[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]






                            


 
   RECRUITING, EMPOWERING AND RETAINING A DIVERSE CONGRESSIONAL STAFF

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

           SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS

                                 of the

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                              MAY 13, 2021

                               __________

                           Serial No. 117-05

                               __________

 Printed for the use of the Committee on the Modernization of Congress
 
 
 
 
 [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
 
 


                    Available via http://govinfo.gov
                    
                    
                    
                          ______

             U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
 48-589                WASHINGTON : 2022                    
                    
                    
                    
                    
            SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS

                    DEREK KILMER, Washington, Chair

ZOE LOFGREN, California              WILLIAM TIMMONS, South Carolina,
EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri              Vice Chair
ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado              BOB LATTA, Ohio
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota             RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois
NIKEMA WILLIAMS, Georgia             DAVE JOYCE, Ohio
                                     GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
                                     BETH VAN DUYNE, Texas

                             COMMITTEE STAFF

                     Yuri Beckleman, Staff Director
                Derek Harley, Republican Staff Director
                
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                           OPENING STATEMENTS

                                                                   Page
Chairman Derek Kilmer
    Oral Statement...............................................     1
Vice Chairman William Timmons
    Oral Statement...............................................     2

                               WITNESSES

Ms. Kemba Hendrix, Director of the House Office of Diversity and 
    Inclusion
    Oral Statement...............................................     4
    Written Statement............................................     6
Ms. Keenan Austin Reed, Former Chief of Staff and Co-Founder & 
    Chair of the Black Women's Congressional Alliance
    Oral Statement...............................................    11
    Written Statement............................................    13
Mr. Gregg Orton, Former Chief of Staff
Oral Statement...................................................    17
    Written Statement............................................    20
Ms. Maria Meier, Former Director of the Senate Democratic 
    Diversity Initiative
    Oral Statement...............................................    24
    Written Statement............................................    26
Discussion.......................................................    30


  RECRUITING, EMPOWERING, AND RETAINING A DIVERSE CONGRESSIONAL STAFF

                              ----------                              


                         THURSDAY, MAY 13, 2021

                  House of Representatives,
                            Select Committee on the
                                 Modernization of Congress,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:03 a.m., via 
Zoom, Hon. Derek Kilmer [chairman of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Kilmer, Cleaver, Perlmutter, 
Phillips, Williams of Georgia, Timmons, Rodney Davis of 
Illinois, Latta, Reschenthaler, and Van Duyne.
    The Chairman. With that, the committee will come to order.
    Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare a 
recess of the committee at any time.
    And I now recognize myself for 5 minutes to give an opening 
statement.
    So, in preparing for this hearing today, I actually looked 
back at the work this committee did on staff diversity in the 
116th Congress, and I was struck by a few things. You know, our 
work began with a member meeting devoted to first talking about 
diversity more broadly and then as it applied to Congress, and 
we talked and, more importantly, listened to each other in an 
effort to find common ground and figure out how the committee 
should structure a hearing on the topic.
    And, through that discussion and through many since, it is 
clear that our experience as individuals and as members of 
larger groups and communities profoundly shape how we process 
daily life and experience daily life. Our experiences shape how 
we see ourselves in relation to others and how we react to and 
with the world around us. And recognizing that and respecting 
that fundamental reality I think builds empathy.
    Last year, just as we began a series of virtual discussions 
on staff capacity and diversity, the Nation was seeing in 
communities all over this country demonstrations over the 
murder of George Floyd, and the work we were doing felt 
inconsequential compared to what was happening right outside 
our doors. But it was, and I think continues to be, a lesson in 
how our own histories and experiences shape the way we 
understand and react to the events in our lives.
    That same lesson applies to the events that unfolded at the 
Capitol on the 6th of January. Members and staff are still 
processing what they experienced that day and will continue to 
do so for some time to come. But to assume that everyone who 
works in the Capitol reacted to January 6 the same way would be 
to ignore the lived experiences of every person who was here 
that day.
    For more than a year now, we have been living through a 
global pandemic, something very few of us have ever 
experienced, and we are now beginning the slow process of 
returning to normal. But, for so many of our fellow Americans, 
normal now looks very different. Thousands of people have lost 
loved ones and have suffered tremendous financial loss. The 
pandemic has been a shared experience but with vastly different 
outcomes, and for that reason, recovering from the pandemic 
will mean radically different things to different people based 
on what they have gone through.
    So all of this is to say that this committee began its work 
on diversity with the understanding that our lived experiences 
affect the way we see and interact with the world around us, 
and this past year has thrown a number of intense experiences 
our way, and we have all processed them in accordance with what 
we know.
    So our job as Representatives is to give voice to the 
people we serve, and that responsibility is bestowed upon us 
from the moment we are sworn into office. The beauty and the 
challenge of upholding that responsibility lies in the fact 
that we speak for so many. Our constituents are diverse in 
their backgrounds, in their experiences and views, and it is 
our job to listen.
    It is also the job of our staff to listen, and they are 
often the first people our constituents encounter when they 
reach out to the Federal Government for help. Staff also help 
Members make sense of complicated policy questions, and given 
the diversity of people and policies that staff encounter 
daily, the experiences and histories they bring to the job 
matter a lot.
    Our constituents are better served by staff who reflect the 
diversity in our own districts and in our own country, and 
Members are better served by staff who bring a diversity of 
perspectives to the policymaking process. We do our jobs better 
when we are willing to acknowledge that we don't know 
everything and when we are willing to listen and learn from 
people whose experiences are different from our own.
    Building a more diverse congressional staff is a process, 
and today we are joined by a panel of experts who are going to 
help us understand why investing in this process is so 
important. I am looking forward to hearing about the work they 
have done and their recommendations for how Congress can 
recruit and retain a workforce that looks like America.
    And, with that, I would now like to invite Vice Chair 
Timmons to share some opening remarks as well.
    Mr. Timmons. Thanks, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to our 
witnesses for being here today for this important hearing.
    Since the establishment of this committee, we have made 
staff retention and diversity a top priority. When we talk 
about modernizing Congress, we don't just mean updating the 
technology in the House but investing in and developing a 
talented and diverse workforce that accurately reflects the 
communities we represent.
    In the 116th Congress, we made a recommendation to make 
permanent the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, and I am 
pleased that this recommendation came to fruition and is now a 
permanent office. However, other than the creation of a human 
resources hub, which we recommended and envisioned in part as a 
way to help diversity recruitment, the Office of Diversity and 
Inclusion was really the only recommendation made last Congress 
that dealt directly with diversity in Congress.
    There is a lot of diversity just on this committee and the 
constituencies we represent. Just as our constituents have 
unique backgrounds and different experiences, those who come to 
work on the Hill are no different.
    In both this Congress and last Congress, we have heard from 
many witnesses on ways Congress can improve its hiring 
practices and promote diversity and inclusion broadly, whether 
it be for people of color, disadvantaged communities, people 
with disabilities, different socioeconomic backgrounds, and 
varied geographic locations.
    I am looking forward to hearing from our expert witnesses 
today on ways we can continue to recruit and retain a diverse 
and talented workforce that better reflects the diversity of 
the American people.
    Again, thank you for your leadership, Mr. Chairman. This is 
a top priority for this Congress, and we need to get it right, 
so I just appreciate you working so hard on this.
    And, with that, I will yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair.
    And today we are joined by four witnesses. Witnesses are 
reminded that your oral testimony will be limited to 5 minutes.
    And, without objection, your written statements will be 
made part of the record.
    Our first witness is Kemba Hendrix. Ms. Hendrix serves as 
the Director of the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, where 
she works to cultivate an inclusive environment in the House 
with a workforce that reflects the diversity of the country 
they serve.
    Prior to her appointment as the inaugural director of the 
House ODI, Ms. Hendrix served as the Director of the House 
Democratic Diversity Initiative, where she focused on 
increasing House Democratic workforce diversity and expanding 
opportunities for diverse candidates at all House staff levels.
    She has also worked within several organizations prior to 
joining the ODI, including the Equal Employment Opportunity 
Commission, the U.S. Department of State as a legal advisor to 
the chief diversity officer and Office of Civil Rights, and the 
U.S. Office of Personnel Management.
    Ms. Hendrix, you are now recognized for 5 minutes to give 
an oral presentation of your testimony.
    Oops. Sorry, we still have you on mute. Sorry.
    Ms. Hendrix. Thank you.
    The Chairman. There we got it.

