Photo illustration by Leanza Abucayan, CNN
What is your company doing to improve Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion? President Biden’s Cabinet serves as a model for workplace diversity!
Politics aside, let’s review President Biden’s cabinet picks: 50% of nominees for Cabinet-level positions are people of color including Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, the first female of Black and South Asian descent to hold the office of Vice President.
How diverse is the Biden Cabinet? By comparison, former President Barack Obama set the previous record for diversity with a Cabinet that was 42% people of color.
President Biden’s diverse cabinet appointments are a way of signaling broader initiatives and values – inextricably tied to policy, but also indicators of identity. Simply put his cabinet picks better reflect the American people – more than any other cabinet in history.
Diversity in the Presidential cabinet mirrors a similar, global workforce movement towards diversity at the management and executive level. Companies are increasingly striving to increase diversity because it better cultivates a sense of community within the company.
Studies show that higher rates of workplace diversity can help companies evolve, innovate, problem-solve, and be more efficient. Moreover, highly diverse workplaces offer employees a better sense of community, increased worker engagement, and a more positive corporate culture.
It’s a good bottom-line business decision, too! Companies with a more culturally and ethnically diverse executive team were 33% more likely to see above-average profits.
Above all else, employees are now demanding diversity in the workplace. Highly educated young professionals want employers to be equally committed to changing themselves. This includes hiring a more diverse workforce, helping employees of color advance through the ranks, giving them more decision-making power and facilitating uncomfortable conversations about systemic racism.
According to a recent Glassdoor survey, 76% of employees and job seekers said a diverse workforce was important when evaluating companies and job offers. Nearly half of Black and Hispanic employees and job seekers said they had quit a job after witnessing or experiencing discrimination at work. And 37% of employees and job seekers said they would not apply to a company that had negative satisfaction ratings among people of color. These numbers show that workplace diversity is driving how talent looks for jobs in the current economy.
Despite overwhelming evidence showing how diversity improves production, profitability, engagement and retention, many companies are still far from building a Management team and workforce that represents a proportionate number of women and people of color.
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