Difference shows us in all shapes, sizes, colors, accents, languages, cultures, classes and backgrounds. So how do we want to be with that difference? In this episode, Ronnie Ndlovu discusses ways we can normalize and acknowledge our differences and use them as an asset for collaboration. After all, if we were all the same, where would innovation, learning and creativity live? Across the episode Ronnie and Katie cover a range of topics including the impact of intolerance, rank and privilege, working with different languages and accents, building empathy and leaning into edges.
Ronnie Ndlovu is one of South Africa’s first two coaches to certify in the advanced ORSC methodology and be chosen for CRR’s international faculty. As a top coach in the southern African region over more than a decade, he serves corporate, individual and non-profit clients throughout the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region find alignment while maximizing productivity and innovation. In addition to his ORSC qualifications, he completed a one-year Co-Active Coach training program in 2007 with the Coaches Training Institute and is an expert in the use of the Enneagram. He is a member of the International Coach Federation (ICF). He has also completed a two-year program on Process Work Facilitation based on Process Orientated Psychology.
For over 18 years, CRR Global has accompanied leaders, teams, and practitioners on their journey to build stronger relationships by focusing on the relationship itself, not only the individuals occupying it. This leads to a community of changemakers around the world. Supported by a global network of Faculty and Partners, we connect, inspire, and equip change agents to shift systems, one relationship at a time
We believe Relationship Matters, from humanity to nature, to the larger whole.
Difference shows us in all shapes, sizes, colors, accents, languages, cultures, classes and backgrounds. So how do we want to be with that difference? In this episode, Ronnie Ndlovu discusses ways we can normalize and acknowledge our differences and use them as an asset for collaboration. After all, if we were all the same, where would innovation, learning and creativity live? Across the episode Ronnie and Katie cover a range of topics including the impact of intolerance, rank and privilege, working with different languages and accents, building empathy and leaning into edges.
Ronnie Ndlovu is one of South Africa’s first two coaches to certify in the advanced ORSC methodology and be chosen for CRR’s international faculty. As a top coach in the southern African region over more than a decade, he serves corporate, individual and non-profit clients throughout the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region find alignment while maximizing productivity and innovation. In addition to his ORSC qualifications, he completed a one-year Co-Active Coach training program in 2007 with the Coaches Training Institute and is an expert in the use of the Enneagram. He is a member of the International Coach Federation (ICF). He has also completed a two-year program on Process Work Facilitation based on Process Orientated Psychology.
For over 18 years, CRR Global has accompanied leaders, teams, and practitioners on their journey to build stronger relationships by focusing on the relationship itself, not only the individuals occupying it. This leads to a community of changemakers around the world. Supported by a global network of Faculty and Partners, we connect, inspire, and equip change agents to shift systems, one relationship at a time
We believe Relationship Matters, from humanity to nature, to the larger whole.
Key
KC – Katie Churchman
RN - Ronnie Ndlovu
[Intro 00:00 – 00:06]
KC – Hello and welcome back to the Relationship Matters podcast. We believe Relationship Matters, from humanity, to nature, to the larger whole. I’m your host, Katie Churchman, and in this episode I’m talking the Ronnie Ndlovu. Difference shows us in all shapes, sizes, colors, accents, languages, cultures, classes and backgrounds. So how do we want to be with that difference? In this podcast, Ronnie discusses ways we can normalize and acknowledge our differences and use them as an asset for collaboration. After all, if we were all the same where would innovation, learning and creativity live? Join Ronnie and I as we look at ways to create design team alliances that delight in the diversity that difference brings. Across the episode we cover a range of topics including the impact of intolerance, rank and privilege, working with different languages and accents, building empathy and leaning into edges. Ronnie Ndlovu is one of South Africa’s first two coaches to certify in the advanced ORSC methodology and be chosen for CRR’s international faculty. As a top coach in the southern African region over more than a decade, he serves corporate, individual and non-profit clients, helping them to find alignment whilst maximizing productivity and innovation. In addition to his ORSC qualifications Ronnie is an ICF Coach, a Co-Active coach, and is an expert in the use of the Enneagram. He’s also completed a two year program on Process Work Facilitation based on Process Orientated Psychology. Without further ado I bring you Ronnie Ndlovu.
KC – Welcome Ronnie to the Relationship Matters podcast, I’m so happy to finally have you on the show.
