Insider Outsider Memberships

As SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women, or Veteran Business Enterprise) businesses we find ourselves members of multiple groups and the dynamics of these memberships is discussed at length in chapter six The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan. Insider outsider dynamics happen at the group…

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Talk or Walk?

Thought we’d take a break from our in-depth review of The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan to return to our theme of supporting each other.  As SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women, or Veteran Business Enterprise) businesses we expect large corporations and government agencies to…

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Diversity Dividends: Reducing Bias

Bias is the very human and perhaps unfair preference for or dislike of something. Its synonyms include prejudice, partiality and favoritism.  At the heart of the original equal opportunity movement, laws and regulations were enacted to mitigate conscious bias in American education, employment and procurement opportunities. As SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women, or Veteran Business…

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Inclusion Dividends: Taking the Initiative

During the summer, we talked about The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan, intending to relate the book’s concepts to supplier diversity and how we SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women, or Veteran Business Enterprise) businesses might be able to incorporate this information in our organizations.…

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Spotlight on USBLN

The US Business Leadership Network (USBLN) like WBENC (Women’s Business Enterprise National Council) and NMSDC (National Minority Supplier Development Council) is a national third-party certifier.  USBLN certifies business that are owned and operated by a person or persons challenged with a disability – those with physical and/or mental impairment; including disabled veteran businesses, regardless of gender or ethnicity.  Like the other…

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Shameless Request for Votes!

We’ve applied for a Mission Main Street℠ Grant in Chase’s program that will award twelve (12) small businesses with grants of $250,000 in January 2014.   You can learn about last year’s program and listen to interviews with last year’s winners. Abator, always a WBE, knows getting certified as diversity owned can be challenging for small businesses. And…

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Similar, But Not the Same

Having researched the UCP (Unified Certification Program) for all 50 states, as well as Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands; I thought I had a pretty good handle on what to expect from the certification process. Recently though we’ve experienced some new quirks as we’ve sought certification in additional states as a part of our…

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Lean In and the Chaos Imperative

By now it is probably evident that we’re a bunch of readers here.  This time we’re taking another break from The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan to talk about Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In: Women, Work and Will to Lead and The Chaos Imperative: How Change…

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Inclusion Dividend: Concepts

Earlier this summer, we talked a bit about The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan, with the intent of relating its concepts to supplier diversity; and, how it might apply to us as SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women or Veteran Business Enterprise) businesses.  Chapter three…

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Inclusion Dividend: Business Case

In late June, we talked a bit about The Inclusion Dividend: Why Investing in Diversity & Inclusion Pays Off by Mark Kaplan and Mason Donovan, with the intent of relating its concepts to supplier diversity; and, how it might apply to us as SDMWVBE (Small, Disadvantaged, Minority, Women or Veteran Business Enterprise) businesses.  Chapter two’s…

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