S5 E3: Featuring Jonathan Stutz

Tracie Edwards:

Hello everyone and welcome to Traceability podcast. I am your host Tracie Edwards and today my guest is Jonathan Stutz who is the founder and president of Global Diversity Partners Inc. He has over 25 years experience working in leading companies such as Amazon, Microsoft and Zoolilly. He's led inclusion, diversity, and equity for four international businesses within those organizations. He has led the global readiness team at Microsoft and he's also a community leader. He serves on the board of trustees for Youth EastSide Services, which is a nonprofit for youth and families in the Seattle, Washington area.

Tracie Edwards:

He's also been a human services commissioner for the cities of Belleview and Kirkland. And previously founded the Seattle area's East Side Diversity Task Force and the East Side Latino Leadership Forum. While at Microsoft, he also founded the professional technical diversity network in the Puget Sound and Bay Areas. So, a ton of technical experience working with technology organizations and…

Tracie Edwards:

he’s also a specialist and advocate for inclusion, diversity, and equity efforts within organizations. Jonathan, thank you so much for being with me today.

Jonathan Stutz:

You bet,…

Jonathan Stutz:

Tracie. Thanks for having me.

Tracie Edwards:

So, we were able to connect through our mutual acquaintance, Sabina Nawaz, and I hear so many good things about you and I'm just grateful to have you with us today. So, generally as we start out, we talk about sort of what got us into a particular area, especially for those of us who, are maybe younger in our careers or, more technically siloed and that kind of thing. We like to just get a feel for how everybody got their start.

Tracie Edwards:

So, I know I didn't prep you with this beforehand, but how did you really get into technology and…then what brought you to inclusion and diversity?

Jonathan Stutz:

As far as getting into Microsoft, in the early days, at the time I joined Microsoft, there were only about 18,000 employees. Now, there are somewhere over a quarter million people worldwide. So, it was pretty early on in the Microsoft days. And prior to that, how I got recruited into Microsoft I was working for a temp service actually in sales where Microsoft and Nintendo and Safe Go, some of the bigger companies on the east of Seattle were my customers. And it was a customer problem.

Jonathan Stutz:

I had a customer come to me and said they were struggling on the east side which was at in those days predominantly white and kind of upper middle class suburbs and they were struggling to increase the diversity of their workforce which they understood and valued which was Seaman's AG German company they were making ultrasound equipment out in East Issaqua, another east side area where Costco's headquarters is now for example and they were struggling with this and I've talked to my other customers and they were also having this challenge.

Jonathan Stutz:

And so I started talking to community- based organizations on the Seattle side which had a great amount of racial diversity and they had people looking for jobs and so it was a matter of kind of trust kind of applying sales skills to recruiting and so I created something called the eastside diversity task force with some of my east side customers and we brought people together on a monthly basis so we felt like that person regular contact would build trust see people more about who they are, not as stereotypes based upon some, perception or stereotype they had of them, a narrow experience. And we did that and it started off slow, but then it built quite quickly and we would have these large events where people would come in and present their resumes. 00:05:00

Jonathan Stutz:

There was a social aspect to it…

Jonathan Stutz:

where people became longtime friends and through that I was recognized in diversity business news, a local Seattle paper where I had my picture taken with Jesse Jackson, who was in town and Microsoft saw that and recruited me out of there for this role as a strategy leader in doing diversity outreach work. And that's how I got into Microsoft back in basically the mid 90s when on that first diversity team at Microsoft.

Tracie Edwards:

And to really make that happen from sort of the grassroots kind of levels so that then you were able to attract the attention of some of these companies. So you go from the grassroots nature of this and now many organizations have ID efforts though there is some controversy about it these days. So, do you want to maybe give us an idea of…

Jonathan Stutz:

…

Tracie Edwards:

How do you define inclusive leadership and why is it such a crucial thing for us right now?

Jonathan Stutz:

For me, inclusive leadership and we talk about it in my book, “Daily Practices of Inclusive Leaders.” It's really about some foundational elements and it comes down to having heart, which is about empathy and compassion for people. And we talk about getting to know people at a deeper level beyond just what you see visually, but really getting to know them as individuals and what they're about and all the different dimensions of what makes up each one of us. and listening, we call it lead with your ears and really listening and getting to know people at a deeper level, connecting with them.

