A Business Owner Dares to Start a Real Conversation About Race
White owners often ask Mel Gravely, CEO of TriVersity Construction, what they can do to help. He’s got an answer for them, which he offers in this interview and in his challenging new book, ‘Dear White Friend.’
By Loren Feldman
Mel Gravely did not grow up in poverty, and he wants to be clear about that. Still, he says, there was no path from where he started to where he sits today as owner and CEO of TriVersity Construction in Cincinnati. He managed to get there only because a whole bunch of people made very deliberate decisions to reach out and offer opportunities. At TriVersity, he’s been trying to do the same, but he’s always surprised when he meets other owners who don’t seem to realize how consequential their hiring and buying decisions can be.
As he says in this conversation, it’s not easy. And it won’t always work. But it’s a path to progress. You can watch the whole video above or read the edited transcript below.
Loren Feldman
Obviously, you decided that being an entrepreneur isn’t risky enough. You decided to make your life truly interesting, you needed to do something really risky, like writing a book about race.
Mel Gravely
Yeah, yeah.
Loren Feldman
Tell me a little bit about what led you to—I mean, didn’t you have anybody in your life who said, Have you thought about golf? What prompted you to take this on?
Mel Gravely
So you know, I mean, it kind of snuck up on me to be honest with you. It’s starting to hit me now that people are reading it and saying, Yo, man, this is about race, Are you sure?
I went to this training that I didn’t intend to go to because I didn’t think that Black people really needed to do this kind of racial equity training, because I’ve got lived experience. But I went to this training because I thought that the business leadership in Cincinnati should do it. And this education just opened my eyes wider than they’ve ever been and showed me these patterns. And so I leave this two-day training, and I’m just disoriented about everything that I see. All these patterns of behavior that now I can see, because I’ve been educated on kind of how they’ve come about. And I was looking for what I can do about it. I talked to a few friends. I didn’t come up with any real concrete answers.
So I started to write because I love to write. And then the pandemic came. And I thought, well, I got more time now. Right? So I wrote more. And I wrote more. And before I knew it, I had these series of letters, and I start sharing them with friends. And then I decided—and I remember when I decided—it was Ahmaud Arbrey, the gentleman in, I believe it was Georgia, that was chased down by the white pickup truck. And they got in an altercation, and he was killed. That was the day I decided we’ve got to have a different conversation about race in this country. And I’ve got to stop talking about it and do something about it. And so those letters became an intentional book. And here we are, I don’t know how many months later, and yeah, Dear White Friend is a thing.
Loren Feldman
It’s a good thing. It’s a really good book. I highly recommend it, especially for business owners. It’s a very generous, warm book written as a series of letters to a friend. And I’m wondering a couple of things about that. One is, you obviously put a lot of thought into how it would be read by White people. Were you concerned about how it would be read by Black people?
Mel Gravely
Yeah, yes. Your short answer is yes. But in the pre-reading group, there were equal numbers of Black and White, male, female and some age variation as well, though less so than the racial diversity, but I was very worried. And I was criticized a little bit. Statements like me saying, “I don’t think that you’re racist,” were a little controversial. So my Black friends: “How could you not think White people are racist?”
And I got called “accommodating” to White people, and it did adjust my tone, because I don’t want to sound accommodating. I think we’ve got a sense of urgency here, and I hope I’m direct and pointed about that. But these are my friends that I’m writing to, and there’s certain places you go with your friends that you can push them pretty hard. But it’s in a way that respects the friendship and preserves the relationship, and that’s what I’ve chosen to do. And I hope I’ve struck that balance. We’ll find out.
Loren Feldman
Well, my reading of it is that your tone is respectful and warm, but you don’t sugarcoat things. I think you say things that are going to make some people uncomfortable. And I think that was your intention.
Mel Gravely
Yeah, and I’m not a sugar-coating kind of person. So my friends know me as that person, but they also know my heart. They know my intentions. They know I come to their aid, just as they come to mine. They know that I trust them, just like I asked that they trust me. And so although the people reading the book won’t necessarily know me, I think they’ll get to know me through the writing. And that’s why I share so many personal stories in it, because I want the people to get to know me—that I really am the generally smiling, pleasant, loyal friend. But I’ve got a serious message, and I think it’s time we talk about it.
