Human resource and diversity professionals have been contacting DTUI.com in an effort to figure out how to manage volatile discussions about Barack Obama being elected as the next U.S. president.

The presidential race has been especially tense since the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic decision to declare George W. Bush the winner in 2000. It did not help matters after the final tally weeks later showed that Al Gore won the popular vote. George Bush won a second term in 2004, which further infuriated his opponents. One bumper sticker states how some felt about him as their leader—“Somewhere in Texas a Village Is Missing Its Idiot.” So, it may not be surprising that people have some pretty harsh things to say about our new president, Barack Obama. Imagine the things opponents are saying about the first president of color.

Check out these news reports:
Baylor University (11/05/2008)
• One guy taunted Obama supporters by saying “You’re in Texas and y’alls vote didn’t count because Texas still voted McCain.”
• One African American woman says she overheard some white males talking about how they were going to beat up the next black person that walked by.
• The Lariat, Baylor’s student newspaper, posted video of the burning of Obama and Biden campaign signs on their Web site.
“Those expressions of disagreement or that ‘my candidate didn’t win’ can take on a racial overtone, either on purpose or indirectly,” Baylor sociology professor Kevin Dougherty said in response.

The Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate crimes, said there have been “hundreds” of incidents since the election, many more than usual.
• There have been cross burnings.
• Schoolchildren have chanted “Assassinate Obama.”
• Black figures have been hung from nooses.
• Racial epithets were scrawled on homes and cars.
While most of the reported incidents were in southern states, they certainly have not been limited to the south.
The major problem is that people have to take sides in these incidents which most often than not reproduces racial divisiveness. Consider the following reported incident:

University of Texas backup center Buck Burnette was kicked off the team by Coach Mack Brown after he posted the following message on his Facebook page:

. . . “all the hunters gather up, we have a #$%&er in the whitehouse”

Before he took his Facebook page down, Burnette offered the following as an apology:

“Clearly I have made a mistake and apologized for it and will pay for it. I received it as a text message from an acquaintance and immaturely put it up on facebook in the light of the election. Im not racist and apologize for offending you. I grew up on a ranch in a small town where that was a real thing and I need to grow up. I sincerely am sorry for being ignorant in thinking that it would be ok to write that publicly and apologize to you in particular. I have to be more mature than to put the reputation of my team at stake and to spread that kind of hate which I dont even believe in. Once again, I sincerely apologize.”

One reader’s comment about his remarks stated:

“I am glad he was kicked off. He supposedly is a “Christian” and spoke to youth groups at his home town as a role model. What a terrible example of christianity he is. I am embarrassed to say he is from Wimberley [Texas]. Those comments don’t just accidentally get posted. Buck’s true colors are showing.”

Someone else felt compelled to stick up for him by stating the following:
“What he said was stupid and inexcusable. That being said he is still just a 20 year old kid. He deserves a second chance as much as anyone. Who among us didn’t say or do something you later regretted when you were 20?”

You can imagine this discussion in a diversity course. People will take sides, disagree, and the discussion may heat up to the point that the facilitator will need to intervene.

Now consider the potential impact of post presidential election discussions in creating tension among workplace colleagues. This real life case from Canada drives the point home.

“When his boss labelled him a “terrorist” and referred to him as Bin Laden, car painter Sashram Dastghib struck back with a discrimination complaint. Dastghib, who emmigrated from Iran in search of a better life, often worked 14 hours a day at Richmond Auto Body in North Vancouver and rose through the ranks to become its highest paid painter.”

Although he claimed to love his job, Dastghib alleged co-workers Joel Franske and Peter De Santis made him the butt of racist jokes. This included addressing him over the loudspeaker as Bin Laden, and [posted] a “Wanted — Dead or Alive” poster, portraying him as a terrorist. The poster claimed he dressed in drag, had been indicted for bombing, was arrested for prostitution and was involved in bestiality and pornography.”
“Dastghib was fired after a workplace altercation with coworkers and laid a complaint of discrimination before the B.C. [British Columbia] Human Rights Tribunal. The managers admitted to the poster but denied repeated racist name calling. They claimed the human rights application was trumped up as retaliation for his being fired.”

