The 3 most-common organizational investments in DEI

As companies made their initial investments in DEI, a handful of solutions — employee resource groups, Chief Diversity Officers, and anti-bias training — emerged as especially popular. Each of these options can have a positive impact in the right circumstances when executed effectively, but their pitfalls are well-documented.

Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) often served as the first responders to calls for increased inclusion and belonging. As affinity and networking spaces for members of underrepresented communities, ERGs represent both a safe space for employees processing the effects of tokenism and marginalization in the workplace and a curated group for leaders to engage about the needs of those specific employee populations. This duality can leave ERG leaders and members overburdened, as they are expected to manage self-care while contributing to the company's efforts for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Employees are often expected to contribute to this work without additional pay, formal responsibilities, formal authority, or a reprioritization of their original roles.

Hiring for Chief Diversity Officers and other DEI professionals has seen a sharp increase throughout the last five years. In its 2021 Workplace Trends Report, Glassdoor reported a 30% increase in hiring for DEI roles year over year, expecting this trend to continue in 2021. Whether elevating existing talent or hiring new talent, these roles help signal the investment and importance of DEI for companies internally and externally. While having a leader that is accountable for DEI is crucial, holding the responsibility of solving systemic issues of homogeneity, exclusion, and assimilation can be draining. The average tenure for a Chief Diversity Officer is three years based on "a lack of resources, unrealistic expectations, and inadequate support from senior executives."

Similarly, diversity and anti-bias training remained as a reliable response for organizations looking to advance change in DEI. Company leaders leverage external experts to define and address issues of power, privilege, and bias, helping employees to identify ways to create more affirming environments. Yet, these trainings come with their own challenges and mixed results for efficacy. Research has shown that diversity and anti-bias trainings reduce bias at a negligible rate or can even activate biases in the workplace.

Sustainable ways to improve DEI

While these initiatives and programs help build visibility and momentum in the short-term, fostering diversity, equity and inclusion within the workplace requires long-term investment in perspective-taking, increased access to stretch and growth opportunities, and transparent opportunities for career advancement.

When addressing diversity, you may start by investing resources into sourcing and recruiting members of underrepresented communities within their companies. Yet diversity recruitment is most effective when preceded by an assessment on why these gaps for underrepresentation exist. Is your organization a place where employees believe they can bring their whole selves? One way to address this is through intentional relationship and community building. When examining the employee experience, Gallup found that managers are responsible for 70% of the variance within employee engagement in the workplace. Therefore, it's important for managers and team leaders to create opportunities to check in with employees and engage each other as whole people.

This is doubly important for managers of members of underrepresented communities. Take the time to understand what it means to be a part of that community within your organization. Check in about how you can serve as an ally and advocate to your team members. Organize spaces for employees to share their stories about what they need to thrive within your organization. Help employees build connections across their departments to make sure they feel welcomed into the space. The options are limitless, but all stem from listening to your employees, amplifying their voices, and taking action to provide what they need.

Another area that can help build sustainability for DEI initiatives is examining your organization's approach to performance appraisal and review. Feedback and assessment are essential for employees to thrive in the workplace and these discussions often inform readiness for new projects, stretch opportunities, and even promotions. However, performance reviews are quite susceptible to bias and stereotypes. One key bias is similarity or affinity bias, with which people favor those who are most like them and distance themselves from those who are not like them. By building relationships with each of your employees, you can help mitigate this bias in time for performance reviews. Yet, addressing bias in the performance review process is best handled during work assignment and delegation.

While reflecting on your team and their performance, think about the following questions:

• How are new projects and tasks currently distributed?
• If there is ambiguity about where a specific project should land, how do you determine who should receive the project?
• When faced with a tight deadline, who is trusted to take on those responsibilities?
• When faced with a project that requires navigating organizational politics or is under heavy scrutiny, who is trusted to take on those responsibilities?

Acknowledging that affinity bias can affect your management style is a necessary first step to eliminating your processes and intentionally increasing access to stretch opportunities for your employees.

Lastly, as you create stretch and growth opportunities for your teams, it's also important to assess your processes for career advancement. In the highest levels of leadership, companies continue to be challenged with homogeneity and lack of representation. The most effective way to improve this is to create both transparency and targeted support for high-potential members of underrepresented communities to transition into leadership. Key actions include building mentorship and sponsorship programs, creating clear policies for internal mobility, and communicating proactively around internal roles and promotions.

What can you do next?

Wherever you plan to start, know that efficacy is built on long-term investment and action. DEI thrives under the same conditions as most business priorities: clear goals, realistic expectations, adequate resources, and effective executive sponsorship. Creating these conditions—along with practicing perspective-taking, increased access to stretch and growth opportunities, and transparent opportunities for career advancement—will help sustain your efforts in 2021 and beyond.

Dion Bullock is Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) Strategy Lead at Bravely. 

Read more: 

• Growing demand for training in virtual teamwork, diversity
• How to develop meaningful workplace diversity: Start at the top
• Diversity and inclusion: Moving from saying to doing