Episode 152: How to Navigate Your Organisation's DEI Journey (Interview with Ella F. Washington)
In this episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast, David is joined by Dr Ella F. Washington, Professor of Practice and Georgetown University McDonough School of Business, CEO of Ellavate Solutions, and author of “The Necessary Journey: Making Real Progress On Equity and Inclusion.”
Ella has dedicated her career to creating diverse and inclusive workplaces and in this episode, she shares her research on how organisations can navigate their DEI journey through her DEI Maturity Model.
In this conversation, expect to learn more about:
Ella’s DEI Maturity Model that outlines the different stages of an organisation's DEI journey;
The three P's of DEI journeys: purpose, pitfalls, and progress;
Common mistakes organisations make on their DEI journey;
How organisations can measure their DEI progress and what they should focus on next.
This episode is for all the people and HR leaders and professionals looking to create a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace.
Support from this podcast comes from Charthop. You can learn more by visiting: charthop.com/digitalhr
David Green: The past few years have seen a positive shift in the conversations we're having around diversity, equity and inclusion. But while we're seeing progress in how DEI strategies are approached, there is still a lot of work to do. To help us put some clarity and vision into the DEI mission, joining me today is a very special guest, Ella F Washington, Professor of Practice at Georgetown University McDonough School of Business, CEO of Ellavate Solutions, and Author of a great new book, The Necessary Journey: Making Real Progress on Equity and Inclusion.
As a leader in the DEI space, Ella has dedicated her career to helping organisations create diverse and inclusive workplaces, and with that she has developed the powerful DEI Maturity Model, which outlines the different states of an organisation's diversity, equity and inclusion journey. In this episode, Ella talks us through her model and how to apply to it within your own organisation. She will also share insights on what she has coined, "the Three Ps of DEI Journeys", and outline the common mistakes organisations invariably make when it comes to diversity, equity and inclusion.
My conversation with Ella is an inspiring one so without further ado, let's jump into the conversation, where Ella starts by giving us a brief introduction to herself and how she got to where she is today.
Ella F Washington: Well, hello everyone. David, thank you for having me. So excited to be here and be in conversation and community with you today. I am an organisational psychologist by training, meaning I've spent my life's work thinking about the human side of business. Specifically, I've studied diversity, equity and inclusion, and I've been applying that in my consulting work as well as my research work. And so, my two worlds often intersect.
My mission in being an organisational psychologist is to help improve the work lives of people like me and like you. I truly believe that everyone should have the opportunity to thrive in the workplace, and we spend so much of our lives at work that work shouldn't always be the thing that is stressing us out, or we feel like we don't belong. And so, that is the reason why I entered this field many years ago, and that's what keeps me going, even as the workplace changes, as people change; there's still this need for us to be in organisations where we can not only belong but also thrive.
David Green: And really interesting that you get to apply your research in your consulting work with clients as well, so that's quite a nice mix, isn't it?
Ella F Washington: Yeah, it's also one of the things that is core to who I am. I was really clear when I was going through my PhD programme that although I think research had a really important place in the world, there's often a disconnect between what is happening in the ivory towers and what is happening in real organisations. And as an organisational psychologist specifically, I thought it's my duty to be one of those bridges to marry the two. So, it's something that I get really excited about. I have so many colleagues in academia doing such great research, so many practitioners doing such great work, and I think the more that we can have those two groups talk to each and learn from each other, then the better off we'll be in general.
David Green: And as you said, helping improve people's lives at work, that's a good mission, I love the way that you described it there, and we've really seen that in particular, I think, play out over the last two or three years. If we're focusing on the DEI aspect of that, with all the social issues that we're facing over recent years, there's definitely more talk about that, which I think is good because if we're talking, hopefully we're leaning and doing something about it. Obviously we had the pandemic and the murder of George Floyd. The DEI landscape has been exponentially gaining significant attention. As a leader in the DEI space, how would you say conversations around this area have changed?
Ella F Washington: It's interesting because 2020 was such a formative year in this work. So many people turned their attention to the first time, and other people became much more intentional about DEI. But the reality is that DEI isn't a new thing. In the first chapter of my book, I talk about the history of diversity management, all the way back in the 1970s and 1980s and to where we are today, and some companies have been on very long journeys, even though they still may have challenges. Other companies just came to their place of awakening in 2020, and so there's such a variance, which is kind of the impetus in the recent book that I published, because everyone is on the journey at some place, it's just figuring out where we are on our journey, where do we want to go and how do we get there, and I think that's a universal element of this work.
So, I've seen certainly ebbs and flows of conversation and intention. I think this year is a pivotal year in seeing how much of those conversations in 2020 are organisations still having three years later. So, I know we'll talk about that a bit later, but I think it's been wonderful, but it's also a bit telling, because history often repeats itself. So, we have to make sure that the ebbs that we saw before 2020 we don't return to, now that we're a few years beyond 2020 and the summer of the Racial Reckoning.
David Green: I think increasingly, and certainly we're seeing it in the work that we do, we work with people analytics teams in big organisations, Ella, and when we ask them where people analytics is adding most value in their organisation, for the last two years they've told us, "The DEI space", which is great to see, because what we're seeing in some of those companies is they're moving beyond representation to actually looking at inclusion and equity at a much deeper level. And I think also, the reason for doing it is, number one, it's obviously a business priority that's good, so let's hope it's still a flow and continues to be a flow and not an ebb; but also, I think employee expectations from all employees in the workplace, increasingly employees want to work for an organisation that is actually doing things about DEI and creating equitable workplaces.
Presumably, is that helping the discussion as well? So, some of it's coming from leaders, but a lot of it's coming from the bottom up as well.
Ella F Washington: So, one of the core tenets in my work is that a successful DEI strategy has to be, it's mandated, that it be top-down and bottom-up. And I know we often say that about many business imperatives, but the thing about DEI work or any human capital or cultural work, the leadership sets the tone from the top, as you're mentioning, but it's really the people in the organisation that bring that to life. For example, you could set a culture and talk about the culture you want to have all day, but it's the people working in all parts of the organisation that either bring that culture to life or go against that culture in their behaviours and actions.
I see DEI work as really critical that every place in the organisation, every person in the organisation, whether you are a frontline employee, or whether you manage hundreds of people, we all have to see our part in this work. And the more that we push away this notion that this work is just housed in HR, this work is just housed with the diversity officer, if we have one, they can be the leadership, they can lead the charge. But to implement it, it has to be both grassroots efforts, middle-level management effort, and of course coming from the top.
Quite frankly, my students will tell you, I often talk about middle-level managers being the critical piece in the success of a DEI strategy, because they're the ones that can get the messages from the top and they have to feed it to their teams and show what that really means. But they also have this opportunity to be a feedback loop and take from their teams back up to management what's working, what's not working. And I think empowering our middle-level managers to see how important they are in the success of these DEI efforts is one of the things that organisations haven't quite tapped into enough from my perspective.
David Green: Brilliant, and that's something we'll explore as we move through the conversation, Ella. Firstly, I'm really keen to talk to you about your recently published book, The Necessary Journey: Making Real Progress on Equity and Inclusion. Can you share more with listeners about the book and the inspiration behind it?
Ella F Washington: Absolutely. So, in 2020, as we've been talking about, I met with many leaders of organisations, CEOs and Chief Human Resource Officers, and it was interesting the direction of the conversations. No matter where the company was, that they were doing really well or they were completely clueless, at some point in our early conversation the leader would pull me aside and say, "Okay, no really, where are we on our journey and how do we compare to other people?" and those questions are very natural.
However, when I got them 5 and 10 and 20 and 30 times in the course of a very short amount of time, I was like, "There is something that's missing out here", because leaders are all having the same questions. There's lots of great resources online, but people keep wanting to understand where are they on the journey and how do they know if they're making progress and certainly, how do they compare to other people?
So, I wanted to provide a framework of sorts so that people can start to have a mental model of where they are on this journey. So, to do that, I needed to study as many organisations as I could to see what are the things that all organisations, no matter where they are on their journey, have in common. And then, to bring it to life, I decided to feature nine case studies of real-life companies, and where they are on their DEI journeys. What's wonderful about this approach is that it's narrative style. It's written in story format. So, anybody that likes business stories will really enjoy this book.
There's a lot of books out there that have a lot of frameworks and "how tos", and I think those are great, and I think this book is a complementary perspective to those books, because it's not a text book, it's really meant to bring to life what the journey is all about. Hearing from real people and their real stories, my hope was that anyone reading this book can see themselves somewhere in this journey, whether they connect with a leader that was really struggling on a personal level, or they connect with a company going through some tough times and trying to help that turnaround.
David Green: So, Ella, in the book you talk about how organisations can understand and define their own workplace utopia. What is a "workplace utopia" first of all; and how can those HR leaders listening go about understanding their own individual workplace utopia?
