5 Things / Comms

My guest on 5 Things in 15 Minutes this week is Catharine Montgomery, whose consultancy focuses specifically on “using communications to achieve equity.” I’m so excited for this conversation, especially when the headlines urge us to believe that DEI is under attack.

How do you officially communicate to your internal and external stakeholders about topics like war, racism, anti-LGBTQ legislation, disability access, and more? How do you communicate with substance in your messaging? How do organizations decide when to take a stand, and how to do so without being accused of performativity? And how do you do it all using the right language, the most up-to-date terminology, without culturally appropriating anybody?

There’s a nuance to that work, and Catharine’s going to help us answer these questions and communicate with confidence and authenticity. I’m always still learning and often have more questions than answers, so I hope you’ll join me in learning together.

Here Are This Week's Good Vibes:

1. Big Bonuses for Delta Employees

   Delta made headlines with a staggering $1.4 billion bonus for its employees, nearly doubling last year's payout. This move showcases the airline's commitment to sharing success and boosting morale. Delta's profit-sharing program aims to rectify injustices by distributing wealth more equitably among its workforce. Its consistent payouts reinforce its employee-centric approach and are a departure from the historical oppression and exploitation of workers in the industry.

2. Four-Day Workweek Sticks

   The world's largest four-day workweek trial in the UK yielded lower stress and higher job satisfaction and initially stunned skeptics. A year later, over 60 companies continued to embrace the concept, with 89% of companies from the trial still operating over four days. Workers report improved well-being and work-life balance, while businesses enjoy increased revenue and retention rates. This is especially beneficial to the 73% of the workforce that are caregivers. We’ll see if the four-day week continues to gain traction – and if it does, you can be sure to read about it right here in 5 Things!

3. Breaking Barriers in Whiskey

   Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey, founded by CEO Fawn Weaver, became the top-selling Black-owned spirits brand globally. With a valuation of $900 million, it's led by a Black woman in an industry dominated by white men. Named after the first-known African American master distiller, Nearest Green, the brand emphasizes long-term legacy over short-term gains. Weaver's vision aims for permanence, challenging the trend of Black-owned brands being acquired by white-owned companies. Fawn is an inspiration and sets a precedent for future generations.

4. Churches Teach Black History in Florida

   In defiance of Florida's restrictive education laws, nearly 300 churches are spearheading Black history lessons. Led by Faith in Florida, this grassroots initiative combats Governor Ron DeSantis' push to limit race-inclusive education. Through an online toolkit, churches offer resources ranging from books to documentaries, preserving Black heritage and countering erasure. This movement revives a tradition of social justice activism within the Black church, empowering individuals to grasp their legacy and celebrate their history. There will always be creative resilience in the face of systemic oppression.

5. Starbucks Re-Designs Store for Inclusion

   Starbucks rolls out a fresh store design prioritizing accessibility and inclusion. The inaugural site in D.C.'s Union Market boasts power-operated doors, lowered counters for wheelchair users, and voice-assist checkout. A revamped brewing system offers tactile feedback for employees’ easier use. Digital boards update customers on order status, while improved lighting and insulation enhance ambiance and reduce noise. Starbucks worked with customers, employees, and accessibility experts to develop the so-called Inclusive Spaces Framework. The guidelines will be open-sourced and continue to evolve to further expand accessibility in the retail sector, and other Starbucks locations. Remember, all of this is good for everyone, not just those with disabilities. (h/t to Karen Catlin for this one)

This Week’s Call to Action:

If you have Paramount+ streaming, check out the TV show Bet on Black. It’s like Shark Tank but for Black entrepreneurs. Target is a big sponsor and one of their employees was a judge. The company that makes our client gifts competed in the most recent season…no major spoilers but they did quite well.

5 Things / 10 Things

This week marks four years of writing 5 Things (that’s 850+ stories!) – and just over a year of my podcast 5 Things in 15 Minutes. As I’m sure you can imagine, there are plenty of weeks when it’s hard to find stories worthy of “good vibes in DEI.” You might be able to tell when you read those weeks. 😉 

Writing 5 Things keeps me in a growth mindset, and I love sharing what I learn – plus I just have so much fun in my conversations on the podcast.

