Race-based Caucusing in the Workplace (EP.44)
Last Updated
September 20, 2021
Courtney Harge (CEO, OF/BY/FOR ALL) and Nicola Carpenter (Director of People Operations, Fractured Atlas) sit down with Tim Cynova to answer the 30 questions they most frequently receive when speaking with individuals and organizations about race-based caucusing in the workplace.
Want to learn more? Join them for their brand new course "Race-Based Caucusing in the Workplace: The Why & How" taking place in October 2021. To find out more visit.
Guests: Nicola Carpenter & Courtney Harge
Host: Tim Cynova
Guests
NICOLA CARPENTER works on the People team at Fractured Atlas, where she finds ways for tools and processes to better align with the organization’s purpose. She believes in tools so much that she sets personal OKRs every quarter. Prior to joining Fractured Atlas, Nicola worked for a variety of arts organizations including MoMA PS1, Walker Art Center, and Heidelberger Kunstverein, and she still has a particular love for museums. Originally from Minneapolis, she received a BFA in Art from the University of Minnesota and continues to stay creative through knitting and sewing clothes. She is currently in too many book clubs, but still somehow finds time to read books about organizational culture for fun. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at @colacarp.
COURTNEY HARGE is an arts administrator, director, and writer originally from Saginaw, MI who has been working in the service of artists for the last fifteen years. She is the founder and Producing Artistic Director of Colloquy Collective, an emerging theater company in Brooklyn, NY. Courtney is also a proud member of Women of Color in the Arts, and a 2016 alum of both APAP’s Emerging Leaders Institute and artEquity’s Facilitator Training. She holds a Masters of Professional Studies, with Distinction, in Arts and Cultural Management from Pratt Institute. You can find more information about her at www.courtneyharge.com and find her on Instagram and Twitter at @Arts_Courtney. Her credo (#HustlingKeepsYouSexy) is not merely a hashtag; it’s a way of life.
Host
TIM CYNOVA (he/him) wears a multitude of hats, all in service of creating anti-racist workplaces where people can thrive. He is the Principal of the consulting group Work. Shouldn’t. Suck. and has deep knowledge and experience in HR and people-centric organizational design. He currently leads curriculum design in WSS’s areas of expertise: from sharing leadership and power to decolonizing the employee handbook and bylaws; talking with humans to how to hire. His book, Hire with Confidence, based on his experience leading hundreds of searches and “retooling” the traditional search process to center anti-racism and anti-oppression, is scheduled to be published in Winter 2021. In April 2021, he and WSS produced the Ethical Re-Opening Summit, a one-day online convening that explored the question, “How can we co-create a future where everyone thrives as we move into this next stage of a global pandemic?”
In August 2021, Tim closed out his 12-year tenure leading Fractured Atlas, the largest association of artists in the U.S., where he served in both the COO and Co-CEO roles, and was deeply involved in its work to become an anti-racist, anti-oppressive organization since they made this commitment in 2013. Additionally, he serves on the faculty of Banff Centre for Arts & Creativity and The New School teaching courses in People-Centric Organizational Design and Strategic HR; he's a trained mediator, and a certified Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR). Earlier in his career, Tim was the Executive Director of The Parsons Dance Company and of High 5 Tickets to the Arts in New York City, had a memorable stint with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, was a one-time classical trombonist, musicologist, and for five years in his youth he delivered newspapers for the Evansville, Indiana Courier-Press. Also, during a particularly slow summer, he bicycled 3,902 miles across the United States.
Transcript
Tim Cynova:
Hi, I’m Tim Cynova and welcome to Work Shouldn't Suck, a podcast about, well, that.
On this episode, we explore 30 frequently asked questions about race-based caucusing in the workplace. How do I know they’re frequently asked? Because my guests have had hundreds of conversations with individuals and organizations over the years interested in learning more about the caucus process, and they’ve told me that these are some of the questions at the top of most people’s lists.
For this episode, it's a pleasure to welcome back on the podcast the always awesome Courtney Harge and Nicola Carpenter. And I’m excited to announce that if you want to dig into this topic further with them, they’re co-teaching a brand new four-week course online this fall: Race-Based Caucusing in the Workplace: The Why & How. Head over to work shouldn’t suck dot c-o backslash courses to find more information about the course and to register.
