Well, welcome, welcome. For those of you who were at the first session, welcome back. And this is intimate. So I guess I'm up against the afternoon at this point, but we're still going to have fun, right? So today's topic is, can I use this? Let me see. Can I switch? Okay, this is good. All right. This is more fun. All right. So today's topic, we're talking about how to actually build a program that you can take back to your office, to your practice. So we're not going to do a whole complex program today, but you will leave here with the components and the steps necessary to build a program for your office. So today's agenda, I always like to let you know where we're going with this. I'll go over my story. It might be the encore performance for some of you, what DEI is and why you should care. And then how you can prepare yourself, how to identify, recruit and prepare your team, how to start communicating, gather data, set goals, identify strategies and tactics. There was actually a question, it was more of a tactical question in the last workshop, so we'll get a little bit more into tactics today. And of course, we will need to not to only implement, but also assess the results of any program that we put into place. Now, my business is mind blowing happiness. I've said this more than once. So if we're going to do anything, we're going to have fun. And celebration is actually more than just having fun. It's important. It's that positive feedback that makes us want to continue doing the things that we're doing that are useful and that are helpful. So when we have to do things that we maybe don't really want to do, and then we do them, even if they're successful, if we don't celebrate, it doesn't close out the positive feedback loop so that we want to do it again. And again, I will be raffling some books that I have for you today. So there's me. So I'm a transformational coach. I'm a diversity, equity and inclusion teacher. I particularly like to talk about the intersection between DEI work and confidence and happiness, because I think the intersection is actually very interesting. I'm the author of three books, and I have a fourth one coming out in the spring of 2024. So the two that are very popular right now is my self-help memoir, Thinking Outside the Chrysalis, A Black Woman's Guide to Spreading Her Wings, and the companion book to that, which is 12 Steps to Mind-Blowing Happiness. And who doesn't want to be mind-blowingly happy? I got some really lovely endorsements. One from Iyanla Van Zandt, which was huge for me. There was a lot of kind of jumping around and screaming going on when that happened. And then also I got a beautiful book forward from Marcy Shymoff, who is the co-creator of the Chicken Soup for the Women's Soul. She is also one of the featured teachers in the film The Secret. And she is, you guys should write this down, she is the narrator of my favorite documentary, which is called Happy. In the last session, somebody was asking me about, well, you know, how can I get happier? The documentary Happy, I've seen it like three, four times, because it always makes me happy. But it also gives you some really good data about positive psychology, positive psychology, happiness, and how you can level up your happiness, your personal happiness. And then Jack Canfield is a co-creator of Chicken Soup for the Soul. So he gave me a nice endorsement for that book as well. I think we already got that and that. I did not have this in my introduction. I think you guys have heard this before, but I worked in finance for 12 years for some really major firms. And the class action lawsuits wouldn't stop. So there were two class action lawsuits for black financial advisors, one for female financial advisors that I was party to. And you know how they say, you know, when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. That was really what informed my work. You know, that's what made me get interested in this work that I'm doing now. So DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion. We know that diversity is just variety. And variety is spicy and fun. So we like that. Equity is about justice. So it's not always equality. Sometimes there's confusion between equity and equality. An easy example that I love to give is if you are a dad who is expecting a baby and a mom who's expecting a baby, only one of you needs the prenatal pill. I mean the dad could take it, but you don't both need it. So equity has to do with justice, with giving what is required to the person who needs it. And inclusion, you know, sometimes these can get politicized and become words that people don't like anymore. But everybody wants to be included. You know, nobody wants to feel left out. We've probably all had those moments, some of us more than others, where we were like the only one sitting at the lunch table, or you know, the only one who was going to play. And you had these moments where maybe you didn't feel like you had all the friends, which is not the best feeling. So we all want to be included. We all want to have a sense of justice. And diversity is a spice of life. So it's all great stuff. And then what creates diversity? Some of these, you know, until I started working in this area, a lot of these I didn't think about. Like I didn't think about things that were not impacting me, to be quite honest. So I'm an able-bodied woman. I didn't think a whole lot about friends or people with vision impairment or with hearing impairment or with physical impairments. So when you think about diversity, you think not just about the first things that we think of usually, which is gender and color and those types of things, but ability. It could be age. You know, it could be older. Sometimes people, I'm committed to saying my age because I feel like it's part of my confidence and authenticity