By Natasha Jamal and Teresa Tschida

How to Improve DEI in the Workplace

Workplaces globally have expressed a new or renewed commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), largely related to social and political trends — along with increasing awareness about the importance of DEI from a moral and business standpoint. 

To this end, many organizations are re-evaluating their DEI strategies and goals, hiring for DEI roles — especially Chief Diversity Officers — and publicly pledging to support more diverse and inclusive workplaces.

There's no question these are necessary steps toward embedding DEI into an organization's culture — that is, changing "the way work gets done" at an organization so every employee feels respected and included — but it will take more for leaders to create the conditions for meaningful progress on DEI outcomes.

Studies from the Gallup Center on Black Voices find that one in four Black employees in the U.S. have reported experiencing workplace discrimination in the past year and that Black women are less likely to feel they are treated with respect in the workplace. Disparities in the employee experience represent real, and potentially significant, differences in the way workers approach their jobs and their teams. And with a lack of diverse representation in leadership and only 42% of U.S. managers strongly agreeing that they are prepared to have meaningful conversations about race with their teams, it's increasingly important for leaders to consider the employee experience through a DEI lens.

Leaders can turn good intentions into reality by creating an employee experience with formal structures, clear strategies and alignment to values that uses employees' perspectives to prioritize change and measure progress.

3 Actions to Help Leaders and DEI Ambassadors Create More Diverse, Equitable and Inclusive Workplaces

To improve DEI in the workplace, leaders need a strategy that combines their aspirational vision with the right metrics and processes to create change in a sustained and proactive way, rather than as a short-lived reaction to current events.

To get started, Gallup recommends three actions for leaders based on our advice and analytics for culture transformation and the employee experience.

     1. First, identify DEI priorities based on a rigorous assessment of the organization's current state.
     2. Next, consider how the work will get done to create the organization's future state.
     3. Finally, plan to sustain momentum.
   
Read the rest at Gallup.