But when you hear the term DEI with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Here's what it means. It has, it defines our fans, it defines our marketplace, it defines our viewing population, it defines our, our, our, our virtual interaction with our fans. It is not identified as black or white, but it's looked upon as here is a marketplace And if on any of those fronts on the marketplace, if we haven't developed that relationship with a group of people, regardless of who they are, we have a business opportunity.

We'll discuss race and how it plays a factor and how we didn't even talk about this topic because we were afraid.

A Black Executive Perspective.

Welcome to a Black Executive Perspective podcast, a safe space where we talk about all things about race, especially race in corporate America. I'm your host, Tony Tidbit. And as we always do, we want to throw a quick shout out to our partner CODE M Magazine, whose mission is saving the Black family by first saving the Black man. So please make sure you go and check them out at CodeM. So today we're going to delve into the growing challenges facing diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives across various sectors. As these essential efforts face increasing scrutiny and pushback, understanding their nuances and distinctions from the broader social impact and equity initiatives become more critical. Joining us is Kevin Clayton, Senior Vice President and Head of Social Impact and Equity at the Cleveland Cavaliers. He will provide his expert insight. And to the landscape, Kevin will also explain the key differences between DEI programs and social impact and equity initiatives. Using real world examples from his extensive experience, he will discuss how DEI efforts often, often internal and organizational focus are sometimes perceived as divisive and how they differ from social impact and equity strategies, which aim for systemic changes. Benefiting broader communities. Let me tell you a little bit about Kevin. Kevin Clayton is the senior vice president and the head of social impact and equity for rock entertainment group, which includes the Cleveland Cavaliers, Rocket Mortgage, field house, Cleveland Charge, Cleveland Monsters, and the Cavs are re legion gaming club under his leadership. Kevin oversees community relations engagement, DEI, and the Cavaliers Community Foundation. Kevin previously has executive positions at Bond Secures MercyHealth, United States Tennis Association, Russell Athletic, American Cancer Society, and was the managing partner of Jump Ball, LLC entity he found in 2012. Kevin started his career with Procter and Gamble where he was a successful sales and marketing executive. He is currently the chair of the greater Cleveland urban league and black sports professional board member of the United way of greater Cleveland shaker schools, foundation, Cleveland city club, and serves as the advisor to other local and national organizations. Kevin is a native of Cleveland, Ohio. He has four daughters, three grandchildren, and an alum of North Carolina Central University in Wilmington College, Ohio, where he was a member and the captain of the basketball team. He's also a proud member of Kappa Alpha Phi Fraternity Incorporated. Kevin Clayton, welcome to a Black Executive Perspective Podcast, my brother.

Hey, Tony, it's a pleasure being with you, man. Thank you for that. Nice introduction and. When you read my bio, it just reminded me how long I've been at this game, man.

Well, not only how long you've been at it, but how accomplished that you've been at it as well. I was waiting for the line that says they gave him land and title. So, uh, but maybe you'll get that from where you at rock entertainment right now. So more importantly, my friend, we're excited that you're here. We're definitely going to talk about a topic that, um, as you know, is in the headlines. Um, it's interesting and we'll dive into it shortly. Four years ago, it was, it was very, it was getting a lot of accolades. And now four years later, it's, uh, at the bottom of the bottom. So I definitely want to hear your perspective, but before we get started, tell us a little bit of like, where are you currently residing and a little bit about your family, my friend.

Yeah. So, so Tony, I've had a chance to live all across the United States. I'm right now in Cleveland, Ohio, where I grew up. And, you know, went to, went to school here. Uh, and then when I left right after, actually right after college, um, is when I kind of left the Cleveland area and I've lived all across the country. And after 33 years came back to Cleveland for this opportunity with the Cavaliers. And I've lived in such places, such as Atlanta, such as Atlanta, such as, uh, LA, New York, Charleston, Cincinnati, twice, back to Cleveland once. Orlando, Jacksonville, all over the country, and I've had a chance. I had no plan to come back to Cleveland when you think about some of the places I've lived. They're kind of nice warm weather areas and really had a lot going on socially. But I got this call from, um, really, it was really more of a spiritual call. Of coming back home and I grew up playing basketball. I grew up cheering for the Cavs. So to be able to start their DEI program back in kind of in, in, um, actually 2019 was a great opportunity for me to, to really do some good work back in my home community. Um, so this was a surprise that I'd come back home. But I haven't, you know, this is where my roots are and I couldn't think of a better place to be other than Cleveland, Ohio.

Well, my brother, I mean, number one, thank you for that. Number two, I love it that you've been around a lot of places because obviously it broadens our horizons. Number three, coming back home is great. But then I got to say, number four, you remind me of LeBron James. Okay. When he left all of a sudden, he felt like it was spiritual. He had to come back to fulfill his mission. All right. Which he did. So I'm pretty sure that you're on your mission and you're making it happen as well.

Uh, Tony, I, I could not have written the script any better than what it is right now. And as we have the conversation, it'll be really clear to you and, and and our viewers as to what that looks like. But as I said, my plan was not to come back to Ohio. I was in Atlanta and have been there for a number of years, and I kind of, wherever I am, I like to call it home. Right. And you know, when I was in Orlando, I was very much a big part of the landscape there. When I was in Atlanta, I was part of the landscape, New York, Charleston, because you never know. to end up. And people ask me now, well, Kevin, are you going to, is Cleveland your last stop? I don't know. I'm on a spiritual journey that has led, that I've followed the work to be done and wherever I am, as I said, I just, I call it home. So for me being able to come back home to Cleveland at a time when the whole social justice, social impact, diversity, that whole industry blew up around the murder of George Floyd. I know that this is the place in which I was supposed to be, and also know kind of what my calling is and the work that I'm supposed to get done.

