Adam Torres and Dr. Lanise Block discuss creating diversity equity and inclusion programs.
Subscribe: iTunes / Spotify / Stitcher / RSS
Apply to be a guest on our podcast here
Show Notes:
Sankore Consulting is committed, through intensive research-based best practices, to deliver innovative ideas for inclusion and impact. In this episode, Adam Torres and Dr. Lanise Block, Founder & CEO at Sankore Consulting LLC., explore Sankore Consulting and the upcoming book Lanise will be launching with Mission Matters.
Watch Full Interview:
About Sankore Consulting LLC
They are an organization that provides robust solutions for corporate, educational, and organizational leaders struggling with the challenges of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as well as strategic planning.
Sankore Consulting is committed, through intensive research-based best practices, to deliver innovative ideas for inclusion and impact. Their focus is on organizational planning with an emphasis on diversity, inclusion, racial equity, and social justice.
Sankore is an ancient college within the University of Timbuktu in West Africa. The University of Sankore was known for being a highly organic and rigorous space for intellectual as well and practical thinking. They chose this name to pay homage and continue the legacy. Their logo includes the Adinkra Symbol which means “Aim High” or “Thinks Ahead”. This symbol reminds us to set goals. Adinkra Symbols originate from Ghana West Africa and are used to convey messages of uplift and heritage.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to mission matters.com and click on BR Guest to apply. All right, so today is a very special episode. We have Dr. Lanice Block on the line, and she is founder and c e O of SanCor Consulting.
Lanice, welcome to the show. Thank you. Thank you for having me, Adam. I’m delighted to be here. All right Lenny. So I’m excited to have you on. For those that watch the show often one of my favorite type of episodes to do is when we’re, we’re welcoming new members into our community and into our bestselling business leaders book series.
So, hey, first off, I just wanna say congratulations and welcome, yo, for being chosen to be published in the upcoming book. I’m super excited about that. I’ve been, this has been a goal of mine for a very, very long time to be an author. I feel like I’ve done lots of things and accomplished many of my, those on my bucket list through my life.
This is one of the things that I, that’s been one of the major humps that I’ve not been able to do. So I definitely am, am an honor to be a part of the Mission Managers team and be able to be a part of this amazing establishment and and be my, have my contribution be a part of this amazing publication.
Well it’s an honor to have you here and as, as, as everyone knows, we’ll start this episode the way that we start them all with our mission matters minute. So Lenise, we at Mission Matters. We amplify stories for entrepreneurs, executives, and experts. That’s our mission. Lenise, what mission matters to you?
The mission that matters to me is, you know, this, obviously the mission is around how to address inequities in societies. My, my business is focuses on diversity, equity, inclusion, and it, it matters to me that there are. We have a history in our, in our country of not, of having the, the lofty goal of having no inequities, but we, there’s always a stickling, a struggling forward.
We always are wanting to, to make it happen. It’s something, a lofty goal as we move. One of the founders says as a, if the tour more perfect union, and that’s my goal is to continue to help us as a country, as society mm-hmm. Continue to move toward a more perfect union. So where did all this start for you?
When did, when did you get inspired to go down this path of helping people with, with diversity, equity, and inclusion? Well, you may already have, be able to tell from my references. I’m a former social studies teacher. I taught high school social studies for about 15 years. Your inner city program in inner city and really that what drew me to that experience was that when I looked around and saw the things that were happening, you know, in society, both locally, nationally, regionally always was wondering what, what is the why around us?
What are, what is the context? What is the, what is, why are these things happening? And so as I learned more about what the, the, the background information, right? That, that helps us un inform the, the social science and how we’re experiencing the world today, I understood that, that that was to me a very liberating experience to understand the why, but then also it provides to, in, in my view, a way, a pathway to how to solve many of the problems that there, we’ve had many.
Opportunities throughout our history that were, that were opportunities to do what I would say the right thing. And some of them we, we’ve taken and some of them we’ve not taken. So my, my intention is to help us as a society, my, I feel like my role is to help individuals collectives organizations be able to take, to make the right choice, to make, to do, to do the, to do the right thing when the moment comes, when the opportunity arises, when that critical.
