Episode 3

Race and the Workplace

Transcript

Kevin Stevens: Welcome to the Q-Talks podcast as we launch a miniseries exploring critical issues of race and systemic injustice in business. I am Kevin Stevens, Dean of the Quinlan School of Business. Like you, I am sickened by the killing of George Floyd and the long history of systemic racism and violence of us directed towards the black community. I have spent much time listening and reflecting on what the Quinlan School of Business and I can do to move the world toward greater social justice. This podcast miniseries is just part of a list of concrete, measurable steps Quinlan has taken. This miniseries centers on the perspectives of black members of our community to explore critical issues. Please join us in these conversations and other Loyola and Quinlan initiatives as we seek to help end systemic racism.

Seth Green: Hi. My name is Seth Green, and I'm the founding director of the Bomb Heart Center here at the Quinlan School of Business. And it is a true pleasure today to have four Bournemouth scholars who are going to be talking with us about the Black Lives Matter movement and how we move forward an agenda that truly addresses systemic racism. I'm joined by Shalane Walker, the associate media director of WAVEMAKER. Myla Skinner, the chief of staff to the CEO. At one goal, Rebekah Kikama, who is the founder and executive director of One on One and Annie Weinheimer and engagement manager at the Ryan Specialty Group. We're going to start with a personal and important question for this group. What has racial justice and inclusion meant to you and how is it impacting your daily life? Shalane, can we start with you?

Shalane Walker: Of course. Faf, thank you so much. So racial justice and inclusion to me personally, working in the advertising industry has meant how far have we come since the Mad Men days of, you know, men in suits and cigars that were very homogenous? It also to me means how do we have access to the advertising industry in particular, and just corporate America in general, for people who may not come from schools that have IB courses or may take nontraditional paths to college. I look around and, you know, in my whole company there's less than ten of us who are at the associate director and above and none of us in the C-suite or ExCo. And that's in 2020. And it's the same as it was in 1960 when why didn't Kennedy and BBDO and, you know, Young and Rubicam were founded? And so personally in my daily life, it's meant I felt very lucky to have mentors. And very luckily, I've actually had women of color as my boss and men of color. And that's made such a huge difference in my career, but so many others haven't. And now that I'm in a place where I'm able to manage others, they've been able to tell me what a difference it makes having someone who looks like them in a position of leadership. And I feel that all employees should have an opportunity to have that.

Seth Green: Thank you. Shalane. Myla, can we hear your perspective on what racial justice has meant to you?

Myla Skinner: Yeah, absolutely. So. As a black woman, I mean, this is this is my existence. It is who I am. You don't run from it. You don't look away from it. It's present in all actions and in your whole being. And so for me, racial justice and inclusion, I think, took on more clarity when I moved to Chicago. I'm a native of Colorado, which one would think is far less diverse than Chicago. And in fact, that is true. And however, I didn't understand true segregation and how it manifested itself until I moved to Chicago. And so being in an environment and doing work and seeing the impact that racial injustice has and the lack of inclusion and more importantly, the lack of equity in our communities and with people brings to light, one, which I have to be very honest about, is my own privilege. And having access to platforms like this and being part of Baumhart and working in a place, as I've had the opportunity to work and recognize that like the work that we do in this space matters so greatly and it is about so much more than any one individual. It is about a community of people who deeply deserve and need to be seen and to be heard and to be brought into spaces. And so I can't you can't look away from it, not just because of how I identify or who I am as a human being, but it is it's a requirement for just being nowadays. You can't do this work without fully and deeply understanding the impact of racial injustice, inequity and lack of inclusion.

Seth Green: So we just heard from two Black women who shared how this impacts their daily life in meaningful and constant ways. And it informs both how they look at their work and at their lives more broadly. We're going to now turn over to hear two additional perspectives from women who are not black, but who are aiming to be allies. And it will be interesting over the course of this conversation to look at all of the different ways that racial justice matters to us and to think about what that means in terms of our personal and professional responsibilities. Annie, can we start with you and can you share what does racial justice mean for you?

Annie Weinheimer: Yeah. Thanks. So what has it meant to me? To be honest, we don't have racial justice. So I personally think the question kind of needs to be flipped to how has racial injustice impacted my daily life?

Kevin Stevens: Thank you.

