Making Diversity + Inclusion the New Norm with Nicole Armstrong of Queen City Certified

“我们都想要最好的人才。我们都希望最具创新的想法。如果你只是在那些想法和那种创新的一小群人看着一小群人，那么你将非常有限。我们谈论的一部分是多样性 - 多样性的想法，经验，生活经历 - 这不会花费你很多。它只是花费你的时间，承诺和意图。“-NICOLE阿姆斯特朗，女王城的创始人兼首席执行官认证

Why do stories matter to the innovation process? What values can be instilled in innovators who share stories? How do innovation leaders inspire creators to tell and share their success and failure stories?

We speak with Nicole Armstrong, founder and CEO atQueen City Certified谈论数据驱动的策略，跨学科协作，同理心和激情如何促进创新的运动。皇后市认证是美国工作场所的性别股权的第一个雇主认证和领导方案。妮可与雇主合作并认识到不仅仅是谈论公平，而且实施数据驱动的策略，以确保所有性别的人可以茁壮成长，无论种族，性取向或社会经济地位如何。随着实践的教练和指导，她提供了远见愿景领导者，这些工具重新设计组织政策，转变公司文化和破坏偏见，以便他们可以吸引和保留最友好的人才。

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TRANSCRIPT

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凯蒂：我们的客人今天是妮可阿姆斯特朗。她是皇后城的创始人兼首席执行官认证。我会让妮可与女王城市的谈话，以及你的创新背景，特别是在社会企业部门。妮可，我很感激你在播客上。谢谢你在这里。

妮可：谢谢你让我。因此，皇后城市认证是美国工作场所的第一批对性别股权的雇主认证。我到达这里的背景有点可能是非传统的。所以，我实际上开始设计，我认为解决问题的能力解决了我在整个职业生涯中，但在社会部门工作了十多年。因此，总是对社会正义和公平充满热情，最近一直在使用社会创新空间中的技能。

凯蒂：它对我感到令人着迷。不仅仅是你作为图形设计师的背景，也许在你的核心根部在当天回来，但我认为在我看来，像你的职业生涯转变为设计思维专业知识。然后导致您创建自己的启动，以及我争辩的是不仅仅是一个启动，它是两种性别股权的运动。那么，你能与我们分享一点关于从设计思考到胆量开始运动的转变吗？

妮可：绝对的。所以，我总是将其视为生命经历的高潮，我自己和我所知道的人，并且在社会创新空间工作，我有机会与许多边缘化的社区合作。有一个故事尤其是与我一起谐振，这是一个女人，我在我们看过五岁以下儿童的健康成果时，我与我们一起参加过我们的项目。她是一个单身妈妈，她期待她的第二个孩子，并且在30周之前，在30周之前，劳动很早。

凯蒂：That’s so scary.

妮可：非常非常可怕。她的儿子在尼古尔，她没有获得有偿时间。她没有获得报酬的育儿假，因为她的公司不到50人，她甚至没有获得无偿休假。

凯蒂：正确的。

妮可：所以，它总是和我坐在一起......

凯蒂：所以她的工作本身就受到了风险？

妮可：Exactly, yeah, just simply for having a child. So, I always remembered thinking, you know, we talk about how much we value family in this country, and we hear that a lot, but it sort of raised the question about which families do we value? After my experience working as a social innovations specialist, I was actually undergoing my own job search, and had received this offer from a great company, very large company here in town. They sent over the benefits package—

凯蒂：在我们总部的辛辛那提。

妮可：在我们总部的辛辛那提。有益于育儿假的好处。我是一个妈妈，我不打算马上拿走孩子，另一个孩子立即，但我想知道这是在我未来的情况下，有机会吗？这是一种不舒服的位置，因为你问道吗？你问过它，然后让雇主假设你想马上有孩子吗？所以，我记得认为它应该是透明的，对吗？需要有一定程度的透明度。我收到了很棒的报价。我对这个角色非常兴奋，但角色并不完全符合他们提供的标题和薪水。我记得那些薪水正好在一个非常小的非盈利，而当我有点地带来时说，“嘿，有一个错位，”招聘人员完全同意了我。 So, I did what any person would do in the era of leaning in, and I negotiated and the offer was rescinded. I remember thinking in the back of my mind, “Had I been a man, would this have happened in the same way? Would the outcome have been the same?”