 STATEMENTS OF KEMBA HENDRIX, DIRECTOR OF THE HOUSE OFFICE OF 
 DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION; KEENAN AUSTIN REED, FORMER CHIEF OF 
STAFF AND CO-FOUNDER & CHAIR OF THE BLACK WOMEN'S CONGRESSIONAL 
 ALLIANCE, ON BEHALF OF HERSELF; GREGG ORTON, FORMER CHIEF OF 
 STAFF, ON BEHALF OF HIMSELF; AND MARIA MEIER, FORMER DIRECTOR 
         OF THE SENATE DEMOCRATIC DIVERSITY INITIATIVE

                   STATEMENT OF KEMBA HENDRIX

    Ms. Hendrix. Good morning, Chairman Kilmer, Ranking Member 
Timmons, and the members of the select committee. My name is 
Kemba Hendrix, and I am the Director of the Office of Diversity 
and Inclusion.
    Thank you for the opportunity to speak today on our shared 
perspective of diversity, recruitment, retention of the House 
workforce. It is my honor and privilege to speak on behalf of 
my team and with their support.
    OD&I's dynamic diverse bipartisan team is one that I feel 
privileged to work alongside every day. Over the past year, the 
Office of Diversity and Inclusion has worked tirelessly to 
serve the House. That was a possibility because bipartisan 
House leadership and this committee were committed to and 
believed in the power of diversity and teamwork.
    In our inaugural year, we have executed a comprehensive 
staffing plan, delivered an operations plan, and a diversity 
plan to House leadership, developed strategies for engaging 
with House employment offices, colleges, universities, and 
other stakeholders.
    Furthermore, the office has completed a novel barrier 
analysis of the House workforce. Some of the outcomes of this 
data collection are shared in the information we submitted for 
the record. We have engaged with over a thousand job seekers, 
and many of the many exceptionally qualified and diverse 
individual job seekers have become our colleagues.
    Of the many accomplishments that we have worked together 
collaboratively to exceed, in all of this that our staff has 
done, some of this is what points to the benefits of 
recruiting, maintaining, and supporting a diverse staff, 
something that we all view as a critical goal.
    While I intend to discuss our analysis and recommendations 
today, I would also like to briefly discuss how COVID-19 has 
impacted our staff and our funding.
    While our staff has continued to work, members of my team, 
like many of the others of the staff community, have lost 
family members and friends, acted as caregivers to our 
families, managed virtual school for children, experienced 
medical incidents that required either extensive testing or 
hospitalization. One of my staffers is studying for the bar 
while working full time. All of this on top of a global 
pandemic, historic civil unrest, and the January 6th attack on 
our place of employment. What we experienced as a team is not 
unique, but it does represent a microcosm of what has happened 
here at the House.
    The events of the last year have tested many communities, 
including the community of the House. Communities that are 
disproportionately impacted are exactly those communities that 
are home to many of the diverse staffers on the Hill, including 
but not limited, to Black, indigenous, Asian, Hispanic, 
LGBTQIA, and people with disabilities. We, and I say ``we'' 
because as a diverse House staff, we are the people living this 
experience.
    Our staffers who utilize the Office of Diversity and 
Inclusion as a resource frequently recommend programming and 
services they would like to see from us. Recently those 
recommendations have included many things, but what I will 
speak to are recommendation that have included OD&I House-led 
staff support groups, executive coaching for senior staff, a 
core curriculum that would include cultural competence for 
senior staffers, facilitated discussions on race, bias, 
experiencing microaggressions in the workplace, professional 
communication, team building, and many other things. And while 
we would like to provide all of those services and more to the 
House community, we know that other resources or offices may be 
more appropriate, and the recommendations we submitted 
sometimes do reflect that.
    Furthermore, OD&I's diversity, equity, and inclusion 
barrier analysis offers insights, support, and relevant data 
about what staffers believe are substantive hurdles for diverse 
staffers. The results of reporting identifies what staffers 
believe from various demographic groups, and they seem to 
believe that they are often overlooked in consideration for 
House leadership roles and promotions. Many employees feel that 
the only way they can get promotion is either to leave their 
current office or to leave the Hill entirely, which makes 
creating a pipeline of diverse staffers, a sustainable pipeline 
for leaders of color and those from nontraditional backgrounds 
very difficult.
    The barrier analysis provides anecdotal insights into their 
beliefs and feelings of the participants about the unique 
hurdles that they face, many of which were exacerbated by the 
events of January 6. Additionally, what staffers communicated 
seems to be a lack of awareness about available resources. And 
compounding that issue for staffers who are aware of existing 
resources is that some expressed a feeling that those resources 
may not meet their unique needs. It should be noted that these 
are observations that may not actually be the views of all 
House staffers.
    After stating these challenges, I want to circle back to 
what I stated at the beginning of my testimony and speak about 
my exceptional and resilient staff. I believe our staff remains 
resilient because of our diversity and our concerted efforts at 
inclusion and belonging within our staff.
    I am grateful for this opportunity to connect with the 
select committee and testify on our shared and important work 
on modernizing and strengthening the House community, your 
thoughtful and sustained attention to these critical issues and 
making a meaningful and positive difference and making a better 
House community and specifically a better American community.
    I thank you for your leadership and the opportunity to 
contribute to your work.
    [The statement of Ms. Hendrix follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Ms. Hendrix. Thank you for your 
testimony and for your leadership of ODI.
    Our second witness is Keenan Austin Reed, vice president of 
the Alpine Group and a veteran of Capitol Hill. She served as 
chief of staff to Congressman Donald McEachin and led his work 
as the whip of the Congressional Black Caucus.
    In 2018, Ms. Austin Reed cofounded the Black Women's 
Congressional Alliance, a membership organization of more than 
300 bipartisan and bicameral Black women Hill staffers. She has 
led dozens of professional development briefings, events, and 
webinars to inform staffers about new career opportunities, 
provided a platform to elevate their profiles to the broader 
Capitol Hill community, and pushed growth in diverse hiring in 
the United States House and Senate.
    Previously she served as chief of staff to D.C. Council 
Member David Grosso and as deputy chief of staff and senior 
advisor to Congresswoman Frederica Wilson.
    Ms. Austin Reed, you are now recognized for 5minutes.

                STATEMENT OF KEENAN AUSTIN REED

    Ms. Austin Reed. Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Kilmer 
and Vice Chair Timmons, members of the committee, staff, and 
interns.
    I am grateful for this committee for creating a space to 
advocate for staff, and it is a pleasure to be with you. As the 
chair stated, I am Keenan Austin Reed. I serve as vice 
president at Alpine. I recently ended my decade-long career as 
a Hill staffer this past January, and previously I served as 
chief to Donald McEachin, deputy chief to Congresswoman 
Frederica Wilson. I am also a wife to a current chief of staff, 
which beyond my affinity to see Congress as an institution 
continue to evolve, keeps me closely tied to its success.
    In 2018, I co-founded and currently chair the Black Women's 
Congressional Alliance, an organization representing over 300 
Black women staffers, with a goal to increase the number of 
Black women serving in senior staff positions in Congress and 
providing them professional and personal support, particularly 
as they seek more senior roles.
    Retaining staff goes beyond what staff are paid. It is 
about the community and experience, and we choose this work as 
more than a job. It is a calling. Improving the dynamics of the 
workplace and hiring significantly boosts job satisfaction and 
fulfillment.
    While there are many longstanding and underlying issues in 
empowering and supporting diverse staff, the current climate is 
particularly challenging. For all that love this institution, 
January 6th was and very much still is unnerving. Staff of 
color, who felt especially targeted by hate symbols displayed 
by the mob, continue to feel angry, unsafe, and unprotected. 
And despite this emotional toll, these staffers continue to 
serve, allowing the work of the Congress to go largely 
uninterrupted.
    Pay disparities, underrepresentation at the highest levels, 
structural inequality, and cultural bias leaves staff of color 
feeling disenfranchised. The insurrection only compounded this.
    I commend the leaders of staff-led organizations who have 
supported their peers during this time and challenge us all to 
improve. It is with this in mind that I make the following 
recommendations.
    First, professionalize hiring to attract a wider and more 
diverse talent pool. I strongly encourage the Congress to 
invest in the expansion of our House Diversity Office to 
include recruitment staff. Currently, hiring managers are 
tapping into their networks of a select few people of color to 
produce a diverse talent pool. It is a strong start, and it 
demonstrates intent beyond hiring the traditional network of 
candidates, but the burden of hiring people of color should not 
exclusively rest on people of color to produce candidates from 
their networks. I, along with many others, have volunteered and 
supplied resumes and recommended candidates. But this work is 
hindered by those who do it often have other full-time jobs, 
and our reach does not go far or wide enough.
    Next, we must provide cultural competency for these 
offices. For offices that are making their very first diverse 
hire or those that have hired diverse candidates in more junior 
roles but never see those staffers transition to the leadership 
of the office, we need to provide greater support for the 
competency of that office. It is not enough to hire a diverse 
candidate. We must make sure that the environment is ready to 
integrate them into the work of the office. We should also 
recognize that an environment that has had a homogenous staff 
for the majority of its history will need to make some cultural 
adjustments.
    Lastly, establish a diversity, equity, and inclusion point 
person in each office and give a compensation adjustment to 
support that work. The success of DEI principles demands that 
the ideology be accepted fully in how the office does that 
work. It must have member-level engagement and buy-in and be 
continuously prioritized.
    I commend the work of Senator Tammy Duckworth, who is 
already doing this.
    I recommend that that staffer become the internal support 
for that office and the member in chief for those issues, which 
could include leading or initiating culturally sensitive 
conversations, ensuring diverse networks are engaged in the 
hiring of interns and staff, supporting staff by identifying 
professional growth and mentorship opportunities, and expanding 
stakeholder engagement to support legislative goals. This 
staffer should receive a pay increase for doing this work.
    It is critical that we recognize that diversity in 
congressional offices is a prerequisite to fulfilling the 
tenets of our democracy.
    Thank you for your consideration of my testimony, and I 
welcome questions and followup by the committee.
    [The statement of Ms. Austin Reed follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Ms. Austin Reed, and you stuck the 
landing of 5 minutes. Well done.
    Our next witness is Gregg Orton. Mr. Orton is the national 
director of the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans, 
where he leads the coalition in developing policy and 
communication strategy and advancing a joint agenda to address 
the needs of the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific 
Islander communities.
    Prior to joining the council, Mr. Orton spent 9 years 
working on Capitol Hill for Representative Al Green. He has 
served as a dedicated advocate for the AAPI community, as well 
as a mentor for many AAPI staffers in Congress.
    Mr. Orton, you are now recognized for 5minutes.