RN – Yes Katie, I am happy to be here too and the opportunity to converse about this very important topic.
KC – Yeah, and it’s a big one. So, today we’re talking about how to be with difference. What do you mean when you say that, being ‘with’ difference?
RN – Well I suppose you know it’s recognizing that people come from different walks of life. But that essentially people are different, even the way they look, in their differences, and also in the way they impact us. So some people shake up our believes, some people align with our beliefs, based on how they’re different. So by being with differences is actually recognizing that and allowing for it in our lives. And we don’t necessarily have to like the difference, but recognizing that it is its own right for expression, for existence, eventually we need to be with it.
KC – Yeah, with that idea of its own right for expression and individuality and uniqueness, what gets in the way of us being with that difference at times?
RN – Well, I think there are many things. I think a lot of it is what has been passed down to us from previous generations. It’s usually right, think of racism, think of gender, you know, chauvinists, you’ll find that there are beliefs that have been passed down from before us, our ancestors, our great, great, great grandfathers. It just gets passed down. Families, women, chauvinism. So, and that difference actually prevails because of that in the whole social system around those people tends to be disappointing. Because in a way I suppose these people kind of self-selected people who are like them. So I think that could be one of the major things. I also think that sometimes you may have a bad experience with someone who’s different. And we start generalizing to everyone else. So, walking down the street you get robbed by a black person or a white person, and you may notice and you’re turned in either direction, and so people start getting a little worried about it, about people. And so that could be that too. So I think, yeah, maybe those two main sources of how we start developing that sense of I don’t want to be with these people because there’s enough ranting when I engage with them, you know, when you engage with heterosexuals or a homosexual person there might be some generalization that happens, they start becoming a way of, that you may notice being a way of and that’s making it difficult to enter into with the heterosexual community. Because there is a lot that might be misunderstood about your difference. Could be a woman, you know, who’s met by a person who’s always… who’s never really met a woman who shakes up that basic belief that women may not be as bright as men, they may not be as capable and they may not be as strong. And then that man for the first time is contrited by the fact that maybe my knowledge is not correct and I need to revisit it, and it may be too tempting, too daunting to cross that edge because of what is on the other side, means they’ve got to reframe their life, they’ve got to change a lot of things in their own system, about how they interact. So yeah, it could be this.
KC – So many edges, it’s a very edgy conversation to have, I can feel it in my body already because it’s some of the stuff that we’ve experienced, as you say, and some stuff we’ve inherited from generations prior to us, and so… and I’m aware as well, this is audio and people might not be aware that you’re a black man from South Africa and so how do you help people to work with difference, you work all over the world, so how do you help people to work with that difference.
RN – Well I think you know it’s easy just embracing some of what ORSC has taught me and maybe some encounters with other people before. A big part of it is my experience, right, and bringing that into actions with those encounters. So, what do I mean with that? When you’re a black person and you’re walking around, you’re marginalized right from the time you leave your home and you interact with the white world – that’s the reality in South Africa. And so most organizations really, mainstream organizations, are run by white people. So I think many black people experience, even if it’s slight, a sense of being marginalized. And one may be acutely aware of it. One may be dead to it, kind of like to getting automatic and ignoring it. But if you really are aware of it you do sense some form of marginalization, kind of adjusting and assimilating into a world and realities that don’t represent who you are, that are not, a kind of encounter to some extent to your identity and what comes with that identity, you know. So, having that experience and knowing what it is like to be without power or to be the marginalized one, it has in a way allowed me to have insight into what it’s like, so I take that with me when I work with people who may be marginalized in ways in which I’m not marginalized, and that will be different, right? So it could be people who are not as fortunate from the work perspective as I am. It might be women who are marginalized, and so I really understand what it’s like to be marginalized. It might be other black people who might also be relating to the experiences of being marginalized. There’s reasonings for me when it comes to really looking at communities that are made to feel lesser. So when I work with diversity and inclusion or inclusiveness, my honest experiences inform some of those insights, right? So that would be the one thing. The other thing is what we call, in our world, eldership, really holding on to the fact that all, it’s a deep democracy thing, deep democracy means, as you know, that we have to be, well we don’t have too, but it’s useful and helpful and it makes our lives easier, if we are embracing those voices that are really different from us. Particularly if we detest them. If we detest them, we don’t like them, because they really stand for marginalizing who we are, they stand for bigotry for example, as a black person, but being able to stand in the face of that voice and really get curious and step into what those realities look like, try to call eldership, right, it’s like holding all voices and you’re making room for them, really getting a sense of… you have insight about even that voice, the one that you find hard to be with.
