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Structural racism in-depth LinkedIn article from Dr Shereen Daniels

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Structural racism in-depth LinkedIn article from Dr Shereen Daniels

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A must read on the need for anti-black racism to be the focus of in-depth, systemic change work.

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“Inclusion” Cannot Fix the Structural Roots of Systemic Racism

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“Racism needs specific intervention. Taking a generalised approach to a specific problem never yields impressive results.

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November 2025 report into Metropolitan Police by Dr Shereen Daniels 

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November 2025 report into Metropolitan Police by Dr Shereen Daniels 

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The LinkedIn article also links out to the podcasts detailing the work. A must read.

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You can access (and download) a PDF version of the 30 Patterns of Harm report and the Structural Companion Guide .

Instead of a formal press statement, I've compiled a list of questions and answers that may help contextualise the existence of the report, and I'm also conscious that at the moment, people are mostly skim-reading the report to confirm what they know; therefore, some of the nuance in what I have done may be missed.

1. How should this work be read?

Part A sets the intent. It explains why the review exists, what it stands for, and the boundaries it holds.

Part B provides the structural diagnosis. It traces how racism operates as design within the Met, and how systems, governance, and leadership produce harm, not just fail to prevent it. [This is the section that has garnered the most media attention, but it is incomplete if people only focus here.]

Part C moves from diagnosis to discipline. It identifies the structural conditions that must be created if the Met is to repair and avoid what I term "institutional drift". It asks the organisation to build the capacity to act differently, not simply to act faster.

30 Patterns of Harm and the Structural Companion Guide should be seen as a single body of work rather than two standalone documents:

The report diagnoses how racial harm is organised and sustained inside the Met.

The companion guide translates that diagnosis into a route for reform . You cannot have one without the other.

Said a different way, the report explains what must change; the guide sets out how that change must be led and sustained.

Both documents are available in audio format on all good podcasting platforms.

2. Why was this review asked for?

The Metropolitan Police commissioned me to provide expert strategic advice on its commitment to becoming an anti-racist organisation, with a specific focus on addressing anti-Black racism and improving trust and confidence within Black communities.

This followed two key moments. First, Baroness Casey's 2023 review recommended that the Met bring in subject matter expertise on systemic racism, advice it did not act on until 2025. Second, in late 2024, the People and Culture Committee of the London Policing Board raised serious concerns about the clarity, seriousness and effectiveness of the London Race Action Plan (LRAP). Alongside this, community voices and oversight bodies were raising consistent questions about whether the Met truly understood what structural change requires. Not helped by the Met's persistent refusal to accept the term institutional racism.

It was within this broader context of lost trust and confidence that I was asked to support.

To determine whether the LRAP was fit for purpose, I had to do more than repeat examples of racism and discrimination that have already been well documented. The task was to assess how well the Met understood the structural conditions the plan was supposed to address. In other words, why racial harm remains patterned and recurring despite decades of public commitments to becoming an anti-racist organisation.

That required a structural reading of the Met itself: an examination of how the organisation recognises, downplays or absorbs racial harm through its systems, leadership practices, governance and culture.

My job was to hold up a mirror so the Met could see itself clearly.

3. How independent was this work?

The Metropolitan Police commissioned me to carry out an independent review, but it had no role in setting the methodology, shaping the analysis, or approving the findings. The work was issued in full, without alteration, "feedback" or internal sign-off.

Independence and autonomy shaped every decision about how harm was read, what counted as evidence, and how conclusions were drawn. Many reviews of public institutions are subject to internal clearance or approval before publication, which can soften or control critique. That did not happen here.

4. What makes this review different?

Many people will read 30 Patterns of Harm and find it familiar. It isn't telling many of us anything we don't already know. The patterns described will echo what has already been said in inquiry after inquiry over the past fifty years. That familiarity is the point. That familiarity is why systemic racism cannot be excused or dismissed by the narrative.

Most reviews of the Met have focused on responses to high-profile racial events: individual cases, incidents or failures of conduct. This review examined how the organisation's systems, governance and leadership thinking make those events possible, and why the same forms of harm keep returning, no matter who is in post.

To do that, the review treated the Met's own records, communications and decisions as evidence. It read the organisation itself, not the people harmed by it, as the primary site of inquiry. That shift matters. It moves moral and evidential responsibility back to where it belongs: to those who hold power and are ultimately accountable for intentional response and repair.

5. What do you mean by a "structural reading"?

A structural reading examines how an organisation produces and sustains harm through its systems, governance, culture, and ways of thinking. It focuses on how the parts fit together, not just on what any single part does.

This approach doesn't ask who is racist. It asks what within the institution keeps producing racial harm, even when individual intentions are good. It looks for the logic behind the pattern; how procedures, habits and decisions combine to make harm a persistent and therefore predictable outcome.

A structural reading makes the familiar visible in a different way. It shows that repetition is not a coincidence or failure of reform, but a sign that racism is built into the organisation's design. It explains why the same issues reappear, regardless of who holds power, position or responsibility.

6. Why focus on Black Londoners and Black officers, staff and volunteers?

Ah, yes, the question we cannot get away from.

Firstly, the Met police commissioned the work with this focus.

Secondly, true accountability begins with specificity.

When organisations speak in general terms about "ethnic minorities", "diversity" or "racially minoritised" groups, everyone's experiences are flattened and those most harmed disappear from view. That drift is not just a pattern; it is one of the main ways power protects itself. It turns structural critique into abstraction, allowing the institution to look responsive while avoiding change.

This work deliberately begins where harm is sharpest, because nearly fifty years of evidence show that this is where real structural change must start.

Anti-Blackness is the clearest indicator of organisational dysfunction. It shows where an organisation's stated values collide with what people actually experience. That gap is where credibility erodes, where accountability weakens, and where trust is hardest to rebuild.

The same systems, leadership practices, cultures and governance arrangements that sustain racial harm against Black people also enable other forms of harm. Confronting anti-Blackness is not an act of exclusion; it is the most accurate diagnostic of how an organisation understands power, responsibility and repair.

There is a moral tension here.

Some will want to widen this work to "include everyone" or to position Black harm as one example among many. It is essential to understand what that instinct does. In this context, universalising the work does not make it fairer; it makes it safer for the institution. It allows the focus on Black communities, and on the Met's Black officers, staff and volunteers, to dissolve into generality and yet again disappear from view. That shift is another pattern of harm.

It repeats the erasure this review was written to confront.

7. Why didn't you include statistics or personal testimonies?

That was an ethical and structural decision. The evidence already exists in abundance. I am not saying that Black people should not be listened to. I am saying that within the Met, the way that listening operates is not about understanding. It often works to manage credibility.

Testimonies are collected and then reframed, translated or softened so they fit within the organisation's comfort zone. In that process, they lose their truth. They are stripped of anything that might suggest the Met itself has caused or sustained harm. Listening becomes a way to question Black people's experiences, to treat them as emotional, subjective or unreliable, while presenting the organisation's view as fair and objective.

The same logic applies to data. Within the Met, statistics and quantitative data are often used not to clarify the scale of a problem and determine the best course of action, but to debate it. Questions about methodology, sample size or interpretation become ways to cast doubt on the evidence itself. Numbers are treated as the "holy grail" until, of course, they point to racial harm, at which point they are disputed or dismissed. Collecting more data in this context does not lead to truth; it fuels denial.

Repeatedly asking Black people to relive their trauma or collecting new data to prove what is already known allows the Met to look attentive while doing little of substance. Doing so would have offered nothing of value beyond confirming what dozens of previous reviews and inquiries have already shown. Asking people to prove what has long been evident is not accountability. It is harm.

The evidence underpinning my analysis came from the Met's own materials, including policies, presentations, briefing papers, spreadsheets and emails, alongside its public record: transcripts of committee hearings and public meetings, press statements, media interviews and responses to high-profile racial incidents. I also attended and observed internal and public meetings, spoke with colleagues across different levels of the organisation, and met with external stakeholders connected to the Met's work. These materials and interactions were cross-checked with previous reviews, reports and inquiries already in the public domain.

Viewed together, these sources and observations provided insight into how decisions are made, discussed and communicated in real time, and how the organisation reasons about racism and accountability through its formal and informal processes and priorities. This was a diagnostic inquiry, designed to identify causation rather than assign blame.

Ultimately, this review was not written to re-evidence what has already been proven. It was written to explain why racial harm continues to recur despite decades of inquiry and reform.

8. Why, in the report, does it not finish with a traditional list of recommendations?

The absence of traditional recommendations was intentional, but it does not mean the Met has not been told what it needs to do.

In most reviews, recommendations act as the closing gesture: gather evidence, list actions, and hand responsibility to someone else. That sequence looks constructive, but it produces the illusion of progress. It allows organisations to perform accountability without altering the systems that created the harm.

Traditional recommendations often become tools of control. They are used to manage the response rather than transform it. They shift attention to activity, new initiatives, revised policies, task forces, training programmes, while leaving the underlying logic untouched. The focus moves to doing something, not changing how the organisation thinks.

This decision was structural. It interrupts the choreography of compliance, the reflex that turns critique or scrutiny into a checklist rather than a transformative catalyst for change.

9. What is the purpose of the Companion Guide?

The guide outlines a four-phase approach to structural reform. It explains how the Met must address its own culpability and the way it has protected itself over those most harmed, identify where harm is deepest, prioritise what repair requires, and build the capacity to sustain that repair over time. It prioritises thinking over creating to-do lists, depth over speed to action, and accountability over PR narratives of "the work".

The guide also establishes a shared reference point.

It ensures that everyone connected to the Met, senior leaders, partners, oversight bodies and communities, is working from the same understanding of what structural change means. That makes selective interpretation or symbolic response much harder to sustain.

It also guards against the risk of activities or initiatives that are not anchored in what the review revealed and its reasoning. Without that anchor, even well-intentioned work can pull the organisation off course. This is not about ownership or whose idea prevails. It is about keeping the Met focused and accountable so that repair happens where harm has been most enduring and most ignored.

10. It is understood that you issued the Met with the report and the Structural Companion Guide in July 2025. Why has it taken the Met so long to publish them?

Yes, that is true, and the honest answer is I don't know. That would need to be a question posed to the Met itself.

This work did ask the Met to slow down.

Not to delay, deflect or sit in endless cycles of reflection, but to create space for depth and intentional action. The challenge ahead is to build the leadership discipline to face what the report has revealed and act on its findings in a way that protects the public rather than the institution.

The Met cannot mark its own homework. Progress cannot be measured by statements of intent or lists of completed actions, but by verifiable, felt change in the lived experiences of Black Londoners, officers, staff, and volunteers. Until that difference can be evidenced and trusted, the work remains unfinished.

11. What are the implications for other organisations?

The Met can be criticised on many fronts, but it is one of the few institutions willing to look directly at anti-Blackness within its own structures. That willingness matters but it does not equate to a gold star.

This work is therefore a challenge to the wider ecosystem. Structural reform cannot rest on a single organisation. Each institution must examine how its own governance, policies and cultures reproduce the same logics of harm, and take responsibility for repair within its sphere of power.

12. What would you say to Black readers who see themselves in this work?

I wrote this work with conviction, not distance. I refused to play devil's advocate with Black experiences. Black people have had to defend the truth of our own pain for decades while organisations and leaders debate its existence.

This review is an act of recognition. It names what many already know and have lived. It places responsibility where it belongs, with those who hold the power to prevent harm, not those who endure it.

Belief here is not sentiment. It is an analysis. To believe Black people is to recognise what the evidence has already shown: that racial harm is not accidental, and that repair must begin where that harm has been most sustained.

I won't be doing media interviews as I believe it is vital that the focus remains on the Metropolitan police. Setting that boundary protects the integrity of my work and keeps it from being reduced to soundbites of personality-led commentary that distract from the core issues.

There will be one exception. I'll take part in a future conversation where there's room for depth, nuance and honesty, and where I feel safe. I know some of you may be thinking that all publicity is good publicity, but I can assure you it is not.

I'm not insulated from the same patterns of anti-Blackness that this work exposes. The way society and sometimes the media treat Black women who speak clearly about power and systemic racism is very different to how others are treated. I name that not for sympathy, but for understanding. Producing this work does not protect me from harm; it makes me more vulnerable to it.

Here is some of the media coverage the report has received

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A Sort of Press Statement: 30 Patterns of Harm - A Structural Review of Systemic Racism Within the London Metropolitan Police Service

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You can access (and download) a PDF version of the 30 Patterns of Harm report here and the Structural Companion Guide here.

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LinkedIn article about language and power that prevents systemic and structural shifts in power and therefore change.

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"Can you help my executive leadership team understand that systemic racism isn't just about 'bad apples'?"

It is one of the most frequently asked questions I receive. Often it comes from people who feel they have tried everything: data, stories, workshops, awareness-raising sessions, empathy programs, and yes, the dutiful unconscious bias training. Yet their leaders still respond as if racism is just the fault of a handful of rogue managers or "racist" colleagues. Thus, it feels as though the barrier is explanation.

If only I could find the right words, if only I could make them see that racism is about systems and structures, surely they would finally act?

Let me say this: I understand why people think this way.

So yes, language matters. Having clearer words can help, and a small part of my work is to sharpen that language, which is particularly beneficial in organisations accustomed to hiding behind euphemisms and softer "DEI" style framing.

However, the truth is that the issue isn't that you are failing to explain it properly. That you don't have the right words or that you are not as articulate as you feel you should be.

Organisations and public institutions cling to the "bad apples" narrative because it protects them. It contains risk, it shields leadership from deeper scrutiny, and it allows the system to continue unchanged.

This is now where we need to make a sharp turn.

Instead of asking, " How can I get them to understand? ", the better question is, "What does the 'bad apples' narrative make possible for leaders who continue to repeat it...even when they know better?"

Why the "bad apples" narrative works so well

If systemic racism is framed only as the bad behaviour of a few, the system itself remains untouched.

Leaders can quietly relocate one manager or Director elsewhere, dismiss one or two colleagues for gross misconduct, issue a new statement, or make a minor policy change, thereby presenting the matter as resolved.

The story is compelling because it delivers six quiet yet powerful benefits.

Inclusion is conditional: acceptance, credibility, and often even safety, both physical and psychological, depend on your willingness to keep certain truths unspoken, or to only voice those that serve the organisation - that's where the saying "toeing the party line" comes from after all.

What the narrative sounds like in practice

You will know the narrative by the way it lands after every racial incident - sometimes the phrase "bad apples" is used, sometimes they are not, yet the sentiment is repeated with a familiar rhythm:

"We've made some great progress, but there's always more to be done."

"The vast majority of our teams are made up of good people."

"It's not everyone, just a few bringing the organisation's reputation down."

"We know we have more work to do, but these things take time."

"We are very much committed to doing better and rooting out racism wherever we find it."

"We have dismissed X number of colleagues over X period of time."

Progress, as measured by activity rather than impact, and harm can coexist, meaning an organisation can improve in one area while still maintaining its core structures. That is why pointing to activity cannot replace asking whether the system continues to produce predictable outcomes.

Some organisations have made progress, some leaders are committed, and most people in the team see themselves as decent.

The issue is not the truthfulness of the statements in isolation. The problem is how and when they are used.

Thus, the real test is not "is the statement true?" but "what happens after it is said?"

Do processes change? Are those most harmed protected and believed? Or do we see leaders and HR crafting a palatable narrative while the system continues unchanged?

The statements may contain elements of truth.

But their function, in context, is preservation rather than transformation.

They avoid looking inward, examining decision-making and processes, and asking whether the design itself produces the outcomes we keep seeing.

They keep the focus on individuals as a shield to protect against interrogating organisational structures.

Why can't we get away from the "bad apples" narrative?

The narrative continues because it operates at three levels simultaneously.

In plain terms, power is exercised not through dramatic acts or removing people, but through everyday decisions to shift risk away from leadership and preserve their comfort.

That is why, after high-profile revelations of racism or misconduct, we so often hear the same choreography from senior leaders. They emphasise the bravery and dedication of the 'vast majority,' point to the numbers of "bad" employees being dismissed, and highlight new tools or techniques to identify and address problematic employees that they haven't got round to dealing with yet.

Swift assurances of progress often accompany apologies. What we do not hear is an admission that the very structure has enabled the culture to take root, nor a commitment to redistribute power, open up to independent scrutiny (with expertise), or dismantle the processes, behaviours and decision-making that have created a culture where racial harm persists.

It's also a narrative that travels

The "bad apples" narrative isn't unique to one type of organisation or one type of harm. It's a script used across public institutions, a communication strategy if you like, that performs accountability while protecting the system from deeper scrutiny. The phrases change, but the choreography stays the same: individualise harm, perform regret, cite progress, and move on. The system survives, the story resets.

Example: Inquiry into Lucy Letby

"Steps should be taken to root out the 'bad apples' in the NHS."

In the aftermath of the Letby inquiry, headlines focused on rooting out "bad apples." The phrase offered moral clarity, there are villains, and the system will find them, while leaving design and oversight unexamined. It reassured the public that action was being taken, without confronting how organisational structures allowed repeated warnings to be dismissed.

Example: A report by the Working Party on Sexual Misconduct in Surgery (2023) found that co-workers had sexually assaulted 30% of women surgeons surveyed

"We must all change, not just the bad apples... Zero tolerance" of issues such as bullying and misconduct is unhelpful, as it "reinforces an absolute or binary idea of good and bad practices, shaping reporting behaviours to disclosure only when issues have passed a discrete threshold."

Here, a senior surgeon challenges the logic head-on. Writing about sexual misconduct in surgical teams, she argues that focusing on a few offenders lets the broader culture off the hook. It's not just about "bad people doing bad things," but about everyday norms, who gets believed, how power is exercised, and what is tolerated as "normal" practice. The piece names what institutions often deny: harm persists because systems protect comfort, not justice.

Example: Statement in response to a recent BBC investigative broadcast into Charing Cross Police Station

"We are partway into conducting what is already the biggest corruption clear-out in British policing history. We are relentlessly arresting and sacking officers and staff with 11 forced out each week - more than triple the rate of the previous weak approaches that left this toxic legacy behind."

Yet, beneath the performance of accountability, the system itself remained intact. The statement framed misconduct as an aberration, a failure of a few, rather than the product of design. Structural causes, patterns of protection, and the culture that enabled harm were replaced by metrics of activity: numbers dismissed, training delivered, percentages improved.

Here, it reads as reform, but functions as risk management. The language reassures the public that the problem has been contained while preserving the deeper logic that allowed it to occur.

The "bad apples" narrative survives, not because leaders don't understand systems, but because it is the most effective way to protect them.

The cost for those most harmed

Meanwhile, those most harmed, including colleagues and communities, are left unprotected.

They are asked to trust apologies while continuing to live with unchanged conditions.

Internally, those who dare to suggest that the structure itself might be the problem, irrespective of whether they are directly or indirectly impacted, are quickly recast as the problem: difficult, divisive, not a fit...disloyal.

Reading your organisation: a simple diagnostic

When leaders fall back into the "bad apples" story, the focus should not be on pleading for more understanding but on paying attention to what is really happening beneath the words.

This is what it means to observe patterns rather than fixate on incidents.

It is the practice of asking: what keeps recurring, what responses are repeated, and what outcomes remain unchanged? This is what it means to do a structural reading of your organisation.

With this in mind, here are four places to look.

This is where we need to challenge the idea of objectivity. Objectivity is not the absence of bias. It is not a "view from nowhere." Facts exist, but in the workplace, what constitutes a fact is often decided by those with power. Credibility and, therefore, belief, is not distributed evenly; it is granted to some voices and denied to others.

When leaders are seen as distant from the problem, that distance is mistaken for neutrality. Their lack of "skin in the game" is honoured and reinforced by others, while those closest to harm are treated as subjective, unimportant or even not trustworthy. The outcome is predictable: a leader who was not even in the room can be trusted more than the colleague who directly experienced the incident.

The real question is not, "How many times has this happened?" The sharper question is, "What does the repetition tell us about the design of our system?"

It signals structures that make harm predictable. If the same kinds of incidents keep resurfacing, then something in the way the organisation is built has not been touched. That does not mean leaders set out to design harm or that there was a deliberate intent to be "racist", but it does mean the system reproduces it regardless of good intentions. And this is the crux of the problem.

If harm continues despite all the listening, all the training, all the public statements, it means the change has not gone deep enough or there is an insufficient understanding of the depth of the problem.

The better questions are:

What does clinging to the "bad apples" story make possible here?

What or who does it protect?

Whose comfort is being prioritised over whose safety?

What would truly be at risk if the system were faced honestly?

What are we protecting by not telling the truth? What is the cost of that, and how does that align with our stated values, ethics and claims of integrity?

What are we hiding?

What are we scared of?

What this critical lens will ask of you

The "bad apples" narrative persists because it serves to protect power more than people. That's why it is so sticky, becoming a widely adopted script for leaders who need to appear accountable while keeping the system itself untouched.

These declarations seem humane. They are often genuine, at least on an individual level. But organisationally, this display of empathy serves another purpose; it acts as a reputational shield. What does that mean in practical terms? Organisations promote personal testimony and vulnerability not to question their own assumptions or investigate more deeply into what has been accepted, but to absorb outrage and reduce the stakes for themselves.

I say this not as a cynic, but as someone who maps patterns of harm, of racial disparity, for a living. I.e. I know what good looks like, and this cyclical behaviour is not it.

So where do we go from here?

The first step in honesty is to stop asking for understanding and start mapping what the "bad apples" narrative protects, and for whom.

The next step is about deciding what you will do with that analysis once you have it: whether you will use it to keep the peace, to protect yourself or the organisation, or whether you will find the courage to name what it reveals and act accordingly, even when the organisation is heavily invested in concealment.

This is the hardest part of the work: not seeing the pattern, but facing the choices it demands once you recognise the system for what it is, including, at times, your own complicity in sustaining it. True interrogation of a system requires examining the ways we each participate in its maintenance, whether through silence, self-protection, self-interest or misplaced loyalty.

That level of honesty comes at a cost. I wish I could tell you otherwise. Reputational risk. Career consequence. Isolation. The threat of being discredited or losing safety. It can feel like too much, and that is exactly what the system relies on.

Let me explain what happens when someone holds up the mirror inside a system deeply invested in its own innocence. The reaction is almost predictable: the system moves to protect itself by discrediting the observer. Discrediting you. It questions your credibility, your character, your motives. It picks apart your work, casts doubt on your integrity, and reframes your courage as disruption. The message is clear: you are the problem. That is how consequence is redistributed away from the structure and onto the individual who dared to name it.

And that cost is not evenly shared. Racial identity, gender, role, and proximity to power all shape how severely the system responds. For Black professionals in particular, truth-telling carries compounded risk, professional exclusion, whispered rumours, and even physical and psychological harm. The system knows this, too, and counts on it to keep things quiet.

That's the mechanism of systemic racism's survival.

If you have reached this point and feel that what I have written sounds cynical, or reads as a harsh indictment of organisational or leadership integrity today, then pause and ask yourself why. Is it because it is untrue, or because it is uncomfortable to confront?

The real test lies not in how you feel about these words, but in what your organisation does when racial harm occurs and when patterns are named. What evidence exists, not statements or promises, but proof, that harm is acknowledged, addressed, and prevented without deflection or performance?

That is the measure of integrity. And that is where the truth of any system is revealed.

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"A Few Bad Apples"? Why That Narrative Protects Power More Than People

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"Can you help my executive leadership team understand that systemic racism isn't just about 'bad apples'?" It is one of the most frequently asked questions I receive. Often it comes from people who feel they have tried everything: data, stories, workshops, awareness-raising sessions, empathy program

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Anti-Racism - Shereen Daniels 10 June 2024

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Anti-Racism - Shereen Daniels 10 June 2024

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My eldest daughter (she's 16) has plans to build a business alongside her studies after completing her GCSEs next week. She is my child, as this is probably business idea number four as we have gone through various iterations of lip gloss, t-shirt and drop shipping enterprises since she was 11 years old. As the supportive mum, her IOUs, "I'll pay you back, mum, I promise," are getting longer by the day, and I am the owner of a gazillion website domain names and a few Shopify accounts to boot.

I think about her and others like her-young Black women aspiring to be their bosses and make their mark as budding entrepreneurs.

Over the last year, I've been closely following the case of the Fearless Fund , an Atlanta-based, Black woman-owned venture capitalist firm. Recently, a suspended the firm's Fearless Strivers Grant Contest, a program designed to support Black female business owners with a $20,000 funding award. The team at Fearless Fund have been pivotal in supporting Black female entrepreneurs; however, in a 2-1 ruling, the panel found that the grant program likely violates Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which prohibits race-based contract decisions. US federal court of appeals panel

This ruling, driven by conservative activism, highlights the ongoing challenges faced by Black entrepreneurs in a legal system historically skewed against us. We are far from reaching any form of equality, which necessitated the Civil Rights Act of 1866 to give redress for formerly enslaved people.

The Civil Rights Act of 1866 was designed to integrate formerly enslaved Black Americans fully into society, ensuring they enjoyed the same rights as white citizens. However, Black (and Hispanic) women-owned businesses receive less than 1% of venture capital funding. Between 2009 and 2017 , firms started by Black women received a mere 0.0006% of VC funding. Additionally, Black entrepreneurs' loan requests are three times less likely to be approved than white entrepreneurs. These statistics underscore the persistent economic disparities that the Fearless Fund aims to address - the business case should be self-evident. Their mission is not just about funding but also about fostering an ecosystem where women of colour can thrive, innovate, and lead.

White supremacy: A political, economic and cultural system in which whites overwhelmingly control power and material resources and in which white dominance and non-white subordination exist across a broad array of institutions and social settings. - Professor Frances Lee Ansley (1989)

The rise and power of conservative activism

Edward Blum, a conservative activist, has been a driving force behind the dismantling of affirmative action in college admissions and now initiatives like those of the Fearless Fund. Blum, lacking a legal background, has effectively utilised tactics developed by civil rights organisations, repurposing them to challenge and undermine efforts to promote racial equity. His actions are a case study example of how legal strategies can be co-opted to maintain systemic racial inequalities.

Blum's involvement in this case is particularly troubling, given his history. He was instrumental in the Supreme Court case that ended affirmative action in college admissions, arguing that race-conscious admissions policies were discriminatory against white and Asian students. Now, he has set his sights on diversity initiatives in the business world, using similar arguments to challenge programs designed to mitigate inequalities experienced by Black people.

It's important to understand that Blum's tactics are not new. They echo the strategies used by civil rights organisations like the NAACP but are twisted to serve an agenda undermining the progress those organisations fought for. This repurposing of civil rights tactics to maintain white supremacy is a powerful reminder of how the law can be manipulated to serve different ends. It also highlights how such movements gain traction by capitalising on political and social anxieties.

As Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw has noted recently, "The very laws that were designed to dismantle racial hierarchies are now being used to uphold them." Blum's actions exemplify this phenomenon, as he leverages the language of equality and non-discrimination to attack programs that aim to redress historical and ongoing racial injustices.

Moving the focus away from Blum and other activists like him, it would be disingenuous to claim that his influence has not significantly altered the course of public and corporate progress. High-profile companies, notably and tech unicorns like , significantly scaled back their diversity efforts in response to growing pressure from anti-DEI activists. Google and Meta

As I observed what happened with Fearless Fund, I paid close attention to what didn't happen. Where are the institutional investors, the banks, the big corporations that committed millions to social justice initiatives after the murder of George Floyd? This isn't a rehash of the lack of action post-George Floyd-we know this and have talked about it at length. But I wish to emphasise that the successful legal attacks have been predominantly led by one person, albeit with strategic resources and unnamed silent supporters, who aren't even lawyers.

Fearless Fund isn't asking for handouts or taxpayer money; they found a way to finance and support Black women entrepreneurs, which are still ignored in venture capital circles. Despite the shocked exclamations and disappointment, few corporations have stepped forward to use their might and scale to defend the team at Fearless Fund.

Using the myth of meritocracy to further our own aims and ambitions

Consider this: White-led organisations never openly advertise for white-only managers and directors. These organisations talk about diversity and inclusion while maintaining their white-dominated status. Venture capitalist funds talk about looking for only the 'best' businesses and most solid entrepreneurs. They argue that it's a coincidence or an example of meritocracy in action that most of the funding goes to white entrepreneurs. It's not their fault that most FTSE100 and Fortune 500 boards' racial composition has remained unchanged over the last few decades. The most successful business leaders and entrepreneurs happen to be white, right?

Ok, cool, what if we adopted the same approach and embodied that same mindset? Follow me for a moment with this hypothetical situation:

What if Black-led organisations opened our programs and initiatives to everyone and just happened to select and support Black individuals only? By leveraging the principles of meritocracy, as white organisations consistently do, we could achieve similar outcomes without the fanfare and accusations that we are playing the victim - it, therefore, becomes a coincidence that the individuals who benefit the most happen to be Black. That will be our story, and we can stick to it.

Imagine that when challenged about the racial disparities in our hiring and promotional practices, funding, and resource allocation, which invariably prioritise people who look like us, we could take time to reflect and then point to unconscious bias as the possible explanation. In response, we could reaffirm our commitment to running a meritocratic and fair organisation. We remain steadfast in asserting that we only hire and promote the most capable individuals and apportion funding to the best entrepreneurs, which could be our default response to any public or private challenge.

Going one step further, when tasked with addressing the under-representation of white people in leadership positions, for example, we can engage in difficult conversations and focus on awareness-raising activities, utilising the fear of saying and doing the wrong thing as examples of the challenges we face to address such racial disparities.

Calling out the double standards

As Black people, are we adhering to a set of rules-emphasising transparency about our target demographic and goals-that is ultimately an illusion? Many organisations and institutions clearly do not follow these same principles.

If Black people are expected to rise above such tactics and be the poster-child community who can "rise above it all," it's important to recognise the inherent double standards and the inconsistencies in how the principles of fairness and meritocracy are applied and upheld.

Taking it back to the disgraceful ruling against the Fearless Fund, if the small self-determined efforts and funding focused on Black women provoke such a violent response, could it be that transparency is undermining our success?

Just in case you missed the previous episodes of Advancing Racial Equity 4.0 Podcast

Sustainability: From Origins to Opportunities with Stuart McLachlan

In this conversation, Stuart discusses the evolution of sustainability from primarily environmental concerns to encompassing social and governance issues as well. He emphasises the interconnectedness of environmental and social challenges, citing the impact of regulations like the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) on driving businesses towards more responsible practices.

One of my favourite parts of the conversation is where Stuart advocates for businesses to "emotionally divest from old models to embrace both the challenges and opportunities of this new era."

Racial Equity: An Issue of Risk Rather Than A Matter of Conscience with Tejal Patel

Tejal joined the SOC Investment Group in 2016 as Corporate Governance Director, where she focused on shareholder advocacy issues, including the opioid crisis and racial equity audits.

In her current role, she has worked with investor coalitions to develop strategies for issuer engagements, shareholder proposals, director accountability, and asset manager outreach.  She serves as a director and the Labor Constituency Co-Chair for the Council of Institutional Investors (CII) and previously served on the U.S. Asset Owners Advisory Council from 2019-2021.

This episode explored the delicate balance between setting meaningful goals and the resistance encountered when calling for a deeper, more substantial commitment to racial equity and implementing preventative measures.

- Corporate accountability and what it looks like when you have an outsider influencing internal accountability and disclosures

- Translating social issues into business risk

- The three types of resistance faced by financial institutions that are required to undergo a racial equity audit

- Pitfalls of diversity and inclusion (in the way forced or advocated by the companies themselves)

- The cost-benefit analysis of racial equity audits versus facing fines for discriminatory practices. The numbers for the latter will astound you!

🎧 More guests talking with me in more depth.

Subscribe/follow on all major podcast platforms, including , and , for more bi-weekly insightful conversations.

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When Transparency Becomes a Trap: Lessons from the Fearless Fund Ruling?

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My eldest daughter (she's 16) has plans to build a business alongside her studies after completing her GCSEs next week.

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The anti racist organisation by Shereen Daniels book review by Sharon Hurley Hall

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The anti racist organisation by Shereen Daniels book review by Sharon Hurley Hall

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When I heard that Shereen Daniels was writing a book, I knew I'd have to buy it. I've been following her on LinkedIn and elsewhere for a couple of years now, and I expected that her book would provide the direct, actionable advice she regularly dispenses on her social media channels.

I'm happy to say that "The Anti-Racist Organization: Dismantling Systemic Racism in the Workplace" did not disappoint. In it, Shereen manages to be simultaneously welcoming and uncompromising. As a personal bonus, since I've watched so many of her videos, I could hear her voice in my head as I read, like a kind of DIY audiobook.

I read the Kindle edition cover to cover in just a few days. It's extremely readable, and filled with information you can use no matter where you are in your anti-racism journey as an organization.

The book is divided into 7 chapters.

2. Moving Beyond Conversations

3. Defining Meaning

5. The Four-Factor RACE Model

Shereen sets the tone from the very start by specifying that centering white comfort won't help you build an anti-racist organization. In addition, it's important to be able to name the key problem - racism - rather than dancing around it with diversity, equity and inclusion language. As she says: "if you don't confront the roots of what excludes people due to their ethnicity, if you fail to challenge your own preconceptions of what racism is and what it isn't, and if you use your discomfort as a convenient barrier to block change, this is exactly how we've gotten here today."

Who is This Book For?

This book is for leaders who are willing to be bold and direct, and to act - much like Shereen herself. Shereen makes the point that within an organization anti-racism has to be "an ongoing leadership practice that judges every company decision against its potential racist or anti‐racist impact, one that is visible to colleagues, stakeholders and clients, actively guiding the organization towards greater equity." And to do so means sitting with and working through your own personal discomfort (a great lesson for would-be allies as well).

As expected, Shereen pulls no punches, highlighting the gaps between what people and companies say, and what they actually do - and urging them to do better. For example, she points out that Black women are often left out of gender equity initiatives, and that a belief in meritocracy hides the workings of systemic racism. She also discusses internalized oppression and the fact that many Black people in positions of authority aren't able - or indeed, willing in some cases - to disrupt the status quo.

To do this work, Shereen says, you have to be ready to challenge your assumptions and have direct and difficult conversations. "if you need ten conversations to get to the point of being comfortable about saying Black, it will take another five hundred years for racial equity to advance anywhere."

Tools, Assessments and Models

While the first half of the book sets the scene in terms of approach and language, many organizations will find the assessments and models even more useful. First, Shereen asks you to assess where you are as an organization in your anti-racism journey, with four possible levels. I've picked out a relevant quote from each section.

Level One: A Compliance Issue: "Bold for you could be anything from having the conversation to not stuttering over the word 'Black' or wincing at the thought at having to talk about racism and racial equity. In public. With no notes. Or a teleprompter."

Level Two: Intent to Be Inclusive Level: "An umbrella concept for Level Two leaders and organizations might be that there is comfort with inclusion but discomfort in specifically talking about race."

Level Three: Strategic Focus and Specific Commitment: "Advancing racial equity is an identifiable personal mission of a Level Three leader. In Level Three you have moved out of the diversity and intention arena and into visible inclusion and transformative action."

Level Four: Public + Private Accountability: "Level Four is Level Three with the addition of accountability, both public and private, with you leveraging your influence to effect positive change across your entire ecosystem"

The Four-Factor RACE model is also excellent. RACE stands for:

For each section, there are questions to assess where you are and what you need to do next. These aren't diversity checkbox questions, either. Shereen invites leaders to assess why their organizations work well for white people and how they're using their privilege to create equity.

Finally, Shereen talks about allyship in the workplace, and rounds out the book with 10 key principles to remember in creating an anti-racist organization.

Why This is a Must-Read

Any leader who wants to be truly anti-racist and lead an organization built on anti-racism will find this book a valuable guide. It's all the more valuable because you can return to it time and again to assess your progress and focus on new priorities as you get closer to your goal. Frankly, it's a must-read.

7 standout quotes from the book:

Finally, I always like to share some of the quotes that stand out most to me. It was hard to pare it down for this book, as there was so much wisdom., but there are seven of the best:

1. "Racism is one of the best manmade systems every created. Over five hundred years later it is still doing exactly what it was designed to do. And it feeds off our apathy, compliance and obedience. It rewards insecurity, superiority and scarcity."

2. "...when the white world started seeing Black people as less than human, as the 'savage antithesis' to the rational white man, it changed the way white people thought about justice, about politics and about economics."

3. "There is absolutely no correlation between increased numbers of Black colleagues and a decrease in the existence of racism and racial discrimination."

4. "Who acts as your independent voice of challenge, to make sure you don't mark your own homework, so to speak? Who can you confide in? Who can you trust?"

5. "It's systemic because it is a pattern that is replicated in organizations all over the world, in territories with a history of chattel slavery, colonialism and/or imperialism."

6. "This is why anti‐racism and racial equity is sometimes so challenging, because we are used to operating from a place of self‐interest, taking actions that directly improve things for us, or the majority. Here, you and your peers will be required to do the heavy lifting, knowing that the payoff won't be immediate, there is no gold star or certificate of recognition at the end and your Black colleagues are not going to trip over themselves in gratitude..."

7. "Can we acknowledge that pressuring people to validate their lived experience - whether it is about their racial identity or other identities and characteristics that make up who they are - is reinforcing our power, our truths and therefore we become part of the system called racism, destined to keep doing the work is was originally designed to do. Because what we're saying is their lives don't matter unless we validate..."

© Sharon Hurley Hall, 2022. All Rights Reserved.

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Review: The Anti-Racist Organization by Shereen Daniels

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A must-read book for businesses committed to equity

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Neurodiversity coach - Angelica Simpson & Nancy Doyle

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Neurodiversity coach - Angelica Simpson & Nancy Doyle

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Recommended by Dawn Morton-Young & Mihaela Diaconu

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At Genius Within we stand proudly at the intersection of lived experience and expertise. As both a neurodivergent led and owned business, and by being experts in our field, we have made it our life's work to help neurodistinct individuals access their inner genius and be at their best at work.

Our team of highly qualified Occupational Psychologists, workplace coaches and HR experts understand what works, not only because 68% of us are neurodivergent/disabled ourselves, but also from decades of research and experience with clients.

Our evidence based approach and consistent results have made us leaders in our industry. Whether you are an individual, or organisation of any size, we can provide specialist support.

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Passionate about Neurodiversity - Genius Within

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At Genius Within we stand proudly at the intersection of lived experience and expertise. As both a neurodivergent led and owned business, and by being experts in our field, we have made it our life's work to help neurodistinct individuals access their inner genius and be at their best at work.

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The Myth of Meritocracy - Runnymede Trust 

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The Myth of Meritocracy - Runnymede Trust 

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Found June 2022 following article by Alba Kapoor in The Big Issue

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75% of women of colour have experienced racism at work, and 61% report changing themselves to 'fit in'.

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Women of colour across the UK already know that experiencing racism at work is the norm.That's why we've partnered with the Fawcett Society to produce our ground-breaking research, Broken Ladders: The myth of meritocracy for women of colour in the workplace.

Broken Ladders centres the voices and experiences of thousands of women of colour at work and explores the different experiences of women from different ethnic minority groups and religions.

Our research shows that every stage of the career journey, from entering work to senior leadership, women of colour are being locked out of reaching their true potential.

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Our key findings show:

‍Institutional racism is common in all sectors and in all organisations: 75% of women of colour have experienced racism at work, with 27% having suffered racial slurs. ‍

Forced to mould to conform: 61% report changing themselves to 'fit-in' at work, from the language or words they use (37%), their hairstyle (26%) and even their name (22%). ‍

Well-being is being impacted: 39% of women of colour stated their well-being had been impacted by a lack of progression compared to 28% of white women, whilst being refused promotion led to loss of motivation for 43% of women of colour.‍

Locked out of progression: 28% of women of colour (compared with 19% of white women) reporting that a manager had blocked their progression at work, and 42% reporting being passed over for promotion despite good feedback (compared to 27% for white women).‍

Recruitment discrimination:52% of women of colour experience discrimination - such as, being asked for UK qualifications or English as a first language and being asked for ethnicity information outside of monitoring processes.

Urgent change is needed across all institutions and sectors.

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Our calls for change

The skills, abilities, and experiences of women of colour should be harnessed and celebrated or our workplaces risk losing them -resulting in a huge loss of talent. That's why we are calling on employers, the government, universities, unions and businesses to take action now.

We want employers to:

implement effective, evidence based Anti-Racism Action Plans with clear and measurable targets, and regular monitoring and evaluation of progress.

have clear and transparent processes for reporting racism, with multiple reporting routes, including options outside of line management structures.

set structures that ensure line managers deliver equitable and fair promotion outcomes for all employees and make progression routes explicit and well-known rather than based on informal networks.

We're calling on the government to:

set-up and back a business-led initiative to tackle ethnicity and gender pay gaps and accelerate change on progression and representation.

legislate to ban salary history questions and require salaries to be published on job advertisements.

‍

"Women of colour face a double jeopardy. From school to the workplace, there are structural barriers standing between them and the opportunities they deserve. Our landmark research exists to support these women to thrive in their workplaces, and to challenge employers to harness the talents, skills and experiences of their employees, or risk losing them.