Here Are Five of My Favorite Celebrations From the Past Four Years of 5 Things:

1. Private Equity Giant Carlyle Thinks It’s Found the Formula for Incentivizing Diversity Work

   • Carlyle Group is incentivizing diversity with DEI Awards. The event recognizes (and pays) employees who have contributed significantly to the company’s DEI efforts, where employees nominate their peers to earn the awards. In the program’s second year, the number of nominees and employee engagement scores went up, and DEI has become increasingly embedded in the company’s operations. The article details Caryle’s impressive process and results. This matters because we’ll take buy-in any way we can get it.

2. Mastercard Introduces Accessible Card for Blind and Partially Sighted People

   • Mastercard introduced the Touch Card which has special notches on the short ends to enable visually impaired and blind folks to more easily distinguish between debit, credit, and pre-paid cards. Not only that, but the company released an ad with visually impaired people in mind first. The card was vetted by several major organizations supporting those who are visually impaired. This matters to many who face this challenge out of the 2.2 billion visually impaired people around the world.

3. Mellody Hobson Has A Plan To Bring More Black Executives To The Top Of Corporate America

   • Project Black is a new fund created by Mellody Hobson, Co-CEO and President of Ariel Investments. The private equity fund invests in middle-market companies, installs Black and Latine executives if needed, helps them acquire smaller minority-run businesses, and positions the companies sell to large corporations. The ultimate goal is to satisfy big companies’ supply chain needs and diversity goals at the same time. This is a radical idea to help close the racial wealth gap, and it’s already working – read the article for a fascinating case study about their first investment. This matters because only 2% of corporate spending goes to minority-owned suppliers, and of the ~500 private companies in the U.S. with $1+ billion in sales annually, just five are Black-owned. That’s astonishing. Here’s an incredibly interesting interview with an update on the first investment.

4. How Tyler Perry Turned an Army Base Into a Major Studio

   • Tyler Perry opened a new film/tv studio in Atlanta, the largest in the country, and the only one owned by an African American. It’s situated on a former Confederate military base and the individual soundstages are named for Black icons like Oprah Winfrey and Harry Belafonte. The studio is creating countless jobs for African-Americans and the complex even has shelters and job training for homeless LGBTQ youth, victims of sex trafficking, and homeless women and girls. Equity in action.

5. The Most Featured Company on 5 Things... We Are Skipping Them and Talking About #2

   • While the prize for the most featured company on 5 Things in the past 4 years officially goes to Target, I’m a little mad at them now, so let’s talk about the #2, LinkedIn, instead. I’ve featured LinkedIn 11 times for inclusive and accessible features such as name pronunciations, auto-captions on videos, the ability to add a career-break or job titles like “stay at home dad” to your profile, the ability to add dyslexic thinking as a skill, and a number of features for recruiters to nudge for diverse candidates. Perhaps what I like the most, though, is that they pay their Employee Resource Group leaders. LinkedIn is doing great things and because they have such a powerful reach, their impact towards creating a more equitable world is significant.

Call to Action:

Monday is Juneteenth! In this LinkedIn article, former 5 in 15 guest Crystal Whiteaker shares 6 Meaningful Ways to Honor Juneteenth and Celebrate Black History.

5 Things / Getting It Wrong

This week my team and I had the opportunity to learn from our mistakes. Sometimes we get it wrong, and I appreciate the folks who took the time to point out issues, help me get it right, and hold me accountable. This is ever-present, ever-evolving work and we’re all going to make mistakes from time to time because we’re all human.

Our first lesson was in response to my use of the term “breast milk” and sharing a headline with the word “moms” in the last newsletter. To be clear, I know that moms are not the only people who give birth (because some trans and non-binary people do also, and may not use the word ‘mom’). I also know another term for breast milk is expressed milk (and thanks to the thoughtful human who provided feedback, ‘human milk’). They also, kindly, shared a resource on the topic of transgender fertility.

The second lesson was social media-related. We were contacted by a follower who is visually impaired. It’s pretty amazing that there are readers out there who “see” via screen readers that recognize alt-text. But we had pushed out some posts without alt-text. Because the images on the Equality Institute posts didn’t have alt-text, this follower didn’t know what the images represented. I am very conscious of the need for alt-text (and usually – but not always – remember for my own posts). 

