Celebrate Pride — Celebrate Diversity

The curtain opened to reveal the performers — all clad in tie-dyed shirts, a tribute to the summer of 1969 — the summer of love. I immediately noticed the inclusion of individuals with disabilities among the chorus members, themselves a diverse group. Diversity has no limits. They burst into song, one of my favorites — a classical tribute to diversity — Everyday People, words and music by Sylvester Stewart — Sly and the Family Stone.

The New Mexico Gay Men’s Chorus was performing its annual Pride Concert, and the theme this year, 2019, was a celebration of Stonewall and the summer of ‘69. Interspersed with the songs was a narrator telling the history of Greenwich Village as a haven for the LGBTQ community and the events leading up to the Stonewall Riots which began with a raid on the Stonewall Inn on June 27, 1969 and sparked an avalanche of anger. For the LGBTQ community, it was their Rosa Parks moment – the start Gay Power and Gay Pride.

Stonewall’s legacy is resistance against repression. Read more about Stonewall on the History Channel’s website, History.com at https://www.history.com/news/stonewall-riots-timeline

The songs in the program captured the music of that summer, but also the spirit of the dawn of the Gay Liberation movement. How many of these songs do you remember: Cherish, You’ve Made Me So Very Happy, The Impossible Dream, Time of the Season, and Aquarius — just to name a few.  They ended with a poignant rendition of He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother before getting the audience on their feet for a rousing encore of Everyday People.

June is a month of celebrations. Celebrate Summer, Celebrate the Arts, Celebrate Equality, Celebrate Human Rights & Dignity. Let The Sunshine In.

#KuToo

You may have read recently about the protest in Japan. Women are protesting, no revolting, against the requirement that they wear high heels to work, claiming it’s gender discrimination. Japan’s Health, Labour and Welfare Minister, Takumi Nemoto, a man, claims, “It is socially accepted as something that falls within the realm of being occupationally necessary and appropriate.”  Well, I respectfully disagree.

When I heard a news clip on the radio about the #KuToo movement, a play on the words for shoes and agony, I thought of something I read in a career advice column earlier in the year.

The advice seeker wrote that her company requires professional office attire and for women that means high heels. She’d been diagnosed with back pain and told by her doctor to wear flats.  Her boss called her out for wearing casual shoes. She wanted to know if the boss could dictate what she wore.

Well, both columnists who responded totally missed the mark. She talked about employment-at-will, securing doctors notes and eliciting advice from the boss. He did an on-line search of women’s shoes where he found 25 types of women’s heels, and talked about a shopping trip with his wife for women’s shoes.

While Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn’t specify manner of dress as a protection, there are state and local non-discrimination laws that do. And without checking with an employment attorney, I’d venture an opinion that requiring women to where a certain style of shoes, while not making the same demands on men, is likely sex discrimination under Title VII – or close to it.

The advice seeker didn’t elaborate on the nature of her back pain, but its root cause could be covered by the Americans with Disability Act.  Her employer could be flirting with yet another claim of discrimination.

Dress codes are tricky. Indeed, we struggled with how to talk about “questionable” workplace dress in our next book about the dynamics of workplace behavior.  Yes, employers should have the expectation their team members – male and female – will dress in a manner that’s professional, acceptable and appropriate for the organization’s business. In certain occupations, those that are safety related for example, requirements for certain manner of dress, including shoes, is certainly reasonable.  But mandating that high heels is the only acceptable foot ware for women, is not.

In The Manager’s Answer Book, we talk about recognizing other legal pitfalls in Section 7. We’d be delighted if you’d purchase a copy and check it out. https://tinyurl.com/y8umaqpz

Commencements and Commitments

It’s June, the month of graduations and weddings — commencements and commitments. 

Graduations.  They occur at the end of an academic phase — the end of high school or college, for example — with a commencement ceremony. A commencement is a beginning or start of something new. So, graduations are about ending one phase and starting a new one. 

We are in a commencement phase ourselves. Since 2011, we’ve been writing and publishing nonfiction business books of a prescriptive nature. Now, however, we’re on the cusp of a new chapter — writing and publishing in a new genre — narrative nonfiction. Narrative nonfiction is like a novel. It tells a story or stories.

We've been on a journey writing this narrative nonfiction book. Recognizing there are many stories to tell about the dynamics of workplace behavior, we set out to gather them from our colleagues. Since we wanted to write a compelling and enticing book, we took many storytelling liberties. The stories we heard were molded, tweaked, and often combined with others to fit the structure of the scenes we created throughout this book.

In order to preserve the privacy and identity of the individuals and organizations involved, we created a fictitious company and cast of characters as a backdrop against which we tell these tales. The characters portrayed are composites of a large number of professionals across a wide variety of industries and throughout multiple careers. 

Weddings. They represent commitments. A couple on a journey is looking forward and making commitments to each other about the future.  Our idea for this work of narrative nonfiction formed in 2011 as we concluded writing The Big Book of HR. Along the journey — gathering stories, countless drafts, rewrites, and edits — we were interrupted with requests from our publisher to write three more books. Then there were other life events that stalled us. 

Now we are rocking it. This year alone the manuscript has been in the hands of four HR colleagues for peer review and now it’s been turned over to three beta readers for their critique.  Once we get all this feedback, more rewrites will be done. Then we can move onward to get the book to market.

We know there’s still a great deal more to do — cover design, editing, formatting — but we’re on a solid path to the next stop on our journey. Publication and book launch are planned for 2020. 

Many of our readers have been along on this journey with us.  Now, we invite all of you to keep up with our progress and hold us to our commitment. We’ll be sharing more information in our weekly blog — makingpeoplematter.blogspot.com — and in this monthly newsletter, so please be on the lookout for them. 

Barbara and Cornelia

First Impressions

I recently walked into a huge office complex for the first time and stopped for a moment looking for the building directory. I heard a voice behind me say, “Do you have a problem?” I didn’t think he could be talking to me but when he repeated the words, I realized he was – he was asking me if I had a problem.

I was stunned at his choice of words.  He must have thought he was being helpful, but he made me feel I’d done something wrong.  I certainly didn’t feel welcomed.

I politely explained that this was my first time in this building and I was a bit unsure of where I was to go. What I really wanted to say was no, I didn’t have a problem, but you certainly do.

It would have made such a difference to me if he’d said something like, “Can I help you find where you’re going” or “The building directory is to your left.”

Sure, we all have bad days when we say or do something that is out of character. Maybe on another day, this man would have welcomed me and been helpful rather than treating me like I was a problem he’d have to fix. However, I may not ever go to that building again and he’ll never have a chance for a do-over.

There was an old Head and Shoulders commercial that said, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” How true that has turned out to be. We all need to be aware of what we say and how we say it so that the person we are interacting with, is left with a positive impression – even if the interaction is as short term as the guard in the example above. 

How about when you go for a job interview? What about your first meeting with a prospective client? Do you think about what you plan to say and how you plan to say it before your meet? If not, you may want to run your opening through your brain or practice it out loud a couple of times so the first impression you make is a positive one.

Now, don’t get me started about the habit so many people have of saying, “No problem” instead of “you’re welcome” when they are thanked!  I want to respond – “I know I wasn’t a problem” but I stop myself.  Yet, it is tempting!