Business Finance - Management Assignment 1

Assess the Sources of Inclusion

Ideally, inclusion is fully aligned and integrated across the organization, and that means at the organizational level, at the management level, and at the work-group level. What does this look and feel like to employees? In this module, you will examine and discuss your own experience with inclusion. You will read about what inclusion looks like to the individual employee and you will use helpful tools to assess inclusion at different levels. Finally, you will complete your course project, in which you report on your results and write a memo to your boss with your recommendations for improvements.

Organizational Level of Inclusion

If you are like many people, you focused on the variety of practices Company A uses to try to create a diverse work environment. At this point, what's important to recognize is that having these practices in place does not necessarily mean employees experience the organization as inclusive.

So the question that I asked you is whether or not you expect Company A or Company B to be more inclusive. Most people focus on the fact that Company A has a lot of diversity best practices or D&I best practices in place. And given that, it's easy to assume that Company A is probably more committed to diversity and inclusion issues. And that therefore, people might be able to expect that the company will invest more in their success, that they are more valued if they work for that organization, and probably that they'll experience some sort of pride for working for a company that has these best practices in place. And it's true that well-designed diversity and inclusion practices are indeed important and it's good for companies to have these practices in place. But the question is whether or not having these practices in place alone guarantees that employees will experience inclusion. It's important to keep in mind that these practices alone are often insufficient for promoting inclusion in all the different ways that we'll be talking about in this course. So I once heard somebody say that traditional diversity management is like counting numbers, whereas I think we can think about inclusion as making those numbers count. So a lot of these practices that had been in place for awhile, like targeted recruiting and having these mentoring programs and the like, help to attract people to an organization, help the organization to hire diverse employees. But they don't guarantee that the employees, once hired, once in the door, experience inclusion and end up staying with the organization. When inclusion, it requires is a fundamental shift in the organization's culture. It requires that there is a change in the way that people interact with each other at work such that traditional stereotypes can be debunked. And people can start to really interact in much more authentic ways, such that one's particular social category membership, like gender or race, ethnicity, or disability status, any of these social categories should no longer be predictive of how successful one can be within the organization, how integrated somebody feels within the organizational context. We'll talk a little bit more about these different definitions of inclusion but what I'm trying to point out to you here is the idea that these D&I best practices alone will not guarantee inclusion. In fact, there's some recent research by Alexandra Kalev and her colleagues that shows that these diversity practices that have been implemented by organizations for decades now are not actually successful at helping to increase representation at higher levels of the organization and senior management. Although some argued this is not inclusion per se, it is indicative of a lack of inclusion if people are not staying with the organization and advancing through the organization, such that women and ethnic minorities are represented in these senior leadership positions. And so we're starting to really focus in the research literature on the idea that we need to expand our view of what needs to happen within organizations, in order for people to be successful and to experience inclusion. The primary reason why these practices may be insufficient, they're actually probably two main reasons. One is that even really well-designed, well-intentioned practices are often not consistently implemented within an organization. There are a lot of reasons for that; managers have competing demands on their time and their resources, and managers differ in how committed they are to diversity, how much they value these practices in influencing them carefully. So that's one reason, the other is that these practices tend to focus on individuals. So individuals' decision making, hiring certain individuals, training them to have different They also tend to focus on key kind of decision-making moments in time like hiring, The practices don't tend to focus on the dynamics between individuals, so they don't address the social relational sources of discrimination and bias within organizations. And so even though they might help individuals to improve in certain ways and to develop new skills and amass new knowledge, they don't alter the social fabric of the organization. And to the extent that that's true, then we'll always continue to have these interpersonal dynamics that can get in the way of true success of individuals who belong to historically marginalized groups.

Citation:

Kalev, F. Dobbin, & E. Kelly. 2006. Best practices or best guesses? Assessing the efficacy of corporate affirmative action and diversity policies. American Sociological Review 71:589–617.

Inclusion and the Individual

Key Points

Does the person feel like an insider?

Does the person believe their uniqueness is valued?

For many people, the most salient context that determines their experiences of inclusion is their work group. It's where they have their everyday interpersonal interactions, and the nature of those interactions usually influences how included people feel.

