I Know I Belong When...

Innovation Unbiased
  • 5.0 (13)
  • Management

Bold voices. Curious stories. Authentic Impact.What does it really mean to belong?Not just to be invited... To be seen. Heard. Needed."I Know I Belong When…" is more than a podcast; it’s a movement. A mirror. A megaphone. It’s where raw truth meets radical hope.Each episode brings you unfiltered conversations with people who’ve wrestled with the question of belonging in the spaces that shape our lives: workplaces, schools, communities, and digital worlds. From the boardroom to the breakroom, from the sidewalks to our living rooms, our guests share the exact moment they knew they were in, and the moments they knew they weren’t.______This is not about feel-good soundbites. It’s about radical accountability.We explore:~  Where equity is the foundation, not a divider.~  The steps it takes to build diverse cultures, not only to survive, though to prosper.~  Ensure inclusion is not just a checkbox; it is a commitment.~  Where accessibility is not an afterthought, but the amplification to thrive.______At the heart of our conversation is the Belonging Formula:"Belonging = (Inclusion × (Diversity + Equity)) ^ Accessibility."It’s not just math; it’s a mindset. A blueprint. A challenge to every leader, builder, and changemaker: Are you creating spaces where every identity is not only welcomed, however, is valued and respected?______Here’s how we do it:[ We Say Names ]Names are not nicknames. They carry legacy, identity, and power. Inspired by #AlwaysChristopher #NeverChris, we explore how honoring someone’s name is the first act of belonging.[ The Moment of Belonging ]A defining story. A turning point. The moment our guest knew: I belong here. We unpack how that moment shaped their confidence, creativity, and connection.[ Navigating Non-Belonging ]We don’t shy away from the hard stuff. Guests share what it felt like to be excluded, erased, or underestimated, and how they reclaimed their space and voice.[ Sustaining Belonging ]What does it take to keep that feeling alive? We explore the systems, rituals, and leadership practices that make belonging a daily reality, not a one-time event.______Why it matters:This podcast is for anyone who’s ever asked: Do I really belong here?And for every leader who’s ready to answer: Yes, and here’s how we’ll prove it.Whether you’re building inclusive teams, designing accessible tech, or rethinking your own role in equity work, these stories will challenge you to show up differently. To lead with intention. To listen with humility. To act with courage.Because belonging isn’t a destination, it’s a practice. And it starts with listening.

  1. 4d ago

    The fashion industry was the problem: Designing for disability and dignity with Pamela Shainhouse

    Belonging does not begin at the office. It begins in the mirror, in the clothes that do or do not fit, and in whether the room was built with you in mind. On this episode of I Know I Belong When…, host Christopher Bylone sits down with Pamela Shainhouse, an entrepreneur, accessibility advocate, and lifelong fundraiser who spent a career proving that the people the world leaves out were never the problem. The design was. Pamela built Canada’s first size-diverse and sustainable fashion brand years before inclusive design had a name, brought it to the runway at Toronto Fashion Week, and later founded a consultancy that helps organizations treat accessibility as a daily practice rather than a slogan. Her story moves across the arenas of a whole life: the private work of self-worth, the structural reality of disability in public space, and the family legacy that still drives her. This is a conversation about building belonging in everyday life, about authentic leadership earned the hard way, and about the language that lets a person name a sense of belonging that reaches far past any workplace. Christopher, Principal Strategist of Innovation Unbiased and a voice in people experience and strategic inclusion, draws out how Pamela turned exclusion into design, grief into a mission, and decades of imposter syndrome into the moment she knew she belonged exactly where she stood. Must-hear insights and key moments - The reframe that opens the show: why the fashion industry, and not the body, was the thing that needed to change, and what Pamela built instead - The story behind her name, and why she reclaimed her father’s legacy after her divorce when she could have let it go - The runway moment with model Whitney Thompson when years of imposter syndrome lifted and she knew the work was hers - What exclusion looks like in practice: event design, back-of-room seating, and what it takes to move a walker through a crowd of five hundred - How curb cuts explain accessibility as something that serves everyone, from a parent with a stroller to a traveler with a bag - The origin of her fashion line in her daughter Ally’s story, and the charity that now carries Ally’s name - Her closing challenge to organizations to make access a line in the budget rather than an afterthought Pamela’s standout quotes - “we should all belong, and we should all belong in the same room all together” - “our money looks exactly like anybody else’s” - “Mommy, I don’t feel like wearing poly and ester from China” - “Do you know what it’s like to push a walker through 500 people in a small room” - “I don’t know what the hell’s wrong with you, but nobody sees what you see, so smarten the hell up” - “I build my life in testimony to my daughter” - “I know I belonged when I looked in that mirror and realized that I am who I am, and I’m happy to be that person” Why this episode matters Belonging is often sold as a workplace perk. Pamela’s story puts it back where it actually lives, in self-worth, in the design of public space, and in the choices that decide who gets through the door. She gives listeners plain language for the difference between being tolerated and being built for, and she shows that creating belonging in everyday life is a practice anyone can start. The result is a sense of belonging that holds up at home, in community, and in every system a person has to navigate. Who should listen This episode is for anyone, not only people leaders. For the person still working out who they are. For parents and anyone building a home or a chosen family. For disabled people and the allies who want to show up better. For community organizers and people of faith. For HR leaders, people managers, and inclusion practitioners building inclusive culture on real teams. For designers, founders, and anyone who shapes a space others have to live in. And for anyone searching for the words to name belonging in their own life. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    The fashion industry was the problem: Designing for disability and dignity with Pamela Shainhouse

