to talk about, like, your journey, right? Like, this--like, over the past, you know, seven, eight months, and the growth that you've shown--Ade: I don't know if I can put that on a public platform. [laughs] Wait.Zach: [laughs] But no, just the growth that you've shown and the obstacles that you've overcome and the resilience that you've demonstrated, and just all of the--just the development. I mean, there's just so much there, so I'm inspired by you, and I'm excited to be here with you and to continue forward with you on and through Living Corporate. So cool, enough of that 'cause I'm not gonna cry. Let's talk about some house-cleaning and just kind of, like, what's next for Living Corporate, right? So you guys--I'm sorry, I don't want to be so hetero-normative in my language. You all should know or should be hearing this around Thanksgiving, right? So we're recording this in mid-November. You all should be hearing this on the 23rd or the weekend of the 23rd around Thanksgiving. The regularly scheduled programming of Friday Living Corporate episodes, either full episodes or B-Sides, will be on pause until early 2019, which will be sometime in mid-January or so, okay? So that's when we're gonna be coming back. We will be back in mid-January, and that's gonna be, like, our formal, full episodes. Like, that's when those will come back, but in the meantime we actually have a really exciting partnership that we want to announce for you guys, for you all.Ade: Sure do.Zach: And that's what with the Coalition of Black Excellence. So the Coalition of Black Excellence is a non-profit genuinely focused on the uplifting and professional development through networking, through education, of black professionals. They're based in California, and they have a really big, major event called CBE Week that's gonna be happening in early 2019, and so we actually have a partnership with them to really feature a lot of the speakers for that event as special co-branded, co-facilitated learning series that we will be airing through this platform, through the Living Corporate podcast, up and leading to--up and leading to CBE Week, okay? So you'll be hearing those on Mondays, okay? Those will be starting up soon. So if you heard this on a Friday, really you'll likely hear that content--the first episode for that particular learning series will be dropping that following Monday, okay? So make sure you stay tuned for that. We're really excited about that, really thankful for the opportunity to work with the Coalition of Black Excellence in this regard, and we actually have even more content that we're gonna share with you around the CBE Week as it gets closer, but we're gonna hold some of those jewels back for ourselves. So we're excited about that for sure.Ade: Definitely.Zach: What else, Ade, housekeeping-wise? What else do we need to talk about?Ade: While we're gone, please keep sending us your letters if you want to vent, if you want to write, if you want to ask questions. We're on hiatus, but we can certainly--maybe get on Live and answer a couple questions.Zach: Ooh, that's a--what a good idea, yeah. I agree with that. No, we should definitely do that. That's a great idea.Ade: Thanks.Zach: Yeah, and then also--listen. Now, look, I'm not gonna share all of the--all of our download data 'cause I don't--you know what I'm saying? I'm not trying to give away the sauce, but look, we have thousands--we have thousands upon thousands of downloads every month, right? And I share this to say I need y'all to give us five stars on iTunes, okay? Please. That would be a great holiday gift for us. Give us five stars. Like, right now I think we're around, like, 115 or so. I need to check again. I know that, like, they come in kind of in delays, but let's see if we can get to 200 before January. Can we do that? Can y'all get on and just give us five stars real fast? It don't take too much time, and I know y'all not some haters 'cause y'all listen to the show. Like, there's plenty of people--thousands of people listen to the show every month, so just go ahead and do that for us. The last thing is to make sure that you run back some episodes. I know that we publish on a weekly clip, and some people have commented like, "Man, y'all are really putting out a lot of content. It's hard for me to keep up." Like, thankfully it's a podcast, so you don't have to even quote-unquote keep up. Now you can just go back and listen to 'em. You have a little bit of a break. So make sure you check out some episodes if you missed anything. We have some really great content, really proud of it, and yeah. Okay. Well, if that's it--Ade, is there anything else you're thinking about?Ade: As y'all go into the holidays, I hope that you have a peaceful, blessed time. If you get to spend your time with your loved ones, I hope that you hold them close, you hold them tight, you have wonderful, wonderful memories--you make wonderful, wonderful memories, and if you are not around your loved ones or your chosen family, if you have to spend time in uncomfortable spaces in this holiday period, I pray for peace for you as well. I pray for ease for you as well, and, you know, make sure that you prioritize your mental health. The downside to a lot of the holidays is that you're sometimes surrounded by people who trigger you, people who put you in unhealthy situations, and I want you all to choose yourselves first. Take time off work because those people will replace you in a heartbeat if necessary. So as important as it is to build your brand, build yourself, like we were saying earlier, make sure you make time, you make space for healthy habits. I think that's all I have to say. Oh, see y'all next year. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] All right, y'all. Well, yeah, so we definitely will. And, man, echoing everything you just said, Ade. That's dope. That's super agreed. Hit us with the wisdom. I'm over here trying to rush out the door. Yeah. So you will hear other Living Corporate content, but as far as the Living Corporate regular season goes, you will hear us as a duo next year. So with that being said, you've been listening to Living Corporate. My name is Zach.Ade: I'm Ade.Zach and Ade: Peace.Zach: [scat singing]Kiara: Living Corporate is a podcast by Living Corporate, LLC. Our logo was designed by David Dawkins. Our theme music was produced by Ken Brown. Additional music production by Antoine Franklin from Musical Elevation. Post-production is handled by Jeremy Jackson. Got a topic suggestion? Email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. You can find us online on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and living-corporate.com. Thanks for listening. Stay tuned.

We sit down with Mentor + Mentees Founder, public speaker, entrepreneur, community leader, social influencer and Living Corporate ambassador Tim Salau again to talk about his journey in landing amazing jobs and his perspective on the gig economy.TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and you're listening to a B-Side. We've introduced the purpose of a B-Side before, but everyone's episode is someone's first episode. So for our new folks, B-Sides are random shows we have in-between our larger shows. These are less structured and somehow even more lit--that's right, even more lit--than our regularly scheduled shows. You don't believe me? Sound Man, I want you to go ahead and drop the air horns right HERE.[Sound Man complies]Zach: Okay, now listen. These B-Sides, we switch 'em up, y'all. Right? Sometimes we have a host conversation between myself and Latricia or Ade and Ola or Ola and Latricia. You get the point. Sometimes they're monologues just with your boy or with Latricia or one of the hosts, and then sometimes they're one-on-one interviews. And you can probably hear our guest laughing in the background, because we have such a guest and such an interview today. In fact, the only person to make two appearances in the same season, Tim Salau. [Sound Man throws in the cheers]Tim: I'm here. I'm here, man.Zach: Tim, what's going on, man? How you doin'?Tim: I'm doing well, man. I'm doing well. Thank you for having me again.Zach: No, no, no. Thank you for being here again. Now, look. For those who don't know you or didn't meet you the first time, I'm gonna ask you a few rapid-fire questions for the audience so they can kind of get to know you or get to re-know you. Are you ready?Tim: I'm ready.Zach: Okay. Where are you from and what degree did you graduate with, undergrad and grad school?Tim: I am from Houston, Texas. I graduated with a psychology degree from Texas Tech University and a Master's in Information Studies at the University of Texas in Austin.Zach: How many LinkedIn certifications do you have?Tim: I have over 200+ probably. [laughs]Zach: And what is your tech area of expertise?Tim: And my tech area of expertise is in artificial intelligence and user experience design.Zach: What are your primary initiatives these days?Tim: Primary initiatives is growing the Mentors and Mentees community and creating content that can help people in their career paths.Zach: What companies have you worked for in the past five years?Tim: I've worked for Facebook, Google, will be working for Microsoft. I've worked for the University of Texas in Austin, and I've worked for Living Corporate as a brand ambassador too. So I've worked for a lot of different companies. Oh, and Waze Carpool. [laughs]Zach: [laughs] Okay. Now, folks, y'all heard those companies that he name-dropped, right? Tim, how did you land those gigs?Tim: Honestly the hustle, really putting myself in the right position and being proactive in who I reached out to and sharing my value as much as possible, even when people ain't looking.Zach: So today we're talking about landing the job of your dreams. Now, Tim, what are some myths around getting a job that young people and definitely minorities need to understand?Tim: #1 