Experience happens or when this this opportunity to, to do, do the right thing and do the wrong thing, to really help them be equipped to do the right work and make those courageous decisions as part of the, as part of the. So, and I love it, and thank you for sharing that by the way, because I, I feel like there’s many times when people are inspired to do something and they have this, this vision or this mission, but they don’t necessarily always take that next step to actually make a business out of it and think about how they can really serve a greater population with that mission or vision.
What kind of advice would you give to those that are out there that maybe they’re sitting on an idea? It doesn’t have to be de and i, de and I, it can be. But just in general, they’re, they’re sitting on an idea. They have this thing they wanna do, but they haven’t gone out and done it yet. What kind of things would you tell them?
If I learned a concept when I was doing so I had to do workshops and all this kind of thing, but I learned a concept that I really tried to apply for a lot of things. It’s like the, a mvp, a minimal viable product. Mm-hmm. And so that’s where you take the take some the ideas you have and make the smallest version of it that is, that is viable and try it out.
And see and see, see what, where you get from it. So I would encourage anybody who has an idea, that’s what I actually do, encourage people and, and you know, even like young people oh, whatever they’re doing to Tru, you have an idea for something, get taken the smallest, viable product of, they create an mvp and then try it out, test it out, put it out there and see what happens.
Sometimes you’re like, oh yes, this is, this is great. I’m gonna continue and this all I have to do is just like, make this bigger. And sometimes you’re like, oh, this is, this was horrible. This is not gonna work. I need to make, I need to make a lot of changes before I do something different or before I continue this road.
So that’s would be my idea. Just, just try it. I’m, but I’m, the, the philosophy that I’m so more, I’m a more of a, some, like see, see something I’m more of a jump in and, and try. Yeah. If I’m a, if life was a pool, I’d be the person to kind of just jump in and just figure it out. Once I’m in there, that’s kind of my, have my disposition.
Other people are like, you know, walk around the perimeter and take, take. Water samples and, and observe for a week. I’m not that person. I’m just like jumping in there. And so that’s my thing. Just try get something and try it out and see what happens. That’s kind of, mm-hmm. I dunno if that’s good advice, but that’s the advice I would give.
Hey, I, I tend to be on your side of the spectrum on this one for sure. We a funny story, so, Where we’re experimenting and we’ve been putting out quite a bit of YouTube shorts. And, and the re idea is to get more and more attraction and more get stories like yours that I believe people need to hear about d and i and other, you know, meaningful stories to reach a larger audience.
So the first version, the M v P, my team’s like, ah, what do you mean? It’s got the black on the bottom and the top and the this and the that. And I’m like, let’s see if anybody even cares about this type of content from us and not be obviously on our podcast. A lot of people, a lot of listeners, Building that for years.
But is our content good for YouTube shorts or is it good for Instagram reels or is it good for TikTok? And we didn’t know until we tested. So instead of, you know, what some of maybe my team would’ve wanted to do is, is what you said, put your toe in the water, do this, do that, like talk about it. For a certain amount of time, create the perfect piece.
I was like, no, post it, post it, post it. Let’s see what happens. If it works, then we’ll spend some more time on it. If it works, great, then we’ll spend a lot more time on it. If we knock it out of the park, we’ll build a team around it. Okay. But we’re not gonna be diverted on what we know works and we know is our bread and butter, which is to, you know, produce the podcast and the live show and to distribute it.
So I’m a huge fan of the MVP model you mentioned. Right. And you just don’t, you don’t know anything until you actually tried it. I feel like that’s another thing I take a lot from my teaching experience. Cause I, I would sit, you know, when I first started, I would sit in my, you know, space at my desk and make these, you know, elaborate wonderful lessons, plans that had all the stuff in ’em and all the wonder.
And I was like, this is gonna be so wonderful. My shoes are gonna love it. And I would get to my class, my student, they were like, this is horrible. I had high school students and they were like, this is so Wayne. Oh. I would be like, oh my goodness. It hurts my feelings with her about when I was, when I was a young teacher.
But after that I was like, my feelings are not gonna be hurt. And so I always, I always was like, nothing ever, I never know what is gonna actually work with my students until I actually tried. I always, even when I’m teaching at the, at the college level, say, you never know if what’s gonna work until you actually try it with children with, with whatever lessons.
And so I take that even until my, my business. My own business. Then as I advise other people with businesses that, you know, just try it cuz you won’t know it’s gonna work In a vacuum, in a room sitting with all the people who you employ, all the people who are, are beholden to your idea in the first place.