Ella F Washington: So, a workplace utopia is about conceptualising the ideal work environment for everyone to be able to thrive and how we make that a reality. And so, this concept relies heavily on the belief that our workplaces are ecosystems with different participants and contributors; and in the end, we all deserve to have an experience at work where we feel valued, respected and that we can thrive. And so, that means that everyone's workplace utopia won't be the same. What I think of an ideal work environment may not be the same as what you think about it. However, the more that we can conceptualise and understand what makes each person thrive, the more that we can create an organisational environment that at least tries to reach the most amount of people.
Furthermore, specifically for people doing the DEI work, workplace utopia for me is kind of a North Star, like what are we working towards, because this work can be really hard and really taxing. So, the more that we can think about what is the ideal state that we're working towards, not because we'll have unicorns and butterflies, it's not about that; but it is about, if we can't envision the future of our organisations in a way that we can see this work having an impact, it's hard to keep going after it every single day.
David Green: Yeah, and as you say, conceptualising that gives you something to strive for and maybe if you make it measurable or understand where you are today and maybe where the gap is, and what areas you need to close, it's having that vision, isn't it, that you're trying to get to?
Ella F Washington: Absolutely. And I think it's really powerful when you have a clear vision in mind, and that helps you to make it real. If we can't first say out loud what is it we're trying to create, what is the experience, what is the feeling, when people come to work what is the feeling we want people to have when they go through these different processes in their employee journey, if we can't conceptualise that and say it out loud and share it with the other folks that we're in leadership with, then it's hard to make those things come to life.
David Green: And the fact that it's called utopia, me being quite a fan of 16th century Tudor history as well, I particularly like that. But calling it utopia, it's a statement that this is an ambition as well?
Ella F Washington: Yeah, absolutely, and we know no workplace is perfect, but we can certainly strive. We can strive towards workplaces, especially if we're centring our team members and our employees, and we're centring the human aspect of the workplace, which I think is something that's been missing in recent years.
David Green: In the book, and you published a great article in Harvard Business Review on this, you present a DEI Maturity Model, and it consists of five stages of the DEI journey. Could you explain the various steps in more detail, and maybe even highlight how organisations can progress from one stage to the other?
Ella F Washington: Certainly. So, the first stage in the journey is awareness. There has to be a reflective period in an organisation where you think about what you really stand for, what are your values, how does diversity, equity and inclusion connect with your values and who you are as an organisation. Ideally, this happens at the conception of the organisation, but we know that sometimes these human capital elements are forgotten, especially for example with start-ups, they're just trying to survive, or with organisations that have been around for so long, it's time for them to reset and realign with their values, especially as it comes to DEI. So, awareness is really critical. We saw many organisations revisiting that or starting there for the first time in 2020.
The next stage is compliance. So, this is a way people are thinking about maintaining equal employment laws or other legal standards that they have to do to make sure they're not in violation. And compliance is not a bad thing. Compliance is a necessary part of this journey; you need to know what the laws and regulations are where you are. However, the challenge is when organisations get stuck in compliance. We saw many organisations in the early 2000s get stuck in this compliance space, because they were actually afraid of litigation and other things. So they thought, "We're going to do the bare minimum, not because we don't care, but we're afraid that if we step outside these boundaries, we can't make everyone happy, someone might be upset". So, we want to make sure that though compliance is part of the journey, that we're moving forward into more tactical stages of how we think about where does DEI fit into our goals as an organisation?
So, the third stage is that tactical stage. And so, we're thinking about our DEI strategy. What are we trying to accomplish here; and how does it align with our strategic goals? And so, in the tactical stage, you may have lots of programmes happening, you may have recruitment efforts, you may have thoughts on how you create more equity in the organisation; there's so many things that can happen at the tactical stage, and much of those things are generally positive.
The challenge at the tactical stage though is that oftentimes, we are at different places within the organisation on our journey. So, you see organisations that in one place, you may feel like there's so much inclusion and connectivity; and then if you go to another place, the same employee goes to another part of the organisation, those managers are not paying attention to these efforts in the same way. So, at the tactical stage you can have a lot of stuff going on, but it has to be connected, going towards a more global or overall strategy for the organisations. We can't just do things in pockets, and that's what often happens at that tactical stage.
But we want to see organisations pushed to a stage four, the integrated stage, and this is exactly the opposite of tactical. It's thinking about how do all of these things work together in a more integrated, strategic approach? Specifically at the integrated stage, an organisation can truly say that DEI is a part of everything that we do. And by everything that we do, I specifically mean our whole sphere of influence, so not just internally to our employees, but we're also thinking beyond that, we're thinking about our external stakeholders, we're thinking about our pure organisations, we're thinking about our influence on social media, we're thinking about our industry, we're thinking about the communities that we connect with or serve in some way. So, organisations that have gone even beyond just those initial thoughts internally about DEI, and are thinking across their whole sphere of influence in this integrated approach, would be at stage four.
