People Matters: The Moment To Fix The DE&I Equation - March 2021 by People Matters

VOL XII / ISSUE 3 / march 2021

BIG INTERVIEW Karima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, AXA Group

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Can we 'fix' the DE&I equation?

mid all the chaos and disruption caused by the pandemic, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) plans across organizations have been tossed aside. COVID-19 has revealed the cracks in our societal and corporate outlook on diversity like never before. A lot of jobs related to diversity roles were shed in the early months of the crisis. However, this was followed by a sudden surge in hiring diversity officers globally. The equation still looks topsy-turvy because DE&I is more than about meeting numbers, it’s about making your investment pay off. Often diversity and inclu| march 2021

sion strategies are found disconnected from business priorities, instead, performance goals are relegated to the realm of HR. Over the past few months, we see a renewed vigor on diversity with nearly all major corporations today are in a dialogue at the C-suite and Board of Directors level to double down their DE&I efforts. After all, the business case for diversity is clear. What is critical now is to build on the momentum we gained, to make sure the impact is far-reaching in driving innovation, enabling economic growth and parity. The door is now open for a diverse workforce with jobs being redesigned and new practices being introduced. Lack of clear remote working options was one of the factors that historically kept a large number of women away from the job market in the pre-COVID-19 times. Today, organizations have the opportunity to tap into a broader range of potential candidate pools, previously untapped, to contribute to the economy. With the crisis nudging even some of the conservative organizations to consider work-from-home, diversity advocates see a more balanced workforce in the days to come. People who can’t afford transportation to work suddenly find ways to become part of the workforce. While we are still

learning about the sustainability of the new work-fromanywhere model, companies now have the option to hire and retain best talent from around the world. Just as we’ve seen a dramatic pivot towards digital transformation, there’s absolutely room for the same thing to happen in terms of diversity and inclusion in the workforce. Diversity and inclusion is not a one-time event, just like tech upgradation, it requires consistent and sustained effort and commitment throughout the organization starting at the top. In the end, our goal should be to build a future workforce that champions racial equity, values different backgrounds, and celebrates unique perspectives. This is a step-up call for businesses and society at large. There is a clear need for the public and private sector to ensure the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on women globally is not ignored and we remain committed to driving gender equity in our companies and society. So, how do you leverage this opportune moment to ensure your diversity efforts pay off ? Change needs to start at the top with leadership highlighting DE&I as equally weighted priorities. And it should start with asking the right set of questions. Are your employees feeling excluded, and have

future of work and how the pandemic has provided the opportunity for organizations worldwide to evaluate their digital footprints and accelerate their digital transformation plans from years down to a matter of days/ weeks. People Matters BeNext, our cohort-based certification program, launches three new courses on Diversity, Inclusion. The programs aim at complimenting your DE&I efforts and accelerating individual and structural shifts within your organization. Diversity, Inclusion & Balance Program: Levelling the Workplace Leading Inclusive Teams (10th May to 4th June); Diversity, Inclusion & Balance Program: Everyone’s Duty Rethinking Men’s ability to lead Organisations towards Gender-Balanced (7th June to 2nd July); and Diversity, Inclusion & Balance Program: Promoting Women (12h July to 6th August). For enrollment, you can reach out to sumali. purkyastha@gopeoplematters.com As always, we would be happy to hear your views, comments, and suggestions regarding our stories.

THE COVER STORY (BEHIND THE SCENE)

I’m puzzled.

Rubiks cube, is puzzling me too...

I want the real puzzles back!

Different coloured puzzles please...

M > @Ester_Matters F > estermartinez > ester.martinez@peoplematters.in

VOL XII / ISSUE 3 / march 2021

Happy Reading! Esther Martinez Hernandez Editor-in-Chief follow

From the Editor’s Desk

you explored the reasons behind? Are you providing learning opportunities and safe spaces so people can share their challenges? Could you be doing more to hire from talent pools you’ve previously excluded? Will workplace diversity initiatives survive in a postCOVID-19 era? How can diversity give your company a competitive edge? Our cover story of this issue digs deep into this to find out the answers. For the Big Interview, we have Karima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, AXA Group, who shares that the remote working transformation is not a parenthesis, it is a profound trend that lays the foundations for a new working environment while sharing how AXA plans to combine the best of remote and office working to offer their employees a hybrid organization. We also have an interview with Schneider Electric's Head of HR for Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei, Karen Lim, who gives a few quick pointers on how the company views gender equality; and an interaction with Playboy’s Chief People Officer on equality, workplace, and the brand legacy. This issue also features an exclusive interview with Jeetu Patel, SVP and General Manager, Security & Applications, Cisco, who shares intriguing insights on the

PHEW!

