 It is so lovely to see some beautiful faces in this room. My name is Sam Morielli. I use they, them pronouns. I'm on the land of the Lenape people in Brooklyn, New York, the Lenape M. Canarsie people, excuse me. And I am just here to do a little bit of housekeeping at the top of this session for all of you today. Thank you for joining us. There are captions available if you need them. They're enabled. You can click the live transcript button and show subtitles at the bottom. I, as I said, I'm supporting all logistics. So if you have any tech needs throughout this session, feel free to message me directly. And I'll just remind everybody there will be participation later in the session, but throughout just keep yourself muted and you can be on cam, off cam, whatever works for you. We'll spotlight the speakers so you'll see them. And we are recording this session. So just note that. And with all that business out of the way, I'm just gonna offer the floor to Elena to do a little bit of framing for us. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Sam. Hi, my name is Elena Chang, Director of ED&I Initiatives at TCG. She and her hers, dialing in from the land of the Lenape, West New York, New Jersey. I have dark brown mid-length hair and I'm wearing a blue blouse and my backdrop is a bit blurred today. On behalf of TCG, we're thrilled to have with us today, ALJP, C-Jam, Stewart Cultural Group and Unlock Creative, as well as those of you zooming in. On the ALJP side, I do wanna lift that we have Leandro Zanetti with us and I was very pleased to see that Leandro made it to the beautiful slide from Marketing and Production, Go MMP. I've really been looking forward to this session and I can tell that many of you have been as well. We've received messages, a lot of excitement, so I'm just gonna offer a little bit of framing before we begin. You may have seen a McKinsey piece last fall called Diverse Employees Are Struggling the Most During COVID-19 and here's how companies can respond. The piece pointed out the importance of asking new questions for a changed future for the workplace. Executives were asked to what degree their CEOs prioritized diversity, equity and inclusion during the pandemic and unsurprisingly, nine out of 10 responded that even with the pressures with the crisis, DEI remains a moderate, very important or top priority. So what is the role that search firms can play in this? What are the unique challenges that BIPOCs may face in navigating a job search during these times? In terms of structure for today, we're going to kick it off with brief presentations in an open space for all. Afterward, we'll be transitioning to a BIPOC-only affinity space. The companies featured today are all BIPOC-led and have at their very core methodologies in place as the field reopens. They are working to alleviate traditional barriers of access through their positions as leaders of searches and strategic planning and consulting. So thank you so much all for joining us, Jocelyn, Leandro, William, Harold and Ashley. Super happy to have you all ALJP. Let's have you kick this off, shall we? Thanks so much, Elena. Really happy to be here. So my name's Jocelyn Prince, she or hers. I'm in Chicago, which is the land of the Council of the Three Fires. And I'm a principal and co-founder of ALJP Consulting. Just to tell you a little bit about us, we incorporated in August of 2019. And we had been informally sort of doing this work for some time, myself and my partner, Al Hartley. And we were getting approached all the time by these sort of white led old school search firms contacting us about lists, like give me a list of BIPOC people, who are the development managers out there? Do you have a list of people who might be good for a production management job? And we thought, why are we doing this? We could do this ourselves. And we could also think more deeply about the context in which these searches are happening. So we wanted to think about what it means when you have the gatekeepers to the industry, these sort of white led, very white male dominated search and strategic planning firms who have connections to Ivy League institutions. And it's very elitist and it's very difficult to get on their radar. And so we started to think about what it would look like if we leveraged our network and started to try to create more opportunities and more pathways for BIPOC folks who are working in the industry and who are looking for leadership positions. We started to think about things like retention, strategic planning, thinking about the culture within the organization and building community in these organizations. So that BIPOC people working in organizations and institutions can be successful. So we're interested in changing kind of the fabric of institutions having an influence on that from a BIPOC center perspective. And then we're also very interested in changing the ecology of the arts and culture sector of the whole. So we think that that sector should look like the world in which we live, it should look like, certainly the United States and the diversity that exists within our country. So we're a mission-driven firm. We are for profit and our services cost money, but we have a mission sort of beyond that monetary gain that has to do with making real change. I wanna pass it to Leandro to talk a little bit about some of our methodology and the tools that we use. Thanks JP. My name is Leandro Zanetti. I'm a senior consultant at ALJP. I've been with the company since May of 2020. So I just hit my one year anniversary. I couldn't be more thrilled to be a part of this amazing group of people. And I just wanted to talk a little bit about the ways in which we do this methodologies and how we think about really supporting candidates through process and organizations to make the most equitable decisions possible. And what we center focusing on bias and unconscious bias in each one of our services, particularly