Jonathan Stutz:

I think leaders that connect with their employees and really value them, hear them and take the time to understand them. They can create that connection where employees are really committed and dedicated and loyal and the manager is taking care of the employees career and personal needs, aspirations and goals. So that those employees really work hard for them. But it's also about having wisdom. We talk about in the book the 2IL model which is really understanding the impact of stereotypes cultural competency unconscious biases the effect of micro inequities or microaggressions and then It's having this courage to speak up and speak out and act and look out for your people having their back being an ally and accomplice.

Jonathan Stutz:

And then understanding that on a daily basis how this all can play out to take care of your people and take care of your team to deliver that high performance organization. So for me inclusion is about being heard, valued and understood. so people really feel they belong so our book is all about these daily practices,…little things you can do along the way to create that culture of belonging for folks.

Tracie Edwards:

Thank you for that.

Tracie Edwards:

So most of our listeners are technology people and tech companies are very prominent these days. and as a woman in particular with a career in technology,…I can certainly see the need for inclusion and belonging. But what are some unique challenges that tech companies maybe face when trying to build that culture of belonging?

Jonathan Stutz:

Yeah. I think some of the challenges that a lot of the companies face and…and I'm thinking about Microsoft specifically in the days that I was there, they were promoting people based upon their technical capabilities and so there wasn't as much of a focus on their leadership capabilities and developing their leadership capabilities. So Microsoft actually shifted direction about, I don't know maybe 15 years ago, actually, and put a strong emphasis on developing leaders and leadership with mentoring programs and…and training programs to really help them develop their people skills because people were promoted for technical capabilities not their people skills.

Jonathan Stutz:

And so you had a lot of folks moving into very senior roles that had either just not had any training really in creating high performance organizations how to build high performing teams what that was about. inclusive, we always say inclusive leadership is leadership and you talked a minute ago, you asked me and I didn't really answer the question directly, which was how are we dealing with the push back, or the attacks on inclusion, diversity, equity today. And it's really understanding that inclusive leadership and creating these cultures of belonging is a business issue. It's a business strategy. And the companies like Costco and Chase Bank that are out there now saying, " we're going to double down. 00:10:00

Jonathan Stutz:

We're going to invest in this because we think it's a competitive advantage. They realize it's not about a zero- sum game where if we focus on people who have historically been underestimated or marginalized or oppressed, that means a white man's going to lose. That's not it at all. That's not what it's about. In fact, people that are in what we call a dominant culture actually benefit…because you do have these teams that are performing at a high level. They're more creative. They're more innovative and so that really leads to the financial success of the organization

Tracie Edwards:

I like that as far as at the team level and…and I know that we, maybe “always” is a strong word, but in organizations we often receive training and that kind of thing on these issues. But we don't always get that at the team level and we don't always get to see that modeled. So, do you have some suggestions for…how teams and individuals can sort of model what they're seeing in their training and that kind of thing?

Jonathan Stutz:

Yeah. Some of the daily practices in our book, …we set up the book along the employee life cycle so that leaders can actually go to a particular section of the book, open it up and it can be the area that they're specifically involved in whether it's recruiting or it's promotional process or it's hiring or it's just talent development. So some of the things we talk about, for example, are when you're recruiting and going through the process of interviewing candidates is to ensure you have a diverse interview panel. So this is the ability to have different perspectives of people with different backgrounds interviewing the candidate.

Jonathan Stutz:

So not only the candidate sees people themselves potentially on the slate of interviewers that they're going to meet with,…but also you get that rich discussion from people coming from different lived experiences interviewing the candidate. So they get a more robust rounder view of the candidate from diverse interview panels just right there is a great one. Another one that I think is on just everyday inclusion that's overlooked is the one-to-one meeting. We don't get a lot of training as managers in how to conduct a one-on-one meeting with your employees. And so we give insights and that this is such an underestimated, and undervalued opportunity to really build that relationship one to one between the manager and the employee. So we talk about taking the time to listen and get to know them, hear what their issues are, what their goals, their aspirations, their career ambitions are.

Jonathan Stutz:

By getting them to know at a deeper level. Let's say you have somebody in the team that's a software developer and you're not interviewing them, but you're doing your one-on-one with your employee and you find out by talking to them at a deeper level about their goals and where they want to go with their career. You find out they really want to develop their project management skills. They’d like to move maybe into program management. And so you can then know that and give them opportunities to develop that skill. Give them a project or an opportunity, maybe even sponsor them to go for their certification as a project management professional.

