Joel Okpala, Sr. Store Designer, joins Media Producer Justin James Lopez for a chat about critical issues of diversity in design and the challenges faced by Black designers. Let’s hear his story!
Joel Okpala is a Senior Store Designer at Amazon, where his passion for the richness and diversity of global cultures shines through in his work. From food and clothing to language and, most notably, architecture, Joel draws inspiration from the world’s varied cultural tapestries. An architect and designer by trade, his design philosophy is deeply rooted in human connection. Beyond his professional accomplishments, Joel is a dedicated family man, proudly taking on the roles of father, husband, and son to an incredible mother. A fun fact about Joel: he firmly believes that Nigerian Jollof reigns supreme in the world of cuisine, a testament to his vibrant cultural heritage.
Joel Okpala:
Life, it’s like this frequency or this sound and everyone can acknowledge that it’s there, but everyone hears it differently.
Justin James Lopez:
Hey everyone. Welcome to another episode of Amazon’s Black Stories where we highlight the stories of black designers, researchers, and creative minds from all around the world. I’m your host, Justin James Lopez, and today we’re joined by Joel Okpala as we talk about the importance of taking perspective and understanding how that perspective shifts your overall success. Let’s hear his story.
Thanks Joel for joining me on the show for this episode. I wanted to start by just letting you introduce yourself to the audience here.
Joel Okpala:
Thanks for having me, man. My name is Joel [inaudible 00:00:56] Okpala. I am a senior store designer here at Amazon. Come from an architectural background. I’ve been working in the architecture field for plus or minus 15 years. I’m originally from Nigeria, first generation Nigeria, born here. Spent most of my life in Nigeria until I moved out here for grad school. Went to NJIT, did a dual master’s degree out there, architecture and urban planning with a focus on sustainable infrastructure. Graduated, got my first internship out there.
Justin James Lopez:
NJIT, that’s in New Jersey.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. That’s in New Jersey. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
So I actually grew up in New Jersey.
Joel Okpala:
Oh yeah? Nice.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. Yeah. I grew up in South Jersey, basically this small city, Camden, connected to Philadelphia.
Joel Okpala:
I know Camden.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. Yeah. So I grew up in Camden. I wasn’t born there, but I think we moved there when I was five or something like that.
Joel Okpala:
Okay. Nice.
Justin James Lopez:
So I spent most of my life there. So yeah. When I heard NJIT I was like, “Wait. I haven’t heard that in a while.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
‘Cause I’m here on the West Coast. So you said you’re a store designer?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
So what does that mean?
Joel Okpala:
To summarize it up in one sentence it means solving problems.
Justin James Lopez:
Okay.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. In a micro scale. In a macro scale, it’s like what we’re tasked to do is to integrate Amazon’s proprietary tech into physical spaces. Most of those physical spaces where customers come into our retail spaces. So Amazon sell products in those spaces and we sort of create a journey for their customers. We create an experience for them from how they walk into the space, to what they smell, what they see, how they feel, the kind of products that are on the shelf. So we curate everything. The store designer’s task is to create prototypes. So it could be replicated and scaled. We create the customer journey and then we facilitate how it would be executed from drawings to products and operations and things of that nature.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
So it’s a mixed bag.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. It sounds like it. When it comes to that work, you said you had come from an architecture background, right?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. I come from an architectural background, yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
How did you decide, ‘cause this is interesting to me. I think you’re the first store designer I’ve ever interacted with. So when did you decide and how did you decide that this was kind of the path that you wanted to take for your career?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. I can’t really pinpoint a time that I said, “Okay. This is what I want to do.”
Justin James Lopez:
This is it.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. I was young I think the first time I heard about architecture, and it’s somewhat of an embarrassing story, but it is true. It was in high school and I had a crush and her dad was an architect.
Justin James Lopez:
So how do I impress?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. How do I impress this girl? So in Nigeria, when you’re graduating, they’ll put a sash over your shoulder or whatever to say, “This is what you’re going to do in the future.” And I’m just like, “You know what? I’m just going to put an architecture-
Justin James Lopez:
Architect.
Joel Okpala:
Just so she could just be like, “Oh, man. Now I’m going to go out with this guy.” And then my mom and dad saw it and were like, “Oh you want to be an architect? That’s so nice.” And I was like, “No. I want to be an entertainer.” Then I wanted to be like Usher or something, dancing, but it stuck. Yeah. Even when I went to college, I was like, “I’m just going to do this for a little bit and then bring out my own mixtape or something.” But then it came easy to me. The first year went and I was first crushing it. Second year I was like, “Okay. Wait, wait. Hold up a second.”
