Memorial Day

On Monday of last week, we celebrated Memorial Day. According to the Old Farmer's Almanac, founded in 1792, "Memorial Day is a day for remembering and honoring military personnel who died in the service of their country."

The sacrifice our men and women have made in the service of our ideals can never be appreciated enough. Memorial day is also a reminder that as diverse a group of peoples as you can imagine made and continue to make this sacrifice. Men and women, wealthy and poor, and people from every heritage all gave their lives for what we all believe in. We see the differences between us on the factory floor or in our offices, but what differences are there in the acts of courage and sacrifice on the battle field? Do acts of sacrifice have color, age or gender?

There is a spark of life that animates us and unites us all. When we seek first to recognize, honor and respect that in all people, we will then begin to practice inclusion, fairness and respect not because it is an executive mandate but rather because we need to unite the collective organization around goals that are bigger than any one individual.

This is what true inclusive leadership is: helping others see beyond our differences, beyond biases, to see the value each can contribute to our business initiatives if included at the right time and in the right way.

One way of making diversity come to life is to go out of our way to obtain divergent input from various groups when undertaking a major organizational change. What better time is there to reinforce the value of diversity than by asking for input about how to manage complex change so that we consider the many angles and diverse perspectives on how best to evolve the organization.

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