Camber Outdoors: anti-racism workplace action agenda
What you can do right now and how to change the way you do business
Note: This is part our Verde’s DEI resource series>
Here at Verde we are grateful for all who have been willing to engage in the challenging topics around current events this week. We are feeling encouraged by the organizations that are taking a stand against racism with us and inspired by those who are taking actions on this topic. With this, we want to make sure we are not losing focus on the issue that is front and center regarding Black Lives Matter. When we look at the root issues and cause of the protests, it is about police brutality/murder, militarization of the police, racism within police departments and our justice system. Innocent Black people are being killed and have been for a long time.
Taking Action now:
In response, we have seen a rush of support by outdoor brands to make statements regarding their stance, and their attempts to pivot in bringing more diversity to their organizations and the industry in general. It is important to remember that, at this time, the need is in the actions focused on supporting the root issues of the protests.
Examples of brands taking action can be seen with what Patagonia, Burton, and Ben & Jerry’s are doing. More than only making statements, they are donating money to organizations like the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and creating plans of action to fight racism. They are supporting the immediate need.
Long term action:
We understand that not all companies can make large donations to support the protest and are unsure which steps to take, leading to inaction. We recommend those who do not have the funds to donate can take this time to begin laying the groundwork, listening, learning, and in the coming weeks, to start creating concrete plans for Diversity, Inclusion, and Equality (DEI) within the workplace and the communities they serve. This needs to happen at all levels of your company.
Our industry, over the next several weeks, months, and years, will need to thoroughly reflect and examine how we can help bridge the social, economic, and racial divides. We need to find ways to leverage the outdoor industry to bring more DEI to our organizations, our activities and communities. Ultimately DEI should become an integral part of every aspect of each business.
The Journey Begins:
At Verde, we are committed to Diversity, Inclusion, and Equality. Earlier this week we listened into a membership call where Camber Outdoors’ Emily Newman and Renita Smith discussed their Anti-Racism Agenda Preview. Below are our notes and the transcript of the conversion. Over the coming days and weeks, we are planning to host more town halls around this topic.
We invite all to join us on:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020, at 1 pm MT for our Facebook Live with Kristin, Emily and Renita to learn how we can take action and make an impact.
Camber Outdoors’ Anti-Racism Workplace Action Agenda Preview:
Emily Newton
Executive Director
Renita Smith
Chief Programs Officer
Summary Notes:
Camber’s Role:
Camber stands against racism & violence, and against police brutality. The way Camber does this is by equipping members with tools so that they can be a vehicle for change against systemic racism. DEI & acknowledgment matters now more than ever. It’s vital for companies to evaluate their values, and in some cases create new guiding principles.
Camber is building out a new suite of tools, navigating how to move to action and how to continue this action for the rest of the year.
They’ll be on Camber’s website shortly for companies to utilize.
Evaluating Values & Our Voice
How to bring more voices to the table, and what are the steps?
Listen, and value the experience of others.
Remember this is not about you. Don’t speak out on behalf of communities you don’t belong to; don’t take center stage.
Get comfortable with being uncomfortable.
Engaging in supportive partnerships with organizations that add value to your approach.
Take informed action.
Think about the guiding questions that will help create health workplaces
Respect + inclusion
Should be a community based conversation - ask your team, ask your leaders - no one should be afraid to have the harder conversations
Ask yourself what are your most important values? Ask your team, what are your values? Ask your leaders, what are you doing to make sure everyone feels included? What can you be doing better with your employees?
Action Agenda
Why did Camber create an Action Agenda? There has been an outcry for companies and organizations to issue statements. The statement is only the first step. After that first step, your company needs action to back up your statement. Otherwise, your statement is not authentic. Many companies are in early stages of DEI work.
Goal of the Agenda:
Navigate Issues
Create source of best practice learning
Connect to a network to learn from
Take you by the hand through the agenda
LEARN: Educate yourself and others.
The burden of educating should not rest upon Black employees or those subject to discrimination. It’s all of our responsibility.
Learning creates fluency around these issues, creates credibility, creates confidence around these issues of racism, bias and discrimination.
ACT: Most recently, take action against recent acts of violence and police brutality.
It’s not enough to remain neutral.
