EPISODE #4.2:

Racism Reckoning – Just Talk or Progress? 

Nikki Lanier, SVP of Federal Reserve St. Louis, Reflects

Or listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts.

“There is no distinguishing between the personal and the professional, especially on the issue of race and racism,” says Nikki Lanier, Senior VP of the St. Louis Federal Reserve, Louisville branch. “This is an economic argument, as much as it is about social justice and the right thing to do. Our economic footing really does depend on how much we can get this together, because we’re not getting whiter, we’re getting blacker.”

Nikki returns for her second interview on the Conscious Culture Café.  I invited her to join me to reflect on the past year and to offer her observations on whether corporations and communities are making progress in the fight against racism one year after the George Floyd murder. 

She says while companies and communities have come a long way this past year in condemning racism, we need remedies. She says denouncing racism is important, but it pales in comparison with acting. 

Nikki frames the issues in terms of who matters and who doesn’t. And she argues the behaviors and norms that dictate who counts have an impact on every person in this country. 

Nikki describes her frustrations with the “infantile” approach some corporations take to addressing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. She says diversity must come first. 

“There is no way that you can get to the equity and inclusion conversations, ideology, mindset, belief systems if you can’t even understand how important it is to have someone of a different hue in your workplace.” 

She recounts how a company leader contacted her and tried to recruit her to a leadership position with his firm.  However, when she investigated the company, she found no other POC in leadership, on the Board, or in their consumer ads.

She says this company must address diversity before moving on to any other aspect of DEI.

She identifies other organizations doing very well with bringing Black employees on board. And she praised her employer, the Federal Reserve, as a model for taking meaningful action towards DEI. 

Here is a snapshot of a few topics we cover in this podcast…..

• Why diversity must come first 
• Definitions of equity and how to address it 
• Community branding problems and why Black professionals leave
• How to reframe the arguments for DEI and make more progress 
• The importance of our viewing this time as “an entirely different normal.” 

 TimeStamps: 

• 2:53 Nikki describes what the first anniversary of the George Floyd murder means
• 4:54 Why it is easier to blend personal and professional now 
• 6:03 How it feels to be both the patient and the doctor regarding racism 
• 7:01 Condemning racism vs. acting 
• 7:10 What can corporations do now 
• 13:38 Corporations’ infantile approaches to DEI 
• 16:47 Her definition of equity and how to achieve it 
• 20:09 How community consciousness is leading to action 
• 22:39 Cities’ branding issues with Black professionals 
• 26:00 Do Black people matter now?  

About Nikki R. Lanier

Senior Vice President, Louisville Branch 

Nikki Lanier is senior vice president and regional executive of the Louisville Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The Louisville Branch is focused on community development and education, as well as regional economic research and policy input. The branch covers western Kentucky, metro Louisville and southern Indiana.

Ms. Lanier’s experience includes serving as personnel cabinet secretary for the Commonwealth of Kentucky, chief human resources officer for Charter Schools USA, vice chancellor of human resources for Maricopa Community Colleges, and other positions in both the health care and legal fields. In her positions, her roles focused on strategic planning, community partnerships, succession planning, recruitment and retention, and labor negotiations. Ms. Lanier earned a J.D. from the University of Miami School of Law and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Hampton University in Virginia.

She is deeply involved in the Louisville community and serves on the boards of numerous organizations including Greater Louisville Inc., the Louisville Regional Airport Authority, the Board of Advisors of University of Louisville’s College of Business and Family Scholar House and the Robert S. Miller Family Foundation for Equity and Justice Inc. Ms. Lanier is the chair of the board of the nonprofit OneWest, as well as serving as chair of the Kentucky Kerner Commission 2.0. She also serves on the LEAD360 business development team and the UNCF Louisville Leadership Council and is a member of the Kentucky International Women’s Forum and the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.

