Shakti Diversity and Equity Training

  Last week, I had the honor of facilitating a communication competence workshop for a company that was looking to improve their employee's listening skills. The upper management in this organization was frustrated by the lack of listening that was occurring on a day to day basis. This organization understood the reality that effective listening directly relates to increased productivity, workplace relationships, and most importantly, revenue! I have been teaching listening skills for the past decade and am very aware that effective listening is imperative to both our personal and professional success. Unfortunately, too many of us don't realize the importance of listening in our everyday lives and fewer of us actually work towards becoming more effective listeners. Effective listening is valued and expected in most professions. Whether you are a CEO, a computer engineer, a nurse, photographer, marketing manager, hair stylist, a teacher, stay at home mom, or stud...

Incidents as the one illustrated in the above video are more common than you might think. This video illustrates how people of color may be subject to microaggressions in their everyday lived experiences. The topic of Microaggressions (the newest diversity buzz word) has received a great deal of media attention in the last few years. I have no interest in continuing the “buzz” about microaggressions but do hope to create awareness about this silent oppressor. For those of you who have never heard of this term- microaggressions (a term introduced in the 1970’s by psychiatrist Chester Pierce and made popular recently through the work of Dr. Derald Wing Sue ) are considered to be a subtle form of discrimination directed at a member of specific social identity groups.   According to Sue , microaggressions are brief and commonplace verbal behaviors and messages whether intentional or unintentional that communicate hostile, derogatory slights and insults that potentially h...