Then the fifth and not final stage is the sustainable stage. And this is where an organisation maybe has been on this journey for quite some time and they can truly say that they have made progress, and the progress on DEI has sustained over changes in the economy, changes in leadership, changes in organisational direction, that through time these efforts have been sustainable. And the reason why I say it's the fifth and not final stage is because we're never done. There should always be a readjustment, realigning of our efforts because people change, organisations change. I hope that our conversations continue to evolve, but there should be an evolution in DEI efforts. So, even your most successful organisation is not going to be done, they're going to continue to have to evolve.
So, those are the five stages and how they continue throughout an organisation's life cycle.
David Green: It's actually really interesting. When you were talking through the Maturity Model, that importance of defining that workplace utopia becomes even more important. And then to something you said even before that, you get asked, "How do we compare?" and there is an obsession, I find, with organisations of comparing themselves to others in a number of different fields. To me I think, yes, you can learn from what others are doing and, no, of course you don't want to be behind the curve. But perhaps a more important thing is to compare where you are versus that utopia that you've defined?
Ella F Washington: I completely agree. It's one of the hardest things to talk to leaders about, because to your point, people get quite obsessed with comparing themselves to other people. And the challenging part is there is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to DEI work. So, yes, it's helpful to look at what your direct competitors are doing and to what other people are doing, that maybe you admire some of their efforts and seeing how you can replicate those, but you must take into account your specific approach. You have to take into account your specific mission as an organisation, what resources that you have. You're not like every other organisation. Maybe you have more, maybe you have less resources to connect to these efforts.
You also have to think about your organisational priorities. You have to have a leadership team that's aligned with those same priorities. And so, the list goes on of ways that we should certainly learn from other organisations, but we must understand that there is no one-size-fits-all, and what works at another organisation may or may not work here. And we have to be okay with trying things out and realising, "Well, that didn't quite work, because our culture may demand something a little bit different", or, "Our workforce is thinking about other specific things that we need to consider".
So, I love the community learning efforts that have certainly increased since 2020. Many more people are sharing their journeys, many more organisations are sharing their DEI reports publicly; I love that, and I want that to keep being the standard. But I think when you think about your own organisation, you must be willing to look internally and have those internal metrics of success, David, to your point of comparing where we were last year to where we want to be three years from now.
David Green: What's the role of data in this, so for an organisation (a) to understand where they are, but also (b) how they can use data to get where they want to be?
Ella F Washington: It's interesting, because a lot of the people analytics efforts really have increased in the past ten years, as your audience likely knows, but they didn't just start in 2020. So, for many organisations, they have had data, it's how do we use the data? Are we actually using the data to make decisions for the future of our organisation; and how are we thinking beyond demographic data? So, analytics can really help us to understand, to your point, a baseline of where we are.
But I encourage organisations, especially that have more mature analytic capabilities, to start to be more predictive in their models, like how can they think about their performance management system using their data; how can they think about attrition, or for certain groups within the organisation, using the data that we have? And also, how do we make sure that we're not just relying on quantitative data, but we're also allowing qualitative data to fill in some of the gaps that maybe just our engagement of our culture survey doesn't quite give us the full picture if we don't dig deeper with some focus groups, or some of those qualitative questions?
So, I think data is a huge part of the journey, because it's how we know if we're making progress. If we're not measuring our efforts in a meaningful way, we cannot track our progress. So, that's one of the critical pieces to success, is being able to track progress, and I think analytic data is the number one way we do that.
David Green: And then, if we look at a sustainable organisation, are you able to give an example of an organisation that's at stage five, at the sustainable level, and if you can name the organisation, great, but I understand if you can't; but also, what you believe is helping them to stay there?
Ella F Washington: I would say from my book that PwC is an organisation that is really at or nearing the sustainable stage, not because they're perfect. You'll hear me say a lot, "No organisation is perfect", but it's because they have been truly intentional about their DEI efforts over time and they've demonstrated, even throughout ebbs and flows within their organisation, changes, in the tide of what's popular. They've been on this journey for 40-plus years. So, they are not new to the work of DEI.
However, they have had to interrogate themselves over and over, which is what we want organisations to be doing to understand, "Okay, what we did in the 1990s maybe isn't enough to meet the need of today, so how do we continue to evolve?" I think they've shown strong leadership under the helm of Tim Ryan over the past decade, but also other leaders that report into Tim that have really taken this seriously.
You've also seen PwC go beyond pockets of these efforts to having efforts throughout the whole organisation. So, their day of conversation wasn't just in some markets, they did it across the whole organisation; everyone participated in those days of conversation, which is really big for a whole organisation to go offline for any amount of time for people to talk to each other. So, that's a big deal.
I think the other thing you've seen with PwC is they've really thought critically about their larger sphere of influence, so not just the hundreds of thousands of employees they have in the US, but also they think about, "How do we impact this industry; how do we think beyond just the PwC round?" And Tim Ryan, along with other partners, started this coalition with the CEO pledge of organisations to not only know how we can all improve, but how can we help each other, how can we create a community of open resources to see a better world.
So, in many ways, I think PwC has used its resources in a way that has really made them at a sustainable place in their turning, though not perfect. And so, what I love is their leaders are still always thinking about, "What do we need to focus on next; and, how do we continue these efforts; and, how do we continue to move and grow with the ever-changing landscape of our employees, of our customers and clients and our suppliers?" and all of those parts of their sphere of influence.
David Green: I really like that example, because it talks to what you were saying earlier when you went through the five stages on sustainable, of actually thinking about the communities that you serve as well. And as you said, PwC is a recognised brand name, it's a name that people respect and people know. So, when you hear that coming from them, that kind of coalesces people together I guess. Really good example, Ella.
Also in the book, you describe the three Ps of DEI journeys: purpose, pitfalls and progress. Can you share more about this with listeners as well, please?
Ella F Washington: Yeah, so the three Ps is, after I wrote the book, I was thinking, "What are those things that people, whether they're leaders in organisations, or they're an individual on their own journey, what are those things that we can all connect with?" And, when I thought about it, it was purpose, pitfalls and progress.
So, purpose is again that question of, "What's important to us; or, what's important to me as an individual? Why do I seek to improve in this area?" And this is not for us to have our communications team give us the best party line. This should be a truly authentic, genuine answer about why is this important to us as an organisation, or as an individual? What are we trying to accomplish?
In my book, and I often say in my consulting, Ben & Jerry's is a fantastic organisation; they've done so much work in the social justice and workspace. But you know what, we can't all be Ben & Jerry's, and that's okay. Maybe our mission is not the same as theirs. Our purpose, our stakeholders are different. And so, when we think about our purpose, we have to be honest about who we are and who we want to be. And so, that's that purpose question, and that kind of sets our goal; what's that ideal state; what are we working towards?
Then, the next question is holding up the mirror. So, we've decided who we want to be and why, we hold up the mirror, "What's holding us back; what are those pitfalls?" and that's got to be the hardest thing for organisations to answer, because we all like to talk about the good, but we don't always like to reflect on the bad, and the things that have maybe held us back. Sometimes they're grave mistakes as organisations, sometimes they're things that we've overlooked. Maybe we say we want a diverse recruitment pool, but we really haven't truly put the effort to diversifying our recruitment pool. Maybe we've gone to ten new schools, but did we really go to schools that serve minority populations, for example? Have we really thought about non-traditional ways to get our recruitment effort, so maybe it's not a college degree, maybe it's a certification, maybe it's a community college?
So, we've got a hold of the mirror, is the point. We can all have the best intentions, but if we're not honest about either the mistakes we've made, or the things that may be holding us back to get to that place where we're leaning towards, then we're never going to be able to make progress. And at that individual level, sometimes it's being honest about how you grew up, or the blind spots that you have, or the areas of insecurity maybe that you have in talking about pronouns, or talking about a difficult area, talking about race, or really engaging with your team. We all have areas to grow, but we've got to be honest about those pitfalls.
And the last is progress, so we talked a little bit about that earlier. But progress is all about, what are the short-term and long-term metrics that tell us when we have made progress. How do we get to that ideal state of purpose? I think that's truly where analytics comes in, because we must have short-term and long-term ways of saying, "We're on the right track" or, "No, we need to revisit and rethink". And progress doesn't have to be linear, and that's one of the challenging things. I really encourage organisations to try new things, think outside the box, and be okay with saying, "Hey, we tried this thing, it didn't work the best. We tried recruiting at these three new schools and we didn't do a great job there, maybe we need to revisit this strategy". We should be able to experiment and try new things and be honest when they're working and not working in order to really make progress.
David Green: That's great and it's a nice simple model for people to look at, the purpose, pitfalls and progress as well. And you're right, it's so important, what are our long-term and short-term goals, and how can we measure what we're doing against that; and not being afraid to experiment and learn and move forward as well.
So, you've talked about some of these I think, Ella, already in the conversation, but what would you say are the most common mistakes that organisations make during their DEI journey; and, what can they do to avoid them?
Ella F Washington: So, I think the number one mistake is thinking the journey is going to be linear. We often want to see, if we put one effort in, we want one effort out. We think it's a one-to-one ratio, and that's just not the truth, because we're dealing with people, we're dealing with humans. So, maybe you had a wonderful slew of DEI programming, but maybe it didn't land with the audience; something was missing for whatever reason. You've got to investigate that and you have to know that doesn't mean it's a failed effort, but it is still an opportunity.
That can be frustrating, because I think in a lot of other spaces, leaders are used to, "Okay, we put this plan into action, we activate on the plan and we get the desired outcomes", and sometimes that's the case for DEI, and sometimes it's not, and we have to understand the journey is not always going to be linear. It's also not a short-term journey; it's hard to change culture. Any culture book you read will talk about how even one person cannot change a culture. One person can certainly influence a culture, such as a new CEO or something like that, but people have to buy into culture change and it takes a while to see that.
So, if we're thinking about things beyond just demographics, if you get into the equity and inclusion part of the conversation and those senses of belonging, those are all cultural elements. So, even if you change all of the formal parts of the organisation, those informal parts of culture are not going to change overnight. So, we have to give it time and also not get frustrated and give up if we don't see the impact of our efforts in one or two, or even three years.
David Green: And would you say, if we take DEIB, to be integrated and be sustainable, you have to be focused on the E, I and B as well, not just the D?
Ella F Washington: Absolutely. I think diversity is just one part of the story. It's an important part of the story, but it's not the only part of the story. And so much research over the years has shown us that diversity without inclusion doesn't go very far; it actually can have the reverse impact by creating more silos in the organisation if you bring in a lot of women, for example, in a male-dominated organisation, but you don't support them, you don't make them feel integrated in their teams, their voice is not valued and heard, then they're likely not going to share their perspective, you're not going to get the benefits of a diverse population if you don't have those senses of inclusion and belonging.
Equity is one of those necessary elements that if there's not equity, there's not going to be that sense of inclusion. You need processes and how we get things done to be equitable, because that is also a necessary piece. So, I think it's all of it which is, as you think about the industry, people are always like, "Well, should we call it diversity and inclusion; diversity, equity and inclusion; belonging; justice?" and for me that's always an interesting question, because I've been doing this work for a very long time and I've seen the evolution of the acronyms.
I think it's great to have a title that reflects the work that you're doing. But from my vantage point, the work is still the same, so call it what you need to call it to connect with your stakeholders, but make sure you're doing the actual work; don't just throw equity in there if you're not really going to be focused on making your processes and your systems equitable, because if you're just say equity for the sake of saying equity because most organisations are doing it, that can actually cause further damage, because when your employees ask, "What does equity mean for us and what are we doing to ensure it?" if you don't have anything to respond, that can cause even more challenge.
David Green: Yeah, and obviously to deliver equity, you need to be able to measure it, and you've talked to this a little bit as well. So, the question is, how can organisations measure the progress of their DEI efforts? Maybe if you've got an example to share around how an organisation is successfully measuring it, or typical long- and short-term KPIs or measurements that they might be using to measure that progress, that would be great to hear as well, I think.
Ella F Washington: Yeah, so some things that organisations have done, certainly we can start with the demographics around diversity, so they're tracking not only their recruitment efforts in these spaces, but they're also tracking attrition within the organisation, because oftentimes you see people of colour or other underrepresented groups leaving the organisations at higher rates than other people. So, paying attention to those differences. Same thing with promotion. If we're thinking about diversity, we can't just be thinking about diversity of people that come in the door, or diversity overall, we've got to think about what's the diversity at each level of the organisation. So, those are some areas that people have focused on in terms of diversity.
When we think about inclusion and belonging, it's interesting because many organisations are using things like inclusion surveys or engagement surveys and I think those are great, but I do think that they miss the mark if those are the only elements of connection that you have, if you have a once-a-year survey. And so, organisations that have been most successful, I think, have some ways that their managers are engaging in these conversations and these feedback loops on a more frequent basis. Some companies, like Amazon, will have more frequent surveys, so their managers I think answer surveys on a bi-weekly or monthly basis, on a more frequent basis, so they're getting more information.
But it also can be charging your managers with having these conversations on a more frequent basis, and having some type of reporting back mechanism to upper management. So, it's one thing to have conversations, but creating that feedback loop for those managers to really be bringing back the challenges and the things that are going really well, to your HR leaders, to your diversity leaders is really important.