in search services, we do trainings with folks to make sure that people are aware of their biases and how to become more aware of their unconscious biases. We help them develop questions that help address those biases in the room. And then throughout the deliberation process, we continue to sort of bring up this idea of bias and the fact of bias. And we're not trying to eliminate bias because we know we all hold them. We just want to acknowledge that they exist and be sure that we're looking at them as we're making these decisions so that we can make sure that we're taking those biases into account and making sure that we can start to work against them. And the first step of that is really acknowledging that they are there and acknowledging that they will influence the way that we have these discussions and the decisions that we make. In terms of our influences, we are very heavily influenced by Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Marie Brown. I do this all the time, but I literally have her book like within arms reach at all times thinking about those things as we go into this and really thinking about the emergence of these processes, right? Not sticking to any sort of rigid structure of like this is the way that ALJP does it. We really try to focus our methodologies and our process on what the organization needs and we listen first and then make that plan. So allowing for things to change throughout the search process and allowing for the emergence of new ideas to really come up as we go through this process with folks. We are also heavily influenced and often refer to the white supremacy culture characteristics by Tema Okun and DR Works, really naming those within organizations, knowing that we operate within a white supremacist society and culture, just knowing what those characteristics are and being able to name them when we see them both in our strategic planning and in our search processes. And then in terms of services that we offer, we offer talent searches that range anywhere from artistic directors, executive directors, senior level positions and entry level positions, depending on what folks need. We do strategic planning with a focus on anti-racism and really putting anti-racism at the core of that planning. And then we do community building, making sure that folks have access and have the tools to really communicate with their communities and building those relationships. Some people that we've worked with have included the LARC where we placed May Adralis as the artistic director, Marin Theater Company where Meredith Settles was placed as the executive director and we did a community building and strategy process with Waterwell, which is a company in New York City. And in all of those cases, again, we have developed this methodology that has really allowed for folks to make what we believe to be more equitable decisions and decisions that help people share power. Decisions that allow folks who are not necessarily in these positions of leadership to have their voices heard and to really build the systems and address the systems that maybe keep them out of power. Jocelyn, anything you would wanna add there? No, I think that's good. Thank you. Great, all right, thank you. I'm gonna pass it over to William at Sea Jam. Thank you, Leandro. My name is William Bryant Miles. My pronouns are he, him, his. I've got on a festive little polka dot shirt in front of some books. I'm a black boy and I'm here in New York City. I represent Sea Jam Consulting where I'm a senior consultant. I've been with Sea Jam since 2008. However, Sea Jam was founded in 2006 by Candace Jackson. That's the CJ in Sea Jam. And Sea Jam, basically it was founded to strengthen the business of arts and culture now that has evolved into really working with arts and cultural organizations at pivotal moments of change. Our practice specializes in small to mid-sized organizations that are impacting and or led, excuse me, impacting communities of color and or led by people of color. And our work involves many different things. We really pride ourselves on having a bespoke approach to projects and really getting in there and identifying what this moment of change is for the organization, whether that's moving into a new facility, creating a new operating structure, bringing on new executive leadership or so many, or responding to some external crisis, figuring out what that changes in identifying the appropriate solution. We work on innovative solutions that are rooted in best practice. So we are very excited by ideas that have not been tried before, but we also recognize that some things that have existed have worked. And so there's no need to reinvent the wheel unnecessarily, but if we need to, we are totally about getting in a boat or jumping into an airplane. Our project, excuse me, our services include strategic planning, business plan development, project management, DEI training and facilitation, visioning exercises, and what we call Full Scope, which is where we partner with the organization to fill gaps in operational needs or actually operational and or staffing needs and being on site until the appropriate person can be hired and or training the person that has been brought in for the role so that the organization can really work effectively. What we've learned over these 15 years is that a lot of times, especially small organizations in communities of color have really dynamic leadership, perhaps some of the most dedicated leaders that you'll ever meet, but they just don't have the bandwidth. And so the work doesn't always get done most efficiently because they don't have the appropriate people at the wheel and to bring on that person sometimes even takes away from the doing of the thing. So we like to partner with them through the Full Scope program to help them fill that gap in the short term while we work to figure out a long-term and permanent solution. That is our work. Where