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Addressing Health Inequities in Our Communities w/ Andres Gonzalez
38 Plays3 years ago
This week, for the 2nd installment of "The 3D Podcast, host Cedric Chambers sits down with the Andres Gonzalez, Vice President, Chief Diversity Officer at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin to discuss health inequities in our communities and what can be done by Healthcare Systems to achieve a better outcome for the people we serve. This is a great episode packed with a ton of gems, so get your notepads ready as we dive deep and “Discuss the Dimensions of Diversity.”
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Transcript
Introduction to the 3D Podcast
00:00:10
Speaker
Hey, I'm Cedric Chambers, and I would like to welcome you to another episode of the 3D Podcast, a masterclass where we share with you everything you need to know about how to transform diversity and inclusion in your organization as well as in your community. We're on a mission to amplify the voices of leaders that are making an impact in the world today so that we can have a better tomorrow.
00:00:34
Speaker
Our goal every episode is to keep it simple, honest, and transparent with you by uncovering the truths in diversity and inclusion with the hope of creating behavioral change all while presenting it from a unique perspective. So look, if you're ready, get your notepad out, pour you a drink, and let's dive deep as we discuss the dimensions of diversity.
00:01:05
Speaker
Welcome to the show today.
Meet Andres Gonzalez
00:01:06
Speaker
I am excited about our next guest. Today we're speaking with Andres Gonzalez. He is the Vice President, Chief Diversity Officer at Fredder in the Medical College of Wisconsin. In this role, he provides direction to the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, where he leads D&I strategic initiatives that include business resource groups, community engagement, diversity action team, and health equity, among other responsibilities.
00:01:30
Speaker
In addition to his work at Freighter in the Medical College of Wisconsin, Andreas has worked in the nonprofit sector for over 20 years, where he has been instrumental in creating culturally and linguistically competent programs. In his previous roles, Andreas served as the Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer for Bay State Health, the Director of Diversity and Community Outreach, and Interim Supply Diversity Director at Cleveland Clinic Health System, Executive Director for Hispanic Urban Minority Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Outreach Program,
00:01:58
Speaker
and the executive director of a borrow a workforce development agency that serves Hispanic and Latino communities in near west side of Cleveland. I'm excited. I know you're excited. So without further ado, let's kick off this show and let's speak to Andreas. So Andreas, how are you doing today? I am doing super well. Thank you, Cedric, for the invite and looking forward to our conversation this afternoon.
00:02:23
Speaker
No, awesome, awesome. Look, I'm excited to have the conversation. I know there's some great things that you're working on, so I can't wait to dig into it. And so, look, I know I gave a little bit of your background and I didn't do it justice, but if you could, if you could share just a little bit more about your overall background and how you got into diversity inclusion space, just so our listeners can understand a little bit more about who you are.
00:02:43
Speaker
So let me start actually by providing a little bit about my background here in terms of where I'm from originally. So I was born and raised until the age of 13 in a beautiful island in the Caribbean called Puerto Rico.
Andres' Journey and Career in Diversity
00:02:56
Speaker
So Puerto Rican by birth, but ended up migrating with our family, right? Looking as many of our parents have done in other parts of the world, looking for that American dream. And we landed in no other place but Cleveland, Ohio. So Cleveland became home and
00:03:11
Speaker
I spent about 30 years in Cleveland, so Midwesterners by those standards. I was really fortunate that as we arrived there, and certainly I grew up in kind of the inner inner city of Cleveland, went to Cleveland public schools there. So certainly a product of public schools. I had great mentors along the way who kind of steered me in the right direction.
00:03:31
Speaker
got me involved in community efforts. And that's how I kind of started shaping my lens about the opportunity to make an impact in my own community. Hence how I ended up migrating after getting my degrees, certainly in the not-for-profit sector. I have a bachelor's of science in pre-med, thought that I would become a physician, never made it, because I fell in love with the not-for-profit sector and Hispanic give it up, as you read earlier in my bio.
00:03:59
Speaker
and the rest of history. I was able to see the impact that I can have in being a change agent and giving voice right to those who perhaps don't feel empowered in our community. And so that really started shaping my lens and certainly started providing a greater platform for me
00:04:17
Speaker
In terms of the work that i do today and so was fortunate to stay with humid up for about ten years got my masters as a clinical counselor while i was there and certainly with a minor in cultural competence which is how i think i started in migrating
00:04:32
Speaker
Into true diversity inclusion cultural competence work and then run a not-for-profit as you read as well bario which was workforce development so that gave me another kind of a great insight and some great ideas of things that we can do differently and better to create community and economic vitality.
