Even Thinking about Having a Child Can Impact a Woman’s Career

Guest Post by Sam Newman

Having a child still tends to have more of an impact on the careers of women rather than men,  for reasons with which most of us are already familiar.  The actual process of having a child, the maternity period itself, is one key factor driving the gap in salary between men and women who started out in the same careers at the same time.

Maternity holds women back and discourages them from changing employer in order to progress their career.

Enhanced Maternity Pay – Golden Handcuffs?
The rules some employers impose around enhanced maternity pay – and having to repay it if you do not work enough days/hours on your return – can mean that some women are effectively trapped with their employer from when they are trying to conceive until the end of the enhanced maternity pay tie-in period.  Allowing 12 months for conception/pregnancy, 12 months maternity leave and 12 months tie-in, that’s a minimum of 3 years when a prospective mum cannot risk changing jobs, and it could easily be far more.  This is not a situation a man has to factor in if he’s having a child with his partner; a man can change employer with impunity, with no risk to his income.

Even thinking about having a child has an impact on women’s choices
In the Summer of 2022, I spoke to a number of women who were thinking about having a first or subsequent child, and all of them were frustrated and felt blocked in their careers.  They were successful and ambitious women, keen to progress, but moving jobs was simply too risky in a way that it wouldn’t be for their male counterparts if they were also contemplating a child.

The biggest issue is maternity pay – to qualify for Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP) you must have worked for your employer for at least 26 weeks.  Many women rely on receiving some enhanced maternity pay, but there are often conditions attached to that by employers, and these can vary significantly.  How can you risk changing jobs if you are trying to get pregnant, knowing you may not get enhanced pay?  How can you know what you might get?

Mother Nature is Unpredictable
For the vast majority of women trying for a baby, it simply isn’t possible to control when you conceive.  It may happen immediately, but for some women it can take months, years, or never happen at all.

One woman I spoke to had recently applied successfully for a role that would have given her good career progression.  Unfortunately, having spent significant time and energy on the interview process, she had little option but to decline the offer on receipt of the terms of the contract.  Enhanced maternity pay was only available once the employee had completed 2½ years of service!  She could not manage financially on SMP alone, and was not prepared to delay trying to start a family for that length of time.  This is not a choice a man would have to make if considering having a child with his partner.

What can be done to make things fairer? 

There are two obvious things:

1. Offer enhanced maternity pay regardless of length of service.  If you hire someone, you want them to work for you!  Imposing an arbitrary 26 week period before enhanced pay applies not only disadvantages women, it stops them from applying.  More companies should follow examples such as Vodafone, Aviva and TFL, who offer enhanced maternity pay regardless of length of service.

2. Be clear about your maternity pay policy in your recruitment information.  No woman should be forced to ask how long they have to work before enhanced pay applies (if, indeed, it does) because this is not a question a man would need to ask.  No woman should be allowed to waste their time going through a recruitment process only to find that she has to work for a minimum period before becoming pregnant.  Information on maternity pay should be clear up front.

These are just two simple steps any employer could make, which would make a lot of difference to women and make the workplace fairer.

Sam is Director of Light The Spark Limited.  Prior to starting her consultancy business, Sam worked at Hiscox Insurance for 10 years, where she also headed the Women at Hiscox network in the UK, championing women and helping them further their careers.  Sam is known in the insurance industry as an outspoken campaigner to highlight the challenges women still face in their careers and is going to be judging the insurance category at the We Are The City Rising Star awards this year.

You can contact Sam at sam@lightthespark.co.uk or on LinkedIn.

3 Nudges that help attract and progress women

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

Last week we celebrated International Women’s Day with our blog about gender equity. In this blog, I offer practical guidance on what organisations can do to attract and progress more women.

     1. The ‘why not?’ approach
Often, those who don’t represent the ‘typical’ employee are often judged on their performance through a biased lens.   Women, for instance, often experience being part of a ‘riskier’ pool of candidates when it comes to promotion.  This is because women tend to be judged on experience rather than on potential in the way men are.

To avoid biased tendencies such as this, change the default approach and think instead that all the candidates are amply qualified for the promotion, and then go through the merits of promoting each candidate from a ‘why not?’ perspective.  In this way, the female candidates in the mix will not have to be proven as qualified, they will need to be proven as unqualified for the promotion, just like their male peers.  This approach will help broaden the pool of candidates and make it more likely that the less typical candidates will be evaluated more objectively.

     2. Interview in small groups
To hire as many diverse people as possible, the London Organising Committee of the 2012 Olympic Games interviewed candidates in small groups, giving them tasks to accomplish that would demonstrate the requisite skills. The outcome to this approach led to the most diverse workforce in the history of the modern Olympics.

This intervention is particularly helpful when filling several roles.  If, for instance, you’re looking to hire 4 people, with a diverse list of 24, you could assess 3 groups of 8, picking out 4 per group.  Then, in a second round with a shortlist of 12, assess 6 candidates in 2 groups, picking 2 final candidates from each.

Interviewing in this way ensures that candidates are observed for their skills, avoiding stereotypes and other biases that tend to creep into one-to-one interviews.

     3. Justifying a non-diverse candidate recommendation
I often hear senior leaders recount scenarios where, having done everything they know to avoid biased assessments, when it came to choosing between two final candidates – one male and one female – the male candidate won out.

To ensure the final decision is free of bias, ask the decision makers who recommended the final candidate to justify on what grounds the OTHER candidate wasn’t suitable for the hire or promotion.  Ask what facts and data were used in the final assessment that disqualified the losing candidate over the other.  Even in cases where the final decision is entirely justifiable, it is often the case that looking at the other candidate in this more objective way might uncover other opportunities for them.

Knowing in advance that the hiring/promotion panel will have to justify their reasons not to recommend the minority candidate ensures a more reflective thought process. This is because when people know that their decision will be reviewed, they tend to be more meticulous in making it.  This more thorough, reflective process results in a more objective approach that minimises the effect of unconscious bias.

Minimising Bias

Although not all these interventions might be suitable to your particular needs, it’s worth knowing that there are many ways in which to identify and minimise bias in the process of attracting and progressing people from underrepresented groups.  The above three nudges are included in the book Inclusion Nudges by Lisa Kempinski and Tinna C. Nielsen.  Other fantastic free resources include the Bias Interrupters website, based on the research by Joan Williams which is summarised in her recent book Bias Interrupted.

Of course, reading about how to disrupt bias and implementing the guidelines in your organisation are two very different propositions.  So, if you need help identifying and addressing systemic bias in your organisation, be sure to reach out to us.  We have successfully helped many clients recognise, acknowledge and address bias in several employee life-cycle processes (such as attraction, recruitment and progression). We can help you with yours, as well.

A look at gender equity

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

It’s March 7th.  Tomorrow is International Women’s Day.  Each year we celebrate.  Each year we have a different theme.  Each year we are asked why we are continuing to celebrate – have we not made progress already?  And what about the other genders, ethnic groups, and myriad other diversity characteristics that are well behind women in terms of equality? Shouldn’t we focus on them now?  And each year I say, let’s not become complacent when it comes to gender parity because the moment we do, progress doesn’t just stall, it rolls backwards.

Taking the lead from the World Economic Forum, I have perused the 2022 Global Gender Gap Report.  According to the latest figures, we are now 132 years away from full parity – a 4-year improvement from the previous report. That said, the report also points out that:

The economic and social consequences of the pandemic and geopolitical conflict have paused progress and worsened outcomes for women and girls around the world – and risk creating permanent scarring in the labour market.

In fact, when it comes to the workforce, global gender parity has been in steady decline since 2009 and was exacerbated by the pandemic in 2020.  As a result, the 2022 gender parity gap in the labour force is at its lowest ever at just under 63%.

When it comes to women in leadership positions at work, the picture is a little better, but what’s clear is that more women are hired across industries that already have a high representation of women than other industries.  In other words, we’re only making progress with women in leadership roles where we have already been making progress.

So what can you do?