So fast-forward maybe month, month and a half, and I ran into a good friend of mine who I had gone to college with, and she said, “You know, I was working for a firm for over a year as a freelancer, and they told me they were going to make this job permanent, and I said, “Well, I’d love for you to consider me.” At the time, she was expecting, and her boss looked at her and literally said, “Well, look at you. We can’t hire you.” So, it was one of those moments where I just—first I was so—

凯蒂：难以置信的。

妮可：是的，这是令人难以置信的。我想，“为什么我们仍然在2018年谈论这一点？这是荒谬的。“

凯蒂：是的，绝对。

妮可：At the time, my daughter was a little over a year, almost a year and a half, and I just thought, “I don’t want her to be having these conversations, or to doubt how far she can go or what she can achieve based on her gender.” So that’s where this idea for a certification around gender equity was born. I sort of thought, if we looked at this from an asset based approach, how can we celebrate what organizations are doing well, make it more visible, right? That’s that accountability in that transparency piece. Then, encourage them to raise the bar for everybody else in their industry. So that’s where this was born. It was just life experiences, I suppose.

凯蒂：极好的。因此，这是一个高潮的社会观察，这很多都是由于您在社会企业组织中作为一个创新专家的职位，然后与个人经历相结合。I think, even as you’re sharing those stories, I personally, and I’m sure listeners, can think of 10 other people in your life or a personal memory you have of feeling nervous about how to advocate for your family needs or your personal needs, your health needs, and some of those issues are just even more heightened for women when we are the ones to deliver children, for instance. So, I mean, I’m thinking of my own stories.

我知道作为一名研究生，如果研究生在我是学生的大学怀孕，那么没有政策可以保护我们作为大学的劳动者。我们是教师，如果您愿意，我们是教师，如果您愿意，并且没有政策保护研究生在我曾经工作过的一些大学。或者我认为甚至谈判达到亲子休假。I had a good friend who worked in a manufacturing company, and when he went to request paternity leave, the answer he got from HR was, “Well, we’ve never done that for anyone in the past, so we really can’t start a new precedent, that would be unfair to the past.” These stories, they sound almost like they’re from an alien planet, that we’re still having these debates. So, tell me more about, you know, I think that just speaks to the power of pulling those stories together in order to identify why something innovative must happen.

妮可：绝对的。当我有点有这个想法时，我开始进行研究。我真的想了解那里的东西，存在的东西。我找到了一个认证，全球认证，周围的性别股权，但我认为，美国的文化以及我们如何处理的工作场所和机会是非常不同的。It’s very different based on culture, even between the United States and a country like Canada, which you would think culturally isn’t that different, but when we look at benefits, for instance, we don’t have any protected paid family leave in the United States, whereas I have friends and colleagues in Canada who have up to 18 months of paid leave and protection for their job. So, I really wanted to design something around the United States.

但我认为对您的观察有什么感兴趣，这对您如何收集故事以及如何影响个人的想法，我认为这是我们工作的一部分所在的地方。我们甚至谈论的是，我们的系统是如何设计的，以各种男性经验为中心，它有点被认为是普遍的，对吧？女性经验，或者我甚至争论人们的颜色，他们的经验被认为是利基。所以，即使我们如何设计我们的工作场所，我们如何设计我们的系统是如何反映的。我使用这个例子，我不知道你还看过这部电影，但小女人。我为她的生日带走了我的妈妈，这是一个神话般的电影。我们进去了，我认为观众中的两个人都是女性。那么，这部电影是一个女人的电影，对这个概念有点好吗？这是一个利基薄膜。

凯蒂：是利基，是的。对，右，右。

妮可：那么你看起来像是一部像死亡诗人的社会这样的电影，那里都是关于男学生和一位男老师的，但没有人认为这是一部男性的电影，对吧？

凯蒂：Sure.

妮可：因此,我们谈论的一部分,圣的一部分orytelling that we do, is we start to look at systems through the frame of, who are we actually designing them for, and how do we define a human experience? When we really dive a little bit deeper, we start to see that it’s through usually a white male lens. But it affects men, too, and that’s what I think is so important. You were talking about paternity leave. Even within our own certification, we don’t reward organizations for maternity leave, because it reinforces the notion that it’s a woman’s job to take care of children.

凯蒂：有趣的。

妮可：Right? But really, it’s everyone’s job and opportunity to take care of children, and there are many men out there who would like to be more active in their children’s lives. There was a study that Deloitte did that found that even when men have access to paid time off, they don’t take it. At the most they take about 10 days.

凯蒂：It’s culture. Because culturally, often it’s not accepted.

妮可：确切地。

凯蒂：So even if you can get it passed through human resources, you may come back to your particular co-workers and say your plans, and their response, and this is true for women, too, you know, expecting mothers, their response might be, “Oh, well I only took two days off.”

