3 Ways To Establish Leadership Accountability & Combat Toxic Cultures
Here’s why leadership accountability matters even more in a #MeToo world and what you can do to get started in building more inclusive cultures.
Pluto Power Shift is an event series designed to help companies navigate the diversity and inclusion landscape. Our September event was another major success in providing amazing insights on why leadership accountability matters in building better work cultures.
In discussing why leadership accountability matters in the #MeToo world, we wanted to explore the relationship between diversity & inclusion and harassment, discrimination & misconduct. During our panel, we discussed why this is now a CEO-level issue; how misconduct produces toxic, underperforming workplaces; and how there’s both a growing number of cases and yet remaining systemic underreporting.
Joining us for this conversation were Meredith Finn (VP, Salesforce), Nabilah Irshad (VP of Legal & Business, NewsCred), and Wade Davis (Inclusion Consultant & Culture Adviser at NFL, Google, and Netflix).
Here are 3 takeaways from this candid and compelling discussion to help you establish leadership accountability & combat toxic cultures in your organization:
Host discussions on why leadership accountability in toxic cultures is vital for growth
Understand leadership buy-in matters to properly measure transparency and accountability
Validate the business case for D&I initiatives in ways proven to work
(In preparation for this event, our team held pre-panel interviews with each panelist. The interviews have been edited for clarity and brevity.)
Discussing toxic cultures and leadership accountability is vital for growth
Meredith: Creating a culture where everyone can succeed and each individual is set up for success is critical for the long-term success of organizations. Toxic cultures not only impact a company’s ability to attract and retain the best talent, but as we have seen, can also negatively impact a company’s relationship with its customers. As a result, it is critical for leaders to be active participants in defining, creating and monitoring culture within their organizations. Given the critical importance of culture to businesses, leaders have to be held accountable for the environments they are creating.
A company can have diversity within its employee base, but without a real culture of inclusion you will likely still see harassment, discrimination and employee misconduct. In my opinion, inclusion is actually much harder to achieve than diversity, and diversity is hard to sustain without a real culture of inclusion, as harassment and misconduct will drive employees away from a team or company.
So, again, if you have diversity without inclusion, the episodes of misconduct are going to be higher.
Nabilah: It’s the top down effect really. The leaders and exec teams set the stage and tone for companies. They reflect how employees should react in certain situations or in general. Also, it’s a matter of accountability. Holding leaders accountable is extremely important because companies need leadership buy-in. If you don’t have leadership buy-in, your efforts in improving your culture aren’t going to work. We’ve been lucky enough to take a proactive top down approach in having a culture that talks about these issues.
While I haven’t worked in a toxic culture per se, one company I was at was demotivating in that they weren’t advancing these issues. They were completely unaware of how this was impacting their teams, which was bad. It was like living in a constant state of fear of whether the culture was progressing or not. And, no one should have to experience that. I can’t say I know others who have worked at toxic cultures, but, either way, being in one is extremely demeaning and demotivating. It signals a lack of awareness or understanding among leaders about their own culture and how to best improve it.
Microaggressions are entrenched in our organizations and in our day to day, and that’s what the Me Too movement has allowed us to have conversations about…which leads to us having bigger conversations about inclusivity.
Wade: The first thing is that I believe organizations are doing is being more thoughtful about inclusivity around different individuals. Organizations will have to shift their thinking in being able to lead a broad scope of people versus your typically white, heterosexual male. The lion share of cultures have been created for white men and been suited for them to thrive, but what does that mean for others who aren’t like that? This means that either an individual will leave or try to become conducive to the environment. And, the problem with this is that individuals have to take on the characteristic of the culture which means they lose their identity in the process.
(Stephanie Laffin, Executive Director of Creative Affairs for Wade Davis, also provided further insights into why Wade is creating an exemplary culture.)
Stephanie: With the exception of one person, we’re majority women and Wade has created a culture where he’s intentional about allowing us to bring our authentic self to work. It’s also a culture where he celebrates our identities, strong suits, skills, and works with us on things we need to improve. It’s always an environment of communication and never where someone is talking down to you or at you. Wade is always supportive about encouraging you to take risks and try things.
Wade: Haha thanks Stephanie! Again, the number one predictor of success is diversity of thought, but if individuals from different backgrounds become like everyone else, not only does the business lose, but these individuals lose. I would say people or companies that are well intentioned still have blind spots. So, it’s not always that the culture is toxic, but that it’s meant for certain individuals.
Leadership buy-in matters in properly measuring transparency and accountability
Nabilah: Regarding leadership buy-in, our leaders show up to the meetings, are active participants despite whatever else is going on, while putting their money where their mouth is and investing in our D&I initiatives. Without leadership buy-in, you can’t move forward and progress as a culture. Lip service is completely different from having leaders meet to advance certain initiatives. For example, leaders in meetings demonstrate that they care about advancing these issues and want to see their teams move forward. It’s like when you were a kid growing up and being influenced by your peers. It’s no different at work. Leaders must demonstrate they can set a good example for others to follow.
