A path forward for systems stuck in the mud of a racist past

Things I learned today from talking to a diverse group on issues of race, safety, and desiring good outcomes from organizations:

1. We must shift the burden of professionalism from the people who aren’t professionally trained or prepared in these situations. (Borrowed language from a professional in the conversation)

2. We don’t deescalate early enough, when we begin to feel uncomfortable and options are greater to walk away with positive outcomes. Instead, we overconfidently believe we have things under control, until we don’t, and only have the most extreme and heavy handed solutions left to use.

3. When we examine the situations, we start from the point of crisis, and don’t adequately address what could have been done to not get to a crisis point.

4. We fail to do this because our systems don’t track it, and we don’t capture any data to hold ourselves succeeding in what doesn’t reach a crisis.

5. This failure is based on a fundamental lack of knowledge/application of human behavior, brain science, and different cultures. We expect people to behave in ways they cannot. We are uneducated in predictable ways they will behave.

6. Consequently, we spend a ridiculous amount of money and effort in trying to control behavior instead of understanding behavior, and responding more effectively.

7. We could have environments that are safer and better outcomes if we just are willing to confront our false assumptions on how human behavior works.

8. It is going to take a lot more conversations and time to turn this ship around. I have a mental image of a ship stuck in the Suez Canal, and a lot of little tug boats attempting to get us all unstuck.

But we can get unstuck. It’s urgent that we do.