KC – Yeah, what’s coming up for me is the fact that when you have privilege you’re sort of not aware of it and when you were saying how when you leave your door you feel marginalized in certain ways and I guess when you have the privilege on the flip side of the coin you don’t sort of see it. What was that example you gave before, something about shoes that was such a great analogy for this.
RN – Yes, you know, we say that having privilege is like wearing a nice soft shoe. You’ve had it for a while, it doesn’t pinch you, you know the way of it, it’s comfort right? But if you’ve got a new shoe and it’s still a bit tight and it doesn’t yet yield to the shape of your feet it’s painful, it reminds you of what you don’t have. So it’s the same with privilege you know? When you’ve got power because of it you don’t feel the length of that power. You don’t feel the pain that comes with not having this extent, so if I’m a white male I don’t realize my power most of the times. If I’m in circumstances where, as a black man, I’ve got power, I don’t recognize it, I forget it, I kind of fall asleep to it. But without that power we’ll feel it. And in a way I’m going to be the one to remind me of the fact, eh you’re unconscious of your power that you may be using. I also say perhaps, perhaps, it is our role, those who are marginalized, to really remind those with power the fact that they’re marginalizing us. The fact that, you know, it has impact in itself. And as I say that I’m reminded of the fact that it’s debated, it is debated if it should be the work of the marginalized to keep awakening those with power, or should it be the work of those who share the same privilege to help each other to become awake to the power they have and the responsibility to use it consciously.
KC – Yeah, it’s both and I think you’re doing some really powerful work because it must be hard sometimes to go into a room or a coaching engagement wherever it is and to feel marginalized and then use that perspective to help educate and expand the awareness of others.
RN – Well it is, and it’s hard, and then we’ve worked within organizations where diversity and inclusiveness is the agenda. People who are marginalized who speak up and want to share their experiences and want to create a kind of awareness to the majority, in South Africa of course if you are looking at the racial dimension, are usually black people in the minority in all conversations, and you find some are quiet and accept it because it’s a bit too dangerous in this retribution in some organizations, not all of them, but in many. Most of them theirs is retribution for saying I am feeling marginalized, I’m feeling I’m treated badly because I’m black. The problem with the majority is they may respond with some retribution . I’ve seen instances where people are treated as trouble makers because they dared speak of their sense of not being in power, their sense of being marginalized. In asking for those people who are in power to really start being aware and consciously using their power to create a more enabling environment. So, yeah, you see that in a number of organs in our society, I think wherever there’s racism, whether that’s the USA, whether it’s the UK or Europe or some other parts of Africa you’ll find the same dynamic, where people who may want to speak up about how they’re impacted negatively by unconsciousness of power that sometimes, and usually they’re branded as trouble makers.
KC – Yeah. I’m wondering, so when it comes to being with difference of course there’s so many areas to that, there’s color, there’s size, there’s culture, there’s language, and something I’ve become very curious about since living in the US is the fact that suddenly I have an accent and I didn’t realize I have an accent until I moved to the US and people are fascinated by it. It was just how I spoke, right! And I’m just wondering because you have a strong accent and, at least to me, obviously probably not in South Africa, and you work a lot globally and I’m wondering how you work with that, helping people being with that difference that might be unfamiliar to them?
RN – Well I think you kind of have to design, right, how people are going to be with your accent because we all have accents, right, so who’s accent is better than the others, right? But there is kind of a sticking order, whether I want to admit it or not. But unless we really have a conscious and intentional conversation about differences in accents it’s going to probably become a source of conflict and so some people may be able to, when you design, may be able to say what they need from you to make sure that they can understand your different accent, yeah? So in the world that we work in that’s one of the first things that I do. So I call in, design intentionally and conscious, how we’re going to be with that accent. Differences in our accents and we start from there. We start to agree that no accent is inferior to another but that, you know, and we work from the fact that they are equal. It might be hard for me to hear the other accent as much as it is for the other person to hear me, and what we’re going to do about it? It becomes a very strong way for moving forward in the conversation. So some requests might be let’s speak a little bit slower so that I’ve time to read your lips and make sense of what you’re trying to say. Speak a little bit slower so that with context I can understand what you say. Or for some people it’s no issue at all, they’re used to so many different accents that they can, we don’t even have to design around it. Being aware of those differences and really willing to engage and consciously and intentionally design around that is very useful and it’s helped me a lot in the past. You may say some things and people don’t hear you, you might have to slow it down and go over it, repeat it, so that people can understand it. So, things like that are taken care of.