As a preview to this upcoming course, I thought it would be fun to ask them about -- in a kind of 73 Questions with Vogue -- some of the questions they frequently receive when people ask them about race-based caucusing workplace.
We don’t have 73 questions, but what we do have are two incredibly knowledgeable people whose answers are chocked full of expertise and insights. And even with these 30 questions, we’lll just start to scratch the surface -- which is why they created the course to dive deeper into the content -- so let’s get going…
Courtney and Nicola, welcome to the podcast!
Courtney Harge:
Thanks Tim. Happy to be here.
Nicola Carpenter:
Yeah. Same. I'm excited.
Tim Cynova:
What is anti-racism, anti-oppression work, and in particular, anti-racism, anti-oppression work in the workplace?
Courtney Harge:
Anti-racism, anti-oppression work is in all spaces the act of interrupting and redirecting oppressive systems. Oppressive systems are at play at work. Capitalism is imbued with oppressive systems. And so the work of anti-racism and anti-oppression at work is interrupting how those systems are laid on top of how we do our jobs.
Tim Cynova:
What does accountability look like for anti-racism, anti-oppression work in the workplace?
Courtney Harge:
Accountability looks different than it looks I think in other aspects of work. It's difficult to measure that we are 30% less racist than we were last week or that we have improved our anti-racism by 20% over last quarter. Like it's less measurable than one would seem. It's more about the workplace feels less hostile, there's less tension. There are ways in which you can be more productive because people are more willing to be honest and open in the work that they're doing. So accountability actually looks like a healthy, thriving, happy workplace in ways that may not be measurable, but are definitely tangible.
Nicola Carpenter:
And I think that accountability looks different depending on what you're talking about. And I think that we talk about this more with caucusing. There are very specific ways that we talk about accountability related to caucusing. I think that there are different ways that we talk about accountability related to, you know, with smaller things. I think it's harder to talk about accountability in a large way and easier when talking about accountability in smaller ways. How are you accountable in your specific job? How are you accountable in smaller little chunks? So I think it's hard to talk about accountability in a huge chunk, but it's way easier to talk about accountability in tinier little pieces. So how are you accountable in this one decision, how are you accountable in this one smaller way I think is a much easier way to approach this. And I think later we can talk more about accountability within the caucus structure and building accountability in the workplace through caucusing. I think that it becomes a lot easier to answer these big hard questions when you start breaking them up into smaller pieces.
Tim Cynova:
What is race-based caucusing?
Nicola Carpenter:
So when we talk about race-based caucusing, I think that there are different ways of talking about it. But when we're talking about race-based caucusing at work is splitting up into a people of color caucus and a white caucus and meeting regularly. We're specifically talking about meeting monthly and having spaces to understand that there are different things that need to happen in these two spaces and understanding that these need to happen separately, that we can't have these conversations all together without having these conversations separately. So that is what we are talking about when we're talking about race-based caucusing.
Courtney Harge:
I like to think of caucusing as working out as somebody who doesn't always work out, but in the same way that you don't train for a marathon at the marathon, many people like or at least attempt to have really complex conversations around race and relationships when the stakes are super high in the course of their kind of day-to-day work interactions. One way to view caucusing is the workout before the event. It is a space where you are going to work on different things based on where you identify, but to work on them in spaces that are contained that are supportive and that are there to do the workout. Caucuses at their most simple are leg day, make you stronger for the rest of your encounters.
Tim Cynova:
Is a caucus an affinity group and an Employee Resource Group the same thing?
Courtney Harge:
Caucuses, affinity groups and Employee Resource Groups can frequently be used to describe the same activity, but they are different. And frankly, in the same way that sometimes people name things and do the same thing, it can depend on place to place. I think for any one of these groups, it's very important to understand what the intention behind it was, what was started, what is the culture of the org and if you're going to have multiple or if you're going to have just one, knowing what its purpose is is actually more important than what it's called.
