 Welcome to our session from allyship to sponsorship solutions to design a diverse and inclusive community. I'm sure you heard these terms before, but today it's all about putting them to practice. My name is Yurikendi Valdez. Well, I'm Kostora Placencia. We run a company called Forefront. In our day to day, we work with leaders such as yourself to help you build diverse and inclusive communities. But we're super, super excited about this session because allyship and sponsorship are the most powerful tools against bias. So the work starts today. And we put together an ambitious agenda to get you through the definitions into through some frameworks to kids, you can start using right after you finish watching this recording. So let's get to work. What is allyship? What is sponsorship? Allyship is the process of building relationships based on trust, consistency and accountability with marginalized individuals and or groups of people. So let's talk allyship. Often when you think of an ally, you might think of this scenario. Saturday night, you're on a train, you're about to catch a criminal still someone's wallet. And so you're like criminal criminal, and the criminal gets caught because of your bravery. Are you an ally? That's just being a witness. You're there. You notice a bad event happening. And you said something about it. Basic duty as a human being. An ally is much more than that. It's about the proactive building of relationships. You're actively having to really work on getting to know people outside your circle, actively listening and being there for them. It takes work and we'll show you how to get started. But secondly, let's talk about sponsorship. Well, sponsorship is the ultimate game changer as a regards to being an ally. It's the ultimate form because it directly impacts someone's house's career and sponsor actively nominates people for opportunities, promotion, races, you name it. So if you want to do allyship at the highest level, you need to become a sponsor. And we'll also get to talk about that during the session. But let's dig deeper a little more. I said being an ally takes work. Well, it's because you're using all your senses as an ally. So this is a way to visually think about it. So from using your mouth, your words to speak against injustices. So if you're in a meeting and someone says a microaggression to someone else in the room, you can say, hey, that that wasn't nice. Here's the research. And maybe you should read this article or do this if we want to create a more inclusive environment for our team. So that's verbally you talking about it and exercising allyship. But an ally also digs deeper. You're like an inspector, you're sniffing around. Anytime you notice biases or any gaps in the system, you're asking yourself why and continuously reflecting. Even if the answers to the questions you're asking hurt, you hold yourself accountable because that's what an ally does. And similarly, you're using your eyes to make sure you're not putting on blinders. You're actually noticing when there's discrimination happening when certain people are not in the room that should be. And you're actively listening to those experiences that often don't get the center stage. You have those conversations and want to know the experience about women in technology or other marginalized communities. Similarly, you're always leading with your heart, right, your empathy, and being a leader that actively looks for opportunities to support other people. You know, as an ally, you might be out there protesting marching for justice, where you might simply be advocating for a new policy at work that allows people to to thrive. So an ally is really using all the resources to support other people. And a sponsor, again, which is the ultimate form of allyship, it's going beyond supporting people generally and putting pen to paper. Inviting someone to an exclusive event that's going to help their career. You're nominating them for an award. You're helping them get a promotion. You're helping them get a salary increase. A sponsor is a great advocate and champion for someone's career. And that's ultimately where you want to be right. Allyships are good. Yes, we need a better society and better world. But at the end of the day, how are we helping that individual get to that next stage. And, you know, I'm sure we feel like we've done this things before you're like, I got this, you know, I'm a good person, I've done that for people. But are we doing that actively data is showing that we're not in particular, more than 80% of white employees see themselves as allies. Yet, if you ask women, if you ask women of color in particular, just 45% of them say they have strong allies. And with Latinas in particular, 55% say they have allies. So there's a huge gap, and you see the same thing happening with sponsors. 13% of black women have sponsors that is a minimal number. What I mean is, is a sponsors usually have this meaning me complex right. I want to see a meeting me I want to be able to support someone that looks like me, because it reminds me of me, my background where I started, but the reality is, if the diversity of leadership leadership is different, who's going to help those other many needs, people of color and marginalized communities so as sponsors, we actively have to try to support people that are different from us, not just that are the same. And for us, you know, we love the work that we do because we lift it. We've been in the other side, we needed those sponsors and those allies as young professionals of color. Oswell, can you share more about what that experience was like for you. Yes, thank you. And while the data is important, the personal stories bring them to life. And here I am being thrown in the air as a one year old by my father. But what you may not know when you see what will now is that I was raised by a single mother, and my father was incarcerated and deported from the United States when I was just a few years old, limiting that photo to just a memory. And in one aspect of my identity, I'm also low income first generation