KC – Yeah, it’s such a good point because there’s so much bias I think around language particularly, because quite often, particularly in Western organizations, English is the dominant language so if it’s your second or third language that’s a challenge. And then something I’ve noticed moving over to the US is just how much having a British accent actually gives me privilege, it really does. My friends joke over here that if I was to say 1+1=3 they’d believe me and, you know, it’s sort of funny but there’s also something, there’s a flip side to that that’s what happens to the other accents that show up here that aren’t some popular? There’s a real awareness about we come with privilege in ways we often don’t even realize like just the language, the accent we were born with can bring us either privilege or something else.
RN – Yes, well it can be a source of privilege because it’s a sought after accent and I think earlier I said there’s a pecking order. You’ll find that in some countries the accent they really want to hear is an American accent. You go to the USA they are like wow, I love your accent, where are you from? From the UK? Oh, say some more, say something! Yeah, you’re right so it depends where you are but there’s usually a pecking order. And again, it seems to be tied to where you come from. So it also, unfortunately, filters into the world of racism and maybe even nationalism, so some people may not have patience because of their racist attitudes towards black people, they may not have the patience to really want to try hard and start understanding someone, a black person with an accent that is different from theirs and different from “mainstream accents”. And I say mainstream in quotation marks because I don’t want to connote that they’re better and they have a right to be there as mainstream but it just happens to be, it tends to flow into some of those marginalized aspects, who’s got power, who’s got rank, who doesn’t have. Look at the Japanese, for example. It’s probably a hard accent to hear if you are not used to that accent in the Western world, it’s easy to read for an African accent, but when people actually slow down and take the time to listen and help people like that, right, because they’ve got another source of rank, another source of power. They Country they come from, and there’s a lot of reverence for Japan.
KC – It’s so interesting because it’s another form of intolerance that we might not even recognize in ourselves as perhaps a racist attitude and yet, what you were saying there about mainstream, yeah you’re right it just depends on the lens or the angle you’re looking at, if you’re from a different country the mainstream accent is going to be very different but it’s a good awareness to have going into particularly a globalized world where we’ve got these teams with people from all over the planet. Who we’re drawn too just because they’re more like us or they sound like us, those kind of things I think are useful cues to get aware of because what might we be limiting if we don’t lean in to difference?
RN – Indeed. We may miss out on perspectives that a person can give, who probably can’t speak English well, and so yeah, you can miss out on relationships. So where it is useful in engaging with people around difference is remembering what it is like to be discriminated against because of your language and how you speak and how that can just limit many opportunities. So you asked that question earlier, what are the things that really helped me work with different people and I think many other people who have been marginalized would say from their point of marginalization is to remember, if we want to be empathetic, it’s to remember how it was like for me to feel marginalized. Because of language, because of my race, because of my income status, because of my education, we all have aspects in our lives where we’re marginalized. And we know them because it feels painful.
KC – Yeah.
RN – and it’s easy to name them. But it’s really going there and taking that into an interaction with somebody who’s different, particularly with someone who’s got rank in the situation and then the power and privilege that comes.
KC – Yeah. I’m wondering, it sort of goes back to your point about deep democracy and how it’s all about really hearing all voices, and I guess to really live from a space of deep democracy, to embody that, we have to listen differently don’t we?
RN – Yes, and particularly listening and being curious about the voice that challenges you the most. For black people it could be like really out of right, mean person who says I don’t want to hear, you have no right to survive or live. For women it could be that chauvinist who says why do you want to sit at the same table as me? Go sit somewhere far away from me where women belong. You know, but really slowing down and wanting to understand that particular voice. That for me is what makes the difference between having a democratic attitude and having a deep democracy orientation. To really being with those voices that are hard to be with. Curious, interlocking, empathetic and understanding. And that doesn’t mean you like them. It’s just the impact.
KC – Yeah. I think that’s what I’ve really started to become aware of, is that empathy isn’t about agreeing or liking, it’s about leaning in and allowing their experience from their past to be true.
RN – Right, right.
