Meet Yeruwelle de Rouen of Intersectional Innovations Consulting

Today we’d like to introduce you to Yeruwelle de Rouen.

Hi Yeruwelle, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Like many, I fled from an unhealthy work environment in 2021 to start a consulting firm that gets at the crux of unhealthy work culture. Intersectional Innovations is Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Change Management consulting that focuses on serving executive leadership, STEM education, tech indusrtries, and women serving groups; yet, I work with organizations in many sectors. I desire to support anyone who is ready to underline the importance of a diverse, inclusive and restorative company culture in an effort to attract and retain employees. My work affects systemic shifts in social equity through education and interdisciplinary methodologies of integration and collaborative leadership. To solve problems, we must innovate solutions that serve each unique community.
My inter-generational, visible, and personal identity are the foundation of how I understand the bridges between people and mindsets. Personal narrative and my desire to understand why the world works the way it does set a course for accumulating my expertise in counseling psychology, philosophy, rhetoric and law, critical race theory, and restorative organizational development. Our personal narratives are a map to understanding the dynamics of the world at large. We need to center the self more to understand where we’ve been and where we collectively want to go.

Since youthdom, the three experiences that bring a constant awareness of and questions about power dynamics to my attention are:

a) My skin color: As a black and indigenous woman, the history of “passing” (allowing others to believe you’re white or non-black to ease your way through life) is something I knew happened around me, and so I decided to never participate. Yet, I can not forget that my lighter skin color allows me privilege, no matter my ethnicity or gender.

b) Science and the evolution of human understanding: Our far-reaching understanding of the universe, the natural environment, human development, the brain, and epigenetics demonstrate so much about our capabilities. The collective human possibilities are astounding! Yet, the low-level beliefs about ourselves and “the other” are crippling our evolution.

c) Gender and the positioning of the female: There was a special moment in life when I realized that I would one day transition to being a woman. I was stoked…until the world made clear that being “not a man” will displace you. Your experiences, your needs, your ideas, your passions are secondary – quieted – or violently silenced. This is across spectrum of colorism, ethnicity, language, location, etc.

These prominent experiences, combined with my education, have led to a passion for melding innovation with equity, belonging, and inclusion (EBI) within STEM, tech, and organizational culture. I now have 13 years of experience creating equitable inclusion in both climate and institutional policy. By facilitating with communities, I help organizations empower voice and innovation, which support their outcomes for sincere inclusion and belonging.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Collectively, the unpredictable changes and stressors of the past three years have led to immense shifts throughout our lives. These shifts are reflective in personal needs, home life responsibilities, the great resignation, and the level of attention we’re paying to domination and toxic leadership. COVID and social violence have created an immediacy in addressing workplace culture and employee attrition rates.

Employers have and will continue to battle the threat of high turnover in 2023 as 41% of U.S. workers plan to seek a new role by the end of 2022. This number only increases as you aggregate the data and learn that 53% of young talent ages 35-40 years old, 50% of working parents, and 43% black women are planning to change their place of employment this year.

Despite these widespread needs and realizations, I experience constant resistance from both white female and male leaders when tasked to redesign their spaces “with” their employee community. Burnout, fear, discomfort, and fragility keep many from seeing the world as theirs to design in a better way.

So the challenge of this work is to address harm within work culture while creating the time for individuals to center wellness. Only as we address well-being for leaders and staff alike will we be able to also stop harm and create an inclusive organizational climate.

We’ve been impressed with Intersectional Innovations Consulting, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
What sets Intersectional Innovations apart is my leadership, which is established in my multi-ethnic, multi-racial female identity experience and an emphasis on sustained wellness. The personal works in tandem with the educational and professional experiences, and has contributed to the development and success of the firms unique program.

Our unique DEI consulting process helps companies improve culture, employee happiness as well as their community reputation and online presence. Through group, individual and leader coaching, Yeruwelle de Rouen has developed assessment, strategies and tools that promote anti-domination and anti-racist learning in order to reduce interpersonal conflict and create healthier more productive organizational cultures. Supporting culture and climate shift through change management frameworks.
How we work is different because we start from both an organizational review and restorative process to stop harm and conflict and gain a deeper understanding of the culture of work and relationships. Human-centered design training allows each team to create restorative culture implementation that:

Retains talent by keeping the leader’s finger on current staff experiences and need.
Decrease staff strife and unhappiness to synergize outcomes.
Propel your organization ahead with the kind of innovation that only comes from a diverse employee team.
Achieve 4x more by shifting leader mindset, centering relationships and well being.
Make a co sought after by top, diverse talent because of the companies brand of work culture

Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
Some may call it luck, but I call it manifesting. Or setting one’s mind, energy and intention on something until it happens. I have set my energy on living and working in the service of others and towards the healing of our communities. I believe that everyone has the ability and desire to create the world around them, and so I am manifesting a consulting practice that supports organizations to design empowering work cultures. Spurring on real innovation.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.intersectionalinnovations.com/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCahcy_LWH_ji-ex3bRvgQiA
• Other: https://www.linkedin.com/company/intersectional-innovations/?viewAsMember=true 

Image Credits
Andrea Flanagan and Megan Enos