Words That Win Webinar

So good afternoon everyone. My name is Beth Ridley. I am a leadership and workplace culture consultant. If you don't know who I am, I own Ridley Consulting Group and we do all things developing inclusive leaders and helping organizations build workplace cultures of belonging. I am experimenting with doing 30 minute webinars. I'm going to try to do one a month, 30 minutes. Because people are busy. So I'm challenging myself to maybe provide you information that you can use, practical advice that you can apply right away, get you off the call so you can actually go implement and get on with the rest of your day. So this is my first one, so I'm kind of experimenting and we'll see how it goes. For my first topic though, I chose this topic around what words that we can use other than diversity, equity and inclusion to lower the temperature a little bit and to re engage people who might be resistant or indifferent around your efforts. This is a really hot and timely topic with my clients because let's be honest, as of late there has been a lot of stronger, really vocal opposition to dei. DEI is not necessary. It, it's not working. A lot of resistance. And frankly, the words DEI together and individually, they're like fighting words these days. They trigger a lot of emotions. They trigger anger, anxiety, confusion. And I think at the end of the day, not everybody sees how this work is relevant to them. So personally, I've gotten sort of tired and impatient and constantly debating about the merits of dei. We all know on this call that the need to engage people who are all very different in an inclusive way will never go away. But convincing people of that and helping them overcome their objectives to DEI is exhausting for me. And I thought if there's just a better way, if I'm talking to them and engaging them anyway, can I use different words? That invites them into the conversation and more importantly helps them see how, how they connect to this work if they previously didn't see that. And then my conversations can be less about debating and more about how do we partner so that we can co create a better workplace culture together. So I've been experimenting with words. Some words are not new and I have always been using them since I've been doing this work. But I've been a lot more intentional as of late and it is working in terms of getting people who are resistant around dei. So what I want to do is essentially I want to just share with you the words that I'm actually using and replacing instead of dei, the words that I use instead. More importantly, I want to share with you the tips that I use mostly in form, in the form of reflection questions that after I introduce a word that seems more approachable to someone, how do I again engage them in the conversation around, okay, how do you see yourself in this work? And then how can we, how can you be part of the solution to get to better? And then also if you like what you hear and you're interested in maybe swapping out old words using some new words, I know it can be like, oh, okay, but we already have a DEI council. We already have our DEI strategy. It just be weird to replace that with new words. Not weird at all. You should think about changing your words with confidence and I'll sort of share with you how I approach the topic of possibly using new words for employees and leaders so it doesn't seem weird or confusing. I'll save questions at the end and we'll sort of take it from there. All right, so the first word that I use, and I've actually been using this word for like six years now and I really, really like it because it really invites people into the conversation. It's far more approachable than dei. I've swapped out dei, I don't mention those words anymore. And I call it belonging. The outcome of what we want to do together, certainly rooted in values around diversity, equity, inclusion. Don't say those words. Is we want to create a culture of belonging. Belonging is the outcome. We want everyone to feel like they belong at work. People immediately get belonging. It's because it's a fundamental human need, the human need for connection and acceptance. And when I talk about belonging, because sometimes it's a word that people know but they haven't thought about it in the context of work, I actually show this fly because belonging appears on this Maslow's hierarchy of needs, what we all need to be self motivated to move forward in life. And as you can see, I didn't make up the word belonging. It's in this right along with love are the foundations for a strong self esteem and a high sense of self worth. So it's one of those universal human needs that people can immediately connect to. So it's already like, oh, okay, we want to create an environment where I belong, I can, that resonates with me and where everybody can belong. I get no pushback on that. None whatsoever. So they're already open and receptive to the work and so I bring them in to kind of co create and just have a more conversation. But what does belonging mean to you? When do you feel the Greatest sense of belonging. Because while it's not an unfamiliar word, people aren't used to talking about it or thinking about it in the context of work. And actually they really do enjoy this question because it's something that everyone can answer and people do like talking about themselves. Now I've been using the word belonging for a long time, so I've really worked hard to be able to really define it and measure it. I don't want it to be so squishy. So when I work with clients to do a cultural belonging survey, I measure four things. They call them the