In this episode of The Social Leader, Fr. Justin Mathews talks with Gwendolyn Grant, President and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Kansas City. They discuss about how self awareness can lead to social awareness, the importance of evaluating the data to understand disparities facing people of color, how to lead without "positional power," and the necessity of leaders to lean into discomfort.
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EPISODE 9 — TRANSCRIPT
Father Justin Mathews: Well hello, my friends! Welcome to The Social Leader podcast where we learn to lead with greater social impact. Before we begin today, just a quick reminder that The Social Leader podcast is presented by Reconciliation Services and sponsored by Thelma’s Kitchen, Kansas City's first donate-what-you-can restaurant. The mission of Reconciliation Services is to cultivate a community that's seeking racial and economic reconciliation to turn Troost Avenue from a dividing line to a gathering place in our city and to reveal the strength of all. You can find out more about Reconciliation Services, our social and therapeutic services, our program Thelma’s Kitchen, as well as our Foster Grandparents Program at rs3101.org. Now let's jump into the show. It is the ninth episode of The Social Leader podcast. I am incredibly honored to have a special guest with us today. Her name is Gwendolyn Grant. She is the CEO and President of Kansas City's Urban League. We're going to have an amazing conversation about leadership, about learning to lead with greater social impact, about how she became the leader that she is today. We're also going to dive into some very important issues around the state of black Kansas City and then extrapolate that on to other socioeconomic and social factors, particularly focusing on equity in our country during this time of COVID-19. Stay with me and we'll be right back with Gwendolyn Grant of the Urban League.
Fr. Justin: Well welcome Gwendolyn. It's so wonderful to have you here today on The Social Leader podcast. How are you?
Gwendolyn Grant: I'm wonderful. Thank you, Father Justin, it’s definitely a pleasure to be here with you this afternoon.
Fr. Justin: Absolutely. We've been longtime friends here in Kansas City and I've admired your work for many years in the community. And if I'm not mistaken, you started as the CEO of Kansas City's Urban League all the way back in 1995. Is that right?
Gwendolyn: No, no, no, no, I actually started working at the Urban League in 1995. I became CEO in 2001. But I've been there a long time. It's been a long time.
Fr. Justin: Well, your impact is so great I just had to extrapolate it across all the years that you've been there. No, for real, I've seen you on so many shows. You're on every important panel that's happening in Kansas City. Your organization publishes a book almost every year, although this year is a bit of an exception, as I understand. We'll get back to that, the state of black Kansas City. Obviously the Urban League is a historic national civil rights organization with tremendous impact and I think going even further beyond the beginning of the civil rights movement, and perhaps you can illuminate some of that in a minute. But before we jump in, this podcast is all about helping us as leaders learn to lead with greater social impact, whether we’re in nonprofits or in the for-profit world, wherever we are in life, learning to lead with greater social impact. And so of course, on this show, we bring on folks like you who can speak not only to the depth of the social issues, but also can teach us about leadership. So the first thing I really want to know, and we've never really had a chance to chop it up and talk about this, is how did you become the leader of the Urban League? How did you know from childhood even that you were destined to be the leader that you are today?
Gwendolyn: Wow, what a question, Father! This takes me back. Well, I think one thing I must say about leadership is that we really have to be tuned into our life experiences and recognizing that we live on purpose and to know what your purpose is or what your calling is and evidence of that starts to show up early in life. So I grew up during the civil rights movement. In the aftermath of Dr. King's assassination, I had the opportunity to visit Washington DC for the closeout of the Poor People's Campaign, the March on Washington that he led, which is one of the the final civil rights activities that he was engaged in and he left that to go to Memphis to deal with the garbage workers strike, in which point he was assassinated. Well, growing up and watching all of these events unfold on TV, of course, being emotionally invested and personally invested in the civil rights movement, I had the opportunity to, after his assassination, they planned an event called Solidarity Day to close out the Poor People's March on Washington and to celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. King. They had caravans coming from all across the country, buses, and my mom allowed me to go to the ceremony as a preteen. I don't want to say exactly what age because we don't want anyone trying to guess how old I really am. I will never tell! My mom allowed me to go and I basically got on a bus with a bunch of church people. It was a bus that left out of the Kaw Valley Bank over in Kansas City, Kansas. And I got on the bus by myself and the church ladies took care of me and I rode on this bus to Washington, DC. And I had the opportunity to witness not only that celebration, but to walk through the camp site where people had left their homes and traveled to Washington, DC to make a statement about poverty in America because Dr. King started to begin to focus not only on the racial divide, but on the issue of poverty for all people in America at that time.
