Caribbean Cultural Identity at Work: A Hidden Leadership Advantage

Caribbean-American women are leaders—but do our workplaces recognize that? In this episode, Dr. Kerry Mitchell Brown joins me to unpack how cultural identity is a leadership strength. From code-switching to radical self-care, we explore what it means to lead boldly, confidently, and Caribbean.

Takeaways:

• Cultural identity is not a weakness—it’s a strategic advantage.
• Workplace narratives can be rewritten through self-awareness and storytelling.
• Radical self-care is essential for sustainability and impact.
• Leadership doesn’t require a title—it’s about influence and clarity of purpose.
• You can’t do it all at once—and that’s okay.

Connect with Dr. Kerry - https://kerrymitchellbrown.com/

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Transcript

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Introduction to Caribbean Leadership

Speaker 1 0:03

Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of Carry On Friends the Caribbean American Experience. I'm your host, carrie-anne, and today we're going to be diving into a very relevant layered conversation that's been building on this podcast since its inception, and one that connects our cultural heritage to how we show up and lead in the workplace. Now, if you've been listening to the podcast for a minute, you might remember I've mentioned a workshop called Confidently Caribbean at Work, and this was recorded many, many years ago. I think this was in 2020. And before that, we've just had many conversations about working.

Speaker 1 0:46

Now, one of the things that you know that is important to me is our professional strength has a lot of our culture and heritage behind it. It's a leadership asset or a heritage, and it's a strategic advantage, right, and so today I'm glad to be taking the conversation even further with someone who brings a fresh, outsider, yet very connected and researched perspective, and that is Dr Kerry Mitchell Brown, yes, who carries on the podcast today. And oh, carrie, and the last name too. Imagine that right. So, even though Dr Brown isn't of Caribbean heritage herself, she works with women of Caribbean heritage and her work powerfully validates some of the things that we've been discussing on the podcast and something that I've been working or developing with the Caribbean Diaspora Experience Model, and something particularly as heritage, as a professional strength. Dr Keri Mitchell-Brown is a nationally recognized organizational theorist, leadership strategist, who's been working not only with Caribbean women but Black women across all sectors to develop what she calls transformative leadership rooted in cultural intelligence, community and radical self-care. Dr Carey, welcome to the podcast. How are you?

Speaker 2 2:19

I am amazing and I am so glad to be here with you. I've been following Care On With Friends for a little bit now and I love, love, love, love, love how you created space for these authentic conversations about the Caribbean experience here in these United States. I know, and you know, it is so funny how we both have the same name, almost, so this connection makes me feel like this conversation was just meant to happen. Absolutely, absolutely Carrie, carrie, carrie, and so I didn't have a middle name formally growing up, and so I adopted Anne as my middle name right, and Brown is my married name, so I'm Carrie, anne Brown too, as far as I'm concerned.

Speaker 1 3:16

No, this is. And you fall right in because you know the saying goes. You know, if you meet a Carrie or a Carrie Anne, there's a chance that there's a Jamaican root somewhere in there and it's spelled exactly the same and that is so rare because it's the male version spelling of Carrie.

Speaker 2 3:35

So I'm exactly in the right place at the right time having this conversation. And, carrie Ann, you are correct, I do not have Caribbean heritage. But as a Black girl growing up in the Midwest Omaha Nebraska to be exact I didn't have a whole lot of exposure to Caribbean people, much in the Midwest growing up. But all of that changed when I went to college. So, moving from the Midwest to the East Coast in a city where there were just a lot of transient folks it was a military town and in that environment there were Caribbean folks, caribbean women became some of my closest and strongest connections and these relationships they date back 30 plus years and they have really been foundational to who I am today.

Speaker 1 4:38

Wonderful, All right. So let's take a step back and start with your background and your profession as it is. Could you tell us a little bit about that? And then we'll get into the work specifically with Caribbean Women. You know I did say you're an organizational theorist, but what exactly is the work that you do and how are you working with women across the board?

Speaker 2 5:02

Sure. So I studied organizations as part of my doctoral studies, both in practice

Understanding Organizational Culture

Speaker 2 5:10

and in moving through organizations, and was really interested in how Black women both navigated and not just survived in organizations but actually thrived in organizations. And I started doing that within organizations through their organization development department, and then, several years later, started my own consultancy.

Speaker 1 5:38

What fascinates me about the work that you do. As I mentioned in the prior workshops that I did, I had like this handout because I had to learn the hard way how to navigate the workplace, because my parents and when I say parents, I use that term broadly, because in the Caribbean we are a multi-generational family structure, so I'm talking my uncles, my grandparents, you know the aunties and stuff, including my parents' parents and they didn't really teach us on how to show up or to work and succeed in American corporate structure or American corporate life. The shock of my life when, in 2000, let me back up, let me make sure I get this clear so up until 2010, I was good because I was working with a generation of Americans, maybe the older generation, who were very focused on let's get this work done heads down. And then I think, when the younger generation came into the workplace and wanted to be a little bit more social and friendly, that was very different from what my Caribbean upbringing would say, that this is how you should go to work and how the older generation, maybe the boomer generation and the generation before, were operating.

Speaker 1 7:03

And this became very challenging for me, and so one of the things that I did was I came up with this worksheet for people to try to identify what type of organization they were in, so I said all of that. To get to this thing about organizations, have you figured out archetypes for different organization in your work? Maybe you don't, but I'm just curious. Are organizations in general or broad are archetypes that can help you decode certain things about how the organization functions?

Speaker 2 7:36

It's all very different and dependent upon the organization and, more importantly, their culture, right, and it's all very different, right? So the person who leads or the group who leads the organization, they set the tone for what that organization does. It's not necessarily or always about the policies of the organization, is what people do and how they enact those policies. There are always systems that signal to us what matters and what doesn't, and who matters in those systems and who does not. Right, and depending upon how far someone is from the what I call the denomination line and those are factors related to all types of identities that make up who we are often will determine, you know, what side of that equation you are on the important or not so important. And so it varies across different types of organizations, different types of governing structures. A lot of times, you know, they're in categories around corporate structures and progressive structures, and sometimes there's a whole lot of overlap, right?

Speaker 2 9:07

And it's really about the culture, like, what do the people who lead these organizations espouse about their values and about the outcome and how they treat the people who actually make up the organization?

Speaker 2 9:23

And then, what are the internal systems

Cultural Intelligence as a Superpower

Speaker 2 9:25

that manage the people from the start on? What attracts them there, how they treat people while they're there and the process when they leave, either voluntarily or as people are forced out, are forced out. So it's not as cut and dry, you know, as it used to be when you know there were. It's not as diverse of a workforce as we have when we have multiple generations, you know, within a workforce. But what I would say about organizations is that they are perfectly designed to get the outcomes that they get, which means that you can change them. Like organizations are ran by humans, right, and you can influence human behavior. And that's often what's missed in these practices around organizations is if they're just these standalone brick and mortars that just are what they are, neutral in that they can't be changed, but they absolutely can be changed and they can be changed for good to where they serve the majority of the population instead of a select few, the majority of the population instead of a select few.

Speaker 1 10:52

Wonderful. So organizations there's no one set way, there's no archetype for an organization. It varies based on the leadership, the culture. The culture is intangible. It's people, what they do, how they do it, what they say don't say all that other good stuff and I think one of the things that you've said is organizations are run by people, and if they're run by people, you can influence human behavior. So that's a critical point. So let's get back to what brought you here. So you've observed Caribbean women in leadership roles, or you've observed Caribbean women just in work, right, and I mean other than your move from Nebraska to a place where there was just a lot more people that you're interacting with from all cultures. What really drove you to explore leadership when it comes to Caribbean women?

Speaker 2 11:49

Well, I've had the privilege to walk alongside these incredible leaders as they've navigated environments not designed for their success or success for Black women in general. I was in these environments as well and these have been some of the most powerful grounded relationships in my life. So relationships built on love and care, not just collective pain or trauma. And I've had the privilege to witness firsthand their brilliance, their resilience and innovative approaches to leadership, and I would say, first as colleagues and as co-workers, and then through my consulting work and the most meaningful and dear friends in this journey called Life. Some of my biggest collaborators now are Caribbean women and you know we work together on projects, we work together in leadership. So in your work, you know we work together on projects, we work together in leadership.

Speaker 1 12:48

So in your work you describe cultural intelligence as a superpower. Cultural intelligence could we define that? And then let's talk about how does that show up practically at work no-transcript.