"Women of colour know first-hand the myth of meritocracy, from the mental gymnastics of constantly code switching to being repeatedly passed up for promotion, in 2022 it is high time we invest in them. Until we do so, we will continue to lose them as they leave the workplace, resulting in a huge waste of talent." - Dr Halima Begum, our CEO

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Dr Halima Begum, our CEO

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75% of women of colour have experienced racism at work, and 61% report changing themselves to 'fit in'. ‍ Women of colour across the UK already know that experiencing racism at work is the norm.That's why we've partnered with the Fawcett Society to produce our ground-breaking research, Broken Ladders: The myth of meritocracy for women of colour in the workplace.

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Women Talking about Learning podcast on Inclusive Leadership 

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Women Talking about Learning podcast on Inclusive Leadership 

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Iffat Iqbal and & Chloe Gillard talk about inclusive leadership sharing top tips, pragmatic approaches and great resources in the show notes

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The Women Talking About Learning Podcast

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You can contact Women Talking About Learning through our website, womentalkingaboutlearning.com or on Twitter @WTAL_Podcast. You can donate to support the podcast via Ko-Fi. You can e-mail us at he…

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Recommended by Sharon Green, an excellent read about the intersection between race and social class

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The importance of sponsorship & support in the workplace - Cheryl Samuels

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The importance of sponsorship & support in the workplace - Cheryl Samuels

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You can find Cheryl on twitter as @chezzy319

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Cheryl Samuels explains why, as a Black HR professional aiming to develop her career, sponsorship is just as important as mentorship

Over the last few years I have reflected upon my own career journey and that of others, the relationships I have forged, the way others treat me, and the privileges I have been afforded which have supported my career aspirations and development. The theme that runs consistently throughout is the importance of sponsorship. But not any old sponsorship - it's about understanding the various guises this appears and the impact it has when you're in my skin.

When you're in my skin, society has conditioned the people that work in organisations to think, behave and judge people that look like me. Throughout my career I have met some incredible people who see me as human and are able to look beyond my ethnicity and race to see my capabilities, competence, traits, abilities in the here and now and beyond, even when I could not see them myself.

When you're in my skin, you are not always placed in positions and line managed by good leaders who enable you to take on high profile and impactful work that supports building your credibility and reputation in a way that is priceless. This is what happened when I founded and set up the London Deputy Directors of HR Network more than seven years ago.

When you're in my skin, you rarely have the opportunity to be let into the various clubs that exist, which allow you to build networks, meet influencers, and be at the forefront of up and coming strategic work so you can be a valued contributor having built relationships with key leaders. This is what happened when I was encouraged and supported by my former HR director David Grantham - although shy - to attend the London HR Directors' Network.

When you're in my skin, it's rare that leaders, staff or third party organisations endorse your skills in a way that matter to those with the power to make the next step happen for you. This is what happened when I worked in mental health and led a high-profile project to reduce agency expenditure while maintaining safety. A nursing agency that I worked with was willing to publicly endorse my collaboration and partnership in an open way of working despite the challenges along the way.

When you're in my skin, it is not often in your early career that you are led by a HR director like Ruth Lewis who was abstract, seen as different, thought outside the box, held high levels of integrity and role modelled authenticity in a way that meant I could also be authentic and speak truth to power even when it was not in line with the group think. This is what happened when I was relatively new to the NHS, but this level of sponsorship created a safe space to think differently, to be valued for all that I bring, and to accept different perspectives because there is not always a right answer, but that context is everything.

When you're in my skin, it is not often that you can expect compassion, empathy and to be listened to in a way that results in action being taken to improve the status quo within my profession. This is what happened to me when I met the development director of the London Healthcare People Management Association (HPMA), when I described the rollercoaster of experiences of some of the HR & OD professionals I had mentored from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds. This led me to work closely with Rachael Tyler, who presented a business case to London HR directors, which in turn led to her receiving funding for us to commission independent research to understand the lived experience of ethnic minority HR and OD professionals. This culminated in us publishing the report and launching our first conference. Since then, this has led to the creation of a career hub to reduce workforce inequalities through greater transparency, a number of blogs, HR system leaders sharing the personal journeys and reflections, national speaker events, a 30 per cent increase in the HPMA commissioning of more culturally diverse content delivered by diverse HPMA trainers, and more recently launching an anti-racist leadership programme for HR and OD leaders in the NHS, and launching the 'Five-step challenge to change' which focuses on transformation and the social movement for change #InclusiveHR.

None of these experiences happen by accident. Sponsorship is just as important as mentorship and it happens in many ways. Given ethnic minority colleagues have such poor experiences in all walks of life, we can all start to individually take action in the workplace to create the conditions where dreams can become a reality. When those in the majority put their name and reputation on the line for someone in my skin, it can be one of the most powerful cultural tools in the tool box that can change someone's career, life and their family.
Cheryl Samuels is deputy director of workforce transformation for London at NHS England and NHS Improvement

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"When you're in my skin, this is why sponsorship is important"

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Cheryl Samuels explains why, as a Black HR professional aiming to develop her career, sponsorship is just as important as mentorship Over the last few years I have reflected upon my own career journey and that of others, the relationships I have forged, the way others treat me, and the privileges I have been afforded which have supported my career aspirations and development.

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Found by Sharon Green following on from a weekly #HRHour on Twitter

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Simply put, unconsious bias training doesn't work.
-John Amaechi OBE, Founder & CEO, Amaechi Performance Systems
Recently, I was part of a panel at the FT Women At the Top event in London alongside Athalie Williams, Chief People Officer at the mining & natural resources company BHP and Kate Glazebrook, Co-Founder and Head of Insight, Applied, formerly a part of the UK governments behavioural science "nudge unit",bound to answer questions about hiring and keeping future leaders.

For my part I wanted toaddress the latest management fad that has become near ubiquitous in "solving" the challenges of workplace inequity: unconscious bias training.

This subject is one that we are often asked about by our clients, and our answer to them is the same as what I told the FT audience: unconscious bias training only works if it's actually unconscious bias that is the problem.

If a company has a sub-optimal workplace culture then unconscious bias training is often the first in the box of tricks that managers implement to bring about change in the workplace. However, given the continued negative experiences of so many in the workplace resulting from the behaviours we see from colleagues and managers, unconscious bias training is simply a way that organisations can achieve a level of plausible deniability

I question whether we even fully understand what unconscious bias really means. The evidence offers a counter argument to ideas that it's the main reason for the woeful inequities in our workplaces that wound our ability to increase productivity, engagement and ensure long-term, sustainable success. So why are we so willing to spend billions on something if there is a misunderstanding about unconscious bias, and a growing body of evidence that training on it doesn't impact behaviours in a way that changes the look and feel of organisations in any meaningful way?

Unconscious bias training is only the solution if unconscious bias is the problem.

I understand that many reading this will have been through unconscious bias training, and many well known companies have implemented it- Google, for example, has reportedly spent $265 million on unconcious bias training in the last two years, even while organisations in the Tech sector especially, but across the board, have seen something between negligible gains and no movement at all in the make up of their recruiting classes, retention patterns and demographic ratios in succession.
For more stats on Google, visit google.com/diversity
When I talk about the definition of unconscious bias, I don't mean that people can't look up the definition. I mean the construct has become a proxy. Unconsious bias has become a 'get-out-of-jail-free' card for too many.

People have misunderstood the term to mean a part of their psyche they were once unaware of (and thereby not responsible for), but now have some sight of (and should be thanked or rewarded for that), put there by the more ignorant factions of their family and society (that they had no power to prevent), but certainly not a result of any personal bad intention.

Unconcious bias is the perfect storm of "it's not my fault", "I was powerless to prevent it", and "people should be grateful that I'm addressing it". This is not a recipe for action.

Some realise their bias may have an impact on their personal and professional thoughts and even their behaviour, (although that impact is debatable) but many seem to think their job is done with " awareness ".

There is mounting research, including a rather impressive meta-analysis of unconscious bias training, that there's very little evidence that training aimed at unconscious bias as measured by the Harvard IAT for example, has a meaningful effect on outcomes.

It's worth pointing out that measurable is not the same as meaningful. We are at a stage now where organisations are touting the numbers who are being put through unconscious bias training as an indication of the success of unconscious bias training! You will see these participation stats, often accompanied, if you look a little harder, by recruitment, retention and succession numbers that have remained completely unchanged over time.

When looking at factors that influence human behaviour, what indiviuals think -consciously and unconsciously- is clearly a factor. However, when attempting to fulsomely change the culture and climate of an organisation and change people's experience within it, it's what colleagues, managers and senior leaders do everyday that is the defining factor.

1. It's easy to deploy. Tens of thousands of employees can have this training delivered quickly over a couple of hours and relatively inexpensively, giving impressive stat lines to add to annual reports about XX% or even XXX% of employees having undergone training.

2. It's less disruptive to individual sensibilities to gently address what people 'misunderstand in their own heads' about diverse people - especially when we often implicitly suggest that these thoughts are 'personally unauthorised', somehow put there by society or by old fashioned parents- and not actually a reflection of the individual.

3. The much harder and efficacious work to truly address, with swift and unflinching zeal, the behaviours employees and managers manifest every day that create a toxic culture that prejudices minorities, and confronting them with tangible sanctions, will likely heighten tensions for a period. And, it will inevitably force organisations to manage out interpersonally toxic, but otherwise reasonably productive workers.

There are many reasons for the ongoing allure of unconscious bias training, even given the mounting evidence that it doesn't work:

Unconscious bias training assumes all people care to change the status quo. It ignores that there are, in most organisations, a large group of tenured but mediocre individuals for whom the status quo of reduced competition has been key to their success and stability. For them, inclusion is a threat and the bias in language and behaviour is their weapon against that threat.

Their swiftly evolving sophistication in manifesting their personal biases and flawed perspectives in ways that consistently and effortlessly circumvent the policies and rules of our organisations, act as a hand-break on change. Their prejudicial behaviour is all too often labeled as banter, and thus immunises the speaker from prosecution. In reality these 'jokes' do incredible harm, and reinforce the status quo. I would encourage you to read Jason P. Steed's twitter summary of his PhD dissertation on the social function of "just joking", to see an example of how sophisticated we have become in skirting sanction while maintaining the status quo of power and privilege in organisations and society as a whole.

Lastly, and perhaps the cherry on the top of this particular sundae, unconscious bias doesn't force us to look at the reality as it stands and really face the true picture of workplace exclusion and inequity. It allows leaders to look and indeed feel, like we are doing a lot while, to the relief of many, very little actually changes. It allows those who wish to slow or halt change to feel "disenfranchised" by the attention given to minorities, while never really being impacted by it.

To my mind, given the evidence at hand, this is actually a case of the most implausible deniability and we must do better. Making organisations more equitable and inclusive isn't about being 'nice'. It's about winning.

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Unconcious Bias Training: the 'Get out of jail free' Card of Change Management

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Simply put, unconsious bias training doesn't work. -John Amaechi OBE, Founder & CEO, Amaechi Performance Systems Recently, I was part of a panel at the FT Women At the Top event in London alongside Athalie Williams, Chief People Officer at the mining & natural resources company BHP and Kate Glazebrook, Co-Founder and Head of Insight, Applied, formerly a part of the UK governments behavioural science "nudge unit",bound to answer questions about hiring and keeping future leaders.

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How curiosity can address racial inequality

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How curiosity can address racial inequality

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Shared by Switch network from Wilton & Bain

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How curiosity can address racial inequality | Louisa Awolaja | TEDxTinHauWomen

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Black History Month 2022 article in HR Zone

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Black History Month 2022 article in HR Zone

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Great article by Valentina Hynes from svhinc.co.uk

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This year's UK Black History Month theme is #TimeForChange; Action Not Words. It focuses on the actions we can all take to tackle institutional racism and support Black people in the UK, taking into account how the past can inform actions that tackle institutional racism.

Black History Month means different things to different people. To me, it is a celebration of strength, creativity, vibrance and tenacity. It's a reminder to keep going, to speak up, and that truth is subjective - anything could be a fact, but the truth means different things to each of us. And that's our truth. It's a reminder to be brave, to be compassionate and to be original."

Poor mental health differs from mental ill health because of the length of time, diagnosis, treatment and recovery

At first, I found it difficult to fully engage because I was made to feel that Black History Month is a time to spotlight how marginalised we are as a race. The constant exposure to content that triggered trauma surrounding slavery, colonialism and racism made it a challenging month personally.

This narrative didn't change for me until I started to focus on celebrating the resilience, doggedness, and creativity of those who are breaking the glass ceiling and turning back to shine a light for others to follow through.

How can HR be part of the change from a wellbeing perspective?

Black people, especially those in the diaspora are often exposed to racial trauma in one way or the other, whether as a by-product of colonialism or slavery. This makes us vulnerable to developing poor mental health and illness.

(Poor mental health differs from mental ill health because of the length of time, diagnosis, treatment and recovery. Just like you may feel unwell, without necessarily being ill or, needing medical attention).

What are your Black colleagues /employees exposed to every day both within and outside of your organisation, that places them at risk of developing poor mental health?

1. Racism and discrimination including micro-aggressions

Zero tolerance should include taking a careful evaluation of your hiring procedures and employment policies by consulting with a diverse range of professionals, who represent your target audience.

Are there hidden barriers that stop your organisation from attracting and keeping people from Black and minority ethnic groups?

2. Wellbeing support

It's impossible to be all things to everyone, but it is possible to create an equitable environment where everyones' needs can be met.

Don't criticise people for not smiling more, talking more or, being present at every work gathering. Black people can be introverted too

Here are some tips to help HR be more aware this Black History Month

If I am expected to pronounce, Nigel, Fiona or, Bryony correctly, then you and everyone else is expected to correctly pronounce Amaka, Kunle or Gihan. Don't give people with 'foreign' names nicknames, unless they offer it.

Don't expect every Black person to be the life and soul of the party. Don't criticise people for not smiling more, talking more or, being present at every work gathering. Black people can be introverted too.

Create a culture where people can feel comfortable without masks of forced extroversion. Nurture a culture founded on respect and kindness. The workplace can be a protective factor in mental health, but it can also be a risk factor for poor mental health.

This feeds into representation. For mentorship to succeed, the mentor and mentee need to meet at an intersection of shared understanding of the unique struggles they face or have faced.

How representative are your top and middle management? How diverse is it? How representative and diverse are the trainers you hire? How diverse are the keynote speakers you hire?

We cannot have an equal workplace or community until everyone is given a fair chance to start from the same level. This would mean providing more support to some to get them to par with others. This would mean engaging with your people to understand what their needs are.

Some benefits that some of your Black colleagues or clients may need could include medical cover for family, immigration support (immigration lawyers), housing, reference letters, etcetera.

Relationships are built and maintained through networking opportunities. Creating opportunities for colleagues to get together socially across all levels, builds connections.

Your organisation has brought a diverse range of people together from different cultural pots. It is your responsibility to educate your people on cultural awareness, by creating opportunities for learning and discovery. This will expand perspectives, reduce conflict and promote empathy.

Do more than tick a box

The observance of Black History Month is not a 'nice to fill' box, but one that feeds directly into the United Nations' Global 2030 Sustainable Development Goals of Decent Work and Economic Growth and Reduced Inequalities.

Black History Month is about celebration, compassion, connection and collaboration

The business case for this is that creating a workplace environment where people feel supported, protected and seen, leads to a more engaged workforce, stronger retention and increased bottom line.

Black History Month is about celebration, compassion, connection and collaboration. It may feel perfunctory, but taking a sincere part in it, would prompt deeper reflection as our experiences shift and alter, enabling us to perform actions, and not just words.

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Black History Month: How can HR be part of the change?

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This year's UK Black History Month theme is #TimeForChange; Action Not Words. It focuses on the actions we can all take to tackle institutional racism and support Black people in the UK, taking into account how the past can inform actions that tackle institutional racism. Black History Month means different things to different people.

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What is anti-racism? Business Insider article 

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What is anti-racism? Business Insider article 

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Shared by Sharon Green

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"Please just think about how MILLIONS of black people had to die in this country before you decided to care about race," the writer Megan Reid tweeted on May 31.

It was three months after Ahmaud Arbery was shot by a former police officer while jogging, two weeks after Breonna Taylor was shot and killed in her home by the police, and six days after George Floyd died under the knee of a police officer.

These names are just a few of the many Black Americans who have been killed by the police in the past decade alone. But it was Floyd's death that intensely woke America up to police brutality and the horror of systemic racism that has seeped into America's underbelly since slavery began in the US four centuries ago.

-Megan Reid (@meg_r) May 31, 2020

The Black Lives Matter movement, which originated in July 2013 after George Zimmerman was acquitted for the killing of Trayvon Martin, is out in full force across the nation and worldwide.

But for a non-Black person to fully understand anti-racism, they must endeavor to grasp the underlying context of Reid's Tweet: Black lives (and voices) have been marginalized and silenced to the point of death for centuries. They've been trying to tell us about the deadly problem of institutionalized racism; the white community has not been listening to them and has not been acting to fix it.

Racism against Black Americans isn't perpetuated among white Americans alone, and Black Americans are not the only racial group to suffer from racism. That is to say, racism and anti-racism exist in multitudes. But it was white European colonialists who were at the helm of slavery 400 years ago, laying the foundation for today's structural racism that everyone is born into.

In researching and writing this article, I was transported back to my readings and studies on colonization and racism from college African American literature classes. I realized with discomfort that I shouldn't have stopped my education on the subject just because I no longer had a formal class - maybe I sooner would have understood how racism has embedded and benefited my daily life. But I also realized that my white privilege is not a burden to bear, but a way for me to enact change.

The first step is learning what racism and anti-racism are, what it means to be anti-racist, and how to take action. The guideline below is just a beginning point of understanding it all.

What is anti-racism?

"Anti-racism is an active and conscious effort to work against multidimensional aspects of racism," Georgetown African American studies professor Robert J. Patterson told Business Insider.

Patterson, who wrote " Destructive Desires: Rhythm and Blues Culture and the Politics of Racial Equality," added that we need to collectively shift our thinking of racism as conscious, intentional, overt actions to unconscious, covert, and unintentional actions. He added that while racism can happen individually, it often happens institutionally.

When abolitionist Anthony Benezet founded America's first abolition society in 1775, it may have signaled the first known act of anti-racism in America. Anti-racism has its foundations in abolition and the post-liberation fight for structural change as well as 20th-century civil-rights movements, Malini Ranganathan, a faculty team lead at the Anti-Racist Research & Policy Center at American University, told Anna North of Vox.

But it's difficult to trace the exact origin of the term "anti-racism."

Merriam-Webster will tell you the first known use of "anti-racist" was in 1943 - the same year Marxist historian Herbert Aptheker dismantled the longstanding argument that African Americans accepted slavery in his book "American Negro Slave Revolts."

Aptheker, who later became the literary executor for author and civil-rights activist W.E.B. DuBois, subsequently overturned the then widely held idea that all whites universally accepted racism in his book "Anti-Racism in US History: The First 200 Years."

Today, anti-racism is perhaps most closely associated with Ibram X. Kendi, the founding director of American University's anti-racist research center (who is now moving to Boston University to open an anti-racist center there), who popularized the concept with his 2019 book " How to be an Anti-Racist." In it, he wrote: "The only way to undo racism is to consistently identify and describe it - and then dismantle it."

What does it mean to be anti-racist?

You don't need to be free of racism to be an anti-racist, Ijeoma Oluo, author of " So You Want to Talk About Race," once tweeted. "Anti-racism is the commitment to fight racism wherever you find it, including in yourself. And it's the only way forward," she wrote.

Racism views a racial group as culturally or socially inferior. An anti-racist, per Kendi's book, is "one who is expressing the idea that racial groups are equals and none needs developing, and is supporting policy that reduces racial inequality."

But to understand what an anti-racist is, one must also understand what an anti-racist is not: a non-racist. There is no such thing as a non-racist, Kendi writes, because it signifies neutrality.

"One endorses either the idea of a racial hierarchy as a racist, or racial equality as an anti-racist," he says. " One either believes problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an anti-racist. One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a racist, or confronts racial inequities, as an anti-racist."

Patterson, the Georgetown professor, said that people "collapse identity and behavior" when they misconstrue not being racist as being anti-racist. In the process, they underappreciate how action signals anti-racism and underestimate their own influence in dismantling the systems that support racism.

Patterson said Kendi's view of anti-racism highlights the way racism is socialized into behaviors - how racial inequities and disparities are embedded in private and public life. We must unravel those behaviors by thinking about and pulling back assumptions we make about "the naturalness of things," he said.

If your default thinking is "I'm not racist," a more informed point of view would be recognizing how you're informed and influenced by the embeddedness of race and institutionalized racism.

"It's really critically thinking about and analyzing how race matters in seemingly nonracial context," he said.

To be an anti-racist, Kendi said in an interview with Vox, is to admit when we're being racist and then challenging those racist ideas.

"We adopt anti-racist ideas that say the problem is power and policy when there is inequity, not people." That is, it is the system, not a racial group, that needs to be changed. "And then we spend our time, we spend our funds, we spend our energy challenging racist policy and power."

What is the difference between an ally and an anti-racist?

"I think that people think that racism is Black people's problem," Patterson said.

It is not. Misunderstanding whose problem racism is and who can fix it misplaces the burden of responsibility to solving racism on to the disadvantaged group.

"Racism is a white problem," Robin DiAngelo, sociologist and the white anti-racist author of " White Fragility," told The Guardian in a February 2019 interview. "It was constructed and created by white people and the ultimate responsibility lies with white people. For too long we've looked at it as if it were someone else's problem, as if it was created in a vacuum."

That leaves the onus on white people for personal accountability: Understanding and recognizing the economic and social benefits and privileges this system bestowed upon them (including this writer) and taking action to transform these conditions.

This involves getting past white shame and guilt. While white people today didn't create racism, activist Ben O'Keefe tells Vox, they can choose to admit that they benefit from it and acknowledge their power in changing conditions.

"We don't need you to carry the burden of your privilege," he said, addressing the white community. "We need you acknowledge it and to use your privilege, promote good, and to fight oppression."

But in using white privilege for different vantage points to talk about anti-racist practices, it's important to not speak for Black people's experiences, Patterson said. That "kind of reinforces the idea that Black people can't speak for themselves or that you need a white voice to authenticate what the Black perspective is," he said.

The act of doing also marks the difference between an ally and an anti-racist. An ally, Patterson said, is someone who supports the cause and is interested in the issues, but doesn't as explicitly engage in actions. "An anti-racist is more actively fighting against the structures, et cetera, that perpetuate racism, whereas an ally might be in a more supportive cast role," he added.

To be clear: It is action that lies at the heart of anti-racism. As Kendi wrote in a December 2018 article for The Guardian, "A racist or anti-racist is not who we are, but what we are doing in the moment."

Where can I find anti-racist resources?

-Ijeoma Oluo (@IjeomaOluo) June 1, 2020

How do you take the step from ally to anti-racist, moving beyond the black squares of Instagram to doing real work? One must move past the biggest obstacle: feeling that racism is too big a problem to tackle.

Thinking you can't do enough to enact change, Patterson said, leads to inaction. Instead, think about the ways you may participate in the problem, your sphere of influence, and how your conversations can reshape views.

"What happens besides a hashtag, a tweet, an Instagram post?" Patterson asked. "And what is the work that you are doing in these spaces where you can really have influence?"

Keep in mind that anti-racism isn't about sitting on information, but acting on it.

Here's where you can start.

Educate yourself. Read about privilege, histories of race, and oppressed voices with the help of anti-racism reading lists from publications like The Strategist and Time.

Identify steps to take by talking to friends, family, and peers.

Check out this Google Doc of anti-racism resources.

Volunteer or donate to organizations fighting racist policies that create and support racial inequality.

Call out racism when you see it and espouse anti-racist ideas to help change racist policies.

Patterson said all these different steps will create an arsenal of demonstrative ongoing interest that isn't just "for the hashtag." For example, consider how these actions would play out when you're in a board room discussing diversity and inclusion or in a college-admissions committee discussing test scores and supposedly objective measures, Patterson said.

It took too long for non-Black people to catch on to the Black Lives Matter movement. But now that the white community is listening, we all need to recognize our power in creating change. And Kendi said it best in his interview with Boston University earlier this week: "You have to believe change is possible in order to bring it about."

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What it really means to be an anti-racist, and why it's not the same as being an ally

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"Please just think about how MILLIONS of black people had to die in this country before you decided to care about race," the writer Megan Reid tweeted on May 31.

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Recommended by Clare Morgan

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Listen to Black History Buff Podcast on Spotify.

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An excellent, accessible read about the experiences of growing up in a dual heritage Ghanian/ Jewish household. The chapter - New Black- was especially powerful.

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BBC piece explaining what they are and what you might do about them

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What Adjani Salmon's Dreaming Whilst Black teaches us about microaggressions - and what people in the real world are doing to prevent them.

Sabrina Fearon-Melville

In an episode of BBC Three's new comedy drama Dreaming Whilst Black, Kwabena is told by the head of a film industry diversity scheme that she deliberately starts screenings late because she's "used to running on black man time."

This comment was an example of a microaggression - a comment or action that subtly and often unintentionally expresses a prejudiced attitude toward a member of a marginalised group (such as a racial minority).

It reflects the real-life experiences of the writers room of Dreaming Whilst Black - and the experience of many people in real workplaces. A 2021 study conducted by construction company Wates found four in 10 people had experienced microaggressions at work. The figure rose again to 64% for people from a black Caribbean background.

Susanne Kirlew, for example, experienced a microaggression when she asked a colleague where another team member was. "She was in a car accident," a colleague replied. "Somebody ran into the back of her at the lights, and they were black. And you know how they never have insurance."'

For Susanne, this conversation empowered her to speak up and tell her colleague what she had said deeply offended her.

'As authentic to myself as possible'

On tackling these issues in his work, Dreaming Whilst Black writer, director and star Adjani Salmon spoke of how the show's writers room was a diverse and safe place to "play," which drew on the personal experiences of those present.

In Dreaming Whilst Black it is not only his character Kwabena who experiences microaggressions. Amy's (played by Dani Moseley) boss implies her viewpoint represents the entire African diaspora, a less qualified white colleague is promoted over her, the that colleague moves to touch her hair without asking.

Adjani found he was able to touch on societal issues through humour mixed with drama, but it was occasionally difficult to maintain that pace throughout the series.

"Sometimes it was like, five pages have passed and there's not one joke."

But in creating Dreaming Whilst Black, Adjani feels like he has made a character who, "isn't being a palatable or acceptable black man, to make others feel comfortable."

Adjani reflects this in his daily life. He'd been approached about wearing his hair in dreadlocks prior to entering the workforce. But he stuck to being "as authentic to myself as possible" - which has paid off as this hairstyle is what his character Kwabena is most well known for.

'I started lessening my brown and turning up my white to fit in'

Sonya Barlow runs her own diversity and Inclusion consultancy firm, empowering women through "mentoring, masterclasses and meaningful networks".

Sonya started her firm after feeling she had hit a glass ceiling as a Pakistani woman in the workplace. She felt her career progression was stagnant and she wasn't being taken seriously.

Sometimes she'd code switch, a term describing when a member of a minority group adjusts their behaviour, language or appearance to fit in. "I started lessening my brown and turning up my white because it made me fit in. It's only recently I really started claiming my identity a lot more and being quite proud of it."

Even in the space she'd created for herself, she faced microaggressions. Sonya co-hosted a large UK tech event, but was omitted from the event coverage in a national publication. All the credit was given to the other host, who was white. Sonya says she felt "dismissed" and her community rallied around her in encouragement to ensure she didn't let it go.

Sonya felt as a woman in a largely male dominated space she had to be careful with her approach. She sent the journalist an email explaining the issue she had with the article and what they could do to make it right.

Sonya believes it's important to break the cycle of microaggressions. "I think businesses need to take responsibility for developing their staff, so they can retain us and help us grow into leadership positions. Especially women of colour."

'One person is hired to fix everyone else's prejudice'

Susanne decided she wanted to make the incident she experienced a chance to expand her entire company's outlook on racial issues and microaggressions.

She had the HR director organise an external workshop. She felt many of her colleagues came away with a better understanding of microaggressions and some even began correcting colleagues on comments made to one another.

Susanne felt empowered to speak up. Whilst she recognises for some people it may be hard to do so, it can have a greater impact on those who enter the workplace after you.

Susanne also believes when it comes to work surrounding racial equality, it's often important to not have people of colour lead the conversations. "I said 'you need white people to do this, not me' because it just looks like I have an axe to grind."

By having white people champion speaking up, Susanne hoped this would discourage a toxic workplace culture and not place an onus on minorities to fix issues they hadn't created.

Cultural Historian and former lecturer Sofia Akel says there must be a holistic approach to dismantling racism and, as a result, microaggressions in academia or the workspace.

She approached this by allowing her students freedom in the expression in their writing.

"I used to teach Black Studies to students at university. I told them, 'I do not want you to write in standardised English if that is not the way you naturally speak or write.'"

As a public speaker, Sofia has noticed fewer companies are hiring diversity and inclusion speakers to tackle racism head-on since the boom of conversation surrounding the death of George Floyd in 2020.

"Some organisations feel like, 'yeah, we've ticked that box,'" she says.

Sofia wants to highlight the taxing nature of being brought in to do this kind of work. She's come to the realisation that there are "other ways I can contribute to race equity that don't involve me specifically mining my trauma...one person is hired to fix everyone else's racial bias and prejudice."

Dreaming Whilst Black is streaming now on BBC iPlayer. The series will air weekly Mondays at 10pm on BBC Three.

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'My character isn't being a palatable or acceptable black man' - BBC Three

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'I started lessening my brown and turning up my white to fit in' How people and the show Dreaming Whilst Black are dealing with workplace microaggressions

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Recommendation from by Sharon Green. Excellent short read that packs a powerful punch and is thought provoking in the area of allyship 

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Black History month session 2021

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What is colourism anyway? (And is it still a thing?)

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Micro aggressions short film - warning this could be triggering

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Micro aggressions short film - warning this could be triggering

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Shared by Tony Jackson on Twitter and added by Sharon Green

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New film cuts to the heart of racist micro-aggressions | shots

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This new short film from director Meena Ayittey takes a closer look at the toll taken on one man after a series of race-related micro-agggressions.

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Leadership coaches video on inclusive leadership 

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Leadership coaches video on inclusive leadership 

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Made and shared by Coach Zoe Lewis & her team

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The Leadership Coaches on LinkedIn: #leadershipcoach #leadershipcoaching #leadership

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This week at The Leadership Coaches, we are thrilled to have Grace Moronfolu MBE (Her/She) MBE, chair of the The National Black Crown Prosecution Association...

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Henley Business School Racial equity report 2021

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Henley Business School Racial equity report 2021

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Referenced in CIPD Work Autumn edition 2021

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Naeema leads on professional development, people and the future of work at Henley Business School, including establishing our annual World of Work (WOW) conference. She created the Henley Hives, a vibrant and productive community of innovative members working on making Henley a better place to work.

Naeema is also Principal Practitioner with the Association of Business Psychologists. She also speaks extensively on side-hustling, future of work and generations, and flexible working such as the four-day week.

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Naeema leads on professional development, people and the future of work at Henley Business School, including establishing our annual World of Work (WOW) conference. She created the Henley Hives, a vibrant and productive community of innovative members working on making Henley a better place to work.

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Shared by Sharon Green

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John Amaechi is a psychologist, a New York Times best-selling author and a former NBA basketball player. In the wake of the George Floyd killing and the Black Lives Matter protests, and at a time when many people want to learn how they can be better allies for black people, we asked John what it means to be anti-racist.

There's a big difference between being not-racist and being anti-racist. I know it doesn't seem like it. I know that both of these things seem equally good, but they're not.

Video Transcript Video Transcript

John: There's a big difference between being not-racist and being anti-racist. I know it doesn't seem like it. I know that both of these things seem equally good, but they're not. Think of an interaction. I'm afraid you've probably had one right? With somebody, maybe even somebody you respect, maybe even someone you love, who says something that's racist, does something that's racist, behaves in a way that's racist. Someone who's not-racist: they won't say or do anything in that moment. They want to not rock the boat. They don't want to be upstanding. Instead, not-racists: they tend to be bystanders. But afterwards, after the event, they'll find other people who are also not-racist and they'll talk to each other about, well, that was terrible, that thing that happened the other day. I would never say anything like that. Anti-racists are different and they come in all shapes and sizes. They come in all ages. Anti-racists are constantly looking around to say, what tools do I have available to make it clear that this is not acceptable? And this, this is what anti-racists do. It's not that they stand up at the dinner table when their uncle's a little bit racist and kick the turkey off. That's not it. But what they do is they say, I'm sorry uncle John. That's not acceptable. That's racist. Quietly and respectfully. What they do is they make sure that they never miss an opportunity to let the world know where they stand, even if they can t change everything. You're probably in a position where other people have a lot more power around you. I know how that feels. Sometimes, we sit and we look around us and we think, how can I possibly change all this? And sometimes you can't. But what you can do is make sure wherever you go, people know where you stand. They know that you're an anti-racist. You become a beacon of light that way. You become someone who makes other people want to be anti-racist too. You've got tools at your disposal. Learn. Read. And make everybody clear where you stand.

Sometimes, we sit and we look around us and we think, 'how can I possibly change all this?' And sometimes you can't. But what you can do is make sure wherever you go, people know where you stand. They know that you're an anti-racist. You become a beacon of light that way. You become someone who makes other people want to be anti-racist too. You've got tools at your disposal. Learn. Read. And make everybody clear where you stand.

If you need support

You should always tell someone about the things you're worried about. You can tell a friend, parent, guardian, teacher, or another trusted adult. If you're struggling with your mental health, going to your GP can be a good place to start to find help. Your GP can let you know what support is available to you, suggest different types of treatment and offer regular check-ups to see how you're doing.

If you're in need of in-the-moment support you can contact Childline, where you can speak to a counsellor. Their lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

There are more links to helpful organisations on BBC Action Line.

It's important that you keep yourself safe when confronting racism. For support and advice, see the articles below.

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Not-racist v anti-racist: what's the difference?

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John Amaechi describes the difference between being not-racist and anti-racist.

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Made in partnership with The Open University, with OU consultants Dr Mark Pinder and Dr Lystra Hagley-Dickinson ANGELA SAINI, Author, Superior: The Return of Race Science: I think we have a lot of preconceptions about what race really is. C. BRANDON OGBUNU, Assistant Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University: What is race has changed dramatically through time. JONATHAN MARKS, Professor of Anthropology, UNC-Charlotte: There is no official scientific definition of race. CAPTION: IS RACE A MYTH? MADE IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THE OPEN UNIVERSITY CAPTION: FROM AN EARLY AGE WE'RE TAUGHT THAT PEOPLE OF THE WORLD ARE MADE UP OF DISTINCT, DIFFERENT RACES TV CHARACTER: We're all different. CAPTION: AND TALK OF RACE IS EVERYWHERE AROUND US IN SOCIETY SOPHIE WILLIAMS, Author, Anti-Racist Ally: I was aware that I wasn't white. TESSA MCWATT, Author, Shame on Me: An Anatomy of Race and Belonging: The teacher said, "No, no, Tess is something else." And everybody's eyes are on me, and I'm a really shy person. She said, "But what are you, Tessa?" ANGELA SAINI: A lot of people imagine that there is some biological tangibility to race, because we use it so much. Race really is a social construct, but just because something is a social construct, that doesn't mean it doesn't have meaning in peoples' lives like money, or the nation state, or democracy, or all these other things that define how we live, but are also constructed. C. BRANDON OGBUNU: It influences what you're eating, it influences the type of healthcare you have access to, the type of schooling you have access to, how people feel about you. I mean, it's a powerful marker for all of these things that we care about when we're trying to run a society. SOPHIE WILLIAMS: Race has never been something that I don't have to think about. It's put on to us. ANGELA SAINI: When you look at the history and origins of this idea, you start to see it for what it really is, which is the manifestation of power. CAPTION: THE TERM "RACE" FIRST EMERGED IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN THE LATE 16TH CENTURY - AND ORIGINALLY JUST MEAN "TYPE" ANGELA SAINI: People imagine that people have always thought about skin colour in this racialised way, and we really haven't. That idea is no more than a few hundred years old. JONATHAN MARKS: It's not really until the age of colonialism, in the 17th Century, that you start getting the idea that each continent has its own individual kind of people. It arose at a very specific moment in history. In the 17th Century, you're taking long trips by ship, and you're struck by how different people look than you remember them when you got on. CAPTION: IN 1735, SWEDISH SCIENTIST CARL LINNAEUS SET OUT TO CLASSIFY THESE APPARENTLY DIFFERENT PEOPLE ISABELLE CHARMANTIER, Head of Collections, The Linnean Society: So this is the first edition of Systema Naturae, so the Systems of Nature. And for man, Linnaeus distinguishes four varieties, these varieties correspond to the four continents. Where it really changes is in the 10th edition of Systema Naturae. This is the foundation of scientific racism. He brings in moral character, so the American is "red and choleric," and stands up straight. The European, "white, sanguine, and muscular" The Asian, "sallow, melancholic and stiff" The African, "black, phlegmatic and lazy" So these stereotypes have endured through the ages. CAPTION: THIS WAS JUST THE START OF WHAT CAME TO BE KNOWN AS "RACE SCIENCE" - A DISCIPLINE THAT EMERGED AT THE SAME TIME AS COLONIALISM AND SLAVERY. AND THAT WAS NO COINCIDENCE. SOPHIE WILLIAMS: If you're going to take a group of people, and you're going to decide that they're not people anymore, then you need something to justify that. ANGELA SAINI: You can be defined very differently depending on the country that you're in, or the time that you're in. And that's how these categories have always been used. They are political tools that change depending on their usefulness to whoever is doing the categorisation. CAPTION: BY THE 20TH CENTURY, RACE SCIENCE HAD GIVEN RISE TO EUGENICS - "THE SELECTION OF DESIRED HERITABLE CHARACTERISTICS IN ORDER TO IMPROVE FUTURE GENERATIONS". BRITANNICA CAPTION: EUGENICS WAS USED IN ITS MOST EXTREME FORM BY THE NAZIS TO SUPPORT THE EXTERMINATION OF ENTIRE RACES. CAPTION: AFTER WORLD WAR TWO, THE UN BROUGHT TOGETHER EXPERTS FROM ACROSS THE WORLD TO OFICIALLY DECLARE THAT THE IDEA OF DISTINCT RACES HAD NO BIOLOGICAL BASIS. CAPTION: WHEN THE HUMAN GENOME WAS SEQUENCED FOR THE FIRST TIME AT THE START OF THE 21ST CENTURY, THE DNA EVIDENCE ALSO CLEARLY CHALLENGED THE IDEA OF RACE AS ROOTED IN BIOLOGY. ANGELA SAINI: We are one of the most homogeneous species on the planet. Humans have far less genetic variation than chimpanzees do. And yet, those chimpanzees look the same to me. There were never any "pure" races, there is no gene that exists in all the members of one race and not another. There is no black gene, there is no white gene. JONATHAN MARKS: Human groups overlap completely in their genetic variation. CAPTION: SO IS THERE NO SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR RACE AT ALL? ANGELA SAINI: In the same way that you're related to your family, you can get a kind of fuzzy genetic similarity. But when you get to the continental level, which is really where we're talking about race, that genetic similarity is so fuzzy, and so statistically weak, as to be almost meaningless. C. BRANDON OGBUNU: We have this envy of fields where things are hyper-simplistic. We want to be able to look at a genome and say that people are these kind of concrete immutable things, that cannot be changed. Genetics doesn't work that way, it's the product of many genes interacting with each other and their environments. To fully answer the question about what a living thing is it's going to be about much more than genes. ANGELA SAINI: If I were to go out on to the street today and find someone of Indian heritage like myself, and randomly then pick someone who is not of Indian heritage, it is perfectly statistically possible for my genome to have more in common with that person who isn't of Indian heritage than that person who is. CAPTION: IF THE IDEA OF RACE HAS BEEN CREATED BY SOCIETY, WHAT DOES THAT MEAN FOR HOW WE SEE OURSELVES - AND OTHERS? TESSA MCWATT: Even though race itself is a construct, racism is real and we are not in a post-racial society. Race keeps making itself and power keeps making race. SOPHIE WILLIAMS: Even though we know that race isn't biological, we've been living with this idea of it being real for so long that it means that people who do have a shared racial identity have now cultural similarities which has been born out of hardship, but it's still beautiful and important. C. BRANDON OGBUNU: The biology of race is not a useful concept. I have a different historical trajectory, I love the African American tradition, but it's not better than anybody else's, it's just the one that I'm a part of. JONATHAN MARKS: I don't think we're going to stop classifying people, because I think that's how we make sense of the world. I think every generation is going to classify people according to the criteria that are politically important to them. SOPHIE WILLIAMS: I don't think we need to find new boxes to put people in, I think we now have the opportunity to say, we understand that all of these things are a spectrum, in a way that we hadn't considered before. So instead of finding new ways to categorise people we can just find new ways to exist better together. TESSA MCWATT: Race is a story that's handed down and handed around. But we can choose the stories that we tell.

