Intentional Conversations

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Amanda Miller Littlejohn to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM AMANDA:

• People spend a lot of energy trying to produce with perfection instead of just producing as they go. Perfection shouldn’t be the goal… progress should be.
• Work as worth - machine mindset dictates your output, your level of doing as work in the world, determines your value. We find ourselves over working to try and make up those deficits, even though we are inherently valuable as we are.
• If you’re chasing your self worth - via the work you produce - and you forego rest to do that, you can see how burnout lives.
• Muscle memory is why we ignore humanity.
• If working twice as hard is tangled up in your self worth, you will never be able to satiate it. Working twice as hard is detrimental when you prioritize it over everything else. Working twice as hard sometimes doesn’t yield the results you are wanting.
• Burnout is caused by a series of misalignments across the board... our time, our ambition, our relationships, our relationship with ourselves.
• Rest is very important piece of burnout.
• Recognizing your humanity and reminding yourself that it is ok to feel what I’m feeling.
• The people who make a permanent shift actually change their lives.
• Realignment is a daily practice.
• Become a student of yourself!

CONNECT WITH AMANDA:

On Instagram | X

Get Amanda's Book!

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

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Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Wade Hinton to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

Wade's TEDx Talk

• Business strategy needs to fill like it’s a part of the work, not something separate.
• "People want to feel like you did something with them, not to them." - Shirley Franklin
• Leaders set the tone for their company culture. It is being created with or without your guidance.
• Give your employees space and time to process so that they feel valued.
• Organizations need to really understand what your values are and put them where people can see them.
• Create space for people to feel like they can come to you as a leader.
• Allow check-ins - doesn’t require solutions, but let’s you make sure your team members can be heard.
• Make sure the resources are available for people to use those.
• His ebook provides a framework for how to have conversations - BUILD is an acronym for: Be curious, Understand, Impact, Learn, Determine
• When you are curious and willing to listen and learn, that can change the conversation.
• We sit, listen and talk to organizations, there are some really practical things that can be done, by just a small tweak, but it makes all the difference in the world.
• Pay attention to your own mat!
• Make sure you have a learning culture, where you do not have to be perfect on day 1.
• Let’s make some space for grace.
• Have the courage to say, "Here’s what I’ve learned… "

CONNECT WITH WADE:

Purchase Wade's Ebook Bridge Building

On Instagram | LinkedIn

Visit his company's website

Learn more about Wade

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

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Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where diversity, equity, and inclusion meet leadership and business in a powerful dialogue.

This week, we’re thrilled to feature Rochelle Younan-Montgomery!

So grab your headphones 🎧, hit play, and dive into the conversation with us.

Don’t forget to SUBSCRIBE—there’s always more great content on the way!

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Find other ways to connect - send a voice memo, take a breath, slow down, think before sending the email, what is an unmet need and identify what it is to think what can bring resolution and solution, and include humor.
• Going from Conflict Avoidance to Conflict Curiosity often involves true mindfulness.
• Conflict curiosity allows for restoration.
• Great leaders understand the power of a pause.
• Open The Front Door Method - rooted in non-violent communication
• O - Observe
• T - what you Think of that
• F - what you Feel about it, rather than leading with the emotion, you bring it into the conversation
• D - what is the Desired outcome (We’re unclear about our unmet needs, but we go in fighting, need to know what you desire as a part of the conversation.)
• We are less effective when we are burnt out. Often we are making things worse for ourselves and others when we’re working from a place of depletion.
• RESET framework is:
• R - Reflect - slow down and ask a powerful question “How might we be out of alignment with our values?”
• E - Embodiment - slow down and tapping into our inner wise guide for clarity
• S - Strategize - what do we need to do differently, both individually and as a team
• E - Experiment - culture of learning
• T - Trust / Tending / Tether - how do you really bring together the head and the heart
• Human centered approach means I’m modeling it. Acknowledging the work your team is doing. Allowing for moments of gratitude and praise, but not forcing it.
• Impossible standards are not the same as human standards.
• Compassionate leadership gets a bad rep.
• Be fiercely clear about what is and is not ok. Am I cultivating a daily practice outside of work in the way I talk to myself? What am I taking in on a daily basis that’s informing my world?
• When teams see a leader modeling the behavior, they know it’s ok to do the same.

CONNECT WITH ROCHELLE:

Sign up for Rochelle's FREE webinar, Monday, 11 /11 - Stay True, Handling Difficult Conversations With Calm And Clarity

Connect on LinkedIn

Subscribe to Rochelle's newsletter, at the bottom of the website!

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect with us: LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel for new weekly content!

Visit our website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated (Paperback Coming Early 2025!)

Get the weekly newsletter!

