Karen Thomas-Bland of Seven Transformation: 5 Steps We Must Take To Truly Create An Inclusive, Representative, and Equitable Society

Take ‘culture fit’ out of your hiring and promotion criteria. I have been in too many meetings, maybe you have too, where decisions are made based on him ‘being a good guy’ and the mantra ‘he’s one of us’, often thinly veiled as ‘cultural fit’. If you look for culture fit, it becomes hiring people like you already have.

As part of our series about ‘5 Steps We Must Take To Truly Create An Inclusive, Representative, and Equitable Society’ I had the pleasure to interview Karen Thomas-Bland.

Karen Thomas-Bland is a Global Board Advisor, Management Consultant and Non-Executive Director with over 24 years’ experience leading complex enterprize-wide business transformations and M&A integrations to over $105 billion turnover. Her clients include Accenture, EY, WPP, RELX Group and Private Equity Funds. With an excellent track record in creating sustainable long-term value, she is a trusted advisor to many boards, executive teams, and investors and has been a Non-Executive Director on several private equity boards. Before founding her business Seven, Karen was an executive in IBM, KPMG, and several boutique consultancies, based out of New York, Dubai, and Sao Paulo. Karen is a Chartered Organizational Psychologist, Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society and is an INSEAD accredited Board.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to ‘get to know you’. Can you tell us a bit about how you grew up?

Personally, I grew up in a small mining village in Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. Think low aspiration, unemployment being rife, and high levels of poverty. I quickly realized I wanted something more from life, needed something bigger and would eventually escape — hence If I could transform my own life then I could transform the lives of others and ultimately organizations. So, my journey into transformation was very much a personal one and started with my own. The great news is I had a good brain, was hardworking and had a game plan very early on!

I started my career as an Organizational Psychologist because I was interested in how individuals and organizations go from one state to another and if is there a way to codify the process. My second pivot was into corporate strategy and business transformation in management consultancies. The third pivot was then growing and running large service and software businesses organically and through acquisition. Then I set up my own business focusing on business transformation and M&A integration alongside taking board roles in Private Equity backed businesses. My next chapter I am just starting to write but there are a couple more pivots I’d still love to make!

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Yes, I’ve read Carol Dweck’s book on growth mindset for the third time recently. I believe wholeheartedly that talent can be developed through hard work, collaboration, and a smart strategy, and believe in ongoing learning, we are all a work in progress or to borrow from tech we are all in beta. The real power becomes when organizations embrace a growth mindset as employees’ report feeling much more empowered and committed and there is much greater support for collaboration and innovation and diversity of thought. The opposite of a growth mindset is a fixed mindset where the goal is looking smart, seeing others’ success as a threat and being defensive in response to criticism. Fixed mindset organizations often struggle to change.

Do you have a favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life or your work?

Can I have 3?

• You only have two lives and the second one starts the beginning you realize you have 1! Taught me not to do anything I don’t enjoy — life is too short to waste. Early on in my career I might have toughed situations out being a martyr to grit, but I learned to know when to walk away.
• The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago and second-best time is now. Taught me the importance of acting and not waiting for that new job, new partner, new… you are the only blocker to moving forward.
• Comparison is the thief of joy. Taught me to avoid the comparison trap — you can always see, particularly when mindlessly scrolling, someone else doing something bigger, bolder, and better than you.

How do you define “Leadership”? Can you explain what you mean or give an example?

Leadership for me is the ability to create followership that’s not driven by hierarchy. To achieve this requires creating a state where people give the extra discretionary effort you need for the goal or task in hand. To do this people need to feel safe, supported, challenged and that you care about them on a human level. Most of what I do in an organization involves big transformative efforts that are not business as usual activities and require extraordinary effort from individuals and teams.

In my work, I often talk about how to release and relieve stress. As a busy leader, what do you do to prepare your mind and body before a stressful or high stakes meeting, talk, or decision? Can you share a story or some examples?

Before a high strakes meeting, I will walk to the venue first listening to a podcast. If it’s really high stakes I will have recorded what I want to say in the meeting and will listen to that 2 or 3 times — the pressure of time means I will create better examples and anecdotes the closer, I am to the wire! I will then listen to some up temp songs to switch my brain away from the content of the meeting. After a day of busy meetings, I will retreat to my own inner world — classic introvert behaviour!