                    STATEMENT OF GREGG ORTON

    Mr. Orton. Thank you.
    Good morning, Chair Kilmer, Vice Chair Timmons, members of 
the select committee. As was mentioned, my name is Gregg Orton, 
and while I currently serve as the national director of the 
National Council of Asian Pacific Americans, which is the 
leading coalition of 37 of the most prominent Asian American, 
Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander civil rights 
organizations in the country, I am here today to share my 
personal views as it relates to the current state of staff 
diversity in Congress. And I certainly appreciate the 
opportunity to be back amongst friends and certainly back 
amongst at least the virtual halls of Congress.
    Before I begin, I would like to note that my very presence 
here today is an example of what is possible when a 
congressional office is meaningfully and authentically 
committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. I simply 
wouldn't be here to share my experiences but for Congressman Al 
Green and his former chief of staff, Jackie Ellis. You know, 
she in her own right was a trailblazer for diversity, and for 
them to both take a chance on a then young Korean American 
adoptee, given the chance to make mistakes, learn, and 
eventually build a skill set that served not only the 
constituents of the Ninth Congressional District but now the 
national AAPI community, that is a remarkable and humbling 
thing.
    My written testimony contains a number of similar 
recommendations based on my observation as it relates to pay 
and staffing structure, but I really want to focus my remarks 
today on the experiences of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, 
and Pacific Islander staffers that I have had the privilege and 
opportunity to interact with.
    To start with, many of the staffers that I still talk to 
today began their careers when I was still on the Hill, and so 
it is with great pride that I have watched many of them put in 
the time to put themselves in a position to be eligible, at 
least on paper, with the number of years of experience for 
coveted senior roles. But in reality, many of them that I talk 
to now express a sense of real frustration and are approaching 
burnout or reached it already.
    And so, coupled with the fact that we know that missed 
perceptions about our community persist, my belief is that 
there remains a real need for unconscious bias training amongst 
all congressional offices and hiring managers. Harmful 
stereotypes about monolithic community success or the fact that 
maybe Asian Americans are too quiet and timid to be successful 
in leading a congressional team are harmful, and they are 
incorrect, and it is long past time that Congress tried to 
address those things.
    As it relates to staff organizations, I will simply say 
that I think Congress should fund them. They create vital 
environments for staffers to thrive. I know that I wouldn't 
have made it for as long as I did without the support of 
colleagues and friends and also a place to build meaningful 
friendships.
    Simply because community spaces clearly will create 
themselves on the Hill doesn't mean that institutionally 
Congress shouldn't support them.
    I personally believe that Congress is a remarkable place to 
work, and the truth is that Asian-American staffers on a day-
to-day basis face racial microaggressions that can make the 
experience quite isolating and frustrating. Some of these 
elicit amusement; others elicit much more painful responses. 
One example would be it is sort of a rite of passage, I think, 
for all staffers of color to eventually be mistaken for one 
another or a Member of Congress. I will be honest, today I 
would be flattered to be mistaken for some of the Asian-
American chiefs that are still on the Hill, and I am glad to 
consider them friends. I am also proud to see that they have 
climbed the ranks.
    The truth is, though, that there is one personal experience 
that I will always carry, and this goes back to 2010 when there 
were protesters on the Hill concerned about the Affordable Care 
Act. For those members who were present when, they will 
remember that the halls were flooded with protestors, and I 
remember riding an elevator in Longworth, standing next to a 
few of those protesters, and regarding one and perceiving a 
look of a mixture of disdain and disbelief and being told that 
they couldn't believe they let foreigners work in Congress.
    Fast forward to today and January 6th. I can only imagine 
how Asian American, Pacific Islander staffers must feel after 
navigating a year of the COVID-19 pandemic. You know, staff 
were taught to take verbal punishment and slights with grace 
and service of constituents, but the anti-Asian rhetoric that 
has been politicized, it has got to carry weight for many of 
them. And if not for themselves, then for fear for their 
parents, their grandparents, their elders, and many of those 
who have become targets for this violence.
    In conclusion, I will say I truly believe the staffers of 
color are resilient as they are brilliant. To choose to work in 
a place surrounded by everyday reminders that you don't belong 
and then turn those reminders into motivation to work harder is 
precisely why Congress should be spending more resources and 
time in promoting greater diversity. So many of us have watched 
our families struggle to navigate government, watch government 
harm us or ignore us completely, and it is far past time that 
we address some of those inequities.
    It is a privilege to work in Congress, but it shouldn't be 
exclusive to those who are already privileged, and I hope that 
the select committee will continue this important work and 
encourage their colleagues to lean in as well because I think 
this is one solution that is really going to require the 
entirety of the institution to get it right.
    So thank you again for the opportunity to be here today, 
and I look forward to answering questions.
    [The statement of Mr. Orton follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Orton.
    And our final witness is Maria Meier. Ms. Meier is a former 
senior leadership staffer and served as director of the 
Congressional Hispanic Caucus, as well as the Senate Democratic 
Diversity Initiative.
    In 2017, she founded her own practice where she helps 
clients build inclusive environments. Her newest venture, We 
Are The People, is a community of support and training for 
underrepresented voices in public service.
    Over the past decade, Ms. Meier has counseled over 1,500 
individuals nationally and abroad on career and personal 
development and has spoken to hundreds of others on issues 
related to diversity, U.S. politics, and public service.
    Ms. Meier, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

