Lily Zheng

Let me set one thing straight. When people talk about “creating a culture conducive to #Diversity, #Equity, and #Inclusion,“ this doesn't mean a culture where everyone speaks the vocabulary of intersectionality and belonging and psychological safety every hour of every day. It doesn't mean a culture where people are bringing every aspect of their identity into every conversation, or opening every sentence with “as a [class level] [sexuality] [race] [gender], I believe--“.

It means creating a #culture where people have the CHOICE to do so, and the workforce as a whole has the requisite level of knowledge to empower and support those choices.

Do I want to come to work and only talk about technical issues and the specifics of my job description? The company culture should enable that.

Do I want to come to work and talk about the implications of the sociopolitical landscape on the work that I do? The company culture should enable that.

Do I want to come to work and talk about the implications of the sociopolitical landscape on me, even if it doesn't directly relate to my work? The company culture should enable that.

A culture of inclusion does NOT mean a culture where DEI is dogma; where every issue is only allowed to be seen through the singular lens of identity. Not even the most enthusiastic advocate wants to use that lens all the time, every day, and yet this straw man continues to be propped up again and again to fearmonger and drum up opposition to DEI work.

Set the record straight. A culture of inclusion is about giving people the choice to show up to work with whatever degree of vulnerability they feel like on a given day, to talk about identity--or not--and equipping the workforce with the skills and competence to make space for all of it. Say that again in your head, then once again out loud. You'll be using that line a lot.

A week or two ago, I wrote about how the #GreatResignation has been a long time coming, a product of toxic workplace cultures, systemic overwork and burnout, performative and ineffective #Diversity, #Equity, and #Inclusion, and a failure to sustain the wellbeing and growth of employees through an ongoing global pandemic.

As I read through the comments and reshares of the original post, one question appeared over and over again:

If this is truly what's happening, what can leaders in the thick of this massive shift DO about it?

It's a good question. Here's my answer.

If your company is experiencing its own Great Resignation, your very first step is to pause, take inventory, and assess the situation. What are the proximal causes of turnover? New internal remote work policy or leadership decision? External development in your industry? To the greatest extent you can, rapidly build understanding of the employee rationale for leaving. Drive resources toward exit interviews and short pulse surveys, and empower well-connected people managers to expeditiously share feedback up. Then breathe deeply, center yourself, and get ready to hear some tough news.

You good? You've probably now learned that a decision you thought was right had wide-reaching effects you didn't think of, or that you overlooked something important in your decision-making process. Well, here's the tough part--now you have to own it. Sometimes that looks like an apology, rolling back a decision, making a substantial strategy shift, all three, or something else.

Just know this: to truly address your Great Resignation, you must heal the harm you inflicted on your employees.

Easy to commit to; hard to achieve, I know. But it's never too late to start trying.

There's no such thing as high- or low-potential candidates or employees, just managers and cultures willing to invest in people, or not.

To understand this more fully, you need to understand the Pygmalion effect.

In a classic study conducted in 1968, psychologist Robert Rosenthal and school principal Lenore Jacobson gave teachers the names of students--about 20% of the school--who were indicated as “intellectual bloomers“ and would do better than their classmates. At the end of the study many of the students indicated as “bloomers“ did in fact perform better than other students. The catch? The 20% of students on the list of “bloomers“ were chosen completely randomly.

The Pygmalion effect, that the expectations of teachers or leaders about their students or reports could influence their behavior and thus important outcomes, has been further built upon in the 50+ years since the original study.

In the workplace, when leaders have high expectations of their reports, reports are more likely to develop clear and specific learning goals, receive more challenging goals in general, and get more time and opportunities to grow and develop. As a result, they feel a higher degree of self-efficacy, and perform better because they have been given the room to do so. When leaders have low expectations of their reports, the reverse happens: people perform *worse* on tasks--a phenomenon dubbed the Golem effect.

These effects are strengthened when you go beyond the behavior of managers and look also at organizational culture: does your culture believe that ALL employees can grow, learn, and thrive, as opposed to just a select few with “innate talent“? Then these expectations will become reality as well.

Employees' performance is far from fixed when they enter workplaces. Many leaders already know this and go out of their way to help those they view as “high potential“ grow into more challenging roles. But if “high-potential“ employees succeed and “low-potential“ employees fail, it's because the labels themselves become self-fulfilling prophecies.

🔥 If we rethink our approach to employees, especially junior employees, to frame *everyone* as “high-potential“ and needing only the time and attention of leaders to grow into stellar performers, employees and their workplaces will all thrive.

🛠️ If we shift our usage of mentoring programs and L&D courses from “tools ambitious employees use to get ahead“ to “tools that managers should put in all their employees' hands to help them grow,“ employees and their workplaces will all thrive.

