Go Boldly: Your Company’s Best Journey

Welcome back to the #GoBoldly series, where I share learnings and observations from my conversations with chief executives and experts on how senior leaders can guide their organizations into a post-Covid world.

Among the many challenges facing global companies, few are as complex as that of fully achieving diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) goals. Yet few challenges have the upside potential not only to improve our companies but also to deliver a lasting positive impact for our employees, customers and communities.

Embracing DE&I as a company is the right thing to do for society, but that is not the only value. The research shows that it inevitably leads to better business results. The more diverse and inclusive the company, the sharper the thinking. We make wiser business decisions when they encompass a range of views reflecting the many dimensions of diversity: age, gender and gender identity, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation, belief systems, and more. For global companies, diversity may be about country representation. We improve ourselves when we openly embrace a diversity of thinking, something that many find increasingly challenging in the polarizing political environments that encompass so much of the world. 

But the reality is that DE&I is a journey of continuous improvement; it never really ends. You assess, you strive and you make progress. Then you reassess and push some more. You never can declare victory. This is a hard message for some business leaders who are accustomed to more well-traveled missions – building more transparent supply chains or divesting an unprofitable business unit, for example – endeavors in which they can cross a finish line.

DE&I transformations are also different from other change efforts because this issue is deeply personal, inherently subjective, structurally complex, and because data alone won’t tell the full story or reveal the true root causes. Adding to the complexity is the vastness of diversity’s scope. People often primarily think about their own flavor of diversity; but from an organizational standpoint, leaders need to consider all dimensions. Racial equity is front and center in the US today, but gender equity is more in focus in many other parts of the world. Minorities in one geography are majorities in others.

Moreover, individuals who are minorities on one or even multiple dimensions can be majorities on others. For example, while I am not Caucasian, I am an American male, which makes me part of the majority in my firm. In addition to the complexity, business leaders need to recognize that the path to progress will be lined with multiple obstacles – including their own understanding and readiness.

I believe management science can help leaders navigate this multi-faceted journey. We can apply learnings from one issue as we advance, improving what works and changing what doesn’t. As with any transformation, it is important to think about both the foundational enablers and to strive for progress within particular vertical areas, paced and sequenced over time.

Like so many professional services companies of its time and place, Bain started out with little diversity. As DE&I rose on the corporate agenda throughout the years, we deepened our focus and ensured we took a comprehensive and structured approach to keep the journey on track. DE&I is an organizational mindset, with every business leader needing to think about how their functions and decisions can contribute to the company’s goals.

Foundational moves included making diversity and inclusion a leadership priority, establishing unconscious-bias training, embracing diversity in metrics and leadership selection, and creating a board-level DE&I committee, for example. On the vertical side, one approach is to foster affinity groups. Bain has had affinity groups since the establishment of our Blacks at Bain (BABs) group in the 1980s.

In the 1990s Bain made the bold (for its time) goal of embracing employees of all sexual orientations and gender identities. In the years following the US military imposing its “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, we advanced in the opposite direction, establishing BGLAD, the LGBTQ network at Bain and Bridgespan, with the stated purpose of creating a culture inspired by the words “Go where you are celebrated, not where you are tolerated.” Among the many valuable lessons for us: the importance of active allies in the journey. Creating an inclusive culture in which all can thrive relies on all employees to drive change, not just those within an affinity group. Our BGLAD group has achieved rapid growth and continues to expand steadily around the globe today.

It is also critical to clarify ambitions and targets and to measure improvements. We established goals for gender and racial diversity, making progress, encountering obstacles, making more progress. For example, in our pursuit of racial equity, we encountered a fundamental issue: schools we traditionally recruited from had limited diversity themselves.

To recruit more Black candidates, we expanded our efforts to historically Black colleges and universities and we established partnerships with other talent ecosystems to broaden our reach. As a global organization, we also became increasingly aware of how much the situation varied in each of the 37 countries where we operate. We have made tremendous progress with gender diversity for example, yet we know we now have more to do to recruit and retain more women within specific geographies. We acknowledge that new priorities will emerge as the company evolves.

Raising our game inside our company has had profound impact, yet our ambition is higher: to help our communities and clients achieve their own DE&I objectives as well.

When CEOs ask where to start, I tell them to get a clear picture of their point of departure. How diverse and inclusive are you―really? Invest to understand your employees, your customers, your broader ecosystem. Some CEOs will focus on the data, others on stories or one-on-one conversations. Whatever your starting point, accept that this is not a place for zero-sum thinking. One person’s diversity is not more important than another’s. As one executive recently noted: “Creating equity and inclusion is not about setting special standards, but making special efforts to tackle conscious and unconscious biases.” 

I also talk about role-modeling DE&I behavior in what you say, what you prioritize and whom you pick. While both count, actions speak louder than words. You can rally support in role-modeling DE&I behavior by encouraging your organization’s leaders to transform from coaches into mentors and then into sponsors. Another executive recently shared her wisdom by saying, “When helping others achieve success, mentors are people who talk to you, while sponsors are people who talk about you when you aren’t in the room.” 

Finally, be patient. Be willing to acknowledge that this is a multi-year agenda, and that the focus of your efforts will shift over time. Sequencing and taking a longitudinal approach allows for the benefit of learning. You apply the lessons from one group to help you make gains with another group. You build on your successes as you keep looking ahead to the next one because, ultimately, everybody wins.