You’re not gonna know if it’s gonna work with, with those people. You have to put it out there and give it a shot and see what happens. Now again, you don’t wanna spend, like we, so we just talked about a whole lot of time, a whole lot of money, a lot of interest in it, but create something small and see what works and be able to have a having place.
A pro, a process to track it, to evaluate it, to determine what are the metrics that you wanna do, and then what you’re gonna do with an information once you have it. And that’s, I feel like that’s a, the key to, key to success and happiness. Yeah. At least according to me and Adam, right? Oh, for sure. And I, I think this is a great transition actually, Lanice, because when it comes to a lot, a lot of business owners, entrepreneurs, executives, That, that watch this program.
And you know, they may not have started a de and I program. They may have wanted to, they may be thinking like, where do I start? What does this look like? And they may also be, you know, stuck on how do we move forward. And I feel like bringing in a consultant or, you know, getting some outside help is often a great way to move initiatives faster.
With, from somebody that has more experience than that. They’re just experts in the field. Yes. So let’s maybe start that part of the conversation with just. Defining de and I programs, especially for those that haven’t ever, ever experienced one, been to one themselves or launched one for their businesses, but they, you know, they kind of heard of it.
They hear the term and they’re like, should we be doing it? Should we not be doing it? Maybe start by just again just giving us an overview of what a program looks like. So, diversity, equity, inclusion this is as at a, as a basic kind of notion. And idea is like diversity is just like’s very basic definition is who’s at the party, right?
Who’s at the party? And inclusion is what are the people who at the party are, who is anybody asking ’em to dance? Right? And then the inequity is how are the people, how is the work that’s happening? Are there. Are they feeling comfortable? Are there the right amount? Is there, you know, rock and roll versus, you know, blues, you know, all those kinds of things are the people who are at the party getting what they need.
And so it, it seems to me, right? And so to many people that it’s a no-brainer that all businesses would want to have a program of. Of some kind that, that speaks to the ideas of diversity, equity, inclusion because Right. Because our society, our history has let us know that that has not been the case for many, many years.
And that is, and we are still, we are working toward changing that, but we still like where we always say, Lots have changed. We’ve done a lot of work, but there’s still a lot more work to go and things are, because we are a society, we are still experiencing bipo people, and that’s black, indigenous people of color.
That’s the concern are still experiencing such great disparities in almost every aspect of life and almost every kind of in every space, we know that those things still exist. And so there’s still must be work to be done. So, Businesses, organizations need something, need some sort of version of that.
And so what that looks like depends on your organization. If you are a big organization and you need something big, if you are a small, you know, mom and pop, you need something, you need something small. So it can be, they can be, you know, what I call fat and skinny, sort of, sort of the versions of, but basically it’s really about what are you doing to address the inequities that exist in societies as, as they are filtered through your.
Organization, your business, your, your, your school, whatever it is that you do, there are inequities that exist there, and what are you doing about it? Mm-hmm. That’s basically what, what I, I feel like a de d and I program could and should look like. And it’s, and it’s, and it’s very. Tailored to what your experience, what the, where, where you are, what your business are, the size, the stakeholders as you involved, because everybody is not experiencing oppression dis disparities the same way.
So for instance if you have, if there are people that are, for instance, indigenous, they’re, they’re experiencing oppression differently than people who are Latinx, people who are African American. People who are Asian, all of those people are experiencing different things. And so if you have one particular group or people who are experiencing dis dis that have disabilities, you need to be responsive to those people who are in your ecosystem.
And doing things that make ma matter and make a difference to them. Not just blanket, oh, we’re gonna have, you know international, you know, potluck day, not that, right? So there’s something that is really meaningful to the people that are in your space. And I agree with you that in a way it’s just, it’s just the right thing to do.
But you know, time and time again, like businesses are learning it and there’s more information coming out that shows that there’s also a business case for this. So this can lead the, it’s good business to be diverse, whether it’s from new ideas, retention like all these factors that not having a diverse workplace can lead to.
Maybe, can you speak on that a little bit more? Maybe the business case for having the de and I program. The business case is, you know, they just say they make that more diverse teams are function better, that they make better projects. They, they make better decisions. You offer, you get a better, you get this better in every way.
