“The past weeks have been very traumatizing for African-Americans because it’s Derek Chauvin, who is supposed to be on trial, and yet they were talking about the victim’s life,” saidInternational Diversity ExpertKathleen Dameron.
(San Bernardino, Calif.) Black Americans celebrated this week’s three guilty verdicts in the Derek Chauvin murder trial, hopeful that Minnesota jury’s votes to convict the former policeman for killing George Floyd signal a new era in American justice.
In previous cases of Black people killed by police, it was rare for an officer to be charged with any crime, let alone convicted of murder. And in most cases, the Black victims were scapegoated as though they were to blame for their own murders, explained International Diversity Expert Kathleen Dameron, a Black American.
“As soon as the jury convicted Chauvin of murder, there was an enormous sigh of relief in the African-American community,” she said.
“The trial has been hard to watch. It was very traumatizing for African-Americans because it’s Derek Chauvin, who was supposed to be on trial, and yet they were talking about the victim’s life,” said Dameron, a corporate diversity trainer withoffices in San Bernardino and Paris.
“Why did they have to talk about George Floyd’s life? Why did they have to talk about his health? He was not the perpetrator, and yet the defense argument was that he was inherently not worthy of living because he may have done this,or he may have done that.”
Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer, was convicted of second-degree unintentional felony murder, third degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter for pinning Floyd’s neck to the ground for 9½ minutes while Floyd pleaded, “I can’t breathe.”
Floyd’s death was filmed by horrified bystanders, who repeatedly told police that Floyd was no longer moving and pleaded with them to check his pulse and resuscitate him, according to court documents.
Video of the incident led outraged viewers to rally against racism and police brutality throughout the United States and Europe.
Dameron said the way police violently responded to protests following Floyd’s death, and the convoluted jury-selection process made people question the U.S legal system and America’s commitment to justice.
“And the image of George Floyd being crushed by someone with a smirk on his face, that was seen literally around the world,” she noted.
Acquittals would have further traumatized Black people, said Dameron, who has more than 30 years’ experience training American, European and Asian executives worldwide.
“If the jury had acquitted the cop, it would have been absolutely devastating for what’s left of the legal system in the United States, because we have so much footage of George Floyd coming out of the convenience store, standing handcuffed, not resisting. We have pictures and videos of what happened from the front, from the side, from the back. You have so many people trying to point out that the man’s life is in danger and he’s not dangerous.”
“He’s on the ground, handcuffed with two policemen on his body. Where is the danger? Where is the need to kill him?”
Before the verdicts, there was a “high level of anxiousness in the Black community around a possible acquittal despite world-wide witnessing and condemnation of the murder,” Dameron explained.
“That’s because of the U.S. track record of acquitting police despite live video footage since the Rodney King beating,” she said.
Many Americans and citizens of many countries, as well as Black people who protested against police killing Black people with impunity, are both surprised and pleased at the verdicts.
“George Floyd’s life cannot be restored, but at least the cop who killed him is being held responsible this time. Let’s hope the guilty verdicts are just the beginning of justice for Black people in America, and not a unique occurrence” she said.
The Dameron family 1965 in E. St. Louis, IL. Barbara, Carl T., Crystal (baby), Denise, Carl and Kathleen. “We we integrators,” said Katheleen Dameron.
“When you look at the history of redlining, the history of denying Black people and Native Americans the right to housing, this is a significant step in saying, ‘Yes, we did do wrong,’ and when you do someone wrong, you apologize and you make amends,” Dameron said. “That is the beginning of the healing process.”
(Paris, France). A Chicago suburb recently became the first city in the United States to agree to pay Black residents reparations for slavery and past discriminatory policies and practices.
That decision shows that some communities are beginning to recognize and acknowledge the harm caused by America’s systemic racism, an expert on race relations said.
“It’s a historic decision to do this, and we’re hoping that this is the beginning of people being able to open their minds, open their eyes to what’s happened in the past and the consequences today,” said Kathleen Dameron, an internationally recognized cross-cultural trainer.
