Growing with Zahra Ebrahim, Monumental
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This episode of the Growth for Good podcast features guest Zahra Ebrahim, co-founder of Monumental. The episode delved into the complex dynamics surrounding incremental change and radical transformations within the social good sector. They examined the challenges faced by organizations in implementing incremental change and the inherent desire for more revolutionary shifts to address societal issues effectively. The conversation explored the impact of significant events such as the pandemic-induced lockdowns, which revealed the potential for rapid change when problems directly affected the middle class.
One of the key topics discussed was the importance of giving social purpose a prominent role in decision-making processes. Zahra emphasized the need for diverse perspectives and voices to be included at the decision-making table to ensure that the outcomes truly reflect the needs and aspirations of marginalized communities. The episode also touched upon the evolving landscape of equity and social justice, highlighting the shifting attention and investments in these areas. Zahra acknowledged the progress and achievements made in their work, particularly in fostering diversity and inclusivity within their organization and empowering emerging leaders.
The episode also explored the role of social media in the social good sector. While recognizing its significance as a platform for sharing invitations, asking questions, and amplifying others, Zahra also shared her reservations about its dominant use and the need to strike a balance that aligns with their organization's values.
Overall, the episode provided a nuanced exploration of the tension between incrementalism and radical change in the pursuit of social good, examining various factors that influence decision-making, equity, and the role of social media in shaping the sector.
Zahra Ebrahim is the Co-Founder of Monumental. She is a public interest designer and strategist, and her work has focused on community-led approaches to policy, infrastructure, and service design. She is an established bridge builder across grassroots and institutional spaces, and is a leading practitioner in surfacing key stories and narratives that build trust and connect communities. Prior to this role, she built and led Doblin Canada, focusing on engaging diverse sets of stakeholders to use design-led approaches to address complex organizational and industry challenges. In her early career, Zahra led one of Canada’s first social design studios, working with communities to co-design towards better social outcomes, leading some of Canada’s most ambitious participatory infrastructure and policy programs. Zahra has taught at OCADU, MoMA, and is currently an Adjunct Professor at the University of Toronto. She is the Vice-Chair of the Canadian Urban Institute, and the Board Chair for Park People. She was recently named Next City’s Vanguard “40 under 40 Civic Leader”, Ascend Canada’s Mentor of the Year, one of “Tomorrow’s Titans” in Toronto Life, and one of WXN’s Top 100 Women in Canadian Business.
Episode Transcript
Daniel
Zahra, welcome to growth for good. I'm so excited to have you on the show.
Zahra
Thank you for having me. I can't believe I'm here.
Daniel
Yes, you're here, finally. I know you do a lot of different amazing things, we're gonna start off with you giving a quick elevator pitch for your company, Monumental..
Zahra
Okay, here we go. Monumental is a social purpose business that helps city building organizations that include civil society organizations, and nonprofits, municipalities, and developers help create more community informed strategies to do their work. So to go beyond community engagement, which is meaningful and important, but get to sort of the higher order work that we need to do, which is understand how to bring to life this concept of what does it mean to share power with communities? What does it mean to share resources with communities? What does it mean to design shared decision making models where we don't have to engage people one time, but we make decisions together over the long term? How do we embed equity in our work? And so our organization works with a variety of, of actors, and we build bridges. And it's a really unusual role to play. But someone needs to do it. And did this come about during the pandemic? Where were you kind of launched this? Or did you have the idea before? Many stories, it depends on who you ask. So I was running an organization and my co founder, Kofi Hope, was also running an organization for many, many years, and we both left at exactly the same time, we both left in June 2018. And having worked together on a project that should have gone completely sideways and off a cliff, and that we saved together years ago, with the help of many bright, smart, wonderful people, we earmarked that we'd wanted to work together again. In 2018, we started practicing, what does it mean for two changemakers to come together who have a profile and a brand to come together and co-lead something. So we began the process of professional dating, what does it mean to bring our professional practices and our brands together? In the post George Floyd moment, when the worlds consciousness finally was arriving at the place where so many of us have been for a very long time, and institutional consciousness is waking up, Kofi began writing for the Toronto Star and wrote an article about how organizations need to think in more dynamic ways about anti racism work.
