After many years being on the conference speaking circuit, followed by the pandemic, I have chosen to limit my availability for speaking engagements to fewer opportunities.
When America finally woke up to the horrors of racism in our country, and the vital need for an anti-racism stance, I chose to decline a number of offers to speak at search industry events. Making more room for people with more diverse backgrounds, and to ensure “yet one more white male” wasn’t taking away opportunities from People of Color, was an obvious necessity.
As more and more conferences were shown to fail to include enough women, and where that shortcoming was glaringly painful to observe, that too was yet another reason for me to step aside. So many great professionals in search are out there, who happen to not be white men.
I do, still, with all that, consider opportunities from time to time though.
However I will only consider accepting an invitation to speak at a Search Industry Conference if there is already true diversity on the speaker list. Women and POC need to be well represented.
If that’s the case for your conference, and you would like me to speak, please contact me. I will seriously consider your offer.