and a person of color. Growing up, I didn't know what the word ally or sponsorship was, but many times I needed one I could have used one. And it was through allies and sponsors as I got older, that I even have the opportunity to speak to you all today. I'm sharing that. And my story is very similar. I was born in a small town in the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean, and like many, many folks in search for better life. My parents ended up immigrating to the United States. And so I was separated from my parents for a long, long time. And when I finally got my visa to come to the United States, I was already 11. And I was put in a world where I didn't know any English, I often felt like the only one, but I did have those allies along the way those sponsors that gave me internship opportunities, gave me projects. And at the end of the day, I ended up encountering a lot of these labels and stigmas that for me was just my identity, being Dominican, being Afro Latina, being a woman, but for some others, they've read it as as as stereotypes as stigmas of things to fight against. And so I, for me, and for Josuel, we ended up doing this work and leaving the workplace because we knew there was a better way. There was a better way to be allies and sponsors, especially to the next generation. And take you through a very recent example. You know, the reason I left work was because of the police brutality that I witnessed in the communities and I'm sure you heard this past year about the Black Lives Matter movement take on the global stage as people as allies, got in the streets to create better relationships between the police and communities of color, especially the Black community. We'll see that happened to me while I was at work. And I remember crying and not having anyone to speak about this. I wish I had an ally who would have taken me on a walk or invited me to a meal and simply listen to my experiences and my stories. So these are things that will continuously play out and will be up to us to bring out our allyship to bring out our sponsorship to actively be there for someone. So that brings you in to the conversation. Where do you play in this world? What does your identity tell you about the way you can give allyship and sponsorship and the way you also receive it, right? In some cases we're allies, in some cases we receive allyship, in some cases we're sponsors, and in some cases we're protégés, we're folks that are either the giving in or the receiving in, it's a very reciprocal relationship. But let me take you through a model that might explain how this system really works. So as you see here, you see coins, money. We're all born with a bag of coins. And the question is, not how much money you have, but are we heads or tails? How many heads and tails do you have in your bag? Which one's better? Well, we heard this before, you know, heads, you win, tails, you lose, you don't want to be in the tail end of the stick, right? So why am I talking about these things? Well, coin, money are a good model for talking about systems of inequality. See, they're twofold. So at the head of the coin, you, my experience, privileged. Just because of how you were born, you know, you didn't do anything. You have advantages that others do not just because of who you are. And at the bottom of the coin, you might experience oppression. You might see and feel disadvantages that others do not. You did not earn it. It's just simply because of who you are. And this plays out in a spectrum of identities. So what we see usually in most societies is that people at the top of the coin that experience privilege are white, young, educated men. At the bottom of the coin, you often see women, LGBTQ immigrants, low income folks, under-resourced folks. And the reality is, it hurts to see it, that the system works like that. But again, that's why allies and sponsors are important. Because just like Oswin mentioned, just by working hard enough, we don't have, we do not all have equal resources to get there. We need allies and sponsors along the way to help us rebalance the scale, rebalance the system. To take you through what that process looks like of really looking at your bag of coins that you were given at birth, we call it, you got to empty your bag of coins. You got to let go of all these things we carry, the power, the privilege or oppression and start to really understand where you play across different systems. So, Josuel, what has it been like to empty your bag of coins? It's been a journey, and it's complex. On my end, I may walk into a room and you may see me with both heads and tails. And that's visible identity, there's parts you may not know. For example, I am and I identify as a man, and that is a clear hand in society. That said, I am also a young person who grew up low income. And I am a person of color and a son of immigrants, and that brings ails and disadvantages. But for me it is important, and in my journey and I'm still coming to terms and struggling with this journey. And the more I get out there and I tell my story and I share where I come from, the more comfortable I can be coming to terms with my privilege with my gender, due to my current immigration status as an American, and also come to terms with some of the challenges that I have in the tails. We were sharing that, and you know, I'm sure that for you, Josuel, similar to myself, because of those tails, sometimes we didn't feel like we deserve that level of sponsorship. You know, we internalize our oppression to the point that we think we didn't deserve access to those things. So that's when allies really come in to make someone else feel like they belong, feel value. But to do that, to hold yourself accountable, you have to empty your bag of coins too. So obviously this is just a recording. So in your own time, do me a favor, pause the video here and do the same exercise. Run through each identity category and ask yourself, as regards to race, are you heads or tails, as regards to your gender, are you heads or tail, and really come to terms with how your identity plays