True Value Of Diversity In Business: It's Not Representation, But Value Creation

What is this piece is about?

A lot has been said about Diversity and Inclusion and their role in business.

However, mostly when we hear about diversity, we hear about the need for a better and more effective social representation. But that is only the starting point for the debate about Diversity in business. The true value of Diversity in business is as an engine for value creation and meaningful social growth.

The true meaning of diversity in business is about the diversification of value. Not just about the input, but mostly about the output. That is the competitive advantage that businesses have over each other.

This new in-depth piece explores how our wrong, inaccurate and outdated thinking about Diversity is costing us in the future value creation we don't have and how it's stopping us from making real social progress. It also looks at what we can do to fix it and rewire our minds to unleash the real creative power of diversity in business.

What we cannot think we cannot change.

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The Problem with D&I in organisations today

A lot of people and organisations are still getting Diversity & Inclusion wrong.

Even though it is an incredibly important topic, when addressed as an ideological problem instead of a social problem and a business problem, it can create more difficulties than it addresses.

For instance, by creating "fake diversity" that only looks like diversity on the surface and mimics the physiological differences between people, but isn't producing real diversity on the inside. It only hires bodies but reinforces the same culture, the same mindset, the same principles, the same mental programmes, the same prejudices and the same limitations.

How can the same mental and psychological settings produce different results? Of course, they can't. We cannot expect real social change from solutions that aren't systemic. That’s why we need to change how we think about things (such as diversity and inclusion) and understand their real meaning and real purpose in business to achieve actionable results.

When I said that the current take on corporate diversity often remains on the surface level, while true diversity happens on the inside, it is also important to explain what the former is and what it leads to.

The former isn't diversity. It is a democratic representation of people with the aim to create a proportional reflection of our society. That isn’t diversity. This is only one half of the diversity equation. It is only an A to a B. It is important, sure, but without the intrinsic factor, it doesn't produce any real business results for the organisations other than increased racial and gender visibility. In other words, it creates the mimicry of change for an organisation instead of being an actual vehicle for a real social and business change.

What is True Diversity?

True diversity is diversity both on the outside and on the inside.

Without the internal factor – in the diversity of values, viewpoints, neurodiversity, different ways of thinking, different beliefs, different ways of problem-solving and people's MOs – corporate diversity stands at the hazard of becoming just a carefully orchestrated sameness.

This would be a shame because the true value of Diversity for business organisations isn't just in reflecting the proportional representation of the society it is a part of. The true value of diversity is in the immense value of ideas contributing to long-term meaningful growth.

The true value of Diversity in business is future-proofing and innovation. It is in becoming a truly Human Organisation that reflects and respects the fundamental truth of people being not resources, but human beings. Human beings with a creative potential that remains unexpressed and which when tapped into leads directly to exponential business growth.

What is blocking us from unlocking true diversity in business?

What often stops any real change from happening is our current level of consciousness. That is, how we think about a situation, what we see as possible and how well we are equipped to think about concepts and ideas based on our past level of experience.

In our society, we still have a very stubborn preoccupation with everything solid, physical, visible and tangible. But what is meaning? Meaning is an abstract – an intangible, ephemeral thing that floats in the connections in between things, concepts and ideas. Meaning isn't visible, but it is important. We cannot see it, but it structures the internal relationships between what we can see and changes the success rate of the final output.

If we continue to fixate only on what we can see, we are largely discounting any substantial value from the value creation process. Like ideas, creativity, imagination, viewpoints, problem-solving, critical thinking, leadership, soft skills, insight, understanding, anticipation, intuition, foresight, purpose and meaning...

In order words, everything that makes a business a business in the first place. Because everything that we see around ourselves today – everything solid and tangible – first occurred as an idea in somebody else’s mind.

"The true value of a business is in the ideas it disseminates, the values it inspires, the value it delivers and the meaning it adds to people’s lives."

So as far as diversity goes, we should understand it not as a mere social representation tool, but for what it can bring to businesses when understood and utilised for what it does best: as a value creation engine.

The true value of diversity in business

True diversity is a VALUE CREATION engine for any business. It taps into a wide pool of talent in order to bring diversity on the inside of the organisation and then adapt ITSELF to the people and the way THEY see the world.