📖 If we create organizational cultures that extend growth and learning to everyone, rather than just perks awarded to those who are already succeeding, employees and their workplaces will all thrive.

The next time you talk about not just hiring employees who can “hit the ground running“ and focusing on helping new hires get to where they need to be, cite the Pygmalion effect. Research thinks you're right.

Those of you following political developments in Texas over the last 48 hours will know that millions of women and birthing people have suddenly lost the right to make a critical decision over their own bodies.

The refusal of the Supreme Court to block a Texas abortion law banning abortions at six weeks (before most pregnant people know they are pregnant, and when the embryo is only a 3-4mm lump of cells) not only restricts seven million+ people able to bear children from seeking services, but also empowers ANY private citizen, including people from outside the state, to sue a person or organization they believe in violation of the law and collect a $10,000 bounty if they succeed. This law is one of the strictest abortion bans in the country, has no exceptions for rape or incest, and will disproportionally impact birthing people who are low-income, people of color, and/or disabled the hardest.

Why am I sharing this on LinkedIn? First, because many of the people affected by this new law and others like it in other states are employed. These employers may be instituting new policies to promote greater autonomy, asking their #Diversity, #Equity, and #Inclusion councils to help them celebrate Women's History Month, selling #BlackLivesMatter or #Pride stickers, and otherwise positioning themselves as allies to marginalized communities.

Second, because many of these employers have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund politicians and groups that engineer laws like these.

If you're working in a company that prides itself on caring about its employees and society, determine the impact your employer is having on this critical issue. Look into corporate donations and lobbyists. Inquire into your supply chains, vendors, and partners. Do your utmost to steer corporate resources toward organizations working toward reproductive justice, and away from organizations that contradict the values your CEO espouses every all-hands.

I've attached a starter guide of resources to self-educate. Start here, keep learning, and let's make a goddamned difference.

#Diversity, #Equity, and #Inclusion practitioners, heads of DEI, and other DEI leaders, this is for you.

Your employees and clients will want to talk about race, gender, sexuality, ability, inequality, and social movements, and what they mean for workplaces.

They will not have a plan for what to do after that conversation.

You will help them talk about race, gender, sexuality, ability, inequality, and social movements, and what they mean for workplaces.

You must have a plan for what to do after that conversation.

Despite what catchphrases might suggest, “courageous conversations“ don't actually create change. What they do create, if facilitated well, is momentum.

It's momentum, skillfully wielded by leaders and advocates, that creates new mission statements, concrete strategies, new policies, and long-reaching projects. It's momentum that moves and locks in budgets and resources toward sustained work. Left on its own, momentum stagnates and dissipates, taking with it a little bit of trust, and ensures that future progress requires the whole process start over from the beginning.

The average employee isn't responsible for understanding this kind of DEI change management. But you, DEI practitioner and advocate, must be. Use your responsibility well.

A “resource“ that requires employees to out themselves to their managers, peers, and #HR departments, leave a paper trail documenting their private health information, and seek permission from leaders who may potentially retaliate against them, is not a resource that employees most needing help will use. And so while some companies' pledges to support their employees' travel expenses to seek an abortion are well-meaning, I worry that the way these resources are executed will hinder their actual utilization.

This isn't a hypothetical.

💬 Most companies have well-written harassment and anti-discrimination policies, and formal processes for employees looking for help to reach out, but most employees ignore these “resources“ for the same reasons: they want to avoid retaliation from their harassers, and worry about their privacy being breached and becoming “everyone's business.“

💊 Many companies have workplace gender transition guidelines for their trans workers, and formal processes for employees hoping to transition at work, but some trans people still avoid these policies for the same reasons: they want to avoid retaliation from transphobes, and worry about their privacy being breached and becoming “everyone's business.“

⏲️ Many companies have flexible working arrangements and unlimited time off for all employees, and formal processes to request them, but many employees avoid them anyways: they want to avoid retaliation from managers who might perceive them as “not prioritizing their career,“ and worry about their privacy being breached and becoming “everyone's business.“

The versions of these resources that avoid these problems look similar. Informal processes, with minimal documentation. Privacy and confidentiality are prioritized. Decisions are made on a case-by-case basis according to an “honor code,“ rather than strict requirements and bureaucracy.

“But Lily, how are we supposed to know that people aren't gaming the system? How do we make sure that people don't just decide to take advantage of the resource en masse?“

You trust them. For people to utilize any resource, they have to trust the arbiters of that resource to act conscientiously and thoughtfully. That trust is a two-way street—and incompatible with the controlling, over-documenting, and self-advocacy-reliant approaches that so many companies are implementing.