The Must Have DEI Metric To Track For An Inclusive Workplace
Dr. Jonathan Ashong-Lamptey
Join the waiting list for Inclusion Ready Leader today
Most people aren’t tracking any useful measures for inclusion.?
Before we get to that.
Here are 3 popular posts from the last week:
Share this with one of your colleagues who needs to know this.
PS.
I write here every single day.
Make sure you follow Dr. Jonathan Ashong-Lamptey for daily insights and inspiration.
In a previous life I was an accountant. Then I was an auditor.
It wasn’t as boring as you might think.
At the heart of the job was reporting:
- Management reports
- Financial reports
- Dashboards
- Decks
People think we only report money but it’s more than that.
A few things I’ve learned are crucial for those building an inclusive workplace.
3 criteria I’ve found for leaders who are taken seriously.
Not everyone who talks about inclusion is taken seriously.
People who are taken seriously used reports to signal 3 things we always looked for.
Control:
Reporting is a way to control how leaders managed their resources.
Communication:
Reporting is a way to communicate how resources are managed to stakeholders.
Challenge:
Reporting is a way to identify gaps between expectations and performance.
It gets better.
If you are visible and taken seriously in an organisation.
You can tie what you do to a report that leaders care about.
The flip side of this.
If you cannot tie what you do to a report that leaders care about. You are invisible and NOT taken seriously in the organisation.
This is important if you are responsible for creating inclusion where you work.
(What are you reporting on?)
The one DEI metric you must track for an Inclusive workplace
Lots of HR Leaders like metrics like:
- Net Promoter Scores
- Engagement surveys
- Approval ratings
But these aren’t always helpful for inclusion.
These are important to HR professionals but often confusing to others.
This can make you unpopular.
By that I mean irrelevant to day to day decisions.
As a people leader how do you become “popular”?
You report on the must have DEI metric to track for an Inclusive workplace.
What is that?
It’s something specific to you.
It’s a measure directly related to the “must solve problem” you have in your workplace.
I’m very confident you know what that is.
- People are scared of it
- People lose sleep over it
- People complain about it
Chances are this problem is impacting the careers of people you know.
Maybe they’re not being hired.
Maybe they’re not being promoted.
Maybe they’re not being invited to stay.
I don’t know exactly what it is.
But it’s your job to know.
If you don’t know what this is. It is now your business to find out.
Beware of strangers assuming they already know this.
It’s your job to discover this for yourself.
Let me be even clearer.
It’s irresponsible of you to NOT track this measure.
I’m using the term “measure” very ambiguously.
That’s deliberate.
I want you to think for yourself.
I want you to make your own mind up.
领英推荐
Listing generic measures will encourage you to think like a generic leader.
That’s not who you are, or else you wouldn’t be here.
3 factors that make people buy into you
Another thing I learned as an accountant.
Surprisingly, it’s not all about the numbers.
The numbers you track either:
- Go up
- Go down
- Stay the same
The real value is in understanding why.
This is what gives people confidence in your ability.
This is how you get buy in.
Reporting plays a role.
You already have a performance management cycle.
What ever you call it, it will have 3 steps:
- Plan
- Do
- Review
I pay a lot of attention to the review part.
Remember what I said earlier about Challenge?
Reporting is a way to identify gaps between expectations and performance.
That gap needs to be understood.
I always look for 3 factors.
1 What is the reason? ????????
What was the cause of the gap and is there a reason it was not anticipated?
2 What is the explanation?
How did this cause specifically result in changes to the outcomes?
3 What is the action?
Based on the information available, what action is required to mitigate the challenge or repeat our success?
I always need this to be answered.
This is the short version of this.
I talk about this in more detail on the full show including an example.
Please note.
This is not theory. It's a tried and tested system.
But this approach reflects my experience and frankly my bias.
Can you understand why I never suggest you lead with Flags, Food and Fun as strategy.
I’m talking about:
- Parties
- Parades
- Panel events
These are mainstream DEI practices.
Often it’s entertainment disguised as education.
I don’t think of this as high impact inclusion work.
Why?
It’s difficult to demonstrate responsible use of resources in the way I described.
There are more educated risks to take.
Also, they don’t help you:
- Earn the trust of your colleagues
- Optimise for measurable results
- Implement a systematic process
Therefore it’s a distraction.
I don’t want you to get distracted or to be considered invisible or irresponsible.
I’ve got something that can help.
Every week, you get an actionable brief to help you do the following:
1) Earn the trust of your colleagues
2) Optimise for measurable results
3) Implement systematic processes
This is what we call high impact inclusion work.
In the last 7 days we’ve had 865 leaders register.
Each brief combines real-world insights and practical tools to help you achieve measurable results in just 5 minutes.
It’s designed for People Leaders who want to efficiently build inclusive workplaces without needing to become DEI specialists.
If you want to join 865 leaders learning how to deliver high impact inclusion work.
Have you shared this with a colleague yet?
Think about who needs to know this.
They need a friend like you.
As always
I’m cheering you on.
Dr. Jonathan
Voice Actor, Audio Specialist, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion consultant
3 周Insightful