Ever felt like there’s a powerful voice inside you, waiting to be unleashed? Finding your voice can be a journey of self-discovery, resilience, and courage, especially when it comes to navigating a world that often seeks to silence diverse perspectives. In this episode, host Darrin Tulley sits down with Jennifer Brown, renowned DEI expert and author, for a heartfelt conversation about overcoming self-doubt, embracing authenticity, and using your voice to create positive change. Jennifer shares her personal story of overcoming adversity and finding her purpose, offering listeners valuable insights on how to step into their own power and live their possible. Whether you’re seeking to make an impact in your workplace, your community, or the world at large, this episode will inspire you to embrace your unique voice and become an agent of change.
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Amplifying Voices: On Being A Voice For Others To Be Heard With Jennifer Brown
Our guest is Jennifer Brown. She is a globally recognized DEI thought leader, highly sought-after speaker, award-winning entrepreneur, and bestselling author. Jennifer envisioned inclusive organizations where all of us can thrive. As someone who has experienced both the advantages of privilege and the sting of stigma, Jennifer is boldly redefining what it means to truly belong in the workplace, in families, and communities. Jennifer speaks for truths.
She openly shares her powerful and unforgettable true story with audiences to help us challenge our assumptions about ourselves, leaders, and others, and to take meaningful action today for a more inclusive tomorrow. Jennifer believes leaders who intentionally move from certainty to authenticity, transparency, and vulnerability will build a culture where people are welcomed, valued, respected, and heard.
Listen to how we navigate the future without precedent and where we can create the space where people are accepted to be their best and achieve things once deemed impossible. Be sure to hear Jennifer’s incredible gift to all of you at the end of the episode, as she defines a path for you to reach within and to live your possible in the community needing your voice today. Enjoy the show.
Jennifer Brown, good to see you. Welcome to the show.
Thank you, Darrin. I’m so glad to be here.
It’s great to see you again. We met each other this summer at the Next Pivot Point’s event, the Allyship event at NYU. You’re amazing.
Thank you. That conversation and that audience, those are my people. It was delightful to be together. We are drawing on that now as we accelerate into the year and look into next year, and anticipate this work and how it’s going to change and be challenged in new ways that we probably can’t even imagine, but many think we can. I think it’s a good time to reassess and also find our community.
I agree. There were lots of wonderful people there. As we talked about challenges, there are lots of opportunities as you mentioned. As you think about what you’re coming into this conversation with today, what is top of my mind?
I’ve been in the work of DEI, which used to be just D when I started, and the I, E, B, A, and all the things have been added and shuffled. I’ve been here in a long time and we’ve seen the ebbs and flows and the pendulum swings. We’ve been through serious challenges both on the work. The work itself has practitioners, but also I was a business owner in this space for twenty years.
Somehow I figured out how to survive that long through sheer force of will and the need. We all say we do the work that chooses us, we don’t choose it. I think it’s also this massive healing process from being outside or from being aware and awake to all the lack of belonging, and the harm of exclusion in our world. The work continues. The shape may change and how we call it may change, but I know the idea there is so strong, universal, and so right because it’s about love, kindness, grace, compassion, forgiveness, and all of those beautiful things.
Deep down, I’m optimistic but I’m very curious and vigilant about what’s next and want to make sure we as a community bring to the table. We listen very carefully, we are resilient, and we’re strategic in what we do going forward. There are going to be challenges. It’s going to be an interesting and unpredictable period of time.
I love how you went to the level of curiosity that’s needed, how we listen, and how we understand what’s in front of us, whatever we call it. I love all the components of humanity that you’re putting back out there that we all want. It doesn’t matter who we are, where we come from, or how we are feeling. We all want the humanity that fills us up every day. At the conference at NYU, I loved your story. Do you mind sharing a little bit about the story of how you changed from one stage to a different stage?
Finding A New Stage After Losing My Voice
We probably all have this, but it’s one of those things in life when we thought it was all over. We thought every door was closed to us, which is never true. When we lose a dream. When we’re unable to do something that we think is like a deep soul calling. For me, it was not just social justice, which is a deep soul calling of mine to be a part of positive change in the world, but music and the arts also are huge things for me.