KC – Gosh, that’s deep democracy in every sense of the word and I’m completely in awe of you actually Ronnie because some of those perspectives and opinions you mentioned must be so hard to even want to sort of listen too, let alone create space for, and I’m just wondering tips you have for people, because I’m aware in myself I think I’d struggle with that, with those kind of people to really be in a deep democracy space with them, what advise do you have?
RN – Well, yeah, I think, what is in my experience, what is in the experience of other people I see developing into engage with those difficult voices. I think the biggest thing is really empathy, before that I suppose curiosity. For me the curiosity would be what goes on for them, what kind of worlds do they come from, what state their belief and what makes it hard for them to examine this belief? And also the empathy bit, after the curiosity is how am I like that? How do I show up like they do? So if I’m in a position of power how am I unconscious and helpful in the way that they are? I would ask those two questions to be curious and really want to understand that place, what do they find and what difference does it make to my world? And I always say there is quite some powerful differences to me made. And the second one is to really understand that to accept that a man like that in other areas of my life and that I’m always developing continuous awareness of how I am like that. The extent to which I might be… my constrict is to work on myself, in my world so to say, but I really think that there always is a residual aspect. I can never get rid of it so I have some chauvinism in me, there’s a classist in me even though I work at it, there is some, it’s there somewhere and sometimes I catch myself. Sometimes I catch myself being asleep to the privilege of health and income and education and being able to do more things in life than someone else. And being oblivious to that. Being dead to the fact that someone else is marginalized, I may be marginalizing them. And if we stop long enough and think about it we will all find areas where we’ve got power because of the period in which we live and the ranking that society gives us.
KC – Yeah. I’ve not thought about it in that way, Ronnie, that we could use these really challenging voices almost as a mirror, a wake up call. A mirror for how that quality may show up in me but also a wake up call too well I have privilege too in other areas and how does that show up and can I be more awake to it and more aware of that impact?
RN – That’s right, that’s right.
KC - Wow.
RN – How am I like them? If you look at it enough you’ll find and so it makes it harder to be almost callous to ourselves.
KC – Yeah. How am I like them, I mean what a courageous way of looking at some of these really challenging voices. What a way to live a life, right, that’s curiosity in every sense of the word, and deep democracy as we’ve been saying and I’m sure in those spaces it’s where we grow the most, right?
RN – Yes. That’s where we grow. We may be shaking as we enter into that world, you know, and that land, as we say, or even in that time, contemplate that world view because it’s edge is difficult to contemplate, but it’s always close, there’s always something waiting for us that’s just informs in a useful and powerful way, our own world.
KC – You are, Ronnie, a learner in every sense of the word. Am I right in thinking you sort of see every opportunity, every relationship, as a chance to sort of grow within yourself.
RN – As you said, it’s how we listen right? It’s important how we listen. And maybe listening to understand, really listening to the other person, and listening for what they’ve said and what’s been said and many other things around it. If we really listen that way we learn a lot from others. You know, so it makes it hard when you are being marginalized, when you’re being discriminated against and in the case of the USA, you know, you’ve got white policemen wanting to shoot you and as a black person you know you’re an endangered species, particularly black men. It makes it hard to actually want to really understand and contemplate that reality, who wants to eliminate you. And develop, and this is even worse, and develop an empathetic understanding of that world. And it makes it hard for black people to want to hold that position where you really hold all voices and you want a clear expression. You know, it makes it very hard because there’s this battle within you. But what also makes it hard is that you’re pissing off other black people because they’re also in the same position and they’ve got this internal, you know, kind of battle with really wanting to step into that difficult voice and try to understand and develop empathy for him.
KC – Yeah, I guess a final question for you Ronnie is around what do you think is possible from this space of deep democracy, if more of us can learn to live from a space of deep democracy?
RN – I think better relationships where people can really appreciate that there is difference and all of those forms of difference should be allowed expression. So I think relationships will be better if we step into those zones. If we didn’t and we marginalized other voices and we did so in a way that made it hard for them to even think of saying something to us, those who would be in a powerful position. So, if we make it hard for people to make a living, well that is powerful because we are abusing our resources and we create a very, very poor community. What comes back to us is a lot of unfortunate things in society. They’ve gone underground, tried to find ways of living, it’s very hard, we’ve closed the doors in so many areas and then we start having crime. There’s a lot of debates about this, but when you really make it hard for people to live there’ll be some form of subterfuge that comes from anger and that anger really drives how we interact with you so it makes it hard for you to have your own life because with anger comes revenge and with revenge comes some heartbreak to us because those people are acting from a position of hurt, it’s sometimes disparaged because they’re just constantly, constantly just closing their options. You have to look at Black Lives Matter, and just see that, you know, that they went underground but they came back out fighting and screaming. And in some cases we have some very angry voices and we don’t want to be prone to violence.