The City Council of Evanston, Illinois, recently voted to distribute $400,000 in housing assistance and mortgage relief to eligible Black households. The city will provide $25,000 for down payments on houses or property, home repairs, and interest or late penalties on property in Evanston.
To qualify, residents must either have lived in the city between 1919 and 1969 or be a direct descendant of a black Evanston resident from that time. Those who experienced housing discrimination in Evanston after 1969 are also eligible.
The $400,000 comes from a $10 million reparations fund created in 2019 using tax money from the city’s recreational marijuana program.
“When you look at the history of redlining, the history of denying Black people and Native Americans the right to housing, this is a significant step in saying, ‘Yes, we did do wrong,’ and when you do someone wrong, you apologize and you make amends,” Dameron said. “That is the beginning of the healing process.”
Even though $25,000 is not enough to pay for a house, paying reparations is still important for the city, said Dameron, a Black American now living in Paris.
“It’s not reparations in the sense of, ‘We denied you a house, so we’re going to give you a house now,’ but it is acknowledgement of the damage done, of the impact on the generations of that damage,” Dameron said. “It recognizes and it acknowledges that we did harm consciously, in policy, in law and in practice and we’re seeking to recognize it and to make amends.”
Dameron said that getting national reparations or getting some areas to agree to reparations is still a difficult process.
“One of the problems we have is that there are some people in the United States – and this happens consistently across the United States – they would rather close the swimming pool and have no swimming pool in the community than to have Blacks have access to the swimming pool, so as desegregation started throughout the South, public swimming pools disappeared, public parks disappeared,” she said.
“Some people thought, “I’d rather have nothing than have Back people share in this,” she said.
“That mentality makes it extraordinarily difficult to say, ‘We did you wrong. As human beings, we did not give you a fair environment. We persecuted you. We banned you. We burned your houses down and we killed people.’ ”
So even though Evanston is making amends and recognizing and acknowledging that they caused harm, “that acknowledgement is still difficult for many Americans to make,” Dameron noted.
Dameron is currently leading a series of seminars on “Healing the Collective Trauma of Racism.” In her sessions, she helps participants recognize the difference between interpersonal and institutional racism.
Participants build a feeling of community and energy to create social justice.
To introduce people to her sessions, she is offering a free, self-paced, one-hour course. You can learn more by going to www.KathleenDameron.com
Kathleen Dameron, American in Paris, Healing the Collective Trauma of Racism
“In our collective trauma, we still choose not to see our history, our past acts and our current blind eye to injustice. Even as a Christian nation, we still do not pay attention to the well-being of other human beings,” said Kathleen Dameron, American in Paris
(Paris, France) Internationally recognized Cross-cultural Trainer Kathleen Dameron is launching a series of seminars titled, “Healing the Collective Trauma of Racism” as a way to help Americans recognize and move beyond the systemic racism that has plagued society for hundreds of years.
The importance of her sessions became clear when angry white insurrectionists invaded the United States Capitol carrying Confederate flags on Jan. 6. The insurrectionists were cheered by then-President Donald Trump, who openly supported white supremacists throughout his presidency.
His lies about the election being stolen were a blatant effort to disenfranchise the millions of black voters who voted against him.
“The insurrectionists were so convinced of their impunity, that they took selfies of themselves and then posted them on social media,” Dameron said.
With the horror of that day still fresh in people’s minds, Dameron said it’s time to work toward healing the collective trauma of racism.
“The times, they are a-changing,” she said, quoting Bob Dylan’s iconic song. “We have a perfect window of opportunity. We need to work with whites not to feel ashamed, but to open their hearts so they can recognize how cold and cruel and undemocratic they have been toward their fellow human beings…. and themselves.”
Dameron’s seminars are ongoing, and sessions focus on everything from enslavement and Jim Crow laws to targeted policing and mass incarceration of black people and people of color.
In her seminars, Dameron will help participants understand the difference between interpersonal and institutional racism, guiding them to build a feeling of community and healing energy.
Before starting her sessions, she is offering a free, self-paced, one-hour course “First Steps” so each one can build their Racial Literacy. You can enroll by going to www.KathleenDameron.com or clicking on the following Web link:
“We will take time over six weeks, then six months, to explore the impact of racism in the United States,” Dameron said. “We will take time to open our eyes, our minds and our hearts. “We will start our individual action, looking at what’s very local around us. And in community, we will walk together toward larger and more impactful actions.”