I got my Master’s in Opera when I moved to New York City to do that. It was amazing. I had high hopes and then I unfortunately injured my voice and I had to get vocal surgery several times because it kept recurring. Ultimately, I would not be able to use my instrument for eight shows a week. You can imagine living on the road and how arduous it is. You have to have a bulletproof voice. We can’t have anything that is temperamental at all. Mine was temperamental.
Looking back, it was a message to say, “You are not meant to use your voice in this way.” You may have this talent and you are here and getting all the stagecraft and all this courage and resilience. You talk about the hardest field ever, audition after audition after, no after no with the occasional yes. The discipline required of it, the practice, the awareness of your audience, the kindness of being on a cast together with other people and the partnership of that, the creativity, innovation, and improvisation, when I think back on it, it equipped me completely for what I’m doing now that I never could have imagined that I would be doing now.
I think this metaphor of losing my voice, being silenced, fighting to get it back, realizing I wasn’t meant to use it in the way I thought I was supposed to, and then rediscovering a different stage, a different audience, and a different topic, but the voice metaphor is especially powerful for me as a part of the LGBTQ community as well. I’ve been out for 25 years, but I was closeted. As a performer, I was closeted in the corporate world.
Finally, over twenty years of owning this business, now I’m still not fully aligned. I don’t think any of us are, but I’m so much closer to being aligned to my voice and my purpose, which is to give voice to what’s not voice and who hasn’t had a voice, use my voice to do that and amplify that. It’s such a beautiful full-circle moment that I never expected. You only understand how these are like lights on a string. They all relate. You look back and say, “That happened to me because I was meant to do this and use it this way.”
I’m sure there’s more a-has ahead of me too, but that is sort of the crucible moment. We have these in our lives and I think they matter when we string them together and understand how they relate to each other, how they feed each other, and nothing is lost in our lives. If we learn the right thing and then we bring it forward, and then if we’re on stage and we’re lucky enough to be able to say, “Here’s the learning I had.”
To me, the learning that I want to pass on to my audience is the universal truth of what I learned, which is how all of us utilize the voice that we’ve been given. Also, the voice in every definition of the word. How we are using it to uplift, to shine a light, to be courageous, to enable courage in others, to shine a light in someone else’s darkness, to pave the way or show the way for others to be heard and seen. All this work, we’re doing it for ourselves and we’re also doing it for the next generation.
It’s very beautiful. I’m so grateful that it led me on this path, and now we all have a lot of work to do to shine a lot of light, show ourselves up, and remember all that resilience that we have. We all have that. That’s all possible within us. Those ingredients are in us. Life is about peeling the onion and getting that light in us, amplifying it in the world, believing that there is someone who needs to see you to hear you, and to understand their life through your storytelling about yours. It’s beautiful when that happens.
That’s a very touching and beautiful story about your voice, that connection to your ability to share what you have been going through and your vulnerability. You talk about resiliency, you’re living it. I love what you say about how you’re trying to open doorways for others without telling people. You’re sharing and you’re walking the talk about who you are. You’re proud of it and have others turn their lights on. I had this visual when you were talking about the light string. There’s one light that was out. The whole string was out, and when your voice started to talk, all of the lights went on at the same time.
That’s beautiful. I’m going to steal that, Darrin.
Overcoming Imposter Syndrome
It’s a true story and it’s amazing. It’s great because you’re showing and sharing with folks that we can do that. I recognized that with people. I’ve talked with them and I’m sure people on your podcast as well. When we are vulnerable, people pick us up. People pick you up along the way. Have you noticed that? Have there been some moments in your life that have gotten you to this point to speak to this level and to share your voice the way you’re doing? Have there ever been certain events or maybe certain people who have helped you along the way?
Definitely. A parent who is pushing you at the end of the stage helps. That has happened my whole life. Luckily, I took to it. It was not something that terrified me. It was like, “This feels right.” I would subsequently become a soloist and fearless in a lot of ways, thank goodness. When I started my company, I felt very much like I should stay in the background. I always wrestled with not being the expert because, in the early days, I wasn’t. I had gone to school after my Master’s in voice. I did a Master’s in organizational development and leadership.
All I knew was I could facilitate discussions but I certainly didn’t have the expertise because I was beginning this new career. The expertise would end up building over twenty years in leadership, org change, human psychology, and all those great things, but it took a long time for me to come to the front.
