I mostly like Wharton’s website — I have linked it many times over the years — and here’s a new-ish article from them about inclusion. Cool! Now I want you to look at this paragraph within said article:
“An unqualified view of meritocracy is problematic because it perpetuates the injustice that we say we’re trying to fight against,” she said. “We have to account for the complexity of calibrating inputs, outputs, rewards and penalties, especially in light of biases, mind tricks and institutional barriers that undermine the meritorious principles we desire.”
OK, now go show that paragraph to an executive or senior decision-maker. He or she will fall asleep before he/she finishes reading it. Where is a financial acronym? Where is a number? Why are we talking about calibrating inputs and “in light of biases?” Why are discussing meritocracy twice? “Institutional barriers?”
Show me a CAGR reference, a ROI reference, a KPI reference, and by the way, why isn’t this in a deck? Why is this an article?
I’m out. Got a stand-up on Japan strategies.
Herein lies the problem.
First: what is work to a senior decision-maker?
It’s about competition, relevance, control, and markers of success. Most of those are material in nature, i.e. revenue, growth, market share, etc. If you have a diverse, inclusive company, but your market share is .0001%, is that successful? Does that make you feel like a king back at your 4/3 house? No. So you need to remember that first of all.
Secondly, a lot of senior decision-makers have had their ass kissed for somewhere on the order of 5-10 years, often about 30+ years. They like having their ass kissed, and they like it when like-minded, like-looking people are around them. That’s why senior leadership teams are so often 11 white guys within six years of each other age-wise. They want to be surrounded by people from the same subdivisions, whose children attend the same schools, whose wives look similar, etc. That’s fun to them. Like-mindedness is fun. Inclusion and diversity rail against that. It’s something you say but not something you operate on. Who wants a bunch of minority women or guys with nose rings? Those people ain’t KPI hounds. I know what KPI hounds look like. They look like Chad and Brad over here.
Second: who runs these initiatives at most companies?
It varies, but oftentimes it’s a veteran of the company who happens to be a POC, often a woman. For a while, Amazon had 18 direct reports into Bezos, and the only black female was running inclusion efforts.
I’m sorry, and this is not 2020-woke to say, but that just reeks of token. What guy that “ships” or “sells” is going to look at Denise running HR/inclusion and think “Yea, that’s a seat at my table?” He just won’t, unfortunately. Should he? Yes. But factor in psychology. It’s about control, relevance, success, growth, etc. If you see a token helming another department and you know at most said person will show up at a few meetings/year and you’ll have to sit through a couple of decks as you check your email on your phone, why would you really care?
There’s just not buy-in. It feels very paint by numbers at many places.
Third: Buzzwords
Much of the inclusion and belonging discussion is rooted in buzzwords, and there isn’t enough of a tie back to what senior decision-makers (notice I don’t call them “leaders,” but they do have formal power and can move shit forward) care about.
If you want “belonging” to advance as a concept in a company, for example, you would need to:
- Define it
- Figure out how it’s measured
- Figure out what financial metrics decrease or increase based on it
- Get an executive sponsor
- Put together a short deck
- Pitch the deck with 3 action items
- Heavy acronyms and fiscal stuff
- Get approval
- Go
- Report back in 3 months, again mostly about money and metrics
Instead what “Inclusion Leads” usually do is talk in vague, fluffy, bullshit-y terms that no one really understands for months at a time. They make some decks, send around some articles, and sit in meetings. Six months later, the E-Team is still all old white guys, and maybe the brand posted on Instagram about a social justice cause. Rinse and repeat.
You want top dogs to care, you need to speak to top dogs. Corporate vocabulary is important.
Fourth: Woke-chasing
A lot of people that talk more about diversity and inclusion online are woke-chasers, which means they’re usually doing it to appear on keynotes and panels and get paid work. They’re not doing it necessarily because they deeply believe in the causes. (Some are.)
“Woke-chasers” also appear in high corporate ranks, in a concept called “woke-washing.” In such a concept, a POC woman with amazing credentials would like to be promoted. Instead of actually promoting her, the executive team is worried about what hashtags to use online to appear woke to potential Gen Z consumers. Instead of taking immediate action internally, they chase the tail of maybe attracting a 23 year-old woman to their brand because they mentioned Elijah McClain. Meanwhile, the amazing POC woman who deserved to be promoted? She will get poached.
The priorities are in the wrong place, often.
So should we give up on inclusion efforts?
No.
But, we need to think about and define them differently.
- Tie them to financial metrics: Only way you will get buy-in. Execs run their shops on cost and their incentive structures. Know those, tie your goals to those, and you’re going to get a few ears perking up.
- Re-define inclusion and diversity: It’s become very narrowly about gender, race, and trans/identity in the last three years. There are lots of types of diversity and inclusion, including cognitive, background, industry, or just treating your team like human beings.
- Stop chasing woke: Instagram and flowery, poetic descriptions of how you’re “listening” and “will always stand up for my peers” are a farce. They very rarely mean anything. Take tangible action. Promote good people. Hire from other schools or backgrounds.
- Promote people with self-awareness, regardless of their color or sexual identity: A white guy with self-awareness will promote and develop the best people on his team, regardless of who they are. It doesn’t matter, per se, that he’s a “cis male.” That doesn’t make him the enemy. The problem with “cis males” is that many lack self-awareness and empathy, hence they just promote more Brads and Chads up the chain. But in the last 36 months, the narrative has been that the problem is white males. The problem is actually self-awareness. Find people with that attribute and give them decision authority, then get out of the way.
All this is deeply psychological and hard to do. But to quote the richest man in human history, there are two types of failure:
Trying to do better about inclusion efforts is tough, and it may not work. That’s OK. It’s a good failure. Go try again. It’s worth it to get it right.