Jonathan Stutz:

That's going to drive higher levels of performance from the employees because they really feel like you've got their back and you're looking out for their career,…but also retention. You're going to keep that employee rather than moving on to a team where maybe they get that opportunity to work on that skill somewhere else, and you missed out because you didn't get it.

Jonathan Stutz:

So that's just a couple examples there.

Tracie Edwards:

I appreciate you bringing up the one-on-one connection because I think it's sometimes much easier to develop empathy and really see and hear another person if we're right with them one on-one like that.

Jonathan Stutz:

And that's a great point because one of the ways to do that is to demonstrate that empathy is obviously the employee has to feel comfortable sharing something maybe personal that's going on in their lives or struggles they're having at work or with another employee or relationship is for the leader to realize the huge power of being vulnerable and sharing information about where maybe they're struggling either in their personal life or at work and just that they can, open up and the employee sees, wow, they're being vulnerable with me based upon…what they've told me, I feel more comfortable sharing what's going on in my life. And then that's where the manager can demonstrate that caring, and that compassion for the employee. And that's going to create that special connection where they feel safer to share their ideas, take risks and ultimately be more creative and that's supporting just the goals of the organization overall. 00:15:00

Tracie Edwards:

What are maybe some common mistakes that the tech leaders might make when they're trying to build those diverse teams? They're to feel that They're trying to hire and retain different ideas and…different people, but are there some common mistakes that they might make in doing that?

Jonathan Stutz:

Yeah, in the fast-paced world of tech,…especially if that's a large part of your listening audience, is there's this incentive to fill open positions quickly and move fast. And so they may not even be because they're so busy, the plates are so full, they may not even be investing in building relationships outside of the team to create a more diverse candidate pool. So one of the things we talk about is this concept of who's in your kitchen. And who's in your kitchen is kind of a fun story and it has to do with the kitchen being one of the most intimate places in your home. It's where you spend your time with parties. Oftentimes people congregate in the kitchen. and if you look around your kitchen,…

Jonathan Stutz:

Are you seeing people with different backgrounds, diversity of just your most intimate relationships in your home, of your friends, who do you hang out with? And if you're spending time with people different from yourself outside of work, it's a lot more conducive to when you're recruiting, if you're spending if you have somebody across from you in the interviewing table that is the first time you really sat down and spent time with a person of color, person who's gay, person who's trans, what you're going to be less comfortable.

Jonathan Stutz:

But if you are spending time outside of work in your social circles with people that bring that diversity, you're going to be a lot more comfortable. You're going to feel more open to those folks. So, who's in your kitchen, the idea is challenging folks just like “what's your circle look like that you spend time outside of work?” But then also there are professional technical organizations focused on people of color such as women in technology international the society of Hispanic professional engineers NESBY national society of black engineers black NBA's association there Asian Accountants Association there's many different professional associations they have local chapters so a great way to increase your candidate pool is for you to sponsor events for these local chapters to speak at those local chapter meetings to host them in your company's offices for when they have chapter events. So that as you're building relationships with people outside your organization when you have open positions, they're going to be more inclined to apply for your jobs when you promote them. that can really help you with diversifying your candidate pool. And the mistake people make to your question is they oftentimes don't have those relationships. So they typically will recruit and hire people through their own professional network that oftentimes are people just like themselves.

Jonathan Stutz:

And that's where it really becomes a challenge…

Tracie Edwards:

And that makes sense. And I love how you're really talking about the whole person. in support of a goal of inclusion and diversity and equity. …

Jonathan Stutz:

because we all Tracie, I mean we all bring a, you look at me and…if you just looked on the surface of the visible dimensions of my diversity you would think maybe me, and my co-author who's black. You might say they must not have much in common. Jonathan's black or Jonathan's white, Eddie's black, he was a professional athlete at one point in his life. I was not, but I love sports. But then as you start talking and realizing we both are very passionate about, nature, about photography, about social equity, social justice, we both love sports, I mean, we have a lot in common. We both have two kids. We're both heterosexual. We both live in the Seattle area. We just have a lot in common.

