For Our Edification

It's one of the coolest interviews I have ever had the pleasure of conducting. In 2010, I interviewed artist Voice Monet for the "Sunday Journal" Success Series segment. The smooth MC is the daughter of actor Lance Nichols whose throwback interview I featured for Episode 5 of the podcast. By the way, her new EP "Black Maria" will drop September 2016.

African American fraternities and sororities, particularly the Divine Nine, played a major role in diversifying leadership in America in the early 20th Century. Since that time, thousands of African Americans have benefited from this powerful network by providing social capital that would boost communities of color. In my Black Greek Success segment, I invited a social capital expert to join the podcast.

Froswa' Booker-Drew, Ph.D. is a very cool friend of Halima's and mine. She has done research on social capital in communities of color as well as research on relationship based on Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey's book "Immunity to Change".

Since Froswa' is a fellow Black Greek--a sister of Alpha Kappa Alpha--I thought it would be interesting to chat about how social capital works among members of African-American fraternities and sororities as well as members of the HBCU community. 

The insight is as plain as the nose on our faces but takes more work than a lot of us may be willing to do.

WRITE TO BEAR ALMS

 

In 2016, the A-WOW World Summit returns to the U.S. Halima, being the fantastic giving professional she is, was a guest workshop presenter at the 2015 summit. She shared her experience with her "Write to Bear Alms" radio audience in August 2015 on Radio Azad.

 

This edition features Halima's inspirational commentary about how these dynamic young women seek to be catalysts of change in health, education, and legal justice. She talks about seeing the light bulbs go off in the participants about using collaboration, petitions, and social media to be world changers.

A-WOW Global Initiative is an organization committed to leadership development and enhancing cultural and socio-psychological change through interactions among diverse cultures in parts of Africa, Latin America, and the U.S.

As a recruiter, one of my favorite things is to call someone to make him or her a job offer. Unfortunately, many people have to wait weeks and months to get those calls because they are victims of racial employment discrimination. Research shows that many employers have no qualms with passing over the resumes of people with "black" names.

Based on a blog I wrote, I talk about the utter ridiculousness of this practice while inspiring uniquely named folks with suggestions to strengthen their resumes during the job search.

 

Check out this piece:

"He Dropped One Letter In Name While Applying For Jobs, And The Responses Rolled In" Huffington Post, Sept. 2, 2014