The Learning: Unraveling Unconscious Bias

Wow, what a difference two weeks makes. The last several days have been challenging and emotionally charged on so many levels. We feel so full of love for our beloved communities across the country, and we hope this painful, eye-opening time marks the start of a big transformation for this nation.

The peaceful protests and powerful statements and imagery filling our streets, social media and news feeds—combined with the conversations advocating for social justice that are now taking place—make us hopeful that change is indeed already underway. There’s no way we as a society can go back to “business as usual.”

 Site Selection Services is committed to doing our part to listen, advocate, amplify and act to create a better future. As part of that, we are thinking a lot about the role inclusivity plays in meetings and how to unravel unconscious bias and champion diversity. 

 We found the work of author and business professor Dolly Chugh, Ph.D. to be very insightful. The author of The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Fight Bias talks about how thinking of yourself as a “good” person can hold you back and that being “good-ish person” is actually setting a higher standard. That’s because, in her words, “Then you’re saying, ‘I probably do have blind spots. The question is: What are they? How am I going to find them? I’m going to take ownership for that process and for that learning.’” As a “good-ish” person, Chugh reveals, “you realize that you are going to make mistakes. It’s what you do afterward that counts.” 

 Watch her informative talk here featured on PCMA’s website. 

 May we all work to be "good-ish" people.