Out in Finance

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Welcome to Business Gay podcast, where we talk about all things business, marketing, and entrepreneurship. I’m your host, Calan Breckon, and on today’s episode, I have Eric Krull. Eric currently serves as the director of programming for Out in Finance, an LGBTQ+ nonprofit founded in Chicago in 2019, which brings together LGBTQ+ finance professionals and their allies to network professionally and work towards making the financial services industry a more inclusive place. In addition to this, Eric is second vice president and senior paralegal for the asset servicing team at Northern Trust. He is the current president of NT Pride, Northern Trusts LGBTQ+ ERG, and is a mentor with LGBT Great. I’m excited to chat about how Out in Finance is supporting LGBTQ+ folks in the finance world. So, let’s jump in.

Welcome to the podcast, Eric. I’m so excited to have you. How are you doing?

[00:01:41] Eric Krull: I’m doing great. Thank you so much for having me.

[00:01:43] Calan Breckon: Yeah, I’m really excited because finance is a very important part of kind of culture. It’s how the world runs. It’s very important. And I’ve had a couple of, you know, kind of queer finance people on, in different sectors, different scenarios, talking about, you know, in the queer community, we have different needs, and we’ve not ever, you know, back in the day, we didn’t have the access to the boys club unless we were just secret homos inside of the boys club. Um, so I’m really excited to jump in and talk about things. So let’s start off with tell us about Out in Finance.

[00:02:18] Eric Krull: Sure. So Out in Finance. Washington founded here in Chicago in June of 2019, which was the perfect time to start a brand new organization.

And everything that we’ve been doing up to that point had been just focused on getting people together, giving them the opportunity to network and learn some things. And then the pandemic happened. I don’t know if you heard about this. There was a global pandemic, and, yeah, girl, I know, I’m shook. It happens. So we decided, okay, we need to stay around. So we pivoted and moved everything onto a virtual format, and a lot of similarly situated organizations, they said, well, we’re just going to kind of go underground for a little while. We’re going to ride this out. How bad could it possibly be? And unfortunately, a lot of them did not survive the pandemic. But because we had rolled with it and we decided to do everything virtually, we were not able. Not only able to survive, but to thrive and to grow and continue to build out our membership. So once the world started opening up again, we had people saying, well, when are you coming to Boston? When are you coming to San Francisco, New York? And we’re like, well, you’re right. I don’t know what’s stopping us now. And so, beginning in November 2022, we’ve started expanding across the country. So we’ve already set up chapter, not chapters. They are not chapters. We have set up presences in Boston, New York, San Francisco, Atlanta, Milwaukee. And right now, we are in the process of preparing to expand to LA in the first quarter of 2025. So we’re very excited about that. But really, we’re focused on uniting individuals across the financial services industry to drive LGBTQ inclusion and equality. We want to advocate for workplace policy policies that go across the industry, collaborating with different firms on programming, engaging with communities in all of our different cities across the country, and really providing a networking forum for LGBTQ financial service professionals and their allies. And with that, we cast a really wide net. Like, you could be an accountant, but you work for a healthcare provider or an airline or something like that. And at the same time, you could be an administrative assistant, but you happen to work for a financial services firm. So by doing that, we’re able to really bring in as many people along with us and take them on this journey that we’re going on.

[00:05:06] Calan Breckon: Okay, so it’s kind of this all encompassing finance, not a specific. Like, you have to work at a bank or you have to be here. It’s kind of like, everybody’s welcome if you are in this kind of realm of finance.

[00:05:19] Eric Krull: Absolutely. And we’ve even had people who have just happened to come to our events. We’ve had people who their friends are like, hey, I’m going to this thing. It’s free. There’s going to be some drinks and you’re going to get to meet some people. And so people just come along and they’ve stuck around with us and which is fantastic. I mean, even though a lot of our programming is focused on financial services and things that are the pertinent to finance as a whole, a lot of this really transcends fields. These are storytelling things. These are things that you can take and pick and choose what really sticks with you and apply that into whatever you happen to be doing in your daily life. Because despite what my MBA says, I don’t know shit about finance. I’m a paralegal by trade, so I don’t really know the numbers and everything, but im able to get so much out of the programming and everything that we do because those messages just resonate with people in the community and resonate with people who are in other, often maligned communities, definitely.