Justin James Lopez:
There’s something here.
Joel Okpala:
“Maybe I’m good at this stuff.” And then I graduated and I was like, “Wow. That wasn’t too bad.” And then I was like, “Okay. I kind of like it.” And I went to school in Nigeria. I did my undergrad in Nigeria. And then I came out here and I moved to Texas and I worked for a local architect there and he was like, “Dude, you’re so talented. You should go do your masters’.” And I’m like, “Masters? Yeah. I still want to be Usher.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. I was working two jobs. I was working for the architect and I was working for Walmart. And he was like, “Yeah. You got to do your master’s because if you want to get to the next level, you want people to recognize you. You do have the talent, but you have a degree from Nigeria, which is not very recognized. You want at least try to get something.” It’s like, “You know what? Just go to the northeast.” And it’s like a coin toss. It’s like, “I’ll just take the G,” is it GMAT or whatever?
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. The GMAT, yeah.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. I’ll just take it, like a test try. Take it, I got high score, and I was like, “You know what? I’m not going to wait for the next year,” 'cause I think I took it in October. So it was already passed. I was like, “I’m not even going to wait.” I told myself, if I don’t get admitted January, I was going to buy a house in Texas and just live in Texas.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. That’s it.
Joel Okpala:
And then NJIT just reached out to me and was like, “Hey. You want to come out here?” I was like, “What? For spring?” “You don’t even have to do a first semester. You just come second semester and then you have a scholarship and a stipend and teacher’s assistant.” And I was like, “Really?”
Justin James Lopez:
Nice.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. And I just got a plane ticket. I didn’t know anyone here. Just straight to Newark.
Justin James Lopez:
And so you gaslight yourself into a career.
Joel Okpala:
I guess. I never thought about it, but I think I did. I think I did.
Justin James Lopez:
That’s what it sounds like.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. It’s crazy. It’s been a crazy ride.
Justin James Lopez:
So you went through that pathway and thank you for sharing that. So it started in Nigeria with your undergrad, you came out here, and then you got your dual master’s you mentioned, right?
Joel Okpala:
Dual master’s. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
How did you end up at Amazon?
Joel Okpala:
So I was working for Gensler. It is the largest architecture design company in the world. It’s a great company, but I was getting burnt out.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
In the architecture field, there are two things that they say. You’re either on the client side or you’re on the design side. So when you’re in the design side, you have multiple clients. So you have a plethora of types of projects you can do. So I used to do mixed use developments one day. Then I’d do hospitality the other day. Then I do high rise ‘cause it’s just different clients. But being on the client side, you’re specifically executing on the client’s behalf. I was like, “You know what? I need to recalibrate. Need to change course a bit because I was just getting burnt out.” I was like, “You know what? I need to have a balance in my life.”
I started dating at the time and I was like, “I want to raise a family and this, it’s just not sustainable.” So with her own, she also pushed me and was like, “You know what? You should do what makes you happy.” And a part of me, I had always been saying, “What would be ideal would be just to work for a tech company and just be the designer there.” But in my mind I was like, “That would never happen.” It’s like that would never happen. But I was like, “That would be the most awesomest thing.” And I saw the position. I was like, “Amazon High is architects?” So I just applied for just chances of this happening is, and then they called me. I remember the call and they were, “Hey.” I was like, “Is this a scam? Is this Amazon?”
See I was so chill about it because I thought it was a scam. Like, “Yeah. Whatever. Okay, okay, okay. Yeah, yeah.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. You’re like, “You’re not really that person.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And you know what I’m really loving about your journey is one, there’s a lot of humility here, but there’s this aspect of even if you’re not fully bought into an idea, you’re still okay with the reality of like, “Well let me give it a shot anyway.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah, yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
Like who cares, right? And then in your scenario, it’s like you kept trying and it kept working. So you just keep going and it keeps working.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
Where did that kind of mentality come from for you?
