I am a consultant with expertise in leadership development, organizational development, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. I am a person with a disability.
Almost 11 years ago, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. In fact, the first time I said this publicly was less than a year ago. While in class, completing a certificate in Executive Strategic Diversity and Inclusion Management from Georgetown University, we were covering disability. I did not realize until that very moment that this was a difficult conversation for me.
Just recently, at the closing reception of the Leadership Institute with over 50 people in the room, I said it again—I am a person with a disability. ADA 25 Advancing Leadership (now called Disability Lead) empowered me to own this part of my identity.
I was taught how to be Black, and to be a Black woman, but no one taught me how to be disabled. I was gifted and cursed with a disability that you cannot see, so I did not always live out my intersections of being a Black woman with a disability.
Before joining [Disability Lead], I never felt like I belonged to the disability community. Because I do not have a disability that you can see, corporate America, through unspoken cultures, did not allow me to belong to this community either. I never knew how to ask for accommodations. I didn’t know that I deserved them. I could not help myself, therefore, I could not inform others how to help me.
As I interviewed to become a Fellow, I knew I found my place. I knew I was where I needed to be. I knew I found the place that would teach me how to live in this world as a person with a disability.
During the Leadership Institute, I learned of the connection of the disability movement to the civil rights movement. I saw, at that moment, all of us were living as beneficiaries of their sacrifices. It became real to me in a way that I did not even know it could. For the first time, at the root of my very being, I felt like I belonged. I was finally able to own and live out my intersections I was gifted with: Being a Black woman with a disability you can’t see.
As a diversity practitioner, I know that in order to make a lasting impact one must be exposed to the community in which they struggle with the most. Additionally, as a practitioner, I know disability is often the last category discussed and has the least amount of attention and innovation.
As a person with a disability, I know I now have the same passion, vigor, and responsibility in my work and with my life as the activists who came before me. I invite you to join me as we work to advance leadership for those of us who have a disability by leading with your whole identity.
Nakia J. Green is the founder of both Culture Solutions and Culture Solutions In Action, for-profit and not-for-profit organizations designed to decrease unemployment and underemployment amongst minority and disabled college graduates. She also founded Nakia J Consulting, a consulting firm with specialized capabilities in leadership development, OD, and DEI. Nakia hopes to further the conversation on invisible disabilities in the workplace and its impact on minorities. She is a 2019 Fellow of Disability Lead.