Kathleen Dameron is an American based in Paris with more than 30 years’ experience coaching, facilitating, and training within multinational companies in French, English and Spanish.
Through KD Conseil, her French consultancy, she coached coach American, European and Asian executives all over the world, helping organizations transform their cultural diversity into a competitive advantage.
Moving beyond America’s systemic racism and even getting some Americans to recognize that it exists will not be easy.
Dameron noted the ongoing drumbeat against Black Lives Matter and the false equivalency of BLM and the violent insurrectionists heard daily on conservative news programs. It is important to listen to different drumbeats.
But her seminars are one step toward healing the collective trauma of racism.
“In our collective trauma, we still choose not to see our history, our past acts and our current blind eye to injustice. Even as a Christian nation, we still do not pay attention to the well-being of other human beings.
“We need to talk often and softly with humor and enthusiasm and begin our transformative journeys,” she said.
(Paris, France) Weathering the storm of an international recession is not an easy task. However, for international businesses, one thing has remained constant in good, as well as bad times, a competent multinational and multi-ethnic team. The ability to sustain effective cross-cultural communications is a crucial skill required for international business success in today’s global economy.
For the past 20 years, KD Conseil has played a key role in facilitating this skill. Launched by Kathleen Dameron in 1992, KD Conseil improves the intercultural communications skills between the corporate offices and the executive management teams who work in the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, Africa and South East Asia.
Dameron, based in Paris, France, says “KD Conseil is strategically situated both geographically, as well as for business cultures in most industries and Fortune 500 companies. We know how to meet the demands and needs of our clients in an international business center for multinational corporations.”
“I truly adore the city of Paris. The companies here have very strong business connections with the Middle East, Africa and South East Asia,” said Dameron. “It’s easy to travel from Paris all around Europe, the Middle East and Africa.”
Dameron explains that some of the key challenges faced by companies working across national and corporate environments are born out of cultural differences. It is those differences in cultures that can also create the building blocks to success.
“If an organization works with other cultures, I help them make it possible for senior managers, experts and employees to work together with greater efficiency and comfort,” said Dameron. “There is a joy that comes from working in an intercultural surrounding, discovery of different ways of succeeding, new and tried solutions to issues, as well as the pain of differences in attitudes and ways of working. My role is to help individuals, teams and organizations understand and appreciate those differences, thus developing a more harmonious working environment.”
Standing the test of time, KD Conseil has developed quality relationships with clients, generating customer referrals, which have enabled her business to grow even in difficult economic times for businesses globally.
“I believe that one of the keys to our success during this economic hardship is our ability to guide clients through different interventions,” said Dameron. “For instance, we develop intervention materials that assist in increasing multicultural competencies or adjusting to an organizational change. The goal is for our clients to keep their employees motivated and improve performance and that has a positive affect on their bottom-line.”
However, Dameron points out that KD Conseil’s affect should not be measured solely by quantity and direct immediate contribution to the bottom-line. In fact, she informs that the best contribution comes when her company is embraced as a partner on a strategic journey to understand and implement cultural change.
This enables her to implement the best evaluation measurements, reviewing what has changed over a six-month period.
With the growth of the global economy, Dameron notes that her industry has likewise expanded. Others are finding their way to play a role in assisting businesses to adapt and adjust multicultural working environments on an international level.
“This is an exciting time for the multicultural training industry,” said Dameron. “20 years ago, I had to explain what multicultural intervention was all about. Today all of the corporate leaders I speak to say they are engaged in some sort of multicultural professional activity.”
Dameron says the key is to go beyond merely giving a catalogue listing of “dos and don’ts.” KD Conseil delivers facilitators who develop strategies to increase individual, team and overall organizational multicultural competence.
“Keeping abreast of what is happening in the business world, as well as taking the time to interview managers and business leaders is key to any successful intervention,” said Dameron. “However, investing in your client by listening, to develop their skills and vision, that is what allows you to create leading edge impact intervention processes.”
