Attuned In: Stacy Fields

Aside from a once-in-a-century pandemic, 2020 was a year of social and racial injustice. Cases like that of George Floyd brought emotions to the forefront and gave rise to protests and division. While this was clearly a difficult time for the country, it was also difficult for many of Dow’s employees.?

When an employee told me he didn’t feel supported and no one checked on him after the events of last summer, it made me realize that I was not informed or empathetic to this particular situation. It was eye opening to see the level of distrust that’s out there, and many employees didn’t really believe I cared. I wondered how we make progress if we have this huge lack of trust. However, the more I learned about American history, it’s very apparent why there is no trust.?

It became very important to me to get that next level of understanding and education from my colleagues. I needed to create an environment where employees felt comfortable sharing those feelings. For this reason, I began to have conversations with the people in my organization to gauge their feelings and to offer my support.?

While the conversations continued and I learned increasingly more about racial and cultural differences, this led me to an idea. We needed to share these perspectives and normalize these types of open and honest conversations so everyone can learn and grow. These conversations can help us better embrace diversity of thought and experience and remind us that we are all more alike than different.

Each month, I plan to share my learnings from this past year, as well as my colleagues’ advice and perspectives (with their permission, of course). These one-on-one conversations will be honest and transparent. I’ll do this to continue my own education and growth, and to hopefully help others broaden their understanding and knowledge of cultural issues.?

The word “attuned” means aware or receptive, which is how the name for the series evolved: “Attuned In.”?

A Conversation with Stacy Fields, Key Customer Executive

When my conversations began last summer, employees were understandably a bit hesitant to join these listening sessions. However, Stacy Fields stepped forward as a leader not only to participate in these conversations, but also to lead “lunch and learn” sessions with employees around cultural differences. Because of his leadership, openness and his 30-year career with Dow, it made sense to invite Stacy to be my first counterpart in this series of conversations around cultural awareness. Stacy is seen by other members of the group as vocal. But he also believed someone finally cared enough and is committed to make real change. He was willing to put his distrust aside in the hope that real changes are made.

One of the biggest things I learned from Stacy is that while the events of last summer have pushed our society and corporate America to rectify race inequalities, it cannot possibly make up for the history of inequity over the past years. If you liken this situation to a foot race on a track, history has put people of color behind the other team members at the starting line. This hasn’t been rectified so that it’s now a fair race. As Stacy put it, “As we look forward, based on where we are today, we need to reset the starting line so we all start from the same place. Everyone thinks we’re off to a great start and wants to ‘reset the team,’ but we have NOT reset the starting line, and now when the race starts, it’s still not fair.”?

And this is true. We can all agree the system is not correct. It’s a systemic issue we’re dealing with.??What Stacy believes needs to happen is to make this adjustment right now.??But are schools, organizations and government willing to do that??

Stacy said: “We can say we’re looking at things differently, but we’re not actually really doing any of this reconciliation to reset the starting line and make things more equitable. Since the early years of my grandparents and parents, change has evolved too slowly. We don’t need to keep saying that ‘things will change, but it takes time.’??We need to reconcile for progress now. The time is now to move forward. The question is:??Who is willing to make it right, right now?”

As a Brazilian who moved to the U.S., I became a student of American History. It didn’t take me long to realize that the system has always left people of color behind. While we’ve made a lot of progress, the events of 2020 show how far we still need to go. Something Stacy said when I tried to empathize with him was very profound. I told him it was hard to be a “foreigner” in this country. Stacy said, “This is my native country, and even I don’t feel welcome. I have nowhere else to go. That’s not okay.”

The other issue is that,?at times in our society reliant upon real-time social media, some people may?expect instant results, similar to social media. But true change takes work, time and guidance.?

When I asked Stacy about the generational aspects of racial and cultural bias, he gave me a very interesting and instructive answer. Stacy shared that his parents taught him to work twice as hard and use education to gain more opportunities to fight against the racial and cultural biases he faced.??He believes change has evolved slowly over the years, enabling him to have more opportunities than his parents. He hopes these changes will enable his children – if they are determined enough??–??to become even more successful. In fact, Stacy took a page from his own experience and cancelled his lawn service when his son turned 16.??His goal was to teach his son that being successful, even at mowing your own lawn, takes skill and hard work. It’s all about sweat equity. This isn’t something that happens at the click of a mouse.

Stacy is optimistic about change. However, when he conveyed the aforementioned advice his parents gave him during a lunch and learn session, a Black colleague at least 20 years his junior said his parents gave him the same advice, which means we’ve not evolved as much as we should have over time.

I then asked what needs to be done for Dow and our society to try and catch up. The answer was that we needed to create more opportunities to learn and grow. Unfortunately, not all of Stacy’s experiences have been good.