In 2021, Ms. Lanier was named by Louisville Business First as one of the region’s Power 50. In addition, she was inducted into the publication’s Forty Under 40 Hall of Fame and has appeared on their Women of Influence and Notable Financial Executives lists. Ms. Lanier has also been honored with the Presentation Academy’s Tower Award, the Robert C. Burks Distinguished Business and Leadership Award and has been recognized as one of the 10 Most Influential Women of Louisville.

EPISODE #4.2 TRANSCRIPT

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Welcome to the Conscious Culture Café, the podcast that explores how you can lean into your purpose, live your values, and enhance your social impact through your work. I’m your host, Kathy Miller Perkins.

Just a short year ago, corporations rushed to publish statements supporting Black Lives Matter. The movement really did feel different this time. The question we explore in this episode, is what have they done since? Have they acted? Have they really supported, through their behaviors, the positions that they expressed? My guest today is Nikki Lanier and she is back for a second visit to the Conscious Culture Café. While Nikki has held several human resources positions at corporations in her earlier career, currently, she is senior vice president of the Louisville branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. I am so honored to have her join me again today to reflect one more time on the question, do black people matter?

Welcome back, Nikki. It’s so good to have a conversation again with you, approximately a year after the first one. Wow, a lot’s happened in the last year, since we talked. Let’s start out, if you don’t mind, Nikki, by you just giving us your general observations about what’s been going on over the past year?

Nikki Lanier:

Well, first, thank you so much for permitting me yet another opportunity to engage with you and engage with your audience. I just so adore all that you do on this podcast and all that you are. Thanks for the opportunity to continue to share my musings.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

My pleasure.

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. It’s been a year. It’s definitely been a year and I think that we’ve made some progress. It’s way too soon to really understand if that progress is rooted more in the perfunctory, obligatory progress or if, in fact, it rooted in long term efficacy, real understanding, and unpacking of the venomous sting of racism and the many ways that it has manifested. I can’t say that I’m displeased with what I am seeing and experiencing and feeling these days, versus all other days prior to 2020. We still have a lot more to do. A lot more to do.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah. This is quite an important day. Can you say what this day means to you?

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. Today is the day that we remember George Floyd. I mean, we remember him every day, but a year ago, he died on this day … on May 25th. I’m torn, Kathy, because I both want to try to immerse myself in the memory of him and in all of what he represented, in terms of being catalytic to spur a movement and a reawakening, but I also am trying to protect my soul and my psyche and my sense of peace. Reliving it is hurtful and it’s just painful. Yeah. I’m thinking a lot in terms of policy and reform, what has happened to assure that there will be no more George Floyds, anything near that senseless slaughtering in a very public way. How do we assure that that doesn’t happen, especially at the hands of legions of our government, who are ostensibly positioned to protect and serve. Yet, those concepts continue to be so elusive for black people. This concept of being protected and served by the federal government is just still too elusive. 

Today’s a big deal. All these days are very big deals, but today, in particular, my heart continues to go out to George Floyd and his family and his daughter. Oh man, it’s just really tough. It’s a tough time.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah. Well, last year you were actually talking about how hard it was to differentiate your personal reactions from your more professional thoughts. Has that become easier, harder? Where are you now with that differentiation? Maybe it’s not as important to differentiate? What do you think.

Nikki Lanier:

That’s it. Kathy, that’s it. It’s easier, because I don’t feel compelled, any longer, to distinguish between the two. To be blunt, I feel a sense of empowerment about talking about my personal convictions in furtherance of my professional wellbeing and the wellbeing of the only country that I know, and the employment setting that I’ve become accustomed to, and the professional sector with which I traverse. There is no distinguishing between the personal and the professional, especially on the issue of race and racism. I think I’m even more anchored and more dogged in articulating a point of view around the extent to which racism has really invaded every aspect of black American life, and, in fact, white American life. Every person, really, in this country is in some way impacted by the realities around our structural and institutional and behavioral norms that dictate who gets to matter and who doesn’t. 

