Ronderings: Recent Episodes
Ron Rapatalo
In season one of Ronderings, Ron talks to his guests about their superpowers, including career advice, diversity, mindset, wellness, and leadership. Ron grew up in New York City, and has been coaching and leading executive searches for the last five years, taking what he has learned from 15 years in corporate, higher education, government, and non-profit contexts. He and his wife are obsessed with reality television, and Ron also moonlights as a men's personal stylist and group fitness instructor. Ron says, "I believe in the power of intuition and deepening one’s self-awareness and impact on others. I believe in the power of connection and transparency. I believe that we must dismantle systems of oppression and racism to recover our fullest humanity. Most of all, I believe our power to change the world starts from changing ourselves first."
Being confident in your identity is the key to growth.
Marc Etienne is a Partner at Rethinc where he helps to provide the support and coaching needed to evolve communities and organizations away from inequitable practices. With over 25 years of experience in helping students achieve their potential, regardless of their background, Marc continues to follow his passionate pursuit of the dismantling of systemic racism.
A big part of unsubscribing from systemic racism and inequitable traditions is breaking free from the chains, refusing to conform, and being comfortable and confident with who we are. To achieve this growth, and help our communities evolve toward a stronger and more equitable future, we must willingly and confidently face discomfort, commit to practice, and become the best versions of ourselves.
If we aren't fulfilling our potential by putting in the practice, we can't properly love and support others, and we can't face discomfort with confidence. Invest in yourself, practice what you are passionate about, and move towards your purpose and potential!
🇭🇹 Marc is a New Yorker born in a Haitian immigrant family: celebrating his family’s legacy. 02:38
🍪 Getting into an elite private school was not easy: the difference between being Black and being Haitian. 04:03
👦🏽 The first time he realized he was Black: seeing how whiteness was playing out all around him and getting detentions for asking questions about it. 05:49
👨🏽🏫 Trying to find himself and living in anger and confrontations during college: becoming a teacher and learning from kids and parents.15:36
✨ New Leaders and becoming a principal at 26 within their innovative programs. 20:35
🥰 Moving to Maryland and race equity policy: his wife is his best friend. 23:05
😲 COVID took 9 close friends: the day when Marc decided it is time to do something different. 28:24
🧒🏽 What it really means to be educated for kids of color: an appropriate curriculum for minority groups is essential. 32:50
⭐ Joining Rethinc and finding how to be yourself at work and do good work without being conformed to fit in the box and cutting your culture. 37:08
⚠️ Identify where whiteness exists and prevails and what anti-Blackness is: systems are enforcing the idea of whiteness. 39:11
😇 Marc finds joy in yoga, being with his wife, and connecting with his kids and family, but doesn’t like masking and faking it. 42:57
🎯 Growth and discomfort are inextricably linked: the best friends are ones that push you to get into uncomfortable situations you will handle. 46:27
🤩 The martyrdom is killing us - we never do anything good alone: interconnectedness in your community is the key. 53:27
🌌 The universe conspires to have you get what you want, as long as you believe it. 55:57
💎 Marc’s RONdering: everybody has the ability to be great, but don’t be afraid to practice. 57:55
🎆 Practicing consistently means putting yourself first: fulfill your potential, so you can help others around you. 1:04:56
🤓 The Lion’s Story and Rethinc: equitable and just world and workspaces. 1:08:42
🙏🏽 Being a teacher is the hardest job in US: being a principal is also very hard, so find time to thank them. 1:12:02
Links:
Connect with Marc: www.linkedin.com/in/keepreading
Website: http://rethinc.us/
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
What you accomplish is not a measure of your value as a human.
Stephanie Morimoto is the owner and CEO of Asutra where she shares her passion for self-care through her products and business practices. With nearly 20 years of compassionate leadership and serving those in need under her belt, she continues to provide equitable career pathways and opportunities to her employees and her community.
Many people today are stuck on the proverbial hamster wheel and don't stop to appreciate the journey or take care of themselves along the way, and this can lead to burnout. We need to shift the paradigm of what it means to be successful and create the conditions and systems within the workplace that allow us to focus on who we are, instead of what we do, and listen to the needs of our mind, body and soul.
Real success is having a well-rounded and joyful life where we can practice self-care, set boundaries for ourselves and live and work in alignment with our values. Decouple your productivity from your self-worth, slow down, and reflect on who you want to be!
