Celebrating Diversity: Mary Brown Of Maxim Healthcare Services On How To Build Inclusive Communities
An Interview With Vanessa Ogle
You have to be willing to evolve. The legal landscape, which includes the terminology and issues are constantly evolving in the diversity and inclusion space. I think you have to be nimble and willing to make adjustments as the times change in order to actually build and maintain inclusive communities.
In a world where diversity is often acknowledged but not always celebrated, we are taking a step forward to highlight the importance of inclusivity in building strong, vibrant communities. This series aims to explore the various facets of diversity — be it racial, cultural, gender-based, or within the differently-abled community — and understand how embracing these differences strengthens our social fabric. As part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Mary Brown.
As Chief Counsel for national home healthcare provider Maxim Healthcare Services (Maxim), Mary Brown has practiced labor and employment law for more than 22 years. Working for Maxim since 2010, Mary founded the company’s diversity and inclusion initiative, as well as created the organization’s D&I Board. Mary firmly believes that a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion — including implementation of thoughtful practices and training — is essential to creating a successful and healthy work environment.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive into our discussion about celebrating diversity, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?
I knew I wanted to be a lawyer when I was 9 years old. After I graduated from the University of Virginia School of Law, I started my career working at big law firms in DC, practicing labor and employment law. However, I always knew that I wanted to work as in-house counsel. Part of that was driven by a desire for a better work-life balance, but I also felt that I could have the most impact working within a single organization.
Can you share an interesting or hopeful story where spending time with someone who did not look like you or who was different from you taught you something that has been useful to you?
I was raised in Prince George’s County, Maryland and I went to diverse Catholic schools, so I was exposed to people with different backgrounds at a young age. But when I went to law school, my closest friend was Korean American, and I realized I wasn’t as enlightened as I thought I was. We had so many things in common as women of color, but she definitely had a different perspective as an Asian American woman. She spoke about how some people assumed that she was Chinese, did not speak English or was not American. I realized that I often thought about racial issues in America as just black and white, but that friendship really helped me broaden my perspective. To this day, I think that relationship shaped how I view other people, and prompted my desire to understand different perspectives, viewpoints and race in America.
You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
- Hard-working
- Intelligent
- Personable
Generally, I think that in order to be a successful leader you have to have an incredibly strong work-ethic; you have to be smart, bring value to the organization and be a person people want to work with. I think the combination of these three traits helped me garner respect from my colleagues and encouraged people to want to work well with me.
Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Can you share a personal story that highlights the impact of diversity and inclusivity in your life or career?
My General Counsel, TJ Lisa, is a great example of the importance of having diverse leadership. When I started at Maxim Healthcare Services (Maxim), I was newly married and had an 8 month old daughter. I was coming from a law firm environment, so “facetime” and strict hours were the norm for me. But TJ told me that I would blink, and my daughter would be a teenager. She wanted me to be successful at Maxim, but she also wanted to make sure that I didn’t miss being a mom. That discussion with her at the outset of my employment gave me license to be a room mom, a dance mom and a chaperone for countless field trips. None of that time with my child prevented me from succeeding in the workplace. I believe because TJ was a mom with two daughters, her diverse perspective shaped how she managed the legal department and her perspective wasn’t the same as some of the partners I had worked with in the law firm setting. She had a great impact on my life and how I approached work-life balance.
How do you approach and manage the challenges that arise when working towards creating more inclusive communities?
I think it’s easy to get frustrated when operating in this space. If you’re involved in diversity and inclusion efforts, it is usually something you’re incredibly passionate about. You want things to happen instantly. I try to step back and look at diversity and inclusion from a management perspective, and not just as someone who is invested in D&I. You might want to try ten different ideas, but you have to stop and figure out what is feasible, where the resources are, who will manage the effort, define the communications strategy, evaluate if it interferes with any other company initiatives, ensure all activities are legal, and the list goes on and on. Therefore, I try to look at D&I as a marathon and not a sprint, and I think that enables me to get things done in a steady, consistent manner.
What innovative strategies or initiatives have you implemented or observed that effectively promote the importance of diversity and inclusivity?
We have launched a host of different initiatives at Maxim, but three come to mind immediately. We launched an online diversity and training course that garnered almost 100% participation from team members at the time of its launch, which was extraordinary since the program was a voluntary course. Leadership really drove the training and it almost became a competition because no one wanted to be the region or department with the lowest D&I training numbers. This was particularly exciting because the program was easily measurable, an obvious win and we were able to raise awareness.
Other memorable moments have been arranging panels held by our affinity groups. We’ve held really successful panels with women and people of color in leadership positions sharing their experiences and tips for success, and those have been well attended and generated a lot of positive feedback.
Additionally, we launched a “Who I Am” video series which consists of short video profiles of diverse leaders and employees at Maxim. The video series is promoted both internally and externally, and they really allow the organization to celebrate and showcase our diverse workforce.
In your opinion, what are the key elements that make a community truly inclusive, and how can these be fostered on a larger scale?
Inclusive communities promote an environment where everyone is respected, and where there is equal access to resources and opportunities. Additionally, we need to encourage everyone to share their opinions freely, work together in the decision-making process and ultimately act around our unified purpose, which at Maxim is to enhance the lives of our patients and their families in the communities we serve.