I do credit many people who saw in me something that I didn’t yet see in myself, who encouraged me, stretched me, put me in uncomfortable positions, and said, “You are ready for this. Why aren’t you doing this? You are this person.” Even writing the first book. The second book and third book are terrifying. The minute you send that final thing back to the publisher to hit the go button, you still get imposter syndrome. You still think, “Does my voice matter? Does my story matter? Am I saying something that’s already been said? Is anyone going to resonate with this? Is it going to be redundant?”
There are so many doubts. At some point, you have to talk about listening. You have to listen to people around you if you’re fortunate enough. I deeply hope that everybody listening to this has the encouragers in your world and the people who can see you for everything you could be and more and to take those leaps of faith over and over again towards that.
I think in this world right now, particularly their needs, the bigger the story, the person has to stretch themselves because desperately, someone needs to see you now, more than ever. Never assume that your story is inconsequential, that somebody doesn’t need to hear it, and that it’s been said before, whatever form it’s in. It can be your own business, your keynote speech, or a book someday you hopefully will write, but the way you’ve pivoted through your life has taught you a lot of wisdom, whether you see it that way or not.
Never assume that your story is inconsequential, that somebody doesn't need to hear it, that it's been said before. Share on XMany of us kill our story before it has had a chance to blossom and beautify the world. Right now, we could save lives with those stories truly, and get over our own hurdles of fear, self-doubt, imposter syndrome, stigma, and all the ways we’ve internalized what the world says about who we are. Overcoming that, owning all of that, and then being able to stand on stage and tell it, to me, is the work of life. I have more of that to do I’m sure in the future as I continue to get deeper and more authentic, and even more real and more brave. That work never ends. I wish that all of us as change-makers can accelerate that journey because the world needs us more than ever.
Amplifying Voices In Uncertain Times
It’s so relatable. I love that you’re sharing about the imposter syndrome and the doubt. Does our voice matter? Does our story matter? It’s fascinating because you have a website called Jennifer Brown Speaks and you still have those feelings. To anybody listening, it’s relatable. We all have different lived experiences. You talk about that quite a bit about respecting our differences in our lived experiences. That alone is our unique voice. That’s a way to come screaming, like a megaphone that was put in front of someone who wasn’t heard in the past. We need to allow for that, accept it, and embrace it.
We know there’s uncertainty. This is being recorded after the recent election here in the US. How are you helping leaders through the potential change and the unknown? We often talk about trying to equip leaders for the future without precedent. How do we get people to continue forward and to make that change to be resilient? I’d love to follow up with how we get into some of your continuums and your book, how to help guide leaders with being inclusive leaders. Tie that into whatever you’d like. How do we encourage folks right now with what’s going on?
Regardless of how the election turned out, there are some interesting things to mine in that too because there’s an exclusion that happened in some of our political strategies. Whether we intended it or not, somehow we’ve ended up extremely polarized from each other, but still experiencing our own version of not feeling seen and heard and excluded.
A big challenge for all of us is to say to ourselves, “Am I including or being inclusive of everyone? Am I truly listening? Am I truly curious about different viewpoints and about real reasons that matter for people’s voting decisions, etc?” That can be very hard because it’s so much easier to lean into the choir and people who agree with us. There are shared fears. Our decisions might be different as a result of those fears, but this world is a future without precedent.
I love what you said. It’s a future without a roadmap. Organizational leaders are leading without a roadmap or even an understanding of what makes people tick, the complexity of humans, productivity, happiness, and being able to thrive. Returning to office, there’s a giant battle going back and forth of employers forcing people to do something, and then people pushing back and saying, “I don’t want to do it. I’m not productive in that way.”
There’s this battle around agency and power. It’s a total power struggle, which I’m enjoying watching. I never thought to say I have the answer, but I think it’s fascinating to watch that and then think about leaders in the middle. They are trying to strike this balance of accountability to the institution, but also everything I hope a good leader has learned in the last couple of years, which is empathy, compassion, flexibility, transparency, agility, resilience, and curiosity about how I can enable each person around me to feel a sense of belonging and psychological safety so that they can do their best work.
If you are a leader who is not asking yourself that on a regular basis, then you haven’t been paying attention. Diverse identities play a role in all of that and safety. To feel acknowledged and not diminished or “treated like everyone else,” like “I don’t see color,” that classic thing that our generation was told was the right answer. We thought that was very equality-minded of us, but the last couple of years have shown us that the data and the experiences are extremely different.
