Left: Oumar Dicko, Chief Economist at the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA); Right: Edith Pencil, Director of Employee Services at Performance Auto Group. Both are founding members of Accelerate Auto.
Launched on Feb. 16, 2021 amid Black History Month after months of work, Accelerate Auto, a new not-for-profit organization was established by Black professionals in the automotive industry, along with allies and supporters across all verticals of the sector.
“The main goal of this not-for-profit is to increase Black representation in the industry for career advancement of Black professionals and opportunities and community engagement,” said Oumar Dicko, Chief Economist at the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA), and a founding member of the initiative. “We aim to be the voice of Black people in automotive.”
(Watch the organization’s launch video)
In an interview with Canadian auto dealer, Dicko said that Accelerate Auto includes members from industry associations, OEMs, dealerships, and industry suppliers.
He also offered a quote from Nelson Mandela, in which he famously said in his 1994 autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom: “It was not the lack of ability that limited my people, but the lack of opportunity.” The group’s main goal will be to address that lack of opportunity.
“There are a lot of opportunities for many people to join this industry, and there’s a lot of Black talent in Canada,” said Dicko. “And we want to make sure we are the bridge that attracts Black talent to the automotive industry.”
Asked how Accelerate Auto plans to address these issues, Dicko said they will work collaboratively and raise awareness to educate people around anti-Black and systemic racism, and to increase representation of Black people within the industry. However, Dicko said they will need industry supporters and allies to join the conversation, and to create a group that will be specifically focused on educating and raising awareness of the issues discussed, while also working with the industry to find solutions.
In his role at CADA, Dicko will have a massive platform to help spread the word. CADA caters to approximately 3,200 dealerships in Canada where these conversations can be launched at the dealership level.
In the months following the launch of Accelerate Auto, Dicko said they intend to enter a consultation phase that would entail inviting supporters from the industry to work with them to develop the programs needed to raise awareness, promote scholarships for Black students, and to develop mentoring programs for career advancement and career pathing for Black professionals within the industry.
“So this is very, very important to us, that we work with the industry, because we want this to be a solution driven-initiative so that everyone in the industry works together,” said Dicko. “So we can find a solution to continue advancing this issue.”
He said the goal of the organization is to create a stronger and more diverse workforce that truly reflects the consumer base that dealerships serve, while helping to pave an easier path for current- and next-generation Black employees.
Canadian auto dealer also reached out to Edith Pencil, Director of Employee Services at Performance Auto Group, to discuss her role in Accelerate Auto. From a dealership perspective, she said part of the focus will be on human resource professionals to reassess their current hiring practices to ensure that it is inclusive. One aspect of this is addressing and accepting the realities of unconscious bias and how that plays into the recruitment of talent.
“From an HR perspective, that’s just going to be the call to action for dealerships,” said Pencil. “And not just dealerships, but I think all sectors of automotive — from the human resources aspect, the talent acquisition, and the hiring managers typically have the decision-making power at dealerships. And my understanding is, in all the other aspects of the other sectors of automotive.”
Pencil said that, to address the issue, they will need to start with addressing current dealership hiring practices to ensure that they are inclusive and that they are eliminating as much unconscious bias as possible — that there is no stereotyping or lack of inclusive decisions being made. “I think that’s where we’ll really start to see some progress,” said Pencil.
Dealership management and automotive management will also need to review their workforce and consider if it truly reflects the customer base they serve. Pencil said Canada has more than one million Black people in its population, and that nearly 10 per cent of that population is situated in the Greater Toronto Area.
“So one question I’ll ask is, for some of these GTA automotive workforces, can we really say that our workforce truly reflects the diverse customer base that we are serving?” said Pencil.
Pencil said that when she walks into a store, she looks for diversity — for someone who looks like her. And that is a question or a consideration that will need to be reviewed from an HR recruitment perspective.
She also discussed the educational aspect — something Dicko touched on as well, regarding educating people about anti-Black and systemic racism, and employment and career opportunities in the auto industry as part of Accelerate Auto’s goal to boost Black representation in the auto industry. The strategy will be to reach “early talent” such as students from secondary and post-secondary schools.
“We’ve identified that there is a lack of awareness on the various career paths and career opportunities that the automotive industry has to offer,” said Pencil. “So we really want to create that awareness; Accelerate Auto aspires to connect and partner with educational institutions, to raise awareness, to feature successful Black professionals in automotive to really inspire hope, inspire an interest.”
Pencil said they will heavily focus on raising awareness at the high school level, but that at some point, they will also focus on the elementary school level. So far they have connected with colleges and universities, and organized speaking engagements and career information sessions.
While Accelerate Auto works to raise awareness of some of the issues Black people face and the opportunities that await them in the auto sector, Black people also need to be able to visualize themselves in key roles within the industry, from entry-level up to senior leadership.
“We believe that ultimately impacts the prospect of having more Black talent in automotive,” said Pencil, who is preparing to attend a speaking engagement at a high school in Brampton, Ont.: a Black History Month/ Black Excellence event that will see Pencil and four other members of Accelerate Auto speaking to about 800-900 students from the eleventh and twelfth grades.
For more information or to get involved, visit: https://www.accelerateauto.ca/