[00:06:30] Calan Breckon: And so you started in 2019. Youre getting your feet as an organization. You know, pandemic obviously aside is one thing, but now that, you know, people are peopling again, you’re getting your feet as an organization. What are some of the big goals or has Out in Finance set any kind of big goals or big ideas that you are now working towards as an organization?

[00:06:52] Eric Krull: Absolutely. I mean, number one is world domination.

No, I’m kidding. Only half kidding.

But we really just want to reach as many people as humanly possible. And because all of our programming, actual programming type events, not more of our social type things, all of our programming is hybrid. So there’s that in person component where people can come in and engage with other people, be there in the room where it happens, but then still get that opportunity to network and meet other people who are within the industry and are a part of the community, who want to continue to build out their professional network and want to learn and share those resources and experiences they have with one another.

But we also have the virtual components, so people can literally join from anywhere in the universe as long as they have the link to it. So because of that, we’ve got people that are in these cities that we have not gotten a chance to go to who are like, come here. We could really use this. This is important. We want to help you all succeed. So that kind of helps us drive our expansion plan, which is our first big strategy. We want to set up presences in as many different parts around the country as we can because there are people who need something like Out in Finance. They need that community that you get by being a part of an organization like this. We also, at some point would like to expand beyond just the United States. We’ve had people say, when are you coming to Toronto? London is over here. And it’s like, yes, we want to do those things. We just have to make sure that we can shore up the numbers and get all of our ducks in a row and have a strong base here before we start really trying to take over the world. We also want to do more with university outreach. We know that the people that are currently in finance. That’s great. This is wonderful. We’re trying to break that idea that this is a pale, stale, male dominated field. We want some cracks in the rainbow ceiling. And so we’re doing the work in the field right now, but we want to encourage people to get into finance. There are so many people who are part of the LGBTQ community who don’t even think about finance as a possible thing to them. No, you have to be straight, white, and male and probably come from some sort of wealth to really succeed in that industry. So it turns off a lot of people. But by reaching out to people at universities and saying, no, there is so much that you can do here. There are so many ways that you can succeed and ensure that people are welcomed and feeling included and have a seat at the table with all of this.

That’s key because obviously, straight people have been handling the money for a long time, and I don’t know how well of a job they’ve done like this is. You know, let’s have some of the gays be doing some of this.

[00:10:10] Calan Breckon: Although there is a specific gay who does have a lot of money, who I don’t exactly like right now, who might be backing a certain politician who I think you bright, probably know who I’m talking about.

[00:10:21] Eric Krull: We’re not talking about. We’re not talking about her. She’s not featured. She’s not invited to the barbecue.

No, she’s not happening.

[00:10:29] Calan Breckon: Yeah, everybody else. So I’m hearing a lot of change. You want to have change happen and see change happen. Speaking of that, and kind of following that thread along, what trends have you seen or do you see kind of developing in the markets around diversity in finance?

[00:10:47] Eric Krull: So right now, the world is kind of a scary place. Dei has quickly become a four letter word, and you see it, you know, just in the last couple months, HRC has put out. They put out in a statement all about how these few companies, they said, we’re basically getting rid of Deni. We’re putting it under some big umbrella term. So we’re not doing LGBTQ affinity groups or black business resource groups or groups for women or groups for minorities. We’re not doing any of that anymore. It’s all just going to be one umbrella, which is, we know how that worked out before. It’s inherently problematic because not everybody’s needs are the same, experiences are very similar, but it just. It really undercuts all the work that people are trying to do. And that’s just becoming an ongoing trend where you’re seeing all of these companies pull away from that. And especially in an industry like finance, we’re always kind of.

You have your ear to the ground, like, is something going to be happening, something going to change?

You don’t really know. We haven’t seen a lot of that. Fortunately, we do have. You know, we’re continuing to grow as far as corporate partners are concerned. We’re. We have over 60 that go across the country, and some of them have locations internationally, which is phenomenal. And we love everything about that.

