Please join HARRT’s Faculty Director, Professor Corinne Bendersky in a conversation with Malaika Billups, Chief Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Officer, The City of Los Angeles, and Ruby Flores, Commander and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Officer, Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) as they discuss the DEI-driven culture in Los Angeles, the 3rd largest city in the world. Our speakers will share the complexity of operating in the public sector with multiple government regulations while driving culture change and developing comprehensive diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies. The city’s DEI leaders must consider multiple stakeholders including 50,00 employees, approximately 4,000,000 residents, more than 250,000 businesses, and over 50,000,000 visitors annually.

This session focuses on L.A.’s evolving journey to align the city’s forty-five very different departments and bureaus such as airports, police, fire, transportation, and public works to name a few. Our speakers will provide insights on the importance of planning, collaboration, and accountability in a decentralized organizational structure, the critical role of internal and external communications to gain consensus, the imperative of creating strategic department alignment to build a universal DEI-driven culture, and the challenges of implementing change management initiatives to overcome implementation barriers.