                    STATEMENT OF MARIA MEIER

    Ms. Meier. Good morning Chair Kilmer, Vice Chair Timmons, 
and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to 
participate in today's hearing along with this panel of 
esteemed leaders who, as I am, are committed to promoting 
diversity and building inclusion in Congress and throughout the 
public sector. And I do want to associate myself with all of 
the comments previously given, that they were brilliant, and I 
appreciate their willingness to share their experiences.
    The perspectives I offer today come from having spent a 
dozen years working in both the House and Senate in positions 
ranging from answering phones to serving as a senior staffer in 
leadership offices. But it was during my last job on the Hill, 
where I led the Senate Democratic Diversity Initiative, that I 
had the opportunity to look at how to connect the multitude of 
dots that are necessary to create a truly diverse, inclusive, 
and well-trained talent force on the Hill.
    Drawing from my experiences, I recently launched a social 
enterprise called We Are The People. We work to strengthen our 
democracy by supporting those who are within our institutions 
shaping and impacting policy. We do this through developing 
relevant and common training for staff, creating sustainable 
inclusion plans for the organization, and promoting careers in 
public service, particularly for diverse professionals.
    There is a saying that institutions are only as strong as 
the people who run them, and Congress is no exception. The 
makeup of current and future workforces is not an ancillary 
issue but integral to how well you, the Members, are able to do 
your jobs.
    Last year, I coauthored a guide for Congress and their 
hiring managers on how to have a more diverse staff. We sought 
to offer actionable and relevant advice that spoke to the very 
unique work environment that is the Hill. As a first step, our 
guiding encouraged managers to be intentional with regards to 
developing a diversity plan, by having a clear understanding as 
to what the office even means by diversity.
    I recognize that there is a lot of discussion about this 
issue and about the various types that diversity can exist, be 
it gender, age, military service, or socioeconomic background, 
among many other points of identity, and I wholeheartedly 
support any office's deliberate and intentional outreach to job 
candidates that reflect underrepresented voices and 
perspectives. However, I do want to be clear and stress that 
these efforts cannot cloud the issues that the largest racial 
and ethnic groups in this country are still underrepresented at 
the staff level in Congress, particularly in senior level 
positions. This lack of representation in turn has real 
implications on how Congress develops meaningful legislation 
and policies.
    Looking at the recommendations that your committee has put 
forward, I believe that there are some areas in particular that 
can be expanded to help ensure that staff and Members have the 
tools necessary to successfully create a diverse and inclusive 
working environment. Change begins at the top, and for this 
reason, I support your proposal for new Member orientation to 
be more comprehensive and nonpartisan. Add to this, I recommend 
that the training also address human resources issues. You, the 
Members, are in reality chief executive officers within your 
office. While you are not likely to manage staff day to day, 
you are the ones who set the tone and the culture for your 
staff who serve you.
    Additionally, I would recommend that this training needs to 
include instructions on how offices can address issues of 
diversity, equity, and inclusion, not as a partisan issue but 
as an approach that helps members understand the role of 
diversity in creating better policy.
    Secondly, the committee recommends boosting congressional 
capacity by providing more comprehensive training options for 
staff, including creating certifications and formal onboarding 
processes. Here too I support this recommendation and propose 
the creation of a certification program for all chiefs of 
staff, staff directors, and anyone who manages staff. This 
program can be completed over the course of a Congress and 
include a set of core competencies that will benefit all 
functions to the office. I believe also that learning how to 
write a diversity plan and how to manage diverse staff is a 
critical skill set for all managers and should be part of this 
instruction.
    Finally, expanding training budgets and training 
opportunities is critical, not just to recruitment but to staff 
retention. A recent survey in the tech sector found that 94 
percent of employees would stay in their current role longer if 
they felt that the organization invested in their professional 
development. I believe if we surveyed staff on the Hill, the 
numbers would be equally high. Providing professional 
development opportunities is not an investment in the 
individual employee alone; it is an investment in the level of 
service that you are delivering to your constituents.
    Again, thank you for this opportunity to voice my support 
for your committee's efforts to look for ways Congress can 
expand the capacity of its staff as a means of developing the 
future diverse and inclusive workforce that serve the American 
people. And I welcome your questions.
    [The statement of Ms. Meier follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Ms. Meier.
    And thanks to all of our witnesses for your terrific 
testimony.
    We will now give our committee members an opportunity to 
ask those questions, and I will start by recognizing myself for 
5 minutes.
    Let me start, Ms. Hendrix, with you. You know, we currently 
rely a lot on outside groups to do our diversity analysis, and 
even your recent reporting is just a snapshot in time. Give me 
your sense, would it be feasible to collect and track more data 
on the diversity of our staffers as we onboard them? Is that 
something that would be helpful? Give us some guidance there.
    Ms. Hendrix. Yes, I do believe it is feasible to collect 
that data at onboarding, use as an example, the Federal 
Government uses a standard form at the point of onboarding to 
collect some of that information at that point. In that way, we 
could--the information that we do as a survey could be 
collected and completed and updated at regular intervals. 
Rather than doing it as a snapshot at one point in time during 
the year, it could be updated regularly. For example, we plan 
to do a compensation study that will be a snapshot of a point 
in time at one point in the year. I believe we will collect 
that information in July of this year. Rather than collecting 
it at that one point of that workforce in that singular month 
of that year, we could update it throughout that year because 
we plan to move--rather than doing a static report, we plan to 
do a digital manipulation of that. We could update--if we do 
that, we could do it over time and collect it and update that 
regularly. Rather than doing it as a one snapshot of the time, 
it could be updated regularly.
    The Chairman. I appreciate that.
    Ms. Meier, you talked about the importance of leadership at 
the top, and I appreciated that. I want to get your sense of 
how Members who are often not involved in their office's day-
to-day operations can do better, can encourage and to help 
ensure that their teams are enacting their values in the office 
when it comes to diversity. And specifically if you have 
guidance for us as to recommendations this committee could make 
to try to enhance that, I am very open to your suggestions.
    Ms. Meier. Yes. Thank you for the question.
    And I do believe it is important, and it is absolutely 
understandable that Members have schedules that they don't need 
one more thing to do, but that they do recognize their role in 
setting this tone and the culture of the office. And it is 
important for the chiefs of staff to know that they are in sync 
with their Members as well.
    That is why I recommend integrate diversity/human resources 
training not just for new Members but also every time you have 
your retreats at the caucus level, periodic speakers when you 
have your weekly caucus meetings. Again, it is introducing the 
concept of how you identify this, and they can provide very 
specific, easy actionable things to do, like sitting down with 
the chief of staff and writing a simple statement as to what 
your office values are, your mission statement that includes 
how you reach out to the diverse constituencies that you 
represent. Again, this is not to add extra to-do's and tasks, 
but it is to include you and implement and chiefs of staff and 
all the staff can manifest your values as to what you want to 
see and how you want to serve your constituents.
    The Chairman. I think that is really helpful. And I think 
it is important for us not to look at this as extra work. This 
is the work, right? Having an environment where people want to 
work and where we have a diverse workforce, that is the work.
    So let me ask, Mr. Orton, do you feel that the AAPI 
community is sometimes overlooked in the diversity discussion? 
And, if so, you know, what do you think about a recommendation 
that congressionally funded reports actually include data 
disaggregation with regards to the AAPI community?
    Mr. Orton. I appreciate the question, and I think it is 
spot on, not just within the context of staff diversity but 
more broadly speaking in the public sector.
    We found that many times Asian Americans and Pacific 
Islanders are just not a part of people's calculus when they 
are talking about communities of color, and that is something 
that has been a bit baffling. I think it is driven by, again, 
misperceptions about sort of this widespread belief that Asian 
Americans are successful and, you know, don't require the same 
kind of consideration as other communities of color, and I 
think that is a mistake because the Asian American, Pacific 
Islander community is widely diverse, has a huge range of 
different lived experiences, different immigration experiences, 
and that has to be captured if we are really going to lead into 
this diversity, equity, and inclusion conversation.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Let me recognize Vice Chair Timmons.
    Mr. Timmons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I want to thank all of the witnesses for taking their 
time. This is very important, and we just appreciate all of 
your input.
    I want to start with objective. So, in my mind, our 
objective should be that every Member's office--well, let's 
start with Congress. Congress should be representative of the 
country, and then within Congress, every Member's office should 
be representative of the people they represent. So it should be 
diverse based off of race, gender, geography, socioeconomic 
background, lifestyle, and it should be proportional based off 
of the population they represent.
    Can we start there? Do we all--I want to open that up to 
comment. Do we have any--is that accurate? Are we on the same 
page there? Is that the objective?
    Anyone?
    Ms. Austin Reed. Congressman, thank you for the question.
    I do think it is a strong objective to have a workforce 
that looks like America. I wouldn't limit it to exact 
proportionality, is not currently, and I think we have got so 
far to go before we set that as a standard. I think we need to 
