About a decade ago, I was meeting with a new client in Manhattan about a project. We were similar in age, had hundreds of mutual friends, and the project had all the trappings of an experience that would forge a lasting relationship.
There was a lull in the conversation as our kickoff meeting was winding down, and to my utter bewilderment, he started making a series of racial jokes. Not in an exploratory, test-the-waters kind of way—it was a rapid-fire I’ve-been-waiting-for-this-moment vibe.
The jokes weren’t incredibly offensive, but they were nonetheless shocking and unwelcome. The client happened to be a white guy, but equally important is the fact that this was our first meeting. We had nothing close to the kind of rapport that would make his comments okay.
I didn’t have the patience or sophistication to address it diplomatically, so I asked him what the hell was going on. His face sank as he turned fire engine red.
He sheepishly explained that his primary exposure to black men was as a high school football player, and their way of relating to each other was to crack predominantly racial jokes. He assured me that no harm was intended and that he only meant to poke a little good-natured fun.
Finally, it made sense. Bless his midwestern heart.
Understanding his point of reference and intent allowed me to soften my reaction and view him with compassion; he was doing the best he could using the tools he had and simply trying to connect with me.
It’s easy to believe that people around us harbor animus and overt bias—we’re all living through a destabilizing period of polycrisis—but this makes the need for connection, courage, and community even more urgent.
This week, I delivered a Global Black History Month session for a client I’ve been working with since 2022. The story goes back to 2020, when many organizations were dealing with the racial reckoning following George Floyd’s murder. Sarah saw my MAKERS keynote about the ally skills framework I helped co-created and reached out on LinkedIn, thinking she’d never hear back. We had our first call 10 days later and our first project 60 days later.
My work as a speaker, consultant, and facilitator isn’t possible without partners advocating for me in rooms I don’t yet have access to. And it’s not like I’m speaking about standard business topics like sales and marketing—I’m often steadying the hand of leaders looking to navigate the tumultuous terrain of race, gender, and difference more generally.
I could write a manifesto on the role an external speaker like me plays when being brought in to deliver a timely message, but here are three that have served me:
Know your audience: When working with an array of constituents across an organization, I will show up differently in a meeting with the CEO than in a meet-and-greet with the organization’s Black ERG (Employee Resource Group). I’m not a different person on these calls, but the message I’m bringing has to address a different set of unspoken needs.
Share the spotlight: in my address this week, I asked for brief, recorded videos of two employees in the NYC and London offices talking about their career highlights and challenges. The audience loved this format from a stagecraft perspective and in providing global visibility for people who had the courage to speak personally about their professional experiences.
Read the room: the worst thing you can do as a speaker is offend your host, and the second worst thing is being forgettable. Dancing without a net is my specialty; audiences appreciate it when you take risks.
But mostly, my job is to make the people who hired me 1) look good and 2) feel glad that they brought me in.
Today marks my 40th revolution around the sun. To celebrate this milestone, I’m launching something new. But first, a story.
In 2016, I lived in Harlem and ran a small media company. I had been at it for a while and the daily grind of publishing other people’s writing for a living was losing its appeal—to say nothing of selling sponsorships against that writing to keep the lights on. I was bored and desperately needed a new challenge.
Around the same time, I learned that WeWork was opening an office in the neighborhood. It was long before the company’s spectacular implosion, and the news of their arrival had the streets buzzing: one of the hottest and fastest-growing startups was descending upon Harlem, replete with all the uncomfortable racial and economic optics one would expect.
I met with the team leading the charge and they were armed with well-rehearsed talking points about looking to build with Harlem. To soften the landing, they were clearly looking for some socially connected locals to partner on a few events with. At the time, WeWork was producing tens of thousands events around the world, and had it down to a science.
I pitched my idea, and we executed my vision in fifteen days. It was a flat-out sprint. Boredom: vanquished.
I wanted to showcase Harlem’s rich history and dynamic residents, so I decided to moderate a panel. I assumed that many of the people I asked to sit on the panel would be out of town, uninterested, or unavailable, so I made eight simultaneous requests. They all came back in the affirmative, so after weeping silently as my inbox produced a rapid stream of excited yeses, I prayed to Oprah and strapped in for the grand social experiment that I had inflicted upon myself.
