Senior leadership is stuck in "business as usual" practices. Senior leadership is repeating systems of oppression and white supremacy that we see in our society. They are trying to be perfect and when they make a mistake they repress it. This repeats harms in society. There is a culture of stress and scarcity.
A few specific examples from my experience:
-Senior leadership was not transparent in how they made decisions for employees or the company. There were no effective tools for feedback between my colleagues and the senior leadership team. Decisions were made in ways reliant on unspoken social norms (e.g. hallway meetings and spontaneous conversations).
-our working environment was reliant on the goodwill of our team members. there were not systems to support us.
-when I spoke to my colleagues, I heard them say "I don’t understand why management is making this decision, it doesn’t make sense for me and the work I do, I don’t feel that I have any power or tools to change the decision or offer feedback in a way that would make things better for me."
-in January at the full staff meeting, the senior leadership team hired someone who delivered an emotional intelligence presentation based in the harmful ideologies of ableism and racism.
-most people at the company demonstrated cynicism -- believing that change can never happen and outcomes will never be achieved. Lily Zheng, author of DEI Deconstructed, explains that this is an indicator of a low-trust environment. I definitely felt that JSI is a low-trust working environment.
-lack of workplace safety (non-OSHA compliant)
-when workers began organizing to unionize, management invested a lot of time and resource into union busting. They hired a union busting law firm. They chose to go to great lengths and expense to create a hostile workplace. They chose that instead of listening to the needs of employees, amplifying the diverse brilliance of all the musicians and luthiers and workers, and taking steps towards building trust and making changes towards a sustainable, thriving workplace.
