We're excited to have Dana Duckworth join us for Hints from HR today. Dana Duckworth is DEI & Social Impact Specialist with Zumper. Join us as we dive into this important conversation about diversity, equity and inclusion.
We're excited to have Dana Duckworth join us for Hints from HR today. Dana Duckworth is DEI & Social Impact Specialist with Zumper. Join us as we dive into this important conversation about diversity, equity and inclusion.
[00:00] Nicolle Block: Well, good afternoon, everyone. We're so glad that you are able to join us today for a fantastic episode of Hints from HR. I'm Nicole Block, director for Brookfield Properties, and I also have with me, of course, my partner in crime, Becca Ramadi, the vice president for the Texas Department Association's Education Foundation, and at Per, the usual, we have found a fantastic and dynamic guest to join us today for these 30 minutes. Her name is Dana Duckworth. She works with Zumper and she is a DE&I and Social Impact Specialist. We are super excited to have her today. We're going to give her a chance to kind of introduce herself and kind of kick off what she's passionate about. But if you guys will remember, we talked a little bit about DE&I with Jason Cantu and Staci Hasman, which were NAA's DLP Diversity Leadership Program, recipients of a scholarship through NAA. We talked with them earlier in our program, and we just kind of scratch the surface of DE&I, and we really wanted to bring someone back that had a lot of insights and knowledge for us so that we can just, again, just be better, just grow in this industry and grow as people. So I definitely want to recognize Dana Duckworth. Give her an opportunity to introduce yourself. Dana, we're so happy that you're here. So tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got to this position that you currently are supporting.
[01:17] Dana Duckworth: Well, thank you so much for your kind words, first and foremost, and thank you all for having me. I'm super excited to have this opportunity to share something that I am truly passionate about within the multifamily industry. So I will start off the way that I start all of my DE&I trainings with our team, with our roomies is what we call employees at Zombie. I start by introducing myself and then asking them who they are. So I will tell you who I am. I am Dana Duckworth. I am a black woman. I am a mother of teenage twin boys. I am a wife. I'm a business owner. I am a dog mom to a very spoiled Yorkie poo. I am a forever student. And I am a passionate champion of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. And I've served the multifamily industry in multiple facets over ten years, going into eleven years, starting as a leasing agent, working towards assistant manager, property manager, and then later supplier partner.
[02:19] Nicolle Block: What a great way to just introduce and kind of open up, really, the conversation anytime you're meeting anyone. So I know that's part of digging out here a little bit. I know it's part of your secret sauce there at Zumper, but how did this position that you currently hold take part? Because I don't believe you started at Zumper in this role. So can you kind of walk us through how you started with Zumper and really how you're activated to serve in this capacity.
[02:44] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. So if you all are not familiar with Zumper, we are actually the largest privately held rental marketplace, so we connect renters with landlords and multifamily communities. And I originally started in a sales capacity, again, still serving multifamily. For me, if you can tell through the screen, I am a big conversationalist and a relationship girl. Okay? So I love calling on multi family communities because it resonated with me because I was on site, so I knew exactly what the day to day was like. I worked for a previous company doing that, and then when I had someone who I worked with before reach out to me about Zumper, it was a no brainer for me to step back into the supplier partner role and really come into this establishment. Never having worked at a start up, I was really excited for that challenge. And through my time in sales, I like to say that my passion really outperformed my profession here at Zumper. I founded our Black Lives Matter employee resource group after the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020, and from there, my passion just grew. I was trying to do any and everything I could to make sure that myself and everyone around me and all of the employees had a space where they felt they really belonged. So I worked my way out of the sales career and into a career.
[04:05] Nicolle Block: That's absolutely fantastic and really inspiring. And if you don't mind, I'd like to kind of break that down a little bit further. As you know, our target audience is going to be a job seeker. It's going to be an operator, it's going to be a supplier. And for the leaders that are out there that may or may not have either knowledge or awareness of these types of initiatives and programs, how did it work with numbers? How did you kind of activate, like you said, and kind of get them to create this role and then define it? So can you share a little bit about that journey?