Joel Okpala:
I’ve been trying to figure that out, bro. I’ve been trying to figure that out. I want to say my dad, but here’s what happened. So there’s this new song, it’s a soundtrack to Oppenheimer. I don’t know if you heard it. It’s just very nice. And I made this analogy of that song and how life is and that life, it’s like this frequency or this sound that everyone can acknowledge that is there, but everyone hears it differently because if you hear that song, you would hear different cadences. People hear different things when they hear that song.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
And in [inaudible 00:09:37] I just said, “Life is sort of like going in flow with that rhythm.” You can choose to go in flow with it. You can choose not to. You can choose to hear something else. You can choose to hear what other people hear and then tell you what they’re hearing so you can try to vibe with what they’re, but somehow I’m just choosing to just flow with what I’m hearing. And if the end product is good, it’s good. If it’s not, it’s not. At least I was part of that dance.
Justin James Lopez:
I really like that analogy. It’s almost like people, they hear what they want to hear when it comes to different things. I like to think about it in a similar way when I look at just the experiences that we have in life. In my master’s, I studied emotional intelligence based research and how do we as humans work through our emotional regulation and management?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And one of the things that I really came to the conclusion of was that at any given time, you have something in your life that you can be happy about right now. You have something in your life that you can probably be sad about. You can probably be frustrated about. You can probably be insecure about, but who shows up at the end of the day is the person or the version of you that decided to choose one of those.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And that’s really difficult for a lot of people to wrap their head around because with that decision comes a lot of agency almost, right?
Joel Okpala:
Exactly.
Justin James Lopez:
‘Cause if I say I’m having a bad day, but I also in the same sense acknowledge that I’m responsible for the day that I chose, then it’s like, “Who do I blame?”
Joel Okpala:
Exactly.
Justin James Lopez:
I feel like our generation is really about, “I need to be able to blame somebody for what’s going on.”
Joel Okpala:
It’s true.
Justin James Lopez:
Fundamental attribution error. Have you heard of this?
Joel Okpala:
Ooh. No.
Justin James Lopez:
Okay. So this is super cool. Basically the concept that, and the moment I describe it, you’re going to be like, “Oh yes. For sure.” But it’s this idea that we tend to, at a high level, it’s we tend to blame other people for their mistakes and attribute their successes to the environment or chance. But when it comes to us, we attribute our successes to our internal strength and natural abilities, but our failures are then the environment or circumstance. And that’s what we call fundamental attribution error.
Joel Okpala:
Why is that? Because right though and I’ve done that.
Justin James Lopez:
I think a little bit about it is ego and that slight narcissism that we have as children because we, not the buzzword narcissism that we have thrown around now, but the true definition when you think of the world is happening because of you, that develops when we’re young children. When I think about my son, my son just turned six. Whenever I have a bad day, I come in from work or something and I’m having a bad day, he hasn’t seen me all day, and I come in and he feels the energy. He automatically assumes it’s because of him.
Joel Okpala:
At that young age.
Justin James Lopez:
At that young age because it’s this natural inclination for narcissism of understanding the world based on how we interact with it and based on how the world interacts with us. I would pose that that’s where it starts where it’s like the world is happening because of me. So if this is happening, then that’s because of me too, but for some reason that’s flipped when it’s other people because we were almost removed their agency.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
It’s like, “Well, no. If you make a mistake, then that’s on you. But if you are successful, then that’s probably just luck. If I’m successful though, no, that’s on me.”
Joel Okpala:
That’s on me.
Justin James Lopez:
It’s interesting the way that that happens.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. It’s an interesting phenomenon. But yeah. You do touch on something that’s true that I haven’t really thought about yet.
Justin James Lopez:
I think a part of truly successful people or just being truly successful or getting a different echelon of success is being able to be consistent across your wins and your losses. Being able to say, “I’m responsible for the day that I’m having hard stops. If I’m having the best day, I’m responsible for that and if I’m having the worst day, I’m also responsible for that, regardless of whether there’s other variables involved.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
I think Nietzsche said that, right? Friedrich Nietzsche said something like, “The experience that you have with the world is not based around the things that happen, but based around your interpretation of those things.”
Joel Okpala:
And that’s true.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. And if that’s true, then this other part has to be true too, right? It’s like, yeah, if your day sucks then you did that. You did that.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah, but there’s a counterbalance that your successes are based off of the actions that you took. That’s why you feel like I have to take credit for it because I saw myself building these building blocks to get here and I’ll use fitness for example ‘cause I like to go to the gym. So it’s like, “Yeah. I want to get a six-pack.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I know I have to watch my diet, do cardio, go to the gym at least three times a week to get to that milestone of in 30 days, I can see the abs. In that regard, I would say yeah, that was my effort.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
But if something goes wrong, I can also blame the gym. The equipment was kind of shady.
