Episode 58 of "What is Innovation?" is here! This time Jared talks with Whitney Parnell, a Black millennial activist, singer, and the Founder and CEO of Service Never Sleeps, a nonprofit that empowers individuals and communities to catalyze social justice through service and Allyship, on the dismantling the status quo and working for and towards social justice. Is your innovation self-serving, or is it something that resonates with society? How does your innovation approach manage the discomfort that arises from having different points of view? Whitney's insights and on-the-field experience as a social justice defender will help you align your values, spark your activism, and recognize how challenges can make your innovation processes stronger.
Whitney Parnell is a Black millennial activist, singer, and the Founder and CEO of Service Never Sleeps, a nonprofit that empowers individuals and communities to catalyze social justice through service and Allyship. She is also a musician and has released a social justice album called "What Will You Do," with the goal of using empathy through song to ignite action.
More about our guest:
Whitney's movement work involves racial justice efforts, and equipping effective allies through truth-telling, bridgebuilding, empathy, and action. She grew up between Latin America and West Africa as a Foreign Service child. At Washington University in St. Louis, Whitney doubled majored in English and Spanish, and minored in Communications and Journalism, during which she also embraced her calling as an activist. Whitney’s passion for service and social justice brought her to Washington, DC after college to serve with City Year, and then work in homeless services, before founding Service Never Sleeps in 2015.
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Episode Guide:
2:05 - What is Innovation?
3:52 - Societal Innovation: defining "White Supremacy"
8:06 - Dismantling and Destroying: A contrast
8:54 - Getting Innovation 'Wrong'
12:14 - Taking the first step to big decisions
16:33 - The field of social justice and nonprofit
19:52 - Service Never Sleeps: Centering race equity
23:14 - Keeping it in-check
24:02 - Facing the uncomfortable
26:45 - Activism, kindness, polarizations
31:36 - Processing thoughts: What is next?
34:44 - Operating at the intersections
36:25 - The either-or binary
38:40 - Advice for Innovators
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Resources Mentioned:
Companies:
Music Album:
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OUTLAST Consulting offers professional development and strategic advisory services in the areas of innovation and diversity management.
/This transcript was automatically generated using AI; please forgive any inconsistencies. We are working to provide the correct and more concise copy of the transcript. For urgent need, please send us an email.
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Jared Simmons 00:05
Hello, and welcome to what is innovation. The podcast that explores the reality of a word that is in danger of losing its meaning altogether. This podcast is produced by Outlast consulting, LLC, a boutique consultancy that helps companies use innovation principles to solve their toughest business problems. I'm your host, Jared Simmons, and I'm so excited to have Whitney Parnell.
Jared Simmons 00:30
Whitney Parnell is a black millennial activist singer and the founder and CEO of Service Never Sleeps, a nonprofit that empowers individuals and communities to catalyze social justice through service and ally-ship. Her movement work involves racial justice efforts and equipping effective allies through truth telling, bridge building, empathy, and action. She grew up between Latin America and West Africa as a Foreign Service Child. At Washington University in St. Louis, Whitney double majored in English and Spanish and minored in communications and journalism, during which she also embraced her calling as an activist. Whitney's passion for service and social justice brought her to Washington, DC after college to serve with city you, and then work in homeless services before founding service never sleeps in 2015. Whitney is also a musician, and released the social justice album called "What will you do?" with the goal of using empathy through song to ignite action. Whitney, I am so excited about this conversation. It's been years in the making, I remember the day we met. It's been fun staying in contact with you and watching the amazing things you've been doing. And I can't wait for everyone else to get the chance to hear from you. So thank you so much for making time to join us on the show.
Whitney Parnell 01:49
Thank you so much for having me always grateful that people who know me and know what I talk about. It makes me want to amplify that. So thank you so much.
Jared Simmons 01:59
Yeah, of course, of course. It's important. It's important. So why don't we just dive right in? What in your mind is innovation?
