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Even in what may seem like “lower-stakes” uses of AI, it’s those most often subjected to unjust treatment by inequitable systems who will suffer most and be most harmed.
If you’re a person of Middle Eastern descent misidentified as a terrorist, it’s not low stakes.
If a machine downgrades your ability to get a kidney transplant because you’re Black, it’s not low stakes.
Read MoreThe term “woke” has come to mean alert to racial or social discrimination and injustice, but it seems to instill animosity among some groups. We dive into what wokeism is and why this might be.
Read MoreJust how the balance of power gets tipped can feel like a mysterious thing, even though there are some consistent statistical patterns behind this…
Power and entrenchment of status quo interests can be intractable… until they’re not…
Change seems to stall and stall and stall until suddenly the floodgates open, often to the surprise of everyone…
Read More[W]hat if—when it comes to at least some forms of Indigenous thinking—the concept of rights is the wrong framework altogether?
Read MoreHow do we balance grief, anger—rage, even—with an obligation to move forward? To DO something, be of use, and not let this become “just two more” in an endless string of violent gun massacres?
Read MoreLike so many, we are still processing what it means that people all over America are about to lose a right they’ve exercised - despite varying degrees of burden - for nearly 50 years.
We are processing what it means that, for the first time in U.S. history, a constitutional right is being taken away instead of added—by five people with decision-making power over millions, whose voices, needs, and lived experiences they don’t begin to represent or seem to understand.
Read More“…it’s precisely this concentration of power that an Equity Sequence® mindset challenges you to call into question—whether that concentrated power is brought about by economic policies that increase wealth inequality; by racial or cultural dynamics that breed paternalistic attitudes; by status-worship social habits that foster deference to celebrity gurus as sources of authority; or by elite-educated, tech-bro networks that lead to insular thinking.”
Read MoreTo democracy and social justice watchers, observing this business-as-usual behavior is like watching corporate giants sleepwalk toward the edge of a cliff, dragging with them our hopes for more a democratic, inclusive society—and for more democratic, inclusive organizations—tethered as we all are to their outsized power and influence.
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At its root, DEI work is, or should be, in my view, a moral endeavor. Its aim should be to nudge, cajole, demand, sometimes even shame an organization into acting on the basis of moral instead of business imperatives. But insofar as business is about making money, generating profit, and maximizing gain—essentially selfish endeavors—its deepest motivation is not to act morally or care about moral choices.
Read MoreWas it never really about democracy, after all? Or was it only about democracy for some?
If you have been watching this past year, you know that democracy in America is not less at risk but more, even with Trump out of office.
Read MoreWhat if, I couldn’t help but imagine—because I’ve been steeped in thinking about the Equity Sequence™ and its relevance to the most pressing forms of inequality weighing on the world today—what if those with decision-making power had truly applied Equity Sequence™ thinking and Equity Sequence™ questioning in drafting the Glasgow Climate Pact?
Read MoreIn case you hadn’t noticed, there’s been a recent spate of criticism—you might even call it verbal dumping—aimed at white women as a group. To be specific, it’s aimed at a subset of “privileged white women” who wield their racial and social status like a weapon against people of color going about their day—as if to insist the person is answerable to them—and in doing so earning themselves the viral “Karen” moniker.
Read MoreRight now, in many organizations, even where the embrace of diversity, equity, and inclusion seems most sincere, advocacy can still be a delicate affair, if it’s not delivered in the kind of sanctioned, milquetoast, feel-good packaging we’ve all come to recognize.
It can strike a nerve, for example, if it calls into question the matter of CEO salaries, or impacts to the bottom line, or money from advertising, or corporate donations to political action committees.
The double-helix of fear—of backlash intertwined with fear of backlash—may make itself felt if advocacy pushes too far, in a way that threatens concentrated power, or asks those with power to cede a portion of their holdings, literally or figuratively.
In fact, I’m starting to think that if you don’t sense a touch of fear lurking in the form of defensiveness when you push for change, there might not be real skin in the game.
Read MoreFar from thinking about D&I as a siloed business objective — something you take into consideration only during the hiring process, or when you’re planning D&I — he likes the fact that you can invoke the Equity Sequence™ at any given decision-making moment.
“I’m not necessarily conscious of it every day,” Daniel acknowledged. “But it’s there in your brain. And it comes back to you in key moments.”
Read MoreSo what will all of our questions actually give us? Beautiful graphics and visuals representing analytics that are “hit-and-miss” and rife with bias themselves? “Hit-and-miss” like the effectiveness of so many “gold standard” D&I interventions - namely, unconscious bias training, among others?
How can we prevent metrics, benchmarking, and indexing from becoming the new tick-box risk-mitigation exercise - part of the window-dressing of “woke” organizations?
Read MoreBias training wasn’t created by people with experiences of discrimination and prejudice.
It wasn’t created by folks who were passionate about making a wave that would change the landscape and ultimately create a more equal world.
It wasn’t designed to actually work.
Read MoreWhat we need to recognize is that the many manifestations and expressions of inequity are as numerous and as unique as the individuals who experience them. Only inequity itself if ubiquitous.
Read MoreSo - this is my call for all the #changemakers: don’t wait for a budget, don’t wait for buy-in. Start innovating, start using strategies proven to work, and then try, and maybe even fail, then try again, and then keep going, for as long as you can. Until you’ve got something that’s working, even if only a little bit. Then refine what you’re doing. Then refine it some more. Then invite others to join you. So we can all make a ruckus, together.
Read MoreAt the end of the day, regardless of the word(s) we use to identify ourselves or the diversity of our experiences as disabled people, we need solidarity and intersectionality in a broader collective pursuit of equality hand-in-hand with others engaged in the same pursuit - women, people of colour, Indigenous folks, immigrants, the elderly, the LGBTQ community, and so on. What we’re all after is an equal opportunity to reach our full potential.
Read MoreWe owe it to the world we’re designing, whether we know it or not, to finally confront the fact that the vast majority of our organizations and institutions have inequality baked in.
Inequality in the NDA.
Black folks know this. Other marginalized and underrepresented groups know this.
It f*cking sucks.
And it is the motherlode of opportunities for reform, for (r)evolution, for re-design, for co-creation.
So, if all it took was the business case. If leaders make their decisions based on ROI and fiduciary responsibility and market value and all the rest of it, why isn’t John the CEO and all the other “John-the-CEOs” pound their fist on the table and declare: “If we don’t have 50/50 gender representation across the ranks of our organization… if we don’t hire and promote all people - regardless of race, gender, etc. - at equal rates… if we don’t create a culture of anti-sexism, anti-racism and so-on… Then people at this company don’t have an equal opportunity to succeed and achieve their full potential. Then - godammit - neither can this company! And that’s not okay!”
Why don’t they?
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