Celebrating Black History Month: An Interview with Manager Dr. Desmon Daniel
Black History Month is a time to honor and reflect on Black history and to celebrate and highlight Black contributions – past and present. This Black History Month, we interviewed our very own Detroit Labs Developer Manager Desmon Daniel, where he covered areas of leadership, opportunity, and what it means to be a Black leader in our industry. As we celebrate color this month, we challenge ourselves and others to dedicate the time and energy to continue to celebrate and recognize communities of color throughout this year and beyond.
Desmon Daniel joined Detroit Labs as a Developer Manager in April 2021 to provide dedicated support for team member growth. He brings with him over 25 years of experience in the educational and leadership space. For him, growth and new challenges are a way of life. From a sports enthusiast and athlete in school, a line-up of higher-ed degrees including a PhD in education, and completing the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion program at Cornell University to leading school districts, Dr. Daniel’s life motto is “Education is a liberating process”.
Desmon’s PhD dissertation titled “Strength for the Journey: A portrait of African American Achievers . . . African American Educational Leaders” is an award-winning work that has been noted as well researched and illustrious. Desmon’s passion as an inspirational and personal coach has led him to become a published author of two books and an active contributor within his communities.
Let’s get into the interview.
The Interview
Diana Kourani:
We will kick off. Okay.
Desmon Daniel:
Alright.
Diana:
Alright. First question that I had prepared for us is, tell me a little bit about your background and journey into leadership. Maybe how you began and milestones along the way.
Desmon:
Sure. I think I’ve always been, even since a little guy, always been in some type of leadership position. And that’s a little different in that I came from a family of four, two older brothers, one younger sister, but I always enjoyed education. And one of the things that I found is that education provided a space for me, one, to just be myself, and two, to learn, meet other people and develop social skills and all of that kind of stuff. So I took that on within my family, even having those older brothers, that I wanted to do some things that were different.
And I wanted to do some things that allowed me to grow as a person and in support of people around me and their growth, so that’s what I did. I think it was early high school, I joined a youth group that was focused on leadership. It’s a part of my fraternity actually. It’s called the Kappa Instructional Leadership League, and so I became a part of the Leadership Kappa League. And they actually took us around to colleges and things of that nature, and we had several speakers and trainers on what leadership is like, and I really enjoyed it.
So just being exposed to great mentors and family members who supported me and showed love and they were leaders within the community, so it just seemed right that I would do so. After graduating from high school, went on to Central Michigan, got a Bachelor’s in Psych. And I really, really enjoyed school, like I said before, so I just wanted to make school a life endeavor. And for me to further leadership skills, education was again, a natural route.
So I got my Bachelor’s in Psych, then a Master’s in Education, then another Master’s in Theology. And then I went on and got a PhD in Education. So it’s always been in me. I love school. And again, leadership to me, it’s about not only learning, but training, giving back to the whole venue from what you’ve come. And so that’s how it happened for me. Most of my background is in education. I worked at a couple of colleges, and then my primary work, I worked as an educational leader, assistant principal, principal, superintendent, athletic director, that kind of thing.
And again, it was just natural, just having that opportunity to lead young people, as well as lead staff members and put them in a position where they can support others in the best way possible.
Diana:
I love that. I think with a lot of what you said about your background and love for academics and school, it sounds like that had a strong influence on your path into leadership.
Desmon:
Absolutely.
Diana:
Could you talk a little bit about that bridge for me?
Desmon:
Sure. Again, I think education is a liberating process. So because education is a liberating process, how do you become liberated personally and how do you help others to become liberated? And a lot of that comes from leadership for those who want to be liberated, but don’t know how. And so when you’ve been put in a position where you can learn, you can read books and you can break the book down, and you can share it with others, and you can take different philosophies and put them into practice for yourself, you find yourself naturally in a position of leadership because people want to gravitate to you.
People want to find out, “Okay, so what if I do this, what does that mean for me?” And everybody’s on a journey, life is that way. We’re all on a journey and there come times when we meet individuals on our path. And we don’t know if we’re going to be with them for a long time or if it’s just an experience. And for me, that opportunity to give somebody a stone to help them to keep building their bridges, that’s leadership. Showing them, “Okay, this is a stone. You can do this with your stone or you can do that with your stone, the choice is yours. But this is your journey, and I’m along the journey too, so I want to help you just as much as I want help from you.”