👩🏻 From teacher to entrepreneur: Stephanie is the owner of Asutra and a social justice activist. 01:00
😍 Reflecting on who you are, and who you want to be in the world, is just as important as what you accomplish. 02:41
2️⃣ Two main forces in Stephanie’s life: growing up without an Asian American role model, but having the influence of her parents and her grandfather. 04:03
🔥 The push for achievement and to be perfect led Stephanie to burnout: the balance her grandfather achieved was a perfect example for Stephanie’s new business model. 07:54
👴 Her grandfather as the pillar of caregiving and community impact: joy, balance, and success are possible. 09:03
👧🏻 Hardworking parents and a push to be perfect in order to fit in. 11:47
⭐ Freedom to explore intellectually and academically: life at Brown University and how DEI was back then. 15:43
7️⃣ Seven seminal moments in your life: burnout, and understanding how to live differently and be a good human being. 19:51
😇 Do you treat yourself and others with love and kindness: what is enough? 23:27
🛋️ Recovering from burnout and one more seminal moment for Stephanie. 25:01
👩🏻💼 Creating a business and culture she always wanted with Asutra: the journey from a customer to owner through acquisition. 29:34
🤩 Active self-care concept and Asutra products: magnesium products for better sleep and pain relief. 34:18
💪🏻 Ron’s post about his fitness routine inspired Stephanie: sleeping and eating as a foundation. 37:56
‼️ The benefits of topical magnesium: which Asutra product Oprah loves the most! 39:35
🎯 Creating a workspace culture: changing the lives of people is the best gift for Stephanie. 43:53
✌🏻 Safety and integrity for all as pillars for the business: humanity and care for employees. 48:03
☯️ The importance of sustainability, spirit, body, and mind. 50:05
⚠️ Challenge: try to reduce your hours to see how many things you can still get done. 53:48
💎 Stephanie’s RONdering: incorporating real self-care into your life is a game changer. 54:30
🤓 Stephanie and Hope Chicago: helping students and parents. 56:06
Links:
Connect with Stephanie: www.linkedin.com/in/stephanie-morimoto
Check out Asutra: www.linkedin.com/company/asutra
Hope Chicago: www.hopechicago.org/
Learning ways to hack the system is the key to living the lives we deserve to live.
Atnre Alleyne is the founder of The Proximity Project, where he advocates for diversity and inclusion and helps organizations build authentic connections with marginalized communities. Founding multiple advocacy organizations, Atnre is an impassioned leader that empowers other leaders with equity-centered values as he fights for racial justice.
Despite the dependence on funding that many advocacy groups have, the system is designed to hand over resources to the most privileged, so it's imperative that we build communities that can help strengthen us. In order to move forward in a healthy and sustainable direction, we need to innovate new ways to apply ourselves because many of these organizations are filled with people doing superhuman levels of work.
We have to hack the system to fight inequality and design new cultures and spaces so we can continue to fight for the community in a system that is inherently oppressive and inequitable. If it is no longer serving us to wait for blessings from founders to fix the problems with the world, we need self-determination and to lead with our hearts, so we can make our dreams of an equitable future a reality!
👦🏾 Growing up in New Jersey as the youngest of five children: his unusual name and his mother's influence on him. 02:25
🇬🇭 Going to boarding school in Ghana: empowering communities and fighting for social justice. 05:51
🎯 Travelling abroad provided him with an understanding of all perspectives: finding yourself and things that are really important. 11:55
🎓 Helping marginalized groups get the best education: the reason why Atnre created an advocacy organization. 15:28
😇 Tatiana and Atnre founded TeenSHARP: the difference between having a big national brand connected to an advocacy organization vs a grassroots organization. 20:35
⚡ Events in 2020 made him write a lot about the racial justice front: the Proximity Project as a critical, foundational piece that was missing. 24:31
💸 From non-profit to profit founder: work in communities of color in the nonprofit space is being hindered, hampered, and undercut due to dependency on funding. 32:06
✌🏾 Philanthropy imbalance: two important tips for non-profit founders. 36:37
🇺🇦 Atnre’s experience with Pahara, and moving to Ukraine and having an amazing life. 41:44
⭐ Spaces for re-invention: seeing different cultures is giving us easier insight into the core of who we are and what really matters. 49:08
3️⃣ Three questions to ask in interviews. 53:01
💎 Atnre’s RONdering: how to hack the system to have true power, true agency, and self-determination. 54:54
✍🏾 Atnre’s project and new book: The Guide to Starting and Growing a Nonprofit in an Unjust World. 57:47
Links:
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/theproximitypro
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-proximity-project
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
To fight inequity, we must slow down enough to review and understand the behaviors that contribute to it.