and joy and all that good stuff. But look, you're not going to ask me, are you? I'll tell you. But a lot of people feel like they cannot show up in a space and be their accurate age. I'll never forget years ago, a friend of mine told me she was working for like an ad agency type firm and they were going to pitch a car manufacturer. And they were told nobody over 35 could go to the pitch, which is probably, is that illegal? I don't know. But it could be, depending on the age classification, the type of company, all that stuff. But the reality that these things happen based on age, and it could be being too old or sometimes it's being too young, you know? So age creates diversity. Body type, right? Do we have a particular look that we need our sales team to have or a particular look that we want our managers to have? And then the things that we're more familiar with, things like ethnicity, gender identity, languages of your birth, of your country. So really, immigrant language, immigration status, of course, race and color, we hear probably the most about. Religion is another one, or even lack of religion. Sexual orientation, of course. Just a lot of things. And sometimes you might look at this list. I know there was a time I had gone to a training with a trans woman. And at the beginning of the training, she said, okay, everybody, take off your shoes and put them on the opposite feet. And we were like, what? And then when we did it, you know how it feels when your shoes are on the wrong feet. And she said, that's how it feels to be in the wrong body. And then I was like, ah, I get it, you know? So I just say that to say sometimes we don't necessarily understand everything. But just being open to learning and being open to the perspectives of other people. Because most of us are what they call cisgender, which is we feel like the gender that we look like. Okay, so it could be veteran status. But this is not a list that covers everything. I'm sure there's more categories we could put in here. And then why do you care? You know, when we write books, on the back cover of your book, you're supposed to write why the reader should care. Why would anybody read your book? So why would anybody care about your book? Why the reader should care? Why would anybody read your book? So why would anybody care about diversity, equity, and inclusion? The first one is, come on, you know, we all remember kindergarten. Do unto others as they would do unto you. Be nice, right? So we want to be good, nice people who treat other people the way that we would like to be treated. The second is the business benefit. So diversity is a business asset. More and more we're understanding that when we have diversity of thoughts, ideas, experiences, backgrounds, it creates the groundwork for innovation, for conversations that normally wouldn't happen if you're in kind of a silo where everybody is thinking the same way or has the same experiences. Because it could even be demographic, right? People from different places within the U.S. And then federal laws. So, you know, you have your spiritual laws to make you feel good, grow as a person. You got your business benefits. We all want money, right? Yay, money. And then you got your federal laws in case you get out of line, depending on the size of your industry and that kind of thing. You could get involved with lawsuits with the EEOC, and you don't want to be spending money on that. That's no fun. You're better off spending money, getting a nice program in place, right? All right. So I talked about this. Diversity drives innovation. This is a nice data point. Isn't that a big number? So this is from Forbes, and I looked at different numbers. But can you imagine 33 percent increase in revenues? It doesn't seem like, you know, it's, you know. But that's the numbers that are coming back. All right. So we're going to start with a little visualization, because, you know, I like visualization. I'm also a yoga meditation instructor. So I want you to think about two to three diverse groups that are currently not in your organization. And I want you to think about how that could be fun if they were there. Would you eat better food? Would you have better parties? What would, you know, what could be fun about that? Because so many times we think, oh gosh, you know, if somebody's in my group that's not like me, it's going to be really annoying. But I want you to take a moment and think about some of those. I think you guys all have the handouts. So some of the groups that you looked at before, whether it was different size people, different ability people, people of different backgrounds, and just get two or three groups in your mind. And then I'm going to give you just a little minute to do a visualization. So if you're comfortable closing your eyes, you can go ahead and close your eyes. Once you have that group in your mind. okay so if your eyes are closed now so just bring those groups that are a little different from you bring them to the forefront of your mind and see if you can see what they look like what kind of hair or outfits what are they wearing so just see those people and then see if you can imagine maybe some sounds some music I'm going to imagine anything like culturally interesting that they might bring to the table like a food Something that smells good Maybe something that tastes good Then I want you to check in with your gut So if you're imagining some people who you're not normally around How does that make you feel in your stomach? Do you feel any tension there? Can you relax it? Then just take a few more breaths there and see if you can relax into this idea. See if you can even visualize something really fun, like a really fun party or off-site event with a different, more diverse, more interesting group. There's something a little bit different than