[04:36] Dana Duckworth: Honestly, it was very organic. When I started my work with the employee resource group, we went to our CEO and said, hey, this happened. This hurts us. We are in pain. We want to do something. We want to start this employee resource group. And thankfully, some amazing people who were already here had already started our Out ERG, which supports LGBTQIA Plus. So we had a format. So when we said we wanted to do this, our CEO was like, absolutely, and I will be your executive sponsor. From there, we started creating and doing sessions and panels and challenging and building and working with nonprofits and engaging our audience and educating so much educating and really standing in as a black person, having so many allies within the company just raised their hand like, yes, I want to be a part of this group. I want to be a part of this thing. I want to learn more. I want to educate myself. I'm here with you. So it really was very organic, and I worked in my ERG, and then I started supporting other ERGs because Black Lives Matter at Zumper had a great format. We met every month. We would operate off of our pillars, which are diversity, education, advocacy, and change, and we will provide amazing sessions for our members. And from there, I wanted to help anyone else. So we had our AAPI ERG that rolled out, which supports our AAPI, Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage. Like, what can I do for you all? What can I give you that we've already established here? We had our women's group that I set up the board for. I was very hands on in that, like, what can I do for you all? How can we make this thing work? So really, having people that are already here, already employed, already passionate professionals, already seeing that, hey, we want to make this thing the most amazing that we can. I'm so fortunate for my ERG leaders, but through working in the ERG space, I worked myself into a der space. And thankfully, our VP of people, I recognize it and say, hey, you can definitely do some things on this HR team. We will have it.
[06:49] Nicolle Block: And that's fantastic. And so the ERGs are their employee resource groups. And so you name four of those that you've already created or helped to create. And it wasn't just you help to create a ERG so that you can give several different diversity options, several hundred people voices, and also allies, as you mentioned, to join these type of resource groups. Can you share with us a little bit about the kind of the programming that goes on? I know you shared some of the nonprofits that you guys support also as a company, but the ERGs drive a lot of at least direction. It's a group. I know it's not just one, but can you kind of talk through the nonprofits you support and how you kind of back into that as a company, making sure your ERGs are represented?
[07:33] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. So just for the audience to know, ERGs or employee resource groups are voluntary employee led groups. And the reason why they're so organic is because an employee says, hey, I want to do this. It's not the company saying, hey, do this. Run this for us. It's the people that are already in your organization that wants to do these things. So really, if you're engaging the population of your employees, you will know who these champions are who want to do this type of work. We'll get into a little bit of that later in our chat here, but through our ERGs, we're able to support so many nonprofits. So it's Pride Month. Our ERG, of course, is going to make a donation to a nonprofit that aligns with them. They typically do a cabaret every year that raises money for a different organization. Excuse me. This year it was Broadway cares.
[08:26] Dana Duckworth: Last year it was Broadway cares and equity fights AIDS. This year they raised money for Broadway fights. Racial injustice. So amazing things there are BLM ERG, we are so excited. This is our second annual internship that we're running with the Harlem Children's Zone. We welcome four interns last year. We welcome seven just this Monday. And they serve youth in Harlem, New York. And we're fortunate to have them come in and work in our accounting, our client services, our operations department, social media, to really give them that real world experience, our Asian American Pacific Islander heritage, ERG, they support AAPI communities. One thing that I absolutely love, that this group did, unfortunately, is something they had to do at the height of the violence in the Asian community. They noticed that elders were being attacked or having acts of violence, so they volunteered to do safe walks to work. Safe walks to the store. So this is the type of work that you see within these employee resource groups. These people are dynamic and passionate and definitely not to forget our women's, ERG, who made a nice donation to care.org to support women and children impacted by the crisis in Ukraine.
[09:44] Nicolle Block: Yeah. And fantastic. And I think that the key word for the owners of the world and the associates that are working and job seekers is that this is voluntary and it's driven by your passion. And so it's something that you're probably already aligned with in your personal life, potentially. And then maybe you can also carry that over to your professional life. But what a great foundation just for a voice and just for the actual activation, as you said, of the associate, just to bring that much more like I think about we were talking yesterday, you were so proud to work not worse, sorry, are so proud to work for Zumper because they're able to give you this platform and do something that aligns with your passion. And I think that as a job seeker, we'll talk about that, too, is that when you're looking for a company to potentially join, are they aligning with your value? So let me step back for 1 second and let's ensure that you're able to give your kind of broad based definition of DE&I and really what companies should be, what they should look like excuse me. If they are really living a de and I kind of experience in their culture.
[10:52] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. So, for me, diversity is going to be the differences amongst the populations in your organization. So a lot of times when we talk about diversity, the first thing people think of is race, maybe sex. But diversity is so much more. And that's why I always start with an introduction of who I am. Because if others are to follow the format of who I am, they're giving me the things that they want to lead with. They're giving me their authentic selves and the things that really resonate with them. It's important that you know that I have teenage sons. That tells you a lot about me. It's important that you know that I'm a dog mom and I work from home, so you may hear that dog from time to time. So these are the things that we need to be encouraging our employees to lead with and really building that authenticity. So it's really about the differences amongst your population. Then we get into that equity, which most people think is just equal. It's really impartial processes, programs, practices that you have built within your organization. It also means that equity is different from me to you. So you need to meet your employees with where they are in order to get them where they need to be. And then we move into the inclusion, which is the equal access. And it's not just the representation or the symbolic of, I have a black employee, we have Asian employees, we have women employees. It's the actual part that they get to chime in. Their voices are heard. They're not just seen, but heard and felt. And their influence and impact thrives throughout your company, throughout your program. You have their decisions, their voice, and you will lend your ear to those folks for me.
