June CLT Monthly Meeting Summary - "Driving Diversity for Organizational Resiliency"

See the deck here. Notes from the meeting and chat below.

We opened with a readback from member Donna Flynn, following the presentation of her Burning Issue to the CLT last fall.

Here are a few of Donna’s take-ways from fellow CLT members that she put into action:

• Leadership Skills for the Future: "Leaders need to think through a broad scope of things and overall context… and we need to ensure that we're assessing for that ability." "What I had to do was create a specific fingerprint of the right set and weight of skills, hard skills and so-called soft skills, power skills, for each of those businesses."

• Adaptable Authenticity: "It's all about adaptable authenticity, organizations that have the best chance where senior leaders have humility and are always learning."

• Emotional Intelligence as a Strategic Tool: “I would argue that emotional intelligence isn't just innate. It's a tool that you need to be able to use strategically."

• Cultural Change: "Something I've learned is that, for an effective leader, they can change the culture from day one."

• Gender Dynamics in Leadership: "Remember, the self-advocating people will be men. We had actually quite a few very strong self-advocating women, but we also had the pattern of a woman who thought she wasn't ready. We had to specifically reach out to her and have conversations about how we would support her in balancing her personal needs with the demands of the job."

Next, we launched into our main theme, leveraging diversity to drive resilience. The topic was framed by speaker Jackie Cureton. [See Catalyst Constellations’ podcast with Jackie here: Openness and Calling People In.] 

Jackie shared a masterful framing of the historical context and playbook for discrediting DEI efforts. (Please let us know if you want more details on the historical context.) Here, we will focus on notes to move to action.

As Individuals (Micro level):

• Share your own story and listen to other's stories

• Practice self-care, as DEI work can be exhausting

• Build support systems for yourself and others

As Collectives (Macro level):

• Be an active ally - take action, not just think supportively

• Advocate across intersectionalities, ensuring inclusion of all underrepresented groups. For example, a lot of women of color feel excluded from efforts advocating for gender equity.

• Consider holistically who is being underserved or facing bias.

As Organizations:

• Operationalize DEI into core business practices beyond just celebratory events

• Make DEI a part of the organization's core DNA and commit to DEI efforts long-term

• Create a culture of learning and "calling in" rather than "cancel culture"

• Provide support for those making changes or shifts in behavior

• Recognize that perfection isn't attainable, but progress is key

General principles:

• Be intentional in DEI efforts

• Focus on progress rather than perfection

• Allow for mistakes and missteps, giving grace and opportunity for learning

• Commit to sustainable, long-term DEI work

• Name and address issues directly rather than avoiding them

Our participants then broke into smaller discussion groups and shared back a few discussion notes:

Psychological safety and contained conversations: "Psychological safety is a is a privileged play space to go." Instead, the focus should be on "contained conversations."

DEI strategy: "Clarify the intent of your DEI efforts at the organization, go beyond lofty goals and set out a real, material way to track it, and outline the incremental steps to get there like you would with any other strategy."

Leadership responsibility: "When leaders are at the top table, or even if not in any circle you're at, speak about DEI as if it's a critical pillar to your business, just like you would with digitalization or sustainability or any other kind of core value."

A holistic approach to DEI: "Diversity is not about differences. It's a competitive differentiation. Innovation is not optional. It's the only option. Advocacy is not a passive act. It's an act of authentic passion and leadership is not a quality. It is an earned qualification."

Continuous improvement: "Protect against complacency. Look for it be village. Be vigilant. Now that we know there will be people who challenge, who lay in waiting, expect that, and act assertively. Act quickly, intervene."

DIAL it Up: Jayshree introduced her DIAL framework as a holistic approach to combining diversity, innovation, advocacy, and leadership:

The DIAL framework stands for:

D - Diversity: "Diversity is not about differences. It's a competitive differentiation."

I - Innovation: "Innovation is not optional. It's the only option."

A - Advocacy: "Advocacy is not a passive act. It's an act of authentic passion"

L - Leadership: "Leadership is not a quality. It is an earned qualification."

The idea is to tie diversity efforts directly to business outcomes like innovation and leadership, making DEI an integral part of organizational strategy and success.

Finally, we discussed how to move into collective action to increase diversity and push back against anti-DEI efforts. This includes an offer from Saidah Nash Carter,  co-Founder and CEO of Bright Insights Global (BIG), to work with our members to increase social impact through programs like the Equity Circle and the League of Intrapreneurs Equity Action Collective. Please let Shannon and me know if you would like more information.