THE ONLY BLACK GUY IN THE OFFICE

All Skinfolk Ain’t Kinfolk in Corporate America

What happens when you’re no longer the only Black guy in the office?

The Only Black Guy In the Office
LEVEL
Published in
5 min readApr 13, 2020

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Illustration: Richard A. Chance

Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.

I’I’ve never been one to make my presence immediately known at a new job. I’ll usually spend a couple of weeks scoping out the scene, getting a feel for the office culture, and figuring out how to seamlessly integrate myself into the team — a team that, at least in my professional experience, is predominantly White. That was the case in my last job, the bro-y internet startup, and I still remember my early days there.

The first thing I noticed was how quiet the office was. Nearly everyone wore headphones at their desks, and Slack was the go-to mode of communication, even if you were within arm’s reach of the person you needed, so the sound of keyboards typing filled the open space. But I got some actual week-one face time with my co-workers during an in-office mixer. Everyone was friendly enough, but I really wanted to chop it up with Mike — other than me, he was the only other Black dude on the staff.

It’s rare that I’d see other Black folks working at tech companies in Seattle, so I was…

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The Only Black Guy In the Office
LEVEL
Writer for

Do you know him? Is it you? The trials and tribulations of a Black man navigating corporate life.