The best way to strengthen and attract diversity within a company is to stop talking about diversity and inclusion and do it.
Highlighting the words “diversity and inclusion” on a company website or job board is great, and it gets the point across. But, it does not indicate exactly how the company is making a direct appeal to strengthen and attract diversity.
The inception of a business, a product, or service is primarily focused upon enhancing the lives and economy of their consumers and employees. We know our economy is not reliant or constructed from consumers of another species. We are not selling bananas to monkeys, water to fish, or oxygen to extraterrestrials. Our economy is essentially from and for all of humanity. However, humankind continues to encounter segregation (intentionally and unintentionally) from the key, indispensable enhancement every business produces in our economy: employment.
Here are 3 tips on how to best strengthen and attract diversity to your company:
1. Employee Resource Groups (ERGs)
An employee resource group is a network of employees within a company who meet-up based on shared goals, characteristics, and/or culture. Many ERGs are contributed of women, veterans, LGBTQ members, and various members of cultural backgrounds. ERGs have many benefits beyond candidate retention and recruitment, other benefits include:
- Increased employee engagement
- Establishing an inclusive environment and allowing members to embrace differences and accept them
- Professional developments, mentorships, and team building
- Opens the floor for informal shoptalk to bounce ideas, leading to new business innovation
2. Diversity and Inclusion Training
Mandating the completion of diversity and inclusion training for all members of a company is another example of how to strengthen and attract diversity. Diversity and inclusion training should involve open engagement from all employees. Addressing issues that may arise in the workplace; unconscious bias, cross/intercultural communication, and microaggression are a few examples. A few providers of diversity training programs are:
HRDQ – Three-hour workshop and game designed to help employees increase their own cognitive social awareness while encouraging positive communication.
eCornell – Online 2-month workplace diversity training that is specifically engineered for business owners, executives, and managers.
ProProfs – Located in Santa Monica, California, the company has built a platform for people to create digital courses, games, quizzes, and other tools.
3. Ethical Recruiting/Employment Processes
Ethical employment processes are great examples of how a company can strengthen and attract diversity. These processes help to remove unconscious bias from all phases of the employment cycle; from recruiting candidates to promotions and bonuses. A few examples of ethical employment processes are:
Blind Hiring processes – these processes are structured to present the analysis of an individual’s ability through the assessment of data excluding any personally identifiable information (name, age, location, alumni, race, etc.). The processes rely only on the analysis of individual performance.
Cognitive aptitude exams – current recruiting processes have many candidates taking exams to prove the application of their ability. These tests are usually designed as a practical application of knowledge, but these only scratch the surface of what hiring managers are really looking for; the ability to critically think, problem-solve, learn/understand, utilize teamwork, leadership, and applying/teaching a new skill. Cognitive aptitude exams do this, thus providing a more ethical predictive analysis of an individual’s job performance.
Conclusion:
