The journey from Diversity to Inclusion

Summary: Here I discuss the importance of diversity and inclusion surveys, how to benchmark your results and offer a framework to evaluate different levels of organisational inclusiveness.

“Diversity is the one true thing we all have in common”

While your Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) programs are up and running and are fully embedded in your HR work, the broader quantitative tools to measure the pulse of your corporate culture become a key monitoring step in your D&I efforts.

Large-scale employee surveys provide valid, reliable and most importantly, statistically representative metrics for the successful diagnostic of your D&I work and your current corporate culture of inclusion. The results of quantitative employee surveys provide critical information related to reaching your D&I goals and objectives.

The results of a well-sampled employee pulse survey with a well-constructed inclusion index should be regarded as important and relevant to measure how inclusive your current corporate culture is. This will ensure your D&I audit provides the robust and representative information required to implement necessary cultural change. In this respect, D&I survey models normally comprise core survey components: work environment, internal policies, external reputation, perceived benefits of D&I, and overall corporate culture.

Yes, what gets measured gets done… but measured against what?

So you think all your D&I results won’t mean much unless these are compared against external norms? Against results of other organisations operating in your sector or geographical region? Is it crucial to rely on benchmark (normative) data to determine whether your D&I scores are high or low when compared to other similar organisations in your country of operation? The answer is yes, but…

The impact of D&I benchmarking has nothing or very little to do with the type of company (for example its size) or business the company deals with on a regular basis (for example, the sector in which it operates) on which the specific benchmarks are built. As an external norm, the geographic location of the company is more relevant in the broadest sense, because the cultural norms and practices of the countries and regions where the company operates are different. D&I survey results need to be benchmarked against the local culture where each specific business unit operates.

However, having said that, when you measure your D&I survey results, your most important benchmarks are actually internal, your own workforce: your actual employee majority. You need to compare the D&I survey results of the dominating majority in your workforce against those of minority employee groups, and identify the opinion gaps in those various key areas of your corporate culture. The objective is to close those gaps, for which you will need to organise further pulse surveys or focus groups to measure opinion trends on those hot topics (opinion gaps) identified to monitor the effectiveness of your current D&I interventions.

So how inclusive are we?

The opinion gaps between majority and minority employees identified in your D&I Audit are not only an outstanding holistic way to monitor all your organisational D&I initiatives, but most importantly it will allow you to determine in which stage of the Diversity & Inclusion organisational development spectrum your organisation is at. This high level assessment will guide the necessary interventions required to move along / progress in the D&I organisational development continuum.

I have identified seven clearly defined stages of the D&I organisational development spectrum:

1. The mono-cultural organisation: where diversity is not valued and workforce diversity is non-existent at all. The organisation maintains the power of dominant majority groups and excludes others even from entering the institution.
2. The assimilative organisation: where people are excluded but in a less explicit way. Some members of minority groups are allowed to join in as long as they conform to predefined majority norms, in other words, where employees are allowed as long as they assimilate into the dominating organisational culture. Minority groups are normally not granted access to the circles of power within this type of organisations.
3. The dispassionate organisation: where the organisational culture recognises that there are other perspectives, but don’t want to do anything that could upset the status quo / stir up trouble. They may actively recruit minority groups at the bottom of the organisation and make some token appointments so as to not disrupt the ‘perceived’ harmony in the organisation.
4. The compliant organisation: where diversity efforts are motivated by staying out of legal trouble / meeting legal requirements. The organisation is committed to eliminating discrimination and encourages employees to examine their attitudes and think differently. There is a strong support for the development of new employees from minority groups.
5. The multicultural organisation: where many diversity activities and celebrations occur, there are visibly committed leaders, and bias is not tolerated, yet the comprehensive effort to weave diversity into the institutional fabric has not yet been fully achieved. The organisation is not satisfied with being anti-racist and so examines all it does, and its culture, to see the impact of these on its diverse multicultural workforce. It develops and implements policies to distribute power among all diverse groups.
6. The inclusive organisation: In this organisation differences are recognised, valued, celebrated and utilised, there is an emphasis on inclusive practices at all levels of institutional functioning, and all members of the organisation are accountable for diversity and inclusion success. The organisation creates an inclusive work environment that values and respects differences. It encourages and enables all employees to draw on their talents, skills, and experience for the benefit of the business.
7. The broader socially responsible organisation: This organisation regards human differences in the workplace as contributing to the success of the business and optimises the ability and willingness of all employees to contribute to that success. The organisation reflects the contribution and interests of all its diverse members in everything it does, champions and advocates. All members are full participants of the organisation and there is recognition of a broader social responsibility – to educate others outside the organisation and to have an impact on external oppression / elimination of discrimination. All their D&I related activities extend outside the organisation to customers and suppliers and the community as a whole.

Based on your D&I Audit outcomes, you can use this organisational development framework as a backdrop against which to reflect organisational progress in your D&I journey to improve your institutional and educational climate and practices.

The way forward…

So, how do you know if you have an inclusive culture for employees? It is simple, measure it. Look at employee engagement of specific employee groups and your D&I surveys. Look at data on the actual diversity of your workforce. How representative is it? Look at the diversity profile of your new-employee pipelines as well as those at the senior levels of your organisation. Review your turnover rates for various employee populations within your organisation. If you see that you seem to be losing more women, ethnic minorities, people with different sexual orientation of physical abilities, then perhaps there is a reason for it.

Lets not forget that managers and business leaders tend to make decisions every day in favour of specific groups without even realising it. It often takes a third party or an objective diagnostic process to help them recognise these unconscious biases. Yet these biases lead them to give certain individuals and groups both unearned advantage and unearned disadvantage in the workplace. On global teams, these biases can be enhanced by the distance and lack of face-to-face meetings, as well as differences in workplace behaviour and cultural norms.

All this quantitative and qualitative information will allow you to place your current corporate culture in the D&I organisational development continuum that we have discussed in this article. It will help to visualise and measure, in an objective way, the evolution or non-evolution at all of your organisation’s D&I journey.

The aim of this D&I framework is to uncover these unconscious biases and hidden micro-inequities in daily business decisions by generating awareness about them and by sharing and addressing best practices in D&I which can make the difference between success and failure in the aim of achieving a more inclusive organisational culture.

• Read more: The most effective way to measure 'Diversity & Inclusion'
• Read more: The best qualitative metrics to create a more inclusive workplace
• Read more: Social Inclusion Approaches in the European Workplace
• Read more: Caring for Employees with ‘Hidden Disabilities’
• Read more: The Diversity and Inclusion Plan

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Disclaimer: The author is making this ‘Opinion Blog’ available in his personal effort to advance the understanding of best practices in workplace related matters. The author assumes no responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions in the content of this ‘Opinion Blog’ or for the results obtained from the use of the information provided. The information is provided on an ‘as is’ basis with no guarantees of completeness, accuracy, usefulness or timeliness and without any warranties of any kind whatsoever, express or implied. The views expressed are solely those of the author in his private capacity and do not in any way represent the views of any entity whatsoever with which the author has been, is now, or is to be affiliated in the future.