Daniel
I remember that article.
Zahra
yeah, and if you remember that article being shared, you remember the fated tweet, where I decided on a random June afternoon, a few months into the lockdown to say, myself and Kofi hope are starting a company. And it's exactly all the things he says in this article that are the reasons why. And within days, we had enough work and opportunity to keep us busy until the end of the year. I had doodled around the name Monumental a couple of years ago over a drink in Chicago with my partner, saying, when the time is right, “Monumental” is going to be the name of my next organization. I'm notoriously the worst namer in the world. So this was a real maybe my one and only naming when and, so it came about in response to the moment that the world was sort of that was happening in the world. But it came as a result of sort of a long standing trust that had been cultivated over a decade. And the time was right, and the market was right. You'll remember me saying years ago, it's hard to find a budget line for the kind of work I do or want to do. And all of a sudden, the budget line started to appear. And we were ready, right emergence is where momentum meets opportunity is what a mentor of mine says. And so we've been building momentum. And the opportunity emerged and are Monumental. There was an opportunity for Monumental and everything else is the emergence, right.
Daniel
So amazing. It's so great to hear the origin story of it. I love the branding, and the colors and all that as well. It all came together perfectly. And so it's been about three years since you've been running this practice.
All the guests on the show are very passionate about what they do. Outside of your client work, although I'm sure you're very passionate about your client work, what are some of the issues that are most important to you?
Zahra
Well, it's interesting because it starts Monumental and grows, right? So, in this conversation, I guess we're in this context where Kofi and I are both also mid-career. I think that's what you could call it, that's what we're gonna call us. And so there's sort of two things happening with Monumental one is a chance to respond to the moment, which is everything you just heard. And then there's another sort of half of what we do, which is creating the future, and creating the future is self initiated projects that we want to see happen. Because we've seen the cycles happen. There's no consulting project, no institution that's going to come to us saying, we want to solve this problem we've learned, and that's okay. And so as creatives, designers, innovators, social change makers, intentional people, a huge part of our practice is stepping into creating the future we want to see. And so right now, on the Monumental side, and you'll hear more about it on February 7 2023, when our report launches, a huge focus we've seen is that cities are our home room for our work. They are driven in large part, their economic outcomes are driven largely by development, real estate development, and it's an industry that's predominantly non racialized people. And so we did some research last year that launches in a couple of weeks. But ours were being supported by an Institute of the federal government to launch an incubator program to build a cohort of mid career, folks who want to get into real estate development. Wow, you can also speak into the emerging opportunities that are happening because legislation is changing around how we build in cities, massive economic opportunities emerging. With great partners like our federal housing agency, CMHC, and a whole bunch of other folks, we actually have the opportunity to create a cohort of developers who can build the city we want to see. So that's very close to my heart right now. I think on the other side, unsurprisingly, there is a focus on being aggressively more intentional, with an equity lens on my own work. I think none of us are exempt from this kind of self reflection. And so a project of mine this year, and I've been using sort of the creative side of who I am to explore this. Someone said to me over the last year to decolonize, your practice, you need to expand the aperture of who you think community is, right? You need to think about all beings more than human kinfolk, you need to think about nature, you need to think about the energy of the beings in the world. And how do you meaningfully liaise with all of them and recognize from a more indigenous worldview? Who else needs to be involved in decision making? So that's, that's become something I'm learning but I'm finding a lot of connection and creativity and expansion in that learning.