Whitney Parnell 02:08
innovation? There is such a broad scope. And I'm holding two particular buckets right now, on the one end, I say think innovation is things like envisioning into action. It's taking creativity, and like envisioning what could be. And I think the big thing is actual implementation. Because a lot of times where humanity can get limited is having all these ideas, but not actually making it happen. So for me, innovation is like an action thing, putting envisioning to action. The other piece that I'll say particularly given that I am an activist my my life is racial justice work is that by default, innovation means that that really means challenging and dismantling white supremacy, and trying a different way, right, because you just you think a lot of what has been curated as the default way, then literally, by default, trying to do something different means disrupting that. So I can't say that I can't have a conversation about innovation and doing something different and envisioning, and putting that to action without hence saying that that means dismantling white supremacy.
Jared Simmons 03:20
And there it is, here we go. I love it. We're just gonna get right into it. It's right there in the definition, I love it. I love the sort of foundational definition that you gave around creativity and, you know, envisioning how to bring that into action and take that into action. And in the context of the environment in which we live and the society in which we live, and the historical context in which we live. I love the frame that you put on that in terms of dismantling. That's a great term. And I want to help people understand and I want to make sure I understand what the term white supremacy means, especially in the context of a societal view of innovation.
Whitney Parnell 04:04
Sure. Yeah, we go. Well, and I'm glad you asked that question. Thank you for making that space. Because a lot of people when they think white supremacy, their mind goes to white nationalists. KKK in Charlottesville. And what I often say is, I was in Charlottesville. Oh, and I was a counter protester on August 12 2017. Because people need to show up to show that that will not be stood for right. Sure. I'm unapologetic about the fact that I was there, though, still will be traumatized for the rest of my life from it. So like, I know what white supremacists involves.
Whitney Parnell 04:43
I always try to distinguish. White supremacists are certainly trying to uphold white supremacy with intention. But I get people to understand that white supremacy is actually the air that we're breathing, the water that we're swimming in. I say that it's the institutionalization have white dominance and power. And so it really means understanding that we're operating in a society where we have to acknowledge the history of dominance, and the creation of race that literally impacts everything and its creation to uphold white supremacy. But then what people often don't think about with, like, what I call the formula of white supremacy, its dominance plus culture. And this whole creation, if you literally study history of whiteness, right, and hence the default of what is deemed as right. I'm not getting the actual quote, right, but rest your soul, Tony Morrison said something to the effect of in this country, American means white, everyone else has to hyphenate. And that's, I think that's such powerful language to think about power deems, what the default is right, and what should be. And we can't deny the history of like violence and power involved in that. Right, right. And so once we understand white supremacy, as the institutionalization of white dominance and power and something that we're operating in, sure, that's why by default, innovation means working against that, knowing that there's a better way. And I'll leave with I'm glad that you lifted up the term, dismantle it, because that scares people to they're just like, Look, I'm a pacifist. I'm non violent at bat. But I would hope that we want to dismantle things that are not good, right, things that are bad. And so I also always invite people to even be innovative in terms of their language, and think about even how society has impacted what we deem as good language and bad. I want to dismantle oppression, don't you? Like I hope a lot of people do. And so how do we also like just embrace where dismantling is unnecessary thing? Right? And that is also innovation.
Jared Simmons 06:46
Right? Hmm. Wow. Yeah. So much there. That is, that is good stuff. Vegas, I'm dealing mentally with the Toni Morrison quote around the everyone else has to hyphenate. And that fascinating, I never really thought about that, in terms of what that means when everyone else is Asian American, or African American, or Native American or whatever. What does American mean? If those are the modifiers, then the unmodified version must then by default, interesting.
Whitney Parnell 07:17
Yeah, think about it.
Jared Simmons 07:19
Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, I love history. And I love that. I love conversations about innovation in the context of history, because innovation as a term as a thing to think about is really quite new to the civilized world. We've been doing things that we would look back and labeled as innovative for 1000s of yours, but that term innovation is relatively new in language. And so I think having this lens of what it means to have a dominant race, a race with the power and the influence to have a culture and to impose that culture on a broader society, what does that term innovation mean, in a society like that? I think you're exactly right.