妮可：正确的。I actually had a gentleman come up to me and say, “Look, we had a young father who was going to take the entire parental leave, and one of the partners in the firm said, ‘Well, you’re not going to take the whole leave. I thought you wanted to make partner?'”

凯蒂：哦哇。

妮可：因此，这种期望即使在某种程度上给您提供，您也不应该占用全部时间。因此，我们实际上只有为所有性别人民提供育儿假的组织的奖励积分。

凯蒂：美丽的。这有很多意义。

妮可：是的，因为真的，它是关于分享这位护理并为爸爸提供机会。我们可以讲述我们的影响的最佳故事之一是来自我们的第一个队列之一。我们的一位经过认证的组织改变了他们的政策，包括育儿假的男人，并且有一个新的爸爸在该组织获得认证后，它能够首次接受育儿假，并在他的孩子之后债券。事实上，我们听到的第一次创新或影响故事之一是一个受益于性别股权的人。

凯蒂：美丽的。That’s incredible.

妮可：是的。所以，我的意思是，我认为部分是有点发现人类的联系，我认为每个人都可以以某种方式与平衡家庭生活与工作生活的挑战或障碍有关，因此这是一个很好的开始。

凯蒂：绝对的。我知道,我问了很多questions that kept us focused on parental leave, but I know that’s only one element of what certification means. So, tell me more about your innovation, how you thought of this concept of a gender equity certification, and what does that actually look like?

妮可：是的，绝对。所以，我喜欢你之前所说的，这是一个运动，因为这真的是我们的最终目标。我们的真正使命是雇主和致力于在工作场所的性别股权的人的运动。所以，即使在考虑这个过程可能看起来像什么时候，我的一个主要焦点是我们如何将人们聚集在一起，我们如何利用已经做得很好的事情？因此，我们实际建立了认证作为队列模型。因此，通过认证的雇主实际上与其他雇主一起做到，这是从跨部门和跨大小进行的，所以我们在文化机构到政府部门向律师事务所作为一个团体进行。对此是共同的经历，对右边有什么惊人？许多组织面临着类似的挑战，即使在他们自己的经历克服这些挑战或他们的成功故事的经历，他们也有很多故事，他们已经尝试过的东西。所以，我们将它们带到一起，以便他们可以将那些作为队列分享。

然后，另一个是，我认为，有一件事是让政策和实践到位，作为认证计划，我们审核这些政策和实践。我们希望确保它们到位。但是，另一个是真正了解他们如何实施，因此我们对雇主员工进行了调查，以真正了解不同群体的经验。因此，我们分解了人口亚组的数据，因此我们可以真正开始潜入某人可能拥有的交叉体验。这是另一个故事，我想，也是经常在我们考虑性别股权时，我们想到了女性。但我们真的希望开始挑战人们说，“真的，这是关于所有的家庭人的人，以及我们如何创造一个允许人，无论种族或收入或性取向茁壮成长的环境如何？”

所以，我们在一个完美的看法中看待性别，因此我们周围有很多对话和讲故事，以及性别和课程，我们可以开始揭示一些个人故事，但也允许我们的雇主以不同的方式开始看系统，他们可以开始说，“但它会如何影响这个特定的群体，”吧？因为政策如何影响女性，例如，可能与男性不同。如何影响颜色的女性可能与跨妇女不同。所以，我们真的希望开始挑战他们通过这些镜头思考。所以调查数据给了我们很多人的见解。我们真的可以开始了解，“女性如何经历工作场所，例如，与颜色女性相比，整体而言？有相似之处，有差异吗？“

所有这些数据，所有这些数据点都使我们的雇主给出了专注于他们应该在未来几年后将其优先事项的机会。我们真的和他们一起走，他们陪伴他们在开发出来的路线图中向前移动，他们彼此分享他们的目标是他们可以开始彼此构建支持网络。那么，我会说的那个决赛，是我们尝试做的一部分是与雇主共同设计，所以在每个队列结束时，我们总是有一个我们说的反思会议，“有什么用的是什么？你需要什么？我们如何帮助您实现目标？“2019年初队列中出来的最令人兴奋的作品之一是这一想法，我们的许多组织正在努力解决类似的挑战。

凯蒂：绝对的。

妮可：但他们在孤岛上工作，对吧？

凯蒂：正确的。

妮可：因此，您可以在城市周围和地区各地的所有这些不同组织进行类似的挑战，但他们在自己的组织内的孤岛工作。因此，挑战是“嘿，如果我们在这项工作中互相支持，如果我们将互相帮助，那么我们的容量限制，那会看起来像什么？”这个特殊的队列说：“好吧，如果我们开发了工作组怎么办？如果我们发现我们的共同挑战是什么，我们将作为一个团体聚集在一起，然后我们深入了解这一挑战，发达的方法，然后与其他工作组分享出来？所以我们可能会深入了解一个问题，但随后在它结束时，我们可以根据组正在努力的其他问题访问三种不同的方法。“所以，我们去年十月推出。