Talking about that in the context of my work is important and, in many respects, even welcome. Also, talking about that as the experience of a black woman trying to manage both being the patient and the doctor, trying to be both the problem and the problem solver … well, not trying to be, but being presented or regarded in this country as the problem, but also being expected to solve the problem, it its own weight and its own conundrum. At least, I find some level of respite in being able to talk about that out loud in every setting that I find myself in in an overly condemning way without fear of losing my job or my community standing. There’s some sense of respite that comes from that.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Was there a turning point for you when that became unimportant? That differentiation?

Nikki Lanier:

I think really when the protests began here in the streets of Louisville, when I was bottling up all of what I was trying to personally reconcile around Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna and George Floyd. What I was trying to personally reconcile, I saw explode a thousand fold in the streets of Louisville and Minneapolis and, really, across the world. As odd as this is to say, I was heartened to see that it was a struggle that was more universal than not. I felt activated and unleashed in my desire to bring to the forefront of my psyche and my being. Just bring to the forefront of how I behaved, this angst. Not just the angst, but also the desire to remedy. This is how I think about it, Kathy, a lot of folks have done a really great job in condemning racism. We’ve seen that corporately, we’ve seen that philanthropically, we’ve seen that through communities, economic development folks, we’ve seen that through politicians, we’ve seen that through governmental offices. That is important, but it pales in comparison to the importance of what should follow from that. That’s why I feel activated.

Now condemnation is not enough. We really have to begin to repair. We have to repair all that racism has eviscerated for not just black people, but black people primarily. America cut its teeth on how to hate at the expense of black people- what Hispanics feel and what our Asian American brothers and sisters feel and what other groups of folks feel. The pablum was nurtured through the black body. Really understanding we have got to repair. Condemnation is great, but it’s not enough.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah. Yeah. That’s for sure. I was wondering how you were feeling about that. You’ve talked about two different arenas, really, the corporate and the community. Let’s start with the corporate. Let’s talk about what’s happened with corporations over the last year. About a year ago, corporations were making statements in support of black lives matter. It looked like maybe real change was on the way. They seemed to be willing to look at race with a new lens. What’s happened within corporations, in your opinion? Have they made progress?

Nikki Lanier:

I guess it depends on how you define progress. Let me put it this way, I read an article today in Bloomberg and it talked about whether companies can do more since George Floyd’s death. I think it did a great job of laying out … we see companies, again, doing a great job with the condemnation they don’t understand or have yet to articulate, en masse. What is the long term plan now?

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah.

Nikki Lanier:

Now that you’ve got this information, now that you’ve got this reckoning and you’re positioning yourself for racial reconciliation and you’ve got a clearer awareness of how racism has eviscerated so many people in this country and how it has bled into the work environment, what is the long-term plan to solve that? What I know and you know and your listeners know, Kathy, about America’s corporations is that when they are steadfast and dedicated to a remedy, to a strategic ideal, to an ideology, that there are resources that are allocated against that, time, money, intellect, mind share. All allocated against assuring that strategic imperative is met. We are excellent at that. We’re excellent at starting a vision, casting a vision, allocating resources against that vision, building capability toward that vision, and continually checking in, to assure that we’re marching toward it. We should see all of that momentum, as it relates to race and racism and the eradication of the same.

What I’m seeing now with companies is that there’s a lot that are getting dialed up to be more transparent and more vulnerable with regard to their reporting and their statistics on how they are utilizing black and brown talent in their workplaces. I’m seeing more companies that are being transparent and releasing their EEO1s, which, of course, captures their internal demographics by race, gender, and job routes. That’s cool. That’s fine. That helps us understand what their current state is, but it doesn’t, again, help us understand what is to be. As it’s interesting to know and quite frankly, I don’t know that I reveals anything that’s all that earth shattering. I think we knew that, en masse, American companies are just not great in advancing black talent throughout and up its ranks. No surprise there. The EEO1s reinforce that. Again, what else are we doing? What other effort are we putting in place to make sure that the numbers that you’re releasing today, look nothing like the numbers that you’re going to be releasing tomorrow. We’re also seeing more investors that are pushing for more visibility, more disclosure. 