In the same system, we can have an incredibly different experience based on what we look like, what we identify, what we’ve shared about ourselves, and how honest we’ve been about life and the consequences of doing that, sadly. This power struggle is between the authenticity that people want to bring because we all know to stay here, I need to feel respected. I want to be able to author the way I work, the time I work, and find my purpose ideally. A lot of us can find purpose through work if we’re in the right setting, the right employer, and the right team.
Managers and leaders are honestly going after the same thing. They have to generate results and are accountable for all those things. We have the institutions who are on their own path in this new world order deciding, “Am I going to be on the side of my employees? Am I going to advocate for them? Am I going to engage in the public square in an unprecedented way because they are going to be challenged when they do that? Am I going to shrink back and divest as we’ve seen a lot of my own clients do because of pressure and fear of retribution and consequences?”
It’s going to be a very interesting time with all the stakeholders that I described to see what I can control as a leader. I might work for an institution that isn’t supportive, for example, and is shrinking back. What does that mean then for me as a leader and a person? What do I want my legacy to be? That would be when you pick up my books and others and say, “There are things I can do that I can put my head on the pillow at night and say, ‘I did everything I could and I stood up for the things that I value, and the people that I value and need, and the people that I care about.’”
I hope empathy fuels a lot of us, but leaders are going to be extremely important regardless of what the institution they work for does. At the end of the day, somebody has to be able to look in the mirror and say, “Am I a new leader for a new age? Am I taking this into account?” By the way, if you aren’t, you’re never going to be able to generate the results that you need. I know that’s true. Demographics are changing. Global teams are challenging. It’s going to get more challenging.
I hope that every leader who wants to thrive and grow their career in the future, at the very least, is looking at all these things and saying, “How can I update my operating system to resonate with all the changes that are going to be around me and succeed in that?” We may have a lot of the answers, but the attitude, the mindset, and the heart that we can come into this with is what we can control.
We need to make that a way of being. We have to state that to ourselves. We have to create the conditions to allow ourselves to look for it, As you said, be curious about it and embrace it because we are trained. We’ve been trained a certain way. We’ve gotten to a role because of what we’ve done in the past.
To your point, it’s different going forward. It’s much different. The expectations at the workplace are beyond a paycheck. It’s our social interactions, how we engage, how we connect, how we love, how we grow and learn. It’s not the way it used to be. That’s for sure. I saw a stat from O.C. Tanner around empathy. They do a lot of work on culture. They have questions that have been raised. I think something like 41% of people feel like their work from their boss is empty. They feel empty.
There are other studies that 90% of people said they’ll leave a company if their boss and people are not being empathic with them. You could do the math, 90 times 40. You got over a third of organizations. How can we be an inclusive leader? I’d love for you to showcase your book. I’ll put a picture up so folks can see that. Are there some tips out of there or some tips for us to start to get in that place of being?
Becoming An Inclusive Leader
We need to unpack people’s assumptions about this process too. I think it’s been a very heavy topic for people and it doesn’t need to be. I think that the heavier it is, the harder it is to get going on your own learning journey. It’s been a truth-telling couple of years. I think we’ve had a more way and more honest conversation about the flaws in our system, our country, our own blind spots, the limitations of our own learning, going back to what we learned in school, what we didn’t learn, the ways we benefit in this society and others don’t.
There’s been a lot of learning and there’s a lot of feeling in that. There’s regret, sadness, anger, some guilt, and certainly some shame. I’ve pivoted through all of those and I still do as I try to exercise my voice. I always start by naming the feelings of this because I think if we can’t shine some disinfectant on that and say that is real, it has been a lot to metabolize. For some of us who’ve been relatively more comfortable in society, it’s been a lot to metabolize because it shouldn’t be new information, but it is because we live in our bubbles.
We walk through the world protected, whether it’s our gender expression, who we love, the color of our skin, or whatever it is about us that puts people at ease because we are not the “other,” depending on what circle we’re in. By the way, I can be in different countries and different parts of our own country. It depends. This is what’s so interesting about it. We don’t just exist in a place where we are an insider. Most of us have parts of us and who we are.
