About

 
 

I am a….

  • Mother

  • Proud Daughter of Immigrants

  • First Generation College Student

  • Award Winning Professor of Communication Studies

  • Experienced DEI & Anti-racism Practitioner

  • Nationally Recognized Public Speaker

  • Agent of Change

 

Cindu Thomas-George is the Founder and Principal Trainer of Shakti Diversity and Equity Training.

Cindu Thomas- George is a disrupter of injustice and cultivator of inclusion. As the Founder and Principal Trainer of Shakti Diversity and Equity training, she designs and facilitates professional development experiences that promote inclusion, equity, antiracism, and intercultural intelligence. As a DEI practitioner, she works across industries to help cultivate workplace cultures that foster a sense of belonging and inclusion for today's increasingly diverse workforce. In her seventeen years of experience, she has developed a mastery of creating and facilitating meaningful and impactful learning experiences that work to empower individuals to become agents of change and champions of inclusion and equity. As a nationally recognized speaker, Cindu’s speaking engagements are focused on encouraging cross-racial allyship, disrupting anti-Asian hate, moving beyond color-blindness to color consciousness, understand and embracing equity, disrupting anti-Blackness in communities of color, empowering women of color in the workplace, and cultivating inclusive organizations.

Furthermore, Cindu is a tenured professor of Communication Studies at the College of Lake County (CLC) specializing in Public Speaking, Intercultural Communication, and Online learning. Cindu is an award-winning educator, receiving the 2017 NISOD Teaching Excellence Award, a national recognition of excellence in Higher Education. Cindu is also partnering Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Non-Profit Management, teaching inclusive leadership.

 Cindu began her career as an adjunct faculty member at San Francisco State University and City College of San Francisco. She holds an M.A. in Communication Studies from San Francisco State University where she learned the art of teaching, public speaking, and the importance and relevance that diversity and social justice education has in our world. It was her own lived experiences of being the daughter of Indian immigrants and navigating her role in Higher Education as a woman of color that drew her to a career committed to driving inclusion, equity, and anti-racism forward. Her passion and commitment for this work extends beyond her professional life. Cindu is a co-founder of the Chicago Women’s Leadership Accelerator, a leadership development conference dedicated to increasing representation of women in leadership roles. She also actively volunteers and is a co-founder and Board member of Malayalees for Social Justice, co-founder of the South Asian Solidarity Project, co-founder and co-chair of the Women of Color Employee Resource Group at the College of Lake County.. Previously, she sat on the advisory board of Orion3 and was also on the board of YWCA Lake County, helping direct the organization’s racial justice initiatives and programming.

Cindu resides in Chicago’s Ukrainian Village neighborhood with her husband and children.

To learn more about Cindu, read her story that was featured by Lean In or her recent feature in Brown Girl Magazine.