Why Measuring Diversity Isn’t Enough
And why you need to measure Inclusion instead
The benefits of diversity are well documented. Reports by Mercer, Forbes, Catalyst and others have all concluded that a diversified workforce drives greater innovation and business growth. It can also help your team stand out to potential candidates, recruit top talent and improve retention.
In addition to being the “right thing to do,” the business case for diversity is clear. What is not as clear is how exactly leadership teams can focus their resources to unlock all of the benefits referenced in research and studies.
A growing number of organizations are taking action by hiring D&I officers, setting quotas and publishing diversity reports. In an attempt to move the needle, they invest in initiatives such as unconscious bias training, pay analyses, interventions in recruiting processes, employee surveys and more.
But within most organizations these diversity initiatives, while well intentioned, are failing to achieve the intended outcomes. Even with clear values, commitment from leadership and access to resources, very few companies can point to significant, quantifiable progress.
Current approaches simply aren’t enough.
This isn’t to say that diversity is not important; however, in order to drive meaningful and lasting change, the focus needs to shift away from diversity and toward inclusion.
“Hiring people from diverse groups is easier than successfully addressing the deep- rooted cultural and organizational issues that those groups face in their day-to- day work experience.” — Boston Consulting Group
Our team thinks of inclusion as the act of ensuring that people’s experiences within an organization are not impacted negatively as a result of their personal characteristics. Even more, we believe that it is, in fact, inclusion that drives diversity and business performance, not the other way around.
If you are focused primarily on meeting diversity quotas, you’re likely not creating an environment where every employee feels supported, is compensated fairly, provided the same learning & growth opportunities and enjoys their day-to-day interactions with peers. If instead you focus on Inclusion, you’re able to establish a work environment (be it in person or remote) that enables each employee to happily thrive within their role.
But how exactly do you improve inclusion within your organization? Where should you start? And how do you measure your progress?
We’ve recently published a downloadable resource to help you answer these exact questions. In it, we present our unique framework for quantifying inclusion, introduce the “Categories of Inclusion” and discuss the benefits of this approach.
Click the button below to access Measuring the Invisible: How and Why You Should Measure Inclusion and to determine how you can strategically increase employee satisfaction and business performance.