I understand that the new chair of the SEC has talked a lot about disclosure rules being his top priority. On one hand, it pains me a little bit to know that it will probably take a lot of external pressure, continual pressure, continual public expectation, lots and lots of expectations around that. I think that will continue to help companies get where they need to go. They’ll move more through compliance than through commitment. It’s frustrating.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah, really. Well, last year you talked about how companies were good at diversity, but they weren’t good at using the equity lens. Can you say more about that? I gather from what you’re saying now, that they’re still not using an equity lens. What do you think?

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. Listen, I have a whole 45-minute talk that I could probably give on my frustrations with DEI and why we just attached such infantile thinking. In so many other areas, we, as corporate leaders, are so sophisticated and elevated in our maturity and innovative in the way that we approach programs solving. For DENI, we tend to be so ridiculously infantile. Let me tell you why I say that. I actually got a solicitation yesterday from a firm that was looking for a general counsel. Their recruiter reached out to me and was telling me all these great things about the job, blah, blah, blah. I said, listen, I’m not really interested in leaving the Federal Reserve, especially to work for another company, but let me take a look at your website. I’d really be interested to know more about you. The first thing I did was look at their governance on their board. No black people. Twelve people, no black people. Customer feedback with the quotes and the photos and how great their products and services are. No black people. 

I called him back and I said, why are you calling me? I said, let me tell you my worry. What your organization has already conveyed to me is that you’re not necessarily interested in resilience. You’re not necessarily interested in growth that saves yourself. You’re not interested in being a positive disruptor. You’re not interested in being an agent of change or folding into the burgeoning ESG framework, like the environment, social recovery. You convey, just in the page that I saw that says nothing. I have no desire to have any conversations, nor do I have a desire to share with my network this opening. What I would love to do is put your leadership in touch with some folks that I know that do really great diversity work. His retort was, yes, we need help in the DEI space. I said, no you don’t. You need help in the D space. 

There is no way that you can get to the equity and inclusion conversations, ideology, mindset, belief systems if you can’t even understand how important it is to have someone of a different hue in your workplace. That’s your strategy. There’s no shame in that, but just recognize that this is an evolution. In my opinion, DEI is a maturation scale. When you think about these concepts, they have to be modulated. They have to be paced, they have to be sequenced. They have their own strategic imperatives and values and norms that have to be reset and adjusted and jettisoned in order to make each of these principles real. I think diversity is the low hanging fruit. Many companies have at least done a decent job in getting other people of different races and faces in the building. 

Equity, on the other hand … and again, this is my definition- It is defined differently for various organizations. Equity is proportional fairness that considers the cultural and historic realities that have beset black people. It works actively to address the same. Right? It’s a verb. It’s an action word. It’s not a noun. It requires constant activity. It is rooted in this idea of segmented repair.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yeah. You talked about that last year. You talked about not focusing on diversity in general, but focusing on black employees, for example. Then, going to the next marginalized group. Is that what you’re talking about in terms of segmenting? Do any companies do that well? Do any companies get it, in your opinion?

Nikki Lanier:

Not that I’m aware of. Let me just say this, I want to toot the horn of my own employer. The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis last year, at the heels of all of this … here’s another little caveat on that. The Fed, arguably, can be regarded as and, in fact, sometimes is one of the more conservative organizations in the country. Yet, even in the midst of that, our awakening around race and race relations has just been nothing short of miraculous. I’m so proud of who we are becoming. Last year, the St. Louis Fed embarked on a racial equity assessment, focused exclusively on the black employee lived experience. It was a several month endeavor and now we are working through the recommendations that came from that, from our consultants. We’re moving forward with, I think, all of those recommendations that were discussed and suggested. What I am most excited about is how bold we were in articulating the stance that we are focusing on black employees first. I think that’s the way to go, not because I’m black, but because it’s the most marginalized group. 

