Becoming Agile – Ep.36

Trinita Carlton explains how to embrace inclusive culture when approaching product management. Carlton discusses strategic practice to enhance our ability to become agile when navigating Inclusion in the workplace.

Melyssa Barrett:  Welcome to the Jali Podcast. I’m your host, Melyssa Barrett. This podcast is for those who are interested in the conversation around diversity, inclusion and equity. Each week, I’ll be interviewing a guest who has something special to share or is actively part of building solutions in this space. Let’s get started.

Trinita Carlton is an experienced leader, coach and team builder. She received her undergraduate degree in psychology from the university of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s degree in organizational management from Pfeiffer University. As a lifelong learner she maintains advanced Agile and PMP certifications, and is currently pursuing a designation as a certified professional coach. Trinita is currently a Scrum Master at Major Financial Services Firm. There, she marries her background in psychology and delivering business value, which makes her masterful at building teams. She also serves as a mentor and coach for young professionals in the corporate space. When Trinita isn’t cheering others on to the best version of themselves, she enjoys playing golf and traveling with her husband. I am so excited to have Trinita, with me this week, and you are just going to be excited about what she has to say as well. So thank you for joining me, Trinita.

Trinita Carlton:  Thank you for having me.

Melyssa Barrett:  I keep wanting to call you by your maiden name I think, because we’ve known each other so long, so I got to get used to Trinita Carlton.

Trinita Carlton:  That’s true. I’ll always and forever be a McCormick, which is why I slid it right into my middle name when we got married. So that’s okay.

Melyssa Barrett:  Very well. Welcome. Welcome to the Jali Podcast and I am excited to talk to you about just how we create more inclusive teams and environment. But first I really wanted to maybe just have you share a little bit about how you got to where you are today?

Trinita Carlton: Yes. Oh wow. That’s that’s a journey, I’m going to keep it short. So I will say I was raised to always aspire to be the best I could be. And so for me and part of my generation that has always been, you’re going into corporate America. And so that’s how I got landed where I am. I’m in a big investing firm, mutual fund firm. And one of the things that I think is really key in developing a career is, as a young person you get in where you can make some money. That’s the first thing, “How could I generate income?” But as you start working in your career, you want to think about the things that you’re really passionate about and things that you see coming up that tie back to you. One of those things that are strengths for me are building powerful teams, really having a keen air for the voice of a customer service and being of service, and leading from my seat, and giving back to those who are coming behind me, specifically women of color, underrepresented groups.

And then of course in my natural environment, I am super organized, very strategic. So project management came up as a way for me to lean into my organizational skills and my very kind of keeping a schedule. And as I got into project management, one of the things that I loved about it was delivering a product to our customer. One of the things I was not a fan of in traditional project management, was not having the customer in the journey, us creating these products where we didn’t get feedback from our customers and not responding to the very, very rapid pace of change. So insert Agile. And so that’s how I became a Scrum Master, working in Agile environments, and Agile project management.

Where two of the big things that I love about it is that built in is the ability to quickly pivot, two things that are changing in the marketplace to renew or changing needs from the customer, but also taking the customer along the journey without using a lot of jargon. There are periods of time where there’s two weeks, three weeks where we go back to the customer and say, “Hey, this is what we’ve done so far. Do you like this? Is this what you still had in mind? Give us some feedback? And the customer gets to say, “Yes, I love it. Or no, we were thinking more this,” and then we can change.

The other part that I like about that is not only that feedback loop, but the feedback loop that we have among the Agile teams. Where at that same period of time, we take a pause and say, “What did we learn from the last period of two weeks, three weeks? Did we like how everything went? Were there are opportunities for improvement? What can we as a team hold ourselves accountable to, to get better and mature.” And so I love that about both of those.

