Welcome to the latest in a series of brief interviews with guest experts from KnowledgeBrief’s Innovation Programme, providing a window into the experts’ latest ideas and new advice for executives.
Following the Innovation Day in March, Tamara Thorpe (TT), Leadership and Organizational Excellence Strategist at Real Global, gave us an interview to discuss her latest insights on how to foster belongingness in the workplace.
KB: What’s the key business challenge that organisations need to address, that your research tackles?
TT: Organisations struggle to recruit, retain and engage diverse talent; despite the strategic initiatives and financial investment, their efforts are falling short. One of the ways in which organisations can strengthen their workforce and increase their retention and engagement is to foster belonging in the workplace.
Research on belonging in the workplace has found that employees who feel they belong perform better, are more resilient and are more willing to challenge themselves. Employees who do not feel a sense of belonging take more sick days, underperform and leave organisations. Dr. Karyn Hall has said: “Yet a single instance of being excluded can undermine self-control and wellbeing and often creates pain and conflict” (Psychology Today). As a result, organisations are paying out millions annually on sick leave, low job performance, and employee turnover because of employees not feeling a sense of belonging in the workplace.
KB: What advice would you give to executives, based on your findings?
TT: In order for diversity and inclusion initiatives to succeed, executives must build practices that foster belonging in the workplace into their Diversity and Inclusion initiatives. It is not enough to attract diverse talent; the workplace has to be a safe and inclusive space for people who do not represent the majority. Executives must also have policies and practices that meet the diverse needs of their workforce.
Research in Diversity Management and Communication has found that organisational cultures are influenced and typically mimic the norms of their dominant societal culture. Within North America and Europe, the predominant culture is white, and the white normative influences an organisation’s culture, policies and practices. As a result, diverse populations who enter organisations are confronted with these cultural norms that may be in conflict with their own cultural norms. For example, in North America and Europe, companies may have events centred on social drinking such as going to the pub after work. For employees who do not socially drink for cultural, religious or health reasons, this creates an internal conflict for them. So rather than it being an opportunity for a team to engage, going to the pub after work creates the opportunity for someone to feel excluded.
Researcher Diane Susan Grimes believes “…when whiteness is accepted as an invisible norm, differences are ignored; and white people, their assumptions, and ways are empowered.” (Grimes, 2002). It is important for executives to be willing and able to explore how whiteness and white normatives impact their organisation’s culture and their employee’s sense of belonging. Grimes has also said that “…interrogating whiteness can help us better understand and change what goes on in organisations.” (Grimes, 2002).
Executives will achieve greater success in their Diversity and Inclusion initiatives when they are willing to acknowledge the impact of the dominant culture, whiteness and white normative culture, within their organisations. Once an organisation is able to acknowledge its influence and impact, they can then begin to challenge the status quo and create alternative solutions that support a diverse workforce and foster a culture of belonging.
KB: How does your latest research approach this? What do the results indicate?
TT: There are several misconceptions about Diversity and Inclusion among organisational leaders that become barriers to fostering inclusion and belonging. If organisations are able to reframe their perceptions and embrace a more inclusive perspective on diversity and inclusion, then they will increase their ability to retain and engage a diverse and productive workforce.
The most common misconception executives have is that the dominant culture group is not included in the definition of diversity. It is the belief that “diversity is about them, not us”; and the “us vs them” mind set only reinforces the dominant culture group as the norm. It also, unfortunately, puts the responsibility for “fitting in” on those who are underrepresented and can result in employees feeling excluded and lacking a sense of belonging. The dominant and/or majority culture must be able to also see that they are also a part of the diversity landscape. It is critical for organisations to understand that the dominant and/or majority group also contributes to the organisation’s diversity and has an equal role and responsibility in ensuring that its Diversity and Inclusion initiatives are successful.
