Building Better: Improving Cross-Functional Collaboration in DEI

A DEI leader, HR leader, and Comms leader log on to Zoom. The topic? How we can be better partners and improve our collaboration to drive real change in diversity, equity, and inclusion. We had a lot to say (two hours worth of conversation!) so this blog is a two-parter.

Part 1: Where We Are

Katura:
I’m really excited for this conversation. Before we jump in – cause I know we’re ready -- let’s introduce ourselves and share how we got into DEI. Terrence, you’re our guest on the blog, so you can go first.

Terrence: 
I'm an experienced HR leader turned business owner. I own and run Express Employment Professionals, a staffing agency with deep roots in the Houston community. My strengths are in change management, leadership development, and creating diverse and inclusive environments.

Bria:  
I probably have been doing DEI work my entire career without it being called that particular thing. I’ve worked in corporate as a project manager, nonprofit as strategy leader and as an independent consultant in multiple industries. Building high-performance teams, driving organizational strategy and taking a people-centric, stakeholder-focused approach shaped me into the DEI leader I am today.

Katura:
I come to DEI through my work as a communication leader. I started by doing some writing in support of corporate DEI and purpose initiatives years ago and expanded to more comprehensive DEI communication, including messaging for executives. Eventually I began developing and leading DEI initiatives: from managing ERGs and heritage events to launching education workshops and a sponsorship program.

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Bria:
Terrence something you said once was that a COO you worked with was a champion for DEI.  I'm curious, what are the some of the things that he did or didn't do that make you consider him a champion?

Terrence:
The COO would always challenge our leadership team using the data, such as diversity Power BI’s that included overall and department specific diversity numbers -- both gender and ethnicity.  He was always looking at talent within the organization, wanting to understand where they are, what they want to do, creating succession plans for them, and having conversations with me (as an HR leader) about those individuals and their talents.

And when it came to programming, he’d find ways to create synergies or close gaps. I would go to him with proposals. He wanted to understand impact and desired outcomes. After thorough questions and analysis and he would give me the blessing to go ahead. If I got any pushback, at our next [team] meeting he would talk about the importance -- the why behind what we were doing and his expectation that they would support the programs or the initiatives. He understood the impact diverse teams had on an organization which made it easier for me to make an impact in the organization.

Bria:
The champion piece is huge. What I'm finding is that people don't know how to do the things that you discussed, Terrence. Challenging their peers, mentoring people not like them, sponsoring Black, Hispanic and Native people and women to get to executive levels of leadership, which is quite frankly, where it matters. What does it look like to actually give people the accoutrements that go with those big titles? And then supporting them with intentional action. You usually have a group of passionate folks who want to see change and say “let's go do this thing.” But without those champions who really have the cache and influence to implement initiatives and programs that hold people accountable for success or failure, people run out of fuel (passion). 

Katura:
When I hear champion, I think about the term “ally” and how many people want that title, but don't want the work that comes along with it. It's not a crown that you put on. There's real work behind being an ally, being a champion, being an advocate. I think some people really do believe they’re champions even if they haven’t done the work. They may say and truly believe, “Everyone is equal.” They might spout the “I don't see color” (which is problematic, but that’s another conversation.) But those things don't say anything about what you actually did. What action did you take in support of those beliefs?

Terrence:
And then they go back to Texas A&M to recruit engineers.

Katura:
Same old places! But what system did you help up-end?  Who did you stand up for? What thinking did you challenge?

Bria:
And that’s the important part right? How do people show up in action. I appreciate a good debate or discussion. One recurring discussion I remember having was about development programs being for everyone, not just diverse talent. Should everyone have development opportunities? Yes. Also, DEI leaders have to ring the bell and remind folks that employees from marginalized communities (not everyone) require additional support getting these opportunities (i.e., face time with leaders, identified for succession, etc.) because of historical and structural barriers.

It’s the same thing when we're discussing college recruitment strategy. Black and Brown students attend HBCUs and PWIs. So, when you’re recruiting at PWIs you also have an opportunity to connect with them through student organizations that focus on tech, engineering, law, business, etc. Most large professional organizations have student chapters on campus. If we’re not prioritizing in this way, it’s exactly what you’re saying Terrence, recruiters keep doing the same thing and DEI goals aren’t met.  

Terrence:
That’s how I worked with my HR team to partner with DEI. Because they were the ones building those relationships with the collegiate chapters, and the national chapters of those organizations that you spoke with. I'm getting intel from DEI about the engagements that they have on campus. I'm sharing that information with the leaders of the organizations and coming back with recommendations: “We have to spend more time here; we have to invest money here.” We started doing a great job of attracting diverse talent. We created an interview process where we encouraged a diverse candidate pool before we moved forward. This allowed those who would typically be overlooked to at least have an opportunity to be interviewed.

So, you’ve got to have people who are willing to challenge leaders in those spaces. From an HR standpoint, that doesn't happen a lot because “they're the hiring managers, it’s their money, their hire – so they get to bring in who they want to.” No -- we have a strategy. We are trying to increase diversity across the board, not just diversity of thought. We want to see diversity from a gender standpoint, a race/ethnicity standpoint, etc. And we can't do that if we keep doing the same thing. So here's the plan. And of course, it's not [always] 100% right off the bat, but we will tweak it, and wherever the gaps are, we will fix them along the way. But we’ve got to have that feedback from everybody involved – from our DEI team, on the candidates that they are helping us identify, as well as in communicating what we're trying to do to increase diversity, which ultimately increases engagement of individuals who are already in the company. Then they see they have a path in this company as opposed to getting hired and then three years later, they have all the skill sets that they need to advance but nobody is even giving them an interview. Programs and initiatives, such as what we created, allow those individuals to get an interview. You’ve got to have people who are bold enough to challenge that and then work across the aisle to ensure that we are doing what's right and what will help the business advance. You also want to make sure we’re not setting the company back by doing it just because everybody else is – like it’s the flavor of the month. No, we’ve got to be intentional about it.