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Made in partnership with The Open University, with OU consultants Dr Mark Pinder and Dr Lystra Hagley-Dickinson ANGELA SAINI, Author, Superior: The Return of Race Science: I think we have a lot of preconceptions about what race really is. C. BRANDON OGBUNU, Assistant Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University: What is race has changed dramatically through time.

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Francis Churchill May 2022

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Experts lambast 'myth of meritocracy' as research highlights how women of colour face barriers to opportunities at every stage of their career

Thomas Barwick/Getty Images

Nearly two-thirds of women of colour have been forced to hide aspects of their personality in the workplace, a report has found.

The poll of more than 3,000 women found 61 per cent of women of colour had changed things including the language they used, the topics they talk about, their hairstyle and the food they eat in the workplace.

This included more than one in five (22 per cent) women of colour who said they changed their name in the workplace.
Majority of employees are happy to share ethnicity data, poll finds MPs criticise government for refusing to introduce mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting 10 microaggressions Black women experience at work - and how HR can put a stop to them
In comparison, just 44 per cent of white women said they changed aspects of their personality in the workplace.

The findings are , the largest representative survey of women of colour in the UK, conducted by the Fawcett Society and the Runnymede Trust.

Of 2,000 women of colour polled for the report, three-quarters (75 per cent) said they experienced racism at work, and more than a quarter (27 per cent) have suffered racial slurs.
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One of the women interviewed for the report, called Matilda, told of how her HR department advised her to "hide how clever I was, as people find that easier to manage and deal with".

"As long as you conformed to stereotypes and remained passive and compliant, you were deemed a safe and manageable employee. But if like me, you questioned why you were not given access to training... those questions were deemed unwelcome, and I was labelled as 'aggressive'," she said.

The report found that women of colour were facing barriers at all stages of their career: half (52 per cent) said they experienced discrimination during recruitment, including being made to feel uncomfortable about their race or cultural background and being asked for ethnicity information outside of monitoring processes.

And while two-thirds (64 per cent) of women of colour said being promoted during their career was important to them (compared to 49 per cent of white women), more than a quarter (28 per cent) have had a promotion blocked by a manager and 42 per cent have been passed over for a promotion despite receiving good feedback (compared to 19 per cent and 27 per cent of white women respectively).

This carried on into leadership and decision making roles: more than a third (34 per cent) of women of colour reported they needed colleagues to vouch for them to have their decisions accepted, compared to less than a quarter (23 per cent) of white women.

The report said all of this had a knock-on effect on wellbeing: two in five (39 per cent) of the women of colour polled said the lack of progression had impacted their wellbeing, compared to 28 per cent of white women, while 43 per cent of women of colour said it led to a loss of motivation.

Jemima Olchawski, CEO of the Fawcett Society, said it was "sickening" how many women of colour have experienced racism at work.

"We just can't accept this as a society. If we want to be a country where everyone can achieve their potential, to progress and make the most of their talents, then we need serious and concerted action to address this," she said, adding that given the current skills crisis this was "a waste of potential we can ill afford".

The report called on employers to implement evidence-based anti-racism action plans with clear targets; to ensure they have clear and transparent reporting processes; and to introduce anti-racism training.

It also encouraged employers to look at their structures and policies to minimise bias and ensure promotion processes had fair and equitable outcomes.

"From school to the workplace, there are structural barriers standing between [women of colour] and the opportunities they deserve," said Halima Begum, CEO of the Runnymede Trust.

"Women of colour know first-hand the myth of meritocracy, from the mental gymnastics of constantly code switching to being repeatedly passed up for promotion, in 2022 it is high time we invest in them," she said. "Until we do so, we will continue to lose them as they leave the workplace, resulting in a huge waste of talent."

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Two in three women of colour forced to hide their personality at work, poll finds

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Experts lambast 'myth of meritocracy' as research highlights how women of colour face barriers to opportunities at every stage of their career Nearly two-thirds of women of colour have been forced to hide aspects of their personality in the workplace, a report has found.

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Big Issue article with Simon Frederick talking about The Outsiders

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Big Issue article with Simon Frederick talking about The Outsiders

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18 Oct 2021

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In this country we are told that you shouldn't stand out. That you should try to fit in. And fitting in for me as a Black person means being invisible.

So when I see people standing out - when I see a Lewis Hamilton, a Stormzy, a Michaela Coel, a Mo Farah or a Mo Gilligan - and see that audiences love them, I see the ordinary man and woman in the street don't give a damn what colour you are.

They just give a damn whether or not you're good enough. Then you realise we are in a system that is controlled by gatekeepers - and it is those gatekeepers who are trying to stop culture from moving forward. It's not in any of our interests to allow that to happen.

I started to make a list of names of people who were the first to do something. Like I was the Black person to have the largest acquisition of portraits acquired by the National Portrait Gallery. I have had a lot of other firsts in my life and that made me scratch my head.

What has happened in society that means we have been kept out of the room for so long that a few of us are making inroads now, 21 years into a new millennium?

That's how I made my list. And it's a considerable list. So I'm hoping that we get to do The Outsiders? over a few seasons. Because there is a lot of conversation still to be had.

I've always found that human beings are always interested in the stories of other human beings. And that will always be the case.

Talking to them, it feels like being an old portrait maker. Because if you've got five minutes or five hours, you have to get inside someone's mind in order to unlock them. And that's what we tried to do with our interviews.

Racism is a key part of this series. We have a problem in society. I call it a disease. Racism is a disease that certain people in our society suffer from and put that on to other people. They make them the victims of their disease. A key part of our series is the fact that you've got a group of people who, in spite of racism, still prevail.

Racism isn't the only part of this series. This series has lessons for anyone who has been told in their lives that they can't, anyone who sees themselves as being different, anyone who ever had a dream and was told by their own mind that they weren't good enough. This series is a love letter to all those people.

We have a group of people who are talking about their shared experiences, how they overcame, what they went through, so that it can become a guide for somebody watching it.

An inspirational figure

Lord Bill Morris Photo: ROGER HARRIS PHOTOGRAPHY

Who did I see when I was growing up that showed me I could be anything? Lord Bill Morris is one. I grew up thinking, how's he got there? How has he become so powerful?

He ran the largest trade union in this country [Lord Morris was general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union from 1992 to 2003] - and in doing so had more votes than any politician in the country.

I used to look at him, tackling Thatcherism. He tackled several prime ministers and they could never get the better of him. And he looked after the people within his union as if he was their father. He is a really brilliant man that I think doesn't get enough flowers. Maybe I should make a documentary about him...

For a long time, we as Black filmmakers were told that anything that comes from us, anything that has a Black cast is not going to sell around the world.

The people in this show have said: we can do things differently. We don't have to go to the normal gatekeepers, we can change the paradigm. We can do business differently. That has been really liberating.

What usually happens is that you have a commissioner who doesn't understand what you are putting in your show. They don't understand the subject matter. So they ask you to dumb it down to a level that they personally can understand.

But they don't say it's them who can't understand - they tell you the audience won't understand. But the audiences are miles ahead of them. It's about that person, that commissioner, that gatekeeper's lack of cultural education.

It's the first time I've had that relationship with a network where I had creative freedom. I wasn't being told what to put in my show. We've ended up with a show that is by us, for us, about us. And when you do that, when you make something that is authentically speaking to Black people, you end up making something that authentically speaks to all people.

Halfway through making The Outsiders?, I thought we were making something so important that we went back to YouTube Originals to discuss not putting the show behind the paywall. Making it available to anybody on YouTube, which is a considerable amount of people around the world.

In this country there's a group of people that are insistent on defining people as other. So, last week, I was in a meeting and I asked the people to stop referring to people that looked like me as BAME.

Why? A few decades ago, it was common to call people who look like me by the N-word. And now in polite society we realise that the N-word is no longer appropriate - so why the hell do we replace the N-word with one that begins with B? Why don't I have a word for you?

The UK television industry and the way it is run needs changing. There's a lot of talk about the D-word: diversity. In a lot of places it has become a dirty word. Because a lot of people now think diversity simply means Black. It's another euphemism for Black.

Instead of thinking about diversity, we should be thinking about the word inclusion.

There are channels that think if they put more Black people on popular TV shows, they have done their bit. That's why people are watching YouTube and other streamers in their droves, because there's a real diversity of content on there.

There isn't a diversity of content on UK television. The people who run UK television have not got to grips with how to solve that because they see it as a problem. It's not a problem, it's just a lack of creative thinking.

For a long time, TV was a white middle-class world. But we live in a multicultural society. Instead of thinking about diversity, we should be thinking about the word inclusion. Who are we including? If we include more perspectives, if we include more ideas, if we include different people, we get to see a diversity of perspectives. And we get to use the word diversity in the way it was intended to be used.

We need to start doing things differently. I hope that's what we show within The Outsiders? - that people have gone through this but in spite of all that they have ended up on the other side, creating things we can all enjoy consuming or taking part in.

Because I want to ensure that any child growing up in the UK - and the rest of the world - should be able to see people who inspire them and know they can be whatever they want to be.

Inside The Outsiders?

Ncuti Gatwa Photo: © 2021 Simon Frederick/Atelier Frederick/ AFL

Ncuti Gatwa

Ncuti is an exceptional star in the acting world who could go on and do anything. He's only limited by the writing he is given. An absolutely immense talent - he can do comedy, he can do straight drama. He could do it all. He was homeless and couch surfing, thinking he was going to have to go back up to Scotland and take a job in a supermarket.

He went into the Sex Education auditions thinking they hadn't given the character of Eric Effiong a description.

He was convinced - because this is the nature of the acting world for Black actors - that this character was going to end up white. So he went in there with no fear, no inhibitions and did his thing. He says on our show that he ended up twerking, and looked over to see the producers cracking up. He had an inkling then that he might get the role.

Sex Education absolutely changed his life. He went from being someone who was homeless to somebody world famous in that instant. And he will change people's lives. He is undoubtedly one of the stars of this series.

Reni Eddo-Lodge Photo: © 2021 Simon Frederick/Atelier Frederick/ AFL

Reni Eddo-Lodge

I love her dry wit. I first met Reni when she interviewed me just before her book came out, about my BBC series Black is the New Black.

And I think, just like I have done with all my series, she wrote something out of frustration. And her book, Why I'm No Longer Talking To White People About Race, just caught fire around the world in a way no one could ever have predicted. That is testament to this group of people who really are just doing stuff from their gut and putting it out there, but their talent is immeasurable.

Alex Scott Photo: SIMONFREDERICK-AFL

Alex Scott

I think Alex is an inspiration to a hell of a lot of people. Being a football pundit is not easy. Being the first female football pundit is incredible. And doing the other things she's now doing in not just staying there, but opening up her universe in a way that six-year-old Alex Scott could never have imagined, is inspirational to anybody.

Literally a minute into her interview, she broke down and really started to open up on things about her life that weren't in the research. Because it was that personal. And to her credit, she allowed us to keep it in.

Jamal Edwards Photo: © 2021 Simon Frederick/Atelier Frederick/ AFL

Jamal Edwards

Sometimes I like to think that Jamal is underrated. But then I look at all the things he's doing and the people he knows.

We started interviewing last November. He was really tired and had been working really hard. He told me he had never been to St Vincent [in the Caribbean]. And it's the next island up from my parents' island, Grenada. So I know it very well.

I told him he should go and he went and fell in love with the island where his parents are from.

We were talking just after Christmas. I rang him up and he was saying they were helping somebody buy an island! This guy grew up poor on a council estate and now he's helping someone buy an island. He is friends with Richard Branson and Prince Harry.

In a 15-year period he has gone from creating music videos on YouTube to having a production company and becoming a philanthropist. You can't make this stuff up.
The Outsiders? is available to stream on YouTube Originals
Simon Frederick was speaking to Adrian Lobb @adey70. This article is taken from the latest edition of The Big Issue magazine. If you cannot reach local your vendor, you can still click HERE to subscribe to The Big Issue today or give a gift subscription to a friend or family member. You can also purchase one-off issues from The Big Issue Shop or The Big Issue app, available now from the App Store or Google Play.

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YouTube series The Outsiders? profiles the Black creators shaping our culture - The Big Issue

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In this country we are told that you shouldn't stand out. That you should try to fit in. And fitting in for me as a Black person means being invisible.

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How I deal with microaggressions at work - BBC Ideas

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Tired of stereotyping and sweeping generalisations based on your race? This BBC Ideas video has some top tips for managing microagressions at work.

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We know intuitively that diversity matters. It's also increasingly clear that it makes sense in purely business terms. Our latest research finds that companies in the top quartile for gender or racial and ethnic diversity are more likely to have financial returns above their national industry medians. Companies in the bottom quartile in these dimensions are statistically less likely to achieve above-average returns. And diversity is probably a competitive differentiator that shifts market share toward more diverse companies over time.

While correlation does not equal causation (greater gender and ethnic diversity in corporate leadership doesn't automatically translate into more profit), the correlation does indicate that when companies commit themselves to diverse leadership, they are more successful. More diverse companies, we believe, are better able to win top talent and improve their customer orientation, employee satisfaction, and decision making, and all that leads to a virtuous cycle of increasing returns. This in turn suggests that other kinds of diversity-for example, in age, sexual orientation, and experience (such as a global mind-set and cultural fluency)-are also likely to bring some level of competitive advantage for companies that can attract and retain such diverse talent.

McKinsey has been examining diversity in the workplace for several years. Our latest report, Diversity Matters, examined proprietary data sets for 366 public companies across a range of industries in Canada, Latin America, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In this research, we looked at metrics such as financial results and the composition of top management and boards. The findings were clear:

Companies in the top quartile for racial and ethnic diversity are 35 percent more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians.

Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity are 15 percent more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians (exhibit).

Companies in the bottom quartile both for gender and for ethnicity and race are statistically less likely to achieve above-average financial returns than the average companies in the data set (that is, bottom-quartile companies are lagging rather than merely not leading).

In the United States, there is a linear relationship between racial and ethnic diversity and better financial performance: for every 10 percent increase in racial and ethnic diversity on the senior-executive team, earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) rise 0.8 percent.

Racial and ethnic diversity has a stronger impact on financial performance in the United States than gender diversity, perhaps because earlier efforts to increase women's representation in the top levels of business have already yielded positive results.

In the United Kingdom, greater gender diversity on the senior-executive team corresponded to the highest performance uplift in our data set: for every 10 percent increase in gender diversity, EBIT rose by 3.5 percent.

While certain industries perform better on gender diversity and other industries on ethnic and racial diversity, no industry or company is in the top quartile on both dimensions.

The unequal performance of companies in the same industry and the same country implies that diversity is a competitive differentiator shifting market share toward more diverse companies.

We're not suggesting that achieving greater diversity is easy. Women-accounting for an average of just 16 percent of the members of executive teams in the United States, 12 percent in the United Kingdom, and 6 percent in Brazil-remain underrepresented at the top of corporations globally. The United Kingdom does comparatively better in racial diversity, albeit at a low level: some 78 percent of UK companies have senior-leadership teams that fail to reflect the demographic composition of the country's labor force and population, compared with 91 percent for Brazil and 97 percent for the United States.

These numbers underline the work that remains to be done, even as the case for greater diversity becomes more compelling. We live in a deeply connected and global world. It should come as no surprise that more diverse companies and institutions are achieving better performance. Most organizations, including McKinsey, must do more to take full advantage of the opportunity that diverse leadership teams represent. That's particularly true for their talent pipelines: attracting, developing, mentoring, sponsoring, and retaining the next generations of global leaders at all levels of organizations. Given the higher returns that diversity is expected to bring, we believe it is better to invest now, since winners will pull further ahead and laggards will fall further behind.

This article is adapted from the report Diversity Matters (PDF-1,732KB), which was re-released in February 2015.

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New research makes it increasingly clear that companies with more diverse workforces perform better financially.

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Buidling an anti-racist organisation - Shereen Daniels 

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Buidling an anti-racist organisation - Shereen Daniels 

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The Anti-Racist organisation - Shereen Daniels

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Many organizations endeavored to institute structural changes to racial equity efforts following the morbid booster shot effect of George Floyd's murder on stagnant national conversations about race. Countless companies released statements, and some took actions that focused on anti-racism instead of mere inclusion. Yet, while attention to culture and new ideas can be modes of influence, organizations-whether dot org, dot gov or dot com-ultimately make their most significant changes through internal policy. Hiring and promotion policies determine an organization's makeup. And this past year's dramatic increase in remote work has demonstrated that institutions are not buildings or products-they are the talent: the talent that comes, the talent that stays, and the talent that leads. The importance of hiring and promotion in the workforce makes the problematic trope of the "hard-to-find" qualified Black candidate more than just a stereotypical cliché: its damaging effects are an enduring racist cog in the wheel of progress.

A Leader Says the Quiet Part Out Loud

Last spring during a Zoom meeting with staff, Wells Fargo's CEO Charles Scharf said that the bank had trouble reaching its diversity goals because there was simply not enough qualified Black talent, reiterating in a company-wide memo: "While it might sound like an excuse, the unfortunate reality is that there is a very limited pool of black talent to recruit from." Reuters reported that "Black senior executives across corporate America said they are frustrated by claims of a talent shortage, and called the refrain a major reason that companies have struggled to add enough racial and ethnic diversity to leadership ranks, despite stated intentions to do so." By September, Scharf had apologized, calling his comment "insensitive," and said that it reflected his "own unconscious bias."

This Is What Racism Looks Like

This series aims to explain how racism operates within organizations and create conversation about racial justice, dignity, and belonging. FOLLOW THIS SERIES

By using the language of "sensitivity," the apology reduces the racial bias and its harmful effects to a matter of hurt feelings. However, Scharf's words are more than indelicate; they harm worker confidence and sense of belonging. His words don't just reflect a largely accepted way of thinking, they reflect the harm potentially inflicted throughout an entire career-in hiring, promotions, and organizational culture.

A Common Refrain

The Wells Fargo CEO is not alone. The beliefs that qualified Black candidates are rare and that Black employees are not as qualified for promotion as their white colleagues are real and far more common than many may realize. Within multiple organizations, hiring managers claim that they couldn't diversify a program, team, panel, or advisory council because the Black candidates simply weren't there to be hired. Whether hampered by a "tight timeline" or daunted by the "extra effort" of finding a qualified Black candidate, they insist that organizational diversity is too hard to achieve, not because of the efforts being made to do so, but because of the talent pool.

Darrick Hamilton, professor of economics and urban policy at the New School, has rebuffed the claim of some technology companies that there is a severe shortage of qualified Black and Hispanic candidates in Silicon Valley. The " claim does not hold water," he contends, citing a USA Today report showing that Black and Hispanic computer scientists and computer engineers graduate from top universities at twice the rate that leading technology companies hire them. Dominant groups make the excuse that they "'searched but there was nobody qualified,'" but, Hamilton observes, "if you look at the empirical evidence, that is just not the case."

When business leaders ask if diversity should be more important than "merit," this query betrays the false impression that these goals are mutually exclusive. Several hiring agencies and DEI professionals supporting organizational change have confirmed that this refrain is commonplace. DEI consultant Tamara Osivwemu says, "It's definitely a trope. I've heard it from many clients, even those with the best of intentions-the ones really trying to do the work-who say, 'We want to get diverse candidates, we want to do our part, but we absolutely can't let our quality of work, or expectations suffer.'"

Foundational Fallacies

The foundation that both supports and perpetuates this set of harmful organizational practices is comprised of four primary fallacies.

Objectivity | The notion that there is a single, most-qualified candidate or employee is false. There is great variation in how two applicants with different experiences and skills would successfully perform the same role. Assigning a "most qualified" label is based on measures that are difficult to quantify and are nested in opinion. The rubrics used in hiring and promotion are highly subjective. This subjectivity can lead to false narratives that repeat stereotypes about applicant potential, assumptions often steeped in bias.

Meritocracy | Subjective criteria associated with likability still figure strongly into the hiring process, usually couched in the organizational language of " culture fit " and expressing a desire for candidates who are similar to the employer. Similarity plays a significant factor in this equation: more often than not, someone considered a "good culture fit" is someone "I'd want to grab a beer with," someone "like me."

Who is the "me" in this scenario? According to research on Fortune 500 companies, the majority of organizational hiring managers and leadership are white men. It is no surprise that a cycle of exclusion is perpetuated when most Americans have largely homogenous friend and peer groups and a large percentage of hiring happens through these networks. Per a LinkedIn survey, nearly 85 percent of jobs are filled through networking, making social capital, rather than so-called "meritocracy," a critical element of hiring and promotions.

Equal Goal Posts | If organizations find it challenging to identify qualified Black candidates, it might be because racial biases have skewed the perception of "qualified," moving the goalposts for both Black candidates and employees. A commonly held belief among many Black workers is that one needs to be twice as good as their white peers to simply be considered on par with them. Indeed, a six-year study found that people of color had to manage their careers more strategically than their white colleagues and to prove greater competence before winning promotions.

Bad Apples | Hiring and promotion practices are often executed at the individual level, which can lead to the misconception that problematic behaviors are one-off occurrences. It can be difficult to see the systemic nature of this sort of workplace racism. Akin to the " bad apple" concept in policing, many managers and those in leadership positions are comfortable considering these practices as merely individual occasions of unconscious bias rather than products of a system-wide failing.

The Individual Burden of Workplace Racism

Inconsistent levels of scrutiny imposed during the hiring process creates an additional burden for individual Black candidates. A Vox article chronicles how a white male candidate was ushered to the final round of a job search alongside a Black female candidate, despite the fact that he had less relevant and fewer years of experience, graduated from a far less prestigious university, and did not have an advanced degree. She faced additional hiring requirements -more interview rounds, screenings, writing samples, references-beyond those agreed upon with the client organization. These additional steps amounted to asking the Black candidate to "prove it again" and revealed the client's doubt regarding her qualifications; doubt not shown for the other candidate.

For many Black employees, this problematic behavior persists after being hired. A Harvard Business Review article shows this trend spans sectors and industries, where Black employees still face obstacles to advancement and are less likely than their white peers to be hired, developed, and promoted. Workplace discrimination adds stress and threatens an employee's sense of belonging and overall well-being, and Black workers navigate a work experience that is demonstrably worse even than that of other people of color. Many face explicit racism, on the rise over the past few years, as well as subtle racism on the job. The more subtle elements include "aversive" racism (when people avoid or change their behavior around those of different races) and "modern" racism (the belief that the ability of Black people to compete in the marketplace means discrimination no longer exists, that we live in a "post racial" society). In addition, there are microaggressions -brief and commonplace verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, both intentional and unintentional.

Additional assumptions that can burden Black employees include being perceived as the "diversity hire." When organizations suggest that diversity comes at the expense of quality, Black hires may feel a need to combat the belief that we are a company's diversity good deed, and awareness of this sentiment can have a detrimental effect on Black employees' sense of belonging and experience of the workplace.

Organizational Repercussions

The hard-to-find qualified Black candidate trope is a flavor of systemic racism that also limits an organization's incoming workforce diversity. It is understandably challenging to attract diverse talent without an existing heterogeneous staff. When organizations cannot provide examples of employees of color contributing, flourishing, and building their careers, applicants of color are justifiably skeptical of accepting a job within them.

Organizations that ignore workplace racism empower it, which hinders an employer's ability to be productive. Awareness of the competitive advantage of equity and diversity is rising, with many organizations regarding inclusion and diversity as critical enablers of growth. Research has demonstrated the return on investment (ROI) of racial equity. Yet, even with the business case made, lower hiring and promotion rates for Black candidates and employees persist.

Finally, it does white employees and hiring managers no favors to enable bad behavior. Overlooking racism among staff squanders a solid learning opportunity and sends the message that the behavior is condoned or, even worse, embraced. If people, Osivwemu says, "fall into the trap of thinking implicit bias is the friendly cousin of racism," they will have dressed it up as something far more innocuous than it is. In order to show up as committed and accountable problem solvers, white employees and leadership need to see racism in the workplace as their problem, not someone else's story with which to sympathize.

Introspection and Action

When attempting to come to terms with institutional racism, avoid simply hiring staff of color without addressing underlying issues that created a hostile office in the first place. Consider the case of the Bon Appetit test kitchen, which came under fire last summer when it was revealed that staff of color on their hugely popular YouTube channel were paid significantly less than their white colleagues-and, in some cases, not at all-for video appearances. While show producers diversified the chef lineup later that year, some were concerned that the fundamental issues like hostile workplace culture and pay inequity were not resolved.

There are no easy answers or quick fixes to address racial inequity in the workplace. It necessitates going beyond " woke-washing"- appropriating social activism language into marketing materials-or hollow gestures, to make sure efforts reflect solid commitments to explicit internal and external changes. Turn the lens inward by exploring internal policies, practices, and structures, as Demos did, when this two-decade-old public policy organization, embarked on an organization-wide racial equity transformation and published their process and lessons.

Other contextual and strategic resources include a McKinsey & Co. Race in the Workplace report published in 2021, which explores Black worker participation, representation, advancement, and a path forward, including actions companies can take. W. Kamau Bell's United Shades of America-which the host has called Sesame Street for grown-ups-is another introspection tool. And culture commentator Jay Smooth's TEDx talk, "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Discussing Race," is a great primer for broaching internal race-related conversations. He tackles the defensiveness that often accompanies these discussions via a reframe from talking about who someone is to what was said or done. He also addresses the false binary of being or not being a racist and discusses the general "goodness" of people as a practice, not a static state. Exploring multiple resources like these as a starting place is important, but so too is doing the work to chart your own path of discovery, change management, and organizational transformation.

Organizations embarking on a transformational journey can benefit from asking themselves some hard questions:

1. How is your organization combating the meritocracy myth at a structural level?

2. How could you dismiss the valuing of sameness and instead replace it with valuing those who can to existing organizational culture? How can you create what writer Brené Brown calls "transformative cultures" and eliminate or emend the "culture fit" component of hiring?

3. Are you willing to prioritize diversity targets in the same stringent way that a Fortune 500 company might prioritize sales goals? What is the level of accountability? Will leadership be removed if they fail to produce results?

True investment in creating a diverse and inclusive culture sometimes requires drastic changes. If your organization's make-up is 8 percent from underrepresented groups, but your aim is 30 percent, it may mean hiring exclusively from these populations until the goal is met. This could, in some cases, include members of dominant groups stepping up by stepping back. Reddit's cofounder, Alexis Ohanian, became an example of this when he stepped down from Reddit's board and specifically asked that the board replace him with a Black board member. "I believe resignation can actually be an act of leadership from people in power right now," he said of his decision. Less than a week after he stepped down, Reddit named entrepreneur and Y Combinator managing director Michael Seibel as the first Black board member in the company's history.

No one is quite sure why George Floyd's murder, and not the murders of countless other Black people, snapped the world, even if momentarily, out of a stupor of indifference. But it's important that leaders connect atrocities happening "out there" to what is happening within organizations, companies, and institutions. We should not squander this season of awareness, and we should recognize that this is about much more than an opening for incremental change. It is a chance to do what is indeed serious work. It's systems-level work. And it is forever work.

Read more stories by Autumn McDonald.

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The Racism of the 'Hard-to-Find' Qualified Black Candidate Trope (SSIR)

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Many organizations endeavored to institute structural changes to racial equity efforts following the morbid booster shot effect of George Floyd's murder on stagnant national conversations about race. Countless companies released statements, and some took actions that focused on anti-racism instead of mere inclusion.

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CIPD stories of lived experience

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How can organisations ensure their workplaces are anti-racist and how can people professionals show good allyship? The CIPD invited black HR professionals to talk about the change that is needed in order to stamp out racism in its myriad forms.

Organisations have a clear part to play in addressing racism and championing inclusive workplaces. From diversifying the talent pool, to creating safe spaces for employees to speak openly and honestly, these short videos include practical suggestions that can enable organisations to act with integrity and compassion.

Guided by first-hand insights, CIPD is equipping people professionals to bring cultural, behavioural and practical change to their workplaces.

Explore our selection of inclusion videos below.

Eight steps to help employers establish an employee resource group (ERG) for black and ethnic minority employees, including the business case for doing so

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Experts, leaders and practitioners tackle the key issues and questions around how to create a safe and inclusive workspace

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Building anti-racist and compassionate workplaces | CIPD

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How can organisations ensure their workplaces are anti-racist and how can people professionals show good allyship? The CIPD invited black HR professionals to talk about the change that is needed in order to stamp out racism in its myriad forms. Organisations have a clear part to play in addressing racism and championing inclusive workplaces.

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Race & Privilege: A Social Experiment | Regardless Of Race | CNA Insider

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Setting up and ERG for black & ethnic minority workers 

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Setting up and ERG for black & ethnic minority workers 

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CIPD anti racism hub

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About this guide

ERGs exist to provide support to their members, to create a sense of belonging that may not exist elsewhere in the organisation, to share their experiences with the organisation if they choose and deem it appropriate, and to provide feedback, recommendations and support on how to dismantle systemic and structural barriers that have hindered their development, progression and retention in the organisation.

This guide aims to help employers set up an ERG specifically for black and ethnic minority groups, to:

provide psychological safety to the group's members in the wake of very uncomfortable experiences

ensure their voices are heard - and listened to

provide support as an entity that adds value to the organisation

contribute to the implementation of the broader D&I strategy.

At this point, it's important to note that all employees, regardless of race or ethnicity, should be encouraged to participate in and support the ERG, with the understanding that they would work together towards the common goal(s) specific to that ERG.

The business case for setting up an ERG

Employee networks or employee resource groups (ERGs), representing different and specific groups from diverse communities, can help offer an inclusive environment in which everyone in an organisation feels like they belong.

ERGs can also provide a safe channel through which black and ethnic minority employees are able to express their voice and share their experiences with a sense that these experiences will be understood, heard, listened to and responded to without judgement or condescension, and with genuine concern and care by those who are more likely to have experienced similar issues and challenges themselves (both in and outside the workplace).

Setting up and establishing the framework to enable ethnic minority employees to connect through an ERG demonstrates that the employer recognises the need for under-represented groups to have access to social support. In the absence of trusted mechanisms to share their views in a physically and psychologically safe environment, ERGs are vital to the health and wellbeing of black and ethnic minority employees at work. Research linking the impact of mental health on performance and productivity has also been well documented (see the CIPD's Health and wellbeing at work survey for more information).

A company-sponsored and resourced ERG enables black and ethnic minority colleagues to feel they have a place in the organisation where they are welcome, and can be themselves without having to 'cover' (managing or downplaying one's differences). It can also provide a network for social and business connections, which may also drive personal development and a wider understanding of the organisation.

Organisations shouldn't leave it to the ERG to define or justify its value-add or existence. Historically, organisations have required networks - already made up of under-represented, non-majority, marginalised groups, individuals and cultures - to justify their existence or prove why there should be any investment made in them. This, in reality, is a form of microaggression. The executive leadership team, HR and D&I should already be able to proactively recognise the value of diversity and inclusion, and, therefore, place the black and ethnic minority ERG on a solid business platform.

Eight steps to set up an ERG for black and ethnic minority employees

1. Leaders, HR and internal D&I professionals from the majority group should articulate and write down the value, role and importance of black and ethnic minority networks not just as a support group, but also to the business.

Leaders should be able to link the role of the ERG to your existing D&I strategy and plan by:

reviewing the organisation's D&I strategy

seeing where and how the black and ethnic minority ERG can (and does) support the delivery of your strategy.

To develop the strategy, leaders should:

highlight the gaps that exist without this employee voice

recognise the opportunity to engage and, more directly, support under-represented groups within the organisation.

Make sure you identify the potential role and contribution of the ERG in highlighting practices, processes, behaviours and actions where systemic and structural barriers and racism exist within the organisation.

Draft the strategic input that ERGs can provide and the role they play, being specific in the examples and areas identified, and share with potential and actual network group members to find out what else they believe may need to be included and addressed to dismantle these barriers. Acknowledge that it's a start, and ask for their input to shape the content, delivery process and mechanism for achieving these goals.

2. Identify executive sponsors to formally support the ERG, to help demonstrate its importance and business value.

Sponsors, or senior allies, should preferably be selected from the business or organisation, and ideally be influential, credible leaders who are committed to D&I and willing to learn and support the ERG and the organisation along its journey.

One sponsor is sufficient; the individual doesn't have to be from an ethnic minority. Someone from the majority group may act as an ally (see the InterLaw Diversity Forum's guide to being an effective BAME ally for more information). The key considerations are that the person:

is willing to learn along the way

is committed to actively and visibly supporting the network (both internally and externally)

recognises the ERG's value to the organisation. This may mean speaking at some events and attending some meetings, for example.

3. Consider the budget and allocate financial resources to the ERG.

The ERG should be funded on an annual basis by the organisation in the same way that resources are allocated to strategic investments and day-to-day business operations and deliverables.

Consider using a proxy amount to represent the average cost of recruiting a key role in the organisation. The principle here is that, although there is a cost to recruitment, there's also a clear benefit: A key role will be delivered, with the contribution and performance of the new recruit adding value to the organisation's ability to achieve its objectives. This analogy applies to the ERG. There is a cost to helping ensure the group functions effectively, but there's a clear benefit to the contribution it provides to the organisation.

Factor into budget allocation the costs of external speakers, development programmes and modules and learning sessions, for example. Research suggests that black and ethnic minority colleagues value - and would like - further opportunities for learning and development (see Inclusive succession planning: A toolkit for employers).

Plan the organisation's resources to support the ERG, individuals and members. Imagine the ERG was a valuable customer or client:

How would you treat the ERG if it was a customer or client?

What would you do to put in place the support to enable the ERG to deliver the value, loyalty and return you may seek from respected, external clients and stakeholders?

4. Allocate time for ERG leaders and members to participate in company-supported activities as part of their role - within normal working hours.

It should not be expected or assumed that leaders and members of the ERG carry out their role and contribution to the ERG on top of their normal day jobs. It's important to position the ERG as a tangible, core, value-add activity to the business that's afforded time in its own right - in the same way that other business roles and projects are. It should not be treated as a voluntary contribution carried out in the member's 'spare time'.

In determining time allocation for ERG members, practically consider what the business can accommodate. For example, this could be from around two hours to half a day per month. Bear in mind this may be higher - for example, around one day a month in the early phases of set up. Make sure you agree this as a formal part of the individual member's tasks, targets or performance objectives and gain agreement from the department they're in.

The ERG leaders or members shouldn't be required to justify their participation in agreed ERG activities with their line managers when these meetings, activities and events should already have been agreed. Discuss and communicate this formally with line managers to ensure they're fully aware of the member's contribution to organisational goals in this way.

Ensure that members receive active support in the day-to-day so that they:

can participate fully in network activities as part of their wider organisational role

can do so in normal working hours

are not pressured or expected to carry these out in their own time.

5. If you set up one 'multicultural' network, make sure you recognise any different cultural sub-groups within.

Whilst many organisations set up multicultural networks to value and celebrate the diversity of backgrounds and the richness that various cultures bring, it's also important to recognise the uniqueness of each culture in its own right. For example in a 'BAME' network, there are common features but the experience of being 'black' is different to that of being 'Asian' or any other ethnic minority, so it may be important to separate out some groups.

In addition, intersectionality within these large groups exists, so homogeneity shouldn't be assumed - nor that a single ERG will automatically address the needs of any specific sub-groups within it. For example, in discussing black lives in the workplace, it's important for any focus group or listening session specifically wishing to engage with the ERG to distinguish black employees from other ethnic minorities, as some of the historical roots of racism and the experience of black people is different compared to other ethnic groups (whilst recognising that there are also individual experiences within these groups as well). Be prepared to split out certain groups where appropriate and avoid lumping all non-majority groups together.

6. Look into allying with other groups.

As the ERG becomes more formally established, it's likely to expand to promote further connections - with other members and other seniors, allies and other networks.

Consider allying with other cultural groups or diversity ERGs once the needs and contributions of black and ethnic minority colleagues have been agreed (as long as the link between both ERGs is strong and there's genuine interest in allyship).

7. Create a clear, psychologically safe channel for black colleagues to be able to share their lived experiences.

The willingness to hear and act on feedback of lived experiences demonstrates that the organisation embraces the value and credibility of the ERG and its members. ERG members can guide people professionals, leaders and line managers on how best to support them.

Sometimes, black and ethnic minority colleagues do not feel heard or safe when they approach HR to raise an issue of potential discrimination, for example, by a manager or colleague, or repeated micro-inequities (the subtle, often unconscious, messages that devalue, discourage and impair workplace performance, conveyed through facial expressions, tone of voice, gestures, choice of words, nuance and syntax). They often report feeling that HR supports the line manager or organisation, rather than fully considering the issue from the perspective of the employee with a view to addressing and taking real action to follow up.

By engaging with ERG members, HR can reflect on how their black and ethnic minority colleagues appraise the HR role, function and position in responding to - and taking effective action on - such issues when they're raised. This may highlight potential unconscious bias on the part of HR and/or weaknesses in HR policies/processes, as well as how they're implemented in practice to resolve such issues. ERG members can also advise HR on ways to make the process of reporting incidents more accessible, safe, equitable and fair - both improving the interaction and relationship between HR and black and ethnic minority colleagues, as well as a physically and psychologically safer environment. In this way, HR should consider how they play their part as active anti-racist allies while formalising this role within the organisation.

8. Consider providing ERG members with guidance on governance and implementation.

Provide ERG members with general and more detailed, specific guidance to help them with the practical governance and implementation of the ERG. This guidance could cover/outline:

a mission statement

purpose

objectives

governance and sponsorship

what the network does

how the network will communicate

how the network will operate

who can join the network

budget · what success looks like (see the CIPD's 2017 research for case studies of organisations that removed barriers to career progression faced by many BAME employees).

As the ERG becomes established, with some form of governance structure it can further contribute to the wider organisational D&I strategy/plan as a resource, recognising the benefit that diverse collective input and perspective can bring.

Next steps

An ERG can add value by providing support in the workplace, empowering members to share their lived experiences and their experience of the organisation's culture. The real benefit comes where the network is engaged:

at a strategic and business level in providing feedback on different aspects of the organisation's systemic and structural barriers that have resulted in the exclusion of black and ethnic minority colleagues from senior roles

in using their different perspective to review and interrogate existing HR, business and other processes through the employee life cycle, including attraction, recruitment and selection.

Organisations wishing to continue an anti-racism strategy should adopt the following mindset and approach after reading this guide:

Conduct further research. The CIPD's D&I topic page and anti-racism hub provide a wealth of evidence, resources and guidance to support you in fostering an anti-racism strategy.

Articulate how a black and ethnic minority ERG adds value, and how it supports the D&I strategy and agenda.

Engage with the potential network members to build on this and develop their specific requests, needs and contribution to the organisation.

In partnering with a supportive, senior ally in the role of an executive sponsor, listening to anecdotes and experiences and formally taking action to address and resolve each issue, there's a tremendous opportunity to transform the organisation into one where all colours and cultures can feel safe, that they can belong, and are positively contributing to truly making and maintaining your organisation as a great place to be, and work, for all people.

See how the CIPD champions racial diversity and inclusion through their own employee resource group, EmbRACE.

Petunia Thomas, MBA CPCC

Petunia is an independent consultant who works with businesses, teams and leaders to implement strategies for change. She designs and delivers training, modules and workshops covering inclusive leadership for culture and behavioural change, race fluency for leaders, reverse and reciprocal mentoring, as well as career sponsorship and black and ethnic minority talent programmes.

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How to set up an ERG for black and ethnic minority employees | CIPD

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ERGs exist to provide support to their members, to create a sense of belonging that may not exist elsewhere in the organisation, to share their experiences with the organisation if they choose and deem it appropriate, and to provide feedback, recommendations and support on how to dismantle systemic and structural barriers that have hindered their development, progression and retention in the organisation.

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Definitions and explanations added by @SharonGChiara

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"Please just think about how MILLIONS of black people had to die in this country before you decided to care about race," the writer Megan Reid tweeted on May 31.

It was three months after Ahmaud Arbery was shot by a former police officer while jogging, two weeks after Breonna Taylor was shot and killed in her home by the police, and six days after George Floyd died under the knee of a police officer.

These names are just a few of the many Black Americans who have been killed by the police in the past decade alone. But it was Floyd's death that intensely woke America up to police brutality and the horror of systemic racism that has seeped into America's underbelly since slavery began in the US four centuries ago.

-Megan Reid (@meg_r) May 31, 2020

The Black Lives Matter movement, which originated in July 2013 after George Zimmerman was acquitted for the killing of Trayvon Martin, is out in full force across the nation and worldwide.

But for a non-Black person to fully understand anti-racism, they must endeavor to grasp the underlying context of Reid's Tweet: Black lives (and voices) have been marginalized and silenced to the point of death for centuries. They've been trying to tell us about the deadly problem of institutionalized racism; the white community has not been listening to them and has not been acting to fix it.

Racism against Black Americans isn't perpetuated among white Americans alone, and Black Americans are not the only racial group to suffer from racism. That is to say, racism and anti-racism exist in multitudes. But it was white European colonialists who were at the helm of slavery 400 years ago, laying the foundation for today's structural racism that everyone is born into.