four C's. Comfort. People feel confident being who they are. They don't feel like they're walking out around at work on eggshells or, or they feel like they have to minimize or hide who they are to fit in. They don't have to work so hard to fit in connection. You know, you feel like, you know, your work has meaning, you're part of something bigger than just the tasks that are part of your responsibilities. And you feel a genuine sense of fondness and understanding with your colleagues contribution. Everyone wants to feel like they matter and that people are interested in your thoughts and ideas and take them seriously. And then commitment leaders have to demonstrate, right, that they do care about people, they do care about culture. For the other three Cs to exist, these we can measure, right? So I don't even show the definition the four Cs. When I ask people again, who are somewhat resistant or indifferent towards cei, when do you feel the greatest sense of belonging? At work. And they'll always have an answer. And it might be something like, oh, when people laugh at my jokes, when people say good morning to me, when people ask for my opinion, when people considered me to be an expert, whatever they say, it's going to fall in those four Cs. So whether they know it or not, I've already brought them into oh, okay, our DEI strategies. I don't talk about DEI, but your DEI strategies are moving these Cs forward in some fashion or another. So before they know it, they're already sort of thinking about and being part of the solution, helping to co create what the vision for a better workplace culture should be. Because it now resonates with them. Belonging is a wonderful word to use now to get to belonging. I also say, well, there are pillars of belonging. There are things that we have to pay attention to if we want everyone to feel that sense of belonging that you described. How can others feel that as well? And the first thing is we need to talk about differences now. I used to say diversity. It's kind of the same word, but for whatever reason. Diversity, a little bit of a trigger word. Especially because when you hear diversity, some people think like, oh, they're diverse people and they're non diverse people. Generally diverse people means, you know, women, people of color, lgbtq, for example. And if someone doesn't identify with those demographics, they think, I'm not diverse. This work has nothing to do with me. And in fact, it might put me at a disadvantage somehow just using the word differences. No one is arguing with that. I don't ever get pushback with differences. We're all different. We have different identities, backgrounds, life experiences that make us each unique, resonates with people. This circle chart I have been using forever just to simply show when we talk about, I used to say diversity. There's visible diversity or differences that we tend to pay attention to because they're visible. But there's also really people are full people. They're more than just the rapper that we come in. I like to say all these other hidden differences that really matter in terms of how someone defines themselves and thinks of themselves. And this picture always resonated with people because they're like, oh yeah, I see myself in like geographic differences. I see myself in like, you know, you know, different, like military status or my tenure. All those things that they don't necessarily associate with diverse diversity, but they can see how differences applies now. How do I engage them now that they've warmed up to? Yes, I acknowledge everyone is different. We all have differences at work. I really talk about here are the differences that I see at work that are sort of invisible, they're not obvious, but they really do impact someone's sense of belonging or not. And these are ones that honestly, like, I just took a tally over the past month that clients have raised these differences are causing a little bit of tension at work because they're not helping everyone feel a sense of belonging. Some of these are oldie but goodies and have always been there. Department, for example, a lot of organizations, if they have a sales unit or a revenue generating unit, that those people in that department are treated a little bit more on a pedestal, maybe they're given a little bit more credibility because they bring in the money. If someone is in an admin team or an operations, a cost center, maybe they feel that they're a second class citizen. That ain't new. It's just that when we talked about diversity, we started and ended the conversation with race and gender as an example. Now we're getting to other things that more people can relate to. Personality traits. Introverts versus extroverts. Introverts, feeling overlooked, you know, oldie but goodie. Some of the newer ones though, that I like to bring up just to show that this work is always evolving. We always have to pay attention to culture because there's always differences that make more of a difference, certainly location. Now, most organizations do have fully remote or hybrid employees. You know, do they feel that same sense of belonging as an in person employee? Neurodiversity is a big topic that is coming into the forefront, especially with your early career professionals. Younger employees are far more open. Talking about My brain processes information differently. I have adhd. It's hard for me to be on zoom calls all day. I'm dyslexic and I receive information or I can have more time to process. Mental health. People are becoming more comfortable talking about their mental health needs at work that are different for everyone. Political