Annie Weinheimer: To answer that question, I'll say I'm angry. I'm deeply angry and sad. And this area is one that I've invested a lot of time and energy. I majored in racial and ethnic studies. I went to a very diverse high school. And so I've known and studied this for several years, and I cherish the diverse community and background that I've been able to learn from and to continue to witness what's gone on, not just in the past weeks, but for so, so many years. It's just so distressing and disheartening. I don't feel good as a white woman of privilege because I don't feel like we're doing enough. I know we aren't doing enough. And let's be honest, for white people, it's unfortunately pretty easy for people like me to turn away. We live in our bubbles. And on its surface, it doesn't appear to affect us. And I want to underline appear, but we've learned that when one population is brutalized and marginalized and not given a fair shake, it affects all of us. These are not just some words. Many studies have shown the actual impact and the cost to all of us physically, emotionally, monetarily, etc.. Segregation in the city of Chicago alone has cost billions of dollars, so we can turn a blind eye and pretend like it doesn't impact each and every one of us. But to answer your question, racial equity is something I'm deeply invested in and this work means a great deal to me and we are all impacted on it by it on a daily basis, whether we realize it or not.

Seth Green: Rebekah, can we hear your perspective on how racial injustice is impacting you?

Rebekah Kikama: Yeah, thank you. And I appreciate that. Absolutely. We recognize we do not have racial justice in almost any way right now in this country and that pervades every system in our society. Right. We're thinking so much right now about police brutality because it highlights so much of the egregious realities of that. But we also see this in education and housing and banking and economic opportunity. And so as somebody who has dedicated my life and my career to writing one tiny slice of that, I think about it in a very personal way of I think so often the word inclusion is more comfortable for white people than justice. And so it's easier to say, okay, we're going to include different people in these ways. But that's not true justice. True justice is turning systems on their head and rewriting the whole playbook, and that's uncomfortable. And so for me personally, I've been thinking about, you know, on any given day, what good does it do to pat my back myself on the back and say, okay, I'm seeking justice in this way? If I'm comfortable with whatever amount of progress I've made in that area, then it's not good enough. I know I'm not pushing hard enough because it should be uncomfortable for me.

Seth Green: Well, let me just start by saying how grateful I am for your thoughtfulness on that question. I think that you are already bringing to the listeners. I mean, they are truly both important and truly I am just taken by how thoughtful each of you were in that first response. And I feel like I've listened now to quite a few conversations on this topic and, and I'm just really grateful for all of you. So I just want to say that out loud. So I know your perspectives are all rooted in a commitment to equity, and I'm eager for you to each share your journey that brought you to this place and what the Black Lives Matter movement means to you. Because there are many people that are reckoning with this topic more acutely now, and they are wondering what it looks like to get on that journey. And so we want to hear from the four of you who have been on this journey for decades. Myla, can we start with you?

Myla Skinner: I absolutely think so. I mean, as I mentioned, I was born and raised in Colorado. And at different points in my life, I was either the only Black kid in an entire school or in an environment where my neighbors were. I mean, you name the race or ethnicity, they were in my community. And so, again, really understanding. This the work and again, the idea of segregation and the impact that it has on individuals lives and in communities wasn't until I came to Chicago. And so my journey has been complicated at best. My own identity work, which I think as we talk about this work, is as important, if not more than any other work. And so bringing people along, whether it's a movement or a moment or whatever, is about doing your own internal work first. And so I appreciate Rebekah and Annie and Shalane in naming that like we all are doing our own internal work and we have to continue to do that. I would say in terms of this movement, the Black Lives Matter movement, I think Rebekah hit on this a moment ago when she talks about police brutality and that happens to be the focus area right now. And as people believe, the Black Lives Matter movement, whether they realize it's been around for many years or not, that is where people's attention is right now. And I think we are shortsighted when we are focused on justice through the lens of police brutality and not on the whole life of a person. And what I mean by that is it's less for me about are we decreasing police brutality while incredibly important, are we building our communities in a way that allows for true justice? Are we ensuring that people of color, black and brown people across this country are able to live their fullest life, that they have access to equitable education, healthy foods, health care, all of the things that we know contribute to the fullness of the human. And so while I care deeply again about Black Lives Matter movement, when we talk about the Black Lives Matter, it's not just that we deserve not to be killed by police or shot in the back. It is that we deserve to live our fullest and holistic life and have access to all of the opportunities and spaces and places and ways in which we can live that full life. Just to wrap, like I just saw a post on Amazon where it talked about Walmart is now going to start unlocking multicultural hair supply in communities and that is where racial injustice shows up so significantly and where we see that people aren't treated with the respect and dignity they deserve.

