How to evaluate a company’s DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) strategy?

This article is a follow-up of my previous article on DEI in Tech.

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

• Simply hiring underrepresented employees is not enough, but a good start. We need to set a minimum number of headcounts for minority groups (based on sexual preferences, race, ethnicity etc.)
• Evaluate our hiring practices. Have we removed potential sources of unconscious bias in the interviewing process so that all the candidates are reviewed at an equal playing field?
• We should also evaluate the job level of hiring the underrepresented groups.
• Are we targeting tech schools that are majorly underrepresented? All women schools, schools with a majority of Hispanic / African American students etc.?
• Have we set promotion targets for the underrepresented hires? Are we evaluating our promotion numbers at a more granular level — slice and dice based on race / gender to understand the data effectively?
• Do we have regular surveys to understand the level of job satisfaction among the minority groups?
• Do we evaluate employees’ self-perception? Data from tech firms has shown that underrepresented hires rate themselves lower than their managers.
• Do we have confidence intervals to determine the statistical significance of these numbers?
• Do we have support groups?
• How are our one-on-one conversations with the employees to learn about their experiences with biases? We should share own stories to build trust and make them feel safe for discussion.
• Have we had training for the entire organization to promote inclusivity and teach techniques to remove unconscious bias?