we've done our work has been all over the United States. Both Candace and I bring and the rest of our consultant team, we bring international perspectives but our work has been rooted in the US. We've worked with the Apollo Theater, the Flea Theater, quite a bit of work in Pittsburgh with August Wilson House, Mendless & Choir, Pittsburgh, Hill Dance Academy Theater and many, many, many, many more. You can see our full client list on our website, CJM Consulting. I'm most excited about being in conversation with the wonderful panelists and all of you. So I'm going to stop there and pass this on to Harold at SCDG. Thank you, William. So my name is Harold Stewart. For those of you who don't know me, my pronouns are he and city Boston. And many of you may know that I am in another hat, and I wear many hats, literally. I am the executive director and creative strategist for the theater fans up here in Boston. However, when I took that job, I said that, you know, I have my own private practice and it's important for me to maintain that practice. And I think that's important, especially for BIPOC people to understand that one organization does not kind of shape our practice or own our intellectual property and practice. So we had that conversation up front and I would manage what jobs I took in consulting, but it was important to know that I still wanted ownership of self and what I was bringing when I came to this organization, that the organization would indeed increase my knowledge. So Stewart Cultural Development Group was founded in 2015. LinkedIn just let me know that it was six years a month ago. And I was like, well, what anniversary do I have? And interesting enough, it was founded in dollar six is where I'm from. And even before that, when my class and my generation came home from college and being out there in the world, the elders in our community made us prove that we had learned something. So we had to do a series of workshops and trainees and all of these things approved that we had learned something. And that really is how it got started, you know. Some of you may know Ashley Wilkerson and Sarah McCurria, who I feel like we all came back at the same time and was on this, you know, the Ms. Clark call you, you got to go do this and talk about what, man, me too. But they would do things like Asada Shakur teach-ins and then I would do things like, how do you have art support the core curriculum at our DISD schools and all just kind of, whatever was, you know, top of mind we had to prove that we knew something in community. And that's important because once we had this work under us I was pushed to the front to kind of start the consulting group. And I said I would only do it if my friends would kind of work with me. And it's been that way since the beginning, you know, the philosophy is any knowledge that we know is knowledge that we have to share, right? So the consulting firm is because at some point we grew up and decided we needed an LLC, like, you know, we were growing in our business knowledge as well, but it's been really a phenomenal kind of project of passion and community to share what we've learned as we continue to learn and grow. We define and work around this concept of cultural development. And for us, that means we work with organizations to increase their capacity to assess their capacity and increase and sustain cultural assets and may get to define what a cultural asset is, right? So that could be a non-profit arts organization. It could be, you know, a piece of art. It could be just self. We don't define what cultural assets are. I think in terms of our services, and this is also important, you know, we do long-term planning, whether that's strategic planning, program plans, accession, change of management, policy work, Sarah sits and works a policy link. So she is our policy guru. So we do policy work, facility planning, revenue enhancement, so that's contributed and earned revenue, risk and change management, feasibility studies and capital campaigns, as well as equity enhancement. So whether that's EDI workshops, assessments, plan development. And that was also important too, that we didn't starve at EDI. You know, we definitely started from a place of community, but, you know, once we engaged in non-profit work, all the best practices was coming from white folks. So we felt like it was important for us to say, one, don't pigeonhole us into EDI work, but, you know, we can successfully do revenue enhancement. We can close any size gift, major gifts. You know, I am happy and very proud. And this, you know, the pride that I have goes all the way back to my grandmother to say, I've closed, you know, seven-figure deals, you know, multiple ones, right? And to be the face of that, because when I was coming up as a managing director, whatever I was, I didn't see black people closing these types of deals. So I always felt like I had to depend on white strategy and philosophy, but that is a myth and a lie, because we apply, you know, cultural strategy to anything in terms of organizational development. So I think that's what's important to know about our work. The other thing that's really, you know, liberating is that we get to pick our projects. So again, our lives is in service to the liberation of black people. So when we get requests, and there are a lot of requests coming right now, we say, well, how does this liberate black folks, right? Is it just by awareness or where, you know, where is that at? And that's inter-culturally and as well as with white folks. And so it is liberating to be able to turn around and turn down some consulting if it's just not a good fit. So that keeps us humble, right? It keeps us kind of motivated and it keeps us kind of mission oriented because we really are selective about who we work with as selective as the organizations are about working with us. Our work in recent years have been in New England because that's where I am with