Debunking Myths & Building Brands: Practical Lessons About Inclusion at Work with Mita Mallick
Read time: 5 min
What are the myths around inclusion? What does inclusion have to do with brand?
Mita Mallick is a corporate change-maker with a track record of transforming businesses. Her passion for inclusive storytelling led her to become a Chief Diversity Officer, to build end to end inclusion ecosystems across big and small organizations. Mallick has brought her talent and expertise to companies like Carta, Unilever, Pfizer, AVON, Johnson & Johnson and more. Mita is also the cohost of the popular podcast, The Brown Table Talk, part of the LinkedIn Podcast Network. She is also an author - Reimagine Inclusion: Debunking 13 Myths to Transform Your Workplace (coming out on October 3, 2023), pre-order below!
In this episode, we dive into three of those myths, along with discussions around company and personal brands.
WARNING: Shocking stories and ‘aha’ moments await
In this episode:
How inclusion activates brand
Employees - the forgotten consumer
Deep diving into three myths from the book
Race privilege and self-education
Toxic leaders and systems of equity
Pay inequities and the no-negotiation rule
Tips on building a personal brand while working for corporations
The discipline and process of book writing
The ‘aha’ in Mita’s life journey
KEY LESSONS
How Inclusion Activates Brand
Inclusion work is often seem as disassociated from the rest of the company, but it’s absolutely untrue. A brand starts from the inside and if your employees aren’t INCLUDED in the experience of the brand, how can it fully deliver on its promise to customers?
“Your employees are your forgotten consumer. I always say that.
We are so busy thinking about who we're gonna sell, how much to, and why, when, where. We forget the people who work for us are the most important in some ways, constituents and most important consumer. And they can be setting little fires in your organization, or they can be your fiercest and most loyal advocates”
Often times, companies focus externally so much that employees don’t feel like they are living the culture the company is espousing outwardly.
“You're so busy trying to go external quick. Without thinking about have you informed and brought employees along on the journey? Would they actually say that this is their lived experience? Would they agree with what the company's putting out on social media?
We all have our own microphone now. We're not afraid to use it.”
The Three Myths
For this conversation, I picked out three myths from Mita’s book and we dove in. She talked about the goal for her book:
“I document the highs and lows of my career, and I process and learn through writing. And so it was four years ago I started working on this book.
There are a lot of great books on leadership and inclusion in the marketplace. But I didn't feel like people were saying the quiet parts out loud
And if one person reads this book, like if you read the book and there's one thing you take away that you could show up and do differently, then that's success for me.”
Myth #3: It’s time to have some courageous conversations on race, let’s ask our employees of color to lead them.
“It was the shooting of another unarmed black American by police. And at the time, a leader asked me, and I felt pressured to ask our black employee resource group to get together to basically put their pain on display and share that the trauma they've experienced personally and their community has experienced at the hands of law enforcement. And I still regret that because I wish I had had the courage to say, why are we putting pain on display?”
We talked a lot about privilege and the symptoms of race privilege where you are never in an uncomfortable position. As a brown person, Mita has always had to put her comfort aside and engage in uncomfortable conversations about race.
We should think very critically about WHO we are putting in uncomfortable positions and really educate ourselves instead of asking those who have lived through trauma to educate us.
Myth #5: We protect the a-holes because our businesses wouldn’t run without them.
“What's really interesting is like, are the toxic leaders the one really leading the businesses or it's everyone under them that they're terrorizing that are actually the ones running the business?”
I believe many people have experienced this, I have. Some leaders, even though toxic are protected by senior leaders, especially when they are friends outside of work.
“I always ask leaders this, it's like, why are you willing to risk your own reputation and your company's reputation on Mita? Like, how many people does she have to hurt and harm? How many people have to leave her organization for you to finally listen and say, huh, maybe she should no longer work here”
My personal take away was this question from her book: Have I placed personal friendship and relationship over the harm that’s being inflicted?
This is a question all leaders need to ask themselves.
Mita then talks about putting together systems and processes to uphold the desired behaviors across the company because
“Culture is defined by the worst behavior you’ll tolerate in your organization”
Myth #6: Why are you asking for a raise? Your husband makes more than enough money.
“The myth I wanted to debunk here is that white women and women of color don't negotiate. We often do negotiate and we're gaslit, dismissed and minimized.
As a result. We are punished for what our partners might make. We're punished if we're the primary breadwinner.”
This myth reminded me of the harsh realities of gender bias compounded with race bias. The amount of strategic gymnastics required to remove any reason to NOT give a raise is mind-boggling.
“I've been in rooms Howie where someone has said, well, Mita has a Birkin bag. She doesn't need this job. I mean, it's wild.
I was going to a leadership offsite at one point in my career, and my husband's like, why aren't you wearing your wedding ring? I was like, I don't want them to give me another reason to pay me less.
Mita offers an at first counter-intuitive strategy to combat this: A no negotiation policy.
“Some people might be really amazing negotiators and they might get paid more. That's actually not what we should be valuing pay on.
I'm looking at Howie, his track record of success, his expertise, his ability to build brands, his ability to build community engagement. That's what I'm gonna pay him for. Not on how much he's asking or how you can negotiate
Building Your Personal Brand As a Corporate Employee
Personal branding is not reserved for the founders or entrepreneurs. Mita shows us that Corporate Employees can lift up themselves and their employers.
“Whether you're a CMO or a CFO or the CEO, start thinking about how you can show up and share some of your leadership lessons, your expertise in your function, advice you have for people entering your career. I mean, there's so many different ways you can be showing up in a positive way”
3 Tips
1/ Share lessons, advice and expertise
2/ Don’t pick a fight and don’t be harmful or hurtful
3/ Show up as a positive ambassador of your company and don’t indict your industry
Mita built her personal brand without ever mentioning the company, but every time she is on stage, on a podcast, writing for a magazine, her company is mentioned. Talk about a natural co-branding opportunity!
Conclusion
Mita Mallick is the indisputable inclusive leader. It was an absolutely joy to have her as a guest and she reminds us the importance of building an organization and culture all employees want to belong too. Don’t forger to pre-order her book!