the everyday. And I want you to imagine you're having fun. You're having a really good time. You feel really relaxed. And then when you're ready, go ahead and relax your concentration and come out of that slowly. And I hope you guys all had fun in your mind just now. How do you feel? Did you have a little fun in your mind? Okay. Yeah. Visualization is pretty amazing because our brains don't really know the difference between visualization and reality. And you find that when you're sleeping. You know, a lot of times, like I had a really weird dream the other night and then I woke up and I was like, oh, my goodness, thank goodness that wasn't real. You know, because our minds don't really know the difference. So sometimes, even if it's just for your own personal health or wanting to feel happier or better, you can take a minute and visualize your happy place in difficult times. But it's also nice before you embark on a new project to visualize a successful outcome, you know, to visualize a joyful experience. So there you go. And you can just take a few, maybe 30 seconds, and write down what your experience was like for you. Okay, so let's go ahead and get started. So how are we gonna create a program, right? So first, we're gonna prepare the team. So you're gonna think about who would be the key players? You know, who would be the most important people to begin a diversity program at your organization? Would you use just people in the organization? Would you need a consultant or a trainer or somebody to come from the outside? Would you wanna collaborate with another practice or another vendor even? Who might be a good collaborator? Because you're not the only one working on this issue, right? And you also wanna make sure to communicate what you're doing. I really like transparency. You know, some firms, they wanna make sure everything's perfect or not even just firms. I think some people, it could be a personality trait too, wanna make sure everything's perfect before we communicate it. I think it's more authentic and people understand when you communicate as you're going through a process. So it doesn't mean that you go back to your office and Monday you just start sending out emails saying any old thing you do wanna think about a little bit. But I would include the staff, you know, let them know that this is something that if it is gonna be a directive of the firm that you want to have people start thinking about and get prepared for. And for, you know, some of the same reasons that we know this is the way that our country is trending, right? The demographics are what they are. And besides all that variety is spicy, so yay. So you can do your mission statement, include diversity in there if it's not already in there. Communicate with your employees. And you can also ask for volunteers. You know, some people will be resistant but some people will be totally into it. Like if I were at your organization, I'd be like, yay, put me on the team. So look for people who are interested. And this is important. So you know, not everybody's gonna love diversity. Like not everybody on your team is gonna be Trish. Like, yay, diversity. Some people are not gonna be into this. We know this. So don't set yourself up to not expect the pushback and to not expect the skepticism and the questions. All right, so let's take some action. So write down your first thoughts for who would be the key players on your team if you were going to put a new program in place. All right, so you guys, are you good? Let's just a little bit more than 30 seconds. All right. All right, so I spoke about this a little bit. Stay strong. You know, what you don't wanna do is say, yeah, we've made a commitment to diversity. And then three months later, like, yeah, we're not doing that anymore. You know, so you wanna, if you're gonna do it, you wanna really do it. And part of that is remembering why you're doing it. Be transparent about what you're doing. Listen to people, address their concerns. There's a lot of fear. You know, people are really, gosh, fearing so many things. And there is a media machine that is helping to create these fears. So it's not something where people are just making it up by themselves. There's a real machine in place that's making people very fearful. Remember your why. So for me, it helps to remember my spiritual why. Because again, we show up in businesses and we show up as workers, but we're not really workers. We're really humans. We're really people. We all have families. We have people who are important to us, loved ones, all of that. So whatever your why is, whether it is from a more spiritual perspective, or if it's, I just need to make some more money, or, you know, I just don't wanna get in trouble, you know, or I just don't wanna be left behind, right? If everybody's moving one direction, I don't wanna be left behind. Whatever your why is, and any why is fine. It doesn't have to be my why. You know, my why doesn't have to be your why. And when you think about engaging your team, recognize that their why may be different. Like your why might be really happy, sugar-coated with the golden rule, but their why might just be like, I don't wanna get in trouble. Tell me what I have to do. This is a hard one. We are kind of hardwired to want to be comfortable. So it makes some of this work difficult because many times we're having conversations that we don't normally have, or we don't feel like we know everything, so we don't have our kind of area of expertise that we're used to having at work. So you can have these feelings of discomfort. I have a thing that I tell my daughter, my daughter's 22. Anytime she has, you know, like a presentation like this, or a big paper, or, you know, just something that's out of the ordinary, I always tell her to lean into that feeling, that feeling of