Summary: <p>The ongoing pandemic and social unrest in the aftermath of George Floyd sparked a greater emphasis on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) training within organizations. As the demand for DEI trainers continues to rise, many lack a clear path for making progress and must learn on their own without clear guidelines. Maria Morukian, President of <a href="https://msmglobalconsulting.com/"><u>MSM Global Consulting, </u></a> authored the new book <em>Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion for Trainers: Fostering DEI in the Workplace</em>, to create a guide for trainers to develop the skills needed to deliver sustainable change and unpack their own biases.</p> <p>For Maria, DEI is personal and is largely influenced by her upbringing as a first-generation American: Maria’s father, Val Morukian, had a bi-cultural identity. He was an Armenian whose family fled Istanbul during the Armenian diaspora and he was born in Cuba to a single mother of three. Maria opens her book by sharing how her father embodied the old adage, ‘looks can be deceiving.’</p> <p>“I would say people looked at my dad as this small in stature, older, hard-of-hearing guy with kind of a funny accent who always looked a little disheveled and like he was lost,” says Maria.“But the truth was that he had had this incredible life and so many rich and sometimes hard- to-imagine stories…looking at what was on the surface, if people just saw him or knew this one little bit of the story, they would never know all of the richness that was underneath.”</p> <p>As a young man, her father was enlisted in the U.S. Army, during which he was shot in the line of duty. Val was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for saving members of his battalion. He went to college after the army and became a Detroit public school teacher for nearly 40 years, and at various times was a bartender, a carni, and even a security guard for Jimmy Hoffa. Maria’s father’s life inspired her to become a diversity trainer and educator.</p> <p>In this episode of <a href="https://consciouslyunbiased.com/listen/"><u>Breaking the Bias</u></a>, Consciously Unbiased founder <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesbusinesscouncil/people/ashishkaushal/?sh=341e51752a76"><u>Ashish Kaushal</u></a> (virtually) sits down with Maria, to talk about her journey and the power that DEI training, when done right, can have in the workplace. They cover:</p> <ul> <li>Why blame and shame aren’t effective for creating change—and what is</li> <li>How to encourage people to look at the world from others’ perspectives</li> <li>The most essential skills diversity, equity and inclusion trainers should have in order to make a real impact</li> <li>The next frontier of DEI training in the workplace, and much more.</li> </ul> --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/consciously-unbiased/message