Diana:
I love this. I love the point on journeys in that some people will be there for a long time, some, you’ll give them tools and they just continue to run with it.
Desmon:
Yeah.
Diana:
That’s a lot of influence. You mentioned your background in education and being a principal. What are things that you did to get better acquainted with being a leader once you stepped into those positions
Desmon:
I have a business, it’s a leadership training business. So it’s speaking, training and motivation, essentially. I became a John Maxwell speaker, trainer and coach, and reading the John Maxwell information was extremely helpful. So that’s a tremendous resource that I’ll always go back to, not only in my job, but in my personal life. Because again, leadership is a journey, and along your journey, you’ll meet so many different people who in many cases can benefit from a meaningful conversation.
I appreciate the fact that you said, “Okay, is it okay? Can I record this? Because I really want to be fully present with you so that I can get everything that I can and I don’t want to miss anything. I’ll go back and I can listen to it.” That’s leadership. Many people say, “No, it’s just about being present.” No, you demonstrated for me what leadership looks like and that you wanted to be present. You didn’t want anything to disturb the conversation and the flow. That’s leadership.
But so many times we take for granted those things that we do on a daily basis that it’s leadership. What you’re doing is being a leader, even when you’re leading yourself. That’s a position of leadership because you’re going through a thought process. You have your own decision matrix that you go through in order to choose to go left or to go right. That’s leadership. Someone is always watching, and if someone is always watching, that’s influence. And so you have to be intentional about your influence and that makes you a leader.
Diana:
I love this, that’s incredible.
All right. Next one, and I think we’ll wrap up the first section, but talk to me about your approach to management. Like how you approach those conversations with team members, and your management style. For example, if someone came to you with a problem, what’s your thought process there?
Desmon:
Sure, sure. First thing, that happens because we all have problems and we have problems every day. And again, we go through this decision matrix to determine, okay, is this a problem or is this just an experience? If it’s a problem, then I need to spend some time with it so I can come to the solution, the best solution so I won’t have to have this problem again. If it’s an experience, we move through the experience a little bit differently mentally, because an experience is something that I want to learn from, but I also want to make a mental note. That’s an experience. You can have an experience… Do you like sports?
Diana:
Yup.
Desmon:
What’s your favorite sport?
Diana:
Basketball.
Desmon:
Okay. You have an experience where you go to see the Pistons play and they happen to be playing the Warriors. And it happens to be one of those breakout games for Steph Curry and Draymond. And Draymond is from Saginaw my hometown, so I know him. And so both of them put up 38 points, right? If you are a basketball fan, you may be a Pistons fan, but you had a chance to see these guys put up 38 points a piece and you get excited about that because it’s the experience.
You didn’t say after this basketball game, “You know what I think I’m going to try out for the WNBA because I enjoyed that.” No, it was an experience. And so when we help others to create experiences and learn from the experiences, that’s a whole other world. Just having the chance to engage in conversation with someone. And this is typically what I try to do. We have a conversation, “So what’s the issue?” So we talk about the issue and then there’s a discussion that takes place. And it’s woven into, “Okay, you got this journey that you’re on.”
And for me, the best thing is to talk to the person to the point that you can literally see the light go off, being like, “Oh, okay. Yeah, now I can do this.” You got it. You just needed me to help you uncover this thing. The answer’s already in you. Sometimes individuals want you to affirm them, “Okay, is this the best decision?” And I would love to say, “Oh yes, it’s the best decision,” or, “No, that’s not the best decision.” But you have to make that decision about how you’re going through your journey and continue to grow through your journey. So I don’t want to give you the answer, it’s better that we discover the answer.
You know, one of my favorite books is Siddhartha. Have you ever read the book, Siddhartha?
Diana:
I haven’t, no.
Desmon:
Great book, you want to look it up?
Diana:
Just made a note about it.
