EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
(Excerpted from A Canadian Black Empowerment Manifesto (CBEM) Version 2.0. Volume 001. Revision 002, pp. 37-39)
2020 C.E. “A YEAR OF AWAKENING.”
OUR MISSION IS EMPOWERMENT, BLACK EMPOWERMENT, AND NATIONAL EMPOWERMENT
The year 2020 has been a year of “crisis awakening” with significant impacts on peoples and nations worldwide, particularly Blacks and Indigenous peoples—the Canadian Black Empowerment Manifesto 2.0. Volume Number 001 will enable the Black community to rise to higher levels of “collective resolve,” unanimity of vision, mission, and purpose, after 50 years (1970 – 2020) of empirical and analytical observation and experiential knowledge of unmet challenges. These include anti-Black racism, police injustice, education inequity, employment inequity, and social, political, corporate, and economic exclusion. The goal is to create and implement a Canadian Black Empowerment Think Tank (CBETT) Initiative, synonymous with major corporate enterprises, designed to accomplish strategic, tactical, and operational objectives.
At the nucleus (the core) of the CBETT is a Portfolio Management Office (PMO), with 15 – 20 multi-disciplinary experts serving non-profit, for-profit, and public and private partnerships. The Black community is aware of the need to explore “new frontiers” of management ─capable of taking on Capital Cost Projects (CCP) and procurement in multi-million dollars. But, more importantly, the PMO will serve as the engine to foster an “industrial mindset” among Blacks while fuelling creativity and innovation, powered by new ideas, approaches, and funding models.
The critical need and value of the interface between the Portfolio Management Office (PMO) and multiple Program and Project Management Offices (PPMOs) are indispensable to prepare the Black community to meet the complex challenges of the emerging Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) (Industry 4.0.). The PPMOs are representative of existing and future community organizations. Therefore, the CBETT is central to facilitate “vertical” integration between the two critical entities, the PMO and the PPMOs. Likewise, the CBETT will enable “horizontal” integration across the PPMOs to establish high levels of “information sharing,” unlike organizations that function as “organizational silos,” thereby diminishing individual and collective growth and negotiating capacity.
The proposed masterclass CBETT Initiative is a hub for “big ideas” (creativity and innovation) to drive new Black empowerment approaches. The CBETT will also function as a repository for archiving data ─a skills repository to data-mine experts to assemble multi-disciplinary consortiums rapidly. To address macro-level endeavors, such as bidding on major procurement contracts, engaging in public and private consultancy, or negotiating on behalf of PPMO (community) leadership to fulfill the principal objective of the PPMO. More importantly, to ensure that the “Black empowerment” vision stands supreme as holistic, permanent, macro-level, job creation, wealth creation, and digital and physical infrastructure.
The 50 years (2021 – 2071) journey we are about to embark on will take us along many unknown, unfamiliar, challenging, and illuminating paths. This new journey invites us to invest some time to infuse a deep philosophical understanding of the nature of the journey in our minds. Specifically, the journey invites us to gain a keen insight into the multi-millions of dollars in studies, analysis, statistical reports, and recommendations that nobly strove to address the problems of minority communities, with many unanswered questions. What ought the state of the future of the Black community? Who will help to pioneer the new frontier? Can we know that we are making progress without quantitative and qualitative measures? What should be the definitive criteria to classify progress ─Black empowerment?
We will understand that we are making progress by fulfilling the goals of a representative sample of 15 Innovative Strategies that undergird holistic growth. Moreover, the manifesto proffers implementing a Black History Month Scorecard (BHMSC) ―synonymous with a “dashboard” in an automobile and an aircraft, with sufficient critical indicators to measure and report on progress during each successive Black History Month (BHM). The ultimate goal is to measure progress consistently over the next 50 years (2021 ― 2071) ─generationally.
Empowerment is essential for a society to function harmoniously. It is about the “bigger” goal of individual, community, and corporate empowerment, when combined, forms the “aggregate empowerment” of the nation. For this reason, the Black community can only achieve empowerment in the context of these higher empowerment imperatives. Furthermore, empowered people are obligated to enable others to make their highest contribution to their community, the wider community, society, corporations, and the nation. Finally, empowerment demands empirical measures of progress and growth that are equitable. Thus, black empowerment is the individual, family, community, corporate, and national empowerment.”
The Portfolio Management Office (PMO) is a “master class” organization to translate ideas to viable programs and projects, underwritten by a repository of knowledge available to develop standardization, assist with policy directives, and high-level corporate representation of issues on behalf of the Black community. These executive businesspersons, corporate individuals, retired academics, intellectuals, scientists, high-thinkers, engineers, builders, educators, community advocates, entrepreneurs, and ministers will facilitate Black community organizations with the best corporate governance in a seamless and integrated infrastructure. The need for such an entity as the PMO to undergird the CBETT cannot be overstated.
The preceding narratives to justify the need for a CBEM, CBETT, PMO, and PMMO, the challenges confronting the team of pioneers are threefold: (1) The challenge to onboard the 15 – 20 Advisory Council members that will commit to a tenure of 3-5 years. (2) To obtain the capital funding for five years before achieving self-sufficiency, and (3) to develop the administrative and portfolio management skills necessary to manage the integration (vertical) between the CBETT/PMO and the PMMOs (non-profit organizations), public/private, and for-profit entities. Likewise, the integrating (horizontal) across all of the entities mentioned above.
Gibbs _EXECSUM
September 2021