凯蒂：有些内容是什么？

妮可：是的。因此，最大的领域之一是招聘和面试实践。那么我们如何增加我们进入门口的候选人的多样性，但我们甚至如何解决各种各样的部门，对吧？所以我们有在科技产业中的组织，生命科学行业，往往是非常的行业，我会说，缺乏多样性，非常白色，在某些情况下，非常雄性。我们如何帮助多样化？我们如何使这些行业更加包容，对于可能对他们感兴趣的其他人？那么，那个特定的小组将不仅要做一个深远的潜水，而且你如何达到更多多样化的候选人，但我们如何开始支持部门本身的多样性？所以这是一个非常令人兴奋的人。

另一个是回到我们我们re talking about before around parental leave. But also there’s other policies, I think, that organizations put in place that people often feel like maybe they can’t take. So how do we create a culture where people feel empowered and able to actually take advantage of the policies that are in place? We have a group that’s committed to culture, and they’re going to be doing a deep dive to understand, “What are some of the barriers that get in the way of people wanting to take the time, whether it’s flex time to care for an aging parent, or maybe time off for a newborn child or an adopted child? But how can we begin to shift that culture?”

然后，我们的决赛是领导力发展。所以，一旦我们得到了门口的人，我们就会在门口得到这种令人难以置信的人才，我们如何保留它们？我们如何通过管道从速度到最大值的流水管移动妇女和其他不足的群体？因为常见的是我们看到的是中途管理的一滴，所以我们想说，我们如何确保我们将系统放在适当的地方来获得它们？所以这就是工作组将正在努力的事情。What’s really exciting is they’re using the design thinking process, so over the course of a year, they’re going to go through discovery and sense making and ideation and prototyping to see what works, and then they’re going to be developing tools that then they’ll share out with the other working groups at the end of the year.

凯蒂：That’s incredible. It’s really beautiful. I think so much of the heart of innovation lies in that interdisciplinary and collaborative creation, and you’re bringing together leaders and workers from so many different sectors who are diverse in terms of their identity and their backgrounds, and even the particular function that they’re serving in the companies that they work for, and you’re asking them how to sort of percolate together to solve problems that really do cross every sector, and some more than others, as you mentioned. What’s so neat to me is, you’ve created … Queen City Certified is an innovation in and of itself, but to become part of that community, to become certified is, in my opinion, it’s an articulation from those companies that they also want to be innovative. There’s a lot of research out there to say that diversity fuels innovation.

妮可：绝对，是的。实际上，这就是如此鼓舞人心。I always sort of brag on my clients, because I love them so much, and they are … I think the interesting thing about certification, even when we’re talking about storytelling, it’s almost a visual symbol to the community and to peers and to other organizations that this organization is committed to doing this work.

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：我总是说认证是旅程的开始，而不是结束。So, the organizations coming in, they’re not coming in … It’s interesting, when we talk to them, certification is sort of the icing on the cake, but really what they’re coming in for is the framework and the structure and the tools they need to get to where they’re going. It’s really that idea of, how do we have accompaniment on the way to getting to our goals? So, certification is sort of this visual symbol that they’re on this journey.

凯蒂：是的，一点没错。这是问责制。

妮可：正是，这是问责制，这是透明度，这是庆祝活动。

凯蒂：这是如何。

妮可：是的。

凯蒂：我认为这么多组织，今天的商业文化，人们更加清晰，更加清晰，对性别股权和种族股权和包容性的重要性。但我认为是因为你在如何完成业务的系统中提到的，或者行业如何运行，如何真正最困难的部分。因此，您不仅是提供路线图，您也是汇集领导和建立独特的想法和策略。

妮可：绝对的。I think that’s how we get there. So, sort of one of my main missions is to always be based in research, to always be based in practice, so that we can understand what works and what doesn’t work, and never to become so in love with an idea or an approach if it doesn’t work. So, even at the beginning of this process, part of the sort of work that I’d done was really doing research to understand, “How do we actually disrupt bias in organizational systems,” right? Because we spend, in the United States, we spend a lot of money on diversity trainings, and there’s little research to show that they actually improve diversity. Part of the challenge is that behavior is really difficult to change, so even when we’re aware of our own bias, it’s very hard to change habits, behaviors, things that we’re comfortable with, right? So what are the tweaks that we can make to our systems? What are the little things that we can do, whether in policy or practice, that can actually help disrupt bias? I always use this example, because I think it’s such a phenomenal example, but there was a study that Harvard Business Review did where they found that in a final pool of four candidates, if there’s only one woman, or if there’s only one person of color, they statistically have zero chance of getting hired.