ideology. As we head into the election season, you might assume, oh, we all sort of think the same politically and then realize, oops, no we don't. Causing tension at work. So just with this list, I think it gets people's wheels spinning. And a lot of times they can see themselves in this. Like, yes, that I identify with that. And you know what? It doesn't feel good. So again, I've brought them into the conversation. Okay, the third word, kind of, or the second I should say pillar of belonging is inclusion. I don't mess with inclusion. I don't get a lot of pushback on inclusion. Most people like inclusion. It feels inclusive. But the only pushback I get is people say, we all need dei, We're a polite and professional culture. We're nice to everybody. And then I remind them like, well, nice, polite and professional. That's not quite inclusive. That's a lot of times just tolerant of different people. And I sort of go through the spectrum of inclusion so they can appreciate, you know, true inclusion means more than what you think. And to get there, we got to do more than what you think. So on the low end of inclusion is tolerant, polite, professional. We're kind to everybody. We say good morning. We appreciate that everyone is different. Not too interested. I'm going to stick with, you know what I know in my comfort zone. We'll stick to the sports and the weather that feels good and it's not bad. But what I tell my clients, you know, we're not going for a not bad culture. We got to plus it up A little bit with some effort and intentionality to be great, a great culture that people want to come and stay. That means we got to think about not just tolerant of differences, but respecting differences. That's harder because that means you acknowledge there are differences. You don't like ideas, you don't like beliefs, you don't like values that maybe you didn't grow up with. They may not be important to you, but I acknowledge they are important to others. A little harder to do. So people start to see, oh yeah, yeah, I can see where we got to work on that. And then true inclusion means appreciation. That means I believe so much in the value of people feeling that sense of belonging, I'm willing to go out of my own comfort zone to uncover, explore differences that may be holding people back from feeling that sense of belonging. So people kind of start to understand, like, oh, it's more than just being polite. Got it. It's still a little high level. So I try to make it a little bit more tangible with an example of what does this look like in a meeting? So tolerance in a meeting may look like, hey, you know, everybody's talking about the plan, the goal in mind, and somebody raises their hand and said, I got an out of the box idea. What do y' all think? And people say, oh, thanks for sharing, but let's just get back on track. We're going to go down that path. So it was polite, it was professional, no one was hurt, but the person who shared the idea might be thinking in their mind, oh yeah, well, of course, why did I bother anyway? Not horrible, but kind of like wa, wa. What respect would look like in meeting is the same person says, here's an idea and even if it's not an idea that you like, even realistically, we're not going to change the plan, the fact that someone raised it. Let's acknowledge right and say, well, okay, why don't we explore how your ideas may impact what we're trying to do here. They were thoughtful enough to raise it and I think acknowledging that there might be something there before we dismiss it. And then true appreciate, true appreciation means in a meeting, we're actually going above and beyond, we're being proactive and we're not settling for just the ideas that were in the room. Because what do we know? There could be different ideas that, that push us to be even better and more thoughtful. So we say, actually what. What are some differences that are not represented in the room? Who's not in the room? Who maybe should weigh in before we Say the decision is final. So when I give those concrete examples, people start to appreciate inclusion a little bit better. And I don't get as much pushback, like, but we're already inclusive. They can see themselves where, oh, yeah, I think we do have more work to do. And then it's like, okay, well, why don't you help us with our strategies to do that? The last word, change. I don't say equity anymore. I say flexibility. Equity just required way too much explanation. That was a real trigger word. And people were confused. What's the difference between equity and equality? So, you know, I just say it's about being flexible, recognizing that we're all different. We have different needs, ideas, beliefs, backgrounds. You know, how can we be flexible in our approach? So not everything is just the way that we've always done it. Not everything is one size fits all, because occasionally it just doesn't fit everybody. And, you know, a lot of times flexibility means, you know, not a big initiative. It just means we're willing to explore. And the example I like to give people, especially if I'm doing something in person, is, look around the room. What are we all wearing today? Most organizations have sort of moved to dress for your day. You know, when I first started working, it was business attire, right? Women couldn't wear certain things, had to wear suits and that type of thing. Now you look around, you got suits, if you want to wear a suit, because maybe you have a meeting with the client, you know, more casual if you're internal. And so that's flexibility. It's actually equity. But I don't say that. And people resonate with flexibility. Okay, so