In researching and writing this article, I was transported back to my readings and studies on colonization and racism from college African American literature classes. I realized with discomfort that I shouldn't have stopped my education on the subject just because I no longer had a formal class - maybe I sooner would have understood how racism has embedded and benefited my daily life. But I also realized that my white privilege is not a burden to bear, but a way for me to enact change.

The first step is learning what racism and anti-racism are, what it means to be anti-racist, and how to take action. The guideline below is just a beginning point of understanding it all.

What is anti-racism?

"Anti-racism is an active and conscious effort to work against multidimensional aspects of racism," Georgetown African American studies professor Robert J. Patterson told Business Insider.

Patterson, who wrote " Destructive Desires: Rhythm and Blues Culture and the Politics of Racial Equality," added that we need to collectively shift our thinking of racism as conscious, intentional, overt actions to unconscious, covert, and unintentional actions. He added that while racism can happen individually, it often happens institutionally.

When abolitionist Anthony Benezet founded America's first abolition society in 1775, it may have signaled the first known act of anti-racism in America. Anti-racism has its foundations in abolition and the post-liberation fight for structural change as well as 20th-century civil-rights movements, Malini Ranganathan, a faculty team lead at the Anti-Racist Research & Policy Center at American University, told Anna North of Vox.

But it's difficult to trace the exact origin of the term "anti-racism."

Merriam-Webster will tell you the first known use of "anti-racist" was in 1943 - the same year Marxist historian Herbert Aptheker dismantled the longstanding argument that African Americans accepted slavery in his book "American Negro Slave Revolts."

Aptheker, who later became the literary executor for author and civil-rights activist W.E.B. DuBois, subsequently overturned the then widely held idea that all whites universally accepted racism in his book "Anti-Racism in US History: The First 200 Years."

Today, anti-racism is perhaps most closely associated with Ibram X. Kendi, the founding director of American University's anti-racist research center (who is now moving to Boston University to open an anti-racist center there), who popularized the concept with his 2019 book " How to be an Anti-Racist." In it, he wrote: "The only way to undo racism is to consistently identify and describe it - and then dismantle it."

What does it mean to be anti-racist?

You don't need to be free of racism to be an anti-racist, Ijeoma Oluo, author of " So You Want to Talk About Race," once tweeted. "Anti-racism is the commitment to fight racism wherever you find it, including in yourself. And it's the only way forward," she wrote.

Racism views a racial group as culturally or socially inferior. An anti-racist, per Kendi's book, is "one who is expressing the idea that racial groups are equals and none needs developing, and is supporting policy that reduces racial inequality."

But to understand what an anti-racist is, one must also understand what an anti-racist is not: a non-racist. There is no such thing as a non-racist, Kendi writes, because it signifies neutrality.

"One endorses either the idea of a racial hierarchy as a racist, or racial equality as an anti-racist," he says. " One either believes problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an anti-racist. One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a racist, or confronts racial inequities, as an anti-racist."

Patterson, the Georgetown professor, said that people "collapse identity and behavior" when they misconstrue not being racist as being anti-racist. In the process, they underappreciate how action signals anti-racism and underestimate their own influence in dismantling the systems that support racism.

Patterson said Kendi's view of anti-racism highlights the way racism is socialized into behaviors - how racial inequities and disparities are embedded in private and public life. We must unravel those behaviors by thinking about and pulling back assumptions we make about "the naturalness of things," he said.

If your default thinking is "I'm not racist," a more informed point of view would be recognizing how you're informed and influenced by the embeddedness of race and institutionalized racism.

"It's really critically thinking about and analyzing how race matters in seemingly nonracial context," he said.

To be an anti-racist, Kendi said in an interview with Vox, is to admit when we're being racist and then challenging those racist ideas.

"We adopt anti-racist ideas that say the problem is power and policy when there is inequity, not people." That is, it is the system, not a racial group, that needs to be changed. "And then we spend our time, we spend our funds, we spend our energy challenging racist policy and power."

What is the difference between an ally and an anti-racist?

"I think that people think that racism is Black people's problem," Patterson said.

It is not. Misunderstanding whose problem racism is and who can fix it misplaces the burden of responsibility to solving racism on to the disadvantaged group.

"Racism is a white problem," Robin DiAngelo, sociologist and the white anti-racist author of " White Fragility," told The Guardian in a February 2019 interview. "It was constructed and created by white people and the ultimate responsibility lies with white people. For too long we've looked at it as if it were someone else's problem, as if it was created in a vacuum."

That leaves the onus on white people for personal accountability: Understanding and recognizing the economic and social benefits and privileges this system bestowed upon them (including this writer) and taking action to transform these conditions.

This involves getting past white shame and guilt. While white people today didn't create racism, activist Ben O'Keefe tells Vox, they can choose to admit that they benefit from it and acknowledge their power in changing conditions.

"We don't need you to carry the burden of your privilege," he said, addressing the white community. "We need you acknowledge it and to use your privilege, promote good, and to fight oppression."

But in using white privilege for different vantage points to talk about anti-racist practices, it's important to not speak for Black people's experiences, Patterson said. That "kind of reinforces the idea that Black people can't speak for themselves or that you need a white voice to authenticate what the Black perspective is," he said.

The act of doing also marks the difference between an ally and an anti-racist. An ally, Patterson said, is someone who supports the cause and is interested in the issues, but doesn't as explicitly engage in actions. "An anti-racist is more actively fighting against the structures, et cetera, that perpetuate racism, whereas an ally might be in a more supportive cast role," he added.

To be clear: It is action that lies at the heart of anti-racism. As Kendi wrote in a December 2018 article for The Guardian, "A racist or anti-racist is not who we are, but what we are doing in the moment."

Where can I find anti-racist resources?

-Ijeoma Oluo (@IjeomaOluo) June 1, 2020

How do you take the step from ally to anti-racist, moving beyond the black squares of Instagram to doing real work? One must move past the biggest obstacle: feeling that racism is too big a problem to tackle.

Thinking you can't do enough to enact change, Patterson said, leads to inaction. Instead, think about the ways you may participate in the problem, your sphere of influence, and how your conversations can reshape views.

"What happens besides a hashtag, a tweet, an Instagram post?" Patterson asked. "And what is the work that you are doing in these spaces where you can really have influence?"

Keep in mind that anti-racism isn't about sitting on information, but acting on it.

Here's where you can start.

Educate yourself. Read about privilege, histories of race, and oppressed voices with the help of anti-racism reading lists from publications like The Strategist and Time.

Identify steps to take by talking to friends, family, and peers.

Check out this Google Doc of anti-racism resources.

Volunteer or donate to organizations fighting racist policies that create and support racial inequality.

Call out racism when you see it and espouse anti-racist ideas to help change racist policies.

Patterson said all these different steps will create an arsenal of demonstrative ongoing interest that isn't just "for the hashtag." For example, consider how these actions would play out when you're in a board room discussing diversity and inclusion or in a college-admissions committee discussing test scores and supposedly objective measures, Patterson said.

It took too long for non-Black people to catch on to the Black Lives Matter movement. But now that the white community is listening, we all need to recognize our power in creating change. And Kendi said it best in his interview with Boston University earlier this week: "You have to believe change is possible in order to bring it about."

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What it really means to be an anti-racist, and why it's not the same as being an ally

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"Please just think about how MILLIONS of black people had to die in this country before you decided to care about race," the writer Megan Reid tweeted on May 31.

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Useful examination of what it means and the differences shared by @SharonGChiara

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Ibram X. Kendi is a black man and an award-winning scholar who's studied the history of racist ideas. Conventional wisdom would have you believe that Kendi, by virtue of his identity and life experiences, couldn't be racist himself.

In his 2019 book, How to Be an Antiracist, Kendi doesn't just upend this assumption - he obliterates it with an unflinching examination of the racist ideas and beliefs he previously held, before embracing antiracist values and views.

He writes about once believing that education and hard work would "uplift" black people, no matter the policies that specifically made such success improbable for many black Americans. He confesses to internalizing racist ideas about black youth behavior as a teen, only to realize that the "mind can never be antiracist" when it thinks there is something wrong with an entire racial group.

Kendi's surprising, arguably risky self-critical approach illustrates how easily racist thoughts take root and how they're linked to policies that create harmful social, economic, cultural, and political disparities. One reason racism persists is because most of us cannot see as clearly as Kendi how the mind - and body politic - casually harbors racist ideas.

Kendi argues that without the capacity for honest self-reflection and critical thinking, we'll remain a nation of Americans who, like President Trump, swear they " don't have a racist bone" in their body all while racism and white supremacy persist unchecked, destroying communities and lives.
"I wanted to convey that this sort of striving to be antiracist is an ongoing journey."
As the public searches for fresh answers about how to end institutional racism in the wake of George Floyd's death, who died after an officer kneeled on his neck for nearly 9 minutes, it should turn to Kendi's book for essential insight. Using his own personal evolution as a guide, Kendi lays out the steps we can all take toward confronting the racist ideas we've held and what's required of us to become antiracist instead.

"I think first and foremost I wanted to convey that this sort of striving to be antiracist is an ongoing journey," says Kendi. "I realized that in many ways my sort of story or journey, tracks the journey that many people have gone through or are going through ... I wanted to model for people what each and every one of us can do and should do in terms of how deeply critical we need to be of ourselves."

Below are six steps you can follow:

1) Understand the definition of racist.

Conversations about racism often suffer when participants can't define the meaning of the word. Merriam-Webster defines racism as "a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race." Few people would admit that definition reflects their views but nevertheless consciously or unwittingly believe in or endorse racist ideas.

Kendi goes further, defining the word racist as: "One who is supporting a racist policy through their actions or inaction or expressing a racist idea." This incisive definition forces the reader to hold themselves accountable for their ideas and actions.

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An antiracist, writes Kendi, is "One who is supporting an antiracist policy through their actions or expressing an antiracist idea."

2) Stop saying "I'm not racist."

It's not enough to say, "I'm not racist," and often it's a self-serving sentiment. Kendi says people constantly change the definition of what's racist so it doesn't apply to them. If you're a white nationalist who's not violent, says Kendi, then you might see the Ku Klux Klan as racist. If you're a Democrat who thinks there's something culturally wrong with black people, then racists to you might be people who are Republicans.

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By reflexively defining yourself as not racist, or beyond racism's firm grip, you're making it impossible to see how your own ideas, thoughts, and actions could be indeed racist. Moreover, being antiracist means moving beyond the "not racist" defense and instead embracing and articulating decidedly antiracist views and beliefs.

So, for example, if you're a white liberal who considers herself "not racist" but you refuse to send your child to a local public school because the population is predominantly African American, that choice is racist. The antiracist position would be to at least consider enrolling your child and/or learning about the disparities and inequities affecting that school in order to fight them.

3) Identify racial inequities and disparities.

Racism yields racial inequities and disparities in every sector of private and public life. That includes in politics, health care, criminal justice, education, income, employment, and home ownership. Being antiracist means learning about and identifying inequities and disparities that give, in particular, white people, or any racial group, material advantages over people of color.
"What an anti-racist does first and foremost is identify racial inequities."
When Social Security was created in 1935, for example, it excluded domestic and agricultural workers, the majority of whom were black. While the Social Security Administration denies racial bias was a factor in that decision, it still meant that black workers had less opportunity over the course of decades to accumulate savings and wealth compared to white workers. Other policies that disproportionately provided " tax-funded wealth-building opportunities" to white Americans produced similar results for black Americans.

"What an anti-racist does first and foremost is identify racial inequities," says Kendi.

So a racist analysis would ascribe poor or worse outcomes for black Americans to the group's behavior or characteristics. An antiracist analysis would make clear that the problem is not the group, but the policies that put racial groups at a distinct disadvantage.

4) Confront the racist ideas you've held or continue to hold.

Once you've begun identifying racial disparities, examine whether your own views, beliefs, or voting patterns have justified racial inequality.

If you're the parent who won't send a child to a predominantly black school, consider how that choice influences your views on discipline policies and charter schools, policy issues that are deeply intertwined with race and racism. Do you vote for school board or city council candidates who don't want to address educational disparities or actually work against local advocates trying to increase educational equity? Do you know that funding policies affect how resources are allocated to schools and why those practices can create racial disparities? To many people, these realities probably seem disconnected from whether or not they're racist, but Kendi argues that remaining ignorant about them, or declining to change policies that produce disparities, is not an option for someone who wants to be antiracist.

Kendi's own journey demonstrates that people can hold racist ideas without realizing they're biased - and while they embrace ideas that are antiracist. If you don't know whether your beliefs or views are racist, listen to frontline racial justice advocates, activists, and organizations that have outlined antiracist positions and policies. Let that listening prompt deeper reflection about why you've believed in certain ideas.

Related Video: How to donate to support the Black Lives Matter movement

5) Understand how your antiracism needs to be intersectional.

Kendi argues that racist ideas and policies target many different people within racial groups. A policy that creates inequality between white and Native American people, for example, also yields inequality between white men and Native American women. If one believes that black men are superior to black women, then that person won't be able to see how certain ideas and policies disproportionately affect black women in harmful ways.

Because race intersects with multiple aspects of people's identities, including their gender, sexuality, and ethnicity, it's imperative to use an intersectional approach when being antiracist.

6) Champion antiracist ideas and policies.

One cannot strive to be antiracist without action, and Kendi says that one way to act is by supporting organizations in your community that are fighting policies that create racial disparities. You can volunteer for or fund those organizations. Kendi also recommends using one's power or getting into a position of power to change racist policies in any setting where they exist - school, work, government, and so on. The point is to commit to some form of action that has the potential to change racist policies.

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Kendi realizes the risk of openly discussing one's own racist ideas or beliefs, and knows that vulnerability can be weaponized against someone. He also has a unique vantage point on this question.

"As someone whostudies racist ideas and upwards of 500 years of people weaponizing racist ideas ... no matter what antiracists say or do, racists are going to figure out a way to weaponize their words and their deeds against them," he says.

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Given that inevitability, Kendi believes in the power of being vulnerable as an antiracist, because it gives the listener an opportunity to be similarly capable of self-critique.

"There are many Americans who believe sincerely that they're not racist," he says.

Kendi's hope is that they'll be open to recognizing the ways in which they're racist if others around them show them what that looks like.

UPDATE: June 2, 2020, 9:30 a.m. PDT This story was originally published in 2019, and updated in 2020.

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6 ways to be antiracist, because being 'not racist' isn't enough

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Ibram X. Kendi is a black man and an award-winning scholar who's studied the history of racist ideas. Conventional wisdom would have you believe that Kendi, by virtue of his identity and life experiences, couldn't be racist himself.

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The importance of considering Intersectionality

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The increasing focus on the pay gap and pay gap reporting in local and global organisations across the UK has shed light on the challenges faced by business and government leaders looking to address this key indicator of workplace equality. Reports such as the one written earlier this year by the provide evidence that black women have the lowest probability of being amongst the UK's top earners. Staggeringly, less than 0.1% of black women are in the top 1% of earners. It points also to a feature of intersectionality: black women face a double-barrelled negative impact of both gender inequality and racial inequality.

If the drive for creativity and innovation in the world of work and the need for increased and sustained productivity is to be genuinely successful, all elements and aspects of the world of work must be representative of society and the communities served. The commercial and economic benefits of have long been eschewed. Whilst diversity goes beyond the physical features of your people, they nevertheless are a significant and contributing enabler. The absence of the black woman in the top percentages of earners in the UK must hold a hidden and costly disadvantage to the success of organisations.

The size of the challenge means that this will not be an easy one to tackle. Business Leaders can, however, take some definitive steps forward by doing the following:

1. Assess the gap in your organisation

It's one thing to read the useful surveys and reports produced by the leading consultancies and business schools, but it's another to fully understand the lay of the land in your own organisation. Start by assessing the gap. Charge your HR Departments and your Analytics Teams to take a deep dive into the data in your business so that it shows who earns what and for how long, including the length of tenure in role and/or in organisation and performance ratings history.

2. Set a target and incentivise against it

The Financial Reporting Council - FRC has made it a requirement for companies employing more than 250 employees to publish and make public Gender Pay Gap reports. The CIPD has this year requested in this report that the Government makes it mandatory for employers in the FTSE 100 to report on their Ethnicity Pay Gaps from 2023 onward. This is helpful and will influence many organisations. The positive impact of this will however not be fully experienced unless the CEOs and the leadership teams of the organisations set targets for themselves and their teams and incentivise against them. There is a saying: "you measure what you treasure". Set targets that are meaningful, stretching and realistic; targets and incentives that speak to your purpose, your values and the needs of the end-users of your products and services.

3. Hold your search firms accountable

The more senior the role the more likely you are to engage a qualified Executive Search Firm with a great reputation. Encourage them to present diverse shortlists and be explicit about the requirement to see black women on the list. Be supportive and patient in response to any requests to have the deadlines for the submission of shortlists extended as they in turn challenge themselves to step outside the traditional boundaries to be creative with the sources from which they find talent.

4. Challenge tradition

Be willing to challenge your own dearly held traditions too. With the opportunities that technology presents, be willing to explore the viability of delivery in the role in a way that doesn't meet traditional expectations. Import talent from outside of the UK and be willing to flex your organisation's international compensation policy and engage your lawyers internally and/or externally to ensure no elements of the law are being broken. To drive decisive change for good and in an area as challenging as pay, it will take a determined and committed leader who not only believes it makes good business sense but also believes that it's absolutely the right thing to do to close the pay gap.

5. Accelerate development

Not only is the black woman less likely to be in the top percentages of earners, but she is also the least likely to benefit from the positive impact of career development and training in organisations, as highlighted in this McKinsey Women in the Workplace report . Therefore, in addition to being willing to hire externally at the top of your organisation and/or into critical decision-making roles, make it imperative to accelerate the development of the black woman in your organisation. Nominate her for external leadership programmes targeted specifically at the black woman and demonstrate an interest in her learning and how this learning can be translated into a win-win for her and the organisation. Second her to high-profile projects and ensure she has the resources to deliver on the project goals successfully. Be proactive in ensuring that the black woman in your organisation is comprehensively discussed at your talent and career reviews and request tangible evidence to back up any claims by her direct line managers that she may not be at present 'ready' for that promotion.

6. Sponsor over mentor

Whilst mentoring is a highly beneficial form of development and should be put in place for all talent and, in particular, the black woman in your organisation, having a Sponsor can be more effective. This is because the key role of a Sponsor is to proactively promote her advancement, raise her profile and personally back her for the opportunities that emerge in the organisation and even outside of it. When a black woman is sponsored by a significantly more senior individual in her organisation, she is more likely to attain that promotion faster, be seconded to those high profile and career-defining company project teams and be invited to forums and key decision-making meetings, all of which will count in her favour when the opportunities for promotion come.

Addressing the ethnicity pay gap effectively can seem daunting because of the many different aspects and levers that can and must be pulled to do so. This should however not deter a leader who knows and believes that the keys to change lie in his, hers or their hands. What it takes to genuinely tackle it is belief, decisiveness, tangible action and a willingness to stand up and be counted.
Yetunde Hofmann is a Board level executive leadership coach and mentor, global change, inclusion and diversity expert, author of Beyond Engagement and founder of SOLARIS - a pioneering leadership development programme for black women. Find out more at http://www.solarisleadership.com/.

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Black Women Are Least Likely To Be In UK's Top Earners - Here's How We Tackle It

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The increasing focus on the pay gap and pay gap reporting in local and global organisations across the UK has shed light on the challenges faced by business and government leaders looking to address this key indicator of workplace equality. Reports s

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Yetunde Hofmann in Training Zone

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How L&D can develop more black women into leaders

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Learning and development managers can contribute to the development of black

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Shared by Maureen Ghirelli

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I promised a colleague I would put this together so here it is. Whilst Whiteness Studies is multidisciplinary, I have given vague subheadings to help direct people to themes they are interested in ... all these texts may well fit under multiple headings.

bell hooks, 1988. (Photo Credit: Montikamoss / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0)

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Talking About Whiteness: A Bibliography. I promised a colleague I would put this together so here it is. Whilst Whiteness Studies is multidisciplinary, I have given vague....

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Why is black talent opting out of Corporate America?

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Why is black talent opting out of Corporate America?

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Korn Ferry

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LSE shared by Mark Roberts HR Interim Networking Group

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This web page will outline in detail the process of an Equality Impact Assessment. Please find the guidance structured in a frequently asked questions format.

In response to Covid-19 we have created guidance on completing Returning to campus and Covid-19 Equality Impact Assessments and provided a template of considerations that should be taken into account. Additionally, we have commissioned AdvanceHE to deliver comprehensive EIA training. You can view a recorded session here.

Please see our prioritisation guidance. This document will help you determine if your policy or procedure needs urgent assessment.

Please see our Equality Impact Assessment Template.

If you need assistance completing the Equality Impact Assessment, please see the annotated version of the template.

If you would like a digital copy of a delegate pack from our event that took place 8 July 2019, please click here. For the most updated guidance, please use the links above.

If you need any help, please contact us.

An Equality Impact Assessment, or EIA, is a way of ensuring LSE's policies, practices, services and functions are the very best that they can be by checking:

That they do not inadvertently disadvantage anyone, and

That wherever possible, they proactively advance equality, diversity and inclusion.

For example, a decision to move a team to a different office on a different campus may seem like it impacts the same way on everyone, but actually:

Staff members with a physical disability will need to know about the accessibility of the new office to ensure they can get in, evacuation procedures to ensure they can get out in an emergency, the location of the new office to test their new commute etc...

Staff members with certain mental health issues may feel more anxious about the move, they may have their commute and working arrangements mapped out to suit the current office and the new location will require changes

Staff members with childcare and/or caring responsibilities may need to think about changes to their commute, and therefore changes to daycare locations

Staff with particular religions and beliefs may need to know about faith provision, for example a prayer room in the new building, or local places of worship near the new office

And there are likely to be other considerations as well.
The purpose of an EIA is to pre-empt any issues: anticipate what the impact of the policy is on different groups of staff, students and prospective staff and students, mitigate any negatives and maximise any positives.

Equality Impact Assessment (EIA) processes have been developed in response to legislation - the Equality Act 2010, and the Act requires LSE to specifically consider:

Age - including older and younger people

Disability, including those with physical disabilities, unseen disabilities and mental health issues

Sex- both men and women

Gender reassignment or gender identity, including trans staff and students who have transitioned, are thinking of transitioning or are in the process of transitioning from one gender to another, and also non-binary staff and students (those who do not identify with, or reject gender labels)

Marriage and civil partnership

Pregnant people and those on maternity leave

Race and ethnicity, which includes a person's nationality, colour, native language, culture and geographic origin

Religion and belief - which includes those with no religion or belief

Sexual orientation- including gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer and straight staff and students

It's also important to think, where possible, how these characteristics intersect. For example, a Black woman will have different experiences to a Black man, and considering how gender and ethnicity intersect may impact on how policies are developed and implemented.

Ideally an equality impact assessment (EIA) should be conducted as early as possible, to enable any identified issues to be mitigated or avoided altogether.

This is usually a good way to save money as well: it's easier to create something that's accessible for everyone from scratch, rather than having to make changes later.

It can also save potential embarrassment, even in projects with equality at their heart, like this accessible toilet.....with steps!

If you are developing a new policy, process, function or service, or you are reviewing an existing policy, process, function or service, conduct an EIA.
Existing policies, processes, functions and services

Eventually, LSE wants to ensure that everything has been equality impact assessed, but that will take time.

In the first instance we want to prioritise those policies, processes, functions and services which are likely to have the biggest impact on different groups, and start there, whilst developing a timeline for other areas.

A fundamental part of EIA is evidence, and involvement from relevant protected groups. This might include:

statistical data-survey data-focus groups and interviews

complaints and feedback forms

other qualitative research-feedback from relevant networks and societies-evidence from other universities (and other organisations from outside the sector) where they have similar issues

Consider what information you already have and whether that is enough. If you need more, think about where you might be able to get further information internally, and externally.
The EDI team has a planned programme of engagement with our internal staff networks to manage the additional workload placed on them, and coordinate what is being reviewed. If you have a policy, practice, function or service that you would like our staff networks to feedback on, then please get in contact with the EDI team, and we will facilitate the review.

The whole point of equality impact assessments (EIAs) is to plan things inclusively, and so any changes resulting from the EIA are likely to be easy to build into plans and actions as they are developed. That's why it's important to conduct the EIA as soon as possible.

Where you are conducting an EIA on an existing policy, process, function or service, be prepared for actions to arise. Small tweaks and changes can probably be implemented easily, but where bigger issues are identified they may require further thought. You need to take proportionate and reasonable steps to rectify issues identified, but where there are significant budgetary and resource implications, speak to the EDI team to plan a suitable way forward.

1. Have a look at our full information, advice and guidance

2. Watch our webinars on how to conduct an equality impact assessment. These are listed above.

3. List, and then prioritise your team's policies, processes, functions and services. If you want some support, contact the EDI team and we can come along to one of your team meetings to help you. Our email is edi@lse.ac.uk.

4. Start conducting equality impact assessments. Remember that you know the policy best - be methodical and take your time, and you'll be able to identify equality, diversity and inclusion issues.

5. If you have lots of questions, or want to check you're doing it right please email the EDI team.
Once you've done one, it will get easier, and the EDI team can provide support and feedback.

Remember

Equality impact assessments are a legal requirement (we need to demonstrate 'due regard' to equality in all that we do) but that's not why we're doing them. We all want to make LSE the very best it can be, and any changes you make will ultimately benefit everyone. So have some fun, be creative and make our policies, processes, functions and services fully inclusive and sector-leading.

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London School of Economics and Political Science

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How to undertake an equality impact assessment

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This web page will outline in detail the process of an Equality Impact Assessment. Please find the guidance structured in a frequently asked questions format. In response to Covid-19 we have created guidance on completing Returning to campus and Covid-19 Equality Impact Assessments and provided a template of considerations that should be taken into account.

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Race in the Workplace
The McGregor-Smith review

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Baratunde Thurston recommended by Alex Killick @killick_alex

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By subscribing, you understand and agree that we will store, process and manage your personal information according to our Privacy Policy

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Baratunde Thurston: How to deconstruct racism, one headline at a time

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Baratunde Thurston explores the phenomenon of white Americans calling the police on Black Americans who have committed the crimes of ... eating, walking or generally "living while Black." In this profound, thought-provoking and often hilarious talk, he reveals the power of language to change stories of trauma into stories of healing -- while challenging us all to level up.

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Government report from Behavioural Insights Team

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This document provides an overview of research into the design and efficacy of unconscious bias and diversity training.

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Details

Unconscious bias and diversity training commonly feature in organisations' strategies for creating a fairer and more inclusive workplace. It is easy to procure this training - training providers are many and varied - but evidence that their training content and techniques 'works' is lacking. This document provides an overview of research into the design and efficacy of unconscious bias and diversity training. This and other research reviews concludes that training interventions do not seem to be effective at improving diversity outcomes within workplaces.

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Unconscious bias and diversity training - what the evidence says

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We use cookies to collect information about how you use GOV.UK. We use this information to make the website work as well as possible and improve government services. This document provides an overview of research into the design and efficacy of unconscious bias and diversity training.

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Organizational diversity learning framework 

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Organizational diversity learning framework 

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Emerald

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Organizational diversity learning framework: going beyond diversity training programs

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Organizational diversity learning framework: going beyond diversity training programs - Author: Yuka Fujimoto, Charmine E.J. Härtel

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Being an ally - Dana the Trainer

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A special note from Dana: There were 4 "Is This Ok?" sessions run over the course of a week so you're probably wondering why there's only one recording available. The truth is that I've chosen to only share the session that my favorite people attended. No, no!

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Harvard Business Review shared by Human Times

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Idea in Brief

The Problem

A person's social class origins leave a cultural imprint that has a lasting effect. U.S. workers from lower social-class origins are 32% less likely to become managers than people from higher social-class origins.

The Prevalence

This disadvantage is even greater than that experienced by women compared with men (27%) or Blacks compared with whites (25%). And it prevails in every major economy in the world.

The Solution

To combat social class disadvantage, companies should add social class to diversity goals, avoid degree inflation, promote candidates from all departments, and build a cohesive organizational culture.

I once had a student in my executive education class, a managing director at a global bank, who told a heartrending story of her first steps toward professional success. As a teenager she had become a mother, and to make ends meet she'd worked cleaning offices. Even though she was dealing with substantial hardship at home-caring for a young child while defending against an abusive partner-she always brought a spark to her work, and soon she caught the attention of a manager at the bank. Sensing her potential, the manager encouraged her to apply for an entry-level white-collar job at the bank and to pursue training in finance-developmental steps that won her admission into the bank's professional ranks and then allowed her to start rising up the managerial ladder. By the time she and I met, she held a top job negotiating massive debt deals and was working alongside colleagues who had started in positions right out of elite universities. The work she was doing required grit, courage, and a deep human understanding-qualities that I venture are more common among the stars of custodial crews than among the middling members of junior-analyst groups hired each year out of universities.

Unfortunately, her story is the exception, not the rule, as I've learned through years of teaching managers, working with companies, and researching the role of lower social-class origins on behaviors and outcomes at work.

When I refer to people of lower social-class origins, I mean those who through the conditions of birth and upbringing have had relatively less access to money, to contacts who promote their upward mobility, and to the cultural know-how necessary to get ahead in schools and companies. Those of us who study social class origins often measure them along several dimensions: family income during early years, parents' level of education, and parents' occupations.

A person's social class origins leave a cultural imprint that has a lasting effect, even if the individual gains money or status later in life. Class origins certainly have an effect in the workplace. In recent research, my colleague Jean Oh and I found that U.S. workers from lower social-class origins are 32% less likely to become managers than are people from higher origins. This disadvantage is even greater than that experienced by women compared with men (27%) or Blacks compared with whites (25%). And it prevails in every major economy in the world.

The disadvantage matters-for individuals, organizations, and society.

It matters for individuals because it materially reduces their career potential and general well-being. We would consider a disadvantage of 32% among equally qualified candidates to be problematic when it comes to pay; we should also find it problematic when it comes to promotions. Researchers have found that promotion to a managerial role creates substantial job satisfaction-as much as a 60% raise in pay would, according to my own analysis. Managerial roles are also associated with better health: Managers experience less stress and live longer than nonmanagers do. Top managers, for example, are one-third less likely to die from coronary heart disease than are those on the bottom rung of an organization. One study found that simply labeling a participant as a "leader" rather than a "support person" before a task produced a better physiological response and better performance under pressure. Overall, the well-being benefits of hierarchical advantage are even greater than those of the accompanying boost in income.

The class disadvantage matters for organizations because it excludes from the management ranks a group that may produce better-than-average leaders. A study using data from the U.S. military, for example, suggests that individuals with lower social-class origins are less self-centered, which sets them up to be more effective as leaders. Similarly, a UK study found that lawyers from less-elite backgrounds are more motivated and capable than their privileged peers. Not surprisingly, too, research shows that when a disadvantaged group is well represented among company managers, it receives more-effective advocacy. This suggests a trickle-down effect: If firms had more managers from lower social-class origins, employees and customers with similar origins could expect more-equitable treatment. Managers have an outsize influence on their companies, so inherited privilege in the promotion process can be a source of durable inequality.

The class disadvantage matters for society because it means that many workers do not have the opportunity to contribute to economic growth to their full potential. This is true of any disadvantaged group, but it's notably so in the case of social class, given that the majority of people in the workforce have lower social-class origins. In representative samples, more Americans identify as "lower or working" class than "middle or upper" class. Only a quarter of American adults today were raised by a parent with a degree, and by that measure three-quarters of adults fall into the lower social-class origins category. That's a startling figure. In discriminating against people who come from a lower social class, we're discriminating against a majority of the eligible workforce-a grossly harmful indulgence, especially when you consider what happens if you don't discriminate. According to my research with Jean Oh, GDP is higher per capita in countries where more managers come from lower social-class origins.

We've learned a good deal in recent years about how social class inequities affect access to jobs and promotions, but what we've learned is still mostly ignored by U.S. companies-even those celebrated for their diversity and inclusion efforts. In 2020, for example, not one of the companies on DiversityInc's "Top 50 Companies for Diversity" mentioned social class in their diversity, inclusion, and equity (DIE) goals and programs.

Those companies paid a lot of attention to gender and race, however, and for very good reason: Researchers have definitively established that being a woman or Black adversely affects the likelihood of being promoted. Consequently, companies such as Google and Bank of America publish extensive statistics every year to document the representation of women and racial minorities in their workforces, including in the ranks of managers. But as a rule, they do not report on social class disadvantage. Twitter, Facebook, Netflix, Google, and Amazon have all established employee resource groups (ERGs) to support employees from racial minorities or other underrepresented groups (Google alone has 16), but again, none of them addresses social class. In my own extensive search, I've found only one U.S. company that has an ERG based on social class: Uber.

Companies may feel daunted by the prospect of another battle to fight, but they need not. By attending to social class disadvantage, they reinforce their efforts to combat other forms of disadvantage. As the Harvard sociologist William Julius Wilson points out, racial disadvantages in particular are intertwined with social class disadvantage in such a way that remediation of the former is impossible without attention to the latter. Any hopes we might have of understanding and addressing racial inequity in the workplace require a clear-eyed analysis of its root causes-and these, recent studies suggest, are increasingly connected to social class.

In this article, I'll detail the most promising interventions that are emerging from research and practice to help remediate social class disadvantage. But first we need to explore the causes of the problem.

Cause and Effect

Workers with lower social-class origins tend to be less educated, a factor that, according to my research with Jean Oh, explains about 60% of the disadvantage they experience in the workplace. But that disparity in education levels has nothing to do with intelligence. As is the case for women and racial minorities, it has much more to do with context, expectations, and what's known as "stereotype threat"-the well-documented phenomenon whereby people perform worse because of negative stereotypes attached to their identity. When people from lower social-class origins are inoculated against negative stereotypes, they perform just as well as others on tests of intelligence.

Olalekan Jeyifous

The real deficit that workers from lower social-class origins suffer in school is not intellectual but cultural: They know less than those from higher class origins about what the pathways to education are and how to make the most of them. Evidence from elite colleges indicates that cultural capital matters more than financial capital in predicting which students will succeed. For example, the sociologist Anthony Abraham Jack identifies a group he calls the "privileged poor," by which he means people with few economic resources who nevertheless understand how to take advantage of the opportunities at college, often because they have been supported in their teen years by nonprofit leadership-development organizations. The privileged poor, he has shown, achieve educational outcomes comparable to those of their economically advantaged peers. Similarly, experiments show that when sufficient effort is made to help first-generation students adjust culturally to college, they achieve the same academic outcomes that other students do.

Fascinating recent research has shown that cultural capital matters in the workplace, too. In one study, Lauren Rivera and András Tilcsik found that interviewers for elite jobs in banking and law use markers of culture associated with social class, such as an interest in sailing or classical music, to screen candidates. A senior leader at my own organization, Columbia University, once informed me that he favored certain candidates for management roles on the basis of the high-status occupations their fathers had held.

Even when workers with a lack of cultural capital manage to get hired, they are hindered in their ability to move into management roles. One study has shown, for example, that workers from lower social-class origins are unwilling to engage in office politics to get promoted, in large part because they tend to be more focused on others than on themselves and thus shy away from what they see as a self-serving pursuit. Even though they understand that playing politics is necessary for getting ahead, they are reluctant to seek advancement in that way-and over time, they become less enthusiastic about working for their organizations. Bias also seeps into everyday workplace interactions: Workers from higher social-class origins tend to distance themselves from those from lower ones, cutting them off from the connections that are essential for job performance and advancement and well-being at work. Although culture creates disadvantages for workers from lower social-class origins, it can be a source of strength if they're able to overcome barriers and attain managerial roles. Many become "social class transitioners"-workers who have managed to move up in the world despite their origins. A 2019 study, for instance, shows that such workers, like the bank managing director whose story I used to open this article, are more creative, more empathetic, and uniquely capable of bridging cultural divides, which makes them a precious managerial resource. As such they might be expected to be the focus of intense recruitment, inclusion, and development efforts. But so far, that has not been the case.

Why not?

Confronting Inaction

Social stigma is one reason. As Joan Williams and her coauthors put it in a recent HBR.org article, "It's awkward, talking about social class." CEOs and diversity VPs I have interviewed have suggested that some employees are ashamed to put themselves forward for programs designed to include or develop employees from lower social-class origins.

But stigma can-and should-be overcome. One VP of diversity and inclusion, a Black woman, told me that early in her career as a manager she was hesitant to join women's support groups and consciously avoided frequent hallway conversations with Black colleagues, out of concern that such associations might cause her to be negatively stereotyped. Today, the companies where she worked all have corporate programs designed to include and develop women and minority leaders. There's no reason the same can't be done for social class.

The corporate leaders I work with sometimes raise the question of how to measure social class representation in the workplace. For answers, we can again look at what's been done with other disadvantaged groups. The challenges involved in measuring race, ethnicity, and, increasingly, gender are not trivial-but many companies have nonetheless managed to overcome them. In the UK, the government has provided some very practical guidance on how to study social class origins in the workplace, using measures similar to the ones listed above: parents' education level, parents' occupational status, whether workers attended private or public high school, and whether they qualified for free meals in their school years. These measures are easy to implement and can translate across contexts. On its employee engagement survey, for example, Spotify has recently added this question: "Did any of your parents or guardians have a college degree?"

One top leader of a global company told me that social class is probably overlooked in corporate DIE efforts because it's not a protected category in employment law. That represents a flagrant hypocrisy: To genuinely embrace diversity, inclusion, and equity, organizations have to embrace it for everybody. Attending only to groups in protected categories would discredit the whole enterprise.

The Way Forward

There are some good examples of well-designed policies and practices that counteract class disadvantage and pursue equity and organizational performance by recruiting, including, developing, and promoting individuals from lower social-class origins. Here are a few ways to get started.

Add social class to your DIE goals.

Many companies have successfully increased the representation of women and racial minorities in their managerial ranks by setting specific DIE goals, backing them up with smart programs, and holding themselves accountable for results. The same approach works for social class.

Consider PwC, the number-one-ranked firm in the UK's 2019 Social Mobility Employer Index. In 2017, PwC created a team dedicated to improving social mobility in its workforce; its goal was to apply the same level of attention to the disadvantages of social class that it was already applying to those of gender, ethnicity, and race. The company now has a 1,000-member social-mobility support group that serves as a bridge to the community-notably to schools, where it facilitates outreach to students from lower social-class origins. Leveraging a broader effort that's under way in the UK to collect and disseminate data on social class in the workplace, PwC will also soon begin publishing statistics on the social class origins of its employees in its diversity reports. Such reporting helps promote accountability and has been shown to be one of the most effective practices for improving the representation of disadvantaged groups in management. To encourage access and fairness, PwC has also reviewed its recruitment processes and now strives for social class diversity on its interview panels.

Push back against degree inflation.

A recent study found that 67% of job postings for "production-worker supervisor" in the United States required a bachelor's degree or higher, even though only 16% of the people who already held the title had that qualification. By demanding an educational credential that was not necessary for performing the job, recruiters were exacerbating social class disadvantage. In the UK, Ernst & Young has taken the bold step of eliminating the requirement of a degree as a qualification for joining the firm, after finding that success at a university has no relationship to achieving professional certifications. A better approach, the firm concluded, would be to measure capabilities directly in the recruiting process through formal tests and assessments. IBM has a kindred initiative that it calls the "new collar" program, which aims to hire for jobs, including software engineering, on the basis of skills rather than degrees. Google's recently announced Career Certificates program provides a noncollege training program to prepare people for jobs in IT throughout the United States.

Promote the best candidates from every department.

Departments in organizations tend to be stratified according to social class: People with higher origins cluster in high-status departments; those with lower origins work in less-visible groups. Because companies often seek candidates for managerial roles from only a handful of departments, the odds are stacked against some of the best candidates simply because they work in the wrong place.

Olalekan Jeyifous

Walmart, where 75% of today's salaried store managers began as hourly associates, seeks out leadership talent in overlooked places. The company has recently established more than 100 Walmart Academies at its supercenters around the country. These academies provide developmental training in leadership and management to hourly employees who have moved into supervisory roles. And sometimes the path continues all the way up to senior leadership, as it did for the current COO of Walmart U.S., Dacona Smith, who began as an hourly employee at an Oklahoma Walmart at the age of 17, after his dream of playing college football was ended by a broken hip. That first job was arranged for him by his mother, who was herself a Walmart associate.

Face up to the interdependence of race and social class.

As William Julius Wilson noted, it's impossible to understand racial disadvantage in the U.S. workforce without also considering social class. Working with data from the General Social Survey, a comprehensive, representative survey that has been conducted in the United States since 1972, I've found that for workers from higher social-class origins, race is not a factor in determining who becomes a manager. For people with lower social-class origins, however, race does matter: Blacks from lower-class origins are substantially less likely than whites with similar backgrounds to become managers. These people, Wilson points out, are the "truly disadvantaged." Understanding this interdependence is fundamental to improving economic outcomes for Blacks and remedying social class disadvantage.