Nicola Carpenter:
And I think that sometimes organizations hold up and say, we have an affinity group or we have an Employee Research Group and say we're done. You know, like stamp of approval, done. We don't have to do anything. And I don't think that that's a great approach and oftentimes it can do more harm than good. There are lots of organizations that view Employer Research Groups or affinity groups as groups to do free labor. They don't necessarily have, you know, they might have a group of Black employees, not necessarily have a group of white employees, doing the group, doing the work that white people need to do which is not beneficial. So I think that there are organizations that are trying to do things, but might be doing it from a place of we wanna look good instead of from a place of we wanna actually make our organization a better place to work. And we want to actually fix things from a structural level and do the things that need to happen and have these conversations on a regular level and make changes that need to happen from those conversations. So whatever you call it, I don't think it necessarily matters as long as you are doing the things that need to happen.
Tim Cynova:
Why should companies provide space for caucusing in the workplace?
Courtney Harge:
My quickest response to that is if you don't provide the space, employees will take it. It's very much like a release valve in the sense of people are having these conversations that are grounded in people's social location, grounded in their identity, grounded in race, class, any other oppressive system and they're having these conversations in spaces that you don't necessarily want them to be having them or you know, it becomes a conversation around, like an email actually becomes a conversation around race. Or if you look at some companies in the news, like sometimes that Slack channel that you think is for fun turns into the space where people are having these conversations. And so the best answer I can provide for why companies should provide a container for these conversations is if they don't have a container, they will show up everywhere.
Tim Cynova:
Who should be caucusing?
Nicola Carpenter:
I think that any organization that wants to further their anti-racism work and put words into practice should be caucusing.
Tim Cynova:
Why would someone be a part of a caucus?
Courtney Harge:
People approach caucusing and their participation in caucusing for a variety of reasons. Some people want a safe space to be able to work through some of the things that they need to work through at work with people who look like them or with a support that is familiar to them. Some people frankly feel like they just should participate and don't even know how to articulate what their participation would do for them. Socially, the organization will change as you caucus. People who are doing the work will find that they are having deeper conversations or people may feel a greater sense of psychological safety. And while peer pressure is never the strongest motivator, sometimes watching your colleagues change and watching relationships deepen because they are doing the work is an excellent motivator to get people to participate. People want to be connected to other people and seeing growth and change and honesty emerge becomes a great reason for somebody to participate in a caucus.
Tim Cynova:
What do companies need to do before they introduce race-based caucusing in the workplace?
Nicola Carpenter:
So I think there's some things that can be helpful. I think that it could be helpful to become clear on why organizations are doing this and have some shared vocabulary. Having some kind of organization-wide anti-racism, anti-oppression training can be helpful to do this. Without some kind of shared language around it, there can be some misunderstandings without this because caucusing exists within the current culture and it's helpful to know that. Any kind of mistrust within the organization, any kind of conflict that arises within the organization will happen inside of caucusing. But that being said, caucusing can be a helpful container to work through some of these difficult conversations. So while it is helpful to have some of these things when start caucusing, it doesn't, you don't have to be a perfect organization to start caucusing. You can have caucusing as a way, as a container to work through some of these things. You know, you don't have to be a perfect organization before you start caucusing. If that's the case, you'd never caucus. I mean there is no such thing. There's no such thing as a perfect organization. You would never, it's impossible.
Courtney Harge:
I wanna echo that and I also wanna offer having a difficult conversation I think, leadership should have a difficult conversation with itself about how they are willing to change because caucusing as a process isn't necessarily linear. It's not like we're gonna meet this often and at the end we're gonna have these deliverables. It is a means, a growth. It is an experience. And one of the downsides to people getting more comfortable at work is they will also share more about what is harming them or what is unhelpful for them. And leadership should be in a space to receive that, that they actually may not know everything that is wrong or harmful in their organization and caucusing provides a space for that which means that before you start caucusing, leadership needs to be prepared, not with a plan to fix everything, but to understand that you may hear or receive things that are happening that you didn't know.
Tim Cynova:
What do employees need to do before they start caucusing?
