DEIB, shorthand for diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging, reflects a shift towards more ethical, sustainable and productive workplaces. It transcends mere compliance with legal requirements or meeting organizational quotas. Instead, it’s about creating a genuine and sustainable culture of inclusion in which every employee feels valued, connected and supported.

And it’s not just about happier employees. By embracing DEIB, organizations benefit from diverse perspectives, improved employee engagement and satisfaction, stronger decision-making abilities, increased talent attraction and retention, and a better reputation among potential clients and customers. These advantages, in turn, contribute to a more dynamic, adaptable and successful organization.

Understanding diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging

Understanding DEIB is key to creating a workplace where everyone feels valued. DEIB emphasizes recognizing and appreciating the unique differences among individuals, ensuring equitable opportunities and treatment, establishing an environment where everyone can contribute and thrive, and building a sense of community and connection among all employees.

Diversity

Diversity refers to the presence of differences within a given setting. In the workplace, this could mean differences in race, ethnicity, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, socioeconomic status and more.

Organizations face many challenges in creating a diverse team. These include:

• Attracting people from different backgrounds.
• Overcoming unconscious biases.
• Addressing discrimination and harassment.
• Ensuring opportunities, and therefore representation, at all levels of the organization, especially in leadership positions.
• Tackling these challenges helps organizations establish a more inclusive culture that attracts and retains top talent and boosts employee engagement. This ultimately results in better business outcomes. In fact, McKinsey found that companies in the top quartile of diversity financially outperformed the bottom quartile.

But while creating a diverse team is a vital first step, it’s important to understand that diversity alone won’t confer these benefits. Organizations also need to acknowledge and value the unique perspectives that each team member brings to the table and to foster an environment in which everyone can thrive.

That’s where equity, inclusion and belonging come in for DEIB.

Equity

Equity in the workplace means ensuring fair treatment, access and opportunity for all individuals. Acknowledging that everyone has different circumstances, equity is a commitment to allocating the resources and opportunities needed to create a level playing field.

This means creating an environment where all employees have the support they need to succeed, regardless of their background, identity or position within the company. By addressing the systemic barriers and biases that can hinder an individual’s success, equity helps ensure success is based on merit.

Note that for DEIB, equity is different from equality. Equality is providing the same resources to everyone. Equity is providing resources based on individual needs. Giving every employee the same type of desk would be an example of equality, while providing desks based on individual requirements — such as adjustable desks for employees in wheelchairs — is an example of equity.

Policies and practices play a critical role in promoting equity within an organization. For example:

Pay equity: This means ensuring that all employees are compensated fairly for their work, without discrimination based on gender, race or other irrelevant factors. It involves regular reviews of pay practices to identify and rectify any disparities.

Fair hiring practices: Organizations can take several steps to ensure that their hiring processes are unbiased and inclusive. For example, they can remove names and other identifying information from resumes to prevent bias, standardize interview questions for all candidates and advertise job openings in various forums to attract a more diverse applicant pool.

Promotion opportunities based on merit: It’s important to develop transparent and consistent criteria for advancement and provide equal access to development opportunities. This gives all employees the knowledge and ability to move forward.

Flexible work arrangements: This practice enables employees to achieve a better work-life balance by giving them the option of flexible work schedules, remote work options or part-time positions. In particular, it supports equitable access to career opportunities and progression for employees with caregiving duties, health conditions or other situations that make traditional work hours difficult.

Inclusion

While diversity brings people from different backgrounds together, inclusion allows them to feel valued, respected and supported. It’s about actively ensuring that every employee can participate fully in creating and sustaining their environment.

Challenges to inclusion often manifest in subtle yet impactful ways, such as microaggressions and exclusionary behaviors. Microaggressions are indirect, often unintentional expressions of racism, sexism, ageism or ableism. They can undermine the target’s sense of belonging and self-worth, leading to a less inclusive environment.

Exclusionary behaviors are those that leave people out of a group or activity. These can include not inviting certain employees to meetings or team activities where their input could be valuable, consistently overlooking contributions from certain groups during discussions and forming cliques that exclude others. Whether intentional or not, exclusionary behaviors create barriers to full participation and can make individuals feel isolated or marginalized within their teams or the organization at large.

Addressing these challenges requires conscious effort from everyone within the organization. It starts with awareness training to recognize and understand microaggressions and exclusionary behaviors. From there, developing DEIB policies and practices that actively promote inclusion, such as facilitating open dialogues and ensuring that decision-making processes are transparent and involve diverse perspectives, is crucial. By doing so, organizations can move towards a truly inclusive culture where everyone feels they belong and can thrive.

Belonging

Belonging is the experience of being accepted and valued as an integral part of a group or community. While inclusion focuses on creating environments that support diversity and equitable practices, belonging emphasizes the emotional and psychological aspects of feeling connected and appreciated. It’s about creating a workplace culture where everyone can say, “I am seen. I am heard. And I matter.”

That sense of belonging is often challenged by work cultures that outwardly promote diversity and inclusion but fail to make individuals feel that they truly fit in or are part of the team. This can be due to a lack of understanding, failure to acknowledge individual contributions or insufficient efforts to integrate diverse employees into the core fabric of the organization.