As I said, I’m LBGTQ+. That’s giving me an outside-in approach to how I teach and how I understand myself, but I’m also an insider based on other identities that I carry. My fear in this and the data as well is we are all these different things. It depends on which room we’re in, which community we’re in, how we’re viewed, what’s visible about us versus, and what’s invisible about us as well. We could be a part of the community with disabilities but nobody would ever know. We don’t make that known and we suffer.
Talking about shining your light, the whole disclosure process of the invisible and making it visible is a part of our growth and evolution. You asked, “How do we start?” It’s seeing the system we’re in and identifying the parts of who we are, acknowledging we can be in many places at once, and then beginning that journey of deepening that knowledge, particularly about the identities that we don’t carry.
That’s the first step in the book on the continuum. It’s from unaware to aware and it’s coming into now I know what I don’t know. It’s making a plan to expose ourselves to different identities and friends, and those identities, being a fly on the wall, consuming media strategically, and all the things we can do, but then it’s not enough to stay there. It moves to the third phase in the model which is active. We went from unaware to aware to active.
Active is I barely know what I’m starting to know. I’m beginning to get into that arena that Brene Brown talks about. I’m beginning to engage. I’m beginning to use a new language. I begin to act differently, behave differently, raise uncomfortable conversations with peers, for example, or begin to story-tell more honestly about invisible, diversity, dimensions, or I’m beginning to invite deeper empathy and begin to say, “I’m going to prioritize things that I invite from my team, my colleagues, and co-workers. I’m going to do the same.”
We’re in that messy place. It’s awkward, experimental, and uncertain. We may need to apologize. I would recommend we say, “There’s so much I don’t know. There’s so much I’m learning. There’s so much I care about and here’s me in process. You are seeing me develop, change, try, and not do so well, come back in and try again. If you want to help me on this journey, I would be deeply grateful.” That’s what we can ask, but I think we need to do the work on the journey and not lean too much on others, but have the partnership of others,
That’s active phase three. The last phase is phase four, which is to advocate. I think the advocate level is a squeaky wheel. It’s a noisy change-maker. It’s somebody who’s done their homework and knows how to inhabit both the insider and the outsider and uses both of those to leverage change, create it, spark it, and challenge themselves and others. They have lots of energy for it. Those of us who do that a lot, worry about fatigue and burnout for us because it can feel and has felt that very few of us are carrying the water for change at the institutional level.
That’s the need for allyship. Darrin, that’s where you and I met at an Allyship Summit to say, “How can we get more folks to chip in and lessen the labor and the stress on people who have been there their whole lives? How can we step in and join hands and strengthen each other? That’s a beautiful question coming into 2025. That’s what I’m sitting with. We could do a lot more with that if we have more folks saying, “I’m going to roll up my sleeves. What can I do?”
360-Degree Allyship And Its Evolution
When you think about allyship, is it one way? Is it two ways? Is it multidimensional?
I love that question. No. I refer to it as 360-degree allyship because technically, cisgender men should be allies to me if we’re thinking of it in terms of gender representation and my struggles to being heard, being paid equitably, being promoted in advance, being thought of as having an executive presence, and all the things. I feel very much like I can be an ally to people who may have, on paper, more privileged than I do because I can extend the learning that I have from whoever I am.
I would say the marginalized identities that I carry have so much wisdom in them that I can impart, hold space for, encourage others, and support them on their journey. I love your question that it goes all directions. If we think about that, then that shifts the whole privilege binary, which is you’re a white guy, you have all the privileges, and I have none. That is never true. We have a mix of things that we can use and we all have so much we could deploy in this effort.
From all the identities that we carry, I think that’s so activating because that’s an invitation to everyone of every identity. I do not want people to say, “I have nothing to give. I have nothing to contribute. I’ve been so fortunate in my life that I’ve never dealt with this, this, and this. I don’t even know what that is, no microaggressions and no whatever.” Fabulous. Talk about it and say that. Say, “What am I doing with that? What does that mean I have access to? What does it mean I can do that and somebody else can’t? What am I enabling to shift that truth, that current state towards a better future state?”
It’s beautiful to think about all that we can do. That’s the 2.0. That’s the evolution of allyship that I would like to see in the new year. It’s not new to me, but it’s a shift in the paradigm and how people think about it. It’s not the usual privilege, which is a word nobody wants to talk about because it’s been used in an incomplete way.
