The Election, Your Organizational Culture & Your Employee Engagement: Sorry, But You're Going to Have to Do Something

Smart leaders look behind the headlines and superficial data analysis to better understand the real facts revealed by a situation. Here is a fact for you: 92% of black women voted against the candidate that 60% of white men and 53% of white women voted for. And despite much media attention to black male support for the Republican candidate increasing this year, roughly 80% of black men voted with the black women. Regardless of whether anyone discusses politics at your organization, this fact remains: People are coming to work with strong views about one another, their values, principles and attitudes. And these views can make workplace trust very challenging.

Do I trust the performance review or feedback I am given? How do I interpret the moment my majority group boss or colleague confuses me with another minority woman who doesn't even work in my department? Do I resolve conflict with a conversation or with a lawsuit or with a very damaging rant on social media? When I notice an error in work product that could lose my company a client, do I point it out or do I secretly hope my colleague gets in trouble for making the mistake? The answer to all l these questions and thousands more depend heavily on the quality and strength of your workplace culture. Given the outcome of the election and the polarized views across key demographics, leaders have every reason to refocus and proactively create the "oasis culture" where outside antagonisms can not flourish.

3 Key Takeaways from the Election and Various Groups' Post-Election Commentary:

1. The term "People of Color" Continues to Be Completely Useless: The huge differences between black, Hispanic/Latino, and Asian voting show that Cubans, Mexicans, Immigrant Latinos, Puerto Ricans, Other Hispanic blocks, African-Americans, Immigrant Blacks, South Asian Indians, East Asians, etc. view the world through very different lenses. Lumping them together didn't make sense 20 years ago and makes zero sense today. Workplace outreach strategies, leadership development programs, and inclusion messaging need to reflect the myriad complexities posed by this reality.
2. There are huge racial and gender gaps in how the population sees opportunity, the existence of a meritocratic society and inclusion. Trying to pretend that your employees don't bring these filters to work and to interactions with superiors, colleagues, subordinates, customers, vendors and others is not leadership- it is actually managerial malaise. Smart organizations will create leadership teams that know how to bring people together despite these beginning point obstacles.
3. Finally, given much rhetoric you hear, the term diversity, or DEI, will now be attacked more vigorously than ever before. I advise practitioners of inclusion work to focus less on what it is called and make certain that efforts to create fair inclusive cultures, train inclusive leaders, and develop future leaders from the ranks of underrepresented people continue- regardless of what you call it. And you must find new, quiet allies to help you get things done and people promoted- perhaps without the fanfare of times past.