Thank you all so much for joining us. This is the session on diversity, equity, and inclusion driving meaningful change. Thank you all so much for joining us. I'm Liz Stigler, I'm at the American College of Chess Physicians, and I'm the moderator for this session. I'm going to introduce our panelists with their bios. They are all very impressive, awesome, skilled, and then they're going to come up here and give little sort of individual talks. And then we have some questions that we'll talk about as a panel, and then we're going to open it up for your Q&A. So that's what we're going to do together for the next hour. So as you hear and are talking with them, be thinking about what you would love to ask them, because we'll have time for questions. So I will introduce each of them right now, and then they'll come up here. So our first panelist is Patricia Frustace, right? Great. And she is the Senior Director of Awards and Diversity Programs for the American Society of Hematology. Patricia is responsible for the management and oversight of recruitment, retention, and recognition award programs across the society. Further, she's responsible for overseeing the strategy, program operations, and volunteer support for highly regarded ASH DEI efforts. These efforts, begun in 2003, have expanded from a limited recruitment and retention effort into a multifaceted and comprehensive focus on embedding principles of DEI within and across all aspects of the society. Patricia is regularly requested to consult on peer organization efforts and as an invited speaker on DEI-related work in the medical specialty space. Patricia has 20-plus years of professional experience, ranging from external auditing for nonprofits to working as an internal consultant for a Fortune 500 media company to working as an internal consultant and operational lead for one of the most recognized nonprofits in the world. Prior to joining ASH, she served in a variety of roles, including Executive Director for Development Advancement at the American Red Cross National Headquarters. She has two bachelor's degrees in Accounting and Decision Sciences and earned her Certified Public Accountant Licensure in Virginia in 1995. That's our first panelist. Our second panelist is Dr. Jermaine Monk, a passionate, visionary, and accomplished teacher, scholar, and academic administrator. He brings over a decade of experience in higher ed, in developing and implementing research, teaching, mentoring, and advisement of underrepresented and marginalized student populations. Prior to arriving at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, Jermaine held faculty and administrative roles at the City University of New York Rutgers, Temple, and Drew Universities. His commitment to DEI and belonging includes building out a structured, faculty-student-centered diversity and inclusion platform that includes curriculum design. In addition, he supports faculty, staff, and students by designing, implementing, and facilitating professional training programs to support institutional and organizational effectiveness. Dr. Monk holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Urban Systems, a joint program between the School of Nursing and School of Public Affairs at Rutgers University and the New Jersey Institute of Technology. He completed an M.S. in Business Management from U of I Urbana-Champaign, earned an M.A. in Theological Studies from LaSalle University, received an M.S.W. from Temple University, and a B.A. from the Edward J. Blonstein School of Urban Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers. In addition, he completed a certificate in Leading for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Higher Ed from the University of Michigan and the Harvard Graduate School of Education. So Dr. Monk likes school a lot, and we're glad he's here. And our final panelist, Sybil Green, is the Vice President and Chief Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Officer at the American Society of Clinical Oncology, where she's responsible for advancing the society's EDI goals. Her expertise is in health policy, advocacy, and equity, diversity, and inclusion. Ms. Green has served as ASCO's Director of Strategic Initiatives in Policy and Advocacy and has held various leadership roles in state government, professional associations, and the corporate sector. She's an active member of the National Pharmaceutical Association and a member of the National Pharmaceutical Association Foundation Board of Trustees since 2011. Ms. Green earned her J.D. and M.H.A. from Indiana University and a B.S. in Pharmacy from Xavier University of Louisiana. She also holds a certificate in Diversity and Inclusion from Cornell University. So those are our panelists. Please join me in welcoming up to the mic here, I'm going to pass it off to Patricia who's going to kick us off here. Thank you. Well, hello everyone. My name is Patricia Frustaci, and I'm the Senior Director of Awards and Diversity Programming on the ASH staff. ASH is the American Society of Hematology. It is the society that is focused on blood and blood sciences, as well as inclusion of informing how blood influences health and health outcomes. ASH is a membership society that has over 18,000 members, and our annual meeting attracts about 30,000 individuals. And pertinent to today's presentation, we have been focused on DEI work for more than 20 years. Today, what I hope to share with you is sort of the blueprint that we use to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion within and across ASH, with the hope that it gives you suggestions for how you might think through incorporating or accelerating the DEI work in your space. I have no disclosures to share because I'm not that interesting. So I want to share with you a little bit about the way ASH thinks about DEI. For us, DEI is really an ecosystem, and that's because the actions and activities that we embark on influence and impact each other. And what that means is, is you can do things in parallel. You can work from top down, thinking about how to make sure diverse perspectives, talents, and experiences are in your leadership positions. And at the same time, you can be thinking about recruitment and retention so that the next generation reflects these same values. So for us, I'm going to share today a little bit about how we think about this ecosystem. And I'll tell you, it's a little bit dense. It's going to feel like a lot. But I want you to just think about this in the context of the levers that we have that we can use to shape and influence DEI as specialty societies. Think of it as your choose-your-own-adventure guide. So the first question that we at ASH ask ourselves, and these questions really can be applied to your specialty spaces, is, does hematology represent the people that we serve? And if the answer is no, and we all know the answer is no, what are the interventions that you can think about taking on to address that? You can think about things like an award pathway to recruit and retain the next generation. You can think about things like what sorts of career development are going to help make sure that those same students advance in their careers and serve in positions of influence eventually. Some of the interventions can require people. Some can require money. Some can require data. But that doesn't mean if you don't have data or people or money, you can't get started. So the second question that we ask ourselves is, does ASH represent the people that we serve in hematology? And if the answer is no, and yes, the answer is no, what are the interventions that you can embark on to address that? And the first thing I would tell you as you're thinking about this question here is to be mindful of the well-meaning and often intelligent speed bump. What I'm talking about here is the person that says, well, we need to be careful. We need to get this right. We have to use the data. And that sounds really smart, right? It sounds like the right thing to do. But in essence, that can often be something that slows you down or pauses you so that everyone else can get comfortable. And comfortable benefits the status quo. And if your answer to question one and your answer to question two are no, which we all know they are, then the status quo is not the place where you should be comfortable. So the third question that we ask ourselves at ASH is, do we create a culture where everyone feels like they belong? And if the answer is no, and we all know the answer is no, what are the interventions that you can take that will help you address this challenge? You can do things like we do. We have a micro-learning studio at our annual meeting. We change the theme every year, but it's always EI related. We've discussed principles of anti-racism one year, health equity and social determinants of health another, implicit bias, and advancing the principles of DEI as allies in another. These are spaces where you can help people think about and confront our internal biases, understand systemic biases that influence health and health outcomes. So the first three questions are really about who we are, right? Who we are as specialty societies. Who we are as the people advancing DEI in our space. And the last question, and it's a doozy, is really about what we do. Does the work of ASH and hematology result in fair and equitable outcomes? And if the answer is no, and we all know the answer is no, what do you do about that? And this one could be its whole own ecosystem, right? There are so many ways that you have to think about the influence that bias can have on the work of a medical specialty society. This is publications. It's annual meeting content. It's the requirements that you have for speakers who are presenting their science and whether or not they disclose the limitations to their demographic data. It's asking yourself if there's a specific disease state that you should be addressing inequities in. There is rich opportunity to contribute in this space in meaningful ways. So it's a lot. It's choose your own adventure. And sometimes with choose your own adventure, you need to put the book down for a little while. And when you're ready, you pick the book back up. And maybe you flip to the next chapter. Or maybe you need to flip back to your last choice to ask yourself if you would make a different choice. But use the choose your own adventure. Use this guidebook to think about the ways that you can contribute to the advancement of DEI, especially capitalizing on the levers that we have as specialty societies. The single most important thing you need to know is that we can't do this alone. There are things that we can do. We have levers that we can influence. But we can't do it alone. We need industry. We need academia. We need regulators. And so I'm happy to turn it over to my colleague, Dr. Monk, who's going to talk a little bit more about how academia thinks about this issue and the work that they do and the work that he does to advance DEI in their space. Thank you. Thank you so much. Good afternoon. All right. I'd like a little call and response. So again, my name is Jermaine Monk. I'm so pleased to be here and to share this panel with my esteemed colleagues. I'm just going to offer you a few things that we are doing at Johns Hopkins, specifically within the School of Nursing, that hopefully we can share with you, but then at the same time that we can learn from each other. As a school, as an institution, we're really trying to get it right. We don't have it right at this moment. But one of the things that I think that we all share is that we're all connected to healthcare and whatever our particular professions and specialties may be. And I think part of the conversation is about how can we learn from each other. So I'm so glad to share this panel with my colleagues from different professions or different specialties because I think that we all are trying to get it right, and we're all trying to add to this conversation. So like my colleague, I don't have any disclosures to report, so there's no conflicts of interest at this point. So in academia, I'm actually keeping it... I'm not going to be dogged down with a whole bunch of theories and concepts, but I do want to introduce a couple of things that I think that may be helpful at your institution. There is a new term that has emerged, diversity, equity, and inclusion, as a phrase, I think both academically, I think politically, has become very contentious. Folks have a lot of things to say when we think about these terms or these letters, DEI. So one of the things that has actually emerged academically is this concept around inclusive excellence, which does still posit diversity, equity, and inclusion as part of it, but this concept is that everybody has a contribution to make, despite where you may come from. Most times, when I have conversations with folks, when we talk about diversity, equity, and inclusion, they think race. They think who, you know, and I've actually, I was at a presentation the other day, and the presenter was saying that most often that when we talk about diversity, equity, and inclusion positions, they oftentimes are people of color. I just so happen to be a person of color. My institution hired me for this role I'm about a year or so in, but what I want to kind of push back on is this idea that you have to have different voices at the table in order to move the conversation forward. So this concept around inclusive excellence include a couple of things that I just want to, again, introduce you all to, and I'm absolutely open to having a conversation relative to it, is access and success. One is who do we invite in? The other part is how do we measure success? And by that I mean is that when we think about success, we think about either patient outcomes, we think about revenue, right, grants, whatever your particular industry may be, the concept is that we quantify those in specific numbers. We have some benchmarks by which we hold people to by which we identify success. One of the things about inclusive excellence is this idea is that, one, do we have enough voices at the table, and then are we being practical when we use this term success, meaning that are we giving or are we setting the bar higher than, we're setting an expectation that's higher than what the person is able to do or what the institution or what the division is able to do. Climate and intergroup relations. One of these ideas that, like my colleague, we're really working on, my position is actually diversity, equity, inclusion, and my dean added the term belonging. So once folks get here, or once folks get to the School of Nursing at Johns Hopkins, do they feel like they are part of that community? So part of what I want you to think about is this idea is that not only are we keeping the door open, are we allowing folks, are we hiring folks who are qualified, but then also when they get here, do we also have room at the table? We are thinking about the holiday that's coming up, Thanksgiving, and part of the concept is this. Hiring someone in the job or forward position, generally speaking, folks, I would hope, really try to be cognizant of making sure that we have folks that are qualified, but then also that diversity exists in the institution. The other part is when we think about this concept of belonging is do you go out to lunch with that person? That's a different conversation. Yes, we hired you, we gave you the offer, so forth and so on, however, do I also, I'm not saying that you're bringing them over every night, they're the godparents of your child, right? I'm not, but what I am saying is that we as professionals, we understand that there's difference when we break bread with someone, right? Oftentimes, some of us have probably had that where the interview actually happens over a meal, which is different than the usual, you come in, right? That's what I'm saying is that it's a different feeling, a different sense of, and part of what I want to, again, introduce you to, this idea of inclusive excellence is about how do we treat a person, not just giving them the offer, that's step one, step two is once they get there, do they feel that they're part of that community? Education and scholarship. Part of what I would say is that even though you all are degreed, however, education does not stop. Whether you have a PhD or MD, whatever it may be, the argument is that you have not learned everything. If you learned everything in the world, just raise your hand. If there's nothing else for you to learn, raise, right? Scholarship is what you all do, I'm sure, every day. The work that you do in terms of patients, whether you're working with pharmaceuticals, whatever it may be, we're sending out reports, we're publishing articles, we're engaging in research, that is all considered to be scholarship, so part of the idea is that how do we also utilize these mechanisms as we think about diversity, equity, inclusion? Infrastructure and investment. Infrastructure and investment is that, yes, you hired a person to do the job for diversity, equity, inclusion, or culture and climate. A lot of institutions have different terms for it. Are we giving them a budget to be able to do things? That's a different conversation. Yeah, I gave you a nice office, I gave you your own laptop, your name was on the door, but when it actually comes to programming that involves doing something in the institution, we actually don't support that, right? That's the concept around infrastructure and investment. The community partnership, you cannot do this work alone. I would argue that the very people that are in this room, all of us have different specialties. All of us are helping to bring or to a part of this when we talk about medical community, healthcare community, we are all members of that. Because we are all members of that, the idea is that even if you are not part of my institution, I should be able to go to Patricia, I should be able to go to Sybil, I should be able to go to Liz and still be able to rely on them as part of my network, even though they may not be part of my network or my institution. Last part, I'm trying to keep it short, I want to share the time obviously with my colleagues, but then I think the questions are really important. We call it E6. Six components about what we are trying to do in terms of, and again it's an acronym, but it's specific things that we are as an institution are trying to do for the purposes of as we think about building out a more structured program around diversity, equity, inclusion, one is engage. I'm not going to shy away from these conversations, so let's have it. Sometimes when we have these conversations around diversity, equity, inclusion, it's kind of like, I don't know, I'm going to say the wrong thing, so therefore I don't say anything at all. Our approach is no, let's have the conversation, why? Because we are a school, and again I understand that we are an institution of higher learning at Hopkins, so the idea though is that we are learning, we're not going to always get it right. I don't care what the degree is, I don't care what the title of the person may be. The idea is that we are trying to get it right, and some days we're going to get it better than others, but to not have the conversation is worse off for us, so we engage. Second is that we evolve. We realize that as we are learning, that we should be constantly changing. Think about strategic plans. I'm sure all of your institutions and organizations have a strategic plan. Why? Because it constantly evolves. This conversation around diversity, equity, inclusion constantly is evolving. Thank God that we are in Florida. Thank God that we're not, at least I'm not. I recognize that my personhood is different here in Maryland than if I were in Florida, and part of what I want you to think about is that an institution is not devoid of what's going on around them. Evaluate. As medical professionals, we understand the importance of evaluation. What's working, what's not working, what do we need to do to change it? Embed. If it is working, how do we bake it into, so part of what my job is is to bake that into the curriculum, bake that into working with the faculty, working with the students as well as working with the staff, my position is actually facing all of the stakeholders, which includes the faculty, staff, students, and the alumni. The idea is that I'm not just working with one group, and I'm like, oh, just making the students happy. No, I'm also having those conversations with the faculty. How do we help bring them up to a level to where they are baking in some of these concepts and some of these thoughts? Empower. I am not, I'm only one person. I can't do everything. Part of my job includes empowering the faculty, staff, and students to be able to speak up and speak out. So the idea is that I can't be everywhere and every place, whether every classroom, every meeting, and I know several of us are meeting after meeting after meeting, but the idea is that helping to bring up the constituents within the organization so that when I'm not in a room, they can speak out, or at the very least, know to come to me and how do we now workshop some of these ways to fix or address some of these issues? Equip. One, empower, is I want to get you the courage. The other part is I want to get you the tools. That's the equip. You feel the power to do it, but now do you know how to do it? Do you know the mechanisms? Do you know the people? Do you know the resources? That's the equip component. So part of what I want you to think about, and again, I'm more than willing to have these conversations more drawn out, but I want you to think about these are just six. There's not perfect. There's obviously there could be others. There could be an E8, but the concept is trying to figure out how do we bake in the work that we're trying to do because we have a goal. We're trying to get there. What are the steps that we need to take in order to get there? Last thing, this is my contact information. This is really nifty. A student at the school gave this to me. It's actually free. It's a digital business card, so if you actually scan it, you can put all of your stuff, TikTok, Instagram. It's free, so I'm not plugging them, but what I am saying is it's a free app that is really helpful and useful, so feel free to contact me, reach out, and I'm going to now pass it on to my colleague, Sybil Green. I am so glad to share the stage with her. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. I'm a big fan of the digital business card, because I always forget mine at home. Thank you to the organizers for inviting me here today to talk about the bigger picture. I intend today to bridge the gap between what we all do as professional societies and how we get it done. Everyone here stands in as staff, perhaps, of a professional society, maybe a member, and our role and goal and function is different. No doubt our professional societies have a mission that speaks to whatever the specialty is doing on behalf of the patient and disease, but equity is a part of that. I just want to be able to bring the two banks together here. I have so few disclosures, I don't even have a slide. Let me get started here. Philip Alberti, who is with AAMC, about a year and a half ago, penned a very short article that he posted on LinkedIn that was entitled, The Three Flavors of Equity. It was meant to delineate between what he called EDI, or Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. We use the terms in a different order. Part of the reason for that is as a healthcare organization, health equity we wanted to put first. When I say EDI, I mean the same thing that everybody else means when they say DEI. I wanted to clarify that first. He wanted to distinguish between equity, diversity, and inclusion, which is meant to focus on people and organizations, including the four walls and the staff that work within an organization, as well as the members of the organization. That includes things like pay equity, it includes things like promotions and representation, all of those things that we want to see on behalf of our own staff, but also we want to support our members as they show up to work every day at their own institutions. The second piece is health equity, which deals with the patient. Then there's healthcare equity, which deals with the patient, and health equity, which deals with communities. The bridge between those two is the staff. The point that I want to make here is we have to keep our own houses in order first. At ASCO, where we service 45,000 oncologists towards the goal of conquering cancer, one of the things that we know has to happen is that we have to have volunteers who are stepping in, but we also have to have staff who are supporting it. Many of our organizations have volunteers who do the work and lead the work, but then so many other organizations have staff who kick all of that off. There has to be some connection. One of the questions that we got asked most frequently when we started our work, and I shouldn't say started our work, ASCO's work actually started 60 years ago, almost 60 years ago, with the founding. We had one woman and one African American at the table of seven founders, Dr. Jane Wright. Dr. Wright, if you don't know, was a pioneer in the use of metformin for cancer. That was the diversity that occurred in our organization in 1964 in the height of the civil rights movement. I'd like to think that the reason why we haven't seen in oncology a break in the oncology professionals into a black organization of oncologists is because she was there at the table and she helped to keep the conversation going so that we wouldn't have to have that split. In 2003, we started our work in health equity, but it wasn't until 2020 in the height of COVID that we started our work in our inward facing work in equity, diversity, and inclusion. One of the questions that we got in 2020 when we started to refocus was, what are you doing for your staff? I say that to remind you that your members have professional relationships with your staff. They rely on your staff to do the work of the organization. They are just as concerned about their well-being as we are as we work there every day. If we think about the path to EDI success, both Patricia and Jermaine have talked about that commitment. That commitment is not just being about the lip service. It's about making sure that your leadership reflects your EDI commitment, and it's the leadership of your board as well as the leadership of the organization, and then bringing that all the way down throughout the organization so that the organization represents the community that you serve. Support speaks to the resources, and as Jermaine said, enabling your staff, empowering your staff, and equipping your staff. That is the level of support that you need in order to get to the action. Because the commitment, even the resources, mean nothing if you're not doing anything with it. That action is really important in terms of moving the needle in how you do things. Making sure that you have a clear strategic plan, and a clear pathway, and a clear focus That starts with an assessment. That starts with understanding who your organization is, both internally and externally, and that's the only way that you get to progress. If you read this kind of going up, it's commitment and support mean action and progress. That's the path. Patricia talked about this a little bit in terms of the role of professional societies, and what we are intended to do as professional societies in terms of having control and oversight and safeguarding the profession, and collaboration, and greater impact, and developing and monitoring the profession, all of those things. This slide shares a little bit just of what Patricia said about how we do that as an organization. What I want to point out here is that for every one of our organizations, and every person who's working within the organization, their job description includes some function on this slide. Even down to the IT person who is responsible for ensuring that our big meetings get carried off in the way that they should. They may not understand what that health equity looks like, but they should understand that they have a role in the organization's overall goal towards health equity. We'll talk a little bit later about the business imperative of equity, diversity, and inclusion. When we first started the work that was inward-facing, we were faced with that question, too. The answer to the question was, we would do this if it didn't make us a single cent, because it's the right thing to do. When we think about the job descriptions and what everyone is doing, it's important for them to understand that they are supported in the organization, and not just supported for the sake of the organization, but for the sake of them being there and succeeding. Just a little bit about how ASCO looks at it. I'll start with the bottom line there, which may sound a little bit familiar to what Jermaine presented, but our three pillars are enabling staff success, making sure that everyone comes in the door and has the opportunity to succeed, and that we are training them, we are providing the resources, we are reinforcing those things, aligning with our partners. As we sit here today as a college of medical subspecialties, we're all partners. We wouldn't be able to have this conversation unless we aligned on the principles of DEI. That goes, too, to how we procure services, how we react with those who are supporting us as donors. We want to make sure that we have the same goals in mind. That's the only way that we can pull this EDI thing off. Finally, the reason why we're all here is to uphold the mission of the organization. What that comes down to in a practical sense are things like making sure that culture and belonging is where it needs to be. This goes beyond just a celebration from day to day. Incorporating those celebrations, if you're talking about Native American Heritage Month, bring in doctors who represent that so that you can make that connection for the staff because nothing brings staff engagement to the forefront more than staff being able to see the fruits of their labor in action. If they're doing these things every single day, seeing the providers, the physicians, your members who are actually out there, the boots on the ground doing these things, that's where it's important. It allows them to feel like they belong in an organization that has put all of the action behind the things that they're saying. The infrastructure speaks, again, to the tools and the resources. Do you have the staff to do this work in equity, diversity, and inclusion? Not just one person, but empowering everyone else in the organization to be able to do it. Are you collecting the data? Do you have the means and the resources to use the data effectively? The lack of data is no excuse to get started. How do you take that data to use it for your staff to be able to do the work that they need to do for your organization in order to move the needle? Finally, in workforce, I talked about procurement a little bit, but I'll go back to that. In workforce, this is the end-to-end employee life cycle. Everything from how we recruit all the way to how we separate and everything in between. What are you doing to think about not just do they fit in culturally? Do they understand the mission of your organization? But how is the mission of your organization also feeding them as staff? Because that's the only way that you can get this done. Are you bringing the right people to the table? Are you equipping them when they're at the table? Are you including them? Are you valuing them in the conversations? Because the business imperative, we have to go back to that, is when you have diverse representation and engaged staff, it also helps with things like being competitive in the marketplace. It helps with thinking through your future strategies. All of those things are important. And then procurement. Who are you buying services from? Are you buying services from the same people who have the same ideas? And by the way, that's a two-way street. They're asking us, what are your DEI priorities? What are your priorities for your members and what are your priorities for your staff? The two go hand in hand. And so you can't pull one off without the other, and there has to be that bridge in order to be successful. So I'm looking forward to the conversation. Thank you. Okay. Great. Thank you so much. So we're going to have a panel conversation here, and then we'll open it up. So be thinking of your questions. But thank you all so much for everything you shared. Really great. I think the first question, which you've talked on a little bit, but I'd like to hear, give you a chance to elaborate, is for an association or organization that's maybe new to this work, where would you advise them to start? And we can just go down the line here. That's a great question. And I actually get that a lot from colleagues who are looking to start. I don't think there's any single one place that is the best place to start. I think it's a combination of where is there an appetite for the work, and what kind of resources can you bring to bear? So some things require labor. Some things require money. Some things require both. But there is nothing that you can do in DEI that doesn't require anything. So do you have resources? Do you have the people to do the work? Do you have the will to do the work? Because sometimes this work is hard. Not everyone's going to be in the same place as you. So I think you have to do an assessment. And I think in my presentation, I talked about this. There are four different places where you can engage in thinking about contributing to DEI within your space. And there's a myriad of things that you can do in that space. So I don't think there's one place that I would say you must start. You just took my answer. No, I think, one, I'm very practical. When I took the position at Hopkins, part of my interview was very much like, I don't believe in reinventing the wheel. There was somebody in the position that was there before me. There was some work that was done. I saw my role as helping to add on to that. But the other part was also identifying who are those partners that we can lean on and that we can bring in to expand and take us where we want to go. So I saw, one, I would say start, find out what work has already been done. And that doesn't necessarily mean in your organization. There may be something that has been done in that profession or that specific specialty already. These are not new conversations. We've had these conversations probably as long as I've been allowed. I'm not going to say how old I am, but probably that long. And I'm saying that to say that these are things that, to me, are humanistic. It does not, you don't need to write a book or publish an article to be kind and respectful and treat somebody with dignity. Those are easy enough, I think, things that