SJ Janjua
They/Them
"I'm unapologetic with regard to diversity and inclusion efforts. I want everyone to be under the big tent. For in doing so, we are chasing humanity in a way that is beautiful, necessary, nuanced, perhaps messy, but vital."
Resilience
When you are striving for liberation and helping create more leaders for liberation, it is vitally important to understand when you need to pause, rest, and reset. My personal “reset button” is spending time in community with others who I share aspects of identity with and spending time in nature. Nature can teach us so much about growth and for me, it specifically always reminds me to slow down. Almost nothing in nature happens quickly. Nature doesn’t judge. Nature doesn’t discriminate. It is a place I go to feel calm, to reflect with an open and clear mind, and a place where I go to learn about the world and myself. Spending time in community with other BIPOC LGBTQ+ folks also helps me reset. When I am around my community, I am able to lay down any burdens I feel and just be present. I am also able to go to community to discuss my thoughts, ideas, dreams, and visions. When I feel like I am part of something larger than myself, I’m able to reset from the overwhelm of life.
I support others in discovering their own ways to manage stress and regain focus by modeling it for them and inviting them to define what a reset looks like for them. I’ve spent a large majority of my career working with youth, and something they’ve taught me is that some skills aren’t learned by telling people how to do them, they are learned by showing them. My students were watching me whether I realized it or not, watching how I handled stress, how I handled conflict, how I moved through relationships, and how I reset. It is the same with adults in my experience, sometimes we need someone to show us how to reset. At the same time, we’re all different with different needs and interests. What might be a reset for me, might not be a reset for you. Allowing folks to define what looks like a reset for them helps them create that for themselves. I also find that providing opportunities for deep reflection often is a great way to help folks tap into what feelings are behind the feelings of stress and overwhelm. I try to create spaces where deep reflection feels easeful for others.
Purpose-Driven
It was a big decision – but my answer is starting my business, Empowered for Equity Consulting. I waffled on starting my business for years, I felt so inept in understanding what it really meant to own and run a business. I felt I didn’t know enough about business, all of my background is in education, youth development, and diversity, equity, and inclusion, I didn’t feel I knew the first thing about being a business owner! I was terrified of the financial aspects of owning a business, the time commitment, and if I was qualified enough. After years of keeping the idea in the back of my head, I talked to a mentor about it. She encouraged me to just start. She asked me to pick a date on my calendar and by that date I would start my business. I was still terrified, but with her support and encouragement I chose the date and I started my business.
I realized I knew so much more than I thought I did, and that there are so many resources out there for people who are brand new to owning and running businesses. I was able to almost immediately connect with other consultants doing similar work, and being part of those communities is one of the best parts of owning a business. I realized that I was stopping myself from doing something I really wanted to do because I was afraid. Imposter syndrome was keeping me from realizing the impact I could make. I have worked with so many amazing schools and organizations throughout my time as a consultant, and I can say I’ve made a lasting impact. Part of the reason I wanted to start my own business to educate folks on LGBTQ+ inclusion at work and school is because of the negative experiences I’ve had at work and school as an openly queer and trans person. I didn’t want anyone else to have to go through what I have, and I know that by providing the training and support I do, I am helping ensure that folks like me don’t have to have negative experiences in these settings where we spend so much of our time.
Being bold enough to start my own business even though I didn’t feel confident in my ability is something that I believe has influenced others. I often tell the story about talking to my mentor and picking a date because I know so many people like me who have amazing, impactful ideas, but there is something holding them back. Sometimes regardless of feeling confident, you just have to start.
Developmental Leadership
At the heart of everything I do is the desire to empower others. I am where I am today and doing the work I do currently because I’ve been empowered by others to do it. If we don’t feel empowered, it is difficult to lead anyone or anything. My work empowers folks to advocate for LGBTQ+ folks at work, at school, and beyond, and it empowers them to lead this work long after we are no longer sharing space.
We can empower others in a lot of different ways, but I have found that active listening, creating opportunities for learning and knowledge sharing, creating a practice of reflection, and helping folks cultivate the tools to act beyond the space we share are all foundational to leadership development in the context of my work.
Recently, I worked with an organization who on paper seemed to be doing everything correctly in terms of workplace LGBTQ+ inclusion, but while working with them, we realized that we can be doing everything correctly “on paper,” and still be othering folks socially in the workplace. I worked with different teams at the organization to start unpacking their assumptions about gender and how they could deconstruct some of the gendered assumptions and language they were using at work. As a result of working with the organization, some members on different teams decided to start hosting a monthly discussion group for staff to continue unpacking and unlearning gender roles and binary thinking. The creation of this group wasn’t part of my work with them, but it was born out of a desire to continue learning, unlearning, and growing together.
Intersectionality
I’ve worked with quite a few LGBTQ+ ERGs at different organizations, and although I enjoy working with people who share identities with me in terms of sexuality and gender ( I am queer and transgender), it can be complicated. As an openly queer and trans person in all aspects of my life, I have learned that just because something is deemed “LGBTQ+ friendly,” doesn’t necessarily mean it is trans friendly, safe, or affirming. Some of the most complex discussions I’ve had about gender and sexuality have come from spaces that my clients or audience are labeled as LGBTQ+.
Sometimes we don't realize that the harm we are experiencing in the workplace or at school is coming from our own community, and I've had to help walk folks through that. I’ve had discussions at length with clients about the differences between lived experiences in the LGBTQ+ community and how intersectionality impacts the experiences you might have. Something I always try to remind folks, regardless of the identities of my audience, is that we don’t know anyone else’s experience better than they do.
As someone who has been on the receiving end of harm from those in my own community, and been someone who helps others navigate those conflicts, I have learned that we can never assume the depth of someone’s knowledge about your own experience, even if they share identities with you. I can see both sides of the coin in these situations and I can understand different perspectives, but we have to seek to understand each other instead of making assumptions. I have also experienced this with other aspects of identity in my work, and it has allowed me to understand how to help others navigate these situations and conflicts.
Future Facing Legacy
I hope my passion and dedication to this work stands out, but I also hope that the lasting ripple effect of empowering others also stands out. My legacy is built on feeling empowered myself and wanting to share that with everyone else I come in contact with. When I empower someone, they in turn empower someone else. This creates a ripple effect where we then have a whole bunch of people empowering each other. There’s not a lot that can stop someone who feels empowered, and we need more of that in the world, especially for people who haven’t traditionally been enabled to feel empowered. The impact of that is immense, and ever growing.