Speaker 2 13:37

You know where they come from, their preferences around. You know communication. You know something more recently the preferences around pronouns, preferences around communication styles and just a number of things, and often, sometimes, what we don't talk about is you know preferences around or processes around, assimilation to the dominant culture, right, but what that means is teaching us to learn about everyone else where you spend a lot of time and energy, and often at the expense of leaving your culture at home, or at least at the door right home, or at least at the door right. And what I like to talk about, and where I say to use you know culture as your superpower, is this mentioning that it's not just social skill, right, and so I'll share with you something around one of my clients and also a friend, and through my years of research and close work with Caribbean American women leaders, there's something that I observed that I would say is pretty remarkable is the way that they have navigated multiple worlds Right. They have navigated multiple worlds right. So you talk, carrie-anne, about the lessons that you learned from your uncles and your family, your large generational family, about how to move and to work both at home and community and the workplace here in the US, and I've witnessed these women to code switch without even thinking about it.

Navigating Multiple Worlds

Speaker 2 15:30

Right, they move between cultural spaces with ease, and that's just not a cultural skill. That's like a superpower, right. The ability to engage with folks not from the Caribbean culture and the ability to immediately slip in to a Caribbean dialect with someone that you know is from your island or a neighboring island, and in a way that you all feel at home with each other right in a meeting or a breakout room, just to have a cultural connection and then right back into the space, right, and so, just thinking about that, in a global marketplace, who's better to bridge that than someone who's been doing it their entire life? That than someone who's been doing it their entire life? Right, like that's a superpower. Most people that have lived in one particular environment and you know if I use myself, for example like living and growing up in the Midwest and you know moving to the East Coast a little bit of different, but that's not changing worlds. Right, it's changing a little bit of different, but that's not changing worlds right, changing major, major environments.

Speaker 1 16:48

I appreciate the word superpower because a lot of times when I do just that, even here on the podcast, people are like whoa, and I believe it's a superpower. I think there's a place where people feel like but I don't want to code switch, but I think it's not code switching and there's a future episode coming up. It's language right, so going into or you know our accent or language. It is a separate language, so we don't think of it as being bilingual, but in a way it is. You know, and so you know. It's no different than someone goes from French to English, spanish to English and vice versa, and that is why I see it as a superpower.

Speaker 1 17:31

But also, I think for a lot of people they don't have the gift that I've been given to do this podcast and over 10 years to appreciate that, but because it comes so natural, it's an everyday thing. You don't think of it as a superpower, it's just something that you do. So, in terms of how Caribbean American women, or Caribbean American broadly, can leverage this superpower in work, how does this come into play? Maybe not everyone works in a global company, but how can they use this superpower to level up their leadership at work. How do you see that in play?

Speaker 2 18:12

Don't hide it, like when we bring our full selves to work. I mean, it's like leaving a part of yourself at home, and when you, you know, break parts of yourself off, then you can't be your very best, right. And so don't hide your Caribbean perspective. It helps you to see solutions that others miss, because people can make you feel funny, and not in a good way, about your accent or the way you wear your hair or the way that you look and that pulls you off your game and you're second guessing should you do this or should you be that, or should you hide this? And where does that leave space for your brilliance to shine and to show through? So I say, you know, and one of my approaches is to embrace it, just to embrace it.

Speaker 1 19:06

I think it would be, you know, a very big oversight if I didn't bring up this point. So, even before our current political climate, you know, this idea of being confidently Caribbean or whatever I would say, was like oh wait a minute, because it's not something that, as you said before, you don't announce it at the door. You know, I can tell you how people knew I was Jamaican at work, is you know? Someone on my family would call me, and then I went into it and then someone rolls over on the chair and like, did I hear an accent? You know that type of thing. So much less now where there's a lot going on and people may not feel so confident about letting people know about their cultural heritage because there are assumptions that come with that, assumptions that come with that. So, given the realities of our current political climate, how do you still encourage people to lean in with this cultural intelligence and their identity at work?

Speaker 2 20:17

people will make it up right. So if you don't engage with the things that people assume and share the information that you are willing to share, well, then they'll make up whatever they want to make up. So, for example, I got married young. I had kids, young People that looked at me. They had no idea how old I was and there was one part of me that was like who cares? And why should you know how old I am? But they had that mystery they were making up stories about, well, I was a teen mom or I was all of these things that I was.