Since receiving this feedback I’ve communicated more clearly with my team. We’ve talked about expectations, assumptions, and ensuring we’re visible and inclusive for all folks. I am deeply sorry to anyone who was excluded due to these errors. Part of this work is in admitting our mistakes and clearly defining how we plan to do better in the future.

Because we’re all human and humans often default to what’s easy, fast, and predictable, training isn’t always the solution. Instead, we must change the systems to embed equity and inclusion as the default. In these cases, we’re implementing some checklists and additional checks and balances moving forward. 

I speak and write about DEI -- and still, sometimes, I exclude people. I make mistakes and those mistakes have consequences. Most of us don’t mean to exclude others but it starts with awareness. What truly matters is what we do next.

Here are the good vibes I found this week:

Job Vacancies for Salesforce Are Now Listed by Time Zone, Reveals Co-CEO Bret Taylor

Salesforce (one of my favorite companies to follow) has a great compromise to the return to office dilemmas many companies are now facing. All job positions are now listed by time zone, not by city. This can dramatically increase the hiring pool, and matters to everyone, but especially underrepresented talent who may not choose to live in the more obvious, and expensive cities like San Francisco and New York.

Walmart Works to Prioritize Employee Mental Health

Walmart continues to impress me with its employee benefits and is now focusing increasingly on mental health care. Every single Walmart employee and their family members has access to 24/7 confidential counseling services with licensed therapists at no cost. Additionally, the company is rolling out a four-hour Mental Health First Aid training for associates. This matters because there’s a mental health crisis in this country, which is leading to all sorts of other crises, and this benefit can help a lot of people, especially those who may experience generational trauma.

Target's 2022 Pride Collaboration Features Binders and Packing Briefs from TomboyX

Target (another one of my favorite companies to follow) has a new retail partnership with the clothing company TomboyX. TomboyX products are easily available on its website, but the amazing thing about this partnership is that the line of products for Target will be lower-cost AND include things like binders and packing underwear (popular with queer, trans, and non-binary people). The availability of these products in a big box store is unheard of – and this matters to these folks who want to express themselves authentically but may not have the resources to pay the online prices.

This Program Pays New Grads a Big Tech Salary to Work at Nonprofits

Schmidt Futures, a philanthropic organization started by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, is paying recent college grads competitive salaries to build innovative tech for nonprofits. One example is the technology that helps people navigate the criminal justice system, which reduced technical violations and warrants for rearrest by more than 50%. Another is an open-source platform used by child crisis hotlines that let children reach out for help via text and other messaging platforms. This matters because these products are creating systemic, sustainable changes that address major problems and can create greater equity.

Mattel Debuts First Barbie With Hearing Aids

Mattel (yet another one of my favorite companies to follow) has a new Barbie doll with hearing aids. Mattel is a leader in diverse representation within its product lines, particularly Barbie, and this matters because children with disabilities don’t often see themselves represented in toys. These dolls may help children with hearing impairment feel less alone.

5 things/ Abundance

This week, one of the attendees at my keynote mentioned how creating seats at tables for others (who have been historically marginalized) can be challenging because of the fear that making room for others means giving up one’s own power – and power is scarce.

So, is power scarce? I used to think so. My parents were immigrants from Ireland, having come to the States in the 1950s. My dad was super racist, likely because he felt his own limited power (as an immigrant) was threatened by other races. 

 As I grew up and later started my own business, I worked hard to overcome that scarcity mindset (and the racism..). I used to be very competitive professionally. But now that I think more abundantly, I realize that when we create room at the table for others, the table gets bigger. Your spot doesn’t shrink. I realize that’s a hard (and kind of metaphysical) concept but I have experienced it to be true. It takes quite a bit of self-work to shift to that perspective, especially if you were raised similarly to me – but then it becomes really fun because the energy in that headspace is much more positive and joyful.

Here are the good vibes I found this week…

In a really fascinating move, Seattle Pride declined to accept Amazon’s $100,000 sponsorship offer (which included a request that Pride be called Seattle Pride Parade Presented by Amazon). This story blows my mind a little and it matters because it’s an example of a small organization standing up to a big corporation that has donated to anti-LGBTQ legislators and allows donations to anti-LGBTQ groups through Amazon Smile. 

