Beginning in the Middle

I have a commitment to blog twice a week. Two weeks from tomorrow, our team has a "public" event. We are participating in a conference named "BuildBoston"http://buildboston.com. This conference is celebrating its twenty year anniversary this year. I believe I have attended all twenty, and been part of a program in at least five. BuildBoston is a conference attracting the design and construction communities. These are communities where I have spent the entire 30+ years of my professional life. During these thirty years, I have always had, in the back of my mind, one unanswered question: "What could change so that people like me could feel like "insiders" instead of "outsiders". And this always relates to a second question: "Who is on the "inside", who is on the "outside" and why?" Our community looked a lot different 30 years ago. Almost every office contained a lot of white men in white shirts and dark pants and ties. The engineers and contractors usually wore traditional ties and the architects wore bow ties. Other than the tie distinction, and some variations in cut and quality of clothes and shoes, everyone "looked" the same.