myth I think I often see and see people follow is "I've just got to apply and I've got to chill." Not at all. You can--like, putting your application through an application tracking system and just expecting something to happen for you [isn't how?] you go about it now. Now you have to have a presence. You actually have to have a marketing strategy, some sort of approach in how you get your next job, which requires you to have an online profile, whether it be on LinkedIn or whatever profile, whatever online channel that aligns the next position you want to get, and then also offline networking, right? So really that myth that you just apply and you wait, and you apply to multiple companies and wait, are kind of like just shoot and pray. That's a myth. That's the #1 myth I've seen.Zach: So you've had multiple amazing jobs. [laughs] My question here is why did you leave any of them? Like, what was the--what was the reason for transitioning from one to the other and, you know, what is your long-term goal?Tim: So I'm a gig worker, and I'm glad you asked that because I think there needs to be more visibility on what gig work looks like. A lot of the work I've done in the past has been either from a partnership standpoint, and really the reason I've left is that, you know, whether it be the internships I've had or, you know, kind of like looking for a new opportunity to grow my skills and my perspective, but just kind of in search of understanding how I can go grow my skills to be the best community builder I can be. So I usually tell people I'm a full-time community builder, but, you know, I have skills and expertise in a lot of other different verticals, but my long-term mission is to be in a position to build communities. And, you know, that doesn't really--you know, I already have the title that I want. It's not to be a CEO or something like that. I'm, you know, kind of executing on what I want to practice every single day, but in order to do that I have to have a collective, you know, breadth of experiences that allow me to build a skill set, and being in front of the right people that will kind of, like, fire my vision, right? So, I mean, I've had a lot of great experiences, a lot of great jobs, but it's been a matter of, like, growth. Finding opportunities to grow in a new area and kind of, like, start puzzle pieces together on where I want my future to be like. Zach: See, what's interesting about this and what energizes me about your career story is it's like you have this ultimate mission that you're driving towards, and the brands and things that are associated with you driving towards your mission are just that, they're associations tied to this mission that you have. So talk to us a little bit more about being a gig worker and really how you see that playing a part in the future of how we all do work, right? Because I do believe, right, that the era of me saying, "Well, I work at Insert Company Here, and that's what I do. I do X," and you do that for 10, 20 years, whatever, that those days are coming to a close, right? I think that your approach on how you're one structuring your career and how you're navigating these spaces is really gonna be a larger framework for how millennials and Gen Y, how we work. So can you talk to us a little bit more about what you mean by being a gig worker, what you mean by, you know, being a community builder, and how that mentally helps you navigate these spaces?Tim: I love what you mentioned. So being a gig worker, I think there's a huge misconception around what a gig worker is. A lot of people think it has to do with freelance work or freelancers, but really it's a matter of--honestly, man, the way I put it is, like, you a hustler, right? I grew up in an environment where, you know, my dad was working multiple jobs. My mom was working multiple jobs. The people that we--the neighborhoods that we lived in, there--you know, there were families there, and the dad and the mom were working multiple jobs. So it's like this really had me--but understanding that, you know, you're working to survive, but at the same time being a gig worker is a matter of, like, choosing what your career path looks like but aligning it to the purpose, in terms of, like, the purpose of why you exist, of why you want to work for a living, and I think for me it's really a matter of having people understand that gig work isn't just a manner of contractual work, but it's understanding what are the opportunities I can pick up, paid or unpaid, that will strengthen my career, right? That will allow me to build skills in verticals, whether it be to become more technical or to build my social aptitude or my emotional intelligence, and see how that aligns to what your end goal is. So for me I actually don't have an end goal, and that usually surprises people because I tell people I have a purpose. So my purpose is the fact that I want to strengthen the bonds that people share with compassion and empathic action. In terms of the position I claim and I usually want people to kind of see me as is that I'm a community builder. So I put myself in positions to strengthen bonds, right? Whether it be hosting an event, me organizing a function, me creating a community or me educating someone. I do that actively. Now, I'm not necessarily always thinking about ways to get paid doing this. I'm thinking about ways to put myself in the position to follow my purpose. So when it comes to goals and long-term achievements, that might change, right? I can't say I'm gonna do this by 2025. The world is gonna be really, really different by 2025, right? Like, a lot of things are gonna change. So I can't necessarily say this is gonna be my exact goal. I think a lot of people do that, but for me it's easier to kind of follow my purpose, being a gig worker, and seeing how I can pick the opportunities, the jobs, the roles that allow me to kind of further my purpose. So where I see the modern workforce going is that a lot of people are gonna start doing more purposeful work, and it's due to the fact that it's so accessible now to start your business, to start your own initiative, to partner up, right? To really use the technical tools at your disposal, to really say, "Okay, I want to do this. How do I do this," right? "And how do I find the people that will help me do this?" But better yet, how do I build the skills, right? If education is more accessible, you know, the ability for Gen Z millennials or people who are currently in the workforce right now to say, "I want to learn this so I can create this," whether it be for the people that I want to serve, will only continue to get easier. So I expect that, you know, this is gonna be a cultural pattern, and we're already seeing it, right? You have young influencers who haven't even, you know, reached the workforce yet who are creating presence, right? They have their own brand. They're working with large brands such as Louis Vuitton, Microsoft, who are doing all these great things, and their entire business is on social media. They don't even have a--they've never seen a corporate office in their life. They're selling e-courses. They're using their presence to commoditize, you know, who they are and whatever their purpose is in, you know, the community that they serve. So this trend is--I mean, it's all part of this whole notion of the digital transformation that we've seen happening in every sector, and especially from a consumer end as well.Zach: So it's so funny, right, because--the reason I'm at a pause is because, you know, the topic of this show that we're doing a B-Side on was around landing the job of your dreams, right? But the conversation we're having right now, I think having the premise of landing a job of your dreams--you know, if you try to find the job of your dreams, dreams and goals change all the time, but your purpose doesn't necessarily--doesn't change. Isn't as fluid, right? Your purpose is something that is fairly solid because your purpose is who you are, right? So it doesn't mean that--again, that doesn't mean that your purpose won't shift. It might change, but the degree by which your purpose changes and the degree by which your dream job changes are completely different.Tim: Absolutely, and I think it's a matter of creating the job of your dreams.Zach: Hm. You know what? I think that's gonna be the title of this B-Side, Creating the Job of Your Dreams. I like that. [laughs]Tim: [laughs] Creating the job of your dreams. Zach: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, straight up. This is good. Okay, look. Tim, this has been a great conversation, man. Before we get out of here, any shout outs you have? Any parting words?Tim: I want to shout out to the Mentors and Mentees community. Shout out Living Corporate. You all are doing great things, man. The resources y'all are providing for people who are coming into Corporate America, who have been in Corporate America or who are trying to exit Corporate America is magnificent. Keep doing what y'all are doing.Zach: Man, I appreciate that. Now, look, that does it for us, folks. Thank you for joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. Make sure you follow us on Instagram at LivingCorporate, Twitter at LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through living-corporate.com. If you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. This has been Zach, and you've been talking with Tim Salau. Peace.Tim: Peace.Kiara: Living Corporate is a podcast by Living Corporate, LLC. Our logo was designed by David Dawkins. Our theme music was produced by Ken Brown. Additional music production by Antoine Franklin from Musical Elevation. Post-production is handled by Jeremy Jackson. Got a topic suggestion? Email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. You can find us online on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and living-corporate.com. Thanks for listening. Stay tuned.