00:04:49
Speaker
And then ended up by Serendipity landing a partnership with Cleveland Clinic and the rest is history. I mean, that really opened my doors in healthcare systems and into the work that I do professionally and have been doing professionally for the last 20 plus years in health or healthcare organizations. Awesome. Awesome. So I have a question though. So you spent 30 years in Cleveland. So are you a Cleveland sports fan?
00:05:13
Speaker
I am. True and true. Cleveland Browns fan, Indians fan, certainly Cavaliers and Jurgen LeBron came back and won it for us. But certainly I have to say, honestly, in all honesty, that Milwaukee certainly has been a great place for us.
00:05:30
Speaker
And it gives me the opportunity and the duality to also root for the Brewers and for the Packers. And certainly, I mean, who would not root for the Bucks having Giannis Antecumpa right to time MVP right back to back. So it's been fun to be able to be here. But certainly I am a Cleveland fan for sure.
00:05:50
Speaker
No, that's great. Look, I know a lot of individuals from Cleveland. I did my master's at the Ohio State University. And so, you know, I am a lot of Clevelanders and regardless of if they was winning or not, they were fans. Look, I can't speak too much about that because I'm a Falcons fan and we see that. So to get into our discussion today. So, you know, today, of course, we're talking about diversity and inclusion and its impact in the
Freighter's Diversity Strategy
00:06:16
Speaker
healthcare space. And so,
00:06:17
Speaker
Just to go a little bit deeper, can you provide, just take a few minutes and provide a high level overview of the work you and your team are doing at Freighter? You know, I will say that, you know, I'm very fortunate that I've been able to do this particular work professionally for three
00:06:33
Speaker
exemplary health systems over the last 10 plus years because I feel that this is kind of my third version and the right one, right? You start perfecting kind of the formula of what works and how to do it differently and better. And so from that particular standpoint, we have been able to create a cohesive strategy here for the entire health network where every single goal
00:06:57
Speaker
that we are orchestrating and leading as an organization. We have thought through from an anti-racism, health equity, diversity and inclusion. So we've been able to bake that in. We also have baked in the line of sight and our CEO, who's exemplary in terms of leading the way, has set the tone and the expectation.
00:07:15
Speaker
for leadership accountability, and then we have tied executive compensation. In that capacity, we have been able to touch the entire enterprise, right? So from your traditional and typical DNI efforts around working with HR, around recruiting, retention, development, and promoting, to really working with a lot of operational and clinical leaders around our health equity efforts, to then looking at strategies externally, right? In terms of how to engage our consumers
00:07:41
Speaker
and how to engage patients or potential patients. Right. And what's that key differentiator for them and for us to be able to provide culturally and linguistically equitable care, which is always right. What we promise and what we need to deliver on as part of being an integrated health network here, you know, and providing academic medicine in southeastern Wisconsin. So I've been very fortunate that I have a great team and that's kind of the strategy that we put in place five years ago, wrapped it up successfully about seven months ago.
00:08:11
Speaker
And then a few months ago as we all know right the pandemic came along we decided that you know what we're gonna double down on diversity inclusion health equity but we're also gonna actually embed as part of the new frontier of this work. Given obviously the long standing racism bigotry and hatred and the social unrest looking at things as through an anti racism.
00:08:31
Speaker
And to that point, we are bold enough where we've said we will become the first anti-racist health system nationally. And if we can do it here in Milwaukee, being the most segregated city in America, as you know, Cedric, as you lived here for a while, then it could be replicated right in other parts of the nation. So we're hoping that we will not only influence, but also inspire others to follow suit.
00:08:53
Speaker
That's amazing and when you think about the city that you're in the pandemic that's going on when you think about. There's all the different factors that we're facing right to steal here that you're doubling down on diversity includes especially from a health equity perspective is just great to hear and with everything that you all are doing in the organization.
00:09:13
Speaker
I'm curious, having accomplished so much of your work that you're doing, what does it look like to be a high performing organization and be committed to diversity and inclusion? Because some would say that it's difficult to do both when the results of diversity and inclusion aren't always realized as fast as other business critical activities performed in the organization.
00:09:32
Speaker
That's right. Well, I think you're absolutely right. And it's a key question. You know, I will say that, let me start with that last point that you made there as part of the statement and the question, which is this is not about the right. I mean, this is not about the sprint. This is about the long haul, right? About the marathon. And so you have to stay true to that. It's about looking at creating a strategy, right? So being intentional, being strategic.
