Growth through Equality and Diversity for Salesforce Partners

As the Salesforce Ohana grows, so do the number of Partners in the ecosystem. To stay competitive, Partners must go beyond simply improving their offerings; one way is to align with the Salesforce values of diversity and equality. With ample evidence for the business benefits provided by a diverse workforce, the idea that “doing good can help you do well” is one Partners should embrace. Employers who have concrete plans to improve equality and diversity within their organization will not only reap these benefits, but will find it easier to attract talent now and in the future.

Recent research shows diversity is an important success factor across all kinds of organizations, including tech organizations.

A 2018 report from the Brookings Institute shows the nationwide progress made for blacks and Hispanics participating in tech, although there’s still “significant underrepresentation overall.” Another report, in 2016 from Dalberg, focuses on the stunning upsides to improving ethnic and gender diversity. For U.S. tech firms, Dalberg notes that improving diversity “represents a massive economic opportunity, one that could create $470–$570Bn in new value for the tech industry, and could add 1.2–1.6% to national GDP.”

• More organizational diversity correlates to more adaptability and innovation. In the January 2018 issue of the International Journal of Engineering Technology Science and Research (IJETSR), the authors point to Cedric Herring’s research showing that “…racial diversity is associated with increased sales revenue, more customers, greater market share, and greater relative profits. Gender diversity is associated with increased sales revenue, more customers, and greater relative profits….Diversity leads to contestation of different ideas, more creativity, and superior solutions to problems. In contrast, homogeneity may lead to greater group cohesion but less adaptability and innovation.”
• For small tech companies, the benefits could be even greater. In “Decoding Diversity,” Intel Dahlberg research shows that “small tech companies are, on average, 25 to 30 percent less racially/ethnically diverse than large tech companies.” But those small organizations have a powerful opportunity to grow revenue. Those “that succeed in boosting their racial/ethnic diversity by just five employees out of a hundred could expect to see annual revenue growth of 15–20 percentage points.”
• Less diverse organizations underperform their peers by nearly 30%. McKinsey & Company recently updated their widely-cited research from 2015 with their January 2018 report, “Delivering through Diversity.” In it, they highlight the continuing relationship between diversity and business performance. “The statistically significant correlation between a more diverse leadership team and financial outperformance demonstrated three years ago continues to hold true on an updated, enlarged, and global data set. … Overall, companies in the bottom quartile for both gender and ethnic/cultural diversity were 29% less likely to achieve above-average profitability than were all other companies in our data set. In short, not only were they not leading, they were lagging.”

The future of the Ohana: increased diversity

Your future success depends not just on understanding the business benefits of diversity, but on understanding the changing demographics of Salesforce admins and developers. Spanning’s most recent Trailblazer Community Survey results includes trends from the past five years, and shares data about the growth of underrepresented groups in the Ohana.

While the percentage of women has remained steady (majority of admins, significant minority of developers) over the survey’s five-year timeframe, ethnic diversity has shown a marked increase, more than doubling from the survey’s inception.

PepUp Tech alumni like Nicholas Grant and fellow Golden Hoodie winner Aaron McGriff represent the more ethnically diverse future within the Salesforce Ohana.

Spanning customer Stephanie Herrera, founder of Salesforce Saturday Community events, exemplifies the power of rising, then lifting others up.

As a Salesforce Partner, diversity is a positive not just for the Ohana, but — as we saw in the research cited above — for your business.

Aaron McGriff was awarded the Golden Hoodie at Dreamforce ‘18.

How to align your business with the future Ohana

If your organization hasn’t already started its journey, there are four key ways to align your business with the future Salesforce Ohana.

1. Support diversity / equality initiatives. Whether you’re a very small services group or a large ISV partner, your organization can support diversity and equality initiatives through sponsorships, pro bono work, discounted licensing, and even direct volunteer action in your local schools and communities. Learn more about Salesforce’s four core equality pillars, and use them to inspire your own efforts.
2. Hire talent from underrepresented groups. If you don’t think are enough qualified, diverse candidates to fill your hiring pipeline, think again. Contact groups like PepUp Tech, Black Girls Code, Stemettes and the Merivis Foundation and ask for help making candidate connections and getting more, and more diverse, candidates into your hiring process. Review your hiring processes for areas such as “culture fit” that may inadvertently block future superstars; refocus your hiring process to seek out “culture adds.”
3. Learn how to best be an ally. Trailhead makes it easy to learn how to improve your personal skills at allyship. Trails like “Cultivate Equality at Work” and “Strengthen and Diversify Your Workforce with Military Veterans” contain Modules like “Equality Ally Strategies” and “Military Friendly Workplaces” that will walk you and your team step-by-step into a deeper understanding of how to best be an ally.
4. Connect with like-minded peers. Increasing diversity, towards greater equality, is a path best walked with others. You’ll find like-minded peers in the Salesforce Trailblazer Community, in the Salesforce Partner Community and on social media. Search for those peers using hashtags #equality, #diversity or #womenintech. When you next attend a Salesforce event or an Ohana event, make time to participate in the sessions on equality and diversity, and come ready to listen and learn!

What your organization can do, starting today

To reap the benefits of a more diverse Salesforce Partner organization, take action now.

1. Start at the top. If your organization’s leadership wants to progress along the path of diversity and equality, leadership need to be prepared. One way to start the process is to have your leadership team complete the Trailhead Trail, “Manage the Salesforce Way” and the Module, “Inclusive Leadership Practices.”
2. Empower your teams. Whether your Partner organization is large enough to have dedicated resources for HR, or even if you only have hiring managers, connect them to groups like PepUp Tech, Black Girls Code, Stemettes and the Merivis Foundation to enrich your recruiting pool.
3. Asses the current state, then set quantifiable goals. You can benchmark your organization against the portion of the Salesforce Ohana Spanning recently surveyed, or what Salesforce reported in their own EEO-1 data. Set measurable goals for the coming year — for example, increase ethnic diversity in the hiring pipeline by 20% — and follow up with a quarterly review of progress made.
4. Give back in ways that support diversity in tech. Participate in Pledge 1% and 1–1–1 giving — it can help improve your Partner Score. Do what Marc Benioff suggested and adopt a local public school or playground. Become a member of the Partner Ohana Hub in the Partner Community and discover more ways to give.
5. Share your learnings. Once you’re on your way to increasing diversity within your organization, offer to present at Ohana events, like Midwest Dreamin’ or Snowforce, on topics related to equality and diversity. You’ll get the chance to share lessons learned, inspire others, and multiply your impact.

Ready to benchmark your Partner organization?

Get ready to grow! Start by downloading the most recent Trailblazer Community Survey to help assess how your organization compares to a portion of the Ohana.