How do you respect identity and honor ethnicity in the workplace? Start with your staff.

Respecting, honoring, or celebrating different ethnicities means both understanding and valuing different cultures, and understanding how the dominant society and culture devalues them as "other." From day to day, it means valuing and respecting the identities of the people around us, and being aware of our own assumptions about them. For a business owner it means fostering a workplace culture that values the diverse cultures of its employees, rather than pressuring them to conform to an imposed standard. It is with its own employees a business must begin in building a culture of respect and inclusion for a culturally diverse workplace.

For example, this is the time of year that in the retail world we call "the holiday season." Most businesses -- and certainly most bookstores -- keep a cultural calendar of holidays and celebrations, usually dictated around the eleven officially recognized Federal holidays

Allowing employees to help build the cultural calendar for the year is one way expand the traditions such holidays celebrate. It gives staff the opportunity to observe the holidays meaningful to them without requiring they make a special request or ask for unpaid time off. An employee-built cultural calendar gives owners and managers the opportunity to plan activities for the store around the celebrations that are important to their staff, being mindful of the cultural nuances such as dietary restrictions, work day limitations, or key traditions and practices for the holiday.

Organizations like to share how they are celebrating important days: what they plan to serve for Thanksgiving Dinner, where they went to watch the fireworks on July 4th. Welcome staff to do the same if they are inclined: post pictures on the bulletin board you have in the store, add posts from staff to the store Instagram and TikTok accounts. Mention them in the store newsletter.

Engaging your staff underscores how much you value them. An engaged staff that feels a sense of belonging has an effect on your company's vitality and success. What starts as input about the store cultural calendar may grow to influence your business's local impact. Your employees may have ideas about other local businesses to partner with. Other charities and organizations in their communities to support. They may have a perspective on cultural issues in the community that align with your values. A diverse workforce is always greater than the sum of its parts.

Sample Cultural Calendars:

Cultures Connecting Diversity Calendar for 2023-2024
Developed for to help teachers and schools to respond to and celebrate the diversity of their student body. In particular it notes if a celebration is religious or cultural, and when it may require a student to miss school.

Diversity Cultural Calendar for 2024
Includes religious holidays, heritage months, and monthly diversity themes

Global Diversity Calendar for 2024
For organizations creating DEI programs and training, the full kit (which requires a subscription) includes materials to center events in conversations and diversity initiatives

PTA Multicultural Calendar for 2023-2024
A resource for parent-teacher organizations with guidelines on engaging underrepresented communities.

Cooleaf Workplace Diversity Calendar (evergreen)
Targeted towards workplace environments, this is a Google calendar that can either be downloaded for the year, or imported into your Google Calendar account, in which case it will update every year.

"When you're accustomed to privilege, parity and equity and equality may feel like oppression." --Ralph Warnock

In October, this column will look at the concept of "equity," --what it means, how it plays out in our lives, and how business can use it as a guiding principle in creating an inclusive workspace. Starting with an expanded version of an earlier column from last year that looked at the difference between equity and equality.

The Difference between "Equality" and "Equity"

People often used the words "equality" and "equity" interchangeably, but they mean different things. They are complementary concepts, not synonyms, and a business needs to pursue and nurture both to create a truly inclusive environment.

Equality means each individual or group of people is given the same resources or opportunities.

Equity recognizes that each person has different circumstances, and allocates the exact resources and opportunities needed to reach an equal outcome.

(International Women's Day)

Illustration credit via International Women's Day

Equity levels the playing field so that everyone has the opportunity to succeed. Organizations struggle to balance the need to maintain equality -- a set of rules and expectations for all their employees -- against the need to address inequity-- when those rules and expectations unfairly disadvantage some employees. When that balance is achieved, workplaces are happier, more diverse, more creative, and more productive.

Equity is therefore more focused on dismantling the obstacles that prevent people from participating fully and thus bringing all their talents and skill to the organiztion. "Dismantling obstacles" being those problems and structures that are systemic, such as requiring a 9-5 workday of all employees, instead of allowing for flexible scheduling for, say, single parents who need to arrange care for school aged children. Or giving staff Christmas off but not acknowledging other religious observances employees may practice. But also more insidious things such as penalizing a woman as "bossy" where a man would be considered to be demonstrating leadership. Or treating someone with a disability as a person to be "accommodated" instead of simply an employee with talent and potential.

