A cohort of five Pittsburgh arts groups has created the Talent & Equity Director position and today announced Fatima Bunafoor as the choice to “advance equity and inclusion practices and facilitate human resource collaboration.”
Bunafoor moved into the unprecedented role on April 18, working with arts groups representing four Pittsburgh communities: City Theatre (South Side), the Mattress Factory (North Side), Pittsburgh Glass Center (East End), and Pittsburgh Public Theater (Downtown).
“The cohort seeks to advance better practices related to human and personnel management – by developing and sharing learning and policies around hiring, retention, staff development, and organizational culture – in an industry,” according to a press release via City Theatre today.
Additionally, the release said that the August Wilson African American Cultural Center will participate in a series of staff training sessions directly tied to equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in conjunction with the larger cohort.
“The impetus of the shared Talent & Equity Director position was born out of a previous project on which we collaborated to create a six-month cohort focusing on DEI training with fifteen local arts nonprofits and funders,” Hayley Haldeman, current executive director of the Mattress Factory, said in a statement. “We found that our organizations had a lot in common: similar budget size, aligned values that center [on] equity and inclusion, and the need and desire to expand our capacity around human capital. By pooling our resources, we can meet our common challenges while also creating an environment where we learn and evolve together.”
Bunafoor is a native of Bahrain who moved to the United States in 2010 to participate in the NESA Undergraduate Exchange program through the U.S. State Department. She spent the last 12 years focusing on equity and inclusion in different spaces, including the government, nonprofit, and private sectors. She holds a Master of Science in Public Policy and Management from Carnegie Mellon University. She has most recently served as a Manager of Special Projects within the Office of Equity and Engagement at the Allegheny County Department of Human Services. She also worked as a Diversity and Program Coordinator at Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy, where she completed her graduate degree in 2018.
“The Director of Talent and Equity role is an opportunity for the Arts Cohort to put into practice all their DEI goals and learning,” Bunafoor said in a statement. “I am honored to be chosen to lead these efforts and support internal HR and equity priorities that can create structures, accountability, and sustainability for this work.”
Executive leaders from each organization began meeting bi-weekly last fall to review goals and strategic objectives for the position, eventually landing on the first draft of a job description. With grant support from the Art Equity Reimagined (AER) Collective Action for Reimagining Fund, the cohort was able to hire a search firm, Equitable Hiring Group, founded by Abe Taleb, to lead the search. Finalists met with staff from each organization before selection.
In addition to Haldeman, Heather McElwee (Pittsburgh Glass Center); Lou Castelli (Pittsburgh Public Theater); Denise Church (AWAACC); Pam Lezark (Mattress Factory), and Clare Drobot and James McNeel (City Theatre) make up the leadership council managing the cohort. According to the press release, each organization has committed to different responsibilities to ensure the long-term success and maturation of the cohort model.
Categories: Arts and Ideas
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