  2. Oct 19

    Joy is a choice, not a personality: Rewiring what your brain notices with Rachel Bents

    Joy is not a personality trait handed out at birth. It is a practice, it is available in the middle of a hard season, and Rachel Bents can explain the biology of how it works. In this episode of I Know I Belong When…, Rachel Bents joins host, Christopher Bylone, for a conversation about what changes when joy stops being the reward at the end of the work and becomes the thing that makes the work possible. Rachel is the founder of The Joy Collective, the author of Joy Is the Strategy, and the creator of the ENJOY Method, a framework grounded in wellness, connection, giving, and purpose. She hosts the Joy Unfiltered podcast and holds two master's degrees, in education and kinesiology. What gives this conversation its weight is where Rachel locates her own belonging, and where she lost it. She did not know she belonged in a room somebody else designed. She knew it in a community she created almost by accident in her fifties, when roughly five hundred people joined a joy membership she had started on a whim. She knew the opposite at a four-person consulting firm, at the table where leadership was rewriting its values, when she proposed fun as one of them and the chief executive dismissed it in a single sentence. That night she told her husband she needed a new job, whatever the salary. This is belonging as a whole-life reality: in the version of yourself nobody else is present for, in the communities you choose, in recovery rooms, and in a workplace where one sentence can tell a person they are finished there. Must-hear insights and key moments •  Why joy remains available in a hard season, and the difference between choosing joy and pretending nothing is wrong •  The eleven million bits of information arriving in your brain every second, and how the filter that sorts them can be retrained •  The moment Rachel knew she belonged: a joy membership started as a lark, five hundred members, and the exhale that followed •  The sentence from a chief executive that ended a job Rachel liked, and the non-negotiable values she wrote because of it •  How she reworked the interview into a two-way conversation once she understood that an employer does not hold all the power •  What recovery rooms taught her about shared humanity, and the breath she takes before entering any room •  Her thirty-second practice for retraining attention: notice, allow, share Rachel's standout quotes "So joy is always available. I think that is the first thing for people to recognize." "it is our brains, and we can train our brains to filter for joy" "All of a sudden, I had five hundred people like, I don't know, a couple of months join this joy membership, and I thought, 'Oh, these are my people.'" "I was finally in my fifties learning these are my gifts, and I can fully exhale." "it was like somebody turned the light on and said, 'You do not belong here.'" "I don't care how much money they're paying me, I need a new job." "I'm in recovery. and I think what those rooms taught me was that I am no different than anybody else." Why this episode matters Most conversations about joy stop at encouragement. This one does not. Rachel describes the mechanism, names what it cost her to remain somewhere her values were dismissed, and gives listeners language for the difference between a room that tolerates a person and a room where that person knows they belong. Her answer to the closing question refuses the premise of the show's own sentence. Who should listen Anyone working out who they are and what they are for. Parents and people building a home or a chosen family. Students, educators, and anyone earning a credential later in life. Community builders, organizers, and people in recovery. HR leaders, people managers, and anyone practicing strategic inclusion or building an inclusive culture across remote and hybrid teams. And anyone searching for language to name a sense of belonging in everyday life, well past the workplace. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    Joy is a choice, not a personality: Rewiring what your brain notices with Rachel Bents