Alli Myatt is the co-founder of The Equity Practice and helps organizations redesign themselves to embody more equitable practices. Throughout her life and her long career in advising organizations, Alli has followed her passion of advocating for more human connection and liberatory principles in the workplace.
Business is inherently about performance, urgency, and moving at a fast pace to meet deadlines and achieve milestones, but many of these structures are deeply ingrained with patterns of oppression. In order to disrupt the behaviors and mindsets that create inequity, we need to slow down and examine these processes and structures so we can deconstruct them and refocus on less oppressive practices.
If we are mindful and willing to unlearn the behaviors and mindsets that create inequity, we can create a workplace where people can build real connections and thrive in a more abundant and human-centered work environment. There is more to life than deadlines and productivity, so slow down and become invested in the connection with others!
Show Notes:
🤩 A different approach to equity work: Alli’s and Ron’s friendship. 00:40
👧🏾 Getting through life in unsupportive, predominantly white spaces: Alli’s Mom and Dad taught her to advocate for herself and others. 03:18
🤯 How the expectations of a role can differ for some people: not getting into the Gifted and Talented program, even with perfect results. 05:43
⚡ The unwritten rules for Black women: the unwritten rule of power. 08:44
👮🏾 Being funny but not too funny: policing your body and facial expressions. 10:15
😠 Gaslighting in the workplace: Black women don’t get developmental feedback from management. 13:00
⚠️ Building new rules in her equity practice: oppression is everywhere in the workplace. 15:13
⏸️ How behaviors contribute to inequity issues: slow down to see where you are, see issues, and re-wire.18:03
🦥 The power of urgency and the white supremacy norm: slow down to learn your behaviors. 20:32
🎯 Slowing down builds trust: see how others are trying to share. 24:42
🙈 Getting out of the shame spiral: how to change your practices to get the space of shame and blame. 26:03
☯️ Mindfulness work helped Ron to say grounded: being present is crucial. 28:52
🔥 Results are not the most important thing: identity should not be attached to the result. 32:04
⭐ What we are doing on this planet: what matters in the end. 35:19
😍 Deepening humanity and living the gift we have. 38:11
🏃🏾♂️ Urgency is creeping on us in so many different and unhealthy ways. 39:45
🫶🏾 The art of business: let’s enjoy what we can make together. 41:39
😇 The influence that the service businesses had on Alli: the power of hotels is in caring for the well-being of people. 42:23
🏨 Ron’s experience with the Marriott Hotel and Alli’s best experience in a Greek hotel. 46:11
👂 Why it is important to slow down in order to hear the equity culture: treating your team abundantly. 50:45
💎 Alli’s RONdering: people are resistant to having relationships at work because of vulnerability. 53:02
🫱🏾🫲🏻 The RPR triangle and understanding how to build collective energy. 54:54
🎇 New projects and experiments Alli is working on. 57:50
Links:
Connect with Alli: www.linkedin.com/in/allimyatt
The Equity Place: www.linkedin.com/company/the-equity-practice
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
Self-care is essential in the mission to advance inclusivity and racial equity.
Laura Donald is the founder and CEO of Axis Talent Partners, where she focuses on supporting leaders of color in accessing positions of power. Through a career in teaching and recruiting, Laura has followed her lifelong passion for spreading a culture of liberation and leaving a positive impact with her liberatory values.
Centering the experiences of people of color and cultivating a sense of belonging is a challenging goal in the fight to advance equity and justice. There are many tensions and hurdles along the path to defining and constructing the roadmap in liberation-focused work, and it requires constant examination along the way.
To lead with clarity in the fight for liberation, you have to commit to your own endless journey of healing and learning and truly feel like you are enough. Remember to self-care and self-reflect in this ongoing balance between self-leadership and our shared liberatory leadership journey!