Jonathan Stutz:

Whereas if you just looked at us, you'd think, "these folks are very different from each other." So, you really do need to look at the whole person. To your point,…

Tracie Edwards:

So also in technology organizations there's a heavy emphasis on the tech and on the innovation and how can we ensure that the actual technology and the innovation is happening. In addition to the inclusion

Jonathan Stutz:

I think ways to do that are to make sure you're hearing lots of ideas they're getting out on the table…because advancing technology is really thinking outside the norm. 00:20:00

Jonathan Stutz:

Thinking what are new ways to solve these tough problems whether it's artificial intelligence or bad actors in those areas such as privacy or security and so we have a couple things we recommend one of them is something hitting the pause button and this is if you're in a meeting and let's say Tracie you have an idea and…and somebody interrupts you because women get interrupted a lot more frequently than men, studies show, and so if you have somebody in the room that sees you getting interrupted and not letting you finish your thought, we say, "Hit the pause button." And the person will say, "Hey, I'm going to hit the pause button. Tracie wasn't finished speaking. Let's let her finish and then we'll come over to you, James, and hear let you go. But we really want to hear all let her flesh out her idea before we go on because we might be missing something."

Jonathan Stutz:

So creating this cultural norm of hitting the pause button is one way we say of dropping a pebble. It's a little ripple that you can create in the water and then somebody else sees that cultural norm. They go to the next meeting and they use the pause button.

Jonathan Stutz:

Maybe it's not for somebody getting interrupted, but maybe it's somebody taking credit for somebody else's idea. you have an idea, 10 minutes later somebody else says it and all of a sudden they get all the credit. You can hit the pause button and say, "Hey, hold on a second. I'm hitting the pause button. that your comment was really good, but it seems very similar or the same idea that Tracy had 10 minutes ago and we overlooked it then, but everybody else is getting on this idea. Let's shine a light on Tracie who really had the original idea.

Jonathan Stutz:

So this idea of hitting the pause button becomes a ripple that a pebble you can drop to create this ripple and then it becomes a cultural norm that we don't interrupt or we don't take people credit for people's ideas and if we see something that isn't right in the room something doesn't sit right with you. We're in this fast-paced, go, culture and really to be interrupting biases and creating a culture where you can drive the technology forward with new ideas and…innovation is, you want to slow down and think more critically about why you're making the decisions you're making, how you're making them. And hitting the pause button is a great way to do that.

Tracie Edwards:

I like that. That's a very practical norm, so to speak. And it goes back to what you initially said, which was seeing and hearing each other. And often we're distracted and…maybe not paying attention the way that we should and so that seeing and hearing and then translating that into a cultural norm in the organization seems pretty powerful.

Jonathan Stutz:

And there's a couple ways to do it because sometimes somebody says something that is so inappropriate, a joke that really is, racially offensive or it's kind of, puts you it's sexist. In those instances, you really want to call somebody out. because you want to set the norm that it's not okay, and speak out. We call it creating a speak up culture and…and encouraging that.

Jonathan Stutz:

Have managers encourage your employees to speak up and speak out when they see something that isn't consistent with the values of the organization. That's “calling out.” But there's also those times when you just want to educate somebody in a room without throwing them under the bus, without really calling them out.

Jonathan Stutz:

And that's what we call “calling in”. And that's a softer, more diplomatic, thoughtful approach. It can either be done, in person with a group. So you also, kind of educate everybody at the same time. So, there's this judgment that comes in whether you're going to call in or…you're going to call out and you just have to know in the situation what's the best way to do it. And you can tie that in with the pause button, too. You can hit the pause button,…call somebody out, or you can click the pause button, call somebody in. So, they're nice techniques to really hear what people have to say and create a thoughtful more just slow down a little bit.

Jonathan Stutz:

So we really hear each other and take the time to listen and let everyone's voices be heard.

Tracie Edwards:

And actually I think there's the adage that you can slow down to speed up. So it doesn't mean that your decision making has to be a slow thing. It just means that you need to be all there and engaged and slow down to speed up.

Jonathan Stutz:

And then yeah, that's true with resume reviewing, because if you're distracted, let's say you're watching a TV show and you got a pile of resumes to go through and you're like, I’ve got to go through these resumes. I'll just do it while I'm watching The Voice, and I talk about this in the book is this idea that when you're distracted, if you're watching TV, while you're looking at resumes, it's more inclined for your unconscious biases to slip in. 00:25:00

Jonathan Stutz:

And so what somebody's name is if it's a woman's name and you're looking at a software engineering position that just in your mind might go that doesn't sit software engineers are men and if it's an HR professional and it's not a woman you're thinking that doesn't I have some cognitive dissonance. So taking the time to slow down to get to think about…why you're making the decisions you're making is super helpful. And then of course, what do they do on the voice when they're looking at candidates, when they're evaluating talent, they have their chairs turned around so they're not biased from how they're dressed or what they look like or their gender, right? So, it's important to slow down in order to go fast.