And so that’s kind of how I ended up in Agile and where I’m going with that, is one of the things that I’ve learned is that it’s not just about that particular framework. I do a lot of coaching in helping people be better people individually, so that we have better stronger teams. And so as I continue to lean more into the coaching and helping individuals show up as the best version of themselves, I’m really learning that, that is something that I’ve been doing my entire life in my friend groups and my networking groups, with my friends’ children. And so that is the next phase, I guess, Trinita, 3.0 of my [inaudible] we’ll end up in the same picture.

Melyssa Barrett:  That’s fantastic. I mean, what’s interesting about it is it’s such a discovery of yourself and then you have clearly kind of showcased your strengths in the things that are passionate to you, which sounds like helping and coaching people, is just kind of part of who you are.

Trinita Carlton: Absolutely. Yeah, it is.

Melyssa Barrett:  So let me ask you a quick question because when people say Agile, all Agile teams and all companies that have Agile are not equal in terms of, so everybody seems to have a little bit of a different flavor for Agile. I assume that, that makes things a little bit more challenging when you’re bringing teams together across customers. Are there tips and tools you can, you can maybe share?

Trinita Carlton: Yes. One of the things that I think I consider myself not an Agile fundamentalist. Agile is a way of approaching project management, specifically defined for software engineering teams, but that now people are using it outside of technology. And there are many different frameworks within Agile. The one that the company that I work for right now supports Scrum. There are many others. Kanban, Lean, XP. And so one of the things that I love about, from specifically other Agile frameworks is that it can be customized based off of the needs of your business and the needs of your team. And there are definitely frameworks to scale that if you’re in a large enterprise versus keeping it very small if you are in a startup organization.

What is helpful when you’re working with teams, of course, once you’re in a company, decided this is the framework, and this is the way we’re going to use this framework in our environment, when you’re working outside of that, with customers that are outside of your organization, you need to establish, in my opinion, a baseline and an agreement we call these working agreements or how are do we use this within this project? If you’re going to work it outside of your organization, that’s the first tip. Make sure we’re all on the same page, create this baseline of understanding what is Agile? What does it look like in this environment? What are the agreements that we’re going to have on this particular team for this specific project? What support are we going to have in place?

And then I love the concept of let’s call each other accountable. We have Scrum Masters and other titles and leaders that are there that sometimes are looked to, to fix everything, but the best way for and the most Agile teams to hold themselves accountable. And these Scrum Masters they’re just to make sure we stay on the road, if you will. And so you have this agreement, this work working agreement, let’s buy into it, let’s agree to it and then hold each other accountable to the things that we agreed to. So those are some of my tips, have a baseline, have a working agreement and decide for this project, for this team, what are the things that we’re going to embrace as far as the Agile principles and specifically the tools and things and for this piece of work?

Melyssa Barrett:  I love that. So then in terms of, we’ve had so much conversation over the last year about equity. Whether it be gender equity, racial equity, I mean, we could go healthcare equity, all over the place. And I think companies are really trying to figure out how they create more inclusion, especially when it comes to the culture and climate of the company. So can you talk a little bit about, I mean, how do we create more inclusion when it comes to really kind of making the business grow and delivering product?

Trinita Carlton: Yeah. I love how you said that. Making the business grow, because the main thing is the main thing. A company or a business is in place because they want to make money. Otherwise, why are we here? But in order to do that, you have to understand that there are going to be people who are going to contribute to that end goal. And you have to make sure that they feel valuable, that they feel like they have a place in that organization, because you want them just passionate about helping your company support as possible. And so in order to do that, I’ve heard this phrase a million times, but I really believe it’s true. People don’t care how much you know, it’s they know how much you care. They’re not going to buy into your vision and your passion if they don’t feel like you care about them as individuals.

And we’re seeing that more and more as the generations change. I know you and I are in a different generation where this is what we purpose to do, we’re here to make money, we’re going to support the company and we have this agreement that at the end you’re going to make sure that we’re settling retirement. The newer generations don’t necessarily feel that way. That loyalty is not there from the organization or the individual. So how do you create this mutually beneficial organization, very different from what we had before? And so definitely you want to respond to the issues of the day. Last year was a very pivotal year in how to your point, racial equity, inclusion, diversity was viewed. I think the country had a reckoning season where they had to stand to that day because now you have people organizations who say, “Part of our core values that we want to see that we value this. These are important to us as a core value of our organization.” And as you have partnerships, sponsorships, you need to align to that. That’s important to you.