Kathleen Dameron, president and founder of KD Conseil, works to build international partnerships with companies that are going through cultural changes.
Kathleen Dameron returns home to the Inland Empire to be with her family, as they celebrate the marriage of Carl and Malaika Dameron in the summer of 2000. (Left to Right: Crystal Dameron, Sister; Brian Mathis, Cousin; Kathleen Dameron; Carl Dameron, Brother; Malaika Dameron, Sister-in-Law; Cherise Griffin, Sister; Jason Bell, Brother; Denise Dameron, Sister; Shiane Dameron, Niece; Thomas Talbert, Nephew; Alan Dameron, Nephew and Barbara Dameron-Bell, Mother)
Kathleen smiling, as she takes a little time to enjoy a day away from work, as she joins her brother Carl Dameron and his family on a trip to LEGOLAND in San Diego.
(PARIS, France) Almost twenty years ago, an African-American woman living in Paris took stock of the many cultures she had experienced, and of the growing interdependence the world’s cultures had developed, especially in business. Her name is Kathleen Dameron.
The world’s growing multiculturalism fascinated her. However, she saw room for much improvement.
“I want to stimulate people into multicultural competency,” Dameron said. “In many ways, the world is becoming more multicultural, but we also still see people saying ‘There is one right way to do things, and that’s my way; if you don’t do it my way you don’t deserve to be on this planet.’ I want people to use their company’s diversity as a means to accomplish more than they could alone.”
With that in mind, Dameron opened KD Conseil (KDConseil.com) for business in 1992, with the mission of improving communication skills of those whose work brings them in contact with many different cultures.
Dameron actually began to lay the foundation to successfully coach global corporations in bringing their diverse cultures together for common good prior to opening KD Conseil.
The seeds were planted when she studied cross-cultural studies and communication in Southern California at the University of Redlands. It continued when she studied social and economic administration at the Universitè de Paris, a major focusing on law, business, politics and economics.
This foundation really began to take shape when she managed training programs for Thomson Consumer Electronics, the parent company of RCA and Technicolor, and other products worldwide She had also taught English as a second language in the corporate environment.
“A lot of what I do is help people to understand that they have a culture,” she said. “When you are in your own culture, everything goes more or less the same way. When you go to work with a different culture, they will do the same things for very different reasons. And sometimes they will do things very differently; the unexpected is to be expected.”
Dameron’s experiences with different cultures began early. She grew up in East St. Louis, Ill., a neighborhood that today is mostly African-American, suffering from high crime and poverty rates. However, when she lived there in the 1960s to the early 1970s, the neighborhood was very much an American middle class existence. This is what the Dameron family experienced, as her parents were both civil servants, and the family members were leaders in the African American community.
Several years after her father’s death, her mother moved the family to Rubidoux, in Southern California’s “Inland Empire” region. Rubidoux is more ethnically diverse, but there, Dameron encountered people who expected less of her because of her race.
With support from her family, and educators at both Rubidoux High School and the University of Redlands, Dameron proved them wrong.
When she was 18 years old, Dameron moved to Paris, a city that fascinated her from childhood. Although the culture and language was even more diverse than that of the two regions she had lived in the United States, she felt very at ease in France.
“I have always loved Paris,” she said. “It is very diverse culturally, and very open-minded, as well as having amazing architecture and food!”
After completing her college education on two continents, Dameron initially worked as an English teacher, before taking a position with Thomson Consumer Electronics as an in-house trainer. When the company “right-sized” their headquarters, it created an opportunity for her set up her own organization and sign Thomson as her first client.
“I was privileged to start my own business with three year’s worth of contracts in Poland, England, Germany and France dealing with topics ranging from accompanying the French / Polish joint venture to European teambuilding projects to improving communication skills in English,” says Dameron.
Shortly after this, Dameron was hired as the executive secretary for Fashion Fair Cosmetics, which marketed ethnic cosmetics to women in Europe and Africa, and is a subsidiary of Johnson Publishing Company, the publisher of magazines Ebony and Jet.
At Fashion Fair Cosmetics she was responsible for human resources functions, such as motivating employees, hiring and terminations. She was also legally responsible for the organization.