Loren Feldman
You do have a serious message. You have a lot of very moving personal anecdotes. I wanted to choose just one—it was hard to choose one, but the one I picked—correct me if I’m getting this wrong—but I think it followed a conversation you had, it may have been with other business owners. It was a small group. You might have been the only African American there or one of the few. And the topic of internet access came up, and you shared your concern that that’s a problem. It’s an issue. And there were a couple of people there, who took a different view of it and said, Wait a second. There are libraries, and there are places you can go. There’s no problem with internet access. That’s an excuse.
And what you wrote in the book was, “Their statements bothered me mostly because of how they were expressed forcefully and adamantly. They were confident in their ignorance. Why were they so energized to attack this particular example of disparity. Their responses left no room for discussion, or for them to receive additional insight. These two decided they already knew everything they needed to know about this topic.” And I thought, I’ve had similar conversations way too many times. And I guess my question to you is, am I reading this right? Was that part of the reason you wrote this book? And also, are those the people you’re hoping to reach?
Mel Gravely
Well, I don’t know if I’m trying to reach those people. But I am trying to say in general, we have to have better, more nuanced, more in depth, more balanced, more forward-thinking conversations about race than we have today. This book is about the fact that until we discuss it back and forth, come to understand either what we can agree on or what we disagree on, and then create strategies on the things we can’t agree on, we’re not going to make very much progress. And this was just an example of the way they stated it, that they hadn’t really studied it. They hadn’t really looked for nuances. They just knew. They just knew. And they were so damn sure that I started to think, Well, maybe I’m an idiot.
So I went and looked at the library to say, Well, what are the hours? Maybe they’re 24/7. And maybe the library comes to your house in the middle of the night, so you don’t have to take two buses to get there so that you can have the same internet access that I have at my house. I found out that’s really not true in that there’s actually a chance that you don’t have internet access. So I know it’s a small example. And internet access is not just a race thing, but the fact that they were so blatantly sure of themselves. And I run into that a lot, where they’re not studied. They’re not knowledge-based, but they’re certain about it. And when it comes to race, we’ve got to be a lot less certain, a lot more open. We’ve got to start questioning what we think we know.
Loren Feldman
And I think that’s what you do in this book. You acknowledge that we all need to know more about the history of race in this country, that none of us have been taught—or very few of us have been taught well—about racial history. And you take on a lot of issues and you anticipate a lot of responses. I imagine that must have been a grueling process in some ways. I mean, to study all that to be able to write authoritatively about it. It’s a lot to take on your shoulders.
Mel Gravely
I really want to make sure I stay in my lane. I am not an expert in race relations. I don’t claim to be. But I have studied a great number—as you’ll see, the book’s well annotated—a great number of sources and researchers and big thinkers on this topic. And I’ve talked to my White friends in depth. And so I tell the story in the book, my journey with White people started in 1976 when I got bused to a different school. And since that time, I’ve been learning how to be with them. I’ve been learning their perspectives. And I don’t always get it right. But I can anticipate their responses. And this book was an iteration. So I’d write a letter or two or six, and my friends would read them, and I’d get some feedback. And I’d say, Oh, okay, that wasn’t as clear as I thought it should be. So here’s what I mean. I still mean it, but let me say it in another way. And it was that iterative process. I met with a young man last evening, and he had read this book early, and he had some comments about some things that weren’t in the book that he thought should have been. And I agreed with him, by the way. I got worn out. I got to the end, and I just said, I’m tired. I mean, the book is done. Now we’re gonna go. We’re gonna give it to the publisher and editors and let them do their thing.
Loren Feldman
Obviously, I realized that the book is organized as a series of letters. I didn’t realize that you had actually written it that way and shared it as you were doing it. That makes perfect sense to me now that I know that, and it must have had a real impact on how you were writing it, I’m guessing, adjusting as you went.