Based on your experience and research, can you please share “5 Ways We Can Build Inclusive Communities”?
1 . You have to have executive buy-in. It is essential to take a top-down approach in building inclusive communities. If your executive leadership team and other leaders are not invested in diversity, then the company as a whole will not be invested. At Maxim, we have been extremely fortunate that both our past and current CEO served on our diversity and inclusion board as executive sponsors. Because they were dialed in, it was easier to drive enthusiasm and actually put initiatives in motion because we had high level leadership involved.
2 . You have to have a clear mission and purpose. At Maxim, we have a diversity statement which is: Maxim Healthcare Services is dedicated to creating a culture, which promotes diversity, equity and inclusion by recognizing, respecting and celebrating our differences, encouraging everyone we employ and serve to be their authentic selves. Having a strong and clearly defined mission is important as this will help shape and guide the important work you’re doing.
3 . You have to be willing to listen. I was a couple of years into our D&I initiative, and someone reached out to me and said that our newsletters did not contain enough spotlights on older employees and that the pictures in our training courses did not have employees that represented this population. I was flabbergasted — not by the feedback, but because this was such an obvious miss. America’s workforce and our company is filled with older employees and most slides in our presentations pictured people ranging from age 20 to 50. So, I listened to that feedback and I’ve been cognizant of that issue ever since because I think it’s important for people to feel like they’re seen and reflected in inclusive communities.
4 . You have to be inclusive. Often times, diversity is limited to just race and gender, but diversity is so much more than just those two components. There are so many different ways people bring a unique perspective: age, religion, disability, educational background, geography, marital status, socioeconomic background, career field, among many other ways. When building an inclusive community, you cannot just have one perspective. You truly need to try and garner involvement from all walks of life.
5 . You have to be willing to evolve. The legal landscape, which includes the terminology and issues are constantly evolving in the diversity and inclusion space. I think you have to be nimble and willing to make adjustments as the times change in order to actually build and maintain inclusive communities.
How do you measure the impact and success of diversity and inclusion efforts, and what changes have you seen as a result of these initiatives?
I tend to measure impact and success holistically. At Maxim, I believe we’ve changed the conversation over the last seven plus years, and because of that, we have been able to implement so many different initiatives. Maxim has, among other efforts:
· Developed a Diversity and Inclusion Board and various regional D&I Committees.
- Developed a Diversity Statement and incorporated the promotion of a diverse and inclusive workplace as an organizational goal.
- Launched a successful diversity and inclusion training series.
- Started multiple affinity/employee resource groups for women, people of color and LGBTQ+ employees.
- Partnered with consultant firms to bring in speakers on diversity & unconscious bias.
- Launched a long running monthly D&I newsletter.
- Launched a “Who Am I” video series.
- Hosted monthly calls and coffee breaks.
- Helped start a social justice committee, which donates to local and national 501c3 non-profits and sponsors a “Future of Healthcare Scholarship”.
Generally, I cannot measure the specific impact of each initiative individually. But, when viewed collectively, our D&I initiatives have reached a number of our employees and I believe we’ve had a significant impact on the overall culture of the organization.
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
I would recommend mandatory diversity and inclusion training. I know that may sound extreme, but there are a number of states that mandate different types of workplace training, such as anti-harassment training. I think there is a lot of misinformation about what diversity and inclusion actually is, so mandatory training would go a long way towards people potentially understanding the value of D&I and what this can bring to an organization.
How can our readers further follow you online?
To learn more about Maxim and what we do, you can visit our website: https://www.maximhealthcare.com/. I also maintain a profile on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mary-brown-a429777/.
Thank you for the time you spent sharing these fantastic insights. We wish you continued success in your great work!
About The Interviewer: Vanessa Ogle is an entrepreneur, inventor, writer, and singer/songwriter. She is best known as the founder of Enseo which she and her team grew into one of the largest out-of-home media and connected networks in the world, serving more than 100,000,000 people annually. Vanessa’s talent in building world-class leadership teams focused on diversity, a culture of service, and innovation through inclusion resulted in amazing partnerships and customer relationships. She collaborated with the world’s leading technology and content companies such as Netflix, Amazon, HBO, and Dish Networks to bring innovative solutions to the hospitality industry. Enseo has also held an exclusive contract to provide movies to the entire U.S. armed forces for almost 15 years. Vanessa and her team’s relentless innovation resulted in120+ U.S. Patents. Her favorite product is the MadeSafe solution for hotel workers as well as students and children in their K-12 classrooms. Accolades include: #15 on FAST 100, 50 Fastest Growing Women-Owned 2018–2020, Entrepreneur 360 Best Companies 2018–2020, not to mention the Inc. 500 and then another six times on the Inc. 5000. Vanessa was personally honored with Inc. 100 Female Founder’s Award, Ernst and Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year Award, and Enterprising Women of the Year. Vanessa now spends her time enjoying her children, sharing stories to inspire and give hope through articles and speaking engagements. entrepreneurs-to-be with her articles including her LinkedIN newsletter Unplugged. In her spare time she writes music with her husband Paul as the band HigherHill, teaches surfing clinics, and trains dogs.
Please connect with Vanessa here on linkedin and subscribe to her newsletter Unplugged as well as follow her on Substack.
Celebrating Diversity: Mary Brown Of Maxim Healthcare Services On How To Build Inclusive… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.