Two weeks of pure adrenaline ensued, culminating in an oversubscribed event with nearly 300 RSVPs. We had to turn off reservations because the venue couldn’t accommodate more people. New and used friends came from as far away as California for the evening, and I still vividly remember the energy in the room. It was electric.
The upshot is that we took the Harlem WeWork office from 50% to 75% sold with that one event. The stress was astronomical, and I remember lying on the floor and vibrating with overstimulation that night when I got home. In retrospect, I was merely dehydrated, but I reported back to my advisor in a dramatic fashion the following week that I was getting out of the events business. I shared that I didn’t enjoy the experience and wanted to stick to publishing.
He looked at the event photos and the scale of my accomplishment and dismissed my complaint. “The event wasn’t for you. And what you did was hard.”
“No kidding,” I said to myself in French. But he was right. And I was hooked.
Over the years, I’ve produced and hosted events that reached thousands of people across four countries, from informal meetups in Argentina and intimate dinners in Paris to sponsored rooftop mixers in Oakland and networking events on Wall Street.
“To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan and not quite enough time.” —Leonard Bernstein
After leaving my job last year, I had some big decisions to make—not just about what I wanted to do for a living but also how I wanted to spend my time. But instead of seeking out something new and novel, I noticed my instincts in the immediate aftermath.
I started writing, making introductions, and planning events to host. Absent the familiar routine of a job to create imaginary obstacles, I found myself putting pen to paper and laying the groundwork for…an events company?
Introducing Power Circle Events
Power Circles create the conditions for people to connect more deeply than they typically do. Magic happens when a group of people give generously of their time and attention, looking for ways to advance a conversation, someone’s journey towards a goal, or simply being more present to what someone has to say.
And a memorable experience can reliably take shape with careful planning and facilitation. Based on 15 years of bringing people together, here are three essential elements of a Power Circle:
Connection: we’re social primates hardwired for connection—meeting the right person at the right moment can shift the arc of our lives
Community: finding our place and voice in the world—even and especially among people we may disagree with—can clarify what we stand for and what’s worth doing
Courage: the stakes may feel higher than ever, but showing up despite this inspires others to do the same
After six tremendous years, I’ve stepped away from ReadySet—the company I’ve helped build over the last six years and longest job I’ve ever held.
I moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2017 after four years of running a small media company in Harlem, eager for a change of pace that didn’t involve commercial publishing. I loved writing the newsletter and producing live events, but I grew weary of selling sponsorships for a living.
In 2016, I spoke at a conference in Berkeley and was subsequently recruited by a fellow panelist—an Oakland-based founder whose B2B SaaS startup was hiring. Candidly, it didn’t take much convincing to trade my dwindling savings for a Bay Area-based startup and all the attendant trappings. I was thrilled.
But neither startup wealth nor professional stability befell me in San Francisco. Within two months, I returned my laptop and paid back my relocation advance—a story for another day.
Things were bumpy in the immediate aftermath, but I had the good fortune of crossing paths with a fledgling diversity strategy firm called ReadySet while consulting for a competitor and eventually joined as their third hire. I started as a generalist but learning and development quickly became my focus and specialty. I thrived.
For a while, I had a fairly ideal flywheel. My conference talks were well-received and resulted in media, sales, and more speaking. I was in an average of two cities per week for nearly two years until the pandemic, and I loved the work. It was a formative time, and I blossomed as a speaker and team leader as ReadySet grew.
But companies evolve and so must their leadership. When what the firm needed from my role diverged from my zone of excellence, I decided to step away. The decision wasn’t difficult thanks to supportive partnership and great coaching, and my resignation was sent (and received) with gratitude.
“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” —Zora Neale Hurston
So what’s next?
Aside from leadership development consulting, I’m organizing a series of events for executives in the NYC area. If you’re subscribed, you’ll be the first to know.
But mostly, I’m excited to write—there’s so much I have to catch you up on.
On Friday, February 16th, we’re hosting a Black Panther costume party and networking event. The festivities begin at 7pm at WeWork’s gorgeous new City Center (downtown Oakland) location. Bay Area native DJ Red Corvette will be meticulously curating auditory sensations, drinks and light refreshments will be served, and everyone is invited to step out in their best “Wakanda Glam” costumes.
Check out the details and let us know if you’re coming.