discomfort. Because, you know, when you're super comfortable, when you're not doing anything, when you're like lying in bed or watching Netflix, you know, you are not changing the world if you're not comfortable. You know, so that feeling of discomfort, instead of saying, oh my God, I don't like it, just say, okay, yeah, I remember you. I did live TV once, I'll tell you this. It wasn't comfortable. It wasn't like putting on my pajamas and getting in bed. You know, live TV, you're kind of like, oh, this is kind of a thing. You know, one day I would love to do Oprah, the Today Show, and it's not gonna be comfortable. It's gonna feel a little funny. So embrace your discomfort, it's a good thing. If you feel uncomfortable, it's good. It means that you're doing something. Oh, and here you go. You can give your staff a book, give them my book. But these are actually really great books. So, 12 Steps to Mind Blowing Happiness. I know one of the ladies came in here earlier and she was like, oh my God, Mind Blowing Happiness. And I'm like, yeah, well, who doesn't want that? The reality is you can go through K through 12 college, get a master's degree, a PhD, and never do any self-awareness work. You know, and then we're presented with these periods where we have to do things that are uncomfortable, but we've never had to do any kind of interior work on ourselves. So this is the easy way if you wanted to, you know, put something in the hands of your staff where they can look at things at home by themselves, not with you, and address things like self-awareness. Who am I healing? You know, am I generous? Do I even know what compassion is? So things like that. And then Thinking Outside the Chrysalis is a nice companion. It tells my story of overcoming institutional racism. Whether it's my books or someone else's books, it's very helpful to read stories from people who do not look like you, who do not come from the background that you came from. I started earlier with a story about the trans woman, and I was like, I had no idea until I had a conversation with somebody. And I said, oh, okay. You know, and of course, since then I've met other people, but I was living in Atlanta. Depending on where you live, you may not come into diverse audiences or groups of people where you can speak to them personally. So books are a great way to do that. All right, prepare yourself. Get ready. Do you have personal resistance? You know, I'm thinking if you're in this room, you probably don't. Or at least not that much, because you got in here. But within all of us, we've grown up a certain way where we learned a certain way of being from our parents, from our culture, from media, from our churches, from our cities. You know, so when we come across people who maybe didn't grow up where we grew up or think differently, there can be a personal resistance where it's like, well, I'm right. Duh, you know. So pay attention to that. There's nothing wrong with feeling that. You just want to notice it. And just in general, resistance to change is very normal. You know? It kind of goes back to that example of relaxing at home. You know, sometimes it's just like, well, I'm thinking of my parents. They lived in the same house for 50, gosh, 60 years. You know? So yeah, change can be difficult. So having a little resistance is normal. Just be compassionate with yourself. And now we're going to try a little meditation. All right, so this is one of my favorites. And if you get nothing here today, hopefully you'll get a lot, but this is something that you can take with you anywhere you go. Sometimes I do it when I can't fall asleep and it works really nicely. We're not going to do three, three, three, because that would be 10 minutes, basically. We'll probably do like 30 seconds, 30 seconds, 30 seconds. All right? So let's go ahead and get comfortable. And I didn't give much guidance on this before, but typically if you're meditating, you do want to sit up straight because it makes a difference in the energy in your body. So you don't want to kind of be like this. There is actually a stream of energy that's going to go from the crown of your head to the base of your spine. If you can have your feet flat on the floor, that's ideal as opposed to like crossing your legs or crossing at the ankle. So go ahead and just come to a comfortable seat. If you feel good closing your eyes, you can close your eyes. If you don't, you can just take a gaze about two feet in front of you, like an unfocused gaze. And go ahead and just relax the crown of your head. Relax your face. We hold a lot of tension in our jaws. So you can go ahead and relax your jaw. Imagine a warm blanket wrapped around your neck and shoulders. And just relax. And then relax your upper arms, your elbows, your forearms, your hands. Relax your chest and your belly, your hips and your thighs. Relax your knees, your calves, and your feet. And then go ahead and scan your body from head to toe and see if there's any place that's bothering you that hurts that needs to be adjusted. And just bring your awareness to that area. Adjust if you need to. And then the first thing I want you to do is think about what you are grateful for. It could be your family, friends, loved ones. Then I want you to take 30 seconds for prayer or for well-wishing and I want you to wish people well So, of course your loved ones are easy But I also want you to do some well-wishing for people who are a little bit difficult for you Yeah, everybody's fighting a battle we don't know about Just a few seconds for prayer for well-wishing however you look at that and it could be for your team in the office. And then I want you to go ahead and visualize a diversity program success. So, say a year and a half from now. You've launched this program, or your firm has launched this program, and it's just been amazing. Like