Fr. Justin: Yeah, that was a logical step and something actually that you are building you're still dealing with today and trying to advance. We'll get to that.
Gwendolyn: So basically, having that experience, seeing the sacrifice that people had made, and understanding the sacrifice that Dr. King and other civil rights leaders and volunteers had made just to try to make America better, to try to make life better for people of color in this country, had an overwhelming impact on me as a young child. And so from that point on, I have pretty much invested my life or focused my work and my service on trying to improve the conditions, the social conditions and the economic conditions that impact African Americans.
Fr. Justin: That one bus trip sounds like it was sort of a seminal moment for you, a real axiomatic moment where your life sort of turned and it also sounds like your mother was a bold and visionary parent as a preteen. I have three boys who are all teenagers and I kind of can't imagine putting one of my teenagers, even with church ladies, on a bus and sending them. Your mom must have been a pretty incredible person. Where did you grow up and what was home like for you and how did that impact your leadership today in the way that you approach leadership at the Urban League?
Gwendolyn: So I grew up here in Kansas City on 20th Street, just off of Indiana. So I actually now live in work not far from where I grew up. Life in my household. My mom's a single parent, I had two older brothers, but she was definitely a force in our lives, pressing for us to become well educated, pressing for us to be socially engaged and to use our time here on this earth to make a difference. She was someone that read a lot, watched the news a lot. She did not complete high school, but she was a very like self educated woman and she instilled those values in her children. So all of us have, through either our work or through our community service, made strong efforts to give back to pay our rent for the time we have here on earth.
Fr. Justin: The impact of our childhood I think we discount sometimes the thoughts and the things that come forward in our life that really shaped the work that we do. And as we kind of take a look at the recent history of your leadership, and again, you've been there in one way or another as a leader since 1995 at the Urban League. I'd love for you to tell some of our listeners who might not know the importance of the Urban League, what's the mission of, particularly, Kansas City's Urban League? And then in this time, there's been a lot of change, what are maybe two or three of some of the greatest victories that you've been able to lead the Urban League in Kansas City to attaining?
Gwendolyn: Greatest victories? That's hard to say. I will just point out that our mission is to enable African Americans and other disadvantaged populations to secure economic self reliance, parity, power, and civil rights. We do that through developing data driven, research proven programs and services to help our people to achieve economic self sufficiency. So we operate workforce development programs. We are heavily involved in education. Those are our two primary areas of focus education and workforce development. And under those umbrellas, there are a number of things that we do. We publish, not annually, about every two to three years, we publish the State of Black Kansas City Equality Index. And through that publication, we measure the disparities that exist between blacks and whites and Hispanics and whites in economics, education, health, social justice, and civic engagement. And we use those data to help to elevate the important issues relative to advocacy for improving or changing policies and practices that continue to contribute to the inequities. And we use it to inform dialogue to try to bridge the racial divide in Kansas City. And we think that it's really important to have data to elevate those conversations.
Fr. Justin: I was going to ask this question a little bit later, but let's actually get into that, because the State of Black Kansas City book is actually incredibly important. And in my opinion, there isn't enough data. There isn't enough data about people of color and the entrepreneurship or access to capital issues. We hear a lot about lots of different issues. In our society, we hear about inequity but until you hear family stories, which is sort of how you get that lived experience, and then when you see the data that then extrapolates those families stories out into the larger framework, it's difficult for folks to understand the plight of our neighbors who might even just live a few blocks away from us. So what I want to ask you is what is the importance of quality and comprehensive data, particularly in social leadership, not just for you as a nonprofit leader and someone who's trying to bring forward the issues in the black community in Kansas City in particular, but help us to understand why do we need to slow down and make sure that we look at comprehensive and high quality data in our social leadership when?
Gwendolyn: Well, one of the primary reasons is because it's just the facts, right? So when you bring data to substantiate or to make it crystal clear, these are the conditions that exist, this is not something that we're bringing from an emotional perspective or from a rhetorical perspective as often that can be a label that is placed on civil rights organizations or social justice champions when we start talking about inequities. We need to bring the data that supports that because then it makes it unequivocally clear that this is the situation that we need to address. So let's take all the personalities out of it, all of that, the distraction and let's just focus on the facts. The other reason that is important is you have to know where you've been and understand what the conditions are in order to be able to address them. So you can't go out here and try to solve these problems, if you don't have clarity about what the problems are and what are the contributing factors. So it just makes it extremely important to understand data, it is the reality and then build programs and build advocacy around the information around.