Here's a good video from Jennifer Willey of Wet Cement of the 5 things businesses can do to "embrace equity" (the 2023 International Women's Day theme) and identify the inequitable practices in their workplace culture: Value talent based on talent.

Human Rights Careers offers some examples of how this balance plays out in common workplace scenarios just as the recruiting or hiring process, the way businesses determine salaries and raises, or what is meant by "reasonable accommodations." For example, it is an example of equality to require all people working the same job get the same pay. But if all the higher paying jobs in the organization are held by white people, and all the people of color in the organization only have lower paying jobs, then that organization has a problem with inequity that needs to be fixed. Immediately.

Allyship: Your Store and Your Customers

What does it really mean for a space to be inclusive? Is your shop as inclusive as you think it is?

In the Racial Bias in Retail Study conducted by Sephora one of the things that became clear was that the experience of shoppers varied widely depending on their race, ethnicity, or identity. Regardless of a store's welcome message or marketing, customers reported feeling judged, discriminated against, or ignored whether directly by store staff, or implicitly by store policies. In the study, the things shoppers felt most judged by were

• Black Shoppers: Skin Color
• Latinx Shoppers: Body Weight or Size
• Asian Shoppers: Ethnicity
• White Shoppers: Age

More than half of LGBTQ+ people report being discriminated against in public spaces such as stores, public transportation, or restrooms. The situation is also serious for disabled people and those who are neurodiverse, because they are continually judged against a standard of "normal" that excludes them by default.

One of the first things a store can to do create an inclusive space is put together a diverse team to look at the shop from other perspectives. Working with organizations within the local community to re-imagine or re-invent the space also amplifies those groups and voices.

Stores should also involve staff and invest in training, as well as continually seeking feedback from staff and customers alike. Providing multiple options for feedback is critical: online surveys, written forms, social media inquries, focus groups, town hall-style meetings... because the store is asking for their honest opinion, it is important to give people the option to choose the method they are most comfortable using.

Transforming space into something truly inclusive is an ongoing process that can involve both major changes (widening store aisles to be comfortable for larger body types, making an older building ADA compliant) or smaller ones (turning off the store music or scheduling "quiet shopping" times). Even very small changes can make a big difference to the comfort of your customers:

1. Look at your inventory with a fresh eye. Your book selections and displays may have been created for diverse readers, but what about the greeting card rack? The wrapping papper you use? The gift items you display? What about the store t-shirts you created on Bonfire.com? Are plus sizes available? Are they available in the store?
2. What is your customer's journey through the store like? Do they have to navigate narrow spaces? Reach up high or down to the floor to see something? Are they forced to interact with the store staff to find what they want, or is there an online store map or texting service they can use? How easy is it for a customer to check out? Do they have to fit everything into a tiny counter space? Are there different check out/payment options?
3. How inclusive is your marketing imagery? Do your store photos show diverse shoppers and staff? Are your social media posts created with your diverse audience in mind? What about your in store signage? Adding icons alongside or in lieu of text is useful for people who have dyslexia or for whom English is not their first language.

As you work towards turning your store into a truly inclusive space, it is worth sharing the story of its transformation. This not only holds you accountable to your customers, it allows them to become engaged in the process and therefore in your business.

That "All are Welcome" sign on the front door, the Diversity & Inclusion statement posted on the store website, are promises made to your customers that require dedication and committment to fulfill. It is also important to note that "All are Welcome" is a promise not only made to your diverse customers, but to ALL your customers. According to a study from McKinsey & Company, two out of three Americans consider social values when they shop. Diversity and inclusion matters the people who shop at your store. The changes you make are not "accommodations" for hypothetical people, but investments in reaching real people in your community.

Allyship: What does it really mean?