凯蒂：哇。

妮可：When we think about this, or even when we think about EEOC standards, and we have sort of these minimum requirement roles of interviewing at least one woman or person of color, well we know now that statistically that’s not going to have the impact that we’re actually hoping it will have, right? So what can we do instead? What they found was even if you increase that by one, so you have two women or two people of color in that final pool of four candidates, their chances jump to 50%. It actually becomes representative of the candidate pool.

凯蒂：这是令人难以置信的。

妮可：是的。那是一个简单的调整，对吗？

凯蒂：是的。是的，究竟。

妮可：这是我们可以在我们的系统中改变的东西 -

凯蒂：是的，试图瞄准的是一个指标，这是非常实用的。是的，这有很多意义。

妮可：它与结果相关联。所以，我认为我们的一部分是我们的目标是让雇主为尝试这些东西的工具出来，不要与任何一种方法联系起来，但要真正了解什么作品，并只是真正基于对性别股权的方法所做的我们可以开始移动针。

凯蒂：是的。I want to ask a question about the vulnerability that it takes to get a group of business leaders to open up and share stories about what’s not working and how they’re failing. I just think there’s so much vulnerability and fear that people might have around talking about disparities of any kind, and it’s tied to what our personal identities are, how much privilege came with our backgrounds. Could you share some stories that you’ve heard, or some moments where you were very proud that vulnerable conversations that needed to be had were spoken because of the nature of what you’re drawing attention to through Queen City Certified?

妮可：是的。It’s interesting you mention vulnerability, because at the beginning of this process, one of my biggest fears was that no one would sign up to do this. It takes a lot—

凯蒂：当然，人们太害怕了 -

妮可：People would be too afraid, and sometimes I think, especially in our current culture, we often view vulnerability as weakness. So, I think for companies, and for employers in general, it can be challenging to acknowledge what’s not working, right? But what was amazing, I think, and what maybe is a little bit unique in our structure, is this cohort model. What we began to hear from our employers was having this safe space to have conversations with strangers.

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：有时候在一个充满陌生人的房间里有安全性，因为你可以开始说，“嘿，这就是我真正挣扎的东西，”甚至，“这就是我个人挣扎的原因。”这与你被同事或其他队友所包围的不同，你觉得，如果你在小时，你不能说什么，对吗？

凯蒂：一定一定。

妮可：但是，我会说，在某种其他面临着类似挑战的其他人所包围的情况下，能够在某种程度上透明地透明。

凯蒂：是的。因此，这是一个有意的设计决定，你制作了这家公司，你可以让顾问一次进入每个组织，并赋予他们的任务并告诉他们他们的期望，“这就是你通过认证的方式。”你完全翻了一番，说，“不。它必须是跨学科，“我认为这一部分是这可以打开人们来拥有一个安全，安全的环境，能够通过困难的谈话来谈谈。

妮可：绝对，甚至通过他们在工作场所的包容和多样性周围的一些个人挑战谈论。所以，在我们的学习课程中，我们潜入了很多事情。我们谈论更改和变更管理，您如何种类如何导航该过程，因为您开始滚动这些产品？但我认为另一个是一个内心潜水，“我在哪里有偏见？”即使我看起来很多次作为DNI从业者，或者是人力资源专业人士，我们逻辑地知道我们希望在我们的工作场所拥有多样化，但是当我们开始看着我们自己的内在圈子和我们自己的个人生活时，在某些情况下您可能想要的实例，您想要的多样性，以及在某些情况下可能没有。那么，部分是对我们在工作场所看到的结果的结果，这是一种与我们在工作场所所看到的结果中的分类，因为工作场所只不过是充满个人人的建筑物，对吧？

凯蒂：正确的。

妮可：因此，每个人都会带来这些个人镜头。因此，当我们开始潜入其中时，可以进行对话真的很有意思，我们开始看到交叉点。And I think what’s beautiful about the cohort, because people are there with good intentions and we sort of start off these conversations with the understanding that we’re going to sort of walk into the uncomfortable, people are willing to say, “Hey, tell me more about what you meant by that, because here’s how I heard it, and here’s how it makes me feel.” It sort of opens up a dialog between people that maybe wouldn’t have happened otherwise, and we can get a little bit deeper into the intersection of the challenges that the LGBTQ community might face versus, in particular, women of color, or women who might have a disability, or even men who want to take a more active role in caregiving and sort of the barriers that they face. So, I think that the space that it creates, that safe space that it creates, is really important to the process, both for the individuals, but I think also in helping them frame sort of the, I would say, almost the pitch to the work when they go back into their organizations of explaining why is this important.