Justin James Lopez:
But that’s my point. So remember the root was your analogy of that sound of people hear what they want to hear.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. That’s true.
Justin James Lopez:
My point is the data doesn’t change.
Joel Okpala:
The data doesn’t change.
Justin James Lopez:
In the same sense, you can do the same thing of like, “Hey, maybe a person got out of shape.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
They’re like, “Oh, well, you know what? It’s all these other things happening.” It’s like, “No. You didn’t go to the gym. You didn’t do these things.”
Joel Okpala:
And when I get out of shape, it’s like, “Yeah. It’s just work.” All of these things.
Justin James Lopez:
That’s why I said, the moment I describe it, you’re going to be like, “Damn. True.”
Joel Okpala:
And you said Nietzsche said this. Who did it come from?
Justin James Lopez:
The fundamental attribution theory. It’s just a theory in psychology.
Joel Okpala:
Okay. I got to talk about this one.
Justin James Lopez:
But no, Frederick Nietzsche, he was the one that made the comment around your experience is based on how you choose to interpret what’s happening to you, not necessarily what’s happening. And there’s a bunch of variations of that throughout history like different people have said variations of that, but I really do subscribe to that belief where life isn’t happening to you.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
It’s happening to everyone at the same time. But when we think that, “Oh no. This is happening to me,” that’s when we fall into that error where we go, “Okay. The things that go wrong, I’m choosing to listen to this melody.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
“And when it goes right, I’m listening to this melody,” but it’s the same song.
Joel Okpala:
It’s the same song.
Justin James Lopez:
Same song. And that’s interesting. So when you think about, to the question that I had around how you process and challenge yourself to push forward, even when you feel like maybe it will work out, maybe it won’t, there’s that kind of ambiguity there.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
You mentioned you have a child.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
How are you instilling that in him or how is that translating for him?
Joel Okpala:
I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s translating at all yet. He’s two, but yeah. I’m trying to teach him concepts right now. Concept of action, reaction. Concept of time. Concept of authority. These things, these different concepts. Maybe I get it right. Maybe I don’t.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah, yeah.
Joel Okpala:
We’ll find out in 18 years.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. I love that.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. It’s just concepts for now.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t have the answers. I don’t know. I don’t know why I do some of the things I do. My wife says I’m just a happy-go-lucky guy. I’m always happy for no reason. And I’m like, “Yeah, I guess.”
Justin James Lopez:
Well maybe. Maybe you’re just choosing to listen to a specific melody, man.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. That’s the thing. Maybe it’s just a frequency. I’m just like in my head just the whole time.
Justin James Lopez:
I noticed that it frustrates other people when you’re the happy person and then they’re consistently listening to the other part of the song.
Joel Okpala:
I’ve gotten a criticism about my happiness at work.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
In my previous job, I think we were having happy hour and I noticed the guy doesn’t really associate with me, doesn’t talk to me, he always get grumpy, and he came up to me and said, “Dude, one of the reasons I don’t like talking with you because you always smiling and I think you’re a phony.”
Justin James Lopez:
Oh.
Joel Okpala:
It’s like, “Whoa.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah, yeah.
Joel Okpala:
And I think he was like, “No one should be always this happy.” I was like, “Yo, what the hell?”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. But you learn more about people through that vulnerability and honesty of like, “Oh. I see your perspective.”
Joel Okpala:
I want to ask him, “Bro, what are you going through?”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. But that’s a prime example of your specific perspective is the first thing ‘cause it’s very easy for a person probably to be defensive when someone says something like that, but instead you were like, “What are you going through, man?”
Joel Okpala:
Oh, right. See, I didn’t even think about that.
Justin James Lopez:
Now you could have easily been like, “What? You just called me phony. There’s so many insults embedded in that,” but instead you were like, “Are you okay? What’s going on with you?” But I love this example. Now I’m not going to forget it. The music example that you had-
Joel Okpala:
The music. Yeah. Thanks.
Justin James Lopez:
‘Cause that’s a really good example of that idea of like, “I’m here. I’m listening to this one.”