00:09:57
Speaker
having senior leadership buy-in that's key and when you have some of those key factors or elements built into your framework into your structure right as a health system and you have a ceo who's extremely committed so much so that she chairs our diversity council and she has not missed in the five years that i've been there she has not missed one of our diversity council meetings it told you how how committed and how purposeful right we are
00:10:23
Speaker
about treating DNI and equity and anti-racism as a business imperative. This is actually not a nice-to-have, but it's a have-to-have, certainly in this trine and unprecedented times. And that, I think, is what I attribute to being very focused, very intentional, having a roadmap writer plan,
00:10:42
Speaker
with very clear metrics, right? I mean, you have to understand and really measure, right, and hold the organization and your teams accountable to what success would look like, right, or impact for that matter. And so we've been able to do that at Freighter and the Medical College for over 10 years now, and hopefully for the next 20 or 30 more as well.
00:11:00
Speaker
No, awesome. And just to understand that, how has been the feedback with everything that you're doing from inside of the organization as well as externally? What kind of feedback have you all been getting with all of the programs and all the things that you're working on? I think that when the pandemic hit us, right, and then we saw the
00:11:17
Speaker
second wave of the crisis, which was the economic collapse or impact of the unintended consequences of the pandemic. And then you have the third one with the long-standing racism. For us, we were able to shift quickly.
00:11:32
Speaker
to understand how to support our staff members, our 14,000 staff members within the health network. And part of that was to move them right and look out for them in terms of keeping them safe, well and healthy into a virtual platform so they can continue to do their best work remotely, empowering our leaders. And actually I was fortunate enough to be part of that work from home team.
00:11:55
Speaker
to be able to create a toolkit and leading practices for now this new reality right of working virtually on how to stay stay engaged right how to stay productive what would be the leaders right accountability and behaviors and actions right in terms of the virtual rounding right in touching base with their teams.
00:12:13
Speaker
and making sure that they are still, you know, being present and mindful, right? I mean, social distancing does not and should not equate to isolation for anyone. And so we were very intentional about that, also looking at the well-being of everyone within the system, because obviously we knew that this would be for the long haul, as we're seeing it with a second surge, unfortunately, and then externally kind of mirroring that, right, in terms of our commitment to our community. And so we're able to double down on a lot of our key partnerships in the community,
Community Collaboration and Education
00:12:41
Speaker
working with fairly qualified health centers where the safety nets in our communities and understanding red and getting a good pulse of what's going on what what's truly happening from a pandemic standpoint economically and otherwise right through also the the social and community unrest and we decided to not come in with a prescriptive plan
00:13:02
Speaker
but one where we were showing humility and based on that then we were able to create right as we have continued to deepen relationships and build trust what the right solutions would be and so we're able to actually do that and deliver the right messages the right resources so we could actually start educating our communities especially diverse communities and those that are limited english proficient.
00:13:25
Speaker
in a culturally relevant manner as well. So everyone was getting the same consistent messaging, but both culturally and linguistically attuned to their needs. And certainly, at the end of the day, ultimately making sure that people were staying healthy
00:13:41
Speaker
wearing their masks, social distancing, hand washing, and making sure that they had resources, including where to go and get tested if they actually were experiencing symptoms, the pandemic symptoms. So that's a lot of the work that we're able to do. And I think that what we've heard both internally and externally is that people are grateful that we showed our commitment in this manner, that we were all not about words, but about actions, and that certainly we were actually willing to come in and listen first
00:14:09
Speaker
before, you know, we actually came up with plans, right? And so that's one of the greatest probably lessons learned in my experience that you should ever come with a prescriptive approach, but one about inquiry, right? Appreciative inquiry to understand better the situation. So that has been probably a key factor for us and why I think we have been successful. You know, the one thing that that stuck out just in what you just said was the education part.
00:14:36
Speaker
And I think that when you say education is key, that really struck a chord with me because that education in the various different communities, especially in diverse communities, is paramount because sometimes
00:14:50
Speaker
Diverse communities can be weary of the motives when it comes to healthcare systems and what is their motive for me going to the hospital? Is it really to get the care that I need or is it about the bill? Or are they just trying to push me out as fast as I can? All these different factors go across.
00:15:06
Speaker
And I know just traditionally going to the hospital has not always been, you know, top of mind, you know, for a lot of diverse communities. So when you think about just, you know, I will call it like this distrust between the systems and diverse groups, like what can we do to build that trust back so that even in a pandemic or not in a pandemic, we can trust that when we go and get care, the individuals and the organizations in the systems that we're going to get care at have our best interests in mind.
