In honor of Pride month, Medallia’s Q-Field ERG hosts events to engage Allies and celebrate together. From a drag queen story time to a Body & Mind Celebration, check out what we have planned for Pride 2021!
Q-Field is Medallia’s Employee Resource Group (ERG) serving the Queer community. Q-Field aims to create a safe space for LGBTQ+ Medallians and our Allies to build community, exercise authenticity, and advocate for marginalized identities. At the forefront of everything we do is the human experience and providing authentic safe spaces. The conversations we have and bonds we’ve formed are beyond your standard coworker water cooler chat. They go deeper. We truly learn about one another by sharing stories, laughs, and sometimes tears.
Hear from a few of our members on what having Pride celebrations and being a part of a community such as Q-Field means to them.
Alisha Thomas, Global Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Manager
Going to be vulnerable here for a second. When I came out to my sister two years ago as Queer, she needed time to process. But not in the way you think. She didn’t need time to know whether or not she loved me or supported me or accepted me, that was always a given. She needed time to process her fear for me. She told me the first thing she thought about was how life was going to get that much more difficult for me, especially in my career.
You see, being Black is already an uphill fight to have a seat at the table, and then on top of that I am a woman. So without anyone having knowledge of my sexuality there was already discrimination, misconsceptions, microagressions, and a constant battle for equal pay and for my voice to be heard. Now I am adding being Queer to the mix. This was and is a very true and valid fear many have when being faced with the intersections of their identities and how society treats them.
However, at Medallia, specifically being a part of Q-Field, I have never felt so seen, valued, and heard. Belonging and acceptance is so critical in one’s journey, and when someone is able to find this in their workplace and/or community, it promotes the highest form of self love and acceptance within. And that’s exactly what Q-Field, Pride Month, and building my Queer community has done for me. To be honest, being a QBIPOC is nothing to walk in fear over – I’d consider myself one of the lucky ones. I get to experience the joy of life in so many ways.
Dan Bennett, Director, Professional Services
June is a time to celebrate Pride! As I think about what Pride means to me, one of the things I’m most proud of at Medallia is my work on the Q-Field leadership team and the relationship we have built with the Trevor Project. Last year, Q-Field went from selecting Trevor as our non-profit partner, to making a donation from our generous Talent Show donations, to getting permission to offer Medallia software/services, to Medallia becoming a Bronze Corporate Partner. The work that Trevor does every day in suicide prevention for LGBTQ+ youth is so incredibly important, and they rely on donations and volunteers to complete their mission. Being a small part of that gives me Pride!
Some of the ways we foster the community you read about above is through our Slack channel and scheduled events such as monthly Moments to stay connected to each other, and support and learn from one another. Moments are a monthly informal Zoom gathering in which we get to know our fellow Q-Fielders and chat over beverages or snacks.
In honor of Pride month each year, we host various events to engage Allies and celebrate together. This year might be our busiest yet! We are kicking things off this Pride with a Moment on June 3rd. During the second week of Pride month, we’re hosting an informal Zoom happy hour. During the third week, we will host drag queen story time for our mini-Medallians, in partnership with the Parents ERG. During the last week we’ll be hosting an environmental justice and climate change conversation with Ang Roell, a queer beekeeper! That same week we’ll also host a film discussion with Alvaro Delgado-Aparicio, the writer/director of Retablo (2017), in conjunction with our LatinX ERG. To round out the month, we will close with a Body & Mind Celebration, which will be a workout and mindfulness session presented by The Class around liberation, love, and acceptance, in collaboration with the Women@ ERG.
In addition to our own Pride month programming, Medallia is a proud sponsor of Lesbians Who Tech & Allies (Not IRL) Pride Summit! Several Medallians will be speaking on a panel during the Summit. We will also be hosting a virtual booth to encourage conversations among Summit attendees. If you’re attending, too, please stop by and say hello!
All year long, we support the life-saving work of The Trevor Project as one of their Bronze Corporate Partners and by fundraising through our annual talent show and Medallia’s gift-matching initiative. We welcome anyone to join our fundraising team!
Happy Pride 2021!
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