you can't believe how great the feedback's been. You've had such wonderful results. You feel so good about it. So, take a few moments and breathe that in. How would that feel? To really make a change, to be acknowledged and respected for this work. Okay, and then when you're ready, you can go ahead and relax your concentration slowly. Open your eyes if they were closed. And then just write down, what was your experience like with that? This is one of my favorite things to do. All right, so did you guys enjoy that? That's like one of my favorites. And the nice thing is it's accessible, you know? So you could do it in your car, parked in the parking lot. You could do it when you're driving. Probably not the visualization part. But sometimes I'll do the gratitude when I'm driving. You know, we all have difficult days. And on those difficult days, we're usually thinking about the things that aren't working. And we have a negativity bias. So that's kind of the norm. We normally think about what's not working. So it just allows you to kind of flip it and think about what is working. And typically there's a lot more things that are working that we're thankful for than what's not working. But the reason I include it here is because in order to do this work, you want to be shored up, because you will get resistance. You know, depending on what your office is like, there will be resistance. So you want to make sure that you're in a good space where you feel healthy and supported. And it makes you happier. So, you know, that's always a great thing. All right, so one of the first things we want to do is go ahead and gather existing data from the employees that you have. So this doesn't mean you're asking them any questions. You already know this stuff. Most of this you're going to have already. If you don't, you're certainly not going to go and ask anybody their sexual orientation and don't tell them that Trish said to do that. So you're going to gather information for your program. And basically you're looking around, right? Like, am I in a practice where it's all white men, right? Then I would say, well, okay. Maybe I have different ages, but I don't have any ethnicity or race diversity, right? Or you might be in a practice where they're all, I'm calling people out. Okay, let's say they're all black women, right? It's so funny. And you might say, okay, well, maybe I should have some men in this practice. I might be missing something. So we can go either way, but this is basically just looking around, right? Who's in my office? Who's missing? Who's missing from the party? And then the next piece is when you start talking to your employees, where you say, okay, you might ask for some optional demographic information that they can answer or not answer. Of course, you want to let people know why you're asking them questions. And then we get into the main topic, which is around belonging. Do they feel like they belong? Do they feel that there is fairness at the organization? Do they have access to opportunities and resources? Do they approve of the decision-making? Do they think decision-making makes sense at the firm? And it's funny because I've worked so many years and these are the things that people complain about when they don't like them. And then of course, is there diversity? Do they have a voice? And is there a contribution to a broader purpose? And these are some sample survey questions. So you have these to take back with you. You can use them directly like this, or you can add your own or look for other types. But I really like a one to 10 scale because for me, it's easy to track data movement. If somebody moves one point, then they're moving a 10%. You could, it depends how far you want to go with the data. Yeah. Yeah, you could. You know, what happens sometimes with these is employees are concerned about answering them. You know, so sometimes you may want to have a third party that's taking the responses. Yeah. Yeah. But you would, I guess, take that under some advisement, right? Because you don't want to have a survey and nobody does it, or they feel like, oh, if I say that now, they know that I don't feel like I belong. Okay, all right, yeah, and so they believe that it's not being tagged. No, I'm sure it isn't. I was just wondering, yeah. Yeah, thank you for that. And then another way too, do you incentivize people to do their surveys? Okay people love PTO like you are giving you are giving the right present yeah yes thank you for that question and so this is the next one you know do you feel like you're treated fairly access to opportunities for advancement resources for growth you know what I like about this is that you know when people think of diversity they don't necessarily think of it this way like but that's really how it plays out a sense of not having equal opportunity for advancement or not being treated fairly I like this one means you disagree with most companies but this is on decision making and again these are handy because you can you can use them and then level of diversity do you feel like you have your voice heard and I love this contribution to a broader purpose a lot of times we don't think about this is firms you know we'll think well I have a medical practice and that's what I do but I think that it's really inspiring to employees to have a little bit more than you know I just that's what I do so thinking about ways to make your purpose a little bit more engaging maybe than I just I don't know or the only time I went to an orthopedist I think I was training for like a half marathon and I did something to my foot but you know more than just I could fix your foot or I could fix your knee you know all right so setting smart goals we talked about some of this in a previous session but you want to use the data that you collected to now create your