Few companies in the United States set a goal of establishing equality across social class origins, but those that do often conflate social class origin with race and then make interventions solely on the basis of race. It's possible to justify that approach, given that Black workers are more likely than whites to come from lower social classes and suffer more disadvantage because of those origins. But to the extent that race-based interventions favor Black workers from higher social-class origins, they do little or nothing to resolve the class disadvantage in management. For example, although historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are unusually diverse in terms of their students' social class origins, half of their students come from the middle class or higher. A company recruiting on those campuses might make no hires from among students with lower social-class origins unless they deliberately attend to social class bias in their recruiting interviews.

The most effective recruitment programs focus on race and social class simultaneously. That's what JPMorgan Chase does in its Advancing Black Pathways (ABP) program, which gives special attention to first-generation and low-income students in the recruiting it does at HBCUs-an approach it calls recruiting for "diversity within diversity." ABP also supports a financial-hardship fund for students at HBCUs, providing money for transportation, technology, and food, the goal being to enable students under financial duress to stay in school and earn their degrees. After participants in the program graduate, ABP maintains contact with them and invites them to apply for internships and jobs.

Build a cohesive organizational culture.

Companies that hire with cultural fit in mind can significantly improve employee commitment, satisfaction, and motivation, and in doing so can reduce turnover and boost overall performance. Building a cohesive culture is also a means of social class inclusion, because workers from lower social classes are more likely than those from higher ones to understand that their outcomes and responsibilities in the organization are interdependent with those of the people around them. Hiring for cultural fit, however, too often consists of hiring employees who share managers' hobbies, personal interests, or backgrounds-a practice that HR directors increasingly denounce because it can be used to exclude disadvantaged groups, especially those from lower social-class origins.

Airbnb has shown that a rigorous evaluation of fit can produce a strong organizational culture without allowing discriminatory biases to hold sway. It has established guardrails against personal bias in its hiring process, for example, by clearly and explicitly identifying the competencies and attributes required for each position. Organizations can also use machine-learning techniques to avoid the superficial noise that sometimes distracts interviewers. For example, my colleagues and I have used machine learning in reviewing MBA applications. It has helped us identify students who are diverse on many dimensions but hold similar values and are therefore likely to perform better together.

Organizational culture can be strengthened among current employees by implementing strategies of active social inclusion. Consider the case of Televerde, an Arizona-based marketing company at which incarcerated women make up half the workforce. The company introduces new employees to the organization through an intense socialization process it calls boot camp. The process promotes such values as "caring for people," "trust," and "courage to change"; this resonates with people of lower social-class origins, who understand that their outcomes are dependent on those around them. The approach pays dividends for Televerde's incarcerated employees, who after release are employed at rates double the average for formerly incarcerated women-and whose recidivism rates are 90% lower. It works also for Televerde's clients, who, thanks to the dedication and professionalism of the company's employees, benefit in the form of increased sales. Televerde today has 600 employees, and in 2019 it grew at a rate greater than 10%, a testament to the economic viability of its social inclusion strategy.

Role modeling presents another opportunity to build organizational cultures that support and integrate workers from lower social-class origins. It's been shown to work, for example, in programs aimed at assisting first-generation college students, who typically don't perform as well academically as students from higher social classes. That performance gap can be closed, it turns out, if those students participate in workshops on navigating social class disadvantage in higher education-especially workshops run by older students with similar origins.

Role modeling helps in the workplace, too. When social transitioners offer guidance to new employees from lower social classes, they can effectively make up the know-how deficit. That's the case at PwC UK, where Laura Hinton, the company's chief people officer, speaks regularly to employees and potential recruits about her upbringing in public housing and how she avoided the path expected for her by high school counselors.

. . .

In recent decades, companies have focused on building programs that improve the representation of women and racial minorities in management. That work is far from over, but it demonstrates that the barriers to inclusion and equity are surmountable. As research reveals the powerful negative effects of the social class disadvantage, we must expand our DIE efforts to improve the representation in management of workers from lower social-class origins. A few organizations are showing the way forward-by explicitly recognizing social class as an important and measurable target of DIE efforts, by addressing the causes of social class disadvantage, and by confronting the relationship between social class and race. But we have much more work to do. Given the significant number of people from lower social classes in the American workforce, I estimate that if we were to resolve the problem, we might increase the supply of capable managers by a third.

Imagine that. The potential rewards-for individuals, organizations, and society-are enormous.

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Idea in Brief The Problem A person's social class origins leave a cultural imprint that has a lasting effect. U.S. workers from lower social-class origins are 32% less likely to become managers than people from higher social-class origins. The Prevalence This disadvantage is even greater than that experienced by women compared with men (27%) or Blacks compared with whites (25%).

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Shared by Sarah Walsh for ODNE SE June 2021

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Caroline Criado Perez is a social activist and journalist who, in 2017, successfully campaigned for British banknotes to feature the image of Jane Austen, after the Bank of England said it would be phasing out Elizabeth Fry's portrait in favor of Winston Churchill. Criado Perez has also been a vocal critic of Twitter's policies around abusive tweets, since she herself has been the target of severe Twitter harassment. And her Women's Room database of female experts tries to ensure that more women are tapped as sources in the media.

In her new book Invisible Women, Criado Perez examines different elements of the modern world that appear to be designed with less consideration for women: Transportation systems, medical devices and treatments, tax structures, consumer products, even the smartphones and voice-recognition technologies we use every day. The 321-page book is a rapid-fire delivery of data sets, making it more of an academic tome than a light and hopeful read to take with you on summer vacation. But despite the occasional meandering, Invisible Women often arrives right back at the same seemingly inevitable conclusion: There exists a real gender data gap that is "both a cause and a consequence of the type of unthinking that conceives of humanity as almost exclusively male."

Criado Perez spoke to WIRED about the book. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity and includes information provided in follow-up emails.

Lauren Goode: My first question is this: What was the moment for you that made you think, OK, this is the time for me to write this book? You've been observing and covering these issues for a very long time, but I'm wondering if there was something in particular that made you want to publish this book at this moment.

Caroline Criado Perez: I first came across the gender data gap in the world of medicine in 2014, when I was writing my first book. I was just so shocked that this was an issue in the 21st century, that doctors were misdiagnosing women because the symptoms of our heart attacks don't confirm to those of men. And that women were more likely to die and more likely to be misdiagnosed. Around that same time I also found out that we don't tend to involve female humans or animals or cells in medical trials, and the result of that is women have less effective treatment and more side effects.

That was just really gobsmacking. So really it was that, and me not being able to get it out of my head. And because I knew it was happening there, I realized it was happening in other places. Since I'd studied behavioral and feminist economics at the London School of Economics, I already knew about the default male in that area, but I started discovering all of these other areas where it was popping up. The more I found out, the more learned about data gaps in technology, and car safety design ... and even data gaps in refugee policy. And so eventually it was just that I had so much information that the only way to cover it was to write a book.

LG: Can you talk specifically about the technology devices you highlight in the book, and how biased data sets have informed biased design? I always think about giant smartphones, because as a reviewer I often note that they just don't fit in my hands all that well. But then in marketing, the companies might use professional athletes with giant hands holding the phones, so of course it seems small in comparison.

CCP: The category of smartphones is a massive bugbear of mine because I actually got RSI [repetitive strain injury] from an iPhone 6. And I now am stuck with an iPhone SE which I can't upgrade. The only small phone they had, they discontinued, and it's the only one that fits my hand. It's incredibly frustrating. And then later when [Apple] introduced Siri, you could use it to find a viagra supplier but not an abortion clinic. So there's all sorts of examples like that, where there's not as much thought being put into, you know-female customers exist. Another example is VR headsets being too big.

But to me the most worrying examples are about algorithms rather than hardware. Because with hardware, it's kind of easy to see how it is affecting us or not fitting us, and so it's relatively easy to fix. What's more concerning to me are algorithms being trained on highly biased male data sets, and the way these algorithms are being introduced in all sorts of areas of our lives. There doesn't seem to be much understanding amongst the people who are coding these algorithms about the issues with the data they are training them on. That goes from voice recognition systems that don't recognize female voices, to online dictionaries, to algorithms deciding whether a certain CV will ever reach human eyes.

And this is often proprietary software, so we don't always get to see whether gender bias is being accounted for. So we're outsourcing the future to private companies that are using biased data sets, and there's no way of knowing what's going on there.

LG: Transportation, and really more broadly city planning, is something else you cover quite a bit in the book. You point out that in some societies, women walk more than men, and that the way they lump trips and errands together -referred to as trip-chaining-and even their safety isn't really considered. How do you fix something like that when the transportation systems are so firmly embedded?

CCP: There are a number of things that can be done. The obvious one is to move bus routes because, as you say, things like subways are fixed and it's much more expensive to change them. When new lines are added and new stations are added, absolutely those things should be taken into consideration. But bus routes are very easy to change and the thing about buses is that, in some places, women are much more likely to use buses. That's one easy way of addressing the male bias in transport infrastructure in a relatively short order.

More long term, it really is about the design of cities themselves and looking again at zoning laws. One of the big problems with the way we've laid out cities is that they've been laid out in such a way to serve the needs of this mythical male breadwinner who has a wife home in the suburbs. This man drives to work and conceives of home as a place of leisure, so you don't have as many services; you can just have a residential area. It's this idea that you just go home and you sleep. And it's completely untrue to how women and people live their lives. They've got to take kids to the doctor, to school, get groceries, check in on a relative ...all the things we are doing on a daily basis requires a lot of complicated logistics.

In some societies women are also less likely to have access to a car than a man; if a household has one car, men dominate access to it. So women use public transport, but the public transport hasn't been designed for unpaid care work. The ridiculous thing about this as well is that by making it difficult for women to complete their unpaid care work, it makes it much harder for them to engage in their paid work. In the US, for example, female labor participation has been dropping behind other developed countries, and there's a need in America for women to engage more in the paid labor force. But nothing is being done to help them do that in really this very simple ways, enabling them to do the unpaid work that has to get done.

LG: When I think about bias in transport design, I think about this breastfeeding pod I saw last year in an airport. It's this Zappos-sponsored pod in the middle of the airport terminal walkway for women to nurse in. The person I was traveling with at the time said something like, "Isn't that an interesting idea that there are these pop-up mother's rooms?" And my thought was, "Isn't it terrible that adequate family rooms weren't designed in the airport back when it was originally built?"

CCP: I sort of take it one step further and wonder why we have to lock women up in pods to feed their children. It seems bizarre. I'm not sure I see that as progress in any way, shape, or form. I can't think of the word. I'm quite horrified by it ... And I know obviously some women would want to use them, but also, if a woman wants to put a muslin over her baby that should be enough.

LG: In the book when you refer to your campaign to get the Bank of England to put a woman on its banknotes, you wrote something that comes up often in the book. You wrote, "No one meant to deliberately exclude women. It's just what may seem objective is actually highly male-biased." At what point though-especially now that we have access to more data sets-at what point does the ignorance of data become deliberate?

CCP: That's a very good question, and it reminds me of a quotation someone sent to me on Twitter the other day. It was something about how ignorance or a refusal to know is an epistemological political project. This is something [feminist scholar] Nancy Tuana argues. I think that that's such an interesting way of framing it. That's not the way that I frame it exactly, because I do think that even when ... how should I say this? So, I think there are two things.

First of all, a lot of the male bias we come across shows they just forgot to factor women in because it was a male-biased team and they just sort of forgot we exist. It happens all the time by accident. And then there is simply just not knowing what women's needs are.

For example, I always think of Sheryl Sandberg going in to ask the head of Google to put in pregnancy parking and he said, I never thought about it, of course. And she says he feels bad for never having thought about it. But that highlights the need for diversity. Because it's perfectly normal that a guy who has never been pregnant, or also a woman who has never been pregnant, to not think about that. Of course, they could have been collecting data on the needs of women employees. But nevertheless, it wasn't an act of malice.

The point where I start thinking about this as a political project is when you start getting to the excuses. One of the things I'm asked most about the book is, "What is the example that made you the most angry?" And I can't really choose one. But the thing that does really make me angry and never ceases to is the excuses. At that point it's not forgetting. It's about excluding. For example, with car manufacturers, the decision was made in the EU to finally introduce a female car crash system and it's just a scaled-down male dummy, and it's only used in certain tests and in the passenger seat. How did that decision happen? That's not forgetting; that's a deliberate act.

LG: Do you see a world in which technology can actually help solve some of these problems?

CCP: Maybe. I think that certainly technology has historically helped women. It has lessened the amount of time that women have to spend doing certain things. One of the examples I talk about in the book is stoves. Most women in low-income countries still cook using the three-stone stove, which gives off incredibly toxic fumes. So the stoves we have in modern homes are absolutely incredible when it comes to helping women when it comes to both the health burden and the time burden they reduce.

There is hope, though I don't know what that technology will be because I'm not an inventor. But I suppose the answer is, it depends on who is going to be allowed to do the inventing. The large majority of VCs are men, and they are just much more likely to give funding to male entrepreneurs. And male entrepreneurs are much more likely to develop technology that helps men.

And that, again, is not a conspiracy. That's just because you're more likely to develop something that fixes a need you yourself have. Female entrepreneurs are more likely to develop tech that helps women. And that's great, but they're not getting the funding. And that goes back to the data gap. It's just this catch-22. And that's where the concern is: Because we don't have the data and because the mostly-male VCs don't recognize it, will technology be able to solve the problems because will we give the women the money and resources to do it?
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Why Everything From Transit to iPhones Is Biased Toward Men

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Caroline Criado Perez is a social activist and journalist who, in 2017, successfully campaigned for British banknotes to feature the image of Jane Austen, after the Bank of England said it would be phasing out Elizabeth Fry's portrait in favor of Winston Churchill.

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Author: Jessie Lee Posted on 11th June 2020 by in The Gryphone - Official paper of the University of Leeds
I came across this article written by Jessie Lee about Performative Allyship. I have said on many occasions that putting out a solitary statement and not acting on it is pointless. All it takes is for bad this to happen and for good people to do nothing.
A fact: social media is not a measure of activism.

A lie: this means we are allowed to be silent.

Black Lives Matter is not a trend that we forget about as soon as the media decides to report on something else. Every day, we should be taking actions in our lives to ensure that we are combating the systematic racism that has been infecting us since we were born. We are not allowed to care only when it's convenient, or post only because we want to prove that we are "not racist".

Most of us are not celebrities or influencers with a large following, but black people deserve to be supported and to know which side we are on. Racists shouldn't be owed anything, but they also need to see that we are not on their side. Whether we like it or not, social media has a big impact on the world today. Black people deserve to know that they are not alone in this fight.

However, with this, comes the danger of performative allyship. By this, I am referring to those who post once on their Instagram, because others are, and then forget all about the issue. Those who posted the black screen for #BlackOutTuesday and then logged off social media for the rest of the day, continuing with their daily life. Those who 'spread awareness' without any self-evaluation.

Of course, public allyship is positive. It is good to demonstrate unity, but we need to take real action.

If we are posting about our support, we must be practising what we preach. At the end of the day on Tuesday, the hashtag #BlackOutTuesday contained nineteen million posts on Instagram. The petition for George Floyd had less than twelve million signatures. This is only one example of how dangerous performative allyship is. Posting for self-gratification and not doing anything in real life is useless. It's performative.

Petitions, donations, protests, sending emails, calling institutions up: these are only some of the things we should be doing, not instead of, but in collaboration with the posts we share. Police brutality will not stop because you posted a story about how your heart is broken by the situation. Black people will not get justice because you retweeted "we must all stand together". Posting a black screen and deciding that that was enough activism for today does not help anyone.

As non-black people, as real allies, we must do the best we can. That means direct action. I'm sure we all have good intentions when we post about solidarity, but it's not enough. There's something self-gratifying in the reason we post because of social pressure: we don't want to seem racist, right? If I do not post this black screen, I don't want to be the only one of my friends not doing it and, therefore, be branded as racist. Of course, we all think like that, but what does it do for the authenticity and progress of this movement if the reason we are posting is to save our own face? We shouldn't care because everyone else is. We should care because there are black people dying and facing injustices every day.

The very least, the bare minimum, of what we should be doing if we're posting our support is to reflect on the way we view racism and how we interact with daily racism. We should be thinking self-critically about what we do, what we post, how we interact with this movement. That means consuming media that is educational, whether that be books, documentaries, or podcasts.

Do you call out the microaggressions you see daily? Do you challenge your racist friend's views, or do you just roll your eyes to stop yourself from "being difficult"? Do you acknowledge your own privilege, or do you act defensive when someone forces you to recognise it? You posted that you care about black lives online. But what are you actually doing to show it?
Jessie Lee

Author: Jessie Lee Posted on 11th June 2020 by in The Gryphone - Official paper of the University of Leeds
I came across this article written by Jessie Lee about Performative Allyship. I have said on many occasions that putting out a solitary statement and not acting on it is pointless. All it takes is for bad this to happen and for good people to do nothing.
A fact: social media is not a measure of activism.

A lie: this means we are allowed to be silent.

Black Lives Matter is not a trend that we forget about as soon as the media decides to report on something else. Every day, we should be taking actions in our lives to ensure that we are combating the systematic racism that has been infecting us since we were born. We are not allowed to care only when it's convenient, or post only because we want to prove that we are "not racist".

Most of us are not celebrities or influencers with a large following, but black people deserve to be supported and to know which side we are on. Racists shouldn't be owed anything, but they also need to see that we are not on their side. Whether we like it or not, social media has a big impact on the world today. Black people deserve to know that they are not alone in this fight.

However, with this, comes the danger of performative allyship. By this, I am referring to those who post once on their Instagram, because others are, and then forget all about the issue. Those who posted the black screen for #BlackOutTuesday and then logged off social media for the rest of the day, continuing with their daily life. Those who 'spread awareness' without any self-evaluation.

Of course, public allyship is positive. It is good to demonstrate unity, but we need to take real action.

If we are posting about our support, we must be practising what we preach. At the end of the day on Tuesday, the hashtag #BlackOutTuesday contained nineteen million posts on Instagram. The petition for George Floyd had less than twelve million signatures. This is only one example of how dangerous performative allyship is. Posting for self-gratification and not doing anything in real life is useless. It's performative.

Petitions, donations, protests, sending emails, calling institutions up: these are only some of the things we should be doing, not instead of, but in collaboration with the posts we share. Police brutality will not stop because you posted a story about how your heart is broken by the situation. Black people will not get justice because you retweeted "we must all stand together". Posting a black screen and deciding that that was enough activism for today does not help anyone.

As non-black people, as real allies, we must do the best we can. That means direct action. I'm sure we all have good intentions when we post about solidarity, but it's not enough. There's something self-gratifying in the reason we post because of social pressure: we don't want to seem racist, right? If I do not post this black screen, I don't want to be the only one of my friends not doing it and, therefore, be branded as racist. Of course, we all think like that, but what does it do for the authenticity and progress of this movement if the reason we are posting is to save our own face? We shouldn't care because everyone else is. We should care because there are black people dying and facing injustices every day.

The very least, the bare minimum, of what we should be doing if we're posting our support is to reflect on the way we view racism and how we interact with daily racism. We should be thinking self-critically about what we do, what we post, how we interact with this movement. That means consuming media that is educational, whether that be books, documentaries, or podcasts.

Do you call out the microaggressions you see daily? Do you challenge your racist friend's views, or do you just roll your eyes to stop yourself from "being difficult"? Do you acknowledge your own privilege, or do you act defensive when someone forces you to recognise it? You posted that you care about black lives online. But what are you actually doing to show it?
Jessie Lee

I am happy and proud to introduce Sarah Emmerson, Group Operations Manager and Ally. Thank you for your support and writing the passionate and powerful post.
I believe that my experience is much the same as many others. I am a 'nice' person. I smile at the security guard as I go into the supermarket. I let the old lady get on the bus first. I buy my friends presents when they are sad. And I do all these things regardless of the colour of that person's skin. Therefore I am not a racist, right?

The last couple of months have been a real wake up call for me and my comfortably 'not a racist' life. At intervals through my life I have seen stories in the news of black and other ethnic minority groups being the disproportionate victims of violence from police and civilians, of the lack of representation of those individuals in senior leadership and politics, of their increased rates of exclusion and expulsion in schools. But I have never stretched myself to question why that is the case, what causes these disparities and if there is anything I can actually do about it. I have been looking from afar, thinking that if everyone was 'not a racist' as I was, this wouldn't be happening.

The last couple of months have shown me how wrong I was.

- Have I ever been nervous about walking past a police officer in the street? No.

- Have I ever considered that my teachers and lecturers might treat me less favourably because of what I look like? No.

- Have I ever been the only person with my skin colour at a business meeting, networking event or job interview? Of course not.

It is a much more pleasant reality to go through life believing that everything we have, we have earned on our own merit. But as white people, can that really be said to be true of us? For some perhaps it can, but we have to try to imagine how different our lives might have looked had the colour of our skin been different. White privilege doesn't mean that your life hasn't been hard, just that the colour of your skin hasn't contributed to your difficulties. Would that teacher have given you a detention, or an exclusion? Would those police officers have watched you walk by, or stopped you because you looked suspicious? Would those interviewers have viewed you as qualified, or 'not a cultural fit'? Sadly, there are a whole host of statistics available which show us that our white skin gives us the upper hand in all of these areas, and so many more.

As white people in the western world, we hold an innate advantage that we can neither escape nor deny, and with that advantage comes a responsibility. It is not enough for us to wander around being nice and 'not a racist', we need to take affirmative action in every area of our lives to begin dismantling the systems which have provided us this white privilege that we take for granted every day.

So what does this mean in everyday life? I am in no way claiming to have the answer to that question, and am, like many of you, in the process of doing my best to work it out!

One of the most obvious actions is to voice support for movements like Black Lives Matter on your social media channels. This is a great thing to do, but if you're serious about being an Ally, that can't be it. Your words of support need to be followed up by authentic action and personal change, or they will be worth nothing.

From what I have understood from listening to many people smarter than me (thanks Chikere!), the key is to educate yourself first. In the last two months I can openly admit that I have read, watched and listened to more content about systemic racism than in the last 27 years of my life combined. My social media feeds are full of activists, writers and artists who are speaking openly about their experiences of being black in a white privileged world, and from whom I am learning something new every day.

Become familiar with the terminology, the history, the issues we are facing now. Look at the statistics so you can understand how and where the systemic differences are separating us. Listen to black people when they talk about 'micro aggressions' (there's a whole blog on that here), be honest and recognise when you have those tendencies so that you can root them out of yourself and call them out in other people.

Examine yourself every day to recognise where your white privilege has brought you, and how willing you really are to fight against it in favour of a more equal world for everyone, even if it means that your life might be more difficult as a result. Sign petitions and donate to causes that aim to bring justice, equal opportunities and support to those who would not otherwise have them. These types of contributions can seem too small to be significant, but if everyone thought like that, they wouldn't be able to exist.

Speak openly to friends, family and those in your networks about what you have learned, debate with them and learn together. Elevate the voices of your black friends and connections, be vocal in your school or workplace where change is needed, call it out when you see it. Seek out new friends and connections with a different experience than yours so you can better understand what the world looks like from someone else's point of view (this is the key thing burning up my to-do list right now).

Most importantly, do not continue to sit back and believe that it is up to politicians, educators or 'the BAME community' to fix. It is the responsibility of each and every one of us to use our voice and our influence, however small we might believe it to be, to make sure that the generations who follow us have the genuine equality of rights, freedoms and experiences that do not exist for us now.

I am happy and proud to introduce Sarah Emmerson, Group Operations Manager and Ally. Thank you for your support and writing the passionate and powerful post.
I believe that my experience is much the same as many others. I am a 'nice' person. I smile at the security guard as I go into the supermarket. I let the old lady get on the bus first. I buy my friends presents when they are sad. And I do all these things regardless of the colour of that person's skin. Therefore I am not a racist, right?

The last couple of months have been a real wake up call for me and my comfortably 'not a racist' life. At intervals through my life I have seen stories in the news of black and other ethnic minority groups being the disproportionate victims of violence from police and civilians, of the lack of representation of those individuals in senior leadership and politics, of their increased rates of exclusion and expulsion in schools. But I have never stretched myself to question why that is the case, what causes these disparities and if there is anything I can actually do about it. I have been looking from afar, thinking that if everyone was 'not a racist' as I was, this wouldn't be happening.

The last couple of months have shown me how wrong I was.

- Have I ever been nervous about walking past a police officer in the street? No.

- Have I ever considered that my teachers and lecturers might treat me less favourably because of what I look like? No.

- Have I ever been the only person with my skin colour at a business meeting, networking event or job interview? Of course not.

It is a much more pleasant reality to go through life believing that everything we have, we have earned on our own merit. But as white people, can that really be said to be true of us? For some perhaps it can, but we have to try to imagine how different our lives might have looked had the colour of our skin been different. White privilege doesn't mean that your life hasn't been hard, just that the colour of your skin hasn't contributed to your difficulties. Would that teacher have given you a detention, or an exclusion? Would those police officers have watched you walk by, or stopped you because you looked suspicious? Would those interviewers have viewed you as qualified, or 'not a cultural fit'? Sadly, there are a whole host of statistics available which show us that our white skin gives us the upper hand in all of these areas, and so many more.

As white people in the western world, we hold an innate advantage that we can neither escape nor deny, and with that advantage comes a responsibility. It is not enough for us to wander around being nice and 'not a racist', we need to take affirmative action in every area of our lives to begin dismantling the systems which have provided us this white privilege that we take for granted every day.

So what does this mean in everyday life? I am in no way claiming to have the answer to that question, and am, like many of you, in the process of doing my best to work it out!

One of the most obvious actions is to voice support for movements like Black Lives Matter on your social media channels. This is a great thing to do, but if you're serious about being an Ally, that can't be it. Your words of support need to be followed up by authentic action and personal change, or they will be worth nothing.

From what I have understood from listening to many people smarter than me (thanks Chikere!), the key is to educate yourself first. In the last two months I can openly admit that I have read, watched and listened to more content about systemic racism than in the last 27 years of my life combined. My social media feeds are full of activists, writers and artists who are speaking openly about their experiences of being black in a white privileged world, and from whom I am learning something new every day.

Become familiar with the terminology, the history, the issues we are facing now. Look at the statistics so you can understand how and where the systemic differences are separating us. Listen to black people when they talk about 'micro aggressions' (there's a whole blog on that here), be honest and recognise when you have those tendencies so that you can root them out of yourself and call them out in other people.

Examine yourself every day to recognise where your white privilege has brought you, and how willing you really are to fight against it in favour of a more equal world for everyone, even if it means that your life might be more difficult as a result. Sign petitions and donate to causes that aim to bring justice, equal opportunities and support to those who would not otherwise have them. These types of contributions can seem too small to be significant, but if everyone thought like that, they wouldn't be able to exist.

Speak openly to friends, family and those in your networks about what you have learned, debate with them and learn together. Elevate the voices of your black friends and connections, be vocal in your school or workplace where change is needed, call it out when you see it. Seek out new friends and connections with a different experience than yours so you can better understand what the world looks like from someone else's point of view (this is the key thing burning up my to-do list right now).

Most importantly, do not continue to sit back and believe that it is up to politicians, educators or 'the BAME community' to fix. It is the responsibility of each and every one of us to use our voice and our influence, however small we might believe it to be, to make sure that the generations who follow us have the genuine equality of rights, freedoms and experiences that do not exist for us now.

I am not too sure where or how to start as I have so many things to say. But here goes.

By way of introduction, I am a mixed-race woman (White mother & Black Carribean father) who some would say was brought up in a 'white' world. My Carribean heritage was hardly ever discussed when I was growing up, the language (patois) not taught to us by my father for fear that we would get singled out at school if we started mixing one language with the other and be made cruelly fun of, and the culture not much spoken about either let alone immersed in me. It wasn't until I was 12 years of age that I got acquainted with my other culture, meeting for the 1st time my Black aunties, uncles and cousins. I felt instantly home, in my second 'home' - joy!

As a mixed-race person, you do get subjected to forms of abuse, unbeknownst to many, where you hear on one side with a certain disdain that you're not 'white' enough and on the other that you're not 'black' enough, in other words that you do not belong - this is rejection. In parallel and to confuse things further, whilst it makes no such distinction, the US is still clinging on to the 'one-drop rule' (assigning minority status to mixed-race individuals), very much prevalent other there: one drop & one hate!

But what essentially matters is how you feel inside and dare I say that I have always felt more Black than anything else. This cannot be explained so no need to try I also tell my sisters who feel the complete opposite, which is fine as let's be clear, it does not mean they are rejecting their Black heritage. We just respect each other's feelings.

Feelings are what counts and make a difference, as much as respect.

I (always) feel deeply cut when I hear about racism, witness acts of violence towards Black people be it fictional (movies) or real (news/tv) and manage to watch with great difficulty movies about slavery (takes me several goes, always!) as I become defensive and reactive. In passing, one of my favourite actors turned directors, Spike Lee whom I had the immense privilege of meeting in person a few years back for a book signing preceded by a question-answer session, overtly depicts racism in America in a way that no one else does. He is one who keeps the conversation truly alive!

I know loads of other races do too and most importantly feel, it is just more profound in Black people themselves.

This piece wouldn't be complete without unmasking racial micro-aggressions I still experience to this day such as 'but you're not Black!', 'you're Black-ish', 'you're quite pale', 'you're light-skinned', 'I see you as White', 'you don't tan' etc.. But my Black side is very much present and 100% alive and again that's that. I've also openly and shamelessly been told: 'I couldn't date a Black person but you, you're OK'!! Deeply offended I was as that is turning a gigantic blind eye to my other race. How dare you as it is there, very much part of me and who I am, like it or not!

Actively feeling, actively respecting, actively listening and actively seeing past a 'colour' is what we all need to forge an Ally-ance for a better world for all of us and our children, right here, right now. Let's keep the conversation Ally-ve!

I am not too sure where or how to start as I have so many things to say. But here goes.

By way of introduction, I am a mixed-race woman (White mother & Black Carribean father) who some would say was brought up in a 'white' world. My Carribean heritage was hardly ever discussed when I was growing up, the language (patois) not taught to us by my father for fear that we would get singled out at school if we started mixing one language with the other and be made cruelly fun of, and the culture not much spoken about either let alone immersed in me. It wasn't until I was 12 years of age that I got acquainted with my other culture, meeting for the 1st time my Black aunties, uncles and cousins. I felt instantly home, in my second 'home' - joy!

As a mixed-race person, you do get subjected to forms of abuse, unbeknownst to many, where you hear on one side with a certain disdain that you're not 'white' enough and on the other that you're not 'black' enough, in other words that you do not belong - this is rejection. In parallel and to confuse things further, whilst it makes no such distinction, the US is still clinging on to the 'one-drop rule' (assigning minority status to mixed-race individuals), very much prevalent other there: one drop & one hate!

But what essentially matters is how you feel inside and dare I say that I have always felt more Black than anything else. This cannot be explained so no need to try I also tell my sisters who feel the complete opposite, which is fine as let's be clear, it does not mean they are rejecting their Black heritage. We just respect each other's feelings.

Feelings are what counts and make a difference, as much as respect.

I (always) feel deeply cut when I hear about racism, witness acts of violence towards Black people be it fictional (movies) or real (news/tv) and manage to watch with great difficulty movies about slavery (takes me several goes, always!) as I become defensive and reactive. In passing, one of my favourite actors turned directors, Spike Lee whom I had the immense privilege of meeting in person a few years back for a book signing preceded by a question-answer session, overtly depicts racism in America in a way that no one else does. He is one who keeps the conversation truly alive!

I know loads of other races do too and most importantly feel, it is just more profound in Black people themselves.

This piece wouldn't be complete without unmasking racial micro-aggressions I still experience to this day such as 'but you're not Black!', 'you're Black-ish', 'you're quite pale', 'you're light-skinned', 'I see you as White', 'you don't tan' etc.. But my Black side is very much present and 100% alive and again that's that. I've also openly and shamelessly been told: 'I couldn't date a Black person but you, you're OK'!! Deeply offended I was as that is turning a gigantic blind eye to my other race. How dare you as it is there, very much part of me and who I am, like it or not!

Actively feeling, actively respecting, actively listening and actively seeing past a 'colour' is what we all need to forge an Ally-ance for a better world for all of us and our children, right here, right now. Let's keep the conversation Ally-ve!

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Author: Jessie Lee Posted on 11th June 2020 by in The Gryphone - Official paper of the University of Leeds I came across this article written by Jessie Lee about Performative Allyship. I have said on many occasions that putting out a solitary statement and not acting on it is pointless.

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Shared by Sarah Walsh for ODNE SE June 2021

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Image credit: Rosie the Riveter (Modern)

It's ok to admit you're not yet comfortable with the concept of intersectionality. It took me awhile to fully wrap my head around it, too.

For Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) efforts at any organization to be truly impactful, we all need to better understand and apply the concept of intersectionality. It's a key part of my work - as previous Head of People at the tech startup, Lever, as well as my current D&I advising work with companies who want to build better organizations.

So what does intersectionality (coined by scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw) mean? Here's a ELI5 (Explain Like I'm 5) answer:

"If I'm a black woman, I have some disadvantages because I'm a woman and some disadvantages because I'm black. But I also have some disadvantages specifically because I'm [a] black woman, which neither black men nor white women have to deal with. That's intersectionality; race, gender, and every other way to be disadvantaged interact with each other." ()

Intersectionality considers different systems of oppression, and specifically how they overlap and are compounded. This is increasingly important because more companies are giving attention to D&I than ever, but often with a narrow, single-minded strategy: "We're focusing on women first."

This approach, while well-intended, might actually get in the way of progress. Maybe you've heard it in your organization, or you've even said it yourself - let's unpack this approach for a learning opportunity.

Take for example, a fairly prominent issue: the gender pay gap. You may have heard a statistic that shows women make approximately 72 cents for every dollar that a man makes. But that number doesn't tell the full story.

According to research, Black, Latina, and Native American women make far less than their white counterparts. In fact, the pay gap between white women and women of color is the fastest growing wage gap according to the Economic Policy Institute. But beyond pay gaps, this is about how who gets hired, heard, promoted, supported, and everything in between, all the small and big things that add up to big inequities.

Thus, the singular focus on one identity - gender - can take away from solving the broader systemic problem. Diversity & Inclusion work is about paying attention to the experiences of marginalized groups, to correct collective biases and obstacles to ensure an equal playing field.

Just focusing on gender may end up only benefitting a subset of the population that already is further ahead.

Since women make up 50% of the population, the "Women first" strategy might seem to make sense for senior leaders who prioritize D&I initiatives based on pure numbers of people impacted. But the numbers-driven approach to D&I is just one part of the equation.

Imagine you're a Black woman working for a company that touts "we're focusing on women." You're being implicitly told, "sure, we care, but only a part of your identity, one that *we* are familiar and comfortable with." Despite the good intentions, there's an insidious implication behind the message - "Wait your turn. We're helping the white women first." And that's what non-intersectional D&I work can often lead to. You can look no further than our own women's rights movement in the U.S. to see examples of non-intersectional feminism.

Twitter thread. I've also heard from many women of color who don't feel like they're being served by ERGs/women's groups at their companies.

The "women first" trap is understandable, to an extent, and I want to make it clear - there's no point in excessively calling out, or shaming individuals. The truth is, "helping women" seems like the low-hanging fruit to many of us. It's the more palatable, comfortable route. We live in a world where too many of us are still incredibly intimidated by talking about race, much less take action to solve it, especially when it involves dismantling institutions and norms that have been in place for decades.

While many great D&I initiatives do start with small steps, asking people with multiple identities of marginalization to "wait their turn," contributes to further inequity. So, all of our efforts must be intersectional, and deliberately focus on those on the fringes. Because unfortunately, a "focus on women" often becomes just white women. The key to remember, if we can remove the obstacles for those who are most unfairly held back by our society, then those in the middle get automatically uplifted, too.

By approaching our D&I work through a lens of intersectionality, we become more effective at fighting injustice. Once we understand that, we can then recognize problematic statements and attitudes such as: "I'm a woman so I show up to all the women's events, but it's not my place to be an ally to people of color." or, "As a member of a racial minority group, I'm extremely aware of the systemic oppression against my people in this country, but the LGBTQ+ community don't deserve the same rights as I do because of [some faulty logic]."

Sign at the 2018 Women's March. Intersectionality fail 😱 Don't be this person.

At the end of the day, being an advocate for workplace equity requires compassion, curiosity, and continual introspection. D&I is also an invitation to hear and learn more about others' experiences and systematically examine the workings of our society, even if it feels pretty uncomfortable sometimes. Furthermore, it's an ongoing conversation with yourself in understanding how your own multiple identities fit into the broader work towards progress.

So continue to advocate for women's causes, LGBTQ+ issues, racial equity, disability rights, immigration, and more - but do it with the lens of intersectionality. Because systems of oppression all overlap and their effects are compounded. With a focus on intersectionality, we can actually solve the systemic problems, not replace one with another, or just work on issues closest to our own hearts. Remember that we're all allies in this work.

And that's Intersectionality 101! With this new understanding, I hope you'll continue to be mindful and expand your thinking, so you can do the work that truly makes a difference.

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Intersectionality 101: Why "we're focusing on women" doesn't work for Diversity & Inclusion

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It's ok to admit you're not yet comfortable with the concept of intersectionality. It took me awhile to fully wrap my head around it, too. For Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) efforts at any organization to be truly impactful, we all need to better understand and apply the concept of intersectionality.

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Excellent podcast with Shola Ope & Ashanti Bentil-Dhue

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James and Jane hand over hosting duties for the week to Shola Ope, who leads a conversation about racism in the workplace with diversity specialist, Ashanti Bentil-Dhue. Their wide ranging conversation explores the current state of racism in modern workplaces and some things that we can do to improve our workplaces.

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E091 - Racism in the Workplace (with Shola & Ashanti)

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James and Jane hand over hosting duties for the week to Shola Ope, who leads a conversation about racism in the workplace with diversity specialist, Ashanti Bentil-Dhue. Their wide ranging conversation explores the current state of racism in modern workplaces and some things that we can do to improve our workplaces.

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Cranfield University shared by Peter Bowyer

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The Female FTSE Board Report is an annual publication looking at trends in female representation on FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 boards.

Produced by Cranfield School of Management with the support of its partners and sponsors, the report has provided a regular measure of the number of women executive directors on the corporate boards of the UK's top companies since 1999.

The latest version of the report is available to download as a PDF, free of charge, via the button below. Previous versions of the report are also available below.
Female FTSE Board Report 2020

The Female FTSE Board Report 2018
Video with Professor Sue Vinnicombe, discussing what women can do to obtain high-level executive positions

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Produced by Cranfield School of Management with the support of its partners and sponsors, the report has provided a regular measure of the number of women executive directors on the corporate boards of the UK's top companies since 1999. The latest version of the report is available to download as a PDF, free of charge, via the button below.

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NY Times article Dolly Chugh

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Illustrations by Ilya Milstein, Animation by Jonah Ainslie

Being the "only" can leave you feeling as an outsider when you just want to be in. Learn how to view your status as a strength, not a stigma.

In my first job out of college, at an investment bank, I spent a year as the only woman - and only person of color - on a seven-person team.

Being the only one had some benefits (I guess): I was usually noticed and remembered. I suspect that my ability to keep up - and even surpass the performance of my male peers - was at times unexpected, and thus viewed positively by some in the firm.

But it also meant there were few role models for me. It was harder for me to visualize being there long-term. I felt like an outlier.

Being the minority in a group - whether that be for your gender, your race, your sexual identity or something else - can be more than just lonely. It can mean that everything you do stands out, or that you are viewed as a "token" or an "other," and that your successes (or failures for that matter) aren't simply perceived to be one-offs but wholly representative of your identity. (Think of Indra Nooyi, the former PepsiCo chief executive who is an Indian-American woman, or Ursula Burns, the former Xerox chief executive, who is African-American. Their race and gender are often mentioned in the same breath as their names.)

Defensive driving teaches us how to anticipate and react to the poor driving of others. Similarly, we need to embrace defensive career-ing. While it is not our responsibility to fix others' poor driving - or biases - we benefit from being able to avoid the consequences of it.

See the Big Picture

A quick public service announcement to people who feel like "others": Do not underestimate how important your presence is. after shows that companies with greater diversity have better performance and are more productive. In her book, The Power of Onlyness, the business thinker Nilofer Merchant argues that we are in an unprecedented moment when a person's "only" status - what she dubs their "onlyness" - can be a lever to move the world. "We lose far too many ideas, not because the idea is deemed unworthy; but the person bringing that idea who's deemed unworthy of being heard," she said. So remember, and don't hesitate to remind others: Your organization is lucky to have you, and your ideas are worthy.

Find a Community

Being the only doesn't mean you have to be alone. Here's how to find a community.

Identify allies. Odds are there are people out there rooting for you and willing to support you. To find them, pay attention to moments when a colleague might make a point of crediting a female colleague for her overlooked ideas or a white colleague challenges an insensitive joke. Or their behaviors may be more subtle, like when that colleague takes time to check in after a difficult meeting. Nurture relationships with these potential allies. Share your experiences - and frustrations - and make it clear that you welcome their support.