[12:33] Nicolle Block: Yeah. That's fantastic. And we share with us what it looks like to you. You shared a great analogy, and I think it's just fantastic. But can you share with me how that's illustrated with some of the relationships you have at Zumper?
[12:45] Dana Duckworth: Oh, absolutely. So my team is so amazing, and for me, diversity looks like one of my great friends and good colleagues here is actually a veteran. He lives on a farm. He has a rescue farm. He's a full farmer in Michigan. I'm a 34 year old black mother, two twin boys, and I work in this office behind a computer screen and have no my nails will tell you that I do not do any hard labor on anyone's part. But this is what diversity looks like in action. I don't know that I will be anywhere else where I will be able to build a relationship with the farmer, but through our employees, and we start to learn, like, who are these people outside of work? We start to learn that, hey, this is really diverse, actually. And what you're seeing on the outside may not always be just the scope of that diversity. When you really lean in and get to know the people that you're working with, the people that you're working for, and the ones that contribute to your success, you will be surprised at how different and how much resonance and how much of the same person you all actually are.
[13:52] Nicolle Block: Absolutely.
[13:52] Dana Duckworth: So there's so much beauty and being the same and equally beautiful is the differences that we all have.
[13:59] Nicolle Block: No that's wonderful. And I can't help but smile just hearing that. I think that as we've had relationships over time, all of us, it's just some of the most surprising things come organically as we are getting to know everyone and really what they're all about. So, as you said, we can meet them where they are so we all can get there together, right? Yeah, absolutely. So for the job seeker, this might actually answer also for the operator, Dana, so feel free to take it in any direction you want. But as a job seeker, how do I know when I'm looking online or when I'm talking to a potential employer? How do I know that their focus is on DE&( or that they thought about it or that they have any type of a platform?
[14:37] Dana Duckworth: Yes.
[14:38] Becca Ramati: And that it's real? It's not sure.
[14:40] Nicolle Block: Absolutely.
[14:42] Becca Ramati: How can they tell that it's yeah.
[14:46] Dana Duckworth: We're checking for authenticity here. So for job seekers, I would say the first thing that most job seekers do after they learned about your job listing is they go to your website. So what does your website look like and what is it representative of? I know for a long time, websites have been very standard. We're going to show you our CEOs and their blue suits with their headshots. No, we don't want to see that. Job seekers don't want to see that. They want an actual inside look of what the culture of your company is like. We know what a CEO typically looks like, and you all look amazing, but that's not what we're looking for when we're looking at positions. So I would encourage job seekers, if that is not accessible on a company's website, don't write them off, because we're all growing and changing within this landscape and forever learning, and we'll continue to be students of diversity, equity, and inclusion. But ask them, hey, I noticed that your website didn't include any photos of your culture or your volunteer acts or how you really engage with your company. Can I see some photos from your last holiday party? Do you have anything that's upcoming an event that you all will be at? Show me the flyers. Show me the way that you promote these things. What is the internal marketing that you're doing to really engage your company? Do you have any challenges, any programs? What is mentorship look like there? So really dig in and ask those questions. Ask what the policies and practices are that support DE&I. And when you bring your authentic self to them within your job interview and first day of working forever more, let them know who it is that you are. So if you do have some of those passions, they will already know when the question arises, like, hey, who would be good at this? Or who do we think this opportunity would be great for? You told them they want who you were, so now they know.
[16:32] Nicolle Block: Yeah, absolutely. And speaking of that interview process, I know kind of went through what Zumper's interview process looks like for, I don't know, all positions, but several positions and talking through the values interview, if you can share a little bit of that, and that might be something for the recruitment process and the community manager on site or the local manager of a supplier's office, et cetera. Walk us through your interview process to where you know that this gets injected into that process when you're selecting and they're selecting their future company.