Tracie Edwards:

Yeah, I particularly loved that tip in the book, the “turning around” thought. Most people would be like,…how could you do that? But at the same time, you need a way to sort of not be influenced by preconceived biases and that kind of thing.

Jonathan Stutz:

Yeah. And with resumés,…they call it blind sifting. This is this idea of actually removing the name from the resume,…so you're not influenced by a name and associating it with a gender or race or a different culture. I mean, I've heard a story at one of the companies I worked for, where a recruiter did not call a candidate because they felt uncomfortable pronouncing their name. They didn't feel they could pronounce it properly, so they didn't call the candidate. I mean, how crazy that, just ask them how do I spell…

Tracie Edwards:

Gosh. Yeah. Yeah,…

Jonathan Stutz:

How do I pronounce your name phonetically? How do I? Help me. I'm struggling with it. Just be vulnerable.

Tracie Edwards:

Be vulnerable and do the right thing.

Jonathan Stutz:

Do the right thing. Absolutely.

Tracie Edwards:

So say that you've got a diverse and inclusive workforce. Something that I've run into in other organizations is that diverse groups have competing needs sometimes.

Tracie Edwards:

So, do you have tips for how you can balance the inclusion needs of different groups?

Jonathan Stutz:

Can you give me an example?

Jonathan Stutz:

What are you thinking of specifically?

Tracie Edwards:

So, you've got a Hispanic ERG or LGBTQ ERG, yet you may have people of faith and that kind of thing.

Jonathan Stutz:

So,…

Tracie Edwards:

And so how do you sort of balance activities and projects and that kind of thing when you may have different points of view on the suitability of those?

Jonathan Stutz:

Employee resource groups are a powerful way to create community for folks that may feel left out that they're an only being. Let's say you're the only woman on the team or the only person of color on the team or the only gay person on the team, so this is a way for folks who have common issues, common challenges, common experiences to come together and support each other through events. But anybody in the company should be able to join these ERGs as aspiring allies. I call them people that are interested in learning and understanding the needs. and to your point I mean I think it's important for those organizations to be corporate-funded that they have help sponsoring their events.

Jonathan Stutz:

They provide speakers, executive sponsors who come and share and be a part of those events. But I think one of the things that's really powerful is everybody's different and so to your point you have different stakeholders and it's important to listen to them and you can use them actually as a resource not only the reason I love the word are in employee resource group…because they're literally a resource for the company when they're making decisions that impact customer service you can go to those groups and understand what their needs are.

Jonathan Stutz:

So to your question, when you have either competing needs or competing ideas about how things should be done, you can go to those groups and help get information and understanding for what's the best way to approach it. Whether it's in a particular geography or a particular region of the country, what's the best way to position things? When I was at Microsoft, we had an actual team that worked on these issues. We called it global readiness as you mentioned at the top and we were responsible for ensuring that the products were politically, culturally and geographically appropriate in different markets around the world. But we knew that the tech teams we were working with and our team didn't always have all the knowledge. I mean we could search and do research and look things up. But we would often go to these employee resource groups to get their perspective.

Jonathan Stutz:

And so that helped us balance those kinds of dilemmas that we were facing and how best to support our customers in different markets around the world. 00:30:00

Tracie Edwards:

I love that actually, is something I had not considered before, that the different groups are actually resources and, you can actually bounce ideas off of them and…get some valuable perspective before making some company decisions and that kind of thing. So, I appreciate that.

Jonathan Stutz:

It's a great workaround for when you have a team that is lacking that diversity or…going into a market where they don't have that firsthand knowledge of the market needs completely and just we're shipping into Canada similar to US it's all North America we shouldn't have to customize there's…there's a group of employees that come together in they may not be a formal employee resource group…but we had groups like Canadians at Microsoft and so it wasn't an official employee resource group but we could go to them and get help get information

Tracie Edwards:

That makes a lot of sense.

Tracie Edwards:

So then let's talk about you've got this inclusive group of and diverse set of employees and now you're trying to grow and scale the organization. Any tips for ensuring that you've got a diversity of candidates and…ability for each candidate to grow their career and that kind of thing?

Jonathan Stutz:

One of the great ways is to leverage the people you have.

