141. Making DEI Values Explicit in the Coaching Industry with Jennifer Voss, CEO of Martha Beck Inc
Embodying Sustainable Values
Reconsidering your normal means questioning the ways things have always been done, in your life and in our culture.
It could be as simple as questioning why you respond “I’m fine,” when you’re not, or it could be making bigger transitions in your business to make your work more accessible, so more people gain the tools and training to impact their communities.
Client Jennifer Voss, CEO of Martha Beck, Inc. joins Erica and India to discuss making organizational shifts in pursuit of embodying your values and building diversity, equity, and inclusion organically.
Listen on your favorite podcast player or keep reading to learn:
Why shifting from scholarships to awards creates major impact
How focusing on values first builds the foundation for effective DEI work
Why sustainability is a key value for Jennifer and Martha Beck, Inc
How starting with what you’re already doing well builds momentum for the long-term
Responding to What’s Present
With more than 30 years of experience in business ownership and executive-level management, leveraging her understanding of the industry and personal evolution, Jennifer Voss coaches leaders to trust their intuition, stay grounded in their integrity, and inspire teams to reach common goals. She trusts in synchronicity and believes our creative powers are of greatest service and impact when we walk with one foot in the magic and the other in the real. Jennifer is a seasoned executive coach and is proud to be the CEO and Director of Wayfinding for Martha Beck, Inc.
Jennifer considers herself a continuous learner, embodying an approach of remaining in “perpetual creative response to whatever’s present.” She says she’s a “workaholic nerd,” who loves approaching challenges and puzzles and learning experiences.
Integrity and Transparency
On the Pause on the Play® podcast, Jennifer Voss says she originally engaged with India and Erica as DEI consultants for Martha Beck, Inc (MBI) when as an organization, they realized that in the predominantly white life coaching industry, “we found ourselves looking kind of in the mirror saying, ‘I don’t know what to do next.’”
Erica and India both say that there has been an influx of people and organizations looking for DEI guidance, but as India says, “I think people were operating out of fear and that fear led them to looking at things in a very simplistic and boxed in way, and it made it challenging for them to expand the possibility of DEI not being just something that they were going to do, but…the way that you do all things.”
India goes on to say that the experience of working with MBI has been the opposite. The organization approached DEI knowing it needed to be baked into every part of the business and coming from a place of integrity and transparency.
Jennifer admits that there was certainly fear and that overcoming fear-based motivations in the work was something she processed with Erica and India.
“One of the biggest lessons was, wait a minute, this is not a module we add to our training. This is, how can we look through…the lens of our values…What are our values? And then how do we want to move through the world and then create it from there.”
Approaching DEI through that process builds diversity organically and serves the ultimate goal of a naturally inclusive organization.
Shifting the Focus
Part of MBI’s process has been shifting their model and language around making their coach training accessible to an impact-based awards model rather than a need-based scholarship.
Changing that language and process represented a huge mindset shift. They’ve gone from employing a model where applicants had to disclose their financial situation to basing their awards on “how are these tools going to be taken into the world?…How can we help serve and create impact in underserved populations?”
Impact-based awards also remove any spoken or unspoken expectations of performance, as Erica says, of “okay, they gave me this because they think I’m poor, I have to constantly be poor,” in order to continue to merit the scholarship.
Awards models also remove assumptions about who needs financial assistance, which can often be tied to racial identities.
Jennifer adds that MBI also changed their selection process to create a committee of paid people from outside of the organization, in order to make the committee more diverse and widen the lens of the review process.
The application process itself has also undergone major changes.
Jennifer says Erica and India helped draft questions that make people feel comfortable and excited about the possibilities, rather than approaching the application from a position of having to prove hardship or being put on the spot.
Because the changes to the awards program were rooted in solidified, explicit values, those shifts have had influence throughout the organization.
The curriculum has evolved to bring more focus to the impact a coach has in their community and with their clients rather than on the individual coach.
Shifts are also happening with internal processes in hiring and training.
Jennifer says they now assess everything they do through a lens of “if we’re already doing this, how can we do it in a way that will create even more impact, create even more value, create even more inclusion and belonging?”
Sustainable Momentum
Erica notes that in the last eighteen months, many people and organizations have realized a need for change, but have gotten stuck or overwhelmed with the process of creating structural shifts.
She asks Jennifer what kept MBI’s forward momentum going as they’ve made significant changes in that same period of time.
Jennifer credits Erica and India for coaching MBI through the process, especially when they received disheartening messages from people who weren’t yet aware of the changes that were happening behind the scenes.
She recognizes that creating a truly diverse and inclusive coaching industry is a long-term project. “We know it’s a marathon. This is not a sprint.”
One of the ways they have combated stagnation has been through the value of coming together as a team and checking in.
Jennifer says they ground in on the fact that they know they are doing their work, and that it is a long process that takes connection and collaboration with other people like Erica and India in order to be successful.
Another key value is sustainability. Knowing that the process of creating a more diverse coaching industry is long-term, Jennifer says they work to be conscious of taking regular downtime as a team.
The top two items on their operations call agenda every week are always “stories so we can laugh and what do we need to do to ensure sustainability.”
An aspect of that is also moving more slowly and always asking “what are the downstream effects of this decision?”
Jennifer gives hiring committee members from outside of MBI as an example of a decision that impacted both the diversity of the committee and the sustainability of the project for their internal team as the number of applications they’ve received has grown.
Erica adds that the focus on sustainability and rest extends beyond Jennifer’s team and to her as a service provider for the organizations. She notes that Jennifer has specifically told her that she doesn’t want Erica or India working for them on weekends or holidays.
Jennifer says that respect for rest and time has gone both ways and that Erica and India remind her to take breaks too.
Jennifer notes that operating from her values has extended into her personal life, “It’s a big reminder [that] I don’t only want to live this within the company, but within my own personal life as well.”
Take Action
Jennifer continues that while she admittedly came into the work from a place of fear, and can sometimes still come to it in fear, “for the most part, now this feels like something that has been integrated.”
She feels that approaching DEI from her values and with impact in mind has been integrated into her life to the point of it becoming a way of being and moving through the world.
She adds that she feels into the excitement around the potential and possibilities of ripple effects from making the shifts that MBI has made with their awards program and initiatives within the organization.
“It feels immense and it’s beautiful and it is very heartwarming and that becomes the reason…that I do what I do, that our team does what we do.”
India adds that she has witnessed the power of transparency in her time working with Martha Beck, Inc. and with Jennifer.
She notes that the changes that have been implemented at MBI, from the awards to internal newsletters “came from being willing to be uncomfortable enough to start talking about something that maybe you hadn’t seen done before…We can all be transparent with each other enough to do that and feel like it’s safe enough to do so.”
Jennifer says that taking action can start by reviewing what you’re already doing well, what’s having an impact already, and what actions you can take to amplify the impact.”
By focusing on an existing system or process, “it didn’t mean we had to create something new or change the direction of the ship altogether. We can just take the momentum we already had and go with it.”
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