But there is still that nervousness. There’s that, ooh, is something coming down the pike? Because finance is a traditionally very conservative sort of area, and you would think that that would be one of the first 1st places that you would see them pulling away from d nine, pulling away from LGBTQ type support, at least very prominent vocal support for these different communities. So we thankfully haven’t lost a lot of that. But it’s still one of those things that we are constantly, never 100% sure of where we stand, which is why we want to continue to push and do more and make sure everything that we’re doing is up to the same level that we’ve been doing and exceeding those expectations of our corporate partners, of our members, of those other organizations that are out there that haven’t maybe come along for the ride with Out in Finance and are still kind of on the fence about us.

[00:13:38] Calan Breckon: Yeah, I definitely think that the world is in kind of this divided duality space where there’s the way things used to be and certain people support certain people and they want it to go back a certain way, and it’s because they had it good. And a lot of those people are of a certain age where they’re running things now and they’re like, well, my life is great and everything’s going well for me. Why do I want things to change? And they’re kind of, you know, running some stuff, most of the stuff. And then we have kind of the new generation that was born on technology and raised on technology and the others who were always othered in their lives, people of color, women who are like, no, no, no. Now things can change. Like, we’re smart enough now for things to change. And there’s this wave of change which is then creating the pushback of no, no, no, we’re not going to change because the fear of losing the power because that’s what it all comes down to a lot of the time. It’s those who have the power never want to lose the power or have the power shift. And so it’s this back and forth between the two of them of like, well, who’s going to win? And in my mind, if you’re nothing looking towards the future and evolving, then you are stagnating and you are devolving. And the only way to progress is through that evolution, through that change, through that growth. That’s what brings livelihood into a business, that’s what breathes life into it. And having those diverse voices coming into an organization really help bring it alive in those ways that they haven’t before. And so I know in the US and Canada we are different places. It hasn’t hit us as hard up here the DEI because I think it’s, it was innately already in our kind of ecosystem and already in our, I guess, way of being as Canadians to already have that. But we definitely are watching and noticing what’s going down in the States. Do you think things will improve or get worse in the short term? And I’m talking very short term, not long term right now, but very short term. Do you think things are going to get worse or better given the current climate and kind of where we are and possibly going into financially over the next couple of years?

[00:15:46] Eric Krull: Ooh, loaded question.

[00:15:48] Calan Breckon: Boom.

[00:15:49] Eric Krull: Yeah.

My hope is. My hope and my, the reality, I think are two different things. My hope is that things will continue to improve. I think, you know, there’s a lot of work that’s being done to really protect a lot of these rights and stuff. But I mean, even just the past couple months going back to people chucking off De and I, it seems like this is kind of ramping up a little bit. So unfortunately, I think for the short term there is going to be a little bit of a dip. And that’s something that is pretty natural with something like a d and I. It’s going to go through those ebbs and flows. There’s going to be those times, you know, we think about right after George Floyd, everybody shot up to the top with we need to do Di, we need to be doing this, we need to be putting money in there. And all these companies were hiring dozens and dozens of people to fill these chief diversity officer and putting in Di liaisons and consultants and stuff to make sure that, you know, we’re. We’re doing this. We’re. We’re a part of this. But after a short period of time that it was almost like people said, well, we did that because of George Floyd. Well, now everything’s better for. For people of color. Everything’s better for women. Everything’s better for LGBTQ people. So we don’t have to worry about this as much anymore.

[00:17:23] Calan Breckon: For all of two minutes, you did it for.

[00:17:25] Eric Krull: For all of two minutes, it’s like, good for you. Gold star. But. But then as soon as that happened, all of it just started to decrease, and you started to see budgets for te and I and diversity efforts slowly and slowly getting chipped away, and we’re pulling money and putting it in other places. And now it’s to the point where you’re seeing companies say, well, we’re just going to do this all under this big umbrella term now. We’re not. We’re not going to focus on individual groups, which is so disheartening. And it’s like, you completely missed the point of all of this. And when you see that at some of these companies because it’s.