"“…politics, religion, the workplace, domestic households, intimate relations- should and could have as their foundation a love ethic. A love ethic presupposes that everyone has the right to be free, to live fully and well. To bring a love ethic to every dimension of our lives, our society would need to embrace change." --Bell Hooks

What does it mean to be an Ally?

To people who work on Diversity and Inclusion it means something like "Support" or "Help" or "Standing with" a marginalized group. But even a cursory search for a definition of what it means to be an ally will return many different descriptions. For a word that was Dictionary.com's Word of the Year in 2021, "Allyship" has almost as many definitions as it has Google search results.. The most widely used definition comes from Nicole Asong Nfonoyim-Hara, the Director of the Diversity Programs at Mayo Clinic:

“When a person of privilege works in solidarity and partnership with a marginalized group of people to help take down the systems that challenge that group’s basic rights, equal access, and ability to thrive in our society.”

In other words to be an Ally is not a noun, it's a verb. It isn't (just) a pin you wear, it is a habit of mind, a way you live your life.

What that means, first and foremost, is that an ally recognizes they occupy a place of privilege that others are denied by virtue of who they are, and they work to change that status quo. An Ally is aware of who is not at the table, not in the room, not part of the process, and they make it a priority to change that.

It is also not a description we give ourselves. It is given to us by those who we want to support, who recognize our efforts. And to be an ally is also to recognize our own power and privilege and accept responsibility for our own role in creating change.

One of the best explorations of Allyship comes from the Anti-Oppression Network, which defines it as: "an active, consistent, and arduous practice of unlearning and re-evaluating, in which a person in a position of privilege and power seeks to operate in solidarity with a marginalized group,"

Their discussion of the roles and responsibilities of the Ally is good blueprint for anyone wondering "how do I even start to help?" and a guide for those of us who have been working to be allies to check ourselves against in our "active, consistent, and arduous practice of unlearning and re-evaluating."

https://theantioppressionnetwork.com/allyship/

The End of Affirmative Action: Implications for the Workplace

When the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action and removed it from the college admissions process, it was seen as a warning of things to come. Although the ruling applied only to higher education admissions (Title VI), Justice Gorsuch wrote a separate opinion that the reasoning behind the decision could be applied to workplace discrimination law (Title VII).

The effect of the decision has been to put corporate America on notice that their current strategies for recruiting diverse workers may have to change. It is already illegal to make hiring and firing decisions based solely on race, and while it is true that the current ruling does not apply to workplace law, as Harvard law professor Noah Feldman pointed out in a recent interview on All Things Considered, "some lower courts would probably take the view that just by saying what they've already said, the court has already done enough to make it clear that you can no longer use racial diversity as an objective in workplace hiring."

Instead, businesses who have created strategies that include DEI as a part of their their decision-making and recruitment process will have to re-assess the language they use both internally and publicly. For example, by shifting their focus on racial diversity to one that looks at the backgrounds of job candidates and the challenges or obstacles they have had to overcome.

One of the most sought-after things in today’s world is the ability to figure out the most appropriate level of visibility on the internet, both from the personal perspective, as well as the business one, and for the last five years, my life has been all about figuring out a way to merge the two.

I started the Instagram page @ablackmanreading in 2018 after having worked for seven years prior in the hip-hop blog space because I wanted a way to connect communities of color, across all diasporas, with my passion for literary citizenship. I wanted to create a space where we could all come to share our love for reading, our rich cultural perspective on the art form, and curate programming that amplified our voices and our stories. 

Since then I’ve created multiple modes of amplification through my Instagram page, one of which is my yearly birthday week, affectionately known as #WoodaWeek, where I interview an author seven days straight on IG live, teasing out the nuances hiding within their pages, complete with giveaways and other online interactive engagements. I also produce one of the most sought-after podcasts in the literary media space, Books are Pop Culture with my interlocutor Reginald Bailey where we spend hours breaking down books with authors and tackling literary news as well. 

