Putting the Pieces Together: Sorting Your Broken DEIB Strategy

The concepts I'll share literally cost thousands of dollars. I'm sharing it with you for free because a better world is worth more than my personal financial success! (And yes, I still consult on implementation)

So, here's the secret to DEIB success - shifting your focus from traditional policy-focused approaches to a more human and self-awareness-driven approach. It's all about empowering our employees to understand themselves before they can truly embrace and support diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging.

At its most basic level, the concept is to help connect employees with the DEIB work on a personal level rather than tell them how must connect with the work.

"To achieve true DEIB success, we must first connect with ourselves before we can connect with the work. It's not just about policies and quotas, but about empathy, grace, and showing up as human beings."

It breaks down into three basic concepts:

Prioritize Self-Awareness

Instead of just training employees to respect differences, let's focus on training them to become self-aware. This means helping them understand their own biases, beliefs, and personal experiences with injustice.

I've worked with executive women who've stated that their connection to the DEIB work is only about their Black employees. This is a very common feeling. It's based on the fact that the struggles of Black people across the world are sort of the headline of and a major catalyst for DEIB work.

The solution is to help stakeholders to see that they have had some experience (whether directly, indirectly, or through our family history) with injustice, bias, prejudice, etc. And then connect that experience and emotion to why DEIB is important to them.

Prioritize Empathy and Grace

Before setting up policies and hiring quotas and training on bias, help employees develop their understanding of concepts like grace and empathy.

These are often called "soft" skills. But research shows that these relationship skills are becoming more in demand each year. In fact, in a very connected world, these skills are proving to be the difference between success and failure.

These concepts are directly connected to our emotional intelligence and are the foundation on which diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging are built. As employees (regardless of role/level in the organization) understand these concepts they will become much more willing and able to see the world from another perspective.

This isn't a magic trick to convert people's beliefs, and you shouldn't ask them to. But learning to empathize, forgive and make space for others and their differences can make all the difference in how they view and their willingness to accept those new policies and initiatives.

Develop Leadership Storytelling

The last concept is one of the hardest because it may require the leadership of your organization to develop two skills that most of us avoid. Public speaking and vulnerability.

Most of us are familiar with the concepts of leadership buy-in. But this concept is more involved. Leaders must buy-in, not just by signing off on an initiative or okaying a budget, but by getting involved.

This will look different in each organization. But the overall concept is that leadership must express their connection to the DEIB work. And not just conceptually, or as an ideal. Leadership must show employees their personal connection with these concepts.

I personally recommend using storytelling. As human beings, we are wired to learn best through stories. When a leader tells an authentic story that highlights their personal "why" in relation to DEIB it changes the landscape of the organization.

Easy, right? Not at all. Leaders have to first, conquer their own emotions. They must go through the sef-work described above and figure out how they authentically connect to DEIB. Then they must have the courage to open that up to employees who will have various critiques. All of this has to be done by the group that is typically the most removed, siloed, and alone in the organization.

The Takeaway

The underlying theme here is self-discovery and self-balance. By helping our employees connect with themselves on a deeper level, they will naturally become more committed to the DEIB work and it will resonate with their internal values.

If we rush into implementing policies and KPIs without first engaging our employees on a personal level, we'll only get surface-level participation and resistance. We need to win their hearts and minds first, and that starts with prioritizing self-awareness and empathy at all levels.

So, let's put our focus on the internal moral compass of our employees and inspire them to be champions of DEIB from within. Together, we can create a lasting and impactful change that extends far beyond just ticking boxes.

#ileadwithlove #DEI #DEIB #howtowin #leadershipdevelopement #leadership #hr #letsconnect