develop--as the chairman said, it is not side work; it is the 
work. And we have got to inject diversity into the DNA of our 
office. And I think if we start to look at if, you know, a 
State's population is a majority White and Black staff cannot 
or staff of color can't work in that office because we are 
focused on the proportionality, I think that limits the work 
product of the office.
    I think your goals of diversifying the Congress and the 
staff of Congress are spot on. I would just approach it a bit 
differently.
    Mr. Timmons. But would we benchmark success as making it 
representative? I mean, is the definition--is our success--my 
own thing is that it should be proportional. So, if there is a 
decision about--well, not decision. An office should----
    Ms. Hendrix. May I?
    Mr. Timmons. Go ahead.
    Ms. Hendrix. As a minimum benchmark, that would be great. 
But if that were our minimum benchmark and that would be 
success, we are not there yet based on the data that we 
collected for the House, if we wanted to set that as a baseline 
benchmark and to say that we could reach that and that be a 
success as a benchmark, based on the data that we have 
collected from our 2019 compensation and diversity study that 
we did for the House. And I want to state that as a caveat that 
we only collected information for about 50 percent of our 
workforce, and that was a survey, and it wasn't done with 
having 100 percent of our workforce represented. And so I state 
that as a caveat.
    Having said that, though, with those caveats included, if 
we use that as a representative workforce and data scientists 
state having a 50-percent representation does give you a good 
sampling size, we are not there.
    Mr. Timmons. I couldn't agree more, we are definitely not 
there. And that is why we are having this hearing and that is 
what our goal is. I just want to make sure that we begin with 
the objectives.
    So, next, internships. We have talked a lot about 
internships as an onboarding access to the Hill. Can we all 
agree that that is a place that we should focus in addition to 
recruitment for staff? But should we put an oversized effort on 
to internships as a way to give additional access?
    Ms. Hendrix. I would think that what we are seeing now is 
that we see a--data reflects that we do not see in the senior 
roles a representation of leadership. And what data supports is 
that when you don't have a pipeline of people in the senior 
roles, it is really difficult to create a pipeline of people 
continuing to flow in the senior roles. If you don't have a 
bench, if you don't have people that are to raise people into 
those senior roles, starting with interns, it is very hard to 
continually push people up because it really does start with 
the leadership. So thinking of, yes, internships but also 
fellowships and subject-matter expertise. It takes years and 
years to just start with the internships. It should be, yes, 
internships and professional development and fellowships. So, 
yes, internships, but you should think that and other things 
that will increase the pipeline at the top and the middle.
    So it should be both really. It can't just start at the 
bottom thinking that an internship pipeline is going to 
increase the level of senior leaders who are going to be able 
to affect policy decisions and affect being able to grow and 
develop future leaders because what we are seeing right now is 
the current leadership isn't there to develop those future 
leaders. It is really important to create people who can grow 
the leaders right now, and we don't have as many of those right 
now. And a lot of that leadership, and speaking currently, we 
have lost, we have lost four cycles of leadership because of 
the pandemic and the situation we are in right now. So, even 
the people we have in place, we have to think of----
    Mr. Timmons. I ran out of time. I ran out of time. I am 
sorry. I totally agree with you it is an all-of-the-above 
approach, and I will do whatever I can to help.
    And, Mr. Chairman, thank you. I will yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Next, up we have Ms. Williams, and then in the on-deck 
circle, we have Mr. Latta.
    Ms. Williams. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And, Vice Chair Timmons, I agree with you. This is an all--
it is not an either/or approach. We have to make sure that we 
are focusing on both. So thank you for those questions because 
we know that to build a diverse workforce on Capitol Hill, we 
need to be sure that our career opportunities are visible to 
talented people, and that includes people without DC 
connections. Some industries base their hiring around 
recruiting and even interviewing college students on campuses 
across the country. These industries bring some of the best and 
brightest into their fold before they even graduate. And, 
Congress, we need to think about ways to broader cast our net 
for recruitment.
    Ms. Hendrix, your testimony referenced the Office of 
Diversity and Inclusion's partnership with colleges and 
universities. How can the House's resource offices leverage 
these partnerships to equip educational institutions with the 
information and resources they need to help their diverse 
graduates consider a career in Congress?
    Ms. Hendrix. We lay the groundwork, but we are one office. 
We are one office. So we are laying groundwork now. We are 
planting seeds. I think it is important to think of how we grow 
that outward. It can't just be us.
    So there are programs that are adjacent to ours, but we 
really want to make sure that we are developing long-term 
internship and fellowship programs that bring people here, that 
provide both exposure and long-term experiences for people to 
transition into long-term employment and how we are going to 
create a long-term pipeline that is sustainable for increasing 
our pipeline for long-term growth in employment.
    Ms. Williams. Thank you, Ms. Hendrix.
    Ms. Reed, in your testimony, you mentioned the need for 
Congress to recruit from a variety of schools, including HCBUs 
and community colleges. In what ways could congressional hiring 
be more transparent and accessible to ensure that diverse early 
career Hill applicants without DC connections feel confident 
navigating the process and putting forth the competitive 
candidacy?
    Ms. Austin Reed. Thank you so much, Congresswoman, for that 
question.
    I think we have to treat hiring like we do in other 
industries and handle it professionally. We have to hire 
recruiters whose job it is to go to college campuses and inform 
them about Hill opportunities. I certainly, when I was in 
college and high school, knew nothing about working in 
Congress. It was happenstance that I got here. But I think if 
we have staff who are focused on--their sole job is to go and 
recruit talent from every corner of this country, I think that 
we can get a broader and more representative workforce, and 
that includes minority-serving institutions, HCBUs, community 
colleges.
    Ms. Williams. And, Ms. Reed, maybe this is me as a new 
Member trying to figure this all out, but each office hires 
their own staff. So I am curious as to what that would look 
like for recruitment into individual offices?
    Ms. Austin Reed. Yes, that is a great question.
    I think that the office that Kemba leads is a great 
conduit. Right now what is happening is when you put out a 
listing, we send it--we take your listing, and we try to 
amplify it. The Black Women's Congressional Alliance has a 
Google listserv, and we try to ping all of our networks. Kemba 
is in touch with candidates that she has done interviews with 
and trained them to interview for your office. I think if the 
recruiters were in her office and finding that talent, then we 
could suggest to you when you are hiring, give you a slate of 
qualified, prepared candidates who are diverse to enter in your 
office. So it takes the burden off of your chief, your LDL, 
your hiring managers whose primary goal is to serve their 
constituents and put some of the burden on Congress to help 
give you a diverse staff that you wouldn't otherwise get who 
are beyond the beltway.
    Ms. Williams. Thank you so much.
    And, Ms. Meier, if we both draw our pipeline from diverse 
educational institutions across the country to Congress, how 
would that help ensure that congressional staff workforce 
represents the diversity of our districts?
    Ms. Meier. Thank you for the question, Congresswoman.
    It is going to build the pipeline, and I believe, as Ms. 
Reed stated, many of us fell into these positions because we 
didn't know that they existed, that working for Congress was a 
thing. So awareness is really critical.
    If I might use a brief example, I worked in an office that 
did not have an HBCU in their State, but they were committed to 
having a representational workforce. So they created a specific 
intern program named after a civil rights leader from their 
home State and then worked with the community to go out in turn 
and recruit diverse candidates to apply for the internship.
    Building that community connection again can broaden your 
outreach and build that pipeline. It is a first step. But that 
is why we have all addressed the multitude of issues and the 
overlaying. Once staff is here, do they seek people who like 
them? Do they have support of networks? These congressional 
staff associations are so important to provide the staff with a 
sense of welcoming and a place to go when they are struggling 
with professional issues or personal issues. Excuse me. And----
    Ms. Williams. Ms. Meier, thank you for your comments. I am 
going to have to follow up with you later because my time has 
expired, and I do not want to get into another member's time 
for questions.
    Thank you.
    The Chairman. Mr. Latta, let me ask you, I know Mr. Davis 
has to hop off in a minute. Do you mind letting him go ahead of 
you? Is that all right, or do you have to jump too?
    Mr. Latta. Can I think about that? I yield to my good 
friend, Rodney.
    The Chairman. Go ahead, Mr. Davis.
    Mr. Davis. Thank you, Mr. Kilmer.
    And thank you, Mr. Latta, for giving me your 5 minutes and 
mine, so just go ahead and run the clock up to 10.
    Hey--Perlmutter, I will take yours too.
    Hey, I really appreciate the group here, and I really 
appreciate the discussion, and I can tell you, as somebody who 
started as a staffer, this institution means a great deal to 
all of us, and we want to see the diversity in this institution 
continue to grow. I mean, when I started in 1997, nobody paid 
interns. Now we have got paid intern programs. We have got 
opportunities to bring people from every socioeconomic strata 
to Washington, DC, and, you know, to work in our district 
offices too. That is where I worked. And we wanted to make sure 
and we still need to do a better job of making sure diversity 
and inclusion matters at the district office level too.
    But I will tell you, as somebody who now has been here 8.5 
years as a Member, 16 years as a staffer, we have had a wide 
variety of very diverse employees in and out of our offices. 
And here is the good news. The good news is that some of our 
most diverse employees have gone on to better and brighter 
jobs. Because of the work that they were doing in our office to 
such a high standard, they were able to move into something 
that they wanted to do beyond their current positions that we 
weren't able to fulfill within ours. I think that is a good 