Daniel
So amazing. I love how all of the work intersects. But what's really unique about your practice is that, if the client doesn't come, you kind of work on it on your own right now to kind of start thinking of these solutions. And eventually, it sounds like there will be an alignment where maybe a funder will come into the play, our partners will exist. And I think you're already there. Because you're ready, you've been thinking about it. Right? So I love that. So you, you've worn multiple hats concurrently over the years, including now. And I know that from one of your TEDx talks, you've done, you've done a couple, you talked about the age of the professional title is over. So a couple of questions there, I wanted to know, what role do you have as a person, you've been the one consistent element that ties all these initiatives together? How is your own personal identity and your brand played towards supporting these various initiatives or drawing more attention to them? You could say perhaps, and then lastly, for someone who's early in their career, a question I often get is, how do I build my personal brand? And you're, you're an amazing case study of someone who's aligned yourself and affiliating yourself with so many diverse different initiatives. I'd love to know, maybe we can start with the first question, which is, what role does your personal brand and network play in the success of your work?
Zahra
We must have met when I was 25. I was an accidental professor. And that was the nucleus, it was almost very much an embodiment of who I would become, an accidental prof who didn't know how to do something but really took the opportunity seriously and wanted to get it right. And promised to do it right. And sort of by my own standard, to be honest, which is what I think what I thought at the time, given the limited worldview I had and the lived experience I had that I would want when I was in the classroom. Brand is a funny thing to talk about now, in the company of someone like you who thinks about it all the time. I think I self identify as an introvert, people don't believe it, but I am. I like to go where the crowd isn't. So, wherever the hype is, wherever there's critical mass, I'm kind of looking to what's in the other rooms. And that's kind of been the history of my career.
Specifically in my experience, doing participatory design, I did a lot of work based in community, that community that space started to grow, a lot of actors started to join that space. And it was people who were as good, if not better than me at it, doing excellent, tremendous work. So naturally, I was like, what's not working here? Who's not here? Let me go find them. So then I’m kind of wait, the corporate sector is not here. They don't know how to show I'm gonna go talk to that. I'm gonna go into that room. And so, my sister always talks about following your questions. And I think that's really been the way I've built my brand is what are the questions, determining sort of how I spend my time doesn't mean that you can distinguish between your work and your job. And so my life's work is really about shifting power. But there's some questions to that. And underneath that different jobs, or opportunities or initiatives helped me activate those questions. So I might not need to, I can do answer some questions from a volunteer role. I can answer some questions in academia, as my role as professor, I can answer some of those questions for client work through my creative practice. I think I'm constantly just looking for that. I think, rolling that up into a brand. I think whenever I put things out into the world, or even the TED talk you mentioned, I don't think I ever speak with certainty about my position. I speak to offer an invitation to say yes, I want people to say, “tell me more”. And what I noticed in my professional journeys, as people try, and I've watched other people sort of explore their own questions, and notice them undermining themselves. Having tons to say about a certain space, I met you when you were in school, you had tons to say about comps and branding, but you're just a student, And it just kept viscerally feeling not right, that there was a lot of people with deep wisdom and knowledge, but because they didn't have the title, they weren't granted the opportunity to participate. And similarly, you speak, you work, I spent my formative years in equity deserving working with equity deserving communities. And they'd like to say about their built environment, but they didn't wear the title of architect or planner, so they didn't get to play that role in determining their their future. So I think I just became skeptical. I think we need credentials. And credentials are really important as it pertains to so many professions, as we've seen over the last two and a half years, we have vaccine because of credentialed professionals. I think it's a yes. And which is where where do we absolutely need this and where is it just convention drives behavior, and that's where I'm sort of trying to poke holes all the time.
Daniel
Got it, that makes sense. And, and I love that I love that whole concept of how you kind of move to where they're, where the crowd isn't where you can discover opportunities and ask the right questions. And that's you have one of your many lenses is the academia, which is to ask those questions, but you can also do that as a strategist, for example, or as a consultant where your job is to ask the questions and, and bring that viewpoint that maybe the existing institution or organization isn't seeing, right, so that's where that value lies. But I love that all of the lens of all of it ties everything together, from the perspective of again, equity, city building design, that's kind of that whole realm that you form. So I guess what you're saying from your story is that you didn't set out to combine all these worlds. But if you look at it, in retrospect, this is your your personal brand kind of sums those things together, would you would you agree?