👉 Executive search can be equitable. 00:10
😇 Laura is a biracial daughter of educators. 02:21
🤓 The inspirations for becoming a consultant and entrepreneur. 06:18
🎯 Designing her work life was beautiful and liberating for Laura: putting all her energy into recruiting leaders of color and inspiring others. 09:52
🤔 Unapologetic, unequivocal focus and values are insufficient for your mission: equity work requires constant examination.17:33
👩🏽🦱 Centering the experiences of people of color: having a preference for people of color in your searches. 21:03
⚡ How do you build diverse candidate pools: laser focus on qualifications, reaching out to as many people of color as possible, and rechecking the application and interview processes. 22:49
🔥 The power of naming things: gathering the evidence on competencies and then connecting with people as humans. 25:33
🔠 After going through equity practice, the core-competency, alignment, interviewing and evaluating, it is time to see if the fit is real. 29:33
🗝️ From the hardcore superscripted core-competency interviewing to the beginning of the onboarding: the key is in honesty and authentic conversation with potential leaders. 31:33
🤩 Laura’s big revelation about liberatory culture: intentional and conscious choices about what's conventional, what's different, and balancing all constantly. 33:32
📋 There is no one way to do this: operating in shared leadership while the default is hierarchy. 35:15
⚖️ Balancing a delicate ecosystem and navigating tensions at every turn: keeping liberatory culture and bringing in revenue. 38:13
☯️ Laura’s healing journey: inner work, leadership development, therapy, and sabbatical are all needed for staying focused and adapting to the constant spinning cycle of her work. 41:04
☑️ Dynamics of changes and healing: healthy interconnectedness starts within you as a leader. 44:25
💎 Laura’s RONdering: how we truly heal and cultivate our own liberation, to feel enough, and bring it to other people. 49:03
🫱🏼🫲🏾 Laura’s team truly brings equity-centered search work for their clients and is an example of a different kind of paradigm of work. 51:42
Links:
Connect with Laura: www.linkedin.com/in/lauradonald
Check out www.axistalentpartners.com
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
In the fight to create more equitable job opportunities, transparency is a must.
Ify Walker is the founder and CEO of Offor, where she leads with her values to ensure equitable opportunities for marginalized groups in the executive search industry. From teaching to attending law school, Ify has followed her passion for identifying and understanding broken systems and designing equitable solutions.
It’s no secret that we still live in a world where meritocracy is overshadowed by the unfortunate truth that opportunities are awarded to people inequitably based on race. We must pave the way forward by increasing friction, disrupting norms, and calling out industries and organizations that lack transparency in their values.
When values are made clear, it’s easier for businesses to hire the talent they truly need, and for that talent to feel aligned with and empowered by their work. Let’s challenge the power dynamic and create a new and diverse generation of leaders!
👧🏽 The oldest of six children and daughter of Nigerian immigrants: Ify was the only black girl in her school. 01:51
👉🏽 Going forward to teaching: opening moment for fighting against inequity. 02:50
👂🏽 Meritocracy myth dispelled: different rules for different sets of people. 05:47
🤩 Growing up in an immigrant family means being innovative and solving problems with the tools you’ve got. 10:30
🛡️ How “family armor” became a guide in Ify’s professional life to fight corrupt and inhumane systems.
🙃 The cultural differences in immigrant families. 20:41
🤯 Figuring out the rules of the system: how genius is equally distributed, but access is not. 24:59
🧐 How to challenge power imbalances, and prioritize cultural alignment to create opportunities for black women and promote inclusivity in the process. 27:22
🆚 High-level fluff and lack of information vs. buddy treatment in executive hiring. 32:21
📘 Ify is the Visionary in Ron’s book: balancing the tension of doing what is right and what it can feel like to do it right. 35:01
😇 When values are clear, decisions are easy: change in one company is not an easy thing to do, but being open can result in amazing opportunities. 38:52
✌🏽 Putting myself first: there is a cost to being so close to the ‘fire’ of racism, and Ify has a new chapter ahead of her. 42:53
🎙️ Building a career portfolio: the creation of this podcast was a sub-product of years of Ron’s work with people and interviewing. 47:35
💎 Ify’s RONdering: The most difficult part is making the decision - the rest falls into place. 51:07
🎯 When we are upfront about our values, that attracts the energy of the universe and people to the pathway of where we want to go. 53:43
🔥 The question that makes all decisions very clear for Ify: what do I want to tell my kids I did? 56:54
⚡ Building powerful and impactful executive teams: culture is everything, and diversity is the path to excellence. 57:34
Links:
Connect with Ify: www.linkedin.com/in/ifywalker
Check Offor: www.offor.co
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
In order to continue the fight against inequality, we need to create a culture where people are taking care of each other.
Kate Gerson is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer at Rethnic, where she partners with leaders to create evolved workspaces that promote healthier and happier work cultures through inclusivity. Throughout her journey, Kate has been the architect of numerous successful organizations, where she has poured her passion for anti-racism and dismantling systems of inequality into crafting disruptive education programs and training strategies.