  3. Oct 12

    People are the whole thing: The courage to be out and leave the group better with Steve Yacovelli

    Belonging does not arrive with a new tool, a new title, or a new job. It arrives when people decide to make room for each other. On this episode of I Know I Belong When…, Dr. Steve Yacovelli, known to many as The Gay Leadership Dude®, joins host, Christopher Bylone, for a conversation about courage, identity, and the human side of every change. Steve has spent more than 30 years in leadership and change management, from IBM and Disney to his own firm, TopDog Learning Group. He is the author of five books, including Pride Leadership and Your Queer Career®. He opens with a truth every organization adopting AI needs to hear: buying the license does not mean people will use it. Change is a people problem first, and people are the whole thing. Then the conversation turns personal. Steve returns to the mid-1990s and a small software company in Orlando, where he had just come to know himself as a gay man. He shared that truth with colleagues a little at a time, in an era when coming out at work held real risk. Their answer taught him what a sense of belonging at work can sound like. He also recalls the day he confronted a colleague's homophobic joke at 25, and the fire it lit that has never gone out. Steve also names the moment he knew he did not belong: a boss who questioned his executive future because of the car he drove. That comment made him notice how alike the leaders around him were, and it still shapes how he checks his own assumptions about people. Must-hear insights and key moments • Why AI adoption stalls when companies skip the change management basics they already know • How The Gay Leadership Dude® name means Steve never has to come out again • Coming out at work in the 1990s, one conversation at a time, and the colleagues who answered with "We don't care" • Confronting a homophobic joke, and using privilege to defend people who hold less of it • Judged by his car: the comment that told Steve he did not belong • "And siblings": the gracious correction that became his standard language Steve's standout quotes "But now I don't have to come out anymore." "I had 24 years, not knowing who I was. At this moment, I now know, and I'm not going to look back." "I don't know where that courage came up as a 25-year-old in this workplace who had just came out, but it was there, and that fire has not gone out ever since." "I have left the group much better than how I found them" The ally A.I. prompt Swap in any group you want to support. Context: I want to understand the current challenges facing LGBTQ+ professionals in the financial industry, but I don’t want to burden my colleagues with questions. Role: Act as a Cultural Historian and Sociologist. Action: Summarize the top 3 systemic barriers this group faces in corporate environments and suggest how a leader can mitigate them. Format: A 1-page summary with 3 to 5 “Actionable Takeaways” for a Senior Manager. Target Tone: Insightful, data-driven, and empathetic. Why this episode matters Organizations are racing to adopt AI, and many are repeating an old mistake: treating change as a technology problem. Steve's story is a reminder that inclusive culture and authentic leadership are built by people, one decision at a time. Belonging grew for him when colleagues valued what he contributed, and when he found the courage to speak up for himself and others. His closing statement gives listeners language for building belonging anywhere: leave every group better than you found it. Who should listen Anyone working out who they are, or deciding when and how to share it. LGBTQ+ professionals and the allies who want to show up for them. HR leaders, people managers, and change practitioners guiding AI adoption. Anyone who has been judged by a car, a wardrobe, or a first impression. And anyone searching for language to name belonging in their own life, at work and far beyond it. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    People are the whole thing: The courage to be out and leave the group better with Steve Yacovelli

  4. Oct 5

    Six arenas, one life: What season four revealed about inclusive culture beyond the workplace

