"Code-switching as it’s been coined by the POC community—specifically centered around the Black experience—is when Black people switch the way they speak, act, and interact with colleagues within the companies they work for. For a long time, code-switching has been a survival tactic. The thought of actually coming to work and being yourself as a Black person could potentially lead to discrimination, tokenism, and in some cases termination. In Black and POC communities, code-switching is seen as a necessary practice for advancing professionally and being considered as valuable at work. Transparently, there is no clear description of what code-switching looks like to everyone who experiences it, but generally, it is a tool that has been used to fit into a specific work culture that has been deemed appropriate. In retrospect, this deems any other behavior outside of the traditional guidelines, inappropriate." Excerpt from Margot Elise's article, "How Code-Switching in the Workplace Has Been Normalized for POCs" We want to talk about the big questions including: - What does code-switching look like in the social sector? - What survival tactics are our social sector colleagues expected to employ to be seen as "valuable" and "appropriate"? - What does it look like to belong inside and outside our organizations? This very powerful and vulnerable conversation will be guided by: Dorian Spears, National Program Partnerships and Strategy Lead, GET Cities Stéphanie Bermúdez, Founder and CEO, Startup Unidos