The Situation
A fine art museum vowed to support Black Lives Matter making a public statement and hosting a series of listening sessions, employees possessed a wide-range of sentiments about the commitment the organization had to social justice externally and internally to inclusion, diversity, equity, accessibility and sustainability.
THE BACKGROUND
Shortly after the murder of George Floyd, the local police asked to use the company’s parking lot to stage a response to the protests and riots nearby. The security team approved the request. However the image of the police in the lot gave the impression of organizational support for the police at the expense of BLM and the police were asked to park their vehicles elsewhere.
The listening sessions had a wide-range of responses from employees that were not necessarily aligned across racial or any other identities. However, older employees wanted to work within the system and younger employees were speaking of dismantling the museum altogether. that varied across age and racial.
The CEO and COO were worried when they called. They could understand how they needed a comprehensive approach that brought everyone along – together.
THE ASSESSMENT
The organization has a compelling mission statement that galvanizes employees around the work they do. They also had several relationships with various groups in order to engage the community. They were also re-evaluating the way they displayed and labeled artwork in order to do two things – acknowledge the racist history of some of the pieces and to highlight the work on BIPOC artists.
They needed a way to help people feel inspired about the work and to leverage the unique differences of employees in order to increase revenue and expand the impact of the mission.
Recommendation
The solution was multi-faceted:
— “Create your Equity Plan” Session
Create a long and short term connection of diversity efforts to the existing plan for the organization.
— Training Session Pre-work & Assessments
Avoid all tell-all, group therapy sessions. Pre-work and homework conducted as a reflective personal activities to reduce shame.
— Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Training Sessions
These begin with the basics and progress to more intellectually challenging and emotionally charged topics:
Diversity & Inclusion Basics: In-person sessions designed to create a shared language and raise the level of awareness at the personal level prejudices lie.
Cultural Responsiveness: Rubric self- assessment and development plan created for every employee. Shifting from cultural destructiveness (conscious and unconscious) to cultural proficiency.
Race & Equity: Deeper dive on the unique opportunities associated with race and racial inequities without traumatizing marginalized racial groups.
The Outcome
“I walked away with an increased self-awareness & many tools that I can implement immediately to further my own DEI journey!”
“I wanted to thank you for a wonderful Session 2 with [our] staff & volunteers. To be honest, I was a little unsure following the first session. Although, I definitely had taken away some great insights, I did have a few questions regarding the presentation. However, during Session 2, I felt you both did an incredible job presenting and engaging each of us by meeting us where we are at our various levels of DEI awareness. And, that could not have been easy. I walked away with an increased self-awareness and many tools that I can implement immediately to further my own DEI journey!
Especially, understanding that this is a journey-not a destination, returning to neutral & what am I bringing into a difficult conversation.
Karen also just shared your email regarding removing all references using the term “blind” from the presentation & other resources which was a wonderful step on the part of your organization. Thanks again and I’m looking forward to [more work] with Lively Paradox.”
— Employee Feedback