In 2022, it’s time to focus on taking the conversation around diversity, equity, and inclusion further and dive deeper into what building an inclusive culture means. Our recent DEI December webinar series at OpenSesame assembled some of the brightest minds in DEI for nearly two weeks of discussions around how organizations can level up their workforces and build psychologically safe environments.

Define Your DEI Anchor

“When it comes to diversity and inclusion, it’s not something where you can fly in an expert for two hours, do one training, and then you’re done,” says Tara Cooper, DEI consultant at OpenSesame.

To create an effective DEI strategy, define your DEI anchor as an initial step. An anchor is a key area or mission that you wish to focus your organization’s time and resources on. The anchor can be socioeconomic, political, or cultural in nature; it gives you a lens through which to build an action plan.

Make an Action Plan

Your DEI action plan can’t be a simple checklist. Leadership must decide how deep the organization is willing to go and what they’re willing to invest in DEI. And that will look different for each organization, depending on where an organization is in its DEI journey. Are you hoping to improve hiring practices? Or are you requiring unconscious bias training for all employees? Assess where your organization is on its DEI journey by accessing our DEI toolkit.

Ensure Support From Leadership

The responsibility of DEI can’t fall on one person or a single consultant. You need buy-in from leadership to implement your action plan. Executive backing is essential for the success of any diversity program. What’s happening at the bottom typically won’t change if nothing is changing at the top.

In addition to inclusive leadership training from managers, it’s important to seek advice from outside consultants and diversity subject matter experts. Bringing in a third party catches problems that leadership may not see when executing a roadmap for the future.

Foster Employee Engagement Through Affinity Spaces

DEI should be a leadership directive, but Cooper says it’s crucial that individuals are doing the work at every level of the organization.

She also stresses the importance of affinity groups, also known as employee resource groups (ERGs), for workers of marginalized identities. “I’m all about self-care. So if you need to have an affinity space to discuss the issues you need to discuss and build yourself up so you can be more productive in the workspace, then that’s what they need to be able to do.”

Affinity spaces sometimes come under fire for being divisive or a form of self-segregation, but Cooper encourages those who feel that way to look at the larger picture. Affinity spaces are not new; they happen naturally all the time.

“Think of all the instances where employees may separate into subgroups in an organization—the gatherings where it’s only men or only white people. If you only get nervous when the subset is around a certain race or gender, then you should question that.”

“Much of this work is pulling the wool back from people’s eyes and showing how insidious unconscious bias can be and how socialized we are to be discriminatory,” Cooper points out. “We want people to slow down on their reactions to others and think about how they treat people.”

As the number of organizations launching DEI initiatives grows bigger, it’s important that employees understand their role in DEI goals. Your anchor must sink below the surface into a deeper exploration of what an inclusive space looks like for your organization and what it can do for your work culture.