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If you’ve been considering investing in diversity and inclusion programs — whether your organisation suffers from a culture problem, is undergoing a cultural shift, or you simply believe it’s the right thing to do — you might be interested to know that companies who do gain a competitive advantage over those who don’t.
In their latest research on the topic, McKinsey & Company found correlations between financial performance and diverse teams:
- Companies in the top quartile for diversity among senior leaders across gender, ethnic and cultural indicators were more likely to experience statistically significant above-average profitability.
- McKinsey also found a correlation between diversity of all kinds and both profitability and value creation.
Bottom-line benefits aside, many businesses still struggle to make the material changes that will drive a diverse and inclusive culture. In fact, 41% of leaders at Fortune 1000 companies say there’s just not enough time for diversity and inclusion efforts.
But it’s high time to make the time, because research shows that 67% of job applicants and 57% of employees say they value diversity.
Using Communication to Facilitate and Perpetuate a D&I Culture.
One highly effective (and even budget-friendly) approach to implementing culture change is through an employee communications app. Here are four ways that adopting an employee communications app as part of your internal communications strategy can create an inclusive culture and promote workplace diversity.
#1: It increases and empowers employee engagement for all.
Employee communications tools aren’t the one-sided corporate newsletters of the past, with content generated solely by internal communications teams or HR departments. Instead, these apps democratise content creation and sharing, allowing every team member to tell their story and contribute to content.
Employee communication and engagement platforms such as Thrive provide opportunities to encourage and promote user-generated content, including video, comments, photos, and more.
#2: It promotes peer-to-peer recognition.
“Employee of the month” and other top-down types of recognition just won’t cut it in a modern culture that emphasizes diversity and inclusion. With in-app features that facilitate and even encourage peer-to-peer recognition, team members can sing out one another’s successes and contributions — whether formally measured or simply observed.
#3: It makes feedback heard and immediately actionable.
Employee communications apps do their best work when treated as circular communications tools. When team members have the ability to “like” or comment on content, or when they have a direct channel to provide feedback to leadership, you’ll know instantaneously if you’re doing diversity and inclusion right, or if your employees see holes in your commitment to diversity.
#4: It’s proof that leadership cares.
Diversity and inclusion is not just a human resources “problem” or initiative. It’s a paradigm shift in the way of conducting business that emphasizes investment in the humans who do the work. When leadership shows a willingness to invest in technology that effectively rewrites the way every team member is able to tell his or her story within the organisation, that’s where real culture changes can take root and begin to grow.
Next steps…
If you’d like to learn more about what the right employee communications tools can do to help you foster an environment where diversity and inclusion are valued, we can help. Reach out today.
Not ready to talk? You may want to download The Fairchild Medical Center case study to learn how they used an employee communications and engagement app to engage employees during culture change.
