Diversity and Inclusion
The Women’s Council on Diversity has inspired Chattanooga since its first meeting the day after 9/11. The influx of international companies led to our community-wide Global Leadership Class six years later, followed by Women GroundBreakers Storytelling. Documented in the American Diversity Report, these projects demonstrate how a small Southern city tackles its growing diversity and internationalization.
Continue reading Chattanooga’s Groundbreaking Women – by Deborah Levine
From the earliest blogs and profiles on Millennials – and there have been thousands – they were described as the anti-formal generation. Popular images painted them as innovating from Starbucks and boycotting performance reviews. No rigid flex options, no packages of stale annual feedback for them.
Times and preferences change. Millennials are quickly becoming the workplace norm, not the newbies. Many seek advancement rather than “job hopping.” This adventurous cohort is forming families in earnest, and with record percentages of dual earner couples. They face challenges that are both considerable and growing.
Continue reading Millennial Dream or Oxymoron? – by Paul Rupert
Guess what readers? It took me 25 hours to go from Dallas to Germany a while back.
But don’t feel sorry for me because that trip was one of my best ever. Now before telling me to get a checkup from the neck up, bear with me for a moment. I’ll get to the rest of the story further down. I first need to come clean with you on a revelation.
Continue reading Learn to Relish the Inconvenience – by Terry Howard
Observations and Tips from recent training in the Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) trenches (especially hostile or militant audiences)
CURRENT EVENTS – Current events are just “upping the volume, the passion, the conversation in the workshop.” Do not shy away from current events. I do not answer “what do you think about…” questions at first, I deflect to rest of room to get them talking. Do your homework, stay up to date on current events – be ready! Address vacuum, hearsay and gossip with facts. You might have to revisit ground rules more than once. Between Trump, Confederate Flag, Terrorism (domestic and international), Law Enforcement News, shootings, etc., – who can keep up? Well, you have to. I read multiple newspapers and watch multiple news hours every night (I watch all sides, all perspectives). You have to be a historian to do this work correctly.
Continue reading Recent Diversity Training Made Me Reflect – by Mauricio Velásquez
Morris Dees, Founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), was the featured speaker at the Jewish Federation of Greater Chattanooga annual First Amendment dinner. Mr. Dees was introduced by Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke. Mayor Berke, a member of Chattanooga’s Jewish community was comfortable in the Federation setting and shared that he was not wearing a tie due to the well-known perils of ketchup. Picking up on the informality, Dees removed his own tie and listened, along with a packed house, to the mayor’s remarks.
Continue reading Race Relations and the Confederate Flag – by Deborah Levine
The traffic was fierce on Martin Luther King Boulevard as people flocked to the community-wide interfaith service at Mount Olivet Baptist Church. Olivet, had grown from humble beginning in the 1920s to one of the city’s largest African-American churches. Yet, the church was packed, overflowing with elected officials, police officers and FBI, military veterans, and media among the diverse crowd of Black & White, Christians, Jews, and Muslim. Together, we prayed over the loss of four marines and a wounded sailor, who would die just hours later. We prayed over the trauma to our entire community inflicted by lone gunman, Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez.
Continue reading Chattanoogans Mourn the Fallen Five – by Deborah Levine
There’s no escaping the lack of trust these days from local officials to world powers. Whether we get our news from television, newspapers or the internet, we’re inundated with highly emotional trust issues. Take the examples of the turmoil around a third bailout for Greece, the fear over a nuclear arms agreement with Iran, and the disgust with declared international truces in Ukraine, Korea, and Yemen and undeclared domestic truces in Ferguson and Charleston. In the US, trust issues will be a dominant theme in the presidential campaign as candidates accuse, blame, and attack. Reporters rely on phrases such as “can’t trust,” “lack of trust,” “trust but verify,”and “rebuild trust.” For most of us, these phrases are just diplomatic talk for “What were you thinking?” and “No, and Hell no!”
I recently had the privilege of interviewing Morehouse College’s 11th president, Dr. John Silvanus Wilson, Jr. We explored his background in both religion and education, his experience in universities and government, and his plans for Morehouse’s future. A deeply religious man, Dr. Wilson’s faith has been the driving force behind his many achievements. Writing this article, I drew on my own interfaith experience in Chicago as a member of its Black-Jewish dialogue and coordinator of Black-Jewish Seminarians Conferences for the American Jewish Committee. The Black-Jewish dialogue lost steam over the years, but remains strong at Morehouse.
Hello there! I sincerely hope that you and yours are doing well and are in good health. I’m being very nice. That’s the stage-setter for where I’m about to take you, some willingly and others, the civility-deficient, perhaps begrudgingly.
Continue reading A Wake-up Call for the Civility-Deficient – by Terry Howard
U.S. Women Benefit, Study from a new Harvard Business School Gender Initiative finds contrary to conventional wisdom, growing up with a working mother is unlikely to harm children socially and economically when they become adults, new research by a Harvard Business School professor concludes. The “working mother effect” actually improves future prospects, especially for adult daughters of mothers who worked outside the home before their daughters were 14 years old, according to recent findings based on a comprehensive survey of 50,000 adults aged 18 to 60 in 25 nations worldwide in 2002 and 2012.
Continue reading Having a Working Mother Is Good For Leaders- Harvard Business School