Care Work with Alida Miranda-Wolff

How do you recognize when staying true to your values means stepping back? Over the past two years, the Care Work podcast has explored the challenges, necessity, and beauty of caregiving. Often, the conversation turns to the need for caregivers to take care of themselves in this difficult work—something that can be hard to prioritize for individuals so tuned to caring for others. 

With these lessons in mind, Alida explores what she has learned on this audio journey so far. She shares how she came to the decision that Care Work needs to go on hiatus in order to uphold her own values and make room for much-needed rest and restoration over the coming months. Her deeply personal glimpse into the challenges and growth she has encountered so far offers inspiring insights about living a life in support of others that stays true to your values. 

The Care Work podcast will return in 2025.

Consider the balance between working for the greater good and caring for yourself:

• The factors complicating the current landscape of DEIB
• Why just being present is such an impactful act of care
• Where to learn more about the link between DEIB and social justice
• How the podcast journey facilitates personal and professional growth

Important resources from this episode:

• Relational Self-Awareness and Compassion with Dr. Alexandra Solomon - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/relational-self-awareness-and-compassion-with-dr-alexandra-soloman-episode-29/
• Bearing Witness as an Act of Care with Micky ScottBey Jones - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/episode-1-micky-scottbey-jones/
• Exploring Inclusive Education Through Storytelling with Tim Villegas - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/inclusive-education-through-storytelling/
• Designing for Neurodiversity Inclusivity with María Emilia Lasso de la Vega - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/designing-for-neurodiversity-inclusivity/
• Embracing Interdependence and Creating Inclusive Communities with Lauren Schrero Levy - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/embracing-interdependence-creating-inclusive-communities/
• Disability Justice solo episode - https://alidamirandawolff.com/podcast/breaking-down-disability-stigma/

Engage With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Get Alida’s latest book “The First Time Manager DEI” -  https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-first-time-manager-dei-alida-miranda-wolff/20207997?ean=9781400246090 
• Order Alida’s first book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underreprese

How can creators innovate to instill more humanness into their designs? Despite being at the root of almost everything we interact with day-to-day, designers can forget to consider the humans for whom they design. 

In this episode, executive design leader, illustrator, podcaster, and educator Antonio Garcia shares his thoughts on the essentialness of human-centered design and innovations that consider people at every step of the process. He discusses where design is excelling, where it still has a ways to go, and why it’s essential to view both work and life from a lens of continuous compassion.

Design your life and work to uphold your humanity:

• The overlap between humanness and innovation
• The simple step that supports human-centered design
• Why the design industry needs to adopt a code of ethics
• The importance of taking a step back when you’re at your limit

Important resources from this episode:

• Listen to the “Dad Well” podcast - https://www.dadwell.co/
• The Nap Ministry Movement - https://thenapministry.com/ 

Connect with Antonio:

• Find out more about his work - https://www.amgarcia.com/
• Engage with Antonio on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/amgarcia/ 
• Follow Antonio on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/a_m_garcia/?hl=en 

Engage with Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Pre-Order Alida’s new book “The First Time Manager DEI” -  https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-first-time-manager-dei-alida-miranda-wolff/20207997?ean=9781400246090 
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

How connected are you to the food you purchase and consume? Over the past century, society’s focus on the food it consumes has shifted from origins and process to the latest price increase. Many communities also face uncertainty about the availability and quality of fresh foods in their nearest store.  

In this episode, Alida Miranda-Wolff speaks with Lisa Tallman, the Executive Director of Community Food Navigator. This Chicago organization champions food sovereignty by establishing and strengthening connections at every level of the food system and helping communities wrest back control from the conglomerates that currently hold most of the power in cultivation, distribution, and consumption. 

Rediscover your connection to food, culture, and community and find out:

• How we lost food sovereignty and why getting it back is so important
• How individuals can rejoin the food system chain for huge local impact
• The challenges and barriers to seizing back control of our sustenance
• The inextricable connection between culture and food security

Important resources from this episode:

• Learn more about Community Food Navigator - https://communityfoodnavigator.org/
• Subscribe to Community Food Navigator’s Newsletter - https://mailchi.mp/communityfoodnavigator/subscribe 
• Read “Rest is Resistance” by Tricia Hersey - https://bookshop.org/p/books/rest-is-resistance-a-manifesto-tricia-hersey/18255493?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwjLGyBhCYARIsAPqTz18KYZtF_v1NLxdZNHGAk1TUVqusbU1Qicr5GGqM7yVu1njswZwS5SUaAk3kEALw_wcB 
• Nancy Folbre’s definition of care - https://transversal.at/transversal/0805/folbre/en 

Connect with Lisa: 

• Follow Lisa on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisatallman/ 

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Order Alida’s new book “The First Time Manager: DEI” - https://alidamirandawolff.com/book/ 
• Order Alida’s 1st book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

How does a culture of care transform the workplace experience? The call for safe, caring workplaces is becoming increasingly loud, which means building these environments is an essential consideration for founders. In this episode, Alida Miranda-Wolff speaks with Michel Fabode, the author of Cultura: A Guidebook for Founders Building Diverse Teams. Michel’s work focuses on helping founders navigate the path to truly diverse, safe cultures of care that lead to business success on multiple levels.

