Dive Brief:
- The gap between company intention and action on diversity and inclusion initiatives is narrowing, according to Salary.com survey results released Aug. 2; in 2022, the gap between measured at around -5.8%, an improvement from last year’s -7%.
- Companies appear to have dedicated increased resources to DEI. According to the survey, 49% of HR respondents said they have a leader in place specifically for DEI initiatives, compared to 43% last year. Just over half surveyed also said those leaders had access to the right resources for success.
- HR pros surveyed said the areas most in need of improvement included: candidate pool diversification, especially for leadership positions; training and education on DEI topics; data tracking; and prioritization of time, resources and budget to DEI initiatives.
Dive Insight:
DEI initiatives are now present at all Fortune 100 companies — a direct reflection of the commitment more companies are making regarding DEI issues.
"Incremental progress is being made towards DE&I goals, yet this survey reveals work still needs to be done to ensure that diversity, equity, and inclusion becomes truly integrated into organizational culture," Lenna Turner, director of DE&I at Salary.com, said in a statement.
To reach these goals — and make intention into reality, as noted by the Salary.com survey — some companies have tied executive compensation to DEI metrics; Starbucks, Wells Fargo and Uber are among such companies. Others have sought to improve transparency of data collection with both employees and the public to improve accountability.
Some companies have faced external pressures regarding their DEI efforts, however. Nike, for example, recently promised to release recruitment and promotion data parsed out by gender, race and ethnicity by the end of 2024 after pressure from activist investor group As You Sow. One exec from the organization pointed out the concern that Nike — which relies heavily on social justice as part of its branding — match its external image with its internal reality.
Wells Fargo and its diverse hiring initiative — in which it claimed that half of candidates interviewed for certain positions would be female, non-White or “otherwise disadvantaged” — came under fire in June due to allegations it held interviews for non-White and female applicants for jobs that had already been offered to other candidates. The bank paused the initiative before restarting it this week with some revisions.
A study published in MIT Sloan’s Management Review noted that DEI goals may be more achievable when employers approach the issue from a core values perspective rather than the business case alone — and instead focus on the “moral case” for why DEI matters.