we probably have been taught at a young age. I think institutionally, when we think about infrastructure, when we think about investment, those are the things that, I think, to Patricia's point, where are the resources, what's the labor look like within the institution, what's the buy-in, what can we allocate in terms of funds, in terms of people? I think that's something that organizations are kind of grappling with. But to me, my first thing would be is when you see somebody in a hallway, say, good morning, good afternoon. Like, it doesn't, there are some things, I think, to your point, that does not require us to spend a whole lot of money. But there are other things that do, right? But I think there's some easy things that we can kind of start with. So let me summarize, because I think you took my answer. Start somewhere, anywhere. It's as simple as that. And if you don't know, then you can always ask. Where are we in regards to this specific thing? An assessment is nice, and it may teach you some things, but just start somewhere. Start by saying, we want to do this. We want to be more human to each other. We want to be more kind. We want to be nicer to each other. Just every day, and just see each other. Just see each other for who we are. It's as simple as that. I agree. I think I always tell my team, perfection is overrated and unattainable, and experience informs your approach. So get started. Great. Great. Okay. I love that. So, I hope you're taking notes, right? Here is a second panel question, and I'll go reverse order, so, Sybil, you can go first this one. So, what is the most challenging part of leading DEI work, and how do you do it? you all navigate that challenge? The work. Okay, great, so we're done. Thank you so much for your time. Everybody go home. The work is challenging. I mean, this isn't, this, it's not hard. It's not easy stuff. Because at the end of the day, we're talking about people's ideals. We're talking about people's personalities. We're talking about people's opinions that are underscored by systems and structures that have been in place forever. And we have to acknowledge that it is a system and it is a structure that cannot be easily undone. So it's slow work. But that's okay. That's okay. We didn't get to where we are in a day. We won't undo it in a day. But again, part of the commitment has to be recognizing that, one, you can't change people. You have to change those systems and the processes. You can share with people the nice things to do and you can instruct them on how to behave, but if you don't have the systems and the structures in place to support the continuity of that, it'll never happen. But the length of time that it's going to take for us to undo those things, going back to the start somewhere piece, you have to be willing to do little interventions that will help to move the needle. We didn't get a whole lot of pushback when after 2020 when we started the work from people saying, why are you doing this? We're physicians. We know better. We didn't get a lot of that pushback. The question was, okay, so how are we going to keep this going? And then I know that we're going to talk about this later and, you know, just now when you think about all that's happening politically and all that's happening in the courts, that it sort of put a damper on the work that's been done. And so keeping people's, keeping people's, the momentum going right now is difficult because in addition to all of the things that have gotten us here, we've got things that are actively pushing against us to undo what little progress we've made. Yeah. So you made me think about this, these, you know, two words or three words versus action. I think as professionals, if we're honest, generally speaking, folks know the right things to say. I can say the right things so that I don't come off as being racist or homophobic or ableist. Ableism is connected to disabilities, right? So this idea of like, I'm not going to say anything, and some folks do, right? But I think part of that, to your question, in terms of moving from the challenges is working to get beyond what people are saying to actually what they're doing. The action part is what, at least for me, my job, one of the things I say to my community is I can't control what you do when you're not in the school. As a faculty person, I can't control what you do when you're not on the school property, on the school campus, when it comes to engaging with students, right? But my job is really trying to help to make sure that this is a safe space for everybody. So when you come in that classroom, you better be mindful of what you say. If that makes sense, right? So part of it is I recognize I'm trying to, I think to the point, I can't change people. I'm really trying to help to invite them. I'm inviting them to maybe think about something differently, but I realize that some things are baked in that they may not be able to see or to recognize. So my job, I see, is I'm trying to create an environment that when students are on this campus, there's an interaction between staff and faculty. Like sometimes faculty, you know, generally speaking, not all, but they may be disparaging to the staff because it's kind of like I'm Dr. So-and-so, give me this. Where's this at? You're supposed to be doing, this is your job. You're supposed to be doing that, right? Whereas I think to your earlier point, the staff are part of helping to make the school run the way it's supposed to run. So we need them. Because some of the faculty, I don't care how many degrees they did, they don't, some of the things that we, that they need to do in order to like to think about just the setup of this is us putting on some of this stuff. I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. Could you please like, so they're like biking us up and doing all this. Like there's some things that I just don't know. And I'm fine with saying what I don't know. So I think in a short way around is one is recognizing I'm trying to help move words into action. But I also realized that there's some resistance by folks. Sometimes they're conscious of it and other times they're not conscious of it. But I think the goal for me is kind of helping to articulate where we're trying to get to, what type of institution, what type of organization do we want to be? And if this is what we want to be, there's some things that we all have to do in order to get there. If that makes sense, right? Oh, it's tough to go after these two. I think from my perspective, the hardest thing is balancing the urgency with the sustainability. And what I mean by that is I feel a tremendous sense of urgency to correct for deeply historical and current inequities. And at the same time, to do that quickly may in essence be something that won't sustain a change. So how I think about balancing those two things and putting that thought process into the choices that I make in terms of the work that we focus on. That to me is a hard part. That in some days are just really