Real Talk: Maintaining the Momentum of your DE&I efforts in 2023
Welcome to Real Talk with Loeb Leadership, a safe-space webinar discussion series as part of our dedication to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. In this series, we gather a panel of executive coaches, leadership development and workplace culture experts, and DE&I specialists to discuss current, relevant, and often challenging topics related to DE&I in law firms and corporate environments.
In today's discussion, our panelists discuss how to keep up the momentum around DE&I initiatives. When it comes to organizational initiatives around diversity, equity, and inclusion, we're seeing some fatigue and stagnation as the initial momentum of DE&I efforts begins to slow down. DE&I professionals and company stakeholders are encouraging "more walk and less talk" for organizations whose efforts are languishing. But what does continuing to 'walk the walk' look like?
Watch Loeb Leadership's expert panel discussion and learn why we're seeing this fatigue, and what can be done to refresh and rejuvenate organizational DE&I efforts -- and, of course, the importance of doing so.
Below is a THOUGHTFULLY Organized transcript of the discussion:
David Sarnoff: Hello everyone and thank you so much for joining us today for our Real Talk episode. I'm David Sarnoff, I'm the director of strategic partnerships with Loeb Leadership. I'm also an executive coach and workshop facilitator. I'm joined today by our expert panelists, David Robert, Joy Stephens, Dr. Michael Burchell, and Dr. Fritz Galette. Unfortunately, our regular panelists, Taris and Rini, were unable to join us today. For those of you joining for the first time and don't know us, Loeb Leadership is a certified woman-owned business. We're a management and leadership training and development company and proud to be certified women-owned. And please reach out to us with any questions at loebleadership.com.
So, as most of you know, we spend several weeks planning our sessions in advance and I was in the process of doing that. And then lo and behold, scrolling through The New York Times and I come across a guest essay by Jesse Singal. And the title really captured me. And I feel remiss if we don't use this opportunity today to respond to this essay. And I encourage all our attendees if they want to comment in the chat, please feel free to do so. We would love to hear from you. So, the title of this essay is, What If Diversity Trainings Are Doing More Harm Than Good? And Jesse Singal goes on to say, in my words, in my opinion, that DE&I training and programs in organizations are more apt to fail than succeed.
And one area where I do agree with the author is that when programming is mandatory and it assigns blame to the dominant constituency in the organization for societal problems or for organizational disparities, in my opinion, that's not my approach to diversity, equity and inclusion programming. But where I think this essay falls far short is that it overlooks significant studies and evidence and reports where organizations like McKinsey and the Great Place To Work have found diverse teams are the most innovative teams, the most productive, effective and efficient. And I also thought this essay approached DE&I programming as one-offs as opposed to part of a comprehensive culture change. And with that, I'd like to toss the question to one of our organizational culture experts, David Robert. And David, I'd like to get your reaction to the Singal essay that really hammers, in my opinion, diversity, equity and inclusion training and organizations.
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David Robert: Sure. A lot there to unpack. But let's see. So, I would start by saying, let's keep in mind that The New York Times wants to drive up readership. So, these provocative articles are by design. So, let's not get too deep into that. But a couple of points. So, I would agree with the author that he's right that a majority of, and I'll call these culture efforts, do fail. That's the reality. And for a wide range of reasons. I think he had a broader brushstroke and categorized the failures as being caused by one thing. But they failed because they're highly complex. And where I see organizations making mistakes, which I think adds to the lack of success, maybe not a complete failure, but didn't reach optimal outcomes, is that the first is, there's still this mindset among leaders that the DE&I work is project driven.
That there's a start date and an end date and there's going to be some day where we all arrive to work and everything's going to be in its place. And that's just not how it works. If you have a mindset that this work is project driven, then you're never going to be satisfied because you're never going to get to that day where everything has fallen into place. And you're going to lose confidence in the process and then lose interest in the process. So, that's one of the things I see. The second is that within the DE&I work, I think that there's a mis-prioritization. And I empathize with those who are being asked to drive the DE&I work within an organization, because there's a lot of opportunity to grab. And we often want to grab the things that we are personally attached to or that we think will have the greatest impact without taking a step back and having an objective conversation around where is the short term low hanging fruit that we can actually accomplish and prove that we can get stuff done and create that momentum with an organization.
Even if it's things that have low impact or may not be things that you are emotionally anchored to. That is a process that has to happen to get that momentum. And so, when I see leaders within the DE&I space grab some of that richer, more complicated stuff right out of the gates, it's usually a red flag that those are not going to be successful because you don't have that buy-in and that credibility yet. So, just want to share that. But I think the part of the article that infuriated me a bit is that he maybe was intentional, maybe not, but we're all living in the most successful DE&I effort in the United States. So, if you think about, and I forget who did the research, but there was economists and researchers who followed the US economy from 1960 to 2010. And in 1960 the value of the US economy was about 550 billion. So, about the worth of Apple.
And in 2010 the value of the economy was almost 15 trillion dollars. And think about what was happening in the US economy. 1960, predominantly the workforce was white and male, and in 2010 it was the most diverse workforce we had seen in that generation. And so, not the only contributor to the growth of the economy, but certainly a major component was the diversity of the workforce. And a lot of that was through immigration and the student college visa program. Students from around the world coming here with their knowledge and expertise, building things, creating companies when they graduated. And so, we can't lose sight of that. And I think that he overlooked that in an unfortunate way.