Seth Green: So, Charlene, can we go to you and hear your perspective on this? How have you kind of gotten on to this journey and how do you see this movement of Black Lives Matter?

Shalane Walker: Sure. So I think one thing I have in common with Myla is that I'm originally from Texas, deeply conservative, deeply red state. And so you see versions of racism there. And then you come to the north. I went to a Big Ten school for college, and of course I'm here in Chicago. And you see, the racism is not gone it's just different forms of it. And for me personally, it's been about having access, as I mentioned earlier. And so, you know, I feel like in America, in a capitalistic society, unless you have people at the table, as Marla said, giving people the opportunity to live their best lives, we haven't achieved justice. And so for me, it's about mentorship. It's about how do we get people who do have the access to feed into the people and teach those who don't have it? I remember the first time I was working with a girl from a high school on the West Side and some of the questions she had just about college applications and scholarships and opportunities. And there's a lot that I took for granted. And I was just thinking about how would the world looked different if everyone was given those same resources, particularly for me, Black Lives Matter means that Black Lives Matter in your boardrooms and your leadership and in your C-suite. It's very easy to not be aware of the problem when nobody is talking about it, when it doesn't face you, when you can go on your day without even interacting with a black person. And so my goal has really been how do we get people the resources they need to get into these jobs? And then how do we make corporate America a place where black people can feel safe, can feel included, and can have the same opportunities to rise as our non-black colleagues? I think the women's movement in the seventies and eighties has helped with some of this, and we've seen so much progress there. But yet I see a lot of companies that tout their diversity by showing their white women who are now on the panel and yet still don't have any representation from black people or other people of color.

Seth Green: Well. So, Annie, you mentioned earlier being angry and you kind of described how you wanted to see change. I'm eager for you to share kind of how you got onto that journey and how you understand this movement, which both Myla and Charlene have powerfully called to broaden to our boardrooms, to our housing, to all of the facets of life where structural racism is deeply embedded.

Annie Weinheimer: Yeah. My dad for many years worked at Chicago with Myla here, actually. And from a young age I grew up with Cara. So for those of you who don't know what care is, it's a workforce development organization that helps individuals affected by poverty get and keep quality jobs and build self-esteem. And I've been a proud member of their associate board for several years now, and so I would go to morning motivations at Cara when I was a young kid, and I would witness all these people of color who were filled with hope and possibility and overcame great obstacles. And they were so incredibly inspiring. And I just couldn't comprehend why they were where they were and why they didn't have what I had, and to learn about the systemic injustices happening to these people that I know and love was disillusioning and very, very frustrating. So from a young age, I was grappling with these very complex questions of racial injustice, and that has been a constant throughout my life. I've tried to educate myself on these issues and the history behind them and take steps every day to align them with my values. So eventually I got here where I am now, by seeking out communities and institutions like Loyola and like Baumhart and Cara that I can help progress this work with. And so for me, the Black Lives Matter movement has allowed so many people just like me to come together and kind of one common community to reach across the country and the world and take really big steps towards racial equity. And that's why I'm so thankful. For the movement.

Seth Green: Rebekah, can we come to you? And I'll make the segue of your work with one on one in many ways reminds me of the same vision and in many elements, the same theory of change that is behind the camera program. And so I know you've seen into this directly through your work as well as the life that brought you there. But I'm eager for you to share both how you came to this and what this movement means.