hard. SCOTUS decision comes out. It's not a good day, you know. Yeah. That is an excellent segue into our next question here. Jermaine, I'll start with you. So I'll go Jermaine and then Patricia and then Sybil for this one. So we're mixing up the order. So we're not going to get into granular dissection of policy, right? There's only one lawyer up here. The rest of us are not. So we're not going to do the policy deep dive. But given the recent rise in anti-DEI legislation, the lawsuits, sort of the ramping up of climate that seems to be targeting diversity and equity, how do you all empower your leaders to remain ardent in their commitment to ED&I? Good question. The short answer, I would say it's easy to do that when you have leaders that are committed to it. It's not a hard sell. I don't have to take 30 minutes, 25 minutes, an hour trying to convince them why this is important. They're already committed to this work. Part of the reason why I started with the concept of inclusive excellence is because academically the literature has started to change the language because of what's been happening politically. So as a result of that, it's like, okay, we still want to do this work, but in certain places, in certain institutions, in certain organizations, it's too political to use the term DEI, so let's call it something else. But the essence of it is still the commitment to making sure that there are different voices at the table. And to be clear, those voices isn't just about race. It's about religion. It's about gender. It's about sexual orientation. It's about folks with disabilities. So I think part of it is that trying to make sure that we posit that we want folks who have different experiences and they bring value, they bring meaning, and they deserve to be at the table. They've earned the right to be at that table. And because they're there doesn't necessarily mean that somebody more qualified isn't. I think that's the other part of the conversation as well. I could answer your question in a sort of question-adjacent way, because my challenge is not with our leadership. They are ardent supporters of this work and true champions, and that is a blessing. And that's true on the staff level as well as the volunteer level. I think hematology is the best of the specialties, personally. It's just the people that are attracted to that field. For me, I think that the question or the challenge or the discussion is how do we as a group start to convene so that our voice is a contra voice to the voice that's out there? How do we challenge an environment where these lawsuits are inhibiting our freedom to pursue DEI initiatives? So that to me, I think, is the question or the challenge to discuss, because these lawsuits are our reality. I don't know where they will lead. I do not have a legal degree. But I do think that we as a collective and as peers need to think about what contra position we can take to sort of counterbalance that. So this is baffling even the legal scholars. I don't count myself among them, but it's baffling even the legal scholars. But I think part of the pushback starts from this presumption that in order to get to diversity, equity, and inclusion, someone has to lose something in order for someone else to gain something. And that's just wrong. That's just wrong. You know, like your leaders, our leaders are ardent as well. We don't have to convince them. And I think that counterargument has to be no one is giving up anything here. And particularly in the healthcare space, when we think about things like innovation in medicine and clinical trials and advancement, it's almost a question of ethics when we don't do it. And so we're starting to talk more about the intersection of ethics and equity as a question, not a question, a reality of the justice that we need to bring forth in medicine. And that's the beginning of this discussion that we need to be having because no one needs to lose here. Everyone is winning when we get to a place where we are treating people equitably. And when I say treatment, I mean treatment in medicine, when we are respecting the differences that people bring to the table, when we are meeting our patients where they are, and we can be assured that the outcomes are what we are really working towards in our missions. You know, it's going to be different, I think, you know, for professional medical associations is a little bit different from, you know, from institutions of higher learning. But the other thing that we've done is we've tried in as much as we can to read these rulings as narrowly as possible, to read the application of these laws as narrowly as possible. And I will say that the commitment is we will do it until such time that we are told we cannot do it because it's against the law. Right now, it's still legal to talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, and we'll continue to talk about it. Okay, so what I'm hearing, folks, is if any of you have leaders who are not committed, these folks all have good leaders. So come talk to them. They'll have their leaders talk to your leaders is what I'm hearing. So we have about seven minutes left. I have one more reserve question, but I want to open it up. If anybody has questions, please come to the mics. Anything you're dying to ask these panelists, these are experts. You have their time. Make use of it. Don't blow it. And we're really not scary, we promise. All right, I'm going to ask my reserve question, but then I need somebody to have a real question. So you can decide amongst yourselves who's that person going to be. So, folks, and Sybil did mention this, but there's, you know, debate around the idea of a business case for diversity, right? There's lots of different opinions, whether it's useful or a good model or not. It's neither here nor there. But when you think about situating DEI as a business imperative, how have you done that or how do you do that within your scopes? Yeah, sure. Well, sorry, I didn't know. Yes. You like to keep us on our toes. Yeah, I like to keep us on our toes. I think the simplest answer is lack of diversity is just bad science. It's just bad science. Appeal to your volunteer leaders. It's bad science to lack diversity. And that is true in the recruitment for clinical trials. It's true in the recruitment of a workforce. It's true in the discussions of leadership. There's plenty of literature. There's tomes of literature that demonstrate the truth, that diversity of perspective, talent, and experience enriches and innovates and achieves at a much higher pace. It is the ethics of doing our level best to achieve our mission. No, I was about to say, I can't add. I think that you nailed it. I have no add-ons. Yeah, I would say that for us, it's the same concept. It's bad science. It's bad. When it comes to in educational spaces, this is what makes an institution great is the vastness of the life experiences of the people who work at that institution, attend that institution, teach at that institution. So I think, yeah, we are