“We have to stop being afraid of the critique,” Joe Scantlebury, CEO of Living Cities says in the Chronical of Philanthropy. “We don’t improve in silence.”
“Scantlebury is one of many nonprofit leaders of color who have stepped in to lead organizations over the past two years as the effort to end racism has been taken up with renewed vigor,” Alex Daniels reports. “Since the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in 2020, many nonprofits, particularly those that serve and advocate for people of color, felt like outsiders in the struggle. For many of those groups, part of the answer has been to replace White leaders with people of color. Those leaders were often charged with changing the culture of the organization to ensure it was a place employees of all backgrounds could thrive.”
According to the Building Movement Project’s recent report, Trading Glass Ceilings for Glass Cliffs: A Race to Lead Report on Nonprofit Executives of Color, there has been an influx of leaders of color who have taken jobs previously held by White leaders in the last year. “The survey found that executives of color did not have the same support as leaders as their White counterparts when they entered their roles. They were asked to do more, and often paid less.”