Joy Stephens: I'd like to weigh in... I agree with David that this is a very sensational byline or tagline and of course people are going to click on it to read it. And then I personally did not agree with everything that I read, but he was right in that a lot of DE&I efforts fail. And then, David Sarnoff, I want to come to something that you mentioned about making things mandatory and punitive, potentially accusatory towards the majority white male demographic, et cetera. I don't think that's why they're failing, because I don't have any clients or anyone that is making anything mandatory.
And I think that is another part of the problem that we're going to get into when we do our real topic about the fatigue is that lack of accountability, lack of tracking incentive, anything to help the people that are trying to drive this program into an entity. Whether it's a law firm, construction firm, hospital, whatever it might be. The people that are trying to drive that change get no support because nothing is mandatory, nothing is tied to KPIs, nothing even has a budget. And so, I'll expand on that in a bit, but I think one of the reasons that things are failing is because we're not asking people to try hard enough.
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Michael Burchell: So, I appreciate what Joy just mentioned. So, I want to springboard a little bit off of what she just said, because in addition to what David and Joy mentioned, I do think people always talk about we want to change hearts, minds and hands. That's the high water mark of what good training should look like. And I'm a believer that we want to start off with changing hands. The behavior is the first. And so, I do think we can debate all day, do you behave your way into a new way of thinking or do you think your way into a new way of behaving? Well, that's an interesting conversation to have, but from a DE&I perspective, a lot of it has been not necessarily focused on specific behaviors that people need to shift and change.
And so, I do think that there's something about, I do think he makes a criticism around the kinds of training that's offered and what is more or less successful. I also think too that, my little armchair analysis of DE&I training specifically, is that in the absence of other important components of a DE&I initiative around how you provide role modeling and how you communicate and how you create and reinforce your structures, you're not going to have the impact in terms of training development that you want to see. So, I think it's going to be a more holistic perspective and those organizations that take a more holistic perspective, that have the role modeling and the communication and infrastructure, they see more effective training. So, I'm just want to highlight that, because I think there's a lot of research that backs that up, people that I can point to.
Dr. Fritz: One of the questions I ask people when they want to do this sort of work is I ask them, why are you trying to do it now? What made you step to the fore, call us to inquire about doing this work? Any kind of work from workshops to seminars to listening groups, which I often am leading. And you'd be surprised how many times they're doing it because of extrinsic reasons. Reasons about what's happening in the world that's pushing them, but pushing them now. We just had the pandemic, we just had a few years of protests, we've had a few years of a lot of things going on. And I'm always worried that in someone who is responding to an external or extrinsic motivator, they're not going to be able to stay into the commitment of doing this work. And this work is complex, it is hard, it is not short-term, it is long-term.
I think if the article is critiquing historically a lot of one-off checkbox approaches to this work, then there is a lot in there I could agree with. But I know that the work we do, a lot of times people are calling us for the DE&I stuff, but really we get into the deeper history and the weeds with them to understand the culture and the history of their organization so that we can weave that into not just a DE&I initiative, but a culture initiative and an organizational initiative that can really change things. Now, I'm a psychologist, so when you think about the idea of what a psychologist does, we are in the hearts and minds, emotions and cognitions. But psychology also started on behavior and actions. And putting it all together that has to be about what we do. Turning the talk into the walk and gaining the commitment by trying to get people to feel the intrinsic motivations for doing this.
We know, it's January '23, and how many of us made New Year's resolutions that we are not keeping up with. And why are we not keeping up with them? Because some of them were made because, that's a good idea to do that thing. We know that willpower does not last. It's a short-term thing. We know that we have to find deeper intrinsic reasons for doing the stuff we do. And I think if we can do that around this work, I've had mandatory sessions with people where they were mandated to be there. I spend the first part of the session helping them find an internal reason for being there, even though they were told they had to be there. And those sessions go much better.
“This article made me actually read about a bunch of other critiques of the DE&I space. And when you read deeply into the critiques of this space, you find some people are not only critiquing but they’re coming up with some ideas as to how to help; how to turn the talk into actions and behaviors.
We need to support each other and talk to each other and commiserate with other people who are trying to do this work. Because it is hard, but we can motivate each other.”
David Sarnoff: Thank you so much Fritz. And that is a nice setup to get into our advertised topic of how to keep the momentum going of diversity, equity, inclusion programming in your organization. And you, Joy and I have been involved in engagements where we do hear back from stakeholders that speakers are great, the workshop was great and then we leave and nothing happens. It's just a hamster wheel. And we hear a lot of less talk and more walk and how do we convert this programming into actionable items or observable actions that are moving the ball forward. And we hear a lot of frustration and fatigue from people when they don't feel they're getting the guidance, support and resources to authentically and effectively do this work.
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Joy Stephens: The imagery that comes to mind, actually I got this from Chris Rock and he was talking about it's like setting a bird free with a brick on its back. You tell the person who's in charge of putting these programs in place, we want you to do this, we want you to succeed, you've got all this support, et cetera. And then as they get into it... Let's use an example of a 200 person company, entity, whatever you want to call it. So, they're responsible for changing the hearts and minds and hands of 200 people. 10 of which are the leadership team. On their leadership team there's maybe one true ally proponent, et cetera. The rest are why do I have to do this? So, you're trying to help someone in spite of themselves and you've got a list of things that they need to do that time and resources and studies have been done to say this is the right thing in this order.