Courtney Harge:
I think one of the hardest things for employees to do is really recognize that the way for change in this space is kind of embracing vulnerability. And so doing whatever an employee needs to do to kind of understand that, you have to be willing to show up to the caucus and you don't have to bare your soul every day, but you do have to be willing to say like this space was harmful or I don't understand this thing or I'm not even sure why we're here. Like the vulnerability of questioning. Caucusing is not a webinar, it's not you sit and receive a bunch of information. It is kind of the active generating of the future you wanna exist in. And that is a vulnerable position to be because you are in essence letting folks know like what is working, what isn't working and what could change. And I recognize that a lot of employees, particularly employees of color, spend a lot of time building a protective and necessary wall from being vulnerable at work for a variety of reasons that are historically informed and being willing to let a bit of that go to go and participate and generate change is I think something that all of the employees need to do while particularly empathizing as a person of color with what it means to do that as a person of color and be willing to do it anyway.
Tim Cynova:
How do people determine which caucus to attend?
Courtney Harge:
Caucusing participation should be based on how people self-identify. There's no way that the organization should assign folks necessarily because there are so many things you can never really know. For anyone who could participate in either caucus or who wants to engage with caucusing as a multiracial person, first choose a caucus. The only kind of "unacceptable option" is trying to participate in both caucuses because the separation is a part of what feeds the process. But for those who are unsure where they wanna participate, it's very much about what is the type of work you would like to be doing. If you will need to examine your relationship to whiteness and you want to see and like kind of see what that works like on you, how you are connecting with that, then I would suggest the white caucus. If you very much want to build community and connection with POC, then you can choose the POC caucus. This can get murky because you know, people are like well, I wanna participate in this or I want to create space or maybe I'm a white person who feels like I wanna create community with POC. And the problem with that is the POC caucus at its core should be a place that is absent and removed from whiteness as a concept. That's one of the things that makes it a safe space. It is taking this however designated time to be able to step away from whiteness. And if in any of your engagement, you want to engage with your whiteness, your relationship to white supremacy, your relationship to whiteness as a construct, that work should be done in the white caucus, not with POC, not in the POC caucus.
Tim Cynova:
How do you get people to attend race-based caucusing in the workplace if it's not mandatory?
Nicola Carpenter:
Yeah, I think that this is a question that people ask us sometimes without realizing that there is lots of things at work that people do without it being mandatory. And I think this comes down to with how do, how do you get people to do anything at work if it's not mandatory. What are the ways that you get people to do work in your workplace currently? And you know, how do you set those things up? Is it conversations with your manager? How are those things set up now? And maybe you can use those currently which I think is how we've done it at Fractured Atlas in caucusing. And I think that those things can be successful. Is it those conversations with managers? Is it a conversation with someone else on the caucus? You know, oh, I noticed that you weren't... Someone within one of the caucuses noticing that someone isn't showing up having conversation, hey, I noticed that you weren't at this caucus. If they already know that this person is participating in one of the caucuses, having that conversation with the person and seeing why that person wasn't there. I think there's lots of different ways to have those conversations with people to see if it's a discomfort having those conversations. If it's something that the organization is doing that's fully new and that person joined the organization not thinking that caucusing was part of their organizational, part of something that they was gonna do with the job. That's one reason why they might not be joining. You know, maybe they have too much work that they're doing. There's so many different reasons why someone might not be joining. But I think that it is really organization dependent and I guess I would ask the question to the organization of how are you encouraging people to do anything within the organization.
Courtney Harge:
I also wanna offer that, as I said earlier, people have these conversations. You'd be surprised at the number of people who want to participate. Reluctance to participate frankly is frequently a leadership driven question and team members rarely ask it, like people who are not in leadership. Leadership, how do I make people do that? And that's almost never a problem. And I know it can be and people will have different levels of participation and some people may have distrust. There may be a variety of valid reasons why people don't participate. But if you get to a point where you are kind of set up and are discussing caucusing, rarely do people not show up or not participate or just say, you know what, now we're not gonna do that. They very rarely just kind of wither.
Tim Cynova:
How often do caucuses meet?
Courtney Harge:
We've done an hour once a month. Each caucus should be allotted the same amount of time and resources. It also shouldn't be considered like time off. Like it shouldn't be like a lunch break. It is in fact a meeting. Sometimes caucus can take place over lunch, but it should be considered work. It is a working meeting. So yes, but once a month for about an hour.
Tim Cynova:
Is there an ideal number of people to be in a caucus?
