Thomas Kochman

Tom Kochman and Jean Mavrelis are nationally recognized leaders in the field of cultural diversity training, research, and management. Tom is Professor Emeritus of Communication at University of Illinois at Chicago, and author of Black and White Styles in Conflict. Jean has written articles on Diversity in the Schools and Diversity and Gender as well as Diversity in the Workplace. She has served on the Illinois Sex Equity Task Force and the board of Mujeres Latinas en Accion, and is presently writing a book on Cross Cultural Women’s Networks in the Workplace. Together they have directed research and development of KMA cultural materials. The mission and goal of KMA has been to prepare individuals and organizations to deal with social and cultural diversity in ways that value and respect differences, rather than, as has been the pattern, treating differences as social matter that individuals must repudiate or leave at the doorstep of the institution in order to better "fit in." In service of that mission and goal, KMA offers new conceptual frameworks with which to work in dealing with cultural diversity. Through cultural and social map-making and the development of cultural literacy, KMA offers a tool kit for leaders, managers and employees to understand and communicate better with people different from themselves, and also, thereby, achieve the flexibility that they and their organizations will need to stay vital and competitive in the local, national and global marketplace during periods of social complexity, uncertainty and change.