Zahra
Yeah. And I think, before multi hyphenate. And now trying to take it back a little bit, but I think what did you say equity design, what it is equity design and cities. If you break that down, it's like why the hell is it wet? So I started with my why, which was doing work in community, which was these folks, these communities are not typically engaged in this thing that really determines their health, their wellness, their ability to thrive, right access, economic opportunity, community, all those kinds of things. That was equity. So what are we going to do? We're going to make cities better, how are we going to do it? With the tool I have, and combined with the collective skills of many,I'm gonna bring this lens of human centered design of design and see what it does. So it ended up by sort of pursuing this set of well, why don't we do it this way, pushing on orthodoxies. I ended up getting to my continuum of my why how what, and again, in retrospect seems very tidy. But sometimes I find that the conventional brand building can also limit our capacity to dream for ourselves of What intersections can actually make us whole right or can make us can make a life can make a profession can make an identity. Because you don't necessarily know, until you make those those connections, I think our limiting beliefs can can do a lot to sort of, really, in all parts of our lives. And I think we talked about it a lot in our personal lives, but I think in professional lives, limiting beliefs about who we are and who we can be, and what worlds intersect are similar to credentials. Where it's, you can't be an artist strategist. Well, who says you can't be an artist strategist? Who said that? Who actually said, No, and that's where it's expanding the notion of what a credential is and what we value.
Daniel
And I think it's the intersection, those intersections are where that amazing work happens. So after I started a nonprofit in high school, I applied to all different programs at all different schools, I applied to the nonprofit program at Dalhousie in Halifax, I applied to communications programs, design programs, business programs, I didn't know what pathway I would need to take, but I learned quickly that design is a vehicle that could encompass any initiative or interest or passion, right? And then being in your Think Tank class that opened the box of okay, wow, it literally is the vehicle - design is the method to get involved in all these community initiatives”. So I think your career is an amazing story for people to look through. And I love how you've been able to bridge those gaps between corporate government arts. That being said, there's a lot of complexity in those environments. So I'd love to know, if there's one or two maybe challenges or kind of projects thatvwere roadblocks or ones that maybe you continue to battle in your career.
Zahra
Well, I mean the tension between fierce incrementalism and radical changes, is an evergreen tension, you see an opportunity for radical change. And then realize that fierce incrementalism and fierce incrementalism is still extremely difficult. And anyone whose early career or working within an organization can attest, it's tremendously difficult. And it's not smaller work. And it's meaningful work. But the tension between how do we open the opportunities for more radical change? And we've seen it happen, the lockdowns in 2020 to 2022. As my friend Adam always has been saying, it's, what was said to be impossible was made possible. So you start to see it in that way, there was some hope in that where it's all the things people said weren't possible could be enabled very quickly because all of a sudden and this is the reality of a lot of things. When problems become the problems of the middle class, they become real, everyone pays attention, right? Folks want to go to museums, they can't go to museums, okay, we'll put museums online, but when folks who experienced accessibility issues, wrote to museums, and this was my friend, Adam, who's an accessibility advocate he talks about how we've been asking museums for a long time, please put your collections online, we'd like to visit virtually, I have mobility issues, or or whatever the case it is, and then it's also so that's a tension, right and then maybe emerging from that just that piece around. This social purpose at the kids table at the CSR table. And at the adjacent to the adults table of here's where business, the business happens with decision making happens. And that applies to all organizations of all kinds. It's not just corporate organizations, I think, that remains the tension where some attention was paid everyone looked over at the kids table. Wait a second, wait a second. This way. It's way more rich over there. It's interesting, it's dynamic. So much is happening that could change the world. I do think there's this tension, because equity almost remains a nice to have, wait a moment where it was an imperative, but that is shifting again. And it's not to say it's lost its urgency, but the investments falling out from under it. There was a moment where our liberation is bound and we know that serving someone from an equity serving community, very different from the person you typically serve rising tide lifts all boats. But that's shifting. And so how do we sort of institutionalize this idea that our liberation is bound like Lila Watson said, It's right, that beautiful indigenous artist. And I think that that remains that will that I hope that's not perennial, but for the moment it remains attention.