Mel Gravely
It slows it down quite a bit, because I didn’t just give it to one person. I might give it to six people. And they’ve all got something to say, and none of it is the same, right? So you don’t have many constant themes. And so I had to keep making decisions about what do I really think and does what they’re saying really enlighten my thinking. And I think it was a great process. And I just hope readers agree. My mission here is to infect this country with a new way to talk about race, an on ramp to the path to equity that I think we can have. And I hope we’ve done that in his book.
Loren Feldman
Let’s take a step back. How did you go from that bus in 1976, that you just referred to, to being CEO and owner of a construction company in Cincinnati. Can you take us on that ride a little bit?
Mel Gravely
I’ll try to make the ride short, or at least as abbreviated as possible. If I look back on my life—and I do write about this in the book, as well—it was a series of intentional moves by individuals and companies all along the way. Because there was no path from my Black neighborhood to the seat I sit in today. Meeting you, being a member of Tugboat, being on boards of companies, there was no direct road from where I grew up. And I don’t want to say we grew up in poverty. That’s not what I’m trying to say. It was a solid, middle-class neighborhood, but we just didn’t have a path here.
So even in my senior year in high school, I remember the college I ended up going to coming to meet with minority students—minority students—my senior year. And they laid out this great program, co-op program, that they were starting. And it was a co-op program that started right after high school and you’d co-op and it’d take you five years and you’d co-op every other semester. And it provided money and benefits and all this stuff. And it was my only way to college. And so I majored in computer science because it was a computer science co-op program. And I went to Mount Union College because there was a Mount Union program, and I co-opped to the Timken company. All of these people were intentional about making sure folks had an opportunity. And that just goes on and on.
When I left college, I went on to work for IBM. I tell a story with seven people that started the day I started. Five of them were Black. IBM was intentionally trying to give folks an opportunity, and that was a wonderful place. I learned so much and did so many things. And so it was just a series of intentional acts—even up into TriVersity Construction. I was not a founder. There were three other founders. And when they were looking to transition two of the founders, one of the founders came to me, and he was intentional. His vision of TriVersity Construction—this is a White CEO in Cincinnati, Pete Strange, CEO-emeritus now—he wanted to grow a $100 million construction company. That was his vision, and he couldn’t figure out why Black people couldn’t do that. So he thought he’d start one—get two of his Black friends, and they would start this company. And they tried for a while, and they wanted to transition to new ownership. And my partner and I, at the time, bought this company.
But it was Pete Strange’s intentionality about growing this company. And we will do a lot. We’ll manage a little over $100 million worth of construction this year. We’ve got close to 100 employees, and I hope people think we’re good citizens in Cincinnati. And we’re a purpose-driven, people-first organization and pretty proud of that. So just a series of intentionality all along the way to bring me to this point right here. And so how could I not write about that experience, and share what collaboration and intentionality can do?
Loren Feldman
I should point out, you referred to Tugboat. For those who don’t know, that’s the Tugboat Institute. We both attended their annual summit in Sun Valley, Idaho in June, where you gave a talk that was extremely well received. You got a standing ovation from a group of people who don’t usually give standing ovations. During that talk, if I recall correctly, I think you referred to yourself a little more pointedly than you just did. I think you called yourself “an affirmative action baby.” Do I have that right?”
Mel Gravely
Yeah.
Loren Feldman
And that’s interesting to me, because I think some people might be tempted to feel diminished by acknowledging that. You’re volunteering it. How do you look at it?
Mel Gravely
Yeah, well, I said before, there was no natural path to where I stand and sit today and the places I’m in. And so somebody had to affirm their actions that I have opportunity. That’s really what affirmative action is. Somebody affirmed their actions. We’ve turned it into quotas and government programs, and all. We’ve turned it into something different. But quite honestly, it was intentionality around having certain outcomes happen, trying to to create some equity in a world that had been inequitable for many, many years. And so I don’t apologize for that.
I say, for those critics, won’t you measure the return on investment in intentionality around investing in me? So it doesn’t diminish me at all. When I show up, I’m pretty confident. I’m not always so self-assured, but I’m pretty darn confident. And I know I try to deliver value every single day. And I try to give back, and I try to make a difference. And that’s what I should be doing. So in my mind, it doesn’t diminish me at all. I can tell you, though, the response to that comment—there were many White people who said, I can’t believe you said that. It really does diminish you. And I thought, Well, I mean, I don’t think you should say it about you. But I said it about me. And I don’t think it diminishes me at all.
Loren Feldman
I have had conversations with African American entrepreneurs who have said things to me along the lines of, I just won this competition, and the reaction I get from people I tell about it is, “Oh, that’s an award for Black entrepreneurs. Right?” And they do feel diminished by it.
Mel Gravely
Yeah. So you know what? The world is not perfect, man. We have screwed this country up, right? We have such great history, and then we’ve got this shadow side that we don’t really want to talk about. But together it’s still a great nation. And so, you know what? If you get a Black business award, be happy with it. And be you, because you were recognized for your contributions. But we also ought to be getting the other awards, too. My position is I want a chance to compete. I want to be in the marketplace. I want a chance to compete. If you give me a chance to compete, I will build my skills. I will build my capacity. I will build my capabilities. And I’ll compete. And that’s all I’m asking for.
Loren Feldman
You referred in talking about affirmative action to how it gets mixed up with quotas and other things. In the book, you write about an episode at your business where you tried to institute a quota. You instructed a division to, I think, hire 20 percent African American employees, and it didn’t go well. What happened?
Mel Gravely
It was a disaster actually. Now they did it. I work with great people, and they want to pursue our mission. And I was either misguided or not clear or didn’t do enough work in detail to get our folks ready. I said I wanted this division to be 20 percent Black. And so it became 20 percent Black, but they ignored performance. They ignored people adhering to our values, and they wouldn’t step in and deal with people who needed to be dealt with from a managerial standpoint because they wanted to stay at 20 percent. And we’re not at 20 percent today, and I want to get to more than 20 percent in that division. But I also want it to be consistent with our values.
And so we struggle with this as well. But I can’t just set a number out there. I’ve got to set a number out there and say, Now, what’s our strategy to get there? How do we maintain the values and the excellence and the performance, because if you don’t, here’s what happens. You bring people to the table, you give them a job, and some of them won’t perform. If they don’t perform, and they’re not dealt with in the same way that White people who don’t perform are dealt with, you’ve done a disservice to the African Americans that you’ve brought to the table. So we can’t be guilty of that. We’ve got work to do. I mean, if this was easy, we’d already have done it. You and I wouldn’t be talking, and I wouldn’t have written this exhausting book.
Loren Feldman
I’m sure you have White business owners who come to you and say to you that they want to be intentional, they want to hire minorities, but they’re nervous for various reasons. Did you learn anything from that experience that guides you in how you respond?
Mel Gravely
Yeah, it taught me that there’s nothing more important than the culture and performance of the organization. But it doesn’t let us off the hook around our effort. And so hiring, meeting people where they are, evaluating our hiring practices and criteria, quite honestly. You know, how many of those criteria are real? And how many of them aren’t? What’s your training program look like? How connected are you with diverse communities so that you have a pipeline of talent coming your way? It does not excuse us from that effort. So I don’t let anybody off the hook. As a matter of fact, I think they ought to be more diverse than I am if they’re bigger than we are, because they’ve got more resources. So I hear the excuses. I get it. If you show me your effort, you’ll make progress. I don’t know of any company that has a sincere, thoughtful effort over time tht doesn’t make progress.
Loren Feldman
I’ve spent most of my career working for large media companies, they’ve struggled with this issue. One thing I’ve noticed is that if you make a hire, and it’s a White person that doesn’t work out, nobody goes, We’ve got to stop hiring White people. But the converse isn’t necessarily true.
