Fighting through Engagement

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(pic from here)

Hey All,

Etain was good enough to send the following story. I liked the story because Etain made a point without making too loud of a point. Instead of driving this woman away, he brought her to his side, and he used it as a teachable moment for the rest of the organization. He fought ignorance with engagement. How much stronger can we be if we’re all working together?

I work for an educational non-profit organization in the Seattle area. We hired a new human resources director (white) not more than 6 months ago and last Thursday was the first all staff meeting at which she was present, though she had obviously been introduced to staff at smaller functions and electronically. The agenda for the meeting was to discuss strategic planning, development, etc. in the morning and then reconvene at a nearby park for lunch and get-to-know-you-staff-morale-boosting activities. Right before we left the morning meeting, the human resources director was giving us directions for our upcoming migration and said we were about to perform a “Chinese fire drill.”

Not everyone heard the comment, but many did, including myself. I looked around to see if anyone else was concerned by what was just spoken and there were certainly some uneasy eyes darting around the room, many of them pointed at me (Chinese American), naturally. After the day concluded, I sent my boss (black) a text asking if he would support me in bringing the matter to the attention of the human resources director. His response was “please do.” Since I was traveling the next day, I wrote an e-mail to the human resources director and identified the faux pas, explained the history of the term, and suggested that it was an inappropriate term to use. I cc’d my boss who’s a program director, and also the chief program director (black) and CEO/President (black) of our organization (all of whom were in attendance at the meeting).

Quick aside, the CEO/President of our organization holds brown bag lunches for herself and the staff. At the most recent one with me (about 1.5 months ago), I mentioned that I was concerned with the lack of representation of Asians and Latinos at the leadership level of our organization — meaning there is none, only whites and blacks. I said that this lack of representation often results in culturally inaccessible programming for the Asian and Latino students we serve, as well as making Asian and Latino staff feel alienated. Coincidentally, at the all staff meeting, the lack of diversity at the top of organization reared its head again, and I obviously felt compelled to point this out in the e-mail I wrote, which is also why I wanted to include the CEO/President in the e-mail. Plus, I felt like the shit for being so clairvoyant.

Anyways, I sent the e-mail the next day and received an apology from the human resources director a few hours later. A few hours after that, I received a call from the CEO/President who thanked me for bringing attention to this matter and explained that she wanted to make this a “learning opportunity.” The human resources director said she would call me directly the following week. She called me yesterday, and apologized profusely. She was very sincere and even admitted that the term was ignorant and that she was ignorant for not initially knowing its inappropriateness. She did fall into the “I”m a good person, I have friends who are Asian” trap, but I didn’t feel like lecturing her again. In addition, she said she would call every person who was at the meeting and apologize to them directly for her words, starting with the Asian employees.

One point for the good team!

Thanks for sharing, Etain!

Fighting Pastors