In the words of Albert Einstein:  If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got.  So more of the same is not the answer. Here are three suggestions for what you can do differently, to ensure progress towards gender balance does not stall in your organisation:

     1. Talk to women in the workplace.
The only way to understand what’s happening for women in the workplace is to talk to them. Ask them –on a regular basis, perhaps annually –  what their experiences are in the workplace. How valued do they feel? How well do opportunities for progression present themselves? How involved are their line managers in supporting them in progressing their careers? Which of the most common biases do they experience in the workplace? How supportive of women are the existing employee benefits at their workplace?

     2. Talk to men in the workplace
Perform a similar information gathering exercise with men. Talking to men about the same issues highlights a number of items:

  • It helps identify systemic biases that affect (some) men equally – these are the areas to prioritise.
  • It helps identify where the system is clearly skewed one way or another.
  • It highlights issues affecting men that may have gone under the radar because they are seen as ‘acceptable’ in our society.  These issues can lead to toxic masculinity, burn-out and other avoidable consequences.
  • It provides a fuller understanding of the existing work culture and allows you to make the necessary adjustments.

     3. Address common barriers
Once you have the relevant information, you can do something about it. Task special groups to creatively address the challenges that have become apparent, first addressing those challenges that are common to all who shared. What are some of the common biases that affect both women and men? Addressing these first will secure broad support for the initial measures you propose and create momentum you can carry forward when you then tackle the gender-specific issues.

It is useful to then look at any specific items that become apparent from the conversations that make it more difficult for women to progress or to identify opportunities for progress. Once you understand where barriers exist, a more in-depth look might be required to identify what is causing them. For instance, when you arrive at a level of seniority where women tend to get stuck, looking at written evaluations and feedback might make it obvious why this has been happening. For example, are women judged differently on their readiness to progress than men? Do expectations differ about when a woman is ready to step up to that next level?

Once identified, more often than not the solutions are quite straightforward. For instance, we know that when it comes to opportunities to improve chances of progression, these opportunities are sometimes made known through unofficial channels and are attained through networking and affinity. To ensure opportunities for improvement are available to everyone, a clearly and widely communicated progression path for future roles helps to level the playing field.

We strongly believe that addressing challenges that women face in the workplace will more often than not also help other under-represented groups. So instead of making small adjustments for any specific minority, keep your energy and efforts focused on the biggest underrepresented group in the workplace and thereby help everyone else who faces similar challenges.

9 Most Frequently Asked Questions

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

We thought we’d dedicate one post to giving you a flavour for the most frequently asked questions we receive about our approach to working with you. You’ll find 9 of them below. Is yours on the list?

1. How can you help us?
If you want to bring about an EDI transformation in your organisation, then it’s highly likely that we can help you do that. Our aim is to identify where you are on the EDI journey and to help you progress to the next level and onwards. Using our customised assessment tools, we are able to pinpoint not only where you are on the EDI journey, but also identify the next steps that would be most impactful for you.

2. What happens in our first meeting with you?
In our first meeting, we ask a lot of questions that help us understand the drive for your EDI transformation and what would work best for your organisation. We also want to understand what challenges you are experiencing so we can help you prioritise. Having listened carefully, we then let you know how we can support you on your EDI journey and how we could work together.

3. What’s your approach?
Our consulting approach comprises 5 phases (see below).

 

 

Beyond consulting, we also offer:

  • A Learning and Development series
  • Awareness Raising and inspirational talks
  • Various services supporting the implementation of EDI

 

4. Are you focused primarily on gender?
It is fair to say that our initial journey began with an emphasis on gender, and more specifically on women in the workplace. We very quickly learned, however, that in order to make a real difference, we need to address the culture rather than individual types of diversity within it. For this reason we no longer focus on any given diversity group. Instead, we focus on inclusion and, within it, inclusive behaviours. We help clients understand how to behave more inclusively, how they mightn’t be as inclusive as they think they are, and how to notice the obstacles that stand in the way of inclusion.

5. What types of companies do you work with and where?
Most of our clients are based in the UK and are organisations with 50 to 1,500 employees. That said, we have also been working successfully with global organisations based in the EMEA region (and even the US) that needed bespoke support in EDI. Many of these organisations have their own EDI managers whose remit may not fully cover the requisite need or whose strategic approach does not take regional differences into account. You can find out more about the types of clients and projects we’ve been working on here.