Mel Gravely
And that’s just our messed-up-ness around race in this country. And it’s hard for me to get people to see that. But you’re absolutely right. You go to a restaurant. It’s not a great experience. It’s a Black restaurant—like oh, my gosh, that’s why. We shouldn’t have done this. Right? But you know, I’ve had bad food everywhere. I’ve had bad service everywhere.
Loren Feldman
Most of us have.
Mel Gravely
Yeah. And I keep telling my White friends, Tell your White friends to stop thinking like that. Call them out on it. I can’t be the guy always calling out all the White people. I think White people talk about race a little bit amongst themselves. And it’s one of the things I call for in the book— Make this a thing. Question people when they say things like that, because it’s factually just not true.
Loren Feldman
So let’s talk a little bit about what you would ask of business owners. You’re very direct about this in the book, and you kind of recount the type of conversations you had last year, particularly after George Floyd, where people reached out to you and said, You know, I want to do something. What should I do? How do you respond to that kind of question?
Mel Gravely
So there’s some things I think we ought to do personally, but you’re specifically asking about the business. And here’s what became shocking to me. I had people who own their business, some of them multigenerational business owners, who were the leaders of their organizations, and they hadn’t thought about influencing their own sphere of influence. There is no company that I have more influence over than my own. And so, what are your practices, principles, objectives? What are you trying to do to solve the riddle? How are you looking at hiring? How are you looking at philanthropy? How are you looking at your supply chain?
So I say, take your company, and look at ways that you spend money, both on people and on supply chain and even in philanthropy. And say, how are we doing across this lens? Right? So to me, looking at your own organization is just a great opportunity. And I was shocked. I mean, this is one that surprised me that people said, I just hadn’t thought about it. They want the world to change, and they’re serious about it. They don’t like racism. They don’t like what they see. They don’t want the protests. But they want everyone else to change in the world, and they hadn’t thought about changing their companies.
All that’s got to be supported by some education and training, some cultural stuff that’s got to happen inside of organizations to retain Black talent and other diverse talent. But start with your business. Why would you be looking at writing a check to the Urban League—not that that’s a bad thing, love the Urban League—but you could be doing something in your company to create opportunity. Loren, what’s missing here is a deeper connection between Black people and opportunity—for employment, for promotion, for ownership, for wealth creation, for fair housing, for equitable health. It’s that disconnect between them and this opportunity, and business owners can do a lot.
Loren Feldman
Well, that was a very broad look you just gave us. You gave us a bunch of different places where something could be done, but it’s not necessarily obvious how any particular business owner could address fair housing for example. Give me something specific — suppliers, employees.
Mel Gravely
So let’s look at the supply chain. In our organization, we want to spend an excess of 30 percent of our dollars with diverse organizations. [A disembodied female voice can be heard]. Alexa is doing math for me.
Loren Feldman
Can you tell Alexa to be quiet?
Mel Gravely
Alexa, be quiet.
Loren Feldman
It worked.
Mel Gravely
Hopefully, you’ll get rid of that before you use this.
Loren Feldman
Nothing wrong with that.
Mel Gravely
I have no idea where my mind was.
Loren Feldman
Suppliers.
Mel Gravely
Yes, we want to be over 30 percent. So we want to be over 30 percent in spending, and I’m particularly focused on African Americans in our community. People of color, the predominant race is Black in Cincinnati. The predominant other race is black. We’ve got others, and we cherish all that. But primarily Black. And so when we are doing projects, when we’re looking at subcontractors, when we’re looking at new subcontractors, we are always mining for and solving for who are contractors that can help us reach that objective. Who can we work with over time to change the complexion of our supply chain? Supply chain is powerful, because when we spend money with an African American-owned business or any other diverse business, woman-owned, etc, we change the dynamics, the economic dynamics, of that business and everything it touches.
And so the ripple effect is amazing. The wealth creation is very, very different. And so in our organization, we’ve set a clear goal so people are being tracked against that goal. We’ve got systems in place to mitigate our risk. We’re not just doing business with anyone, but there are a lot of people you can do business with. Maybe you can’t do business with them on a $40 million project, but they’re perfect for a $5 million project. And so we’re constantly mining for that. And then the leadership team is asking the question, How are we doing? Because if I ask a question, it matters in our organization. People are like, Well, Mel wants the answer to that question. He must want it for a reason. It must be an issue. So leadership can keep pulling that demand for the diversification of supply chain. But supply chain is one of the super secret superpowers of businesses, and I think we underutilize it.