Can’t make it? We’re in the Bay Area and NYC markets now and will be producing events like this regularly, so you’ll have more opportunities to catch up with us if you can’t make this one.
Photo credit: Kwaku Alston • 2017 MVLFFLLC™ & 2017 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.
You might be wondering — why a costume party?
My vision is to create a series of culturally relevant events that shift how relationships are cultivated in tech. For my entire professional life, I’ve attended events where black folks put on their stockings and oxfords, speak the Queen’s English, and nervously qualify themselves to recruiters and hiring managers in hopes of vanquishing their student loans. This works for a lot of folks, but misses the mark for many others.
Tech companies have a really hard time attracting and retaining diverse talent, and working with these folks as an independent consultant over the past few years on their processes and strategies has illuminated why: the lived experiences, cultures, and concerns of the folks they’re looking to reach are rarely centered. Their offices are in prohibitively expensive places to live, bias traps abound in their approach (e.g., placing a focus on underrepresented folks is tantamount to “lowering the bar”), and trust is rarely cultivated between the organizations and communities of color in particular.
This gap won’t be closed by throwing monthly events, but I see events like these being a part of the solution. What if black professionals, instead of being some of the only brown faces at recruiting events, were the majority? And what if recruiters and hiring managers were invited into spaces where we swag surf, millie rock, and connect with our peers? What if instead of “bringing your whole self to work” you could get on with the business of living your best life, and accelerate your career in the process?
I think we can make that happen.
Next week I’ll be back with some fun updates and what we’re planning in the Bay Area. In the meantime, get your costume ready and have a great week.
RSVP to the Black Panther Party and networking event on Friday, February 16th in Oakland, California here.
Last Thursday, Google announced the opening of a new Howard University campus at Google’s corporate headquarters in Mountain View, California. Howard is a private historically black university located in Washington, DC whose alumni include Stokely Carmichael, Thurgood Marshall, and Ta-Nehisi Coates. Dubbed “Howard West”, the campus represents Google’s continued efforts to attract and retain black software engineers.
It’s an important step forward, and not just because of the symbolic connection to one of the nation’s most respected HBCUs. What I’m hoping for is an acceleration of the collisions between cultures. The dearth of black software engineers in the ranks of Silicon Valley companies isn’t simply a numbers issue — a leaky pipeline, as it were — it’s also reflective of the cultural and geographic separation of demographics.
Two of the most effective ways of breaking down cultural barriers in the workplace are are 1) storytelling and 2) the intentional formation of social bonds. Storytelling in this context is the invitation for everyone, regardless of job title, to share personal and candid stories about how they experience the world. Indeed, in my lectures and workshops, sharing my story reliably results in others feeling empowered to share theirs. Social bonds are formed when employees realize that the differences which divide them are at once trivial and interesting once the air is cleared. In fact, we can all relate to feelings of discrimination and marginalization if we create the space to understand and be understood.
And what’s next?
I’m preparing for a few weeks of travel, which makes me sound a lot busier than I really am, and the theme of my speaking engagements revolves around the notion of belonging. One might argue that it’s simply the latest term to inch us closer to acknowledging the suffocating effects of structural racism and systematic, historical discrimination experienced day in and day out by marginalized groups, but we’ll discuss that in another newsletter.
Let’s review:
Organizations became interested in diversity in the late nineties and early two thousands when financial companies were rocked by enormous discrimination lawsuits. Sex and race discrimination settlements in the hundreds of millions forced companies to institute programs to protect their bottom line. Not exactly a warm and fuzzy moral imperative, but it’s what got the ball rolling.
As diversity programs merged with social progress, organizations and those standing to benefit from them started taking a closer look at what was and wasn’t working. The term “inclusion” grew from this, which is increasingly lumped into conversations about diversity. They aren’t the same. If diversity is about representation, inclusion takes into account the subjective lived experiences of the folks who comprise this diversity. Diversity, as the saying goes, is being invited to the party, and inclusion is being asked to dance (Vernā Myers).
Inclusion isn’t as easy to measure, as it’s not a simple issue of headcount. This is is where diversity slogans and taglines begin to ring hollow for many organizations, because it takes courage to see this through. This is why the technology industry has spent the past two years investing in diversity programs that don’t work. They’re safe, socially acceptable, minimize discomfort, and allow leadership to separate themselves from the results.