And so that became a changing point for people. And so I think as we continue to lean into racial equity and diversity and inclusion, we also keeping that the main thing. Think about other ways that we can create inclusive organizations. And one of the ways that I talked about this, actually before the pandemic, just because of some of the things that were going on the team that I was working on at the time is around personality. As our teams become global, we’re not just US based anymore. How do we create inclusive environments for teams that are not just comprised of Americans, Western based individuals. And I was faced with the situation where I had a team that was partially based in China, partially based here, because that we were already on zoom.

And I had situations where people were not jelling as a team, people were not talking. And again, as I talked about in my career, a lot of the aha moments I have are around my own self-awareness and how I’m showing up in these organizations and teams. And I realized that I wanted people to be like me and by [inaudible] see me. I had another awareness moment in this, in this period as an extrovert that I was very dynamic and not necessarily loud, but I live life loud, bold, colorful, talkative. And not everybody’s that way, but I wanted people to show up that way, that made me comfortable. And so I had to take a moment in the beat and I have to give a lot of credit to my sister friend, who shared with me that she is not an extrovert though I thought she was.

And she shared that she was introvert. And in doing a lot of my own research, I found out that a third of Americans are actually introverts, but we in Western culture view extrovert-ism as the desired trait. But not all people are that way. So how do we make those individuals comfortable in our teams? And more than that, how do we value the specific gifts, talents, the way they bring energy, the way they contribute to our teams, those things in high regard. And so I read this book by Susan Cain called Quiet, The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, long title.

But in that book, I found out that many Eastern cultures do not view extrovert-ism the way we do. They highly respect and hold in high regard people who are introspective, reflective. That when information is passed to them, they take a beat, mull it over, think about it and then contribute. And how powerful is that? Because how many times on our teams because we want to be seen as an extrovert, do we shoot off an answer or response or a suggestion a way forward that is maybe half baked? Because we got the information now, let’s go. And we didn’t think about all the risks. We didn’t think about the dependencies we had had down the way. And we end up slowing down because we didn’t consider those things. And so those are valuable things to have, not only your team, but as leaders. Yes, we want to move forward, we want to move in the speed of light.

We also want to be thoughtful and intentional about how we do that. So there’s value in both. And so that’s one way that we create those teams is thinking about those values that they bring, and the gifts and talents they bring, and holding those in high regard.

Melyssa Barrett:  Absolutely. I mean, it’s so interesting because when we think about diversity, a lot of times we think about race and gender. But I mean, a person is so complex. There are so many ways that we can be diverse in terms of how we’re contributing to the business. So I love the fact that you’re talking about being an extrovert versus an introvert. And how you create a team that allows everyone to belong and feel like they’re included.

Trinita Carlton: Yes. And even the way you set feedback loops up, zoom is a perfect example. And as a person who reads body language, verbals, non-verbals. I talk with my hands, I use a lot of expression. There are people where, and even me at this point, almost two years in that are exhausted with zoom. So giving people permission to turn the videos off where they can think without all this constant feedback of all the things that I think help, right? Not necessarily making it where people have to talk in an environment, that they can go back, think about something and then respond later. One of the things that I’ve done, Agile is really big on time boxes, but say, “Hey, here’s something that I want us to think about or brainstorm as a team, let’s take 24 hours. And in that 24 hours, think of your ideas and let’s put them in a team’s chat, separate team’s chat just for this. Or let’s use a digital way of communicating, like a mural or a mural board to provide feedback.”