I agree. I appreciate you speaking to your truth and the privilege that you have and that you don’t have. That’s part of your story. It’s a part of what you talk about in your book and you speak so freely. I love that. Just to be able to have conversations and invite other people to have those conversations with you, with me, and with others no matter where people are coming from because I do fear at times when I’m supporting.
People are looking at me like, “Why are you? You’re not a voice.” I’m like, “I’ve gotten some of the most rewarding kicks in the stomach, friendships, and huge hugs from folks who never expected that I thought I was supposed to be the mentor.” Actually, I was the mentee. I grew and we all grew together. I’m hoping, to your point, in 2025 and beyond that as human beings, as leaders, and as people, how do we give and how do we help? How do we aim to bring out the best in those other people truthfully and fully, not just to say it?
Can I add to what you said? Do it, say it, and then adjust and calibrate that you are having the impact that you want to have too because we can only see ourselves through our own lens. We can have huge hearts and lots of intentions and we can start to put things into practice like what I was describing, but we are limited in our understanding of the right remedy and the right solution.
By the way, the right remedy and solution depends. It depends on the situation and the person. If we want to be considered an ally, it only matters if it is received as allyship in a way that person would define as an ally. We are limited in our understanding of that. I try to stop myself and my enthusiasm and my want to be helpful and say, “What would make the most difference for this person or this team? What role could I play? Where do I need to check and not be the savior, which we talk a lot about?” It’s so tempting to be that.
If we want to be considered an ally, it only matters if it is received as allyship in a way that that person would define an ally. Share on XI think we are learning though. I’ve learned that for every single person, it depends on the day. It depends on the person, the day, the moment, and how they’re feeling. I appreciate the question. Being in the LGBTQ community or being a cisgender female, whose pronouns are she and her, I’m still like, “John, is there anything I can do to amplify this? Is there a way I can step in? I heard something. I don’t know if you heard that. That bothered me. What would you like to do about it? How can I help? What can I do or not do? Who could I have conversations with? What more can I do? What more can I be doing?”
Those are all beautiful questions to ask the people around us, and learn from that response, and not be fraudulent, and not be too sensitive. What we may hear back is, “Every time you say this, it’s a little bit of an ouch,” or “Every time you tell that story, I think I know your intent, but it doesn’t come out that way. I might suggest a different word,” or “Have you checked in with this person? Did you notice that this person doesn’t speak very much or gets talked over?”
I mean the things you’ll learn, and I would tell leaders too. Remember, we all know we’re managing in this remote and hybrid world. As if this was not easy before. It is trickier to not be able to share physical space with people and not read the cues or run into each other or have lunch together or coffee. It’s hard to understand how someone may be suffering and not feeling a sense of belonging and not being confident enough to tell us that.
Leaders, we have to be very proactive in this hybrid world to somehow build enough trust with somebody that they will say, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you. I’m noticing this. I’m feeling this,” and then as a leader or even a colleague to say, “We can do something about that. Let’s take that on. Let’s address it.” It’s a real challenge. This is our new world and I like it because it’s kicking us in the butt to be more intentional and more overt. That’s always been needed in this world. To shift systems, they’re not going to shift through good intentions. They’re going to shift through the right actions at scale. That’s what’s going to change the workplace for the better.
You’re getting to that third step about action. As we think about leadership in the future, it’s going to be different as we’ve talked about. I think inquiry is a great way to go about it. As you’re saying, speak into what is available, making it safe for folks. You’re going to listen to this genuinely. You’re going to have that compassion and empathy thing that’s real. By the way, I’ve seen pictures from scientists of our brain lights up when we have true empathy.
Talk about lighting up the world as you’re talking on and as you’re doing. You’re doing that through your ability to speak into and listen to what’s available, asking those questions that are important to people to allow folks to share, and not react. It’s to build with the other people who are sharing those ideas, maybe insecurities, maybe vulnerabilities, maybe uncertainty, then allow ourselves to be able to work with that together. That’ll preserve what I think we’re trying to create together going forward.
Even things like the imposter syndrome. It’s interesting that many of us know what that is deeply, and then others of us probably haven’t experienced it or even heard of it. When you talked about mentors and mentees, and who we typically think of as each of those, flipping it around. There’s mentoring that needs to go both ways.
