Lenora Billings-Harris

Lenora Billings-Harris is a leading expert in inclusion, diversity, and bias and a certified professional speaker. She is recognized as one of the top Global Thought Leaders on Diversity and Inclusion and is the only African American woman to be inducted into the Speaker Hall of Fame.

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Why you should book Lenora Billings-Harris for your next event

Lenora Billings-Harris is a renowned expert in inclusion, diversity, and bias.
Billings-Harris has extensive experience in public speaking, her powerful yet engaging style is sure to inspire and motivate attendees.
Her ability to help clients build a more inclusive and diverse workplace is a valuable asset to any organization.

Lenora Billings-Harris is a CSP, CPAE Hall of Fame speaker, and an international authority on diversity and inclusion. She is a recognized thought leader and has written several books on the topic. She partners with clients to help them leverage their diversity to impact talent engagement and retention, attract customers, build community, and enhance corporate relations.

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Non-binding request for Lenora Billings-Harris

Keynotes

Keynote by Lenora Billings-Harris: TURNING BARRIERS INTO BRIDGES BY DISRUPTING BIAS

As the dramatic shift to a highly diverse and expressive workforce continues, leaders know they must create the culture that embraces an understanding, acceptance of differences as well as similarities. They know the cultural and racial backgrounds and experiences of diverse employees and clients can enrich the organization, making it more innovative and competitive.

Enhancing your ability to recognize micro-affirmations and micro-aggressions enables you to work more effectively with all team members while appreciating the diversity of thought they bring to the organization. The added benefit is the skills learned can be used professionally and personally thus reducing stress and enhancing positive interactions.

This interactive, non-judgmental, and fun program provides an opportunity for you to discover your own level of knowledge and understanding of people different from you, and then apply the principles of inclusion to build relationships. By exploring the biases that inform some behaviors and impede productivity, you will be better equipped to turn barriers into bridges and focus on inclusive actions when you return to their organization.

Takeaways:

As a result of attending this session, you will be able to:

Improve your awareness of the impact of biases

Limit the influence of hidden biases on decisions

You will be able to apply the 4-Part Compass to expand your cultural competence

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Keynote by Lenora Billings-Harris: S.T.O.P. — TECHNIQUE FOR REDUCING CULTURAL COLLISIONS

How to Diminish Cultural Collisions through Courageous Conversations

Inclusive cultures encourage courageous conversations.

There are barriers, booby traps, and blocked roadways on our journey toward achieving a culturally competent work environment. People say and do things in the workplace without malice of intent, but nonetheless, some of these actions create a less than inclusive environment.

The biggest barrier to giving feedback when these challenging situations occur is fear. The major reason people do not speak up when they experience micro-aggressive behaviors is they do not know how to do so, especially if they must interact with the colleague on a regular basis.

Lenora’s four-step process called
S.T.O.P
. is easy to use and produces successfully results. It works because there is no blame or shame in the process. Sign up now for this skill-based session to learn a technique that can be used at work, home, and even with children.

Audience takeaways:

Explore why most people say nothing

Discover how bias plays a role

Identify common micro-aggressions that impact relationships

Apply the 4-step
S.T.O.P.
feedback process to encourage courageous conversations and disrupt micro-aggressions

Takeaways:

Identify common micro-aggressions that impact relationships

Apply the 4-step S.T.O.P. feedback process to disrupt micro-aggressions

Determine when to use S.T.O.P. as an observer or when you are the offender

Actions for Allies dialogue process

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Keynote by Lenora Billings-Harris: CANDID CONVERSATIONS: GOING BEYOND THE INCLUSION ILLUSION

Are you ready to go beyond multicultural awareness? Are you ready to create a respectful, engaging environment that utilizes its diversity of talent to gain a competitive advantage? If so, this program is for you. By participating in this session, you will be able to:

Define a practical framework for creating a safe space for constructive conversations with individuals, and teams related to race, gender, social issues and other sensitive topics.

Examine approaches that strengthen your ability to be an ally, an advocate to expand the sense of belonging for all team members.

Experience TTEC’s Humanify BOTS (an AI technology).

This presentation is skill-based and is designed for people who have completed the Turning Barriers to Bridges by Disrupting Bias workshop or other DEI awareness session.

Join Lenora for this virtual or in-person session. You will leave with actionable tactics and strategies that drive success with sensitive conversations.

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Lenora Billings-Harris

Expert in inclusion, diversity, and bias, is a valuable asset for any organization.

Lenora Billings-Harris, CSP (Certified Speaking Professional) is a CPAE (Council of Peers Award of Excellence) Hall of Fame speaker and an internationally recognized authority in the areas of inclusion, diversity, and bias. S
he has been included as one of the 100 Global Thought Leaders on Diversity and Inclusion by The Society of Human Resource Management and was named by Diversity Woman Magazine

as one of the twenty top influential diversity leaders in the US. HIVE has included Lenora in 2021 and again in 2022 as North America’s Most Influential DEI Leaders. Her award-winning diversity leadership research is recognized in academic journals internationally. Additionally, she serves on the Advisory Council of the Nido Qubein School of Communication, High Point University, as well as on the adjunct business faculty of two other universities.

Diversity, inclusion and disrupting bias is a full-time focus for Lenora. She
partners with clients to help them leverage their diversity to impact talent engagement and retention, attract customers, build community, and enhance corporate relations. Her powerful yet engaging style inspires virtual and in-person audience members to take personal and organizational actions that disrupt bias and accelerate bottom-line results.

She has presented to audiences in over forty-one countries and six continents, including such places as Dubai, Israel and South Africa and Malaysia.

Billings-Harris co-authored TRAILBLAZERS:
How Top Business Leaders are Accelerating Results through Inclusion and Diversity, and is the author of The Diversity Advantage:
A Guide to Making Diversity Work, 3
rd
Ed. Most recently, she was the cover story
for Inclusion Magazine.

In addition to management positions held with two Fortune 100 companies plus the Graduate School of Business at The University of Michigan, Billings-Harris has held leadership positions with several non-profit organizations. She is a past president of Win-Win Resolutions with a mission to
reduce bullying, violence and prejudice in schools and communities, and was a founding charter member of the Maricopa County Black Chamber of Commerce. She is
a past president of the National Speakers Association, and past president of the Global Speakers Federation. In 2016 she was the Cavett Award recipient, the highest honor bestowed upon professional speakers in the USA. In 2018 she was inducted into the Speaker Hall of Fame and is the only African American woman to hold this honor.