We have the pleasure of sitting down with career coach and resume writer Tristan Layfield to discuss what goes into landing the job of your dreams and how to achieve that goal.Find out more about Tristan here: https://layfieldresume.com/about/Connect with us: https://linktr.ee/livingcorporateTRANSCRIPTAde: Hey, y'all. It's Ade.Zach: And it's Zach.Ade: And you're listening to Living Corporate. So Zach...Zach: What's up?Ade: So we have another B-Side, but this is the last full episode before our Wrap Up episode this month. Zach: Sheesh, already?Ade: Yeah, man. It's been such a wild ride. Can you believe it's only been seven months since we got started? In that very, very short time, we've had some dope conversations, some amazing guests, and more than a few funny moments.Zach: [laughing] For sure, but you know what? We'll talk all about that in our Season Wrap Up episode in a couple weeks.Ade: We sure are.Zach: That's right, but today, we're gonna talk about landing the job of your dreams.Ade: The job of your dreams? That reminds me of that lottery that got over a billion dollars.Zach: A billion dollars. Oh, yeah. What would you do if you had all that money?Ade: Who are you kidding? I wouldn't do just one thing. I would open a restaurant, travel the world, open free clinics and schools all around the world. Pretty much whatever my heart could possibly desire. I think that's the definition of a dream job, something that you would do if money wasn't a concern. What's your dream job?Zach: So I have to start with my passion, right? So my passion is people and creating platforms that amplify the voices and experiences of underrepresented people, so a lot of really what Living Corporate is doing. So my dream job would have to heavily involve Living Corporate for sure.Ade: Ayyyy. You know, it would be great if we could talk to someone like a career coach, but not just any career coach. Maybe a public speaker, someone with professional resume writing experience, an educator. Someone who's been featured in a variety of publications. Let's throw maybe black enterprise in there, and maybe he focuses his work on underrepresented people, especially millennials worldwide but also around his hometown of Detroit, Michigan.Zach: Hm. Oh, wait. You mean like our guest Tristan Layfield?Ade and Zach: Whaaaaat?Zach: *imitating air horns* Look--Sound Man, look. We are so many episodes in. Go ahead and give me those air horns right HERE.[Sound Man complies]Ade: Yeah, shout out to J.J.Zach: [laughing] Shout out to J.J., hey, A.K.A. Sound Man. We'll talk about that more too. [laughing] Anyway, so next what we're gonna do is get into our interview with our guest, Tristan Layfield. Hope you all enjoy. And we're back. And as we said before the break, we have Tristan Layfield on the show. Tristan, welcome to the show, man. How you doin'?Tristan: Thank you, thank you for having me. I'm doing well. It's a little rainy here today, but I'm feeling good.Zach: Hey, man, I hear you. For those of us who don't know you though, tell us a little bit about yourself.Tristan: Yeah. So like you said, my name is Tristan Layfield. I'm based in the Metro Detroit area, and I'm a career coach and resume writer that approaches career development with my clients by combining their personal branding with their career field through strategic coaching, the development of resumes, cover letters and LinkedIn profiles that really help my clients stand out. Zach: So today we're talking about landing the job of your dreams. That kind of assumes though that you know what your dreams are. What advice do you have for professionals who really don't know what they want, and how do they find that out?Tristan: Yeah, that's a really good question, and I think this is a problem that plagues a lot of us. And first, I think it's having an understanding of what you really want to do, and when I say that, I don't mean the thing that everyone has been telling you that you should do since you were young but the thing that you actually like, right? So I've noticed in talking with a lot of my clients and a lot of people I work with that we've been forced to pick what we wanted to do or wanted to be since we were young, and then most of us go to college where we're forced to pick a major well before we even know what we're interested in. So then we graduate with everybody else's dreams on us instead of focusing on our own. I always suggest the way to get out of that is to sort of start by doing what I call an interest alignment activity. So essentially, you make four different lists, and the first one is you list things that are high-skill for you and high-interest, meaning those are skills that you're good at and skills that you like to do. The second list is high-skill and low-interest. So those are skills that you're good at, but you really just don't like to do. And these are the things that cause burnout, right? And then the third list is low-skill, low-interest. These are the things you want to work on or develop. You're very interested in doing those things. And then the last one is low-skill and low-interest, and these are red flag areas. These are things that you don't enjoy and you're not good at, right? So once you make those lists, from there you're able to utilize those skills in that first and third section to build what your ideal job description would be, and you're also able to identify jobs that are heavy in the things that you listed in the second and fourth sections because you'll be able to better identify those roles that aren't a good fit for you because they are, you know, those skills that you're not interested in or those skills that you just really aren't good at and have no interest in overall. So, you know, doing that type of exercise gives you a baseline upon which you're able to assess all of the jobs you're looking at to understand that the position may be a fit for you and your expertise. So that's one of the things that I suggest to really try to narrow down the jobs that you're looking at, is to have something to compare it to, and that's how I sort of get to it with my clients.Zach: So does a--let me ask you this. Does a dream job mean a permanent job? Are dreams allowed to change?Tristan: [laughing] Yeah, that's a great question. So dream jobs can mean a permanent job for some people, but more often than not that's not always the case, because typically, as we grow and change as people, what we want, or our dream or our vision of things, typically changes over time. So to simply answer your question, "Are dreams allowed to change," yes, dreams are allowed to change, and I actually recently was working with a client who grew up knowing that she wanted to be a lawyer. And she went to law school, and she had been practicing law for over 20 years, but recently realized that she wanted to make a pivot into the non-profit sector as she had been working--doing a little bit of that work. So she found out that she loved it, and she came to me to figure out how to pivot her career, right? This woman's been in her career for well over 20 years, and now her dream has changed, and I see that very often, and I see that as a common thing, simply because, like I said earlier, we typically leave college or leave school with other people's dreams on us. Typically that's what we're trying to fulfill. We're not trying to fulfill our own dreams, right? So yeah, I definitely think they're allowed to change. Does it mean a permanent job? It can, and sometimes it runs its course. It was fun. You got the skills you needed, and now you need to move on.Zach: So, you know, I talk to people, especially, like, millennial professionals, and there's kind of, like, this divide, right? So there's a large contingency of us who will say, "Look, man. You've got to figure out where you just need to figure out where you stay and you can get locked in so you can get promoted, you can grow, you can climb the ladder," so and so forth. There's another group of people--and I probably fall more in this camp--of, like, "Look, man. You've got to kind of keep it moving," right? Like, "You need to figure out," you know, every three, four, every really 18, 24 months, you need to really be doing a hard assessment of, like, where you're at and if you need to make some transitions, either internally or externally or whatever the case may be. Where would you draw the line in-between looking for a genuine change and just being fickle or indecisive?Tristan: You know, I think it really depends on you as a person. Like you just said, there's sort of two different camps of people, the people who want to get into a company and want to be loyal to that company and move up through that company, and then there's the people who, unfortunately like many of us millennials, we sort of came out--we came out of school in a recession period, right? There weren't a lot of jobs, this that and the other, so we really had a foot--we were a foot behind everyone when it came to jobs or pay or whatever the case may be, and that has required us to sort of go on what I call a get rich quick scheme, you know? We're trying to catch up with everybody, and sometimes that requires us to move every two years to get that 10% raise in pay or whatever the case may be. So I think it is--it really depends on the person, but for me, where I think--excuse me, where I draw the line between genuine change and just being fickle and indecisive is when you're switching jobs or industries very frequently, like every one to two years, without actually sitting down and conducting a thorough analysis of why you're doing it, right? Most people who are looking for genuine change take the time to think through where they want to go and what they want to do or why this situation is not working for them, and they also provide enough time for them to get into the new area and learn and apply those things that they learn to practice. And that takes time, and sometimes that period can be difficult simply because you're learning and adjusting, and that is where people who are fickle or indecisive tend to jump ship, right? Change isn't easy, and those who are genuinely seeking it tend to understand that this is a process, and those who aren't genuinely seeking it or just being fickle and indecisive are just moving because of one little thing, you know, rubbed them the wrong way. Most of the time.Zach: Okay. So let me ask you this. I'm thinking through this as you're giving me this answer. If you had to give millennials and just working professionals of color advice when it comes to career navigation and finding what's going on for you--what would you say are some of the main challenges that you see with people that look like us when it comes to career navigation and finding that sweet spot for us?Tristan: Ooh, that is a loaded question. Right? [laughs] Well, first, I think--I think we all need to sit down and assess what we're really interested in and what we want to do. We have to make peace with the fact that what we had majored in in college may not be what we actually end up doing in life, and that is okay, and you have to realize that the majority of people are in that place. And then once you get into a place where you do like it, you need to understand sort of what the--what the pathway forward is inside of that company or inside of this industry, right? What are the next steps? How do you get there? What skills do you currently have, and what skills are you missing? And you identify those through a skills gap analysis, and sometimes you can identify, "Okay, this company is gonna allow me to get this skill set, but they don't have anything that's gonna allow me to get this other skill set to get to that ultimate position that I want to be in." So sometimes that means, you know, switching jobs, switching companies, switching industries to get that other skill set, and I think we have to be open about that and open and honest with ourselves that, you know, it's gonna be a process. It takes time. It takes dedication and, you know, no one really becomes successful without actually sitting down and putting in the work to figure out where they want to go, and often times what I find is we try to do all of that alone, and unfortunately that's not always everyone's zone of genius. So reach out and get help, whether that be me, like, a career coach and resume writer, or whether that be a friend that you see in the field doing the work, you know, talking to them, or whether that be getting informational interviews. You really have to be your biggest advocate in your own career search, and I think that's one of the biggest things I think people struggle with, is being their own advocate, and it's typically because they haven't done the work to figure out what they're actually interested in and how to actually attain it.Zach: That's a great last point too around being your own advocate. We just recently had Deborah Owens, who is the CEO of Corporate Alley Cat, and we had a whole episode around self-advocacy and strategic networking, and that was a main point too. So that was more from the context of navigating internally for the sake of your career, but your