Creating mutually beneficial partnerships

We have an amazing guest with us, Ms. Chantell M. Garrett. Chantell is responsible for the diversity and inclusion work at the Federal Reserve bank in Kansas City. In her role, she works to lead and execute the strategic priorities and the robust programming of the office of diversity and inclusion throughout the bank’s seven-state district. She’s also the founder of R.U.B.I.E.S., a non-profit she supported for 10 years that provides mentoring and scholarship for female, first-generation, college students.

In our conversation, she demonstrates that the road to being a DEI practitioner doesn’t follow a single path to get to that role. She has a passion for working with communities and bringing together collaborative partnerships and ensuring that these partnerships are mutually beneficial, and creating relationships that extend throughout organizations.

Topics in this episode

• Creating intentional relationships with community members
• Even without a traditional title, many people are already doing the work of DEI
• Examples of ways an organization can internally do DEI work:
  • Workforce
  • Supplier and vendor diversity
  • Engagement efforts with employees
  • Creating a culture of belonging and inclusion
  • Strong talent pipeline
• Examples of techniques to use when creating mutually beneficial partnerships with community organizations
• The work of DEI is really for everyone within an organization
• When building relationships, introduce partners to your internal team, as well as your fellow collaborative partners
• Measuring the success of a good collaborative partner relationship and ensuring that you add value to a partnership

Contact infO

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chantellgarrett

I’m so grateful to have Chantell here. Be sure that you share this, and share these ideas, because the more of us that are thinking about this and really pushing into these ideas like collaborative partnerships, the more we’re going to be able to move the needle in the diversity, equity, and inclusion space.