Cultivate a sponsor. In her TED talk, the Morgan Stanley executive and author Carla Harris talks about "sponsors" as the people who will take your file into the room behind closed doors and argue on your behalf. suggests that sponsors who are different from you may be particularly helpful, because they expose you to different networks. If you're in the minority of any group, sponsors can be essential in standing up for you and helping you navigate potential misperceptions people may have about you. Make it easy for them to advocate for you by keeping them in the loop about your successes and strengths.

Find people like you. Research has found that for women, forming tight networks is important to finding jobs and getting promoted. How to find these people? Start by showing interest in informal happenings like lunch or book clubs. Look inside - and potentially outside - your workplace for affinity groups (at New York University, where I work, we have a "women's faculty group"). If you can't find one that already exists or works with your schedule, consider starting something. Someone out there is wishing they knew you.

In Her Words

Sign up for the newsletter where women rule the headlines.

Advocate for Yourself

There are a bevy of studies that have found that men are likely to receive more credit than women in a workplace context - even when they work in groups with other women. That means that those in the minority may have to work extra hard to be acknowledged for the work they do, and often that means speaking up to advocate for it or having others do so on your behalf.

Track your successes...and broadcast them. Keep track of things that show your impact - whether that be congratulatory emails or a tally of the number of people you mentor. You never know when these lists will be useful - as a reminder of your value on a discouraging day. (Personally, I keep a "feel good" email folder that I turn to on bad days) or as data in a pay negotiation. Then practice broadcasting those wins. If it feels awkward to say "I was the top sales performer last month," then practice saying it in the third person: "Dolly was the top sales performer last month." Say it 10 times like you mean it. Now switch back to "I."

Be wary of office housework. Research shows that women are more likely to be asked to take on so-called "office housework" - the menial tasks that need to get done, but may not be recognized as "mission critical," such as organizing office parties or serving on committees. Experiment with saying no to these tasks, or using the requests as an opportunity to trade off other less desirable tasks. If you feel you're being asked too often, consider setting up a rotation so that everybody takes a turn. I happen to have a very effective "no club" with two of my female colleagues. We email each other when we are asked to do optional tasks and advise each other on what to decline and how to say no.

Recognize bias. Stereotypes about women's skills abound - from not being viewed as good "leaders" to assumptions that we are bad at math and science. Additionally, women must also navigate the seemingly endless double binds that play out in ways big and small: being viewed as "too aggressive" when they are assertive or too "soft" when they are nice. These stereotypes are often additionally tricky for women of color, who face stereotypes around both their race and gender. Avoiding these stereotypes will not always be possible - but knowing they exist is the first step toward being able to avoid them. Call them out if you feel up to it - and if you know how to do that with a sense of humor, even better. And be careful: Women hold unconscious gender biases, too, so watch your own blind spots.

Acknowledge the Emotional Toll

Tired? No surprise. Being the only in a group can mean being watched, scrutinized, stereotyped - or what I call the "exhaustion trifecta." It can also mean that the burden to educate your peers on how to be "more inclusive" often falls to you, whether you wanted that responsibility or not.

Focus on excellence, not perfection. The adage that you will need to be twice as good as everyone else may be true. Research shows that when you're the "only one," you are held to higher standards. That might explain why women often hold themselves to near-impossible standards - in other words: perfection. But that promise of perfection actually makes it more difficult for women to take risks or fail. Try to focus on being "excellent" - not perfect - and let yourself make mistakes. Think of a failure as a guide map for the future, not a stop sign.

Read more about the challenges of being a woman in the workplace

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What to Do When You're the Only Woman in the Room

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Illustrations by Ilya Milstein, Animation by Jonah Ainslie Being the "only" can leave you feeling as an outsider when you just want to be in. Learn how to view your status as a strength, not a stigma.

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Harvard Business Review recommended by Sarah Bond ODNE

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When discussing the careers of women leaders, there's a phenomenon referred to as the " glass cliff." It's an obvious relative to the term glass ceiling, which describes the invisible barrier to advancement that women often face when they are up for promotion to the highest levels of an organization. The "glass cliff" describes the idea that when a company is in trouble, a female leader is put in charge to save it. When women are finally given a chance to prove themselves in a senior position, they are handed something that is already broken and where the chances of failure are high.

We see this happen frequently enough that it made us wonder, are women in fact more qualified to lead during a crisis? Could that be why they are handed the reins when times are tough?

During the Covid-19 crisis, we've heard anecdotally about women leaders doing a better job and new research backs that up. One study found that outcomes related to Covid-19, including number of cases and deaths, were systematically better in countries led by women. Another looked at governors in the U.S. and similarly found that states with female leaders had lower fatality rates. We decided to look at our global database of 360-degree assessments to see if we saw any patterns in how male and female leaders inside organizations are reacting and responding to the crisis.

Who's Seen as More Qualified to Lead in a Crisis?

Last year, we wrote about how women were rated better leaders by those who worked with them when compared with men. The data for our analysis was pulled from assessments of over 60,000 leaders (22,603 women and 40,187 men). We wanted to look at similar data gathered during the first phase of the Covid-19 crisis to see if these ratings had changed.

Between March and June of this year, 454 men and 366 women were assessed on their leadership effectiveness using our Extraordinary Leader 360-degree assessment. Consistent with our pre-pandemic analysis, we found that women were rated significantly more positively than men. Comparing the overall leadership effectiveness ratings of men versus women, once again women were rated as more effective leaders (t-Value 2.926, Sig. 0.004). The gap between men and women in the pandemic is even larger than previously measured, possibly indicating that women tend to perform better in a crisis.

Women were rated more positively on 13 of the 19 competencies in our assessment that comprise overall leadership effectiveness. Men were rated more positively on one competency - technical/professional expertise - but the difference was not statistically significant.

In the table below, percentile scores for men and women are displayed sorted by the average rating for women based on data gathered in the first wave of the pandemic.

Why Are Women Leaders Seen as More Effective?

Each leader we assessed also received an employee engagement score based on their direct report's responses to questions about how satisfied and committed they felt. The engagement level of those working for male leaders was slightly below average, but the engagement scores for the direct reports of female leaders were significantly higher. The overall average for both male and female leaders was the 51 st percentile.

To better understand what was driving the difference in engagement levels, we looked at the competencies that direct reports ranked as most important during the crisis. Notably, respondents put greater importance on interpersonal skills, such as "inspires and motivates," "communicates powerfully," "collaboration/teamwork," and "relationship building," all of which women were rated higher on. Our analysis echoes what the researchers found in the study mentioned above about U.S. governors: that female leaders expressed more awareness of fears that followers might be feeling, concern for wellbeing, and confidence in their plans.

Perhaps the most valuable part of the data we're collecting throughout the crisis is hearing from thousands of direct reports about what they value and need from leaders now. Based on our data they want leaders who are able to pivot and learn new skills; who emphasize employee development even when times are tough; who display honesty and integrity; and who are sensitive and understanding of the stress, anxiety, and frustration that people are feeling. Our analysis shows that these are traits that are more often being displayed by women. But as the crisis continues, and intensifies in many places, all leaders, regardless of gender, should strive to meet those needs.

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Research: Women Are Better Leaders During a Crisis

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When discussing the careers of women leaders, there's a phenomenon referred to as the " glass cliff." It's an obvious relative to the term glass ceiling, which describes the invisible barrier to advancement that women often face when they are up for promotion to the highest levels of an organization.

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Recommended by Nick Richmond & Penny from OD HR Networking Group

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A YOUTUBE Video Mini-Series

Background to the Video Series:

Q&E would like to introduce to you a mini-series for OD Practitioners and clients. The series is called JUST IN CASE, inviting you to watch just in case you need to be reminded of... just in case you do not know... just in case you want to refresh your memory... just in case you want to know a topic better... etc. Some of the videos will be lecturette, some will be a pair dialogue, and others will be responses to an interviewer. There is no specific theme to the series except that they are set up mainly for "low key" continuous development of Organisation Development Practitioners. The group that motivated me to do the series is the NTL European Organisation Development Certificate graduates, the NTL Alumni Association, a vibrant group and eager to grow and learn.

Some ways to use the Video:

These videos can be for individual viewing, but may I suggest two ways to get the best use out of them, if the subject of the video is appealing:

1. You can get together with a few colleagues within your organisation, watch the whole video or a specific section, then have a discussion group on WHAT? (what stands out for me? What interest me?), SO WHAT? (the implication of the key points to what we are doing?), and possible NOW WHAT? (what may we consider doing or practicing?... etc.).

2. You can use specific sections of the YouTube videos to work with your clients - to start discussions with them, or to ask them to apply what they have heard to what they are doing... etc., or you can build development programmes using segments of the video to help explain or illustrate something.

Beyond the two approaches above, it would be helpful for us know the various creative ways these videos are being used. If you can afford the time, please drop us a note at info@quality-equality.com

What we ask of you:

In exchange for your usage of these video, we would like to ask you to: (1) please ensure these resources will remain free, that is for you not to make any commercial gain from using the resources; (2) always acknowledge the sponsoring organisation Quality and Equality in Oxford, UK and the contributors; (3) if possible, donate £5 to any local and international development agencies. The donation is not obligatory, it is just a nice way for us to know we have contributed not just to the practitioners but to the community that binds us together.

If you need to make contact:

If you need to make contact with us because of technical matter, please write to Gopi at info@quality-equality.com. If you want to contact the contributors direct, you can find their contact details at the end of their video and in the description on each video's page.

Look out, more to come:

New videos will be added to this page as they are released. If you'd like to be notified for each new video, please subscribe to the Q&E YouTube Channel. Have fun using these resources to stretch, to learn and to grow our practice together.
Read the full invitation letter here. Dr Mee Yan Cheung-Judge, Founder of Quality-Equality, OD Consultancy Services, Ltd. Oxford UK

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Just In Case Mini-series - Quality & Equality

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Q&E would like to introduce to you a mini-series for OD Practitioners and clients. The series is called JUST IN CASE, inviting you to watch just in case you need to be reminded of... just in case you do not know... just in case you want to refresh your memory...

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recommended by Adam Meek @Adam_learning

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Same old, same old isn't cutting it anymore.

Diverse imagery is part and parcel of inclusive design. When creating experiences that are supposed to welcome people of all stripes in, the photos you work with can't leave most of your users out.

Check out these eight stock photo resources that will set you up for design that speaks to people of all walks of life-and shows it, too.

Diversity takes a lot of forms, and one widely-ignored one in particular is gender identity. Broadly, Broadly, Vice's gender and identity blog, curated a collection of stock photos featuring people of color and LGBTQ-presenting individuals and couples just being -at the office, at a party, in the kitchen, and wherever else your life takes you.

#WoCinTech Chat's goal is simple: to bring attention to the community of women of color in tech fields. This Flickr-curated collection is free under the Creative Commons license, with one stipulation: that all photos be credited with a link to the collection and/or the hashtag #WoCinTech Chat, bringing them more followers and more eyes on their community.

UKBlackTech didn't see a lack of BAME (Black, Asian, minority ethnic) presence in stock imagery-but everything they found looked so American. The UKBlackTech organization paired up with Deborah Okenla, founder of Your Startup, Your Story (YSYS) and Andy Ayim of startup support studio Twiiged to create their own collection of race-diverse British stock photography for the tech industry. The photos are available for free use under Creative Commons licensing so long as UKBlackTech or www.ukblacktech.com are credited.

When 70% of teenage girls say that magazine representations of women impact their self-esteem, how can we stay silent? Representation Matters hosts diverse stock images for commercial use (for pay, though royalty free). Their collection is focused on diversity and inclusion across all walks of life: race, size, disability, and gender orientation included.

Nappy is a collection of free photos of Black and Brown people spanning exercise/physical activity; food; work; and the nouns, people, places, and things. Nappy's search function lets you get super-specific, so if you've been looking for a man smiling in a sharp suit, it's finally your shot.

Featuring both free and "premium" photos, CreateHer Stock is described by its founder, Neosha Gardner, as a "grassroots resource and digital space." Gardner hit her breaking point in 2014 when she couldn't find photos of women of color-women who looked like her-for a blog post. Her collection encompasses thousands of photos, with a monthly email featuring new photos added to the site.

"Creating an inclusive culture takes both commitment and action." That's the TONL call to action-and it's reflected in their curation of photos encompassing diversity in size, race, religion, and activity. TONL Narratives is a collection within the project encompassing different aspects of daily life, mostly focused on physical activity. Though the photos aren't free, you can either pay per photo or buy a subscription pass.

The founders of Picnoi describe their service as a "co-op of stock image photography," filling the hole where diverse stock imagery should be. Their collection is completely free, and they don't even ask for accreditation-though, between you and me, throw it their way. They're providing a great service.

Want to learn more about diversity and inclusion?

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8 resources for diverse stock photos | Inside Design Blog

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Same old, same old isn't cutting it anymore. Diverse imagery is part and parcel of inclusive design. When creating experiences that are supposed to welcome people of all stripes in, the photos you work with can't leave most of your users out.

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Recommended by @JayneHarrison3

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Sharon Peake Linked In article

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#privilege #maleprivilege #genderequity #genderbalance

There's been a lot of talk about privilege lately, and it's an important dialogue to initiate because it affects us all. But what exactly is privilege. And how does it link to racism, sexism and bias? These concepts are closely related and it is important to understand what they are.

Privilege is an invisible set of benefits, rights or immunity, favouring specific groups such as men, white people or able-bodied people[1]. As my business is focused on creating more gender balanced workplaces, I am particularly interested in male privilege and how this impacts women's ability to progress at work. Privilege manifests in a variety of unhelpful ways. Research confirms that men benefit from higher levels of respect, status and wealth in society[2]. The amount of this benefit varies but the highest collective beneficiaries are white, heterosexual (or perceived to be), middle class, stereotypically masculine men[3]. Research also shows that men are more easily promoted, respectfully viewed and earn more than women for doing jobs in which they are equally qualified and equivalently rated[4]. Additionally, men who adopt less effectual leadership styles than women, suffer no direct consequence to their career progression, perceived competence or likeability[5].

I have no doubt that the men I know have worked hard to secure their promotions and career advancement opportunities. But recognising the benefit of privilege means understanding that women (or any minority groups) are generally not able to achieve the same level of opportunity, recognition, and material reward for the same amount of effort.

It's important to acknowledge that on an individual level, most men do not feel they are the beneficiaries of privilege. After all they are not immune to economic strife, job loss or relationship failure. Equally, many women believe in the meritocratic ideal and that their efforts will be fairly rewarded, and their ventures into motherhood free from penalty. White male privilege is not a personal inference. The term is used to define and acknowledge the societal advantage received by the group. So while not all men individually benefit, compared to women and other minorities, most do.

And of course, intersectionality means that privilege will be held in different ways by different people, depending on their background and characteristics. As a well-educated white woman, I am acutely aware that I hold more privilege than my female friends and colleagues of colour, as well as those who are non-able-bodied, or LGBT+.

Race is a telling example on intersectionality. In the UK, ethnic minority women have a higher participation rate in tertiary education than other demographic groups; it is 3 per cent higher than for ethnic minority men, 17 per cent higher than white women and 24 per cent higher than white men. And yet these higher level qualifications are not necessarily leading to better jobs for BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) women. They remain over-represented in the lower income earning professions such as the '4 Cs' (catering, care work, childcare and clerical work), and under-represented in professional occupations[6]. When it comes to pay, women of all ethnicities experience a significant pay gap compared to their male counterparts. And this intersectionality bias continues in unemployment stats, which show black African women having the highest unemployment rates, while white women have the lowest. For ethnic minority women who do achieve board director positions in a FTSE350 company, they are outnumbered nine to one by white female directors[7]. Of course, the experience of women of colour differs enormously. While only 8 per cent of Black Caribbean women are outside the labour market, this number is exponentially higher for Pakistani and Bangladeshi women (36 per cent and 40 per cent respectively)[8].

In the western world, we're primed to believe that opportunities are equal and that what separates success from failure is a lack of either aptitude or application. But history, and also current affairs, are full of examples of people denied equal societal participation or human rights based on their perceived inferiority, as the above statistics illustrate. Suggestions of privilege are sometimes denied based on our belief in meritocracy. But the awkward truth is that meritocracy is a myth. To understand why, we need to first understand bias.

Bias, sexism and the link to privilege

The processes we use to evaluate people are mostly unconscious and have an important evolutionary basis. Cognitive shortcuts prevent us from being overwhelmed with information and allow us to respond to immediate threats. When taking in information, we firstly classify someone to a general stereotype of gender, race, etc. Then we attribute or fill in the blanks by assuming they meet all the characteristics of that stereotype. Finally, we calibrate the classification with new data. This last step is where we find the biggest opportunity for bias because it relies on the observer considering counterfactual data and effectively admitting to errors in their earlier evaluation[9]. So for example, if our stereotype societal messages are that men are great leaders and women are great nurturers then meeting a female leader (or a male primary carer) runs counter to our stereotype expectations and results in bias. Judgements are made in milliseconds and attempts to override initial assessments are often ignored so on an unconscious level we may reject those who are counter stereotype[10].

Yet bias - conscious or unconscious - does not in itself equate to sexism, or racism. Think of bias as the beliefs (or perhaps prejudices) that a person holds. Where this becomes sexism - or racism - is where these biases are translated into action. Such as choosing to hire a man over a woman because you feel he is inherently more competent in the 'tougher' or more technical aspects of the role. Or excluding a recent mother for promotion because you assume she won't be able to travel now that she's had a baby. The systematic 'acting out' of unconscious biases means that in most c-suite environments a heterosexual white man is favoured above a gay man, or that a highly educated white women is favoured over a lower socially graded white man. It also helps explain why only four of the US Fortune 500 CEOs are black or men of colour, and none of them are women[11]. And why of the British citizens holding FTSE 350 board director roles, only 2.6 per cent of these positions are held by people of colour[12].

Sexism lies at the heart of gender inequality. Individual acts of sexism may appear benign, but collectively and over time these seemingly innocuous actions create a climate of male dominance. Male privilege becomes the by-product of this culture, as indicated below.

What does male privilege look like?

So how does male privilege play out? Examples of privilege experienced by white men include[13]:

On any day of the year, men will see themselves overwhelmingly represented in mainstream media, business reporting, political life, sports and music.

Being confident that co-workers won't think they got their job because of their gender - even though that might be true.

Having the odds skewed in their favour when competing against female applicants. The more prestigious, or higher-ranking the job, the higher the degree of favour.

Men are regarded as having greater intelligence and levels of competence and believed to be 'inherently' suited to the most financially rewarding and prestigious careers.

The odds of encountering sexual harassment or gender-based micro-aggressions at work are so low for men, they are negligible. Even when working in female dominated spaces.

Men asking to see the person in charge will likely be presented with another man. The higher-up the organisation the person is, the more likely this is and that he'll be white.

Men speaking out publicly on issues affecting their gender equity (particularly online) are unlikely to be trolled or threatened with rape*.

When men speak, on almost any topic or in any setting, it is generally taken for granted that they know what they are talking about.

Micro-inequities

"Sexism is not a glass ceiling. It's a labyrinth of micro-inequities that add up over a lifetime"
-- Amy Cuddy, Professor at Harvard Business School
For most women, the daily experience of being on the receiving end of sexism and privilege manifests as micro-inequities. These are small events which are often short-lived, hard to prove, at times covert or unintentional, and frequently unrecognised by the perpetrator. Micro-inequities occur wherever people are perceived to be different[14]. Examples include: being labelled as being too emotional or being told to lighten up, when raising issues about gender equity; Routinely being mistaken for the secretary or someone more junior; Being the default for making the tea; Being labelled bossy or b*tchy if you're assertive; Often, particularly at senior leadership level, team-building exercises favour male stereotype venues and activities such as golf or football matches, pubs, sporting competitions and in some extreme cases, strip clubs. I'm yet to see any men attending a corporate spa day or pedicure event. Some particularly grating experiences include a friend discovering her male colleagues had a rating system on her and her fellow female colleagues' attractiveness. Two other friends recall being told that although they have great potential, they would never be considered for a promotion while working part-time.

So what can we do?

So what can we do about bias, sexism and privilege? I work with organisations to address the systemic barriers to women's progression. But for those not in a position to effect organisation-wide change, what can be done at an individual level? First and foremost it's about awareness. Consciously tuning in and seeing things differently, or from someone else's point of view can be a powerful way of de-personalising the issue and becoming more mentally inclusive. Exposing yourself to new experiences is a key way of broadening your perspective, such as socialising with people outside your ordinary social circle, or mentoring those in the workplace with different attributes to you. Finally, and importantly, using your privilege to help others. Here are 10 practical ways in which men can do this:

1. Speaking up when women are interrupted or undermined or when their ideas are attributed to someone else.

2. Calling out discrepancies in how work is credited or assigned.

3. Immediately stamping out sexist (or racist or homophobic) jokes.

4. Asking women's opinions in meetings or boardroom discussions, especially when they are outnumbered by men.

5. Challenging the lack of women in senior ranks and pushing for greater diversity.

6. Holding yourself, and your team(s) accountable for increasing the level of diversity and inclusion.

7. Refusing to participate in all-male panels or events.

8. Being mindful of language: is the same behaviour being described differently for men and women?

9. Actively support mothers (and all parents) in their transition to, and from, parental leave, helping to ensure their career is not negatively impacted.

10. Role modelling taking paternity leave or working flexibly and encouraging other men to do the same.

There is an important role men can play in fast-tracking gender equality. Given men currently hold more positions of power, their voices and influence can materially help to acknowledge and dismantle the biases and male privileges that hold women back. We know from research that women can benefit from gender equity, but we also know that men and children do too. Men in gender equal relationships are healthier and happier and report greater marital satisfaction, and children growing up in equitable family environments have greater levels of achievement and lower levels of absenteeism[15]. Every one of us has a contribution to make in this strand of our social history. But it is men's voices that we most need to engage on this topic. Or to put it more poetically, in the words of Tennyson: The woman's cause is a man's. They rise and fall together.

* Before posting this article I sought feedback from several men. Some questioned whether there was evidence to support the point on cyber trolling and rape threats: there is indeed significant evidence from around the world to substantiate this. For example, up to 23% of European woman have experienced cyber trolling in their lifetime, and up to 70% of all cyber-stalking victims globally are women. Trolling can be particularly extreme in politics where senior female politicians are three times as likely as their male counterparts to be trolled on Twitter. UK Labour MP Jess Philips received 600 rape threats in one night. Online abuse has been cited as a major reason for a disproportionate number of female MPs standing down just prior to the last UK general election. You can read more in these links: https://www.hopenothate.org.uk/magazine/in-search-of-hope/the-freedom-to-be-free-from-abuse/ and https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/misogynist-online-abuse-digital-harassment-sexism/

References

[1]. Harris, D. (2018). Male Privilege. Abdo Publishing, Minneopolis, US.

[2]. Valian, V. (1997). Why So Slow? The MIT Press.

[3]. Schilt, K. (2010) Just One of the Guys? Chicago, IL. University of Chicago Press https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/J/bo9743256.html

[4]. Employers prefer male managerial potential to female proven track record. (n.d.). ScienceDaily. Retrieved 29 June 2020, from https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150506164244.htm

[5]. See: Heilman, M. E., & Okimoto, T. G. (2007). Why are women penalized for success at male tasks?: The implied communality deficit. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92(1), 81-92; McGinn, K. L., Tempest, N. (2000). "Heidi Roizen." Harvard Business School Case 800-228. (Revised April 2010); Corell, S. (2013). Creating a level playing field. The Stanford Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research. (2013)

[6]. A study of the lives and experiences of black and minority ethnic women leaders... ...same gender, different race. (n.d.). Different Women Different Places. Retrieved 7 July, 2020, from https://74c739d3-4418-486f-b493-6322d46aa6a1.filesusr.com/ugd/2e59af_0fefc37df65241d89efad2917efae678.pdf

[7]. The Parker Review Report 2020: Ethnic Diversity Enriching Business Leadership. Retrieved 7 July 2020, from https://assets.ey.com/content/dam/ey-sites/ey-com/en_uk/news/2020/02/ey-parker-review-2020-report-final.pdf

[8]. A study of the lives and experiences of black and minority ethnic women leaders... ...same gender, different race. (n.d.). Different Women Different Places. Retrieved 7 July, 20202, from https://74c739d3-4418-486f-b493-6322d46aa6a1.filesusr.com/ugd/2e59af_0fefc37df65241d89efad2917efae678.pdf

[9]. Antonakis, J. (2017). About face. Science, 357(6348), 259-259.

[10]. Barriers to Equality, the Power of Subtle Discrimination to Maintain Unequal Opportunity." Mary Rowe, 1990

[11]. Connley, C. (2020, July 1). How corporate America's diversity initiatives continue to fail Black women. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/01/how-corporate-americas-diversity-initiatives-continue-to-fail-black-women.html

[12]. The Parker Review Report 2020: Ethnic Diversity Enriching Business Leadership. Retrieved 7 July 2020, from https://assets.ey.com/content/dam/ey-sites/ey-com/en_uk/news/2020/02/ey-parker-review-2020-report-final.pdf

[13]. The Male Privilege Checklist: https://www.cpt.org/files/US%20-%20Male%20Privilege%20Checklist.pdf

[14]. "Barriers to Equality, the Power of Subtle Discrimination to Maintain Unequal Opportunity." Mary Rowe, 1990

[15]. Kimmel, Michael, Why Gender Equality Is Good for Everyone - Men Included <https://www.ted.com/talks/michael_kimmel_why_gender_equality_is_good_for_everyone_men_included> [accessed 21 June 2020]

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privilege #maleprivilege #genderequity #genderbalance There's been a lot of talk about privilege lately, and it's an important dialogue to initiate because it affects us all. But what exactly is privilege.

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Brain food article - Cambridge cjbs insights

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Inequality has emerged as one of the grand challenges for societies. It is often explained in terms of the intrinsic dynamics of capitalism or government policy. A new paper co-authored at Cambridge Judge Business School argues that the role of organisations in ensuring the persistence of inequality is just as crucial.

The issue of inequality is often linked to free market capitalism and government policy in such areas as tax, wages and educational opportunities. In contrast, there is little discussion of the role that organisations play in fostering and perpetuating inequality.

A just-published review puts the spotlight on organisations as places "where inequality is produced and amplified" - owing to hiring and other practices that go unquestioned thanks to three "highly institutionalised myths" that pervade organisational life. These are the myths of efficiency, meritocracy and positive globalisation.

"Organisations, far from being neutral entities, constitute bounded, rationalised and formalised spaces in which economic opportunities intersect with structures of exclusion and disadvantage," says the paper published in Academy of Management Annals by academics based in the UK and Germany.

Organisational textbooks often misrepresent how people are hired, promoted and paid in organisations. Similarly, they hardly ever mention the numerous race, gender and class-based barriers to upward mobility that pervade organisations. A more honest appreciation of these dynamics is critical to understanding how inequality is produced and perpetuated, says the paper, which draws its insights from more than 400 articles, books and reports by government agencies and think tanks.

Dr Kamal Munir

"The issue of who suffers from inequality has been well understood, but there has been little attention paid to the organisational mechanisms that allow inequality to persist," says study co-author Dr Kamal Munir, Reader in Strategy & Policy at Cambridge Judge Business School, and Race & Inclusion Champion at the University of Cambridge.

"Our paper finds that inequality is fostered by organisational practices, and it is allowed to escape scrutiny thanks to three myths that are deeply entrenched in the organisational world and conceptualised in textbooks written about organisations and taught in business schools."

The article focuses at length on the role played by these myths - defined as "widely shared cultural ideals and rationalised beliefs about how organisations ought to operate". The paper suggests the three myths of efficiency, meritocracy and the positive nature of globalisation have become "pervasive in their influence" in allowing the enactment of practices and "taken-for-granted ways of operating" that reproduce inequality in organisations.

For example, the vast difference in pay between chief executive officers and ordinary workers is often justified by the existence of a neutral and efficient labour market which rewards the best performers. The cultural and social networks that marginalise non-whites, women and the poor are not taken into account in judging these disparities.

Likewise, the widespread belief that organisations are basically meritocratic wasn't borne out by the study's review, which found that entry, advancement and reward in organisations "often remains systematically non-meritocratic" and fails to reflect social and cultural factors. However, the myth of meritocracy is internalised not only by those who rise to the top, but equally by those who do not; the latter end up blaming themselves, suffering from low self-esteem and lowering their aspirations, cumulatively making the organisation less dynamic.

As for the institutionalised belief that globalisation is a positive and progressive force, a tide that lifts all boats, the review found that recruitment, promotion and compensation practices within multinational corporations engender new inequalities while strengthening existing ones. Far from being progressive, they reinforce local hierarchies and class-based social systems, taking advantage of workers, while offering attractive opportunities to the educated elite.

The authors conclude by saying that inequality has not received anywhere near the same attention at business schools as ethics and climate change. Highly sanitised pictures of organisations are painted in textbooks omitting the visible and invisible barriers that characterise organisational life for non-whites, women and the poor.

The paper - entitled "The organizational reproduction of inequality" - is co-authored by Dr John M. Amis of the University of Edinburgh; Professor Johanna Mair of the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin and co-director of the Global Innovation for Impact Lab at the Stanford University Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society; and Dr Kamal A. Munir, Reader in Strategy & Policy at Cambridge Judge Business School.

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Inequality has emerged as one of the grand challenges for societies. It is often explained in terms of the intrinsic dynamics of capitalism or government policy. A new paper co-authored at Cambridge Judge Business School argues that the role of organisations in ensuring the persistence of inequality

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Forbes article - leading on D & I

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Much of the work to manage diversity and inclusion has focused on creating diversity networks and events. Since the death of George Floyd, there has been a marked change shift in the way that Black people view the overall effectiveness of these activities, particularly when they are stand-alone and do not form part of a comprehensive change agenda.

I have written previously about the dangers of hastily co-opting Black employees to lead the race equality agenda. The top dressing of race equality issues only serves to protract and exacerbate workplace inequalities. Many leadership teams remain content with procuring the services of their Black employees in an effort to make this change a reality.

There continues to be an urgent need for leadership commitment to developing an anti racist agenda, that subsumes both behavioural and attitudinal change within leadership, in an effort to embed diversity and racial equality.

Dismantling Systemic Racism

Organizational policy and systemically reinforced behaviours, are key driving forces behind brand culture and inclusion. It is within these frameworks that inequalities are allowed to thrive and cultivate negative experiences faced by Black and Brown employees within the workplace.

Racism flourishes between the historic and group think influences, which form part of power structures across business, operational and relationship contexts.

Group think within leadership is a major challenge to inclusion
getty

Racism is built and reinforced along the lines of power. Those who govern the systems of power, have the relative freedom to subscribe to any level of dominance they choose. The problem is that this becomes the perfect nurturing environment, in which racism can thrives.

Racist sentiments can be emboldened into the fabric of organizational culture. This helps to support the marginalisation of those who do not have the power to shape the culture in an informative way. Having been denied access to the top table, where critical decisions around organisational culture, culture and processes are decided, Black employees and others from diverse groups, face an uphill struggle.

There is much work to do for leaders to break down the intrinsic barriers that serve to perpetuate the very systems that govern the ability for Black employees to thrive in their organizations.

Leadership mindsets that develop actionable approaches to diversity, will support actions that will better embed inclusion. Inclusive leadership is key to this discussion, but action, as always, speaks much louder than words.

Learning about Racism

Conversations around racism can take time and may subject some within leaders to feelings of fragility, but having the discussions is a must. Leaders will not cure their organizations of racism, until they disassemble the thought processes and behaviours that negatively impact their Black employees.

The world is peaking out about racism, but is leadership listening?
getty

They say who feels it knows it. This is a truism that cannot be ignored. Many organizations has diversity networks or employee resource groups that are key to developing conversations. They are a useful tool for leadership, in their journey towards race equality, but must not be utilised in a way that is disingenuous.

For some within leadership, the facts are already known and it is the reticence towards truly enabling inclusion that is the problem. For others, it is lack of understanding around the systemic nature of, and the institutionalisation of racism that is an issue.

Regardless of the cause, leadership must step up to the plate and embrace the challenge in a holistic way.

Moving Away From The Norm

It is time for leaders to be constructive about, and harness the skills and creativity within race equality. After all, history shows us the capability of Black and Brown people and the contributions made to businesses across the globe. Black employees are no longer willing to accept leadership excuses around the marginalisation of race within the diversity and inclusion agenda.

Excuses such as 'We're focusing on gender this year' or 'Why not have an event in Black History Month?' will no longer suffice in the new world, into which we are now embarking. It is time for substantive change.

The systemic racism that Black employees impacts every day of the year. These employees are Black 365 days of each and every year, and are forced to work in less that equitable spaces, due to the failure of leadership to realistically considertheir concerns around inequity and marginalization.

Leadership must value multi-racial input within key decision-making processes - at all levels.
getty

Make no mistake, the new normal is here and attitudes, values and organizational systems will be scrutinised, in an effort to rid the workplace of racism. Real buy-in for diversity and inclusive systems, will move organizations closer to normalising anti-racist behaviors.

Subscribing to real inclusion may be difficult for some who believe it is tantamount to losing power that is invested within their positions. But if that power supports the subjugation of Black employees, then its losing it is not a bad thing. It must an option that it is brought to the table.

Essentially, leadership must make a forceful commitment to the prioritization of race equality, within organizational systems and across agendas. It starts at the top. Leaders must take action and start to make changes now.

... Read More

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How To Dismantle Racism In The Workplace: It Starts At The Top

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Much of the work to manage diversity and inclusion has focused on creating diversity networks and events. Since the death of George Floyd, there has been a marked change shift in the way that Black people view the overall effectiveness of these activities, particularly when they are stand-alone and do not form part of a comprehensive change agenda.

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Centre for Creative Leadership Taking action

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5 Powerful Ways to Take REAL Action on DEI (Diversity, Equity & Inclusion)

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Advancing your diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts requires shifting toward more equitable leadership. Learn 5 ways to take action.

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HBR - Dear White Boss

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It's easy to assume that other people experience the world the way we do. More specifically, it's very easy for white managers to assume that their colleagues of color face the same basic set of challenges they do. On one level that's true: The work itself is the same. African-American and other nonwhite managers have to make their numbers, motivate employees, hire and fire, and plan for the future. But on another level, these managers frequently contend with an atmosphere of tension, instability, and distrust that can be so frustrating they lose the desire to contribute fully or do their best work; they may even drop out altogether. Their white bosses and coworkers are simply unaware of the "miasma," as Keith Caver and Ancella Livers call this noxious and tenuous environment. They're often puzzled when their nonwhite colleagues quit, seemingly out of nowhere, or appear to overreact to what seems like a minor incident-but which is really the last straw.

We asked Caver and Livers, faculty and coaches at the Center for Creative Leadership, to write a fictional letter from a black manager to a white boss describing the miasma and what it's like to be different in the workplace. Their letter, with its attendant suggestions, draws on research from interviews and surveys with hundreds of mid-to senior-level African-American managers, as well as long years of personal experience. The point, the authors stress, is not to belabor the lack of people of color in the executive suite or any of the other barriers that limit opportunities in corporate America. Neither is it to extol the virtues and accomplishments of leaders of difference. Instead, their letter portrays the nature of corporate life once black managers are established-the feeling that they leave some part of their identity at home and the sometimes subtle and often systemic racial biases that inhibit and alienate African-Americans. The letter may not apply to every leader, black or white, or to every organization, but these issues are more widespread than corporate America cares to acknowledge. It should be required reading for white executives-after all, companies can ill afford to allow talent to slip through their fingers.
- The Editors
Do you remember that first management-team offsite I attended shortly after I came on board? You wanted to introduce me to the key decision makers-the people I'd need to know in my job as director of strategic planning. I appreciated the exposure, and, after the introductions and the requisite banter, I settled in to observe the team's dynamics and get a sense of the culture. As a new employee, I didn't expect to participate much in the conversation, although I was prepared to answer the occasional question about a particular strategy or offer any insights from my experience that might be relevant. Instead, I got a barrage of questions about issues related to diversity-what I thought about some new HR initiatives, why Brian and Matthew can't get along, why Diane left the company, and on and on in that vein.

I answered the questions as best I could-I was a newcomer, after all, and wanted to be polite-but I went home feeling pretty demoralized. Despite my 15 years of experience, despite my solid track record, my new colleagues appeared to have little interest in my business expertise. Instead, they seemed to have assigned me some special role: official interpreter of minority concerns for the organization.

You may be wondering why I'm bringing this up after all these years-years that have been by many accounts rewarding for me professionally and for the organization as a whole. It's because on that day, and on so many days before and since, I've been made to feel that my white colleagues and bosses don't see my talents and accomplishments; they see only the color of my skin. I've wanted to write this letter for some time now, because despite all outward appearances I am not entirely happy, and at times my work suffers for it. In fact, when I look at my experience and that of my African-American colleagues, and then look at my white colleagues in this company and at you, one thought keeps resonating in my mind: It must be good to be king.

OK, that's unfair. I don't mean it as an insult. I'm quite sure you don't feel like a king and may, in fact, think it's misguided or even ungrateful of me to harbor such thoughts. I know you're operating under significant pressures-to keep our division solvent, to stay abreast of current trends, and to be fair and aboveboard in your personal interactions and business dealings, just to name a few. You've been a good boss. I've learned a lot from you, and I've gotten my promotions and raises. And that's the devil of it. Everything looks fine, but it isn't.

Just as members of the royalty in medieval Europe were often shielded from the stark realities outside their castle walls, I believe you are in some ways blind to what is happening outside your office door. I truly believe you don't know how frustrated I often am-how frustrated we African-Americans often are-by the lack of acknowledgment or apparent understanding of how our experience in the workplace differs from yours, and how it affects not just our own morale but the health of the organization overall. Have you noticed that the turnover rate for blacks is significantly higher than it is for our white counterparts? Have you stopped to consider why?

You and I both want this company to succeed. Therefore, I want to find a way for us to work together better, and I don't think we can do that unless I can be honest with you. Now, I suspect you're thinking that you've got a few honest things to say to me as well. That's fair. If we're trying to create an open dialogue, it's got to be two-way.

But that's another letter. For now, I'd like to describe to you the miasma that surrounds black managers in our everyday work lives and help you understand how it can erode my productivity and our relationship in insidious ways. I'm going to give you some examples, although I'm wary of doing so because each story, taken in isolation, may seem trivial. But please understand that I could go on and on. I could give you hundreds of examples-things that happen to me and my black colleagues and friends every single day. It's the cumulative effect that wears us down.

All I ask is that you test your assumptions after you read what I have to say. I promise to test my own. Then, maybe we can start a dialogue. At the very least, we'll understand each other better. And perhaps, with some work, we'll both be able to change some of the behaviors that prevent us from being true colleagues.

"I Feel Alienated..."

It may surprise you to learn that I often think you can't see past the color of my skin. We have a good working relationship, so why would I say such a thing? I'll bet you don't remember the time when you pinned me to the wall trying to get an explanation for Jesse Jackson's perceived misdeeds or (much earlier in our relationship) the O.J. verdict. How am I supposed to know? I can't explain Clarence Thomas. By the way, how do you account for some of Bill Clinton's questionable behavior? And what about Timothy McVeigh? I know these questions are unfair; we should be able to talk as two individuals about business, current events, and other topics that interest us, without race-based judgments. And yet, you seem to hold me accountable for explaining the actions of other black people as if I had some personal knowledge or culpability. It makes me feel like you don't see me for who I am; it makes me feel alienated from you, from this company.

It isn't just you. Look back to that day at the management offsite, when the members of the executive team saw me not as a seasoned strategist but as an authority on race relations in the company, even though I had just started and barely knew the players. And do you remember when you, Jim, and I had lunch in the corporate dining room, not long after the offsite? As I placed my tray on the table, Jim surreptitiously pointed to a table of four African-Americans who were having lunch together and said, "Can you tell me why all of the blacks are sitting together?" I was momentarily taken aback by his question. Not only was I sitting with him, a young black woman was sitting alone at another table. Clearly, all the blacks weren't sitting together. I managed to reply, "I don't know, but I've been wondering why all the white people are sitting together."

It may have seemed like a harmless question to you, but it struck a nerve. If Jim hadn't focused on the few black employees in the room, he might have noticed that the vast majority of the 60 or so patrons eating lunch that day were white, and, with the exception of you and Jim, all the whites were sitting with each other or alone. The blacks were doing the same thing the whites were doing-having lunch with friends and colleagues. We have the same need for socialization and acceptance that you do. Perhaps more, because for us the workplace is often an uncertain and tumultuous place, in ways you don't see. Unfortunately, rather than enjoying real conversations with our nonblack colleagues, we are often taken off guard by awkward jokes or slips of the tongue-leading us to wonder if these comments betray underlying feelings or assumptions about African-Americans in the office.