“Everyone in the shop had a nickname based on some personal characteristic, they said. The employer maintained Dastghib never protested and furthermore participated in the workplace banter. Dastghib allegedly joked in one lunchroom exchange that he was entitled to a $1-million reward from the wanted poster because he really was a terrorist.”

“Many of the company’s claims may seem sensible — the workplace was collegial, and Dastghib socialized with the very people named in his complaint. The Tribunal heard that Franske, for example, had invited Dastghib into his home to hold his newborn child. The group even took scuba diving lessons together.”

“The tribunal disallowed the employer’s defence of ‘consent,’ saying the poster was a ‘particularly venal” diatribe. ‘It would be bad enough for this poster to come from a co-worker but it is much worse when it comes from a manager,’ the tribunal said, in concluding ‘the company created a poisoned environment’.”
“It also rejected the company’s claim the human rights complaint emerged only when Dastghib was fired for cause after the altercation. It found the discriminatory actions by the managers, including the poster, contributed to Dastghib’s anger, and was a factor in the outburst that lead to his being fired.”

In other words, Dastghib had to endure a hostile workplace that led to his anger and the altercation—and management was a perpetrator instead of protector.

It may appear that our right to vote for our candidate of choice translates into openly showing our disdain for the opponent even in the workplace, but doing so can create a hostile environment. Human resource and diversity professionals must be prepared to manage workplace hostility to guard against legal action and lower production.

What is the best way to handle workplace conflict due to heated presidential elections discussions? Here are a few things to consider:
1. Get the top leader(s) of your company to make an organization wide statement about the need for post-election civility and that inappropriate conduct will not be tolerated.
2. Use expert facilitators to hold a town hall meeting to discuss the election focusing on the racial, gender, and ageism tones that characterized the campaigns and how they can creep into the workplace. A diverse team of facilitators is a must.
3. Establish ground rules for talking about the town hall topic and sharing opinions.
4. Use an Ice Breaker that will help participants feel more comfortable with each other.
5. Discuss the costs and benefits of sharing personal views with workplace colleagues.
6. Teach participants how to use the Powerful Questions technique as a method of inquiry in sharing and learning about other groups.
7. Break participants into ethnic or racial groups to share their views safely and have them return to the larger group to share what they learned in the dialog. You may want to use an incident like the one involving Buck Burnett to discuss the pros and cons of kicking him off the team or helping him learn a lesson from the incident.
8. Have the groups reflect on what they learned from the summaries the groups shared, especially focusing on seeking clarity and understanding each other’s perspectives.
9. Break participants into randomly assigned small groups to discuss what they had learned and to learn from each other. Have each person write down what she or he learned from the town hall meeting.
10. Have an open discussion in the general group about what was learned.

Of course, you need excellent facilitation skills to create a safe environment, maintain civility while allowing people to get emotionally involved, and to identify teachable moments that you use to increase learning.

About the Author: Billy Vaughn, PhD CDP is a certified diversity professional with DTUI.com. He is a master certification trainer, cultural competence coach, sought after consultant, professional speaker, accomplished author, and cultural diversity thought leader. He can be reach at billy at dtui.com.

A friend of mine called me today about his son’s soccer team being called “Albinos” by a rival team. My pal didn’t know what the word meant, but knew it had something to do with being white. Frankly, he was the first to inform me about it. When I found out that the opposing team was primarily children of color, my first comment was that his son is experiencing the shift to children of color outnumbering white Americans in California public schools. At the same time, I was surfing the internet to find out more. That is when I came across this very provocative video.

Two white males explore what they believe is the origins of the white race and the term albino is used repeatedly. I am against the use of any derogatory words about racial and cultural groups. My studies lead me to believe that they are divisive and maintain the perception of racial hierarchies. This is also true when African Americans use the word nigger to label each other.