“It was my job to maintain good relations with the French labor inspectors, unions and the equivalent of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA),” adds Dameron.
Having launched KD Conseil while starting with Fashion Fair Cosmetics, Dameron recalls those early years as very intense.
“The heads of Fashion Fair were open to me working part-time, while I ran my training and facilitation business,” she said. “In those days, I worked almost seven days a week, and generally 12 to 14 hour days. I was so passionate about working with Black women from the West Indies, Africa and France. Working on the corporate side of business, as well as the training/coaching side, I gained empathy and insights for what my clients experience on a daily basis.”
Demand for someone who could help business grow on a global level helped KD Conseil grow rather quickly into its own international business.
“One of my best work experiences from those days was the Polkolor project at Thomson,” Dameron said. “They signed a memorandum of agreement and I was on the ground the next week in Poland. I was working as an employee when the managing director called on KD Conseil to assist the newly restructured company to work more effectively with its Polish employees.”
For two years, she spent one week a month facilitating and mentoring cross-cultural relations.
“I was there just after Poland had opened up to private enterprise,” Dameron said. “It was fascinating watching the transition of Poland from a Communist economy to a free-market economy.”
Since then, KD Conseil has helped companies based in Europe, America and other continents develop their own cross-cultural relations strategies. One of her recent clients is an Internet networking company with 70,000 employees in 165 different countries, for whom KD Conseil did a multicultural team building. She has also designed and runs a leadership program for high potentials in a Fortune 500 company.
Her other recent clients include:
AGF of the Allianz Insurance Group
Rio Tinto Alcan
BNP Paribas
College de Polytechnic, which is the premier engineering school in France, she trains management/leadership executives enrolled in the continuing education program
ESSEC, the premier business school in France, she trains students enrolled in the Masters of Business Administration and Master of International Affairs programs for executive management
For more information about KD Conseil, call +33(0) 142210073, or go to www.kdconseil.com. About KD Conseil
Established in 1991, KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand the different cultures within their organization. By understanding and working through cultural differences, KD Conseil helps the firm develop “shared practices” that will be highly efficient ways of delivering their services and products in a global market.
Kathleen Dameron, president, KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand different cultures within their organization. Recently, it conducted a training session for a worldwide technology such as being the leader with more than 70,000 employees in 165 countries.
(MIAMI, Fla.) How does the worldwide leader in computer conductivity guarantor loans technology overcome the cultural communications challenges of its 70,000 employees in 165 countries, and keep them working together productively? They call on KD Conseil (KDConseil.com).
KD Conseil is a training and coaching firm that specializes in assisting companies “seeking to improve the intercontinental communication skills of employees who work in an international environment.”
An international leader in intercultural business training based in Paris, France, KD Conseil recently completed a two-day workshop in Miami for high-level leaders in Internet networking.
KD Conseil president and founder Kathleen Dameron, along with training coach Caroline Obolensky conducted the team-building session for the owners of the company managers promoting different products starting with electric razor for men and so on – each from a different country in North America, Africa, Latin America and Europe.
“They all spoke English, but with varying understandings of word usage,” notes Obolensky. “They represented many different cultures, different technology backgrounds and were operating out of numerous time zones. Some also had never met before. Particular challenges involved how information is best passed along and how you can learn to trust a person you’ve never even seen – especially while partnering across the globe.”
Working together “virtually” has problems of its own. KD Conseil was charged with addressing this complex issue for the business. Members were asked to exchange ideas that would get them to have a better understanding of each other and discover the best ways to work together from vast distances, spanning greatly differing cultures.
“The purpose,” Obolensky explains, “was basically to get this team together in one place for them to get to know each other, to share common experiences, to work on real issues face to face and to bond as a team.”
Toward this end, Kathleen and Caroline took a few unique paths. For example, the group played volleyball together to break down personality walls and begin fusing a partnership. Another example: the leaders literally started a dance and we observed the influencing process from “the early adaptors” thru to “the laggards” as the team members accepted the challenge to stand up in a meeting room and dance together. We then explored concretely how to get people in the room on board for a new idea.