organizations like the New England Foundation for the Arts Boston Center for the Arts Boston Jag Productions in Vermont, but a lot of organizations back home and then the reach is growing. And I will stop there and pass it to my sister who we also grew up in this industry together and Unlock Creative Ashley Walden Davis. Thank you, Harold. I'm so nice to see your face today. So nice to see everyone's faces. My name is Ashley Walden Davis. She, her, hers based in Atlanta, Georgia, the Muscogee Creek land. I am the founder of Unlock Creative with my co-founder and business partner, Bestie, Candace L. Feldman. And for folks who don't know, because it's kind of new, Candace plus Ashley equals Cashlin Enterprises. And we actually have three entities that we steward together, which include Unlock Creative, Coaching and Management Solutions LLC, the business that we'll talk about today, the Unlock Creative Foundation, AKA Queendom dedicated to black women, which is a 501C3 and the National Black Women Creative Cooperative, which is a black woman on cooperative. So you'll hear more about those later. Unlock Creative is a social enterprise whose mission is to nurture, grow and sustain black creative leadership. We work strategically to hold human connection and design systems and structures where black people and people of color are personally and professionally, both within organizations and independently. We center joy, love, racial and cultural equity and all our vibe programs and services. And we believe that to create work environments and systems where black people thrive, all people of color and others will as well. And I know some of my colleagues kind of have talked about that today and I feel like a lot of our work is very much in alignment. I have put our link in the chat if you want to check out more of our services. So what our primary goal is for our organization is we are focused on developing black leadership in the creative and nonprofit sectors by enhancing organizations and building capacity and know how our current leaders and future leaders. So again, the link that I provided, you can see a detailed list of all the types of services that we provide, but we are really focused on providing generous compassion and focused coaching to emerging and mid-level creators as well as high quality management of projects in the creative and nonprofit sector in an ethical and values-based manner. So my partner, Candice, really is the one that the big things that she really enjoys working on is equity audience and these searches. What I really love working on is organizational development. So I think for my other friends here, I think maybe William talks about that a little bit is we really love working with organizations to help them build their policies and practices. And when we're helping them, we're trying to build those in an equitable way. So if you do look at our website, you won't see that we're like, oh, the equity folks, but if you want a handbook, I'm gonna give you a handbook that is equitable though and that those are gonna be some of the words that's baked in when you hire unlock creative. So why were we founded? So we're the newbie on the block. We were founded last year, June 4th, 2020 and we took off at the height of Juneteenth with everything that was going on in the world that y'all probably remember doing the pandemic, the violence against black people. It really called for us to do our part. So some folks might know, I had just recently started a position that I thought I wanted for it forever and that lasted all of 30 days. And on Juneteenth, I liberated myself and quit and I started this company and Candace, eight weeks later, Candace did the same thing. And so really where we are part of this work is what we felt like we wanted to do to support the movement. We joined this movement by declaring that black lives are beautiful and black lives matter and so does black wealth. So what we wanted to commit to is giving all of our talent that we have been given across our careers. We each have about 15 years in the industry. We wanted to really dedicate those to black institution and building up black creative leaders. So that's what we're here doing today. And what we wanna share. So again, you can check out our website at unlockcreative.org and we'd be excited to partner with any of the TCG member theaters or folks on this call today. So thank you for having us. Amazing. I'm gonna come in, I'm gonna come in, hold on. There we go. Hi everybody. First of all, thank you to all of our speakers. You all are phenomenal. I am so excited by your work, so inspired by your work. I may be a little baby strategic planner myself. And so again, I just wanna thank you for your brief remarks. And I'll encourage everybody on this call, though I know they all mentioned that they're overextended in these times, hire these brilliant people because they do brilliant work. At this moment, we're transitioning into an affinity space. So if you do not identify as somebody who is BIPOC of color, somebody of the global majority, essentially anybody who is non-white, we'll just ask and hold for this moment that you exit the space so that we can gather an affinity for the next portion of the session. For those watching the live stream on HowlRound, thank you for joining us in order to also honor the privacy of an affinity space. We're gonna stop the live stream as well. So we appreciate you being here, being your beautiful selves. And with that, I'm just gonna literally stay here in front of you for like a minute while people sort themselves out. You're just gonna be awkwardly showing your beautiful self as we hold space for only our BIPOC folks. Let's give it like an awkward minute or two, do a little shimmy Sam. And Lisa says, Lisa Richardson says, those nails show it all, okay? I'm gonna do a little bit of a countdown. This is your final minute folks who are non-BIPOC to please leave us be.