[17:08] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. So our interview process is three to four interviews. You'll meet with your hiring manager. You'll meet with someone who is on the team that you'll be working with, not in that management position. You may have a presentation, a demo or an onsite where you have to show a technical skill. So by the time you get to me, I'm your values interviewer. And when we think of like an interview, we're thinking like, she's going to ask me all these behavioral questions and then give me a grade one through whatever to determine if I answer them correctly, but know what it is for me and what I challenge myself to do is to really have a conversation with them. So when someone comes to me for Values interview, it means that everybody else was really engaged with this candidate. And now it's just time to see if this candidate wants to engage with us and if some of their previous practices kind of align with what it is that we want here. And it's not to say that any answer is the wrong answer, but it's really to have a discussion about what it is that we are at Dumb and what our culture is like. So that, you know, as an employee, day one, this is who we are and we laid that out for you. So what I love about our values and my favorite one and the one that aligns with me so much and when I get to this question, I almost get giddy when I'm talking to those that I'm interviewing, I was like, all right, so we're going to move on to our next value of make a dent. And this one aligns with me so much because I was able to come into the organization and make a dent. I am not the only one who has that story. We have so many people who have started in one role, transition to another, been promoted, are in completely different departments. So Zumper is really, if you build it and you show proof, they will engage you and say, hey, do it for us again and do it here. So I love to talk about that and then ask them in their previous roles, how have you made a dent? Like, what has your impact done? And I think by the time the interviewees get to me, I've heard it so many times that, hey, everybody along the process of this interview process is just, like, really embody the culture of Zumper. And I tell them, I said, listen, when I got here, I've worked in different sales organizations, and I was like, wait a minute. This is pleasantville. Everybody wants to help me. Everybody wants to jump on this. Everybody wants to do that. Everybody wants to contribute to my success. I said, that's real. We're going to be all up in your business because we believe in you. If you're here, like, we want you to be successful. They're like, this is really the culture. Yes, it is. And it's because we started from day one letting you know from our onboarding process, we on board you. We have a cultural onboarding. We have an ERG onboarding. So we're giving you everything that you need to successfully contribute but really shine here in our organization.
[19:54] Nicolle Block: Well, and the way that they react during that values interview, I think also speaks volumes because you are being as truly transparent and authentic as it gets. Hopefully and I say this during our processes too, you're selecting me just as much as I'm selecting you. It's very 50 50. We both have to agree that you are the best fit for Brookfield in my case. And so we have a lot of those similar conversations as well. And it is evident sometimes if they're saying, hey, everyone's been very consistent as far as how they brought them their authentic self excuse me to the interview. It's encouraging, but it is probably a good opportunity if someone's like, I don't know that I want everybody up in my business, right, and they're going to deselect themselves. Whereas if there's someone like, yes, be up in my business because I want to grow, then it's definitely their place. That's really encouraging and just the authenticity. I mean, Dana, during our pre call, three of us like, man, this is a great authentic conversation we had because you show up that way, and that's really fantastic to see. But another analogy that you shared with Becca and I yesterday, and you just kind of hinted just now when you're talking about, hey, once you get here, this is the onboarding process, this is what you can expect. Can you share with us kind of your house analogy? Because I think that actually resonates with everyone, every company, job seeker, because whether it's your culture, whether it's DE&I, whether it's social impact, or whether it's just operations, I think that this really resonates. So can you share that analogy with us, please?
[21:25] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. So a little analogy, and it just kind of came out organically in our conversation. Nothing to do with the fact that Zumper's logo is the house, but to tie it back.
[21:37] Nicolle Block: We are in a multifamily industry, though, so we could do housing if we needed to.
[21:41] Dana Duckworth: Housing. The analogy is like, your home may be beautiful, so your website may display all of the things that I told you job seekers are looking for. They may be talking to the right one person on your team to really get them engaged and think that the culture is like that. Your house may be pristine, it may need a little pressure washing, but it may be pristine. But when they come inside of that house, what does it look like? Is it chaotic? Is it messy? Is it nasty? What are these things? So not only do you need to be looking for diverse candidates, you need to be preparing yourself to help diverse candidates thrive and grow within your organization, because you can get them there, but does that mean they're going to stay? If the environment is not welcoming, if there are micro aggressions, if it's not inclusive, you need to really be thinking about that thing, not just how do I get diverse employees to make it look good, but how do I really engage these people? How do I become culturally competent? How do I provide the things that I need to make the workspace equitable for those folks?
[22:45] Becca Ramati: Dana, what about educating those who aren't of a diverse background or who didn't grow up with diversity in their experience? Is there a part of DE&I that kind of addresses that in terms of helping you say, what kind of cultural competencies do I need to be able to be a good ally? Things like that. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because while I think it's becoming more common to talk about it, it can be difficult still to know what the right terms are, the right things are to say. And so I think some of the times that might be part of the barrier to having a more inclusive workplace as well.