Jared Simmons 08:06
I love the word dismantling. Because dismantle doesn't mean destroy, it just means we're taking it apart, doesn't mean you're not going to build something back with the constituent parts. You know what I mean. And I think when people hear dismantle, sometimes they hear destroy, and dismantling is really more about a reorganization, the beginning of an opportunity to reorganize, if you choose to see dismantling, as destruction, that you won't see the opportunity to rebuild and reorganize. And so I think it's really important that you use that word dismantling, because it offers the opportunity to build something good, something collaborative, something open to other cultures out of something that is currently not culturally open or balanced.
Whitney Parnell 08:54
appreciate you saying that, because that's unpacking so much in me even around the framing of innovation, because it's like, dismantling, has to be a part of innovation where, because where people often get innovation wrong. Especially, you know, with the nonprofit industrial complex, right is, a lot of times people will have good intentions. And I'm quoting, yeah, big ideas for how to solve things, that they're not proximate to that their own privilege has made them think that hence they have the answers, right, as opposed to centering those impacted and realizing that, you know, the answers are there, and how do we build towards that? So where people often get innovation wrong, is just trying to create without context, and so I'm really appreciating what you shared, because you can't innovate without doing the deep work of evaluating and that breaking apart which is dismantling. Right, so I feel like you just lifted up in me that you can't innovate without dismantling, which is a powerful thing. So thank you for that.
Jared Simmons 09:55
Yeah. All kinds of light bulb and things that you went off in my head. Just from the 10 minutes. We've been talking So thank you as well, I think the other piece around institutionalization of things. And again, that's why I believe, you know, I know what you stand for and the work you do, and I'm a tireless proponent of it. But I see it as innovation. I've always seen it as innovation. Because if you think about operating against institutionalized forces that are inherently seeking to preserve and maintain the status quo as a form of momentum, that's what innovation is, is operating against that inertia, to create something new and better, there we go. And the work you do does that in a space that is uncomfortable to talk about, and difficult to abstract. So it's easy for me to talk about innovation when we talk about laundry detergent, or tennis shoes, or financial models, or whatever, because you can abstract those things away from the human context. But when you talk about innovation in the context of who we are, as a society, who our great, great grandparents were as people and as a society in the decisions, and the experiences that shaped this culture and this institution, when you talk about moving in a way that influences that state institution to operate differently, it suddenly takes on a different emotional charge. Right. And it's important that it does, but we have to be able to move through that emotional charge intellectually to be able to talk this out to talk through it.
Whitney Parnell 11:39
Yes, absolutely. And that's what as you're talking, I was, like, the point of in innovation is to make things better, right, yeah, to make society better. And that's where, for me, that's why dismantling white supremacy just ties hand in hand. And that because race literally impacts everything, right? Like the numbers show it, the data shows it. And if anything around our innovation is just trying to work towards better than we should certainly didn't want to work towards dismantling white supremacy, which is, you know, just at the core of so much, it's all of this first making things better.
Jared Simmons 12:14
Right, right. How do you think about where to start in something that big? How do you, you know, put one foot in front of the other? Because I look at it, it's an Everest level problem. And you've you've started to climb that mountain? How did you decide what the first step is to kind of move in that direction?
12:30
Oh, that's a journey. Well, I'm a black woman, right. And so race has always been a part of my experience that I've noted. And I think life and growing just gave me more of a particular lens, and then choice to deepen, right and, and choose to do this work. And it's been a journey in itself. I think specifically, the call to be an activist, was a journey. Because pretty early in life, I realized that I wanted to do justice work, right. And I used to say I wanted to work towards being a professional humanitarian. As I lived more into that, I began to unpack the importance of service, right, and the importance of proximity and being involved and giving of yourself in the way that is needed and asked to view races like Saviorism, and paternalism where the word thick the wires can get muddy then when it comes to is humanitarianism, the way and then that evolved, particularly as I deepened in my understanding of white supremacy, I was like, Nah, activist, is what I meant to be. And the way that I like to frame it is, it's that parable of someone's at the bottom of a river and all these babies keep on coming down, and wanting to pull out as many of them as possible. And then at some point being like, okay, yeah, it's important to pull out all these babies, but we got to go to the top of the river and figure out well, who's putting the babies in there?