00:15:37
Speaker
That's a great question, Cedric, and I think it starts with acknowledgement, right? Acknowledging and realizing the role that healthcare and healthcare systems, right, have played in the United States historically, right? And we can go back, right? I mean, in terms of the history and we can delineate
00:15:54
Speaker
Countless examples, right? Like the Tuskegee experiment where over 400 men or 400 men were actually inoculated with syphilis, right? And they became the guinea pigs, right? And no one told them what they were being inoculated with. And once we even found the vaccine a number of years later, which was penicillin, we still did not provide, right? The cure to those individuals, many of them went either blind
00:16:17
Speaker
but many of them ultimately ended up succumbing and losing their lives, right, to syphilis. And so, you know, when I know that right as part of the history, that has been part of the history and the awareness and the education that we provide, right, from a social justice, from a health justice perspective. And it's probably the uniqueness of our health system that our CEO and our senior leaders don't shy away from understanding that, acknowledging that, owning that. And I think that when you go into the community,
00:16:46
Speaker
with that humility and that acknowledgement then certainly starts openings right at least the dialogue right for us to start. Getting to know one another that's how you start building trust and ultimately then we can get to a point where we can be sitting around the table trusting one another working with one another to create the right solutions right and i think that that's how thoughtful we have been.
00:17:08
Speaker
at Freightered in our 10 years of educating, bringing your system along, you know, concurrently, right, building some of those partnerships, also working with the community.
Acknowledging Healthcare Biases
00:17:16
Speaker
And when we thought that certainly we were ready to bring our senior leaders with the community leaders and the community at large,
00:17:23
Speaker
to have these discussions, we're able to do that. And that's probably about five years ago, quite frankly, when we also unveiled our health equity efforts. And we're very thoughtful again, and strategic on how to do that, and how to let the community right provide their voice, right, the voice of the customer to tell us what is it that they need and what was needed in terms of addressing some of those issues historically, and the resources that it would require.
00:17:48
Speaker
And so I think that we have stayed very true to that every year we continue to deepen those relationships which continues to obviously build greater trust with our especially with our diverse communities and so I would say that that's really the core elements and really the way to do it if you are part of a system.
00:18:05
Speaker
somewhere else in America. I mean, you got to start there acknowledging that, educating yourself, and then owning that as you enter the community and being truthful and transparent about that and what your efforts, right, or intentions are as you build those inroads or partnerships.
00:18:21
Speaker
Yeah, look, it's a journey. This is something to where when organizations such as yours are going down this path, it's great to hear that you're in it for the long haul. And you're really in this to make sure that you're impacting the community and you're there to see the results.
00:18:37
Speaker
of what is happening and what all is taking place as you're going through this path. But you brought up health equity. So that is one of the key pillars and one of the things that you all are doing a great job at. So can you kind of go a little bit deeper and walk us through what is health equity? What does it mean to Fredder and what you all do?
00:18:56
Speaker
When I arrived at Freighter, certainly I was fortunate that I inherited a great foundation, DNI Foundation. We didn't actually had health equity defined. We were networking kind of strategically in terms of having efforts in place, but our chief medical officer knew about it, knew that we needed to start doing that. And so I think that my arrival and building some of those synergies and partnerships actually led to that. And so for us at Freighter, health equity is about committing to eliminating healthcare disparities.
00:19:26
Speaker
and addressing social determinants of health, things like transportation or food security or access to care, right? And so for us as a network is about ultimately providing culturally and linguistically competent health care to all of the individuals, regardless of the race, ethnicity, language preference, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, or any other dimension of diversity for that matter, including disability or other abilities. And so health equity has become a fundamental to the organization's mission
00:19:55
Speaker
and simply the right thing to do. And so that has become part of whom we are, how we think, how we behave. You see it in terms of the actions that we have taken, right, of being deliberate, again, intentional, strategic. You're going to hear those words time and time again, because I think that that's whom we are and how we have been successful, right?
00:20:14
Speaker
about keeping everyone focused on the efforts, creating that leadership accountability and having metrics, right? Destination metrics to what's gonna actually constitute success. And so we actually have five metrics, health equity metrics that today are part of our scorecard and part of the overall organizational dashboard, right? So again, that's the level of commitment that we have. And I think that that's, again, what I've noticed in terms of the difference and really the innovation and the commitment
00:20:42
Speaker
that we have put in place, which is probably different from, you know, other healthcare citizens who might be struggling, right, in terms of getting buy-in or support or traction or being able to have those destination metrics in place. So I think that that's honestly the way that I would answer your question about, you know, how do we define health equity and what are some of those things? So I'll give you a prime example, you know, some of the health equity metrics that we are holding ourselves accountable to, and we're, by the way, very transparent about sharing the results where we stand in terms of current state
00:21:11
Speaker
at any given point, both internally and externally, with our community as well, is readmissions, right? So basically, as you get a discharge of the hospital, right, if you have to come back for the same issue, right, or symptomology, that means that we still have to take care of you, but it means that actually we will not get reimbursed for it, right? So it hits our pockets. At the other day, it actually hits us financially. And so for us, it's not about the financial piece, necessarily. It's about, you know what, let's do what's right for our patients, for our community, right?
