Are we defined by Stereotypes

I was at an event recently and the host decided to introduce me to the other speakers and as I went around with her being introduced to everyone, we approached this one lady. The host said "This is Asif". The lady replied "I have already been miked up, thank you." It took me a few moments to realise that she thought I was the sound technician. I decided to go along with it and not say anything to her, however when I got up to present myself to the guests, I introduced myself as the Head of Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging, at which point the lady that had assumed that of me, turned redder than a plum tomato.

This is unfortunately not a unique experience. I was in a luxury handbag shop a couple of months ago on a mission to buy my wife a certain bag that she wanted for her birthday. It was the weekend and I was dressed down, in a t shirt, tracks and trainers (I do dress down occasionally). As I went into the shop I noticed that the security guard started to follow me around the store, so I decided to stop and ask him why, to which he denied following me.

Interestingly, as I was speaking to him a sales assistant came over and I decided to ask her to show me one of the bags, to which she responded it’s XXXX pounds, to which I responded that I had not asked her for the price but wanted to see it. She then went on to ask me "Do you want to buy it?". At this point I decided to leave as clearly the assumption was that I was going to steal something or could not afford the bag. I can probably list endless examples of how in my day-to-day life, I get stereotyped, but I’ll leave those for another conversation.

We are all aware of the recent ban on adverts featuring "harmful gender stereotypes" that have been going on for years, whereby women are almost always featured on ads showing domestic work, household cleaning items and baby products and men are almost always featured on adverts for cars, DIY products and electronics. Interestingly, we all know that this is far from the truth and no role is specific to a gender, so why do companies make assumptions in adverts? Stereotyping is the key basis for this and this probably worked at some point in time, however with the changing nature of society and roles being reversed in households, it is hugely risky for brands to make such stereotypes. 

So what is the basis for these stereotypes and is there any reality to them? Well, we often hear that black people are the fastest runners, true on occasion but I can also think of great runners who are not black or we hear that women are more emotional than men. Put on The Lion King for me and you will see me cry, I promise. The fact is that there is no evidence to suggest that stereotypes are true and they are largely based on generalisation and we all know that each person is different and that we can’t assume or generalise. 

I think our upbringing also plays a massive part in the stereotypes we believe too. Growing up, without even realising it, we are all programmed and conditioned to believe what our parents, or other elders in our family, believe and before you know it we are also starting to stereotype a group of people based on their characteristics. The media also influences our stereotypes in the same way, we grow up watching programmes and music videos that depict certain stereotypes like showing rappers being into drugs or the news always showing Muslims as terrorists. 

The worst thing about stereotypes is that they are usually based on huge generalisations, therefore all they put forward are assumptions about groups of people and their needs. This clearly is very dangerous, and even more so in the D&I space where we continue to stereotype in the workplace and in the same breath try to promote an inclusive environment for our employees through the work that we are doing. And the sad thing is that we think our “robust” D&I strategies are for the benefit of the very people we are stereotyping and instead make them feel even more like they don’t belong to our organisations.

What do I mean? Well we assume in some of our training programmes that women need more confidence - maybe true for some, but can we assume this is the case for every single woman? Or what about when recruiting BME individuals? (the term BME itself stereotypes a large group of people and assumes their needs are the same)We feel we need to advertise in certain areas where BMEs can be found or that they are all from a lower socioeconomic background. But clearly not all BME's live in poorer areas or are from lower socioeconomic background. Why do we assume that people's needs are defined by their visible characteristics? This is dangerous and we need to move away from this kind of thinking.

All this does is create divides and assumptions about the needs of individuals, when what we should be focusing on is creating a sense of belonging for our people and not creating more stereotypes or reinforcing old ones. By the way, this also applies to white men and the assumption that we don’t need to focus on them in the D&I conversations because they are white, middle aged, straight etc. Because, what about a white South African or a white man who is neurodiverse or a white man who is from a lower socioeconomic background? The danger of stereotyping in this example is the exclusion of the very people you want to include in the D&I conversation.

We really need to view diversity in a completely different way and move away from the traditional diversity boxes that we have created to help us better define people. Diversity is not about boxes. Boxes don’t work and instead they create divides and useless stereotypes – pretty ironic, huh? I am not discounting the need to support diverse talent, I wholly agree with the need to have support for people of different characteristics. However, what I am saying is that they are not all defined in one way and we need to explore that difference as well. We are all made up of more than one characteristic. Intersectionality means I could be black, lesbian, have a disability and be a female - which box will you put me into?

Is it easy? No it’s not. However the question you should be asking yourself is: Has your current box-ticking worked? Evidence would prove that it has not and that's why everyone is trying to come up with the next great diversity programme or initiative. When the real answer is all about how you start to treat your diverse staff as individuals and let them identify what their needs are as opposed to letting them be defined by our stereotypes of their needs. We still need to continue our efforts around supporting diverse staff but we need to just ensure that in the process we do not end up making them feel even more isolated.

I will leave you with a question to ask yourself, do you stereotype within your organisation? The dictionary definition is; A stereotype is a fixed general image or set of characteristics that a lot of people believe represent a particular type of person or thing. Ill let you ponder over whether this is true or not of your organisations.

Written by Asif Sadiq MBE and Sana Butt