Who wants to be an inclusive leader?

I have recently come to the realisation that the best way to explain why inclusive leadership is so important to today's business leaders, is by using the quiz show Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

I was watching the show recently and I began to wonder if the reason why the 'phone a friend' option was rarely successful, is because everybody has friends who are just like themselves. As the contestant already knows the things they know, their friends are likely to know the same things as them, and what they really need is somebody who knows the things they don't. I am convinced they would be more successful if they phoned a complete stranger, but would they be able to trust the person enough to gamble on their answer?

When I deliver DEI training, I sometimes ask the participants to write a list of people whom they trust and are not part of their family, and then I ask them to put a line through those who are the same gender, then a similar age, then the same ethnicity, and it really doesn't take long before there is nobody left on the list. This creates the same problem for business leaders as a contestant who is 'phoning a friend', as people whose opinions you trust will rarely be able to tell you the things you don't know, what is going to go wrong, or provide an innovative new way of doing things. If you had to ‘phone a friend’ would you trust the answer from somebody who worked for the same company? What if you worked together but didn’t know them well? What if you were curious enough to find out about all the things that they know, would you gamble on their answer then?

Everything we do to increase the diversity of Royal Mail employees, both above the waterline with visible differences, and below the waterline with less visible ones, is designed to achieve one thing, and that is to have as wide a range of voices, backgrounds, and experiences, in the room when discussions are going on and decisions are being made. I am not talking about ‘decision by committee’ but making sure that the decision maker has heard the dissenting voices, the different opinions, and the new ideas. However, this will only work if we have inclusive leaders who are comfortable admitting that they don't have all the answers and are willing to, metaphorically speaking, ‘phone a friend’, leaders who value diversity, and who intentionally creates an environment where everybody can put forward their ideas, challenge the status quo, and influence decision making.

I can almost guarantee that if all our Royal Mail colleagues were on Stuart Simpson’s ‘phone a friend’ list, that he could answer any questions that has ever been asked on 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire?', we just need to make sure their voices can be heard when it is needed. Imagine what we can do to solve the business challenges that our decision makers face every day if we harness the knowledge and experience of all our colleagues.

If you are ever on the show then my advice is to use the 'ask the audience' option for the big questions, as there will be a much more diverse group of people providing you with answers.