Michel’s essential and practical exploration of workplace culture strives to show business owners seeking to build something better that they have the power to design environments in which diverse teams can thrive.

Recognize and rethink the importance of workplace cultures of care:

• Why we overlook the care work component inherent in so many professions
• How feeling valued and cared for in the workplace makes all the difference
• Why it’s more important than ever to build diverse company cultures
• The connection between delivering on the bottom line and creating a positive work environment

Important resources from this episode:

• Michel’s book, Cultura: A Guidebook for Founders Building Diverse Teams 
• Alida’s book, The First-Time Manager: DEI 
• Gallup Research: Socialism as Popular as Capitalism Among Young Adults in U.S.
• Pew Research: Modest Declines in Positive Views of ‘Socialism’ and ‘Capitalism’ in U.S.
• Axios Research: Exclusive poll: Young Americans are embracing socialism

Connect with Michel Fabode:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michel-fabode

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Pre-Order Alida’s new book “The First Time Manager DEI” 
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content!
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

As a manager, how do you balance offering care and corporate responsibility? Many managers may not apply the label of caregiver to their work, but Claire Podulka, the Chief of Staff for TXI, a Chicago-based digital consultancy firm, points out that it is the manager “who can operate at the nexus of care and strategy and efficacy” who really brings out the best in their team—and therefore their company—in those inevitable times of change and ambiguity.

New and established managers alike will feel an immediate connection to the topics Alida and Claire cover in this Care Work episode. Their conversation explores the mindsets and approaches that are essential in a great manager, covering concepts that will resonate with anyone who has ever had a direct report or is pursuing a future in people management.

Let Claire’s insights validate and inspire your inner managerial care worker:

• The caregiving imperative for all managers and chiefs of staff 
• The equity argument for employee-owned businesses and ESOPs
• Walking the line between clarity and transparency as a responsible manager
• Throwing out growth for growth’s sake and building a new model for business success
• Balancing self-care and taking care of your employees

Important resources from this episode:

• Radical Candor by Kim Scott 
• Kids These Days: The Making of Millennials by Malcolm Harris
• Alida’s new book: The First-Time Manager: DEI: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Connect With Claire:

• Connect with Claire on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cpodulka/ 

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Pre-Order Alida’s new book “The First Time Manager DEI” -  https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-first-time-manager-dei-alida-miranda-wolff/20207997?ean=9781400246090 
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

In 2022, Care Work host Alida Miranda-Wolff celebrated the publication of her first book: “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last.” In May of 2024, her second book was released: “The First-Time Manager: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.”

Over the next episodes, Alida will explore two intriguing topics: what it takes to be a truly inclusive manager and leader; and how to transform your essential care work experience into a proposal, write the book, and sell and promote it. In this introductory episode, she delves into the origin story of The First-Time Manager: DEI and shares two impactful excerpts from the book.

Ignite the motivation to share your care work knowledge:

• Birthing a book in the midst of life’s unpredictability
• Persevering amidst changing social and political landscapes
• The real struggles of establishing DEIB as a middle manager
• Navigating different kinds of stress to support both employees and self

Important resources from this episode:

• Buy “The First-Time Manager: DEI” - https://alidamirandawolff.com/book/ 
• Maslach Burnout Inventory - https://www.mindgarden.com/117-maslach-burnout-inventory-mbi 
• Pew Research Center - https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2023/05/17/diversity-equity-and-inclusion-in-the-workplace/ 
• "Lady Boss" YouTube video by Rachel Bloom - https://youtu.be/L2_79T1P2qo?si=2IB_O3yo68KqOnxm 

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Order Alida’s 1st book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

For many of us, working to care for others doesn’t stop when we head home from work at the end of the day. The other relationships in our lives, including the intimate one we share with our partner, also require care—of both ourselves and the other person.

In this episode, Alida Miranda-Wolff sits down with Dr. Alexandra Solomon, a therapist, author, and speaker who, over the past two decades, has worked with couples to help them better navigate intimacy and meet both each other's needs and their own. Their discussion of acceptance and relational self-awareness, two key factors in healthy, thriving relationships, reflects the realistic, balanced approach to intimate love that Dr. Solomon teaches.

Explore how to build more meaningful intimate connections:

• A definition of love that embraces the worth of each partner
• The impact of our individualistic society on romantic love
• How recontextualizing shame and disappointment can help us heal
• Positive habits that instill relational self-awareness

Important Links from this Episode: 

• Listen to Reimagining Love 
• Dr. Solomon’s book, Love Every Day
• Taking Sexy Back: How to Own Your Sexuality and Create the Relationships You Want by Dr. Solomon 
• Loving Bravely: Twenty Lessons of Self-Discovery to Help You Get the Love You Want by Dr. Solomon
• All About Love by Bell Hooks
• Care Work Podcast - EP #1 - Bearing Witness as an Act of Care with Micky ScottBey Jones  

Connect with Dr. Alexandra Solomon:

• Dr. Solomon’s website
• Follow Dr. Solomon on Instagram

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content!
• Order Alida’s book “The First-Time Manager: DEI”
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff 

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

How do you define and process grief? Over the next three episodes, Care Work is exploring grief—the collection of emotions and experiences we have with any loss. Essential within this work is inspecting how we process and continue to live within this universal experience. 