Courtney Harge:
The ideal number is everyone who is ready and able to participate. It may take plenty of time and some more trust building to get what is a critical mass of participation, but they should be frankly, a diagonal in that across your organization and at all levels of leadership. Everyone can benefit from community and conversation frankly. And so I think the ideal number is everybody who wants to be there and is willing to engage. If people are not engaging or actively sabotaging the space, it is less than that. Less people not have to participate or not participate if they are undermining the process. But yeah, the number of people who are ready and willing and able to engage is the ideal number.
Nicola Carpenter:
Yeah, I would say more than two and anything more than 15 people can get slightly unwieldy and at that point, particularly for white caucus which tends to be more structured which we can talk about a little bit further and you might want to engage more tools like breakout groups to have more in depth conversations if you start to have a larger group than say 15 people. It might start to get a little bit unwieldy to have full group conversations at that size.
Tim Cynova:
What happens during a caucus? How are they structured?
Courtney Harge:
I'll speak for the POC caucus and we've chosen to structure it really with the guiding principle as I've said earlier of this is an hour outside of the white gaze and were one can disengage from whiteness and white supremacy culture as a construct. And so it is a space, during the caucus we focus on what are the people who are gathered there in need of. Is it a check-in where everybody's just like this is how I'm feeling, this is what's going on. Is it like I have this problem? Is it I have this success that I wanna celebrate in this space. What are the people who are present able to offer and what do they need? And that is, that hour is focused on the people who are present in the caucus without centering or even engaging in whiteness, white supremacy culture or what white people may need or feel.
Nicola Carpenter:
And white caucus, it is very structured. There's always a facilitator. That usually rotates of someone in the group. And it is very focused on learning. Oftentimes there's homework and really is talking about you know, whiteness, white supremacy and how does it show up kind of in the workplace, in the lives and kind of interrupting that.
Tim Cynova:
What happens after a caucus meeting?
Nicola Carpenter:
So we talked a little bit about accountability earlier and something that is important in the caucus structure is accountability within caucusing. So there's a few ways of building in accountability within caucusing, but we think it's very important that the people of color within the organization understand what the white people are talking about within caucusing. So in white caucus, notes are always taken and the notes are always shared with the people of color caucus. This can be done in a few different ways. We've tried a few different things. We've had people of color liaison and a white caucus liaison that have met in person. And then we've also tried out sharing those notes via something like a Slack channel or something virtually and both of those have worked. It depends on, you know, organizational capacity, what you wanna try out. You could have those liaisons switch up. It depends on different things, but just as long as we make sure that our, we make sure that those notes are taken every month and that those notes are shared so that the white people aren't just sitting in a room every month and talking without that just being shared because what we don't want to happen is to have that meeting turn into a staff meeting which would be the white people making decisions without people of color in the room which would be not what we would want to get out of caucusing because that would be white people making decisions excluding people of color from the room which is a terrible, terrible decision. It's just not what we want from caucusing. It would be the opposite of accountability.
Courtney Harge:
For the POC caucus after really depends on again on what the folks present in the caucus needed. So sometimes it's follow up. Sometimes there are questions that go to the white caucus or sometimes they are just broader questions or things to be planned or determined or followed up on. But ultimately it really depends on what do the people need in that meeting and then what can be followed up on, what can be done next.
Tim Cynova:
Who's responsible for managing the caucus process?
Nicola Carpenter:
So everyone really is responsible for managing the caucus process which can get a little bit overwhelming because sometimes if everyone is responsible, it means that it can fall into no one being responsible. So that's where it becomes really important to finding ways of structuring this process which I mentioned there are different ways to structuring this process. You can set up things like caucus liaisons, a POC caucus liaison or white caucus liaison for set periods of time or that rotates or just making sure that you have structures set up to make sure that you understand kind of what the responsibilities are so that you know who is responsible and for what period of time and so you know that they happen.
Tim Cynova:
Do you need a facilitator to get caucusing started? Or keep caucusing going?
Courtney Harge:
I think a facilitator is a great resource to kick start the process and generate excitement if things feel a bit stagnant. The only caveat around facilitators is be sure to hire facilitators that could participate in the caucus they will facilitate. So white folks in the white caucus, POC folks in the POC caucus.
