Talking with Ansela Manful

Ansela, how do you define yourself today?

I am a people person with people's well-being in all aspects at heart.  I can be mistaken for an extrovert but at the core, I am more of an introvert with extrovert skills. With that said, it is extremely important for me to retreat from time to time, to get centered, and come back to what I enjoy most:  helping and empowering people.

When did you come to the realization you wanted to work in the D&I space?

As a young girl, I knew I wanted to work in people’s spaces and this led me to consider career paths such as lawyer or life coach. My family on the other hand had opposite aspirations for me (they wanted me to be a medical Doctor or Quantity Surveyor). Ultimately, I  gave in to the pressures of external voices, toed the line, and ended up in construction (as a Quantity Surveyor) because it felt like a stable field. Moving to Berlin, I decided to chase after my passion, which is to work in people-focused fields. This led to where I find myself today; working in HR. 

When I landed in Berlin, I invested my first year and a half learning German and networking. This is how I met Kave Bulambo. Our encounter has been a turning point. We knew we wanted to work together and focus on D&I. Today, we’re running both My Career Path (job search coaching and recruitment services and the Black in Tech Berlin group. 

The other element that attracted me to D&I was my own experience as an immigrant: looking for job opportunities, feeling integrated, and settling in this country. By meeting like-minded people and seeing we were going through similar struggles, I realized I could not do this alone, that we needed to come together. 

How did you get started with Black in Tech? 

As the months went by, I read and attended more events on D&I. I would often hear the argument, “there are not enough diverse people - for example, Black people - in the candidate pool”. This is wrong. Building a diverse team is possible. The question is are we committed to going beyond our own biases, put in the work needed for a more equitable and inclusive workplace? Kave who, up until that point was also very dissatisfied with the lack of diversity in hiring, looked around and found that there was actually no community for Black professionals in tech. She then went ahead and created the Black in Tech Berlin meetup group in February 2019.

The main goal of this community is to support underrepresented groups, particularly people of color, and help them push their careers forward in the tech space.  Seeing the number of people who quickly joined the meetup was amazing. That, in itself, was proof they exist. As of today, we have 830 members. This is huge.

How did the group evolve?

Our very first event was a meet and greet. Since then, we hosted events to nurture a sense of belonging and create a safe space for us to talk about different issues: leadership in tech spaces, Black history, and financial management. We've had the opportunity to partner with companies like Facebook and TomTom before Corona hit. 

The pandemic and the murder of George Floyd, among other things, highlighted how much talking about mental health was relevant. One of our focuses has been holding events on the topic. 

Black in Tech Berlin is an open community. There are no criteria for job title, sector, or seniority level. We initially created this for people of color.  It is exciting to see the spectrum of diversity in the community as we grow. We have members from different races and backgrounds join showing interest and willingness to contribute to the discussion and to be allies.  When it comes to D&I, we should all be careful we are using the right words and not creating exclusion. But the focus is still on unity and addressing imbalances in society.

What are the obstacles you’ve encountered while building this community?

Creating the group has been very smooth. At a certain point, we as organizers of the meetup group asked ourselves how we could go beyond meetup events and make more impact, especially in a year like 2020, which was saturated with virtual events.  We are now working on a product called Talent Diverse, which will be a platform for talent scouting, with a strong focus on D&I. Companies will be able to sign up and enlarge their pool of diverse candidates. That's something we're excited about and hope to bring to life in the coming months. 

How do you define D&I for yourself? 

Diversity is the awareness and acknowledgment that there are a plethora of voices and experiences that exist beyond yours and that have equal value.

Inclusion is making sure we go beyond this first stage of awareness and actually take practical steps to make everybody feel welcome at the table. It is how we, as individuals, as organizations, make sure that people feel safe so that they can thrive, be it at or outside work. 

Loving it. It draws concentric circles, first embracing, then taking action. Can you tell us what you found specific to Berlin?

I find Berlin generally very accepting; that’s why I am personally happy to be here. Regarding D&I, I can see many initiatives coming from the private sector but also the public sector. For example, a public organization called Because Berlin provides all of its services in English for newcomers. And that can be such a stress relief.  Recently, a friend of mine from Zimbabwe reached out because the visa process was becoming challenging. I could redirect my friend to such an organization, which helped her case. 