Jonathan Stutz:

I mean, support those professional technical organizations and fund or sponsor your employees going to those national or local chapter events to build relationships to increase your reach for referrals of candidates. A lot of companies have employee referral programs and this is where they would pay a bonus for recruiting somebody to your organization and these can be even specifically for increasing the diversity of your candidates.

Jonathan Stutz:

So that you may say, if you can refer somebody to us, we'll initially give you a little basically, a recognition, a $50 Starbucks gift certificate. But then if they actually get through the phone screen and we bring them in for an interview, you get something else. Maybe it's an iPad. And then if they get hired, then maybe they get that bonus check of $2,000, $2,500, something like that for referring an employee that gets hired. But then what I love is retention is so important.

Jonathan Stutz:

So if they stay a year, then you get another hit at the end, another bonus. And so that way your employee has a stake in the success of the new hire to stay with the company.

Jonathan Stutz:

And so they become almost a buddy system to mentor and coach them along the way informally. and they know they're going to be incented to do so with that one-year retention bonus. So that's one way is again, who's in your kitchen expanding your circle and then employee referrals to you leverage the diversity you have to then we create a greater list of candidates. And then the other one that I love is and we talk about this in the book is called candidate slating. And this is the idea that before you actually conduct an interview, you ensure that you have diversity of candidates in the pool of candidates being interviewed. So you always want to have at least two women, if, let's say you're interviewing for a position, two women or two people of color on the slate of candidates. And you always hire the best one.

Jonathan Stutz:

This is where, at the beginning you had asked me a little bit about responding to the push back or the attacks on inclusion, diversity, equity. And this is really where people have really lost sight of what diversity is all about. it was never about hiring somebody because they were black or that they were gay or it was always about hiring the best candidate for the position,…but because in most companies the leadership is typically white. If you look at the most senior level of companies, CEOs and presidents, you're talking about 85 to 90% plus of organizations are led by white men. And so the culture becomes very much tied to that dominant culture of the organization. And so you have to be intentional about recruiting and increasing the diversity of your pools. But nobody wants to get hired because they're black or because they're gay, Nobody wants that.

Jonathan Stutz:

And companies aren't doing any service to anybody by hiring somebody because of their color or their race, or gender ethnicity. So, it's always about hiring the best candidate, but that doesn't mean you want to bring in that diversity of candidates, let them compete, and then always hiring the best person for the job. 00:35:00

Tracie Edwards:

Mhm. I like that.

Tracie Edwards:

And obviously we all want to advance on our merits and that kind of thing. but we also have these hidden biases sometimes.

Jonathan Stutz:

Absolutely.

Tracie Edwards:

So, the candidate slating seems to make a lot of sense and then you've got the diverse pool and a good choice to make there. So, speaking of allyship, this was a word that we heard a lot back in 2020, 2021, and again, this goes to some of the push back that people get, but really from an empathetic allyship sort of thing.

Tracie Edwards:

Do you have tips for sustaining allyship? I can recall being in some meetings during that time and everybody wants to be considered an ally but the allyship in an organization needs to have staying power for that.

Tracie Edwards:

Do you have any tips, or pebbles for that?

Jonathan Stutz:

Yeah, I think that becoming an ally and…aspiring to be an ally begins with self-reflection and coming to grips with your own experiences, your parents, how you were raised, your teachers, your mentors and coaches and all the positive and negative experiences we've all had, and recognizing that we all have unconscious biases and we have stereotypes and you're never going to remove those. But coming to grips with, that we have them, and setting yourself up for ways to interrupt them is key. And then there's this, at least in America, the US educational process didn't do us any favors as far as teaching us about the experiences of black people in this country or…gay people.

Jonathan Stutz:

And certainly we're now dealing with a revisionist history with the new administration. So it's really tough, but you have to go out there and make an effort to educate yourself. There's books like Ron Titaki's A Different Mirror which tells the story of US history through the experiences of different cultures whether it be Chinese or folks that came up from Mexico Jewish, Irish, Italian,…all different cultures and understanding the US history through their experiences of those folks that we really weren't taught in a proper way at least how I was taught. So, I think that's important, education and reading books about unconscious biases and how to interrupt them. I think that's a big part of it. Becoming an ally is really a lot of selfwork and I love the idea of having your antenna up in meetings.

