The outrage that has ensued over the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis and the systemic racism against Blacks in America has been a stark reminder that we have a long way to go to eradicate systemic racism. The fact that protests span every state in the U.S. and reached Rio, Paris, London, Nairobi and Tokyo signal that issues of social justice transcend borders.
Companies and their management have a fiduciary duty towards their shareholders. We have an even greater responsibility to develop a just and equitable civil society though as it is the only environment where free enterprise will thrive.
For change to happen, we need actions more than words, and I want our small company to do its part. Here are a few immediate actions we are taking as a company to support equality and eliminate discrimination.
Internally, we have initiated three projects related to hiring and team training. We pledge to:
- Rethink our hiring process to ensure we are doing everything we can to be purposeful in building a diverse team;
- Provide training to our team to give everyone the tools for active listening, having difficult conversations, and practicing empathy;
- Encourage every member of our team to become a leader in their community and promote values of empathy and inclusiveness in their social and professional circles.
We are in the process of developing training coursework and will begin rolling it out to the team in the next 30 days.
Externally, we are committed to advancing the practice of marketing by asking the hard questions our industry faces, featuring diverse perspectives and providing guidance to our customers, who are also trying to make meaningful changes to the way they engage with current and potential customers.
Specifically, we will support our customers to help them engage diverse influencers and find their authentic brand voice in this essential conversation on social justice. One way we do this is by practicing what we preach.
We will use our marketing platform to listen to and promote minority marketers and influencers and to fight racism and bias in marketing. In early 2020, we started a blog series called Trend Lightly, where we pay influencers to author opinion pieces on tough subjects. We’ve covered marketing pandering to Feminism, the lack of meaningful diversity in influencer marketing and the role of brands and influencers in promoting body positivity.
We will continue to move full steam ahead with this series and will not shy away from asking hard questions. More on this very soon. We are always open to additional suggestions of who you would like to hear from next.
By no means is this an exhaustive list, but this is where we start. We will stay committed to unrooting racism and social injustice in our society for as long as it takes.
We look forward to our continued collaboration with our teammates, customers, influencers, and our community. We hope to hear from you on how you think Traackr can do better and help our community.
Pierre-Loic Assayag
CEO and Co-Founder of Traackr