Desmon:
I won’t tell you everything about it, but Siddhartha is a mythical character that goes through his life and he wants to be a great warrior, so he becomes a great warrior. And in the process of becoming a great warrior you can’t be a great warrior, unless you have vanquished somebody. You can’t sit in isolation and be a warrior, “I’m a great warrior,” but you never have a conflict. So he wanted to be the best warrior, so he went around and he conquered everyone, every community, every group that came against them.
But that desire to be a warrior stayed within him, but what do you do after you vanquish everybody? There’s nobody left. So one day he goes down to the brook, and he looks into the brook and he is looking at himself and then himself becomes another himself. So he goes from one person to two people while looking in the brook and he begins to wage war against himself. Now, anytime you war against yourself, I’m going to win, and I’m going to lose.
In this process, he learned so much about himself because the hardest battle that you’ll ever fight is the battle between you and you. That’s a challenge. So for me, the whole coaching thing, the whole working with individuals, it’s helping them to become comfortable with who they are. And in the process of becoming comfortable, it is uncomfortable because now you got to deal with some stuff that you don’t really want to deal with all the time, but some things it’s just easier to deal with.
Other things, that’s a challenge because you’re changing your true perspective or exposing yourself to the why of your decision making. “Why did I do this?” And not do it in a cursory manner. “I did this because it was the easiest thing to do.” Okay, well, you can do that until you find out that it really isn’t that easy or there’s an underlying reason for you doing this thing and you’re not ready to uncover it yet. So, okay. And when you’re ready, I’ll be here. We can talk about it.
So for me, it’s really a journey. It’s about helping people along their journey, and the process of discovering who we are in our journey. I hope I answered the question.
Diana:
I love this…You did. It’s just wonderful. It’s so refreshing to hear that take on management. You bring your coaching skills into it, which is so wholesome. You’re not spoon feeding people the conclusion, you’re just giving them nudges towards it and then they’re going to find the conclusion.
Desmon:
Yeah.
Diana:
Which is awesome.
Desmon:
Typically we do. Even if in your journey, you’re struggling with a situation and your decision is to go right when you really should have gone left. At some point going right is going to reveal itself as the wrong thing. And at that point, it’s your decision matrix. Okay, so now that I know that this is the wrong thing, what am I going to do? Am I going to turn back and go left? Or am I going to make another right? Am I going to create a path so I can get what to the place that I should have been all along? In either way, it’s the right decision.
If you start to say, “Well, it’s the wrong decision,” now you’re all messed up. But you make it right. And if you find out again in the process, ooh, this is wrong, then make the adjustment. Don’t spend time wallowing, “Oh man, I wasted a whole bunch of time.” No, think about what you learned in the process of figuring out you were wrong. Now, if I would’ve told you, you were wrong, now you’re mad at me because you feel like I’m not supporting you.
Diana:
A mentor once told me, “Whose to say that even your mistakes aren’t perfect? And I was like, “Wow, that’s…” That just struck me because I’m like, “Yeah, maybe I needed to go down this route to learn a lesson.”
Desmon:
Right. It’s a lot of learning.
I have daughters and as a parent, my thing was don’t save them from an experience. Allow them to bump their heads, but be there in case they get a concussion so I can help them. But once they bump their head, they won’t do that again.
One of the things that you probably heard someone tell a child was, “Don’t touch the stove, it’s hot.” But how does the child know what hot is?
Diana:
Right. They don’t, unless they feel it.
Desmon:
So they touch it and they have an adverse reaction to the heat that they don’t even know is heat. And just, “Oh, this hurts. I don’t want to do that again.” So now they’re still curious. “Okay, so don’t touch it when it is what? Red? Don’t touch it when that light is on? Don’t touch it…” You know what I’m saying? Because I’m going to touch it again, but I need to figure out when I can touch it. And how do you figure it out? “Well, don’t touch the oven, Johnny, when it’s on.” Johnny, turn it on, he don’t know what on is.
He’ll look, “Okay, that red light means that it’s on, so don’t do a thing because then that hurts. But if the red light isn’t on, I can do it because it won’t hurt.” Do you think that he waited until the red light was off and then touched it? No.
Diana:
Mm-mm.
Desmon:
He just touched it when he touched it.
Diana:
Exactly.
Desmon:
And so that notion of common sense, what does that mean? Common sense means that we have common experiences that taught us a common lesson. Meaning we had experiences together and those experiences that we had together taught us all the same thing. That’s not true. We can have an experience together, but what you see in that experience is different than me.