Loren Feldman
My sense is that there’s a lot more discussion about the issue of hiring for diversity than for arranging your supply chain for diversity. I know it certainly comes up in government contracting and specific areas where it’s mandated. But am I wrong about that?
Mel Gravely
No, you’re right, you’re right about that. But here’s why that is. I think that people get it around employees. They get income. They don’t get wealth. They don’t get the importance of having other people in the wealth game, in the equity game, and it’s critically important. The other thing is, if we go into most organizations, and you find the Black people, they will disproportionately be at the bottom of the organization. And so again, a job’s a job. Benefits are benefits. Please don’t misunderstand me, but we can populate that a little easier. Again, disrupting our supply chain somehow feels harder. And I’m saying it is one of our superpowers as business leaders. And we should be hiring, promoting, and we should be buying in our supply chain differently.
I’ll throw this out, too. If you think you’re going to hire a kid out of school that’s super bright, and hire them in your organization, and one day they’re gonna be a vice president, chances are, that ain’t gonna happen. Because if you invite them into an organization that does not have a culture that surrounds and supports them, they feel connected to, they may stay a few years and then they move on to someplace else. So you really got to be intentional about having enough activity, mid-levels and even executive levels, even thinking about boards. How diverse is your board if you have a board or advisory board of directors? Because if you’ve got a diverse board, they’re giving you diverse input, and you’re going to start hearing things or having to discuss things that you might not have been discussing before. All good and healthy for your organization.
Loren Feldman
Do you have any advice on how you kind of get started? I’ve talked to White business owners, especially in the tech area, who do not have representation in their businesses. And they’re acutely aware that that makes it harder to bring someone in. Somebody who has options is probably going to choose to go somewhere where they see themselves as opposed to somewhere where they’re going to be breaking new ground. Any advice on how to negotiate that situation?
Mel Gravely
So every situation is different. I say that and I pull up short from giving too much specific advice. I’m not an HR specialist, I’m not a staffing-sourcing specialist. But here’s what I’ll say: I’m also not a nuclear physicist. But if I needed to solve that, I’d get myself a nuclear physicist. And so if this is really something leadership wants, then go seek out smart minds that can help you put a strategy together just like you would if you were trying to go more green and be more sustainable. If you were trying to open an office in another country, you’d get advice. Or if you’re trying to start an ESOP, you’d go get the best minds to help you think through what is a strategy that applies to our organization. Why is this different?
Loren Feldman
That is such a great answer. We’re getting some questions in chat. I think you’ve sold at least one book to somebody who wants to know the best place to get it. Is it available yet?
Mel Gravely
I think not. So Tuesday is the actual publication date. July 27, it’s available anywhere books are sold. I know they’re being pre-ordered, because we became an Amazon bestseller a couple days ago, even prior to shipping.
Loren Feldman
Congratulations.
Mel Gravely
Thank you very much. We got a great marketing team, and Greenleaf publishing—those guys are phenomenal. And we’re just rocking and rolling on that. So any place books are sold. And if you need a place to determine where books are sold, you can go to dearwhitefriend.com. And at the bottom of our page, there’s a bunch of booksellers there that you can go to and get the book. So we appreciate that.
You know, I haven’t said one thing, and I just want …
Loren Feldman
Please.
Mel Gravely
I’m talking about Black, and I’m talking about White. And some people might say, Well, what about all the rest. And as they’ll see in the book, I make this case that our country’s been structured with Whites on top, Blacks on the bottom, and everybody else in between. And I am completely convinced—and I think the data show it—that if you solve for Black people, you solve for the nation. If you create inclusive policies that touch Black people, everyone else in between is better off, women are better off, other people of color are better off because we really did intentionally build this construct—Whites on top, Blacks on the bottom, and everyone else in between.