00:21:39
Speaker
If we say that they could be discharged or should be discharged, let's ensure that they have their treatment, their care of plan, that they understand what it entails, that they actually leave with their medications. And so we actually go as deep as understanding and addressing social determinants of health. Things like, do they have the means to buy their prescriptions, either buying medications or putting foot at the table, right?
00:22:02
Speaker
So for us, it's really important for us to understand holistically what's going on in each one of our patients' lives. Understand how do we actually remove some of those barriers. We have become creative. We're working again with a lot of other wraparound services and community-based organizations to provide some of those other wraparound services. And ultimately, right, it's about keeping our patients healthy and ensuring their wellbeing in our community, right? So then they can enjoy actually their families
00:22:30
Speaker
and you know go back to work or whatever else they really enjoy to do on a daily basis and so that's really our commitment and those are the type of things that we're holding ourselves accountable so you know read missions we also have diabetes management which for african-americans and hispanic latinos and actually even the mall community this tends to be also a major issue and it's one that you know it's a you know it's addressable right
00:22:53
Speaker
We can't prevent diabetes in our community. If people know how to actually have a healthy lifestyle, how to eat a little bit healthier, and in communities where you may have food insecurity, where you don't have supermarkets, then we have become instrumental in bringing in food markets. So we're actually trying to do and make a difference in our community, and everything is very tailored to the different geographies or communities that we're working with. So everything is very much culturally and linguistically tailored to the communities that we serve.
00:23:22
Speaker
Everything you just said, when you think about being able to think about the cost of medicine, which in some cases can continue to be on the rise and what that means for your family and actually going out and if not getting that medicine can mean that you might not even show up for dinner the next day, if that's you trying to put food on the table and be able to provide.
00:23:44
Speaker
You know, that education is just a paramount. And when you think about, you know, I seen a comment yesterday from a celebrity or individual and they made a comment that was, I would say not thought out when they made it, but it was about purchasing healthy food with a EBT or a snap car. And when thinking about, you know, that comment that they had, it kind of just, you know,
00:24:13
Speaker
went, took me back a little bit and just thinking through this process of what options are available, right? To go out and be able to eat healthy. When you think about what you can all get with that car, that's one factor of it. But when you think about what families can afford, what they can actually go out and do, and with the prices of, you know, a lot of the various different health options rising,
00:24:35
Speaker
Right. Whether it be organic, whether it be, you know, the non-meat options and yon meat and all these other type things, it can become difficult to in some cases find the quickest in the food that you can get a lot of. Right. For the least amount of money. Right. Which in a lot of cases aren't necessarily the best.
00:24:53
Speaker
Health options for us as a community so that education and what you are providing I think it's critical right because you know taking care of our bodies now right is that determining factor right between those health risk diabetes high blood pressure the things that we're putting in our body in a lot of cases has to do with what we have access to whether you're in a food desert you know whether you're able to go out and get these various different
00:25:17
Speaker
Options for you so you know as you're thinking through that right you talked about you know you have five health equity metrics that you are holding think about just the success of the overall program what are the success factor for building a health equity program.
00:25:32
Speaker
It is a being intentional. It's about commitment, right? Because in any health system, there's a ton of priorities, right? I mean, pointing in case right now, right? With the pandemic and the flu season already that has arrived, right? And all the other key efforts that we're trying to drive as an organization, it's easy, right? To lose focus or dilute the efforts. But what I love about Fraterd is that again, we have made this a commitment. It is a priority. We have built it strategically.
00:26:00
Speaker
right or baked into the baking it into all of our goals and then we have very clear metrics that will constitute what success is gonna look like right for each one of those and then so that's the internal piece right we also provide educational cultural competence education right to all of our providers.
Integrating DEI into Leadership
00:26:17
Speaker
making sure that they understand how to treat our patients, right? And enter each one of those encounters, patient encounters with that mindset, right? So they're not actually, it's not a cookie cutter approach. And then ultimately on the community side is about, again, understanding what are the issues, again, of the different communities that we serve. And then again, working with our partners there to tailor and customize what those community engagement efforts will be, right?
