What happens after radical truth telling and acknowledgement?

One of the things that often happens when you open up the space for difficult conversations about racism and other form of systemic oppression that might be underlying the challenges and harm experienced by the most impacted in a community or organization is that it gets messy. It feels uncomfortable. It is often intensely painful.

It is not equally painful for everyone though, or painful in the same way.

It can feel painful for well-meaning leadership who never intended or wanted their staff to have these experiences, for example to feel dismissed, devalued, ignored, or characterized as divisive for speaking up about the ways the organization could be more aligned with their mission.

To hear that, and to hear how you specifically might have perpetuated that kind of environment, can hurt.

In some cases, leadership had no idea, and it's a shock that can lead to defensiveness and denial, confusion, anger, and retaliation.

Even where there is genuine openness and empathy, often what we see is panic and a rush to "fix" things. Other times there is a paralysis about what to do.

Meanwhile, the experience of finally being heard and acknowledged can be cathartic for those most impacted - in the organizations we work with, it is usually Black, Indigenous and other people of color (BIPOC) who have experienced the most harm, especially Black women in junior or admin positions, or who have been at an organization for a long time, and through previous even more oppressive leadership. In fact, it is often the arrival of new leadership that opens up the space to be heard in the first place, which can feel terrible for that new leadership who might have inherited decades of harm that does not just dissipate overnight, but also was never previously talked about openly.

It can be a powerful moment of radical truth telling, acknowledgement and healing to have these conversations.

This is an action step in and of itself, and it's important to pause and take a moment for this to take place without rushing onto "but what do we do?" - but it's not enough.

For those folks speaking up, it can come at a cost, both psychological and in the form of fear - fear of retaliation, as well as actual retaliation. I think we all intuitively if not explicitly are aware of and brace ourselves for backlash after speaking truth to power.

Even without a backlash, one of the more damaging things an organization can do, worse than not creating the space to speak up, is to create the space for speaking up and then not do anything.

And in some ways even worse than not doing anything, is to try to do some things without telling anyone.

Seriously, this is a thing.

Equity without inclusion is still oppression.

We've seen this in a few organizations, where leadership starts to put a good faith effort into making decisions that are grounded in equity, but without working collaboratively with the organization or community to co-create shifts in culture, it lands as paternalism (those in power thinking they can make decisions for those without power without actually asking them or involving them), defensiveness, and lack of transparency - no one feels heard or included, despite best intentions.

Even our team at Co-Creating Inclusion has slipped up with this at times, and however co-creative we think we are being, we have to continually ask ourselves how we can be even more so, even earlier in the process.

Equity can often get mis-applied as "if this one solution doesn't work for everyone, then we can't do it at all and nobody gets what we need." It is definitely a step forward to be considering the needs of everyone, and not just those who align with power and privilege, but this can cause more harm by creating resentment towards equity, and specifically towards BIPOC and other more systemically marginalized folks who come to be characterized as "ruining all the fun."

It's also why "secret equity" is not mutually exclusive with "empty promises" - promising to do things but not following through.

Equity is NOT about creating a one size fits all solution that works (or doesn't work) equally for everyone - it's about options and flexibility and multiple points of access so that everyone gets what they need, which might not be the same thing.

And equity needs to work in tandem with inclusion so that solutions are co-created, not determined only by those in power.

All this to say - this work is no joke. It should not be undertaken unless an organization or community has not just the intention but the means to take it seriously.

And be prepared - things might just feel like they got a whole lot worse at first, especially to leadership, once you open up the space to hear what folks are actually experiencing, and not just what they've felt safe to tell you, or what you've been able to hear.

When you start asking questions, you might not like the answers, and you might well wish you never asked YET THIS IS STILL PROGRESS IF YOU CAN STICK WITH THE PROCESS AND MOVE THROUGH THE DISCOMFORT.

One of the most common fears from staff when they come to the workshops that we do within organizations is that "nothing will change" as a result. We remind people that establishing common language and frameworks within which to engage in radical truth telling and acknowledgement is itself an action.

You can't skip this step, but you can't stop here.

It can be a start to the healing process, but only if you keep going.

What we've found that looks like is moving on to create an overall strategy - a plan that identifies areas of focus and priorities, some sort of timeline, as well as a structure for implementation. It's a roadmap that is co-created and then communicated transparently across the organization so everyone knows they are on a journey and the direction they are going in.

They need to know that there will be consistency and accountability. Things do not need to be "fixed" overnight but there needs to be a sense that there is a plan and progress in the right direction - sustained, intentional progress, even if progress is slow.

I've heard many people talk about how divided the US feels right now (as well as many other places across the globe). I don't disagree, but my work gives me a different perspective, which is that we have always been divided, but it hasn't always been spoken about, or rather, only one side, the side aligned with power and privilege, had a voice. And so they didn't need to speak as loudly either.

Calls for unity often land as calls for silence, as though the oppressed are creating the divide, not the oppressor.

Of course, there have been many points in time in history where the more systemically marginalized has spoken up, and it has almost always lead to a "divide" - and often to war, rebellion, revolution. Power doesn't like to give itself up, and will try to protect itself by any means necessary. Oppression takes violence. But the "divide" was always there, and it wasn't created by those who seem to be speaking most loudly about it, only because they have been forced to in order to be heard at all.

So, what will we do? Are we willing to confront the divide, even if it is inconvenient? Even if it is painful? Are we willing to pay the cost of disrupting the status quo?

And more importantly, for how long are we willing to pay the cost of NOT disrupting the status quo?

Banner photo by Jonny Clow on Unsplash. Also published on LinkedIn.

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