As I said, this country has understood and figured out how to hate based on its years and years of institutional, behavioral, and systemic practice at the expense of black people. We’ve perfected it with black people. If we could figure out how to remedy it with black people, all the other races that also are impacted by the way that America hates, the idea is that it will be remedied, as well Right? Over time.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Yes, makes sense. Makes sense. Well, that’s great. Maybe the Fed can be an example for other companies or other organizations. Let’s switch a little bit now to community. Let’s talk about here, in Louisville. We’ve had some real issues in your community and we’re not the only community that’s had issues with race. What’s been happening over the last year in communities, in terms of either making progress or not making progress?

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. That’s equally elusive, Kathy. I think what I can say is that what I’ve seen and what I know to be true here in Louisville is that the community that is the consciousness, the coming together of the corporate sector and private sector and philanthropy and government. All these sectors and the individual leaders that buoy the economic sustenance of Louisville. The coming together to establish a new equity based framework and a new equity lens and a more mature understanding of how racism has played out in our city. That is happening with varying levels of efficacy and impact, but that is happening. As an example, under our chamber of commerce, we have a business council to end racism. I can say with some level of confidence that probably never would’ve happened, had Breonna Taylor not been murdered here. I can’t see that; I could be wrong. I just can’t see that our corporate business leaders would come together and say we need to figure out how to end racism, except for a very violent call to do so. Nonetheless, we have it now and they’re doing really great work. 

We have another group that’s formed under Simmons College and that’s called the Kerner Commission 2.0. I actually chair that commission. We, too, are coming, together with a couple of commitments that we’re going to be looking for in Louisville community and business leaders to make and furtherance of racial equity, but with the understanding that we need to better endear ourselves to our HCBUs as a community. There’s an organization, it’s a national organization, it’s called 110. Basically, it’s a pledge that many organizations are undertaking to help advance racial minorities, black folks in their workplaces and in community. You see a lot of that, which is great. You’ve got a lot of these organizations that are committing, pleading if you will, to behave differently and to engage differently in and through black communities. To commit resources very differently. 

Kathy Miller Perkins:

That’s important. That’s really important.

Nikki Lanier:

Yep. The question, though, still remains, is it going to be enough to assure that the branding, the understanding, of who Louisville is or who Minneapolis is or who Charlotte is or Atlanta, who these cities are to black people. That will matter. We still struggle with holding on to black talent here, in the city, en masse. That is a city problem. That’s community issue. We’re still struggling with that and we’re also struggling to court more black talent here, given the reality of the blacks leaving that I just mentioned. Also, given the reality that we still have yet to really reconcile a new order in our policing strategies, which a lot of black folks, black professionals in particular, are asking about before they’re even considering looking at jobs and career advancement in cities like ours.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Wow. Are there other communities that are doing really well? You talked about Minneapolis and Louisville having some challenges. What are the communities, in your opinion, that are handling this really well, that are attracting black talent as a result?

Nikki Lanier:

I don’t yet know enough to unpack what exactly is happening in these cities that’s not happening in Louisville, as an example. I do know that when I hear about my contacts, my friends, my colleagues here who are engaging in this exodus, they’re going far west coast. We’re seeing California and Seattle. I’m seeing a lot of Colorado moves. I’m seeing a ton of Atlanta moves. Lots of Charlotte, North Carolina moves. Houston/Dallas moves for black professionals. In the last year, the folks that I can think of that have left, have gone to one of those places. There either is, in fact, or is by perception a softer landing for black people in those cities to either maneuver or manage their professional lives and/or live a fulfilling and endearing, peaceful personal life in those cities. One of those two, if not both, must be at play for those folks as they’re thinking about making these moves.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Well, that’s interesting, because some of the cities you just mentioned are southern cities. It’s not a north/south thing, it doesn’t sound like.

Nikki Lanier:

Right. No.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

That’s really interesting.