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Simma Lieberman to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

1. People have different strengths.
2. Ask, "What can I do to make people comfortable?"
3. It’s not your fault you don’t know about groups of people, science has shown you get to be more comfortable with them as you spend time with them.
4. Most people don’t talk about race with people who don’t look like them.
5. People make assumptions about other people because they just don’t know them.
6. Not everybody has the same way of showing respect, there isn’t a right or wrong way.
7. An inclusive culture means people are more comfortable coming to work and contributing.
8. Everyone wants to feel a part of something greater than themselves, they want to feel part of the community.
9. People are willing to take risks when they feel included. When they don’t feel included, they’re keeping their genius to themselves.
10. If you’re the leader of an organization, you have to be willing to be wrong and don’t put people down because you don’t agree with them.
11. When people feel included at work, they want to make others feel included.

CONNECT WITH SIMMA:

On LinkedIn | Instagram

Visit her website

Simma's Books

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Join our weekly newsletter!

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Dr. White's book: Inclusion Uncomplicated

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Carolina Barsa to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

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CAROLINA'S KEY TAKEAWAYS:

1. Growing up as a first-generation American and daughter of immigrants, education was instilled in me, but not how to understand the processes of education.
2. Having mentors helped me understand the nuances of navigating the professional world.
3. My team is diverse, and that leads to diverse thought. People, specifically women, have the opportunity to speak up and say what’s on their mind.
4. Our vision is about studying the healthiest and diverse people. We study those biomes. We study diverse groups and listen to feedback from diverse consumers to ensure generational healthy living.
5. 60% of Americans are battling some type of chronic disease.
6. Your gut controls a lot of your health. Promoting gut health will reduce chronic pain and fatigue and increase longevity.
7. People are looking for holistic healthy choices.
8. It takes women 10 years to get diagnosed, so we need to focus on preventative care.
9. There’s a strong gut and brain connection; if you don’t feel well, you can’t show up as your best.
10. Companies that are led by women are more productive.

CONNECT WITH CAROLINA:

On her website

CONNECT WITH DR. NIKA & NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

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Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Christina Blacken to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS & RESOURCES:

• Storytelling is your most powerful tool for trust building. Story helps in finding meaningful connection beyond transaction.
• Leadership is a practice, it is not just about title status and appearance.
• If your culture is toxic and unsafe and full of inaccurate stories, people will not want to stay.
• How do you create when all you're talking about is what’s bad and what’s wrong?
• It can be difficult for companies to shift cultures without a change management strategy.
• Recognizing what the positives are in the change… how does the change actually express your values?
• Leaders need to be clear on your transformation story, if you’re not doing this, people will insert their own story.
• Telling story Pulling from lived experience is important. These steps sound intuitive, and not difficult, but a lot of people are not doing it.
• What are you regularly consuming? What you are consuming has an impact on the internal narratives you have.
• Practice. Get clear on your values and create a structure of story-telling around your values.
• Psychological safety is very important when telling stories, affirming what you’ve heard deepens trust.
• Whatever narrative you’ve picked up from your family will show up in the workplace.
• Slow down the stories you assume about others. Ask "Is the story I’m attaching to this person in this moment inaccurate and am I asking enough questions?" It will create changes we didn’t know was possible.
• When things are falling apart, it is a great time for regeneration.
• Christina's LinkedIn Course

CONNECT WITH CHRISTINA:

On LinkedIn and Instagram

Visit her website



CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

Get the weekly newsletter!

Want to be the first to know about upcoming events, tips and more? Sign up for our SMS list. We promise no spam, just the good stuff!

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Shani Dellimore Barrax to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Cultural competence is turning the mirror outward, learning about other people.
• Cultural humility is turning the mirror inward and thinking more about your own identity and how it’s juxtaposed to others.
• Everything is relative!
• To apply the DEI concepts to real life, you have to engage with other humans.
• DEI is both head work and heart work.
• Psychological Spanx - we all think about as women the standards of beauty, there are white standards of beauty which dictates what our hair, body and skin should look like and, we as Black women, will alter our bodies to that beauty.
• Why can’t we get past race? We have to go through it. You can’t resolve something by just passing it, but you have to stop and engage.
• The only way you move through tolerance is through understanding, otherwise you stay in the spaces of willful oblivion.
• ERG’s and the associated broader programs are trying to facilitate bonding and bridging capital. You get the collective support when working with people who are like you.
• DEI is an art and a science.
• Service and progress are inextricably linked.
• Why complain if you’re not going to be part of the solution? You have to be willing to use those gifts to do something.
• Without struggle there is no progress, power exceeds nothing without command.

CONNECT WITH SHANI:

On LinkedIn

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

Get the weekly newsletter!

Want to be the first to know about upcoming events, tips and more? Sign up for our SMS list. We promise no spam, just the good stuff!

