From DE&I targets to actual behavioural change. Since the early ’00s, research has made it increasingly and abundantly clear that diversity has clear commercial advantages. Yet, on average, while organisations have the related targets and have had them for a while, progress is slow. Why is that? Apart from the commercial benefits, doesn’t everyone want to work in an inclusive environment and feel that they belong? Looking at how people are wired and how coaching works, gives an interesting perspective.
The societal shift the world is experiencing, tangible in businesses as ESG developments, in combination with an acute shortage in the labour market, forces companies to change their approach towards employees in order to be able to continue to attract and retain talent. For me, the resulting concept of employers inviting their employees to ‘bring their whole selves to work’ summarizes what diversity, equity & inclusion and the added extra dimension ‘belonging’ (hereinafter: DE&I) is about. Welcoming everyone, with all their differences, and aligning what they can bring with what the business needs, is quite different from the more traditional way of looking at employees, i.e. as an anonymous collective that needs to fit the company’s structure, referred to as ‘the workforce’, ‘human resources’ or, my favourite, ‘BIS’: ‘butts in seats’.
To make this different, inclusive, approach a reality, most larger organizations have adopted clear DE&I targets, supported by policies and training. This should result in the employees feeling that they belong, as they are, and that they can thrive without interpersonal fear. The latter is crucial, as people of different backgrounds need to feel that their voice matters, that they are included in the important meetings and they belong there as a member of the community. Without psychological safety, people will not bring their whole selves to work.
Unfortunately, research shows that targets, policies and training are not enough. Creating a diverse group of employees and a sense of belonging to retain them is by definition not the result of a top down approach: the people working in an organisation need to create this together. Leaders are expected to be coaching their teams rather than knowing all the answers and colleagues are expected to be curious about each other and to embrace the notion that we are all different rather than everyone trying to fit in. Fitting in is assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be to be accepted and the opposite of belonging: being who you are. For many people the shift from fitting in to belonging requires massive change.
Changing our behaviour, however, is very hard, because of how we are built: we are biologically hardwired to resist change, we are drawn to people that are similar and familiar to us and we want to be part of a group, our ‘inner group’, the members of which we tend to see as individuals, while we see other groups as more homogenous. In addition, habits and unconscious decisions determine the vast majority of our behaviour (system 1 – fast), leaving only a very small percentage of our behaviour being determined by conscious choice (system 2 – slow). This results in clear tension between our ‘natural’ tendencies on the one hand and DE&I goals on the other.
If done well, coaching results in behavioural change by means of the coachee, not his or her employer, formulating goals, linked to the coachee’s own intrinsic motivation. Formulating goals is not enough. Once the coachee sees a reason to change and has set the related goal, they need to decide to make the change and to take action before anything will actually shift. When coaching in the area of diversity and inclusion, the Daniel Difference Model (DMM) is very useful, not only to the person being coached, but also to their team. The DMM takes as a starting point that the people involved are different and will have different perspectives and needs. Asking questions to understand these differences is crucial to gaining an understanding of the reality as people experience it (where are we?), before being able to get to exploring the options (where could we be going?) and the actions (what will we do to achieve our goals?). The goals will represent steps, taken one by one, as and with the support of the entire group in order to be able to bring about a sense of belonging for all.
The manager, clear on the DE&I goals, initiates the conversation with the team to formulate goals supported by everyone involved. In the conversations to be had, exploring the different needs and qualities is key in bringing about effective change. Putting oneself in the shoes of a colleague is imperative in this regard. This can be done by making the topics personal, e.g. through testimonials. Also, stressing the organisational relationship and common goal – going after the same outcomes – tends to promote the willingness to join the effort, or to be compliant with what the organisation asks from its employees. Running such meetings in a so-called Thinking Environment will ensure the conversation being inclusive and producing better ideas: everyone will be given a turn to speak without interruption and questions will be asked to remove assumptions that are limiting ideas. In her book, Nancy Kline gives the example of such a meeting on the topic of attracting and retaining more female engineers, which had proven to be a tough nut to crack. ‘Ask the women’ turned out to be solution that, however simple, had not been thought of until that moment. When focusing on DE&I targets, involving everyone in the conversation is a crucial part of the way forward. This tool has been highly underutilized.
Coaching in the form of a structured and inclusive conversations can bridge the gap and deliver actual change, on the ground.