This provocative piece is so interesting I am still trying to get my head around it which will require more research and discussion. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Diversity professionals must navigate the rugged terrain of uneven support, hostility, and apathy. Doing their job well takes political savvy that some people are born with, but most of us must find a way to learn it. The human resource officer and organizational development professional typically enjoy comparably little resistance in their work because it is perceived as less political. But, where would diversity professionals have learned the skills needed to manage social politics? Most of them do not have a degree in diversity leadership, cultural competence, or organizational development. Most have learned how to succeed in the diversity business from the School of Hard Knocks. A few can get by with this trial by error approach, but most will struggle along unless they take continuous education seriously.

In installment two, I pointed out that you can take the political issues concerning a diversity initiative by linking it to the organization’s purpose and return-on-investment. I emphasized the point that even the most politically savvy diversity professionals succumb to the pressures of nonsupporting leadership and limited authority when it comes to the diversity initiative.

This third article in the series continues the discussion about the top ten things diversity leaders need to know to navigate diversity politics. The full list includes the following:

1. Become a cultural diversity leadership expert and actively pursue continuous learning
2. Be clear about your own diversity lenses
3. Take the sting out of the diversity program in your business case
4. Be clear about the diversity and inclusion ROI
5. Have a really clear plan based on the big picture of the organization
6. Get the leadership on the front lines of promoting diversity and inclusion
7. Become part of a diversity professional network
8. Establish allies within your organization
9. Align the steering committee
10. Request the authority needed to do your work effectively
11. Neutralize diversity trouble makers
12. Hold managers accountable
13. Work with unit managers individually
14. Avoid personalizing criticism of the diversity program
15. Pat yourself on the back

The entire summary of the list of items is too lengthy for a single article. I covered the first six items in the first two installments, which can be viewed by following this link. In this installment, I cover diversity politics items 7-9 which are shown above in red font.

Become Part of a Cultural Diversity Professional Network

Too many cultural diversity professionals are isolated. They may be the only in-house expert or consultant on the job. I learned from my mentor, Judith Katz, Ed.D., that we should always find a way to work in partnership with at least one other professional. Our work is too tough and we are under too much scrutiny to work in isolation. Even when you have a staff, this does not always translate into a support system. I know diversity professionals who have acquired their staff by default. One Chinese American human resource officer in a large accounting firm announced that she was ready to quit her job when her boss offered the diversity professional position in order to retain her. She did not have a clue about what the position required. A related point is that the most qualified person for a new diversity resource role is seldom based on cultural competence. How long you have been with the organization typically trumps diversity expertise. Yes, the person knows the organization’s culture, but that does not directly translate into being able to manage social politics.

The in-house diversity expert may be someone who has been hired from the outside as the “new” diversity officer. No matter how much homework you do in making a decision about whether or not to take such a job, inevitably you will find that the place is not as inclusive as you were led to believe. I often hear clients say that while the leader said all the right things to appear sincere about her or his diversity commitment during the job interview, it was absent in everyday reality on the job. In fact, most new hires for a new diversity position feel isolated, lonely, and poorly understood.

A common story I hear from diversity officers is that the first staff member they acquire is someone who is “appointed” by their supervisor. The supervisor protects an employee who has lost her or his position by requesting that the diversity officer accepts the individual. All too often the “new” hire brings with him or her very limited cultural competence and many of the deficits that led to dismissal.  

One of the best ways to deal with isolation is to hire a diversity coach. This is someone who is an established expert. The individual basically champions the diversity professional, assist in problem solving, and keep the diversity professional motivated. Most diversity professionals find solace in attending professional conferences. I have personally attended the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education (NCORE) for more than ten years. I am also fortunate enough that they request me to offer a workshop or presentation each year. I have grown fond of professional relationships I have established over the years of attendance—especially exchanging stories. This is one of the conferences that offer me opportunities to refresh my commitment to the profession.