Promoting a sense of belonging, however, can significantly enhance employee experience and, by extension, benefit the organization. When employees feel a strong sense of belonging, they are more engaged, productive and loyal to the company. They are likely to go above and beyond, not just for their own success but for the success of their team and organization.

This sense of belonging can also lead to better mental health outcomes, reduced turnover rates and a more positive workplace atmosphere, contributing to the organization’s overall performance.

Why is DEIB important in the workplace?

Despite anti-discrimination laws and public awareness campaigns, discrimination in the workplace remains a real and pressing problem: 55% of workers claim to have been discriminated against, while 61% have witnessed colleagues being discriminated against. Additionally disturbing is the fact that only 54% of those who reported problems felt that the issue was fully resolved. What’s more, younger workers deliberately avoid companies that lack a diverse workforce. Workplaces that fail to prioritize DEIB not only risk legal and reputational damage but also miss out on attracting top talent. Focusing on diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging enriches your workplace culture, resulting in the following benefits:

Empowered workforce

A commitment to DEIB goes beyond compliance to encompass the deliberate creation of an environment where all employees, regardless of their background, feel valued and empowered to contribute their best work.

Diverse customer base

Companies that embrace DEIB are also in a stronger position to serve a diverse customer base and create stronger connections through more personalized and culturally sensitive services. The result is higher customer satisfaction and loyalty, as customers feel their identities and experiences are reflected in the organization’s values.

Positive work environment

By ensuring that all employees feel valued and respected, regardless of background or identity, DEIB creates a positive work environment where diversity is viewed as a strength. This results in more innovative, inclusive and productive outcomes.

Employee engagement and retention

Building a culture where everyone feels supported and understood improves employee morale and retention, as people are more likely to stay with a company that appreciates their unique contributions and offers a sense of belonging. Workplaces with strong DEIB principles often experience better performance thanks to high employee engagement, creativity and innovation.

DEIB vs. DEI

The shift from DEI to DEIB reflects a deeper understanding of what it takes to create a truly inclusive workplace. DEI lays the foundation by addressing the structural and behavioral aspects needed for a diverse and equitable environment. On the other hand, DEIB also addresses people’s emotional and psychological needs.

For diversity and inclusion efforts to be truly successful, individuals must not only be present and supported but must also feel that they are an indispensable part of the organization. Emphasizing belonging in addition to diversity, equity and inclusion is a step forward in creating work environments that value differences, promote fairness and cultivate personal connection.

“Belongingness” speaks to the human desire to be part of something greater than oneself, feel understood and have one’s contributions valued and recognized. By nurturing a sense of belonging, organizations can enhance employee engagement, drive innovation and improve overall workplace satisfaction.

How to promote a culture of DEIB

Promoting a DEIB culture calls for a systematic approach. This approach includes measuring, training and evaluating efforts to ensure progress and effectiveness. Here are a few ways organizations can support DEIB:

• Establishing DEIB baselines: Create specific metrics and benchmarks to evaluate the organization’s current DEIB status. This might involve conducting surveys to understand employee experiences, reviewing recruitment and promotion processes for fairness, and analyzing workforce demographics to pinpoint disparities and identify areas for improvement.
• DEIB training: Implement comprehensive training programs designed to increase awareness and understanding of DEIB principles among all employees. These programs should cover topics such as unconscious bias, cultural competency and effective communication strategies to foster an inclusive environment.
• Monitoring DEIB progress: Conduct periodic analyses to assess the effectiveness of DEIB strategies, identifying areas where they are succeeding and adjusting as needed. This involves comparing actual results to the metrics set earlier, gathering input from the workforce on their perceptions of DEIB practices and evaluating the success of specific initiatives in achieving their goals.

Implementing effective DEIB Initiatives

Popular DEIB initiatives that have proven effective in various organizations include:

1. Inclusive hiring practices: These include developing recruitment strategies that reach diverse candidate pools, implementing unbiased screening processes and ensuring diverse interview panels.
2. Employee resource groups (ERGs): ERGs provide support, advocacy and professional development opportunities for employees from diverse backgrounds and identities.
3. Mentorship programs: Mentorship opportunities connect employees from different backgrounds and levels within the organization. These programs promote knowledge sharing and support career development.

By integrating these strategies and initiatives, organizations can make significant strides toward creating a more inclusive, equitable and supportive workplace where every employee feels valued and has the opportunity to thrive.

Get started with your DEIB initiatives with BPM

At BPM, we believe that innovation and productivity thrive when employees feel seen, heard and included. We also recognize that building a DEIB culture isn’t easy. When DEIB initiatives are half-hearted or poorly implemented, they can do more harm than good.

That’s why it pays to work with BPM. We offer a wide range of services to a broad range of clients and won’t give you a one-size-fits-all program. Instead, we’ll meet you where you are to design and implement the initiatives you need.

Our DEIB consulting services include:

• Assessment and audit
• Strategy development
• Training and workshops
• Talent acquisition, including hiring and onboarding
• Policy review and implementation
• Coaching and support
• Metrics and evaluation

We invite you to partner with BPM for your DEIB consulting needs. Contact us today.