goals because now that you have some data you have an idea which direction you want to go like what what does this diversity program need to look like who's missing from the party and you know who should be included in our practice so using the data we have we could say things like oh well people don't think we're fair we can kind of work on this perception of fairness over the course of 12 months so whenever we set goals we want to make sure they're specific that there's some time frame around it otherwise it just kind of becomes a you know a slow-moving boat down a river and we don't know if we've ever gotten there or not for most programs they're gonna be 12-month programs where you're looking at data have you done different time frame besides 12 months or Yeah, I think 12 months gives you enough time to try to have, move the needle a little bit, you know, to try to create some change. So another goal could be something like increasing ethnic diversity by 10%. It could be something like increasing vendor diversity. You know, sometimes we forget about our vendors, like who are we getting our materials from? So with that in mind, write down maybe a goal or two that might be something interesting for you to bring back to your practice. All right, so you should have a goal or maybe two goals to start. Okay, so once you have your goals, then we're looking at, okay, well, how are we going to reach these goals? What are our tactics or strategies to do that? And it could, you know, there's such a wide range. Once you know what your goal is, then you can think kind of strategically, okay, well, how am I going to find these results? So in this example, if maybe you want to hire more women, your tactic might be to join an organization that recruits women or to use an organization that recruits women or to hire a recruiting firm that specializes in diversity or to advertise on a podcast that targets women. The opportunities are endless. The main thing is to figure out who you're looking for, and then you can figure out where you might find them. So if it was something with diverse vendors, you might just be Googling diverse vendors. You might ask your employees. Your employees know a lot of things. A lot of times we don't ask them. It could be going to the Chamber of Commerce and asking them about diverse vendors. And see, based on the goals that you've written down, if you can write at least one tactic or strategy to get you to your goal. I don't know if I'm going to be able to do that. So let's continue. All right. So the next step you're going to go to, of course, is implementing and then assessing results. So typically your launch is going to be over 12 months. It gives you enough time to kind of do the work and see what changes take place. After 12 months, you can still go in and assess progress. If you want to do certain check-ins, maybe with an employee survey or something midway through. And at the end of the 12-month period, you're going to go ahead and collect your data, assess it against your goals, and see where you are. And whatever happens, you're going to celebrate. Whatever happens, you're going to celebrate. Sometimes we can't control everything, right? But if we move the needle at all, we're going to celebrate it. Why? Because it closes the positive reinforcement loop, right? You don't want to spend 12 years or 12 months. I'm thinking of my own life for the 12 years. You don't want to spend 12 months working on a project or a program, and then at the end, maybe it didn't go exactly the way that you thought it would go. That's reality. But it did something. If you didn't get all the results you want, you got all this data. You learned all this stuff. Now you know these things. There's been a shift. The next year, you put another step forward. Yeah. Sometimes we think things are going to be quick and easy. We have a really quick and easy culture. But yes. So take action. Do you have an idea of what a program launch celebration might look like for you? Like what could you do that's fun for a launch? And what could you do that's fun for the end of a program? That should give you an idea of what not to do. I'm going to tell you a story. So when I first started working as a financial advisor, and I first moved to the south, and I was working for a major financial services firm, which I will not mention. Although they got bought out by somebody else. And I was one of probably zero in the office. It was in Atlanta. And I really thought that there were going to be a higher population of black people in the office. But there really were none. And there were very few women. And I remember that we had some event that they invited me to. And it was to go into like the woods and go skeet shooting. I'm from Brooklyn. So don't take them skeet shooting. You know, so just be conscious about what would be a celebration that might be fun. And accessible for a lot of people. Let's keep going. So this is me. You know, you guys all have my information if you want to find my work anywhere. Again, I do work in diversity, equity, and inclusion, training, speaking. I can put programs together for organizations. I also really enjoy this idea of happiness and confidence. And I love to talk about the intersection because sometimes people don't think there is an intersection, but if you think of this idea of people who are very stiff, you know, closed-minded, who don't want to try new things, who don't want, you know, new people or different people around them, they're not really happy people. You know, they're usually not the people you want to hang out with. So there is a connection between being open and being happy and being confident. So it's always fun to talk about that. Yes, and you can find my stuff pretty much everywhere. I have podcasts, I'm all over social media. It would just be