Jonathan Stutz:

That you're focused obviously on the agenda of the meeting, what you want to accomplish, what the goals are, but watching the room and seeing who's participating, who's being heard and ensuring that all voices are being heard and asking people, hey, we didn't hear from you, Tracie. What are you thinking? Especially if you have introverts in the room, folks that aren't more likely to speak up or…be the loudest voice, oftentimes those quieter folks are really thinking deeply, introspectively, you want to hear from them. So asking them, you don't want, put them on the spot, but you say, "Hey, we haven't heard from this person, Patrick, Joan, we haven't heard from these folks. Let's hear their ideas, too." What are y'all thinking so that they have an opportunity? Again, slowing down to hear people's opinions.

Jonathan Stutz:

Allies are looking for that. It's allies using the pause button, calling people in, educating, and even just, listening. Again, lead with your ears. Go to lunch with somebody different from yourself. someone a co-worker that you haven't spent much time with. "Hey, you want to grab coffee? I'm heading down for coffee." And just get to know them. What do they do on the weekend? What's happening in their lives? How did they get into this job? Where do they start their careers? Just curiosity. Again, getting into more of the depth about the individual and…creating those connections can be huge in becoming not just an ally, but an accomplice is somebody who actually, speaks up and has that person's back and really is vested and…and risking their own agency. Using their agency to create accountability for folks in the room and… 00:40:00

Jonathan Stutz:

using that power they have as maybe part of the dominant culture to lift up other people and shine a light on other folks. So, recognizing that if you're a part of the dominant culture in the US, it happens to be white and mostly male, it's using that to actually create space for other people and at some point you're putting yourself at risk a little bit, but that's okay. to help other people because overall you're helping the organization.

Tracie Edwards:

I like that word that you used the accomplice instead of accomplice means that you're in it together, So,…

Jonathan Stutz:

Yep. Absolutely. Yeah. It was a term that I hadn't,…used and my co-author really encouraged me to embrace the term accomplice because I was thinking of accomplice being a poli-sci major coming from that. It had a negative vibe for me. It's like collaborators, World War II collaborators.

Tracie Edwards:

Right. Right.

Jonathan Stutz:

But this is the terminology and we're all learning and I'm learning too. I make mistakes and, and accomplice is a word I've learned to embrace as somebody like you said that's partnered.

Jonathan Stutz:

They're vested in it. They have agency in lifting others up.

Tracie Edwards:

Yeah, thank you for that.

Tracie Edwards:

So, as we wrap up today, and I can't believe we're already having to wrap up, technology and big business is about staying in business and it's about a bottom line. Any final thoughts on the bottom line as it applies to inclusion and…diversity and equity and mostly as what's in it for me from an organizational perspective.

Jonathan Stutz:

This idea of creating a speak-up culture. Nothing changes if nothing changes and an airplane is taking off and you can change the direction by two degrees and it's going to end up in a completely different location. So in our book we talk about this idea of two things becoming a tempered radical and this dropping pebbles is these little things that can lead over time to aggregate to big change.

Jonathan Stutz:

Is this making little changes one two degrees in a different direction? You end up in a different place, a more inclusive environment, a culture of belonging, dropping pebbles.

Jonathan Stutz:

And then this idea of creating a speak-up culture is tied to the other major theme of the book and that's rocking the boat. You want to rock it hard, but you don't want to rock it so hard that you knock yourself out or anybody else out. And when we're talking about diversity, who thinks that they're going to get knocked out of the boat? It's white men. And really, it's about keeping everybody in the boat…because if we're going to solve these really tough, challenging problems, and these days, it's still about security and privacy as it always has been for many years.

Jonathan Stutz:

And we need everybody in the boat to solve these tough problems. So, drop pebbles, rock the boat, and not be afraid to make those little changes, that because, we know as you aggregate them, that's going to really create waves of change.

Tracie Edwards:

That's a perfect analogy of the ripple effect. So, thank you so much, Jonathan. The book again is “Daily Practices for Inclusive Leaders: A guide to building a culture of belonging.” Thank you so much for your time today. I very much appreciate it and I really appreciate being able to talk with you about a topic that I'm kind of passionate about and one of my core values. So, Thank you.

Jonathan Stutz:

Thank you.

Jonathan Stutz:

Thanks for having me so much, Tracie. Appreciate it.

Tracie Edwards:

And if you've enjoyed our podcast today, please leave me a review. I'm on Spotify and on Apple Podcasts. And if you'd connect with me on LinkedIn.