Whitney Parnell 14:05
I think higher level, that's like my symbolic journey into recognizing we got to work on white supremacy. And I would say that in terms of execution, to your point, things can feel so big, especially with white supremacy, impacting everything, it can feel so overwhelming, especially as a black woman and just even feeling the toll on my body every day from it. And so what really gives me empowerment, I always say we're working towards a hope, which is the belief that we can build better tomorrow than today. And I was like, okay, so how can I practice building better tomorrow than today? And then realize that there are so many things in my everyday that I can do. And furthermore, putting the framing on in my areas of privilege within the scope of justice. It's my responsibility to do as an ally. Yeah, and like that's what our organization teaches that's what my bread and butter is, is teaching people to recognize where do you have privilege? This is where you should be an ally. And this is how, yeah, which is solely from a racial justice lens. So it's primarily in engaging white audiences, but also black indigenous people of color when it comes to intersections and racial solidarity. It's my way to contribute to equipping people to to have this lens in their own life, in all the ways that they may be complicit, in upholding structures of oppression, and teaching tools to do that little chipping away, as I call it. So if white supremacy is the iceberg, how can we all have the lens to identify our participation in that iceberg, and then identify something that we can do or stop doing that would symbolically chip away? That's how I'm landing it. This is how I can contribute to the work of building a better world by empowering everybody to do their own work that collectively we're all chipping away that iceberg. That was very, like symbolic of a story. I didn't give you too many tangibles. But hopefully, that was the takeaway there.
Jared Simmons 16:03
No, there was there there lots of takeaways, the thing that really strikes me as you kind of unpacked your emotional and mental journey, because I think that's why it was somewhat abstract is because it's not a physical journey that you went on. Right? And so how do you convey to someone this inner journey, and it's metaphors, it's analogies, it's all those things. So I really appreciate you sharing that and contextualizing it, the thing that jumped out at me was that your approach is so pure.
Jared Simmons 16:33
If we stay in the field of social justice, and we stay in the field of the nonprofit, sort of nonprofit NGO sort of world, there's lots of lessons there. There's lessons for the business community. I mean, you are focused on one race, one community, right, you're focused on white supremacy. And that context, I mean, there are probably a dozen other things that are very important, and have a huge impact on society and on people of color and on X, Y, Z, ABC. And you're brilliant. And you could go work on those things. And I'm sure you worry about those things and think about those things. But when you talk about what you do, it is laser focused in a very specific area. And your language is built around it and your focus is built around it and your programming is built around it. And that is even harder to do in the space that you're in, you're in that space, because you see the pain and you see the suffering, and you see the negative outcomes that society is experiencing from this, and you want to help, and there are negative outcomes and problems are strewn all around us, right. And so I think it's even harder to kind of focus in this type of space. And so the fact that you can hold a focus in this one area and drive your passion, deep on that specific topic, I think is why you have impact. And it's a lesson for for all of us, I think you have to trust that this is the place where your effort is going to be most needed, and most impactful. And the exploratory phase is important. But you can't stay there. You know what I mean?
Whitney Parnell 18:18
I do thank you for that. Because it gets me to reflect on my organization's journey service never sleeps, like in alignment with what you shared and an offering it that because when we first met, it was literally the moment where the org was at a shift because the original idea for service never sleeps, was a fellowship year part time service for working young professionals. We'd match them with local nonprofits to do skills based service, after hours, right? Right, a 10 hours a month helping these nonprofits growing capacity, while building this next generation of committed leaders who understood everybody doesn't have to commit their careers to justice work, but you can give something right. Sure. And when you and I first met, it was, it was when SMS service never sleeps was having a shift where after the elections of 2016, I was really processing look. As a black woman, I'm not responsible for addressing anti black racism and sexism that's primarily on white people and men. And if I'm saying that then in all of my areas of privilege, I have the responsibility of being an ally. And so the big idea was, you know what, let's create this ally ship training as well as a way to engage people beyond the fellowship. And then the more that I got into this as much as I was trying to keep race as an equalizer, sure. The more I was like, No, you got to center race. Then I was in Charlottesville, and I was like, forget it like I don't care how people react for centering race. Like you and I met actually right before Charlottesville, right.