Those are ways that you encourage people who are maybe more introverted and don’t think really one of there. I pretend they don’t really think really quickly on the spot, where your extroverts may just spit something out. This gives them opportunity to contribute powerfully without pushing them to be extroverted. And so those are just a few ways to help them with that. But also value again, as I said, highly the characteristics that they bring. That they can bring up those risks of those things that we need to think about as we’re building products, as we’re thinking about strategic planning that we ordinarily would not even consider because we’re so ready to get to the next thing. And so, yes, thinking about that is very, very powerful and helps create those inclusive teams where people feel like, “I don’t have to be like person A, in order to still be a high valued member of this team. And so that was just one way that I’ve looked at, it’s environments.

The other way I’ve been thinking about lately is about how we view leadership, because it’s what I think about, talking about personality inclusion is, how we have coached, encouraged and talked to young women, veering back to gender, but in a different way about how they should proceed in their career. I remember being a young woman in corporate, and as we talked about networking, we’ve always held or we’ve held in high regard male leadership. So the way to progress in corporate America is to think about things that are important to them, so that you can build this common thread that you all have relatability with. And so I was encouraged, learn about sports. Now I like sports already to a degree, but traditionally basketball is what, don’t play it, but love to watch it.

But I was encouraged to learn football, baseball, hockey, sports that I don’t traditionally think about. Those are the conversations that when you’re going on a business trip and you might end up at the bar that the men will be talking about. So you don’t want to stand over here by yourself without anything to contribute to this very casual conversation. So let’s learn about that. Let’s use these personal characteristics that men use when they show up in a meeting. How to create space, how to command a room that are sometimes can be seen as very male characteristics. That’s what I was to told to do, coached to do as a woman to move up the ranks. And so, as I’ve been thinking about that more recently, I wonder, again, when we talk about inclusion and diversity, this word of authenticity comes up quite often. Maybe [crosstalk] about that as well.

But what’s that really authentic advice for me to get to, for me to receive, and then now to have passed on to women about this is the way to get ahead. I think about, a little earlier in my career I was more junior, there were a group of women leaders who invited me to this happy hour. And what I loved about that particular happy hour, we didn’t talk about any of that stuff. What we talked about was Pinterest. For those were mothers, they talked about their children and their activities that they picked up, picking them up after school and how exhausting it was. We talked about meal prep, we talked about couponing, we talked about sales. We talked about makeup and all the things that women tend to talk about, but in that group were VPs, directors, managers. At that time, I was a manager that were in that group. And that networking group helped me to move around in the organization where I’m employed and I didn’t have to do anything outside of who I naturally am to be present in that group and to contribute to those conversations.

So I’ve really now been reflecting about how can we talk about authenticity, we talk about career mobility and how we coach and mentor young women. Do we always have to lean towards being more like a man to get ahead in your career? The answer is no, we just need to be more intentional about creating these opportunities for women to learn from others, in ways that are more natural to them. So those are just two really, things that I’ve been thinking about recently around inclusion and capability and how we create these organizations, whether it’s formal teams or informal networking teams within the organizations.

Melyssa Barrett:  Absolutely. I totally agree with that. And it’s funny because I think as you create those cohorts, I mean whether they’re informal cohorts and you’re just at the same place and all of a sudden you’re relating to one another across all sorts of different topics. Doesn’t necessarily have to be professional, but you have now common things or other things that they can relate to with raising children and the challenges associated with that. Or what you like, Halloween, whatever. There’s so many different ways that people can relate. But I love the way you said, giving space. Because I think in business there’s so often periods of time where you are trying to run so fast, that you don’t get to give space. You’re just continuing to run.

And so I think last year I saw a lot of companies just take a step back, let’s just give the space. Which has been really helpful I think for a lot of folks, although we’ve seen so many women leaving the workplace because of just sheer overwhelm, or inflexible work environments, or we could count the ways. So it’s really interesting. Yeah. Go ahead.