[23:23] Dana Duckworth: Absolutely. I always say, Give each other grace. And since I was in the Director Leadership program, erica Mullins, she actually taught us about the art of the ouch. And if someone says something, does something, or something happens that's offensive to you in that moment, if you say ouch, it does not put people on the defense. It does the opposite. They want to know, oh, my goodness, what's wrong?
[23:46] Nicolle Block: What happened?
[23:47] Dana Duckworth: Are you okay? It allows for that pause. So I would say, give each other grace. This is a continued landscape, and like I said, I'm a continued student. I will be a student forever because we're learning, we're growing, we're evolving every day. So give each other grace. If you are in a position to teach, do teach. But if you are in a position where you're seeking information, it is not your job and it is not the requirement of your underrepresented minorities to teach you what it is that you want to know. We have all of this Internet, all of this YouTube that you can really lean on to learn the things that you need to learn. I use coursera to teach myself different things. Like I said, I'm continuing to learn. So I'll go in there, I'll pay for a quick session and learn some different things, some fundamentals. Also, it's about exposure. So who are you inviting to happy hours? Who's coming to lunch with you? Who else are you getting to know? Like, for a lot of us, it's very easy to be like, okay, this person looks like me, sounds like me, they will get me. So I want to work on this project with them. No, challenge yourself. And it's really an exercise on we all have to be knowledgeable of our unconscious bias. And it's really hard because for a lot of us, is unconscious. But you need to evaluate those unconscious biases, and then once you shine light on them, you can work against them. So moving your biases from unconscious to conscious will allow you to grow in the space of desi and be a better ally.
[25:20] Nicolle Block: Well, in several of our episodes that we've had, regardless of the topic, we're trying to just engage and spark a conversation at your company. We're trying to get you to ask yourself some of these questions as a company, as leaders, as job seekers, as operators, as supplier partners. So this has been really eye opening and hopefully engaging for our audience because kind of this overview, like she said, if we are not prepared to be walking that denai lifestyle and becoming like, the fabric of our culture, then are we doing a disservice to ourselves and to all of our job seekers when they come in at our house and they see the doors are closed? Just kind of follow up your analogy. Right? So I think that for our audience here, just kind of take some inventory. Again, ask yourself the tough questions. I think this has been fantastic. Again, just be thought provoking just to ask those questions. But one of the things I'll wrap up with Dana is who is doing it right. So I know we had talked about you have lots of different peer groups that are outside of our industry, and you get to have those types of engagement meetings just to make your program stronger and your platform just that much more impactful. So who outside of our industry is doing it well and why are they doing it well? What are they doing to support this?
[26:42] Dana Duckworth: Yeah. I am so fortunate to be able to talk to other practitioners who do this work. It's very important that if you are in the DE&I space doing this work, burnout is real for us, that you have your tribe that you can communicate and that you can lean on and that you can pull from as far as resources, education, and moving your biases along from the unconscious conscious. Because biases are natural and we all have them, unfortunately. So I would say, for me, I look at Salesforce, they're incredibly transparent in what it is that they do. There their website. They have a section. Dedicated to DE&I and they're telling you the numbers and they're telling you their targets. I would say Adobe as well. And then LinkedIn is really shining in that space. So if you're looking for a framework, these companies of course, are very, very huge and number is 257 people to date. So we are not that large. But it just starts with really that fire and that passion. Like, look at people. Look for your Dana Duckworth in your company who are doing one thing, but you obviously know that this person has something else to offer in that space. Look for your most loyal people. Look for the ones who champion your company on the weekend when they're not in their nine to five role. Look for the ones who are wearing their T shirts to the gym and anybody asks them about it. They want to talk about it and tell you how great that organization is. These are people that will stay and play with you and help you build something amazing in your company.
[28:16] Nicolle Block: Oh, absolutely. I think that just the information. I think it's just so enriching and being able to activate I think that's just such a strong word for me from our conversation is that we do have these people, whether your company is ten people or 10,000 people, you're still going to have people that are passionate about a multitude of things. And so being able to have them engage that passion when we talk about the challenges that we have as far as finding and keeping great talent, this is just one more way that we can ensure that the people that are here feel enriched, they feel supported, they feel loved and valued, so they continue on. And that only makes our company stronger, which makes our industry stronger. So I think that that is just fantastic advice and I think that it's something that every person listening can really relate to. So I know our time is up. I mean, Dana, you have just been such a breath of fresh air to the past couple of days for me to be able to talk to you. So I appreciate your time, I appreciate your insight. I look forward to just learning and growing and as I hope everyone in the audience is going to take something from today and really do something meaningful with it. So, with that being said, I bet you guys to do. Thank you again, Dana. Thanks, Becca. And we'll see you guys next time.