5 ways HR leaders can prioritize DEI in the workplace
The journey to building a diverse workforce starts with laying out a path.
It’s an exciting time in history that employers have made diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) one of the top five business priorities for businesses in 2022. However, the journey to building a diverse workforce requires important steps in the process. Here are 5 methods to build a culture of belonging and welcome more diverse employees to your business.
Related: Has diversity in the workplace ‘worked’/?
1. Take stock of your current situation
Take time to understand your company’s current workforce diversity to begin to set realistic goals with clear timelines for your organization. Here are a few questions to ask yourself before laying out a DEI strategy for your workplace:
- Are you tracking demographic data currently?
- How, and to what depth?
- Where does your industry stand?
- How does your business stand against your industry?
- Are there other organizations in your industry you can learn from?
- What are you ready to invest in this initiative from $$, people, resources, etc?
Once you’ve answered these for your organization, you can take the next steps toward implementing a DEI plan and foster a culture of belonging that welcomes more diverse employees to your business.
2. Build an inclusive recruitment and hiring process.
Your organization should develop clear recruitment metrics around diversity hiring and be able to reflect on how those metrics helped them achieve positive outcomes. Metrics that can indicate positive outcomes are increases in demographic diversity, greater retention of diverse talent, higher returning intern rate for different minority groups, and stronger sense of belonging among interns and full-time employees. If you aren’t reaching diverse candidates, try sourcing from alternative talent pipelines like YUPRO, Ripplematch or ColorStack. In addition, pay attention to the diversity of your hiring panel; it’s important to candidates to see a person they can relate to in their potential place of work.
3. Paid remote work opportunities and internships.
Not all qualified candidates have the means to work from an office every day. By opening up positions and internships to remote workers, or even hybrid, you increase the diversity of your talent pool. Just like in-person programs, not all internships are created equal. If you choose to embrace this flexible model to increase DEI, follow best practices for virtual internships and provide the necessary technology and resources to provide a positive candidate experience.
Alongside those best practices, offer only paid internships. Many diverse populations don’t have the luxury of working an unpaid internship, even if it’s just for a few months. Unfortunately, 60% of internships are unpaid, disproportionately affecting African-, Hispanic-, and multi-racial Americans. Unpaid interns typically undergo a longer job-search process than paid interns. One of the reasons is because paid internships lead to full-time offers about 72% of the time compared to only 44% of unpaid internships. By offering paid internships only, you encourage those in more diverse socioeconomic standings to apply to your company.
4. Demonstrate diversity in your executive leadership team.
People want to work for an organization where they can see themselves becoming a leader. Among the nation’s 1,000 largest corporations across eight industries, women hold 25% of key C-suite roles. Only 6% of CEOs are women. Representation of People of Color is even slimmer. One strategy to support this effort is to implement upskilling and reskilling initiatives. A great way to retain talent is to adapt with them and encourage their career growth through internal mobility. The future of work will increasingly integrate human and machine resources, accelerating the rate in which people must advance their skill sets.
Research from the Boston Consulting Group suggests that companies will need to upskill or reskill approximately 60% of their workforce over the next two to five years. Offer upskilling and reskilling programs to establish a corporate learning ecosystem, and then create measurable criteria to identify successors and support them through networks and development to move up the ladder of your organization.
5. Create employee resource groups (ERGs).
ERGs, or Affinity Groups, began in the 1960s as a way to ease racial tension and has since evolved to amplify voices of like-minded groups that have historically been suppressed. Establish these groups to provide employees with safe spaces to connect, support, share resources, educate and strategize to create change within your organization. Robinhood created 10 ERGs led by members and allies who join together to support their inclusive workplace. Companies with dedicated ERGs have reduced turnover rates, increased performance on goals, and increased productivity.
Building a truly inclusive DEI strategy requires company-wide change. Sprinkling in accommodations as you go is not enough. Rather, adjust your overall operations to be more inclusive by measuring and reporting diversity data, offering flexible work-from-home options, paying your interns, establishing ERGs, and building an inclusive recruitment and hiring process to encourage the advancement of historically underrepresented populations in your industry.
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