    A parking lot. A lunch counter. An empty chair. A baby left with somebody who had never met him. Four moments from four lives, with nothing in common except the thing happening underneath all of them. Season four of I Know I Belong When… brought twelve guests through twelve conversations. This recap does what the season could not do in real time. Host Christopher Bylone, Principal Strategist at Innovation Unbiased, lays it across the six arenas where a life is lived: Self, Home, Learning, Community, Work, and Society. What comes out is a map. Belonging in the workplace is one arena of six, and this episode is direct about what happens when one gets treated as the whole picture. You will hear a woman change a verdict about herself in a room in Detroit, a ten-year-old learn what mattering registers as in the body, a four-time chief human resources officer ask a boardroom to justify a parking lot, and two men in 1975 eastern North Carolina find out whether a door would open. Two guests appear twice, in two different arenas. That repetition is the argument. The behavior a person practices in one part of life is what the other parts are already asking for, which means the skill you think you are missing is one you already have somewhere else. Must-hear insights and key moments Self. Pasha Marlowe changes a verdict on day two, in a room that had not changed at all. Öykü Api retires the question that hands it away. Home. Greg De Koker, ten years old and lost for three and a half hours. Rebecca Taylor, left with a baby she had never met. Learning. Greg returns at eleven, certain he cheated a prize he won. Grant Harris, teaching special education, concludes it is not the children. Community. Darlene King Turner builds a room and a seventeen-year-old comes out with a village. Fabi Preslar promises a book that does not exist. Pasha counts chairs. Work. Kate McKinnon is disciplined for eating with the participants. Salomão Cunha Lima runs thirteen people on a rule about what he says out loud. Dean Carter prices a parking lot. Society. Effenus Henderson and a colleague test a door. Julie Pham sits across from men the state reduced to a single word. What traveled. Six behaviors, each turning up in two arenas, carried by people who have never met.   Guests' standout quotes Pasha Marlowe: “day two, I decided that I belonged... because I belong to myself” Öykü Api: “You stop asking, ‘Do I fit in here?’ And start trusting the fact that, ‘Mm, I will find my way here no matter what.’” Greg De Koker: “home isn’t just a physical dwelling. It was a feeling and I could just feel it in my body” Grant Harris: “It’s not always— it ain’t always the people” Darlene King Turner, quoting a scholarship recipient: “Today, I just acquired a new village.” Dean Carter: “Tell me what’s the ROI of your parking lot. Do you have one?” Effenus Henderson: “Let’s see what happens if we show there one day.”   Why this episode matters Most conversations about belonging start at work and stay there. This one starts with a person alone and ends with a country nobody elected into, treating everything between as one continuous life rather than six compartments. For anyone building inclusive culture, the payoff is transfer. The meeting habit worth deleting at work is the habit worth naming at a dinner table. The chairs you count before a community gathering are the chairs somebody needed. Belonging is what inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility produce together, carried farther when justice distributes it. Who should listen Anyone working out who they are and whether that is enough. Parents, partners, and people building a home or chosen family. Students, educators, and anyone returning to school or earning a credential later in life. Community builders, organizers, coaches, and people of faith. HR leaders, people managers, and inclusion practitioners who want language that reaches past the workplace. And anyone who has been the only one in a room and stayed anyway. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    Six arenas, one life: What season four revealed about inclusive culture beyond the workplace

  5. Sep 28

    People live beyond their labels: Curiosity without conditions with Julie Pham

    The room where Julie Pham knew she belonged held none of her credentials. No Cambridge doctorate. No Gates scholarship. No bestseller list. It was a prison, and nobody inside knew who she was on paper. Dr. Julie Pham is the founder and CEO of CuriosityBased, and she joins host Christopher Bylone for a conversation that travels from a refugee family’s naming decision, to a correctional facility, to a weekly team meeting where a third of the agenda goes to how everyone is actually doing. Her argument is simple and inconvenient. Curiosity is a practice rather than a personality trait. It can be learned, named, and shared, and nobody gets to opt out. This episode of I Know I Belong When… is about what happens when the labels come off. Julie walked into Washington Corrections Center through the nonprofit Defy Ventures and sat across from men serving time for serious crimes. She arrived carrying assumptions. She left understanding that people hold lives far larger than the worst thing they have done, and she has asked ever since where the edges of our compassion sit. She also reframes code switching as strategic communication rather than loss, names the moments her work was not counted as real work, and offers one question worth asking a colleague this week. Building belonging is not a program bolted onto a culture deck. It is something a person knows, across self, home, community, work, and society. This conversation gives language for all five. Must-hear insights and key moments •  Julie is her American name. Hoai is the name she was born with, and it means to remember one’s homeland. Her parents chose it in 1978, after her father spent three years in a reeducation camp and the family knew they would leave Vietnam for good. •  Why "What is your real name?" misses the person, and what to ask instead. •  Code switching as a choice rather than a cost, and why Julie calls it strategic communication. •  The prison visit that changed how she hears a neighborhood notice, a news story, and a person she disagrees with. •  Three moments of non-belonging in one organization: relationship building treated as socializing, an email thread that went silent after she spoke, and paper lanterns above her desk that a team complained about for years without telling her. •  The highs and lows ritual her team runs weekly, why the lows come from outside work, and what it does to hard conversations later. •  The question she wants every listener to carry into their next conversation, delivered word for word. Julie’s standout quotes "I have to actually get curious about myself before I can ask other people questions" "I actually think of it as strategic communication, and that we get to code switch, not that we have to." "let the person tell you how they want to be called" "they have lives beyond their labels" "Do I let other people change?" "every work has value and it just requires different skill sets." "My company is like my child. It’s an extension of who I am. It’s not just work." Why this episode matters Most conversations about inclusive culture stay inside the office. This one does not. The practice that helps a leader hear a quiet colleague is the same one that lets anyone see past a label, a record, or a name they cannot pronounce. Curiosity sits underneath strategic inclusion, authentic leadership, and human-centered innovation, and it is available to anyone willing to practice it out loud. Who should listen Anyone working out who they are and where their value lands. Immigrants, children of immigrants, and anyone carrying more than one name. Parents and people building a home or chosen family. Community builders, organizers, and anyone who cares what a second chance requires. Founders whose work is inseparable from who they are. HR leaders, people managers, and people experience practitioners building belonging in the workplace. And anyone searching for language to name belonging in everyday life. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    People live beyond their labels: Curiosity without conditions with Julie Pham

