Ten years in, Deborah Biddle finds her journey with The People Company remarkable as she gets ready to celebrate the milestone with an event tonight at the new Center for Black Excellence and Culture.
The People Company, a consulting company that works across industries to understand how diversity, equity and inclusion are important to their work and business, will host an anniversary celebration at the recently opened Center for Black Excellence. Biddle started the company 10 years ago in her 50s with the hopes of supporting women of color in their career transitions and leadership coaching. However, after she spoke at Madison Nonprofit Day, she pushed towards work in advancing organizational culture and inclusionary space.
“As a small business, the stats are if it gets five years, you’re lucky. If you get to seven, it’s kind of remarkable,” Biddle said. “As a business owner, Black woman owner, who started my business when I was in my 50s, I wanted to mark the occasion … it’s a significant milestone to still be able to do the work.”
Biddle’s business grew strongly through word of mouth. She has been known to produce high-quality work that has a meaningful organizational impact. Partnerships continued to grow and The People Company’s reputation has grown with it.
Her work has led Biddle to speak at conferences across the country and build relationships with multinational organizations, while still also keeping roots in Dane County strong.
In the span of her work with The People Company, Biddle went on to write a book that pivots off her TEDx talk she did the previous year. Biddle’s book, “No More Patch Jobs:Stop Renovating Exclusion and Start Designing for Belonging” was released earlier this year.
“It starts with a personal story about how I was challenged to examine whether or not I really believed in the things that I teach when it comes to my personal story, and how reexamining that helped me to reassess how I do the work that I do with organization,” Biddle said about her book.
“No More Patch Jobs” focuses on the foundations of creating sustainable and inclusive organizational cultures instead of surface-level fixes — or patch jobs.
“Are we building a place where people really experience being seen, valued and heard? And when we do that, how that is really the basis for inclusion, not a training or workshop or an assessment, but how have we looked at inclusion and belonging from a practice, process, and perspective,” Biddle said.
At the anniversary celebration, Biddle will read a passage from her book.
Other features of the event will see the awarding of three companies that have been with her throughout The People Company’s journey. One recipient is her very first client, and the other two have partnered with Biddle for more than eight years.
“They are organizations that I believe were committed to seeing the best for everyone, creating space for everyone long before it was fashionable,” Biddle said. “Black Lives Matter, or long before the #MeToo movement, and all of the movements that we’ve seen in the last 10 years, they were doing the work before that.”
Recipients of the awards will be announced at the celebration.
The People Company’s anniversary celebration will be held tonight, 5-7:30 p.m., at the Center for Black Excellence and Culture, 571 W. Badger Rd.
