OUR RDEI AND CULTURAL ASPIRATIONS

Race, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Aspirations

As a firm, we will not accept discrimination against any human being based on their race, ethnicity, gender identities/expressions, sexual orientations, physical/developmental ability, or religious beliefs. We are committed as a firm to fighting against the implicit and explicit biases that harm the communities where we live and work.

We know that better is both possible and necessary, including in our own firm. We at CFAR are committed to making a difference—by working with leaders, organizations, and communities to create space for dialogue and connection. Through our deeply held belief that differences are a virtue, not a liability, we believe we can help to create the impactful outcomes we seek.

Leaders have an important role in our collective next chapter to demonstrate values and build cultures that embrace differences, learning, hope, and commitment to change.

While the world around us continues to feel uncertain and divided, we see more that connects us while acknowledging our own work to do. CFAR stands firmly in our commitment to clients and to each other, to do better, to appreciate our starting place, and to bring compassion and dedication to issues of race, diversity, equity, and inclusion, wherever they show up in our lives.

Our Cultural Aspirations

CFAR’s organizational culture, evolving through our lived history and in continuous development, empowers our strategy, our growth as people and a community, and the flourishing of our ideas. Together, they propel our success as a profitable business with a powerful legacy. This success enables us to cultivate a culture that helps generate the impact we create with our clients and in our disciplines in a productive cycle.

Ideas in Action
Learning and curiosity are core to what we do. Rigor, appreciation, thoughtful questions, illuminating answers, humor and reflection, and diverse viewpoints from varied backgrounds activate this curiosity. We seek it all out, take it all in, synthesize and make sense, and take ideas out into the world. We map systems, navigate organizational dynamics, explore the past and envision the future, get to the root of it, see the context, and act our way to new thinking. This makes us compelling, relevant, and effective colleagues.

Purposeful Collaboration
We work together because the work is better that way. We strive to integrate our diverse skills and perspectives to help us go further, deeper, and have more significant impact.

We slow down to speed up. We know it takes trust, psychological safety, acts of leadership small and large, clear expectations, accountability and direct talk, engaging differences, and candid sensemaking to do our best work. We focus on these as they sharpen and sustain our collective efforts.

Vitalizing Work
The work is hard — interpersonally, intellectually, and emotionally — and we embrace it, learn from it, and find joy in it. We know it is not for the faint of heart. We stretch ourselves and push each other. We push our clients and they push us back. We try, fail, learn, adapt, develop. We stay with it and deliver high-quality interventions that move groups forward and achieve results and learning. We know the work matters.

Inclusive Community
We nurture a connected organization that we recognize needs continual care and nourishment, awareness, listening in, discomfort, disruption, development, celebration, and grieving. We make the tacit explicit, unlearn and rethink, and respect identities and differences. Our compassion, trust in one another, and well-being enable our success and growth, which support our collective compassion and the broadening of our community.