“Also,” Obolensky adds, “we had them build a ‘village.’ Not a real one, of course, but a model for the dynamics in their team. Within that, they had to make a number of decisions that pointed out their strengths, interests and goals.”
Who was going to be in charge of the project? Who could take on “fund raising” for the “community”? Who might be the workers, the teachers, the retailers and the government officials? “It brought all these diverse managers together,” Obolensky says, “realizing each other’s needs, talents and business obstacles to be overcome.”
“Our experience proves it is possible to adapt to other cultures without having to give up one’s own cultural practices and values,” notes Dameron.
“Let’s look at the Fortune 500 companies in the world in 2010,” she adds. “Three businesses in the Top 20 are in Paris, twenty out of the Top 40 are based in Europe and of the 500, 39 are headquartered in France. So, as an international business person, can you afford to ignore how to deal with those cultures?”
“I have always been fascinated with different cultures and curious about how they can work together.” So in 1992 the U.S.-born and -raised African American woman founded KD Conseil in Paris. Educated in American universities in Cross-Cultural Studies and Communication, then in a French university in Social and Economic Administration, the step to creating her business to aid firms working globally was a natural evolution.
“Our programs,” Dameron says, “target middle to upper management: senior managers of Operations, Human Resources, Marketing, Administration and Finance. We know that individuals and teams are best developed through addressing real life business challenges, so our coaching and advisory services are all applied to simulated work sessions.”
KD Conseil’s clients have included such international leaders as 3M, Alcan, France Telecom, MBDA, Pfizer, PSA and Herman Miller. Kathleen Dameron is certified as a business coach by the International Coach Federation (ICF) as well as certified in Team Management Systems, Success Insights, Situational Leadership, Coaching and Modeling plus Self-Relations, and is a Master in neurolinguistic programming. .
“I’ve coached senior executives in one-on-one sessions and have spoken to groups as large as 400,” she says, “in English, of course, but also in French and Spanish.”
The KD Conseil team of senior bicultural consultants includes:
Eveline Bouillon, a coach/trainer with 15 years experience in various capacities in international advertising, speaking English and French. She specializes in developing creativity in marketing and operational teams. Her book in French on how to spark creativity in individuals and teams in the corporate environment will be out in January of 2011.
Ute Drewniak, executive coach, consultant and trainer, focuses on multicultural management, diversity and strategic HR development. A psychologist with a Master’s in Business Coaching from International Mozaik in France, she has more than 15 years of international experience in the financial sector. She conducts her sessions in English, French or German.
Pascale Reinhardt specializes in leadership development in multicultural environments for teams and individuals, in conflict and crisis resolution and in intercultural negotiation. She has worked in China, Southeast Asia and Western Europe as well as North America, and has lived in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Sydney, New York, Lausanne and, naturally, Paris. She’s fluent in English and French, and also speaks Mandarin Chinese and German. She co-authored Glocal Working and regularly contributes to the international magazine, “Negotiations.”
Dr. George Simons is the author of Global Teamwork Diversophy and Cultural Detective: Global Teamwork. His focus with KD Conseil is global team management. Simons has developed virtual teams for the likes of Coca Cola, Bosch-Siemens, Shell IEP, Texas Instruments France, Unilever and the Management Development Program of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. Though born in the United States, he has worked in more than 40 other countries.
Caroline Obolensky is a Corporate Coach certified in 2003 by the International Coach Federation, possibly the largest of its kind in the world. She is of Greek and German background, and has lived over much of the world, her parents having been diplomats who changed homes every few years. As a result she speaks French, Greek, German and English fluently, and other languages to varying levels. It’s been said she has a gift for communicating what being multi-cultural is all about. Her Bachelor’s degree in International Relations is from American University in Washington, D.C., and her Master’s from the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium is in European Administration.
“Our message is simple,” summarizes Kathleen Dameron. “KD Conseil’s training will help you be more effective when doing business abroad.”
For further information, KD Conseil may be viewed on the Internet at www.kdconseil.com and contacted at info@kdconseil.com. The phone number in Paris is +33 (0) 1-42-21-00-73 and their fax is +33 (0) 1-42-21-00-26.