Daniel
That's a great challenge that a lot of organizations and people at different levels can all relate to and see. And like I said, I love that there was that shift that happened. But it's a matter of what parts of that thinking can be sustained and continued. And some were fundamental. Earlier guests have talked about things like funding cycles, grants that opened up specifically because of the pandemic, specifically because of the equity issues that were brought to the forefront. And so all this funding was available. But now we're starting to see that it's also shifting back to, “normal”. So we need to find ways to keep the focus on the priority areas.
Zahra
Yeah. And that's where the sort of the notion of, I think there's phases of a career. And I think that's important to remember that sometimes you're in a phase of radical change, where and maybe that, as an intrapreneur, within an organization, and maybe there's a fierce incrementalism when you're an entrepreneur trying to pay rent and those kinds of things are seasonal. And I think if there are early career entrepreneurs listening, I think that's okay, great, just because you're working in the space of fierce incrementalism at the moment, doesn't mean you're not radical. And I think it's also known, I remember going to the private sector, and people said it was the death of my career. But really, to me, it made so much sense to depart from the systems I knew, and step into a system I didn't, because I was seeing its impact on cities and the communities that I cared about and gave me a literacy that, in part is what is one aspect of Monumental success, many, there's many aspects of Monumental success, but it's one is that sort of literacy around how to navigate large organizations and their bureaucracies, and do things in a way that are good for our mental health and well being to allow us to do great work and take care of ourselves in the process. So just I would also say that your questions can also take you to places that you wouldn't expect. And I think that's where Audrey Lorde, talks a lot about how we removed intuition from professionalism. And that was an act of some kind of supremacy. And, and I think it's time to really think about where that sort of intuition and gut gut check plays a role in helping us pursue the answers to our questions.
Daniel
I love that. I think, with some of the ways that hiring has changed, even just the way certain job descriptions are worded, nowadays, within certain organizations, it looks like some organizations are more open minded to different ways of thinking, different approaches, even when it comes to curriculums and programs. I saw some postings, where education institutions are saying; we want you to tell us what the needs are. We're not going to tell you what to teach or what content we are looking for the needs for, you to tell us the needs, right. And so I think that there are some positive shifts in that direction as well. It's not just all coming from the top down from traditional institution lens. Sometimes there are those opportunities. I wanted to know if there was any specific wins that you wanted to share. I know in our sector, especially in the nonprofit, social good space. A lot of times we're pointing out the problems, trying to show people what's wrong, trying to show people that they need to take action and help or donate or support a volunteer. Are there any wins from any of the organizations you've been a part of, or any projects that you consider a success that you'd like to share over the last few years?
Zahra
I mean, yeah, I feel really blessed. There's a lot, the top line is, when we started Monumental, we had a dream that the traditional landscape of urbanism and urban development was so predominantly dominated by men and non racialized men. And part of my brand, I think, and this is me saying it, I was unexpected, when I sort of joined the conversation or invited myself to the conversation on urbanism. And, and gave myself permission to take some space. Right. And that, in part was part of my brand. I think that part of what we wanted in Monumental was a team of people who were barriers from experiences for a variety of reasons. Smart, engage dynamic, great leaders, to have to have the opportunity to work on the problems of our moment, with institutions that had power to make change, right. And when you talk about brand, part of the opportunity with Monumental is bringing my brand together with the brand and my co founder, Kofi hope to see how much opportunity we could unlock and we operated We have unlocked a lot. It could be stage of career, it could be brand, it's probably the alchemy of all those things. But I think one of the points of pride that we have is that we found this space to bridge being an organization that does consulting work and being at an innovator in and of ourselves and being a community. And we take very good care of the people that we work with, if you work with us for a week, or you work with us forever. And so we have this mantra advancing a fair and just world, raising others up as we rise. And I think that's been sort of traditionally the story of leadership is one leader rises, it's our choice of being co-leaders, it's our choice of raising up, other racialized or intersectional leaders so that they have opportunities as we get opportunities. And we're doing our best, I think we're doing an okay job. And I'm really proud of that culture of the organization, we built the values, even though we're entrepreneurs in our third year. So that feels like a big one.