Donate, elevate voices, take immediate action.
CHANGE: Make sure a process of change is underway to ensure near-term and long-term systemic change within your organization.
After learning + asking, companies must ask themselves: do you have equal pay? Have you created an equal environment? How do you plan on addressing your shortfalls?
Takeaway:
Action is important. This work is a journey… the action that stands behind statements is what will truly begin to build a better workplace.
Action is more important internally than externally.
It’s easy to feel like the external issues need to be tackled, but you have to start with the inside out.
Admit that you’re not an expert, that you’re not perfect. Don’t be afraid to be a beginner - start small.
Here is a transcript of the conversation:
Emily Newman: I see so many wonderful names of our partners. Thank you so much for being here today. It's exciting to connect.
While we're waiting, I just want to add quickly that this is the beginning of a few conversations. We're thrilled that some folks signed up with us on Facebook Live today. We've adjusted that to next week, and are looking forward to continuing the conversation then as well. We want you to feel that we are your partner in building out and flexing your capabilities in these complex times. So we're excited to be continuing, with depth, some of these specific conversations.
Okay, I want to just welcome everyone. We'll assume anybody else who's joining us is running a couple minutes behind, and they can join us mid-process. I'm Emily Newman and I'm the Executive Director with Camber Outdoors. Joining me for this conversation today is Renita Smith, our Chief Programs Officer, and we also have a number of Camber members and staff who are on our line today.
I wanted to just begin the conversation with being clear about Camber's role. Camber stands against racism and violence, as well as police brutality against the African American community, and the way that we live out that stance is by delivering an array of tools to equip our partners, our partner companies, in using their inclusive, equitable, and diverse workplaces as a vehicle for systemic change.
And so I want to thank you all for your commitment to both laying the groundwork for that work, as we will discuss today, as well as for your commitment to doing this work throughout the year. And it really is, as we are seeing played out across many companies, your willingness, your commitment, your energy, your dollars, your work to this end is critically important. And the wonderful part of that is that, at the end of that work, what you end up with is an inclusive, equitable, and diverse workplace, which we know leads to all kinds of important successes for companies. So let me just pass the mic to Renita for a moment just to introduce herself, because she's new to many of you.
Renita Smith: Thank you, Emily. Welcome everyone, and thank you so much for joining. We appreciate your engagement around this issue. We've received many, many emails requesting additional guidance, building off of the guidance that we provided already through our programming that we've been delivering, so thank you for your engagement in this important issue. As Emily mentioned, I am fairly new. I joined Camber at the beginning of the year. My background is that I come to this work through a combination of private for profit, working with companies that are in the private sector, as well as some companies in the nonprofit sector, and I feel that is actually relevant for this conversation in particular, because many of these issues are intertwined with brand identity and who a brand is in the marketplace, how authentic that identity is, and how linked and aligned internal culture is with the brand messaging and brand presence in the marketplace.
So I draw from my experience working with a lot of tech companies doing marketing and strategy work, and also I led the research and publication effort for the State of Black Los Angeles while part of the Los Angeles Urban League, which is particularly relevant to these times and these challenges. In that report, we measure various outcomes, healthcare, safety, economic jobs, education, employment of African American Angelinos versus other communities, and measured their progress or lack thereof versus other communities, and prescribed actions to address those issues. So Emily and I, Emily also has a rich history in this work, and we bring all that we support you in.
Emily Newman: Thanks Renita. We're so thrilled that you're here to join us. And I want to just be clear that diversity equity, inclusion, and acknowledgement of racial discrimination and brutality, it matters now more than ever. And because of this, these uncertain times, it's vital for companies to evaluate and commit to their North Star values, in some cases develop new guiding principles to navigate the gravity of the current national events. So what Camber is doing in that context is we are building out a suite of tools. Today we're going to talk a little bit about that groundwork, and also the framework for those tools, and in, tomorrow, the next day, the next day, the very short term, you'll be able to find tools as they go up on our website for navigating the complexity of moving to action, as well as to begin to lay your plans for the rest of the year, as you continue that action beyond this moment in time.
So the first place I just wanted to encourage people to think about evaluating your values and your voice. And we've developed a tool that we will circulate to our members and folks on this call, but this concept of how do you bring more seats to the table, and what are the steps to start that process, right?
