CI’s Anti-Racism Commitments: Q4 2021 Update
Capacity Interactive (CI) created and published a list of Anti-Racism Commitments in June 2020. This public statement outlined our action plan for becoming an anti-racist organization and served as an accountability mechanism. As a part of this statement, we committed to reporting on our progress.
This blog post highlights our progress from Q4 2021—I hope it sparks inspiration and courage to enact necessary change at your organization.
What We’re Working On
We recently dissolved our specific sub-committees in favor of creating project-based teams. This new framework will allow our team members flexibility as the needs and interests of our company change.
Digital Marketing Partnership Grant
We officially launched our new partnership grant dedicated to extending our consulting services to BIPOC-serving and BIPOC-led organizations and organizations that center BIPOC arts and culture. We’re currently in the applicant selection process and hope to share more details about the recipient of our grant in future updates.
Digital Marketing Boot Camp for the Arts
We hosted our second fully-virtual conference, using many of the lessons learned from our conference in 2020. Below are a few highlights:
Accessibility: We provided more robust education to speakers and attendees about our accessibility measures (including visual descriptions, land acknowledgments, and pronoun declaration). Additionally, we continued to offer live captioning and ASL interpretation.
Affinity spaces: We hosted post-conference affinity spaces after each day of the conference, led by our staff members. In the future, we plan to incorporate these affinity spaces into our planning process sooner, hoping to increase the number of attendees.
Hiring New Staff
Using lessons learned from our hiring process earlier in the year, we were able to bring on 13 new staff members in November. Our Hiring Advisory Committee, composed of volunteers from across our company, enriches our hiring process and creates a more positive hiring experience for our incoming employees. Members of the committee observe each candidate interview, share feedback, and are vital members of our decision-making processes.
Promotions Process
After launching our promotions process framework earlier this year, we put it into practice during our November semi-annual review process. Our new approach empowers team leaders to advocate for their direct reports and provides a framework so everyone knows what to expect from the process.
Accountability Team: We have also included an accountability team (comprised of more senior and more junior staff) to serve as an extra set of eyes before promotions are made public. We’ve only had one iteration so far, but we hope that having a third party review process will create accountability for our leadership team and the managers who oversee the growth of their direct reports.
We’re starting 2022 with an influx of new members and a new slate of projects to work on, including resurfacing our mentor program for new employees and revamping our pulse survey after a year of use. As always, I’m eager to hear if any of our work resonated with you.