Whitney Parnell 19:52
When I was in this weird spot, but ever since service never sleeps, that I empowered myself to have that folk is on race to be a racial justice organization. It's made everything come together, because now there is a heart for our fellowship. Now our fellowship is grounded in understanding systems, right, and how white supremacy shows up in our role as allies and how that informs how they do their service. But how they also show up at their workplace and our organization, to your point about having a thing, we don't consult, we do our fellowship, and we train I do is train every week. And what we try to get people to understand is that race, equity has to be a priority of any work, any institution, it's got to be the heartbeat, right? It can't be the side thing, but rather, by centering race equity, that's the lens through which you make all of your other decisions, from your programming, to your mission, to your budget, to your board, to your staff, to your policies. So that's my offering, right is holding the both end of my learning journey and how it informed that we've got to center this and everything that we do, but also that what we offer to anybody is that we believe everybody should be centering race equity, right? Everybody who wants a better world shouldn't be centering race equity, particularly at their institutions. So I would challenge what does that mean for the business world for all nonprofits? Perfect for philanthropy? Yeah. How can you center race equity, so that that's your heartbeat, and impacts everything that you do as well, even if you're not an org that focuses specifically on that like us?
Jared Simmons 21:35
Right, right. And I think it's so important to be able to have that somatic view, right, because across everything, because with something so charged, and so hard to talk about, and hard to hear, if it's not the magic, if it's not immersive, if it doesn't cut across everything, then attention will take the path of least resistance, like oh, I can't think about that right now. So I'm going to go over here and think about that. And I think that's why it's so important that you have this sort of immersive view of the world. And it's, it's inspiring. Like I said, it's a great object lesson for innovation. And I want to pull the innovation lessons out of this conversation. Because it's important not to minimize not to compare the work you do to other types of things and products and services that other people are working on. Not to equivocate from an impact standpoint, but to analogize, the two, because if you can see the approach and the process and the thinking and all the things that go into how you methodically and systematically approach this problem, when you can apply it to what I and other people do every day. But to this is a deeply human problem. But the approach, we can start to de escalate the thinking around the issue. Yeah. And that's what I really like about how structured and thoughtful you are about tackling this, and how open you are about it. It allows people to get to a point where they can think about it in an intellectual sort of way.
Whitney Parnell 23:08
Yeah, and and to not be scared of it or push it
Jared Simmons 23:11
away. Yeah, exactly. Yep. Yep.
Whitney Parnell 23:14
I'm everyday trying to unlearn white supremacy, leading this black-led, anti racist ally ship organization, as an institution, we are constantly challenging ourselves and trying to mirror ourselves and be like, Wait, are we upholding white supremacy right now? What does that mean? How do we address it? But how do we build? So to your point, I think that there are a lot of symbolic takeaways, right? There are takeaways in the fact that innovation means not doing the status quo. How do you compare like, if you allow yourself to accept that society's norm is the default of whiteness? Right? What what created what that culture is, you know, innovation, by default would mean trying to work against the status quo. Innovation requires discomfort, right?
Whitney Parnell 24:02
It's so interesting to me. So many people do not want to get uncomfortable when it comes to talking race, which impacts everything. And yet those same people will talk about how, in order to achieve something, you've got to be willing to do the work and get uncomfortable, it will be hard. On some ends. I'm like, How can you not willing to apply that same willingness for discovery, right, when it comes to making change and innovation, but not apply it to like, human work of dismantling white supremacy? And I would say it takes action, right? Like that's why I always say innovation is envisioning and creativity plus action. Because if you're not doing anything, you're not going anywhere. And that definitely aligns with racial justice work. Because if one more person Jared tells me that kindness is the answer, I always say kindness is wonderful. But that won't end racism is Gonna take a whole lot more, and so like having to be action oriented. And then lastly, the last like alignment is that the outcome is wonderful. It's excellence. Right? you innovate for better. And I always just remind people of that, that as difficult as the process of innovation, the process of dismantling white supremacy, is it so that we can achieve better for everybody? And that nobody loses. So it's directly aligned there. And that's why I always tell people that's, it's directly aligned, because the systems are applied to everything. So yeah, that's why I can't talk about innovation without talking about justice and dismantling.