Buddy, I love it. I love it. And speaking of that, so look, because I'm chomping at the bit to hear from you. I know you chomping at the bit to talk about it. So let's go ahead and just get into it. Are you ready to talk about it, my brother? I'm ready to get into it, brother. Let's talk about it. So why don't we do this? Let's start here because you have, um, you know, and I'm going to ask you some questions about DEI and social impact, but you have a major role with rock entertainment. So why don't you tell us a little bit about your role and your duties in terms of what you do in terms of Social Equity and Impact.

Yeah. So when I started with the, with the cabs organization, so rock entertainment group. Is, is the kind of overarching umbrella for all of the sports and entertainment organizations that we, we have and understand that, you know, Rocket Entertainment Group and the Cavs are part of Dan Gilbert's portfolio, but over a hundred companies of which is kind of led by Rocket Mortgage and StockX and Quicken loans and bedrock development and what have you. So with that, as I said, I came back here in 2019. And it was to start the DE&I team. So if you think back to 2019 and the NBA, and this is when I tell people this story, they're kind of like, wow, I can't even believe that. So in 2019 when I came back here to start our DE&I team, there's 147 professional sports teams. Tony, if you think about NBA, if you think about MLB, NFL, National Hockey League, and then if you think, also add to that MLS, which is a major league soccer out of the 147 sports teams. In just 2019, I was the fourth C suite level person to lead a DEI team. So now there were people that might have been a coordinator over HR and something else and something else, or they had multiple titles, but at the C suite level, Sitting in the boardroom. I was the fourth and the thing is all four of those sports teams were in the NBA and None of the other teams across any other league Had them now at the top of the like the MLB has had somebody leading the league When I was it when I was in the USTA from a tennis standpoint, I led that for the USTA But at the team level, it hadn't happened. So my role was to open up the, the DEI department, and I've always thought about this as a very strategic business format or from a strategic format, because that's what this is. DEI is a strategy to get you to an end game. So, in doing that over a couple of years and then understand in 2019, and that was in the, in the spring of 2019, a year later, George Floyd is murdered. Then you go through the next 6, 7 months. The pandemic hits. So I come on board to do the work of DEI had no clue. How could I? That the world was going to turn upside down and we were going to have the duality of two pandemics, if you will. One from a social and racial justice. The other from what Penn, what, uh, what happened with COVID. So in managing through all of that, uh, and then we got on the backside of kind of COVID and we all came back, my work was elevated to, and I had a chance to have some input with my CEO around what my title was going to be. And I saw, and I mean, God has blessed me with the vision to kind of see where the puck is going, if you will, which is a hockey term. And we have a hockey team as well. And it's not looking at where you are, but where are we going? So I saw, and I could just see by the, kind of the, the, the, the headwinds. That the work of DEI was beginning to shift. And now I'm going back two years ago. So my title is Senior Vice President of Social Impact and Equity. Those are outcomes, Tony, of the work that I do. That's the outcome of DEI. So I talked about the DEI being a strategy. If we do the work of, of developing and managing and leading and executing our DEI plan, we're Then we will have social impact. We will also create internal and external equity. What happens is that this work is perceived to be the end all it's not the end all it's it's really a road to get us from point A to point B and therefore my work is now DEI falls underneath me everything we do from a community standpoint government affairs. What we do with our legends, and those are all the past greats and players with the Cavs, and then also our foundation. So I have the philanthropic part, government affairs, social impact, or social, yeah, social impact, and also the work of DEI. All of that work is geared towards one thing. And that is how do we make tangible, trackable, measurable impact in our community and within our footprint of where our fans are.

So buddy, thank you for that. And I appreciate the, um, you backing up and, and, and painting that picture. I got a couple of questions out of this. So number one, um, 2019, 147 sports teams, four. Individuals for positions in terms of DEI or social impact. What case may be, why was that?

Yeah. And to be clear, it was, it was DEI, social impact, no social impact. It not even been, not even

coming. So, so, so why is that? Yep. So here's

what, here's why, why that was the case. And if you think about professional sports, what happened over the years is that people look at professional sports and said, Oh, we don't need to do anything from a diversity standpoint. Because look, look at all the black athletes. Look at all the women that play. Look, I mean, you even got LGBTQ players. You, you have athletes, you have all these folks that typically are not in the mainstream. So why do we need diversity? Well, what they didn't understand was one diversity is not just representation of individuals Two what they didn't understand was that's the athletes on the floor That has nothing to do with the business behind the scenes So if you then kind of go behind the the the curtain of the wizard of oz and you pull back that curtain What you will see is that professional sports look just like every other corporate Corporation in this country predominantly led by white males, you had a handful of women, a handful of people of color. So just from a representation standpoint, people did not associate who was on the court to who was running the business. And that's no different than when I worked at P&G, who was running the business had nothing to do with our marketplace and, and what, who, who our brands were associated with. So that's why I've always connected this work to what is the mission or the business objective of the organization so that I can kind of dismantle the whole conversation around, Oh, this is about black and white. We got enough black athletes. So therefore, why do we need diversity? So that's why that was the case. Then George Floyd is murdered. America now raises, I mean, the, the, the, the ugly scar of racism is now seen by the whole world in this country. And sports teams, including the NBA are like, Hey, we need to make sure that all our teams have, or sports leagues, including the NBA, wanted to make sure all of our teams had representation of DE& I leaders. That happened across all the sports. It happened across this entire country. Well, for us, it wasn't about reacting to something that happened from a societal standpoint. For us, it was just a matter of, this is part of our strategy that we implemented in 2019. It wasn't in reaction to, and our other three teams in the league that actually had DEI officers were now in a position to really get ahead of this because it's just how we operate. It's how our league operated,