6. What is the difference between consulting and training in your world?
What we mean by consulting is working with you to identify how EDI will support your organisation’s business mission and vision. Consulting also means working with senior leaders to assess senior levels of commitment and their understanding of the EDI transition. We may also conduct one of our diagnostics as part of our consulting work, to identify where the organisation is at that time with regard to inclusion, relative to where it wants to be. We would then advise on the necessary steps to get there. Another critical part of our consulting is to help identify systemic bias and advise on how to address it. Examples of this include making the attraction and hiring processes more inclusive and ensuring a more inclusive progression and promotion process.

What we mean by training is offering sessions that equip people with skills that allow them to be more inclusive. We have a wide range of EDI-relating training topics, with some of the most popular being around inclusive behaviours, biases in the workplace, inclusive language and inclusive leadership.

 

7. How long does it take to notice progress?
Progress on a small scale can be noticed almost immediately after you’ve started working with us. A subtle shift in behaviours, in levels of awareness and the use of certain words can be seen relatively quickly. Changes with regard to certain targets can also be seen quite soon – within 2 or 3 cycles, sometimes even sooner. Cultural changes, however, take longer and can involve setbacks; these are sometimes due to changes in leadership and motivation, sometimes due to inconsistent messages and behaviours across the organisation, and sometimes due to external factors. Progress on a cultural scale isn’t linear yet one thing is certain: the sooner you embark on your EDI journey, the sooner you will notice the progress.

8. How do you measure success?
Success can be measured in many different ways. If our engagement with you is to help meet certain targets, success is measured quantitatively. If you want us to help expand the pool of diverse candidates and hires, this too can be measured quantitively.

Similarly, we show you the measure of successful change in behaviours through various (self- and other types of) assessments, through personal accounts and through levels of engagement which are often measured internally with engagement surveys.

9. Can you help with one specific query?
Yes, of course! You don’t need to engage us for the entire EDI journey. Our Expert on Tap sessions are designed to provide advice for specific challenges or questions, after which you may be able to address a more involved agenda. Equally, we’re happy to come in to run one workshop or training session on a specific topic, like Inclusive Communications or The Why What & How of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion.

However we help you, our aim is to partner with you for as long as you need us and to help you progress successfully without the need for further external intervention.

5 Things to say to the ‘nay-sayers’ or cynics about EDI

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

This month we’re looking at organisations who are at the very early stages of their EDI journey – so early that they may not even fully comprehend the benefits that EDI affords them.  And it’s at this very early stage that we may be easily derailed by those who are categorically opposed to change and progress, those whose views might be ‘if it ain’t broke, why fix it?’ and those who prefer to stick to what they already know rather than learn something new.  In other words, the EDI nay-sayers.
One of the biggest nay-sayers I know, Justice Scalia of the US Supreme Court, also succumbed to the thinking that EDI is not worth pursuing. Matthew Syed quotes Scalia in his book Rebel Ideas as saying:

You can either choose diversity or you can choose to be ‘super-duper’.  If a diverse workforce, student population or whatever, emerges organically through the pursuit of excellence, that is one thing.  But to privilege diversity above excellence is different.  And it is likely to undermine the very objectives that inspired it.

 

If Scalia can be so wrong about Diversity, how can we blame other smart people who do not fully grasp the fact that is not an either-or choice between excellence and mediocrity?

So what can we do when we have powerful, smart people with seemingly credible arguments saying that EDI is not worth pursuing?  I offer five responses for your consideration:

   1. If it ain’t broke… Things might very well be fine as they are.  But what about tomorrow?  Is the way you’re doing business today going to serve you just as well tomorrow?  Look around!  Everything is changing – from societal views to how people do business.  Diversity is everywhere, from the biggest, most successful companies to those just getting started.   What do they all know that you don’t?  If you’re not considering EDI as part of your business model, then the answer to that question is, ‘plenty’.

   2. There aren’t enough diverse candidates who are good enough… The people who are currently doing a fantastic job in your organisation are excellent.  But what one potential common weakness might they have?  Just as the CIA (who hired only the Ivy League cream of the crop) failed to see the threat posed by Bin Laden, so a group of homogenous employees can be blindsided to the risks and opportunities that exist in your business.  And you’ll never know until it’s too late, either because a threat has materialised or an opportunity has passed you by.  A group of diverse individuals – whatever you might assume about their intelligence or experience – will be better equipped to minimise blind spots and maximise opportunities.

   3. How do we attract diverse candidates? Your business might be particularly attractive to a specific type of person.  For instance, engineering, video games development or finance.  But is it really true that people from underrepresented backgrounds don’t see themselves in those roles or don’t want to work in your industry?  Consider the story of blind auditions in orchestras.   Were certain types of musicians not attracted to the repertoire of music certain orchestras played or did bias hold the door firmly closed to them?  In my experience, companies who open their doors to underrepresented candidates are astounded by how many people DO want to work in their sector and how many of them do well.  So my question to you is, are you sure you’re unable to attract them?

   4. The end of promotions for white men? Many are concerned that if we are to progress people from underrepresented backgrounds it means that those from the dominant group will no longer be able to progress.  In response to this, I invite you to look at the evidence.  Are no members from the dominant group (mostly white educated men) being promoted? Have the opportunities for promotion been ‘taken over’ by employees from underrepresented groups?  I expect that if you look at promotion records for the past year, you’ll find that only a few people from underrepresented backgrounds have in fact been promoted.

Conversations on this topic are not about lowering standards or promoting people who are not deserving, but about the definition of who is deserving and why.  Are you sure you’re promoting candidates who can perform well in the required job, or those who you think will do well? Or those with whom you feel more comfortable? Or those who seem a better fit? It’s quite difficult to remove the natural biases that creep into processes like promotions.  For this reason, it’s unlikely that promotions are going to change radically, if at all, despite best efforts.  And if/when they do, it will be in favour of everyone who has the potential to do well, not just those who are currently underrepresented.

   5. All this is just a trend that will soon pass.  If anyone suggests that EDI is merely a trend, I respectfully invite them to look around.  Despite some political efforts to the contrary (for instance in Afghanistan, or Iran, or even the US), companies everywhere are getting behind EDI – both in their marketing efforts and their working culture.  The business world understands that we have passed the point of no return in favour of EDI. Those who are trying to halt the momentum will soon be shown to be like King Canute, unable to hold back the tide. The future could paint a worrying picture for those organisations that do nothing.   The growing trend now is in fact the demise of companies with all white, all male boards and the successes of companies that embrace diverse talent, markets and thinking.  Ask yourself: which is the trend you’d bet your own money on?

 

When it comes to nay-sayers, there may be very little we can say to them effectively, because EDI seems so obvious to us.  In addition, those who ‘don’t get it’ are in the minority and efforts to embrace EDI should be spent elsewhere, e.g., on training, awareness raising and internal communication campaigns, not on persuading those individuals who may never come along.   But if the opportunity to challenge a nay-sayer arises, I have hopefully offered food for thought in how to address some of the common misconceptions held by those who oppose your EDI transition.

How to raise awareness of EDI in your organisation

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

Last week, I wrote about the importance of understanding the specific reasons why your company may wish to embark on its EDI journey. This understanding comes from clearly seeing the benefits EDI offers to your specific business, and how it props up and supports the business mission and vision.

Today I want to offer you a few thoughts on how you might go about cascading those reasons throughout the hierarchy of the organisation, with the aim of raising awareness and building momentum in favour of the proposed EDI transition.

Many leaders underestimate the importance of speaking about EDI to their work colleagues.  Of course, as soon as they think about it, it makes perfect sense for them to lead the EDI conversation.  After all, we’re talking about culture change, and when it comes to setting the tone for work culture, a leader’s whisper becomes a shout. So the more they talk about how important they think EDI is to the business, the quicker they will be able to bring about a real change in culture.

