In the context of recruiting participants for the affinity mapping session, I’m now exclusively sending invitations to people who are from minorities. It takes a lot longer because (by definition) there are a lot less, but it’s a necessary effort to improve diversity.
Reached out to https://www.duchess-france.org/ this morning, via their slack channel. I made an exception to not using proprietary online services that makes me uncomfortable by registering on Slack and I set a reminder to remove my account by the end of the month (after the affinity mapping which is May 28th or May 26th).
The Affinity Mapping meeting is now full and has diversity among its participants. Based on previous experience I estimate looking for diversity required about 8 more hours and added about a week (calendar time). It is a significant effort but it also shows it’s not mission impossible, far from it.
For the record there has been a single message posted on Slack in the past 7 days. It looks like the organization is not active at the moment.