Belonging is the idea that a person and the elements that comprise their humanity are acknowledged. Many organizations seek to minimize the idea that difference exists in the workplace, to their continued peril. Not only does this not work in places like New York City, it runs counter to the research. Scholars studying social belonging at the University of Colorado in 2007 discovered that normalizing concerns about belonging can be productive. I’d conjecture that it’s essential.
Tech companies have been actively recruiting at HBCUs for years without much to show for it. There are a number of factors to explain this, but the one you’ll hear from black folks pursuing employment opportunities is feeling “othered” in their interactions and experiences. Microsoft found in the nineties that if you provide enough onsite comforts, engineers will spend most of their waking hours at work. Today’s leading tech companies invest heavily in comforts such as yoga classes, rock climbing walls, and massages…without realizing that there might be tens of thousands of potential employees who have precisely no interest in any of these perks.
“She wasn’t a good culture fit” then becomes a replacement for what could just as easily be replaced by “it was clear that she found the artificial reality we’ve constructed for 25 year old white males to be a bit strange and devoid of signals that she’d find a home here” or simply “She didn’t feel like she belonged here.”
The truth is available if we seek it out, but it takes courage. If you were the VP of HR at a multinational tech company on the world stage, would you commission a study that’s likely to surface clear evidence that your best efforts as an organization do more to exacerbate disparities in tech than to shrink them? If you answered “yes” then it’s likely that you wouldn’t have that position in the first place, or for long after commissioning the study.
This is unfortunate, because the data clearly shows that people from different backgrounds experience diversity and inclusion programs differently, and define these terms in different ways. What’s worse is that poorly-implemented diversity programs have been shown to activate bias and incite backlash. This suggests doing nothing is better than doing it poorly, but the former is no longer an option.
Diversity. Inclusion. Othering. Belonging. It’s a lot to keep up with, and even harder to engage with meaningfully. But this is the work, and there has never been a better time for organizations to step up and lead.
Catch me if you can: if you’re going to be at the Forum on Workplace Inclusion in Minneapolis, Bright Horizons’ 2017 Solutions at Work in Austin, The Culture Conference in San Francisco, or the Freedom and Fairness Workshop in Oakland, holla.
If not, enjoy last week’s criminally good articles on Abernathy.
Seriously, writers like Alonge and Jourdan make my work as a publisher a million times easier. My editor, however, must continue to fight with me over hyperbole (smile).
I’ve been publishing Abernathy for more than two years now, and in that time I’ve met a number of publishers looking to make a similar difference in the world. One of the challenges that I see new publishers grappling with is how adjustments are made, especially related to how publications make money. I can certainly relate, and I’ve got an evolving revenue model to prove it.
But one of the things I did before launching that continues to benefit the publication and how it’s received was deciding at the outset what it was, what it wasn’t, and what it stood for. We decided, for example, that we were selling sponsorship and impact rather than subscribers and page views. This informs the kind of articles we publish and the data we’re happy to share with sponsors. I’ve left a lot of money on the table by not writing listicles and selling ads, but I’ve gained so much more in the process.
Having a point of view and exploring event production has changed the nature of the conversation with sponsors. Not just because there are new offerings to sponsor, but also because of the conversations with attendees and subscribers about the ongoing journey that I’m privy to as a result. Yes, it’s helpful to know how black folks consume media and that we have a trillion-dollar buying power, but what’s invaluable is understanding the worldview of the black software engineer who feels like giving up every day because of his company’s culture.
He’ll share things with me that his HR team wouldn’t think to ask, and I can create editorial and offerings and events that address those needs. The macro—strengthening and expanding the pipeline of underrepresented folks working in tech—is informed by the micro. Producing hyper-targeted events and crafting experiential workshops is exponentially easier with a lens into the nature of the challenge we’re up against.
And as I mentioned last week, the linchpin in all of this work is trust. Thanks for yours. Enjoy this week’s articles and spotlights on Abernathy.
The conversation dominating diversity and inclusion in tech is largely centered around the numbers—namely, how many women and underrepresented minorities comprise the workforces of top tech companies. But what lived experiences, worldviews, and perspectives are represented by the folks who comprise those numbers?
