True to his book’s title, corporate social responsibility leader Andrew Beamon wrote From Promises to Progress: A Leadership Guide to Help Organizations Avoid Common Mishaps and Bring Their Racial Equity Aspirations to Life because he wants to help reform standard Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion practices.
“I think there’s already a lot of great books out there that prove the case that diversity matters,” Beamon tells So Booking Cool. “Mine is really to pick up where they left off. You believe this to be true, now how are you executing it?”
A big reason why Beamon says most organizations miss the mark with DEI is due to surface-level solutions with events designed to “feed them well, entertain them, and let’s get back to business as usual.”
In 2017, the Connecticut-based writer decided to engross himself in DEI. He says he committed to reading fifteen of the top books on the topic, and even earned certification in Strategic Diversity & Inclusion Management Executive at Georgetown University as well as Boston College’s Certification in Strategic Corporate Citizenship Management.
Another issue he identified was that many organizations failed to acknowledge racism as the problem. “It is a topic that tended to be taboo before the murder of George Floyd.”
“No one wanted to say racism or racial discrimination in the workplace, those that were doing the work of DEI, HR, etc. They would usually use vague terms. ‘Oh, we have diversity problems’ or ‘unconscious bias.’ If racism was the problem, they should name it, and say ‘Racism is the issue that we’re dealing with in our city’ or ‘Systemic racism is what we’re dealing with at our organization.’ But because most organizations tend to stay away from that, they’re never truly able to address the problem.”
Check out the full conversation to learn more about From Promises to Progress including the adversities Beamon overcame when writing it as well as the structure of the book and how he found his voice; what racial equity should look like; emotional intelligence; leadership; and more! For more information, visit his official website.