  6. Sep 21

    Beyond inclusion, build the bridge: Social architecture with Salomão Cunha Lima

    Some people wait for a door to open. Salomão Cunha Lima decided the room needed to be built. In this episode of I Know I Belong When…, host, Christopher Bylone, is joined by Salomão Cunha Lima, founder and CEO of Sal&Co, a Social Architecture Lab in São Paulo, Brazil. The conversation moves through every arena of a life: self, home, community, work, and society. Salomão calls his work social architecture rather than social impact, and the difference is structural. On one side is a company. On the other is a community. Neither side changes shape. The work is designing something strong enough for both to cross and durable enough to outlast the announcement. Across eighteen years in Latin America he has mobilized more than two million dollars in corporate partnerships for clients including BMW, Disney, and Deloitte. He also makes an argument here that reorders two words people often treat as interchangeable. Inclusion, he says, carries a hierarchy inside it. Someone grants, and someone receives. A sense of belonging works differently, and it begins with permission a person gives to themselves. This is a conversation about inclusive culture, authentic leadership, and human-centered innovation. It is equally about faith, a name he almost surrendered for the convenience of strangers, and what a person does when no existing room will hold them. Must-hear insights and key moments •  Why social architecture is a bridge rather than a program, and why the design has to account for who will cross it •  The distinction between inclusion and belonging, and why one of them requires someone else’s permission •  The story of his name, opened three times from a Bible, and the stranger in Las Vegas who told him to stop making it easy for everyone else •  How GAMES began: government affairs, media, entrepreneurs, and supporters, built because no room like it existed •  The church that asked him to stand before the congregation and ask forgiveness, and the answer he gave instead •  What he practices inside his own small company, including naming his own overwhelm out loud instead of assigning fault •  His single call to action, which is smaller and harder than it sounds Salomão’s standout quotes "So for me to be included, I need the permission of others to include me" "there is no place where I feel I belong, that I can bring my authentic self" "So if I don't find a place where I belong, so let me try to build this place" "I didn't do anything wrong with anyone here. I'm not gonna do it." "from that moment, I just understood that I had the strength to say no to some environments" "it's about self-esteem, it's about self-love, it's about self-respect" "believe in yourself, but if sometimes you don't have the strength to move forward, just stop and raise the hand and ask for help" "When I am in a place where I can smile, feel myself at home, and know that I own the party" Why this episode matters Most conversations about strategic inclusion stop at the office door. This one does not. Salomão traces a single practice across a childhood in northeast Brazil, a faith, a corporate career, and a country where the fight is far from settled. The through line is that he stopped waiting for a place to be offered and started building places instead. For anyone working out how belonging actually gets made rather than announced, this is building belonging with structure behind it. Who should listen Anyone working out who they are and what they add to the rooms they enter. Parents and people building a home or a chosen family. Community builders, organizers, and people of faith holding a question about whether both can be true at once. HR leaders, people managers, and inclusion practitioners looking for language that holds up outside a training deck. Founders and consultants designing partnerships that outlast a press release. And anyone searching for words to name belonging in everyday life. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    Beyond inclusion, build the bridge: Social architecture with Salomão Cunha Lima