凯蒂：哦，绝对。So, do you notice that some of your cohort members will pull on each other’s stories and then take those back to their own organizations to say, “Well, here’s what I’m hearing collectively across other members of my cohort,” and that it sort of increases the confidence in the story?

妮可：哦，绝对，这就是在工作组内令人惊叹的。所以，我们的一些工作组会说，“嘿，我们的一些领导者说，”一岁长的时间。为什么我们需要一年？“”她说，“我能够回去说，”因为我们在一个大型团体中致力于这一框架。All of the different experiences, all the research from all these companies, we’re going to have access to that data and to that information and to that input.'” So in a sense, I think when organizations feel like they’re a part of a larger whole, it sort of allows space for that process to breathe in maybe ways that it wouldn’t have otherwise. So, I think a lot of times DNI practitioners or HR professionals are tasked with creating more diverse workplaces, and they’re sort of tasked with these initiatives to create more inclusive workplaces, but they’re not often given the time or resources to do it well. So this is a way to say, “Hey, not only are we taking this approach, but all of these other organizations are taking this approach and we’re going to learn together.” So, I think that it’s that power in numbers in a way.

凯蒂：绝对的。我想回到这个讲故事如何支持招聘的想法，特别是对于可能还没有准备好的公司或领导者来说。As you go out into the world and explain what this certification is for and why it’s going to make a difference, have you found certain storytelling tactics working better than others, and have you found a way to sort of break through when a company’s culture or its leadership maybe doesn’t see the value?

妮可：是的，绝对。So, I think one of the key things that I’ve learned around storytelling is that it’s all about relationships and trust building. When you meet with anyone to sort of tell the story of innovation or tell the story of the work that you’re doing, I think the most important and the most influential thing that you can do is find a personal connection with that person, to understand, what are the unique challenges that they’re personally experiencing, right? Because I think in many ways, humans are sort of wired to avoid pain more than they are to seek pleasure, and we all struggle with these challenges in the workplace, particularly, I think, for the organizations and for the people that I meet with, they’re responsible for a lot of employees, right? They’re responsible for that employee experience. So, they have that pressure on them of being the person who’s sort of shaping the experiences of other people within their organizations.

所以，它的一部分坐下来，发现，“你的痛点在哪里？你在努力努力？你的目标在哪里？你为你的组织设想了什么？当你想到创建一个包容性工作场所时，这对你来说是什么样的？“在某种意义上，我想，然后你可以开始辨别，“好的，这是他们最大的挑战的地方，这里可以在这里帮助他们解决这些挑战。以下是我们如何自定义自己的经验，并确保他们拥有信息和资源以及他们所需的支持以及实现这些目标的网络。“所以，我认为它的一部分是发现连接，也能够分享个人故事。我总是，当我与人见面时，告诉他们我在这里的个人故事，因为真的，我认为这很重要，特别是作为企业家，你必须拥有它背后的激情。这是给我的-

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：这是不可谈判的，对吗？当我想到我的朋友和同事的经历时 -

凯蒂：我喜欢那个。Passion is non-negotiable.

妮可：这是不可谈判的，因为 -

凯蒂：我喜欢那个。

妮可：Because when you come to somebody, they’re not just investing in the company or the process, they’re investing in you, and I think if they know that this for you is what you’re meant to do, and this is your passion, and this is why it’s so important to you, they’re more likely to come on that journey with you, right?

凯蒂：是的。我喜欢那个。这不仅仅是故事的内容，而是交付。

妮可：绝对的。

凯蒂：Enthusiasm and passion and commitment can be 60% of what makes a story impactful.

妮可：是的。I think the idea of partnership, that I’m not — To be quite honest, I’m not here to sell any organization on QCC. I’m here to find partners in this work, and I think that organizations who’ve come and have worked with us, the employers, in many ways, they’re already committed to this work. They’re bought in. They just might need the extra tools, the resources, the community to push it one step further. So for me, when I’m meeting with potential clients, I’m on the search for partners. I think when you can communicate that, when you can communicate and say, “Hey, we’re in this together. We’re designing this together. We’re going to study the outcomes together. We’re going to sort of experience the pain points together,” it creates sort of a shared journey that I think people long for. Don’t you think?