And the first step, as you might imagine, is listening. And I think that idea is world-class listening, right. Thinking about focus, and sincerity, and empathy, and valuing the experience of others. The next step that we believe is really important is to remember this is not about you. So even as you sort of look at what Camber has been positioning here, we're really about supporting our partners. As you think about what your role is and how your values connect to supporting inclusion, equity, and diversity. You don't want to take center stage or try and speak on behalf of communities that you don't belong to. Getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. The experiences of others can produce feelings of anxiety, so the solution is more interaction and learning, not less. I was just reading a really important study about just proximity and how important being connected in a meaningful way across communities is, for brands especially. Engaging in supportive partnerships with organizations that add value to your approach. So in this document that we will share looking at what are those relationships? Are they reciprocal relationships? Are they mutually growth enhancing relationships? How can you share your social capital with community based groups? And particularly as we think about the flywheel that is represented by the active outdoors industries, it's significant. So sharing that social capital and not assuming how you can best support those efforts.
And then I think finally on this, just remembering that there are two parts to allyship and that committing to support diversity, equity, and inclusion is the easy part. The hard part is taking informed action, which we'll be talking more about today, leveraging your employee resource groups, CSR initiatives, to learn how you can be a great public ally for social justice and particularly for greatness in your workplace, it's just where our focus lives.
So before I move this conversation to Renita to talk a little bit about our framework, which I think is our action framework, which is critically important, I want to encourage everyone who's on this call to think for yourself about what are the questions, those guiding questions that I want to be considering around creating healthy workplaces that respect, that empower, and that include. So that requires that you ask yourself what are your most important values? That you ask your team how important diversity, equity, and inclusion is to them and what their perceptions are of the value that it brings.
You want to be asking your leaders, what are you doing to make sure everyone feels included? And thinking about, with your employees, what you can be doing better and your organization as well, and how do we innovate to become stronger/ So with that, Renita, let's move to you to talk a little bit about our action plan that will be up on our website. Please do, as a friendly reminder for everyone that all of our materials are going up in these rapidly changing times quickly, so to say, a regular check back makes a big difference in being able to access them. Renita?
Renita Smith: Thank you. So as Emily mentioned, we have developed an action agenda, and the reason that we developed this is because we know that there's been an outcry for companies and organizations to issue statements. Where's your statement? Are you going to issue a statement? What does your statement say? We have developed an action agenda because the statement is only the first step. And after that first step, consumers, partners, vendors, employees are looking to your company to have action to back up your statement. Otherwise your statement is not authentic. And we realize that for many of our members, based upon feedback that we've received, some of them are in early stages of inclusion, equity, and diversity, and they're not actually sure how to navigate such a rapidly evolving and highly heated moment in time. And it's a huge leap to go from where some companies are in their process to addressing these issues.
So the goal of our action agenda is to help you navigate the issues, create a source of best practice learning, connect our members to a network of other peer companies from whom they can share ideas and network, and literally to take you by the hand through the stages of the action agenda. Our action agenda falls into 3 primary prongs, learn, act, change. And what I mean by that is learn is defined as educating yourself and others on how to address racism, bias, and discrimination. Educating yourself and others on what it is and how to most effectively combat it to ensure an inclusive, equitable, and diverse workforce. And these inclusive, equitable, and diverse workplaces are part of the solution to creating systemic change and addressing these issues. George Floyd on the ground may seem to be far away from the workplace, but as we've seen, it's not as far away as it appears to be, because employees are wrestling with those issues, wrestling with whether they feel valued, wrestling with whether people around them even understand the definition of racism, discrimination, and bias, and how do you address them.
So the learning phase is very important and the burden should not rest upon the African American employees or any employees in the organization who feel that they are victims of discrimination or bias. The burden should not rest on them to educate. The organization should be educating. So it is a task to learn for us to educate ourselves as employees, leaders, managers, department heads, CEOs, chief human resource officers, even chief diversity officers. Learn for ourselves and help others learn. But after learning-
Emily Newman: Renita, before you move on, I just want to reinforce that critically important point about it's our responsibility. It's our responsibility to engage in that learning, engage in that ongoing learning, to tool our organizations, so all feel welcome. And this is the time to demonstrate your understanding that that responsibility does not just lie with one group to work towards systemic change, but instead, that in order to change systems, we all have to become educated and activated.