  7. Sep 14

    It takes a village: how ordinary people build inclusive culture with Darlene King Turner

    Belonging is not a program that gets rolled out at work. It is the durable knowledge that who you are is enough, and it has to hold at home, in your community, and in the wider society, not only in a conference room. In this episode of I Know I Belong When…, Darlene King Turner joins host, Christopher Bylone, for a conversation that refuses to keep belonging inside the workplace. Darlene is CEO and president of the Unity Collaborative, where she designs strategic initiatives that dismantle systemic barriers for businesses, youth, families, and whole communities at once. She led the Michigan Diversity Council for ten years, and before that she directed training and development for all thirty-four school districts in Wayne County. Before any of that, she spent six years as a national concert promoter, touring the world and producing shows across Detroit. She learned to fill a room long before she learned to change one. Her central claim arrives early, and it reframes everything after it. Belonging does not belong to an institution or an entity. It belongs to every living, breathing person. No degree and no title is required to create a space where another person knows they belong. That is true for a chief executive, and it is just as true for a student, a neighbor, and a store clerk. Must-hear insights & key moments Why building belonging is engineered rather than announced, and what twenty-five years of strategic inclusion taught Darlene about making it hold.The story her name carries: parents who migrated from the segregated South, and a grandmother who raised twelve children and bought her home without ever holding a formal job.The moment Darlene knew she belonged, in a room that held both General Colin Powell and President Barack Obama early in her career, and what she noticed about every other person there.The moment she knew she no longer belonged, when new leadership pushed her out after ten strong years, and the reversal when thirty-four organizations left with her and asked her to build something new.Representation as strategy, including the statistic behind the National Black Men in Leadership Conference and the seventeen-year-old whose response gave this episode its title.Creating belonging in everyday life, at the grocery store, the gas station, and on the bus, where authentic leadership shows up with no audience and no job title attached.Darlene’s standout quotes “We all carry the ability to create spaces of belonging.” “if you don’t know where you came from, then you really don’t know where you’re going” “It wasn’t by luck or happenstance. It was where I was destined to be.” “I knew I belonged. I knew. I just knew it.” “the light comes out of the darkest moments.” “it is everyone’s job no matter where you are.” “I know that I belong when I feel safe.” Why this episode matters Belonging is the outcome of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility working together, not one more pillar on a list. Darlene shows what that outcome asks of people in practice: cross-sector partnerships, representation a young person can recognize, and human-centered innovation in the smallest daily exchanges. Her story also names the real cost when a structure turns on a person. Listeners leave with language for belonging they can carry into a boardroom, a school district, a living room, or a checkout line. Who should listen This conversation reaches every arena of a life. Anyone working out who they are and what they carry. Parents, partners, and people building a home or a chosen family. Community builders, organizers, educators, and people of faith. HR leaders, people managers, and people experience practitioners working on belonging in the workplace and inclusive culture in remote and hybrid teams. Anyone searching for words to name a sense of belonging in their own life. Everyone here has a reason to listen, not only people leaders. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    It takes a village: how ordinary people build inclusive culture with Darlene King Turner

  8. Sep 7

    A Queens kid learns to ask for help: vulnerability, trust, and connection with Rebecca Taylor