00:26:43
Speaker
And so for all of those efforts, whether internally or externally, we actually have kind of the same approach, right? So we build that. It's part of our framework. We have the specific tactics. We know who's going to be working with us, both internally and externally. We know what the metrics are. It's part of our balanced scorecard, and we bring all of those efforts and the updates
00:27:02
Speaker
quarterly in front of our Diversity Council, which are CEO chairs, right? So when you're able to do that, Cedric, then not only that actually allows you to stay focused, but here's the other beauty as well. It's about the investment, right? And our CEO has been very clear that when she sees efforts that come to fruition and are the right ones, right, and are yielding the impact
00:27:26
Speaker
or exceeding the impact that we thought they would have, she's willing to invest. Point in case, you know, five years ago, when I arrived at at Fredron Medical College, I remember meeting with one of my directors from language services. So all the interpretation services and translation services that function rolls up into my into my role as well.
00:27:44
Speaker
And I remember that early on she said, hey, listen, we have an issue here. We now have been moved from just supporting the academic medical center, which they were already honestly treading water as it was with eight interpreters for the whole department now to support the entire system. So now we went from one hospital to three hospital and over 45 health centers right in our region. And she said, there's no way
00:28:08
Speaker
that we can provide that with the in-person. We had telephonic interpretation, but we know that our video remote interpretation was obviously not optimal. And so here we are a few years later, where we made a $1.5 million investment. We right-sized the department. We now have 24 interpreters that support outside of English the top other five languages. So Spanish, Hmong, Russian, American Sign Language, and Arabic.
00:28:33
Speaker
right uh with inter live interpretation so these are folks who support all of our patients and the clinical teams um employed by freighter in the medical college of wisconsin and then we also have brought in a new partner that provides a video remote for up to
00:28:50
Speaker
over 200 languages that are spoken, maybe some of the low-diffusion languages in the region. And then on top of that, we also have telephonic interpretation and when all of that is already exhausted and we need more in-person. So again, that's a great example of how we have committed and have shown in terms of the investments and our behaviors and actions that we want to deliver both culturally and linguistically competent care in every single encounter. And I will tell you, that has been probably one of the greatest game changers
00:29:19
Speaker
in our diverse communities because everyone is flocking to us. They're coming to us and saying, hey, you know, your competitors have decided to shy away or cut back on this when you guys are doubling down and making the investment in this effort. So you're telling us right with your actions and your investments, whether we care or not, right, as a community in this region. So that's a great example of how we have continued to close that gap and address the disparities that exist in our region.
00:29:47
Speaker
That's amazing as other organizations and healthcare systems are working through this same journey. What could you, could you provide kind of two questions here? One is, were there any key challenges that other healthcare systems should be aware of? And then could you provide, you know, just two or three kind of key action points that as other practitioners are listening to this call or listening to this podcast, they can go out and start to look at the work they do differently than how they're doing it today.
00:30:17
Speaker
Sure, sure. I think the conundrum for any EDI team, right? Equity, diversity and inclusion team is that you will probably never be, you know, we'll have all the resources, right? Whether it's staff, your staff count or the investments, right? You can always do more, right? If you had more resources. And I think part of what we have done, and I think it's one of my lessons learned. And one of the things that I would offer is you have to be creative. You have to be innovative in your approach. And this work is about inspiring others.
00:30:44
Speaker
is about influencing your key stakeholders right to bring them along in the journey for them to understand right how to connect those dots to become ultimately champions of the efforts or allies as well and then ultimately right deliver on on their efforts right that's really ultimately kind of the litmus test for my office and and being a center of excellence right for the system where i work with a lot of other leaders around coaching and mentoring them
00:31:08
Speaker
and educating them and helping them to connect dots so that's one piece that i think it's important but i think one of the other conundrums that you're gonna have not only in terms of investment or fte is really right how do you keep this top of mind right as a key priority and how do you actually you're able to inspire a lot of people actually i would say we always hear
00:31:28
Speaker
the issue of the frozen middle, right, the middle managers. And I will tell you that while there might be some truth to that, it's the way in which you approach, right, those individuals. And I think what we have realized, for example, at Fraterd, is that, you know, we know that that's actually the level of leadership that we need to get to, right, because they're the ones who are close enough to the majority of our staff. So they're going to be the greatest influencers
00:31:53
Speaker
right in terms of modeling the right behaviors taking the right actions right and keeping our teams inspired and focus on what the efforts should be and so what we have done is really we have kind of inverted the pyramid rather than working with a lot of our senior leaders we know that they get it so that's not where we need to start let's actually focus very intentionally with middle management
00:32:14
Speaker
work with them, understand, right, the pressures that they have from the bottoms up, right, from their staff, but also the top-down pressures that they get from leadership. And we know that they get squeezed in the middle. So for us, it has been about helping them to connect us that EDI is not a set aside, but how it actually is woven into their goals. And if they actually do this work effectively, right, and proactively, they're going to be hitting all of their goals anyway, right? So we have been able to actually enlist and really turn a lot of those individuals
00:32:42
Speaker
into converts into champions and now they're actually leading the way and so i think that that's actually something that you're going to have to find a way of engaging that particular level of leadership and certainly also right how you enlist everyone and including your individual contributors and so good example of that for us is that when we rolled out our
00:33:02
Speaker
BRGs, our business research group, Cedric, one of the things that we did intentionally, again, is that for the non-exempt, so your hourly staff members, we decided that we're going to actually put an investment in a cost center that only HR and DNI have access to.