Rebekah Kikama: Absolutely. And I think Annie's story reflects so many other white women, including myself, that I know that unfortunately for many of us to be passionate about this, we had to go out of our way. Right? We had to seek out opportunities to educate ourselves and to become proximate to racial injustice because it wasn't the predominant system. It wasn't in my education system. We were not talking about this. I was not educated about this. I did not have a family that was talking about this. I resonate a lot, although obviously from a very different experience. I grew up in Montana, in the West, and so much of my narrative around racial justice kind of when I came to college in the Chicago area and started to become aware was I just was so unaccustomed to even talking or thinking about this. I lived in such a homogenous setting that it was so easy to not know and to just be oblivious. And I think in that work, I'm really grateful for mentors and teachers and leaders around me who really push me to think about what started for me as kind of relief and development interest really quickly became justice. And what started as an international focus recognizing there's problems right in our backyard that aren't being addressed. And for me, I was very moved to recognize what it meant to get involved in a community where I lived, where I was, the majority culture, where I had power and influence, and to do something about the problems I saw, as opposed to relocating myself in another country and being a minority presence and working within a system that I wasn't already a part of. And so in all of that, it's really been a journey for me to recognize what am I bringing to the table? How am I viewing the world around me? And how can I continue to push forward in that and really elevate the commitment I have that all people have equal dignity? And if we truly believe that it changes our actions, it changes our structures and our systems. And every day I have a part in making that true.

Seth Green: Well. So we have, I think, truly laid the foundation of why this is such an urgent and unjust context and why we need to press forward with the change ultimately embodied in the Black Lives Matter movement. And so I think the question that everyone is asking is what does that mean for me personally and what does that look like in our workplaces and in our policies? And so I want to start on the personal side. And Annie, if I can start with you. What does this mean for you personally? What are you doing in your own world, first and foremost, to try to be a source in addressing the structural racism that angers you?

Annie Weinheimer: I think my role in this is summed up with two things one, humility and number two, courage. White people need to listen humbly in this time, we will never understand the black experience. We think we can relate. We will never understand. And we need to get that first and foremost. Some people, I being one of them, can think we have the answers. But I think we need to embrace the role of humbly listening and learning. Number two, I think we need to be courageous. That means taking action when it's uncomfortable. We need to be uncomfortable. One of the criticisms is that white people fear that they will say the wrong thing and so they stay silent. But at this point, now more than ever, we need to be brave. And that means making mistakes and tripping and falling, but being kind to ourselves because it takes guts to be vocal and loud about issues of racial injustice. So we need to have conversations. I need to have conversations with bosses and peers and friends and family and call people out and demand that we do more. So that is where I'm going to start, and that's where I believe my role is.

Seth Green: Shalane, can I come to you and get your perspective on you shared this has been a part of your life every day at the outset. How do you think about this personally as you think about your role in addressing these larger forces?

Shalane Walker: So right now I would say everything for me has been hyperspeed, whereas six months ago we had initiatives, we had ideas, but they were being tabled in favour of other priorities. And then of course, you know, I actually had a diverse allyship and mentorship program that I was pitching for February, and everyone knows what happened in March with COVID, and that got put on the back burner, but now everyone's doors are open. And so for me, I'm using this time to use the voice I've always had. And now that people are listening, I'm taking every meeting, I'm setting up meetings, I'm sending ideas. I've had about four meetings with C-suite leadership just in the past week, including a meeting with my global CEO and global chief talent officer. And so, you know, everyone has a different role to play and some are just they're not able to take that on because it is hard work to say, here are the challenges I face. And sometimes you do fear repercussions. But I have been given that and my leaders have empowered me to say, we want to hear from you. And so, as Annie said, I'm just I'm being courageous and I'm speaking up and I'm saying the things that people whisper about at the coffee and water coolers back when we worked in person. And and yeah, that's what I, that's what it means to me. And that's what I'm doing.

Seth Green: Rebecca, what's your role?

Rebekah Kikama: Yeah. I think very similarly to what's been shared, I've been really intentional about the conversations that could easily just be left and not addressed for not the egregious, explicit racism, but really the subtle racism. And over the last several weeks, I've been personally encouraged by how the Black Lives Matter movement has raised the social consciousness of the average American in a way that, frankly, it makes it easier, which isn't a good reason for me not to have been doing it before, although I was it's easier in some ways to call people out and to hold people accountable because it's in the public discourse in a way that it hasn't been for so long. And so finding both in my personal life and in my work sphere, where are those conversations that I can press into and not just let pass? Because now is a moment we've waited too long. And how dare I be afraid to say something?

Seth Green: And Myla, can we finish this question with you? How do you see your role?