D&I is also becoming a topic that more and more tech startups are taking seriously. I look at companies like Zalando and events like the one hosted at their headquarters in 2019 and run by Vessy Tasheva (who created initiatives like the Vessy report).

What do you think 2020 has changed for  D&I? 

2020 has forced us as individuals and organizations to reconsider some of the things we used to label as “perks” prior to COVID-19. Working from home was a perk, but it is becoming standard for most companies in 2021 and beyond. Github actually has the lead on this, given that they operate remotely even prior to the pandemic and has become a benchmark for other companies

2020 encouraged us to show a lot more empathy in the workplace. Before COVID-19, we all showed up at work. Nobody cared about what was happening in your home. But today, you are bringing people into your home. You'll have your child crying behind you… Not everybody is fortunate to set up an office at home because it is so busy. I'm pretty impressed with companies who took steps to help their team members in their makeshift offices in their homes by sending tables, desks, or whatever was needed then. 

A number of companies are adopting remote working or hybrid systems and this trend will continue. The huge benefit of this is accessibility, which provides a broader employment opportunity to people who may not have gotten the chance, to begin with.  Suddenly, a software developer based in Botswana or Nigeria has a chance of getting a job from a company based in Berlin because it's okay for them to work remotely. So I'm really excited about that.

Another interesting thing that I recently heard during one of our online meetup events: one person, who identifies as a person of color, shared how much this year has been a relief.  Before the pandemic hit, she had to show up 40 hours a week in a physical space where she had to deal with comments on her hair or some other microaggressions. Remote work has preserved her from all this all of a sudden. 

Finally, 2020 has highlighted so many social injustices. We talked about police brutality. It was not that it wasn't happening before but there has been a huge light on this topic with the Black Lives Matter movement and the sad situation in Nigeria (EndSars, the social movement against police brutality).

If you try to project yourself in one year or five years from now, where do you think the D&I space in Berlin will be?

My hope for five years is for difference not to be questioned but accepted. Of course, difference means having hard talks and making hard decisions. D&I work puts everyone in a vulnerable place, and it is challenging to work on yourself. 

For people working hands-on in D&I, we need to count the cost. By this I mean, it is a long road and we need to persist for a society of equality and inclusion.

I have this other anecdote showing how crucial this is becoming. As part of my activity as a talent sourcer, I was looking to fill a particular tech position once. I had a strong candidate, and one of the questions this person asked me was how diverse the team is, what the management looks like because it was very critical to his decision to join the team. I'm happy to hear this is becoming a question!

What would be your recommendations for someone with no HR background wanting to work on D&I in their companies? 

Go for it! I would also encourage the person to do a lot of learning before launching any specific initiative. It is a lifelong learning process. 

I would also encourage that person not to do it alone: it can start with you alone, but try and get one or two people as the backbone of the initiative.

The other thing would be: get close to communities or causes you want to help. We attend seminars and various events, but sometimes we forget to invest in getting close to the people who are suffering in the situation we’d like to address. 

Thank you. Do you have examples of communities? 

There are plenty of resourceful community groups. For example: ABAWT, Black Brown Berlin, Facebook black berlin group, and Women and Work Connect (on meetup) just to mention a few. Women and Work Connect is actually one of the sub-communities run by Kave and me. I  facilitated a workshop for this community in 2020. It was called “#IamRemarkable which is an initiative by Google.  The main purpose of this workshop was to address the topic of self-promotion particularly amongst women, people of color and underrepresented groups. Based on your background culture, it might sound wrong to articulate what you're working on, talk about performances, and being acknowledged for it. We also delved into gender modesty norms, unconscious bias, and  D&I. It was really a memorable session.

Anything in terms of resources, reads?

I like Vessy’s reports and generally follow her activity. I follow Culture Amp for almost all of their webinars. Culture Amp is a platform for people in Culture  & People Management. They have solutions for D&I, and I totally recommend them.

I enjoyed the book Culture Map by Erin Meyer. It helped me understand how people from various parts of the world can interpret the same situation differently. For example, interacting in board meetings doesn’t mean the same thing for a North American, German, or Indian. Some cultures push you to be extroverted. In some others, you need to be invited to share your opinion to do so. Similarly, the way we take feedback works differently depending on cultural backgrounds. It was mind-blowing to understand that it is not just about race or gender; that there is a cultural aspect to it as well.