Diana:
Totally.
Desmon:
So it’s not common, and so we misuse that. “Well, it’s just common sense that you should have known this.” Well, why? We don’t have that in common. And I’m a little bit angry that you presume that we have all things in common. We don’t. We breathe air, we have blood, but we have different blood types and I don’t breathe as much as you or you don’t breathe as much as me and all that. So common sense is a misnomer, and part of this whole coaching experience is, don’t be afraid to do something different.
You don’t have to do it like I did it or like someone else did it or. This is your journey, you can chart this thing out and learn from your experiences. My favorite quote that I believe I made up myself. I haven’t heard anybody else say, but it’s, “You only know what you know, until you know something different.
You only know what you know until you learn something different. So on Monday you have all the knowledge that you have. You can’t be afraid on Tuesday to let go of something that you knew on Monday because you’ve come into a different space of knowledge. More often than not we want to hold on to Monday and say, “Well, I know, I know, I know, I know.” But everything on Tuesday is telling you, “Well, that isn’t correct.” And so part of our journey is coming to the point of saying, “I’m learning every day. That which I knew on Monday held weight for Monday and it really worked out well. But now here it is Tuesday and I’m confronted with a different opportunity that Monday didn’t hold for me. So what am I going to do?” Make a choice, move forward, etcetera.
Diana:
I love that.
Desmon:
So for me, that’s what this job is for me, it’s coaching. The administrative paperwork stuff is what it is. Going through reviews and reading feedback and all of those things. For me, those are just greater opportunities to help someone in writing their story. I approach reviews differently. All of my reviews, I’m trying to tell a story, I’m trying to paint a picture. And so I’m using the information that I have from my team members, from the feedback, from different things that I’ve experienced with that individual or on behalf of the organization to create a story.
Because it’s easier to read, and you typically will remember more about a story than just an article. You know what I mean?
Diana:
That is wonderful. Tell me more about that.
Desmon:
Because we all have a story, and my job, the review is, tell Tim’s story from last year in January to this year in January. “Well, the year started out like this. Tim did this, Tim did this. He had these experiences, and based upon those experiences he had an opportunity to interface with the client. And in his client interactions, he perceived this level of feedback based upon all of his great input, all of his dah-dah, dah-dah, dah-dah.”
And so now you move from his interface with the client to his interface with the organization, the interface with the team members. And all of these and you just weave a story to say, “These are the great things that this person experienced along their journey and here are some challenges, and this is how he overcame the challenge.” It’s a story, instead of just a bunch of bullet points.
Diana:
Yeah. Bullet points that don’t give you much context on what’s happening in the year.
Desmon:
Right. So if I can tell you the story, this was a challenging year for everyone. As we entered into year two of the pandemic, we were confronted with a number of issues, working remotely was one of them. However working remotely created greater opportunities for client interface. It seems like client interface increased once we were in a remote status versus when we were able to be out freely and about. That’s telling the story.
Diana:
I love that. All right. I want to go to this second section now, and I’m excited about this part. This is going to be a two-fold question and you can have them mesh however you like. So, what has leadership or management meant to you over the years and specifically, what does being a leader mean to you as a black male?
Desmon:
I think everybody has a natural place that they were expected to develop and evolve in within the world. So there’s a gentleman by the name of Myron Rhodes. Myron Rhodes was a football player. Myron Rhodes played football… Well, I was going to tell his school and all that stuff, but Myron Rhodes played football and he played as a running back. But he was maybe six feet tall, maybe 200 pounds. But as a running back, you get the ball, you run, somebody hits you, they knock you down. And they don’t hit you and place you down gently.
They hit you with the intention of knocking you down so that you won’t get up. That’s the intention, boom. “If I can take him out, then I’ve done a good job and they got to put in a second string person who isn’t as good as the first. That gives us an advantage.” This is a young man who played four years in college, was drafted into the NFL, and one of the individuals in one of the presentations that he was at or whatever, a young lady took the time to ask him, “So how is it that you’ve been able to play a running back and get all of these yards and get all of these different accolades? How is it that you just keep on getting up and going back into that huddle and getting back on that line and doing exactly what you were expected to do?”