Joel Okpala:
Listening to this song. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
You’re listening to this one and for some reason, your whole outlook is negative. Maybe choose to listen to a different part of this song. I want to shift subjects for a bit because I think this is all really great to understand more about your perspective, but I do want to ask the question of store design ‘cause I mentioned, you are for sure the first store designer that I’ve ever met. How diverse is that space?
Joel Okpala:
It’s not diverse.
Justin James Lopez:
It’s not diverse.
Joel Okpala:
The design industry is not diverse. The architecture industry is the second least diverse industry and the first is pilots.
Justin James Lopez:
Pilots.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. And then the second is architects.
Justin James Lopez:
And then when you get even more into the weeds of what you specifically do, the numbers just dwindle.
Joel Okpala:
It’s just, I’m a unicorn.
Justin James Lopez:
What is that experience like?
Joel Okpala:
At first-
Justin James Lopez:
Do you even pay attention to it?
Joel Okpala:
At first I didn’t pay attention to it. At first I didn’t because even though I’m born here, I’m an immigrant.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
So I didn’t understand context of things. I didn’t understand it. So even when people were being prejudiced towards me, I didn’t even get it because, again, that frequency, I was just like, “Yeah. This dude is just weird.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I had professors fail me and my fellow students were like, “That’s kind of weird because he did the same amount of work and he was chastising.” Didn’t get it. It wasn’t until I graduated, I was like, “That dude was outright racist towards me and I didn’t even know.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
The longer I’m in this space, the more challenging it becomes because the less there are people of color in this space. It’s like the architectural industry, it keeps shedding. When you start the program, they’re like 30 people. Your second year drops. Third, it’s like medical school I think.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
It keeps dropping. And then when you get into the profession, it keeps dropping. So to some people’s eye, they would say, “I dropped out of the architect industry,” because I’m technically not. I’m not working for an architect. You see what I mean?
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. I got you.
Joel Okpala:
So it’s like it keeps shedding. So to find a principle that is black or a minority in true architecture space in the top tier architecture world, it’s just ...
Justin James Lopez:
How has that impacted your development? I think the question, it’s a bit loaded. So I want to take a step back because what I’m asking is, and I’ll speak from my experience and then your experience may be different kind of splitting your time between Nigeria and here.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
But for me, it was hard for me. Growing up in the US, it was hard for me not to see race ‘cause it’s thrown in your face all the time.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And me coming from a mixed background, it was more amplified because then people are consistently telling me what I need to be or how I should feel in different spaces or assuming what I am and then going, “Well then you should be this,” or, “You should feel that way.” So for me, I had this constant battle of, as I’m developing in different spaces, especially when I got into my career of how can I exist at this level? How can I be a principal? How can I be a director if I don’t know anyone like me in these spaces?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
But I’m interested in what your experience was along those lines when it came to your development and how did you view it?
Joel Okpala:
I was lucky to not have the issue of race constantly bombarded to me at a young age. So when I came here, I was naive and the naivety helped me pass certain thresholds that most people wouldn’t. People would just stop out of frustration. But then when I started getting acclimatized to it and seeing, “Okay. This ain’t right. That ain’t right.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I always just felt that I am an architect because of my designability and my designability, I believe it’s a gift that’s given to me. There’s this feeling that I know that in due time, I will get to that position that you are trying to prevent me from getting to. I don’t know why, but again, and that’s one of the classes I’m trying to teach my kid. Time and patience. In due time, if it is buried in your subconscious and like it is buried in mine that, I am one of the best designers you can ever come across. It might be bullshit-
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
But I’m totally convinced myself.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
So when I meet people that say, “Yeah, well you can’t.” You’re like, “Okay. Whatever. You don’t see it that way. I see it that way and my work will speak for itself one day.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. Have you met a lot of pushback on that?
Joel Okpala:
Let me give you an instance of where I actually left a company. I don’t want to say the name.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I was one of the designers for a couple competitions that we did in China and we won one and we started getting to the nitty-gritty of it, like signing a contract and actually starting to work with the Chinese company that was going to do the construction. So my boss here, and then we celebrated we got the contract, but I was like, “Okay. We got to send the design team over to China.” My boss, in his mind, thought he was protecting me by not picking me to go to China. So he put a junior designer, designer who was under me, he put that person in line to go to China. In his mind he thought, “Okay. I’m doing this for you.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
If that happened when I moved to America, I would’ve just thought, “Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you my guy.” Because I got quiet and I was like, “Yo. This is going to hurt me in the long run. This junior guy now has Chinese experience, he’s traveled abroad, and he’s going to overlap me in a couple of years. Just because you think-
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. I might have a bad experience. Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. That was the first time I was like, “This thing is so complicated.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
This guy genuinely think, ‘cause he came to me and was happy. He was like, “Dude, it’s crazy out there, man. I’m not going to send you out there. I’m going to send this guy.”