Jared Simmons 25:41
Yeah, no, it's, uh, it feels self evident when you talk about it. But it doesn't always feel that way when other people talk about. So I think the other thing I wanted to poke at that you just mentioned, was the sort of bi directional aspect of innovation within the social justice within the, you know, racial equity space, and everything else a person does all day every day like that. The fact that there are parallels and analogs in and out of that is an important thing. So I feel like because this is such an emotionally charged topic, and there's so much, I mean, people hear family, they hear multi generational insults when they hear white supremacy, you know what I mean? And that goes to a very, very human place. And so kindness, I understand why people talk about timing, it's because I believe it's an ingredient. Right? But I agree with you. It's not the answer, I think, because it's so charged, things are extremely polar. In this conversation, you're either perfectly kind and infinitely accepting, or you're completely radicalized and militant. And I think the these are my just kind of general terms. I think activism is different from what people kind of, because this is a polarized conversation, you use the term activism, and it immediately gets pulled over to the extreme. And so I would love to hear your thoughts on just that whole thing.
27:17
Sure. Yeah, I have a few things to offer. One, like I said, I'm a fan of kindness. And many times I can be kind, right, I think people just need to understand that niceness as a construct. You're thinking about these issues solely as interpersonal. And when you understand that it's institutional and systemic kindness is not going to dismantle all the inequities out there, like action must be taken. So that's the first thing that I get people to think about is that when you think kindness, that means you're thinking of a limited scope of interpersonal engagement. But the reason why this is systemic is that it's beyond one on one engagements. That's one, two, I'll go to the other end that activism pushes the envelope, right. There's got to be people who are pushing people to get uncomfortable in order to veer into the next thing. When you look at history, and so much transformation that's happened. The people who are now celebrated, Dr. King, sure, were the people who were demonized for the prophetic language that they would use and how they push for discomfort. So I often offer how often are people confusing or conflating niceness with comfort? Right, yeah. And thinking that anything that makes you uncomfortable is hence mean and unkind. And that's just not true.
Whitney Parnell 28:46
Then lastly, what I would offer is that there are so many different tactics for how we engage in this work. Like I tell black white people, for example, I say, look, white people talking to white people about race is required in my book, one because you're more willing to be heard because of the bias of trusting sameness, but also to because as a black woman, I get upset, and that is valid. Everybody can't receive that. But you as a white person can show a grace and understanding and like adjoining along in somebody's process to help them land differently. Like sometimes like I just don't have the responsibility to do sometimes I can do it but sometimes like that labor just can't be on me, but it can be on you because it's different. So I say that Jared to offer that. There are many tactics, some of which can be circumstantial. I make choices every day, about when I need to show up in the grace and the kindness to like have a conversation to help someone understand what how what they did was problematic and how they can be better. There's so much importance and space for that. All the way to direct action, protesting means shutting down the streets and saying that everybody's day will be disrupted so that we must focus on this. And that absolutely has its value as well. And different things are needed for different circumstances, different moments by different people. It's taking all different types of people in different types of tactics and move stuff along. And so I just offer that opening for people, like a real challenge of what do you really mean, actually, when you're talking kindness, or what I offer, the challenge of discomfort is required period, which is not synonymous with meanness. And then I offer it takes a lot of tactics, and for some of which kindness is actually isn't the right tactic for the moment. And I think that people just need to understand that.
Jared Simmons 30:49
That's good stuff. I think that's so important and so nuanced, that it's just so important that someone that articulate is you takes the time to try to unpack that. And I love that you talked about the sort of validity of getting upset during these conversations. Even for someone who does the work all day, every day, I'm sure it's still upsetting, it's still an emotional investment. And being this close to the impact of the problem is a challenge. And there is some benefit and advantage to being a step removed from the direct impact of the problem, when you start to think about being able to sustain engagement on it. So I really appreciate you unpacking that for folks. How do you think about what's next? Innovation? You know, your definition is all about action and moving forward, kind of in a nuts and bolts, rubber meets the road for innovation kind of way? How do you take what's going on and decide what's next for your organization? Hmm.