right? Right. So that makes sense. So it's amazing because I love the way you, you know, you weave the, the situation with, um, the sports leagues and corporate America. They were really the same, right? Set up, but because they were more, I don't even say more because the primary primary product on the field was. You know, people of color, they're like, we're all squared away. All right. But at the end of the day, there, there, there was not. And it's the same setup. So I'm glad you, you, you spoke about that. You also talked about the two pandemics. You said, um, which I never heard that before. So I want you to, you said, cause I was like, okay, there's something else happened, but you spoke very well to it. So I want you to dive in further. You said one pandemic was the racial awakening, social justice. And the other one was the pandemic. Talk a little bit about the two and how it affected what was going on.

Yeah. So the term pandemic, most of us, first time we were ever exposed to that term happened from COVID. Well, COVID was a disease. COVID was a, a illness. COVID was a, a, a, a physical symptom that, that impacted all of America. It shut down our country.

Right.

Well, we all were sitting at home watching George Floyd being killed, being murdered. So, Tony, you and I have been around long enough. George Floyd was not the first black man to be killed by law enforcement officers. It just happened to be the first one in May of 2020.

Right. That we happened

to see.

On TV.

On TV. So seeing it over and over again, it had the same impact. Go back to that, that time of all of the rallies, all of the protests all across the globe that were happening. Didn't we see those same pictures with COVID? All across the globe, how many people were being killed? City had a record. They had a number. Yeah, exactly. So, so it, it, it had the same impact of, wait a minute. There's been a, an alarm had been sound and that alarm was. Unfortunately, racism in America actually exists, which was an awakening as other countries began to say, yes, and it's happened here, but the finger was pointed at at our country, and therefore, if you think about kind of where the epicenter was. It was here from that one pandemic of racism, the epicenter of COVID, you can point your finger, but people were identifying. It was over in China. It was someplace else, but it hit our country. And you recall New York was the epicenter of how many people were dying and how it shut down that same visual you saw all across the country. And it happened to be the visual. The epicenter was in Minneapolis. Where George Floyd was killed. So the impact was the same. Our attention was captured by this ugly disease. Racism and COVID.

Right, right. Well, thank you for breaking that down. Let me ask you this in terms of racial awakening. Let's back up a little bit. Growing up in Cleveland and I don't know when, when you left, even though you're back now, when did you have your first like racial awakening as, as a human being?

Yeah. So I grew up in, in the city of Cleveland up until I was in the fifth grade. And my mother, who was a single, a single, um, caregiver, care provider of our family, and I have two older brothers, we then moved into a Jewish community. In Shaker in Cleveland called Shaker Heights. Shaker Heights has one of the highest, um, population bases of Jewish people in the country. Very affluent community with the exception of kind of this one little area about a quarter mile or so in Shaker where all black folks live that kind of was on the border of Cleveland. And my experience around racial awakening Came from the fact that I live in a two family house. We live on the second floor. We had five rooms, three of which had furniture in it. And when I say furniture, I'm talking about a couple of chairs or a bed or something. And now I was being bused to a part of Shaker that, and this was voluntary busing, but I was being bused to a part of Shaker with my Jewish friends. where their lifestyle was very different than mine. And I would never forget this, Tony. We had, and this was the first day of being bussed. And there were multiple schools that the bus would pick up for the, we'd pick up in the black part of Shaker. In multiple schools along the way, where they would drop three or four black kids off here, six or seven black kids here. And when we got to the final stop, which I was in, in, in the last grouping, there were seven of us that got off the bus. And my very first day, again, I was in, I was in the sixth grade now. All right. Imagine here's this brick school and I'm getting off the bus and these faces of all these white kids are looking down at us, get off the bus. I never, I can't really say that I have been a specimen of any kind. I don't know how zoo animals feel, but if you think about the zoo animals where people are walking by just staring and pointing, that was my experience of having all the white kids staring out this window, pointing. And that was my first experience from anything racially or from a societal standpoint, because I'd never interacted with white kids day in and day out. And I will tell you though, and I use this exercise where I talk about the first recollection of being different.

That

was really one of my first recollections of being different, but the outcome of that had to do more from an economic standpoint. Then it had to do from any type of negative impact of me being black, because I then went to the homes of these Jewish kids, because that was part of the assimilation, right? We're going to take your, take your new black friend home with you and take him to lunch

so he can get a good dinner.

And Tony, I saw, I'm like, wow, the maids quarters were bigger than what our little five room. Two family house was, and that just inspired me to economically to be, to do better. I now had a, I had a example of what that looked like.

Right.

And hell, I became a homeowner when I was, 23 years old. Wow. And the reason why is I knew where I came from. I knew what I saw with my Jewish friends and I'm like, nope, there is a different way of living now. Other other places. Yes. We have black folks that are affluent and they have homes and all of that. I just want to, was not afforded to being able to see that example in my community. So that was my first kind of connection to, from a race standpoint and how would I know in the fifth or sixth grade that the work that I would be doing, the lifetime of work would have a direct correlation to that experience.