The challenge though, that, that sounds really good and it seems, you know, obvious that then businesses would just, oh yeah, let’s just do this. Then the challenge of that though is that, that that is, it does not happen and there’s a whole myriad of reasons why it doesn’t, and that’s what. I feel like needs to be addressed.
And just saying in the business case, is that it, that it makes a lot of sense because it does make sense. It’s obvious to those of us who are, who are, who know that right. Who aren’t understanding, but there are, there are barriers that come along and mitigate that, that benefit. Right. That keep people from, from, from either investing in that or keeping that.
As, as a, a reality in their, in their system. And so that, how does that, what do you, how do you address that? And so that’s where I feel people who even know intellectually that this is, this is something that is the business case and it makes much more sense and to make you a lot more money. But inte, even the intellectual sort of an understanding of that it is impeded by many times.
The, the political, the social, the emotional resistance that people get when they’re, when they, when they try to do something involving diversity, equity, inclusion. Where does a business start? So like, so let’s say somebody’s watching this and they, and they say, you know, we need to start seriously considering this.
There’s a business sense. It’s just the right thing to do as well. Where does a business start when it wants to think about creating a D N I program? So first it starts with what is your intention, what is your goal around the program? Is it to really to, to, to speak to a particular population? Is this, do you have a particular a, a, a backstory around it?
Is something necessarily with your, with your founder or something that is some experience you had, is it, are you in a space that has experienced in particular sort of disparity? So are you want to address that? So be really clear. About what your intention is. The next thing is to have a dedicated leader.
It’s, it’s very risky. Many times, unfortunately, people feel like it’s a great risk to be involved in first equity, equity inclusion programs for, you know, a lot of reasons. I can give you a social studies lesson about that if you want. That might be another podcast. But it’s very, people feel like it’s very risky, so people need permission.
To participate and to really buy into it. And the permission comes from the leader. So it has to be, you know, the school superintendent, the, the nonprofit executive director. It has to be the the, the c e o of the business. Whatever it is, it has to come in many ways, you know, from the leader to get kind of a jumpstart.
Now it could be a grassroot sort of movement pushing up. That’s, that’s it’ll take a lot, a lot more time. And it could be, I mean, it can be absolutely be done. And I’m not poo-pooing that, but I’m saying if, if, if an organization decides to work, we didn’t wanna do, the leader has to take, take it and make a steak on the ground, they has to decide that this is the proverbial hill that they might die on.
You know, that kind of thing. And then the next thing is really starting with self-reflection. It can’t, can’t be like, oh, well, we’re going to do DEI and this is what we think everybody else should do. We really, inflection is about what are, what are the, the organization, you know, as a, as a collective.
Where, where are they? What are, what is their, where, where do they come to this space with? And then also as individuals. So the reflection has to happen both, you know, individually and collectively. Where, where are the mental models? People often think people, especially people who are part of the majority culture, feel like they don’t have, like culture as if they’re not part of a system.
That they’re just kind of these blank slates. And that’s not, that’s not. True. Everybody has, every space has a culture. So acknowledging who you are and how you show up into a space is the very first step with any sort of d e I program. And that’s, again, both collectively and as individuals in this, in this space.
And the next thing really is to establish, excuse me, is to have a resource allocation. You know, put your body where your mouth is, right? Mm-hmm. You gotta walk the walk. You gotta go talk and talk. You gotta walk the walk. And so that is that’s another way to signal. To others that this is something that is important, this is a priority to our organization.
Mm-hmm. This is, again, a, it gives me permission to lean in, to invest emotionally in this, because again, that’s something that’s, that has to be required that investing emotionally and mental mentally. Socially, right in the, into this process is this resource allocation, having to do something, but then that’s so important and often such a big deal, but not a assign resources to it.
Mm-hmm. Indicates that it’s not, you know, that the organization is not taking it seriously, really. Mm-hmm. Then establishing some sort of baseline, always encourage organizations to do something like like an equity audit or having these cultural inventories like diversity the ibi.
Mm-hmm. I d I stands for inter Intercultural Development Inventory, those kinds of things. Those kinds of inventories that kind of just say, this is where we are. This is where we are right now. Then you can take that and you can make a plan for what, what are the things you’re gonna happen? Go, go going forward.
And then also it’s a way for you to establish some some metrics for the future to determine what progress has been made. And to kind of continue to continue that cycle. Those are the things, those are the places kind of like, you know, I would start and, and not necessarily that specific order, but those are the, those the other components that should be a part of the initiating of a diversity equity inclusion program.