Fr. Justin: It's amazing to me in this day and age that we live in, where we've got everything from Google Analytics to smart streets, smart cities, Wi Fi enabled bus stops, you name it, we've got data coming out our ears. But then again, when you try to dig in and get beyond sort of a city level and really get into a zip code level or neighborhood level, it really begins to break down and you can find data about all sorts of things in our city, from transit to stoplights, but it's very hard to find data that can really illumine the kinds of situations that the Urban League is trying to do in advancing prosperity and civil rights. I'd like to know, obviously the State of Black Kansas City, from what I understand at a national level, that book isn't going to be published in 2020? It's going to be published in 2021 after the census, right? Is that right?
Gwendolyn: Well, we hope that that's correct. We're certainly not publishing this year, and intentionally prior to knowing about the COVID-19 pandemic, but certainly because of the 2020 census. But the other driver for us is having the resources and the capacity to publish. We've been blessed and fortunate to have the philanthropic community recognize the importance of this work, of this research in this publication to invest in it. So we hope that in 2021 the resources will be there because it will be post the 2020 census and then we can put out the study with the updated census information.
Fr. Justin: So what do you think is going to be different, post the census, post 2021, when we get into next year, because of COVID-19? We did a show with Qiana Thomason from the Health Forward Foundation a number of episodes ago where we went in really deep about health equity and inequities, particularly among communities of color in Kansas City and across the nation. So we've established a baseline for anyone who's been listening for a while about some of those inequities. But when those State of Black Kansas City and the National Urban League's book comes out on the State of Black America, what do you think is going to be different post COVID-19?
Gwendolyn: Well, I'm certain the data will be devastating, because basically, we are now in a depressed economy. We were in February, prior to the pandemic and the shutdown of the economy, we were in what is called a full employment economy. So the overall unemployment rate was around 5.3%, the lowest it had been in 20 some odd years, right? But even then, the unemployment rate for African Americans during a full employment economy was still 1.5-2 times higher than the unemployment rate of whites in America. So now we are in a depressed economy and we anticipate unemployment amongst blacks is now about 3 times higher than it is amongst whites. So post the 2020 census and post the COVID-19 pandemic, it stands to reason that unemployment amongst African Americans will be probably 3-4 times higher than unemployment amongst whites, which is what it was during the Great Recession. So, the economic impact of this pandemic will be devastating and is devastating already, both from an economic perspective and from a public health, from a healthcare perspective on the African American community. The infection rate and the death rate as a result of COVID-19 is highest amongst African Americans in any other population group in this country.
Fr. Justin: It's amazing to actually look at the data at what's happened. If you think about the Great Depression, we've seen numbers that equal or approach the Great Depression. And I think the last count that I remember from just recalling from memory was like 14.7% unemployment. Right now as we're recording this in May 2020, over 33 million people are out of work. But here's the difference, though, that I think is really striking. Unlike the Great Depression, where that took place over a period of months, 33 million people are out of work now in five weeks. And like you said, these historic racial and economic disparities in the United States are exacerbated by COVID-19, of course. So how should we go and be taking historic racial equity and racial disparities into account when we address equal opportunity?
Gwendolyn: Good question. So first off, you have to understand how we got here. Again, it's about understanding history because I think oftentimes people operate from the erroneous assumption that somehow all things are equal, and we live in a meritocracy, and that African Americans and other minorities have the level playing field, and we are in this situation because maybe we don't work as hard, we need to get more education, we need to do whatever. Well, what the data show is that number one, we are having to address structural and systemic racism in order to bridge this divide and to understand what that means you have to understand historically, the systems were designed to marginalize and isolate basically African Americans We have been denied full access to the economic mainstream of this country. So we are so many years behind economically, that then you layer on a recession, a depression, a pandemic, and it just creates a deeper, deeper divide, and makes it much more difficult for us to achieve economic parity.
Fr. Justin: I just want to drive this point home because a lot of people are going to hear what you're saying, and maybe not agree, because not everybody's looked at the data. But here's one of the best analogies I've heard when and that is: Imagine that we're all sitting down to play Monopoly at the same time. And you've probably heard this one before. And if you took a classroom, and you had all the white kids in the classroom start monopoly, and everyone has the same rules. And then you don't let anyone else in the classroom who are black students or non white students start playing until four hours later. Then you give everybody the same money, everybody the same rules, everybody the same access to the table. How do you think that that second group who didn't get to start playing Monopoly until four hours later, how are they going to do? Well, the point is they never catch up, or I think statistically, somebody's run the numbers and it's like 98.7%, or some astronomical number, that somebody who actually starts four hours later gets to win the game. So I think when people are hearing what you're saying, I don't want them to tune their ears out. I don't want them to turn their ears off. I want them to hear this point, that you're not saying something about somebody’s, necessarily their moral behavior when you're talking about structure. You're talking about 400 years of American history, where men and women of color, particularly the black community, and then we could even add that in later into gender inequality. Look at men versus women. But you're talking about 400 years in the black community where you are not permitted, by and large, to participate in any of the economic life. And so now that's what you're getting at that you've got these structural issues, you've got time bound issues that have to be overcome. So how should we be taking that historical racial disparity into account today? How are you doing that today at the Urban League in Kansas City, to address equal opportunity?
