My Work With Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging
Cultural Sensitivity Consultants
At Hallmark, the Cultural Sensitivity Consultants are a group of around a dozen Creative employees who act as consultants for new products, online posts, internal communications, etc. and give feedback about their inclusivity.
As part of this group, I advised all levels of employee from individual contributors to executives, and provided training to Hallmark U.S. as well as Hallmark U.K.
In 2022 the group received an award at Hallmark’s first Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Summit.
Product Inclusivity Guides
Led a group of 30 Hallmarkers in the creation of two Product Inclusivity Guides as a self-initiated project.
These guides served as a resource on how to turn high level DEIB strategies into actionable ways that individual contributors in Creative could make more actively inclusive products.
These guides were presented to most of Hallmark Headquarters product creators, as well as Hallmark UK product creators. They were praised by multiple Vice Presidents across the company and utilized widely as an ongoing resource.
Visual Guide:
Established clear starting points for how to draw or photograph human figural representation beyond white, straight, thin, able-bodied, cisgender people.
Gave suggestions on things like hair texture, body shape, accessibility devices, religious garments, etc. and worked with Employee Resource Groups as well as research to find the most accurate tips for these areas.
As a result of this guide, Hallmark introduced the first visual representation of a person with a disability, a person with a non-Christian religion (outside a caption specific to them), and cards aimed at neurodivergent shoppers. Overall, cards also became more inclusive with intersectional representation of race, body type, culture, sexuality, gender, ability, and more.
Editorial Guide:
Dug into ways we could remove things that were unintentionally limiting who could send a card such as gender references.
Gave cautions and suggestions about ways language such as African American Vernacular English and Spanish can add range and inclusion in a meaningful way without stepping into a space of cultural appropriation.
Other Notable Work
Personally received multiple nominations for 2022 DEI Summit Award and was publicly recognized at the Summit.
Presented about depression and anxiety to 2,000+ people at the annual Hallmark Creative Leadership Symposium. A coworker and I used memes and humor to dig into the weighty topics and launched conversations about mental health that snowballed into larger movements internally.
Invited to join Hallmark’s Vibrant Voices group, which is an internal blog highlighting marginalized identities and voices.
B.A. in Creative Writing and History, both of which emphasized works by those who were not white, straight, cisgender, and able-bodied. Minor in Global and International Studies.
LGBTQ+ Good Mail Collection
Pitched and led the 6 card relaunch of Good Mail LGBTQ+ product.
Pulled together a diverse group of Hallmark LGBTQ+ volunteers to give insights, ideas, and feedback. Vetted cards multiple times through these groups.
All cards were written and/or illustrated by an LGBTQ+ person or close ally. All editorial was planned by me and another LGBTQ+ editor.
The first two cards, sold as a set on Amazon, were on the first page of Amazon results after launching in late June 2022.
LGBTQ+ Card & Sticker Box
Pitched the concept of an updated box of LGBTQ+ cards to replace an outdated box from 2015.
Took the lead on pulling together a diverse and inclusive group to ideate and create for each of these cards and stickers.
Vetted concepts through internal resources including employee resource groups and Cultural Sensitivity Consultants.
The below cards were all influenced and informed by my D&I work while at Hallmark:
