Originally published on June 12, 2020 by Benjamin Freed on StateScoop.com
A few days after the May 25 death of George Floyd, the black Minneapolis man who was killed when a white police officer knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes, Illinois Chief Information Officer Ron Guerrier found himself thinking about times in his career when he, an accomplished technology executive, was confronted with the racial biases of some of his white counterparts.
In particular, Guerrier recalled a conference he attended during his private-sector career at which he was scheduled to give the keynote address. During a cocktail hour the night before the main convention, he told StateScoop, he found himself mingling around a table with a few other attendees — drinks in hand and conference badges around their necks — when it happened:
“An individual turns to me and says, ‘Hey, can you fetch me a coffee?’” said Guerrier, who before joining the Illinois state government had worked as a CIO for several large corporations, including Farmers Insurance Group and Toyota North America.
Guerrier, initially thinking he was bantering about the location of beverages, said he didn’t know where the coffee was. Then his questioner asked again, and Guerrier realized what was happening.
“He looks me up and down with disdain and that’s when I realize he thinks I work for the hotel, and that’s despite the fact I’m a fellow CIO standing at his table, despite the fact I actually have a lanyard,” he said. “I slink away from the table and act like I’m on the phone. Then the manager of the hotel asks for my credential. He glances over at the table I was just at and the guy glances back and they have a kind of understanding that ‘he’s good.’”
‘Everything I do is super public’
Government IT officials are, most of the time, heads-down, apolitical business leaders focused on supporting other agencies and ensuring the continuity of operations. But over the past two weeks, as Floyd’s death — captured on a bystander’s video that went viral immediately — has sparked a global wave of demonstrations against police violence and a national reconciliation on race and the historic treatment of black people in America, Guerrier and other black CIOs are also speaking up about their own experiences with racism and bias.
“I’ve been processing all the times I’ve had to swallow hard, turn a cheek,” Guerrier said. “I’ve never been in the military, but the closest thing I can think of is some form of PTSD.”
For Louis Stewart, the chief innovation officer for the City of Sacramento, California, the immediate aftermath of Floyd’s death — which came two months after the fatal police shooting of Louisville, Kentucky, resident Breonna Taylor, and the murder of jogger Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick, Georgia — said he sometimes felt helpless. In a June 4 blog post, Stewart wondered whether growing up abroad as the son of a professional basketball player disconnected him from the experiences of other black Americans, and whether his professional achievements have been worthwhile.
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