Myla Skinner: Yeah, absolutely. So I think it's twofold. Something that both Danny and Rebecca just said resonated with me so deeply. One is this notion of calling people out. I would all encourage us to call people in and to call people in with love and to hold the bar high, but also to give grace. And so there is no world in which I am going to say the right thing all the time. Rebekah's not going to say the right thing all the time. And he's not. She's not. Seth, you're not. That's just impossible. And when Annie flips up and says something that doesn't sit right with me, my responsibility is to call her in with love and understand that she is still coming from a place of humanity, care and belief in justice. And so I think that's one of my personal roles and responsibilities. I think the second thing is, again, I have to acknowledge my own privilege and know I'm not a white woman. I'm definitely not a white man. I have all of the identity markers, not all of them, but in particular, being a Black woman, as we are the subject we're discussing in this moment that say, I don't have privilege, and yet I know, I recognize I do, just because of access to certain things. And so my responsibility is to continue to hold the organizations I am part of, the spaces in which I sit accountable to being better and to looking at organizations that I have relationships with and asking While we can say Black Lives Matter, whose in your on your leadership team, who's on your board, who's on your associate board? Are you doing the work that you need to bring in people who look like those that you seek to serve and to work with and to push people to really take that approach. It's very easy in this time for us to use the words and not have the actions that follow. And I think it's my responsibility to both push it from a professional standpoint and to ask people to look at their friends, look at their networks. Who do they engage with? Every time you go to dinner, when we were allowed to go out and eat, who are you having a meal with? Who are you breaking bread with? Are you taking the time to get to know someone that has a different perspective? And this isn't just about black, white, brown or otherwise. This is about diversity of thought. And I think it is all of our responsibility to really expand in ways that are going to I think Annie and Rebekah made this point, going to make all of us very uncomfortable, but we're going to have to get uncomfortable to break through.

Seth Green: Well. So, Myla, you mentioned calling people in and everyone talked about the role that we have to play in holding accountability at a high bar. And another piece of what's been shared is that this is a moment where people are finally reckoning with the injustice that has been here for more than 400 years. And so the question in my mind is, what does this opportunity present? How do we leverage the fact that C-suite leaders are paying attention right now to drive forward change in our workplaces, in our policies, and how do we make sure that we can hold and sustain the momentum of focus on this urgent issue? And, Rebekah. Maybe we can start with you in terms of what you see in companies and then we'll get to the other panelists.

Rebekah Kikama: Absolutely. So I think Myla just so beautifully touched on this. It's not about hiring one or ten or 15 different people than you normally would. That's one tiny part of it. Right. But it takes comprehensively changing the culture of your company to understand that things have to be they can't go back to business as usual. Business as usual wasn't working for everybody. And just simply creating a new hiring pipeline isn't going to change some of the rooted problems and the rooted assumptions. And this is long term work, right? These problems aren't solved instantaneously. They're not solved in the next two weeks while we're all peeled at the TV watching the latest news. It takes a strategic plan and a commitment to seeing that work come to fruition. And I think, Myla, you said this so well that it's not just the hiring of positions, but really the celebration of diverse ideas and who's in the boardroom. But also where is that new product design line starting and who's in that initial conversation and what is the target population and does that match right all through? Are we thinking critically about every level of business? Are we taking a comprehensive look at who our vendors are, who our business partners are? Are we investing in the communities where our footprint is? If it's global are we thinking strategically about what that means? And I think lastly, something I've been really encouraged by is to see so many of our leading companies step up vocally and say, you know, a verbal commitment of where they are. Many of them are pairing that with financial contributions, which are certainly needed, and I applaud. But the next step there is you have a voice, especially in our major cities. Companies have so much influence on policy in that city. They have power, they have leverage. And I would really love to see companies take that seriously, to think about how they use that power and leverage to advocate for racial justice.

Seth Green: Thank you, Rebekah, Shalane?

Shalane Walker: Yeah. I love what you said, Rebecca, because there's two sides of that. For example, within my advertising agency, we're responsible for how billions of dollars of advertising dollars are spent. And something that we talked about just earlier this week is what would it look like if we hold held journalists and content creators accountable for the things that they're writing and the things that they're posting? And if they are posting things that are insensitive or show bias, we say that we're going to withhold advertising dollars for you from there. The other thing I think about as well is this idea of KPIs. We know we've all heard about smart goals and we know there's a lot of compensation, a lot of bonuses that are tied to different KPIs. I would bet, and I know, especially for my company, not a lot of those have been based on diversity and inclusion KPIs. And so I think long term it means that these need to be written into the framework, these need to be written to the KPIs, and that if you don't already have a task force or a third party group who's holding you accountable for this, then you need to get one. One other thing that's been mentioned, at least in my industry, has been metrics and tracking and no one's been tracking it and so no one's been talking about it. And we know about the importance of data in so many areas of our lives. And so we need to have the data that shows it and companies need to be more open about releasing the data. And I think when the data is out there, then you're holding yourself accountable and outsiders are also holding you accountable as well.

Kevin Stevens: Myla?

Myla Skinner: Sure. So I am. I'm taking chunks. I think we've all done this right where we're building off of one another. And I don't want to be the Debbie Downer, but I will for a minute. And so one of the things that we've talked about is we can't go back to business as usual. I think Rebekah just said this because it wasn't working for any of us. And the reality is it was. And it has. And you all have probably heard this, but the system isn't broken. The system is doing what it was designed to do by those who designed it. And so what that means for me is that each of us on this call or on this podcast, each of us in our daily lives, have to be willing to tear down the system as we have to. It's not enough just to dismantle it and then put it back. We have to tear it down and then figure out what does it look like to build it back up. The system was built on white supremacy and white dominant culture, and that is now language that people are far more that's more accessible to people. And it's a reality. And it says that the people who built the system thought that their ideas, their ways of being, their ways of operating were better than greater than any and everyone else's. And so if we truly, truly, truly are committed to doing this work long term, not in a moment, but in totality, we have to be willing to tear it down. We have to be willing to challenge what has been the status quo. We have to push our leaders no matter where we sit in an organization. I am fortunate to sit with our C-suite and yet it is the responsibility of everyone who works at One Goal to push us to be more, to be better. And again, you have to do that in the spaces in which you are present and with the people who you have influence and people who you don't. And I just I am so deeply, deeply invested in how do we tear down the system and rebuild it in a way that is aligned with who we are at our best?

Seth Green: And Myla, if I can just say that you made the case that this racism is embedded in ways where some groups win and it, therefore, becomes kind of a core of the status quo. And I'll just share that there's a really powerful piece a little over a year ago by Caitlin Rosenthal, who is a historian at UC Berkeley, about how the consulting and big data movement in many ways originated from a moment where people were sending essentially data consultants to plantations to better make them efficient. And it included all sorts of inhumane calculations. And what struck me about that is someone who was once in consulting was just how we were able to get to a place where we talked about human lives on spreadsheets and how we had come to that being a norm that felt independent of any type of systemic anything. It was just part of efficiency culture. And so I think to your point, the more we deepen our understanding of history, the more we see how every system inherently was built with this racism and sexism and name all of the other white male approaches that have really underlay those systems. So I just want to underscore and offer that to our listeners. Annie, can we ask you to weigh in on this as well?

Annie Weinheimer: Yeah. I echo everything my peers are saying, and I think we just need to build upon this movement to create space for understanding and learning. The way that we do that is by facilitating racial equity trainings and being intentional about our culture and making sure they are inclusive and transparent. So now is the moment where everyone's attention is on it and we need to take advantage of that and build a foundation of understanding and education around racial equity. And so going forward, just like Rebecca said, companies need to take a good, hard look at all of their business functions from procurement, talent development, wages, promotions, boards, investment managers, and really look at what they're doing and how they can reconfigure them in a way that can progress enterprise wide DEI initiatives. So if we do that now, it'll eventually be a part of the company's culture. And so when the media moves on, we will all have a new view and understanding of how equity needs to play out in our organizations.

Seth Green: Well. So that is a good segue to my last question for all of you, which is where do we go from here in your minds? What would you like to see over the next months and years? And what does the end of systemic racism, the racism that Myla describes so powerfully is embedded into every single system that operates. What does the end of that look like that we should be aiming toward? And this maybe I can start with you, Shalane.

Shalane Walker: Sure. Well now that there's extra pressure I have to get it right. So I would say for me, the long term goal is we no longer need a diversity, equity and inclusion team because it is embedded in who we are as a company and who we are as a country. People no longer have to be reminded that we are different and to celebrate those differences and embrace the differences, it's just a part of who we are. So that would be my long term, what I would love to see. And then I would think again, going back to numbers, I would love to see leadership that reflects the makeup of the country in a country, in a city excuse me, like Chicago, that's 25% black, 25% Hispanic 25% Asian. I would love to see all of our companies reflect that at a minimum.

