From the Front Lines to the Corporate World: My DEI Journey

George Floyd’s murder was a wake-up call. In the aftermath, corporations doubled down on their public intentions to be more inclusive and equitable. Yet, beyond the pledges and promises, it’s hard to see the system changes that need to be made to result in real impact. This is the case for a few reasons. First, people don’t actually know where we are starting from with equity, never mind how to get to where they want to be. Second, changes to systems are hard to do when organizations are using those systems—who gets hired, who gets promoted, who is included or excluded from opportunities to innovate and create new ideas—to generate profits. Sadly, we are already seeing corporations retreat from their DEI commitments made after George Floyd.

That’s why DEI work seems hard on the best day and impossible on the worst—because moving from intention to impact means changing the traditions and culture that normalize whiteness. Like anything else that’s done unconsciously, white-centric actions feel natural in corporate America. But this blindness to bias makes changing whiteness almost impossible.

Many people may assume that DEI work means checking boxes, lowering standards, or, to be really blunt, playing favorites with women and people of color—all the while ignoring the plethora of data highlighting the overall benefits to company profitability from increasing diversity. Without question, centering whiteness carries a heavy economic cost.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) observed that, in the United States, racism has stymied Black economic progress for decades. Examples abound, such as the denial of most people of color access to the benefits of the GI Bill, which propelled growth for the rest of the American middle class. The reason? Opposition from white congressmen from the South who clung to racial segregation. “Redlining” became the shorthand for Federal Housing Administration policy that refused insurance for mortgages on houses in black neighborhoods, effectively shutting black Americans out of home ownership and the means to accumulate wealth by owning property.

As the McKinsey Institute for Black Economic Mobility has observed: “There is a wide and persistent gap in wealth between white and black families.” However, efforts to close the racial wealth gap would result in the US GDP being 4 to 6 percent higher by 2028, resulting in more economic opportunity for all. It’s also a global issue, as the IMF report clearly shows. For example, in France, creating equality in access to employment and education could help boost that country’s GDP by 1.5 percent over the next 20 years, representing a $3.6 billion economic bonus. To capture this value in every country, the onus of change where systemic racism is concerned must be placed on every institution, across education, health care, criminal justice, culture, sports, and entertainment, and, of course, businesses in every economic sector.

Engaging in DEI efforts means taking on the uncomfortable work of anti-racism, including taking reparative actions for black employees, such as addressing racial pay gaps and making commitments to advancement and succession planning that include people of color. Meaningful policy changes can level the playing field for highly qualified people of color and other underrepresented employees. Unearthing and eliminating conscious and unconscious biases goes a long way toward opening the gateway for significant change. DEI won’t look like a marketing campaign but rather will feel like a relationship-building exercise. Instead of becoming transactional, it will be transformational. This will foster more natural friendships within the workplace and encourage the community to speak up about what they need.

Serious and honest DEI work may very well make corporate managers nervous, and that’s OK. (Believe me, my company, the Lazu Group, hears it all the time.) Directly and indirectly, these business leaders voice the fear that they will lose their power as other communities make gains. Why wouldn’t they feel this way? When the system is rigged in their favor and it barely feels like privilege, it’s hard not to feel as though you’re giving something up. It’s a point I raise because it deserves emphasis: So much of the failure of early DEI work was because it underestimated the scarcity mentality that plagues so many people. Theirs is the untrue belief that if others win, they will lose.

That’s why one of the best pieces of advice for corporate leaders is to understand and anticipate the reactions to the work. DEI work challenges an individual narrative of where they sit in society, a scary thing for most humans to do. When it comes to changing ingrained tradition, you need to expect and plan for the pushback that will naturally happen. Any leader working to incorporate DEI work needs to know how to navigate these waters and understand the ramifications.