Organisations need to re-evaluate how their preferred ways of behaviour and doing things may be undermining costly diversity initiatives. Portia Hickey looks at how firms can create an inclusive culture by reconfiguring the organisation’s brain to adopt the very behaviours that leverage diversity
It is normal to have biases. The brain leads us naturally to stereotype people into those we perceive to be like us and those not like us (1). This may be done consciously or subconsciously, and what we base this judgement on is not necessarily the obvious differences such as ethnicity, gender or age. Often our stereotyping is much more subtle. For example, she is a strategic thinker like me; he’s too direct; or she’s too passive.
That said, although we might perceive someone as different doesn’t necessarily mean that we will attach any significance to this evaluation, let alone feel negatively about the difference. Instead, we silently carry our biases around until one is activated and we find ourselves taking a strong liking or disliking to someone without consciously knowing why, and in reaction, we may react in a negative way.
Trouble-making subconscious biases
For example, when I first moved to the UK, I worked on a project team that very nearly fell apart due to subtle cultural differences. The team included three nationalities: British, Portuguese, and Australian. In the initial stages the team seemed to work well together, however, when it came to brainstorming and crafting the solution, the group started to fragment. My Portuguese colleague was very friendly, but the Brits never really warmed to her. Later it transpired that her blunt feedback, such as: “No that is a stupid idea,” was perceived to be extremely rude by my British colleagues, who reacted by limiting their contribution and attendance to brainstorm sessions. My Portuguese colleague became frustrated at what appeared to be a dire lack of enthusiasm from her colleagues, and was completely oblivious to her own contribution to the sad state of affairs.
So what triggers such subconscious biases to come to the fore? The context: the organisation within which we work. It is the organisation (context) that moves us from the natural social categorisation process (like me or not like me) to a bias (it is better to be like me than not like me) (2), because it is the organisation that gives perceived differences meaning and significance.
Preferred ways of behaviour
Like the human brain, the organisation’s brain will often have a mould for its employees and categorise people as fitting or not fitting the mould. In practise this means that there are preferred ways of behaving in the organisation. These norms for behaving are usually silent but very powerful, i.e. behaving in the correct or ‘normal’ way means that you are part of the ‘in group’ and with it comes varying intrinsic (friendship, inclusion) and extrinsic rewards (promotion). However, those norms for behaviour may be so subtle that people do not notice that they are there until someone violates the norms, as in the example mentioned earlier, by not behaving in the ‘normal’ way.
The organisation decides the criteria for the in-group and the out-group. One professional services sector organisation that I worked with had a very strong sales culture. A female employee noted that she felt more marginalised in the organisation because she did not have a sales focus than the fact that she was a person from an ethnic minority. Because she worked in a ‘cost centre’ she was perceived and treated as less valuable than ‘profit centre’ employees who were responsible for sales.
Mind your language
Biases can be fostered subtly through language. Having parts of a business commonly referred to within an organisation as ‘cost centres’ has strong connotations. Another common area for this to occur is when organisations talk about leadership. In the case study opposite, the board stated that, ‘a leader needs to be emotionally strong’. Is this statement sexist? Are men and women equally able to demonstrate this ‘strength’? Who role models this ‘strength’ in the organisation and how do they do it? It is the connotations of the statement that, although not immediately obvious, may have a pervasive influence on who is seen to be leadership material and whether individuals can identify themselves as leaders.
According to DiversityInc magazine, the top 50 diverse companies spend between £250,000 to £2.5 million on diversity initiatives. Often organisations spend their diversity budgets on initiatives such as training and creating mountains of paper on policies only to find that they are losing all the ‘diverse’ staff they invested heavily in attracting. Despite the diversity policy, procedures and training, organisations are failing to change behaviour because simply having robust policies on diversity and discrimination does not actually mean that people in the organisation will embrace and value diversity in practice.
To truly be diverse organisations need to create a culture of valuing difference. That means changing ‘the way things are done around here’. Announcing to all employees that ‘we value diversity’, is not enough to change the way people behave, how power is distributed or the rules of the game within the organisation. The culture of an organization will set the criteria for leadership (3), and leadership is key to enabling the benefits of diversity. Leaders need to demonstrate that they value difference and role model difference as having a positive influence on task/group/organisation success. Even FTSE 100 and Fortune 500 companies struggle with this. Organisations such as American Express are helping leaders value difference by giving them the competencies to manage and leverage diversity before rolling out diversity and inclusion training initiatives to the rest of their employees.