point also resonates because regardless if you're looking--irrespective of if you're looking for a change internally or you're looking for a change externally, you have to be your biggest advocate. Like, no one's gonna care more about you than you.Tristan: You have to be your own biggest advocate. No one knows your experience better than you, no one knows where your expertise lies better than you, and no one knows what you are able to actually go in and do and learn and put on the table, and so sometimes you just really need to show people that, and you really need to exemplify that, and the only way you're gonna do it is if you advocate for yourself.Zach: Absolutely. Well, look, this has been great, Tristan. Before we let you go, where can people learn more about you and your company? Tristan: Yeah, this has been amazing, and I appreciate it. People can check us out at my website, which is www.layfieldresume.com, and for those of you guys who don't know how to spell it, it's L-A-Y-F as in Frank-I-E-L-D-R-E-S-U-M-E dot com, or you can follow me on Instagram @LayfieldResume or connect with me on LinkedIn at TristanLayfield. Zach: Awesome, man. You know we'll make sure to have all of that information in our show notes so they can--our audience can check it out. Any parting words or shout outs before we let you go?Tristan: Yeah. You know, I just want to shout out my tribe. I always like to shout them out. My friends, my best friend, you know, my grandma. Everybody who's been supporting me along this journey, I just really appreciate them. I just want to thank you so much, Zach, for having me on the show. The conversations you're having are just so important for us to be discussing, and I'm just glad to be a part of it.Zach: Man, I'm honored by that. And you know what? Shout out to the word tribe. I gotta start using this word, man. [laughing]Tristan: [laughing] It takes a village, okay?Zach: It takes a village, man. Listen, man. I'm noticing--I'm noticing, man, all of my melanated working professionals who are building things are using this language, tribe. I've heard that from Deun Ivory. I've heard that from--I've just heard that from a few different guests. Tye Miles said it. Okay, anyway. Now I'm on a tangent. [laughs] Tristan, it's been a pleasure. God bless. This has been a great time. Hope to have you back, and appreciate your time, man. Tristan: I appreciate you having me on, man. Have a great one.Zach: Peace. Ade: Yo, we're back. Bomb interview as always, Zach. Excited that we were able to get Tristan on the show, and listening to that discussion reminds me that your resume is only one part of your journey in landing a dream job and that your dreams sometimes change, and that's okay too.Zach: For sure. Now, look, I have some bad news for y'all.Ade: No!Zach: No Fave Things this week, but that doesn't mean you can't check out our Fave Things on our website, right?Ade: [makes the "womp-womp" sound] I'm really nailing our sound effects today.Zach: You're doing a great job with the sound effects actually today. In fact, Sound Man, go ahead and drop, like, a small round of applause for Ade for her sound effects today. She came in very strongly on the "whaaaat?" Actually it wasn't raspy at all.[Sound Man complies]Ade: Ayy. Sir, are you coming for me?Zach: Then the womp-womp was very full, so it was good.Ade: Thank you.Zach: No, it was good. But no, really, our Favorite Things section, we've called out--the books, all of the books that we've talked about on the show, they're on that list. DeRay Mckesson's book, J Prince's book, Amy Waninger's book. They're all on this list of Favorite Things. You can go check out some of our favorite foods. I've got the Capital City Mambo Sauce on there. That's right, Capital City--this is not a paid ad. Capital City Mambo Sauce is fire. I ordered two gallons of the sauce about six months ago.Ade: [laughing] You are ridiculous.Zach: [laughing] But anyway, no Favorite Things this week. However, in a couple weeks when we do our Season 1 Wrap Up show, it's gonna essentially be all of this. It's gonna be me and Ade just talking, having a good time, and we'll talk about a variety of Favorite Things, from our favorite episodes to our favorite things on our list, and we'll actually make one last season update to our Favorite Things list, okay?Ade: Yep.Zach: Okay? So there's that, there's that. But we will have it back. Ade: Okay. Well, that is our show. Thank you so much for joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. Please make sure to follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate, Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through www.living-corporate.com. If you have a question you'd like us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. Also, don't forget to check out our Patreon at LivingCorporate as well.Zach: That does it for us on this show. This has been Zach.Ade: And I'm Ade.Zach and Ade: Peace.Kiara: Living Corporate is a podcast by Living Corporate, LLC. Our logo was designed by David Dawkins. Our theme music was produced by Ken Brown. Additional music production by Antoine Franklin from Musical Elevation. Post-production is handled by Jeremy Jackson. Got a topic suggestion? Email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. You can find us online on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and living-corporate.com. Thanks for listening. Stay tuned.

We sit down with CEO, Author and Entrepreneur J. Prince and talk about his book, "The Art and Science of Respect". Length: 7:56Host: ZachTRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate, and yes, you're listening to a B-Side. Now, yes, we've introduced the purpose of a B-Side before, but every episode is someone's first episode. So for our new folks, B-Sides are essentially random shows that we have in-between our larger shows. These are much less structured and somehow even more lit than our regularly scheduled shows. Sometimes they're discussions that the hosts have, sometimes they're extended monologues, or sometimes they're a chat with a special guest, and today we have a really special guest, folks, J Prince. J Prince is the CEO of Houston-based Rap-A-Lot Records, one of Houston's oldest rap record labels. Known as a godfather to the rap game, he has associations with some of the biggest names in hip-hop, including Drake, Lil Wayne, Scarface, Bun B and Pimp C, Tony Draper, Master P, Devin the Dude, Z-Ro, Lil' Flip, Juvenile, and Trae Tha Truth, just to name a few. Needless to say, the man has put his work in, and he's actually written a book chronically and reflecting on his own experiences called The Art and Science of Respect, which is out now and available for purchase everywhere fine books are sold. J Prince, welcome to the show, man. How you doin' today?J Prince: Ah, yeah. How you doin', my brother?Zach: [laughs] I'm doing good, man. So look, as you know, this is a podcast that explores the perspectives of being black and brown in Corporate America. Can you talk to me about your experiences operating as a CEO and building relationships with folks who don't necessarily look like you?J Prince: Oh, man. That was--where do you want me to start on that one? In the beginning, you know what I mean, making my transition from the streets to Corporate America, my experiences was not inviting, you know what I mean? And I wasn't invited in a lot of different perspectives, you know? I remember, you know, starting off in the music game, you know, we were really discriminated against on how we dressed, you know, in different offices that I rented, you know? So they kicked us out of several because, you know, everything was new to the music game, you know? I mean, everything was new to Houston, I'll say it that way, where the music game was concerned. And, you know, I hit a lot of roadblocks and challenges just based on how we dressed.Zach: 'Cause I would imagine, right, that you can't really build a dynasty like you've had without expanding your circle. So, like, what hurdles? You talked about obstacles. What hurdles did you have to overcome?J Prince: Yeah. I guess my first hurdle that, you know, a lot of that I had to overcome was hurdles to those that was closest to me, and I call 'em dream busters, you know what I mean? When a person--you share your dream with them, you share, you know, your goals with them, and they tell you you can't do that. You can't be this. "You ain't gonna ever be nothin'," you know, all of these negative things that you encounter, you know, in the hood. So those were some of the first obstacles that I had to make my mind up that I wasn't hearing, and really, after that, you know, when I found the strength to deal with those that really meant something to me, that was closest to me, saying negative things, when I figured out how to ignore that, the rest came easy. Those were some of the challenges, you know? The closer ones to you, and then of course after you get past that test there's many more waiting on you because, you know, it's full of challenges when you're playing on a million-dollar playing field, or just playing on the playing field of business any way. Zach: Yeah. I'm curious--let's talk about your book, The Art and Science of Respect. What was the point in which you said, "I gotta write a book," and I ask that, J, because there are a handful of folks, right, only a handful of folks who have the same amount or just breadth of experience that you have, and I would say few folks in the air that you operate choose to really write a memoir. So what was it for you that made you pause and say, "I gotta write a book?"J Prince: Well, you know, it was a combination of things, but, you know, as I travel, you know, around the world, and as I encounter, you know, with, you know, my people, you know, they're always asking me when, what, where and how, you know what I mean? They wanna know how I've done what I've done. How did you turn nothing into something? How can you be from, you know, the mud and yet and still figure it all out? So, you know, I figured out the best way to really speak to the world, the past, the future, and the present, was to put it in a book, you know what I mean? And also, as you know, I've done audio too.Zach: Yes, sir.J Prince: And I narrated it, so, you know, I'm talking to 'em.Zach: What would you say minorities in Corporate America could learn from your book? And why should they go get it today?J Prince: I think they can learn, and they will receive a lot of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding, you know what I mean? I think they will learn a better way, you know? A sharper way. I think that book gonna open up brain cells that may have been clogged up in certain areas because they just didn't think out of that side of the brain. So, you know, this is a book--and also, you know, even from a spiritual point of view, because I share a lot of my spirituality. I share a lot of my wins, my losses. Like, real intimate experiences that I know we all go through, you know what I mean? We all lose someone that's close to us, and, you know, they need to know that, you know, one don't have to throw in the towel because of, you know, things like that happen. So my story is a story that, in some capacity, the world gonna be able to relate to it.Zach: Man. That's amazing, man. So, you know, this has been a dope conversation. Before we let you go, do you have you any shout outs or parting words of wisdom, man, for the audience?J Prince: Hey, man, I--you know, when I think about what I tapped into to really, like, encourage me to--you know, I felt like it was me against the world sometimes. It was--you know, breaking that poverty curse where my family was concerned, with my loved ones, my kids, my mother, you know what I mean? Every time I thought about, "I've got to be the one to break this poverty curse," you know? I reached and grabbed energy out of nowhere, and I think, you know, everybody that's listening that's trying to accomplish anything, it's good to tap into that power that's greater than the power of defeat, you know what I mean? Whether you--I don't care where you are in life. If you have that power that exists that you can tap into, "I'm doing this for this," then that's a power that's gonna be stronger than defeat.Zach: Awesome, man. Well, look, that does it for us here on the Living Corporate podcast. Thank you guys for checking us out. Make sure you follow us on Instagram @LivingCorporate, Twitter at LivingCorp_Pod, and subscribe to our newsletter through www.living-corporate.com. If you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. This has been Zach, and you've been talking with J Prince. Peace.Kiara: Living Corporate is a podcast by Living Corporate, LLC. Our logo was designed by David Dawkins. Our theme music was produced by Ken Brown. Additional music production by Antoine Franklin from Musical Elevation. Post-production is handled by Jeremy Jackson. Got a topic suggestion? Email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. You can find us online on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and living-corporate.com. Thanks for listening. Stay tuned.