my name. Yep, yep, yep. And if you have any questions, my goodness. I don't know that I've ever seen my picture that big. I'm feeling a little like Halle Berry. Okay, so I do have some books that I wanted to raffle. And if you guys have questions, I'm happy to answer them as well. There's so few of us, I almost want to give them away. I still don't have enough to give to everyone. Do you want to be in the raffle? No, I'll leave it there. Okay. I enjoyed your presentation very much. Thank you for sitting in. I appreciate you sitting in. Thank you. Yeah, if you have a card, if not, you could just write on a piece of paper. Thank you. Okay, perfect. So you have a 66% chance. Oh. Well, so let me tell you about these books if you... I'm trying to think, were all of you in the previous? You were, you were. Okay, I know you were, yeah. Okay, so then let me tell you about the books. So I have two books here. They both work really well for diversity education. The first one is my self-help memoir, Thinking Outside the Chrysalis, A Black Woman's Guide to Spreading Her Wings. I started my business in 2019. I thought I was going to have this amazing retreat in 2020. And I wanted to write down all the brilliant things I've learned from studying yoga and Buddhism and life coaching and just all the things. Of course, 2020, nobody had a retreat. Oh, you can't hear me, sorry. Of course, 2020, nobody had a retreat, right? Because everything shut down. So I ended up writing this in 2020 and people really liked it. It tells, you know, part of my story of dealing with institutional racism in the financial services industry, how that impacted me. And it also has the 12 steps in there. It has things like affirmations too, things to work through. So I got really good feedback on that book. And of course I say that because I wrote it, but also it's on Amazon and you can actually see the ratings on it. But my readers came back to me and they were saying, oh my gosh, you're giving me all these concepts. Like, I feel like I need a little bit more space to work through them. So that's how this book was born, 12 Steps to Mind-Blowing Happiness. This is really nice because it's only just like a short essay and then five journaling prompts. So, you know, nowadays people don't really even like to read that much because we want such short attention spans. So it's a short essay, journaling prompts, and it helps you work through what I call the 12 Steps to Mind-Blowing Happiness, which is a foundation for my coaching business. So there are things like healing, spirituality, community and connection, authenticity, self-love and self-awareness, the ability to transform anger into peace or constructive action, right? There's a lot of anger going on right now. I think I mentioned I have a book coming out that's about anger. So it's a whole long book about just that one step. And then it goes into things like generosity, it covers compassion, lots of good stuff in there. So that's what these two books are. I had to tell you that so you get excited, right? Now this is crazy because I only have three colors, but I don't know. I don't know. You want to pick? Okay, look, they're all the same color. No, wait, we got to do it like this. Times square. You know, when they do the shell game. I'm from New York, so that's why. Woo-hoo! Lauren Ashcraft, you're the next contestant. Yeah, I know, I saw that, perfect. I can sign them for you if you want me to. Um, and then, you got the next one for me? Let me see. Terrence. This is exciting. I feel like I could have been a game show host. Who's the next contestant? All right. Lisa Wassermiller? Oh, yay! Okay. I wish I had an extra set. I wasn't. Okay. But I think I quoted her in my book, so maybe she'll be my friend and call me. I think she does talk about a trish. Yes, yes, but that's not me. All right, do we have any questions? Let me see how we are for time. Oh, we're right on four o'clock. Are we? No burning questions, I guess. No, yes. I do have one. Mm-hmm. You know how, you know, Sorry. There's government guidance for how to create your own. more about making sure you don't want to follow rules but not necessarily writing a program that's right for your actual people yeah you know what i mean yeah is there any guidance out there for like you should have this yeah more about what you need for your particular organization i mean in my experience it's been what you need for your organization you know and everybody's impacted differently based on size of their organization you know whether or not eeoc is a big concern for you um i don't i haven't seen any like particular framework you know from like eeoc but yeah but there's a whole lot of stuff in chat gpt and google if you're looking for ideas you know because it really is getting the ideas and getting the structure yeah any other questions we're good all right well thank you thank you thank you so much for sharing your knowledge experience with us today i know i speak for everyone here uh when i say what a great session this was and i'm not i'm not just saying that i really did enjoy it uh no i did i i really did enjoy it um if you are applying for the aapc credit please make sure to write down the code there's the code for the aapc credit it's 8473 1l cq uh if you're just doing the regular checkout code it's 536129 so um enter this code in the mobile app by clicking on the click the checkout icon in the sessions detail section entering the checkout code and clicking submit and as a reminder please uh fill out an evaluation form those are also available um in the app and i want to again thank you uh for a wonderful presentation thank you and thank you for attending the session

diversity

equity

inclusion

workplace program

sense of belonging

smart goals

data-driven strategies

visualization meditation

personal growth