Tips for Raising Awareness

Here are three tips on how to successfully communicate your EDI intentions throughout the organisation:

 

 1.  Know your message

Before the EDI message is cascaded to other leaders and managers, it’s important that the CEO and senior executives understand the message in detail. They also need to be prepared to answer the questions that will undoubtedly arise, including the following:
  • Why is EDI important to the business?
  • What are the benefits to the business and the people in it?
  • What are some of the prospective challenges?
  • How long will it take?
  • How urgent a priority is it?
  • To what extent will it impact the business and the people in it?
  • How will it be introduced?
  • What’s expected from everyone?
It’s important to be conversant with clear, concise answers to all these questions, understanding clearly why the EDI transition is taking place and what it means for each person, including those communicating the message.
2.  Ensure those cascading the message truly understand it
When EDI messages are being cascaded through management teams, it’s quite easy to veer off message and include individual interpretations.  To avoid this, each person relaying the information should be as well versed as the senior leaders in the corporate message and the likely questions and answers.  This reinforcement of the same messaging, even when it’s being questioned, will amplify its impact and ensure that the leadership and management teams speak with one voice.
3.  Make the message relevant
While EDI may make sense on a general level for the business, it’s important to relate it directly to the people being asked to engage with it.  It’s highly likely that each person will need to adapt the way they see others and the way they treat each other.  In order to ensure each person is motivated in the right way, they will need to hear the ‘what’s in it for them’ reason for the change.

Here are some of the points that help bring EDI home to others:

  • Benefit to your job/role: identify the specific benefits that EDI offers to your department
  • Teamwork: embracing EDI will have a positive impact on team performance, likely to lead to a win-win result
  • It matters to your stakeholders: show how those benefitting from your job/role will benefit from the changes, or even how they might insist on them
  • Go with the majority flow: show how others on the team/in the department are embracing the changes
  • Your reputation: when it comes to embracing EDI, how do you want to be seen by others?
  • Don’t be a laggard: what might happen to your role/team/department if you do nothing?

 

Of course, when we’re talking about the EDI transition, we’re talking about change in our work culture, and that type of change requires consistency, collaboration and consensus.  It requires a strong leadership team that can effectively raise awareness to help drive the change.

That said, it is also important to remember that we can’t rely solely on conveying the message.  It takes hard work to embed a culture change, with repeated messaging and consistent behaviours.  The messages conveyed will need to be repeated, reinforced, and supported until such point that every person in the company understands the what and the why, including what is expected of them as individuals.

The importance of understanding how EDI benefits your specific company

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

The CIA learned the need for a diverse workplace the hard way. On September 11, 2001, America experienced its worst terrorist attack on US soil. In the years that followed 9/11, a frequently-asked question was how the Central Intelligence Agency, whose mission it is to gather and share intelligence in order to pre-empt threats and protect the US, was blinkered to such an extent that it just didn’t see this coming.

The answer offered in Matthew Syed’s bestselling book Rebel Ideas, is that the CIA lacked the Diversity it needed to gather the right evidence and interpret it well enough to appreciate the level of threat presented by Osama Bin Laden. This was a mistake that could arguably have been avoided, had the CIA fully grasped the advantages of a more diverse workforce to the agency and to its efficacy.

The clear understanding of how Diversity helps an organisation achieve its specific goals is the most important aspect of establishing a successful EDI strategy.

So how do we tease out these specific benefits?

         1. Start with ‘WHY’

In order to understand how Diversity will help a particular company we work with, the first question I ask leaders is why they want to have greater Diversity.  What is driving this aim?

The answers I get vary from It’s the right thing to do, to We want to treat all our employees fairly, and from We want to better reflect our client base, to We understand that our business will improve if we become more diverse.

All valid reasons.  But also very broad and general.

None of these given reasons identifies the specific benefits that EDI will bring to their individual organisation, because none of them answers the more pertinent questions, such as:

  • What is the business problem that Diversity will address?
  • What is the opportunity Diversity will open up for the business?
  • What specific benefits do they want to achieve from becoming more diverse?

For the CIA, the benefit of Diversity (including the risks arising from its absence) is clear: having more people from different backgrounds and experiences improves the rate of precision in interpreting gathered intelligence.

What are the key benefits that Diversity will afford your company?