凯蒂：哦耶。

妮可：我认为人们想要觉得他们有点以刻意的方式和路线图朝着他们的目标迁移，而是有一个热情的人，这将在长途旅途中与他们一起旅行。对我来说，这是不可谈判的，因为就像我说，我有一个女儿，但即使对于我们的儿子，我认为对我们所有的孩子，我不想在20年内进行这个谈话，对吧？

凯蒂：对，就是这样。阿门。我也是。是的，究竟。I think one of the questions I sent to you sort of before the interview had to do with, how do you use empathy to try to change the mindset of someone who might look at something like this and say, “It’s irrelevant to me, I’m comfortable. I’m in a position of leadership. Why should I be concerned, really, about bias?” I like to think most people wouldn’t at least say that out loud, but perhaps comfort or other reasons might sort of cause complacency. So yeah, what do you think? How do you address that concern about maybe what if this innovation’s not relevant to me? Is there a way? Are there certain strategies that you think are effective ways to convert that person to become a believer?

妮可：Yes and no. So, I think that for the folks who may have sort of an understanding of some level of empathy, they have investment in their company, they’re willing and open to have the conversations, absolutely, yes, you can find ways to relate someone else’s experiences to them. Sort of our approach is we won’t convince the people who don’t want to be convinced, right? I think if we start to go and we start to outreach and we start to build conversations and relationships for the people who are invested and committed to this work, there’s power in numbers.

凯蒂：Yes, yes.

妮可：因此，而不是试图将这些我们可能永远不会转换，而不是在帮助利用并使那些已经完成工作的人更加可见。

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：我会说一些钥匙来构建同理心，我认为，再次将其与个人经历相关联。如果你可以回来，我总是告诉别人，“我不会为性别股权制作业务案例，因为它已经被制作了。”但是有一个人的情况，对吗？所以当我们正在考虑我们的工作场所时，我们都希望获得最佳人才。我们都希望最具创新的想法。如果你只是看着那些想法和那个创新的一小群人，你将非常有限，对吧？这是一个非常有限的体验。因此，我们谈论的一部分是多样性，在某种意义上，思想的多样性，经验，生活经历，这并不花费你很多。它只是花费你的时间和承诺和意图。

凯蒂：是的。是的。

妮可：The benefits of that far outweigh staying sort of in your comfort zone. So, part of what we sort of challenge our participants and our organizations to do is to get comfortable with the uncomfortable.

凯蒂：Yep.

妮可：所以，我以某种方式思考，它会给我带回它的东西，为什么是什么，痛点是什么。所以，如果可能没有看到为什么包容或多样性对你一天的基础是重要的，但如果你可以开始将它绑定到你的工作，对吧？因此，当我们开始查看项目的结果，或创新或新想法，每个人都希望成功的团队。所以，有方法可以将它绑在一起。我认为也有一些东西可以说，因为道德势在必可。我们不一定取决于这一点，但我想到了很多组织，这座领域的很多领导者来到我们来看，这是正确的事情。

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：So, I think that that’s a really great place to start, as well.

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：我认为只是促进这些对话。It can be hard to understand somebody’s experience if you’ve never been there, and I think one can imagine how somebody feels in a specific situation, but I think having a relationship with that person and building that trust and building that relationship, you have more empathy for somebody that you care about.

凯蒂：是的，绝对。

妮可：所以，部分是解决有点关系建设和挑战人们的拓展他们的网络。

凯蒂：是的。是的。我认为你已经解决了，如此美妙地是如何对包含和具有挑战性的组织结构的承诺可以改变工作场所。I’m thinking, in particular, if we zoom out even farther to the systemic sort of structures around venture capital and the innovation community, and the fact that so much venture capital historically has gone to white male founders, young white male founders, actually, too. So, there’s sort of an ageism associated with it, as well. We’re starting to see this change. It’s only, I think, the beginning of the change, but there seems to be more attention, and there is more, from a data perspective, more funding going to female founders. There’s often a business case around that, that you’re missing out on full markets. You’re missing out on divergent thinking. What are your thoughts around, based on what you know about how inclusivity changes a workplace, what do you think we should expect to see in the future when it comes to innovation itself and the way it’s funded?

