The 411 on DEI: 5 Reasons Why You Need to Implement DEI Programs in 2023

You should’ve given your team the day off on the last Friday of this past September. But if you didn’t, it’s probably OK; as long as you’re in business, it’s not too late to invest in yourself — by investing in all your employees. 

This is what diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) means. And it’s the most effective path toward creating a company culture that embraces not only productivity and profits but also worker innovation, engagement and wellness.

So let’s get into it– what is DEI really? And how can your company embrace DEI initiatives to increase employee wellness as well as company wellness?

What does DEI really mean?

Diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, refers to an organization’s policy or program to standardize processes and procedures for actively recruiting, welcoming, valuing, respecting, supporting and providing growth opportunities to all workers — and, most importantly, to members of underrepresented populations.

As Harvard Business School professor Robin J. Ely and Morehouse College president David A. Thomas explains:

“Being genuinely valued and respected involves more than just feeling included. It involves having the power to help set the agenda, influence what — and how — work is done, have one’s needs and interests taken into account, and have one’s contributions recognized and rewarded with further opportunities to contribute and advance.”

 

What is Diversity?

Diversity in the workplace refers to the level of heterogeneity of a working population and can include any differences among employees or, more specifically, members of the ten protected classes: 

1. Age
2. Citizenship status
3. Color
4. Genetics
5. National origins or ancestry
6. Disability
7. Race
8. Religion or creed
9. Sex, including including gender, gender identity, pregnancy, and sexual orientation
10. Veteran status

While no one disputes the potential value of recruiting a diverse team, if you and your management team don’t ensure the people you hire feel respected, included and valued, they’ll quickly become disengaged.

Disengaged employees can lead to accelerated turnover, compromised recruitment, eviscerated brand image, and a shrinking ROI.

Take Google, for example. Google is a company that was initially heralded for its commitment to employee wellness and company culture. But here’s what Ariel Koren, a former Google manager who recently went viral after announcing her resignation, told me when I asked about corporate DEI efforts:

“Google is weaponizing its DEI and ERG systems. Instead of supporting workers who seek to hold the company accountable for grave human rights abuses externally and abuses of workers' rights internally, Google is using its ERG system to stifle worker organizing efforts and scale out acts of retaliation against employees who exercise their protected right to hold the company accountable for working conditions. It is no coincidence that retaliation has disproportionately impacted women, queer, and BIPOC employees. Google has publicly ousted all of the women who played leadership roles in organizing the Women's Walkout against sexual harassment, Google ousted Dr. Timnit Gebru for simply doing her job as a researcher and telling the truth about racial bias in AI, Google ousted the workers who took a stand against its contracts with CBP and the pentagon, Google ousted Tanuja Gupta for her advocacy against harassment and against caste discrimination within the company, Google ousted me after speaking out about its billion dollar surveillance and military contract Project Nimbus. The list goes on and the pattern speaks for itself.”

Now, what if you were to do the opposite? What if you empowered your employees instead?

If you achieve true equity and inclusion, you’ll not only retain your top talent, but you'll also experience all the benefits of a smart DEI policy/program.

What is Equity?

Unlike “equality,” or the belief that all people should have the same access, resources and opportunities, no matter the circumstance, equity in the workplace: 

• Emphasizes that each group and individual enters the workforce — and any job application process — under their own unique circumstances
• Adjusts systems and structures to account for historical and present-day disadvantages
• Delivers each group and individual the access, resources and opportunities they need to thrive

What is Inclusion?

Inclusion in the workplace refers to how inviting, accepting and respectful the employees — and, in particular, the employees from historically marginalized groups — experience the work environment or company culture.

An inclusive culture: 

• Invites collaboration
• Celebrates differences
• Rewards creativity
• Rejects intolerance
• Incorporates safe spaces to promote honesty, accountability, acceptance, and professional and personal growth

Why You Need DEI

There’s a reason calls for DEI are sounding louder; while a lack of inclusion, equity and diversity have been felt for generations, the Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements, The Great Resignation and the disproportionate effects of the pandemic on Black, brown and Indigenous peoples have catapulted these concerns into the mainstream. 

Here’s the hard truth. 