The next misconception is that being sensitive to difference is a weakness, both in the one who practices sensitivity and in the one who is the recipient of that behaviour. The concept of political correctness has reinforced this misconception resulting in a lack of curiosity, understanding, and training within organisations on difference and diversity. A consequence of this misconception is organisations failing to recognise the value of cultural sensitivity and its potential for fostering inclusion and belonging in the workplace. In the intercultural field, cultural sensitivity is defined as: “The capability to generate increasingly more complex perceptions and experiences of cultural difference” (Bhawuk & Brislin, 1992). I compare this skill to the function of a radar, a radio wave detection system used by ships, aircraft, and other extraordinary devices to gather information. When a ship or aircraft rely on radar for direction and guidance, it is imperative that the radar is sensitive because a sensitive radar is better equipped to gather the necessary information. When executives and leaders are more sensitive to the differences and complexities of the people they lead, the better equipped they are to direct and guide them.
Another barrier for executives is the misconception that in order for a problem to be addressed it has to be a problem for the majority. However, this is disproved in organisations time and time again by low retention and engagement rates. Leaders must be able to accept that a problem for one, or a few, is a problem for all, and that policies or practices that negatively impact one is worth being reviewed.
Quite similarly, executives also create unnecessary challenges for themselves and the organisation when small problems are put on hold or de-prioritized. In reality, problems are easiest to resolve in the early stages when they are small. Organisations have a lot of internal and external pressures to meet their targets and objectives, which result in personnel or personality issues being put on the back burner. When this happens, these smaller problems become large problems, at which point it is much more difficult and costly to resolve. Executives have to do more to get it right from the start and invest early in training, communication and conflict resolution so that the organisation is able to be more agile and adept at managing its diverse talent and resolving conflict.
Lastly, executives must let go of the belief that strategic Diversity and Inclusion recruitment and on-boarding initiatives are enough. Today, executives must be more innovative in their approach to diversity and be willing to think outside the norm to create policies and practices that meet the diverse needs of a diverse workforce. One solution for all is no longer sufficient; it is time for leadership to pivot and think about how they can adjust and adapt their policies and practices. Diverse teams are not a monolith and one size does not fit all. Executives must be willing to ask new questions, hear information that they don’t like, and find alternative and creative solutions.
KB: What did you learn or take away from meeting with the executives at the KnowledgeBrief Innovation Day?
TT: Executives care about their people and want to take action to make a difference. There are often blind spots that make it difficult to see what may be in front of them; however, those who are committed to ongoing learning are able to have the “a-ha” moments that make a difference in their leadership and organisations.
Leaders also reinforced the importance of assessment before action in order to identify where they can make positive changes and assess their team’s sense of belonging. It is important to not make assumptions about what is happening or how people feel, but to survey teams and ask questions.
Commitment, curiosity and patience are critical elements to making the changes necessary for organisations to foster a sense of belonging in the workplace.
With thanks to Tamara Thorpe, Leadership and Organizational Excellence Strategist at Real Global.
Sources: Challenging the Status Quo (2002), Whiteness in the Diversity Management Literature, Management Communication Quarterly, Diane Susan Grimes; Create a Sense of Belonging, Psychology Today, Karyn Hall, PhD; https://www.psychologytoday.com/ie/blog/pieces-mind/201403/create-sense-belonging; Intercultural Adjustments and friendship dialectics in international students (2012), International Journal of Intercultural Relations, Jean Hotta and Stella Ting-Toomey; The Measurement of Intercultural Sensitivity Using the Concept of Individualism and Collectivism, International Journal of Intercultural Relations, Dharm Bhawuk, Richard Brislin; Muslim employees within white organisations: the case of Moroccan workers in the Netherlands (2017), International Journal of Human Resource Management, Laura J. Berger, Caroline Essers & Abdelmajid Himi; White Fragility, Robin Di Angelo; The Value of Belonging at Work: New frontiers for inclusion, BetterUp; https://get.betterup.co/rs/600-WTC-654/images/BetterUp_BelongingReport_091019.pdf