And you just beat me to my next question. So I love it. I love, we on the same page, buddy. We vibing here. It's basketball.

I just gave you, I just gave you an alley oop. You're not

giving me an alley oop like a mug. Cause I was going to ask you, okay. So. Did that set you up? Why did, why did you do this career? What brought you to this career in terms of what you're doing now? Because, and I want to get, we're going to dive deeper into it, but you're, you're, you're, you are creating so much equity and so much, uh, how should I say? impact. Well, people can see it. It could be measurable, not just in the sports arena or rock entertainment, but throughout the community of the Cleveland, Ohio, Greater Ohio area. So tell us, how did you get in this career?

Yeah. So, so interesting. And this also goes back to the work of DEI. There is no career of DEI relative to when I went to college, I was a business and psych major. Okay. You, you don't get a degree in DEI.

Correct.

So my career started in with P&G and I had a decade with Procter and Gamble in sales and marketing. And I was a very successful executive with P&G. And after 10 years, what I realized was for me to go where I was, which was an accelerated pace. To the next level, there had not been many folks that looked like me that had gone beyond that. Matter of fact, in the sales function, nobody had gone beyond the level that I was at, but I was at that level with five other of my, of, of, of my peers. All across kind of P&G's foothold. And I'm like, you know, I'm 31 years old. I got 10 years of P&G let me go open up my own consulting firm, because if it doesn't work, I can always go back to corporate America. Cause I got a PD, P&G pedigree. So when I was at P&G my last three years is when we introduced the whole concept of diversity as a business strategy. And Tony, I'm going back to like the early nineties, late, late eighties. And it was just diversity. It was no I and E and B and J and a, it wasn't all that extra. It was clearly a business strategy. As we looked at our marketplace and we looked at our organization and said, what sets us apart is that we have people that look like America versus other companies. That are more kind of homogeneous to just white males. The other thing that we identified and our CEO, John Pepperhead, identified that Asian companies or companies from Asia were coming in, buying up U. S. companies, they too were kind of folk that I mean, their makeup was primarily men, let it be Asian men of multiple kind of cultures, if it was from China, Japan, Or, or, or Taiwan knees, those companies were run by men. So we, we knew that leveraging diversity. And again, it's just diversity. And the key word that I wanted to say was leveraging diversity. It's not just going out and hiring people. It's like leveraging who we have. That brings different perspectives is going to make a difference. It's going to have us say it will set us up for success. So I saw how it worked. I was leading a significant high profile market in Florida, and I then wanted to take that learning to start my consulting company. Around how do you leverage diversity in communities? How do you leverage it in companies? How do you leverage it with institutions of higher learning? And I was able to do that with a lot of success to a point where that began my journey around this concept of diversity well before, obviously, George Floyd. Was was, was murdered.

Let me ask you this question, 'cause I want to be clear. Yeah. I want the audience to be clear and make sure they understand. So when you say leverage diversity, provide examples like what does that mean specifically?

Yeah. That means that you are doing something with the diversity of your organization. Said differently. Oftentimes people look at an organization and they count and they look at the demographics and it's like, Hey, we get two of those, three of those, five of those, six of those, eight of those. Okay. Tony, all that means is you have two of those, three of those, five of those, six of those, eight of those. It doesn't mean that you have created an environment. That your organization can leverage the fact that I come from a completely different background, even different than you, although our skin color and our gender may be the same, you and I are not the same. So if I don't, if I don't create an environment where I now can give people who are different than white males or white females, an opportunity, I don't To bring their uniquenesses. And I call this my cultural added value. Then all I've done is gone out and hired people, check the box and I've moved on. So leveraging diversity says I'm doing something with it. There's also a term that's called managing diversity. Trust me, if you don't manage diversity, diversity is going to manage you.

So again, get, break it down when you say manage diversity specifically.

Yep. Yep. So when we talk about managing diversity, what we're talking about is now that I have a team and let's just say I get five members on my team. That I actually have looked at and said, okay, I had, I do have one of those, one of those, one of those, whatever it might be one female, one person that might be LGBTQ, one Latin, a one black, whatever it might be, then I need to understand that those folks are going to bring different complexities to my management style. And if I cannot manage, I mean, if I use the concept of I'm going to manage everybody the same way. I am a poor manager,

right?

And I would, let me, let me just use a sports analogy. And that sports analogy is if you think about a basketball team, you would not put on that basketball team, five players that all did the exact same thing. Also from a coaching standpoint of those five basketball players. Okay. There are people or there are players, athletes that respond to coaching differently. Some respond to, I got to get in, get, get, put a foot in your butt and get you going to some that like to be reinforced. Yeah. I need to give some a pat on the back. So to that point, it's, it, that's, what's managing diversity coaches and have managed diversity. Those successful coaches Have managed diversity. Think about Phil Jackson with the Chicago Bulls could not have been more. His team could not have been more diverse by having somebody as eccentric as Dennis Rodman to somebody as great as Michael Jordan.

Correct.

And, and the industry looks at Phil Jackson and he was probably the greatest manager of diversity ever in sports because he won six titles by being able to manage the complexity. coach the complexity of different players and their needs. Some he gave books to some, he gave extra time to a day off. So managing diversity from a corporate standpoint is the exact same way.