Although Black people account for more than 13% of the US population, only four Fortune 500 companies have Black CEOs and Black people only occupy 3% of senior leadership roles across all US companies with 100 or more employees. 

Up and down the corporate ladder, job candidates with “African American-sounding names” receive 14% fewer calls for jobs than those with “white-sounding names.” Meanwhile, women only make up 8% of Fortune 500 CEO and 20% of all C-suite roles. 

And even when women, Black people and people of color hold leadership positions, they make less than their white male counterparts; to this day, Black men earn 13% less and Latin Americans make 9% less than white people with the same qualifications — and Black women earn 40% less. 

Across genders, Black and Latinx employees with bachelor’s degrees earn nearly 25% less than white and Asian workers.

In other words, nearly six decades after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, “we find equal pay for equal work is still not a reality.”

Beyond instances of outright racism, sexism, homophobia, etc., this enduring phenomenon can be attributed to what Jackson Gruver, a data analyst at PayScale, calls “opportunity gap” and “occupational segregation.” 

Talented young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are not being hired.

This is because companies are recruiting from a shallow pool of elite university graduate candidates, and hiring only those who “fit” within the (homogenous) company culture. 

Worse still— when companies do hire individuals from different backgrounds, those employees often face discrimination: 

• Nearly two thirds of workers have experienced bias in the workplace in the last year
• Nearly four in 10 workers experience bias at least once a month

Needless to say, these types of incidents produce a hostile work environment and bad company culture.

Almost half of the workers who experience harassment, bullying or stereotyping choose to quit their job; the effects on the employees who stay, and on the business as a whole, aren’t much better.

The Top 5 Business Reasons to Make Your Workplace More Diverse, Equitable and Inclusive

Company culture is key — and employee experience is the new customer experience.

With two thirds of American consumers now choosing to buy from brands whose values reflect their own, whether and how you develop, implement and publicize your DEI policy and processes could literally make or break your business. 

Organizations that develop and follow a smart DEI framework benefit not only from better branding but:

1) Amplified engagement.

A study of more than 1,500 workers concluded that, because of the mutual trust it instills in employer and employee, “engagement is an outcome of diversity and inclusion” — and “the combined focus” on the two “delivers the highest levels of engagement” in the workplace.

2) Quicker, smarter decision making.

Harvard Business Review found that diverse teams are able to solve problems faster than teams with cognitively similar people, and Cloverpop found that diverse teams also experience a 60% improvement in decision making quality.

Neither compares to the People Management research indicating diverse teams are 87% better at making decisions.

3) Enhanced imagination and innovation.

According to Forbes Insights, 85% of Fortune 500 CEOs believe “a diverse and inclusive workforce is crucial to encouraging different perspectives and ideas that drive innovation” — and another study showed an 83% increase in innovation when employees simply believe their organization is committed to diversity.

Authoritative evidence came two years later when Josh Bersin, a thought leader in corporate talent, learning and HR tech, determined that “companies that embrace diversity and inclusion in all aspects of their business” are 170% more innovative (and “statistically outperform their peers”).

4) Boosted productivity.

In “The Economic Value of Cultural Diversity,” sponsored by International Trade and Investment in 2004, Gianmarco I.P. Ottaviano and Giovanni Peri conclude that there’s “a dominant positive effect of diversity on productivity” and “a more multicultural” environment makes employees “more productive.”

Nearly two decades later, UMass Amherst professor Orlando Richard, Vanderbilt University professor Maria Del Carmen Triana and Florida Atlantic University professor Mingxiang Li reached similar conclusions, finding that a mere 1% increase in racial diversity in upper and lower management increases productivity by between $729 and $1,590 per employee per year.

5) Increased profitability.

Companies devoted to DEI earn 140% more revenue, have 230% more cash per employee, and are 70% more likely to capture a new market and 35% more likely to outperform their competitors.

The numbers are all there.

The data shows that DEI is no longer a catchy idea, it's a necessity. Make the pledge to kickoff DEI programs in the new year– and watch your company, and employees, flourish. 

What are your thoughts or questions on DEI programs? Let us know at ccwomen@cmpteam.com.