At one point, Stacy mentioned that he sometimes felt he was in “survival mode.” That meant, because he was different than the rest of his work group, he always needed to prove himself. However, when he asked his supervisor “too many questions,” his boss at the time incorrectly perceived that Stacy didn’t know anything or make meaningful contributions to the company.?

We have to do better than just expecting people of color to survive. This is not our measure of success. They need to have the opportunity to thrive and be successful just like everyone else.

Stacy also faced other negative experiences at work. He felt that when he moved groups within Dow, he went from being known within his business unit to having to build new relationships and rebuild what was already his good reputation. In fact, Stacy said he felt “overlooked for opportunities” with more stature. That said, he enjoys his current role, but is still looking for more exciting opportunities to accelerate his own personal growth.?

My takeaways from the conversation

I am so appreciative of the candid, honest dialogue with Stacy. I was saddened to hear some of his negative experiences and perceptions, and this is where raw authenticity from employees like Stacy helps us learn to “do better.” We need more of these candid conversations.?

One thing I really took to heart from my discussion with Stacy is that we need to work harder to listen, prepare leadership to support our employees and implement more education for our entire organization. I am cognizant, however, that we also need to put actions behind our words, because as Stacy highlighted: “This is where the real change begins.”?

Dow has begun this by laying the groundwork with the?Dow Advocacy, Community and Talent (ACT)?program introduced last year. Stacy finds the Advocacy in Action pillar of this program a great resource where young talent is paired with senior leadership. The senior leader becomes the mentee’s advocate and mentor, exposing them to various businesses across Dow. It can be a bit uncomfortable at first, since the mentor and mentee are somewhat unknown to each other, but within a 12-18 month period, the mentee can be on a completely different and upward path, exposed to good things and opportunities. This is great for both the mentor and the mentee.

Dow and other companies will implement these programs and activities, but we all need to actively participate individually in efforts to make these actions happen. As a leader of Dow’s Packaging and Specialty Plastics (P&SP) organization, I am also personally committed to aid in such efforts. This includes additions to our P&SP cultural listening program to continue to educate ourselves and support employees of color.??Other actions include

• Employee Development Program (EDP):?Our organization held many clear discussions about the EDP and how every employee can build their network, skillset and career so they can have a clear plan and specific tactics to get promoted. The EDP aids employees and teaches them not how just to “survive,” but how to succeed and elevate within the organization.??
• Recruitment and retention:?Stacy shared two examples with me. One was when he went to a historically black college and university (HBCU) Prairie View A&M University in Texas to recruit, and he was blown away that the students didn’t flock to the Dow booth just because the company is a Fortune 50 corporation. They went to the companies and competitors who had built and nurtured relationships with the students by offering scholarships or internships and opportunities along the way.??This is something Dow is working towards actively. He also shared that the editor of a key industry publication?Plastics News?published a transparent article?about the lack of Black employees and diversity in general in the publication and how they were taking steps to try and change that. Stacy reached out to him and told him that he needed to take specific actions like recruiting from HBCUs and operating very intentionally about these recruitment and retention strategies. The editor, in turn,?published Stacy’s response?with permission.?

Awareness, support, bias training and education:?Unfortunately, most of us have bias of some kind. It could be unconscious or deliberate. It could be related to people of color or to those who are different in another way. I believe we can all benefit from education around this and learn how we might improve.??I invited all the leadership team to participate in our lunch and learn sessions to share their own examples and begin these dialogues. As I continue my journey here, I believe all levels of our organization can do more to listen to our colleagues of color. Opening opportunities for dialog around cultural challenges better enables empathy and understanding.

My conversation with Stacy opened my eyes as to what I can do as a leader to understand and become empathetic to what employees face inside and outside the workplace. Listening and learning is something we can all do.??

We must always encourage colleagues to have their own open dialogue on these subjects. Stacy observed that salespeople do better when they aren’t selling. They do better when customers buy into things on their own. That was a great observation we need to take to heart.

This journey has enlightened me about how much I did not know. These conversations were raw, unfiltered and pivotal for me. In fact, I felt a lot of shame about my lack of knowledge around the racial issues and divide. I compare this to learning another language, albeit fundamentally different. When you begin to learn, you start with complete ignorance. Before long, you’ve moved across the spectrum to knowing the language nearly 100 percent and putting it into practice daily. I realized my lack of awareness and education was proliferating racism. While I cannot change my past, I’ve learned so much about what I can do.??I see this as a first step in a never-ending education and plan of action. Although I don’t know where this will take us, I will not let the uncertainty of the end game stop me. I’m going to be persistent in my efforts to move this forward and drive the necessary change.??