00:33:17
Speaker
but that we would not put the burden on the managers, especially clinical managers, to allow their members, clinical team members, to come to the activities or events or lead the VRGs and also be burdened with having now to get someone else. So augment their team for whatever hours there will be and pay out of their cost center. So what we decided to do was actually we were very thoughtful, rolled out a strategy where we said, hey, for the non-exempt,
00:33:43
Speaker
We're going to pay for that hour, so you don't have to incur in the cost. And then it frees up those financial investments for you to then bring a floater in. So it will be a net neutral at the end of the day to augment your team there versus having to run an expense, greater expenses. So those types of things, you have to be very deliberate.
Middle Management's Role in DEI Strategy
00:34:04
Speaker
And because we involved our middle management in those discussions, and they helped us co-create
00:34:10
Speaker
that portion of our BRG policy as we rolled it out, we got greater traction and support from them and from the overall organization. And so we haven't had any middle manager coming back and saying, hey, my team members cannot participate in the BRGs because many of them were able to weigh in.
00:34:26
Speaker
their voices were heard, ultimately, their efforts or their leadership was baked in into our strategy and into the policy. So I think that that's really the things that you certainly have to think through. And the last comment that I'll make here in terms of lessons learned is you can boil the ocean, right? And so start with a low hanging fruit. And for many health systems, it starts in terms of getting your house in order. Start with working with HR, look at what efforts you have already in terms of recruiting.
00:34:52
Speaker
or retention strategies or maybe some of the leadership development programs that you might be launching. So start looking at how you can weave in your EDI efforts there and have success. When you actually achieve success there, celebrate it because what gets celebrated gets repeated. That's a good way of then enlisting not only your internal partners, but then also looking and mirroring those efforts externally as well. But you're going to have to also be mindful of, again, bandwidth and support and investments.
00:35:21
Speaker
even for your own office, in terms of how much do you spend internally focused versus externally focused. Luckily for us, because we've been 10 years in the making, we've been able to kind of strike that balance and have a well thought out strategy. But I think that that's where I would actually advise individuals to look at.
00:35:37
Speaker
maybe get your house in order first make sure you have an inclusive workplace that values everyone that gives you right that sense of belonging and when you have those things there. Those factors are working with a turn number of other leaders maybe you can start right welcoming the community at large right to see you as a workplace of choice and then ultimately you know forging those partnerships externally not only just for work for development but some of the other community engagement strategies that i shared earlier and i think that that's the way to approach this
00:36:05
Speaker
in a face-in right or how you actually build a cohesive strategy over time. That's awesome. That's a great way to make sure that the programs are working for the employees and for the community versus trying to fit everybody into something that may not work for different populations and different groups. This is great. To cap this discussion off, I'm a lifetime learner.
00:36:26
Speaker
And I know many of the listeners are of the show. So, you know, as you've gone through your career and as you've continued to do its work in diversity and inclusion, are there any resources or books that you've found that's been most impactful for you as you continue to move down this journey? There's a couple of books. There's actually the Unequal Treatment for those of you who might be in healthcare.
00:36:45
Speaker
and you want to learn more about the history of disparities in America, all the yields, but more importantly, things that you can do differently and better as being a transformational health system in your own community, becoming an anchoring institution in your own geography. I would say on equal treatment, it's a great book. It's actually probably from the early 2000s, but it was probably the book that became catalytic for Congress to actually then have the Sullivan Commission that then actually instructed a number of thought leaders in the health
00:37:14
Speaker
in the healthcare space to put together, you know, the paper, right? The white paper, I call it the brown paper, because it actually started shedding light on how our diverse communities were actually treated unequally and different from that perspective, and what we can do differently and better. So I would say unequal treatment is one of them. But then I would say, I think there's a, you know, given the currency right now, there's a book by good friend Howard Ross, who used to leave Cook Ross, Everyday Bias.
