Black executives from seven destination marketing organizations across the country call for open dialogue about race and racism.

Diversity is not a problem — it’s a strength, says entrepreneur and speaker Risha Grant. “Inclusion,” she said, “is where we suck.”

Two nonprofit initiatives have strengthened their focus to fight gendered racial inequities on conference stages and elsewhere — and lead transformation.

The National Coalition of Black Meeting Professionals recently hosted the Be Inspired Speaker Series: A Night at the Museum, a five-night virtual event that showcased African-American achievements through the lens of five different cultural institutions dedicated to the Black experience in America.

There has been a lot of talk about why all-male panels are a problem, Ruchika Tulshyan, the founder and CEO of Candour, a diversity consulting company, wrote last fall. “But less attention has been paid to how too many events also lack racial diversity.”

A University of Georgia grad student was motivated to launch a weeklong digital event for Black birders after a video altercation went viral.

Jason Dunn used the current historic moment of social unrest to spotlight how the economic fallout from COVID-19 has pushed off to the side the industry’s diversity efforts.

Marketing superstar Bozoma Saint John said she has tried being less than her true self at work, but “it was just too hard.”

Dorri McWhorter, CEO of the Metropolitan YWCA of Chicago, was the inaugural Ascent Thought Leader at Convening Leaders 2018.