A few years ago, DEI became the term for wanting to promote greater fairness in society. Is that now changing?
The acronym, which stands for “diversity, equity and inclusion,” skyrocketed in use following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, but the concept has long existed, with practitioners working towards meeting those needs in society.
“Diversity is the difference between people. Equity is about whether or not people have equitable access to services, goods, and then inclusion brings in how we are bringing people into the fold that are different to ensure that they feel a part of what you are doing,” explained Monica Gould, founder and president of Mechanicsburg-based Strategic Consulting Partners.
For over 30 years, Gould has been addressing these goals for businesses, highlighting the practical reasons for their importance—that well-supported employees are happier and thereby stay longer, work harder and innovate. This was before the acronym.
“DEI was once diversity and inclusion; before that, it was multiculturalism,” said Hattie McCarter, founder and owner of MEND Solutions, LLC, who has worked in the field for over 18 years, seeing the rise and fall of the moniker. “Before that, it was affirmative action and, before that, it was something else.”
Sense of Urgency
Currently, DEI often refers to equity for Black or LGBTQ+ people, McCarter explained. But DEI has 22-plus dimensions to it, and a lot of people have benefited from this work, she said. Differences in age, geographic location, ability and education are all included but often excluded from the conversation, she added.
“I think that DEI, as we’ve known it, has always been attributed to ‘Black’ the same way that welfare has always been attributed to Black poor, or the same way that certain stereotypes have been attached to people,” said Ana White, owner of Way with Words Consulting Services, LLC. “Now, everybody is attributing, ‘Let’s get rid of these DEI programs,’ when what they are saying is, ‘Let’s get rid of all these racially connected programs.’”
White explained that, after George Floyd’s murder, people came out of the woodwork interested in DEI, but also wanted to separate themselves from this injustice with a “It’s them, not us” posture. DEI practitioners, new and veteran, rushed to meet the demand for knowledge, but White feels that the rush lost the nuances of what DEI represented, and that people weren’t always doing it well.
“There was such a sense of urgency to get this right because black and brown bodies specifically, at that time, felt like we don’t have much more time to waste,” White said.
While that type of violence was a revelation to most white Americans, it was common knowledge to Black people. That rush may have caused some of the problems that upended DEI. Then there was the anti-DEI message emanating from some politicians, including the new administration in the White House.
DEI flipped from being a desire for a more understanding and empathetic society to the opposite.
“What I’d really love to see happen, is that we walk away from the blaming and shaming concepts around DEI,” Gould said. “That’s how we got into trouble with DEI in the first place, because we had practitioners that would go in and do blaming and shaming sessions and make people feel bad for being a certain color or a certain ability or a certain gender.”
The Impact
So, is DEI gone? Maybe the acronym, but not the ideals.
“It’s dead in its current form, but it’s still happening,” Gould stated.
Gould said that, if organizations aren’t inclusive, they aren’t going to attract the most diverse and best talent.
“These concepts don’t change,” Gould said. “We’re still doing the work. We may not be calling it one big bundle, but what we’re doing is, we’re really working with organizations to make them healthy.”
Mark Davis, president and CEO of Pennsylvania Advocates and Resources for Autism and Intellectual Disabilities (PAR), said that DEI has been at the core of what they do since the organization’s inception in 1974.
“It’s not so much what you call it, it’s how you implement it,” Davis said. “It’s what impact it has on the ability for communities to accept people with disabilities and different abilities.”
The concern, therefore, is less about the rhetoric around DEI than what it means for specific communities, he said.
McCarter’s focus has always been transformative leadership, of which DEI is just a part.
“I never looked at my work as being a DEI consultant,” McCarter said. “I looked at it as a person who is partnering with your organization to really help you tap into that space of vulnerability, where you can be accountable as a leader, and you can hold your employees accountable. So, that means we’ve got to have these brave conversations.”
DEI’s tenure as a symbol of inclusivity in America may have concluded in a flurry of backlash and executive orders, but its foundations remain.
White said that DEI was ill-equipped to stand the test of time, but that’s OK.
“I don’t think there’s a way to revive this thing,” White said. “I also feel very passionately that we don’t need to revive this thing, that we need to truly break it apart and re-engineer what DEI and those components look like in this new phase of American society.”
Learn more about the organizations mentioned in this story:
Strategic Consulting Partners, www.yourstrategicconsultant.com
MEND Solutions, LLC, www.mendsolutionsllc.org
Way with Words Consulting Services, LLC, [email protected]
PAR, www.par.net
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