31:56
Well, it's interesting, because as you were talking about, like the toll that this work can take on me doing this work. Yeah. What was also coming up for me, which I'm glad that you sparked is that innovation has to involve community relationship, like the construct of white supremacy, strips us all of our humanity, and creates this idea of like hyper individualism, where it just has to be us doing everything, it's only me. And like, disruption to that is also community and relationship. Like it's innovative to do this work in that not siloed and alone. Yeah. So as you were talking about, like, when I think about our organization, while I'm the founder and CEO, my co founder, my co we're in deep relationship, we're close friends, and he's who I call every day like I call him every day. Yeah, it's outdated. Be like, let me tell you, and he sits with it and supports me, right. And so it's interesting, I just want to put that out there that community and relationship and partnership is actually a really important qualitative thing with innovation with which once again, just mantle's a lot of that individual stuff that we think about when it comes to leadership and work.
Whitney Parnell 33:06
To that point, to answer your question about what's next I hold many things I hold that part of innovation is that is dynamic, right? Like, what we do now, at one point was innovative 100 years ago, until someone came up with it. So part of it is about that continued just chipping away, and doing the most that I can with what I am aware of needs to happen in the short term. But to the point as well, there's envisioning there's something that we're working towards. And while chipping away as part of that, I also honor my ancestors and my elders, and how it's important for us to also unpack that while some of this is creating new, some of it's also just like listening to the wisdom and the answers that others have, and like centering that as our guide. And so that ties in the community piece that right that what informs what's next for us can't just be solely me and my ideas, like I'm always in envision, or I love to think about what comes next and how we do that. But that usually is building off of what's been done before and what's informing me. And not just me, but the community around me. So that's a very nuanced answer on the one and I'm saying it's just a chip away based on how I've been informed. Sure. On the other end, it's like taking the vision for what you want to get towards and how do you think long game? Yeah, but then getting there means centering a lot of the wisdom that's here now and has been in our past and like honoring that, and certainly in community, not alone.
Jared Simmons 34:41
Right, right. Yes, well said. It really is kind of having a foot in two worlds and being able to operate at that intersection, to be able to plan with an innovative mindset. It requires a lot of discipline and a lot of humility. I think in the broader world of innovation To the ancestors and the sort of institutional knowledge in whatever field you're in, it can be very tempting to dismiss that right? And to say that's how things were. That's what we're innovating to move beyond. But there's truth and there's authenticity. And there are answers in what came before us, because it was useful, you know about it, because it was useful to someone that solved a problem. Mm hmm. And so understanding what problem that solved in the context, and that's why I love history, because history is the documentation of iterations of innovation, right? And so if you look at everything from the founding of this country, all the problems that it was fraught with all the things that we're still living with, and fighting against these hundreds of years later, there are so many things that we aren't fighting against, that are still here that are still working, right. You think about 250 years ago, what do we still do the same way we did 250 years ago. We govern the same way. But that's it. So what can we learn from the system of government that has lasted centuries that we can take forward? And what can we learn from it, that we can use as a lesson to operate differently in the future? But there's something there?
Whitney Parnell 36:26
Yeah. And you know, what that brings up for me is I think people often think in the either or binary. Yeah. Which is one of the characteristics of white supremacy culture, like an offering the great resource is Timo coons characteristics of white dominant culture. It has done so much to just unpack and me individually, but also Center, our organization of what's the default. And so what does it mean to try a different way? Yeah. But like, either or thinking is literally one of them. And to your point, right, people hence think that innovation change, good has to be either all completely new things, or sticking to tradition, right? Like it's one or the other. But I love living into the both and in all in everything we're at how can you hold both things? How can you hold all the nuance beyond it in within? And what's given me a lot of freedom is also even when I think about justice work and racial justice work, I hold that some things have gotten better. I my ancestors wildest dream, some things have gotten worse, like that racial wealth gap, which is growing, and some things have stayed the same. It's just morphed with the times. Exactly. And so how do we get to the heart of addressing what those factors are that continue morphing? So within that same framing that allows me to also hold, there are some things from history that like we can certainly learn from. And there are things that have never happened that we can build towards, right. And like so much of the work really is an examination of everything and examination evaluation of everything. And what I always say is that and then decide what can stay and should stay, what needs to go entirely, and what just needs to be altered and changed to be better. And I think that if we can live into those all of those things as option, it opens up for us, as opposed to limit us and make us feel like there has to be that either or situation.
