EGALapalooza 2022
By Kayla Noguchi
On Thursday, October 13, the Center for Equity, Gender & Leadership held its annual EGALapalooza, an exciting event celebrating and building Equity Fluent Leadership in the Haas community. The event featured speakers in industry, academia, and performing arts, as well as honored the newest recipient of EGAL’s Equity Fluent Leadership Award.
The event kicked off with EGAL’s Faculty Director, Dr. Lauren Kray. Dr. Kray presented her latest research on the dynamics of gender differences and “social sexual behavior” in the workplace. In her talk, Dr. Kray subverted the commonly-held stereotype that “women are especially likely to engage in social sexual behavior when they are in subordinate positions.” Instead, through her experiments, Dr. Kray found evidence that, “it’s actually men in subordinate positions who are most likely to flirt, use sexual innuendo, and even harass female bosses as a way to demonstrate their masculinity and power for personal gain at work.”
Next, EGAL welcomed Sara Walsh to the stage, a Senior UX Writer and Content Strategist at Google. Sara shared learnings from the Google and EGAL collaborative initiative on inclusive language in technology and product design. Emphasizing the power and impact of language to bring communities together (or conversely, the potential to drive communities further apart), Sara presented an inclusive language framework and glossary to support individuals and teams in improving awareness and understanding in communication.
We then announced Cristy Johnston Limón (EMBA 16) as the 2022 Equity Fluent Leadership Award recipient. As former VP of DEI in Haas’ Executive MBA program, co-chair of the Haas Diversity Alumni Council, and recent executive director of the Center for Social Sector Solutions, Cristy has exemplified Equity Fluent Leadership in the Haas community and beyond.
The event was capped off by a moving performance by Afraz Khan, a current Haas MBA student (FTMBA 23) and EGAL Student Advisory Board Member. Afraz captivated the audience with “Journey to Belonging”: a rap breaking down the atrocities of British colonialism in India, juxtaposed with his reckoning of personal identity and growth.
In addition to amazing speakers, the Bay Area’s own DJ Leo provided the soundtrack to EGALapalooza’s student club fair highlighting incredible student-led initiatives and Haas groups. The fair included: Asian Americans @Haas, Black Business Student Association (BBSA), Berkeley Women in Business (BWIB), EGAL Student Advisory Board, LatinX, Net Impact, Q@Haas, Race Inclusion Initiative (RII), and Women in Leadership (WIL). EGAL’s own table included a DEI book exchange and lending library, prototypes of conversation prompts through an equity/inclusivity lens, and booklets on equity fluent communication and practices.
From Sara Walsh’s presentation demonstrating how “words matter,” to Afraz Khan’s poem highlighting racial injustice, EGALapalooza reminded attendees that everyone has a responsibility to advance equity, inclusion, and belonging in their communities — in academia, industry, and beyond. EGALapalooza 2022 brought together Haas students, alumni, and faculty/staff with EGAL corporate partners, as well as extended members of the Berkeley community in an inspiring afternoon on DEI leadership and allyship. Looking forward to next year!