In this episode, Alida is joined by Dr. Sunitha Chandy, a clinical psychologist specializing in helping transform both individual lives and communities through mental health services. Sunitha shares her insights on the interplay between community and grief and the importance of accepting both the inherent difficulty and the cathartic potential of the grieving process.

Listen to learn: 

• How COVID impacted how we understand grieving
• The behaviors with which grief and mourning are intertwined
• The detrimental effect of our American taboos against public grief
• Why the grieving process is an ongoing healing rather than a cure

Important resources from this episode:

• Dr. Chandy’s community conversations - https://www.artesiancollaborative.com/learn
• Connect with Dr. Chandy - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunitha-chandy-psy-d-16b785141/
• Dr. Chandy’s website - https://www.sunithachandy.com/ 
• Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey - https://bookshop.org/p/books/rest-is-resistance-a-manifesto-tricia-hersey/18255493?ean=9780316365215 
• David Kessler on grief - https://grief.com/

Connect with Dr. Sunitha Chandy:

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunitha-chandy-psy-d-16b785141/
• Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/artesiancollaborative/ 

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/

How do we dismantle the disability stigma? This latest arc on the Care Work podcast explores the concept of disability justice from the perspectives of three people—Tim Villegas, María Emilia Lasso de la Vega, and Lauren Schrero Levy—who are working to change our social approach to accessibility and inclusivity.

In this episode, Alida Miranda-Wolff reflects on the ways stigma and a repurposed definition of “normal” have impacted disability justice, from the history of society’s aversion to disability to the possibility of a future where people with different abilities are viewed not as inconveniences but as essential contributors to our communities.

Explore the origins stigma and what we can do to disassemble the harmful attitudes that hold as back.

Tune in to learn: 

• The definition of  stigma and the development of disability as an inconvenience
• The role of industrialization in the segregation of and aversion to disability
• How closed captioning is a proof positive that accessible spaces benefit us all
• The role pre-emptive inclusivity plays in standardizing accessibility

Important resources from this episode:

• Episode 24, “Exploring Inclusive Education Through Storytelling with Tim Villegas” 
• Episode 25, “Designing For Neurodiversity Inclusivity with María Emilia Lasso de la Vega”  
• Episode 26, “Embracing Interdependence Creating Inclusive Communities with Lauren Schrero Levy” 
• Episode 22, “Redefining the Inequity of Modern Literacy with Ken Bigger” 
• Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros 
• Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity by Erving Goffman  
• On The Inconvenience of Other People by Lauren Berlant 
• The White Man’s Burden by Rudyard Kipling 
• What Can A Body Do: How We Meet the Built World by Sara Hendren
• Butts: A Backstory by Heather Radke  
• Kids These Days: The Making of Millennials by Malcolm Harris

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn 
• Pre-Order Alida’s new book “The First Time Manager DEI” 
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content!
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff

Advocate for under

From elementary school classrooms to adult care homes, so many of our care structures for disabled people are designed without their participation, often in direct opposition to their stated desires. But why? 

When we pose the question of why people with disabilities are so often excluded from general society, the best answer is often “that’s just how it’s always been.” However, research and the lived experiences of these individuals suggest that creating inclusive environments could have a significant positive impact on our communities.

Lauren Schrero Levy, a disability rights advocate and lawyer, shares with Alida what she has learned since founding the disability advocacy nonprofit The Nora Project and serving as a civil rights lawyer at Equip for Equality. Together, they explore the challenges in our current institutions for people with disabilities and the promise of inclusive spaces.

Discover Lauren’s insights on honoring the dignity of every person:

• The reasons behind society’s segregation of people with disabilities
• The negative impact of remaining uninformed on conversations around inclusivity
• Opposing viewpoints among parents of children with disabilities
• The innate hope and usefulness of interdependence 

Important resources from this episode:

• The Nora Project website - https://thenoraproject.ngo/
• Lauren’s Ted Talk - https://www.ted.com/talks/lauren_schrero_ability_inclusive_mindset
• Equip for Equality website - https://www.equipforequality.org/
• On the Inconvenience of Other People by Lauren Berlant - https://bookshop.org/p/books/on-the-inconvenience-of-other-people-lauren-berlant/17477688?ean=9781478018452 

Connect with Lauren Schrero Levy: 

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-schrero-86411a1/ 

Connect With Alida:

• Share your feedback on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alidamw
• Order Alida’s book “Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations That Last” and gain exclusive access to bonus content! - https://bookshop.org/p/books/cultures-of-belonging-building-inclusive-organizations-that-last-alida-miranda-wolff/17372555?ean=9781400229253
• Learn more about Alida Miranda-Wolff - https://alidamirandawolff.com/

Advocate for underrepresented and underserved groups in organizations with Ethos - https://www.ethostalent.com/