Gwendolyn: Well, one thing just to your point, and thank you, it's an excellent analogy to make because it is difficult for people to really get their arms around it when we use language like structural racism or systemic issues, it sounds very academic, and you make it very real. So basically, it's just like imagining if you're in a race and everybody has a starting line and you're several yards back, in order for you to catch up, you're going to have to run a whole lot faster than everybody else and sustain that for an extended time to catch up, it almost practically defies the laws of physics. So what we're wanting to do is while we address the immediate needs of folks that we're serving, is to also figure out how to accelerate the supports. So basically, you have to invest more, it's like triage. If you go into any emergency room, and you need medical assistance, they're going to triage based on that need. So if I walk in and I have a broken arm and you're walking in at the same time, and you're suffering from a heart attack or something, they're going to invest a whole lot more medical attention and resources in trying to save your life than they are in trying to address my fractured arm. And so the same approach has to be given to what we need to be doing in the central city and doing with the populations that you serve through Reconciliation Services. The people who need the most help, need to be given more resources, not less. So you can't mitigate these issues saying that everybody's going to be treated the same, we're going to allocate resources equally across all of the six different councilmanic districts and we're going to give every community the exact same treatment when everybody's issue is not the same. So what we try to do is look at that and how we serve, how we approach our work, and how we approach the advocacy around civil rights, racial justice, and equity.
Fr. Justin: I know you stood up publicly and supported Robbie Makinen and KCATA for finding money in the city budget to be able to provide free transit, which is a great leveler for a lot of folks in the workforce who want to be working but have access issues and other things. Now, look, I want to make sure we get to some of the personal side because you and I could talk forever about structural racism and barriers. And if you want to find out more, go check out ULKC.org. It's a good portal to begin. You can springboard from there to lots of other places. But again, I'm talking with Gwendolyn Grant. She's my guest, the President and CEO of the Urban League. And Gwen, what I want to get into now is about leadership and really trying to help our audience learn to lead and have greater social impact. And you said something a minute ago about how we're going to model moving forward, how we have to live that out. And so as a leader, how do we model moving from discomfort to comfort in our social leadership?
Gwendolyn: Well, I'm in with that discomfort all the time. Leading a civil rights organization, you create discomfort actually. You have to almost create discomfort to push for the change that we want to see in policies and practices and the improvements to bridge the racial divide and the economic divide. So for me personally, I've had to learn to be comfortable with discomfort. And I've had to learn to know that in order to bring about change, you have to disrupt the status quo. I often think about the Frederick Douglass quote about power concedes nothing without a demand, it never has and it never will. And so if you're in a civil rights space, you see, from my leadership, there's always this push, there's always is an uncomfortable position to be in because for the most part, while folks I believe are inherently good people, most people are good people and want to believe that everyone is treated fairly. It requires pushing in ways that make people uncomfortable. And then what I would say if you're trying to grow your leadership capacity in dealing with this is you got to lean into discomfort and you've got to be okay with the fact that in order for us to get to the next level, we're all going to have to be out of our comfort zones. We're going to have to open up to information that doesn't always feel good and we're going to have to be very introspective about how we're showing up as leaders. How do we bring people along requires that extra work and so it's first we'd certainly have to know who you are as a person and how you show up and be open to change.
Fr. Justin: I talk about often this idea of moving away from charity, moving away from charitable intentions, and getting to integrated priorities. Something that you said that I'd love for you to unpack a little bit, and if you could make it practical for somebody who's not the President and CEO of a civil rights organization, because you're kind of at a bar way up here. You're so comfortable with the uncomfortable that you are able to unpack the uncomfortable with a sort of power that gives a lot of air of confidence. But I really want to, if we're going to make a sea change in some of the issues that you focus on, we've got to have a tipping point of leaders who, like you said, lean into the discomfort. So think about that middle manager, think about that hiring manager, think about that person who's not leading a nonprofit civil rights organization, what are maybe two or three tips that you would give them about how to lean into discomfort in their life to have greater social impact?