Katura:
Two points came to me when you both were talking. So many good ideas – great ideas – come from DEI professionals. We're resourceful and creative. Many of us come from marginalized communities, so we have to be. We may also want to be -- but it’d be nice if we didn’t have to be so resourceful sometimes. Anyway, what seems to happen is that someone else in the organization hears one of those ideas and says “everyone should experience that.” I don’t think there’s anything wrong recognizing a good idea and wanting more people to have that opportunity. But I do think we’re seeing a tendency to skip to equality when we haven't done the equity piece yet. Giving people from underrepresented, marginalized groups the access and opportunities that they’ve historically been denied – which is what initiatives like sponsorship programs do -- should come first. Then you expand to groups who haven’t experienced that historic marginalization. But you can't do that if you haven't done the equity work.

Bria:
So true. I’ve seen this jump to skip over the hard parts and pivot to diversity of thought and perspective because everyone has that, right? They skip equity because equity’s the hard part and look for ways to make everyone the same (i.e., we all have different perspectives). To have a conversation with your business leaders about pay equity, cross-level representation, accessible job descriptions is the hard part. As a DEI leader I have people come to me with these issues and I can escalate it, but I'm not HR. My role as a business partner is to advocate, educate and come up with great ideas.  But from an execution standpoint, my challenge has been that with other functions collaborating often looks like: we need the DEI leaders to go execute this.

Terrence:
At a previous employer, our DEI team saw what we were doing. They saw that the leader was involved and engaging well. So we had a great partnership. DEI had ideas and they would come to me asking if they could pilot them in our organization because our leaders understood the importance. We’d pilot the program, work out all the wrinkles and work with Comms to show the impact that the program was having and why we were doing it. My team was always partnered on initiatives from DEI. As HR practitioners, when you don't understand the impact of not having diverse teams, how can you really be the voice of the people, be a true partner to your organizations and make the company better?

Bria:
What happens to DEI in my opinion, too, is that it becomes an HR thing, a thing for HR to do versus HR really driving their leaders to do these things. It can't just be that every time we talk about DEI that Bria is the only one talking about it, or HR is the only group talking about it. This has to show up everywhere. So every all-hands meeting, webinar, town hall should have DEI in it in some way, shape or form. I worked with a leader who agreed diversity and inclusion needed a bigger priority in company-wide meetings, including strategy planning. Comms saw that as DEI having a speaking role in those meetings, but it’s really an opportunity for leaders to connect DEI to the business. If we’re talking about strategy for the company, why wouldn’t we talk about how inclusion and diversity is part of that strategy?

Terrence: 
That's a great point. I was in the room while leadership was creating their business plan for the following year. So I'm in those sessions, I'm working with them on the business plan. I hear what the business is looking to do, what their goals are, and I use that to create our people strategy. From a people strategy standpoint, I’ve identified things that we're going to do to help the business realize their goals. In our strategy meetings, I bring in the DEI team, Labor Relations, Comms and we have these conversations. So as my team and I are fleshing out what the people strategy is, we are pulling all these different groups in to see how we can partner on making this happen. The result is something that everybody has contributed to, and it's focusing on what the actual organization's business plan is.

We all must understand the end game. What are we trying to do this year? What is the business trying to do? And then how can we all leverage that information, and remove the landmines that the business might encounter? Ego must be put aside. Everybody is usually hierarchical, in their silos. We’ve got to make these structures secondary. The people are primary.

Bria:
Exactly Terrence, all business functions should be looking at this holistically. When we’re focusing on the strategic plan for the next year, that conversation focuses on growth and profitability. But how do you get to growth and profitability without inclusion and diversity? How do you get there without talent? How do you get there without a strategy in place for expansion into global markets that centers inclusion of diverse populations? We need to be able to tell the story of what we're doing, the role DEI plays, and how all of these things work together.

Katura:
I think you’re both speaking to a couple of great points. One, the importance of DEI strategy – not just having DEI programs. Two, the importance of DEI both being informed by and helping to inform company strategy. Another is how problematic it is for DEI to be in a silo regardless of the reporting structure. When DEI is siloed, what you get is: I'm planning a townhall. You have three minutes to talk about DEI. But that’s just providing a DEI update. How else is Comms supporting DEI? How is DEI woven into Comms and vice versa?

DEI won’t necessarily have a spot on every meeting or all hands agenda. Some companies do them weekly or twice a month.  You may not have anything to report every time. But DEI should always show up in Comms. For example: who's speaking during your all hands? If you lack diversity in your senior leadership ranks, that might mean you're putting the same people on the stage all the time. Who else you can bring to the stage? What other kinds of stories you can tell? How are you telling those stories?

Companies also can’t rely on Comms to serve as a defacto DEI. I see that sometimes with social justice issues - a heavy emphasis on statements. Yes, a well-crafted statement can be part of how a company responds to DEI or social justice issue, but it can’t be the only thing a company does. What are you doing to support and hold space for employees? How are you showing up in the community? Are you using this time to reexamine policies, practices and see where you can make your workplace safer, build more trust?

Our conversation continues next week with part 2. But in the meantime, we'd love to hear from you. What's your biggest challenge related to collaborating to drive impact in DEI?