In this episode, Zach and Ade discuss the role of education and building wealth with Accenture senior strategy consultant, Richard Odior.Length: 00:33:33Hosts: Ade | ZachTRANSCRIPTAde: “Research and public policy have traditionally focused on education and income as drivers of upward mobility. There is compelling evidence, however, that education alone does little to explain the source of different levels of economic well-being, especially across race. Observing an association between higher levels of educational attainment and higher levels of net wealth and concluding that education produces wealth is tantamount to observing an association between the presence of umbrellas during rainfalls and concluding that umbrellas cause the rain. It's more likely that the relative wealth of different races explains the educational attainment differences across race groups.” This excerpt is from “Umbrellas Don’t Make it Rain: Why Studying and Working Hard Isn’t Enough for Black Americans” a joint report between The New School, Duke Center for Social Equality, and Insight, a non-profit research entity. What does this mean for people of color trying to secure the bag? What role, if any, does education play in affecting our income? And if education alone won’t secure the bag, what will? Hi, my name is Ade. And this is Living Corporate.Ade: So today, we’re talking about greenery. Cheese. To be more specific, we're talking about paper, stacks, racks, looseleaf, guap, benjamins, all that. Zach: So we're talking about money? Ade: Mhmm, getting to the bag. More specifically and more to the point of this show, what role, if any, does education plays a role in securing said bag. Zach: You know, this is a great topic, I'm really excited that we're talking about it. Because I know for me growing up, education was a big deal. It was a big deal for its own sake because my mom is a principal now and before that, she was an English teacher. Butt off top she told me, look, the expectation is for you to get a Masters. We didn’t even talk about me going to college because we knew that we were going to college, no joke. I didn’t even walk for my undergrad degree. Not because I don’t believe college matters, but because it was so much the expectation. Ade: Same here - it wasn’t even a spoken thing, my family just expected me to go to college. You need to go to college to get a job and you need a job to get money so it was an automatic thought process there. Zach: Right, and to be honest I just figured the more education you got, the more money you’d make. But as I’ve gotten older I’ve realized that isn’t always the case. Ade: Well, to keep it real for a second, how many people do we know who, at the barest minimum, have a bachelor's degree, but have not secured the bag?And before we go any further, this is certainly not to disparage anybody with a bachelor's degree under their belt, or who have terminal degrees. This is just a process of trying to understand what the secret sauce is. Listen, if there's a formula, somebody needs to put me on. I was on Fishbowl, which is, for those who don't know, it's an anonymous posting app for consultants and there were just so many different stories and conversations going on around compensation that I've never been exposed to before. And it’s even more unbelievable because that study I referenced at the top of the show, again it's called “Umbrellas Don’t Make it Rain: Why Studying and Working Hard Isn’t Enough for Black Americans”, it calls out median wealth by education level, and it shows a disparity between black and white families- where Black families with a post baccalaureate have a combined wealth of 84k white families at the same level have a combined wealth of almost 300k. The numbers get even more bleak with fewer years of education. Zach: Right, and I appreciate you sharing this data. It's a great report "Umbrellas don't make it rain", we'll make sure to have it in the actual show description but I look at those numbers myself like “HOW SWAY? HOW!!” How is that possible?! The thing about it is, though, neither one of us has finished grad school, so most of our talking points are gonna be second hand, right? It would be great if we could talk to a 1st generation Corporate professional who, maybe they graduated from a top 3 grad school in the nation. You know, someone who could share their story about their experiences Ade: Right, right Zach: What the job hunting was like and maybe how they used their degree to get to the next level, perhaps? Ade: Like our guest, Richard Odior? Ade + Zach : whaaaaaaa? Zach: Sound man - I need you to go ahead and drop them thangs in here for me! [air horns] Ade: [Laughs] alright, so next, we’re going to get into our interview with our guest Richard Odior. I hope you guys enjoy-------Zach: Hey y’all, we’re back! Annnnd as Ade said, we have Richard Odior on the show! Richard, welcome to Living Corporate man!Richard: Thanks for having me, guys, I'm glad to come to the show, I guess. This is exciting, man.Zach: So, for those of us who don’t know you, would you mind sharing your story a bit? Specifically of how you (1) got into Corp America and (2) what led you to pursue an MBA?Richard: Yeah, so I went to the University of Houston and majored in Finance, and like anybody else in Houston, there's one option - oil and gas. So I quickly hopped into a career in finance in oil and gas for a couple of years, worked in commodity trading, then like financial performance analysis, pretty much all the board for a while. And then luckily I was able to gather with a group of friends who were trying to do some entrepreneurial things, and we opened up a chain of gourmet donut cafes in Houston. Shout out to Glazed. And so one of the things that the experience let me know is that I loved building things. I love growing things. But it also let me know I liked growing things fast. And what I learned about through that experience is that brick and mortar is a bit slower and so I went back to school in a sense to move back to a faster paced growth, and so for me that was tech, right? Tech enabled businesses. So, I went back to business school with two things in mind- either going to Venture Capital, or going to Consulting. Because I wanted to see a faster paced growth, that's kind of how my mission to go back to school started.Zach: So talk to me a bit more about growing things and growing things fast. When did you realize that the pace that you worked at was perhaps a little bit faster than that of your surroundings?Richard: Oh man, it was as soon as week three of work. I think at the time, oil and gas was moving slow, companies were paying people crazy amounts of dollars to do little work, and so I joined my new group, and I was probably the only other person under 30 in my group of like thirty five people. And primarily because companies were paying people to do work that could have been automated and people were not motivated to move up because they were getting annual promotions, annual raises, and it was outlandish. And I just realized this was very slow. In the first 6 month of being there, I had already surpassed a lot of people of the floor because everybody was coasting, and it wasn’t because I was doing anything amazing, I was just putting in more effort than the average individual, right?Zach: Right, right.Richard: And for me, that just kinda wasn't what I wanted to do. I figured 'while you're young, do as much as you can as fast as you can, and learn as much as you can.' So I just kept on pushing and pushing and pushing, and through the experiences I was able, and great mentors at the company, I was able to build really fast, get into new roles, get new opportunities that a lot of people probably wouldn't get into until several years into their career. And so that was pretty amazing, but then I realized I didn’t have ownership of anything. I didn't have anything that I could call my staple item. When you're working in oil and gas, you don't own an oil rig, you don't build an oil rig, you don't make any of that, so I was like 'what is my impact?' and I didn't feel it. And I felt like there was a way to feel it, that I wanted to tangibly know that I had changed something. So, I looked at somewhere else. And luckily I had some friends who were into the same thing, into building, into cultivating, into doing some really cool things. And we just started chatting and we said 'hey, what can we do?'Zach: Were there any preconceived notions about grad school that were proven right when you got there? And were there any preconceived notions about grad school that were proven wrong?Richard: One preconceived notion, at least for business school, and I'll speak to business school, the hardest part was getting in. Once you're in, it's busy, it's difficult, it's kind of like a ride. You're growing yourself and learning and meeting new people all the time, and sometimes a lot of the work gets masked, if that makes sense. You don't realize how much work you're doing because it's masked in so many other experiences. The opportunities really feel global. Like, I traveled almost thirty countries in two years, it was ridiculous.Zach: thirty countries in two years?Richard: Yeah I think the final number was like twenty-eight. And I can speak for myself, I don't want to speak for all minorities, but it's just one of the things that a friend of mine told me - speak up, raise your hand, and don't be afraid. Minorities tend to feel like our voice is not going to be on par with the rest of everybody. We think about what we're going to say so carefully because we want to seem a certain way, and what I realized, and what my buddy told me, he was like 'you're here because you earned it. Don't ever feel like you didn't earn it, and don't ever feel like you can't compete.' Those were really really big words for me because I think often times I went to a public school, I went to the University of Houston, right? And a lot of b school