A group of fuschia flowers growing out of a crack in a broken sidewalk with a green wall in the background. Photo by Artur Voznenko on Unsplash
Check-In:
Since 2016, I have started my days off with a run. Oftentimes, I’m finishing as the sun is starting to show itself. This time alone is an essential part for me to be present and productive during the day. Since 2021, I’ve ended the day with journaling, a recap of the major components of the day as well as what I’m reading, writing, eating, and running. Earlier this year I started therapy. The work with my therapist has redefined how I use running and journaling as part of my daily practice. As I have added practices that center me and my well-being, I have deepened my ability to thrive. I understand you, Serena, I am in a constant state of evolution and redefining what thriving can look like for me given my current circumstances and goals.
In my conversation with Kori, thriving in the equity officer role meant working not from the C-suite but from the margins. In Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Maree Brown thriving is in relationships and collaboration. Thriving is transforming ourselves individually before we attempt to transform the world. Adrienne and Kori, each thriving in the community.
#mondaymotivation:
“Pleasure is political- for the capacity to relax and play renews the spirit and makes it possible for us to come to the work….ready for the journey.” -bell hooks paraphrasing the words of Toni Cade Bambara
Interview with Leader of the Global Majority:
NOTE: Why Leaders of the Global Majority versus Leaders of Color? Rosemary Campbell-Stephens coined the term, People of the Global Majority (PGM) because Black, Brown, and Indigenous people are, in fact, numerically in the majority all over the world. The need to compare to white people and minimize our presence is problematic. Also, the term people of the Global Majority offers an empowering term that encompasses global solidarity against racial injustice
Kori Ricketts was the national manager of diversity, equity, and inclusion within a charter school organization for several years. Below is an excerpt of our conversation:
Mary: How did you start in your role within your organization?
Kori: When it started looking like equity was going to be something that the organization was taking seriously, I advocated that it shouldn't live in human resources. And by advocating that it shouldn't live where they thought it was going to live, advocacy became an assignment.
Mary: You spoke about approaching your role by “working in the margins,” I'm curious to hear what does that look like for you and how did you approach it?
Kori: In the last couple of years, I understood that I'm going to continually be put in spaces that continually beat me down, not affirm me. However, I have really seen that my marginality gives me a purview that most people don't have. And now I can see the entire board. So, taking that context, and then you overlay John Cotter’s model of leading change. One of the key components of that model is to gather your coalition.
Mary: How did you gather your coalition?
Kori: I spent a considerable amount of time talking to people who felt like they weren't in power. Talking to the people who felt like, you know, "I've been here for five years, nobody's ever listened to what I have to say." And so, what that ended up doing in a really beautiful way was having people rally behind something and feel like they were a part of something almost that like the establishment didn't realize.
My work was on the ground trying to talk to as many people as I could, and figure out like, "Okay, when I have this DEI presentation who are my plants in the audience, who are the people that I know will speak up." So, I spent about four months doing that because I had clung to this Cotter model of change and really figuring out how do I empower the people who feel like they have no power in this organization?
Mary: And how did you keep the momentum going?
Kori: It was about my own credibility as much as about the credibility of what I was attempting to build, because I understood from being able to see the whole board, how other people saw me. I realized that I have a very viscerally negative response to neutrality. Neutrality is not my friend. So, it was a part of my leadership style to always be clear about where I stand.
And regardless of how people feel about it, it helps people to know what I stood for. And so that when I was in those CEO presentations, there was never any question of if I was advocating for them.
I knew that my strategy was not to be a mouthpiece for the CEO, but rather to be representative of creating a space where the people who were in the margins in the organization had a voice
What I’m Reading:
Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Maree Brown
About the author: Adrienne Maree Brown is a facilitator of social justice movement work in Detroit. She has many other titles including doula, sci-fi scholar, coach, writer, and others.
Book Audience: Anyone who is looking to facilitate change through a lens of collaboration.
Book Overview: Brown introduces each element of emergent strategy and then ends the book providing practices and tools for emergency strategy facilitation
Element breakdown and notes of interest:
Fractal. The relationship between small and large
What we practice at the small scale sets the patterns for the whole system
See our own life, work, and relationships as the first place to practice justice, liberation, and alignment with each other and the planet.
Adaptive. How we change
How we respond in the face of constant change will determine the quality of our lives and the impact that can be made when we move into collective action
Being aware of how much you can control the change that is happening can increase the time for you to adapt to the pleasure available in that change
Interdependence and Decentralization. Who we are and how we share
Steps towards interdependence- be seen, be wrong, accept your inner contradictions and ask for and receive what you need
In an interdependent movement with decentralized innovation and leadership- you need to be thoughtful about how you respond to the gift and curse of the charismatic leader
Non-linear and iterative. The pace and pathways of change
Transformation happens in cycles, convergences, and explosions and the sooner we realize we are in an iterative cycle the sooner we can learn from it
Emotion and grief are a part of the change that needs to be acknowledged and given space
Resilience and Transformative Justice. How we recover and transform
Transformative justice asks us to consider how to transform toxic energy, hurt, and conflict into solutions. To “get under the wrong” and find a way to coexist
Three questions to ask yourself to shift from individual, inter-organizational anger towards viable, generative, sustainable change- 1. Why? 2. What can I learn from this? 3. How can my real-time actions contribute to transforming this situation (versus making it worse)?
Creating more possibilities. How we move towards life.
Collaborative ideation is a process to have multiple people co-create the future
Meaningful collaboration that is built on deep relationships, as well as actual difference, creates more solutions that will serve more than viewpoints
Other Highlights:
The assess yourself chapter gives prompts for self-reflection for each element
The spells and practices for emergent strategy chapter gives approaches for self-transformation through friendships and poems for meditation, chanting, etc.
The tools for emergent strategy facilitation chapter includes diverse and concrete tips for each element including a variety of agenda structures, ways to approach consensus decision making and how to use technology.
Quotes for reflection:
Emergent Strategy is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. (p13)
Emergence is a system that makes use of everything in the iterative process. It’s all data. (p14)
Transform yourself to transform the world. (p53)
At the human scale, in order to create a world that works for more people, for more life, we have to collaborate on the process of dreaming and visioning and implementing that world. We have to recognize that a multitude of realities have, do, and will exist. (p158)
Reclaiming the right to dream the future, strengthening the muscle to imagine together as Black people, is a revolutionary decolonizing activity. (p 164)
Next Book: Humanity Over Comfort: How You Confront Systemic Racism Head On by Sharone Brinkley-Parker, Tracey L. Durant, Kendra V. Johnson, Kandice Taylor, Johari Toe, and Lisa Williams
Due to an updated library card, audiobooks, and marathon training, my book consumption is at a rate I haven’t hit in a LONG time. I read ten books in August and I recommend them ALL! You can find a full list of my book recommendations here.
Resources:
My latest article for Edutopia focuses on James Baldwin’s “Talk to Teachers” to give leaders strategies for how to “go for broke” at the beginning of the school year.
If this is your first time reading, please go back and read my Introductions post.
Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think. If you like it, please share it with your network!