Trinita Carlton: It is. Another buzzword of 2020, 2021 has been self care. And how we define that, I think prior to the pandemic, maybe the very bit beginning of the… Well, prior to the pandemic, we really thought about it as massages, facials, manicures, pedicures. And now we’re constantly redefining self care. And some of the things that you hear now are creating boundaries. Positioning your energy, determining what kind of energy environment, energy means a lot of things to a lot of people, but what environment that you want to be in, really clearly defining your values and really standing by that. And so organizations have really encouraged people to take a pause. They’ve at least given very good lip service to it. But I think there’s more that we could do with that. There have been conversations about PTO and then when we take time off, “Oh, we also want to deliver.”

But even as I found personally, that taking that time away is highly restorative. And then when I show back up to work, I now have the mental capacity, the space to be creative, innovative, think strategically, and really help contribute in a different way to my team than if I continue to work every single day and not take a break, that you’re exhausted. It takes way more effort. And so sometimes to slowing down, actually speeds things up a bit. And I think organizations are seeing that an exhausted workforce does not contribute in the best way, in the highest way to their work and to the organization and what they want to do with them.

And so that’s definitely an opportunity. I do not have children, but some women who have left the organization, the pandemic was particularly hard for them as they managed home, became unlicensed teachers probably for the first time in their lives, and they would still felt this need and pull to deliver at work. And so I think a lot of women have redefined, where do I need to be? Where are my are my priorities right now? And so I applaud those women who had to have some self-awareness for themselves and make some very difficult decisions, about how they show up best for their families and what to do with their careers. So definitely a difficult-

Melyssa Barrett:  Yeah, definitely. And certainly I am a lover of Pinterest, so I might fit in really well with your group.

For sure. So then I love the fact that when you think about inclusion, you’re thinking about personality based on your psychology background. In your role, as you’re going for your designation, you’re doing a lot more coaching, are there other things that you might share that you think companies can take advantage of?

Trinita Carlton: Yeah. Yeah. I think providing the resources. I’m very blessed the company that I work for provides professional coaching and career coaching as a benefit to their employees. And I think that is something that is very much needed to say, “Hey, where do you want to be career…” Many employees don’t really take the time or have the time to think, where do I want to go in my career? What is really important to me? What am I passionate about? And now after identifying that, how can I cultivate design intentionally a career path for myself. Many times we have employees who never get beyond, I need income for myself. And what I’m just discovering in some of these teams is that you have individuals who are unhappy. They’re good at what they do. They don’t like what they do. And so they stay there because they’re good at it. And that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re happy there.

And so one of the things that I’ve been encouraging people to do as I’ve coached them, on my team and outside of my teams, is first define what are you good at? And what do you like to do? Then, you don’t mind getting out of bed to work. You really are passionate about it. So you would, I don’t encourage people to work 80 hours, but if it was required and you enjoy it, it’s not as hard of a pool. Rather than you working 80 hours, because you’re good at something, but you hate it.

Melyssa Barrett:  Yes. Yes. It’s like the energy flows. Yes.

Trinita Carlton: Correct. And so I think that companies would want employees to marry the two. Then you get to have a person who is passionate about the work they’re doing. Therefore, the quality of the work, the innovation around the work is going to be at a much higher level. So I understand we have staffing issues, but getting back to what kind of organizations do, if we help people with that type of coaching, that will help you to have a better equipped, a more motivated workforce. And then also I’m not a therapist, but a million times in these coaching conversations, you have people share things that really are best equipped for a licensed therapist to help them through. And many companies do already have an EAP program that either pays a hundred percent or a portion of therapist’s costs. And I think, especially in this environment that we’ve had, we’re sort of transitioning out of the pandemic.

We’ve had a lot of unrest in our American culture that people are trying to process through and show up to work as themselves. And so those services are very much needed. And so encouraging individuals to get that help and creating more of a positive narrative around mental health, is also very, very important for companies to support, provide if they’re not already providing these services and then to encourage. And be okay with people talking about it and saying, “Hey, I have this appointment, so I won’t be able to show up to this particular engagement.” So that when they come back, they’re taking care of themselves, getting back into that self care, and now they can be passionate about the things that your organization is passionate.