It’s no secret that many DEI initiatives are getting it wrong, and there is still a growing blob of hatred to confront in the modern workspace. In order to bring more connection and a sense of wholeness into the work culture, we need to adopt a spiritual level of focus on the humanity and dignity of every single person around us and promote a sense of care and belonging.
When you feel seen and heard, and you can ground yourself in a workspace of harmony, compassion, and grace, it allows you to show up as the best possible resource you can be for clients and live with a sense of true belonging. Help dismantle systemic hatred and inequality by promoting connection and growth with a culture of spiritual healing!
Show notes:
✨ Kate takes anti-racism seriously. 00:10
🏫 Kate’s childhood and a need for dismantling a system of white supremacy, inequity, and toxic patriarchy: sticky school systems were a good place to start that. 01:36
▶️ When the mission became more important than the people: her evolution and healing trauma with a great team of people around her. 07:59
🤓 The system is not changing: making a change through corporate spaces by helping adults with grace and decency. 09:47
🎯 Fighting a war on consciousness: everyone needs healing now. 12:35
👩🏽🦱 Gina Breedlove’s healing in corporate spaces: learning journey and understanding humans around you. 16:07
😇 Accumulation of power and access shifted for Kate: everyone has a secret shame and fear, and we need to care about each other. 18:34
🛑 New generations are not rooted in work and careers; new generations are showing boundaries in the working space. 22:29
🕊️ Spiritual healing as the core of our liberation: white leaders who are ready for evolution and injuries in the working space and allowing room for everybody to be whole. 26:00
💣 The truth bomb that hit Ron. 31:09
🤯 Giving up ancestors and lineage for the construct of whiteness and access to capital: Kate’s spiritual healing journey. 33:47
😻 Shifts in their clients’ lives are so profound: articulating standards for proficiency in belonging and inclusion for managers and leaders. 37:34
⚡ Kate had a profound influence on Ron’s professional growth and sense of belonging while working for New Leaders. 41:35
💎 Kate’s RONderings: prioritizing the humanity and dignity of everybody you meet, vs. being stuck in your cause or mission.
Links
Facebook: www.facebook.com/rethinc.us
Instagram: www.instagram.com/rethinc.us
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/rethinc-us
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron
Learning who you are and what values you represent is the key to leading and networking with others authentically.
Russ Finkelstein is a career coach and advisor who helps other people become aware of their possibilities. Acting as a conduit and connector of people, Russ’s passion is in his idealist approach, where he combines empathy and structure to help people discover who they truly are.
Making a connection requires trust, and the best way to gain trust is to show up consistently as your authentic self. Without a sense of connection, people can feel isolated, and like they lack value, so it’s important that we show up for others when they need affirmation and support.
Connections and networking help make the world a better place if we’re all willing to take the time to build trust and help others value themselves. Commit to being the best use of yourself, be proud of what you represent, and provide hope to others!
🙋🏽♂️ Russ is Ron’s friend, coach, and mentor - they met with the help of social media. 00:10
✨ Russ always thought he was an outlier: finding the spark and possibility for people motivates him. 02:50
🤓 Being a truth-teller and being a conduit to connect people: what is the best use of me? 10:04
🤯 Russ’s trade-offs are flexibility, enough time to help unstuck people, working for free and choosing his clients. 16:42
😇 Ross thought he would go to law school, but realized it is not his goal: being curious about people while being empathetic and hyper-logical. 21:33
⚡ Ron’s sense of interconnectedness with all people comes with huge empathy. 25:15
🤩 Understanding the interesting intersections and building trust: getting money out of the picture in coaching work. 28:13
🎯 Understanding the power of trust: the importance of showing up, being consistent, and remembering details in fostering human connections. 31:46
😎 Russ’s document “Why I’m helping you” and becoming a Generation Z influencer. 39:19
👂🏽 Russ doesn’t like public speaking: going deep with helping others to recast the negative stories. 41:31
💎 Russ’s RONdering: the importance of finding your authenticity and figuring out yourself, your values, and feeling proud of that. 43:51
🥅 How to fit your goals: being in the weeds of having no choices. 47:54
📰 Russ’s posts on LinkedIn and his future plans. 50:00
Links:
Connect with Russ: www.linkedin.com/in/russfinkelstein
Website: www.russfinkelstein.com
Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/phenomeron
Instagram: www.instagram.com/phenomeron