Valerie Polunas

Dissent runs in my family. My great grandfather made bootleg gin during Prohibition. My father protested the Vietnam War in his early twenties. My grandmother spoke truth to power when the ministers at our church started preaching who to vote for. I’ve tried to carry on that legacy in my own way, including nonviolence work with Palestinian youth in the mid-2000s and showing up in the United States when I’ve believed democracy was under threat. But some of the most important dissent I’ve...

Creating opportunities for authentic listening and engagement at work What happens when leaders know something is wrong, but the organization does not yet know enough to make the right decision? HR sees this all the time. Trust drops. Productivity slows. Employees become quieter in meetings but louder in side conversations. Managers start saying, “I’m not sure what people need from me.” Leaders feel pressure to act quickly, but the information they are receiving is incomplete, filtered, or...

What if the next workplace conflict is already sending signals? I’m not talking about the loud ones, like the formal complaint, the tense meeting, or the “Can we talk?” email that makes your stomach drop. I mean the quieter signals: The manager who keeps saying everything is “fine” but has stopped asking for input The employee who used to participate and now stays silent The team that is meeting deadlines but leaving every conversation more frustrated than before The cross-department project...