    Belonging does not begin at work. It begins in the people who hand you a baby at a family picnic and never think twice, in the neighbors who show up when the holidays fall apart, and in the quiet moment you finally let yourself ask for help. On this episode of I Know I Belong When…, host Christopher Bylone welcomes Rebecca Taylor, a people strategy leader who has spent more than a decade in HR saying the quiet part out loud. Rebecca co-founded SkillCycle and helped scale it onto Inc's fastest growing companies list three years running, and she now leads community and content at All Voices, where she hosts HR Voices. She is also a Queens kid who will not go 10 minutes without telling you so. This is a conversation about building belonging across every arena of a life. Rebecca traces the four-generation friend family that raised her, the moment at work when she knew she did not belong, and the leader she chose to become because of it. Belonging, here, is not one more pillar of inclusion work. It is the outcome of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility done well, and it gives listeners language to name a sense of belonging in their own lives. Must-hear insights and key moments Why comfort and certainty are not the same as safety, and why real growth requires being uncomfortableWhat a four-generation friend family taught her about trust, including the moment a near-stranger handed her a baby without a second thoughtHow a high school falling out taught her that belonging is something you help build, not something you wait forThe recruiting agency moment that sent a chill down her spine, when a qualified candidate was gatekept over the area code on her phoneWhy she changed her name professionally to be considered palatable, and what that revealed about the culture around herHow she rebuilt HR Voices to center the human in front of you, not the system on paperThe one small, unscripted step she wants every listener to take this week to build the muscle of connectionRebecca's standout quotes “we try to strive for comfort and clarity, and we think that that's the goal, but I don't think it really exists in workplaces.” “You're in the family. Like, I know that nothing's going to happen to this child in your care, because that's the level of just, like, connection that we all have.” “You can call me in 10 years, we might not have spoken, like I'm here. Whatever I can do, I'm here, right?” “when I realized that this was sort of a whole agency that was gatekeeping roles from people who didn't look a specific way, I was like, ‘I can't.’” “I know that I belong to you and you belong to me when I can ask you for help, and I don't feel like I have to bend over backwards to do it.” Why this episode matters Belonging is not a workplace perk. It is a whole-life reality that shows up at the family table, in the text thread that lights up when life falls apart, and in the courage to be seen. Rebecca's story gives listeners language for belonging that reaches from self to home to community to work, and it reframes vulnerability as the doorway to trust rather than a risk to manage. For anyone building inclusive culture or practicing authentic leadership, this episode is a reminder that people experience is human experience first. Who should listen This one is for everyone. It is for the person working out who they are and learning to ask for help. It is for parents, caregivers, and anyone building a home or a chosen family. It is for community builders, organizers, connectors, and people of faith who nurture the circles around them. It is for HR leaders, people managers, and inclusion practitioners searching for strategic inclusion and human-centered innovation that starts with the human in front of them. And it is for anyone looking for language to name belonging in their own everyday life. An Innovation Unbiased Production https://www.iknowibelongwhen.com/about-the-show

    A Queens kid learns to ask for help: vulnerability, trust, and connection with Rebecca Taylor
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Bold voices. Curious stories. Authentic Impact.What does it really mean to belong?Not just to be invited... To be seen. Heard. Needed."I Know I Belong When…" is more than a podcast; it’s a movement. A mirror. A megaphone. It’s where raw truth meets radical hope.Each episode brings you unfiltered conversations with people who’ve wrestled with the question of belonging in the spaces that shape our lives: workplaces, schools, communities, and digital worlds. From the boardroom to the breakroom, from the sidewalks to our living rooms, our guests share the exact moment they knew they were in, and the moments they knew they weren’t.______This is not about feel-good soundbites. It’s about radical accountability.We explore:~  Where equity is the foundation, not a divider.~  The steps it takes to build diverse cultures, not only to survive, though to prosper.~  Ensure inclusion is not just a checkbox; it is a commitment.~  Where accessibility is not an afterthought, but the amplification to thrive.______At the heart of our conversation is the Belonging Formula:"Belonging = (Inclusion × (Diversity + Equity)) ^ Accessibility."It’s not just math; it’s a mindset. A blueprint. A challenge to every leader, builder, and changemaker: Are you creating spaces where every identity is not only welcomed, however, is valued and respected?______Here’s how we do it:[ We Say Names ]Names are not nicknames. They carry legacy, identity, and power. Inspired by #AlwaysChristopher #NeverChris, we explore how honoring someone’s name is the first act of belonging.[ The Moment of Belonging ]A defining story. A turning point. The moment our guest knew: I belong here. We unpack how that moment shaped their confidence, creativity, and connection.[ Navigating Non-Belonging ]We don’t shy away from the hard stuff. Guests share what it felt like to be excluded, erased, or underestimated, and how they reclaimed their space and voice.[ Sustaining Belonging ]What does it take to keep that feeling alive? We explore the systems, rituals, and leadership practices that make belonging a daily reality, not a one-time event.______Why it matters:This podcast is for anyone who’s ever asked: Do I really belong here?And for every leader who’s ready to answer: Yes, and here’s how we’ll prove it.Whether you’re building inclusive teams, designing accessible tech, or rethinking your own role in equity work, these stories will challenge you to show up differently. To lead with intention. To listen with humility. To act with courage.Because belonging isn’t a destination, it’s a practice. And it starts with listening.

Information

  • Creator
    Innovation Unbiased
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    64
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 I Know I Belong When...
  • Show Website
    I Know I Belong When...