Conferences and seminars are great, but they are for limited time periods. I also recommend an online community for diversity professionals. I conducted a Google search to look for a diversity professional organization I use to belong to, but it appears to be out of existence. The only one I came across was The Diversity Trainer and Professional Network, which DTUI.com sponsors. Click Here to check it out.

Establish Allies Within Your Organization

Allies are people who support your organization’s diversity initiative and you. They can assist you in concrete ways even if they choose to forgo being active members of your diversity steering committee. This is especially important for the diversity professional who has been hired from the outside because these diversity champions know the organization’s culture.

1. Make a list of people in the organization that would support the diversity initiative and recruit them as allies.

2. Set a goal to recruit a specific number of new allies. Then tell them that you need their support and be clear about what you are asking of each individual. For example, wouldn’t a member of the leadership team be a value asset in making certain that the diversity initiative is consistently part of the agenda? Will a long-standing diversity champion go to lunch with you on occasion so that you can use her or his knowledge of the organization in strategy development? How can you partner with the human resource officer to make the diversity initiative part of the solution to a range of HR processes? These are the questions you ask in determining who would be a good ally and how he or she may be supportive.

3. Branch out and stretch a bit. Most of your potential allies will be obvious to you. But perhaps you have not considered the compliance department or the finance office. The compliance department has a lot of data, for example. They can help you make your case for the strategy you want to sell to the leadership.—especially in terms of talent management and succession planning. The finance department has a clear view about budgetary matters. Learning about how they view organizational processes from a budgetary perspective can provide insight into how to make the best case for your budget.

Align Your Steering Committee

You may have heard me talk about this in the past. Few things bog down a diversity initiative more than diversity steering committee members having different assumptions about why their work is important. If one member, for example, believes that diversity means people look different on the outside, but everyone must buy into the organization’s existing culture while another member believes the culture must change to accommodate different identity groups, you have a potential lack of alignment. Lack of alignment is not due to their differences, but to the potential for conflict. The savvy diversity professional will have the competence needed to harness differences among committee member assumptions in the service of designing and developing the best diversity initiative.

Alignment work involves taking the time needed to learn about different assumptions among team members and understanding the possible consequences for group decision making. Again, the goal is not to get everyone to agree on the same set of assumptions. That is a recipe for disaster. Instead, the focus is on using the differences among team members as microcosm for the larger organization. Working towards becoming a model of cross cultural team work will serve the organization as a whole.

Summary

The cultural diversity professional role is too often political and controversial. Add the limited resources and lack of leadership support and you have a role that requires a considerable amount of endurance and savvy to succeed in the work. Membership in an online diversity professional network and conference attendance provide support groups to manage isolation and feeling undervalued. Establishing allies within your organization can also be a source of support, especially when mentoring is involved. You may also consider a diversity coach who will champion you and provide support during the trying periods. While a diversity steering committee may offer some support, it can be a source of stress as well. It is best to align the committee in order to get the most out of it. Otherwise, you will spend a considerable amount of time trying to get the members to agree on goals and objectives. Even if members go along with the proposed goals and objectives, alignment work will make certain that they are on board instead of quietly waiting for opportunities to resist the program’s implementation.

It is not easy being a cultural diversity professional. The tools we provide in this set of lessons can make work life less challenging. I will discuss gaining the authority needed to do your work effectively, neutralizing diversity trouble makers, and holding managers accountable in Part 4 of this lesson.

In the first installment of this series, I stated that diversity professionals must navigate the rugged terrain of uneven support, hostility, and apathy. Doing their job well takes political savvy that some are born with. In contrast, organizational development and effectiveness skills must be learned. But, where would diversity professionals have learned these skills? Most of them do not have a degree in diversity leadership, cultural competence, or organizational development. They have learned how to generally succeed in the diversity business from the School of Hard Knocks. A few can get by with this trial by error approach, but most continue to struggle especially in the area of diversity politics.