A change in mindset
In ER Consultants’ view, organisations need to ensure that policy and procedural elements such as training staff are communicated using appropriate terminologies and behaviours. However, this is not sufficient to ensure a diverse workforce, let alone reap the benefits of diversity. Organisations need to become more self-aware and examine the ‘context’ they are creating for their employees. Through the very nature ‘how things are done’ in the organisation, they may be undermining their work on diversity.
We believe that encouraging and enabling staff to value difference requires a mindset change for most organisations. Being explicit about how diversity will help achieve business goals helps align people’s visions and understanding. Changing ‘how things are done’ is the first step to achieving this; the next is to change behaviours by reconfiguring the organisation’s brain – i.e. through the competency framework.
ER Consultants recently helped an organisation to not only identify the skills and behaviours required to ‘embrace diversity and value difference’, but also helped the firm to successfully achieve the change in mindset required to leverage diversity. See case study opposite.
For more information on fostering an inclusive culture, contact:
portia.hickey@erconsultants.co.uk
© erconsultants Topics Issue 1 2007
REFERENCES:
1 Hogg, M.A. & Abrams, D. (1988). Social Identifications: A social psychology of intergroup relations & group processes. London, United Kingdom: Routledge.
2 van Kippenberg, D., De Dreu, C.K.W., & Homan, A.C. (2004). Work group diversity and group performance: An integrative model and research agenda. Journal of Applied Psychology, 89(6), 1008-1022.
3 Schein, E. H. (1992). Organizational culture & leadership (2nd edition). San Francisco, USA: Jossey Bass
CASE STUDY: Changing Behaviour
A global energy consultancy engaged ER Consultants to assist them in realising a new strategy focused on providing integrated strategic solutions to clients, as well as help to implement a succession plan. The organisation had entrenched silos that were hindering communication and client delivery. The silos comprised of four main professional groups, each nicknamed and stereotyped; general managers (pink shirts), environmental engineers (greenies) and the mechanical and chemical engineers (engineers).
It didn’t take long for us to notice that the ‘the greenies’ really did not have much influence in the organisation. Whilst ‘the engineers’ and ‘the pink shirts’ were predominantly recruited from certain universities and developed within the company, ‘the greenies’ generally came from less well known universities and had developed their career through less conventional routes driven by a passion for the environment. Whilst the rest of the organisation was 70% male, the greenies were over 50% female and also had a greater percentage of people from ethnic minorities. Yet ‘the greenies’ had no representation at senior management level.
ER Consultants worked with a cross section of the business to surface some of the prejudices, and refocus groups on the new strategy and their joint role in providing a strategic and integrated consultancy service. Each silo explicitly recognised the positive contributions of all areas of the business and the advantage of collective working. We then worked with the firm to identify the skills and behaviours required for the new business model. A competency framework was designed to recognise and promote collective strengths within the business. The ability to harness differences for the good of the businesses was now a highly recognised and rewarded skill. It then served as an objective framework by which to recruit, assess and develop people within the business.
We also helped them to reassess the use of language in the organisation. For example, the board stated that, ‘a leader needs to be emotionally strong’. This statement could be interpreted to have sexist connotations; although not immediately obvious, it may have a pervasive influence on who is seen to be leadership material and whether individuals can identify themselves as leaders. It was probably one explanation for why there were no women represented at senior management level.
When ER Consultants worked with the board on its senior management succession plan, we found that board members had a very clear idea of whom they expected to see on the list. But our actual evidence provided a very different list of candidates. Results from our assessment centre rated a senior ‘greenie’ female engineer very highly. The board, however, felt this woman did not have what it took to lead at senior management level. After re-examining some of their assumptions they decided to go with our objective decision; after all, she excelled on the competencies that they had identified as critical for realising their new strategy. She was promoted to MD and her positive impact on the business was quickly noted. This appointment also quickly demonstrated that there was now a new inclusive strategy for the business.