again, after talking about the pillars, differences, inclusion, true inclusion, flexibility, again, how do you bring it in so they feel like, oh, I can. I can be part of this is relevant to me. I often ask, well, are there any differences that you experience that are just tolerated at work, or maybe you observe that are just tolerated at work now that you know the difference between tolerated and respect and appreciation. And when you think about your workday, where could we be more flexible than just one size fits all? And most people will have an example. And then it's like, great, now you can be part of the solution. The last word that I use, and I'm being super, super, super intentional about this, whenever I talk about belonging, I talk about leadership. Because to me, I have actually replaced DEI with leadership. DEI is no longer a standalone concept or an initiative. It is, in fact, leadership. Because if you are in charge of people and you cannot appreciate that There are differences. And be flexible in your approach so that everyone feels a sense of belonging. You are simply not leading in the modern era. So to me, belonging, differences, inclusion, flexibility is the hallmark, the hallmarks of new era leadership. A leader can't always choose who they work with. You're going to work with people you don't agree with and you don't like. Can you bridge across that to bring out the best in everyone? Good leaders can. And so good leaders lean into dei. So I just say after talking about all this, we have to work on leadership now because leaders have to be able to bring these concepts to life. And again, not a lot of pushback, because most people appreciate fundamentally that is the role of the leader. Okay, pulling this all together, right? I like to use really simple analogies. Sometimes people work better with visuals. They can remember all of this. And so I think just think of this, right? Think of belonging again as the outcome that we want. We want a delicious cake, for example. We want our culture to be the best. So belonging kind of represents that, right? Just like we all want work together to make the most delicious cake possible. Well, we have to appreciate we have differences at work that come in the package of employees. Every employee is different, just like the ingredients that go into a cake. Now, certainly if we wanted to cobble a cake together, we could throw all the ingredients together, put it in the oven, we'd come up with something, and it might be a tolerable tasting cake. But we're not going for just average cake. We want amazing cake. So that means we have to appreciate, you know, all these different ingredients. All our different employees need to be treated differently to bring out the best in them. And how do you know how to treat each ingredient and pull them together? That is really down to inclusive and flexible leadership behaviors. Or that's the recipe that you follow the directions, right? So the directions may say, you know, don't just, you know, crack the eggs. You might want to separate the egg yolk and the whites. Don't just throw in all of the dry ingredients. You may want to sift them. Don't just throw in the butter. You may want to melt the butter. We are being inclusive and flexible in our approach of how we treat our different ingredients, that is different employees. So that when we come together, we're all firing on our own individual highest cylinders. And then we're doing so collectively to create a more than tolerable cake, an amazing cake. And then people sort of get that. And again, people see themselves in it. It's easy to understand I get zero pushback. And I will tell you, ironically and literally, I can't make this story up. Right before I was starting this webinar, I was talking to a client, and I've been doing a series of leadership develop inclusive leadership development workshops with them using these words. And they did have one leader who was very resistant, didn't want to come to any of the workshops. He finally came to my workshop, and so HR followed up with him afterwards and said, how was the workshop? He said, oh, it was really great. A lot of good tidbits, really well done. And they said, so what was your resistance? And he literally said, I thought it was going to be dei. I. I am literally not making this up. This happened 30 minutes before joining this. And so it was DEI. It was just belonging, differences, inclusion, and flexibility. So words matter. Don't scrap your strategies. If you're getting pushback, your strategies are fine. Doing something is better than not doing anything. Keep the momentum going. Bring people in with some different language. Okay, so let me wrap up here and so I can save a little bit of time for questions. So you want to change your, your words or think about it without confusing people. Did I share? I think I can't remember when I first started. I was in a. Leading a workshop or leading. Facilitating a panel of a bunch of DEI practitioners. And this topic came up. I said, how many people are not using DEI anymore and using different words? And a third of the room raised their hand, it's okay to change your words. And I give a little bit of historical context so people know this work is always evolving as it should. You know, the people entering the workforce, the differences that are making a difference continue to evolve. So the way that we talk about it should evolve as we do and learn more. So I just give a little bit of historical context. These words have always been around, but they, they sort of reflect, like, where we are with our understanding of them at the time. So