And I'll tell you another story-an incident I didn't mention to you when it happened, because I was too frustrated and thought you might think I was overreacting. One weekend I went to the office, in my normal, casual weekend attire, to finish up a report you needed to review on Monday. In the lobby, I had the strange feeling I was being watched and turned around to catch the weekend security guard staring at me. Although a few people were milling about and others were going (apparently) to and from their offices, I seemed to be the only one commanding special attention. Before getting into the elevator, I was stopped by an informally dressed young white man who in a stern voice asked to see my identification. This man was not even the security guard. He was someone who worked on a different floor from me, and I didn't recognize him. Please understand, I had worked here for two years, but because I was out of context, he assumed I was a thug. You might chalk it up to an honest mistake, but I can assure you he hadn't challenged any of the white people entering the building, nor had I demanded his ID.

Now, when I go into the office on weekends, I make sure to put on khakis and a polo shirt-and when I look at my white colleagues coming in wearing jeans or jogging suits, I feel my resentment growing. What's more, this type of experience is so common that many blacks have nearly given up on getting our white colleagues to see us as nonthreatening. Little wonder so many of us remain alienated. Little wonder so many of us leave in search of greener pastures-a place where we can be accepted for who we are as contributors and team members.

"I'm Not Sure You Believe in Me..."

I've said that, at times, I don't think you can see past my skin color. To be honest, I also think you sometimes make judgments about me-usually not intentionally-based on a set of historical and cultural preconceptions. Practically speaking, this shows up in the expectations you and other white managers have for black employees. Those expectations aren't just demeaning; they can limit our ability (and our will) to contribute.

Do you remember when Robert, our black marketing director, hired Marie, also an African-American? Marie had worked in the marketing field for more than 15 years and had won three national awards. Her work was innovative and exciting, and she was by far the best candidate of the four Robert interviewed. Things became complicated, however, because Robert had also recently promoted a black man into a position of authority. Like Marie, this manager was clearly the best qualified of candidates. After hiring Marie, Robert began to hear whispers in the halls-suggestions that he was building his own little "ghetto fiefdom"-and before long one of his white colleagues came up to him, slapped him on the back, and said with a laugh, "So white people aren't good enough for you?"

Robert did his best to ignore the comments, but what really got to him was that his boss suddenly seemed to take a greater interest in the details of his group's work-asking for reports and updates he'd never needed when Robert's team was primarily white. Subtly, his boss was letting him know that at some level he expected the team's performance to drop. As we talked later, Robert explained that his frustrations came less from being questioned or joked with than from knowing his department's as well as his own credibility was now suspect. Consequently, he said, on top of his ordinary work he was going to have to expend significant energy managing his white colleagues' perceptions if he or his two new managers were to have a chance of succeeding. And the stress took its toll-his group has done outstanding work, but, as you know, Robert recently gave his notice. I wouldn't be surprised if he took Marie with him. He told you he's leaving for an exciting new opportunity; he told me he's worn out by the need to constantly defend his department.

The ribbing that Robert took may have been intended as humor, but it feeds the perception among blacks that our white bosses don't really believe in us. Here's another story for you. A black female reporter told me about a startling but open conversation she had at a convention with the CEO of a news media company. Seeking to gain greater insight into the industry, she queried him off the record about his views and hiring practices regarding blacks. He replied that he was afraid to hire black leaders because, he said, "If I fire them, they will sue me." Do you think people hired under such circumstances are really given the opportunity to succeed? I don't. Do you think our white counterparts are scrutinized for positions based on the preconceived idea that they will fail? No, I don't think so either. How can we possibly succeed in an environment where our new bosses have already thought about what's going to happen when they have to fire us? I think stereotypes based on fear that have festered into "fact" are what's behind this behavior.

And no matter how successful and senior we are, we're never immune to these stereotypes. One of my dear, and very talented, black friends was recently hired as a senior vice president for a major financial institution. With the exception of a few initial interviews and meetings, she did not set foot in the new organization until her first day at the office. As she emerged from the elevator, she was abruptly greeted by a white male who directed her to a small cubicle and asked her to quickly put her things away as they were expecting a new senior officer to arrive shortly. In mock obedience, she went to the cubicle and set her box down, only to return and inquire about the rest of her shipment that had been sent previously. As he stared at her in confusion, she smiled and continued, "Quite frankly, I don't believe all of my things will fit in this cubicle." She told me she almost felt sorry for the man as recognition of his error seemed to be slowly reflected in his face first by embarrassment and then by terror. He launched into an awkward and confused explanation of how they were also expecting a new administrative assistant, and how he had mistaken her...and then he fell silent. Instead of berating him, my friend simply smiled and said, "I understand. However, when the new assistant arrives, I hope that you will be far more gracious in welcoming the new member of our team."

These may seem like extreme examples, but my black colleagues and I run into this type of preconception all the time. Every day. It's discouraging, but it also has practical implications for what I and other African-Americans can accomplish. Research suggests that you're more likely to put me into an assistant director's position, even though I'm fully qualified for the director's role. Research also shows that mentoring is particularly important for blacks, yet people choose to mentor others who look like them, making it difficult for us to find mentors. What am I asking you to do? Consider mentoring me, even if I don't look like you. Consider me for that vice president's job. Give me a chance at the most technical and operationally critical roles, rather than limiting me to administrative positions. Give me credit for the ability to make good, rational business decisions. And draw your conclusions about my abilities based on my track record, not on the color of my skin

"I Don't Fully Trust You..."

This might be the hardest thing I have to tell you, because we've worked together for many years and have accomplished a great deal in that time. But to be honest, our relationship goes only so deep because I feel I can't fully trust you. Here's a story for you. A black friend of mine, James, was at a business dinner with a colleague who may have had one glass of wine too many. "Before I knew it," James said, "my colleague was telling me about how blacks get too many breaks and how most of us aren't smart enough to be in executive positions. This is someone who considers himself my friend. This is someone who's dealing with clients, peers, direct reports-some of whom are black or at least not white." At this point in his story James stopped and just looked at me for a moment. "I got through that meal, and I never let on what I thought. I have never forgotten that dinner, though, and I will never trust that man. I'm always professional with him. But I don't share more than I have to, nor do I deal with him if I can get around it."

That story has implications for both of us. The pervasiveness of experiences like James's takes a toll on African-Americans: It slowly eats away at our ability to trust the people we work with. Whether you, personally, exhibit these behaviors or attitudes is less important than the fact that experiences such as this make blacks wary of encounters with our white colleagues. Furthermore, our mutual history in this country and the way our different experiences currently manifest themselves in the workplace often impair my trust in you. Like James, I don't let you know about it-I can't afford to. What's more, James and I aren't alone. My own uncle, who had a long and successful career in corporate America, told me before I started work, "You have to be careful bestowing your trust; your white managers will treat you differently, no matter how well you do." I know times have changed, but I don't know if they've changed that much, as I often find myself being cautious around some of my white colleagues. This feeling that we need to guard ourselves, and the extra work that it takes to discern our true friends, creates significant additional stress for us.

Do you think the impaired trust and chronic stress that African-Americans feel might be contributing to the difficulty of retaining black employees? Because we often don't trust you, or, it seems, you us, is it possible that blacks don't feel free to fully (or openly) contribute? Do you think James's "friend" will appropriately use or develop the talents of his African-American direct reports? And do you think that our mutual distrust allows us to have solid interpersonal and working relationships? I'd say it means we're not likely to be as efficient or as effective as we could be. I'd say that some of us are reluctant to take risks we probably should take, because we don't think you'll support us if we make a mistake.

"Race Is Always with Me..."

I suspect that by now you've picked up one of the main points of this letter. Differences really do matter, although they may matter in ways you probably didn't expect. One of the big ways they matter is that race is always with us. As a friend of mine said recently, "I don't think a day goes by that I'm not reminded that I'm black." Another friend once recounted a minor, but daily irritation she had to contend with early in her career. "I used to work in a place that was pretty mono-ethnic," she told me. "And at my job you were expected to wear stockings. But the town I lived in didn't have stockings the shade I needed. I had to have my mother send them to me. I always thought of it as a mini-Berlin airlift." As you read this, you probably think that this is such a small thing it needn't be shared. You might go on to suggest that if that's all the inconvenience race causes, we should consider ourselves lucky. Well, I know it's a small thing. But it isn't something you have to think about. And more to the point, it's just one of many small-and large-things we cope with, day after day.

Difference itself is not a bad thing. Research shows that heterogeneous groups make better decisions than do homogeneous ones. Diverse groups also tend to have better problem-solving skills, are more creative, and deal more effectively with complex challenges. And with the increasing globalization of business, we need to be able to relate to numerous ethnic and racial constituencies. But because so many organizations manage difference poorly, they may not be reaping the benefits diversity can bring. I don't want us to continue making that mistake.

So, what do we do? There's no easy fix. We're confronting deep-seated, complex, and highly personal attitudes and assumptions-but opening a dialogue is a good first step. I think we have to be willing to ask ourselves uncomfortable questions and be prepared to deal with some difficult answers. At my last company, one of the vice presidents brought the entire senior management team together for a half-day session with five African-American managers, with the goal of putting some of these issues on the table. She stressed that the meeting was to be a safe environment and was respectful and candid throughout. Even with her comments, the meeting got off to an awkward start, but in the end everyone had a chance to ask questions and express their concerns. The senior team came to see that the experience of African-Americans at this company is different from that of whites. And frankly, my black colleagues and I saw that at times we need to drop our guard. We came to see how some of our own experiences and baggage led us to perceive actions differently than they were intended. While I can't say everything was perfect after that meeting, we did arrive at a shared understanding and developed something of a shared language for addressing difficult issues or communication lapses on the spot.

There are other ways to build awareness. My cousin, a product manager for a large manufacturer, told me about a new initiative at her company. Each member of the management team belongs to a racially diverse "learning circle," composed of three or four people who have been charged with studying and exploring issues of difference in the workplace. Periodically, the circle meets to discuss what they've learned and how it might apply to them and the company. It's just a beginning, but at least they've begun to uncover some difficult issues, and that's the first step in tackling them.

I like working here. I believe in the company, in our products, and our future. But I have options, and so do my colleagues of color. This isn't a threat; I simply want you to know that I'm here because I choose to stay. I want our company to succeed, and I want to succeed along with everyone else. I'm an invested and involved partner, and I wish you could see that, in the same way that I wish you could see the miasma that muddies the work environment for me and other African-Americans. Right now, you probably can't see it, but I can tell you about it-and I hope you'll consider this letter an invitation to begin a conversation. And maybe in the future you'll see it for yourself. At any rate, thanks for listening.

A version of this article appeared in the November 2002 issue of Harvard Business Review.

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It's easy to assume that other people experience the world the way we do. More specifically, it's very easy for white managers to assume that their colleagues of color face the same basic set of challenges they do. On one level that's true: The work itself is the same.

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D & I Eight Powerful Truths 2018

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CIPD Diversity management that works - evidence based practice

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Research approach for the report

Practitioner expertise and stakeholder views are crucial for diagnosing issues and identifying potential solutions, but managers need to combine this with insights drawn from research and organisational data to help them make better-informed decisions and avoid bias from their own opinions. This report is based on an evidence-into-practice programme, which brought together professional expertise on diversity and inclusion (D&I) with insights from scientific research.

Our lines of enquiry came from a group of D&I professionals discussing the challenges they faced in their work and the concerns raised by their stakeholders. Based on these questions, we searched and reviewed the scientific literature.

Download the research report:

Recommendations and action points for consideration

Having presented the findings of our literature review to our group of D&I professionals, we drew up a set of recommendations based on the research and professional expertise. We also ran an online discussion forum for people professionals from a range of backgrounds and specialisms to gain further insight and test the robustness of our conclusions.

You can explore the top-level recommendations below, and find more detail inside the full report.

Read more about diversity management that works, and explore the recommendations in more detail, by downloading the full research report:

We outline five areas in which people professionals can take action to build inclusion in the workplace

Take action

The CIPD and Westminster Business School brought together D&I practitioners from different organisations for a series of workshops, to identify the key issues in diversity, to test the scientific evidence in this area, and to co-create practical solutions to better embed diversity in the workplace

Watch the video

This online calendar, produced in partnership with Diversiton for CIPD members only, highlights important themes around inclusion with a special focus for each month

Download now

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Diversity management that works: summary of recommendations | Reports | CIPD

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Practitioner expertise and stakeholder views are crucial for diagnosing issues and identifying potential solutions, but managers need to combine this with insights drawn from research and organisational data to help them make better-informed decisions and avoid bias from their own opinions.

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Unconscious bias training - efficacy & evidence

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Unconscious bias training: an assessment of the evidence for effectiveness

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Unconscious bias training aims to increase awareness of unconscious bias and its impact on people with protected characteristics. The training is often used in the workplace to reduce this bias and reduce discriminatory behaviour and attitudes.

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Why I'm no longer talking to white people about race

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Why I'm no longer talking to white people about race

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Recommended book

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why i'm no longer talking to white cover - Google Search

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racism book structural racism eddo reni audible race white people

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Sasha Scott CEO of Inclusive Group as a guest of Nicola Morris Culture Recruitment

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Diversity & Inclusion in a Hybrid Workplace, with Sasha Scott

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D and I podcast Michael Pickup and Reg Amoah

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Episode 1: In Conversation with Euan Graham, EG Advisory

Welcome to the first of a series of podcasts from Oyster about the world of work and employment. Today Michael Pickup is in conversation with Euan Graham, Principal Consultant at EG Advisory. They discuss the UK government's Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and all things "furlough". Amongst other things, they discuss the purpose of the Scheme, how it works and, not least, things for employers to think about if they decide to furlough employees.

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Episode 2: In Conversation with Nick Bloy, Wellbeing Republic

Welcome to the second of Oyster's podcasts about the world of work and employment. Today we're in conversation with Nick Bloy, Director at Wellbeing Republic, discussing employee wellbeing. We take a look at what employers are doing right now to support their employees together with what steps employees can take for themselves to safeguard their own wellbeing during the coronavirus lockdown.

Episode 3: In Conversation with Dr Hazel Harrison, ThinkAvellana

In the third of our series of podcasts about the world of work and employment we're in conversation with Dr Hazel Harrison, a clinical psychologist and Director of ThinkAvellana. Dr Harrison works with a range of clients including law firms, schools and the BBC and today we discuss children's wellbeing, including advice for a daily routine in lockdown, some of the challenges to wellbeing and screen time.

Episode 4: In Conversation with Angus MacGregor, MUFG

In this latest podcast from Oyster about the world of work and employment, we talk to Angus Macgregor, Deputy Head of Global HR at MUFG in Tokyo about the Japanese Government's approach to Covid-19, HR's response, the steps the Bank has taken to facilitate a return to office working, lessons learnt and the future of work.

Episode 5: In Conversation with Sharon Green, Chiara Consultancy

Trust - so deeply ingrained in our daily personal and professional lives that it is easily taken for granted - seems uppermost right now as the UK Government, led by the science, this week sets out its plans to end the lockdown. So, for this latest podcast about the world of work and employment we're in conversation with Sharon Green, Founder of Chiara Consultancy, a specialist in Change, Tech, Comms and Engagement and we take a closer look at what we mean by trust in organisations, why it is so important, the impact of Covid-19 on trust and, crucially, the kind of steps employers should take to ensure trust in the workplace and amongst other stakeholders both now and in the future.

Episode 6: In Conversation with Euan Graham, EG Advisory

As the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, announces plans to extend the furlough scheme, what better time to catch-up with Euan Graham, Principal Consultant at EG Advisory, for his take on this and the Government's latest announcement on a phased return to the workplace in England. Euan underlines the importance, more than ever, of effective employee communications, practical plans for a return to the workplace, though may be not for everyone, right now at least, and he shares his insights in to what some of his clients and employers are thinking more generally.

Episode 7: In Conversation with Euan Graham, EG Advisory

As employers continue the phased return to the workplace, with flexible furloughing being introduced from 1 July, we take the opportunity to catch-up with Euan Graham, Principal Consultant at EG Advisory to better understand how the scheme will work in practice, possible extensions to the CJRS beyond 31 October and alternative employment arrangements employers are implementing to safeguard jobs and aid recovery.

Episode 8: In Conversation with Nick Bloy, Wellbeing Republic

Cows, mending fences and sharpening swords. It's all in our latest podcast with Nick Bloy, Director of Wellbeing Republic, in which we talk employee wellbeing, self-care for leaders and avoiding the (growing) risk of burn-out as employers begin the lengthy process of re-opening the workplace.

Episode 9: In Conversation with John Scott, Abune Mediation

In previous podcasts, we've discussed the importance of trust in organisations but what happens when this trust (between colleagues, employer and employee, co-founders, Board members and leadership teams) breaks down? It runs the risk of a legal dispute arising (often time-consuming, disruptive and costly). One alternative form of dispute resolution is Mediation, a subject John Scott at Abune Mediation sheds great light on in our latest podcast on the world of work and employment.

Episode 10: In Conversation with Reg Amoah, Norton Rose Fulbright

In our latest podcast about the world of work and employment, we're in conversation with Reg Amoah, Diversity & Inclusion Advisor at Norton Rose Fulbright. Drawing on his own personal experience, we discuss Reg's career, the significance of history and the importance of education, proximity and affinity and the continuing need to challenge people's pre-conceptions, including our own.

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Welcome to the first of a series of podcasts from Oyster about the world of work and employment. Today Michael Pickup is in conversation with Euan Graham, Principal Consultant at EG Advisory. They discuss the UK government's Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and all things "furlough".

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26 June 2020 Race & equality at work

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Overview:

In the second of the CBI's webinars on race, we were joined by Sandra Kerr CBE, National Campaign Director of Business in the Community, Miatta Fahnbulleh, CEO of the New Economics Foundation, Rachel Farr, Knowledge Lawyer at Baker McKenzie and Matthew Fell, CBI Chief UK Policy Director, to discuss race and equality at work.

These were the key points raised in the conversation:

The disproportionate impact of Covid-19 on Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) groups

How businesses should tackle racial inequality

Discrimination and the law

"Build back better" should include racial equality.

The disproportionate impact of Covid-19 on Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) groups
The Black Lives Matter movement and protests have highlighted the need for change at a pivotal moment. "We're right in the moment of the return to work as businesses think about restarting and reopening," said Matthew Fell of the CBI. As companies make decisions about the reopening, they need to take into consideration the "concerns, the nuances" that are affecting BAME colleagues, particularly as many of these communities have been disproportionately impacted by Covid-19. Thinking about racial equality should also form part of our longer term "build back better" planning, he said.

Matthew pointed to the data on Covid deaths and UK health inequalities to illustrate why this moment might be of particular concern to BAME employees.The risk of death from Covid-19 is between 10% to 50% higher for people in BAME communities. The Covid-19 crisis has "highlighted and heightened" existing inequalities in British society including "social and economic inequality, occupational risk, living conditions and, at times, outright discrimination," said Matthew. For example, people in the Bangladeshi community are 60% more likely to have a long-term health condition and people in the Pakistani community are 3 times as likely as white people to live in the most deprived areas of the country.

In terms of the types of work they do, BAME communities are also more vulnerable. BAME groups are more likely to work in professions with greater exposure to Covid such as health and social care, public transport and retail. Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities are more likely to be self-employed than white British people, exposing them to greater economic risk from the present downturn.
How businesses should tackle racial inequality
Sandra Kerr of Business in the Community noted that it is in all of our interests to prioritise racial equality. She pointed out the results from the 2017 McGregor-Smith review of race in the workplace which found that progression for Black and minority ethnic people would add £24bn to the UK economy per year. "Right now that's going to come in very handy as we try to boost back the economy," she said. "It's going to be good for all of us if we just get our heads around this."

Sandra stressed the importance of checking in with BAME colleagues at this time. Most people in BAME communities will know of someone who has died from Covid-19, she said. "Do not underestimate the impact of just being interested and concerned."

Regarding the Black Lives Matter movement too, "employers have to check in" said Sandra. The killing of George Floyd has been a traumatic event for many in the Black community, which is already disproportionately impacted by common mental health problems. Black parents are also having to handle the questions and the distress of their children, who may have seen the video of Floyd's murder. For employers, checking in on employees' feelings is vital. "These conversations have to be had and we need an awareness of that invisible stuff," said Sandra.

Miatta Fahnbulleh, CEO of the New Economics Foundation reiterated Sandra's point that equality benefits us all. Businesses need to stand up and say "it is not in our interest to have systemic inequality. It is not in our interest to have communities that are left behind," she said. Companies can use their voices to influence change and they can work on their own internal policies to promote equality. "What companies can do at a firm level is think really hard about their hiring practice, about their talent management practice. That genuinely creates opportunities and progression for people from disadvantaged backgrounds," she said.
Discrimination and the law
Rachel Farr, a lawyer at Baker McKenzie, talked us through some of the legal intricacies for employers and employees regarding workplace discrimination in the context of Covid, the furlough scheme and the threat of redundancy.

Rachel noted that as employers consider the return to work, they should not necessarily apply all the same measures for all employees. Although government guidance on shielding only applies to people over 70, pregnant women and people with particular health conditions, employers can also take into account the growing body of evidence that Covid has greater health risks for BAME employees. "Mutual trust and confidence" between an employee and their employer is one of the foundational obligations in UK employment relationships. Rachel asked whether this duty can be fulfilled if employers are demanding workers return in conditions where they feel uncomfortable and unsafe.

Rachel likewise noted that businesses should look out for "unconscious bias" in decision making around redundancies. A decision that leads to greater numbers of BAME employees being made redundant that does not impact white workers could be classed as indirect discrimination, although businesses are only liable if there is "no objective justification" for the company's action.

Sandra likewise highlighted the need for companies to think about the impact of their decisions to cut pay, furlough staff and make redundancies. Companies should watch out to see if they are disproportionately furloughing women or ethnic minority staff, and BAME staff should not be overrepresented in redundancies, she said.

Pay cuts may affect BAME colleagues more than others depending on their household incomes, so a whole company pay cut may not actually be the most equitable solution, said Sandra.
"Build back better" should include racial equality
Both Covid-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement have exposed the inequalities at work in our society. But Miatta classes herself as "an optimist." She sees this time as a "moment for change."

The government has spoken a great deal about "build back better," particularly in the context of environmental sustainability. But we should also think about it through the lens of inequality, said both Miatta and Matthew. "Build back better is not just a slogan," said Miatta. We need the government to deal with our society's "deep-seated inequalities" to help us "recover to something better."

Miatta outlined three areas for government to focus on:

1. Protections and support for vulnerable groups including social care and housing.

2. Tackling unemployment and making the levelling up agenda about marginalised groups and disadvantaged people as well as regional inequality.

3. Preparing ourselves for "the next big thing": climate change.

Key questions we answered:

Sandra, how can businesses help address the racial inequalities we see today?

Research shows that fully including BAME people in the UK's workforce can stimulate £24bn in additional value to the economy. So tackling these disparities would benefit all of us.

A report published by McKinsey this year found that companies with BAME members in leadership roles had 33% better financial returns.

Remember that within your workforce, there will be people who have lost people due to Covid-19. So, my message to employers, is to check in with your BAME members of staff to check in on how they are doing.

Think about your furlough policy. Is there a disproportionate number of BAME staff on furlough? And if you have to make redundancies, consider the proportion of BAME staff you have before acting.

BAME people are less likely to have retained savings throughout their life, so when you consider things like pay cuts, consider the impact it could have on your BAME staff.

Rachel, can you give us guidance on the law around discrimination?

The equality act says the protected categories are race, ethnic origin, and nationality. So, they are protected against discrimination.

Employers need to consider this when reopening. A BAME member of staff could legitimately say that if they are brought back to work and do not feel safe, they could feel unsafe as we know that Covid-19 disproportionately affects them.

You have a duty of care to your employees. They need to trust that you are acting with their best interests at heart.

Employers need to carry out a risk assessment under the Health and Safety at Work Act. As part of that, you must consult with your employees.

Rachel, what is your point of view on the equal pay act, which only covers gender? Should it cover other protected characteristics as well?

The Equal Pay Act is now part of the Equality Act.

The Race Relations Act covered both pay and non-contractual forms of discrimination as well.

It is a real oddity that we still have this disparity between BAME and gender-based discrimination.

If you bring a claim against your employer, the burden is on you to prove there is discrimination taking place.

However, there are currently huge delays in the tribunal system due to Covid-19. So, if you bring a claim now, you may have to wait until 2022 for your case to be heard.

Miatta, after recent events, what are your views on the issue of race and equality?

What feels different this time is the solidarity we have seen across numerous races, and the debate it has unearthed about systemic racial inequality.

Can we tackle systemic inequality? We must ask ourselves questions about our economic model. The economy isn't working for many people, and the last ten years have seen living standards stagnating. BAME communities have been at the sharp end of this.

Companies need to think about their hiring practices to create opportunities for people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

You have to ensure that social purpose is baked into companies operating models. The Good Business Charter is a step in the right direction.

Businesses can play a powerful role in this situation. The pandemic requires big changes in how our economy works and the decisions that government make. And it's time for businesses to say it is not in our interests to have systemic inequality and divided societies.

Sandra, if a company wanted to set up a support group for BAME staff, is it better for this to be an all-BAME group or should there be white members too?

We have found, throughout this crisis, that many white people are very keen to be our allies. Part of that process is hearing the stories of BAME people in the workplace, so I would say their involvement is important.

There is also the increasingly common theme of blended families, white people marrying BAME people. So, there may be a vested interest in them being part of these groups to learn and listen with fresh ears.

Rachel and Sandra, is there a risk that an organisation could be seen as institutionally racist if it doesn't consider the BAME vulnerability to Covid-19 when making decisions around redundancies and bringing people back to work?

Rachel - If an employer was to make a large number of BAME employees redundant, but this didn't affect white workers, then there is a chance of an indirect discrimination claim. The employer would need to show why they have carried out this policy and should try to assess the impact of their policy on their workforce. They need to rule out the unconscious bias that may be affecting their decisions.

Sandra - There is an opportunity for people to be redeployed into other roles before being made redundant. It's also important to note that BAME members of staff may be less likely to be in a position where they can take an economic hit. Managers need to talk to employees to understand their lives to inform their decisions.

Miatta, what should the government do in response to this issue?

There is a consensus that things need to change.

I have no doubt that we can recover doing the normal economic levers. But we want to recover better by addressing the inequalities that exist.

We need to provide social care, housing, and public services. We need a drive towards job creation on an equal footing.

Let's recover in a green way so we are not hit so hard in the not so distant future.

Matthew, how will the CBI drive change on this?

This crisis has opened eyes about the power of employee engagement and what it can do for a company's productivity. So, we need to harness that going forward.

The CBI agrees that we need this issue to be at the heart of an economic recovery plan. We have talked a lot about building back better. We need to ensure that fairness and inclusion in our society is even more prominent in an economic recovery plan.

We should be challenging and asking challenging questions to our members to ask them what they are doing on this. Whether that is reassessing recruitment, retention, and progression or BAME pay reporting.

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In the second of the CBI's webinars on race, we were joined by Sandra Kerr CBE, National Campaign Director of Business in the Community, Miatta Fahnbulleh, CEO of the New Economics Foundation, Rachel Farr, Knowledge Lawyer at Baker McKenzie and Matthew Fell, CBI Chief UK Policy Director, to discuss race and equality at work.

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17 July 2020 Taking action

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Overview:

In today's webinar on race and equality we discussed how to turn awareness into action. To speak about this, we were joined by Katherine Conway, Head of Diversity and Inclusion at Aon, Lewis Iwu, CEO and Co-Founder of Purpose Union, Ife Onwuzulike, Diversity & Inclusion Advisor at the CBI, and Josh Hardie, Deputy Director-General of Policy and Campaigns also from the CBI.

These were the key points raised in the conversation:

Representation of progression is key

Don't just collect data, use the data

Companies need to be more holistic about their different agendas

Conversations with peers can drive change.

Representation of progression is key
The recent Black Lives Matter protests sparked an array of tweets from businesses hoping to send a social media signal that they stood with demonstrators. What soon became apparent was the disparity between companies saying they support a movement versus the actual structural changes being put in place to match their apparent solidarity on social media.

"Representation of progression is so important," Ife Onwuzulike of the CBI said. "People don't see a place for them at the top because they see no one at the top that looks like them. And I think that is where we have to have that honest conversation, why aren't we seeing that representation? We've seen many reports about why it's important but why aren't we seeing it in this organisation and what should be done next?"

Lewis Iwu, CEO and Co-Founder of Purpose Union, shared his own experience, "Often when I'm speaking at an event, it'll be assumed I'm a contractor or a security guard and that's happened numerous times because that visibility isn't there. Representation isn't a silver bullet at all but having a sense that actually it is possible to be a CEO of a company and be black, I think is an incredibly important signal and the beginning of a cultural change."
Don't just collect data but use the data
Since gender pay gap reporting was introduced in 2017, businesses have now had the time to establish systems for measuring and comparing employee's wages. The CBI is in favour of mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting as Josh Hardie commented, "I think businesses now are in a vastly different position than they were when gender pay gap reporting was just being introduced. I think people understand the reasons why a lot more."

Katherine Conway, Head of Diversity and Inclusion at Aon agreed, "it's a massive impetus to really understand what's going on in your business. The ethnicity pay gap is going to prove what we already know but it does give us that opportunity to have those conversations with leaders. The stark figures will tell us what we already know but will help us to act, create action plans, make change and create targets."

Collecting data can help companies set targets to become more diverse but Ife raised the point that it's important not to settle once a target is hit. "We have to have those targets, if you have nothing, how do you benchmark your progress?" she said. "Once we finally get to that point, we need to lift it up again until it becomes a place where everybody belongs and we see that diversity."

Lewis told us "the problem with targets is that their aspiration can get buried." Even if you do bring in a diverse mix of people, if the culture of the organisation hasn't changed to help all employees progress and feel like they belong then they will leave as quickly as they joined.
Conversations with peers can drive change
A challenge for companies can be tackling the divide between younger staff who are more progressive and those at the top who are resistant to change. "I think companies need to be a bit smarter about trying to create frames which are more likely to bring people along without diluting the message and without throwing concepts out the window but showing that actually this is quite difficult for a lot of people," Lewis said.

"And I think there is a danger that as we're beginning to see a potential backlash to all lives matter, why do we talk just about race when we're not talking about class and so on."

Josh pointed out the blunt truth that "if you can't make them progressive then that business is probably going to wither over time because they won't be able to recruit and they most likely won't be able to keep customers."

One of the tools used by the CBI is to bring peers together to talk about these types of issues. "When you have those conversations with your peers as a CEO or an executive or any other level, and you hear about what they're doing, that does feel like it genuinely drives quite a lot of change and can be incredibly effective."
Companies need to be more holistic about their different agendas
For businesses, diversity includes a whole range of issues which are often managed by different teams. "All of these issues interface with race and sexuality and identity in a very fluid and dynamic way and I actually think if there's one thing to come from this, it's whether we're being smart about the way we talk about these issues," Lewis said.

"Climate change will have a disproportionate impact on women and a disproportionate impact on socially disadvantaged groups and black communities, but I don't think we're drawing those links out."

By taking a more holistic approach and marrying different agendas together, companies can design better initiatives and programmes and create a greater impact.

Key questions we answered:

Ife and Josh, what is the CBI doing to move this issue from rhetoric to action?

Today we're today launching the CBI's Race at Work action plan. Though we already have a wider Diversity and Inclusion strategy and an Ethnicity Pay Gap action plan, we decided to create a Race at Work action plan after doing a cultural audit.

We found there is still a gap in how our BAME colleagues compare against their white counterparts on progression, representation at different levels of the business and their sense of belonging.

Our action plan has four themes:

Culture - creating an environment where colleagues can talk openly about race and inclusion and share their stories

Representation - ensuring diverse representation across our structures, in our recruitment, progression processes and succession planning, our engagement with external stakeholders and our policy work

Voice - how we how we use our communication channels

Engagement - brings it all together and includes using our data to drive change as well as training.

We're also looking at the CBI's operations more broadly. For example, our commercial team launched a strategy at the end of last year to improve ethnic diversity across our events, marketing material, and the regional councils that steer our policy work.

But we know there's so much more we can be doing.

Ife, what actions do you think are needed?

The key issue is progression. BAME employees don't see a place for them at the top of organisations, because they don't see a person who looks like them at the top.

So, representation and career progression are key elements.

Lewis, companies have put out a lot of messaging to younger generations, but the required change within those companies isn't happening. How are you helping them?

Our polling and research found that transparency is one of the top values held by millennials and generation Z when it comes to companies.

So, unless there is action behind the messages, it won't work.

Until now, we've spoken about diversity and inclusion and purpose in different parts of the company. Now, companies need to be more holistic about those agendas.

There is a danger of seeing this solely through the lens of unconscious bias training etc.

But with the platform and influence we have, we should focus on how we can tackle racism at a system-wide level.

Lewis, have you seen companies who have worked out how to use their external and internal communications and back them up with concrete action?

Reckitt Benckiser created a purpose council - a committee of people who have a direct line to the board to help the management keep up to speed on what is happening.

We are interested in what the next set of issues that companies will have to position themselves on will be. Companies want to know how to position themselves for the future.

What is our position on transgender rights or intersectionality? These are complicated but they should be tackled at a system-wide level, not just an interpersonal level.

Businesses should have worked out their position on racism ages ago. It shouldn't have taken this flashpoint to bring it to the fore.

Catherine, what has worked well at Aon and what hasn't?

Not everything is working for us - we're on a journey. We're trying to focus on what is having an impact.

Data is critical. People need to understand why it is important.

How are we attracting people into our business and retaining, advancing and developing them? We can only monitor this with data. We are not there yet but this is an opportunity.

Our young colleagues are asking what we are doing as an organisation. Yes, we put out a statement on social media, but people want to know what we are actually doing.

A couple of years ago, our apprenticeship and graduate programme showed we weren't getting the ethnicity mix we wanted. So, we launched a BAME future leaders programme to address the issue.

Catherine, Lewis and Ife, how have you handled the issue of progression?

Catherine - That has been a challenge. Our organisation does not look diverse at the top, so we are looking at how we can change it. We need to be intentional about running development programmes for our BAME colleagues, like we currently do for women.

Lewis - I think the conversation on affirmative action is misleading. I think it should be called meritocratic action. It is about getting people to a point where they can compete from the same starting point and recognising there are structural barriers in place.

Ife - Setting targets for progression and recruitment can set a trajectory within an organisation and create a journey of where you are trying to be as a business. But targets need to be backed up with teeth. For example, setting a date when you expect to hit the target by or linking it to executive pay. Otherwise, there is a tendency to bury targets. It is not a silver bullet, but having a sense that it is possible to be a CEO of a company and be black is incredibly important.

Lewis and Josh, what do you do when younger staff are progressive but those at the top are resistant to change?

Lewis - I think the language and tone of the conversation needs a re-think. We aren't winning enough people around, particularly around recognising that white privilege exists. I think companies need to be smarter about creating frames that are more likely to win people over.

Josh - If you cannot make them progressive then that business will wither over time. That change should happen within conversations. One of the roles that the CBI fulfils is to bring people together and convene different companies. Our committees are getting more diverse as well. When you have those conversations, as a CEO, with your peers, and you hear about what they're doing, that does act as a catalyst for progressive change.

Catherine and Josh, what's the value of ethnicity pay gap reporting?

Catherine - They are a huge impetus to get companies to understand what is happening within their businesses. The data will prove what you already know and gives you the opportunity to have those conversations with company leaders on how to change the reality. It will help us create targets and action plans to drive the change we need.

Josh - You must understand why you are doing this. Many businesses may initially see this as another layer of bureaucracy. They need to understand why they are doing this. The CBI are in favour of mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting. We think it will drive change within organisations.

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Race and equality: Turning awareness into action | CBI

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In today's webinar on race and equality we discussed how to turn awareness into action. To speak about this, we were joined by Katherine Conway, Head of Diversity and Inclusion at Aon, Lewis Iwu, CEO and Co-Founder of Purpose Union, Ife Onwuzulike, Diversity & Inclusion Advisor at the CBI, and Josh Hardie, Deputy Director-General of Policy and Campaigns also from the CBI.

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Top 10 tips for diversifying your workplace

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Top 10 tips for diversifying your workplace

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53442614

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Racist, anti racist BBC bitesize

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John Amaechi is a psychologist, a New York Times best-selling author and a former NBA basketball player. In the wake of the George Floyd killing and the Black Lives Matter protests, and at a time when many people want to learn how they can be better allies for black people, we asked John what it means to be anti-racist.

There's a big difference between being not-racist and being anti-racist. I know it doesn't seem like it. I know that both of these things seem equally good, but they're not.

Video Transcript Video Transcript

John: There's a big difference between being not-racist and being anti-racist. I know it doesn't seem like it. I know that both of these things seem equally good, but they're not. Think of an interaction. I'm afraid you've probably had one right? With somebody, maybe even somebody you respect, maybe even someone you love, who says something that's racist, does something that's racist, behaves in a way that's racist. Someone who's not-racist: they won't say or do anything in that moment. They want to not rock the boat. They don't want to be upstanding. Instead, not-racists: they tend to be bystanders. But afterwards, after the event, they'll find other people who are also not-racist and they'll talk to each other about, well, that was terrible, that thing that happened the other day. I would never say anything like that. Anti-racists are different and they come in all shapes and sizes. They come in all ages. Anti-racists are constantly looking around to say, what tools do I have available to make it clear that this is not acceptable? And this, this is what anti-racists do. It's not that they stand up at the dinner table when their uncle's a little bit racist and kick the turkey off. That's not it. But what they do is they say, I'm sorry uncle John. That's not acceptable. That's racist. Quietly and respectfully. What they do is they make sure that they never miss an opportunity to let the world know where they stand, even if they can t change everything. You're probably in a position where other people have a lot more power around you. I know how that feels. Sometimes, we sit and we look around us and we think, how can I possibly change all this? And sometimes you can't. But what you can do is make sure wherever you go, people know where you stand. They know that you're an anti-racist. You become a beacon of light that way. You become someone who makes other people want to be anti-racist too. You've got tools at your disposal. Learn. Read. And make everybody clear where you stand.

Sometimes, we sit and we look around us and we think, 'how can I possibly change all this?' And sometimes you can't. But what you can do is make sure wherever you go, people know where you stand. They know that you're an anti-racist. You become a beacon of light that way. You become someone who makes other people want to be anti-racist too. You've got tools at your disposal. Learn. Read. And make everybody clear where you stand.

If you need support

You should always tell someone about the things you're worried about. You can tell a friend, parent, guardian, teacher, or another trusted adult. If you're struggling with your mental health, going to your GP can be a good place to start to find help. Your GP can let you know what support is available to you, suggest different types of treatment and offer regular check-ups to see how you're doing.

If you're in need of in-the-moment support you can contact Childline, where you can speak to a counsellor. Their lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

There are more links to helpful organisations on BBC Action Line.

It's important that you keep yourself safe when confronting racism. For support and advice, see the articles below.

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Not-racist v anti-racist: what's the difference?

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John Amaechi describes the difference between being not-racist and anti-racist.

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3 July 2021 Race & equality pay gap reporting

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Overview:

In today's webinar on race and equality in the workplace, the discussion centered on pay gap reporting. We were joined for the webinar by Baroness Ruby McGregor-Smith CBE, President of the British Chamber of Commerce, Naeema Choudry, Partner at Eversheds Sutherland, and Rain Newton-Smith, CBI Chief Economist.

Here's what they spoke about:

Collecting the data

Recruitment and progression

Intersectionality and culture

The law

Collecting the data
Rain Newton-Smith, Chief Economist of the CBI, introduced the session talking about the CBI's own experiences of reporting on its ethnicity pay gap. "It's such an important topic. As a chief economist I can speak about how important it is to inclusive growth," she said.

"The CBI is one of only a few hundred organisations that voluntarily release their ethnicity pay gap data and is a signatory of Business in the Community's Race at Work Charter. The organisation also takes the view that all companies over 250 employees should be reporting their ethnicity pay gap.

"Gathering the data is not easy," said Rain, "it can be sensitive as employees may not wish to disclose their ethnicity to their employer," she explained. "Employers should be transparent about why they are collecting this information to get employees on board and to foster trust in the business."

Baroness Ruby McGregor-Smith, author of the 2017 McGregor-Smith review on race in the workplace, made the point that ethnicity pay gap reporting should be made mandatory under the law. "We've had equal opportunities supposedly in the workplace for the past 50 years, but the workplace is clearly not equal," she said.

"To make a real change, ethnicity pay gap reporting should be made compulsory. At present only 282 organisations voluntarily report their ethnicity pay gap data. Many organisations are simply not collecting the information."

When Ruby was compiling the McGregor-Smith review, only 49 of the 74 FTSE 100 companies that responded to her request for information about the ethnic backgrounds staff and their pay bands gave "meaningful data" on their pay gaps.

Making data collection compulsory will mean that boards will have to pay attention to the problem of inequality in their companies, she explained. As a former CEO, Ruby said, "I know if you have data you have to respond to data."
Recruitment and progression
Collecting and understanding the data is the first step, acting on it is also imperative. Companies need to work to address ethnicity pay gaps and the underlying inequalities within companies that produce them. "Start with the data," said Ruby, but then "make a plan to close the gap."