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. Yeah.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Well, a lot of challenges, both for communities and corporations. I think you said earlier in our session today that we’ve made a little progress, but it sounds like there’s a lot more progress to be made. One thing that I wanted to ask you, because we talked about this when I interviewed you last year. You said, this is the question all of us need to ask and that is, do black people matter? Where are we with the answer to that question today, do you think?

Nikki Lanier:

I don’t know if I answered that last year, but if I did, I’m sure I would’ve said no.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

You did and you said no. 

Nikki Lanier:

I would still say no this year. Here’s the deal, Kathy. We matter in context and in situations and in certain circumstances. En masse, I’d say when most people, white people, close their eyes at night and think about the next 50 to 100 years of America, what are people doing, where are people going, what are we experiencing? There’s not a whole lot of black folks that are just running around in that picture. When you envision black people in the future, where are they? What are we doing? What are we being? What are we exposed to? Where are we working? Where are we living? What is our health status? Just thinking about that, I still think that it’s not really top of mind in a way that it should be. We’ve also had 400 years of understanding that there are people who matter and that there are people who don’t. That is an American value, whether we like it or not. Racism is an American value, whether we want to admit that or not. That value has been implicated and nurtured for 400 years. In a year, it is unrealistic to expect that any of that would be dismantled and maybe even diluted. 

At the very least, though, we want to assure that we’re continuing and condemning racism, that we’re continuing and assuring that there is greater visibility and vulnerability around how people are permitted to behave with us in mind. People, meaning collectively, corporations, education systems, healthcare systems, banking. How those organizations are permitted to behave with regard to black lives has to be progressively different. Every single day there should be some demonstrable betterment from a behavior, structural, institutional, certainly policy standpoint that advances us to black people finally being able to live in the fullness of the post-slavery promise.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Absolutely. Accountability. It’s all about accountability, it sounds like. 

Nikki Lanier:

Yeah. Yeah.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Well, Nikki, thank you very much for coming a second time to join us. I appreciate it very much and I’m sure that our audience will appreciate it, too. Especially one year later, it’s very interesting to hear your reflections on what has happened, what hasn’t happened, what needs to happen, where we go from here.

Do you have any last words that you’d like to offer before we sign off today?

Nikki Lanier:

Well, yeah. I just don’t want it to feel doom and gloom. I don’t want to be overly critical, but I do want to be very clear, at least in my lens and what my experiences spell out for the reality that I think black people face, that white people face, that this country will be facing from this point forward. This is an entirely different normal. An entirely different norm. We’ve never been in a place where this kind of reconciliation has been called upon in this way. Most of our civil rights movements have come through the heels of black people just being tired of being murdered, quite frankly, by the police. We just get tired of the murders and that tends to be the catalyst. This feels a little different, because we were in Covid, because we had those three deaths back to back. We’re at a different dispensation in time, so my hope and my prayer is that all of that together really means that we don’t need to experience, as a country, any more senseless deaths for us to continue in this work. That corporations, that individual leaders in those corporations, really do the work to understand when and where racism is showing up, because it’s everywhere. 

That’s the inertia. It is everywhere. That actively remedying it and actively addressing it, just cutting off the head of racism and then treating the wound that it has left and then getting that venom that is coursing through our veins expelled, that really does help the entire infrastructure of this country. This is an economic argument, as much as it is about social justice and the right thing to do. Our economic footing really does depend on how much we can get this together, because we’re not getting whiter, we’re getting blacker. Democracy says, we, as a country, will have to rely on black and brown people in the very near future and beyond, for the economic sustenance of this country. We don’t have a choice. We don’t have a choice. We have got to get this work done.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

I agree. I absolutely agree. What I’d like to suggest is that you come back again next year and we’ll have this conversation again and see where we are. 

Nikki Lanier:

Kathy, I’d love it. Thank you for the opportunity. I’d love to.

Kathy Miller Perkins:

Okay. Thank you, Nikki.

Thanks for listening to the Conscious Culture Café. If you like what you heard, connect with us at millerconsultants.com. You can access the show notes and receive our free materials. See you next episode.