This will be a great opportunity to
network, I thought, to expose my talents to professionals from a different
demographic, i.e. White people. However, after our initial welcoming event, I
wondered how I’d force myself to open to people unlike me. There were so many
of them and so little of us (because you know we count in a room sparse with
people of color). When we took our class photo I purposely tried to stand away
from the other three black women, three Latino women, and the one black man, so
it’d look a bit more …colorful. Still, as we prepared for our weekend retreat
and official initiation into Leadership Pioneer Valley, I prepared myself to
code switch. It’s what we do, change our speech style, volume, body language
and vocabulary to mirror mainstream America. We drop the colloquialisms; avoid
being our true selves to not offend, intimidate, or perpetuate negative
cultural stereotypes. For some of us code switching is fluid and easy, and we
never had to be taught; it was learned by watching. I was ready for it.
To my surprise, the way our differences were
brought to the forefront right from the beginning by executive director Lora Wondolowski,
made me feel comfortable with just being me( in all my Black girl magic), without
fear of making others uncomfortable or feeling like what I said or did
represented all of us. This was just the beginning of the many lessons I
learned throughout the 10-month program for emerging leaders in Western
Massachusetts. Without giving away all
the details (because you should totally check it out yourself), I learned to
listen more and react less. Through constant internal evaluation, that
everything wasn’t crucial or warranted my input. I didn’t have to take over or
take charge, but that I could earn be “happy enough” with the consensus. My
strengths were validated and there were strategies I could immediately
implement on the day job as well as in my entrepreneurial work. In the end, it was way more than a list of
new contacts, it was realizing how we all benefit from honest, uncomfortable discussions
and the value of effectively using your voice. It was building collaborative relationships,
friendships, and a new perspective of myself as well the Pioneer Valley.
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| Class of 2017. A great group of people |
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| Bad Ass Lora Wondolowski, executive director of LPV, handing me my diploma |
For more information
about applying for to be a part of class of 2018, visit www.leadershippv.org
