I’ve had the opportunity to facilitate workshops with three student leadership groups over the past month. Check out Student Leadership – How are You Leading Today? to read more about the programs we facilitate and recommendations for student leaders. Today, I’m reflecting on three things I’ve learned working with these amazing students. They are grateful for the opportunity to learn from others. One leadership class took time to write personalized thank you notes after I met with them. They were all grateful for different things, but the common theme was gratitude in general. Here is one of my favorite notes:
“Don’t meet every single requirement? Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single qualification. At (company), we are dedicated to building a diverse, inclusive and authentic workplace, so if you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyways. You might just be the right candidate for this or other roles.” This was recently included in an actual job posting. I found it posted in an HR group on Facebook and the
We call them strong Those who can face this world alone Who seem to get by on their own Those who will never take the fall We call them weak Who are unable to resist The slightest chance love might exist And for that forsake it all They’re so hell-bent on giving, walking a wire Convinced it’s not living if you stand outside the fire Standing outside the fire Standing outside the fire Life is not tried it is merely survived If you’re standing outside the fire Garth Brooks- Standing Outside the Fire My husband and I attended a
I was taught how to recruit, well really screen people for jobs, before I even graduated college. Working for a large insurance company as a summer intern between my junior and senior year, I was given a glimpse into the world of corporate recruiting. It really wasn’t recruiting. Everyone on this corporate “recruiting” team was welcoming to me and they divided the selection process up amongst the “recruiters” to show me how it was done. I was taught that the process of selection, “recruiting” as they called it, was screening people out, not in. Yes, we needed to make a
One year ago this month, Mary Ila published “4 Exercises to Enhance Your Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Efforts” and featured the Encounter Group Model. This blurb stuck out to me the most: “When we engage in these types of activities, we get to know people. We build relationships. And when we know people it makes it much harder to hate them, or people that are ‘like’ them.’” Since then, our team has partnered with a client to pilot Encounter Groups with about 50 people in an organization of thousands. And it’s working. We define Encounter Groups as “a group of