Renita Smith: Exactly. Thank you for that additional emphasis. So learning time is not wasted time. Learning time increases fluency around inclusion, equity, and diversity issues, builds credibility, and builds confidence, which are all very important in addressing these issues head-on. So once we've learned, educated ourselves and others on how to address racism, bias, and discrimination in the workplace and in the broader world, it's time to act. And in this specific situation, it's taking action against recent acts of racial violence and police brutality targeting the African American community. The issues of bias and discrimination are not exclusive to this community, but right now it's critical to demonstrate solidarity with this community and these issues.
So taking action against these tragic events right now, in a timely, relevant, and targeted manner is key. It's not enough to remain neutral. It's not enough to say, "Well, we have good values and best practices." Companies do need to take a stand. And I've put this again in the context also of brand identity, because our culture of consumption has changed, where we're no longer just taking products in without looking at what the producers of those products value. And I give a lot of credit to younger generations and millennials for pressing this and saying, "How do you back up your messaging in the marketplace? What causes are you truly committed to? And what action are you taking?"
Which is why some of our members may have experienced the sense of having put out a very carefully packaged statement and then gotten some blow back of, "Okay, so now what?" That's a natural response when people are expecting action that aligns with your brand, and with your identity, and the promise that you make to all of your employees, consumers, and partners. Internal culture must align with external brand identity, or there's a lack of authenticity. And in this situation, it's critical to take action now against these specific packs in a very clear and decisive manner.
There are many ways to do that, which we'll talk about. But that's the next step after learning, it's acting, and then change. After taking action against these immediate acts of violence, it's making sure that a process of change is underway to create near term and long term systemic change within your organization.
Consumers, readers, people who have posted on LinkedIn saying, "Sounds good. The statement sounds good." It might even sound good that you donated to an African American civil rights organization, but have you looked again at your company's corporate equity policies? Do you have equal pay? Have you created an inclusive environment? Have you supported the formation of employee resources? What are you doing to create long term change? And what's the status of your organization going forward? And how do you plan to address any shortfalls? That's the framework: learn, act, change, and we've applied it across three primary points of emphasis. I for inclusive leadership and culture. E for equitable policies and systems. And D for a diverse talent pipeline in workplaces.
When you get access to this document, you'll see that we have learn, act and change action items under each of those key tracks of creating inclusive leadership and culture. How do you learn, act and change? Creating equitable policies and systems so that you ensure equitable compensation, benefits, performance, assessment. How do you learn, act and change across that continuum? And lastly, in terms of creating diverse talent pipeline in workplaces, which involves clipping and supporting your current workplace, workforce, as well as building and capping a diverse talent pipeline. And just reimagining the future of work, so that it is a future that is inclusive, and welcoming, and supportive for African Americans, as well as, all other communities, LBGTQ-plus, people with disabilities, Latinos.
But right now we're using the focal point of the African American, because right now that issue is at the forefront. Again, we learn, act, and change across that spectrum. It's a lot to give you all of the actions items within those categories, but I'll tell you that it involves everything from learning. It involves tapping into our content and programming, webinars, guiding templates in terms of discussions with employees, assessing skills and development needs of your employees. In terms of action, it's condemning racism, auditing your current policies, implementing equitable practices, implementing upscaling and rescaling. There's so many ways to leverage the corporate platform to condemn racism immediately in terms of donating to specific organizations, holding government leaders and police departments accountable nationally and locally, supporting African American businesses, making financial commitments, strengthening your internal DEI infrastructure.
We plan to do a building block of DEI series and interactive online training on that. We're getting a lot of questions. I'd like to be part of my DEI efforts, how do I do that? Take me back to the beginning. And then lastly, towards the fourth quarter, we are launching a major survey across our members to gain industry member wide information, so that we have benchmark data on where work company's stand up. So you'll get that member landscape view. And then, specifically, on how your employees view your company. What their daily work experience is, so leaders maybe saying, "We've got this, this, and this in place," but the daily lived experience of employees maybe that that is not enough, perhaps it is. And we plan to launch one-on-one deep dives with each company to develop a company specific action, in general.