Speaker 2 21:04

Not that that there was anything wrong with it, but it became a part of my story that I could not control and I wanted people to be in rooms talking about my impact, not what they didn't add to my superpower, that didn't add to the growth or the potential for my trajectory within the organization. That aligned with my goals. Right, and so that's just who you are. You're not going to be able to erase it, but it also gives you information on a decision about is this the place where you want to be, is this where you want to hang your hat, or should you be working on your exit strategy?

Speaker 1 21:50

All wonderful things.

Speaker 1 21:52

I mean, you are probably a person I was looking for back in 2012, 2013, when I was just navigating this solo and it's like wait a minute 30, when I was just navigating this solo and it's like wait a minute.

Speaker 1 22:05

The narrative that was created about me and there is a narrative that's created is that I was mean and unfriendly, and every time I thought back to when they made the comment. I was like but they were walking past my office and my face is buried in a computer screen. If you want to say hi, come in and say hi, but there was an expectation that I would say hi first. I'm like I didn't even see you, you know, or I'm just really heads down, focused on my work. I'm in a zone and it's just like you're mean and I'm like but I'm not. You know. So people will create these narratives and then, before you know it, you know some of these people. They have the air of other people And're hearing it from they can take that to be true. So what you're saying is absolutely critical, like part of this is taking control of the narrative and your personal brand at work.

Speaker 2 23:12

Yeah, and there's something that's magical, too, around storytelling, like Caribbean cultures, value, like oral tradition, and my experience of Caribbean storytelling it's great. It connects people to your vision Anything more powerful than someone else telling your story and anything more powerful than any PowerPoint presentation, even if it had AI enhancements. Right, and so use your predictions, use your superpowers, use who you are. It's in your DNA, it's in your bones and it may not work in this moment, in this time, but the more practice you are with doing it when it actually counts, it's going

Overcoming Workplace Challenges

Speaker 2 24:10

to matter so much and you won't even look organization and you know similar. I'm not here to make friends, I'm here to keep my head down. She had so many people counting on her, her family back in the islands and her family here as well. I mean, she was a breadwinner for many households and I just kept saying just be your full. You are so amazing. Just be your full self everywhere you go.

Speaker 2 24:54

She stopped hiding who she was, her cultural intelligence, and stopped worrying about the way that people would perceive but they were perceiving her something very different from who she was, and the moment she stopped doing that, stopped worrying about the people who were intimidated about her full brilliance.

Speaker 2 25:19

She helped her company see solutions that others missed. She used her understanding about economics from the work that she did back home that completely reimagined her company's approach to emerging markets, like they were wanting to move into a space no one had even thought about. She had been sitting on a gold mine and, as a result, she was protected. She was sponsored by executives in a way that nobody had even imagined was possible for someone with her background, and so what I mean by this? They were clear about her value, they were clear about her impact and, guess what? Nobody messed with her. Here on out. All she had to do was be herself and to show up and cut out all the noise and all those folks who were, you know, just being aggressive for no reason because they were close to that power line, who ultimately had no power. She were all their supervisors.

Speaker 1 26:34

You said so many things in here that I know I have to unpack. So that is a wonderful story. You said perception, but there are some people who are working from the fear because of what was done to them in a prior organization when it came to their cultural identity and presenting as such at work. So there is a place where people may have wanted to do that, but something negative happened to them. And so what do you say to those people who have been hurt by initially being confident and presenting that? I'm a proud Caribbean American woman and you know they may have lost a job, they may have got demoted, they had adverse actions taken against them, whether officially or in microaggression. So what would you say to them about how they show up at work? I think the key piece, which I don't know how to unlock it how much of the organizational personality should you be paying attention to to determine how much you are showing, you know, leaning forward with your heritage at work?

Speaker 2 28:19

Right. But here's the thing we have to do our research and making the determinations on. We have a choice in where we work Right. We have a choice and you know who we give our time to Like. We are a gift to these organizations. We can choose and sometimes we don't always choose right.