After having done that for a while I started doing consulting work with other folks in the space to help them build their platforms, and that has led me to partnering with some amazing folks. One of the most important partnerships has been my work with Baldwin & Co. bookstore in New Orleans, Louisiana. We connected under our shared vision to create a literary society in New Orleans and build that out through their brick-and-mortar business and my online presence. We started this pursuit by connecting and creating social media content together to promote it and we collaborate to continue creating content via both their online presence and mine simultaneously to build an in-person and virtual book club. We maintain that ecosystem together, and I also maintain an online discord group with the club members that provides around-the-clock literary conversations about the book club, upcoming events, and more. 

Aside from the phenomenal work I get to do with Baldwin & Co., I’ve also been coordinating with two festivals that are near and dear to my heart, the Mississippi Book Festival in Jackson, Ms., and the Oxford Conference of the Book at the University of Mississippi. I work with festival coordinators at both of these events to lead panels with some of the greatest literary minds of our time, having interviewed the likes of Deesha Philyaw, Jonathan Escofery, Kiese Laymon, Brendan Slocum, Mecca Jamila Sullivan, Juhea Kim and more. I’ve collaborated both in person and virtually to create some of the best programming in the nation via festivals and I’m very proud to say that. 

As we enter the second half of the year, and look towards 2024, I’m very interested in collaborating with other bookstores, primarily black-owned ones like Baldwin & Co. to continue to amplify black stories and help them build engaging content on social media that captures the essence of the contemporary reader in a way that we just don’t see enough of. I’m not only looking to bring my years of expertise, my community of over twelve thousand readers, to them physically, but I’m also available virtually as well. With the recent attack on books via book bannings across the nation, I also find it increasingly more important to make sure I’m available for ALL bookstores as well, to coalition build in that regard between black and brown bookstores and bookstores managed by other communities to ensure that we create literary citizenship that is responsive to the political landscape, the shifts in the artform, and the rich cultural history of all.

Bio

Jerid P. Woods, also known as Akili Nzuri, is a writer, educator, PhD Candidate, and literary influencer. He was born and raised in Natchez, Ms and survives on an unwavering commitment to ignite a passion for reading in the youth; he also exists as a living testimony to the power of shared stories and knowing one's self. He is the owner and creator of Ablackmanreading.com and the Instagram blog: @ablackmanreading. He is also one half of the dynamic podcast duo, @booksarepopculture available for streaming on all services.

Small businesses committed to increasing diversity within their organizations often think first of hiring, of diversifying their workforce. But what does your hiring process look like? When was the last time you assessed your interviewing and hiring processes for inclusiveness and equitable practices?

Becca Carnahan, who writes on diversity and inclusion for the Harvard Business School, offers some advice for businesses looking to attract diverse employees. The most important consideration, she notes, is to adopt a principle of inclusivity throughout the entire hiring process, from how your write your job description to the setting you choose for your virtual interviews and the way you ask questions during the interview.

For example, does your job description and job posting use gender neutral language? Do you explicitly cite your commitment to being an inclusive workplace? If you are interviewing virtually, what background are you using? What assumptions are you making about the background of your prospective hire, who is probably at home?

Assess your interviewing strategy make a point to ask questions purposefully, prioritizing capability over experience:

“Instead of asking, ‘Have you done x or y or z?’ you want to ask, ‘How would you approach doing x or y or z?’ This shift in question lets you learn someone’s capacity to think with you.”

"Inclusive language" is not another term for "politically correct." It is not simply a list of things to say or not to say. Inclusive language is a commitment to embrace people as whole beings, not simply a set of descriptors. It puts people first.

Organizations with a culture of commitment to inclusive language see better hires, and retain employees longer, because their employees feel a strong sense of belonging.

"Employees who feel like they belong at a company are 50 percent less likely to leave, according to research from BetterUp. A sense of belonging also improves the way people feel about their employers, making them 167 percent more likely to refer the company to a friend or colleague."