Seth Green: Rebekah?

Rebekah Kikama: The million dollar question. What do we do now? I think it's all of these things and. It's so hard to say. You know, we're speaking a lot about company's roles, and I think that's so important. I think economic opportunity is absolutely critical to seeing true justice in our society. But we also have to get really invested in, as Myla said, what are the structures upholding those realities? Our economy is a part of our political system and we need to be comfortable getting deeply involved in and investing in where those changes need to happen. And at the private level, at the public level, and really looking at what is the vision of the city we want to see in the next 20 years. And we have the power to make that happen and we need to commit to doing that together.

Seth Green: Annie?

Annie Weinheimer: Yeah. The big question. Well, first, what I would like to see is a realization for everyone that this is all of our responsibility. Systemic racism isn't something that only impacts people of color. It affects us all. It hurts us all, and it's all of our responsibilities to correct it. It's such a large and complex issue that it's easy to get caught up in the weight of the problem and question how we can even make an impact. But the truth is that we all have so much power to create change. It starts with ourselves and taking a look at our own biases and how we've played a role in these oppressive systems. So what does the end of systemic racism look like? To me it looks like the definition of what equity is, the access and opportunities given to people of privilege are given to all in education, housing, health care, jobs, government justice system, everything. So that's what the end of systemic racism looks like to me.

Seth Green: And Myla, our final word.

Myla Skinner: Shalane thought she had the pressure. So I'm reflecting here and. One of the things that feels so important to me is that we continue to recognize the uniqueness and the beauty and acknowledge the history of black people. The reality is that this country was built on the backs of the people who remain held down. And we all have a responsibility to uplift, uphold, invest in those people. And so when I think about equity and I think about racial justice, what that means is that for every piece of sweat, blood here sacrifice that we invest tenfold in our communities, that is the only way that we see a place and a time in which you uplift people who, again, have been systemically held down for hundreds of years. This is not something that you flip a switch on and say, now everybody's treated the same and expect that things will be okay. They won't be because the amount of disinvestment and lack of care that have been shown to communities of color is so drastic that it's going to require deep it's going to require us to love on these communities and such a distinct way that isn't going to look like equality, but it has to be built out of equity. The last thing I would say is in terms of. So I think our responsibility, the thing that feels most, the humanity we love on each other, we uphold each other. We lift each other up, we give. You hear me talk about grace all the time. We give and receive grace to ourselves and to others, and that we continue to fight because this stuff isn't going to get easy. It's not going to get easy because it's on the news. It's not going to get easy because people see it more now. It's just going to get that much harder because the people who have been fighting for inequity are going to fight harder to keep what they have. And so we should not assume that we can settle. We should not assume that things are going to now be that much easier because it is going to continue to be hard because the systems, again, are built by the people who have access and those people want to hold on to it. And so I just encourage us to ctinue to fight and we're going to have to fight hard together.

Seth Green: Well, thank you for what has truly been a profound conversation. And just to echo your ending, Myla, if we need to fight, then I think what you've shared on this call is precisely the right way to do so, to do so with kindness, to do so with humanity, but to do so with a really high bar and accountability. And I hope everyone listening out there has taken true guidance from the four phenomenal leaders on this who are moving the needle. And I hope that many others will join you because it will take everyone to have your fierceness and courage and leadership to ultimately undo what has been an epic failure of our society. Thank you all very, very much for your comments, your insight and your inspiration.

Speaker4: This has been an episode of the Q Talks podcast where we seek to marry the wisdom of the Quinlan community with the issues of today. Our thanks to the Baumgart Scholars and Seth Greenes for their contributions. Listeners interested in diving deeper are encouraged to read. So you want to talk about Race by Ijeoma Uloom or the New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander. Additional thanks goes to Dean Kevin Stevens for his generous support of this project. Mat Shiley, our student producer for editing this episode. Loyola School of Communication and WLUW for their continued collaboration. Please take a minute to support us by rating and reviewing our episodes to help us expand our reach. Thank you for listening and we hope you join us next time.