Ok, thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. The United States is currently facing a very important self-reckoning about race, diversity, equality, and inclusion. This is of course a huge topic. But briefly, can you share your view on how this crisis inexorably evolved to the boiling point that it’s at now?

Science tells us the importance of fairness. There is a great study by Sarah Brosnan and Frans de Waal where five female capuchin monkeys were given an unequal distribution of rewards by the human experimenter. They quickly realize when they are being short changed and fight back. Like humans they know what inequality is and can quickly identify it as an injustice. Science tells us that when we are offered a fair share of recognition the reward centres of our brain light up. We are wired to want and need fairness for our own emotional wellbeing. Of course, life is not fair I hear you cry. Well, we have got to the point where people are fighting back and voting with their feet because significant communities haven’t been made to feel respected about their value and contribution. Individuals and companies are rightly demanding more systemic change from leaders and legislators and the pace of change is much too slow.

Can you tell our readers a bit about your experience working with initiatives to promote Diversity and Inclusion? Can you share a story with us?

The first point I’d make is to say that initiatives don’t often work and its perhaps the not right way to think about the problem. Organizations are overloaded with initiatives. The change is more wholesale than that and starts at the top with the behaviour of the CEO and Board of Directors. If they don’t make diversity, equality, and inclusion an integral part of the business strategy, then ultimately it becomes responsibility of the HR department. Diversity, equality, and inclusion are so much more than human resources practices. HR plays a pivotal role, but the tone needs to be set at the top and they need to role model the behaviour they want to see. We still have too many instances where leaders create a culture of unfairness, where inequality prevails in opportunities, progression and pay, where you are at a disadvantage due to a factor out of your control, and where there is no consequence for acting unfairly. We also need to act faster, much faster if we don’t want to lose talented people who simply become disillusioned and walk away.

This may be obvious to you, but it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you articulate to our readers a few reasons why it is so important for a business or organization to have a diverse executive team?

Because it’s the right thing to do and we only need leaders in post who do the right thing. If other reasons like the financial argument need to be used, you have the wrong leaders in place.

Ok. Here is the main question of our discussion. You are an influential business leader. Can you please share your “5 Steps We Must Take To Truly Create An Inclusive, Representative, and Equitable Society”. Kindly share a story or example for each.

1. Appoint people into leadership positions who actively make diversity, equality, and inclusion a central part of their agenda, personal mission, and purpose. Too often it becomes marginalized and made into a niche set of activities that sit with the HR Department.
2. Put diversity, equality, and inclusion at the heart of the company strategy and actively measure progress on the top organization scorecard. The boards’ role is to ensure fair process is in place to achieve these metrics that the executive team are responsible for achieving.
3. Create an inclusive culture and remove those who go against it, regardless of the persons role. There needs to be a zero tolerance on this always. If you allow examples to slip through the net you will undermine any progress made.
4. Take ‘culture fit’ out of your hiring and promotion criteria. I have been in too many meetings, maybe you have too, where decisions are made based on him ‘being a good guy’ and the mantra ‘he’s one of us’, often thinly veiled as ‘cultural fit’. If you look for culture fit, it becomes hiring people like you already have.
5. Regularly examine compensation practices, taking action to eliminate pay gaps and have remuneration committees in place who have the teeth to challenge pay and the causes of inequality.

We are going through a rough period now. Are you optimistic that this issue can eventually be resolved? Can you explain?

I am naturally optimistic so believe if we come together like any problem, it can be resolved. For me it comes down to who feels responsible to solve it, how do we bring all voices into the room and how do we stop it feeling like a side issue. Too often diversity and inclusion get mistaken. Organizations can sometimes believe that its about optics, if we hire diverse people then we have solved the issue, rather than really thinking about how to create an inclusive culture that all people want to work in. For an inclusive culture we all have to work together and speak up when things aren’t working. Boards play a critical role in setting a tone of fairness in an organization. Over time, the practice of fair process leads to greater value creation for shareholders and increases trust between the business and society as a whole. But to ensure fair process requires bravery, well rounded leaders, acknowledgement when get things wrong and an ability to hear all voices.

Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. :-)

I would choose Huma Abedin — I really enjoyed her book Both/And and have listened to her on a couple of podcast interviews. She comes across as unbelievably smart, open, honest, and resilient and would be great in helping solve this issue.

How can our readers follow you online?

My website is www.seventransformation.com and you can find me on linkedin at https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenthomas-bland/and twitter at @KarenThB. Look forward to connecting!

This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success on your great work!