classes have students coming out of Columbia, Harvard, Yale, and so sometimes you get this mindset like 'yoo what am I going to do, I'm not on the same level.' And then you get in there and you pull something out of yourself that you don't understand that you have. And you understand that you're here because you're valuable, you're here because you bring something to the table, and I think that was one of the things that I had to shake off when I first got there.Zach: It's funny that you bring that up, talking about 'you look around the room and you see all these people that got really big collegiate names next to them' and how you question yourself like 'do you really belong there.' it's funny because a couple shows ago we had- we were talking about imposter syndrome and how you battle that. And it's funny that you kind of bring that up when you say 'not feeling like you should have to prove your seat at the table.' But that if you're here, you earned it, and you're here for a reason.I hope that people take that away and that they're encouraged by it. That's a really good message. And I think it's actually applicable in and outside of Academia, right?Richard: I always tell people like 'Let someone else turn you away,' right?Zach: Straight up, yeahRichard: The amount of times we (and I talk about we as the minority population), We self-doubt ourselves, right? We say oh-- I remember in undergrad, there was a career fair and there were several companies recruiting. And my buddies, we walked in and they veered off left and I veered off to the right and I was like 'yo guys, why don't you come in here?' and they were like 'well my GPA's not this and my grades aren't that' and I said 'let them tell you no'. I'm not going to tell myself no, you know? Someone needs to pat me on the back and say 'Hey Richard, what you're doing is not good enough', 'Hey Richard, your product is not good enough', 'Hey Richard, your grades aren't good enough', because I'm not going to tell myself I'm not good enough.Zach: Man, amenRichard: I'm going to walk in there, I'm going to hand in my resume to whoever's there, and we're going to have this conversation, and then you're gonna tell me I'm not good enough.Zach: No, straight up, I'm cheering you on when you're talking because man, that's my philosophy. Like, look man, there's plenty of people out there who will tell me I'm not whatever. I'm either too academic or not academic enough, I'm either too strategic or too tactical, or I'm too this or not enough that. Listen, man. There's enough out there already of all of that. So I'm not gonna be an additional voice for that, I'm going to tell myself I am enoughRichard: You are enough, yeah!Zach: You know, like what's the point? So you gonna sit back and join every other voice that's out there? Not to be super pessimistic and say that the world's against you, that's not what I'm saying. But there's more than enough voices and perspectives and opinions, be that for whatever reason, that are gonna discount you, so don't discount yourself! Let them tell you, Let them push you out the room, let them tell you that you shouldn't sit at the table. Then you fight, but don't kick yourself before you even get started.Richard: 100% you gotta walk in like you already have a seat at the table every time you walk in the room.Zach: RightRichard: Every time. Every time you walk in the room. Now, I'm gonna let you pull my chair out, but I'm not pulling my own chair out of underneath myself.Zach: I'm saying! [Laughs]Richard: I have a seat!Zach: That's rightRichard: I don't care what room it is. I walk in, I have a seat. That's how you have to operate.Zach: No absolutely. Well look, man, today as you know, we're talking about getting to the bag, right? And so the context was all around, like, we looked at a study called Umbrellas Don't Make It Rain and it's essentially dispelling certain myths about wealth inequality and income inequality. And one of the things for me and Ade that we were talking about on the show, growing up, I just thought that if you got a grad degree, that they were just going to hand you money, right? That you're just gonna walk out of that thing with a thick six-figure salary, and so my question to you - what would you say to people who just make that assumption? Like look, I went to grad school, I got my MBA, and now it's time for me to get that 160,000, 180,000, 220,000 dollar bag. Like, what would you say to people who make that assumption?Richard: Whew, uh, I think a couple things to get the bag, you gotta be ready, first what are you bringing to the table? What industry are you looking to go into? What were you doing before? And how are you going to change the organization that you're going to now? So, for example, even me going to business school was interesting. I remember when I was making the decision, I was basically a finance guy, so I had to put it in a spreadsheet, right? And so, I had to say 'okay, if I go to business school and pay X and come out and get paid this, then it's valuable.' And I hate to sound like a snob, in a sense, but I think a lot of times people don't understand what they're investing in when they go to grad school. And I say this to say - not to knock any program - all programs are not created equal, all opportunities are not created equal, so going to any grad school is not the same as going to certain grad schools, if that makes senseZach: YeahRichard: And it all depends on where you are in life, right? At a certain point, I usually say it's a premium spot is maybe 4 to 6, anywhere from 4 to 6 years is a premium spot because you've probably made good enough money at the place you're in, but still have enough value from the MBA to get the post-MBA salary and still be worth it. Let me give an example - if you work 8 years and you've made your salary is now at X dollars, it's harder to leverage the MBA because the jump that you can make is smaller, right? But if you go at prime time, which is usually, for most people about 4-6 years, a jump is still very sizeable. So for example, I was blessed with a really good job before, like I said, it was great, I was making really good money. But post MBA, I was still able to increase my overall salary by more than 50%. At that point, the numbers still made sense. But if I had stayed in my current company for maybe another year or two, the jump would not have been as large.Zach: RightRichard: Also, I think some of the big things - it's not just about the bag now, it's about the bag later. And I say that in the sense that if you go to the right program with the right resources and the right network, the beauty of it is, it's not just about you getting the bag today, but your network will also be getting the bag. And so your network is your bag as well. Because whenever they're looking to hire a consultant down the line? It's you. Whenever they're looking to hire someone for an acquisition? It's you. They're gonna operate in the network of other people that they believe are competent. One of the things I noticed - I work in consulting- one of the things I noticed was some of the best managing directors, what they leverage is their MBA network. What they utilize is their other classmates working in industry, at whatever company it may be, and they reach out to them and they sell these huge million dollar projects back and forth. And because that bag is not just a today bag, it's a future bag, right? And so I won't say that knowledge isn't something that you can always google. There's a lot of aspects you can Google about the knowledge you can get, the documentation, but a large part of business school is the in-person interaction. I used to sit with my classmates from Colombia, India, Indonesia, all over the world, and we would talk about different concepts and I'd learn directly from them. And two things that I got - I got unique knowledge, but I also got to know them better. So, when I tell you I went to 28 countries, I was going with these people from those countries and I was learning business through them and with them and now in the future, they know that if an opportunity comes, I can knock on their door, they can knock on mine.Zach: When we talk about wealth or the bag, I know for me that my default is "how much money am I going to make off of this job?' Individually, me, right now. As opposed to, to your point, pulling from your network, right? And thinking about, you said, the bag in the future. I would say even if your bag is only, you know, in the context of a yearly salary, your bag isn't big enough, right? Like I would say you need to be thinking about really what encompasses the bag. And to your point, it's that network. When you think about MDs and Partners and Principals, especially cats who have been selling work for 5, 10, 15 years, they typically are selling work back and forth to like the same what like 7 or 8 people?Richard: 7 or 8 people!Zach: Like it's not like they're like 'oh I found this brand new guy that just popped out of nowhere' No, they have a network there.Richard: That's part of the bag. The relationships are part of the bag because ideally, one of the things I realized, and if you go to the right program, if you do it the right way, you don't have to get to the bag immediately. And I've seen it multiple times where someone went to grad school, they might have not gotten the exact job they wanted, but they take another job, they did well, they got promoted, then two jobs down the line, when a great opportunity comes with that company, well their friend works at that company and is high in that company, and they pull them over. You see a gravitation of 'oh that company's run by a bunch of X people that go to that school, that company is run by a lot of people that go to that program.' It's because there's a relationship that's being built, that's being carried over in so many ways. There's a reason why certain companies recruit at certain schools, because those relationships, someone high in that company is from that school and has that relationship, so there's definitely value. And if you're changing industries, there's definitely a value there. And that was one of the factors that if you're putting it into a spreadsheet, you won't be able to put that part in the spreadsheet. Your bag might not be actual cash, it might be your happiness and your enjoyment of getting into something you wanna do. I have a lot of friends from school who might have been doing things like banking, investment banking previously, making north of 200 [thousand] a year, and took jobs that make maybe half of that post because their ideal goal was to get to something that was different, and that was the bag for them. And so identifying what your bag is is a big thing. If you identify what your bag is, then you can identify how to get to the bagZach: That's a really good point, man. I like that a lot. So to your point, I think perspective matters. What you're thinking about what your goals are. Which actually is a good segue to my next question, so as a follow up to that, what was your strategy for you on leveraging an MBA for where you want to go? So when you think about - man did you even plug the school? Did you plug the school that you went to?Richard: Oh I gotta plug my school, I was waiting for the end, but I went to Kellogg, man. Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern, man. That's my home, man. They took care of me for a good two years, man.Zach: There we go. So my question is when you think about Kellogg and the degree that you earned, what was your strategy on leveraging your MBA for where you wanted to go? Like how did it fit into your master plan?Richard: I'm still leveraging it now. I mean, in multiple ways. I think for me, the school, ideally chose the school for one a few reasons, right? One was the programs that had the learning that I like to learn. It had a lot of hands-on learning, but mixed with class work. And they promised that you would work in over 400 groups before you left. And I was like wow, 400? I was like alright. And the importance of that was that I work best when I get to know people. Like I'm not the best, but I've always been good at managing relationships and I wanted to go to a school where I'd get to interact with people, manage and harvest relationships, and be able to develop with these people. So when I chose the school, that was definitely in mind, and then on top of that, since I've been in school, the network is amazing. I've been able to reach out to so many people and I've made mentors and connections through our network that have been beyond anything I could have dreamed about. And I'm still making networks and connections, I'm still making calls, and I'm still giving back in the same way. And so I'm always in this realm of gratefulness to the program, but it's leveraged me to be able to have conversations with individuals who probably would never, if I had just tried to make a certain transition, would answer my call. In my phone, to this day, I have the numbers saved of at least 5 millionaires. Easily. And that's a minimum. And those came through the experience of when I got to Kellogg, connecting with certain people, being continuously connected to my goals. For me, I had several short term and long term goals. I was able to utilize my network very early on. I remember the first week of school, we did an exercise, and it was in your sections, sections were usually around 60 people, and so our professor said I want you to tell me something that is one of your largest goals and I want you to put it on the board. And we're one by one putting it on the board. And anybody who could help you get to your goal would come write their name on your sheet.Zach: oh wow, that's powerful.Richard: and it was interesting because he said 'you don't realize what you have alone in this room. Not even the whole school, but what you have alone in this room.' And from that first week of school alone, from the people who wrote their name on my list, I've been able to go so far. It's been crazy, I've met some of the millionaires I was said I connected to was through one exercise. And they leveraged me to introduce me to other people and it's been amazing and so, because of that, I naturally have been given experiences where I don't even have to leverage the MBA, the MBA gave to me directly, if that makes sense.Zach: No it does, that makes a lot of sense, man. So look, I have a last question for you - do you have any other plugs, other shoutouts?Richard: Whew, um, I got a lot of shout outs, a lot og plugsZach: Do your thing man, do your thingRichard: I gotta do a Glazed Donut Café - if you’re in Houston, for sure, check this out. They're my family. Love you. Kellogg's School of Management, Bauer was my undergrad, go Coug's, I learned everything I know from them. I also wanna plug Impact America Fund. One of the firms I used to work at, and I got connected to them during business school. It's a double bottom line venture capital fund which focuses on investing in minority entrepreneurs and underrepresented minorities. I learned a lot from the people at that firm and I've grown a lot through them. I want to shout out to Living Corporate for doing what they're doing. You guys don't know how major this is right here. Honestly, as someone who has constantly worked in corporate america, this is something we used to talk about in business school is - we often have to cover and hover and hide who we are constantly, and what you guys are giving people is the opportunity to really be open, and also an opportunity to see that you're not alone in the workplace. Which is often times when you're the 'other,' you always feel alone. This podcast alone has excited me so much because it lets me know I'm not alone, and lets me hear the stories of people who are doing great things that are also considered an 'other' at work.Zach: Aw man, that's amazing, well first of all Richard, bro thank you for the kind words. The thing about it is, what excites me is your energy is - and spoiler alert for those who don't know, Richard and I are friendly, and we've known each other for about a decade now-Richard: yeah man, a decade!Zach: But what's crazy, and what excites me is the fact that when you say something, especially when you give praise, and also when you constructive criticism, but when you speak all that energy, it comes from a really authentic place. And so, we wanna thank you for joining us today, and definitely all the shout outs- I want to endorse. Eat Glazed. Glazed is a great donut spot, good donuts, great flavors, if you're in Houston, check it out. You'll probably see us shout them out on our IG stories, so stay tuned for that, but anyway, Richard man, thank you for joining us todayRichard: Yeah, and any minorities who are listening and you're thinking about grad school or business school, I can speak specifically to business school, if you're thinking about business school, feel free to hit me up. Honestly, I'm an open book, I like talking, I'll have a conversation with you, anyone who needs anything honestly. My goal is to see more of us in those spaces, because honestly something I will say is it's a leveling ground. It evens out the field and I've seen it multiple times, for people who were not given a silver spoon to start off with. So if you want to have a conversation, if you just have questions in general, these guys have my contact info, feel free to reach out and we can chop it upZach: We'll definitely put the contact info in the podcast description. Drop your stuff, man, what's your twitter, your IG-Richard: yeah so my email is richard.odior@gmail.com, my IG is r.odior. That's it, you can find me on facebook, find me on LinkedIn, feel free to touch base any time. Let me know that you came from Living Corporate first so I can show these guys some love.Zach: [laughs] yeah man, that's what's up. Richard, again brother, thank you. We look forward to talking to you again soon, brother. Alright, Peace.--Ade: And we’re back. Yo, that was a great interview and Richard was a fun guest. He had some great insights on how you can leverage a degree for your goals, but I think I’m more certain now than I was before that that degree isn’t a cheat code. Zach: Yeah, like I said from the beginning, I was raised to think that having a graduate degree would give me one two three four five six seven eight Ms in my bank account. Ade: Right, but at the same time I do believe the degrees have their time and place. They just need to be part of your plan. Which is it’s own thing. Zach: Real talk. I know for me I genuinely want to get a grad degree, right? First it was an MBA, but now I’m thinking an I/O Psych PHD but -- Ade: Oh, ok you fancy huh? Zach: I am very fancy, for sure. The point is, I’m trying to think it through, like the why of the degree, because school isn't free. Definitely not even cheap Ade: Sure isn't, sure is not. And, listen, we started off the show talking about wealth inequality and how it isn’t fixed purely by education. I don’t think this should discourage people from pursuing a degree. I do hope that this conversation helps us think critically and analyze fairly common assumptions many of us were raised to believe about how wealth is generated and distributed. Like Richard alluded to, we’re going to have to re-think what “the bag” is for us and what our strategy to secure it, it has to be more than an annual salary. Zach: Right! That’s a soundbite for sure. This is a huge, complex, and yes, frustrating topic, but I believe the starting point is awareness, then thoughtful dialogue, then planning and then action. Ade: Agreed! Anyway - let’s get into our next segment - my favorite things, where we talk about what our favorite things are these days. Zach : Yes! My favorite thing right now has to be this book I’m reading called Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race, by Reni