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Yeruwelle de Rouen to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM YERUWELLE:

• Color is the denotion of how we interact with each other, especially in the US.
• Always be scanning for who is not here, who is not being included.
• Not only Black women and men being at the table, but specific indigenous voices, that’s where our power comes in to name it and bring it in.
• The recognition for all of us is weighty… there is not another person who is having the same experience as us.
• How do I work in relationship with people? I don’t have to pretend, or not show up as fully myself, but working for myself has allowed me to do that.
• Restorative justice is an indigenous process about calling people in. The point is to rebuild community.
• Starts with the position of self and then turning it outward and seeing how it interacts with others.
• When we begin to align my desires with your desires, we will both win.
• When we feel a sense of psychological safety, it will create a heightened awareness of stepping out of our comfort zone.
• The issues that people have are intricately connected to their families.
• Economics is wholly tied to every decision that has been made since the beginning of western civilization. I don’t know of a system that has been created to be equitable. If we can start from knowing that systems weren’t set up to help, then we can realize the world is actually waiting for us to recreate it.
• When it is a process that lives only in the C-suite, it isn’t real.

RESOURCES FROM THIS EPISODE:

Restorative Leader Watch List

CONNECT WITH YERUWELLE:

On LinkedIn

On her website - IntersectionalInnovations.com

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

Get the weekly newsletter!

Want to be the first to know about upcoming events, tips and more? Sign up for our SMS list. We promise no spam, just the good stuff!

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Shelmina Abji to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• This one exchange changed her whole career. Where do I want to go and being driven by that definition of success every single day.
• "When you see a turtle on the ledge, you know it had help getting there."
• When you show up every day to show your worth, you will achieve success.
• Success is not about overnight, it is about our daily habits and that can look different from person to person.
• Intentional Value Creation - When you’re intentional about creating value, the value you create will far exceed anything that is expected of you. And that’s where you begin to have transformational success instead of incremental success.
• Aim high and get outside your comfort zone! To shoot for something you don’t believe you can actually achieve.
• When you start by defining what 5-year success means, then you define a 6-month or 12-month definition of success and that becomes a stepping stone.
• Gratitude and ambition co-exist.
• The value you are creating is based on your current competencies. If you intentionally grow competencies you will continue to move toward incremental success.
• Take on projects that scare you!
• For transformational growth, you have to step outside your comfort zone. When you step outside of your comfort zone, there is no such thing as failure!
• The world takes you at your own estimate. If you won’t take a chance on yourself, you cannot expect someone else to take a change on you. We have to own it.
• Power quotient - it is your ability to intentionally pick an empowering response to a disempowering stimulus. Whether it is internal or external.
• People will not always be the way you want them to be, but they don’t define you! Your response to that circumstance defines you.
• Every challenge is an opportunity.
• To show your worth, you must first know and internalize your worth. Once you know it, you will never become a victim of anyone else.
• Ask for help! No one ever has achieved success without someone’s help.
• Your career is a long game, not about one project. The experiences do not matter, but who you become will stay with you forever.
• If we look for easy, we achieve incremental success.
• As you achieve success, please bring others with you.

RESOURCES IN THIS EPISODE:

Show Your Worth

CONNECT WITH SHELMINA:

On LinkedIn

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

Get the weekly newsletter!

Want to be the first to know about upcoming events, tips and more? Sign up for our SMS list. We promise no spam, just the good stuff!

Welcome to Intentional Conversations, where we intersect diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business.

This week we welcomed Susanne to Intentional Conversations!

So, grab your headphones 🎧, press play, and let the conversation begin!

** Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to our channel because we're all about keeping the great conversations flowing. **

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Susanne takes a quarterly retreat to just rest, pray and do yoga.
• She started working at 14 with her dad as a bookkeeper, who was a CPA and had his own firm. By the time she got to college, the tests were so easy. She was an expert by the time she was 24.
• The gift we give our children is not just our money, but our experience and knowledge.
• As entrepreneurs, we start our business because it’s something that we. We would probably do it for free. Just because we work hard, super serve our clients, it doesn’t mean we’re going to be profitable.
• We need to take our profit first as entrepreneurs. We need to be creating profitability in our business. Our family is sacrificing when we’re doing the entrepreneur thing.
• The more we have of something, the more we’re gonna spend, but Profit First says set up bank account for the profit first. Accounts to set up include: income, profit, owners pay, taxes, and operating expenses
• Unless you have a process in place to create profitability, you will always be in the same cycle.
• Regardless of the level of business you’re at, you do need some level of advisory accounting services.
• Success doesn’t just impact me, but it effects our children and our legacy changes based on our success.
• Not all contracts are good contracts.
• In 1971, President Nixon, the US dollar is just paper, I think we’re all worth more than a piece of paper. The dollar is NOT backed by gold. Who has the right to say you’re worth only 100 pieces of paper. We’re worth more than a piece of paper someone has assigned us to.
• FIGURE OUT YOUR WHY!?! Once you know your “why”, then create the outcomes and processes to get to the WHY.

CONNECT WITH SUSANNE:

On LinkedIn

Check out her website

CONNECT WITH NIKA WHITE CONSULTING:

Connect on LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X

Subscribe to the NWC YouTube channel (New videos and more weekly!)

Visit the NWC website

Get your copy of Inclusion Uncomplicated

Get the weekly newsletter!

Want to be the first to know about upcoming events, tips and more? Sign up for our SMS list. We promise no spam, just the good stuff!