Well, we don't have the budget for that. But you have the budget, we don't have the time for that, but you have the time. We don't want to make anyone uncomfortable, but everything about this is uncomfortable. And so, what you end up hearing, especially if you do this for more than a year or two, is we don't really want to do this. Now, I'm being very general about that and I work with a lot of companies that are committed to doing it and the work is hard and it's more than just the CEO, the CHRO. And if they have a director of diversity, those three people cannot change the hearts and minds of 30,000 folks. And so, I think the fatigue comes in when you try to tilt at that windmill so to speak, of having such a large organization or even just having individuals with a lot of power in that organization that have the power to undermine your efforts.
It's feeling like you're being undermined, feeling like progress comes at a price sometimes as your own career can be stagnated because you haven't met any goals that were never set for this thing that nobody wanted to do. It gets turned around a lot and eventually you wonder why am I doing this? If nobody really wants to help me, if nobody's really committed to it, if we sign these pledges and put these things in place in 2020 and it's 2023 and we haven't done anything and then they're looking at the person, how come you haven't fixed us? That's exhausting. And that's what I see more often than not. You can tell there's a little bit of personal stuff here too. It can wear on your commitment. Well, it can wear on your energy. Because everybody that is in this work, at least with people in my network, they're all extremely committed to doing this. It's just the breaks get more and more frequent because you've got to pour energy into yourself because you're not getting anything from the organization you're trying to help.
Dr. Fritz: To speak to that energy that Joy is talking about, and it's hard whether you embark upon a mission or embark on an engagement, you're looking for signposts to tell you that you're getting somewhere. And what I said earlier that this work is iterative and it's a long process and it's very complex. A lot of times we're not getting the signs that it's going anywhere, at least in the short run. But in the longer run I see people better and better at being able to communicate these messages and do this work from a learned perspective. And to comment on what the article did for me, it made me actually read about a bunch of other critiques of this space. And when you read deeply into the critiques of this space, you find some people who are not only critiquing but they're coming up with some ideas as to how to help.
We never should make the mistake of just dismissing the critique, or avoiding it, but trying to read between the lines. And one of the best things that I see in that article and in others that I've read is to get some of this talk that we're talking into actions and behaviors. And later I'll talk about how when we're trying to make a pitch to do this work, we need to make our pitches filled with data, and evidence, and analysis, and actions and behaviors. Some of the leadership work we do is very focused on identifying behaviors that you who are watching and listening right now can specifically do around different areas that you're trying to improve your leadership skills. So, that's the work that we need to do and we also need to support each other and talk to each other and commiserate with other people who are trying to do this work because it is hard, but we can motivate each other.
“This work is iterative; it’s a long process and it’s very complex. A lot of times we’re not getting the signs that it’s going anywhere, at least in the short run. But in the longer run, I see people better and better at being able to communicate these messages and do this work from a learned perspective. ”
David Sarnoff: Because of the outsized role that organizational leaders play in whether a diversity, equity, inclusion initiative will be successful, to what extent in large part does their lack of training and education in DE&I impact the effectiveness, the launch, the follow through, the accountability? What role does that play and where can our participants use that knowledge to be more strategic?
David Robert: So, the conversation needs to evolve with the work and oftentimes we get stuck having the same conversation that you would typically have early on in the work. What are our opportunities, where do we start? As this work develops, the conversation needs to evolve and mature as well. And I'm not sure even if we do it often enough, it's “what have we learned so far? How has that helped us? And how do we collectively push ourselves to that next phase, that next step?”
And I think we're looking for other people to serve that purpose and we could actually start initiating those conversations with our peers. And again, I would love to hear from folks on the call but I'm not hearing that from clients that the conversation and the tone of the conversation is shifting at the pace it should be shifting in order to keep the focus in the right area. So, if we talk about motivation and collectively pushing ourselves into that next phase, part of that is through how we actually engage each other through language. And I think that's not happening.
David Sarnoff: And somebody did share a comment and said, “many have started DE&I because of the reasons that the panel suggested and there is so much more to DE&I than checking a box. We have brought in a third party to discuss and evaluate what our firm can do better. Everyone has been given a voice, we have a lot of work ahead of us and many of the sessions were raw. Agreed, it's ongoing. We have already made changes per some of the suggestions.” Now, that sounds like a roadmap for how an initiative should take place.
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Michael Burchell: So, in my little head, an organization cannot do what the leadership team won't allow. Full stop. And so, square one, if you're going to make change with DE&I issues, there has to be a conversation at that executive level. And that's where I think the ongoing nature and not training, but ongoing conversation to pull what David talked about, where are we, what did we accomplish, what does that look like, where do we need to course correct, what has gone sideways, what do we need to do to get back on track? Having those conversations on routine regular basis and looking at metrics and KPIs and what have we achieved is very, very important in terms of shifting the conversation over the course of time and letting that evolve. So, this then connects to this other thing that I've been thinking about and that is how do we set expectations for goals and outcomes?
And I think that in some ways goals and outcomes are a manifestation of what the executive team will be able to rally around. And quite often I think one of the things that is fatiguing for a lot of DE&I initiatives, or CDOs, is when we have this stuff and we actually don't have that alignment and that support from the executive team. So, I always loop it back to that first conversation. And I think what executive teams tend to support is things that are data driven. So, let's understand, let's do as Fritz mentioned, what's our data set, what's our fact base for where we are? What have we have accomplished so far? So, what data do we now have? And that could be taken in a lot of different ways, but there could be assessments or there could be other kinds of data that we have from recruiting and hiring and retention and so on and so forth. But what data do we have? If we actually have that data, then the question becomes, what are the things that we can be doing more of or doing differently? And in this way less is more.
