Break the Bias – Details, episodes & analysis

In today's episode, we're excited to have Anat Shenker-Osorio as our guest. Anat is the principal and founder of ASO Communications and the host of the "Words to Win By" podcast.

As a messaging expert, Anat shares powerful insights on using storytelling and narratives to create impact on issues ranging from abortion rights to drug policy reform. 

We dive into Anat's strategies for engaging in difficult conversations—you’ll hear how she emphasizes the power of individual action and offers advice on finding common ground without compromising core values.

This is a thought-provoking discussion you won't want to miss. Stay tuned as we Break the Bias with Anat Shenker-Osorio!

In this episode, we dive into the world of fashion, beauty and inclusion with our guest, Megan Ixim, also known as “Ms. Gigggles”—she is a Marketing Director and the founder of Socially Deviant Media and Plus Size Thrift.

Evolution of the Fashion Industry 

We journey through the shifting sands of beauty standards in America from the Marilyn-Monroe-1950s, to the rise of the Kardashian era, exploring how national economic conditions have sculpted society’s view of the ideal body type. Megan shares her own battles with body image and the harsh realities of 'body privilege’ in healthcare and the workforce. 

Breaking Rigid Beauty Standards

As we move into the broader implications of these beauty norms, we discuss how New Jersey and New York lead the way with new anti-discrimination laws. We’ll also touch upon the growing concern of eating disorders and the essence of self-acceptance.

Championing Diversity and Inclusion

Inspirational and brave, Megan recounts her life's journey and how she became a driven entrepreneur and a vocal fat activist. And our host, Bindu, also shares some of her own personal cultural encounters with beauty standards. Together, they advocate for room-making in leadership for marginalized voices in the fashion industry, grapple with the power of personal branding and the imperative of clothing as empowerment. This episode is a juicy one, so tune in, and share with those who you think may learn something!

We’re shaking things up on this episode of Breaking the Bias by exploring issues surrounding mental health, motherhood and conscious communication. Consciously Unbiased co-founder Bindu Lokre sat down in a studio in New York with Sandrine Marlier, a meditation teacher, Reiki master practitioner, model and author of the new children’s book “Odette’s Alphabet,” a story about handling big emotions.

Bindu and Sandrine keep it real by diving into Sandrine’s journey of the tools she uses to manage her anxiety and how to identify your triggers and create healthy boundaries. Their conversation also covers how Sandrine’s daughter inspired her to write a book about mindfulness for children, and the biggest lessons adults can also take away from the story.

What does it mean to be a white ally? What are microaggressions exactly? What can I do to help create an inclusive culture? To get deeper insights into these questions and more, check out this episode of Breaking the Bias with Mita Mallick, co-host of the Brown Table Talk podcast, author of the upcoming book, Reimagine Inclusion and head of equity, impact and inclusion at Carta. Mita is saying all the quiet parts out loud of what holds us back from building real inclusion at work. Mita’s candid conversation with Holly Corbett, VP of Content for Consciously Unbiased, dives into:

•  How being bullied as a child led to her lifelong search for inclusion.

• The most common myths about inclusion we tell ourselves that stop us from making meaningful progress. 

• How to meet people with kindness and grace when they make mistakes.

Michael Perry, a father of two and the founder and CEO of Maple, an app that helps parents take the stress out of planning and organizing your home, is making it his mission to help normalize caregiving in the workplace for all. The research shows the majority of caregiving duties continue to fall on the shoulders of women. The truth is that a lack of gender equality is not a woman’s problem or a man’s problem; this is everyone’s problem. That’s in part because most men don’t want to live in a world where they have to live up to the always-on ideal worker norm and feel guilty taking paternity leave or going to their child’s game. 

In this episode of the Breaking the Bias podcast, Holly Corbett, VP of Content for Consciously Unbiased, sits down with Michael for a candid conversation that dives into how Michael’s journey to fatherhood changed him, the regrets he had being a leader at Shopify who didn’t consider caregiving duties because he wasn’t yet a parent, and how cis men in heterosexual relationships can help advance gender equality in the home.

