DESIGN FOR MONDAY MORNING
- Kketan Amarnath Waghmare
- Mar 5
- 1 min read
A DE&I session had to be rolled out.
I said yes.
Not because it’s fashionable.
But because when you’ve worked across 100+ nationalities, you stop seeing diversity as theory. You see it as daily reality.
Accent becomes hierarchy.
Age becomes assumption.
Silence becomes survival.
And if I’m honest — I’ve lived some of it.
So I didn’t walk into that room with definitions.
I walked in with questions.
Who feels interrupted here?
Who feels underestimated?
Who edits themselves before speaking?
The room shifted.
Because suddenly this wasn’t about policy.
It was about people.
We spoke about accents.
About age hierarchies.
About discomfort that never gets voiced.
About how equality on paper doesn’t mean equity in practice.
But here’s the part that mattered.
I didn’t want applause.
I wanted behaviour.
As L&D leaders, our ego wants applause.
Our responsibility demands application.
So I didn’t ask, “Did they enjoy it?”
I asked,
“Will someone intervene next time they see exclusion?”
“Will a supervisor pause before dismissing someone?”
Inclusion only works when people accept it.
And people accept it when they feel it’s real.
If training cannot survive pressure, it will not survive reality.
The sea does not care about your slide design.
A full restaurant does not care about your competency framework.
People use what is simple.
They repeat what is practical.
They ignore what feels ornamental.
Design for Monday morning, not for the workshop room.
That shift changed everything for me.
#LearningAndDevelopment #DiversityEquityInclusion #DEI #HospitalityLeadership #CruiseIndustry #LeadershipDevelopment #InclusiveLeadership #PeopleDevelopment #kketanwaghmare
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