While a considerable number of diversity professionals can competently navigate organizational politics, even the best succumb to the pressures of an nonsupporting leadership and limited authority when it comes to the diversity initiative.

This second article in the series continues the discussion about the top ten things diversity leaders need to know to navigate diversity politics. The full list includes the following:

1.

1. Become a cultural diversity leadership expert and actively pursue continuous learning
2. Be clear about your own diversity lenses
3. Take the sting out of the diversity program in your business case
4. Be clear about the diversity and inclusion ROI
5. Have a really clear plan based on the big picture of the organization
6. Get the leadership on the front lines of promoting diversity and inclusion
7. Become part of a diversity professional network
8. Establish allies within your organization
9. Align the steering committee
10. Request the authority needed to do your work effectively
11. Neutralize diversity trouble makers
12. Hold managers accountable
13. Work with unit managers individually
14. Avoid personalizing criticism of the diversity program
15. Pat yourself on the back

The entire summary of the list of items is too lengthy for a single article. I covered the first three items in the first installment, which can be viewed by following this link. In this installment, I cover diversity politics items 4-6, which are shown above in red font.

Be clear about the diversity and inclusion ROI

Until recently cultural diversity initiative funding was primarily targeted for compliance protection training. Anti-harassment, civil rights, and cultural diversity awareness training received most of the resources. Today, managers want to make certain that they are getting a sufficient return on their diversity initiative investment (ROI). They expect better talent selection, increased productivity, a reduction in insensitivity complaints, and improved employee retention for the resources they allocate. These are basic cultural diversity talent management expectations.

Measurement of diversity initiative ROI starts with defining the diversity initiative business case, determining how much the initiative will cost, and verifying the amount of return.

Questions you will address in making your case are:

• Why is the diversity initiative important?
• What are the goals and objectives?
• What is the amount of investment needed for a successful initiative?
• How is the return on investment measured?

Start with making a case for the initiative

One of the most impactful cases for a diversity initiative based on my experience is made with results from our diversity scorecard analysis. In one case, our client’s diversity committee struggled with getting on the same page about why their initiative was important. One group felt that the company had an obligation to society to promote a diverse organization. Another group emphasized the fact that the metropolitan area’s demographics were changing with the increased numbers of people of Mexican descent. The need to remain a competitive and innovative bank was a third rationale offered by another group of committee members. Different committee members were voicing different opinions about the group’s work to colleagues and managers as a result their different views about why the initiative was important.

We used the diversity scorecard method to create links along four levels of analysis: the bank’s bottom line (top of chart), its mission and vision, the operations needed to produce results, and the cultural competence needed to be productive (bottom of chart). Participants were asked a series of questions and the responses were characterized by arrows pointing between the four scorecard levels on the scorecard chart.

The set of arrows across the scorecard levels indicate that the bank’s ability to increase revenue is directly linked to its excellent customer service vision and mission, and that demographic changes require new skills in order to fill the mission and impact the bottom line. While other diversity initiative goals expressed by the diversity committee were appreciated and maintained in the overall business case, the culturally competent customer service delivery piece took center stage.

Diversity Initiative Goals

Once the culturally competent customer service cultural competence goal was established, the need to provide training became the focus. Obviously, if the bank wants to determine the ROI for training, the allocated resources, especially hidden expenses, must be accounted for. The assessment data from our example indicated that customers of color find the bank tellers so difficult to talk to that they avoid using the services to the extent possible. One young Latina said that “I have to go to the bank often. The tellers act as though I am a burden to them. They are unfriendly and talk to me as though I am not able to speak and understand English. I was born and raised in the United States.” The woman tries to avoid using the services. She is considering moving her money to another bank.

The bank tellers, on the other hand, say that they know it is important to provide each customer with excellent service, but find those with limited English difficult to serve. Their stereotypes about Spanish-speaking people being in the country illegally and not putting enough effort into learning English make it difficult to serve these customers equitably. Training is the key to making the customers feel included and the tellers feel more competent.