Gwendolyn: So that's a really tough question, Father, because it certainly is different for everyone. I think first, I would go back to getting comfortable with who you are, because if you are someone who if you have a very high need to be liked to be accepted, then there's always going to be some higher degree of risk when you begin to think about what are you going to do to try to change a particular situation as a middle manager or whatever. So when I encourage people to do it, and I've done a lot of leadership development training and what I encourage folks to do is to try to figure out how to lead within your domain. So within your sphere of influence, what can you get done? And to have a really good understanding of how to lead within your domain and how to lead without power. And when I say that how to lead without power, I'm talking about how to lead without positional power, because we all have power. So power is something you have to recognize you have and then know how to use it. But everybody has it. So you have to choose to embrace the power that you hold within any given situation. And so in that it requires you assessing that situation, and understanding what do I have the power to influence here and recognizing what you don't, so you don't put time and energy into something over which you have no control or power. You focus that energy and channel it into those things that you can do and you can change. And as you do that, you begin to expand your circle of influence and the impact that you can have just a little bit at a time. But it requires really being socially conscious and aware, and certainly self aware, and learning how to build your own confidence in that space.
Fr. Justin: I like a lot that you brought out that you may not have positional power, but that if you become self aware and become socially conscious, that gets us back to the data, and then to the internal work that we have to do as leaders as we strive to have a greater social impact through our leadership. You might not be the CEO of the company, you might not be the hiring manager who can actualize whatever that you feel like should be done but you do have power. This is what you're saying. And if you learn to use it and to move from discomfort to comfort or learning to be comfortable with the uncomfortable, then you can make a huge impact. Gwen, I really appreciate you sharing that. It's a good reminder for me, and for all of us. I want to give you the final word as we wrap up our time together. What would you leave folks with who are listening to this podcast and who want to make a change, want to be social leaders, but they're not quite sure where they're going to begin? What would you like to leave us with?
Gwendolyn: Well, I think I'm really big on first understanding I think everybody can make a contribution. And no matter how small or how large, it's important that you make that contribution. And so what I would encourage people to do is to really think about where's my passion? What am I most concerned about or one that I want to change most, and then take a deep dive into that, like find that one thing, and then learn everything you can about it. And show up and share your gifts and talents to make a difference. And don't be concerned about how big of a difference or how much money, it’s not always about money. It's about time. It's about what you can bring to improve the situation.
Fr. Justin: Alright, well, if you're listening to the podcast, and you want to become a social leader, go back and rewind because Gwen has dropped a whole bunch of great tips and tricks and ideas and some really important things. I like what you said about dive deep, get into it, really understand that one issue that breaks your heart and then show up and do something. So Gwen, thank you for leaving us with that. And I want to make sure, again, that everybody has your website, if they want to reach out to you, if they want to help fund the State of Black Kansas City book and make a donation, they can do that online. You can help make sure that we have the quality and comprehensive data that we need to be able to continue the work of the Urban League especially right here in Kansas City, but all across the nation. Go to ULKC.org. Again, my guest today was Gwendolyn Grant, President and CEO of the Urban League Kansas City. Gwen, thank you, it's been an honor to get to talk to you about leadership and about all that you do with the Urban League. And thank you, for your advocacy for the community and all that you've given us in Kansas City.
Gwendolyn: Thank you and thanks Reconciliation Services for all that you do to serve Kansas City. We sincerely appreciate you and thank you so much for this opportunity.
Fr. Justin: Absolutely. Hang tight with me. I'll be right back to you. Hey, everyone who's listening to the show, I want to make sure that you know about something that is coming up that I'm super excited about. If you want to go further with the kind of things that Gwen was talking about today, if you want to have greater social impact in your leadership wherever you are, Reconciliation Services is about to launch an e-course called Social Leader Essentials. It's coming up. It will be launched in the next month and you're going to want to stay tuned. So if you go to TheSocialLeader.org, you'll be able to sign up, get on the mailing list and be one of the first ones who knows when this course launches. It's going to be an incredible course to give you the kickstart that you need to become someone who can have the kind of social impact that Gwen was talking about today, no matter where you work and what you do. In addition to that, if you're someone who's looking for a job and you're looking to stand out from the sea of similarity, with 33 million people looking to apply for the job that you want, you're going to want to take this e-course. Go to TheSocialLeader.org, answer a few quick questions, one of our team is going to reach out to you and make sure that you know when that launches. So once again, thank you for joining me today for episode nine of The Social Leader where my guest was Gwendolyn Grant of the Urban League Kansas City. Today was presented by Reconciliation Services and sponsored by Thelma’s Kitchen. I look forward to seeing you every Tuesday at 12:30 live on YouTube and on Facebook. Make sure to smash the like button, subscribe, hit the little bell so you know every time we go live, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. We look forward to speaking with you again next week. Until next time, learn to lead with greater social impact.