And so for those people who are saying, Well, you know, he is so specific on Black people. No, I’m specific on the United States of America. And I believe we’re a better country if we can include African Americans. If we don’t specifically call out African Americans, they will be left behind. In every single approach, intentional behavior, it doesn’t work if you don’t say I’m solving for Black people, because it is almost always easier to select a White woman, or an Asian, or an Asian Indian. And I love my brown brothers and sisters, and I love my female sisters as well, but this construct in this country is strong. And it’s kind of ingrained into what we’ve got: Whites on top, Blacks on the bottom, everyone else in between. And that’s why I’m making that distinction.
Loren Feldman
Is that construct one of the things that made people uncomfortable when you shared the letters with them before you published?
Mel Gravely
That didn’t come out as a super thing.
Loren Feldman
They accepted it?
Mel Gravely
Yeah, by the time I say it the first time, I’ve built a case for it. But I can tell you one thing that got changed. It was some reader of the book, and you had to get, I don’t know, 40 percent into the book, maybe 60 percent in the book, before I said the words, “I don’t think you’re a racist.” And so I had a White friend who said, “If you’re going to say that, just say it earlier because I kept reading, waiting for you to call me a racist. And I thought, Okay, I’ll move it a little bit sooner, and now it’s actually on the cover of the book. Again, it’s a controversial statement for Black people and other people who are very conscious about this title. So I think we need all our voices, and and I hope everybody who disagrees with me just agrees that I deserve to have a voice in this, because I respect all of yours as well.
Loren Feldman
But you did call it “Dear White Friend.” So that does suggest you’re not talking to racists.
Mel Gravely
Yeah, but I—that’s true, because if you’re racist, you’re not my friend. I think there is a notion, though, that all White people are racist, mainly because we live in a country that has racism kind of cooked into it. And I just don’t agree with that. And so I thought I’d call it out.
Loren Feldman
Here’s another question. How can companies intentionally increase BIPOC access to the informal opportunity network?
Mel Gravely
Yeah. Well, so, I struggle with this question a little bit. For the same reasons. These questions are complex. They’ve got cultural layers, too. They’ve got personality to them. They’ve got industry to them. And I’ll just say the same thing I’ve said before: If we get intentional about the idea of doing, and we have enough dialogue and intentionality about it, we’ll find out ways to pull it off. And so if we try things that do not work, and we talk with people about what they need, and what helps them, they will try something else the next time. So I’m trying to be a little coy because I don’t want to start solving problems in a context that I do not know—and have people say, “Well, he doesn’t understand”, or, “What about this?” or, “I tried that.” And so, all I’m saying is, when we get clear and intentional about what we want to do and we’re willing to try it and fail, then we’re going to make progress. I hope that wasn’t too vague.
Loren Feldman
No, not at all. I think that’s very fair. And I loved your answer to the question about what someone should do to try to make their environment more welcoming. Your answer was, Talk to somebody who knows how to make your environment more welcoming.
Mel Gravely
And because there are experts out there on culture, and there’s assessments you can do in your organization to assess how culturally sensitive and how much bias is going on and how you look on promotions and pay. And I mean, if you’ve not looked at all that stuff, you could have a mess going on here that you’re not even aware.
Loren Feldman
So I’m going to ask you another question like that. And if your answer is the same, that’s okay. But you started this by telling us that part of what prompted you to write the book was attending some kind of DEI session. And I know a lot of people working in businesses listening to this are thinking about their own offerings. And I’m just curious—you don’t have to be a racist to be uncomfortable with some of the programs that are introduced. Not all of them are considered effective. What’s your general thought on those kinds of programs?
Mel Gravely
Yeah, I think they’re all over the place. I think the quality is all over the place. I think objectivity is all over the place. I think clarity of purpose is all over the place. And so I would say, I think you’ve got to buy that product like you buy IT services. You might want to vet those people out and make sure they actually know what they’re doing. And test it out. I will tell you that the two-day course I went was called Racial Equity Matters, and it was put on by the Racial Equity Institute out of Greensboro. And I think they do a really good job of working hard to be balanced. There’s no doubt they’re trying to make a point around the history of race in our country, but I think they use data to do it and not a lot of emotion and preaching. And that’s the part I hate when you start preaching to me.