I think less is more when we talk about, because we want to make an impact with DE&I. So, rather than boil the ocean, we want to be focused and clear. And so, beginning to think through from the data set, how do we then prioritize what are the vital few things or areas, how do we ideate around those areas, how do we then collaborate and then decide? And the decision making process, once we get down that road, we can actually say, what's going to have the biggest impact and what requires the most effort? And then create a little bit of a grid and present those things back to the executive team and say, let's prioritize the vital view. And if there's more than two, three, four initiatives, that's way too many at any one point for an organization to really take in. So, less is more and get the executive team bought in. And I think that's really important in that ongoing conversation. So, I've just said a lot there, but hopefully that begins to get some of the thinking out there. And I see Joy ready to jump in.
Joy Stephens: I want to piggyback on the idea of getting the executive team bought in. If you think about any other, whether it's a project, organizational change, bringing in a new IT system, whatever it might be, you've got people that's their whole job. It's more than one person, it's a team. They've got a budget to do what they need to do and they have a leadership team that expects updates and sometimes someone on the leadership team, their incentive is tied to making sure that project comes off without a hitch. I don't see that same level of infrastructure when it comes to, more often than not, I'm not saying I never see it, but more often than not, you don't have a group of people where beyond the director of diversity, it's not anybody else's job. There's no team to support that person. The budget is always iffy. Well, we don't have the money to bring in a speaker, we don't have the money to hire a consultant, et cetera, et cetera. You do this on your own.
And then there's usually a committee of some sort, not knocking the committees, they're absolutely necessary. But when you have a committee of people who are already at 100% capacity with their day job, the time that they are allowed to spend, especially if they're not billing hours there or it's not a part of their personal KPIs, this all becomes extracurricular activity. It's a voluntary job or a hobby, however you want to look at it, which is easily discarded when we have to tighten our belt, when numbers don't come in where they should, when our year to day results are below level, et cetera. The first thing to go is all the people systems. I'm not even talking just DE&I. Usually the people systems are the first things to get cut when we start needing money. So, I think one of the issues that we struggle with as DE&I people is that one thing, who is responsible for this and what are we tracking?
You mentioned data sets, I want to touch on that as well. There's plenty of data. There's plenty of empirical data out here in the internet. Google is good for something sometimes. But above and beyond that, a red flag for me in my own business is if someone comes to me and they don't have the data and I suggest to them ways to collect it and they don't want to do those things, then we don't have anything else to talk about. Because you don't even want to know where you are, which means anything you're going to do from that point on, I can't tell you why it's important to do it because we never set up front that it was important based on data. So, you're absolutely right. And so, any company that doesn't want to know, also doesn't want to do. And that can be frustrating if you're in that company and you're trying to get something done.
David Sarnoff: You're getting applause and thumbs up, Joy, for everything you say. And if I could just follow up on something you and Michael discussed and then let David and Fritz weigh in.
When you talk about KPI and metrics, those tend to be different things to different people in different organizations. And sometimes I get confused around this, because I think it's an important but complex area. Can you both give some examples of KPI and metrics that you would want to see in a professional service firm, like a law firm, in a nonprofit, in a manufacturing company?
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Yeah. The first thing that comes to mind, because my background is corporate America manufacturing and engineering, et cetera, is, what does your supplier diversity look like? What percentage of your suppliers and your vendors are historically underutilized businesses? What percentage of your leadership team has taken the voluntary training that's available? Even if it isn't mandatory, how many of them volunteer to sit through a class on a conscious bias or a class on allyship? What percentage of your incoming freshman class, say if you're hiring, what percentage of that group is representative of the demographics in your area? I live in Atlanta, Georgia, and if your freshman class of new people coming in is not at least 20% people of color, how did you even do that in Atlanta, Georgia? Where are you looking?
I think what are your recruiting efforts, not just at the entry level, but also at the executive level, and this is a pet personal pet peeve of mine, I'm speaking only on myself right now, but one of the things that aggravates me when I hear it is we want to improve our diversity representation so we're going to start going to HBCUs. That's great, but that also means doing just that one thing, you will not have anyone in your leadership pipeline for the next 20 years. So, what you're telling me is, we understand that today we need representation at higher levels, but we're going to put something in place to get that in 20 years.
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Yeah. I can jump in too. I think that Joy is absolutely right on target. So, there may also be some language clarity. So, there's what to measure. So, the metric is hiring, or representation, or development, or advancement. So, those are the metrics. What is that we're trying to measure? And you can think through what the definition of that looks like, but then the KPI is a target. So, if we're looking at hiring, we actually want to hire 40% more women in our collective base in terms of pass through to the next level of the interview process.
Then you can actually determine what's the things to be done off of that. So, I would get super clear about there's the metric about what are the kinds of things that we want to achieve, the KPI, what specifically the target looks like, and then how do we go about doing that? Because I think that sometimes DE&I, we all do this, we think this is a good idea, let's pursue that. But that's super unclear and that's not very focused. So, we want to get really clear, succinct and focus in terms of our DE&I efforts. And I'll also speak to the executive team because that's the language that they use.
