My Crash Course Crayon Video: 4 Levels of Listening

My employer, Pillar, produces a series of two-minute videos related to software development and the people skills needed to do it well.

A video I made was just released. The title is: "4 Levels of Listening" and you can watch it here. I'd love to hear your reactions.

Things I am Learning About my Part in Diversity and Inclusion

As a cis-gendered, heterosexual, white man, I want to:

• do my homework to learn fundamentals about marginalized groups' experiences
• amplify marginalized people’s voices
• believe marginalized people's life experiences 
• understand intent vs impact of what I say
• be ready for the mistakes I will make
• accept that the people that my mistakes hurt may be angry
• accept that they don’t owe me an explanation of why it hurts (see doing homework)
• not “expect a cookie” for working on diversity and inclusion (pic)
• understand that being an ally is not a yes/no condition, but requires a level of proactivity
• find someone besides marginalized people to help me explore my feelings about allyship
• learn to "check my privilege" and understand that I have privilege even if I had a hard life of poverty and abuse.

If these ideas interest you, please follow the links above and come see me present at Agile and Beyond 2016 this May.