Buddy. So, you know what, man, I, I just, so no one, thank you, my brother, you know, You should run for president, okay? Because you know, where we are today, the way you just broke down leveraging diversity and managing diversity in very simplistic term that anybody, regardless of their, uh, racial makeup or their gender makeup would understand. Would for the most part would be behind it, right? Because it makes total sense. And it's to your point, it's for the greater sum. Okay. Of the company or whether the case may be, you know, you said you'd stated that Procter and Gamble. You know, 91, 92, whatever the year was, it wasn't DE&I, it was just like, you know what, here's a business idea. We should become more diverse because by doing that, we're going to have more diverse customers, which is going to help us increase our bottom line. All right now. Here's the thing, while I go to this next question, I don't never remember anybody attacking Procter and Gamble. All right. And saying that their initiative in 1991 was bad for the country or, or bad for their business or, or it's going to make their business upside down or there will Woke. And all the things that you hear today. So my brother talked to us a little bit about why is DEI under attack? And obviously there's, there could be a lot of reasons, but I'd love to hear your point of view.

Yeah, Tony, I know you have a vast audience and I'm a, I am a hundred percent down. For people responding to me, because what I'm about to say is going to get a response.

Please, please be honest. Here's

what happened. There's a lot of fingers to point as to why it's now under attack. And I appreciate what you just said. You know, we, we have all terms for it. Now it woke, here's what woke means. Woke means my eyes were open to something that I did not know before.

Thank you. But yet,

but yet I might as well call you the N word or something because, because it's like, Ooh, I'm the, wait, don't call me woke. Like what? Cause you're aware. Cause you're

aware. You're aware.

Yeah. So, so with that, prior to George Floyd being murdered, you never heard about DEI being under attack. And I'm telling you, I've been doing this work with title up with significant organizations. Since the early nineties, you'd never heard of it being under attack. Why? Because the early kind of the, the, the, the early pioneers of the work understood. That it was connecting back to my mission. If I'm nonprofit or my bottom line, if, if from a business standpoint, George Floyd gets murdered, I will tell you that the hottest job in America from May of 2020, up until probably last year in kind of early 23, the hottest job in America in which the salaries were double and triple the amount of what they should have been was being a DEI leader. Why? Because white America now felt the guilt that they had never felt before. And I'm now talking about business America around. Wait a minute, we have to do something. Wait, how, I mean, what, what, what, what can I do to kind of help black folks? Because now it's, it's obvious that there's a disparity in how they've been treated. Again, Tony, you and I started the conversation, George Floyd was not the first, nor was he the last black man to be killed by the police.

We're talking centuries. Centuries of this stuff happened.

Yes. And therefore, what has happened though, is it caught fire. People made, and companies, they made pledges. In the first 60 days, there were 50 billion, which can be tracked of how many companies and organizations pledge money. You read my bio. I went to North Carolina Central University. I got six generations of folks that went to Florida A& M. Historically Black colleges, you would have thought just got started post George Floyd. It's like, wait, HBCUs. What? I'm like, they've been around since the 17, 1800s.

Correct.

So what happens? Because we, as a people who have been oppressed that have not had the equity or not had the same level of respect from a societal standpoint, Now we have a door of opportunity to just kind of, you know, just get a little bit, just get a little bit.

And it's just, and it's just opportunity. Nobody gave us anything. It's just opportunity. You still got to prove it. You still got to do it. You still got all those types of things.

So now doors are being opened that maybe weren't open before pledges of money that weren't there are now given to us. And the DEI position, and I'm going to tie all this back together. The DEI position I told you was the hottest in America. If you were black or a woman, that was the qualification to become a Senior Vice President or Chief Diversity Officer. Tony, I don't know of one other position that is a real legit position in corporate America, where your qualification is your skin color or your gender or your sexual identification. But because people didn't know, and I'm talking about significant, I'm talking about government, education, business, all and nonprofits, because they didn't know what this was about. They were like, look, let me go get a black person and make them my chief diversity officer. Okay, fine. So if that's me, I'm not going to be upset because you're giving me this job, but it didn't come with any training. It didn't come with what does success look like? Cause success could not look like, I'm just going to go hire black folks. Success could not look like, help me write a check to an HBCU. Sustainable success was not going to be, uh, helping to eliminate the wrongs that have happened to our, to our, our, our community over the years. Success had to be something that was going to systemically change. The economic standpoint of black folks, educational standpoint of black folks, all of the systems that have been broken and administered unfairly. That's what success look like. Not just hiring a black person or a woman and saying, now you're my chief diversity officer. So here's where we are now to no surprise of which why I changed my title to get DEI kind of as a sideline to talk about social impact and equity is that companies didn't have a strategy other than let me go hire somebody and you tell me what to do and I have colleagues literally and I coach and mentor DEI experts all across this country. They have no resources. They have no, no, no, no staff. All they were given was a task of go fix it,

right?

Okay. Some companies that work, some didn't, but here's the reality. It pitted white folks and black folks against each other in a much more acute way than ever before. And therefore, there's a certain side of the aisle that's like, no, you're not going to take away any more away from us Then what has already been taken. So the battle is that white males feel that they are being threatened. And because from a political standpoint, white males have the ability to influence legislation, to also influence corporations, because they're still the ones that are holding the predominant positions of power. That's where it went wrong because it was focused on a short term fix. There are less, less DEI leaders in corporate America today than there were actually when it started, when the whole concept started.