For someone who’s never felt imposter syndrome to truly dig in to make it safe for somebody to share that, understand how that is experienced, validate it, and understand the system that created that result in that human that it’s not just, “This person is not confident or not working hard enough or not pulling themselves up by their bootstraps.” It’s not about that, and then the ownership and accountability to say if you haven’t felt something directly, still taking accountability for the fact that exists and that continues to create that imposter syndrome in so many people.
That to me is the interesting part of that. That’s the takeaway, which is why this system creates and perpetuates people’s perception that they need to play small, that they aren’t capable, and that they don’t have what it takes. Why does that happen? That is the inquiry into the system. I also think a lot about the metaphor of downstream and upstream. In the downstream mindset, we put the Band-Aid on things. We play whack-a-mole. We try to solve without swimming upstream to understand the root cause.
If we go upstream, those are the harder questions. They’re the systems lens to say, “Why does this continue to happen? Can we go to the source of it?” The source is complex. The world of work and the workplace wasn’t built by and for so many of us. We’re not at the table to influence that. It still in many ways disregards a lot of real lives and real people. We say bring your full self to work but we don’t mean it. It’s a great slogan. We continue to perpetuate, then we wonder why we still have the pay gap. We still have promotion advancement challenges, like representation, people keep quitting, retention, and turnover issues.
We can either have the downstream structure and treat the symptoms or we can use this year to question the way we’ve always done things in “business as usual.” This is going to be hard because I think the business world is so reactive and so short-term in its thinking. Unfortunately, we are incentivized by shareholder capitalism versus stakeholder capitalism. I fear we’re going back to a less human-centered year ahead with that vibe coming from the political environment.
That worries me and we’re going to have to see how companies step forward and either lead and say, “We are not going to get the best and we’re not going to be able to resonate with our customers if we don’t take care of our people and if we don’t see and hear them.” There are going to be others who are very dismissive of that and see if they can get by with no investment. That’s going to be interesting to see.
We are not going to get the best and be able to resonate with our customers if we don't take care of our people. Share on XEmbracing Change And The Possibilities Ahead
The fear is the pendulum is coming the other way and the people we’re going to get impacted on the way back through. All people, by the way, as we invest in more machines and different learning. There’s so much opportunity. I view the upcoming times as truly the place where humanity has to take hold, regardless of where we come from. Yet we need everybody involved to be able to grow and to be able to expand.
You use that bubble reference which I love because I talked about how my bubble burst and I felt naked. I felt like I was a fraud at that point in time. What I recognize is that the bubble expanded because I noticed all the differences in the strengths that go with it, the possibilities, and the breakthroughs that come with it. For me, it’s expansive and it continues. That’s what I think we need when this pendulum comes back through. Let’s pop the bubble.
That’s become more of how we can impact the world differently together. Let’s carry each other and not get caught up in some of the language or the words that become so divisive. As you said, it’s hard to talk about privilege because of how it’s perceived. Yet there are very issues of privilege that I imagine many have on this podcast or listening that we could step back and look at what can we do to leverage our privilege more honorably in today’s world, especially what’s ahead.
Many people probably say, “I want to do something. I want to be a part of positive change.” What I want your listeners to hear is there’s so much you have access to that you can use that would be invaluable and appreciate it. We have to lead. We have to be strong and put it out there and say, “I can’t lie about who I am.” That’s not the point. The point is to be honest about who you are and if things have been easier for you, just the willingness to look at that.
As you said, popping the bubble and feeling exposed is the first step, but immediately new people come in. Immediately, you get new relationships, new trust, and a deeper relationship. Almost immediately, probably you felt this richness in your life that you never would have known even existed on the other side. That’s getting leaders to get to that point.
I always feel like, “Trust me. I’m on stage and I’m teaching. I know that you can’t see this. I know you feel stuck. I know you’re afraid. I know you’re well-meaning but you feel like you’ve been burned. I’m sorry for that.” Yet there’s this world of transformation and your own evolution that is like, “You are right.” You’re touching it. It’s there and it’s all around you. It’s in your teams and the people you could know. The workplace has traditionally been this wonderful place of creative abrasion and identities that we never had in our lives and the neighborhoods where we live.
What a beautiful thing. It’s a laboratory for evolution. Cutting ourselves off from that because of fear isn’t the right answer, but I understand why people choose it. I feel like I’m there to help say, “ I have this little light. Come with me. I know it’s dark but let’s find this way together. You aren’t alone.” That’s key because isolation and loneliness as we’ve heard from the surgeon general are epidemics truly. Nobody has a friend at work anymore. I don’t know if you’ve read all that research, but when you’re lonely at work and you don’t have a single person that you can call a friend, I cannot even imagine having to work that way. That’s not necessary.