in the 1990s, when I first started working, there was no DEI. It was just diversity, and it was diversity training. And that meant you go to hr, watch a video around what not to say to women and people of color at work, stick with, you know, talking about sports and weather, because that's safe. And diversity is like a no, no, you know, to engage at work. And that was, that was the mentality that. Fast forward maybe another decade and too much research started coming up like, no, diversity means diverse thoughts and perspectives that leads to better decisions and outcomes. We gotta embrace diversity, celebrate it, include it so the reflection around that, because that's what we were understanding then, was diversity and inclusion. Fast forward and really in more sort of modern times. Think post George Floyd. You know, it's like let's explore the systemic barriers that are really preventing people from fully full inclusion. And that's equity. So dei, diversity, equity and inclusion has been what we've been talking about like over the past, you know, five, ten years or so. And what I like to tell people now is we can't add another word that gets too long, right? We're already short on time. Let's streamline and be efficient. Bundle it up and call it belonging. And I was like, that's reflective of where we are today. A broad and inclusive lens around our differences, flexible in our approach to create a sense of belonging. And by the way, we reserve the right to change it again in another five, 10 years or, or maybe tomorrow. And what do you think we should call it? It's a great way to bring people into the conversation. Okay, those are my tips. How can I help you? Two things. One, well, three things. You'll get the video of this and my slides as a prompt to have your own conversations. I will put, I was going to put in chat, but I don't think I use chat. I will email everyone my link if you want to schedule a complimentary consultation. Call with me to talk through how you might want to be thinking about language differently with your DEI efforts. Also help happy to facilitate something for you and if you want something more robust and you're ready to like dive in around inclusive leadership behaviors. How do you get leaders to embrace this in their day to day? Using the language that I use but also making it the content. Really approachable but also digestible. People don't have time. I like to do stuff in short little sprints. Five minutes here, whatever. I have a new leadership development program that small group groups of leaders go through together. Either executive leaders or emerging leaders, it doesn't matter. Called the Belonging Builder program. It's not a course, it's not a workshop. It's an immersive experience getting people to internalize this work and really co create what the future can look like together. Scan the QR code and with that I will open it up for any questions. Put them in the Q and A. I don't know if you can take yourselves off mute or not. This is also the first time I'm using Zoom webinar. I think it's more than it needs to be. I might just use Zoom next time. Anyways. I'll check the Q and A to see if there are any questions that come in. But in the meantime, a really important question that somebody posed before this, which I'll talk about in that the question is, I understand approachable language to bring more people in, but honestly, are we just, like, not. Are we pandering to certain audiences? Are we watering this down too much that it loses the real meaning? Because, let's be honest, some differences do make more of a difference at work. Right? For example, you know, for people of color, women, lgbtq, for example, there really are systemic barriers that prevent them from fully being successful at work more than someone who has a food allergy. Right. And I, as a woman of color, hyper sensitive to pandering and watering this down and not really addressing the tough, hard issues. So that's always in my mind. I will say I have not yet gotten any feedback on the other side, even among people who are deeply immersed in DEI work, for a couple of reasons. One, honestly, sometimes a lot of people who identify with traditional diversity, women, people of color, lgbtq, for example, you know, they kind of feel like now the burden's on me to carry this work forward. I sort of like bringing other people in to make them accountable. Two, young people in particular identify with so many aspects of their identity, not only race and gender, and they're the main ones saying, can we broaden our definition of differences? And three, people who are really immersed in this work in a serious, serious way recognize that I am okay with changing the language if it means the work moves forward. So so far I've had nothing but receptivity around language. I'm gonna stop sharing now and go to the questions. Okay, so two questions came in. Well, okay, more of a comment. Great webinar. Thank you. Thanks, Marlene. And then are there belonging features we can add to meeting agendas? Ooh, Marianne, I don't know if I understand your question exactly, but there's. I have a chock full of prompts around belonging reflection questions that can all be done in like, five minute doses to get people to think about again, what does belonging mean for them first? And then what does it mean? Receptivity around language. I'm going to stop sharing now and go to the questions. Okay, so two questions came in. Well for us more broadly, why does it matter? So if that's what you mean by feature. Okay, more of a comment. Great webinar. Thank you. Thanks, Marlene. And then are there belonging features?