Tim Cynova:
Can't we just all be in the same room to talk about this? How is this supposed to help address racism and oppression if it's just white people talking in a room together?
Courtney Harge:
So I like to share a very common metaphor in this space and we talk about, many people talk about, particularly in the American context, they talk about the context of the melting pot, right? That America is just all these different things thrown in together to make soup, but it is an inherently violent metaphor. It is, in the making of the melting pot you are literally burning, consuming things to form this one amalgamation of this thing, this ideal "thing where we are all the same." But everything gets burned away in that process. And that is what can happen when we have this all the same room conversation where traditionally people of color have done a lot of burning and removing the things that make them "different" from the dominant culture to exist in that space. Caucusing embraces what I think is a better metaphor of the mosaic where these individual pieces come together and they are still whole. They are still their own pieces coming together to form a cohesive unit. Caucusing allows for the individual pieces to mold and support and stay whole together so that nothing has to be lost or burned away for the group to become cohesive or for everybody to exist together.
Nicola Carpenter:
I really appreciate that the burning up. So I mean a lot of people have heard about this concept of white fragility. I appreciate Sun Yung Shin wrote about this concept of white flammability which I feel like Kat said this idea of burning up, but also white fragility feels like you have to coddle whiteness, but white flammability seems more constructive to the harm that white people can cause when in mixed pieces. So I think that that is something that can happen when that is not always seen by white people in spaces that are all together that really happen on a day-to-day basis within workspaces.
Tim Cynova:
Won't caucusing lead to further division and segregation? Doesn't this just amplify racism?
Courtney Harge:
I always like to take this question and understand what does further division or segregation actually look like. What does that mean? Does it just amplify racism? Racism and oppressive systems are in the paint. They're in everything, they're in everything we deal with. So what would an amplified version of that look like. To Nicola's point it's also an hour a month. Like when has any one hour in an org completely altered the culture of an organization? But mostly, to go to something I said earlier, these conversations are already happening. These conflicts, racism is already present in your organization. It's there. What this does is provide the safe space or this container or this release valve so that these conflicts aren't showing up in every space unexpectedly. This becomes a container to hold some of the things that again are in your organization. They are there.
Nicola Carpenter:
And I think that something that comes up when I hear this question also is that sure, there are oftentimes, especially in workplaces when there are groups of only white people in the workplace. Yes, there is not that often when there are groups of white people in the workplace talking about whiteness and the impact of whiteness at work. And I think that that is the, one of the differences that when people are asking this question don't necessarily, aren't necessarily... I think that this question comes from a fear of seeing a group of white people in a room without necessarily looking at like the intent of it and what the conversations are that are happening and the structure of it.
Tim Cynova:
If caucusing is working apart, working separately, when do we all come together to talk?
Nicola Carpenter:
Every other meeting, simply. I mean, yes, it's more complicated than that, but caucusing really is just one container. You know, if you think of the organization as being like a pantry and you have a whole lot of different containers, of jars and of all of your different lovely containers, caucusing is just one of the containers. All of the other containers are different other kinds of meetings. So all the other meetings is when you come together and those are all of the other meetings. Those might take other forms depending on your organization. Those are all of the other times you come together and that really depends on your organization. And what those other containers holds is up to you and what comes from caucusing might determine what those other containers are and what you need. You might need to have conversations in other forms. You might need to increase anti-racism trainings. You might find that you need that. You might need more conversations about how to have healthy conflict. You might find that you need that. You might find that you need more containers related to, I don't know, I'm failing at coming up with hypothetical containers that an organization might come up with, but you can fill that in with any other meetings or structures that you already have in place. Those are all the other times that you come together within your organization.
Courtney Harge:
I will offer that in the time we've been doing this, that question is only ever asked by white identifying people. The POC who I've worked within our org and outside of the org never ask when are we all going to have this conversation together. Never.
Tim Cynova:
What are the people of color saying about us white people when they caucus? It doesn't seem fair that they don't also have to report to the white people about what they talk about.
Courtney Harge:
Oppression, specifically racism is a white person's problem. Whiteness, white supremacy are the tools that we are addressing and in race-based caucusing. It doesn't have to be fair and the POC probably aren't talking about you.