Meredith: The accountability piece is missing from leadership buy-in. There has to be a measurement ultimately of messaging and how leaders are trying to set examples through an organization. Measuring and quantifying culture around D&I has to become part of the key business metrics that leadership teams are tracking. You won’t know what your culture is like if you don’t measure it and have an honest and open conversation with your employees about it. It is dangerous for companies to think that they are simply covered by a corporate policy, compliance certifications, or marketing efforts. If you aren’t measuring employee sentiment on the topic of D&I within your organization, then you may be sitting on a liability you don’t fully understand.
Wade: Whether you have the greatest Chief Diversity or People Officer, people get inspired based on leadership. So, if leaders can’t talk about their own individual journey around this issue, it becomes less likely people are going to feel included in a culture. If there’s no accountability from CEOs, COOs, and other senior people, then they won’t face consequences for their inappropriate actions. I think it’s more impactful to tie in consequences to bonuses. This not only impacts the business’s bottom line, but the leadership’s personal bottom line.
A good example is imagine you’re the president of the USTA and you’re discussing with Serena [Williams] about everything that occurred at this year’s U.S. Open. A great leader has a broader point of view in understanding the context of her being a woman and specifically a black woman in a male dominated field. This leader will take the time to understand her point of view so that if she has an issue, she knows this leader is someone who understands her and is someone she can come talk to in the future.
Yes, it is much harder to track inclusion which means leaders have to think differently about measuring how intentional they’re being in building a better culture. However, I would also say it’s important leaders understand that being inclusive impacts performance and they’re responsible for understanding what people are carrying into the office.
But, the reason why I personally believe inclusivity is an issue is because employers don’t have to work as hard during the hiring process when people come from similar backgrounds versus when there’s a broader employment base. So again we must ask, “What actionable steps are leaders taking in build a better culture and how are these leaders being held accountable?”
The business case for D&I initiatives is proven to work
Wade: I think all senior leaders need to go through multiple trainings on sexual harassment and misconduct, including understanding bystander prevention and accountability. I believe they constantly need to understand what it is, how to prevent it, and be able to put themselves in the shoes of someone who is a potential survivor of these issues.
I also think all leaders should have to go through training to connect their own personal values and ethics around why diversity and inclusion matters. Going through D&I training is a phenomenal way to understand why these are bigger issues outside from business cases.
However, my biggest concern is where’s the business case for white men? Because it’s extra labor for women, people of color, etc. in proving these issues matter. The truth is they [white men] don’t believe you’re qualified for the position and so now you have to jump through additional hurdles to prove yourself.
There’s a culture in these organizations where all these issues happen (sexual harassment, misconduct, etc.) and no one is held accountable. No one realizes how entrenched these issues are. So, I think from a harassment and/or misconduct standpoint, if leaders aren’t held accountable for their actions or if there are no policies in place, you create a culture of silence, of bystanders and a lack of being able to cope with these issues. Other individuals won’t know what to do when something like this happens and perpetrators will think their actions are okay because they haven’t been reprimanded.
So, in making the business case for D&I, I focus on four tenets:
- I’m dis-interested in being right about diversity and inclusion. Anything I recommend is going to be bespoke for any organization I work with.
- When working with clients, I’m not focusing on pointing the finger about how bad their culture is or labeling things so much as good or bad, but that we’re human and make mistakes and how important it is to correct said mistakes.
- I don’t believe employers should tell their employees they’re creating a safe place, because the word “safe” is different for everyone. But, I do believe employers are responsible for creating a space where people can bring their authentic selves to work.
- I don’t ask ‘why’ questions because these questions are typically judgmental and/or create assumptions. So, I instead ask what or how questions.
Nabilah: So, all of the initiatives we’ve done have required us to make a business case, do a case study ROI, or understand the why and lasting impact of what we’re doing. This has been the biggest key in making the case for why D&I matters. NewsCred leadership is totally committed to transparency and D&I. Our leaders sit-in on our meetings and are very transparent about areas we’re growing in and areas of we could improve. Most of my friends are shocked by how open our organization is compared to theirs.
Meredith: I think the business case starts with looking at the makeup of audiences. If we’re selling to different kinds of people, we’re going to need those type of people in order to attract those types of buyers. I think it’s diverse teams and cultures that bring fresh ideas to companies because this is what makes the business case for D&I so strong. So as a startup, make this a priority from day 1. It is alarming to me that we continue to hear the same stories, stats on hiring, dollars that go to female entrepreneurs, and nothing is changing fast enough. Something has to change in order to speed up this process.
Bottomline: Building better work cultures requires leaders to be accountable, transparent, and invest in D&I initiatives that radically transform their companies. It’s not enough nor acceptable to simply meet quotas or to talk a good game. Rather, be intentional in making spaces accepting and inclusive of all individuals, and watch your organization reach new heights.