You realize that they’re the ones that are probably not going to be, you know, 50, 60, 70 years from now, there’s a good chance we may not see some of those companies anymore because they’re very reactionary. You saw companies that already had a more robust deni type framework in place. They were like, okay, this is not a huge lift for us. We can absolutely do these things. But these companies that were like, oh, I heard about this di. That sounds like something we should do. They had no idea how to really sustain that. And now they’re like, okay, pull it back, pull it back, pull it back.

But as.

As things move forward, those companies that are reactionary, they’re not going to. They don’t have necessarily what it takes to really survive and to adapt with change. And that’s the biggest thing with people who are against D and I, the LGBTQ community, people of color, women, different diversity groups, because they’re like, well, that’s just something that’s there. We don’t have to worry about that. The companies that are really thriving and are making those advancements and are getting people to want to work there are the ones that recognize that there is so much value in these groups because they don’t follow the traditional white, cis, straight male idea that was put in place years and years and years ago.

If you have that adaptability and you recognize that there is potential here, you’re going to want to work towards that and really cultivate as much of a relationship as you can with these communities and grow your business in these unique ways. If you can tap into some of these markets that a lot of people aren’t tapping into, that’s going to set you apart from other people and that’s going to diversify what you’re offering, which will hopefully allow you to stay around for a lot longer. But you know, that’s, some people just don’t think like that. They’re very short sighted or they’re like, well, we’ve always done it this way, so this is the way to do it. You need those conscientious disruptors. You need those people to come in and say, no, this is, let’s try something different. Let’s, you know, I remember I did this at this place and this seemed to work, you know, bringing in those unique experiences. Those are the things that are really going to set you apart and allow you to sail through the rough waters that will eventually happen to any organization at some point in the future.

[00:20:54] Calan Breckon: Yeah, as you grow. Ive always been a firm believer that its the entrepreneurs and the kind of entrepreneur mindset and future thinkers who bring those things to the organizations and organizations who embrace that and go, okay, you know what, maybe we haven’t tried this, or maybe we’ve tried this, but in a different way, but let’s give it another go and are open to learning and growing. They’re the ones that are really going to thrive into the future and the ones that are like, nope, this is the way things are, closed minded. Like that’s anything. The only one thing in the world that I know to truly be true is that change always happens and we will always continue to change and evolve and grow, whether that’s growing forwards or backwards in our belief systems, we’re still going in a direction, right? And so change is the only constant. And so either you can go forward and progress in a positive way that, you know, the universe and the world’s probably going to go, or you can stay stubborn and be like, no, I’m going to stay this way. Um, lots of things to be said there. I also know things that give me hope are, you know, like Mark Cuban, not a perfect person, but he has definitely embraced DNI and being like, there’s so many different opportunities here and these folks of all these different backgrounds help support the businesses that I want to support and. And grow them in ways that I want to grow them, because the world is literally diverse. Everybody in the world is in the world, and it’s a diverse world. Like, it just. It makes logical, rational sense, um, what work is Out in Finance doing to contribute and counterbalance the shifting tides that youve seen on the level that youre playing on in order to still keep it breathing, keeping dei alive, breathing and actually helping these organizations flourish.

[00:22:46] Eric Krull: So one of the big things is really highlighting, excuse me, highlighting diversity.

Even when we started the organization, when you would look at a lot of events, unfortunately, it’d be a lot of gay men who would be coming to the events and white gay men specifically. And something that we have really been pushing for and is ingrained whenever we’re planning different events and stuff is, how can we make sure that we are making this as attractive a package to people of all different backgrounds that we possibly can? So bringing in people of color, women, trans people, non binary people, having a wide range of ages, making sure that we want to have panels and topics and speakers that speak to all of these different other subgroups within the LGBTQ community.