Melyssa Barrett:  Yeah. That’s awesome. Let’s pause for a moment. We’ll be right back. I think, especially when folks are really kind of focused on Agile, the entire company seems like it’s a lot more flat and maybe there aren’t as many hierarchies. But I find that it’s maybe more challenging to navigate your career because you may not necessarily have a pathway. And so I think it’s interesting that when you’re talking about, your company provides coaching, a lot of companies don’t or maybe they’re just getting into providing coaching for maybe people of color or women or something like that. I mean, that’s the beginning, I mean, if you’re keeping track of information and you see the specific drop off between women or people of color moving from one position to the other and through that pipeline in your company, so that’s amazing. Kudos to your company for providing those kinds of resources.

Trinita Carlton:  Yes. You know, so a couple of things on that that I wanted to respond to that you said ,so yes. In my history, most of what working in as far as career coaching being provided in most major organizations, is when you get to the C-suite. And so then you get this professional coaching and how do you get to the C-suite if you’re not coached on how to get there? And so that’s where it becomes very important when you think about opportunities for people of color, women, others, to progress. The coaching needs to start before they arrive. When we talk about making it equitable, let’s help people get there. I think I know also that in my history based off, what my family knew and my network knew prior to me giving in corporate America, I didn’t even know coaching was a thing. That professional coaching was a thing.

And how I learned about it was through, again, my sister friend, who had done her own research and found out about it, but also those networks of women and men who had already reached the C-suite, talked about that. So it goes back to creating those networking circles who are willing to share back how I got here. A lot of people, I love bootstrapping. This bootstrapping narrative and then I hate it. I love it and I hate it. There is something about bootstrapping, but what I’m finding is that not many people bootstrap the way they really make it seem. Someone had to help you, someone somewhere helped you. And so you didn’t do it on your own. And so be honest with people, be transparent, be vulnerable. These are all Agile principles that we talk about quite often.

Share. Like, “So yes, I got my degrees and that was really great. But this person was a sponsor for me. I received coaching from this person on how to present and how to network, how to provide value, how to lean into and be really key on what are the key values that this company has. What are the goals that they have so that I could really be laser focused on that and deprioritize some of the busy work that I get.” Those are nuggets that your sponsor, your mentor, your coaches tell you, so that you can progress. So how do we create these networks for women, people of color, underrepresented groups? So they learn about these things. So they even know these services are available to them. And even if your company doesn’t offer it, let’s hope that they do. If they don’t, you can make a decision about, should I invest in this for myself?

When I’m thinking about the things that I need to invest in for me personally, should I invest in this for myself? So I still get the coaching that I need. So it is very, very important. And we want men to be advocates and allies for us, and we encourage them to do that. And some will. It’s still a cultural change for many. And so I really want to encourage women, that may be listening to the podcast, to think about how they can create these safe spaces to share information back to those who are coming behind them. So they can learn and they can invest in themselves.

Melyssa Barrett:  Yes. I love that. And I was just reading one of the reports that I think McKenzie, put out specifically on women in the workplace. And they were talking about how women are sponsoring, I think it’s like 2.3 to two and a half times more people than the men are. And so when you talk about reaching back, it’s like these women are doing all sorts of work to add and be able to bring people with them. But yet in a lot of cases, according to that report, the women of color actually drop off at the very first run. I mean, going into the management role. So I think the importance of what you’re saying in terms of reaching back is huge. Not only for us as women, but for our allies, men as well. You have to see these women.

Trinita Carlton: Right. And how we talked to our allies, used to change a little bit. I remember when I was on the board of women’s leadership group, which is one of our advocacy groups in our organization, we talked about how can we get men involved? Because we had all these women here and this is great, but how can we get them, encourage them to be allies and encourage them to be advocates. And we had some really great conversations about it, but one of the things we talked about is… So a question I love is, what’s in it for me? So most people want to know, “Okay, this is great, but what’s in it for me? Why should I show up?” And so I said, “What would make it worth a man’s while to show up and to be an advocate.”