Although it’s not official yet, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) here in the U.S. is exploring ways to update its demographic reporting requirements form to include non-binary as a gender option. Currently, companies can add the number of non-binary employees in the Comments section. This matters because adding a third gender option to federal forms further validates the legitimacy of non-binary individuals and can contribute to great wellbeing.

There’s great new research by Amy Edmondson and Henrik Bresman illustrating that teams with high diversity perform better (and are more satisfied) when there's also high psychological safety. Essentially, diversity + psychological safety = higher employee performance and satisfaction. And high diversity + low psychological safety = lower performance. This matters because it provides empirical evidence that can hopefully lead to more manager training, improved communication, and ultimately better outcomes for everyone.

Thinking of revisiting job requirements in order to expand the talent pipeline and ultimately increase diversity at your organization? LinkedIn did just that and provided a little playbook of their pilot for all of our benefit. My favorite part is how they offered prospective applicants access to free LinkedIn Learning courses geared toward helping them develop necessary skills for the role. All applicants who passed the two-part skills assessment received an interview with LinkedIn. This matters because many job postings contain unnecessary requirements which limit women and BIPOC, in particular, from applying. 

Hilton, American Express, and Airbnb are some of the companies providing housing to displaced Ukrainian refugees. Hilton has committed up to one million hotel room nights across Europe. This matters because it shows compassion towards war victims and is an easy way these companies can give back.

5 Things / Lessons From The Puppy

This week, my partner and I became puppy parents. We’ve never had a dog together before, so it’s been a fun experiment establishing trust and expectations with Roy Kent while negotiating with each other. Turns out there are a few inclusive leadership truisms that apply to puppy parenting, too:

• Consistency builds trust. We’re very intentional about crate training so he knows what to expect when. It’s working. Last night there was no whimpering at bedtime, and he only needed to go out once.

• Understand and accept the other’s communication style. After some accidents, I’ve been paying better attention, and now I'm gradually learning how Roy tells us he needs to go outside.

• Take responsibility for mistakes. I can’t be too frustrated at Roy for chewing on my slipper when I didn’t set him up for success by giving him other distractions or managing him better.

• Follow the Platinum Rule. Treat them the way they want to be treated (not the way you want to be treated). This should be self-explanatory – I don’t (usually) need my belly rubbed.

• Positive reinforcement for the win. Providing treats and saying “Good boy, Roy!” simply works to reinforce behavior.

Obviously, this isn’t rocket science, and it applies in so many different contexts: with our children, with our partners, with our team. I know I like it when others relate to me in these ways. But like with so many other things, leading like this can be easier said than done.

Here are some good vibes I found this week:

Target continues to model equitable initiatives during Black History Month, that continue year-round. Target shows how to authentically amplify Black voices with this year’s theme, “Creating Our Own Future”. The company intentionally reached out to and partnered with Black creators and businesses to authentically showcase Black culture and joy. This matters because Target’s approach is so holistic: involving employee resource groups, providing professional development support for Black founders, and providing access to shelf space and marketing resources to these businesses. It doesn’t get more equitable than that.

Employees in Belgium won the right to complete their full work in four days, rather than five, without loss of salary. This is interesting in that it’s the first time I’ve seen this as a law, which seems a bit extreme, but apparently, the Belgium labor market is notoriously rigid. Of course, employers can say no to an employee’s request (in writing). 

Similarly, the small fast-casual food restaurant chain, Dig, is offering this option to hourly kitchen staff, the first time I’ve seen this offered to non-managerial, food industry employees. 

4-day workweeks matter because of the flexibility and freedom they can bring employees. 

TD Bank enhanced its employees benefits to now cover child daycare, elder care, surrogacy, donor, and adoption costs, and more. They’re also including pregnancy loss in bereavement leave. These benefits are all best-in-class, yet still relatively rare, and they matter because employees have diverse needs, and diverse family types, and these benefits are inclusive of that.

Salesforce is the latest company to tie executive compensation to ESG and DEI goals. Specifically, leaders will be measured on “a focus on increasing representation of Black, Latinx, Indigenous and multiracial employees in the United States and of women employees globally.” Simply put, they’re held accountable for how well they increase diversity. That’s critically important and that accountability is a best practice, but the real question for me is: how inclusive is the work environment? That’s what really matters.