00:37:40
Speaker
I think it's always important right to understand in terms of my own journey individually and collectively what are my biases right we all bring biases and i think it's important for us to understand and examining our biases constantly we will never arrive to your point right it's about the middle being a long a long life you know learner from
Recommended Reading on DEI
00:37:58
Speaker
that perspective.
00:37:58
Speaker
I would also offer John Bryant's The Memo that talks about the ability for him as an inner-city kid to be able to actually understand how to actually free himself from financial debt. It's actually a great book. It actually talks about equity, disparities, some of the things that he was challenged by.
00:38:19
Speaker
and a lot of the work that he led in his not-for-profit efforts at Hope there. And then obviously the latest one that I think it's a must-read is Isabel Wilkerson's cast, The Origins of Our Discontents. I think it's a phenomenal book. It actually will illustrate the cast system that exists here, similarly to cast systems that exist in other cultures, in other countries.
00:38:42
Speaker
and how unfortunate, right, and the impact that it has had in the US, in America, and the things that we need to actually unlearn and undo, right, in terms of dismantling that caste system in order for us to start, right, getting into becoming a much more equitable country and society. So those three books, I would say, would be important for anyone who is either starting, enhancing, or certainly just amplifying their knowledge and their overall cultural competence.
00:39:11
Speaker
And there we go. That was great. Look, I have the memo by John Hope Bryant, a great book. Been able to go through that a couple of times actually. So look, this has been an amazing conversation. Before we go, do you have any parting words, any shout outs, and also where can people find you if they want to connect with you further?
00:39:26
Speaker
First of all, thanks so much, Cedric, for the opportunity to have this conversation with you. This is critical, right? I mean, these are honestly unprecedented times in some ways, in others. I think for some of us who are diverse leaders and are inner city kids, I think many of us will say, well, this has been the reality, right, all along. And the pandemic just exacerbated and exposed the realities, right, that happened in many of our communities. But I think that
00:39:51
Speaker
We've been very thoughtful. I feel that we have reached a level of movement right now that gives me hope, inspires me to do this work much more strategically and in collaboration with a lot of my partners in the community. I just would say a big shout out
00:40:08
Speaker
to Freighter and the Medical College of Wisconsin, to our senior leadership team there, to our CEO for her commitment, Kathy Jacobson, but also for my team, my EDI team there who has led the way in terms of operationalizing this plan and in our countless
00:40:24
Speaker
champions and ambassadors and leaders and diversity action team members as well and then all of our community partners right you can do this work alone it requires partnerships it create it actually requires those energy so thank you for the opportunity and for those of you that would like to certainly reach out you can either find me on linkedin
00:40:42
Speaker
Andres Gonzalez here from Fraterd and the Medical College of Wisconsin, the Greater Milwaukee area.
Connecting with Andres Gonzalez
00:40:47
Speaker
And or you can actually send me an email. And I'm pretty good about answering my emails. It's first and last name. So A-N-D-R-E-S period. Gonzalez, G-O-N-Z-A-L-E-Z at Fraterd, which is spelled F-R-O-E-D-S.
00:41:01
Speaker
T. E. R. T. at dot com so andres dot konzales at freighter dot com so either way you can actually just send me a message happy to connect with people share some of my leading practices lessons learned pitfalls or anything else they would like to discuss but again said rick
00:41:18
Speaker
Thank you for this and thank you for, honestly, for the platform and the conversation that you are creating nationally to start uncovering this effort. I really appreciate it. And if it wasn't for you to really shine some light on this issue, not sure that we would be here today, right? And that we would be looking at creating a path forward. So thank you for everything that you do as well.
00:41:39
Speaker
No, thank you. Thank you. Well, look, that does it for us. Thank you everyone for joining us on another episode of the 3d podcast. This has been Cedric and you've been listening to Andreas Gonzalez, vice president chief diversity officer at freighter in the medical college of Wisconsin.
00:41:54
Speaker
Awesome. Well, that does it for us. Thank you for joining us on another episode of The 3D Podcast. If you would like to connect on social media, follow me on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook at Cedric and Powers. And if you have any questions you'd like me to read or answer on the show, or just want to know more about my thoughts around diversity and inclusion, entrepreneurship, or just overall business, you can text me. Yes, I said text me.
00:42:18
Speaker
at 770-285-0404. You'll receive content straight to your phone on a regular basis and you can message back and forth with me. Not a bot or an assistant. All responses come directly from me. But look, this has been a great episode. Until next week, this has been Cedric Chambers and you have been listening to the 3D Podcast. We out.