If your parents were survivors of segregation and the Jim Crow South, you might, for example, be skeptical of companies touting their inclusive culture when their board of advisors is comprised of 95% white males. On the other hand, if you were socialized in a way that equipped you with the tools to thrive in largely-white, homogenous spaces, you might have understandably grown weary of diversity and inclusion conversations since they don’t seem relevant to your lived experience.
These worldviews aren’t mutually exclusive, either. One of the dehumanizing aspects of racism’s legacy in the United States is that stereotypes continue to pervade our national consciousness. The reason I started Abernathy was to provide a counterpoint to the reductive ways in which black men are portrayed in the media. My friend Will Madison isn’t one of the best black software engineers I know, he’s one of the best software engineers I know, period. By the same token, Raye Montague wasn’t just the first black person or the first woman to design a US Navy ship via computer, she was the first human being to do so. We do a disservice to stories like these by relegating them to Black History Month and diversity campaigns.
The tokenizing of African Americans by the media and ill-informed marketing executives contributes to the problems hiring managers are facing: it’s not a lack of opportunity that’s at the root of poor representation, it’s the lack of trust. The whitewashing of United States history has resulted in a cultural amnesia and ignorance that continues to divide our nation. And so I think of myself as a trust broker in my work as an inclusion strategist—I sit at the intersection of an eminently qualified audience of black professionals, and a growing cadre of thoughtful organizations looking to build trust and rapport with them.
No amount of budget can overcome a lack of trust, and the highest-leverage elements of trust are completely free in fact: courage, a willingness to make mistakes, and a reputation for telling the whole truth.
By any measure, I had a lot of things going for me ten years ago. I was a high-flying enterprise technology consultant for a great company, the owner of a brand new five bedroom house in Atlanta, and it had scarcely been a year since I’d graduated from college.
I was on 100% travel, so I flew to the client site on Mondays and back home (or wherever) on Thursdays. This was a fabulous opportunity for a single, freshly minted college grad, but after the first hundred or so flights, the novelty started to wear off. It was nice to feel important and face daily professional challenges with a brilliant team of professionals from all over the world, but I couldn’t imagine doing that work for the next twenty years.
I had a small web design operation on the side, which I started after building the first version of my personal website for a class project. It was a great way to amplify the soft skills and extracurricular activities that made me a strong candidate, and I started building similar websites for my ambitious non-technical friends when they saw how well it was working for me. Small business clients found me through word of mouth and before you knew it, my career as an accidental freelancer began in earnest.
I devoted many nights and weekends to that side hustle, and it was the skills I learned while serving my freelance clients that allowed me to change my life when I was unhappy with its direction. After three years of working for The Man—not to mention two anxiety attacks in one weekend that we can talk about some other time—I quit.
This business allowed me to walk away from my job and make a living while I figured out what was next. Most importantly, I decoupled my income from my physical location. This allowed me to go on some wonderful adventures like helping to launch a book publishing startup with Seth Godin and Amazon.com, working with the founding CTO of Mashable.com, living in Argentina, being on national television (iTunes link), and appearing in documentaries. But the greatest benefits were emotional and psychological. I had freedom, agency, and control over my environment. I hadn’t yet arrived at what felt like a calling, but I had the skills to keep the lights on. So I made the decision to optimize my life for freedom and autonomy rather than income, and this changed everything.
I learned that once you cut the cord, you only have to cut it once—I’ve been making a living at the intersection of tech and publishing and media for more than six years now. I still do a bit of tech consulting because it’s fun and yes, lucrative, but also because of the freedom it affords me to build a media company on my own terms and provide thought leadership for my corporate clients.
Technology specifically presents a number of unique challenges and opportunities for folks of color, and it’s not enough to retweet articles about the progress (or lack thereof) in the tech sector as it relates to tech diversity. A lot of the disparities we see in tech aren’t simply a function of racism and discrimination, a large part of it is cultural knowledge and awareness that’s passed along socially and generationally. By discussing these complex topics honestly and regularly, the world of tech becomes less of an insiders club and a diversity of folks can unleash their brilliance in the organizations that need it.
Dev Bootcamp—the original coding school—is doing the work, and their mission is in line with what I care about bringing to my audience: a greater awareness of what’s possible, both personally and professionally. On Wednesday, February 22nd I moderated the Abernathy Black Tech Panel at the Dev Bootcamp HQ on Wall Street in New York City. Joined on the panel by Career Developer Bie Aweh and program alum Chris Coles, we had a wide-ranging discussion about inclusion in tech, the culture of software development, and what we can all do to move the industry forward.