sign.
    Here is my concern, though. And, Ms. Hendrix, ODI may have 
the statistics. What is the partisan breakdown of diversity? 
Because I think it is important for us as Republicans to 
realize that, while it may be lower on our side, if you have 
those statistics, what can we do, in your opinion, to help 
encourage more conservative Republican diverse employees to 
come out here? And what can we do to work with your office to 
help make that better and make it more accessible for all folks 
who are interested in working for even our side too?
    Ms. Hendrix. I appreciate the question, Mr. Davis.
    The data collection we have done has not broken down the 
data by party. In some ways, that was intentional because it 
would have been harder to get people to agree to data 
collection because people believe that it would reflect on them 
negatively. We wanted to be able to collect the most robust 
information. We have not done it and divided it by party. 
Especially when you think of our offices are so small and the 
information is collected anonymously, we have not even broken 
the information down by Member or Member office. Our staffs are 
just so small, unlike the data that is collected by Senate 
offices because Senate offices are much, much larger. Some of 
our offices, if you break it down by staff or individual staff, 
some staffs have just a small staff of maybe five or six to 
seven people, depending on the time of the year that you take 
the data collection.
    So we have collected the data of the House as a body rather 
than as an individual staffer of an individual Member office. 
So we have not disaggregated it by party or by member office or 
by individual committee. So I would not be able to provide that 
information for you. I do apologize.
    Mr. Davis. No worries. I mean, I can just tell you just 
from our own perspective, the pool of applicants and diversity 
within those applicants has a lot less to do with race and more 
to do with gender and other issues, and that is a concern that 
I have. And I guess my question to anybody who wants to answer, 
what can we do to increase the applicants for internships, the 
applicants for jobs, the applicants of a more diverse nature 
that would want to come work for more conservative Republicans? 
Because we know--I mean, I am only speaking from my experience 
in the hiring process, I know it is a little more difficult to 
get people to apply. And I want your suggestions on what we can 
do better.
    Ms. Hendrix. And what I will do, speaking--taking liberty 
to speak on behalf of my deputy director, who I work very close 
with, Mr. Castro, we do a lot of work with the college and 
university program and the Republican resume bank. They are 
working very hard and very diligently and are seeing a lot of 
success both in placements and both in intake through the 
resume bank just in the same way that you've seen success in 
the intake in our resume bank and in placements. So I would say 
we don't see diversity as a one-party issue. We are a 
bipartisan office. We are working not to seek increase in 
diversity by party. We are seeking to increase diversity for 
the House. So we are really working to work at this in a 
bipartisan and collaborative effort.
    Mr. Davis. And I am glad you are. I am out of time. I 
appreciate that. That is all of our goals. But if there is a 
deficiency in applicants on one side, we would look forward to 
working with you and Mr. Castro to help fix that.
    So I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Mr. 
Latta, and thanks for nothing, Perlmutter.
    The Chairman. Next up, because he was here at the gavel, we 
will go to Mr. Latta and then, after him, Mr. Perlmutter.
    Mr. Latta. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair.
    And, to our vice chair, and to our witnesses today, thanks 
for being here today, really informative.
    And, you know, not to go back on some of the things that 
have already discussed, but I think it is really important 
because, again, you know, we heard--I heard the term 
``pipeline'' used several times by our witnesses this morning. 
And how do we--you know, I know that we want to make sure that 
we are getting more people in these senior positions. A lot of 
times we have to lay that groundwork.
    And I was privileged to serve in our legislature in Ohio 
for 11 years in the Senate and the House, and we have what we 
call the Legislative Service Commission in Ohio, which I think 
is probably one of the best in the State. We have a 13-month 
program where they accept about 40 students from around the 
country to really indepth get to know every part of Ohio and 
the way it operates in the government. And I was fortunate in 
the Senate to always have an LSC intern in my office, and it is 
such a great proving ground for them because after 13 months--
and plus it is paid--they were highly sought after, not only in 
the legislature but across the country, for what they were able 
to do, and also from all the different companies in Ohio 
because of the training that they received.
    And so, before I start asking some questions, I wanted to 
lay that groundwork. But also with the universities and 
colleges--and I know we have been talking about that and it was 
also asked by some of our members--that, you know, I know that 
Miami of Ohio, they have a program, you know, that they have 
students that come here to Washington, and then they place them 
in offices. And I think it is really important that we reach 
out across the country. In the State of Ohio, I would always 
say, why am I only getting students from certain areas or 
certain colleges? And so then we would literally just try to 
get as much information out because Ohio has a slew of colleges 
and universities. I think we are number four or five in the 
country with the number of schools that we have. But I really 
wanted to make sure that we are bringing people in that want to 
have a certain talent. It wasn't always that they had a 
political science background or something like that. We had 
computer science majors and everybody else that participated in 
these programs.
    So I want to just kind of ask, just going across with all 
of our witness today, what--Mr. Orton, if you could start, you 
know, what has been the experience of going across the country 
to really reach out, you know, in the 50 States, the District 
of Columbia, going out there and trying to pull these students 
from these schools and telling them there is opportunity here 
in Washington? And we really want that, you know, that 
knowledge of those students to come here. And then also maybe 
reaching out to the State Legislatures across the country, if 
they have some training programs that we could also utilize.
    So, Mr. Orton, if you would like to start.
    Mr. Orton. Sure. Thank you, Congressman.
    And, honestly, I think you have laid out a framework that 
the Select Committee really ought to think about. All of the 
places you just identified are certainly kind of areas where a 
more diverse and broad pool of applicants could be cultivated. 
But the reality is that the programs that actually do the work 
of finding students or prospective staffers seems to be fairly 
relegated to a couple of organizations. And I guess for me it 
would be saying, can Congress change the game a little bit? Can 
you commit resources to actually build the kind of program that 
you are talking about, either through ODI or elsewhere?
    I think all of us would agree that the universities, at 
least my experience has certainly been, that there are plenty 
of students of different political affiliations that have 
interests, but they just simply don't know where to start when 
trying to sort of crack this code of gaining entry or an 
opportunity in Congress.
    And so my hope is that Congress itself would actually 
commit real resources to building the kind of programs that you 
are talking about.
    Mr. Latta. Ms. Meier.
    I think you are on mute. There we go.
    Ms. Meier. Okay. I apologize. Thank you.
    Mr. Latta. No. That is fine.
    Ms. Meier. Yes, I think everything you said is spot on. 
There are, in fact, a number of organizations; they are 
nonprofits, so they recruit both Democratic and Republican 
students, recent graduates, and current students to come to DC 
for a period of time. And they focus on diversity, APAICS in 
the Asian Pacific community, CHCI in the Latino community, the 
Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, and they are always 
looking to expand and to build their connections with new 
offices.
    When I was in the diversity initiative, I worked hard to 
get them to build connections in Senate offices because they 
traditionally had placed their students only in House offices. 
But it is important to give them more opportunities to serve 
because it, again, builds that pathway for students who come 
early to see this as a viable career and hopefully get them 
hooked on public service.
    I am going to actually throw a better wrench in the 
conversation, and it addresses a couple of the other questions, 
and I will do this very briefly. And that is the traditional 
model has been to recruit students from internships and out of 
college. I mentioned human resources as an issue for Members to 
be more familiar with because understanding the trends of the 
future workforce is also important. Younger workers will be 
less likely to stay at a job for any long period of time. It is 
how they approach it. However, people are staying in the 
workforce for longer. So also looking at how you can draw 
diverse professionals who are farther along in their career. 
They don't have some of the basics you learn as an intern, but 
they are smart people. I have had numerous conversations with 
very successful professionals, people of color, who said: I 
always wanted to work in DC. I never had the money to move as 
an intern. I wish I had started. Is there a way to go back?
    So looking at diversity in this manner too can also 
increase the number of people you recruit and bring in really 
talented diverse professionals to provide you service.
    Mr. Latta. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Chairman, I know my time. I overran it, and I 
appreciate your indulgence. And I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Next up, Mr. Perlmutter.
    Mr. Perlmutter. Thanks, Mr. Chair.
    I guess I am kind of looking at this in sections. So we 
have sort of got the employees of the House. So the staff 
employees, so staff committee employee--committee staff folks, 
but then my personal office, and I am just--you know, and then 
there is new Members and then Members that have been here for a 
while.
    So, for me, the way we have done it is I like to hire from 
my campaign, and I like to hire from within, and I like to--and 
folks come from my offices in Colorado to DC, and so, in my 
three top staff, you know, my chief of staff, who has been with 
me since the beginning, she was my campaign manager. The other 
two top have been with me for the whole time as well, which 
makes it hard to accomplish the things, Ms. Hendrix, you want 
to accomplish.
    And so I am curious how I--I think what I have is a good 
cycle. I have got longevity, which is one of the goals of this 
committee is to have staff stability. Yet I am not able to plug 
in, you know, new faces, if you will, and new and additional 
diversity. It is all coming from my district.
    So I don't know. I am just sort of at a--I feel a little 