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You might also, just to build on what you said Michael, you might want to think about blending hard metrics with soft metrics. So, you could have the most unbelievably inclusive recruitment strategy, but if it's not communicated in a way that actually resonates with your people, you might not move the needle on their level of engagement, their level of a sense of belonging. And that's easy to capture on an annual survey or annual engagement survey, how people feel about a sense of belonging at the firm or at the organization, the degree of happiness they have. And I would say we're big on trust as well. It's hard to trust an organization that you feel is inequitable. So, you can't lose sight of those as well.
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And soft metrics are also known as qualitative metrics, in terms of asking people how they feel about things and their level of satisfaction. Do they feel like they're being listened to? Do they feel like they're a part of the discussion with all the changes the organization's trying to make? These are important things to check into. Remember the hearts and minds are tied to bodies. Bodies that have hands and legs and feet and actions and behaviors and they go hand in hand. As a psychologist, I can tell you, we can tell people about behaviors, but if they're conscious cognitive understanding of those behaviors aren't connected to an inner less tangible or soft factor, we won't get where we want to go unless we're able to tie those two things together. And one of the things that organizations forget to do after they've launched initiative is to come back and check in on the health and wellbeing and the emotional wellbeing of their people. And there are ways that you can qualitatively assess that on a quarterly basis that shouldn't cost much.
David Robert: So, this may seem radical, but why not give your head of DE&I a seat at the table from the very beginning. So, rather than being a guest of the executive committee, make them a full fledged member of the top layer of the organization that's making strategic decisions. Look how long it took HR to get a seat at the table. And I can't think of organization who could look back historically and say, wow, I wish we had waited longer to bring HR into the conversation from a strategy setting. Of course not. I think organizations realize, wow, that was a huge miss. And I still think that, again I'm generalizing it but there's probably some truth to it, that DE&I does get tucked under a layer or two below where the actual decision making is happening. And if they had a seat at the table they could put some of these unnecessary fires out early on. They could actually raise the alarm, I think we're going off the rails here a little bit or losing focus. And if that's not happening, that's a real missed opportunity.
Joy Stephens: And think about what happens with that seat at the table. If you are chief diversity officer, the chief by itself means you've got direct reports, you've got a team of dedicated people. Everything that I was mentioning earlier should come with that seat at the table.
David Sarnoff: So, I'll ask the panel, putting on my executive coaching hat, what would stop an organization from doing just what you suggested?
Dr. Fritz: They don't want to.
David Robert: It goes back to what Michael said, an organization can’t do what the leaders don't want it to do.
Dr. Michael Burchell: So, this is so interesting and so timely, because actually last week I had a coaching call, David, with a chief diversity officer of a health system. Well, actually of a health system and they're going through reorganization right now. And so, the reorganization has actually combined health groups into a larger health system. So, not just the chief diversity officer for several hospitals and one system, but now merging systems, if that makes sense. And so, he was having a hard time, he actually is at the executive level for his health system, but there was no attention being paid to when this new organization forms with multiple systems, is there a CDO at that level? And he's like, how do I keep myself out of this conversation, because I feel like I should be there. But secondly, how do I actually talk about this with a CEO?
So, David is actually right on target around, it's not simply just about the value that diversity brings, but then raising that up at a level. If you're going to participate at that executive level, what is it that leadership is missing? So, people that are maybe familiar with the Johari Window. What is the blind spot? What is it that the organization is missing if we don't attend to this and what's the lost opportunity? And so, the conversation that I had with my client, my coaching client was, let's identify those things that are actually missed opportunities and lost opportunities if you don't have or there's not a seat at that table. And then what does it say to the rest of the system if diversity is not at that level. It's not being valued in quite the same way. So, let's talk about that. So, I think that, that becomes part of the conversation that needs to be happening with values and messaging and how we then communicate that more broadly.
Earlier the panel mentioned that DE&I is causing a divide. Can we expand on that?
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Well, look what's happening in our society. Organizations are just microcosms of the society in which we live. And so, if we see what's happening across the US in terms of the backlash around this wokeness and it's getting quite aggressive too. They're legislating conversations out of the public space, which is really unfortunate. And although I think that most organizations have some guardrails to prevent some of that from seeping in, it's not completely avoidable. And so, I would imagine there are instances or situations where I'll pick on white people, where they feel uncomfortable and they may not want to, they may be more comfortable pausing the conversation, putting a pin in it. Or in some cases [inaudible 00:38:59] digging their feet in and digging their trench out and going all in. Rather than saying, wow, that made me uncomfortable, I'm not entirely sure I understand your perspective. Let's grab lunch and let's start the conversation. I'm curious about this and I need to know what I don't know. And I think those conversations aren't happening enough.
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And often those conversations aren't happening enough because people get anxious. So, before I said people don't want to, often people consciously cognitive want to do things, they want to make things better. They think it's a good idea, but on a deeper level there may be inherent anxieties. I work often sometimes with families where they haven't talked for years and then I come in there as an interventionist and I get them talking and then they sometimes walk out in more conflict than when they started and sometimes they go, what's the purpose of having all this talk. The divide was there already. It was underneath the table for decades. Some people say it was even longer. If you think back to two and a half years ago, a lot of organizations were ready to come and have this conversation. They weren't so afraid anymore because stores and protests and all kinds of things were on fire in society.
