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Forbes: What This Moment Teaches Us About Building A More Equitable Workplace
Originally found on Forbes by Eric Mosley
We are living through a moment none of us will soon forget. This is a moment that has transcended the fray, the chaos of endless disingenuous debate. A moment that exposes the hidden or obscured truth. The stories of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and George Floyd, and too many more, have exposed the deep racial problems in our society in such a truthful and brutal way that it’s impossible to ignore.
Sometimes the pain and despair are so great that it seems like these problems are too just too big to tackle. But a longing to go back to the way things were must be resisted. Once you see the video where George Floyd was killed, you can’t un-see it. It is now part of our culture, and our response to it is part of our morality as a society....
Equity and inclusion in the workplace
These issues of equity and inclusion don’t disappear when we go to work. People want to be seen for who they are and all that they are. How often have you heard the statement “I don’t see race” or “I don’t see gender”? This misses the point of inclusion and belonging. In saying “I don’t see an essential part of you” – whether that be your gender, your relationship preference, or the color of your skin – we are also choosing to deny a large part of what makes someone human. Each of us is, yes, more than the color of our skin, or whom we choose to love, or our gender, or our religion, or our ethnic background. Yet all those elements are what make me unequivocally me.
As our understanding of diversity and inclusion expands, it’s clear that what began as a moral good has grown into a business necessity. A new study published in the Academy of Management finds “a 1% increase in racial diversity congruence in management increases a tech firm’s productivity by $729 per employee. For Fortune 500 firms, analyzed in a supplemental sample, productivity increases by $1,590 per employee.”
Continue reading the original article at Forbes
Read the original research in Academy of Management Journal
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