Daniel
I love that. But that's huge. And it's something that you can own because it's your organization, and you've helped to not help but you've co-built this. Yeah. So that's exciting. So when it kind of switch gears to a little bit on the public facing side, when it comes to communication, social media, how you put things out there into the world. I wanted to know, you personally, your take on social media and sharing what you do, and, and that whole Act of telling people, whether it's to inspire people, whether it's to draw people towards to support what you're doing what are some of the things you've noticed that organizations are doing in your space? And then what is your kind of approach for sharing online?
Zahra
Well, before we went live, I was sharing with you my strong aversion to social media. It's a means to an end, I don't always know what the end is for me. Right. A few years ago, a colleague sort of workshopped with me the reason I use social media just like I'm gonna give you themes. And all of my themes were about putting out invitations, I love social media, when I have an invitation to offer I have loved social media, when I have a question to ask. I love it. When I get to hype up, I did a series women you should know for a while and people loved the series. It was just me showcasing all these incredible women, I got to it's just a selfie of me and another woman and I would just describe in an off by away the humanity of that person and what they do in the world. I just don't think I was early adopter social media, I was in university when Facebook went live, I was think I joined Twitter in 2008. I keep getting reminders all the time that I should be celebrating some Twitter Versary. So, but I don't think I ever really built a meaningful relationship with it. I was looking for a post the other day to send to a friend from 2010 on Instagram. And I was going back to my early posts and eating dumplings. And it wouldn't be like this was a picture of a dumpling. No caption is some kind of avant garde, but that was Instagram, no one really knew how to use it. And now there is this dominant way to use and we know how to use it. And it's a tool and so I think there's analysis paralysis for me around social media. And like I said to you before, when I see other people doing great things, I'm so happy and I want to cheer them on. I just don't know how to do it in a way that feels right for me. So what you'll notice there are boom and bust cycles run extremely active for exactly three and a half weeks. And then I forget for two months. Yeah, that there is an online media universe. I don't know if that's the healthiest way to liaise with it. But it's the reality.
Daniel
Makes sense. I love that honesty and how you approach it because it is different with everyone. And a lot of the organizations I speak to it’s their busiest people, their executive directors are so focused that they can't do everything. They're so focused on the things that are going to move the needle the furthest the quickest. And sometimes, things like sharing the actual work becomes an afterthought. And when you're in organizations that don't have a ton of infrastructure or resources to do that cheering for you and tell those stories, it kind of has to be pulled out of you. So I think there's a lot of opportunity in showcasing impact. And in an ideal way, that's not just hey, look at us, look what we did. But it's really about how we're making an impact and how you can you can join so I love what you said about it does feel good to invite people to join whether to attend an event or support a program or give their input right. You're looking for facilitators, you're looking for whatever it is community feedback. I think that's your style, and that's okay
Zahra
And I should say that Monumental has an Instagram and it is run by our Monumental fellow and she does a tremendous job of it. But even once a week she sends a gentle, not gentle slack note to me.I need some information from you to make this alive. So it extends, right? You asked about organizations that experience extends to our organizational belief system. And that's something I think both Kofi and I are trying to break because we do see that, for some of the people we're trying to reach social media is such a strong and active and lively community that,I think this is the issue with the brand is the identity of the cofounders becomes the identity of the organization. That's something we struggle with a lot. And we're really trying to manage that tension. And so part of that is just because we don't love social media doesn't mean Monumental has to be invisible online. Exactly. We don't need to update our website or do all these different things, and I think, but to do it in a way that feels of us and of the community we're trying to build is it's tricky.