perplexed by this. And I would open it up first to you, Ms. 
Hendrix, and then to the whole panel. I don't think I am that 
unusual in how I do my hiring. So, Ms. Hendrix, what do you 
suggest?
    Ms. Hendrix. I think the beauty of the House is that there 
is so much variance, but in variance, sometimes there is chaos. 
And so what I said is--what I would recommend is that you have 
to think about, because you know at the top there isn't going 
to be movement, you have to think about the future of your 
junior staff because you know your senior staff are going to 
stay intact. So you have to think--your particular staff is 
going to have to think about the future of your junior 
staffers, where they have to go in the future, and so think 
about training options, think about how to keep them engaged, 
think about how to think about their future and----
    Mr. Perlmutter. So what--here is my question to you. If my 
approach is to hire from the campaign to the district office, 
from the district office to Washington, I mean, maybe that is 
what I have got to change because what I don't feel is a pool 
of applicants, if you will, in Colorado.
    Ms. Hendrix. Interestingly, I grew up in Colorado. So that 
could be part of your opportunity. Look at organizations within 
Colorado to think about recruiting for your campaign and think 
about developing the diversity of your campaign staff so it is 
not just in one place. You want to think about the diversity of 
all of those components. And really it is about outcomes on 
campaign. You are thinking about outcomes. How do you engage 
different communities to think about the outcome that you would 
like to yield in your election? And diversity is a component of 
that.
    And so diversity isn't for diversity's sake. You really 
want to think about what your outcomes are, and diverse teams 
do that. That is what we are really talking about here. We are 
not--diversity is about business outcomes, is about audience 
outcomes, and that is what diverse groups and teams do. They 
yield better outcomes. And so that is what your recruiting 
metrics should be about. And it is about skill sets. It is 
about opportunities. It is about creating the needs that you 
would--the needs and opportunities you would like to yield, and 
that is what we are really talking about. It is not a Noah's 
Ark opportunity for metrics or opportunities. We are really 
talking about diversity so that you can engage the people that 
you need to for the opportunities you would like to create for 
your constituents, for the opportunities you would like to 
create for the people that you are serving. And so you need all 
of the ideals and opinions and--I am missing a word here. But 
you need all of those----
    Mr. Perlmutter. No, no, no----
    Ms. Hendrix [continuing]. Things together to begin with.
    Mr. Perlmutter. And so, for me, you know, that would be 
internships locally for sure. And I liked Representative 
Williams' suggestion, and we talked about it, of recruiting 
from college campuses. And it may be that I skip the campaign 
and go straight to the internships for the office, which we do 
a lot of that.
    I will yield back. Thanks, Mr. Chair.
    The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Perlmutter.
    Next up, Mr. Cleaver.
    Oops, I am sorry, Mr. Cleaver, we had you, and then we lost 
you.
    Mr. Cleaver. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    The Chairman. You have got it.
    Mr. Cleaver. I would like to thank you and Mr. Timmons for 
bringing the subject up because I think it is critically 
important, and it is something that we probably avoid too much 
with intentionality. So this--I think this is important.
    And I would like--and thank you for our panel, thank you. 
You guys are very smooth and clear with your comments.
    And so I want to find out if you think this works out. Bill 
Clinton had a White House personnel director by the name of Bob 
Nash, who I will--from Little Rock, and I have known him for 30 
years or maybe more. And he did something his first month in 
office after he appointed Bob. He went in and said to Bob in 
his office--and he said it in front of a lot of folk--he said: 
Bob, if anyone comes to me at all complaining about the lack of 
diversity, you are fired.
    And, I mean, the people who were close in that 
administration will tell you that Bob Nash, who was a good guy, 
but, I mean, Bob Nash was constantly dealing with these issues 
of diversity. You know, he would call, you know, somebody and 
say: Hey, your department is not looking good. You need to do 
something. You need to do it fast.
    So I am wondering if you guys think that is too much 
pressure or is that, you know, something that--in other words, 
if a Member said to somebody, whoever that somebody is, in 
their operation, ``Hey, I want a diverse staff, and if I don't 
get it, I am blaming you,'' you know, is that too tough or----
    Ms. Austin Reed. Congressman, I will take your question or 
at least I will start and turn it over to my colleagues to try.
    I worked for some of your friends who challenged me pretty 
much that, that they expected that their staff be diverse, and 
I think as a chief of staff, what it meant was every single 
opening that my office had and every internship, fellowship, 
any way our office could externally engage, I had to 
challenge--I knew that my bosses, the Members, had a certain 
expectation that I had turned over every single rock.
    And so I think, you know, we talked earlier about setting 
the tone starts at the top, so you as the Member making that 
the expectation really sets the culture for the office and can 
drive the decisionmaking for that chief and the rest of the 
staff. So I think it is a lot of pressure, but it certainly can 
make change.
    Mr. Orton. I would hop in on that as well.
    I would agree. I think maybe I would encourage you also, 
Congressman--it is good to see you too, sir--to set a timeframe 
for your staff. Right? I don't think this can happen 
necessarily in immediate turnaround, but if you set goals to 
Maria's point about a diversity plan and sort of map that out 
what that can look like over the course of a Congress, over the 
course of however many years, that would provide some 
framework. I know that if I were a staffer with that sort of 
directive, I would feel a little more comfortable with.
    And I would also encourage all members of the select 
committee to think about how every Member of Congress, you 
know, there are good times to stand out, and there are bad 
times to stand out. And I remember when everybody started 
bringing in Kindles and iPads. Right? And eventually everyone 
had to have one. In fact, I remember Congressman Perlmutter and 
Congressman Cleaver talking to my former boss in the middle of 
hearings about this stuff. I think that kind of peer pressure 
works. I really do. So I would encourage folks to think about 
that as well.
    Ms. Meier. I would like to--I am sorry.
    Mr. Cleaver. Yes. Go ahead. Somebody was saying----
    Ms. Meier. With respect to hardworking chiefs of staff, 
accountability is what is going to yield results. But I would 
had to that layer, it is not just about hiring, but it is about 
retention and the promotion, so the full spectrum of the 
process.
    Mr. Cleaver. Yes. I appreciate your answers. If you know 
anybody from the Clinton administration, ask them who is Bob 
Nash. I mean, everybody, everybody would know him. And if they 
got a phone call and they said, ``Mr. Nash is on the phone,'' 
they would start trembling. And, I mean, he was--but, I mean, 
that is one way of doing it. But, you know, we are in a 
slightly different situation, you know, in Congress. But, 
nonetheless, we still have an issue.
    Anyway, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the 1 second 
I have left.
    The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Cleaver.
    Next up, Mr. Phillips.
    Mr. Phillips. I had my audio on, not video.
    Good morning, everybody. I joined a little bit late, so 
forgive me if I am covering some ground that has been already. 
But I think it is fair to say if we really want to expand the 
pipeline, we have got to pedal way further upstream than we do 
right now. I know there has been some conversation about 
accessing college students to introduce them to potential 
careers on the Hill, but can't we look at going a little 
further upstream? You know, how can we engage high school 
students? How can we expose the work of Congress in ways that 
perhaps isn't being attempted yet so that we can expand the 
pool of diversity?
    And I would turn that question to anybody who might have 
some thoughts on it.
    Ms. Meier. I will go ahead and start. And thank you for the 
question.
    It is a holistic and comprehensive approach. And I tried to 
do this in my remarks, and I do it in my work, and I stress it 
is, again, not diversity for diversity's sake. But it is the 
work to build inclusion, which in turn is just going to yield a 
better product and help you in the work that you do.
    I cited an example of an office I worked in that created a 
community diversity civic leader task force that was able to 
reach out in ways that the office in DC couldn't. The district 
office had some relationships and were involved in the 
community, but they were extra sets of eyes and ears. So 
building those coalitions at the high school level to even 
introduce the concept is very critical. Again, you don't have 
to do any of this work yourself. There are organizations. There 
are organizations that bring high school students to DC. 
Building off of those and building those coalitions can help 
you take this to the next level of building inclusion.
    And, again, I also recommend going the other direction, not 
just the younger entry level staff, but people already in their 
careers who might be open to making a career change and bring 
really valuable work experience.
    Mr. Phillips. Anybody else want to share a perspective on 
that?
    I not, if I might ask, you know, which organization, in 
your estimation, is doing the best work in high schools so that 
we might try to amplify and advocate for?
    Ms. Austin Reed. Congressman Phillips, I will point to one 
example of my former boss, Congresswoman Frederica Wilson, who 
has the 5,000 Role Models of Excellence Project. It is in every 
elementary, middle, and high school in Florida, and it trains 
young men on all facets of civic education. And those are the 
types of programs that are integrated with their school 
programming that you can get to a young person early, tell them 
that they can be a legislative assistant in Congress, inform 
them about internships and pipeline them.
    I think, you know, to your earlier question, we have to 
fund it. We have to make it programming, and someone has to be 
in charge of and accountable for this work. And I think, you 
know, we are innovative and smart enough to create that.
    Mr. Phillips. And that is called--I am sorry. And her 
program is called 5,000----
    Ms. Austin Reed. It is called the 5,000 Role Models of 
Excellence Project, and I am happy to follow up with your staff 
to give you----
    Mr. Phillips. Yes, would love to learn more about that.
    Just one followup question for all of you too. You know, 
Congress is woefully ill-equipped to train not just staffers 
but Members of Congress, and as a Member now just in my second 
term, amongst my many surprises is how poorly prepared new 
Members are for the work.