And he simply said, “I was born for this.” I think that as a leader and a manager, I was born to do this. So that gives me the opportunity to look at every experience that I have and say, “Yesterday’s experience prepared me for today.” And as an African-American man, that’s who I am. There’s nothing I can do to change that, there’s nothing I can do to separate myself from my cultural experience. And so I bring all of that with me whenever I go, wherever I go. When people say things like, “I don’t see color,” that’s challenging for me. I don’t really know what that means, unless you’re color-blind or unless you are blind.
I see color, but that’s just it, I have to see it as color, but that doesn’t tell me who you are. So as African-American male, I’ve been put in positions where I was the underdog quite often. I’ve been blessed with the ability to read and to be able to read something and then synthesize it for someone else. So then that means that you have to be articulate in order to continue a conversation or make presentations, etcetera. So I’ve been articulate since I was a little guy.
As a little guy, I read the dictionary. I got two older brothers, one younger sister, and I was the one that loved school. So I remember going into my closet, in the back of my closet with a little light, set up a little place in the back of my closet, my little desk area and just reading the dictionary over one summer. Now, who does that? I loved education and I couldn’t do all of the things that they could do physically, because I was the little guy.
So, okay, I’m going to do something that’s going to benefit me. So I read the dictionary. Not knowing that all of those words would help me later on, but that was a part of my experience and I was fully present reading that dictionary and I learned from it.
So it’s an honor to serve as African-American male leader in a community that was never designed for you to be a leader within, never designed. In fact, systemically, there were things put in place so that I wouldn’t be where I am, and I understand that.
I knew when I said, “I’m going to go and get my PhD,” I knew that that was bigger than me. I did it for various reasons, but I understood that this educational system was never set up for a black male, female minority to ever succeed, to ever move from first grade to second grade to third. They weren’t thinking of us. But when you take that and you say, “I’m going to do it anyway. I’m going to learn the stuff you want me to learn, even though some of the stuff isn’t even relevant in my life. You’re not even telling me the truth in all of these situations. My history is hidden from me, you don’t even want me to explore my history. When I start talking about it, it’s a problem. That’s a confrontation, but I’m going to use your own system to help me move forward and in the process, develop a system that’s going to help more people like me to move ahead and celebrate who they are.” So I’m extremely proud to be the person that I am, the person I was created to be.
I’m extremely proud to have had experiences that have prepared me, yes, through all of my yesterdays to be where I am right now. So now it’s a little easier for me because I’m a little older. It’s a little easier for me to stand fully present in a place and say something that people may not have wanted to hear, but they needed to hear. And I think that’s my responsibility. I don’t know what my life would’ve been like had I not been in the skin that I’m in, and I don’t even want to think about it.
Diana:
That’s incredible. Thank you for sharing that. A lot of what you said struck chords with me, but one of them was that you’re in a system that’s designed for you not to succeed and even be in the position you’re in right now. And so just jumping back to that, you’re this African-American male, when you looked into Labs, did you think, “Oh, I want to join the tech industry?” Or did you find Detroit Labs then say, “Oh, it’s in the tech industry and I like this?”.
Desmon:
I found Detroit Labs, which is in a tech industry, but the role, the space that’s been carved out for me could be done in any space, trust me. Because the space that they carved out was to support people along their journey, and that’s what I do. So it made it very, very easy for me to be the person that I am in the tech industry. I think sometimes… Well, it’s tech, so you have to do this, this and this. No.
Diana:
Right.
Desmon:
… that’s again, break that stereotype. No, we’re not your typical managers. We don’t manage your project. We don’t say, “You should be doing this on this project. This needs to be done. I saw the scope of work here and it appears as if the scope of work isn’t going to meet the deadline that we had in place. We’re supposed to be done with this next week. And it looks like this coding is…” Mm-mm, that’s not what we do. We support you as a person no matter what project you’re on, no matter what the status is of your project.
If you’re frustrated with the status, you can talk to us about it and we’ll help you in the mental gymnastics associated with working through your frustration. That’s what we do. That could be done in any arena. I’m grateful that all of my yesterdays prepared me to meet Detroit Labs and present myself as a person that I am.