I liked the way you explain it because what you, what you’ve displayed is that this is something that’s actionable. It’s something that’s measurable and it’s something that can also improve, you know, a business’s performance, you know, lead to a better quality of living for the employees and, and a safer and more inclusive workspace.
I mean, lots of wins there. Why do you feel that? What do you feel kind of holds some businesses back from moving forward with A A D N I program? It’s scary, risky, and because there are, this is a big question, Adam, I could, you know, talk for hours with, about this. So I’m trying to, I’m trying to think about like, where would I, where would I start with that in a, in a, in a succinct manner?
Diversity, equity, inclusion issues in the United States are, people feel like I, I’ll, I’ll start big and kind of try to funnel down. People feel like that they are a, an assault against America, right? Mm-hmm. And so they don’t wanna admit that this is an issue, right? Yeah. And so to have these programs is really, I acknowledge that there’s a problem, so let’s start there.
People often don’t want that to be, we’re not happy. We don’t, we don’t have this problem. Racism is over. We elected Iraq or Wawa, what are you talking about? Mm-hmm. You know, that kinda thing. So they don’t wanna acknowledge this feels like an assault against them. So that’s one thing, that’s one thing that keeps people from doing it.
When they are people who say, yes, we do understand this is a problem then we are just like, okay, now then what? What do we, what do we do about, oftentimes they don’t, they feel like they don’t have a enough knowledge about what is happening. Mm-hmm. And then what to do about it, because they also don’t want to be, don’t wanna be on the wrong side of, you know, the capital culture.
They don’t want us to do the wrong thing. They don’t, they don’t necessarily feel equipped to be out in the space, you know? And that’s the risk part that you’re talking about, right? Like, there’s a little bit of risk there. Yeah. The risk part, they don’t wanna be out there. They’re like making a mistake and all of a sudden, you know, everything is, is, you know, gone.
With a hand basket, and they don’t, they’re like, oh, wow, I didn’t realize that was a wrong thing. I can see that paralysis of fear keeps a lot of organizations from from really, you know, spinning and making these, these grandiose, you know, overtures that are, that are really in not of ways required, but that’s keeps them in, in, in that kind of, in that kind of space.
And that’s kind of the, the bigger, bigger view, the smaller view are we, as we, as we funnel down, is keeps you from doing that. Is it makes. People’s often in the space where they feel like they have something if they can see someone else get something, they feel like it’s taking, being taken away from them.
And so it’s sometimes a knee-jerk reaction that I, while I think intellectually this is a good idea, that people, everybody should have rights. Right. I think that everybody should have the same, you know, e equitable pay and equitable stuff. Mm-hmm. Intellectually understand that. But if that means that I have to give up something of mine or that I feel is mine, or that’s making my life wonderful or comfortable, that that is a difference, sort of that, that, that, that takes a move from the intellect to something else.
And so that I’m, I’m reacting not necessarily out of intellect, but I’m reacting emotionally. And so people are often is responding in emotional social ways to things that are even, I, I experience it with diversity and inclusion that are opposite. And even in contradiction to how they feel intellectually.
About diversity, equity, inclusion, because it’s, it’s a, we, we present it. We see it as a binary, but I would say it’s a false binary. It’s like, you know, we have, like, when parents, when people are parents, once you have, you have more, you have one kid and you feel like, you know, like as I know when I had, when I had just my, my first child, I was like, I can’t even, I can’t imagine loving another.
Human being, wow, as much I love this child. It’s just not possible. But then I had another one and I did, right. And so it, it multiplies. People don’t understand, people often don’t understand this, that it multiplies and these things, you know, and I’m not, I’m not being naive, even think like resources, of course.
Because there are, there are finite mild amount amounts of that, but there are ways to re of course, reframe and re juxtapose different things so that it can be a multiplying effect and not a, not a contraction, but it’s, but it’s, it’s hard work to make people mm-hmm. Understand that on a, on a emotional social way versus what they’re thinking and believing even as espouse intellectually those things.
Often our disconnect. There’s some dissonance there with diversity, equity, inclusion issues because so much of what has happened with our socialization in our country, with our history that I think that that lens to that, to that. Now I, I, I know we can go further in there. And by the way, you can do your whole own podcast, I mean, series on the topic that you just mentioned and dig further and further.
