A week of listening and learning
I usually publish my blog on Tuesdays, but I’m publishing today because I don’t want to wait.
Over the last week, I have taken the time to listen to black and brown voices, learn, reflect, and hold myself accountable to fighting against racism.
I am not proud of the fact that this is the first time I am using my platform to take a stand on social justice issues. I am sorry if I let you down, and I take full responsibility for my silence.
Upon deeper reflection, I know where that silence stemmed from: Fear of losing followers and fear of saying something incorrectly and it being public for all to see.
Let’s talk about losing followers first. I remember some advice I got about speaking many years ago: If someone disagrees with what I say during a speech, it means I did my job and took a stand for what I believed in instead of playing it safe. Can I look at my platform and honestly say that I’ve been doing my job? No way. I’ve been playing it safe. From this day forward, I will treat my public platform like I do my speaking: I will say what I know is true and important instead of being afraid of ruffling someone’s feathers or losing followers.
Now let’s talk about saying the wrong thing. I’ve learned that when white people speak up about black and brown issues, we will inevitably get it wrong. Maybe not all the time, but plenty of times. But I also know that we learn most by getting it wrong. When we speak up and someone corrects us, instead of being defensive and making ourselves the victims (you know, the narrative that goes something like, “I am trying to speak up and do the right thing, and now you are making me feel bad so I will not speak up again”), let’s say thank you and be grateful for the chance to learn. No longer will I let fear of messing up keep me from speaking up: I want to be taught, and I vow to share what I learn.
I have also been reflecting on my role as the leader of a company. I am not proud that last week was the first time we talked as a team about racism. We’ve talked about diversity and inclusion before, but never all together, and we’ve never had a conversation solely about racism. We should have started this conversation long ago, and I should have started it. I reflected a lot on why I never did. Many of the reasons are the same as above—fear of offending someone, fear of saying something incorrectly—but more so, ignorance and apathy. I have certainly thought to myself, “We’ve never had a racism issue, so if it’s not an issue, why bring it up? Let’s just keep doing what we’re doing.”
I am mortified even typing that thought. How could I possibly know that we’ve never had a racism issue? What if we have and people just never spoke up? As the leader of a company, I must do better. I want to lead a company that actively fights against racism, and it’s my responsibility to make sure our team knows what we stand for as an organization.
Here’s how we’re starting an ongoing conversation about racism at Student Maid:
As a leadership team, we are reading books about racism, diversity, and inclusion. We want to educate ourselves so that we understand where we are getting it right, wrong, and the actions we need to take in order to drive change. A few of the books we are reading are: White Fragility, Bias, So You Want To Talk About Race, How To Be An Antiracist, Overcoming Bias, We Can’t Talk About That At Work, Blindspot, Why I Couldn’t Stay Silent, Between The World And Me, and Just Mercy. We will meet in July to discuss what we’ve learned. (If you would like to purchase any of these books, please consider purchasing them from a black-owned bookstore. You can find a list here.)
At our all-hands meeting last week, we made it clear to our team that we have zero tolerance for racism. We will not work with clients or team members who knowingly exhibit racist behavior. We asked our team members for their help in speaking up if they see or experience racism at work. During the meeting, a team member brought up a time we parted ways with a client who made racist remarks. The team felt proud that we made that choice, but as leaders, we owned up to the fact that it took us too long to think about how to handle that situation. It should have been a no-brainer, but instead, we considered the needs of the business before we realized we absolutely had to let that client go. We can and will do better. From this point forward, we will say goodbye without thinking twice.
After we finish reading our books as a leadership team, we will have another all-hands meeting where we will determine our action steps as an organization based on what we learned. We will add the books we read throughout this journey to our company library so that our team members can read them too.
I am thankful for a week of listening, learning, and reflecting. But I know that this fight is so much bigger than educating ourselves. It’s what happens after we learn that matters most. Driving true change in our country is going to take ongoing, deep, hard work and I vow to do that work both personally and at Student Maid. I will do it because all lives cannot possibly matter until black lives matter.
Big hugs,