Diana:
I love that. I love that because it’s definitely alignment on both ends. And it’s not that you were just going into the tech space, but you found an org that aligns with you with regards to tech. Like how you were saying, you’re vetting this company as this company is vetting you. So if this was a company that wasn’t aligned with your initiatives or supportive of just who you are as a human being-
Desmon:
That’s problematic.
Diana:
Yep.
Desmon:
That’s problematic.
Diana:
Totally.
Desmon:
Imagine this, you’re going to… Any time that you apply for a full-time job, you know that you’re going to spend at least 40 hours a week doing that in that atmosphere, experiencing that culture, being shaped by that culture and all that stuff. If you find that that’s not where you want to be, why would you spend 40 hours of your awake time doing something that you don’t like? I don’t have to do that.
Diana:
Totally.
Desmon:
I don’t have to do that and we don’t have to do it. So why would we make that kind of compromise and leave our best self at home because I got to do this dreaded job.
Diana:
That’s like emotional, spiritual torture. It just sucks the life out of you.
Desmon:
Sure it is. And you did it to yourself by saying, “Yes, I want this job.”
Diana:
Yup.
Desmon:
And so, Detroit Labs is everything that I thought it would be, and it allows me to be in touch with a greater part of myself every day when I go to work. Every day, really? That’s awesome.
Diana:
That right there is so awesome. Yeah.
Desmon:
Yeah. Imagine that.
Diana:
I love that. All right. I have two more questions for you.
Desmon:
Sure.
Diana:
What advice would you lend over to someone looking to get into the tech space? Maybe even a person of color if we want to get that specific.
Desmon:
For me, this is advice that I would give anyone. First, the general advice, whatever space you want to find yourself in, make sure that that’s the space that you want to find yourself in. Meaning, don’t get into a job just because it pays well, don’t get into a job because they have an awesome PTO policy. Don’t get into a job because I don’t have a job and I got to have a job in order to meet my daily expectations for my family, financial obligations, etcetera, etcetera. Don’t do that, because when you do that, you’re denying someone else who should be in that space an opportunity to be in that space.
So this is the space for me, and if you find yourself in a position where you’re looking for an opportunity for you to be whole and contribute your whole self, and you find that that area is in tech. And I’m not in tech, I’m a manager, I’m a coach, I’m an advocate. And I happen to work in an organization that is tech-based, but I’m not a technician. My technical skills are limited. I’m not a coder. I went through Code Academy because I thought that that would be a good thing.
I would encourage any person who has an inclination to support people or support growth development. Those persons who are working in the tech field who say, “All right, I like to tinker with things and make something out of absolutely nothing.” Yep, this is what you want to do, because it’s going to stretch you, it’s going to push you. You’re going to work with individuals at varying skill levels who come together as a team and they bring their best self into the experience and you’re going to be pushed in that. That’s great.
If that’s not your strength, then find the area of your strength and put yourself in it by giving everything that you can so you can be there. If you’re looking for a place that really appreciates diversity, not only diversity of culture, meaning of one’s ethnic race, but the makeup of the individual and supports the whole individual. And this is a great place to be and I found it. And again, it’s awesome. It’s awesome.
Diana:
All right. Last question for you. As an African-American manager, in this tech space, what is something you’re looking forward to in the coming years?
Desmon:
Growing as an individual, watching the organization grow, not necessarily numerically, but grow in creating a safe space for people to be whole. And whatever that looks like, I don’t want to paint a picture of what it should look like because I’m limited in my perspective as to what it should look like. But I know I want to be a part of that process. The opportunity to help people become whole, that’s awesome.
Diana:
I love that.
Desmon:
So I want to be a part of that kind of organization that supports wholeness.
Diana:
That’s the perfect wrap-up for this. Thank you for that.
Desmon:
Yeah, no problem at all.
I’ve enjoyed my journey and find myself in Detroit Labs now, and I’m enjoying this space that I occupy and look forward to just growing with individuals, the organization, and being a part of this vital community, vibrant community.
Diana:
I love this. Thank you again Desmon for taking the time to have this thoughtful conversation with me. I had a wonderful time. I’ll wrap things up for now and I’ll catch you later.
Desmon:
Bye now.