In terms of equity, what's interesting there is there's actually equity in processes and outcomes and then there's equity in terms of how it's perceived, those informal parts of the organisation. I think organisations should be looking at both of those things. So for example, some organisations will tell me, "We have this career pipeline process, it's on our HR website, everyone should know about it". But then you ask employees and the focus groups and they think it's so opaque of how you get promoted, so there's a mismatch there; maybe it's increased communication that's needed to let people know about the career progression that's been posted.
But we also have to interrogate, are there informal mechanisms of this process that are not posted that are keeping people back, or there's a perception that it's keeping them from success? So, when we think about equity, you can think about the metrics, think about the metrics of promotion and even evaluation across demographic groups. But you also want to find ways to measure those informal understandings of culture, because they can have a large influence just as much as the actual process itself.
David Green: And, are you seeing or working with organisations that are looking at network data, for example, to understand inclusion between teams, or how networks might affect promotion; have you seen companies doing that?
Ella F Washington: I have seen that a little bit, and I think it's really fascinating the companies that have looked at email and Slack information to measure how many touchpoints across levels, and things like that, that people have, and how that is different or similar by demographic groups, and how that leads to career progression. I think that's amazing data. I think the reality is that most organisations are not that sophisticated to be able to track and measure that level of data, and also having the resources to make meaningful results from that.
So again, you may have the data as an organisation, but many diversity officers will say they don't have the bandwidth, they don't have the internal resources to even sit and sift through that data. And so, I think organisations that are able to do that are really ahead of the curve, but I don't see enough organisations with either the analytic capabilities or the resources, the manned resources, to really dive into those data in a meaningful way.
David Green: Yeah, I suppose a hypothesis for me, and maybe it's because we work with a lot of organisations that have quite sophisticated analytics functions, is as companies build out people analytics, that capability should exist and they should be able to work on that. But I suppose the most important thing, and you've touched on this, you can measure, measure, measure, you can measure all the right things, you can do more frequent surveying, you can empower managers; but ultimately, you've got to action this, you've got to empower people to take action and you've got to communicate that you're taking that action as well, haven't you?
Ella F Washington: Absolutely. This is still a human element of the work. And so, we can measure but we have to have people doing the work, having the conversations, standing up in those tough moments, calling out inequities when we see them. And so, I do acknowledge that this work is sometimes harder to quantify, which is why many organisations just rely on those diversity demographics, because other stuff is really hard to quantify and it can be frustrating.
That doesn't mean we should stop, and I do love how many organisations have used their advanced people analytics capabilities to try to connect the dots more and to make it more real for people, because I know many leaders struggle with that sense of, "I can't really quantify inclusion. How do I quantify belonging; how do I know if it's working?" So, I think even for the analytics folks that are listening, to help people educate the leaders in the organisation, how they connect those metrics to what they consider success.
So for example, many leaders can tell you how many sales they have and how that connects to their bottom line, or how many new clients they get and how that connects to their bottom line. But when it comes to the human side, they don't connect how much attrition their team has, or how long it takes to onboard new employees, or how long it takes for the team to make a decision, for example; they don't connect those elements to their bottom line in the same way, and that's what I want to see more of. I want to see more organisations thinking about how do these human elements of our team and our organisation connect to us doing our best work, and not just conceptually; how do we have data that shows when we had this percentage of engagement, we had this percentage of outputs that we really care about? Again, that's difficult and you need resources to do that.
But we've seen it at a macro level. Organisations like Galop, for example, will show you data over time from many organisations and how things like employee engagement leads to employees staying longer, or taking on new work, or being more honest when they've made a mistake and things like that. We want to see that is at the individual organisational level. If you can say those things for your organisation, that's so powerful, and I think that's where data plays a role. But again, I just don't see organisations spending enough of their resources connecting those human elements to those business outcomes that leaders most care about.
David Green: No, really good point. Moving to the last couple of questions, Ella, so I suppose two looking forward, I guess. So, one specifically around DEI, what do you think organisations should be focusing on next? I know probably part of that, it depends where they are and it depends what their priorities are; but generally speaking, if we think about the field, where do you think organisations or the field should be looking next?
Ella F Washington: It's interesting, because I don't think that organisations have taken enough stock of where they are in the progress they've made over the past three years even. I think we're always trying to do the next thing and ride the next wave, but I want to see from organisations is to take a step back in 2023 and say, "What have we done since 2020? Have we delivered on our promises, or do we need to try something different? Maybe we tried some things that didn't work as well". I think being intentional with that, as opposed to just the next lofty goal, is more impactful, because surveys that have been given globally, most employees have either not seen their organisation really do very much since 2020, other than the initial pledge, or what have you, or they don't think the efforts have been successful.
