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Diversity and inclusion (D&I) have become necessary missions for most businesses. Research has long shown that diverse teams are more productive, more engaged, and the companies that create them are more profitable. And the murder of George Floyd — and the social unrest that followed — made it clear that taking a stand around social justice is necessary to recruitment, retention, and even the viability of your brand.
Despite the requisite commitment and knowledge, however, creating a truly diverse and inclusive workforce takes much more than locating and tapping a diverse hiring pipeline.
According to a recent study in the Harvard Business Review (HBR), organizations of all sizes have made unprecedented investments around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the past few years. That same report, though, found that those efforts are not finding the level of success companies had hoped for. Much of the disappointment is not with recruitment, however. It’s with employee retention.
“In a lot of organizations, especially in tech organizations, you get a revolving door,” says Stuart McCalla, managing partner at Evolution. “People come in and then they leave.”
That’s expensive and frustrating for everyone involved.
CIO.com spoke to DEI leaders and experts to uncover the best practices for building diverse teams and a culture that nurtures those teams and individuals to stop the churn and get closer to the organization’s overall D&I goals.
1. Set measurable goals and then measure them
“One of the most important aspects of creating inclusive organizations is about measurement,” says McCalla. “Numbers don’t lie.” You can’t really know how well you are doing at building the inclusive environment you want if you don’t set goals and measure your progress against them. Yet, according to the HBR study, 60% of companies report that they have a DEI strategy but gender representation goals (26%) and race representation goals (16%) are infrequently part of it.
These are not recruitment goals. They are representation goals. Maybe you hired a diverse team for entry-level positions. But where are they now? Did they get promoted and build diversity in your management team? Or did they leave because there was no opportunity for advancement, the company culture didn’t make them feel welcome, or there was bias that’s invisible to your management...