limiting ourselves by not encouraging the opportunity for others who have different experiences to come to that table. There's actually a lot of discussion now about whether we should be talking about equity, diversity, and inclusion as a business imperative. I put my glasses on for one thing because I knew I wouldn't remember this quote. But last year, there was a Harvard Business Review article that started by saying, most organizations do not feel the need to explain why they care about core values such as innovation, resilience, and integrity. And yet, when it comes to diversity, lengthy discussions of the value of hiring a diverse workforce have become the norm. It's the right thing to do, period. End of story. There's no other way to discuss it. And when we have to take the time to justify it, that means we need to continue doing it. And I won't say anything else. That's it. You should put your glasses on. The library is open, folks. All right. Brave. Wonderful. Question asker. I have no prize for you, but ask a question here. So one of the things that was brought up during the session was that about bringing, sorry, trying to formulate my thought. One of the things that you mentioned was about procurement, which really was, I mean, and the idea of putting that idea into action. I've seen places where, yes, we make these statements. We're going to look at this and that and the other. But when it gets down to procurement in particular, and you can probably think of other areas, a lot of those are transactional relationship building, and people are very leery to break those longstanding tradition. I've been working with this person for 20 years. I know they can do the job. I don't know about these other people you're asking me to commit to. So maybe you guys can talk a little bit about that and how to, it's a very, you know, very specific area, but I think a lot of change could come through that if we could come up with incentives or ways to encourage more diversity in those spaces. It's hard, but think about it. How many people continue to do business because it's the way that they've always done it, only to find out that their business partner has been non-compliant in some way that is egregious? And then all of a sudden, they're cutting ties. When you go to your partners and you have the conversation about, you know, what are your priorities? Do we align on these things? You get a sense, and not just the words and the conversations, seeing the things in action, right? You get a sense of whether or not this is someone who you want to continue doing business with, and I think that every leader wants to get ahead of that and not be caught, you know, by surprise that their business partner is 100% against anything that's equity, diversity, and inclusion. And so this is one of those things where it's a slow start, right? And so we get asked the question all the time, what's the composition of your board? Be willing to say that, but be willing to ask the same question too. And, you know, maybe your partners aren't where they need to be, but you should be having a conversation and saying, okay, this is the place that we're going to, and we'd love to take you with us. So how can we help you to better align with this specific principle that we've got going on here? That's a great question. I think for me, there's two pieces to that question. The first is the economic proposition. How do you spend your money, right? And how does that reflect your values, right? And then the other side of that is the really pragmatic one. If diversity brings greater innovation and more effective problem solving, don't you want your partner to be the most effective innovator and problem solver that's working with you? So to me, it seems like it's a non-starter. You need them to be diverse. You need them to be focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion. And I guess the third piece, sorry, two points, and then A, your employees are going to expect that of you. You want to hire talented people. You need to walk the walk. And that shows up in a lot of different ways. And the younger generations, they're going to ask you these questions, and they should. You know what? I can just share a quick story. We did a luncheon a few months back, and we announced that we were doing it, and we announced that we were purchasing from a large chain. And we declared all of these equity, diversity, and inclusion goals. And the moment we hit send, I started getting all these emails. Are you really going to buy lunch? And I was like, oh my goodness. I didn't realize that it would hit such a soft spot for people. But what that did was that drove us to a point where now all of our staff lunches are purchased from small business owners and minority business owners because the staff expect that of us. And so that's a great point. No, I was just to put a pin on it. I just thought about the point, at least to the question, was that those relationships that I may have for 20 years, is it costing me more to maintain that because they know that they can get it? Because we've been writing that check for 20 years, so nobody's thinking twice versus this other business, which may actually be better quality, smaller business, but will be willing to work with us in terms of charging us for certain things. One of those things, easy things like lunches. We have so many events. Every event we have, we have food. And one of those things, that's one of the things that my office is now working on is identifying these small businesses from throughout Baltimore because the idea is that they provide food. They have their permits in order. Like all those questions that you would get, like is it okay? Is it going to be good? Is it sanctioned by the state? You know, all that stuff. They got all their paperwork in order, but we've been going to this other place. This is a big chain, but it's costing a whole lot of money. All right. If your question's really quick, and the panelists have very quick answers. No, no, no. It's okay. All I'll say is thank you very much. It's a really brilliant articulation, but the reality is, Patricia, I know very well. The thing though, my feeling is a lot of these issues, the opposition is so voiceless. They're such a loud mouth. They get all the publicity to say what's going wrong, and I think we should stand up. Those people on the other side have to stand up and really make a case. Why is it the right thing to do? And everybody knows it's the right thing to do, but we don't make it enough noise from the other side, which is always screaming and going on all these platforms and all these things. We are quiet. We know we are doing the right thing, but there's not enough anymore in my judgment. Well, thank you all so much. Please join me in thanking our panelists, Patricia, Jermaine, Sibyl. Thank you all so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.

diversity

equity

inclusion

DEI

meaningful change

action

challenges

empowering leaders

procurement practices