Nicola Carpenter:
This is specifically why it's set up that the people of color do not have to report back to the white people. It makes it so that we have to practice this kind of report out and the imbalance in that report out. It makes some white people a little bit uncomfortable and that should be the case. It's uncomfortable for white people not to know what's being talked about. That's fine. It should be that the white people in an organization, that we should not know what's happening in POC caucus. But we're invited to every single other conversation. Why do we think that we should be invited to this one hour a month? We should not. We should not. What gives us the right to know what happens in this one hour? Nothing.
Tim Cynova:
Can we also caucus by gender identity, sexual orientation and a class?
Nicola Carpenter:
Sure. I mean you can caucus about whatever you want to. But it's also helpful to know that racism will show up in any space and we often get this question asked by white people. We've often gotten this question asked by white women and we wanna make sure that this is not a deflection to, by specifically white people to hold on to other forms of oppression to avoid dealing with racism. So yes, you can caucus about everything. Sure. Of course. But don't use that to avoid race-based caucusing. You know, keep race-based caucusing. Do that and make sure that you want it, you know what you're getting out of these spaces and keep coming back to asking yourself what you need in these spaces and what you're trying to get of those spaces.
Tim Cynova:
What does it mean to have these conversations in the workplace? And what are companies losing by not caucusing?
Courtney Harge:
These conversations are already happening in the workplace, always already. And there's no way around that. What it does in this case is give resources and support so that these conversations can be more healthy or less secretive. It gives a means for people to actually name things that they are experiencing because frankly, as I said, these conversations happen and they happen in ways that can be very harmful, very destructive. And simply, organizations may never know that these conversations are being had or what's happening in them. Yeah, they may never know without caucusing to give a safe space and a healthy space. One of the benefits of caucusing as I think I mentioned earlier which is kind of surprising is you actually may hear, not necessarily complaints, but you may hear about more harm that's happened. You may actually hear more negative things and that is a win because those things still happened before. People just didn't name them. They didn't say them. You couldn't correct them. So having a space for these conversations to emerge for people to be able to name some of their experiences, for people to be able to name some of their behaviors that we wanna interrupt means that you can actually impact, correct and improve them where if these conversations are in the shadows, harm is happening and you just don't know.
Tim Cynova:
What if their organization's leadership, board of directors, et cetera, doesn't want a caucus, either for themselves or for the organization to offer it?
Nicola Carpenter:
Whenever we get this question, I like to remind people of what the organization is losing by not caucusing. Bringing it back to what Courtney was talking about earlier and also bringing it to the organization's mission or purpose, how does doing this further impact what the purpose and mission of the organization is and how can this kind of impact what the organization is trying to do.
Courtney Harge:
I will also offer that they don't have to. The liberation is not for everybody. Not everybody wants to go there. And if people who are responsible for the future of an organization, leadership, boards of directors, they are compensated and supported with all the institutional power given to them by the institution, if they do not want to go to the future we all long for, they don't have to go. It is up to anybody who's working with or for them to determine if that is how they want to engage. But frankly, if somebody does not want that future, they do not have to build it and everybody who works with or for them can make choices accordingly.
Tim Cynova:
How is the purpose of a caucus different for privileged and oppressor identities versus marginalized and oppressed identities?
Courtney Harge:
My answer is for privileged or oppressor identities, the goal of caucusing is to dismantle the systems that actually support and uplift you. It is frankly, to tear down the ladder you may be standing on. For marginalized and oppressed identities, the purpose is to take the resources from that broken ladder and build your own. And it doesn't have to be a ladder on top of people. It is frankly dismantling the systems that keep some people at the bottom and some people at the top. And if you're at the top, your job is to start taking it down. And if you're at the bottom, your job is to start taking it down from the top so that we can meet in a place that is equitable where everybody can be seen, valued, loved and supported and what people need at those different positions is different. It's not gonna look the same, but ultimately the job for everyone is to build a future, a better future for us all.
Tim Cynova:
What are common reasons people of color may be reluctant to join affinity spaces?
