How to Assess Your Organizational DE&I Practices

As the second installment of WLH’s four-part series on the steps that organizations can take to address DEI practices, today’s podcast will focus on the second step of DEI transformation: Assessment. We kicked off the series by first discussing Awareness, which involves taking the time and space for all members of an organization to reflect on their own biases. After completing this process, it is time for organizations to systematically assess their work practices and how they impact organizational culture. 

In today’s podcast, I will talk with Stephen Kontra, a trusted member of the WLH team. We will discuss the forces that are driving the need for organizations to reexamine and assess their talent management practices, such as the increasing rate of organizational change standards, as well as an increasingly dynamic workforce that seeks transparency and equitable opportunities to manage their careers. Steve and I have assisted many companies in assessing their organizational practices and are therefore able to speak on the target areas that companies should assess, as well as the best practices for carrying out these assessments and moving forward with the information that is collected.

Though many organizations strive to be equitable and inclusive, leaders are often unable to discern whether these goals are actually achieved in practice. Assessments provide employees with a forum with which they can honestly express their experience with specific practices at the organization as a whole, allowing leaders to pinpoint what is working well and what needs to be improved upon. If this step is properly executed, leaders have the capacity to move forward with actions that will appropriately address their organizations’ DEI blind spots.