Justin James Lopez:
You know what it is. like allow me to make my own decisions.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And it goes back to what we were talking about before. That idea of what kind of day are you going to have? I even do this with my son. Whenever my son’s having a moment when he makes statements like, “This person made me feel like this way,” or, “You’re making me feel this way.” I’ll just pause and I’ll say, “Hey. Who’s responsible for how you feel?” Right now, he’s still young. So it’s just this mantra that we go back and forth. It’s like a call and response. But I’ll say, “Who’s responsible for how you feel?” And he’ll say, “I am.” And I go, “Okay. Well are you choosing to have a good day or a bad day right now?” And he said, “I’m choosing to have a good day.” I was like, “Are you?” And he goes, “Yes. I’m going to choose to have a good day.” I’m like, “All right. Let’s move in that direction.”
But I think what I’m instilling, there’s obviously the actual direct application of that, but what I’m trying to instill and what I’m hearing here in what you’re saying is what I’m trying to instill is that idea that I’m giving you the opportunity to decide for yourself how you want this to go. And I think that that’s probably the greatest level of respect that we can show people is, “I’m going to give you the information and I’m going to let you decide what to do with that information.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And I think leaders make that mistake a lot of, “I’m going to protect you from this because I wouldn’t want to deal with this or-
Joel Okpala:
Exactly.
Justin James Lopez:
“I think that you might not want to deal with this.” And in that trying to be sensitive space, you’re actually being very insensitive.
Joel Okpala:
Insensitive. Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And that’s kind of what I heard here and it’s interesting ‘cause you see there’s sometimes little to no malice in some of these decisions, but it has so far-reaching impact when it comes to the amount of designers, black designers, black architects-
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
In that spot. I think that as you shifted from the core architecture field like working for an actual architecture firm into tech as you mentioned, was that experience different for you ‘cause it’s still design, which is still limited, but was that experience different for you when you shifted over into tech?
Joel Okpala:
It’s just a bigger platform, bigger scale.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
The size of the companies are worlds apart and then the sphere of influence too is worlds apart. I can say I’m playing with the big boys now.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah, yeah.
Joel Okpala:
Your voice can be drowned out if you’re not loud enough.
Justin James Lopez:
So there’s two points to this question.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
What would you say to companies to help with amplifying black voices in general and what would you say to individuals like black designers or creatives in different spaces to help amplify their own voices or help kind of stand-up and stand out or create more community ‘cause I think that that’s another thing that’s really difficult in maintaining this space is if you consistently feel like you’re the only person.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
There’s actually research on this where it’s like if there’s only one black person on the team or just person of color on the team, the likelihood of them leaving or quitting is extremely high.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
If there’s two, it’s a little bit less. If there’s three or more, the likelihood of them staying because of community is just exponentially higher. So what are your thoughts on that?
Joel Okpala:
I think Amazon as a company should just first acknowledge that there is value in the black experience. There’s value in what the individual brings to the table. Not, “Okay, maybe let’s try,” but this group of people have something that’s valuable. From there, I guess it’s top down. When there’s that acknowledgement, there is a subconscious activation that, “Okay. If these people are saying this thing is valuable, let’s lean into it to really hear what they’re saying.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
So right now, the BEN community is there.
Justin James Lopez:
BEN is what for the listeners here?
Joel Okpala:
Black Employee Network. And I’ve been part of it for a year and a half and I have coworkers that haven’t heard anything about it. Didn’t even know it existed.
Justin James Lopez:
Gotcha.
Joel Okpala:
And they’ve been at Amazon longer than I have. And I think, not to any fault of their own, but it’s just like there hasn’t been that leaning in to to really listen. So I think it should be a conscious effort. They should be intentional about it, just leaning in. Top down, that should be a start.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
It only would make the product offerings or our services to the customer even richer because our customer base is diverse.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
I know things that some people don’t know and some people know things that I don’t know. If we come together to express ourselves freely and talk about how we can influence customers, I don’t see any downside to it.