Jared Simmons 38:21
Perfect. That's exactly right. Well said. And I think those three buckets of sort of how you look at things are a perfect foundation for evaluating an innovation work process, evaluating a government evaluating a system, a process, evaluating yourself, and how you approach your day to day life. Building on that, do you have any advice for innovators?
38:45
A few things. I'm a believer in just dreaming, right? You can always go big and get all the ideas out there. And then whittled down, everything's not going to work. Clearly, everything's not even going to make sense. But I would rather us get everything out there and think as largely as possible from a dreaming position, and then whittle down as opposed to just being so scared and small, that we're not letting the highest potential even come out of ourselves. So that's one thing. The second thing that I will say is like, build community, both in like, what you're trying to innovate, but also just in life, right? Like, we're meant to be relational beings. There's a reason why solitary confinement is the worst punishment that you could ever get and should not be a thing, right, like, so like, you can't do this heart building work, feeling alone. So what it means to have partnership partners in the work, but also just community around you for that support. It matters white supremacy, culture makes us think that we have to just struggle and struggle isolated and alone. No, we've got to have that community. And then the last thing is just like this tie in of trying new things. And nothing's necessarily set in stone. Yeah, I have a lot of unlearning to do around perfectionism, which is another characteristic of white dominant culture, right? I recognize how I've been conditioned as a black woman to feel like I have to be perfect, and that there is no room for error for me, because that's it. But that also, as a human, I am not perfect. And like, I shouldn't be trying to be perfect, either. Like, we're beautifully flawed. That's the point.
Whitney Parnell 40:31
It's been a journey for me of being able to hold How do I do the best that I can, and then being flawed, I'm gonna make mistakes, which means everything's not necessarily going to stick. So I've actually gotten a lot of freedom, particularly as an innovator, and like, let's try it. But also have the infrastructure in place that holds us accountable to what we got wrong. But also makes room for if you don't work like a, it's not set in stone. So how do we also just have that room for nuance and journey, that means that everything doesn't have to be set in stone, we don't have to get everything perfectly right. Every single time, it's just not going to happen. Nothing's set in stone. So dream and fix as opposed to stay limited. So those are my main things. And your last one, be humble, like humility, humility has allowed me to become my best self. The way that I have learned and built and created best has come from the mistakes that I've made, and the learnings that others have offered to me for how I can be better, far more that is how I've achieved so much better and become so much better than like believing that I had all the right answers and beliefs, the humility and reception of feedback. Hence, tying in that community piece is so important.
Jared Simmons 41:46
Think big, build community, try new things. Yeah, there you go. And be humble, that underlines the whole thing. Whitney, unsurprisingly, it's been a pleasure. It's been fun, your energy is infectious. And the thoughtful approach you take to this work, and the patience and openness you have for helping people along this journey is just invaluable, and you will never be thanked enough for it. So I'll thank you as much as I can today and look forward to our next conversation.
Whitney Parnell 42:20
No, thank you so much for this space. And for this example of the beauty and power of relationship and how we've been able to keep learning and growing from each other. So glad that we were able to do that for others to hear.
Jared Simmons 42:35
Exactly. Well, you keep at it, and I'll keep at whatever I've got going on over here and we'll just keep supporting each other onward. All right, take care.
Jared Simmons 42:50
We'd love to hear your thoughts about this week's show. You can drop us a line on Twitter at Outlast, LLC, o u t l a s LLC, or follow us on LinkedIn where we're at less consulting. Until next time, keep innovating. Whatever that means.