Measuring the ROI

The amount of investment in the diversity initiative is determined by the goals and time line. Our bank client wanted to have a competitive edge over other local banks in reaching out to Spanish-speaking members of the community. They invested in the initiative as though it was extension of their advertisement. They saw the investment as an imperative.

The most important factor in measuring the return-on-investment for training is the diversity initiative goal. Measuring the amount of new accounts generated by the tellers before and after the training, for example, and then comparing the increase revenue with the cost of the training is the typical way to measure the ROI. Different components of the diversity initiative can be measured in a similar way. The diversity officer’s salary, support staff, and employee time away from the desk for training are other factors considered in ROI analysis.

Summary

Take the political game out of diversity initiative by linking it to the organization’s purpose. Instead of getting caught in the trap of uneven commitment and negative stereotypes about cultural diversity programs, get your audience to focus on the bottom line. The rationale for implementing a cultural diversity initiative should be to improve the organization’s bottom line. A non-profit organization’s bottom line may be to improve customer service, while a for-profit organization may focus on increasing shareholders’ value. Help your audience make the connection with a diversity scorecard analysis.

The investment in an initiative consists of the cost of designing, developing, implementing, and sustaining it. By measuring the effect on the organization’s bottom line before and after implementing different parts of the initiative, and then comparing with the costs, diversity professionals can determine the return-on-investment.

The next installment of this article about Navigating the Landmines of Diversity Leadership will focus on (a) the benefits of belonging to a diversity professional network, (b) establish allies within your organization, and (c) align the steering committee.

By Billy Vaughn, PhD–If you like this article you will love this one (Click Here).

In-house diversity professionals often ask me about how to address resistance to their diversity and inclusion program. These professionals describe managers who give a nod to the diversity program in leadership meetings, while making excuses for not being more actively involved in addressing the issues in their units. Others enthusiastically offer their opinions and suggestions on other topics, but disengage when the diversity goals are covered. A couple of the managers seem to be openly hostile towards the diversity program based on the reasons they give for not supporting it and the aggressive tone of their statements about it. Many managers may not openly show support negative statements about the diversity program, but you can see their faces light up while that “brave” individual speaks her or his mind.

Ironically, very few diversity professionals seeking my opinion voluntarily talk about the managers who support the diversity initiative until I bring it up. Diversity professionals appreciate the white male manager who sticks his neck out in support of the diversity initiative, especially when it is needed. However, these brave individuals tend to be under the radar when diversity professionals talk about diversity work. The devilish forces in the organization that are consumed with undermining the diversity program and its champions tend to consume many diversity professionals to the point of losing objectivity. That is one impact of the work on them.

The point is that diversity professionals must navigate the rugged terrain of uneven support, hostility, and apathy. A diversity professional of color or a woman must be concerned about appearing neutral, yet sensitive to the needs of people of color and women who look to them to make their lives in the organization better. It really takes skill to walk this tightrope. But, where would diversity professionals have learned it? Most of them do not have a degree in diversity leadership, cultural competence, or organizational development. They have learned how to succeed in the diversity business from the School of Hard Knocks. A few can get by with this trial by error training, but most continue to struggle at least in the areas of politics.

One diversity professional I have worked with closely for years continue to have a difficult time raising the bar of expectation with respect to her organization’s diversity program. She is so sensitive to the leadership’s own limitations with respect to openness to cultural diversity that she colludes in their undermining the program to a considerable extent. I probably would be as cautious if I were in her shoes? The only difference is that I have much more experience in navigating cultural politics and strategies to deal with them. She has to worry about not moving things too quickly to avoid making her supervisor too uneasy and getting the expected results. It is a difficult predicament that leaves diversity professionals feeling drained, ineffective, and isolated. Too often their experiences lead to illness and depression.

People need to feel successful. The diversity professional needs to feel that he or she is making a difference and that the organization’s leadership is supportive and willing to provide the authority needed to do the job as best as possible. While a considerable number of diversity professionals are great at navigating organizational politics, even the best can succumb to the pressures of an unsupportive leadership and limited authority.