Eddo-Lodge. It’s so frank and honest. I also have a bias towards aggressive book titles. Book titles that let you know exactly what it's about when you pick it up. I just, I really enjoy that. Also, shout out to Glazed Donuts. Glazed Donuts is a gourmet donut restaurant based in Houston TX. I can tell you they have a great product - donuts, sandwiches, kalaches, juice, allat. Shout out to Richard, Bobby, Edose, TJ and all the members of the Glazed Donut team. Ade: So currently, I have at the absolute top of my list of one true loves, I have this book called Children of Blood and Bone. It is by Tomi Adeyemi who wrote just an amazing, amazing work. And I'm looking forward to reading more from her. I'm Nigerian, I'm Yoruba, and it's really beautiful to see the Yoruba pantheon of gods incorporated into a literary work. So go check that out if you are interested at all in, well, reading. But also if you're interested at all in any fantasy novels, really really good book. My other favorite thing- I don't know if you've seen I just got a new dog. His name is Benji. Well, technically his name is Maximillian Benjamin Gold the third. There is no first or second, but yeah. We are extra over here around these parts. I call him Benji because I'm the more sane mama. I'm well grounded and down to earth and all of those things. So my beautiful beautiful baby husky is just my newest ray of sunlight and I just, I cannot get enough of him. I've taken 262 pictures and I've posted maybe 3 of them, so like I'm not being obsessive and I'm not being 'that guy' but. He's a gorgeous pup, and I do say so myself. Zach: Dope! Well, thank you for joining us on the Living Corporate Podcast. Make sure to follow us on instagram at @livingcorporate, twitter at @LivingCorp_Pod and subscribe to our newsletter through www.living-corporate.com. If you have a question you’d like us to answer and read on the show, make sure you email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. Aaaaaand that does it for us on this show. This is has been Zach. Ade: and I’m Ade Both : peace!9:19 -> 10:18

Thank you for joining us for our 2nd Cabral HouseCall of the weekend! I’m looking forward to sharing with you some of our community’s questions that have come in over the past few weeks… Let’s get started! Megan: Hi Dr Cabral, as always, thank you so much for taking the time to answer my question. I wrote in a few weeks back about my 10 year old son and how we healed his leaky gut which in turn eleviated the eye tics he was having. His most recent Nutreval showed the yeast was elevating some again. We are back on the biociden and the biofilm buster. When you answered my first question about why the yeast returned, you explained how we have to get rid of the bad yeast and replace it with the good yeast. Makes total sense. We had stayed away from probiotics that have saccharomyces in them because it always caused his symptoms to flare. At first I thought the flare was because yeast was his highest sensitivity in the IgG. I realize the sensitivity is to the bad yeast but my question now is could the flare be from the saccharomyces (even though they are the good guys) or would the flare simply occur because we were adding the good guys while there were still too many guys which means too much yeast all together? Thank you so much for sharing with us each day, you are such a blessing. –Megan (Continued) Hi Dr Cabral, I just sent in a question yesterday about my 10 year old son and the sacchromyces. I am realizing I may not have posed all of my question clearly so I'm adding on, and I'm so so sorry if this makes it confusing for you. Please feel free to copy and paste for the purpose of your house call. As I mentioned in yesterday's question my sons eye tics used to flare when I would give him probiotics with saccharomyces in them, but what I didn't mention was he was always totally fine with probiotics that didn't include the saccharomyces. His highest sensitivity on the IgG was to yeast. I realize that's the bad yeast and saccharomyces are the good yeast but why do the good cause a flare in symptoms? Is it simply because I added the good before getting rid of the bad? I guess my real question is why would he have been ok on probiotics that didn't include saccharomyces but have a hard time handling the ones that do have them? Is it as simple as too much yeast all together? So maybe when we rid the gut of the bad yeast he won't flare when we add the good? I've avoided the saccharomyces due to the previous flare in symptoms but am now learning that we need to be replenishing the good to keep the bad out! Thank you thank you thank you for sharing all of your incredible knowledge with us. I have the highest respect for you and what you do and can not begin to tell you how much I have learned and how our family's health has changed for the better since we were introduced to you and your incredible podcast. You are a gift to us. Megan PS I again apologize for the mistake and having to submit the same question twice, but I am interested to hear what you have to say about why the saccharomyces in particular cause a problem for him and I left out of the first submission. Eliana: I love your podcast, it is so informative! I wanted to ask you about my workout program split. I typically do this kind of 5 day split: legs, arms, cardio and abs, back and chest, shoulders and cardio. Basically, I lift 4-5 days a week and get my cardio in either on the same day or on alternating days. Is this too much lifting? I have been doing it for awhile now and have enjoyed it, but I was listening to your recommendation about 3 days of resistance training per week. Thank you! Tyler: Hi Dr. Cabral, I know you have a background in body building and personal training and am looking for advice in regards to putting on more muscle. I am a 25 year old former collegiate athlete and am very lean but am looking to put more mass on in the safest way possible. I eat predominately vegan and GF with some wild fish and eggs. I work out 3-4 days a week and do a combo of lifting, swimming, and hatha yoga. I am 6’1” and 182 lbs. I have read on the importance of ingrsting protein shakes before and after workouts as well as BCAAs pre, during, and post workout for anabolic muscle growth. Do you have brands that you recommend for vegan protein (I do your Nutritional Support Powder in smoothies in the morning) and BCAAs? Or are they even necessary? I appreciate your insight. Thanks, Tyler Anthony: Hi Dr. Cabral, What are your thoughts on MRET water activators? Your products and podcasts have become a very positive part of my life, thank you for sharing your knowledge. Sincerely, Anthony James: Is a kenogentic diet good for you  Zach: What's up Doc, writing in for my 27 y/o girlfriend who has recently been to the "doctor" because she was having allergic reactions (tingling itchy lips, redness around the lips, and breakouts) whenever she ate certain foods. She's tired all the time, never seems to have energy to do anything active, and could lay on the couch all day. We recently (within the last year) went vegetarian, and we limit dairy and eggs as much as possible, but this hasn't seemed to help with the issues she's having. She has had allergy problems (histamine issues) her whole life and found out she was allergic to nickel, as well as many different pollens/grass/trees when she was younger. About a year and a half ago she had a psoriasis "patch" show up on the back of her neck on her hair line, during a stressful period at work. It went away after she was prescribed some cream for it, but it bothers her randomly. Basically she's always had skin issues, and her mother and grandmother have thyroid issues that we now know have been passed to her. Here are the results of her first blood test...only going to give you what was "out of range" as well as her thyroid numbers. T3 uptake - 25.9 T4 - 8.1 TSH - 8.32 BUN - 5 CALC/BUN/Creatine - 7 On a food/skin prick test she was "allergic" to almonds, cherries, hazelnut, soy, and green peppers. I know she needs to do an IgG food sensitivity test, but unfortunately we can't afford that and insurance won't cover it. She cut out those foods, and had her blood work taken about a month and a half later. These were her results the second time: Free T3 - 3.2 Reverse T3 - 14.5 Free T4 - 1.11 TSH - 5.07 Thyroid peroxidase AB - 130 IU/ML Thyroglobulin AB - 6 IU/ML Positive for ANA ANA titter 1:1280 Cholesterol - 212 Calculated LDL - 127 So we know she has hypothyroid and an auto immune disorder. I believe its from some form of intestinal permeability (IBS, Leaky gut, etc) but I also think she has high levels of heavy metals, as she's always putting stuff on her skin/hair whether its make-up, hairspray, or dry shampoo. I've told her she needs to cut out gluten and dairy for sure, but what do you recommend for her as far as the next step in testing, diet, detoxing, and overall lifestyle changes? I just ordered a 21 day detox from your store...I'm going to start her on a 7 day detox whenever that comes in, and hopefully have her doing a 21 day detox in January. If money weren't an issue, after the IgG test I'd have her doing a heavy metal detox, candida/SIBO/yeast protocol, and then start rebuilding her gut. What do you think Doc? Thanks for everything you do. I listen to you daily, and I pass your podcast on to anyone and everyone because theres isn't a person it wouldn't help. If you ever want to take someone under your wing and create the next you, you have my email. ;] But then again, you're already creating more of us like you everyday! Thank you sincerely for the knowledge you pass along. Keep it up! -Zach Thank you for tuning into this weekend’s Cabral HouseCalls and be sure to check back tomorrow for our Mindset & Motivation Monday show to get your week started off right! - - - Show Notes & Resources: http://StephenCabral.com/667 - - - Get Your Question Answered: http://StephenCabral.com/askcabral - - -