Let me ask you this. Number one, thank you for that, my friend. Let me ask you this. Um, so just based on what you said. You know that, you know, the companies, you know, felt guilty and now I'm going to try to do something and they created this pretty much new position that hadn't been around and they hired a bunch of people, um, and set them up for failure just to be fair, right? Because there was no way they had no back. They didn't support it. They didn't give them any money. They didn't do it. There was no KPIs. It was no business outcome to try to hit. Just do it. Okay. So nine times out of 10, and you said it a few minutes ago, you said, Hey, some of them worked out and some didn't. Right. My question. And I do not disagree with you in terms of the policy and the power and the pushback. Right. Here's the thing though, that I have a question for you. So, and I asked another one of our guests on this, uh, before. So if DEI is not, it wasn't working and it was, it wasn't, you know, I don't want to say sham, but it didn't, it wasn't effective and it didn't really make any change. What did white people lose? Okay. So what, what, what I, you know, for somebody to get upset and says, I feel like you're trying to take stuff from me and we don't want this no more. And, but what did they take? What, what got tooken? Because if it didn't work. And it's a, it's a failure and we haven't seen companies take it to the next level and jobs, we didn't see the equity increase. We saw more of a negative standpoint than what was the loss to the white, to the white males.

Yeah. So, so Tony, that, that, that's a very astute question and it's all about smoking mirrors. Okay. All right. So when I grew up in my neighborhood, there were some brothers on the street that used to play the shell game, right? You know, what, what, what, what, what, what, where's the ball? Where's the, where's the

ball? Where's the card? The

only time you or I would have won. Is if we were being set up to win because there was somebody else they were trying to get more money from, right?

Correct. They let a couple people win. They let a couple

people win. So here's the point that it's not about the impact of DEI. It's was positioned and it's now being weaponized. And if you think about where is it being weaponized? It started on the right hand side of the aisle from a political standpoint.

Exactly. Exactly.

As, as a way to galvanize that base, to make it appear that something that they were, that something was being, we're losing

something, we're losing

something.

Preach my brother. And therefore we'll talk about

therefore, because it was, it, it didn't exist. I mean, you just hit it on the head. Like, wait a minute. it. In some cases it might have worked, in some cases maybe not. But if you think about where it started, it started in places where legislation could be passed. And if you track where that legislation was passed, and the NBA has a heat map that I get on a regular basis as to where legislation is being identified and focused on either laws that have actually been passed or pending legislation. Then it started with institutions of higher learning, colleges and universities. That, well, it really was a tipping point had to do with the Supreme Court's ruling, which was the Supreme Court ruling that happened in with, with Harvard, where it was saying that you could not use race as a, as a metric from, from an admission standpoint.

Correct. Affirmative action overturned.

Right. So, so with that, and that's not the first time the Supreme Court had actually ruled against that. So it didn't say you couldn't have DEI programs. But at that point it gave fuel, it gave fuel to those who were trying to light the match. Now the match wasn't lighting until that fuel came out and it's like, Oh wait, this caught fire because look, it must be wrong that the Supreme court is saying is wrong. Then you had a number of attorney generals across the country that said, I'm going to take this ruling and take it from an academic standpoint, and I will sue fortune 500 companies. And this is all documented. Right. It's all documented where there were 11 attorney generals that then said, I'm going to now sue fortune 500 companies. If you use DEI in your metric of hiring of any from a perspective of look, we're going to use what the Supreme Court just held up with higher institutions of higher learning. So now think about that. If I, if, if now the spotlight is being put on companies, like it was putting on academic institutions. Companies are now saying, well, wait, I don't want to get sued. I don't want to do this. So therefore We're going to end these programs. We're going to stop the programs at the end of the day to your point earlier I started this work in the late 80s early 90s P&G is heralded as, I mean, their, their stock has gone up, up, up, and up. So the, the, the challenge was those individuals. And I go back to why we were set up to fail. If I had not been taught how to leverage diversity, how to manage diversity for the betterment or the good of my organization, where everybody wins. And if I feel like I'm being threatened, then I'm going to want to fight and rebel against that. So our folks who were leading these programs weren't taught efficiently and effectively on how to develop a business strategy out of this work. They looked at five seats. Let me get five folks that are different around those seats. So five folks that are racially different. And therefore, boom, I have diversity. No, all you got is five people. You haven't done anything with it.

Right, right, right. Let me ask you this, my friend, let's jettison forward. Tell us some of the things that you're doing that's different, that's succeeding, because you're affecting, again, like we talked about earlier, not just the sports industry, but also the greater community.

Yeah, so the first thing that we did that was different is we defined the work of what diversity is, what inclusion was, what equity was. Across our entire organization that was first. So the people understood what it was. And I will tell you in all the sessions that I did, I'm like, however, you want to define this work outside of these four walls, feel free to do so. But when you hear the term DEI with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Here's what it means. It has. It defines our fans. It defines our marketplace. It defines our viewing population. It defines our, our, our, our virtual interaction with our fans that is not identified as black or white, but it's looked upon as here is a marketplace and if on any of those fronts on the marketplace. If we haven't developed that relationship with a group of people, regardless of who they are, we have a business opportunity,

right?