    You know, how can Congress better offer boot camps, whether 
it be--well, Members as well, but for staff members and for 
those who might want to make a career change? You know, we 
don't have mechanisms to expose people to potential 
opportunities in other categories. Any thoughts on that, how we 
become a more intentional training institution?
    Ms. Meier. I will go ahead and start.
    And, Congressman, in response briefly to your previous 
question, as soon as you asked it, I went blank. But I was 
going to recommend Close Up that brings high school students. 
They are a very comprehensive program.
    Mr. Phillips. Close Up?
    Ms. Meier. Close Up. And I can provide that information, 
contact information to your staff.
    Mr. Phillips. Thank you.
    Ms. Meier. They are ones that I know that also work hard on 
ensuring that they recruit a diverse body of students.
    I mentioned in earlier comments that I do support your 
committee's recommendation to enhance new Member orientation, 
and I would say, you know, even expand that to yearly 
conference retreats that contain--bringing in speakers, 
trainers, partnering with management organizations, that 
bringing in a component of HR issues that also address and help 
Members understand the role of DEI. I know you have a lot on 
your plates, but building it into the system early on and 
annually can help that knowledge.
    I also recommended in a certification program creating a 
management certification program for----
    Mr. Phillips. Yes.
    Ms. Meier. In my written statement, I referenced the Civil 
Service SES for senior executive programs. They have a set of 
work competencies, and I think there are elements there to be 
drawn from in creating that certification program that can be 
offered over the course of one Congress so no one is burdened 
by a week-long single training program.
    Mr. Phillips. Wonderful.
    Well, I thank you all. And, please, any organizations doing 
great work, if you would, you know, share those with us so that 
we can elevate and be better ambassadors.
    Thank you very much.
    The Chairman. Ms. Hendrix, I see you have more to say, and 
I want you to say it because I think we want to hear from you.
    Go ahead.
    Ms. Hendrix. I have one organization that is actually a 
Colorado organization. It is Youth Celebrate Diversity, and it 
trains--it started at Cherry Creek High School in Colorado, and 
it is about 14 years old, and they do workshops and training. 
It is a--because I went to Cherry Creek in high school, but it 
grew out of that, and they have been working for about 14 
years, and they do workshops and trainings in Colorado for 
youth on diversity, equity, and inclusion and social programs 
in Colorado.
    Mr. Phillips. And what is it called, Ms. Hendrix? I am 
sorry.
    Ms. Hendrix. Youth Celebrate Diversity.
    Mr. Phillips. Youth Celebrate Diversity. Okay. I love that. 
Yes, thank you. I have made notes on all of those. Any more you 
want to share?
    Just one little anecdote if I could take a moment. You 
know, I remember Business Day in my elementary school about as 
much as anything, having to create a little business and learn 
about revenue and expenses and come up with a marketing plan. 
But that notion for public service, you know, how we might 
implant those, you know, seeds at much younger ages so people 
even know that it--so young kids know what is possible and 
learn how to pass a bill and kind of ignite that potential 
interest at a younger age.
    I would love to work with all of you on that. If you know 
of organizations doing that already, please send them our way.
    With that, now that I am about 10 minutes over time, I 
yield back.
    The Chairman. I have got to tell you, Dean, I think 
Business Day really nailed it for you. Well done, Business Day.
    We have a little bit of time for additional questions if 
our witnesses are open to that. I will give members an 
opportunity to ask a second round if they have them.
    I had a couple I wanted to ask Ms. Austin Reed. I wanted to 
get a sense from you of what types of professional networking 
and training opportunities that groups like the Black Women's 
Congressional Alliance offer that the House doesn't?
    Ms. Austin Reed. Thank you so much for that question.
    What we try to focus on, Chairman, is market responsive 
training, so we are--I hear from our members, we hear from our 
members about issues that are very unique to Black women. So, 
as Kemba mentioned in her--or Ms. Hendrix mentioned in her 
testimony earlier, she hears from staff that they are stagnant 
in their offices. They have to leave to come back. There is 
that anecdotal, but we see it in trying to fill roles 
constantly. And so we talk about how to, in your office, 
navigate the inner office politics. For people who are seeking 
to be a chief of staff, sometimes you don't have that--it is 
great that Congressman Perlmutter brought up the campaign 
experience. Sometimes to be a chief, you need that campaign 
experience. But that is not something that the House can talk 
about. So we talk about how you get on a campaign and how you 
develop those skill sets.
    So we try to think through, we are not a--it is why we are 
a network and not an official staff organization at the House. 
We try to think through all of the unique circumstances of a 
Black woman, whether that is negotiating your pay, being the 
only Black woman or person of color in your office. And I think 
if we could more tailor our trainings to the unique needs of 
diverse staff in an institution that has been historically 
White and male, I think you would start to see more defined 
trainings that are good for that network of staffers.
    The Chairman. And, Ms. Meier, do you have some suggestions 
for how managerial training can be impactful and long lasting? 
You know, obviously, there is a broad set of training that 
would be valuable. But with limited resources being the 
reality, should we focus our efforts on immersive programs that 
offer certifications or on-demand training for when managers 
feel like they don't have the toolset that they need? Give us 
some guidance.
    Ms. Meier. Thank you for that question because it is 
critical. Again, the managers really set the tone for how the 
office is going to function and how you are going to attract 
and recruit staff. And I believe the ultimate goal or goal to 
work towards is a longer certification program. Again, I cited 
in my remarks that Federal service doesn't always provide all 
of the answers that work on the Hill. But as--if you can build 
a program and then as staff enters it, then you have got that 
established way of approaching it and getting managers up and 
running. But the here and now, I do think, again, there is 
enough work being done by management organizations, by other 
groups that focus on training that can be partners for bringing 
them in and simply expanding the training options. That might 
be either allowing an extra day of vacation specifically for 
training or expanding the budgets for offices to send their 
staff short term to start giving them--you know, create a menu 
of the top two or three most critical issues that managers are 
facing.
    Too often trainings can come in and be a punitive manner, 
and I really believe looking at training that staff feels they 
are getting professional development out of, that they are 
enhancing themselves, then they are more likely to be willing 
to commit to that.
    I will add from a personal note, I was involved last year 
in the first of its kind training program for staff through a 
501(c)(3) that also offered executive level coaching. This is 
the kind of training you would get if you were in corporate 
America. But it is amazingly powerful to provide individuals 
that ability to build their own leadership development because 
they are going to bring that strength to their roles and be 
stronger, stronger staff members for you. And I hope that there 
are mechanisms where we can continue that and expand that as an 
option to staff.
    The Chairman. That is very helpful.
    Let me ask if any of the other members who are on have 
additional questions?
    I have gotten texts from many of the committee saying they 
do not.
    Mr. Perlmutter. I do.
    The Chairman. Go ahead, Mr. Perlmutter.
    Mr. Perlmutter. Yes. I just--now that I have gone to a 
chairmanship of at least a subcommittee in Financial Services--
and, clearly, we have staff that has been with the committee 
for a very long time. I mean, how--and to everybody, how, as a 
Member of the House, do I encourage like my chairs in Science 
or Rules or Financial Services or this committee, whatever, how 
do I encourage my chairs, you know, to really be looking at a 
diverse staff? And where do they go? Do they go to Ms. Hendrix?
    I start with you, Mr. Orton, because you weren't kidding me 
about the iPad, so I am going to start with you.
    Mr. Orton. Yes. I would say, I mean, when I was on the 
Hill, Ms. Meier just started the Senate Diversity Initiative, 
and I think all of those sort of efforts had just started. So I 
am amazed at some of the progress. And I would say starting 
there makes a lot of sense to me.
    But I think an earlier point was made about sort of the 
rhetoric and the tone being set at the top by you. I can't 
stress how important that is. I think if staff understand that 
this is very much a real priority for the chairperson of a 
committee or a subcommittee, that carries a long ways I think, 
you know, setting the culture of the committee or the staff as 
well for an office. So I would say certainly ODI, to the extent 
that I understand the work that they are doing. But I think we 
can't get around the fact that if we don't really put some 
muscle behind these efforts, investment in these efforts, there 
is only so much that these offices are going to be able to do. 
And so I think we do have to sort of take a full look at sort 
of how this works. But my hope is that we can continue to build 
out those offices.
    Mr. Perlmutter. Thank you.
    I am prepared to yield back. Thanks Mr. Chair.
    Ms. Austin Reed. Congressman, I just wanted to volunteer, 
the Black Women's Congressional Alliance, we help committees 
and personnel offices fill roles. So staff directors, LDs, 
chiefs can reach out to us, and we can tap into our network of 
women to help fill your roles.
    Mr. Perlmutter. Thank you very much.
    Ms. Austin Reed. You know, it is not a silver bullet, but 
we are ready to help.
    Mr. Perlmutter. Thank you.
    The Chairman. Okay. Any other members with a second-round 
question?
    All righty. Seeing none, with that, I would like to thank 
our witnesses for their testimony today. I am very grateful for 
your insights, and I have found it very illuminating.
    Without objection, all members will have 5 legislative days 
within which to submit additional written questions for the 
witnesses to the chair, which will be forwarded to the 
witnesses for their response. I ask our witnesses to please 
respond as promptly as you are able.
    Without objection, all members will have 5 legislative days 
within which to submit extraneous materials to the chair for 
inclusion in the record.
    I also just want to thank our terrific staff for putting 
together such a terrific panel of witnesses, very grateful for 
the work in pulling this together.
    And, with that, we are adjourned. Thanks everybody.
    [Whereupon, at 10:31 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]