How to Improve Race Relations in Your Workplace, with Paul Mitchell, Mitchell Sales Advisors
John Ray: [00:00:00] John Ray with Business RadioX, and I’m here with Paul Mitchell and Paul is President of Mitchell Sales Advisors and also giving a number of talks on a life in black and white and how to authentically discuss race and address race in the workplace and in business. Paul, as a business leader, my question for you is this. As a business leader, I want to do more to improve race relations in my workplace or in my business. What can I do?
Paul Mitchell: [00:00:33] It starts with exposure and education. It starts with trying to understand what you don’t know about race relations, which you don’t know specifically about what’s going on with black people. And then it leads to compassion and empathy. And being empathetic means to be able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. So in essence, in your business, if you start listening, get in relationship with people and you start talking to them about who they are and the challenges they face, you’ll start learning more and you’ll get in. You’ll get an understanding of what has set them back and what moves them forward. That relationship is so important with everybody we work with and being able to set up systematic ways in your business to do that with every person of color in your organization, knowing that they have had different challenges than the folks that are white in your organization, acknowledging that and being empathetic towards it so you can build authentic relationships with them. That’s what’s meaningful. That’s what my mentor did to me. And I think that’s the opportunity for us all today.
Paul Mitchell, President, Mitchell Sales Advisors
Paul Mitchell, is President of Mitchell Sales Advisors, a firm specializing in sales strategy, sales process, sales execution. Paul has a 25 year history of solving problems through these sales efforts. Paul’s goal is to use this experience and his unique life experiences to help primarily White leaders to learn more about the challenges facing the black community and how it affects their businesses through exposure, education, compassion and empathy.
“A Life In Black and White”
“What do I mean by that? Because of my life experiences, I have been uniquely positioned to provide information and understanding to people of power, primarily White people, to help support better communication and engagement with their employees, families, and expand opportunities to show empathy and compassion to the Black community. Our goal is to help provide information to those who authentically want to learn more about the challenges the black community face in the workplace and how we can develop a true partnership through genuine understanding and knowledge, to help make our workplaces more collaborative and productive. I am seeing interest from many White Americans who want to learn how they can help break the cycle of Black racism and social injustice. This is a key time for business leaders to educate themselves on how to have these meaningful conversations with their employees of all races. Due to my business and life experiences, I find that I am uniquely qualified to offer support in doing just that.”
Paul Mitchell’s LinkedIn profile
Mitchell Sales Advisors website
Listen to the complete North Fulton Business Radio interview with Paul here.
The “One Minute Interview” series is produced by John Ray and in the North Fulton studio of Business RadioX® in Alpharetta. You can find the full archive of shows by following this link.
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