Oh, by the way, it was typically people of color where we had the lagging opportunities, right? That's just a business. That's okay. Well, in order to do that, I now need to make sure that my organization is reflective of the markets in which we're going after. Excuse me. So in putting all that in play, other kinds of things we did, and I'm just building the car for you because we had to build a foundation. I have a CEO that was understanding of this and aggressive enough to say. Kevin, we need to also tie this into compensation and performance development. Why? Because everything else that we do is important and we tie it to compensation and performance development. So at that point, Tony, I basically built the car to look exactly like every other car that was in our garage of important opportunities and important business strategies. So just like we have a marketing strategy, a social, uh, social engagement strategy, just like we have a it strategy, a business analytics strategy, or we have a DEI strategy that connects and is as important as everything else that we do. And the reason why is because people understood no matter if you were short, tall, black, white, male, female, that this is going to be good for me. So with that, that was internally externally, what we did. I went to every one of our fan bases. By population group and ask how, what do we need to do to connect with you? What are the things in which are working? What are the things in which doesn't work as far as how you feel about our interaction with you. People will tell you today that when you walk in Rocket Mortgage's Field House, where the Cavs play or our hockey team, the monsters who actually just won their division championship, you will see a reflection of the population base of our community. And, and that is so that outside people feel that they're a part of what we're doing inside. Correct. So, looking at it from that perspective, if we are a sports and entertainment conglomerate that depends on outside folks, our community, our fans coming into our building. If it's a Jay Z and Beyonce concert, if it's, you know, whomever it might be, I need to make sure that our fans and our, and our, and our customers know that this is a place that you will feel welcome. You won't feel as though you're discriminated against. And we've, we've gone through for five years now to identify areas of opportunity, such as, you know, Cleveland has a nine to 10%, um, 10 percent population base of Latin folks. We didn't have a sign in this building when I got here that was in Spanish. Tony, here's the thing. All of our signage is digital. So it's not a lot to change. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right. But I'm saying it's not like you have to, it wasn't like, Oh, I got it.

You could just easily just plug, program that to speak Spanish. Exactly. Yes,

exactly. Yes. So that's what we started doing. Right. And that population base is like, wow, that, okay. I feel welcome.

Thank you. They were, thank you. We feel welcome.

We had, we put on every concert in this building and we now have, we have two Latin acts that are coming up this year for the first time because those communities said, we don't want to have to drive to Detroit or Cincinnati or Chicago. To hear a Latin performer, Tony, that's the business, right? They feel like they belong. They feel a part of, they feel listened to. We feel the same way and at the same time, we are making, you're making money. We're making money. You making money? Yes. Business Grow money. Of which, and I wanna be really clear to your listeners. Money of which goes back to the foundation that I also run the money that's going back to suppliers, vendors, and the community education programs. So it's a reciprocal relationship, which is what DEI is. So there's nobody that can say, Oh man, you took away from me. Or you're, you're leveraging diversity to make money. Yes. To give back to you.

Love it. I love it. My brother. Let me ask you this. My brother, my man, um, you did a really good job painting the landscape and I love what you guys are doing. What I'm hearing is this. I'm hearing your success is based on the community success. Right? If you make the community and make them feel a part of your, your business strategies, what you put on, right? You become successful and they become success. Let me let me say in other words, they become successful 1st. Then you become successful, right? So it's like you said, it's an investment, not just in the getting LeBron James or getting, uh, uh, Donovan Mitchell. I'm just naming some of your players and signing those players. I'm like, look, we signed these guys. No, that's not, that's part of what we do. But the end of what we want to do is make our community. We're signing them. We're investing money in them, right? Because if we do that, then they're going to partner with us, not just short term, but long term, is that correct? My man,

you hit it on the head and let me just tell you very quickly. We have a five part strategy that starts with our team members and we use sports vernacular. Those are employees, our team members. Our objective is to make sure our team members reflect the demographics of our community. So why not just so I can check the box because I know if I hire people from the community, they're going to give me feedback about the community, which is also our fans. We have a fan strategy. Our fan strategy connects with how do we increase the representation of our fan base across all of our platforms. Retail, virtual, online, all of those things. We then have a marketplace strategy that says, how do I leverage diversity to drive revenue in the marketplace? We have a community engagement strategy and all of these connect. So it's not pillars that are in kind of these silos. My platform is a circle because if I'm not being true to my team members and employees. They're part of the community that are part of my fan base. That's part of the marketplace and it all connects,

correct? Correct.

We, we are verbal about it. We are visual about it. And it then also is connected back to a system that is called our compensation system, where all of our bonus eligible team members, which are about 90 percent of our team members have a stake in the game. Last year, we added it to what we call our game plan. Which our game plan is like our annual review or what have you. There's a, there's a part on there that says it's about DEI and community. What is it that I'm going to do to enhance the DEI strategy and plan? Why would I want to do that? Because it helps everything else that we do.

Correct. Correct. That is awesome, buddy. That is awesome. What you guys are doing final thoughts, my friend, what do you want to leave the audience? You already gave us a ton to be honest, but final thoughts.

Yeah. So, so Tony me your audience, which based on the title, which focuses on the black executive is, is that we have so much talent and skill above and beyond what's on our resume. I referenced this earlier. This is a whole piece that I do is if, if I'm being, if I'm going into interview for a job or for the, say, I'm on a team already, my cultural added value is what is different about me than others. It's not my skin color. It's what is my life's experience growing up in Cleveland, Ohio, being then bused into Shaker, Shaker Heights, being now in a community with Jewish folks. That have taken me to a predominantly black school and then transferring to a white school. What are all those things of my experience that made Kevin Clayton who I am that I now can talk to? Oh, here is why I am. I am a resourceful person.

Why?