This article is written to give you some insights into how to navigate the treacherous diversity leadership terrain. Here are the top ten things to try to impart to diversity leaders in my executive coaching work and certification training:

1.     Become a cultural diversity leadership expert and actively pursue continuous learning
2.     Be clear about your own diversity lenses
3.     Take the sting out of the diversity program in your business case
4.     Be clear about the diversity and inclusion ROI
5.     Have a really clear plan based on the big picture of the organization
6.     Get the leadership on the front lines of promoting diversity and inclusion
7.     Become part of a diversity professional network
8.     Establish allies within your organization
9.     Align the steering committee
10.  Request the authority needed to do your work effectively
11.  Neutralize diversity trouble makers
12.  Hold managers accountable
13.  Work with unit managers individually
14.  Avoid personalizing criticism of the diversity program
15.  Pat yourself on the back                                                        

The entire summary of the list of items is too lengthy for a single blog, so I will cover three items in five over the next five blog publications.
 

Become an expert who is actively involved in continuous learning
The most dangerous diversity professional is one who does not know what she or he doesn’t know. There isn’t a lot of room for error in the diversity business. One mistake and you will be treated like a Don Imus. A common negative evaluation of diversity professionals I hear is that they are unaware of personal biases towards white males. I have also noticed that many diversity professionals tend to treat negative evaluations that express this view suspiciously.

They rationalize the comment away by assuming that the participants’ own prejudices and resistance lead them to view the training negatively. Another rationalization is that the participants will “get it” some point in time after the training has ended because they are still processing what they have learned. The problem is that there is no point at which the participants are re-evaluated after then training to support this claim. I try to get diversity professionals to understand that each evaluation offers insight into what they need to learn to make participants’ experiences both interesting and rewarding. They can get great evaluations and push the participants towards higher levels of thinking about cultural diversity. It takes skill and continuous learning.

Developing your expertise will make you more credible, insightful, and valuable to your organization. You don’t need a doctorate. A great toolkit, a wealth of strategic skills, leadership ability, and mediation skills will safeguard you against the toxic aspects of the work. Complete a diversity professional certification course that offers you the practical tools you need to do the work. Avoid the out-dated programs that continue to focus on the basics as though organizations have not grown since the civil rights movement. You need contemporary strategies and sophisticated people skills that will get even the most resistant manager on the diversity bandwagon, or at least neutralize her or his impact on your efforts.

I have met a considerable number of professionals in my training experiences who say that they are always open to learning new things, but remain entrenched in their views about cultural diversity. There is a “yes, but . . . “ response to any suggestion that organizations have made progress beyond raising awareness and that placing blame on white domination is outdated. The white male or female who “gets it” from this perspective is the one who actively pursues social justice for people of color. I have also met a lot of professionals who really understand the importance of making connections with everyone—no matter where they are on the diversity learning curve. High performing diversity professionals are eager to learn how to embrace members of the dominant group without colluding in practices that maintain the status quo.

The point is that as your organization changes, you will need to change along with it to remain effective. This is true of any organizational leader. The continued success of the diversity program is directly related to how much you are growing and learning as a professional. America’s 2008 presidential race is a very good example of how the country as a whole has progressed socially, while its leaders lag behind in their ability to manage its diversity. Leaders are so behind that the presence of a white female and an African American male as the most serious contenders for the Democratic party nomination took them by surprise. No wonder America was also surprised. The two candidates and the media stepped all over each other’s multicultural toes because they were unprepared to manage diversity. Diversity leadership requires being ahead of the game which is not possible without continuous learning.

Be clear about your own diversity lenses
Many diversity professionals have been asked to accept the role after success in other areas of their company, such as sales, training, and management. A good proportion of them did not really want the job, but felt that it was a great opportunity to assist the organization in moving forward in this important area. They have been asked by the leadership, so it was especially difficult to turn down the request. Even if they were diversity pioneers and had considerable diversity training, that does not necessarily translate into an ability to lead a diversity initiative.