People often leave companies due to their experiences with their co-workers and their immediate manager; it tends to be less about the organizational-level stuff that's going on. The climate of the work group, the norms of the work group, and the interactions that tend to unfold within that work group are all important determinants of feelings of inclusion.

The definition of inclusion developed by Colorado State University Professor Lynn Shore and her colleagues is based on two fundamental questions:

1. Does an individual feel as though they are treated like an insider within the organization? (In other words, does the person experience a high or low sense of belongingness?)

2. Does an individual feel that their uniqueness is valued within the organization?

The most ideal state, inclusion, is when people feel like they are an insider; they experience belongingness within the organization, they are able to be themselves, and their uniqueness is highly valued.

It is common for people to experience some form of pseudo-inclusion, and both the assimilation category and the differentiation category are examples of this.  Assimilation is when people experience a sense of belongingness, but there's a cost. It comes at the cost of hiding parts of oneself to blend in and be in accordance with whatever normative ingroup exists within the organization; as long as you don't rock the boat and you fit in, you can experience a sense of belongingness.

But there's a cost to that, both to the individual and the organization. We know from research that when people have to adopt facades of conformity, or a different persona, they experience higher levels of strain. It's more tiring. For the organization, assimilation means that the diversity that should be an element of the organization is actually not in play if people are withholding parts of themselves.  Differentiation means that the person is not treated as an insider within the organization yet their unique qualities are seen as necessary for the organization's success.

 The image highlights the differences between the lack of inclusion, pseudo inclusion, and full inclusion and learning.

It shows a table with four boxes arranged into two rows and two columns. Above the boxes along the horizontal axis it reads, “Does one feel s/he is treated as an insider (despite differences)?” Above the left-hand column it says, “Low Belongingness (Outside Status),” and above the right-hand column it says, “High Belongingness (Insider Status).”

Beside the boxes along the vertical axis it reads, “Is one’s uniqueness acknowledged and valued?” Beside the top row, it says, “Uniqueness not valued,” and beside the bottom row, it says, “Uniqueness highly valued.”

In the top box in the left-hand column, it says, “Exclusion. Individual is not treated as an organizational insider with unique value in the work group but there are other employees or groups who are insiders. No Inclusion.”

In the top box in the right-hand column, it says, “Assimilation. Individual is treated as an insider in the work group when they conform to organizational/dominant culture norms; uniqueness is downplayed (often because of low status). Pseudo Inclusion.” There is a square around this box, emphasizing it.

In the bottom box in the left-hand column, it says, “Differentiation. Individual is not treated as an organizational insider (e.g., socially excluded, fewer opportunities) but their unique characteristics are seen as valuable and required for group/organizational success. Pseudo Inclusion.” There is a square around this box, emphasizing it.

In the bottom box in the right-hand column, it says, “Inclusion. Individual is treated as an insider and also allowed/encouraged to retain uniqueness; feels safe in being and expressing oneself. Innovative decision-making most likely. Inclusion and Learning.”

R. J. Ely & D. A. Thomas. 2001. Cultural diversity at work: The effects of diversity perspectives

L. M. Shore, A. E. Randel, B. G. Chung, M. A. Dean, K. H. Ehrhart, & G. Singh. 2011. Inclusion and diversity in work groups: A review and model for future research. Journal of Management 37(4):1262–1289.

Aligning Three Sources of Inclusion

Not everyone will have the same experience within their work groups or with their immediate supervisors. This type of variation occurs in most companies. For that reason, it is important that companies have data that allow them to look at inclusion more deeply, and not just at company averages, to enable focused improvements.

Although benefits arise from improving any source of inclusion, it is most desirable to align the three sources for optimal outcomes. Research shows that individuals, groups, and organizations all experience positive results when all sources are aligned.

Alignment From the Employee Perspective

Ideally, the commitment to diversity and inclusion that an organization espouses aligns with what employees actually experience. When employees experience high levels of organizational, work-group,  and supervisor inclusion, they report the most favorable outcomes in terms of individual engagement, psychological and physical well-being, and, ultimately, job performance and intention to stay with the organization. Group processes (communication, coordination, decision making) and organizational performance outcomes (retention rates, financial performance, ability to attract top talent) are also best when all three forms of inclusion align.