But I wanna spend some of the time that we have left here actually talking about San Croix Consulting and how you’re helping corporations and small business owners and other organizations really. Excel in this area by helping them with their de and I programs where they have ’em and they’re looking to move ’em forward.
Or they’re looking to start a first one. Maybe tell us a little bit more about the company. So San Cory Consulting started it in 2000 17. And it’s St. Cory. People are just like, where, what does that mean? I like to say, yeah. It was a, San Qu was a college in the University of Timbuktu that existed in ancient Raleigh in West Africa.
Back in, you know, Ancient times. I forgot, I forgot the exact time I used to go on top of my head, but anyways, it was, it was, part of it was, well, Timbuktu was a university and of a renowned university, and St. Cory was a college within it and St. Cory. It was about having. You didn’t have to be admitted to the college to attend, necessarily to attend these, but it was like a, a intellectual, it was a organic, organic intellectual space.
So people would come there and share ideas and have these discussions in this, you know, this learning experience altogether. And it was like a, it was a horizontal experience. You know, versus, you know, typically in a college experience, it’s very vertical, right? The professor knows everything, everybody else was learning, but it was a very horizontal experience.
So when I heard that, I felt like that’s exactly what I wanted, environment, I wanted to create that. Corey is about all of us committing coming to the process and, and having, I don’t jux suppose necessarily myself as a, as an expert, but really as a, as a member of the, of the stakeholder community to say what is, what is happening here and how can I help us help help each other?
Cause I definitely feel like. The proc, the works that I do, the assignments that I that I’m a part of, the contracts that I accept are things that are near and dear to me that I, that I believe in with my, with my, my heart, my mind, and that are part of my own, you know, sort of mission of, of doing, of doing this work.
And so I lend myself through the process and feel like I’m a part of, part of the team. I’m still working with them. And so that’s kind of, you know, in general what St. Cory is about, is that we are about coming, coming into the space and. And being, you know, they’re, my, our, one of our tags is, you know, all of us are smart than one of us.
And that’s definitely where I like to, like, where I like to begin and where I like to enter in to any sort of relationships and engagements. With, with, with any sort of the partners that I work with further we often work with, you know, organizations that are in a variety of ways. We do things like equity audits and that, and that’s what you’re asking me, like specific things that I would.
Okay, so things equity audits where we look at so, and that can take a lot of different forms. We look at Documents, like policies, foundational documents, frameworks, stuff like that. Then something we might do, something we might have like one-on-one interviews with, with via protocol that we created.
Mm-hmm. With executive leaders. We would do stakeholder engagements potentially. So there lots of things that, that go into. The equity audit that really is the intention of it is to say what’s happening in this space. Yeah. Kind of report, report about that. We do trainings, cultural competent training, microaggressions, trainings.
We do those kinds of things that are really at a, at a very one-on-one sort of level with organizations to kind of say this is some things just like basic knowledge that you. Be aware of and be part of your lexicon that you know what’s happening, that you can have these conversations about. And then we also have kind of tiered sort of professional development.
We have a series called cultural, developing Your Cultural Intelligence. That is a, a series that we do that talks about, you know, first your developing yourself and your. And your own kind of identity. Then it talks about your, your relationships and your competency, and it talks about your leadership, your in and your intelligence.
And so that’s kind of a series. Then we also, the kind of a, the main kind of signature offering is developing an equity leadership identity, which is talks about the five lenses that that need to happen. Paragon kind of level. The thing that we ask people, we, we kind of steer people. The two at the end is really being able to make courageous equity based decisions.
We feel like that is where the rubber meets the role. That is the paragon. Because often people who are leaders in organizations, they, they wanna do the right work. They, they’ve gotten the, the intellect to match the emotion, to match the social, the social. And then they’re like ready and poisoned.
They’re ready to do it. But they come against so much adversity and, and listen to the process. They don’t, they don’t continue because they, because when they get to the, the apex, they’re having to make the decision that is courageous, equity based decision. Some, they, they often are not equipped and they, and they, and they may stop just short of making that critical decision.
And that’s where, so oftentimes I’ve seen equity initiatives fall apart. Right. That’s why we have created a pathway that helps leaders get to that point and say understand what that means to be at that point. And then actually women there to be able to pull the pull, pull the proverbial trigger, right?
