Dorothy Hernandez (@dorothy_lynn_h), a volunteer with the ONA Resource Team, compiled these key moments from the ONA20 session on Oct. 6, 2020. To view a recording of the session, register for on-demand access to the ONA20 archive. Session participants included:
- Sandra Clark, Vice President for News and Civic Dialogue, WHYY
- Moderator: Doug Mitchell, founder/project director, NPR’s Next Generation Radio
5 key takeaways:
- What’s been called a “reckoning” — with high-profile departures most certainly in public media as well as newspapers and other media — is really a demand for accountability, Sandra Clark says. We’re in a period where diversity, inclusion, and equity are no longer optional. They’re part of meeting our mission.
- Diversity and inclusion have been seen as luxuries. In a bad economy, the reasoning has been that we can’t push for diversity and inclusion. “Treating something as a necessity as opposed to optional changes how you spend your money,” Clark says. At one point in the past, “there was a realization that there had to be this digital transformation, and what came with that? Understanding what positions you needed, what kind of people you needed, and what was needed for the sustainability of our industry. But that same attitude has never been taken about diversity and inclusion and equity. … This is a necessity. It’s expected of us, not just from those in the newsrooms but from our communities too. I mean, there’s a reason that so many organizations are flailing to try to figure out, how do we diversify our audiences? How do we build trust? All [that] … is very much connected to the lack of representation.”
- Three things leaders need right now to move the needle on diversity and inclusion:
- Knowledge—this all can’t be something you no longer understand; if you don’t, you need to get the knowledge
- Commitment
- A plan for action: Starting with your barriers is a good place to be, but you have to look at the stem systemic stuff. At WHYY, trainings have at least given the team some groundwork to have these conversations more openly than we would have had.
- The first thing is you have to work on is how people get in the door—but that’s not the only thing. When Clark first started at WHYY she interviewed everyone to understand the organization’s pipelines. And then, going forward, she says, it’s important to prioritize retention. It’s important to help people move up and reach their full potential in a role where they thrive.
- Two other parts of our industry that need to be priortitizing DEI: HR departments and nonprofit boards.
Memorable/tweetable quotes:
- On this idea that pushing the needle on diversity and equity is a marathon: “The reality is that so many systemic issues exist; the marathon is about not wanting to change … These practices that are reinforced and rewarded over and over again and this lack of accountability that has created a marathon instead of – I wouldn’t even call it a sprint, but we got to be running faster than where we are now.” —@sandraswclark
- “I’m not trying to make more woke people. … I really, truly believe that if you are a good journalist, a solid journalist, if you are a journalist who is meeting the mission of what we’re supposed to be here to do, then cultural competency is not optional.” —@sandraswclark
- “We can’t do all the work just in newsrooms if the same kind of work is not being done on the business side. And that also includes people who understand diverse audiences. You know, evaluation of how we, you know, count metrics and who’s counted in in those metrics. I mean, all of this work has to be done across an organization’s membership.” —@sandraswclark
- “I think there always has to be the balance of taking care of yourself and then knowing that you can’t solve everything for everyone, but you can take a piece of it.” —@sandraswclark