The Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD) was founded by writer Jael Richardson to celebrate diversity in literature by promoting underrepresented authors and stories. Based out of Brampton, Ontario, one of Canada’s most culturally diverse cities, the festival marked its fifth anniversary in 2020 with its first-ever all-virtual festival, in light of the circumstances around COVID-19. We were once again a lead partner for its main event in May, providing support through author appearances, sponsorship, and staff involvement. This year, two of our editors held a Process of Publishing workshop via Zoom, informing more than 400 participants about the publishing industry and taking time to answer specific questions during a Q&A segment. And as in past years, select Penguin Random House Canada employees took part in Pitch Perfect, an opportunity for writers to submit sample pages to a publishing professional for one-on-one feedback. To learn more about FOLD, click here.
Commitments: Diversity & Inclusion
Encouraging Mental Health and Wellness
We partnered with Bell Let’s Talk in Canada, a program that promotes mental health awareness, to host a free public panel about writing, reading, and mental health. The panel was moderated by Dr. David Goldbloom, director of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) Foundation Board, and featured writers Don Gillmor, Jael Richardson, and Yasuko Thanh. A display in our Penguin Shop allowed employees, authors, and guests to share their own messages about wellness and mental health and discover related books. In 2020, our second Mental Health Awareness Month focused on in-house sessions promoting employee well-being, including a Drop Everything and Read event that encouraged everyone to take a break from their computers and enjoy a good book, with free health and wellness titles on offer to staff. To learn more, click here and here.
Inclusive Leadership Training with Ritu Bhasin
We engaged award-winning leadership and diversity expert Ritu Bhasin (author of The Authenticity Principle and president of bhasin consulting inc.) as our diversity and inclusion consultant. Together with Bhasin, we are working to create a forward-facing diversity and inclusion strategy. We kicked off these efforts with the introduction of cultural competence and anti-bias training, which has so far been delivered to more than a third of our employees, including all those in leadership positions.
Expanded Support for Indigenous Voices
One of our priorities is to support Indigenous voices in Canada. In 2019, for the second year, we were a major supporter of the Indigenous Voices Awards, broadening our support to help establish full-day mentorship-based activities that would cultivate relationships among emerging and established Indigenous writers and provide practical tools for navigating the publishing industry. Additionally, for National Indigenous History Month in June, we focused on sharing the work of our published Indigenous writers with a Celebrate Indigenous Voices audiobook campaign across social media and podcast advertising. We are proud once again to support the third annual Indigenous Voices Awards in 2020. To learn more, click here and here.
Employee-Led Salon Series for Women
Women Talking is a unique salon-style series run by an employee-led team that aims to empower female-identifying colleagues through access to peer support and advice, learning and growth opportunities, and guest speakers. Since launching in 2018, we have hosted quarterly events, including author conversations (highlights include appearances by Dionne Brand and Carmen Maria Machado), goal-setting workshops, and book discussions. To celebrate International Women’s Day 2019, Women Talking highlighted women employees’ favorite books by and for women and led employee fundraising efforts in support of Sistering, a multiservice agency for at-risk women in Toronto who are facing housing insecurity.
For International Women’s Day 2020, Women Talking presented an in-house author panel on the global IWD 2020 campaign theme, #EachforEqual, which included Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Tara Henley, and Anna Mehler Paperny. In addition, our Social and Charitable Committee led a book sale and donation drive of clothing and menstrual products for Sistering, as well as put together a Women’s Library consisting of donated titles nominated by employees. To learn more about Sistering, click here.
Supporting the Indigenous Literacy Foundation
In Australia we donate up to $100,000 annually to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF), and over the past three years we have also partnered with the organization to manage their Create Initiative. Each year we have hosted 11 students from the Tiwi Islands in the Northern Territory at either our Sydney or Melbourne office and assisted them in writing, illustrating, and publishing a book over the course of a week with an editorial team, ILF staff, and ambassadors. All profits from the sale of the book are donated to Tiwi College and the ILF. To learn more, click here and here.
DREAMing Out Loud Workshops
In May 2019, we hosted students from across several campuses of the City University of New York (CUNY) as part of PEN America’s DREAMing Out Loud, a program aimed at students of diverse immigration statuses enrolled at CUNY schools. In collaboration with PEN America and the NYC Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, we hosted a daylong seminar on the publishing industry at our headquarters in New York City. The career symposium featured panel events with professionals from Penguin Random House and provided participants with one-on-one editorial mentoring from professional writers. Keynote speaker Reshma Saujani, author of the international bestseller Brave, Not Perfect and founder of Girls Who Code, discussed her career as an activist and offered inspirational messages from her latest book. To read more about the seminar, click here.