Justin James Lopez:
I think that’s really valuable. And that kind of addresses that community space. I remember while I was talking about that research that was done where without communities, ‘cause you think about even communities of practice. When you think about different disciplines, you have communities of practice and then you have communities of people and you need your communities in order to feel like home, feel safe when you’re having a bad day. And that’s really important and it sounds like BEN is a start.
Joel Okpala:
Is a start.
Justin James Lopez:
It’s a start, but what’s the next step for that?
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. And I want to be cautious about how I present this. I don’t want to make this as a blanket statement that all black employees at Amazon have to be ambassadors for the black cause.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. For sure. For sure.
Joel Okpala:
Because there’s some people that is just like, “I just want to be looked at as an employee and not a black employee. And I do not want my actions to be seen as this is what black people do.” You know what I mean? So you have to be intentional.
Justin James Lopez:
How much control do we actually have over it ‘cause it’s like there’s the not wanting to be seen as an ambassador and then there’s the reality of, when I raise my hand, I’m reflective in the minds of the people in the room of everyone that I remind them of.
Joel Okpala:
Right. There should be a dialogue. You should have that dialogue. If someone does not carry that on his head, you don’t put it on his head. You don’t say, “Well, you guys are doing this.” It’s like no.
Justin James Lopez:
That’s a really good distinction there. It’s like that shouldn’t just be my identity-
Joel Okpala:
No.
Justin James Lopez:
Is the question, right? It’s like, “No, no. This is a part of my identity, like many other things.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
But this shouldn’t be my identity because when it is, then that’s the only thing you can even think about whenever you interact with me.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And then that’s where a lot of this friction comes in-
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
Where it’s like when this is my only thing in your mind, then that’s the thing that always comes up. Whenever we have discussions, whenever we have discourse, whenever we have disagreements, that’s the thing that comes up.
Joel Okpala:
And that’s where good managers know how to decipher these things. At the end of the day, we are a for-profit company and you want to pull the best out of people. And if you feel like that person is representing themselves in a certain way, you want to get just the best out of that.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
If the person is wearing there LSU, you want to be like, “Hey. What is LSU? Going to go to football? What’s the coach’s name? Give me that.” You don’t start saying, “Well, you guys vandalize a couple stores in ’06.” You’re like, “No.”
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
You’re a manager. Your goal is to get the best out of them to serve the customers because your customer base have LSU people in there too. So it’s how good managers operated. Get the best out of the people.
Justin James Lopez:
When I think about, ‘cause we’ve been talking about the just next generation growth, career, whatever, what would you say is, and I gathered quite a few throughout this conversation just the way you think and your process, but what would you give as a tangible piece of advice for the next generation that wants to move into, whether it’s architecture, design, or the tech space?
Joel Okpala:
Find a passion and lean into it. Give it a year. All your mights. And I can almost guarantee, when you come out of it, you would be a richer person. Not in monetary value, but just in knowledge and experience.
Justin James Lopez:
I remember hearing this a while back and it took me years to really internalize it, but they were like, “Some people are so poor, all they have is money.”
Joel Okpala:
Yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
And it hit so hard. So that’s what I was thinking about when you said your life will be richer when you lean into your passions, you explore different spaces, and challenge yourself to be uncomfortable almost.
Joel Okpala:
And I want to say this though, in hindsight, me saying it sounds as though I listened to someone that told me to do this. I never listened to anyone. I used to hate people that said what I’m saying right now when I was in my 20s. But somehow, coincidentally or luckily enough, I did those things without really knowing.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah.
Joel Okpala:
Maybe it goes back to that sound and just vibe-
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. You started listening to a different part of the melody.
Joel Okpala:
Yeah. And just thank God. So now I’m looking back and saying, “Okay. This worked for me.” It might not work for everyone.
Justin James Lopez:
Yeah. No, yeah. I love that. And that’s a good way to close out this episode. I think that if I had to call one thing out that I gained from this ‘cause I got a lot, but it’s don’t be afraid to gaslight yourself into success.
Joel Okpala:
Oh yeah.
Justin James Lopez:
That’s got to be it. No, but Joel, thanks for joining us again for this episode. It’s been an amazing conversation.
Joel Okpala:
Thank you. Thank you for having me, man. It’s a beautiful opportunity and I’m happy I was able to share my thoughts, my experiences, and I hope it inspires someone.