Our view of cultural diversity has been ingrained in us since birth. It is not easy to unlearn the biases and prejudices we are exposed in a society that gives us the double message of being tolerant in our attitude and exclusive in our behaviors. Liberals tend to bend over backwards for people who are different and too many people of color struggle with their own sense of sense of being treated unfairly. The diversity professional must be clear about any baggage he or she brings to the work.

Diversity professionals must understand the lenses through which they see cultural differences. A social justice set of lenses will have different consequences from an assimilationist worldview. Worldview impacts diversity education objectives, assessment, coaching, and the mission. Integrating the diversity education program into the organization requires understanding how the dominant culture’s lenses are more or less similar to your own as the diversity leader. The more there is a mismatch, the more challenges the professional faces in finding ways to integrate the two. This means that the diversity professional must be able to set aside personal values and beliefs about how the organization should be in order to learn about how to move the organization to higher stages of inclusion.

The diversity steering committee is a great resource for learning how to take multiple points of view. Make certain that your steering committee represent a cross section of the organization and as many different diversity lenses as possible. Developing your ability to embrace even the lenses that oppose your own will be an asset for increasing your diversity leadership effectiveness. Many diversity professionals, for example, make the mistake of avoiding people who overtly take issue with the diversity initiative. In my experience, the people who espouse everyone in the organization should meet “the same criteria” merit lenses express the views others share. If you can get an industrious, good intentioned person with these views on the committee, they often turn into one of your most important allies.

The diversity of lenses poses a challenge however. You will have to align the steering committee to make certain that the different lenses do not undermine decision making and program implementation. This is where your diversity leadership skills come in. Just make certain that you have done the work necessary to truly value the diversity of lenses among your team. Once their on the same page about why the work is important and their different lenses are valuable, you will have a team that helps you communicate the program better and integrate it into the organization more smoothly.

Take the sting out of the diversity program in your business case
The days of lawsuit fears in making a case for diversity programs are all but over in the United States. US Supreme Court decisions that place the burden on the plaintiff in civil rights suits and anti-affirmative action backlash have emboldened organizations in terms of compliance. However, today organizational leaders have a less controversial, potentially more acceptable rationale. The increased diversity in the recruitment pool and succession planning for baby boomer retirement have upstaged diversity programs as a critical talent management resource.

You must have a clear idea about your program’s return on investment (ROI) to make a modern case for diversity and inclusion. Doing so will not only get more people to support the program, especially management, but you will also be able to better articulate budget requests. Instead of making certain that everyone has been exposed to equal opportunity employment rules, the diversity professional must articulate how much the program will increase the talent needed for succession planning and manage its diversity.

You will also need to show how managers will be supported in the development of diversity management skills. Your ability to coach them and cheer their efforts will be a crucial part of the business case. Work with the human resource office, training, and organizational development to develop an integrated approach to succession planning and talent management.

I personally like to engage diversity professionals in considering ways their expertise adds value to the organization. They are stretched to consider what it would take to develop talent management strategies for diversity and inclusion that the other departments will envy. The result is that the diversity office is seen as a critical component in the organization’s efforts to address productivity challenges. In this way, the business case is an opportunity to show how the diversity office plays a crucial role in organizational effectiveness.

In summary, the diversity professional’s job is filled with opportunity and landmines. Continuous learning is critical to stay on top of the fast-moving, ever-changing aspects of diversity work. Understanding your diversity lenses that impact how to do the work and embraces the range of other lenses will increase your capacity to deliver high impact diversity education programs. Your business case for diversity education will be more powerful to the extent that you put time and effort into understanding how the program can add value to the organization’s productivity.

The next installment of this article about Navigating the Landmines of Diversity Leadership will focus on how to (a) Be clear about the diversity and inclusion ROI, (c) Having a really clear plan based on the big picture of the organization, and (c) Getting the leadership on the front lines of promoting diversity and inclusion.