Notes on a Diversity Workshop
At the ABI Winter Leadership Conference, I attended a diversity and inclusion workshop put on by Elton Ndoma-Ogar of Alix Partners and Peter S. Salib of Perkins Coie, LLP. I wasn't sure that writing about an interactive workshop would be useful, but a friend encouraged me to try. At the end of the article, I have included a link to their materials, which you can access if you are an ABI member. If you are not an ABI member, contact me and I can send them to you.
In the first exercise, participants were shown three photographs and asked to write two adjectives about each. I failed the exercise because I could only think of nouns.
Photo #1 was a protest against police brutality.
Photo #2 was a collage of two men appearing romantically and then a photo of one of them as a football player.
Photo #3 was a protest for abortion right.
The crowd of about thirty participants generated about 150 responses. One of the responses to the police brutality protest was Black Lives Matter (which shows that someone else had trouble knowing what an adjective was). However, there was nothing in the photo that expressly mentioned BLM. While the facilitators did not draw an express message from the exercise what I came away with was that a group of people looking at the same photos can come away with a wide variety of impressions.
Culture and Related Terms
Next we looked at the term culture and three culture related terms. We discussed what culture meant but the materials did not contain a defined term. From discussion, I think the closest definition of culture that I was able to find online was "the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group." From that definition, the presenters gave the following definitions:
Cultural Awareness - Acknowledgment of cultural differences
Cultural Competence - Refers to one’s ability to understand, appreciate, and interact with people from different cultural backgrounds
Cultural Intelligence - Ability to interact effectively with people of different cultures
The presenters also discussed four skills for navigating cultural differences.
Cultural Due Diligence (assessing and preparing for the possible impact of culture and cultural difference)
Cultural Dialogue (exploring cultural differences and negotiating mutual adaptations)
Style-Shifting (using a different behavioral approach to accomplish one's goals)
Cultural Mentoring (helping others with cultural adaptation and integration)
Exercise #2
Case study / scenario
• Luisa Perez is a new counsel who works in the New York office.
• Luisa is 36-year-old native Puerto Rican but was raised in New York most of her life. Luisa has been added to a complicated bankruptcy matter led by a partner and a few junior associates in the Pacific Northwest (PNW) office.
• The PNW partner and associates have found Luisa to be quite assertive with her positions on the matter and expresses them often.
• Luisa is frustrated with the slow pace, pushed deadlines, and multiple rounds of discussions about the same topics to try and get consensus.
• Discuss the team dynamics and how both Luisa and the PNW team members could be more culturally intelligent.
Case study / scenario
• What are some of the cultural challenges both Luisa and the PNW folks need to address?
• What other dynamics are in play between the PNW team members and Luisa?
• Putting yourself in the Luisa’s or the PNW folks’ places, what would you do to try and be more culturally intelligent?
• What are the risks if nothing is done, or if the difficulties are mismanaged by either party?
• What are the benefits if the parties work to resolve the issues?
• What are the implications to either the individuals, group, and/or the organization?
The room was broken into groups to discuss the scenario. We were only given about ten minutes which was just enough to sample the problem. In order to fully recreate the workshop atmosphere, I should let the readers discuss the problem amongst yourself. However, that is hard to do in the blog format.
Some of the comments that came up were that Luisa and the Pacific Northwest team had different styles for approaching a problem. Neither style was "right" but they would have to be synthesized if the parties were to work together. For my part, I identified with Luisa. I like for discussions to flow in a linear fashion toward a conclusion. It drives me absolutely bonkers when a discussion seems to go round and round in no particular order. I also value arriving at a conclusion and moving forward even if it's not possible to reach consensus.
The clash of styles had consequences for both sides of the group. If they could not reconcile their approaches, they would waste valuable resources bickering. For Luisa, getting a good recommendation from the Pacific Northwest partner would affect her ability to advance in the firm. For the firm, if Luisa got frustrated and left, they would lose their investment in her and the potential benefits she could have brought to the firm.
My Thoughts
I wasn't sure what to expect when I went to this program. In some circles, diversity and inclusion are considered to be code words for social engineering. This workshop was anything but radical. It focused on empathy, communication and understanding. These are all good skills for any attorney to have.
You can find the materials here.
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