Observing Juneteenth in Insurance: We Can All Do More

We are fortunate to be in growth mode at Foresight, meaning I’m seeing several new hires’ faces on team calls every single week. It’s been as uplifting as it is eye-opening. Many of our incoming staff are long-time veterans of the insurance industry, who share that they have never worked for an employer where Juneteenth is observed as a company holiday. While disappointing, that discovery has provided a starting point for a number of conversations around our responsibilities to continuously developing, investing in, and growing our antiracism — not only as companies within the insurance industry but also as individuals in every space we move through. And as of yesterday’s heartening news that Congress voted to make “Juneteenth National Independence Day” this country’s 11th federal holiday, we have strong reason to hope that more public and private businesses will engage in these kinds of dialogues.?

Foresight’s doors are closed on Friday, June 18, in observance of Juneteenth (June 19, annually), which is one of the oldest holidays celebrated in North America. Juneteenth honors the day in 1865 that word of emancipation at the conclusion of the Civil War finally reached a largely isolated group of slaves in Galveston, Texas — deep within Confederate territory, some of the last enslaved people to hear the news.?

While awareness is increasing largely thanks to the work of activists across the United States and of course the campaigns that resulted in Congress’ decision yesterday, there are still pockets of this country (and enormous populations outside of it) where people aren’t familiar with Juneteenth. Believe me, as someone who was born in Australia, I get it — we have many of our own issues to overcome, deeply tied to the historical crimes and abuses against Australia’s indigenous and ancestral peoples. Since 1998, Australians honor May 26 annually as “National Sorry Day,” or “National Day of Healing,” where we acknowledge the suffering and mistreatment of indigenous people in Australia as a step forward in the healing process. Now that I call the Bay Area home, I’ve had to pick up the pace of my own personal learnings and understandings of the painful history of this nation; and watching the Black Lives Matter movement increase the urgency and reach of its work has been a powerful inspiration.?

Far too often, when we have questions pertaining to race and racism, we ask members of an oppressed community to answer all of those questions for us and provide us with a list of resources. The labor to educate those of us with a knowledge gap should not fall on the shoulders of the impacted community — especially when so many incredibly powerful Black voices have already taken the time to compile lists and resources, and all we need to do is Google or go to the library. It is our own personal and professional duty to overcome the blind spots, ignorances, and miseducations within our worldview, and to correct them.?

Giving our team Friday as a holiday comes with coaching from the leadership team that we must take time this day to improve our antiracism without burdening Black friends and colleagues with requests for their labor. We must do the work, the research, the reading, and the listening, ourselves. Take the time to witness, and then to sit and process what we have learned.?

A few weeks ago the Foresight team began sharing — within our team Slack channel — resources that each of us found helpful in fostering a better education ahead of Juneteenth. Employees shared that they are reading books like Caste by Isabel Wilkerson, How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi, and several articles by Latria Graham; listening to podcasts like “CodeSwitch” and “1619,” and watching films like 13th. We shared a list of books celebrating The Rich History of Black Cuisine, which includes some mouthwatering recipes. We followed Apple’s “Juneteenth: Freedom Songs” playlist.?

We discussed how to talk about why our offices were closed with our brokers and clients. This reminds me to an extent that we are still on the ground floor of solid antiracism work in insurance in many ways. Our hope is that next year when we call to let clients know that we’ll be out of the office in honor of Juneteenth, everyone who answers says “We are, too.”?

What are your hopes and wishes for Juneteenth in your workplace this year and beyond??