Speaker 2 28:25

I know I hadn't always chose right and sometimes I know very early on and I begin working on my exit strategy. I partner with other folks on working on an exit strategy on ooh, this feels funny and not in a good way. How do I get out? Partner with people like me? I mean, I help women do that. Do the analysis on is this the right fit?

Speaker 2 28:51

We have to be clear about the types of companies that we want to work for. Sometimes we are setting ourselves up to work for our own companies right, asking the questions and when we go and interview for a job we should hold very closely. Not only are they interviewing us, we should be interviewing them as well. And if we hear those things like, we know what it feels like in those environments when we've been on the other end of the continuum, where we were not treated fairly, where we were not respected, where we were not valued where we felt like we didn't belong. Not all companies, not all organizations are that way and we have to hold that. When we bump into those that are not that, make the decision, because life is short.

Speaker 1 29:48

Yeah, what you're saying, too, goes back to the other thing that I really want to make sure that you answer what happens to people who have experienced this hurt and what happens to people who just don't have the choice. Given the economy we're in, I want to leave this job, but I need this job because the job market is crappy and I can't just leave this job. So you know, we do understand choice, but with the market there isn't much choice and we do know that there's this level of intelligence that comes with my heritage. But I can't really do that based on my environment. Or maybe they're still at the place that kind of treated them funny because they were very bold about their heritage, and maybe they're still, you know, reluctant because of that.

Speaker 2 30:32

So what do you say to, you know, these group of people who can't leave and those who've experienced that, and those who've experienced that, yes, I've been there too and in those situations for myself, and that I will advise others is to prioritize self-care Right. And so you know, figure out what your boundaries are, figure out what your non-negotiables are Right. Negotiables are right, and so maybe you decide, like, what are the things that you have to? You know, leave at the door when you walk in and still be in a position where you can honor yourself and feel good about yourself. Take your PTO time. You know, utilize your sick time. Make sure you are leveraging all of your health care, all your mental health care. You know, making sure you're putting things in place so you're not burning yourself out and find those moments of joy and when you do enjoy, the heck out of it because you are going to need it. You know, love on your family, embrace your family and work on an exit strategy.

Speaker 1 31:51

I could tell you that's real. You know, that's the radical self-care part that I want to get to, because there was a moment I was feeling very frustrated at work and I just had to take a step back. And you know, most of us, we know ourselves, we of check myself. But I also knew that I couldn't continuously check myself. I had to get accountability, like I would say, hey, if you see me doing this, check in and tell me like time out. You know, if you see me complaining too much, you'd be like girl, it's time to take that half day PTO or something, because we can't control the organization. We can influence it, but we can't control it. I can only control myself and my actions. And so I have my PTO, I have sick day and create boundaries around how I don't want to say how I want to spend my day, but how I want to experience my workday and what I want to be at the end of that workday before I go home to my family.

Speaker 1 33:02

And so this idea of radical self-care is really radical, because you've pointed out that Caribbean American women and Caribbean people, they're hardworking people. So this idea of radical self-care sometimes is like we just work hard and that's the one mode that we have. Talk to me about some of the

Radical Self-Care Strategies

Speaker 1 33:20

tips that you feel are important for us to exercise this radical self-care, especially if we're in organizations that we can't really make the move right now. It's not the right fit and so we have to maintain until we can do better. Or maybe you are a hard worker and you love your organization, but you still need some radical self-care because you know, if you don't, maybe you burn out too quickly. So talk to me about some of those things.

Speaker 2 33:47

I mean sometimes radical self-care is like I have to continue to learn, I have to continue to go, I have to continue to grind. What's their professional development policy? Invest in yourself while you're there. If they have tuition reimbursement, so maybe you go to school to get some more education, maybe you get a certification. Go hard on how you continue to invest in yourself without getting yourself locked in. Some of those have loopholes.

Speaker 1 34:20

If they pay for emails, you know late at night.

Speaker 2 34:39

Maybe you know you're not taking on, you know, additional projects. You're not signing on for additional work. Like setting some boundaries, you know, for like for yourself. Get you an accountability buddy Carrie Ann, that was a of the things that you said. Like talking to somebody making sure that you don't contribute to the noise. Like putting some boundaries around you know, sort of how you are feeling. Like don't promobond with anyone else. Like in the organization.