Courtney Harge:
I love this question. So many reasons that all start from the workplace is a site of both great harm and great resource. Capitalism has made it so that we have to work to live and people of color frequently have been harmed at those workplaces without spaces to exit because they need to work to live. And anything that risks the work to live is dangerous and so sometimes people of color are reluctant to join affinity spaces or caucusing because it creates a different site for harm maybe. It also, as I mentioned, creates vulnerability where you have to open up and say, hey, I don't like these things. And that can invite for some retaliation. It can invite discomfort. It may also be having to admit that you were harmed in ways that you may not wanna deal with. So it becomes a lot of, there are a lot of barriers to address it. Something I think that is particularly relevant and that actually shows this is a recent statistic that says only 97% of Black workers do not want to return to the office if they open. Only 3% of Black workers wish to go back into an office building. And I think that level of, I don't know that that momentum, that level, that critical mass of folks are saying in essence, the office is a space that does not work for us. And that, as Nicola said earlier, everything that exists in your organization exists in caucusing. And so the same reluctance that people want to go back into the building may also show up in people not wanting to join caucuses.
Tim Cynova:
What are common reasons white people may be reluctant to join affinity spaces?
Nicola Carpenter:
So I think there's a variety of reasons. If at the start of this journey in an organization, I think that there are some white people that join your organization that confronting privilege might not be what they thought as part of what they thought they'd be doing at their workplace. You know, I mean it can be uncomfortable to think, oh, this is something that I didn't think I'd be doing at work. This is uncomfortable. So I think that that is one thing that can make people uncomfortable. Once in a caucus space, all of the other points of privilege within an organization, I mean yes, everyone is white within the space, but you might be in the space with your manager. And I think that that can be uncomfortable if there's a question of well will saying something in this space make me lose my job. I think there are other things that can become uncomfortable in that space that unless you kind of have those conversations about what does it mean to be in a caucus space and kind of fears around how do I show up in this space at work, I think that people can have fears around kind of what does it mean to show up in this space at work within the work context.
Tim Cynova:
How long do you need to caucus? When are you done?
Nicola Carpenter:
It's not done until racism is gone which I don't think will happen in our lifetimes.
Courtney Harge:
I'll even give people a break. The day before racism is done, you can stop caucus.
Nicola Carpenter:
The day before. I enjoy that.
Courtney Harge:
Yes. So the day before, we're like you know what? I think racism is finished tomorrow. You can take that day off. But no, it is. These systems are hundreds of years old and we keep emphasizing one hour a month. It really is that. You are definitely going step-by-step. It will always evolve. You will always get closer and closer to building a better existence, but it will never be done because there's always improvements. You also find more things as you correct something or as you will adjust behavior as people have safer spaces. They start to say more of what is wrong. Again, this is the counterintuitive measure of success where people are like, oh yeah, that thing also happened. Or yeah, this doesn't work or it feels like a never-ending cascade and it's worth it to acknowledge that the more things you see, the more things you can address and the more things people are sharing, that actually means the more trust they have so.
Nicola Carpenter:
Yeah.
Courtney Harge:
It is...
Nicola Carpenter:
And I think that's true that the more you caucus, the more conversations, the more work you see that you have to do. So I think that that's totally true within organizations that it might feel like the longer you caucus, the more work it feels like you have to do. But yeah, I think that you're totally right that that is a good thing.
Courtney Harge:
That work was always there. You just now get to see it and it is a gift to be able to address it.
Tim Cynova:
Courtney and Nicola, thanks so much for being on the podcast!
Tim Cynova:
If you want to dive into these questions and more, register to join us for Race-Based Caucusing in the Workplace: The Why & How where we’ll be exploring in more detail how to introduce and structure caucusing in your workplace, including sample agendas, frameworks, and a whole host of other resources. Plus, by being a part of the course you’ll be joining a community of other people interested in this work who you can connect with and learn from as the work evolves in your life and workplace.
To find out more about the course and to register visit us at workshouldntsuck.co/courses.
If you've enjoyed the conversation or are just feeling generous today, please consider writing a review on iTunes, so that others who might be interested in the topic can join the fun too. Give it a thumbs up, or a five stars, or a phone-a-friend, whatever your podcasting platform of choice offers. Until next time, thanks for listening.
The podcast is available for free on your favorite podcasting platforms:
Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | TuneIn | RSS Feed
If you enjoy the show, please leave a review on iTunes to help others discover the podcast.