So, I want organisations to take stock and I think this is a good time, because for many organisations, they are facing the economic downturn. And so oftentimes, as we know, HR roles and especially diversity management roles are among the first to get cut when we do see economic downturns. So, it's an important place right now for us to say, "Okay, how committed are we to these efforts? How can we be sustainable in our efforts, even when we have economic challenges?" To me, this is the period of a true test. And so, I want organisations to really be taking stock.
David Green: So, it's that opportunity, or that period of reflection, as you said, "Have we achieved what we set out to achieve? What have we done well; where could we improve?" and using that period of reflection to reset maybe the workplace utopia that you talked about, and understand how they're going to get there.
Ella F Washington: And, quite frankly, those organisations that have made great progress, it's still an opportunity to reset because it's like, "Okay, we accomplished those goals for the past two years; now, where should our next area of focus be? What are we hearing from employees that they're still struggling with; what's on employees' minds?" That's the evolution part of always asking that question. And there are always going to be trends in the HR market and I think you should pay attention to those, but I think we have to make sure we're getting those basics down before we can ride the next wave of the fancy thing that's out there; we've got to make sure that we really are solid on our diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging efforts.
David Green: Similar question, and this is something we're asking everyone on this series of the podcast, and it's probably a bit broader because we're looking across HR now; what do you think HR leaders really need to be thinking about in the next 12 to 24 months; and in relation to that, what would be your biggest concern and what do you see as the biggest opportunity?
Ella F Washington: So, my biggest concern is a decline in resources and intention around DEI in the looming economic times. In 2020, at the beginning of 2020, we saw a 40% decrease in diversity management roles just at the beginning of 2020 because of the uncertain economy at that time. Now, we had the Racial Reckoning later that year, so we saw that turn completely around; DEI roles tripled by the end of 2020. But we should not have to have a Racial Reckoning, or any other type of social justice reckoning in order for us to know how important these roles are, and not just the roles themselves, but giving the adequate resources to them, giving more to the people analytics team, maybe having someone in charge of diversity on the people analytics team.
Those are the things that I'm most concerned about, because from my clients, I'm seeing that budgets are shrinking and leaders are worried about what seemingly are larger problems, especially when you see all in the news about layoffs in industries like tech; all of those are real things. So, while those real things are happening, we still have to make sure we're finding ways, and maybe it's not monetary resources, but there are still other resources, such as time, and other ways that we can show that we're committed, even if we're not recruiting this year. That's okay, there are other ways we can make sure that we're connecting with the inclusion and the belonging of the employees that still on our team.
David Green: And, the biggest opportunity?
Ella F Washington: The biggest opportunity for HR leaders in general, I still think it's connecting data to their DEI journey, and not the macro level data that you'll get in a really interesting McKinsey report, or Galop report. Those are great and I think you use those as examples for how you bring it down to your organisation. But I would love it if every HR leader could tell me the ROI when they've hired a new class and based on their diversity metrics; I would love it if every business line leader could tell me how their business has been impacted by having more diversity and having more inclusion, in terms of their culture, finding ways to connect the people analytics data to those bottom lines. I would love to see that in every organisation, so I think that's the biggest opportunity.
David Green: And I suppose back to your model, if you can do that, if companies can deliver or realise that opportunity, then that will drive them to be more sustainable as well, because when you connect it to business results, that's when you get senior level attention and real buy-in.
Ella F Washington: Absolutely, and that's where you get the commitment, even in times of economic challenge, because we know that it's not just a nice-to-have, it's not just to make people feel good. That's part of it certainly, but when we think about, "No, this is critical for our business success", then it doesn't become the first order of business on the chopping block when we're thinking about how to cut resources. Maybe we do have to cut resources, but we don't necessarily have to make that deprioritised, just because maybe our resources may not be the same as they were in 2020.
David Green: Well, Ella, I think we could probably talk about this for a lot longer, but we're up to just over 50 minutes, so thank you so much for being a guest on the Digital HR Leaders podcast, I've learnt a lot from our conversation. Can you let listeners know how they can find you on social media and connect with you, learn more about your work, learn more about the book?
Ella F Washington: Absolutely. So, you can find me on LinkedIn, my name is Ella F Washington. I'm very active on LinkedIn and you can find more about the book, The Necessary Journey, on any place that books are sold. But specifically, you can go to thenecessaryjourney.com and find out more about the book and where you can get it.
David Green: Ella, it's been wonderful to speak to you. Thank you so much for being on the show, take care.
Ella F Washington: Thanks so much for having me, David.