So those are some of the examples of what we're doing. And by aligning this member, we're hoping that our members will feel that they have a resource, and that they can say, "We're members of Camber Outdoors, and therefore you're aligned with this action plan." So that gives you a powerful tool in and of itself. I know we're tight on time and I'll stop there.
Emily Newman: Olivia, I know we want to move to questions. I'm not sure if we're able to unmute you, but I think we can take questions in the question box. At the last minute, just what I saw from you. If there's a question that someone wants to ask, please do so, and we'll have a look at that and respond to questions. I want to just reiterate that this work is a journey, but we are here to help you to articulate the work you are doing along that journey. So thinking about your inclusive culture, thinking about how do we evaluate our policies and systems specifically. What are the steps to doing that? And building and participating in a diverse pipeline of talent, looking at... We recently got a call from someone who said, hey, my recruiters are not busy right now. And we said, great. We are right in the middle of working on tools for recruiters around that talent pipeline so that we can begin to diminish barriers for access to entry for extraordinary talent. So thinking about this as a journey, knowing that we are here to be your partner in articulating that, but that it is work and that it is measured work.
And again, we need to mention our data collection. And specific to that data collection, that is really about taking a look at how are your employees feeling and what are they seeing? How are they experiencing work, your workplace? And how does that line up with your understanding of your workplace? So that's a very exciting, very important tool that we'll be launching this fall as well. But in the short term around that action agenda, there will be more to come in the coming days.
Any questions? I'm seeing, thank you, Olivia, for flagging that the chat box, we can enter questions there, if anyone has them. I know we were set for a brief 30 minute discussion today. There will be again, more tools for our members. We welcome specific calls around questions that you are having. There will be specific guidance tied to our action plan that we'll be launching on our website within the next 24 to 48 hours. They are robust tools and they are tools that are meant to be meant to be activated in the context of your brand, your mission, your values, in an authentic way.
Renita Smith: And I would just add that we truly are committed to being your guide as you walk through this. And just a shout out to our partnerships, many of you know Amy and Elise, and they can conduct periodic pretty frequent calls in which they make themselves available as a resource. And particularly during this challenging time, it's quite a valuable resource to be able to have them on the line and have access to all of us on the line, essentially, through them, with your questions, comments, concerns, and also input that will help guide our program today to support you.
Emily Newman: So we're not seeing a ton of questions come through. Maybe what I will do is I will answer this question too, and just sort of also pass it to you, Renita, and you can have our last word here today. But if there is one takeaway that you would like for people to walk away from this first call with, what would you like that to be?
For me, that takeaway is that action is important and that again, this work is a journey and the actions that stand behind and support a meaningful statement are the things that will help us get to those extraordinary workplaces, get to that systemic change. And the work of doing that systemic work requires all of us influencing our workplaces and considering them in the context of the action plan that is to come, as well as the programs that we continue to deliver. And as a friendly reminder, there's programmatic work that's already up. So in the learning phase, there's resources and tools that you can even begin to work on your learning already right now. Renita?
Renita Smith: Thanks, Emily. I would say that my takeaway would be that action is important, and it's actually even more important internally than externally, even though in times right now it can feel that the external is everything, that you don't want to misstep. That the words that you carefully craft into a message on LinkedIn are the be all and the end all. But actually what's even more important right now is to begin to hunker down and make sure that your internal workplaces and your culture are strong, and then that you can be honest and authentic. Once again, we say, we're not perfect. We're not there yet. But we're making genuine, informed, guided efforts to make real, lasting change. So don't be paralyzed for fear that you haven't figured it all out yet, because it is ongoing work. And the internal work from the inside out is the most vital.
Emily Newman: Wonderful. Well, thank you everyone for being here. So please do feel free to reach out. Please keep an eye on our social media. We already have some links to some important articles there in that learn phase. As well as keep an eye on our website in the next couple of days, we'll be communicating that of course as well. But as those items go up, we are hopeful that our members are accessing them and that our members are also reaching out as needed, because we are, to Renita's point earlier, happy to be your guide and your support along this journey. So thank you for coming today.
Renita Smith: Thank you all.
Emily Newman: Take care, everyone.