My Beef With Diversity & Inclusion (D&I)

This has been a tricky topic that I’ve felt strongly about, yet avoided voicing my thoughts on in fear of opening up a big can of worms.

That said, I do believe it’s an important topic, and I do believe that there are right and wrong ways of approaching it. I’m sure I have blind spots and biases myself as well that will eventually be exposed as I challenge myself on it and familiarize myself with more viewpoints.

My views below gravitate towards the discussion on gender and racial D&I. I’m writing this as a stream of consciousness so I appologize in advance for grammatical and logical disconnects.

“I don’t see colour”

I’ve always believed that this statement applies to me, but I’ve come to realize the problematic connotations that are attached to it. Let me begin by acknowledging a few things:

• There is a need for a conversation around race, and there are biases that make it an uneven playing field for minorities – and yes this also applies to Caucasians who can be viewed as minorities if they’re operating in non-Caucasian regions.
• This statement does not mean that I turn a blind eye towards challenges that minorities face or refuse to acknowledge that colour exists and that problems come along with that.
• As much as we’d like to move towards equality and away from labels, labels help with calling attention to the problem and isolating it for what it is.
• My use of the statement here by no means reflects a view that I support an anti-equality movement.

It’s interesting because this topic has always grinded my gears where I hear people being called out for saying “I don’t see colour” or “All lives matter” (though this statement has become more an anti-statement to the “black lives matter” movement). I personally feel that the statements in and of themselves are not harmful, and you have to consider the context in which it’s used and who is wielding it. Some people say it with the sincerest intentions, and I do feel bad that they have to be all apologetic when called out about it.

Would love to hear more opinions on this topic from you readers.

Amendment (and yes I love this, my sharing was to encourage discussion to move the conversation forward and increase awareness): It was brought to my attention that this perception stems from coming from a position of privilege. Despite saying I do not discriminate, it also carries the meaning that I do not acknowledge that people of colour start from different positions and have more hurdles to overcome to be at an equal starting line.

D&I for the sake of D&I

Another beefy topic for me – seeing programs, support, hiring practices etc. that require quotas to be hit to justify equality.

I also have mixed feelings about exclusive support programs that target specific races/genders.

I hope that by challenging myself on this, it allows me to improve how I approach this topic as I do believe there is a need to improve D&I and lift up those that are starting from a less fortunate position.

Speaking from experience and taking a real example from my work at Spring:

We’ve explored a fundraising training program specific to supporting female entrepreneurs/immigrant entrepreneurs.

Why I feel mixed about it:

• There are definitely unique challenges specific to certain people. Creating a safe space for them to share their problems and discuss specific methods of addressing said challenges is valuable.
• I do somehow feel that creating an entirely exclusive environment may hinder more than support in certain instances. It prevents assimilation into real-life context where resources, customers, financiers are indeed biased. It victimizes the characters that we’re looking to support. It’s not their fault, education should be done on the other side to eliminate discrimination, encourage patience, and improve tolerance.

I don’t have a conclusion here on how it should be approached, there is value in exclusive support, but I still wrestle with some of the drawbacks it carries. Welcome your thoughts.

We’ve debated about diversity in our cohorts and how we can ensure better female/non-gender binary/racial diversity

Why I feel mixed about it:

• As I review companies for opportunities, I generally believe that I don’t see colour/gender. As such I wrestle with the idea that I have to concede an opportunity for a company that I believe is more qualified, to make room for a less-qualified company to meet the above diversity metrics.
• I believe that D&I should not be at the expense of quality.
• The challenge here is that those who are discriminated against, often have more obstacles in front of them. This does put them at a less advantageous position which might also create the perception that they are less qualified. An example here could be that many (not all) of the female entrepreneurs we consider for our program, tend to be earlier stage and struggle more with traction. It could be because they lack entrepreneurship support as spots are often conceded to their male counterparts. As such, by measuring them against the same traction metrics as other companies, I might be cutting their opportunity short by doing the same thing other organizations are doing. There’s probably a need for fairer metrics that don’t specifically favour the discriminated but create a more even measurement for all founders regardless.
• That said, “What doesn’t get measured doesn’t doesn’t get done”, there is merit on trying to actively improve those numbers, but I believe we need to work on how we do it.

A ray of hope

Recently, I’ve come across a new viewpoint, or manner of discussing the topic that doesn’t cause friction with my own belief systems.

It was first brought up 2 weeks ago at a roundtable meeting with HR leaders in Vancouver.

“Instead of discussing D&I, we describe it as cognitive diversity. Our organization doesn’t outwardly tout and try to attract employees by highlighting the number of female employees, but by shifting our internal mindset and approach, we’ve been able to grow an 80+ person organization with 64% female employees”

Anonymous People and Culture Operations person at a local Vancouver company

The view of taking on an implicit approach and addressing internal biases as opposed to an explicit approach to dealing with D&I issues sits much better with me.

Another recent reflection that I resonate with is in how Reid Hoffman and the WaitWhat production team address the issue. Positioning it also from a cognitive diversity standpoint, but also articulating the challenges of oversight and blind spots that result in a monolithic culture.

Listen to the episode below:

All in, a juicy topic that I believe we need to constantly challenge ourselves on. It’s great to see that we’re progressively moving towards greater awareness and inclusion in the process. Welcome your thoughts and debates in the comments below!