And obviously, sometimes we can’t do that. There’s just going to be times where we’re going to have a bunch of, you know, cis white gay men who happen to be on a panel. But if we can at least then gear the questions, some of the topics, some of those things to these other communities, we’re showing that there are these bridges that different people can build to help bring people along with them. We also want. We’ve been highlighting some of these different groups within the LGBTQ community. We do a series called diverse perspectives, and it’s entirely focused on these groups of people that make up the financial services industry. So we’ve done one where it was all black LGBTQ finance professionals. We did one all about immigrants and first generation people. We did one for Asian Pacific islanders. We’ve done women. So we’ve done these things that just spotlight, here’s these other groups of people. It’s not all, you know, white gay men. We’re getting together to have some drinks and. And talk about stuff. It’s here’s these other people. Here are their stories. Here are the things that they’re looking for. Here are the things that people have done for them that have helped them to move forward, which anybody can take that with them, because there is so much value in highlighting that intersectionality between different communities. Like, I said earlier, there’s a lot of shared experiences between all of these different demographics, but by highlighting them, people are able to relate to them more and are able to reframe their thinking about some experiences and how they can apply that to their own life and how they could then apply that to other people’s experiences. So showcasing that really is fantastic because LGBTQ is one of those demographics that really can transcend anything. Like, you could be a black lesbian in a wheelchair who fought in Iraq and is jewish.

That’s like six different points of intersection. And if you find that person, please introduce them to me, because I would love to meet them because they’re a unicorn. But there’s so much that can go into one person, and we don’t necessarily think about that, and we really don’t think about that when it comes to a lot of straight people. For the most part, it’s like, okay, you’re a man or a woman, or you’re black, white, asian, Hispanic, whatever. You happen to be like, those are those couple things. But when you add in LGBTQ, there’s a whole nother layer of struggle, of experience, of success, and you want to hear about those different stories.

So one of the things that we’re doing is, is highlighting that intersectionality. The other thing that we’re doing is encouraging our corporate partners to work with us. You know, bring in ideas. We want to either, you know, if it are a smaller corporate partner that may not necessarily have enough money to. Or not. Not money, but enough people to really necessitate an ERG system. So employee resource group system, we can be that proxy. We can be that, you know, use our events for your employees, like, do all this stuff, or if they are somebody that does have a lot of different programming and stuff that they do on their own, we can be a supplement to that, so we can add to whatever they’re doing, and then that opens up opportunities for them to partner with us, which we then can open up to our community. And I say, hey, look. Look at what this company’s doing. This is great. You know, they’re working towards diversity. So that speaks to people who are in the audience who are like, well, I’m not necessarily getting that where I work. Maybe I need to take a look at, you know, at this company. On that note, we also have our job, our job boards, and our job newsletter. So we send out a couple newsletters every month, and one of them is just job posts from our corporate partners. So these are companies across the country who are saying, we see the value in de and I, we see the value in the LGBTQ community, and we want to encourage people to come and work here. So here’s some jobs that we have available. Please come work with us. And we work with those people. Whenever somebody applies for a job, if they tell us, hey, we. I applied for a. This job at such and such place. Great.

We then reach out to our contacts at that company and say, hey, Joe Blow applied for this job at your company. Be on the lookout for his resume, because that’s helping not only the corporate partner, because it’s proving that ROI. And look at. You’re helping us and supporting us, and you’re seeing people that are applying for jobs there, but then it’s also working for our members. We’re trying to give them as much of a leg up, giving them that opportunity to hopefully succeed within this industry by moving to a new organization that better suits their personal needs. So, those are just a few of the things that we’re doing, but we’ve got, you know, we’re only five years old, so we’ve got a lot of ideas in the hopper. We want to do more stuff with mentorship. We want to do more stuff with job fairs. And I, obviously, continuing to expand across the country, we would love to, at some point, get to a level of an out and equal or an HRC and be looked at as one of those organizations that this is a safe space. This is a place that has great resources. This is a place that allows people to network and be their authentic selves and feel more comfortable in being their authentic selves in an industry that for a long time was not super welcoming. So that’s. Those are sort of like our big. Our big, big long term goals. So, hopefully, that’ll be happening at some point.

[00:30:24] Calan Breckon: Awesome. It sounds like you’re doing what our community has done for generations, which is just community ing. It’s like we’re coming together because we know that we kind of have to, even though it’s a mishmash of, like, a crazy, fucked up family that you’re like, ugh.

But at the end of the day, you got to fight for each other and. And. And help each other, because that’s what you do with the family.