I could vouch for everything you’re saying. Immediately, I had folks who were looking at me with eyes of a mixture of frustration, hatred, love, and what’s possible, which is why I got to this place of possibilities. That’s where breakthroughs come from when we create this space. There was a moment like I was coming back to earth. If you think about a spaceship coming back through and all the friction. I was freaking out until you get back into the smoother air and allow this space to fill you up. It’s amazing.
That’s what creates joy that I see. When I think about enjoying the workplace, I think about living your possible. I’d love to get your viewpoint. What does that sound like to you? How can we live our possible today? You’ve shared so many wonderful things. Is there a quick idea that you could say, “Start on your path this way?”
Living Your Possible: A Call To Authenticity
I love the title. Ask yourself, “Am I able in this role, in this environment, in this career, or whatever? Is there something I haven’t yet contributed, verbalized, or shared with the world that is powerful for me, that is meaningful for me, that I am perhaps even meant to show the way for others?” Is there something that you’ve diminished in yourself because there’s no room for it and there’s been no encouragement of it, where there is a whole community waiting to have you lead them?
I realize that early on somehow and I’m not quite sure how it clicked into place. I was like, “I have this assignment.” It is to roll everything together that I have and amplify it. I had to have so much faith that it mattered. I also had to have faith that I would do it in my way and in a way that could reach people maybe for the first time because we get caught in all that stuff of not mattering, irrelevance, imposter syndrome, and everything.
Please, if you’re listening to this, what is hidden in you? What is that something you haven’t fully embraced, and then what is something you could lead with that? Living your possible to me is about authenticity and the bravery of that. If you were to do that, having faith that others would join you and in doing that, you would inspire a whole different conversation, a different business model, a different career, a different level of impact that you could have. Unfortunately, the world is going to give us more of the same unless we break out of that.
Living your possible is about authenticity and the bravery of that Share on XFind the people who will support you in that exploration and in the bravery you will surely need to live your possible. Your own demons and voices will try to shut you down. The world will try to shut you down too because you may scare people, you may threaten people, and you may make them uncomfortable by being you. By being you, that is what changes the world. To me, this is a call to grab your weapon. It’s about seeing the changemaker in yourself. I believe we all have something like that in ourselves, whether we ever bring it to the light is the question.
Maybe we do it late in life. It’s not too late. Maybe we don’t have the bravery until we are a little more mature to do it, or we’re in that age of “I don’t care anymore. I’m going to say the thing. I’m going to live my truth. I’m going to be that messenger.” I think there’s something about age and wisdom that was like it’s now or never. I’ve crossed 50 and it’s like, “I better make sure I’ve done everything that I need to do and I fulfilled the things I was given, and done the thing I needed to do with the things that I was given. When you start to look at it that way, you realize time is not infinite anymore. Have you completed what you were here to complete? I love that question. That’s what I sit with every day.
Closing Thoughts
Thank you for that beautiful gift and thought process for us to ponder and start to live our possible every day. It takes one step. I appreciate that very much. I think this would be a great spot to close out. I can speak with you all day. I am here with you to talk about the community to help you realize your vision and your goals.
Whatever I could do, I’m here. Keep that in mind. For all those listening, reach out. Think about how you can make an impact today because it’s right in front of you. Let’s not let the future happen by itself. Let’s be intentional about what we want to see in the future and make it happen. Jennifer, thank you again for coming. Have a great day.
Beautiful. Thank you, Darrin.
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About Jennifer Brown
Jennifer Brown (she/her) is an award-winning entrepreneur, speaker, author, and leading expert in diversity and inclusion. She is the bestselling author of How to Be an Inclusive Leader and co-author of the Wall Street Journal bestseller Beyond Diversity. Jennifer’s work delves into identity, privilege, and equity, offering practical tools for creating cultures of belonging. A sought-after keynote speaker, she has worked with organizations like Google, LinkedIn, and IBM. Jennifer also hosts The Will to Change podcast and serves on DEI advisory boards for companies like L’Oréal and the Gates Foundation.
Learn more at JenniferBrownSpeaks.com.