But I worry that as things started to simmer down, people's motivation for doing these things was also going to go down unless there was something to keep them going. This is something we have to pay attention to going forward, which is why often will speak to internal motivations versus internal motivation. That we need to find within us an inherent, not just moral, but we have to find very tangible, very practical reasons to keep doing this work. And this is why we have to include in our conversations about doing this work, attention to the evidence and to the data and to KPIs and all the things we talk about in business so we can show businesses that they can make even more money if they included more people at the table. It's not just to be nice, it's also so we're in a capitalistic system, if we do that, we can be a lot stronger than we were when we didn't do that.
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A lot of times people look at opportunities like pie. You've seen the memes so you know, sharing or including people doesn't mean that you don't have what you had before. Giving someone else equality doesn't take away from you. It's not like pie. But I would want to step further and say, if you do include other people and bring folks to the table instead of just trying to share pie, you're sharing fire. If I've got a candle and I give you part of my candle to light it, there's more light in the entire room and we can set this whole place a blaze with brightness if you would just be willing to share, because one grows on the other. The idea of if this other person is given this opportunity, and I want to just caveat and say earn the opportunity, I want to get us away from the idea that people are giving someone something that they didn't deserve.
If someone else earned that opportunity, you may feel like it's not there for you anymore, but if the company or the firm or the outfit, whatever you want to call it is growing, there will be more opportunities. And so, if you want to use the pie example, the pie is getting bigger and bigger and bigger. There's enough for everyone to go around. That's what economic growth is. We mentioned earlier that the economy of the United States has quadrupled, or 10 tuppled, whatever you want to call it, over the last 30 or something, I'm forgetting how old I am, 60 years.
If you let people expand, they will fill up whatever, like gas, fill up whatever container you put them in. So, break the walls of the container. The expansion is exponential. You just need to get out of your own way. The idea that you have to be in this box, there's never going to be any growth, there's only so much money to go around. None of that is true. People are showing record profits. And so, we should help each other on a person to person basis, recognize that sharing is growing, not just caring. And there's the money piece of it.
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And if you go back to that, the US economy example I gave about a half an hour ago, when you examine increases in net worth, increases in salary, over that 50 year period, there was increases in all categories. Women of color, men of color, white women, every category they looked at. But the demographic they actually gained the most were white men. So, the evidence doesn't really add up around the zero sum thing, because when living through one of the most aggressive diversifications in US history in terms of workplace demographics, white men gained the most. So, the article that GB referenced on New York Times when he alluded to the fact that there was a zero sum or that white men in particular have something to lose by driving inclusion and diversity, it just doesn't make any sense to me because the data says something very different.
Dr. Michael Burchell: Here's one of the things that I think for those participants on the call here that are engaged in these conversations on a regular basis, this may be the interesting paradox or dilemma that needs to be explored further. Because somewhere along the way white folks got written out of the definition of diversity. And the question becomes, how to address the issue of white people without reifying whiteness. And what I mean by that is re-centering white people as the center of the conversation and decision-making power in organizations. But create space so that the conversation around diversity includes this issue about white women and white men.
One of the most interesting things that I've seen recently is that some of the very large organizations like Hilton and Cisco and Google and some of the other organizations, they're now having conversations about, we want to continue to support our people of color and other underrepresented groups in very particular specific ways to advances them, to grow the organization. But we also want to continue to have a conversation, or not continue, but to start a different kind of conversation, particularly with white men, but with white people about what does it mean to be a white person operating in a diverse organization.
If you want to work in an anti-racist organization, what does that look like and what does that mean? And that's a very different conversation to be having then I think organizations have been even interested or willing to have up until recently. So, I think it's important, it's difficult because we don't want to, again, to reify the very structures and systems and processes that got us into this place to begin with. With white men in the power center. At the same time, how do we actually address this as diversity folks in a smart, useful, compassionate way going forward.
Joy Stephens: It goes back to the discussion earlier about training and expertise for your DE&I executives, individuals, whoever's running that. Recognizing the need to have everyone at the table. Should be table space for anyone that wants to be doing this type of work. I've come across in my circle of people who have their own unconscious biases, their own prejudices, their own restrictions based on the way they believe, et cetera, et cetera. But they're doing DE&I work. And so, I wonder how inclusive can you be when you are actively excluding another group, or you only focus on your own group. I run into that a lot as well. And that leads to that zero sum mentality. If you are doing diversity because you want somebody else's stuff, then you are just trying to replace the oppressive system.
You're not trying to really make it equitable. But if you're really focused on equity, recognize that somebody is going to win every time, it might not always be. You should celebrate everybody's successes, everybody's wins, everybody's accomplishments and not just the ones of a demographic that you're particularly interested in. That takes a lot of emotional intelligence and a lot of patience that I haven't seen always be expressed. And so, I think when we talk about the certifications and things that people do for diversity inclusion, you go to your colleges, your online training, et cetera. If you don't understand that, you have to look in the mirror and check yourself before you can check anybody else. You run the risk of not doing this very, what's the word I'm looking for, very sensitive work correctly.
Dr. Michael Burchell: And isn't that part of where the fatigue comes from, by not doing exactly what you're talking about Joy? So, if we're talking about fatigue and exhaustion that happens, I've heard people say that diversity work is worthy work but also weary work. And I think part of the reason why it's weary work is because we need to think more comprehensively, more broadly to do exactly what you're talking about Joy.
David Sarnoff: And Michael, if I could just add to what you and Joy have said, because you reinforce that this is complex work. And to Jesse Singal's essay, he focuses primarily, in my opinion, on racial diversity, equity and inclusion. Does not go into a deep dive on LGBTQ, on neurodivergent people. I went to a panel at the now PDI conference on accessibility. That is nowhere near getting the exposure and discussion as a lot of other topics, but it's equally vitally important as many of the things we discussed today. So, it's a global approach I think what everybody is saying and not just focusing on one constituency, which is where it can derail your program.