[00:30:48] Eric Krull: Right. And that’s why whenever we’re going into these new cities, we are one of the first things that I. So, as the director of programming, I kind of map out, like, who’s in these different communities? What companies are there? Who can we be reaching out to? But then I’m also looking at universities, and I’m looking at different community groups in general and reaching out to them and saying, hi, you know, I’m from Out in Finance. We’re looking to come here, and we would love to bring you along for the ride with us. And we’ve partnered with different community groups across the country to say, you know, to shine a spotlight on them as well. Look at what, you know, Diow in Boston is doing. Look at what the center on Halstead in Chicago is doing, just to make sure that people are more aware that there are these other groups out there, because a lot of people just don’t know about them. And so to bring those people along, because there’s probably also somebody who’s looking for something within financial services or does work in financial services or even is looking for something like an estate planner or a financial advisor. And as a gay man, I would prefer to work with somebody who’s a part of the community because, you know, what my needs are. You know, what are some of those considerations that somebody who is a straight person might not even think about or might kind of not discredit, but it be. It’d be less, it’d be lower on their list of things I need to make sure that I cover when we’re. When we’re talking about all of this stuff.

[00:32:31] Calan Breckon: Definitely. So where can folks go out and find more about Out in Finance, where they can meet up, where you’re doing events? Where can they find out all this information?

[00:32:43] Eric Krull: I’m glad you asked. The easiest place is our website, www.outinfinance.org.

you can sign up on there for our mailing list. You get our newsletters. We promise we don’t spam you too much. You’ll get a. A newsletter with all of our events around the country, some of our community events from our community partners. So that’s like, the nonprofits and local groups around the country will highlight some of those events. Then you’ll also get a newsletter. That’s all just jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. But you can also visit the website because it has all of our job boards from all of our corporate partners on there as well. And the same thing applies. Apply a job there, let us know, we’ll reach out. Blah, blah, blah. You know the drill. We’re also on Facebook, we’re on LinkedIn, we’re on Instagram. We have a YouTube page. So all of these different things, you can engage with us. And we’re always looking for people to volunteer. We are 100% volunteer run and operated. We have no paid staff. All of this is just people who have a passion for this and who care about this. Not to get all schmaltzy, but, like, this is like the proudest thing I’ve ever done with my career. I am just so blown away by what we’ve accomplished in five years. Having as many corporate partners as we have and getting quoted in articles, and people are talking about us and looking at us like, wow, they’ve really hit onto something. It’s so cool to see this group grow to the point where it is right now, and just, you can only imagine where it’s going to be going in the future. And so I encourage people to come be a part of that. This is still the early years, and you can really make a big difference in a nonprofit, a registered 501 c three. You get to have experience by doing this and meet a lot of cool people and really help this community that always can use a leg up with whatever we’re doing. So if you want to get involved, you want to plan events, you want to help do communications or tech, or be a part of our partnership committee or be on the board or any of these things, or you’re a company that is like, hey, I would like to be a part of Out in Finance. Please just reach out to us through, via the website, all of the details around there, how to volunteer, how to get involved, how to become a corporate partner, all of those different things. And we would love to have you be a part of that. And I’m happy to talk to anybody. This is the stuff I love to do. This is the stuff they don’t pay me for. So, like, please, I always welcome people to send me a message on LinkedIn.

Send me an email. I’m happy to talk to anybody who is looking to find out more about Out in Finance.

[00:35:44] Calan Breckon: Amazing. Well, thank you so much. I’ll make sure to have all those links in the show notes for those who are interested. This has been a fantastic conversation. Thanks for joining today, Eric.

[00:35:53] Eric Krull: No, it was my pleasure. Thank you so much for reaching out. And hopefully, you know, someday we’ll be up in Canada, so I’ll be expecting you to come to our events.

[00:36:02] Calan Breckon: Fingers crossed. I’ll be there.

[00:36:04] Eric Krull: Sounds good.

[00:36:05] Calan Breckon: Thanks for tuning in today. Don’t forget to hit that subscribe button. And if you really enjoyed today’s episode, I would love a star rating from you. The business gay podcast is written, produced, and edited by me, Calan Breckon. That’s it for today. Peace, love, rainbows.