2012 CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS

Rethinking Community - Up from Institutions: An Overview of Disability History

Jim Parker, Governer's Commission on Disability

The past 150 years have been a “Sea Change” in community living for people with disabilities. From a history of institutionalization and back-room existence to everyday community living and inclusion, people with disabilities have continued to emerge from a shadow life to community inclusion. The catalysts for the ongoing change have been numerous: struggle for civil rights; accessible transportation and housing; education; employment; in- home, community-based services and supports.

Industrial Peacemaking on the Path to True Diversity

David Martinez, Federal Mediation & Conciliation Sevice

In this presentation, David will share from the many lessons he learned over two decades in the field with his mentor and friend Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers of America. He will share inspiring and practical examples of real, personal, organizational, and societal awareness of diversity, including: how we can be allies, team building in a diverse environment, cross-cultural communication and conflict resolution, and problem-solving applications in a multicultural context. He will also discuss interest-based problem solving techniques especially useful in diverse environments, including: understanding and appreciating differences in working styles, active listening and communication, brainstorming, and consensus decision-making. Finally, we will examine our own “conditioning,” biases, perceptions, and working styles.

Fostering Distributed Diversity Leadership

Valerie Romero-Leggott, UNM Health Sciences Center
William F. Rayburn, MD, MBA, FACOG, UNM Health Sciences Center
Mario Rivera, UNM Health Sciences Center
Tomai Webb MBA, UNM Health Sciences Center

This presentation will describe a process which helped cultivate a more inclusive climate and will share some innovative ways in which distributed leadership has been fostered at the UNM HSC. “Distributed leadership,” drawn from information and cognitive theories, is based on the notion of multiple leaders, and leaders-as-catalysts. In distributed leadership., one needs senior leaders who are reasonably comfortable with sharing power, relinquishing control, and conflict.

Think Different! The Gains of Increased Intercultural Competence for Organizational Leaders

Tamara Thorpe, MA, Owner, TNT Development

In this presentation, participants will “Think Different” about culture and diversity. Gone are the days of “shame and blame”. Now is the time to uncover the interpersonal and organizational benefits of advanced intercultural competence and the power we possess when we have the ability to experience diversity differently. Prominent cultural icons Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, John Lennon (with Yoko Ono), Thomas Edison, Mahatma Gandhi, Amelia Earhart, and others were featured in Apple computers 1997 “Think Different” campaign as daring, defiant, game changers. Narrator, Richard Dreyfuss said: “Here's to the crazy ones...The ones who see things differently...They push the human race forward...the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.” To “Think Different” about diversity and embrace intercultural competence is an empowering opportunity for organizational leaders to be game changers. Understanding culture with greater complexity is a powerful tool, equipping leaders to leverage diversity to improve relationships, strengthen teams, increase creativity and productivity, and make lasting change within yourself and organization.

Creating Positive Change Through Mutual Respect: The Magic Of Community

Josh Pando, ADR Training & Development Specialist & GSD ADA Coordinator
Mary Jo Lujan, ADR Bureau Chief

What makes you happy at work? Acknowledgement and appreciation? Satisfaction from a job well-done? Team cohesiveness and camaraderie? Job security? RESPECT? We all have the need to be respected - at the workplace, in our relationships, and in our homes. How do we foster respect in ourselves and others in a way that leads to productive and positive relationships and communities? This presentation will focus on ways to communicate respect for others that maintains our own sense of dignity and self-respect, allows us to work better together, and contributes to our personal and team happiness and quality of life. The ADR Bureau will also discuss how mediation provides people with an opportunity to resolve conflicts through constructive, meaningful, and inclusive conversation.