5 Ways HR Can Work With Companies To Prioritize Workplace Diversity And Inclusion

Companies sometimes take a narrowed look when analyzing the population for potential hires, making it impossible to add the best talent. If a new talent pool put in front of an HR team is all non-disabled white males, for example, there’s something wrong in the hiring process—either in how it’s presented or within the internal funnel that leads to this evaluation. According to Gallup, “It’s more important than ever to make sure all employees know their opinion counts. Workplace inclusion has numerous benefits, among them, better relationships with customers and higher financial performance.” It’s commonly agreed that differences of opinion and diversity are core components of an optimal workforce that brings value to stockholders as well as employees and that many viewpoints give organizations a competitive advantage.

Research shows a major benefit of cultural diversity is that employees from different cultures have different ways of thinking and can analyze a business matter from a variety of perspectives, unlike employees from the same culture looking through the same lens. Along these lines, Gallup points out that policies don’t change unless the work culture changes. They distinguish between diversity and inclusion. Diversity is who you hire, and inclusion is the respect and acceptance employees feel. In order to build an inclusive workplace, everyone treats everyone else with respect; managers appreciate the unique characteristics of everyone on their teams; and leaders take the right action.

Anthony Goonetilleke, group president at Amdocs, also believes a diverse workforce contributes to overall organizational success. “Understanding that diversity drives business success is foundational to building a great organization. Executives do not have many organizational levers that contribute these types of returns. Although there is nothing wrong with focusing on diversity as an element of ongoing business operations, the moment executives realize that real results are attributable to a diverse organization, it starts to become a key pillar of company strategy rather than an operational objective.”

A recent Gartner study found that diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) is one of the top five business priorities for businesses in 2022. However hybrid and in-person work environments could be jeopardizing company access to talent. So while more organizations are doubling down on diversity and inclusion efforts and implementing consequential reporting, meeting those goals still remains a challenge for many corporations. Facing competing priorities and a rapidly changing workplace, HR leaders across industries report widespread challenges and dire issues with meetings, employee engagement, productivity and digital tool overload.

Ahva Sadeghi, CEO and co-founder of Symba listed the five top ways HR can work with companies to prioritize diversity and inclusion in the workplace:

1. Remote work opportunities and internships. Not all qualified candidates have the means to work from an office every day. By opening up positions and internships to remote workers, you increase the diversity of your talent pool.
2. Offer only paid internships. Many diverse populations don’t have the luxury of working an unpaid internship, even if it’s just for a few months. By offering paid internships only, you encourage those in more diverse socioeconomic standings to apply to your company.
3. Host seminars. For the greater company to learn more about diverse employee experiences and how to be a better ally. Building dialogue on the history and experiences of minority populations, moms, neuro-divergent learners, veterans, LGBT+ workers, and others can help to bridge employee differences.
4. Create Employee Resource Groups. ERGs provide employees with safe spaces to connect, support, share resources, educate and strategize to create change within your organization.
5. Build an inclusive recruitment and hiring process. Your organization should develop clear recruitment metrics around diversity hiring and be able to reflect on how those metrics helped them achieve positive outcomes.

Goonetilleke agrees with the importance of organizations taking action beyond diversity and disability awareness. “Organizations can be more tactical in changing how they market positions and view success in terms of recruitment,” he said. “For example, companies should consider re-writing job descriptions to appeal to diverse candidates, setting goals for recruitment of age and gender-diverse talent and hosting ‘Gen Z’ information sessions.

According to data from 15Five, technology also plays a role in diversity and inclusion. Their findings show that traditional “check-ins” are out with a quarter of HR leaders and managers are only doing them monthly. Half of HR leaders are concerned with ensuring reviews are fair and equitable, 40% of HR leaders want to ensure that managers feel equipped to navigate the process and 79% of HR leaders think the process is fair and equitable, although only half of employees agree. To that end, they developed a performance management solution to help HR leaders create a performance program customized to fit with any culture, organizational goals or technology stack. Known as Perform, the program gives HR easy access to pre-built dashboards that are readied for quick insights that drive action. The program’s dashboard and data tools allow HR leaders to get granular when required or view a summary analysis for an immediate read of a situation such as company-wide stats on review completions.

“As companies adapt to a new work environment, the performance review needs to evolve and adapt,” says Vincent Huang, Chief Product Officer at 15Five. “In addition to helping employees develop in their roles and drive informed decisions for advancement and compensation, the modern HR leader needs a performance review system that saves time to deploy, is flexible to their needs and embeds seamlessly into their existing solutions.” He added that the new system supports HR leaders and empowers the manager-employee relationship. “We’ve created a balanced system that accurately measures performance and helps managers hold impactful performance conversations with their employees. The end result is an intuitive user experience that has employees and managers wanting to engage with reviews—instead of dreading them.”

– 15Five’s Performance Review PlaybookHuman-centric experience is in.

Informed by a thorough review of industry research, Perform by 15Five lets HR leaders run a holistic performance management cycle, from reviews to compensation to career development.

“Perform was purpose-built to broaden the scope of the time-honored performance review process. It helps foster a work environment where managers and team members are empowered to thrive,” said 15Five Chief Product Officer Vince Huang.

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