  1. Link EDI to your business mission

To answer these questions, it helps to connect the benefits derived from Diversity to the overall business mission and/or vision of the organisation.

In my last blog, I quoted Google’s EDI statement, which makes reference to its business mission and explains how EDI helps Google achieve it.  In understanding the particular benefit that Google derives as a business from Diversity, it has elevated EDI to the level of a strategic business matter.  By doing this, Google has also motivated its leadership to take EDI personally and to treat it like any other serious business challenge.

Similarly, Amazon’s EDI Statement refers to its mission to be the earth’s most customer-centric company and goes on to explain how EDI supports that. In summary, Amazon’s diverse and inclusive teams positively impact their products and services, and help improve relations with stakeholders including customers, partners, content creators and employees.  In other words, Diversity helps the company deliver on its aim to become more customer-centric by better reflecting and therefore understanding their customers, and by being able to meet their diverse requirements.

How can you link Diversity to your own business mission?

Understanding how EDI benefits your specific company is crucial.  To make meaningful progress on EDI requires leadership engagement, significant budget and other resources. It also involves a lot of time and effort. It’s a long and difficult journey that should be embraced with the same vigour and commitment as a strategic business decision.  To ensure efforts deliver the desired impact, it is crucial to define them in the same business terms as any other strategic business decision.  Anything less will not create the level of commitment and rigour necessary to deliver the requisite impact and results.

Where are you REALLY from?

By Joyce Osei

The recent fall-out and the media backlash about what happened with Ngozi Fulani – when she went to Buckingham Palace and repeatedly faced this question – got me thinking about my own lived experience of being asked this.

Over the years, I have had this question and its different guises asked of me many times in different scenarios such as social events and, of course, at work. I’ve even been explicitly asked ‘Were you born and bred in London?’ at the end of a job interview!
What’s the problem? 

On the surface ‘Where are you from?’  seems like a very simple and straightforward question, and I’ve heard a lot of people say that this question comes from a place of curiosity. Now there’s nothing wrong with being curious, but what about when ‘Where are you from?’ is followed up with  ‘Where are you really from?’ or sometimes even ‘Where you from from?’

For me that’s when it becomes problematic, because the so-called simple question is actually a fully-loaded one!

A couple of things immediately come up for me: If you are the person asking the question, what are you really getting at, and, have you ever considered the impact of those words?

When I am asked this, it makes me feel confused, like I don’t belong or that I am not being believed. It also reminds me of the time I was asked what my ‘real name’ was, immediately after I introduced myself as Joyce. (This is a true story and is possibly a blog for another day!)

Before asking that follow-up question I would recommend thinking about the context to your conversation and asking yourself if it is really relevant or necessary to ask that second question.

What is it about where the person said they are from that you find hard to believe?  Why doesn’t the idea you have about them in your head match their answer and therefore makes it less believable to you? We know that our words betray our thoughts and biases, so these questions could be seen to convey the speaker’s bias that a person who looks or sounds different from them cannot be ‘from here’, or must at least have a name that sounds ‘’unfamiliar’’.

A better approach?

In order to transform this (as it is a real issue, particularly for people of colour, and is worthy of change) you could consider the following points before you ask this type of question:

  1. Context – what is the context of your conversation and is it relevant? Are you having a conversation about birth places (relevant!) or is this a casual ‘getting to know each other’ chat (not in the slightest!)?
  2. Intention – Why do you want to know this and what value does it add to your conversation or relationship? Is the question more about satisfying your own curiosity (not inclusive) or is it about understanding the person with whom you’re speaking (inclusive)?
  3. Impact – Flex your empathy muscle: if you looked or sounded different, how might you have interpreted this question? How do you think it would have made you feel?

Considering these 3 elements will help you determine whether you should ‘go there’.

Alternatively, on the safe side, don’t ask the question at all; be patient instead, and let the conversation progress until a clue is provided or the opportunity arises for you to ask a relevant follow-up question. In time, the person you’re speaking with might talk about where they grew up. If not, you would still be getting to know them better and finding out other – possibly more interesting – things about them that they are happy to share.

And if you have considered the above points and you’d still like to know the answer, you can ask me the next time we meet in person…