Speaker 2 35:12

This manager is so awful this is what it is Because that doesn't help you right. That pulls you further into the garbage and you want to, you know, release yourself. Work on your exit strategy. What is your next job If you want to hustle? Build yourself a side hustle, set up a side hustle so you will have some. You know y'all not going to continue to do just to me money. Um, so when you do need to pivot, if you hadn't found yourself something, you have a little bit of cushion. There are a number of things that you can do, but all that's focused on investing in you and determining what your next moves, you know may be. Ask to do some shadowing with another department, with another team, pick up you know a new skill. Exploring some more about the organization you know, or the industry, or the, or the field, like, if you're going to go hard, go hard on something that's going to matter for the next three positions that you're going to take up.

Speaker 1 36:15

So when you talked about the trauma bonding, I can tell you that that is a critical piece. Like you know, when you're at a company or you're in a place where you're kind of frustrated, everything annoys you and then you get caught up in the emotion of it and I think you know, speaking from experience, it makes it worse. You know the situation and you kind of have to start. You know, speaking from experience, it makes it worse. You know the situation and you kind of have to start. You know backpedaling. Like you have a work friend, you know let's not talk about work issues right now. We know the manager bad, let them stay bad. I don't want to deal with it.

Speaker 1 36:48

But the other thing about having a side hustle is not just the money that you get. I think, speaking as a hardworking Caribbean American woman, sometimes that side hustle is a distraction you need from the full-time job, not just the money, but just like it's where I'm putting my energies, because sometimes at work you're frustrated, because you know what you're. The solution that you're proposing is the right thing. You know you have. You want to go. You is the right thing. You know you have, you want to go, you want to do all these things and you just have all this energy and zest for the work that you're doing in your nine to five, but you feel that that's not appreciated. They're giving this to someone else. Put that energy in a side project.

Speaker 1 37:33

So, the side hustle could be a source of income, but that side hustle could also be a source of your release, of release of your energies, and also a playground, you know, a sandbox for learning skills that you can, you know, take other places.

Speaker 2 37:51

No, I was just going to say absolutely. I remember picking up, you know college courses or free. I mean there are so many free, open source courses now that that you could take just to occupy your mind, because sometimes you can do walks, you can do journaling. I mean whatever you can do to center yourself and to find you peace. Do that. I mean exercise is not for everyone, journaling is not for everyone, meditating is not for everyone, but there is something for you to do. Find that, find that Wonderful.

Speaker 1 38:36

So there are two more points and then we wrap up. Right, you talked about leadership pathways in the beginning, right, and identifying leadership pathways. How do we begin to identify leadership pathways? And to be clear, I'm not just saying we want to get from manager to supervisor to, you know, a title level, but you know leadership could be, you know it doesn't have to be the executive level. I guess that's what I'm saying. So how do we identify, because most of my audience may not be at the executive level how do we begin to assess what pathways are available to us in the organizations we are currently in?

Speaker 2 39:19

Yeah, and when I say leadership, I'm not talking just about the highest levels in the organization. There are so many different ways to lead, and when I think about leadership in its most purest form is, how are you connecting with others on a shared goal and you are providing some strategic direction for how to get there right. It could be on a project, it could be, you know, a special initiative, it could be in a meeting, right. Sometimes we'll go to meetings no agenda, no direction, no outcomes, but how are you getting people organized and clear about where we were heading or what the outcomes you know might be? And so you can lead in a variety of different ways, and some people don't want to lead groups of people, right. They want to be leaders in their own individual, contributor way, and that's perfectly okay. You know as well.

Speaker 2 40:34

I want to come in, I want to put my head down and I want to lead to exceeding expectations and, you know, contributing in the ways that honor my worth, my belonging and my brilliance, and not stepping on people along the way to get there.

Speaker 2 40:56

That's leadership too, right. And so being clear about what you want and the impact that you want to have, and I would say, one way on determining what that might be is two things One, letting go of those personally held scripts on what leadership is and what leadership is not, and then, second of all, redefining what success might be, and it typically isn't just what people tell us that it has been right, and leadership for Caribbean American women may not be the same thing as it has been for white men, for example, in these organizations that, quite frankly, were designed for white men, right, but I hold that leadership is not about just climbing, you know, this proverbial corporate ladder, that it is about making progress, forward motion, not spending, you know, time, churning time, churning old problems and bringing people along with you Right, building bridges and prioritizing community alongside profit, and Caribbean people know that very well.