It’s 2023, and still only 33% of women are in tech positions—with representation for women in leadership being much lower. In this episode of the Breaking the Bias podcast, Holly Corbett, VP of Content for Consciously Unbiased, speaks with Jill Stelfox, CEO of Panzura—the only woman CEO in data management. Jill stepped into this top leadership position during the pandemic when the company suddenly went remote. 

In this conversation, Jill shares how she successfully navigated pulling her new team together during a crisis and turned the company around, why she encourages her employees to “bring your weird” to work, and why she thinks companies who lack radical transparency are set up to fail.

RELATED:

How Technology Can Help Us Close The Gender Gap At Work

Beyond The Numbers: A DEI Leader On How To Create a More Inclusive Workplace

How To Diversify Your Network, According To A Super Connector

In honor of Women’s History Month and Gender Equality Month, Holly Corbett, VP of Content for Consciously Unbiased, spoke with Nina Simons, author of Nature, Culture, and the Sacred: A Woman Listens for Leadership, for this episode of Breaking the Bias.

Nina is also the co-founder of Bioneers, a nonprofit she started with her husband, that focuses on innovative solutions for some of the planet’s biggest social and environmental issues. In this behind-the-scenes interview, Nina talks about her personal journey to embracing her own power and leading from the heart, the history of a time when women were prosecuted in the thousands or even millions for using their voice, and how joy is a bigger motivator than guilt when it comes to advancing equity.

The 34th annual Bioneers conference is happening in Berkeley, CA from April 6 to 8, 2023, and Nina is offering the Consciously Unbiased community a 20% discount on registration by using the code: Nina20. If interested in attending, you can register here.

Did you know the U.S. incarcerates Black people at a nearly five times higher rate than white people?  This is part two in our Breaking the Bias series for Black History Month, where we are highlighting people and organizations who are creating alternatives to incarceration. Today we’re speaking to Brian Stanley, Court Advocate for Avenues for Justice, an organization that’s been around for more than 40 years and that has successfully kept thousands of African American and Hispanic youth and young adults in New York City out of the criminal justice system.

In New York City, it costs about $450,000 to incarcerate a young person for a year, but to put them through Avenues For Justice’s program, it costs about $6,000. Brian Stanley has some fascinating insights about this. In addition to serving as a court advocate, he  also works with youth as  a writing tutor, basketball coach, and art teacher with a focus on hip hop. Here is what he has to say about lowering incarceration rates, and new paths forward.

Our justice system is broken: The U.S. incarcerates more people than any country in the world, in part because other countries do not use prison as a one-size-fits-all solution to crime.

This Black History Month, Breaking the Bias will be highlighting the change agents who are building career paths for the formerly incarcerated, or who are creating alternatives to incarceration, as the U.S. incarcerates Black people at a nearly five times higher rate than white people.

In this conversation, Consciously Unbiased founder Ashish Kaushal sat down with  entrepreneur and CEO of Flikshop, Marcus Bullock, and his mother, Reverend Dr. Sylvia Bullock. They share how Marcus’ personal story of being incarcerated at just 15 years old in an adult prison reflects larger systemic issues related to our justice system, and how daily letters sent to him by his mother paved the way for him to launch Flikshop, an app that connects family members to their incarcerated loved ones.

*You can donate to the Flikshop Angels program here: https://www.flikshop.com/flikshop-angels

As we kick off 2023, many of us may be reflecting on the past year and thinking ahead about how we want to show up and who we want to connect with in the new year. This topic may be especially important, given that research shows that loneliness increased for Americans during the pandemic.

In this episode of Breaking the Bias, Holly Corbett, VP of Content for Consciously Unbiased,  spoke to Susan McPherson, author of The Lost Art of Connecting: The Gather, Ask, Do Method for Building Meaningful Relationships, to find out how we can use technology for good to reverse the growing trend of disconnection, build more meaningful relationships and authentically diversify our networks and overcome similarity bias. Relationship building takes time, but Susan shares practical advice for how we can focus on making connections and expand our networks without feeling overwhelmed.