KC – Yeah, so if we don’t lean into deep democracy we hurt a whole system, even if it’s not us initially, it comes back full circle.
RN – Eventually, yeah. People will be angry and they’re going to respond with their anger. And it may be violent or, you know, they must just not be engaged, they’ll be disengaged. You have to, also if you’ve got two milder forms of it, in organizations people abuse their power. Right? An unconscious leader they are hurtful to their employees, they make their employees really scared of them, or they just degraded them. So employees disengage and it works against that organization because they lose the amount of productivity they would otherwise have.
KC –It’s like the ultimate systems view in terms of the human race, zooming out and seeing that bigger picture that doesn’t even just think about what’s happening now, it’s generations to come. It might not harm you directly but it might come back and hurt your children’s life and so it’s about thinking about that wider, that wider system – humanity, and looking at the ripple effect.
RN – That’s right. There are those aspects and I know there are many debates against this, many debates for this, about what causes crime, what doesn’t cause crime, how come some people don’t feel that they should avenge, you know they find other outlets, why shouldn’t you? If the marginalized behaved the same way, and you already hear that kind of tale of this from a position of privilege, I want to dictate how you’re going to respond, what I call appropriate in an appropriate way of responding. So, yeah, but it is, there are lots of debates around this but my feeling is you’re ultimately hurt yourself, society, if you don’t look after the list of inhabitants in your system because there’s a lot of anger that happens and that anger comes with revenge and retribution. That’s what revolutions are made of.
KC – Yeah. And you make me think, if we go wider, you know the way we’re using the planet’s resources right now, it’s coming back to hurt us, there’s just disastrous global warming going on in the form of forest fires, surprising hurricanes, and so we’re seeing it now. It might have taken a couple of years to get here but, as you say, that sort of lack of deep democracy going on, it comes back full circle.
RN – We can see it in all of the different things, we can see it in the racial dimension, we can see it in the gender dimension, we can see it in the sex preferences dimension, we can see it classes between the wealthy and the poor. We can see it in so many areas of our lives, wherever there is that dynamic of the powerful and the less powerful, the privileged and the not privileged. You’ll find that showing.
KC – Thank you so much Ronnie for such a powerful conversation today. I’m going away with a lot but that piece particularly about using those challenging voices as a mirror for what shows up in us, that’s really the one that’s sticking for me so thank you for sharing your inspiring way of working and living and being in the world.
RN – Thank you so much, thank you for the opportunity.
KC – Thank you Ronnie.
[Outro begins 34:43]
KC – A huge thanks to Ronnie Ndlovu for that impactful conversation. My key takeaways are as follows. By being with difference we are recognizing it and allowing for it in our lives. We don’t have to like difference. Being with difference is about recognizing that is has its own right for expression and existence. Intolerance to difference is in part shaped by our beliefs and past experiences. Beliefs that get passed down through generations and our past experiences that perhaps left a mark. Both of these elements can impact our ability to be with difference and can lead us to self-selecting people who are more like us. Having privilege is like wearing a comfy shoe. When you have power you don’t feel the lack of that power, yet if you’ve got a new shoe that’s tight it can be painful and reminds you of what you don’t have. When we have privilege it can be all too easy to be unconscious and fall asleep to that power. How can we be more awake to our power where we have it and our responsibility to use it consciously? Being marginalized and knowing what it is to be without power can offer insight. These experiences can inform your ability to be with other people who are marginalized and made to feel less than in a different way, and it’s important to acknowledge that we are all in some areas of our lives without privilege and we can use these experiences to create empathy and understanding of other marginalized peoples. To find out more about Ronnie’s work do check out CRRGlobal.com. For over 18 years, CRR Global has accompanied leaders, teams, and practitioners on their journey to build stronger relationships by focusing on the relationship itself, not only the individuals occupying it. This leads to a community of changemakers around the world. Supported by a global network of Faculty and Partners, we connect, inspire, and equip change agents to shift systems, one relationship at a time.