This means that to adopt diversity for the sheer value it has to offer to any business, we need to start seeing organisations not as static and immovable entities, but as dynamic ecosystems of value creation and social growth.

The job of a business is not to be static and set in its ways and then hire people as resources – bodies – to fit its own outdated agenda. With this ideology in mind, it is a miracle that such a business would still be in business. The future of business is in creating nimble and highly adaptive systems that are context-responsive and thrive on change.

The Human Organisation: Highly adaptive humanised businesses that celebrate diversity

In such an organisation, you can have humanity on a systemic level because such an organisation would be a direct reflection of its people and all the knowledge, ideas, viewpoints, beliefs and the sheer unexpressed potential they bring into the business every day when they go to work.

It would have a set of objectives, shared vision, purpose (a reason for being) and meaning as a core organising principle and then give people the autonomy to solve problems and create new value using the best of what they can bring to the table – their minds and hearts.

An organisation managed as a human organism would be naturally diverse and inclusive, with all its potential directed not inward to sustain itself and its own agenda, but outward to benefit the people it serves and the world. Its KPIs would be linked directly to maximising people’s wellbeing by allowing them to be themselves and rewarding them for being who they are.

When you hire for diversity and then punish people for differentiation and plurality of opinions and different ways of working, all your efforts are largely counterproductive. Then it really doesn't matter who it is that is working for you. Because it's your culture and legacy beliefs that are making your people look, think and feel all the same.

It makes people feel small and makes them doubt their value and self-worth as if there was something wrong with them for not fitting into your organisation's outdated criteria. And when you get to this point, you won't stay in business for too long because your very culture (internal operation system) is preventing you from growing and achieving your future goals.

Looking towards the future: Food for thought

So when you think of Diversity the next time you create a diversity strategy at your organisation, when you run an internal briefing, when you think about who to hire, when you think about updating your internal cultural policy or when you look to organise a conference on corporate diversity and its role in the future of business organisations, think about this:

• True diversity is multi-faceted. It goes way beyond just Physical Diversity.
• True diversity is Diversity of the Mind. It is Cognitive Diversity as well as the Physical.
• True diversity is the diversity of ideas, beliefs, values, viewpoints, creative expression, identity and past experiences that respects and celebrates human potential and all that humanity has to offer to the future of your business.
• True diversity in business leads to the diversification of value that you produce. Not to unification, but to plurality. Not to homogenization, but to new opportunities. It opens up the doors to new possibilities, to creating new and more meaningful futures for people.
• True diversity is HUMANITY. It is making your organisation Human.

If your organisation can adapt to Humanity, it can become truly diverse.

Until then, it is only using diversity as a mimicry to make itself seem less out of touch with our shared human reality.

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And remember:

Diversity is a natural occurrence in society.

Representation is having a seat at the table.

Inclusion is having your voice be heard.

Belonging makes Diversity & Inclusion a non-issue.

We should ALL strive for the latter: Belonging.

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What next?

Do you want to understand the impact of Diversity on your organisation?

Make your organisation more Human?

Use Diversity as an engine for value creation?

Future-proof your business by creating a new meaning?

Let's have a chat.

Learn more about how I can help you apply this new thinking here: Meaning.Global

If you want to discuss Diversity with me, email me at [email protected]

Plus, here are my slides from a London talk on Reframing Diversity and Changing The Diversity Conversation I did a couple of years ago when we still did things F2F.

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About the author

Dr. Martina Olbert is recognized by Forbes as the ‘global authority on brand meaning’. She is a global speaker, thinker, writer, social scientist, strategist and meaning and cultural relevance expert helping organisations understand what all the changes the world, consumers and brands are experiencing mean to their business. She is the Founder and CEO of Meaning.Global, a global strategic intelligence consultancy, helping brands and organisations reconnect with meaning and human essence for real value creation and meaningful growth. In her work, she focuses on how the shifts in society redefine the perception of meaning in our culture today. She is most interested in the expansion of consciousness, cognition, social progress and cultural change.

Email:?[email protected]?| Website:?www.meaning.global?| Twitter:?@MartinaOlb