into this big system. And hold yourself accountable for those identities as you give allyship, give sponsorship, as well as receive it. Let me give you a specific example of why that helps you. So let's say there was a colleague that is in the middle of a salary negotiation. They stated that they need help. So first, you have to ask, okay, what can I do to support this. You start by asking yourself, as regards to salary negotiation, this system of salary compensation, I heads, or am I at the tail end. So someone like me is definitely at the tail end data says black women get paid the less in the workplace, right. For the same amount of work. But if you're listening to this and you're either male, in particular, or you're a white male, or you're educated to a certain extent, you might need more on the heads. So there you say actually have an opportunity to help here, because I have privileges I have advantages in this conversations I did not earn it, but just because the system works. Okay, great. You know where you are in the system, you decided to help you want to be an ally. What do you do. Well, one thing you can do in this case is demonstrate transparency around your own salary can be scary right. Money is, we don't talk about it right, but in this case to be an ally transparency is key. And you can also ask your friends your colleagues to do the same, because the more you the more allies you have for a specific scenario the more effective you're going to be. And why, why is important because if this colleague that you have sees your salary and you have the same role, they can advocate to get the same salary as you to another level. Again, if you're using your nose your sniffing senses. If you're using really taking those blinders off, you're going to ask questions, you want to facilitate a conversation you want to do your research and invite your leadership to be part of it and say hey let's talk about pay equity. And why it's important for me, even though you're not the one getting pay less in your case, pay equity might be important because you know your colleagues are going to be more productive. They're going to make it easier for you, you might have family members friends who experienced the same things. So you're putting yourself in their shoes. And lastly, you can even coach your colleague on salary negotiation best practices, what has worked for you, and you can share that in their journey. But let's say you are ready for the next level up right, you want to be a sponsor. So a sponsor again, you're putting your money where your mouth is. So you're actually saying, I see the system is not working. What can I do. So if you're in manager position that's easy. You can just make sure that their job offer or their race is equitable. So you can actually sign on that. But let's say you're not. You can simply pay for a course and give it as a gift for a salary negotiation course. Again, this is what being an ultimate ally means. It takes money, it takes resources and energy, but that's what it takes to balance the scale. Next, we're going to talk about another framework because, again, you're not going to do this work overnight. So we want to give you as many tools in that journey to help you become a better ally and sponsor as well. You want to take it away. To be a strong ally and a strong sponsor means to be aware of your own identity and that of others and your bag of points. You may be asking though, how do you do that. Well, we want to propose a way. That may sound familiar because it sounds similar to a traditional framework that we've seen out here. That was popularized by Simon Sinek, where he saw that the trends of successful leaders and successful companies is to start with their why and their purpose. You have to prioritize your who, over your why. And here's why, no pun intended. We all exist in a series of relationships. So our relationship with ourselves or internalized relationship or relationship with others interpersonal relationships. And then the relationships of the institutions that we take a part of, whether that's a school whether that's a company, whether that's public health institution of bank, etc. We participate in systemic relationships, which are the governing bodies of all of these different institutions when they come together. And specific to us in the open source community. There are the different open source communities that we are part of some of them listed here within all of these groups and networks and networks of relationships. Experiences mean you can share a little bit of our experiences heads and tails, our identities, but we just grasp the surface. And not only is there a huge diversity of experiences. But we experience these identities in very different ways. Some we may emphasize personally some identities over others, we may think about some parts of our identities over others, others may interpret certain parts of our identity. More than we interpret them in ourselves. Some gives us advantages and disadvantages, etc. Here is one example of that using an identity well. We ask you not start with why, but actually start with who make that deep reflection about your own identities, your own bag of coins, and also do the same for others and listen, take time to listen to others and understand who they are and where they're coming from. Ultimately, this is going to make you a better and more effective leader. In my case, what is my who. Well, as you know, as someone who is first generation, low income son of Dominican immigrants. I am passionate about the stories and redefining narratives. And for me, the way I do that might want is delivering training and consulting at forefront. And ultimately that's connected to my why, which is I envision a world where anybody independent of their backgrounds, understood, starting with who is going to lead to benefits as an ally and as a sponsor as an ally you build more effective relationships. And as a sponsor, you're going to uncover more opportunities to be a sponsor. Just like you can't even mention earlier, we really encourage you to take time