I was like, “Men have daughters. Men have wives and they want them to be successful. So let’s get them in the door by talking about when we are doing our marketing and we’re doing our draw for them to show is talking about, when we’re doing what I like to call the sneaker invites. Where you walk around desks, of course is way pre COVID. But, that we invite them and say, “Hey, I know we’ve talked about your daughter before and this would be great information for her to have or whatever.” When we get them in the room, then we can start talking about how can you support the women on your team. And how that makes you look as a manager who has a team, that promotes their women, that helps their women to grow.

So we really need to think about in a lot of ways, what is in it for me? What is in it for them? And creating that draw. And then hopefully that grows and matures into people wanting to be there because you want to support and you want to serve. It’s a growth process. I tell people all the time, especially in Agile, there’s a lot of change. The only thing constant is change. But change also takes time. It is not a rapid process. One of the ways I have a little bit of empathy for those that we are asking to change, is that change is very hard. And if you have been doing something 30, 40, 50, 60 years to ask people to pivot in a day, in a week, a month, it’s a hard turn. It’s hard turn for some of us.

And I know we’ve asked a lot of the unrepresented of our unrepresented groups, but how can we help them along this journey? Let’s start there. Let’s baby step them through. And my hope, I’m a rainbows and sunshine person, is that eventually it becomes a part of them that they want to do it because it’s the right thing to do. That it becomes part of their own value system versus that we have to create a benefit for them in order to show them the room. I’m willing to be patient to a degree and partner with them to try to get them there.

Melyssa Barrett:  Yes. Well, you’re part of my generation. I think sometimes we’re more patient than our younger counterparts sometimes. But you kind of need both. You got to have the push and the pull.

Trinita Carlton: Next question was to not become complacent. One of the things that, in looking at myself and being very aware is that our generation had a lot of time to become complacent and become comfortable. And we needed some of the scales to follow up our own eyes about the way things work. And this younger generation is pushing us to say, “We’re not doing that anymore.”

Melyssa Barrett:  Absolutely.

Trinita Carlton: And so how are we going to [inaudible] right now? So we do need that proof, and that sharing of information and that partnership between want to set some realistic expectations, but we do need some outrageous, outlandish some. Let’s push the envelope thinking so that we do move forward. And I love it. I love what they’ve asked us to do and asked us how to-

Melyssa Barrett:  Yes, yes. That’s fabulous. All right. Any last words for the coachable? We’ve talked a lot about the companies, but obviously those that are being coached.

Trinita Carlton: Yeah. It all relies on you, everyone’s journey is different. Find value in your own journey, but be willing to take a moment to take a page from the introverts and be introspective, reflective, take a look in the mirror, take a journey of your own self-awareness. One of the greatest things and the value that I already have on my way to getting my full designation, is this journey of self-awareness that I’ve been required to go on. And the questions I’ve had to ask myself, and it has not been easy. But I’ve grown so much. into how I show up in my friend groups and my family groups. At work is very different than I would say I did three, four, five years ago.

And so if it is your desire, because not everybody wants to grow. Some people are very comfortable with where they are and that’s okay. That is their boundary, and that’s okay. But for those who do want to grow as individuals, I encourage you to take that journey of self-awareness, self discovery. Ask those hard questions, do the work. I’m in the coaching world, cheering you on. I am the cheerleader’s cheerleader. And there are many that are out there who are willing to partner in link arms with you to guide you along your journey. So that would be my encouragement to those who.

Melyssa Barrett:  I love it. I love it. Well, thank you so much Trinita for joining me for this wonderful conversation and we wish you certainly all the best as you go for your designation and in the work that you’re doing on a day to day basis, we thank you.

Trinita Carlton: Well, thank you. Thank you again so much for having me. I really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you for the great work that you’re to raise awareness around diversity, equity and inclusion through your podcast and through all the work that you do.

Melyssa Barrett:  Thanks for joining me on The Jali Podcast. Please subscribe. So you won’t miss an episode. See you next week.