About KD Conseil
Established in 1992, KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand the different cultures within their organization. By understanding and working through cultural differences, KD Conseil helps the firm develop “shared practices” that will be highly efficient ways of delivering their services and products in a global market.
Kathleen Dameron, owner of KD Conseil, has created a series of workshops to help business leaders draw inspiration from United States President Barack Obama in their own leadership.
(PARIS, France) – United States President Barack Obama inspires millions of people on both sides of the Atlantic.
KD Conseil will host a series of workshops to help international business executives turn President Obama’s success strategies into personal success. These workshops take place on evenings and weekends.
“In his 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama inspired many in today’s challenging environment,” said Kathleen Dameron, owner of KD Conseil. “Obama managed one of the best campaigns in history. He won in a landslide to be the first African American president. These workshops will show business leaders how they can use Barack Obama’s leadership skills to win in whatever situation they face,”
KD Conseil is hosting a series of three-hour workshops that explore aspects of President Obama’s winning campaign strategy and how they can apply to today’s business environment.
“The first of the five workshops inspired participants to implement opportunities in their business and professional environments to lead with the skills they admire in Obama,” Dameron said.
The remaining sessions are:
• Gaining the Vision — April 29th 7pm-10pm
This session explores how Obama found unifying messages that brought diverse people, opinions and agendas together.
• Creating Balance in Your Life — TBD (May) 7pm-10pm
This session shows that even though the campaign for President of the United States is one of the most demanding jobs in the world, President Obama still had time for the things that gave him balance in his life. The participating business executives will learn how, like President Obama when he was on the campaign trail (and now as United States President), they too can lead a balanced life.
The evening workshops take place at Espace Trinité, 3 rue de la Trinité 75009 Paris and cost $35 Euros. This includes heavy hors d’oeuvres and refreshments.
Dameron has experienced first-hand the effectiveness of President Obama’s leadership skills. Although she lives in Paris, this native of East St. Louis, Illinois was so impressed with Obama, after he won the Iowa caucus she came to the United States for several weeks to campaign for him in the swing state of Missouri.
“Working on this highly successful campaign inspired me to think about how I could use my own skills, which are in training and coaching, to contribute to developing leadership in more people, and more of the leadership skills we need to face today’s challenges. From that, I came up with the idea for these workshops,” she said.
“What impresses me the most about Barack Obama is how much he stays in touch with his people,” Dameron said. “After the election he quickly sent all of his staff and volunteers an email detailing what we could expect next, and what he could and could not do. I continue to receive emails from him about once a week.”
“What about him most impresses you?” she asks. “That’s probably where your leadership potential lies.”
KD Conseil is also hosting weekend workshops designed to help business executives take what they admire about Obama and use it in their own way.
The upcoming weekend workshops is ““The Art and Power of Life Balance,” to be held May 21-24. Cost for the May weekend workshop is 600 Euros.
The participants in these workshops will discuss their impressions of Obama. Then they will provide feedback to other participants as to how they could best use their own skills in the same area.
Dameron, owner of KD Conseil (a consulting firm offering international business executives training and coaching in how to manage their companies in a global environment) and Alan Steinborn, an authority on business leadership, facilitate the workshops.
Seating is limited. To reserve your seat or for more information about KD Conseil and any of the workshops it is holding, call 33 (01) 42 21 00 73 or email info@kdconseil.com
French and English speakers may obtain information about the company through the website www.kdconseil.com.
Kathleen Dameron, born in East St. Louis, Illinois, lived in southern California before moving to Europe. She graduated from University of Redlands in California. She also has a degree from the Universitè de Paris. She resides in Paris, France, where she established KD Conseil in 1992.
KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand the different cultures within their organization. By understanding and working through cultural differences, KD Conseil helps the firm develop “shared practices” that will be highly efficient ways of delivering their services and products in a global market.
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That’s not necessarily true, especially when you are an executive with a multi-national corporation and must deal on a regular basis with employees or customers who are based in another country.