妮可：嗯，最大的小企业主人之一是女性。所以，女性在那里做了这项工作，我认为你是对的，绝对是正确的，女性不太可能获得风险投资。我认为不到2％的风险投资转向女性拥有的企业。

凯蒂：一个痛苦的统计，是的。

妮可：It is painful. I think, particularly, when we think of the intersection of race and gender, even less so to women of color, and I think part of it goes back to this idea that we view sort of the male experience, or the white young male experience, as universal, right? So when we look to the attributes that people bring to the marketplace, to the skills that they have, we look at it through that lens. What we know, even in the workplace, is that we hire men for potential, and we hire women for experience. So, even when you think about people coming out of college, right, you have maybe a male founder and a female founder. Well, if we’re looking through the lens of experience versus potential, neither one of those students, or young people, are going to have a lot of experience.

凯蒂：正确的。

妮可：但是，如果我们奖励男性潜力，我们更有可能投资于他们，而不是如果我们奖励妇女的经验，因为他们只是在那个年轻时不太可能拥有它。因此，即使是那种差异以及我们如何从大学中获得人们的奖励人们，就会产生这种鸿沟，然后在整个一生中遵循人们，特别是在他们的职业生涯中。I think long term, when we’re thinking of systemic change, I think addressing some of these things in the workplace will lead to systemic change, because when we look at the gender pay gap, when we look at the raw gender pay gap, even the opportunity gap, how we actually reward professions, we know that it has little to do with the job itself. It really has more to do with the people that fill them. I always use this example of technology. Back in the 60s, coding was a woman’s job. Women were called computers, right? They were literally human computers, and it wasn’t rewarded financially that well.

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：Well, what happened as more and more men entered that field? The salaries went up. The same is true, when more women enter a male dominated field, the salaries drop. So, part of when we’re looking at systems and we’re looking at how we reward attributes and what we bring to the marketplace, is understanding that it’s not that we’re rewarding the job itself, it’s that we literally reward jobs differently based on who is a majority dominant group that fills those roles. So, part of, I think, trying to close the gap within the workplace comes back in some ways to economic justice, right?

凯蒂：是的。是的，绝对。

妮可：It’s rewarding women and people of color and other underrepresented groups for the attributes they bring to the marketplace in ways that are fair and equitable so that they have more influence over decision making, and their voices are heard, and they’re invited not only to the table, but they influence the direction that organizations take. So, I think going back to your point of systems, that’s how I sort of view systems change, is first we have to redesign the system. We have to be compensating people equitably, because with that compensation, and with that economic justice, comes power in many ways.

凯蒂：绝对的。让我们用一种快速的火。您和我想在创新社区的创新社区中讨论工作场所的股权时，您希望听到更多的故事？我们要迅速开火。我希望听到更多女性创始人的故事以及他们获得资金的原因。我想听听这些故事以潜在的潜力为中心。听到你提到这些差异后，我实际上不知道。所以，我想听取更多关于VC或救助者在女性创始人中潜在的潜力的故事，为什么，我只是想听到更多更多的人。这对我来说是一个。那你呢？

妮可：是的。I would take it one step further. I want to hear more stories about women of color and the successes that they’ve had. I want to start viewing success in different ways.

凯蒂：I’m thinking of like Backstage Capital.

妮可：是的。

凯蒂：I love following their work.

妮可：我不想听到任何创造科技公司的更多白哈佛大楼。

凯蒂：我们已经完成了Gurus。

妮可：正确的。我不想要这些故事。我希望从一无所从中建立业务的女性的故事，因为这就是许多女性被迫做的事情。我想听听-

凯蒂：如果那是你，请抬起手。

妮可：是的。

凯蒂：Both of our hands are up. We know you can’t see—

妮可：我想听听母亲和父亲的故事。实际上，你知道我真正想听的是什么？我希望听到更多关于克服性别规范的男性和男孩的故事以及限制他们潜力的性别刻板印象。我认为我们常时我们关注的是女性的性别股权，以及那些我们拥有的刚性性别规范，对男人和男孩同样有害。我想听听这些故事。

凯蒂：是的。

妮可：我想放大这些故事，使男人可以在照顾角色，以及我们为女性想到的职业来说。我一直开玩笑，“我们不需要更多的女人茎。”我的意思是，如果我们在茎中拥有它们，这很棒，但我们需要更多的男性在幼儿教育和护理，对吧？

凯蒂：Sure. Right, right.

妮可：我想听听这些故事。

凯蒂：是的。我喜欢那个。Okay, thank you. We could go on and on. We could talk all afternoon, but I’m so grateful to have had this short bit of time with you to explore these topics, and I can’t wait to hear what all of the listeners think. Please share your thoughts in comments, and let’s continue this conversation around why diversity and inclusion matter to innovation, and how we can start amplifying those stories so much more. Thank you, Nicole

你可以听更多的剧集Untold Stories of Innovation Podcast。

*Interviews are not endorsements of individuals or businesses.