Six things to do when hiring:

• Craft inclusive job descriptions that welcome candidates
  
• Educate interviewers on the benefits of diverse teams to counter “just like me” bias
  
• Level the playing field during video interviews
  
• Use the same set of questions for all candidates
  
• Select questions that focus on capabilities
  
• Use work samples to assess skills equitably

Resources:
6 Best Practices to Creating Inclusive and Equitable Interviewing Processes

70 Inclusive Language Principles That Will Make You a More Successful Recruiter

Zendesk: Start Using Inclusive Language

SIBA's Anti-Racist Work Lauded by AMIBA

In a recent article focused on the importance of amplifying Black-owned businesses to a local economy, the American Independent Business Alliance (AMIBA) included SIBA among examples of groups and organizations working for change.

As small business owners SIBA members already know how challenging it is to be an entrepreneur. AMIBA points out those challenges are exacerbated for Black business owners:

"Black entrepreneurs often begin with lower personal wealth. They also face extreme difficulty obtaining bank loans and other forms of critical capital (even when they have excellent personal credit)."

Shopping local and Black-owned has a "profoundly positive impact on local communities." AMIBA cites SIBA's 21-Day Racial Equity Challenge as an example of working to change people's assumptions about the impact of their assumptions and shopping habits:

"Doing this work equitably requires people to step out of their comfort zones to evaluate which businesses and products they choose and why."

In the case of SIBA, the Challenge prompts booksellers to re-evaluate their own store policies and practices, and their role within their own communities. SIBA hosts the 21-Day Racial Equity Challenge every spring in February, making it available to anyone in the book industry. But booksellers don't need to wait until February to participate. Bookstores can schedule the challenge for their own store staff and/or local community partners as an independent project. Contact SIBA to arrange details. The current challenge, along with its companion weekly column "The Anti-Racist Bookseller" is also available on the SIBA website.

Professionalism is a Racist Construct

As retail operations with frontline staff who regularly interact with the public, many bookstores have either stated or unstated but generally accepted standards of professionalism for how their employees represent the store or interact with customers.

It may be time to re-examine those standards of professionalism for their inherent biases. Last year the UCLA Law Review published an essay by Leah Goodridge "Professionalism as a Racial Construct" which examined how many of the assumptions underlying standards of professional behavior, far from being neutral or objective, work against people of color and people who are not members of the dominant culture:

"It is not merely that there is a double standard in how professionalism applies: It is that the standard itself is based on a set of beliefs grounded in racial subordination and white supremacy." -- Leah Goodman

A lawyer herself, Goodman looks at aspects of legal professionalism, but her analysis can be adapted and applied to other settings and scenarios, including customer service and retail. She looks at how people of color are expected to withstand microaggressions and bias with good grace -- that calling out such behavior is seen as being unprofessional when in point of fact is the person using those microaggressions who is really the one being unprofessional. "If attorneys on the receiving end of microaggressions, bias, and racism are considered sensitive for not laughing along," Goodman asks, "why are the attorneys who engage in harmful behavior not also considered sensitive for their inability to handle criticism about their conduct?"

In the retail world, "professionalism" is often associated with dress codes, with how a person looks, tone of voice, and a general calm demeanor. But these things may in themselves indicate racist, homophobic, ageist, sizeist, or ableist assumptions. For example, according to a 2023 Crown Workplace research study, more than half of Black women surveyed felt they had to wear their hair straight in a job interview to be successful. One fifth of Black women surveyed between the ages of 25 and 34 had been sent home from work because of their hair. "Texturism," discrimination based on how close or far your natural hair is to European hair, is insidiously prevalent in many of our standards of a "professional" appearance.

Some questions to ask yourself as your review your store's policies and expectations of professionalism for your staff:

Is your dress code gender neutral, unbiased, and most importantly enforced equitably? Does it take into account different spiritual practices and cultures, the needs of disabled employees who may have to contend with assistance like wheelchairs? Is is fair to people with larger body sizes? Does it accommodate nonbinary and gender non-conforming employees?

Are you allowing self expression or does your staff have to suppress who they are? Do your LGBTQ+ employees feel able to be out if they choose? Are neurodivergent staff able to work with their own natural movements and communication methods?

These are just a few of the considerations that must go into creating a new standard of professionalism in your store. Creating a workplace that actually works for everyone may mean throwing out some long standing assumptions of what it means to be "professional" but the result could be a happier, empathic workplace where everyone's humanity is celebrated.