Because how I grew up, we had to be resourced. And I'm not saying it. I'm just saying that's my experience. I'm not speaking categorically for all black people, but the point is we look at, Oh, well, I am a certain race or a certain gender, and that's what the added value is. No, it's, it's what are your experiences as that person that you can begin to quantify? And I will tell you a hundred percent without doubt. I know when I learned that when I was 20 years old and interviewed with P&G my senior year. And I know that because P&G hires athletes, they, they want a 3. 2 grade point average. And they want you to come from a big school. I didn't go to a big school. I was my grade point average was 2. 7. I got the P&G interview because my marketing professor was friends with a P&G executive and he did him a solid by giving me the interview. So. The recruiter was like, Kevin, you're great. Really appreciate it. I mean, you have a good basketball career. You're a captain of the team. You're showing leadership, but your GPA, I mean, talk to me about that because it's, I mean, you're 2. 7. We kind of started 3. 2. Well, Tony, I was a father at 19. I played basketball at D1 level, captain of the basketball team, was a resident assistant. Worked, raised my daughter and also finished in transferring in schools. I finished in four years with two degrees. I was a little bit busier than the regular person.

Yeah, they could just focus on school. Focus on school.

So when I went through and he, he was like, Whoa, I said, yeah, what? I mean, I could have dropped some of these things. But being a father at age 19, and I'm not talking about I was a, I mean, I was a dad at 19. You were involved. I was involved and finished my career or, or finished my basketball career in four years. Well, back then, if you transferred, you had to sit out a year. Correct. So I was able to articulate. Here's what that meant. And Tony, here's what that meant. One, it meant that I'm going to be a lot more responsible than another 21 year old that you're going to bring into your organization because I've already had that level of responsibility at a very early age. Secondly, it means that I've had a lot of experiences that most kids don't have at that age coming out of college. So, I'm going to probably go faster in your management program because I've seen things, I've had to be faster, I've had to respond to certain things. Also, being raised by a single black woman in Cleveland, moving from place to place to place from an economic standpoint. I'm thrifty. I'm, I think about budget. I think about, so I just went through to translate all the things that were my cultural added value. Again, that's not all black people. That's Kevin Clayton as a black man. So you're looking at somebody who went to Michigan and played basketball in Michigan, graduated in five years or me. I'm now with somebody that was more adaptable than they were and much more attractive because of all the things, but most of us don't take the time to talk about that or understand it. So the message I want to leave our folks is that there's more to us than our skin color or gender, and it's okay to translate that what is the transferable skills that your life's experiences as a black person has taught you. That's what I have for you, bro.

I buddy. I love it. I appreciate it. And it's a message that is not said a lot. All right. And if it is, it's not said often and people need to hear that because they feel that if they don't check a box or all the boxes, they don't have a shot. And believe it or not, when you break it down like that, you get that opportunity to sit in front of them and explain your experience and what you're going to bring, how your experience is going to help you bring the next level to the table for this organization. It makes a big difference. And it makes a huge difference. So thank you for sharing that, my man. Thank you for appearing on the Black Executive Perspective podcast. Final thing, man, what can BEP do for Kevin Clayton,

brother? One thing that you can do is just make sure that you give good energy to Cleveland Cavaliers as we roll through, as we roll through these playoffs.

Well, look, bro, I'll tell you this. I like Donovan, but I like you better. So at the end of the day, I got you back on that. I'm going to root for you guys hard. Okay. I'm going to root for you, but outside of that, my friend, all jokes aside, if there's anything that we can do for you at any time, you know, just let us know. We really, really appreciate it. We'd love to have you come back at some time soon as well.

Uh, Tony, I appreciate it. Just being on your show. I mean, that's a big step forward. I have a message that I want folks to hear and your platform is a great one for me to be able to communicate. So thank you.

You're welcome my brother. So Kevin Clayton, Senior Vice President at the Cleveland Cavaliers. We really appreciate him coming on. And so now I think it's time for Tony's tidbit. Okay. So based on what Kevin talked about today, the tidbit is from Maya Angelou. And the tidbit is we all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry. And we must understand that all threads of the tapestry are equal in value. No matter what their color. And you heard a lot of that from our partner and our friend, Kevin Clayton. So we want to thank him. We want to thank you. So we hope that you enjoyed this episode of navigating the crossroads DEI under fire and the path of social impact and equity. It's time for our call to action. Our goal is to decrease racism, all the isms. So our acronym is L E S S L stands for learn, continue to educate on people that you don't know, things that you don't know, cultural nuances. You don't know E once you learn now you should have. Empathy for your fellow human being and understand what they go through. S stands for share. Now, since you've learned, you want to share what you've learned to your friends and family so they can be enlightened. And the other S stands for stop. We want to stop discrimination wherever you see it. So if grandma's at the Thanksgiving table saying stuff, you say, grandma, we don't say that no more. And you stop it wherever you are. So if we all incorporate less L E S S we'll build a fair, more understanding world. And we'll be able to see. The change that we want to see tune into our next episode, the black executive perspective, wherever you get your podcast, please go to our website. Give us some feedback. Let us know. How did you like Kevin? Was there some questions you have for them? Did I did, was there some questions I didn't ask? Let us know. And please follow our website, excuse me, follow a black executive perspective on all our social channels, LinkedIn X YouTube, Instagram, and Tik TOK at a black exec for our fabulous guests. Kevin Clayton for my man, AA, who does all the things behind the background and make this happen. I'm Tony tidbit. We love you a lot. We talked about it and we're out

a black executive perspective.