Guest Editorial
The Obama Era
Andres T. Tapia, 03-15-2009
We require a new generation of diversity work. But first we must understand the cultural shifts that enabled President Obama’s election and the platform on which we can build strategies.
For years there has been a global tsunami swelling that many did not see coming, and now it has hit our shores. Even in countries that dismissed diversity as an American phenomenon, demographics have radically transformed society, economics and politics.
In addition to the election of President Obama, some of these transformative changes include the elections of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in Argentina and Michelle Bachelet in Chile, giving Latin America two female presidents. In the corporate world, Yahoo, Xerox and Pepsi have strong women CEOs, and Time Warner and Kodak have African American and Latino CEOs.
Gender and color glass ceilings are cracking. Not only are we seeing diversity at the top of the house, as we move from token representation to critical mass, we see new styles of leadership, new business strategies and corporate policies, and new approaches to create more inclusive environments. “This challenges us as diversity leaders to step it up and come up with transformative ways of doing things,” said Deb Taylor, diversity director at Deere and Co.
We will experience a renaissance for values-driven decision making, which means leaders will pay attention to how we make decisions, as well as how we treat others. As President Obama has declared, words matter. The ends and the means both matter, and we must treat each other with dignity.
As the world faces huge challenges in terms of the economy, the environment, terrorism, health care and retirement, D&I work will be judged not by intention but by impact. Diversity practitioners must shape and deliver solutions that contribute directly and tangibly to the company’s overall goals.
For example, health care services company McKesson is positioning its diversity strategy in terms of growth and margin contributions as it equips its sales force to better understand cultural differences and bring distribution services to independent pharmacists in ethnically diverse communities.
One leading health care provider’s diversity strategy is to diversify participants in clinical trials to ensure a drug’s effectiveness has been tested with a variety of different DNA configurations. At Hewitt, to make retirement and health consulting more effective, the company is developing unique insights into the savings patterns of diverse racial/ethnic groups and women, many of whom under-save, even when earning more money.
Further, we need to make a distinction between diversity and inclusion. Diversity is the mix. Inclusion is making the mix work. To build both, we must challenge the best-practice approach that to achieve inclusion we need to minimize differences. This stance papers over the fact that differences truly exist. Undiscussed, differences lead to invisible group-performance degradation so “we can all get along,” sending emotions, beliefs and talent underground.
Rather than minimizing differences, we need to call them out. Calling out and using each others’ differences in a cross-culturally competent way will unleash the creative contributions of diverse perspectives and lead to better work relationships and greater innovation and profitability that benefits individuals, teams and organizations.
Programs must embed diversity into the design and marketing of companies’ products and services in ways that affect the bottom line. What is the cross-culturally competent way to design dialysis machines that will be used in a Latino home, design a 401(k) plan that motivates women and African Americans to save more, design cars for Millennials or find medical services for LGBT people?
“This is our time,” Obama proclaimed as he closed his acceptance speech. In a world in which conventional wisdom no longer applies, we face great threat but also unprecedented opportunity. If our D&I efforts are not transformative to our cultures and businesses, we might as well close up shop. If they are transformative, we will create a relevant and sustainable D&I approach that will guide business success in this new era.
Andres T. Tapia is chief diversity officer and emerging workforce solutions leader at Hewitt Associates, a global human resources consulting and outsourcing firm. He is author of the upcoming book The Inclusion Paradox: The Obama Era and the Transformation of Global Diversity.
