Beliefs & Values
Compassion creates the space for dignity & joy
Our company wants to support the creation of juicy and enjoyable partnerships between people and their teams, between people and their institution, between different institutions with similar goals, and individuals looking to gain a deeper relationship with themselves and their leadership practice. This is impossible without fostering compassion for all people. Compassion is often seen as permissive or weak and we challenge those notions actively. Extending our compassion, especially in moments when the temptation is to demonize and distance, allows us to make savvier and more strategic decisions. Our apartheid economy has relied on the comfort and homogeny of a ruling class. If we ever want this paradigm to change it will require a societal shift that understands the tensions between individual and collective interests, brokers agreements between the two, and lovingly holds accountability to those agreements.
We are living into this belief when we:
Considering all of the factors that led to a break or disagreement
We are direct with each other in moments of disagreement
Holding the humanity of each and every person as sacred
Not shying away from the challenge of holding compassion when it isn't easy
Taking responsibility for opportunities for connection
Creating space to play
We are living out of alignment when we:
Rush to judgment
Ignoring pain to keep things moving
Dwelling on pain as a strategy to keep things from moving
Denying the lived reality of the people we are interacting with
Making "someone else" responsible for connection
Refusing to play
Friction is an
opportunity for strategy
We create space for frustration, anger, disappointment, and sadness, but we will not build our institutions on those things. We believe that friction should be the jumping-off point for curiosity and learning. The world will be defined by productive negotiations between individuals and institutions that have historically struggled to find alignment. As such, it’s critical that we not shy away from friction or the discovery of deeper truths. Many spaces will avoid conflict in order to keep coalition together. Brava Leaders does not believe in this approach. We do not instigate, but believe that conflict will allow us to shape the boundaries of our work together. For some, it will indicate that this project is not for them. For others, it will be a siren call for the work.
Avoidance does not create justice.
We are living into this belief when we:
Sit in the discomfort of not knowing everything; we find ways to move forward when faced with uncertainty.
Use diversity as our competitive edge; we are able to see differences as a strength when our community shows up with care and consideration for each other.
See problems as opportunities to revisit what is working or not working in a system, and then figure out how to meet the needs of the members of our community.
Consistently engage with a spirit of curiosity; we move to resolve conflict with love and compassion.
Are open to feedback and critique from trusted peers; we work to do better once we know better.
Name tensions and regularly come up with practices to manage them. We also understand that some tensions are healthy and will continue to exist.
We are living out of alignment when we:
Withhold feedback due to the belief that we shouldn’t “have to” engage; or due to fear of social repercussions.
Don’t make space for people to learn and grow.
Have a considerable lag between when problems are identified and when they are resolved.
Shut down, opt out, or exit at the first sign of friction.
Deflect from important issues by focusing on expectations of civility. If you’re too concerned with the delivery, then you might be missing the message.
Jump to conclusions and discard people or ideas before doing due diligence.
Make things overly-complex or fall into either/or thinking in order to avoid discomfort or manage low-trust.
Distance ourselves too far away from the problems that we aim to help solve.
Use conflict as a litmus test or indicator of commitment, instead of investigating its roots.
Misinterpret seeking comfort vs. enforce good and necessary boundaries.
*This value was made in collaboration with Aniyia Williams
Explore the system
and hold the people
Our systems were built for an apartheid economy and we often direct our ire to the people who have managed to survive those systems through a combination of luck and will. At Brava Leaders, we believe it is deeply necessary to be skeptical of the systems first. This means we look at incentive structures, policy, norms, regulations, and history as the first line of analysis in every situation. Then and only then do we address the kind of adaptive processes that will be needed for individuals to shift intention, behavior, and understanding. A lot of our instincts and cultural training tell us to condemn the people and underestimate the system - guaranteeing that new players replicate old patterns or suffer under the weight of old logic.
We are living into this belief when we:
Direct our first suspicions and curiosities to the systems and incentives, not people.
Hold the impatience that comes from the brokenness of a system as a natural extension of this work
Carry deep curiosity about what creates an inequitable moment or system
Hold multiple truths that can exist at the same time
Practice emotional discipline - being aware of your emotions, identifying how they influence your behavior, and learning how to respond in a way that aligns with your goals and values - when confronted with messy and frustrating situations
Provide the appropriate resourcing to support all parties in moving forward
Expect discomfort and treating it as a natural part of creating something new
Build appropriate boundaries and expectations for our approach and build systems to codify those social contracts
Create facilitative and adaptive space for people to grapple with change
We are living out of alignment when we:
Reach for blame of an individual as a first stop in action
Hold onto resentment after a mistake
Are unwilling to move forward because we are afraid to mess up
Put off decision making to avoid conflict
Reject systemic analysis because it doesn’t fit with our notion of the human running the system
Refuse to do systemic analysis in order to protect an individual rather than interrogating it to keep more in health
Reject multiple truths and insist on one point of view
Participate in common enemy intimacy to feel the gratification of being right
Are emotionally sloppy - unaware of your emotions impacting a project, person or moment; leaving responsibility for your emotional state to other people; not being direct about your boundaries
Use
power with intention
Power is the ability to make change as determined by access to resources such as money, information, audience, decision-makers, and decision-making rights. While power has the potential to both harm and heal, it is never neutral. Those who wield power have a responsibility to be aware of how their actions can cause harm and do their best to minimize it. We are at our most effective and connected when we use our power with intention for specific purposes. Our analysis on any situation, system, or practices must have an understanding of power to be useful.
We are living into this belief when we:
Create time to evaluate our own power in any given situation
Are clear on who has decision making rights and who is informing the context in which decisions are made
Are proactive rather than reactive in thinking about how to distribute power
Question instincts to keep, shut down, or not respond
Shape power rather than accepting its current shape
We are living into this belief when we:
Do the foundational work to guarantee alignment, commitments, and approach
Create agreements about conflict and how we will deal with conflict before it comes up
Create clarity on the beliefs that undergird a project, action, collaboration, or institution
Are as committed to creating as dismantling
Ensure we do the work of creating robustly talented multi-racial, multi-gender, multi-sexuality, mutli-ability, multi-generational team(s)
Are pro-Black, pro-immigrant, pro-queer, pro-femme, pro-neuro/physical divergence and committing with policy, regulation, prioritization, and resourcing supporting a world in which all communities can thrive
Dismantle and replace systems that support and reinforce homogeneity with systems that uphold multicultural institutions
We are living out of this belief when we:
Keep information close to the vest
Shut down dissent
Don’t respond or engage in pushback
Live in reactivity
Don’t create time for building in transparency
Play down, under or overestimating own ability to do, influence, create or navigate
Demographics
are not destiny
We are in the middle of a norms-changing demographic shift. This shift combined with the digital revolution has changed the nature and distribution of power. These macro factors have made an apartheid economy more violent to uphold and left many scrambling to understand how to replace it with a just economy for a multiracial, multi-gender, multi-sexuality, multi-ability, and multi-generational populace. Representational politics created a deep belief that our integration into a system would immediately and automatically create new systems. This has been proven untrue, time and again. Representation was a valuable and necessary goal but it cannot be the only goal. Multicultural institutions will bear the weight of creating the social contracts the next version of the country will live off of.
We are living out of this belief when we:
Rely on identity to do the work of alignment
Rely on the goodness of a group of people to do the work of desegregation
Dismantle and resisting without ideas or ability to create health
Dismiss the need for social, economic, and physical agreements
