Are you Kaepernick’d?

When Colin Kaepernick first took the knee to protest, he may not have been the first NFL athlete to use his platform to protest against police brutality and racial injustice, but his dedication brought a huge amount of awareness to this cause. As a Black man of mixed heritage, co-founder of a black-owned business and someone who studies business psychology, Kaepernick’s experience of highlighting injustice and subsequent blackballing of his career provides a microcosm of how many people of colour or other marginalised groups experience injustice or intolerance in the workplace.

Kaepernick paid a heavy price in 2017 after being driven out of his chosen career where he performed at the highest level by the NFL. His peaceful kneeling protests which was also taken up by many other NFL players were finally banned under the threat of hefty fines by the NFL in 2018.

Most recently, current NFL stars shared their feelings and call for justice for the Black victims of police brutality.

Sparked by the widespread outrage of the police brutality that caused the death of George Floyd and the two weeks of protest on 5 June 2020, NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell released a statement apologising for the NFL’s lack of support for Black and ally NFL athletes in earlier protests. Goodall stated “We, the National Football League, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. We, the National Football League, believe Black Lives Matter.” At face value, this statement is a huge turn around from Commissioner Goodall, but one glaring omission was any reference or apology to Kaepernick who is still without a contract and the opportunity to pursue a career in the sport he loves.

Here in the UK, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the inequalities experienced by Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) citizens in the UK. This comes after the recent Windrush scandal, the Grenfell tragedy, employment disparities, racial pay gaps and unequal access to state provided resources such as education, healthcare and housing which negatively impact social mobility for BAME Britons.

In the broader context of the lived experience of black and brown people, many across the world have taken to the streets to join Black Lives Matter protests. Which has sparked a lot of discussion about the dangers of protesting during the current pandemic. This provides an interesting parallel with an organisation such as the NFL and it’s response to a peaceful protest. Considering over 70% of the talent/workforce is black or from an ethnic minority, it quashed a peaceful dialogue about systemic racism and social injustice. This begs the question, what chance do BAME workers have in workplaces where we may only be in a low single digit percentage of the employee base and most likely not considered the most valued or high profile member of the workforce. How do employees openly discuss inequality to bring about organisational change? In the workplace, insensitivity to minorities can range from acts overt discrimination or abuse, denial of support or training opportunities, through to micro-aggressions that are not acknowledged or challenged by leadership.

This brings many challenges for minority employees when navigating the workplace. One strategy is to ignore the slights and lack of comprehension of their lived experience, in other words ‘put up and shut up’ or find a safe space to encourage discussion and engagement with allies on these matters to bring awareness and encourage positive change. The risk for minority employees is being negatively impacted by those who seek not to engage in discussion but see the topics as a challenge to their existing views or not appropriate in the work context. This is analogous to those who counter ‘Black Lives Matter’ with calls of ‘All Lives Matter’. The former does not negate the latter, but when black people and allies support Black Lives Matter, it is call to address systematic and imbedded discrimination that overwhelmingly disadvantages black and brown people.

There are also many black and brown people who after centuries of discrimination and seeing the same patterns of disadvantage repeated decade after decade are just tired of asking for respect and inclusion from a wider society who seem tone deaf to the glaring disparities affecting BAME people.

The accumulated effect on BAME employees causes a lack of advancement and greater employee churn or disengagement. If like Kaepernick, an employee is left with no choice but to leave the organisation, leaders need to be aware of confronting the message this give to others in the business regarding their treatment of their minority employees in the same way the Black Live Matters movement forces our society on reflect on racial discrimination.

As black people, we are often asked or compelled to address bias or come up with solutions. For example, Kaepernick’s original protest tactic was to sit during the national anthem but after discussions with team-mates Nate Boyer and Eric Reid, kneeling was chosen as a more respectful form of protest. In an Atlantic article Kaepernick states “We were talking to him about how can we get the message back on track and not take away from the military, not take away from pride in our country but keep the focus on what the issues really are. As we talked about it, we came up with taking a knee because there are issues that still need to be addressed and there was also a way to show more respect for the men and women that fight for this country.” —

History has shown even this compromise was not enough for NFL leadership and Kaepernick’s career was cut short as a consequence.

This shows that unless we are in positions of leadership or influence in organisations, support for strategies to address institutional injustice rarely get off the ground unless sponsored by a senior leader from the majority community.

To quote Rev. Sharpton at George Floyd’s memorial service, “George Floyd’s story has been the story of black folks because ever since 401 years ago, the reason we could never be who we wanted and dreamed of being is that you kept your knee on our neck.”

My call to action for readers of this post:

On the topic of racial inequality, how organisations address these discussions and your experience of the Black Live Matter movement, please share your response to the following questions:

For black and brown readers:

• What has been the experience of black and brown employees and allies when opening discussions on these topics?
• Does your workplace provide a safe space to discuss these topics?
• Do you feel that leaders from the majority community take onboard the additional stress/challenges experienced by BAME colleagues especially during the pandemic?

If you are a leaders or allies from majority communities:

• How has increased awareness of the Black Live Matter movement sparked by the death of George Floyd changed your perception of systemic racism?
• Have you sought to educate yourself on how systemic racism negatively affects BAME people and which resources have you found most impactful?
• Have you checked in with your BAME team members during the pandemic?

If you would like to reach out and share your experiences, please share in the comments or DM me as I am interested in researching this topic for my studies and better support our clients.