Diversity and Inclusion - why you can't have one without the other

One of my favourite quotes is by Verna Myers: 'Diversity is being invited to the party, Inclusion is being asked to dance’. I like this because it clearly explains the difference between 'Diversity' and 'Inclusion'. And we need to be reminded of the difference because sometimes we can get so distracted by 'Diversity' that we forget about the 'Inclusion' - Imagine going to a party where you are not allowed to dance; you might as well have stayed at home and watched 'Stranger Things 2 on Netflix'.

 So what exactly is the difference? 

Well - Diversity is the about attracting different people to work for you. The benefits of having a range of people from different backgrounds, experience, skill sets and perspectives are well documented. The more diverse your workforce, the better your decision making. People who see things differently are able to spot more risks, identify more opportunities and solve problems.  

Inclusion is about how to harness those differences and make the best of it. It is shown within the culture of an organisation and the behaviours of the people we work with.

 Diversity and Inclusion go hand in hand to make businesses better. You can assemble the most diverse team that resemble a modern day Village People, but if you don’t have an inclusive culture and have an environment where challenge is invited, then all you have is a diverse team. A one-hit wonder you might say!

 The reverse is also true - you can have a very non-diverse team which is very inclusive in the way they work together. But you are unlikely to have challenge, and group think can develop. You need the diversity of experience and background to bring another perspective to make robust decisions.

 It is really important to consider culture when trying to increase diversity. For example if you realise you have no women working in your maintenance team having targeted recruitment to increase gender diversity is a great step, but if you don’t address the culture then you risk failing to integrate the new recruits, resulting in a drop in retention. Now if someone leaves an organisation because of a bad experience, it is not just the fact that they won’t recommend you to their friends but they may leave a scathing review on Glassdoor.

 Diversity is also a limited way of thinking about inclusion, especially if the focus is on the 9 protected characteristics as specified in the Equality Act 2010. Taking this narrow focus doesn’t allow difference that falls outside of that to be included in the same way - consider socio-economic background or education for example; even being T-Total can set you apart from your colleagues if they like to go out for drinks together after work.

 My organisation is currently merging, and as the different teams are starting to work together and D-day approaches, there is inevitably talk of 'how they do things', or 'the systems they use', or 'the structures they have'.  We are naturally curious (suspicious?) about how 'they' operate; but it can set up the organisation as being 'different' and of being 'other'. And as these organisations come together, having an inclusive culture is going to be vitally important and relevant here too. 'Legacy organisation' is not a protected characteristic but if the integration period is going to succeed the including everyone is going to be key. Perhaps even as important as other protected characteristics such as ensuring people with different communications can access our services.

 To increase diversity you need to have an inclusive culture where people feel safe to be themselves, are encouraged to challenge and supported to be challenged themselves. You need to be able to draw on the diversity of opinion, where you actively seek out alternative points of view to make better decisions.

 Diversity is supposed to be uncomfortable - inclusion is how you make it work.