I mean, it’s not a religious thing. There are facts and figures and data around this in history. You don’t need to preach just to show me. The data show me the real stuff. So I would tell people to be careful. References are a good thing. If it sounds like a sermon, it’s probably something you want to be at least conscious of. But there’s some really good stuff out there. And I encourage people to get much more comfortable. So podcasts, articles, books—you can start with mine. It’s a nice on ramp. Get more comfortable with this, with both Black dialect and dialogue, because if the whole thing makes you uncomfortable, you’re just gonna be uncomfortable. And that’s not helpful at all.
Loren Feldman
You have a chapter in the book about investing in Black entrepreneurship. To some extent, what you talked about in terms of thinking about being conscious and intentional about your supply chains, that’s investing in Black entrepreneurship. Do you have other thoughts about that?
Mel Gravely
Let’s start with the premise. Here’s the premise. If we don’t have scaled up, multi-generational Black companies in our country, we are never going to be equitable. It just won’t be, because of how our country runs. The biggest influencers in most communities are those companies that make money, hire people, give to campaigns, sit around the volunteer tables, sit around the corporate tables. And those people are generally people who own companies. And oftentimes, they’ve been around for the last three generations or more.
And so today, I’d be hard-pressed to find more than two companies in this city, Cincinnati. We’ve got a really good base of African American-owned business, but they’re all first generation. And we’re just not getting to the next generation of companies. And I think we’ve got a better chance now than we have in the past. So intentionality around large—I’m not talking about mom and pop, I’m not talking about small—I’m talking about wealth-creating, multi-generational Black companies. It’s got to become a strategy of ours, because of how it can change the dynamics of how decisions are made, how philanthropy flows. And I don’t know another way to do that wealth creation, that multi-generational wealth creation than entrepreneurship.
If you look at the top 1 percent of wealth—$16 million of wealth and above—their largest single asset is their business. And so, if that’s true for White people, we’ve got to make it true for Black. If not, then we’ve got people sitting at tables if they’re in tables at all, and they’re just not equally able to be there. So I just think if I talked to a community that doesn’t have an intentionality around growing scalable Black companies, I’m wondering how serious you are about equity. If all we’re going to do is relieve people’s suffering—we should do that—but if that’s all we’re going to do, how’s that equitable? Sorry, I might have gone off a little bit.
Loren Feldman
Not at all. That was the question I asked. Did I miss anything? Is there anything from the book that you’d like to highlight, especially to an audience of business owners.
Mel Gravely
No, the point I’d like to leave them with though is just to be sure—I want to be sure I’m clear that what I’m proposing is good for America. It’s good for all Americans. It’ll save us money. It’ll heal wounds that we’ve had in this country for a long time—and it’s only going to get worse. It will provide us the opportunity to pursue this promise of America—life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for everyone. And that’s worth doing. And I’m here to work with people. I want to keep talking about it and taking action on it. And that’s it.
Loren Feldman
Somebody said, we all do better when we all do better. And I think that’s kind of your message. And again, I’ve read your book. I highly recommend it, especially to business owners who are trying to answer that question, What can I do?
I will be publishing a video of this conversation. If you know somebody who needs to hear this conversation, please share it with them. Please tell them about the book. The easiest way to know when the video comes out is to subscribe to the 21 Hats Morning Report at 21hats.com. You can also find out about future guests we’ll be having here. They won’t all be as brave and as interesting as Mel, but they’ll be okay. Mel, thank you so much for doing this.
Mel Gravely
I really appreciate it. I appreciate this opportunity. And listen, you can have me on anytime on any topic. I love your stuff. The content’s always great. You’re a great interviewer. So hats off to 21 hats, and I hope we can do this again sometime.
Loren Feldman
We can. Thank you, Mel. I really appreciate it. Okay, everybody. Thanks for listening.