Rain explained how the CBI is attempting to address its ethnicity pay gap through its recruitment and employee progression schemes. The organisation recruits 20% BAME candidates and when it is hiring for a managerial role, the CBI ensures that there is always at least one BAME candidate on the shortlist.

When looking at employee performance indicators, Rain said that it is important to examine whether there might be cultural issues affecting the performance of BAME employees. Data can be used to "drive deeper conversations" about workplace culture and barriers to employee progression, she said.

Ruby agreed that companies need to think about recruitment and progression. They need to draw from a diverse pool of candidates and make sure that diverse talent is sponsored so that they can progress within an organisation.
Intersectionality and culture
Naeema Choudry, partner at Eversheds Sutherland, made the point that we need to consider not just the diversity of protected characteristics, but also diversity within each category. Especially when assessing the progress that has been made in relation to the gender pay gap, Naeema made that point that "we tend to treat all women as one homogeneous entity and that isn't the case," - the experiences of people who fit into that single category can vary greatly.

Naeema said that instead we need to be taking a more intersectional approach to looking at the issue of pay. In her view, it should not be a "tick-box" exercise but rather a part of a wider diversity and inclusion strategy that fosters a culture of trust, thereby encouraging employees to be more open with their data.

Ruby said it's not just about the data but it's about culture too. Senior management needs to make sure that the culture in an organisation is not hindering the progression of diverse talent. When it comes to promotions, difference is often perceived as risk, said Ruby. "Just because someone looks different doesn't mean they are a risk," she said. Women faced many of these same challenges for years, being passed over for promotion because they were not given the same experiences as their male colleagues or because they were characterised in negative ways, for example, being branded "aggressive" if they talked too much. Companies need to do more culturally to change these perceptions and promote differently.
The law
Later on in the session we came to the issue of the Equality Act itself. Naeema mentioned how, despite the fact that it is legally possible for employees to bring a claim for direct or indirect discrimination in pay on the basis of ethnicity, many people were hesitant to progress the issue in tribunals.

Ruby took us through some of the reasons why this might be happening: "It's really expensive. And it can wreck your employment opportunities if you're taking a big company on." Her suggestion was that it's time we changed the legislation to improve the protections for employees. "It's all very vague. And it only covers gender. It's outdated," she said.

Key questions we answered:

R ain, how should companies start the ethnicity pay gap reporting process?

In February 2020, the CBI published Bridge the Gap: a guide setting out actions and good practices companies can take to tackle their ethnicity pay gaps.

What I would say is, know you're not alone - the number of companies reporting on their ethnicity pay gap voluntarily is growing.

At the CBI, we started voluntarily reporting on our ethnicity pay gap last year, and plan to release our 2020 data and progress this autumn. Don't just publish the data, what are you going to do about it?

We have focused our actions to tackle the gap in four main areas. First, culture, to foster culture that is inclusive, open and not afraid of constructive challenge.

Second, inclusive recruitment. Use diverse panels, and focus on ensuring more diverse candidate shortlists, especially for management roles. Apply the Rooney rule for all external management hires. Another key target is for 20% of all roles to be filled by BAME candidates.

Third is progression and development. The aim here is to strengthen the pipeline, so we track how our BAME staff are faring within our performance development review system, prioritise BAME employees attending management development programmes, and ensure transparency through our pay and progression policy.

Finally, leadership. We have signed the Race at Work Charter and ensured inclusion is a core part of our business strategy from the top.

Monitor internal data on a monthly basis, we hope by gaining a better understanding of our data, and the experiences of our BAME staff we can enact real changes for our BAME colleagues.

It's a journey, and we have a long mountain to climb but we've made a start and determined to continue to strive to better equality.

Rain, what have you encountered as best practice in this area?

Just to cite a few examples on the issue of disclosure, PwC introduced a firm-wide 'who do you think you are' communications campaign to encourage people to share personal data. They explained why people were being asked for this information and how the data is used, e.g. for ethnicity pay gap analysis and action planning.

Santander worked to make its disclosure rate campaign as targeted as possible, holding workshops with employees to understand reservations regarding disclosing their ethnicity.

Shell centred its campaign around their diversity and inclusion day, organising discussions on ethnicity and sharing videos of senior leaders explaining why sharing information about ethnicity is important.

Check out the CBI's 'Bridge the Gap' report for more examples like these. One of most useful parts of the report is being able to look and learn from what other companies have done, including assessing existing practices at every step of your recruitment process, from reviewing job descriptions and how they are advertised, to processes around applications, assessments, and interviews.

There may be some who are sceptical of the utility of ethnicity pay gap reporting, why should we introduce it?

Closing the ethnicity pay gap is about making society fairer and overcoming entrenched inequalities. And it's not only the right thing to do: the business case for it is watertight.

The 2017 McGregor-Smith report found that closing the ethnicity pay gap could boost UK GDP by £24 billion per year, which represents adding an extra 1.3% to UK GDP.

The CBI and its members fully back the introduction of mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting. Just as gender pay gap reporting has shone a light on the barriers that women face in the workplace, and we believe that ethnicity pay gay reporting will be a powerful tool in uncovering the barriers ethnic minorities face at work.

Baroness Ruby, what were the findings of your 'Race in the workplace' review in 2017 and what were the expectations of businesses after?

Firstly, we identified that data is so important. We've had equal opportunity in the workplace, in theory, for the past 50 years. But in practice, we know this isn't the case.

We asked the FTSE 100 companies to give us their data on how much they pay their staff, broken down to their ethnicity. 74 responded and out of those, 49 provided meaningful data.

Across every industry of the FTSE 100, the results said the same thing: if you were BAME and lucky enough to be employed by one of these companies, you were paid at a very junior level. You may get promoted once but after that there appeared to be a visible ceiling for BAME employees. Additionally, when I ran the numbers in 2017, I think we identified just ten people across all the numbers earning over £100k annually.

We identified a number of key findings in the report, one being that companies need to start doing pay gap reporting.

As of today, there are 282 that have signed up to the Race at Work Charter. This includes the Big Four accounting firms, lots of law firms and other companies. But, most of the FTSE companies haven't.

I initially recommended that this be done voluntarily, but in 2018, only 11% of employers were reporting this information. So, my recommendation changed to mandating it through legislation.

We conducted a consultation on mandatory pay gap reporting and the results of that consultation were completed last year. The results haven't been released and the government haven't decided what they will do with the results.

I have urged them to release the results because I know, as a former CEO, if you have data in front of you, you have to respond to it. Boards have to look at data that they have to report against. That is why it changes the narrative within a company.

How do you ensure that companies who begin reporting this data, don't do it as a tick box exercise, but take steps to ensure that their culture changes as well?

It is around recruitment, progression, having a diverse candidate list and knowing how to talk about race.

Those are the steps I outlined in my report to help companies ingrain a culture of equality in their workplace.

The final point I'll say is that it is all about promotions. Companies with more diverse people in leadership positions perform well.

Naeema, could you give businesses advice on how to navigate GDPR on pay gap reporting?

You have to be careful that you don't inadvertently out people by reporting on their pay. That in itself gives you an idea of where you are as an organisation.

If you don't have a large group of BAME people in your employment, or even less in senior positions, what does it say about your recruitment practices and promotion practices?

So, if legislation is introduced, you're going to have a period to build up to start collating that data, because otherwise you're going to face some difficulties.

Your people have to trust you to give you the data and ensure that it will benefit them. They don't want to give you the data about their ethnicity if they are worried it will hinder their promotion prospects.

What do you think about the proposal to implement 'name-blind' recruitment and promotion?

There is huge unconscious bias in the workplace. We all have biases. The question is to ensure that you understand your biases.

So, I think name-blindness is a good place to start.

You need a diverse shortlist. In Birmingham, over 50% of its population comes from a diverse background, so why shouldn't companies recruit from their area? It should also be about the diversity of the panel interviewing the candidate.

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In today's webinar on race and equality in the workplace, the discussion centered on pay gap reporting. We were joined for the webinar by Baroness Ruby McGregor-Smith CBE, President of the British Chamber of Commerce, Naeema Choudry, Partner at Eversheds Sutherland, and Rain Newton-Smith, CBI Chief Economist.

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10 July 2020 inclusive recruitment & promotion

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Overview:

In the fourth of the CBI's webinars on race and equality, we were joined by Paul Sesay, Founder and CEO of the Black Leaders Network, Aggie Mutuma, Director of the Mahogany Inclusion Partners, Elizabeth Oni-Iyiola, Development Director for Inclusive Boards and Josh Hardie, Deputy Director-General of Policy and Campaigns for the CBI to discuss recruitment, retention and progression.

These were the key points raised in the conversation:

Companies need to act on the tsunami of change created by George Floyd's death and Covid-19

Blind recruitment is a temporary plaster

The pipeline problem

Leadership and listening.

Companies need to act on the tsunami of change created by George Floyd's death and Covid-19
Both the brutality of George Floyd's murder and the disproportionate impact Covid-19 has had on people from BAME backgrounds have stirred the sense of injustice that exists in the world. "If I think about the last four or five weeks, I've spoken more about race and my experiences and what we need to do about it than I have done in my entire life," said Aggie Mutuma of the Mahogany Inclusion Partners. "People want to understand, people are listening. It's really important that we take this energy and actually turn it into action."

Paul Sesay, Founder and CEO of the Black Leaders Network, described it as a "real awakening for organisations," who have known for a long time that they have needed to make changes. The sentiment has clearly shifted. More and more companies are asking for "hard-hitting" anti-racism training, clients are being bold and admitting they don't have black people on boards or leadership teams, and employees are willing to be vulnerable and ask for help in understanding what the issues are.

The full economic impact of Covid-19 is only just starting. "As we look at the job figures and redundancies, we know that unemployment scars unevenly and unfairly," Josh Hardie of the CBI cautioned. "Unless we take active steps as we rebuild the economy then what we will see is inequality getting worse and social cohesion being damaged."
Blind recruitment is a temporary plaster
How a company sets up its recruitment process, the language used in adverts and the interview panel itself can all contribute to unconscious bias against people from BAME backgrounds. Often applicants are assessed on their experience rather than just their skill set, locking inequality into the process from the very beginning. Blind recruitment can alleviate some of these issues allowing companies to have the right amount of information to make a fair judgement but as Aggie cautions, it's just "a temporary plaster on a big issue."

"For a leadership team, it doesn't make sense to go blind mainly because you would likely know who they are, especially for a senior director role," Elizabeth Oni-Iyiola of Inclusive Boards said. "We've seen this happen with a selection panel where they've gone and research who the applicants are. For entry level positions it can work and have certain benefits but it has to be taken within the context."

Unconscious bias training is another option to blind recruitment. "One of the greatest tricks the devil played was by letting people believe that he didn't exist," Aggie told us. "When people think racism doesn't exist it's really dangerous. Unconscious bias teaches people that we all have biases and people have to understand what biases you might have and how to extrapolate that out of decisions you might make."

There are clearly benefits to offering unconscious bias training but companies need to think about their actions and how to make it part of the wider conversation. Aggie cautioned that "just giving people unconscious bias training won't change anything. The learning and development has to be baked into processes."
The pipeline problem
Out of the FTSE 100's board chairs, CEOs, and finance directors, only 10 out of the available 300 positions are people from BAME backgrounds. "The Rooney Rule has been really hard on internal employment at a senior level because we don't have the pipeline," Josh said. The Rooney Rule is a National Football League policy requiring league teams to interview ethnic minority candidates for head coaching and senior operation roles. "We're quite good on gender, we're much less good on BAME groups. We can do it through external appointments but it is more difficult internally."

Mentoring can play a particularly important role in making sure that everyone in a company feels they can progress and that they understand the process for progression. Companies need to be transparent and ask themselves what information they have given out. Elizabeth told us that, "As a manager, I don't know the pipeline of how to get onto a board or leadership team. I still don't know how to get there. Companies need to tell employees right at the point of induction, in this organisation this is how you get to the top." Josh agreed, quoting that over half of BAME employees feel they'll have to leave their current employer in order to progress.

Paul told us that "lots of organisations are concentrating on their black talent and expecting them to take the mantra of their organisation's black inclusion. Just because they're black doesn't mean they're experts in black inclusion. You need to get actual experts within this area to bring real change to organisations."

A good starting point is to "reflect on the top 20 people within your trusted network," suggests Paul. "Often your trusted network will look like you and have the same cultural background. Open your network up to a wider pool and little changes that you make can have a big impact on the organisation. If you are conscious about your own inclusion personally, greater change can happen from there."
Leadership and listening
Throughout the session it was clear that a lot of the issues raised boil down to whether a company has good leadership. Aggie said that leaders can help initiate change by being open, being curious, being vulnerable, and knowing that they don't know everything.

Rather than just talking about it, it's important for leaders to acknowledge they've got to actually work for this problem to be solved. "Understanding that I benefited from privilege and that privilege has come at a cost to someone else unfairly is a difficult emotional journey but every leader needs to go through that journey," Josh said. "It takes action, being systematic and being determined."

Listening to the lived experience of black colleagues can also help bring greater understanding. "George Floyd has opened up the conversation to them now and they are listening much more," Paul said. "Giving black employees a voice, setting up networks and listening groups so that they can express how they feel to senior leaders, and collating data will all help."

Key questions we answered:

Josh, why is it so important to champion diversity and inclusion from the top? And what are companies doing to make recruitment, retention, and progression fairer?

Everyone, including ethnic minorities, should feel they can progress, and are supported to do so by their employers. But this doesn't happen across the board.

According to Business in the Community (BITC), 52% of BAME employees believe they will have to leave their current organisation to progress in their career.

The culture of every organisation is set by its leaders. If you want your business to be more diverse and more inclusive, you have to take the lead - by embedding that focus across your recruitment and promotion practices, as well as the wider culture, and championing this issue from the top.

The experiences of our Black colleagues will be different from that of our Asian colleagues. And beyond that, the experience of our Indian colleagues will be different from that of our Pakistani or Bangladeshi colleagues.

Companies should consult their employee networks or consider running employee focus groups to understand these different lived experiences, and address the possible issues identified in recruitment and promotion processes, and the general workplace culture.

Fundamental to ensuring a more diverse and inclusive company, is the need to tackle discrimination and bias in recruitment and promotion processes. So, what can companies practically do?

Assess your practices at every step of the recruitment process, from job descriptions and how they are advertised, to their applications, assessments, and interviews

Recruit from a wider pool of candidates

Strengthen your retention and progression routes

Review the senior roles in your organisation, then identify and start to develop a diverse pipeline of people - both within and outside of the organisation - who could take on these senior roles in the future.

Josh, what is the CBI doing to better attract, recruit and promote BAME talent?

At the CBI, we realised that while our pipeline and senior management were good in terms of gender representation, it wasn't for BAME. In response, we set specific targets:

20% of our appointments each year should be filled by BAME candidates

Apply the Rooney rule for externally advertised management roles

Have at least one BAME employee on management board by the end of 2019.

In recruitment, we started looking at who we were asking to help us recruit and challenged them when candidate lists weren't diverse.

We then engaged several diversity agencies to help us increase representation within our organisation.

We also began incorporating diverse panels, so candidates could see people like themselves in those decision-making roles. However, we knew that for gender this was easier for us to achieve internally than for BAME representation.

On progression, we continue to track how our BAME staff are faring within the CBI's performance development review system. And where we've seen that our BAME staff aren't progressing the same as everyone else within the organisation, we've challenged our thinking to root out the bias that could have unconsciously led to those decisions.

We've ensured that inclusion is a core part of our business strategy. And, to re-affirm our commitment internally and externally, we signed the Race at Work Charter.

We've still got a huge amount to do, especially around being comfortable talking about race and the experiences our Black, Asian and ethnic minority colleagues face in work and in life.

Aggie, Elizabeth, and Paul, does this feel like a genuine moment of change?

Aggie - The murder of George Floyd feels like a significant moment of change, as it seems to have shone a light on the injustice that exists in the world. I have spoken about race more in the last five weeks than at any point in my life.

Paul - I think there has been a tsunami of change. We've received so many enquiries form organisations who want to challenge their own institutional issues around recruitment and progression.

Elizabeth - It has been a perfect storm that have led to race and equality being brought to the forefront of organisation's minds. There is more of a conscious effort from businesses to do something about this.

Aggie, we've heard the term 'unconscious bias' in the context of recruitment a lot. What can businesses do to eliminate this?

Unconscious bias, where people believe no racism exists either within their organisation or themselves, is dangerous. It leads to complacency and blind spots

We all have biases; it doesn't mean you're a bad person. The subliminal messages we take in, along with the environment we are raised in, cause us to make associations linked to race.

It is important to be mindful of this and think about how those biases can be extrapolated into the decisions you make.

Ultimately, this comes down to good leadership and being open to challenge yourself.

Paul, what is the difference between unconscious and conscious bias?

When you are not giving someone a job due to the colour of their skin, and in spite of their skillset, I think that is a conscious decision.

Employers should think about their trusted network at work. Who are the people you trust on a day-to-day basis?

When you break down the ethnicity of senior people's trusted network, they often end up being people that look like them.

Diversity of thought benefits organisations and these little cultural changes, such as opening up your network to different people, can drive really beneficial changes in your organisation.

Elizabeth and Aggie, could blind CV's and recruitment processes work?

Elizabeth - If you are recruiting at board or leadership level, I don't think it makes sense. You would likely know who the candidate is at that level. However, for entry-level positions, I think the practice can work.

Aggie - I applaud the intent behind blind recruitment processes, but I think it's a sticking plaster to a bigger issue. We need to tackle the underlying issue that leads to that discrimination. There is also a sense that people from under-represented groups do not want to hide their identity or who they are. That needs to be considered as well.

Paul, how effective are development programmes for BAME employees?

I think they are part of the toolkit that is needed.

Often, BAME employees are left out of the conversation regarding progression into senior ranks in an organisation.

I've spoken to numerous BAME employees who have noticed their non-BAME peers have surpassed them despite having had the same skillset.

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Inclusive recruitment and promotion practices | CBI

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In the fourth of the CBI's webinars on race and equality, we were joined by Paul Sesay, Founder and CEO of the Black Leaders Network, Aggie Mutuma, Director of the Mahogany Inclusion Partners, Elizabeth Oni-Iyiola, Development Director for Inclusive Boards and Josh Hardie, Deputy Director-General of Policy and Campaigns for the CBI to discuss recruitment, retention and progression.

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Speakers:

Ceri Thomas, Editor and Partner, Tortoise Media (Chair)

Dame Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General, CBI

Justine Lutterodt, Director, Centre for Synchronous Leadership

Raj Tulsiani, CEO & Co-Founder, Green Park

Professor Udy Archibong, Professor of Diversity, University of Bradford

Overview:
The impact of the killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests
According to Dame Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General of the CBI, the killing of George Floyd was an electric shock to the business community. It could have been easy to see it as a US policing issue, but it goes far deeper, and is clearly systemic. As a result, many firms reviewed their D&I strategies and found them to be deeply lacking. The CBI, for example, discovered that it had a higher turnover rate of BAME staff. We're also learning that investors and customers really care about this issue - 84% of UK adults expect UK businesses to act on equality. Our first poll found that most firms had taken some sort of action as a result, with 70% of companies having internal discussions about the issue of racial equality in the workplace. But only 49% have created action plans as a result, and we need to see this number increase. As Carolyn said, "it can't be a moment, it has to be a movement."
The role of business leaders
Through her role as Director at the Centre for Synchronous Leadership, Justine Lutterodt sees two different vantage points to this issue. The first is through working at the top of organisations with senior leaders, and the second is being connected at a grassroots level with employee networks. From the leader perspective, they're seeing genuine interest in making a difference. But through the grassroots vantage point, there are a number of different reactions. Some view the actions of businesses as authentic, but others don't. Justine adds that businesses can't just take actions for the sake of it - real action requires being uncomfortable and facing up to structural racism.

The current environment is important, because COVID-19 is helping to bring barriers down. The pandemic is taking us outside of our own experiences and made us more open and vulnerable. But there's more people can do. Justine refers to a recent report they published, which showed that ethnic minority staff not only face having to prove themselves as competent, but also are often unable to be themselves. Too often, the feat of being racist has shut the conversation down, and we need to step into the discomfort.
Transformative, meaningful actions
Professor Udy Archibong, Professor of Diversity at the University of Bradford, says that she sees a lot of people simply 'acting for the camera', and those with lived experience can see through these performances. Udy said that she encourages organisations to genuinely acknowledge the problem, but businesses need to provide the psychological space where people can talk about this issue. Another issue is that businesses can often hide behind data, often looking for the next data set. But, as Udy says, businesses need to stop using data as an excuse, because we already know there's a problem.

Udy had some suggestions for businesses to improve their inclusivity: work with lived experiences, truly listen, be humble, and ensure you are co-creating solutions rather than imposing them.
Why are businesses not hiring ethnic minority talent at senior levels?
Raj Tulsiani, CEO & Co-Founder of the recruitment consultancy Green Park, pointed out that people often say that the necessary BAME talent isn't out there, but that simply isn't true. Raj said that he felt there were two key reasons businesses aren't hiring ethnic minority talent at senior levels. Firstly, the executive headhunters that are used for this kind of work have been saying no to those candidates for years. So, the candidates won't go to those headhunters again. And secondly, the cost of delivery to those recruitment firms is usually very variable, and so they are always driven to give what they think the client wants as quickly as possible. Raj feels that people and businesses want to change, but they're going to the same people to do that.
What businesses should be thinking about
Justine pointed out that there's a lot of goodwill at the moment, and we need to drive that momentum forward. So, she shared her thoughts on what businesses should be thinking about now:

Shift your leadership style - lead by asking questions and admitting you don't know the answers

Take an interest in understanding the history and the deeper nature of the issue

Connect the issue to business-critical issues, such as talent pipelines and developing people

Connect beyond your personal and professional networks, as these are often not diverse

Try to ensure diverse voices at all levels of your business.

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CBI @10am: Black Lives Matter: delivering meaningful change | CBI

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Ceri Thomas, Editor and Partner, Tortoise Media (Chair) Dame Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General, CBI Justine Lutterodt, Director, Centre for Synchronous Leadership Raj Tulsiani, CEO & Co-Founder, Green Park Professor Udy Archibong, Professor of Diversity, University of Bradford The impact of the killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests According to Dame Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General of the CBI, the killing of George Floyd was an electric shock to the business community.

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19 June 2020 - Race & Equality

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Overview:

The Black Lives Matter demonstrations protesting against the murder of George Floyd by police in the United States have had a profound impact across the USA, the UK and many other countries worldwide. We need to take action across society to ensure that the protests lead to genuine change. Today's webinar focused on how businesses can take steps to tackle racial injustice. We were joined for the discussion by John Amaechi OBE, Chief Executive and Founder of Amaechi Performance Systems, Lord Karan Bilimoria CBE, President of the CBI, and Dame Carolyn Fairbairn, Director-General of the CBI.

Here's what they discussed:

Black Lives Matter, business and policy

The language business uses can mask the problem

Progress narratives can be on obfuscation

What can businesses do to make meaningful change?

Black Lives Matter, business and policy
Introducing the session, Carolyn spoke about how the killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement have sent a "shockwave" through our country and globally and described how the past few weeks have impacted her as a business leader and the CBI as an organisation. Carolyn admitted that initially she had thought that Floyd's murder was a "US atrocity" but came to see from the "strength of emotion, hurt and pain" triggered by his killing that the problem of racial injustice is just as serious here in the UK too.

"I made mistakes initially in my own organisation in understanding what this actually meant for black colleagues," she said. Carolyn and the CBI have since raised the issue of racial injustice with colleagues, with senior policy committees, at their own AGM and with the Labour front bench. "It's a conversation, there aren't easy answers. We know there are policy steps we can take."

For business, race seems like a difficult issue to discuss, said Carolyn. "Race is very hard to talk about. Firms don't know how to do it. Business leaders don't know how to do it." This was challenged by John Amaechi who said that "the idea that it's hard to talk to black people or about black people," especially when we work in very diverse cities like London, is something that "feels a bit insulting, but I understand it."
The language business uses can mask the problem
One of the things that is often spoken about in a business context regarding race is the notion of "unconscious bias." "Unconscious bias isn't a thing," said John. His firm has done studies with 10,000 white collar workers asking them "what do you associate with blackness?" Most people give answers like "strong, beautiful, athletic, sports, minority, proud, African." These descriptors are generally positive, if a little stereotypical. When asked what they think "other people" associate with blackness they say "criminal, poor, uneducated, inferior, lazy, violent, trouble, gangs, scary." "That's what they come up with in 90 seconds that's how quick it is, so it's not that deep in the unconscious."

"People don't want to admit that they are saturated in identity pollution," said John. "We are contributing to this because we are unwilling to acknowledge these things that live in the environment around us, steeped in us through education, steeped in us through television and media."
We have made some progress but a focus on progress can be on obfuscation
Lord Bilimoria described his experience as someone who comes from one of the smallest ethnic minorities in the world: he is from a Zororastrian Parsi family from India. He moved to England for his university education but was warned by his family that if he wished to make a career in the UK he would never make it to the top because of his background.

When he joined a large accounting firm in the 1980s, there was only one Indian partner and colleagues said he had only reached that level because his wife was English. We have come a long way since then but Lord Bilimoria pointed out that we have not come far enough: as we saw in the news this morning, still only 11 out of 3,000 partners at the big four accounting firms are black.

Our society has "become far more aspirational" said Bilimoria. "Theoretically, there is nothing to stop you getting to the top regardless of race and background," he said. He is a member of the House of Lords and pointed to the growth in the number of BAME parliamentarians as an example of progress. In 1987 there were five non-white parliamentarians, now there are more than 100.

However John warned that a focus on how far we have come can be a distraction. "Part of the reason we do not make progress is because we laud progress. The reason we don't make actual change is because we look at progress." By pointing out the incremental changes we have made we can create a convenient excuse not to make more change: "progress is a tool of the status quo," he said.

Carolyn countered this by saying that she thinks it is "possible to hold both views in your head simultaneously." You can see we have made progress and realise that it isn't enough. The past few weeks have demonstrated that there is a lot of work to do. "We have a mountain to climb even if we have progress we can point to."
What can businesses do to make meaningful change?
John spoke about the need for allyship in the workplace. Individuals need to be allies "not just in an optical ally way": speaking up on social media, or in rooms full of people who think the same thing, but in the workplace too. If there are peers making veiled, coded judgements about people based on their race, call them out on it. "Use your privilege and your power to make sure that your systems and processes aren't corrupted," he said. Most workplaces won't be aware of the "individually benign" policies that "combine to create bias." But there are steps businesses can take: "the first thing that workplaces have to do is a cultural audit to understand what is causing this problem," he said.

Carolyn and Lord Bilimoria pointed to some of the measures that businesses have taken to ensure greater representation of women such as quotas for boards and targets as possible ways forward to ensure greater representation of black people in business. "I'm a believer in targets," said Carolyn, "I have seen how targets have been really effective in the world of gender."

Lord Bilimoria noted that there has been a review looking at BAME representation in the FTSE 100 and the FTSE 350. The Parker review of 2017 said we should aim to have at least one BAME board member at each of the FTSE 100. Still, 40% of the FTSE 100 have no BAME board members and 60% of FTSE 350 have none. There has not been enough progress. "Let's make it happen," said Lord Bilimoria.

While having conversations about race is important, John says that it is "not enough." And it is not for black colleagues and black employees to tell us what we should do. This is "a learning job for white people" and not something which should take up the "emotional labour" of black people, he said. Bias rears its head "inside the companies of well meaning people everywhere." We have to make real organisational change to address it.

Key questions we answered:

Carolyn, following the killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests, what do you see as the role of the CBI in helping to tackle these issues?

This is an essential and long overdue discussion that we need to have. Over the past few weeks, we've seen protests grow in the US, the UK and across the world. This has been a very personal and deeply painful time for many. In the US, we have witnessed acts of unspeakable police brutality - including just last weekend.

But this isn't just an issue for the US - and these events are shining a harsh light again on racism and racial injustice globally, and here in the UK.

In response, we've seen hundreds of thousands of people from all walks of life come together and speak out. But words alone aren't enough. The discussions we're having now must lead to substantive action if we're to deliver real and authentic change, and create a fair, just society for everyone.

This means there are questions for all employers, including the CBI. As business leaders, we have a collective responsibility to recognise and condemn racism in all its forms, and to stamp it out wherever we can.

Progress been made over the years, but not enough. There have been countless examples of prejudice affecting black and ethnic minority people in their daily lives inside and outside of work - from microaggressions through to overt discrimination.

People who are talented must have the same opportunities to rise to the top of their careers - regardless of race. And the lack of black and ethnic minority representation at the highest levels of UK enterprise must change.

We believe the CBI has a duty to use our voice, our platform, and our ability to convene the business community, influence government and make real change.

Alongside colleagues, I am 100% committed to standing up and tackling this issue in business. Now more than ever, we will speak out against racial inequality at work and support meaningful action by firms to prevent it.

Carolyn, what has the initial response of businesses been like?

Across the board, businesses have been incredibly supportive - with business leaders voicing their support either in direct discussions with us or reaching out independently. We all agree that business must be part of the solution on this.

We recognise that some organisations may need more support, and we believe this is a key area where the CBI could help - with practical advice and toolkits.

As part of our statement we also identified the core actions the CBI itself will be taking, including:

Holding open, honest conversations within our business about race, to ensure everyone understands and feels comfortable talking about it

Reviewing our own internal policies to ensure equality of opportunity

Strengthening our use of the Rooney Rule for externally hired management roles

Ensuring black and ethnic minority voices are represented at every level of our organisation - including our senior leadership team.

We've repeated our call to government to require firms above 250 employees to report their ethnicity pay gap. We're also working with others to establish a business-led movement to increase black and ethnic minority representation in the boardroom.

Karan, what's your view on these issues, and the changes needed in business?

I was born and brought up in India. So, as I grew up, I heard stories of colonial oppression throughout my childhood. At the same time, I received an English education, so I was also taught the other side of that history.

When I left at 19 to study in England, my family warned me that - if I decided to stay and work there - that I'd never get to the top, being a foreigner. And in my early career, I did experience that. In one of my first jobs, only one (of hundreds) of the senior leadership was Indian. And people told me that was because he had an English wife.

In the time since, I've seen this country progress, and the glass ceiling begin to shatter. But by no means are we where we need to be, as these protests demonstrate. There's still a huge amount of work to do to increase opportunity for all - regardless of race.

But I'm proud of the progress I've witnessed. I remember the 1987 General Election, where Paul Boateng, Bernie Grant, and Diane Abbott were elected as the first Black British MPs - alongside Keith Vaz, the first South Asian British MP.

25 years later, in 2012, I posed for a picture as a Peer on the steps of the House of Parliament with other BAME MPs and House of Lord colleagues. There were 69 of us in the picture. Fast forward another eight years, to now - there are over 100.

There are still a lot of 'firsts' happening - for example, when I became the seventh Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, I was the first Indian-born Chancellor of a Russell Group University.

Finally, my wife is South African. When I went to South Africa to meet her family, I was told that had I come two years earlier (prior to the ending of Apartheid) I would have been sent to jail, as an Indian, for trying to enter a white community.

So, we know progress is possible, but it's taking a long time to get there.

Karan, you've highlighted increasing diversity in UK boardrooms as a key priority for you as President - why is that important and what is the CBI going to do about it?

I want to start by highlighting two stats that I think show us the scale of the challenge.

In January 2020, only 178 of the 2,625 FTSE 350 directors were from a BAME background.

Across the FTSE 350 companies that supplied sufficient data to the Parker Review, 59% did not meet the target of having at least one person from an ethnic minority background on their board.

All of the evidence shows that diversity drives better decision-making. Building a diverse organisation is also - of course - the right thing to do. So, increasing equality of opportunity is a must. We need greater black and ethnic minority representation at the highest levels of UK enterprise.

Working together, we need to ensure that everyone, with the ambition and talent - whatever their background and circumstances - get the opportunities they need to rise and progress throughout their careers.

The CBI's 'Bridging the gap' report provides practical advice, examples of good practice across business, and recommendations for action.

Finally, one of my ambitions as CBI President is to use the model developed in the wake of the Davies Report to address gender diversity. And I'm discussing the possibility with my CBI colleagues of creating a 15% club - ensuring our country's boardrooms better reflect the talent and diversity of our population.

John, what is your view on how businesses can be susceptible to unconscious or conscious bias against BAME employees or candidates?

There is a lot of talk about unconscious bias. This is not a thing. The two words jammed together, particularly in the context of business, is a convenient way to say it is nobody's fault.

In my experience, the application of that term leads to crass stereotypes.

When I walked down the street, people would cross the street away from me. They do this because everything they have been programmed with tells them I am a threat as a 6 ft 9 black man. They believe I am stupid, have bad impulse control and can be aggressive.

When we conducted studies on this - trying to find the kind of associations people make with different kinds of racial labels - we found that people are hesitant to talk about what they actually think.

Our study asked people globally about what they associate blackness with. The initial key words they use are things like "strong", "athletic", and "sports. But when we dig deeper, the next crop of most commonly used words are revealing. They include words like "criminal", "violent", and "trouble."

This is part of the reason we cannot effectively tackle racism. People do not want to admit that these are the views they hold. We will not effectively tackle racism until we acknowledge that these attitudes live in the environment around us. These prejudices are steeped in us through the media, music, and mythology.

John, how do we change that?

Education is key, also individuals deciding to be allies - not just with hashtags on Twitter

Be an ally in ways that are meaningful in your workplace. This means when you hear someone expressing themselves in a problematic or even overtly racist way, use your privilege and power to make sure that you don't allow racism to thrive in your workplace.

Workplaces need a cultural audit. We saw that out of the big four accounting firms in the UK, only 0.4% of their partners are black. It means they are part of the problem and while they are not racist, they cannot sit on the fence on this one.

People think racism is a biological construct. It isn't - it's learned.

John, how have we made progress as a society?

Part of the reason we do not make meaningful progress is because we laud progress. Briana Taylor, Trayvon Martin, Rodney King - after each of these events I sat on panels like this and talked about how everything was going to change. Everything hasn't changed.

Progress is a tool of the status quo. It is a way to give a nod to iterative change so that people who want change will shut up. And it is a way to not offend people who like the status quo as the change is so incremental to not be consequential.

In terms of business, there are organisations who don't want the best brains, they want the best brains who look a particular way. What I am arguing against is the stupidity of that mindset. From a purely business perspective, it is stupid. At this time, regardless of personal comfort, surely businesses should want the brightest people who can be most prescient.

Karan and Carolyn, where is there progress and where is there not enough?

Karan - Progress has been made, but nowhere near enough. For VE day last month, how much prominence was given to the 5m volunteers from South Asia, Africa and the Caribbean during the first and second world wars?

Carolyn - I think it is possible to hold both views, that progress has been made but it is nowhere near enough. What we have seen over the past few weeks demonstrated we have a mountain to climb. I know the importance of allies in the workplace is absolutely fundamental. And I've had more conversations on this in the last two weeks than I have over the last three years. There are many people who would like to make this a turning point but aren't sure how to do it.

Carolyn, what does the CBI need to do to change the situation?

I am very struck how many differences there are between how different races experience life. The killing of George Floyd affected our black colleagues particularly deeply.

I am a believer in targets. I have seen how they have been effective in the world of gender, particularly raising female representation at a board level.

I think the gender and BAME pay gap are useful tools.

The Parker review stated that by 2021 there should be at least one BAME board member on every FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 company. However, as of today, almost 40% of FTSE 100 companies don't have one, and 60% of the FTSE 250 don't.

There is a disconnect between rhetoric and action. It is not enough to talk about race. It will not make change. Having frequent discussions on strategy is important but just talking is not enough.

Targets are a blunt instrument. They have been shown to work where nothing else does.

BAME is a statistical convenience. It is not a description of a person. No one individual is BAME. Think of the vanity of the breadth of people are captured under the very description "Asian", and "black". That kind of label only exists because people think Africa is a country.

Multiple identities are common across many people. Many of us have multiple identities and we should have pride in them.

I am a psychologist and I understand I am more likely to be murdered by the police because of one of my identities. My name isn't even John - my mother changed my name when I was 11 years old to give my future CV a better chance of passing through application processes.

I get stopped and searched at least three times a year, and the people in my own building tried to stop me getting in three months ago. It is because I am black. Those people don't care if I am black African or Caribbean, they do it because I am dark.

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Daily Coronavirus Webinar - 19 June 2020 | CBI

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The Black Lives Matter demonstrations protesting against the murder of George Floyd by police in the United States have had a profound impact across the USA, the UK and many other countries worldwide. We need to take action across society to ensure that the protests lead to genuine change.

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You Tube video - Uncomfortable conversations with a black man

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The Inaugural Episode - Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man

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Recommended book

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The case for diversity

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Learn seven ways HR leaders can keep diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) top of mind amid economic and business disruption.

What seems like a watershed moment for DEI could be lost as senior leaders tackle the coincident pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic, racial tensions and an economic downturn. But HR leaders can keep DEI efforts at the forefront.

While recent, widespread protests against racism prompted countless organizations to make public commitments to diversity and equitable treatment for all employees, the pandemic only highlights glaring inequities that organizations must still acknowledge and address.

Workplace equity isn't only the right thing to do; it's a strategic and financial advantage

"Underrepresented groups - racial/ethnic minorities, people with disabilities and women - have been disproportionately affected by the health and economic impacts of COVID-19," says Lauren Romansky, Managing Vice President, Gartner. "And yet, in a recent Gartner survey, only 2% of HR leaders identified DEI, by itself, their No. 1 priority in light of the pandemic."

Learn more: Drive Results Through Workforce Diversity

And now, many organizations may be tempted to reexamine and potentially roll back commitments to DEI programs or initiatives, especially as cost-conscious leaders weigh or implement hiring freezes, furloughs and layoffs to combat the economic fallout from the pandemic.

Hesitation would come at the very moment that leaders have committed to do more - and employees and other stakeholders increasingly expect them to make good on their promises.

Keep DEI top of mind

In the U.S., at least, early studies show that people of color are experiencing higher COVID-19 infection and mortality rates than their white counterparts, and economically, women and people of color are experiencing the greatest proportion of job losses.

This partly reflects the fact that women and minorities are overrepresented in the types of jobs most affected by social distancing measures - notably, positions in hospitality, travel, recreation and retail industries. Women and minorities are also more likely to be less tenured and hold marginal or low-authority positions, increasing their risk of suffering job losses during layoffs.

Help managers and leaders understand the link between DEI and business outcomes

But as organizations navigate the pandemic and its effects, HR leaders can help limit the disproportionate impact on marginalized groups and ensure that DEI remains top of mind for leaders and managers.

To do so, they must emphasize company culture and branding during and after the crisis, and help managers and leaders understand the link between DEI and business outcomes (including crisis resilience).

Employees, customers and other stakeholders are already paying close attention to how companies are responding to this crisis. They are likely to remember how different companies responded and which issues were stressed, acknowledged and communicated, as well as those that were sacrificed or went unaddressed.

Companies that appear to practice their values will likely be viewed favorably, while those whose actions don't align with expressed values may lose out - whether in terms of lower levels of trust, branding appeal, customer satisfaction, or employee engagement or retention.

The suggested actions for HR leaders reflect the reality surfacing in a growing body of research: Workplace equity isn't just the right thing to do; it is a strategic and financial advantage.

7 ways to rally support for DEI initiatives

1. Identify highly affected employee segments and provide additional support. Consider how COVID-19-related disruptions affect different workforce segments, such as parents, certain demographics (younger or older), different gender groups, races and ethnicities, or those with disabilities (visible and invisible, e.g., those without technology skills).

2. Leverage employee resource groups (ERGs) to communicate and connect with a wider network of employees throughout the organization and create social connections that might be missing in a remote work environment.

3. Identify "volunteer" or expanded opportunities for HR and DEI teams to partner more closely and support critical engagement and employee experience projects - especially in developing emotional well-being resources and remote work best-practices.

4. Ensure that rapid response teams are diverse. Make sure these teams represent different parts of the business and geographies, as well as varied demographic groups.

5. Partner with internal communications to embed DEI messaging. Advocate for communications that emphasize unity and shared sacrifice. Ensure that changes and strategies, including the DEI strategy, are positioned in an intentional and inclusive manner.

6. Support and coach managers to incorporate inclusion in a remote and high-stress work environment. Ensure managers know what inclusive behaviors look like in a remote environment, are modeling them properly, are prepared for how they will be tested in a stressed environment and know how they can help all employees to be inclusive.

7. Develop a working draft of your response to this question, "What did you do for your customers and employees during the COVID-19 pandemic?" Partner with DEI teams and other organizational stakeholders to clearly articulate the ways in which the organization practiced its values and commitments.

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Making the Case for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion During Disruption

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Learn seven ways HR leaders can keep diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) top of mind amid economic and business disruption. What seems like a watershed moment for DEI could be lost as senior leaders tackle the coincident pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic, racial tensions and an economic downturn.