Speaker 1 42:38

You had said your PhD thesis was can we do it all or are we just losing time? And I'm curious about what your findings are about that.

Speaker 2 42:51

This question that I've been holding since my youth black women can we do it all or do we just lose time? That wasn't my thesis, but it drove my thesis, and the answer, based on evidence, is yes, we can,

Leadership Pathways and Future Vision

Speaker 2 43:06

but not all at the same time.

Speaker 1 43:09

Ooh, ooh, I want to hear more. I want to hear more Not at the same time, got it. And what does that mean? It means we can have a little bit here and then keep going, and then maybe we add a little bit more down the road. Is that what it looks like?

Speaker 2 43:29

The reality is is we don't have unlimited capacity so we can't live our lives as if we do. This is a piece that goes back to, you know equity and care, like we can't do it alone. You know your question. You know a few questions back around. You know if I have a family that I have to take care of, I mean, there was a time I had two small kids that were dependent upon me for 100% of everything that they needed and I wanted a promotion and I wanted to keep my job and we were in a bad economy.

Speaker 2 44:15

September 11th just happened. The stock market had crashed, I was working on Wall Street. I didn't need to be a disruptor, Like if I was going to quit my job. I needed to do it responsibly. Not because I was pointing at how they didn't live up to their commitments for Black women in the organization. Right, I could be upset about them not living up to their commitments, about Black women in the organization. There were processes and channels at that time through affinity groups that we had and you know we could talk about it, but, and you know, provide information, like through through surveys, that I didn't have to be like out front, you know, in someone's face about it, or or or not. And so that's what I mean. You know, if they're, you know announcing, they're wanting to do you know layoffs, then it may not be the time that I raise my hand and say, hey, I want part-time hours when I have a full-time job, right, right.

Speaker 1 45:31

So wisdom discern mean. This has been a wonderful discussion and I wanted to ask you any last words you want to impart to our listeners, particularly Caribbean American women, as it comes to leading boldly and brilliantly in today's America.

Speaker 2 45:55

Yeah, I would say I don't want Caribbean American women to just survive this moment. I want them to lead through it. Right Through my research and my work, I've seen how bringing your full self to leadership, leveraging cultural wisdoms and building from your ancestral strengths creates transformative results. And the future needs leaders who think differently, who build bridges and who prioritizes community alongside profits. And yeah, I just truly believe that this moment is challenging as it is, and we know it's challenging we're all living through. It is preparing Caribbean American women to lead not just effectively, but transformatively. I've always been an ally and a co-conspirator in this work and I am committed to like walking alongside you and supporting you and creating spaces where this bold leadership can flourish. And so you can visit my website, you can follow me on social media. My website's kerrymitchellbrowncom, and I'm on all social medias. Dr Kerry M Brown.

Speaker 1 47:32

Thank you for that. I mean you've really given us a nice summary of how heritage is a driver for professional strength, right, and we have these things that we were, you know, if not born with it, had access to it just by way of being part of the culture, and it's what most people might need is the confidence to tap into those things that we already have and to lead and just get specific guidance, because I think that's where the work comes in right. Like we are talking generally but you know, someone else might need specific help based on this public entity, you know, or a privately held company I mean on that strength alone, you know or a privately held company. There, I mean on that strength alone, you know two different personalities. It's a publicly traded versus a private company. So, yeah, all of this is going to be based on the type of organization, the industry that you're in, the type of work that you do. So Dr Carey shared all her information.

Speaker 1 48:31

I will make sure I put that in the show notes and, dr Carey, thank you for being on the podcast and to help, you know, give word and validate some of the experience that I've been having, but also you've also helped me to recognize some of the things that in the last couple of years that I stopped doing because I'm like I want to have a peaceful life at work and so we're not, we're just going to cut out some of that. And you know, there's a thing sometimes we complain too much and that doesn't help us get out of the frustration at work, and so we have to find new tools. And so thank you for reminding me that you know we're not to be trauma bonding, trauma bonding. We need to cut that and figure out another way to survive at work until we can get to a place to thrive, whether inside or somewhere else. But thank you so much for being on the podcast and, as I love to say at the end of every episode, walk good.