to do this exercise for yourself. Write your own circle and write your food. And here's one way to do that. Sit down and allow where you personally identify in the following categories in this identity. And also reflect how your identity affects your ability to be a sponsor or an ally. So feel free to take this for your own personal reflection. And here's another exercise. Take a broader view after you started with why and think about your own network. Or the people that you're bringing into the room, or the languages they speak. And what are the identity dimensions. Who has the power, who lacks a control of power. And one of my favorite exercises as well as a little bonus is list your five closest friends or colleagues. What is their background, what does your network look like. Additional questions for you to reflect on include asking tough questions around what are the future potential opportunities and limitations given my network and give it my true. And also ask yourself what you want to do different. So moving forward, you're starting with who now or the later end of our presentation or better said or later and we're going to present three ways that we can become a better ally and sponsor right now. Awesome, we went through a couple of great frameworks, emptying your bag of coins and start with who these frameworks take a long time. It's a journey to reflect on our identities, build relationships our side of circle it takes humility vulnerability. And in the process, it's not essential to get it right immediately, but what is important is that you do go through that process, so you can become a better ally and sponsor. Okay, what is something you can start right now to at least start practicing what allyship and sponsorship looks like so for the last part of this presentation we're going to leave you with three takeaways. And with number one, create allyship and sponsorship intentional goals. So we all go through career planning. We make our goals for the year. We recommend that you add one around allyship and sponsorship. It can be as simple as I want to invite three people to my home for dinner to start building those relationships and extending my network white dinner why something personal why something fun, because remember, these relationships are based on trust. So you can call yourself a good ally or a sponsor, unless you know who you're trying to support and help. Let's see another example. As a regards to allyship. You can say, I want to push for my company to create a more robust parental leave policy. This is a great goal. You're actively shaping the future of your company and affecting the policy. That's what allies do. But let's say you're not as passionate about parental leave policy, even though it's a very important issue. It can be about anything, but writing specific goals helps you become a better ally. Let's see one around sponsorship. Awesome. Sponsorship remember is actively promoting someone so you can have a goal to at least promote one emerging leader in your team. And let's say you're not a manager yet you're not in a position of power, but you have a very close relationship to that decision maker. So you can actively recommend someone that them speak highly of them. So they have a higher chance of getting that promotion so you still can be a sponsor for someone. Now let's take it away to take away number two. Number two, understand the past but redesign the future and the European context. The past is many times I think when you look at colonialism and imperialism. We see the European influence in the world. It's illustrated in this map, and it is a fact that we need to come to terms with. And many times you see history repeat itself, even today. The major of history has led to irresponsible design and many, and in many ways is influencing when we see the lack of diversity in the open source community today. For example, only less than 7% of type professionals in Europe, or women. And this is when we look at open source users. According to a GitHub survey, they are 95% male and open source users and developers, according to a GitHub survey identified as 16% racial and or ethnic minorities. We are setting ourselves up for longevity. Are we building a sustainable open source movement. Design that is achieved for and my communities that make up Europe is equitable. When it's the opposite. It is unequivocal. We must have designers engineers team leaders that reflect our communities. Unfortunately, there are a lot of challenges to that reality. Here we have a survey from the Pew Research Center that shares that for many, they see diversity as a threat, or see diversity in an indifferent manner. That is the reality that we also have to face that we're far from getting to where we need to be. And that is coming against the trends. The world is becoming much more diverse. Africa is the world. The most emerging and fastest growing continent. And there's a shift. We talked about China, but in 200, 200, 100, the biggest countries in the world are actually going to be India and Nigeria. That said, we have an aging Europe as we all know, there are many trends coming together, asking us questions. But yes, we need to understand the past, redefine the future. Now for number three. Last but not least, let's aim for sponsorship over allyship. Remember, sponsorship is the ultimate level of allyship. And it's because research tell us that those that have sponsors, staying in their company longer, they believe they have someone that is really, really advocating for their career. So being a sponsor goes a long way. So let's not get comfortable being an ally. Let's work our way to figure out how we can become sponsors. And the good news is that the more you work at being a sponsor, the more you further your own career. So thank you so much for listening. And these are just a couple of things you can start doing literally tomorrow. Just bring more people to the room. Be someone's hype person, advocate for someone actively refer people to opportunities. And we're excited to dig into this work with you. Thank you so much.