Should children in public schools be “spared” the knowledge of the history of segregation, slavery, and the fact that Rosa Parks was Black? Listen to my conversation about this with Chad Lassiter Hear what Chad Lassiter has to say on my recent podcast guest on “Everyday Conversations on Race for Everyday People,” www.raceconvo.com. Chad is the Executive Director of the…
Conversations on Race and Immigration- Perspectives from a black Ghanaian and a white Hungarian On a recent podcast episode Patrick Tindana, a Black Ghanaian and Peter Kovacs a White Hungarian share immigration stories and perspectives on race. They talk about adjusting to life in the US. Patrick had to leave Ghana because he is gay. It was liberating to be…
Cultural Intelligence is the ability to work effectively with people from any group any time, anywhere. According to the Harvard Business review a key predictor for success in this century is a person’s level of cultural intelligence. To be successful we each need to recognize the multiple identities in each of us, and the differences and similarities amongst us. To some…
Ten Ways To Foster Amazing Innovation Through Diversity Leadership In this business era of speed, competition and globalization, innovation rules all. You never know where the next great product, process or profit builder will originate. Good Diversity Management and Culturally Intelligent Leadership can make the difference between repeatedly hearing mediocre ideas from the same people, or mining the hidden…
A senior leader at a high tech company called and said, “Simma, I just spent an enormous amount of money for a training program about unconscious bias. It was very well received and people are still talking about how much they liked it,” he said. “However, nothing changed.” The demographics stayed the same, people of color, women, and LGBT people…
5-Learn and recognize the different ways in which people are intelligent and contribute to the organization. Stop being stuck in recognizing and respecting only one type of intelligence (yours.) So often in my diversity and inclusion programs, people will make comments like,”I have no problem with people who are different. I respect everyone.” First of all, if you think that…
In this business era of speed, competition and globalization, innovation rules all. You never know where the next great product, process or profit builder will originate. Good Diversity Management and Culturally Intelligent Leadership can make the difference between repeatedly hearing mediocre ideas from the same people, or mining the hidden genius in your organization for breakthrough ideas. Conversely, not knowing…
A participant in one of my Diversity and Cultural Intelligence programs this week said that it was just a matter of having an open mind. That’s like using the word “respect.” To many people having an open mind is being around people who are just like themselves. I don’t even know what that means any more. Most people think they…
Diversity Management and Inclusion Action #3 Decide to be curious and interested in learning about other cultures. Are you willing to take a risk, observe other people’s behaviors and ask questions in appropriate ways? If you’re not interested or willing to view situations from another perspective, it won’t matter how many countries you visit, or diversity potlucks you attend.
I’m tired of people talking about cultural competency. I’m not sure what it even means. It sounds like it is limited to “being good” at one culture, or just good enough to pass. I prefer to talk about cultural intelligence, or cultural flexibility which are processes to be able to interact effectively with people from any cultural group. Cultural intelligence…
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