The point of the event and the discussion was to illustrate a range of possibilities for folks looking to transition into tech, regardless of whether they want to write code for a living. Bie isn’t a software engineer, Chris writes code for a living, and I’m somewhere in the middle. In addition to illustrating what life looks like for folks who participate in the 18-week Dev Bootcamp program, we discussed the role of community, belonging, networking, and self-care for historically marginalized talent making a living in tech.
To kick off the program, Ari from WeWork joined me for an a capella rendition of Ebony And Ivory. That’s not actually true, but this is a great photo of Ari.
WeWork and I connected in 2012 when I spoke at their first Summer Camp in the Adirondacks. This gives me significant street cred when I mention it to WeWork employees, which is hilarious since I spent most of that trip having the time of my life with a handful of my best friends.
WeWork is all about collaboration, as their open floor plans will attest. Coworking spaces have been my saving grace since leaving corporate America, and WeWork’s offices are always teeming with creative professionals and ambitious entrepreneurs. They offer a number of flexible membership options for everyone from people like me who bounce around a lot and simply need wifi and coffee, to growing startups that don’t want to be their own landlord.
Dev Bootcamp’s HQ on Wall Street is a short walk from WeWork’s Fulton Center location, where they are offering a free Hot Desk membership for the month of March for everyone who attended the event. Interested humans should email fultoncenter@wework.com for more information on how to sign up.
The reason I sought out Jopwell for this event is because of their story, what they stand for, and the crucial role they play for people of color. This isn’t just about qualified candidates being able to pay rent, it’s about historically marginalized professionals building the generational wealth previously unavailable. Working for famous companies that pay well is a badge of honor, sure, but what I care about is my friends putting their children through college.
Jopwell is a career resources platform created by and for people of color—Ryan and Porter are two black men who left prestigious investment banking roles to help corporations recruit and retain diverse talent. Some of the nation’s most well-respected institutions from Y Combinator to Andreessen Horowitz and Kapor Capital have backed their efforts and for the past three years they’ve been connecting Black, Latino/Hispanic, and Native American students and professionals to opportunities at over 50 of America’s leading companies across a variety of industries who are actively seeking to hire diverse candidates.
One of the reasons folks of color are poorly represented in many industries isn’t simply because recruiting, interviewing, and hiring practices need an overhaul—it’s also because many diverse candidates don’t feel like applying is worth their time. Searching for jobs in a competitive industry with the economy in turmoil is inherently unpleasant as it is, and can feel like an exercise in futility.
The beauty of Jopwell lies in the promise: applying for a role through their platform ensures your application is considered. Not only do they help you identify interesting roles, they offer an array of networking, skill-building, and recruiting events to serve their community. To boot, they’ve got a content platform called The Well that surfaces stories and insights from industry insiders.
Jopwell was recently recognized by Fast Company as one of the most innovative companies of 2017 and Talent Manager Nadia was on hand to share what 50,000 active members already know—Jopwell takes a lot of the pain out of the job hunt for people of color. Email [email protected] if you have questions about the platform and opportunities, and you can sign up here.
An event is worth doing when you have a photo that makes it look like you know what you’re talking about. We’re done here.
Phillip actually isn’t actually an angry guy, but this photo could be entered into a caption contest.
Rob trying to explain why there wasn’t a chocolate fondue waterfall. Futile.
Alan Johnson (right) works for Artsy and came to show support.
My neighbor Anthony Brown chats with my friends Robin Zander and Emily Doherty who were in from SF.
New friends from Year Up! Shouts out to Briana (tan pants) for bringing her colleagues.
Jordan Thomas, a product manager at HBO, drops some knowledge on us.
Bie Aweh explaining how she feels about the state of “diversity and inclusion” in tech.
Derby, VP at Hackerati, both hired panelist Chris Coles and pulls no punches regarding how unacceptable the state of diversity is in tech.
So meta.
Chris was probably explaining why Node.js is the future of the web as we know it.
Rob was a gracious host and I look forward to putting more events together with Dev Bootcamp.
Jopwell should license this photo. Holla at me, Ryan and Porter.
