DEI in the workplace means addressing equality, fairness, and belonging for employees through inclusive practices that foster age, sex, religion, gender identity, disability status and LGBTQ+ status. Companies that prioritize diversity can reap several competitive benefits including improved employee morale and retention rates as well as higher productivity rates and an engaged workforce.
Implement diversity and inclusion as core business values, discussing them during all-hands meetings, company events, team meetings and one-on-ones. Keep in mind that diversity and inclusion efforts should not be seen as ends goals, but as journeys.
Diversity and Inclusion
Diversity and inclusion can often be confused, but they serve distinct functions. Diversity encompasses all of human differences – gender, race, nationality, age, sexual orientation religion socioeconomic status etc – while inclusion is the deliberate and proactive effort made to ensure all employees from diverse backgrounds feel welcome in a workplace environment. Among its components include policies which allow employees to speak up freely, providing psychological safety so that diverse perspectives may be expressed openly, as well as offering equal advancement opportunities for all employees.
Inclusion is key to building a diverse workforce, but it’s also vital for businesses to realize their full potential. Employees who feel valued and included are more likely to remain with a company and work hard for it, leading to increased profitability and productivity. Furthermore, organizations with diverse and inclusive cultures attract top talent from different cultural backgrounds that contribute greatly towards innovation and competitiveness.
Pew Research Center conducted a recent survey that indicates a vast majority of employees believe companies should prioritize diversity and inclusion efforts within their workplaces, according to 6/10 employees reporting their workplace has policies that ensure fairness when hiring, paying or promoting employees while 52% attended diversity and inclusion trainings or meetings in some form or another.
Diversity can bring many advantages to the workplace. Not only can it increase your ability to attract and retain talented employees, it can also help identify more customers more efficiently while meeting their needs more directly. According to one recent study, companies that excel at ethnic diversity were 27 percent more likely to be profitable than those in the lower quartile.
Implementing diversity and inclusion strategies alone won’t suffice in creating an inclusive business, however; all employees must also feel supported and empowered within their roles regardless of background.
As part of today’s increasingly dispersed workforce, more workers spend part of their day working remotely or from home. To address this, programs and practices that encourage employees to connect in person or online regardless of location may be beneficial.
Unconscious Bias
Unconscious bias is a form of discrimination in which someone holds preconceived beliefs or stereotypes about an entire group without realizing it, leading them to unfairly treat individuals and groups within it in the workplace. Left unchecked, unconscious bias can thwart DEI efforts by creating an atmosphere which excludes people from marginalized communities from participating fully within it.
Unconscious bias in hiring managers may cause them to unknowingly choose candidates with similar backgrounds and characteristics over qualified applicants from underrepresented groups. Furthermore, unconscious bias could manifest itself when evaluating employee performance by assigning more challenging assignments to members from underrepresented groups and criticizing them more severely for mistakes than other employees. Furthermore, managers with unconscious bias could feel uneasy mentoring female employees or promoting women to leadership roles.
Intentional performance enablement practices, including trainings and policies on giving effective feedback and rewarding success based on team and company objectives rather than individual accomplishments, can help counter the effects of unconscious bias. Blind resume screening strategies and structured interviews may also reduce unconscious bias during recruitment processes.
Recognizing that everyone carries unconscious biases can be daunting, yet understanding their potential negative ramifications on workplace culture and DEI initiatives is critical. If an executive finds mentoring female employees uncomfortable or recruiters have negative associations with community college students these unconscious biases may limit opportunities for underrepresented groups within your organization.
As soon as a supervisor shows any bias against an individual with disabilities, this constitutes ableism. Examples may include scheduling meetings at inaccessible locations or refusing to provide necessary accommodations for job seekers and employees with disabilities. According to studies, 84% of those who experienced workplace bias felt it affected their happiness, confidence and well-being to some degree – this makes education on how to address bias and minimize its negative effects within organizations imperative. Unconscious bias remains an ongoing challenge but awareness and action taken together can overcome it successfully.
Creating a Culture of Belonging
Belonging is one of the foundations of diversity equity and inclusion. Belonging refers to a person feeling appreciated, accepted, and treasured within an organization or team; fulfilling an evolutionary human need for deep affiliations which has long been linked to survival needs as well as sociality concerns.
A sense of belonging can significantly improve morale, engagement, productivity and success at work. You can foster this sense of belonging by giving employees plenty of opportunities to interact and engage with each other both inside and outside of work – such as employee resource groups (ERGs). ERGs offer individuals a chance to form bonds with coworkers who share similar backgrounds or experiences, providing a sense of community and support within the workplace.
Establishing a culture of belonging also involves cultivating empathy and awareness by offering educational programs about different customs, traditions, and worldviews that help employees better understand each other and show respect towards one another, which in turn leads to increased collaboration and effectiveness within the workplace. Furthermore, providing benefits catering specifically to demographic groups (such as flexible work scheduling or emotional wellness programs ) shows your employees that you care for their individual needs – thus making them feel like part of something greater than themselves and helps them feel like they belong.
Another way to foster a culture of belonging is integrating diversity into hiring practices. For instance, using diverse panels of interviewers can reduce unconscious bias and help identify the best talent. Furthermore, training managers on what questions are appropriate and inappropriate during an interview may also prove useful.
As part of creating a culture of belonging, leaders must also be open and honest when discussing the effects of bias and discrimination in the workplace. Leaders should prepare employees to share personal stories of victimization while encouraging them to speak out safely in a safe environment. Finally, leaders must show genuine care by showing genuine empathy towards any challenges their employees may be experiencing.
Tracking Your Progress
As your organization strives to become truly diverse, equitable and inclusive, it is crucial that its progress be monitored. Doing so allows you to assess its diversity and inclusion efforts and ensure employees feel connected and accepted for who they are.
Tracking progress requires selecting metrics that best reflect your goals, such as increasing women in leadership positions. Metrics like percentage of female executives at your company or board may help. You could also measure employee satisfaction – an essential driver of workplace culture – by tracking how many of your employees report satisfaction with their jobs and support from colleagues at work.
Retention monitoring is also vitally important. Happy employees tend to stick around longer, helping your company retain top talent and remain competitive in the marketplace.
Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) can also be an excellent way to evaluate company progress. ERGs aim to foster an atmosphere of inclusion among employees who share similar identities – race, gender, religion or sexual orientation for instance – so if employees don’t participate, this might indicate they don’t feel connected and accepted at work; as a potential solution you could increase visibility of these groups or reassess existing ERG programs to see where improvements could be made.
Inclusion is an essential aspect of business. By adopting a DEI framework, your company can foster an environment in which everyone feels valued and empowered in their roles – something to be proud of as it benefits your people as well as society as a whole.