And make, make a decision and say, this is, this is where. We are gonna, this is what we’re gonna do, this is where we’re gonna stand, and this is how I’m gonna speak to the resistance and rally the supporters. So that’s, that’s, I think like that. So that’s one of the, that’s some of the things that we do specifically around first equity inclusion in relation to organizations and, and government agencies and nonprofits.
Hmm. Well, Lanice, I know we’re not going to really talk about the book much today and that that’s intentional. I’ll let the audience know. So Lanice is, is gonna be in the upcoming book launch, but the reason is we’ll be bringing Lanice back on for a second interview where we’re gonna do a. Full interview on her writing in the book.
So don’t worry about that. This is a little bit of teaser, just warming up and, and getting lenise into the into the community and acclimated with our amazing podcast community and Mission matters community overall on Facebook. But Lanice, I just have to ask well, first off, it’s been great having you on the show, but I just have to ask, you know, what’s next?
I mean, what’s next for you? What’s next first and Cory Consulting? Well, one of the things that I’m, I’m doing is I’ve developed, I’m, I’m trying to develop some products and this is me again trying mvp, come on. I love it. I know where this is going. Go ahead. This is me trying things. And so what I part of what I’ve mentioned before that San Cory comes from the con, excuse me, from the Molly Kingdom of West Af Ancient West Africa.
Well, one of the, the people that lived there, although were the, the Ireland, lived there before and still lived in, I call the Ahan people and they have these, these things called adinkra symbols, which are symbols, cinema, which are symbols of Levi. It symbolize lots of different things. And so what I’ve done is created what I call adinkra dialogue deck.
And so it’s a, it’s a deck of, of, you know, cards that I really know they’re about being culturally responsive and learning in the experience, so they have. The, the symbols, the African symbols on the front, and they talk about what, what this symbol means. And then there’s a proverb on the back and then there’s a question a discussion prompt that really focuses on diversity leadership and inclusion.
And so that’s, the intent of that is so people would have a culturally responsive way to do team building. And, and this is a decked that’s, you know, it’s in, it’s in production right now. Yeah. So that, that should be available very, very, very soon. I’m also making a sort of complimentary postcard sort of set to go along with that.
That others also in introduction. So we’re gonna see, see how that goes and, and what’s gonna, and how that’s gonna move forward. So, so, so, so, so I’m in, I’m in the process of making some, some products to compliment some of the things that we do and more to come on this. I’m excited. And when we bring you back, let’s.
See how far along we are with some of these other MVPs. Yes. Hopefully you’ll, I’m all about promoting your, your mission and what you’re doing. I really do think it’s amazing. It’s great. And I, and I know the multiplying effect of people like yourself when they’re, when they’re doing good, when somebody has this like strong mission, they believe in, they start a business around it.
They go out there, they start, you know, preaching their message, whatever it happens to be. But in this case, de and I think it’s a strong issue and it’s really important, and one that doesn’t get enough attention in the media or the market. Place. So I’m, I’m glad to see that you’re putting your expertise, your time, attention, and love into it.
That being said, if somebody wants to follow up and, and learn more about St. Qu Consulting what’s the best way for them to do that? We go to our website, which is is ww dot San cory.consulting. And they on there, they’re my social media tags are at the top. And then there’s also a link to visit, make an appointment to, to set up a consult free consultation, 30 minute consultation with me.
You can, we can just, just. Sign up and we can just chat if you want or if there’s a project you wanna talk about, we can do that as well. So that’s the, the best way to to, to, to kind of contact me and, or just email me at Lanice Lanice San cory.consulting. And I don’t know if those things are gonna be showing up here or something, but they’re definitely, that’s, those are the ways to reach me.
Yeah. And, and, and what we’ll do is we’ll put all that information in the show notes so that our audience can just click on the links and, and head right on over. And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time with Mission Matters or listening to an episode or engaging with us we’re all about bringing out business owners, entrepreneurs, executives and experts, and having them share their mission, the reason behind their mission, really what gets.
Them motivated to go out there in the marketplace and into the world and make a difference. If that’s the type of content that sounds interesting or fun or exciting to you, we welcome you hit that subscribe button because we have many more mission-based individuals just like Lanice coming up on the line, and we don’t want you to miss a thing.
And Lanice. Until the next time, look forward to working with you again. And, but for today, thanks again for coming on the show. Thank you. I appreciate this opportunity.