Daniel
It's gotta be authentic. But like you said, you can't ignore the whole community that may be looking to work with you. And they're going to evaluate you based solely on that presence, for example. So yeah, I love it. That's a balance. And I've spoken with a lot of people in nonprofit as well, that they know you said earlier, it's a means to an end. Sometimes new opportunities come from from those that context, sometimes, you can have an amazing 150 page report that people may never see unless it was broken down. Often, most of the time, there's so many resources that sit on shelves, and even though they're just listed on the website, somewhere where that content needs to be extracted, whether it's an infographic, whether it's a series of videos, whether it's someone explaining the report findings, and there's a lot of opportunity for that content in the social, social good space. And so that's one of the reasons why we have this show is to highlight those stories and to tell people remind people to share their impact
Zahra
well, and that just makes me think, and I'm going to walk out of here and immediately message Malia who works on our social media because I think that actually goes to the broader conversation, which is this kind of work, where you're driving community informed change that bridges, a whole bunch of stakeholders and institutions that is slow and complicated about relationships and doesn't always have visibly tangible outcomes at any given moment. Because it's always a work in progress. It's always a work in progress, right? That sometimes social media can do some great storytelling to anchor moments to celebrate successes to make you feel like you're not in a vast ocean. And you're still on the crossing that you've reached a moment of respite. So as you're talking about that, it makes me think that it's actually for folks who do work that can be quite invisible. What are some of what we do, right? That it is incredibly mission-critical to invite people and show them how change is getting made. For us. It doesn't mean how this is how change should be made. It means this is how we know to do it. It's an invitation. Yeah.
Daniel
I love that. And who knows, it could inspire someone to think of something totally different. Yeah, we have to wrap up for time. But I wanted to know if there was a resource because you, I know you're an advocate of public libraries, you've taught at OCAD you've seen all over the place. So what are some go-to sources of inspiration or learnings or content that you'd recommend people check out?
Zahra
Oh, there’s so many good ones. I mean, On the work side, I think I use every opportunity to speak in a public domain, to talk about Antoinette Carol's work, equity inequity-centered community design, I really think she has done a tremendous job of helping practitioners who are working in communities understand that there are some steps that you can take to ensure that you can get to a design process, design process, meaning anything could mean dialogue could mean mediation, it could mean all sorts of things when you're working in communities that are not communities that you're from. So when I click Carol's equity-centered community design framework, I would say design justice, which is an incredible book at MIT Press, which of course, is wonderful and continues, I think, to iterate but it's a really nice grounding. For the kind of work I do, I think it's important to also trade in the realm of joy and fiction and play and poetry. And so my reading list of good reads is pretty diverse resources. I think my advice is, don't just explore resources in your space, the most time I spend consuming anything outside of work is a chat cast by two comedians talking about inane things, but it rests me so that my imagination and my being can actually expand and, and have clarity around the things I want to do and how I want to be so loved that. It's hard to
Daniel
Yeah, it's hard to keep your content consumption diverse. Yeah, but those were those are great books and kind of fundamentals in the areas in which you work. Yeah, absolutely. Which is super helpful to share. So thanks so much for being on the show. Alright. Yeah, it's been amazing. I know you're very busy. So you gotta get to your next thing. But yeah, thanks for being on growth for good.
Zahra
I appreciate being invited. Thank you
Awesome. Thank you for listening to this episode of growth for good. The show is presented by Daniel Dez and produced by crater club in Toronto. You can find notes, links and more about my guests at Daniel does.co, where you can also learn about ways we can collaborate. Feel free to connect with me anytime on LinkedIn or Twitter. If there's someone from the sector that you'd like to learn from, or you'd like to be interviewed on the show, feel free to reach out to the team at Daniel does.co. If you're considering creating a podcast or video series for your organization, connect with crater club at crater clubs studios.com
