Recently our editorial team received a request to republish some of our content and along with that request, guidance on appropriate photos. The subject matter was how to be an anti-racist and ally to Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC). Several teams, including our diversity and leadership teams — had vetted and blessed the content so the requesting team likely viewed repurposing our work as an easy task, with fewer editorial approvals.

It got me thinking: Editorial teams have incredible power. We work in words and concepts, and yet the images accompanying our words often have more power. Photos and illustrations are the first things people see. Images show us what beauty, status, and — more importantly — “normal” looks like.

You may already be taking some of the steps I detail below, but I’d love to help you establish a process to move beyond good intentions to action. Let’s start with the most basic elements.

1. Review your guidance documents and brand standards

It’s not enough to have the word “diversity” appear in your brand stylebooks and guidance docs. If these documents haven’t been updated since May this year, they need a review. Ask yourself these questions:

· Do these documents describe what diversity looks like?

· Are there photos in these documents?

· Do the photos represent BIPOC?

· Who is going to be using these documents?

For the most part, content producers will use these documents. They won’t read them, they’ll scan them, and then they’ll update content based on what they see. Photos of mostly white people can further racial biases. We’ll leave the role of artificial intelligence as a content creator for a future talk.

2. Jumping ahead a bit

This is not the time to change all photos to all BIPOC all the time. As noble as you think this might be, you risk appearing insincere (because just look at the media landscape right now). You want to instill sustainable change that won’t devolve back to ‘business as usual.’ OK, continue…

3. Inventory your content

Look at your website, printed materials, and other communications (internal and external). Evaluate how BIPOC communities are represented in the stories and images across your platforms. Ask yourself these questions:

· How many images show diversity?

· How many times are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color in positions of leadership?

· Do you hire Black photographers?

· Do your photos show BIPOC winning at life (another way to look at this is how many photos portray racial biases)?

· How many portray tokenism? You know the photos: the party where a single Black guy is laughing at someone’s lame joke, way off to the side.

If you’re looking for more detail: National Press Photographers Association has a code of ethics that I recommend. High Season Co. is another source of helpful insight when it comes to expanding perspectives on diversity.

4. Positive portrayals

As mentioned above, you want photos that show Black people and People of Color winning at life.

Show them as the host of the party. Show them as the boss. Show a Black woman at the head of the table commanding a board meeting. Show passion, joy, love, success, sensitivity, tenderness, empathy, the ENTIRE HUMAN CONDITION through the lens and full spectrum of color.

Ask yourself these questions:

· How do these images look to you and your team?

· How would it look to have white people as the sidekicks?

· Do any of these photos make you or anyone feel uncomfortable?

· Do you have a way to recognize biases and a way to address how they can be avoided at work? This is going to be uncomfortable for many of you, but you have to stay on this.

5. Challenge yourself and your colleagues

For generations, we’ve been surrounded by images in ads and media furthering biases that reinforce Eurocentric standards of beauty. If you’re presented with image choices that don’t represent people of color, continue looking and don’t be afraid to push back (scroll back up to #4).

To understand how Eurocentric standards affect us as content creators, let me tell you a story:

Each day, I program a celebrity images page. Early on, I was told to front-load the prettiest people who had the most clickability into the first three positions (the only ones that appear on the mobile app). But when I looked at the celebrities on the page — the faces looking back at me were mostly white. So I took that as an invitation. I pushed Taylor Swift to the back and moved Lizzo to the front. Actions like this help shift the standards of beauty by normalizing diversity. And I doubt Taylor Swift gives a damn she was demoted.

6. The words that go with the image

Do you reference people correctly by their preferred terms? Get these right before you publish images with alt text and captions in a story or social media post. This is comms and journalism 101.

But don’t stop there. Now you need to look at the photos next to the words with an eye for dissonance. Here’s another story:

Not long ago, a magazine launched an amazing women’s event. They had a planning committee made up of women of different ages, races, and gender identities, representing leadership roles across industries. Everything was going along swimmingly until the magazine blew it. They published a cover photo of the group but left one of the women of color out of the feature article. She felt tokenized, saying that the magazine used her image on the cover but not her interview. The planning committee stood behind her and together brought her grievance to the magazine. To the editorial staff’s credit, they responded quickly by listening, made a pledge to review their practices, and then published an apology. Even so, it was a painful lesson that could have been avoided.

7. Apologize, and then learn

We’ve been granted permission to make mistakes and learn from the fails. Be the first to respond when you make a mistake. Be gracious when you apologize, mean it, and map out a way forward that shows you’ve listened. How many times do you get an invitation to make meaningful change that can be felt for generations?

In conclusion: This is the beginning

There’s no neutral going forward. As the tidal wave of companies, corporations, and organizations move beyond statements against systemic racism (some more elegantly than others), we content creators must acknowledge the role we play in either perpetuating racial biases or dismantling them. Let’s get to work.