KD Conseil, a French organization owned by Kathleen Dameron of Paris, seeks to help multinational corporations work through cultural barriers to deliver the best goods and services possible. KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand the different cultures within their organization. By understanding and working through cultural differences, KD Conseil helps the firm develop “shared practices” that will be highly efficient ways of delivering their services and products in a global market.
“A lot of what I do is help people to understand that they have a culture,” she said. “When you are in your own culture, everything goes more or less the same way. When you go to work with a different culture, they will do the same things for very different reasons. And sometimes they will do things very differently.”
“You can have some surprises,” she said. “Some of them will be pleasant, some of them unpleasant.”
While differences between countries can be quite pronounced, people within the same country can also have different cultures based on the type of work they do.
“Marketing people have a certain way of doing things,” Dameron explained. “Engineers have another. So if you put into a room, people who are all American marketing people, they would have a lot in common as to how they do things. If you are in a room with different American people, such as marketing people, engineers and sales people, there are some things that will be different. And if you put together people who are French, American, German and Indonesian then they might have very different ideas about everything.”
For instance, Dameron has worked with a multi-national company that does business in about 80 countries. When the company first started working with her, it wanted all the subsidiaries to do all things the same way. She is helping them to envision a company-wide plan that addresses the need for flexibility in how things are done.
“Their practices were creating real issues within this organization. It led to things being done partially. They wanted things done that don’t work in the French market, that don’t work in the American market.”
For instance, this company wanted all of their offices to use the same insurance forms. But on a German insurance form, it is natural to ask the customer to state his or her religion. That is because of a difference in how Germany and other countries handle the issue of giving money to churches.
“In Germany, when people pay taxes, the government sends a portion of the tax money to a church, based on the taxpayer’s stated preference,” Dameron explained. “In the United States, if I want to give money to my faith, I’ll do it myself.”
“The Germans didn’t see a problem with that question,” she said. “But if their subsidiaries started sending that form to the United States, we could have had a lawsuit. All the subsidiaries did was argue with headquarters and then do what they wanted to.”
With Dameron’s help, the company and subsidiary managers were able to see that it would be more effective to develop a “shared practice.” That is, they would agree on a form with questions that all could ask, and each subsidiary could then send a supplemental form with additional questions that would be helpful where they did business.
As she did with this insurance company, Dameron works with each of her clients to help them develop a unique solution to whatever problems culture clashes could cause. She calls this “decoding” the other culture.
“A lot of firms want a list of what to do and not to do. You can find those things online,” she said. “My added value is how I can help you learn how to understand and work with the differences within another culture.”
“People want a list of what to do and what not to do because makes them comfortable,” she added. “Some of that is really useful and helpful. Some of it is giving yourself a crutch so you don’t have to learn about other people’s cultures. What you really need to do is learn how to decode the other culture.”
Dameron offers her assistance in decoding cultures primarily by presenting one- to three-day seminars to company executives in retreat settings. She is also a public speaker who has given presentations on multicultural competence to the French multi-national defense company Theles, executive MBA students at French business school Essec and to the French organization Societa Frances de Coaching, which is an organization for business coaches and life coaches.
Her recent clients include:
• AGF of the Allianz Insurance Group
• Rio Tinto Alcan
• BNP Paribas
• College de Polytechnic, which is the premier engineering school in France, she trains management/leadership executives enrolled in the continuing education program
• ESSEC, the premier business school in France, she trains students enrolled in the Masters of Business Administration and Master of International Affairs programs for executive management
• Thales
• KCI Laboratories
• Thomson Multimedia
• Tyco Electronics
• Veolia Water
• Vuitton
To reach KD Conseil, phone (331) 4221-0073 or email info@kdconseil.com. French speakers may obtain information about the company through the website www.kdconseil.com and English speakers will be able to do so soon.
Kathleen Dameron was born in East St. Louis, Illinois and also lived in southern California. She graduated from the Johnston Center for Integrative Studies at the University of Redlands in California. She also has a degree from the Universitè de Paris. She resides in Paris, France, where she established KD Conseil in 1992.
KD Conseil helps multi-national firms understand the different cultures within their organization. By understanding and working through cultural differences, KD Conseil helps the firm develop “shared practices” that will be highly efficient ways of delivering their services and products in a global market.
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