Employee reactions to misalignment depend on to what they attribute differences; that is, on what employees think is the source of the differences between what the organization espouses and what they personally experience in their work groups and with their supervisors.

Individual and Personal Sources of Discrimination

At the individual or personal level, sources of discrimination can be intentional and unintentional. Here, Professor Nishii explores both types of sources and how they manifest on the individual level.

Intentional interpersonal discrimination refers to behaviors that are intended to have a harmful effect on members of another group. An example of intentional interpersonal discrimination is when someone deliberately ignores someone else's ideas or contributions because of their membership in a particular group; for example, based on their gender, race, nationality, disability, etc. Sources of interpersonal discrimination that are more neutral in intent are also possible; for example, behaviors that are based on unconscious biases that may have an unfair impact on members of another group. An example is confirmation bias. It's the tendency for us to only notice information that confirms our expectations. Confirmation biases perpetuate inequities because if our starting point for judgments about people who are atypical for a role is doubt and our brains notice data that confirm our expectations, then it's much harder for rule-incongruent individuals to have their competencies acknowledged. At the interpersonal level, both those who are high and low in privilege can be the targets of discrimination.

Burnout and the Diversity Tax

Key Points

Marginalized employees face the diversity tax in the workplace.

Burnout is more likely for marginalized employees because of the cumulative impact of the diversity tax.

DEI is a critical part of preventing and reducing burnout.

People with marginalized social identities are often told that they "have to work twice as hard for half as much." This expression is a summary of what is also referred to as the diversity tax.

The diversity tax is the idea that the inputs of marginalized people are or will be valued less compared to the inputs of non-marginalized people in the workplace. This often results in marginalized employees feeling like they must work longer hours, that their work must be of higher quality than that of non-marginalized peers, and that they should accept that other people in their workplace may be rewarded before them even if their work is objectively the same or higher quality.

Being aware of the diversity tax on its own is not enough to prevent it if you are a marginalized employee or if you are trying to create equity for your marginalized employees. The diversity tax is a function of the many small and large ways that inequity persists in the workplace. Every time a marginalized employee in your workplace gets less positive feedback for doing the same quality work as their peers, overlooked for their ideas and contributions, or less access to resources and compensation, it adds up. 

Burnout as a result of the diversity tax

The cumulative impact of the diversity tax results in burnout for marginalized employees. Burnout is an issue workplaces are facing for every member of their workforce — however, because of equity issues like the diversity tax, marginalized employees are more likely to reach a state of burnout and to reach that state with greater speed or intensity than their peers. A recent Gallup survey on employees with burnout found that they are 63% more likely to take a sick day than other employees, they are 23% more likely to visit the emergency room in the time they are employed, and they are 2.3 times more likely to look for other jobs.

Burnout is not due to employee laziness or a lack of motivation; it is a direct result of equity issues like the diversity tax, and it creates such a substantial environment of stress that people who experience it display greater physical health concerns. This means that if your organization is not addressing burnout and the cost of the diversity tax, it is not going to be able to successfully create an environment of equity, inclusion, and belonging. A culture of burnout for marginalized employees means that these employees are more likely to experience stress-related physical health concerns and a desire to leave their organization.

Addressing burnout and the diversity tax

The best ways to address burnout and prevent employees from experiencing the diversity tax involve diversity, equity, and inclusion solutions. DEI solutions not only seek to promote equity in the workplace — which, in turn, dilutes the impact of the diversity tax — but, when they are implemented successfully, they benefit all employees. A workplace that practices DEI in all areas shows its marginalized employees that they matter and expresses that through policies and practices that reduce bias and discrimination and elevate opportunities and resources for marginalized employees. 

For more information on burnout and some methods that your organization can use to address it, you can read Gallup's  "How to Prevent Employee Burnout"Links to an external site.  and watch Dr. Emily Nagoski's TED talk,  "The cure for burnout (hint: it isn't self-care)."Links to an external site.