Dr. Fritz: I get energized by these conversations by the way. So, I love being on the panel. And I work with the people that are on this panel and we have these conversations on a regular basis. We may interact with a client or work on a new project and we talk about the stuff that is not only coming up with the client but really coming up within ourselves. We give each other support. And I encourage if you come to these sorts of things and you listen to this information, we are available to talk to and other people who do this work are also available to talk to. I'd like to highlight that when things are going well, when I am not de-energized, it's when I am doing just what I'm talking about right now. Which is communicating, speaking with and working with people that have different ideas from I and we're working together to crowdsource our ideas together to do this work. No one person has it. We all need to work together. We need to continue to tap into each other's motivations and learn about each other's motivations in doing this work.
We constantly read about looming economic downturn. We hear layoffs in technology and law and other industries. And I saw that there was an article in Essence magazine and the title was, tech companies are quietly defunding diversity pledges and industry layoffs are hitting black and brown workers hardest. So, in light of a limited amount or a finite amount of resources allocated to all programs initiatives and there's competition from other leaders within an organization to have their programs funded, what would you advise people who are advocating for resources and support for their diversity equity and inclusion initiatives while they're competing with other initiatives?
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Okay. So, remember I mentioned earlier when you don't hit your numbers, our people or systems is the first thing to go. And so, I think that's what we're seeing there. But I also think, I want to say to Fritz or maybe Burchell's point around what does diversity even mean to different entities. Couching it as just helping people of color or helping black people get into this environment, that misses so much around what diversity really is. And I think if you look at DEIB, diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging, if you're starting to get pushback on setting aside money for diversity and equity, focus on the inclusion and the belonging because they are more general topics.
My preference there is the idea of the concept of psychological safety. Because if you can reach or achieve or even start working on psychological safety in a company, inclusion will follow from that if everyone feels that they are able to belong, to ask questions, to not get punished if they make a mistake. If everyone feels like that you're trying to create an inclusive environment, you can back your way into diversity once everybody feels connected. Helping people understand how to have a hard conversation without making an enemy is a big part of conversations and relationships in any organization. Do that and then you can talk about how to have that uncomfortable conversation if someone has said something offensive, et cetera. Which makes it an easier or better place to work, which will bring in diversity.
It is a longer road to do that without doing any other things concurrently. But I think focusing on the quick win or the easier path of the inclusion and belonging through concepts like, it doesn't have to be that, but concepts like psychological safety can also, there's a lot of data there, there's a lot of organizations that are pushing that. There's a lot of research to be done to create that. Business proposal if you will. And you can probably get funding that way faster than saying that you want to create a diversity program, but potentially having the people that you're pitching that idea to here, I want to put some black people up here, the way people hear things can differ. But if you say I want to focus on a psychologically safe environment, that's good for everyone and it gets a little bit less resistance. But at the end of the day you still got to have a leadership team that is willing to invest in people programs.
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A comment on you mentioned tech companies are laying people off in record numbers right now and it's hitting populations of color at a disproportionate rate. I know a lot of organizations think that the soul of who they are is visible and felt when they welcome you into the organization and onboard you. But really the truth is, the true soul of an organization is felt on how they say goodbye to you. And you can actually lay people off, it's a part of doing business, it is what it is. But you can do it in a very genuine, generous, kind way.
Because the people that remain don't forget, it's completely visible to them how you treated people. And so, if you are just arbitrarily cutting to save money or not really putting thought into the community impact of what your decision making process is, then people will not forget that. And you may actually end up hurting yourself even more around inclusion and diversity because people are going to say, I'm going to stick around just long enough for me to find another opportunity and I'm going to say goodbye. Because I'm not going to wait around to be treated this way. And so, I know a lot of organizations, it's uncomfortable, it's awkward, but it's a time to pause and say, how do we actually do this in a way that actually is a true reflection of the investment that we told our people we're going to make in them?
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I just want to add one additional piece to what David just said, which I was really smart. And that is that there's actually a lot of news out there right now about tech companies and other companies doing reductions in force. And I take a slightly different tact than David, I think it's lousy business, but if you have to do it, I think David would agree, then you want to do it compassionately and carefully in the way he did it. I think one of the things that has really gotten a lot of organizations into trouble is that they're not doing enough study up upfront before they make the final decision about the different impact and why. And so, the question that if you're in a leadership role in an organization, you need to be asking before we let folks go, let's put it all us together. How are we making decisions about who we let go and reduce the force. What's our criteria?
Two organizations I'm working with right now, one has gone through this incredibly very focused process around, is it based upon our performance evaluations, and based upon that, is it having different impacts on different groups in our organization. Either location or job role or underrepresented populations. They've gone through that whole process before they identified who are we actually going ahead and do a reduction of force with. That was smarter process. This other organization, of course I wasn't necessarily involved with this organization when I came in, but they basically like, we're just going to go ahead and randomly just let all these people go. And they did and the impact on underrepresented populations and they shot themselves on the foot too because it wasn't just people of color or women, it was also job roles and they were letting people go that they actually needed. So, you really need to be thinking about this super carefully and also thinking of it from a DE&I lens.
Joy Stephens: When we talk about how complex all of this is, if you think about our comments earlier around looking for talent, racially different talent and having it at those entry levels and then when they do a layoff, a lot of entry level staff gets cut, you just cut the talent you spend so much time recruiting and it looks like it is a bigger impact on black and brown people because they are at a higher percentage level at those lower levels in the company. So, it all feeds on itself.
David Sarnoff: And as we're coming up on time, I want to be respectful of our panelists and attendees. If we could just go around and give a brief takeaway or comment as a result of what I thought was an enlightening, insightful dialogue. Fritz, can we start with you? Something that stood out.
Dr. Fritz: I want to again acknowledge that this work is long and it's a long iterative process. That it requires us to be committed, to collaborate. For us to look at this from many different angles. From the critique or as we started with the article, to talking to each other amongst ourselves, the people who do this work to keep ourselves going to practice as David Robert mentioned before, talking to each other about what we've learned and sharing that with one another so we can keep driving the process forward.
Dr. Michael Burchell: So, I love working with the colleagues that I see on this panel. All the folks that you see on this panel are committed, caring, passionate and expert in this space. They do a lot of important work. And I think it does require sometimes some outside in thinking around how to address issues of opportunity, of fatigue, of challenge. And it may not necessarily be the folks on this panel, but there are lots of people in organizations that are engaged in this work. And so, to make sure that you're reaching out above and beyond, just your own world, but to connect with others like the folks on this panel or others similarly situated, I think is really, really important.
Joy Stephens: Two quick things. As we're talking about, Michael, you mentioned how much you like working with this group and I just did a quick numbers like this. Seven different types of diversity on the five people that you see here. So, it can be done and it can be done successfully. And I think we love working with each other. And so, here's an example of what it could look like. And the other thing I want to say, I want everyone to remember, I'm going to paraphrase from educational division, each one teach one. I would like to say each one, reach one. Because as we talk about fatigue and maintaining that momentum, if you want to help your diversity team out there, help them for real, spread the message. Don't rely on them to be the only ones to say something. Don't back them up after the meeting is over, back them up in the meeting. Be like that and it will help, again, give them the energy to keep this going.
David Robert: Well, it's hard to follow Fritz and Michael and Joy, but I would say that be realistic in how long this work actually takes to see meaningful progress. I think of this work as being a teacher. You plant seeds for future benefit. And so, those who are trying to criticize the process or poke holes in the methodology or the approach because they don't see what they think they should be seeing at this point, I think you have to push back on those voices because it's unreasonable to expect a fully blown maple tree because you planted the seed last month. And I think oftentimes we don't call out those unrealistic expectations in terms of how long this work takes to actually yield fruit. So, that's my big takeaway.
David Sarnoff: Thank you so much David. And thank you panelists. Grateful for you being here today and sharing your insights and perspectives. It was highly educational for me. Thank you. And thank you to all the attendees. Our next session will be sometime in March. We will get the word out. Again, please feel free to follow up with us with your questions. Our emails are on the website loebleadership.com. Feel free to connect and follow with us on LinkedIn. And I did want to get to an allyship conversation today, that will wait for the next panel, but so many other things to talk about. Thank you so much. And we'll stick around for a minute or two if people want to put questions in the chat. Otherwise, have a great rest of your week. And best of luck on your diversity equity and inclusion initiatives for 2023.
Joy Stephens: Just while we're waiting on a couple questions, I'm just thinking about the thumbs up and the peace sign and everything. And I remember when, I want to say it was Facebook, first started putting in shaded thumbs up or peace sign or whatever, how very, very excited we all were. We were all like, they got a brown peace sign. I'm going to use it every day. And it led to more people wanting to see it. I remember when, I can't remember the company because it wasn't the preeminent name, but some company put out a bandage that was brown. And this one guy tweeted about, I finally have a bandage to match my skin tone for the first time in 40 years since I've been alive.
And the increase in that particular company's revenue that year skyrocketed. Rihanna and Fenty makeup. And making sure that she had tones that matched every skin color and I mean every, if you go to, none of you all probably will, but if you go to Sephora and see her lineup, it's a hundred or so individual shades. And now other people are recognizing that, that market exists. And all of these could be construed as capitalist funded diversity efforts.
Dr. Michael Burchell: Yeah, absolutely. One of the best things that affinity or ERG groups can do is actually become business partners to businesses around how to think more broadly and inclusively about their client or customer base. A lot more has happened in the last decade. I remember growing up and now like the bandaid and stuff. So, it's great to see. We should be thinking about, it's not all people look like me. Pasty white people. [inaudible 01:06:14].
David Robert: There's an evolution that has to happen. I think, again, much like other DE&I efforts, I think a lot of organizations want affinity groups to be business groups right from the onset. And there's a whole iterative process that has to happen. And you can't jump over some of those steps. But I totally agree with you.
Dr. Fritz: I've worked with ERG groups who approached that from a mandate and that didn't work out too well, where they're being tasked with the job as opposed to there being created a process where they would want to be part of that process.
David Robert: Then you have the flip. No I'm not, well, maybe I'm judging, but you have a governor of a particular state who's actually trying to force universities to hand over data on gender fluid groups and LGBTQ groups and the colleges are like, are you out of your mind? And he's apparently trying to do this under the guise of research. To me, that makes it less likely for those universities to benefit from having those resource groups, because people will be afraid. But I think this work isn't always linear. It rarely is. And sometimes it's two steps forward, half step back with a step to the side, another step forward, which also adds to the fatigue.