BIG INTERVIEW Karima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, AXA Group

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march 2021 |

C O N TE N TS

contents

The moment to fix the DE&I equation

volu m e xii issue 3

Matt Krentz, Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion and Leadership Chair at Boston Consulting Group

Dorothy Yiu, Co-founder and head of product development, technology, customer success, and design - EngageRocket

Preet Grewal, Head of Inclusion & Diversity, JAPAC, Twitter

Clinton Wingrove, Director of www.WantToBeGreatManager.com and www.ClintonHR.com

Margot Slattery, Global Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer, Sodexo Group

Richard Smith, Ph.D, Professor at Johns Hopkins University where he also serves as Vice Dean, Corporate and Global Partnerships at the Carey Business School

Eric Goh, VP & MD, Singapore, Dell Technologies

Sreekanth K Arimanithaya, Leader of Global Talent and Enablement Services for EY Global Delivery Services (Argentina, India, Poland, China, Philippines, and the United Kingdom)

cover story

expert views

Julie Coffman, Partner and the Chief Diversity Officer at Bain & Company

Sunny Kaila, Founder & Global CEO at IT By Design

Sandra Andrews, Director for Human Resources, at Flex India

Dr. Ritu Anand, Chief Leadership & Diversity Officer, Tata Consultancy Services

Andreas Sungaimin, SVP, Human Capital & Development, Pan Pacific Hotels Group

Editor-in-Chief

Manager - research & Content

Esther Martinez Hernandez

Anushree Sharma

managing Editor

Assistant ManagerS - Content

Yasmin Taj

Bhavna Sarin | Neelanjana Mazumdar

Associate Editor - Print & Online

Design & Production

Mastufa Ahmed

Shinto Kallattu

Manager - design, photography, and production

Digital Head

Marta Martinez

Rubi Taj rubi.taj@peoplematters.in +91 (124) 4148102

Jerry Moses

Senior Features Writer

Shweta Modgil

Features Writer

Mint Kang

Prakash Shahi General Manager, Sales

Manager - Content

m a r c h 20 2 1

Manager, Sales

Saloni Gulati saloni.gulati@peoplematters.in +91 (124) 4148102

| march 2021

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This issue of People matters contains 111 pages including cover

the big Interview

‘Remote work’ is a profound trend that lays the foundations for a new working environment

To help women perform, give them flexibility Carmella Galasso, Head,Women in Management mentorship program for Australia and New Zealand Banking Group By Mint Kang

Karima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, AXA Group By Mastufa Ahmed

14 Wo r k p l a c e Dive r si t y

Driving a KPI-led diversity agenda

40 I n t e r vie w

By Anushree Sharma 28 L e a d e r s h i p

Inclusion is not only the right thing to do, it actually pays off

Meiyea Neo, HR Director APAC, Zendesk By Shweta Modgil

Rethinking your workforce strategies

‘Diversity cannot exist in isolation from inclusion and meritocracy’

Tanushree Mishra, People Director – India & South East Asia at AB InBev By Bhavna Sarin

I believe with certainty that the future of work is hybrid

102 I n t e r vie w

Jeetu Patel, SVP and General Manager, Security & Applications, Cisco By Mastufa Ahmed

Make use of this time to reboot learning

C O N TE N TS

Fair is foul – if profit’s the purpose

By Visty Banaji, Founder and CEO of Banner Global Consulting (BGC)

32 I n t e r vie w

92 I n t e r vie w

96 T h e r o a d less t r a velle d

By Prabir Jha, A distinguished HR strategist and is the Founder & CEO of Prabir Jha People Advisory

Interview

S V Kiran, Senior Vice President & Head - Human Resources, Apollo Hospitals By Jerry Moses

36 S kill Develo p m e n t

Adapting to automation

By Jeffrey Pfeffer, Chair professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University and M Muneer, MD of CustomerLab and Co-Founder of the non-profit Medici Institute

90 Dive r si t y

COVID-19 offered opportunities to promote DE&I agenda

Karen Lim, Schneider Electric’s Head of HR Resources for Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei By Mint Kang

regulars

02 From the Editor’s Desk 06 Letters of the month 08 Quick Reads 13 Rapid-Fire 106 Knowledge + Networking 108 Blogosphere

Featured In this issue Andreas Sungaimin Carmella Galasso Eric Goh Jeetu Patel Julie Coffman Karen Lim Karima Silvent SV Kiran Lim Chee Gay

Margot Slattery Matt Krentz Meiyea Neo Preet Grewal Dr. Ritu Anand Sandra Andrews Sunny Kaila Tanushree Mishra

CONTRIBUTORS to this issue Clinton Wingrove Dorothy Yiu Jeffrey Pfeffer Julie Diamond M Muneer

Prabir Jha Richard Smith Sreekanth K Arimanithaya Visty Banaji

march 2021 |

Letters of the month

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Remote Work will continue but not evenly

Interesting perspective on the gradual merging of the functions of the COO and the CHRO. 2021 has sure brought about a new era of jobs especially with digital dictating the way work is done. Many companies are now open to considering permanent work from home options or even flexi-working which sure will not be an overnight shift, unlike 2020. However, the last year did make a strong business case for remote work, and there is no doubt on the mutual benefits both employers and employees can offer each other under such a setup. The degree to which employers can incorporate remote work into their business will surely vary and remain uneven. Nonetheless, here’s an opportunity to challenge age-old work practices and rethink what the future of work looks like, one that takes into consideration the inputs and preferences of both employers and employees, paving the way for a more productive and celebrated work environment. - Ayan Chatterjee

The dark side of the moon: Negative leadership behaviors to avoid

The way leaders handled themselves, their businesses, and their people in 2020 spoke volumes about their efficiency and effectiveness as a leader, be it in terms of decision-making, connecting with the team virtually, being approachable, and even sharing difficult decisions with the larger team about how the circumstances were impacting business and people. While many were able to drive results, the impact on culture and people remained way below on the priority list for many, with lasting effects on the well-being, productivity, and psychological safety of the workforce. It is time to take stock and rectify leadership behaviors that remain detrimental to the workforce and business going forward.

- jBanerjee

| march 2021

FEBRUARY 2021 issue

The new approach to performance management

“Only 7.3% of people are not doing tasks outside the job they had been hired for.” And yet, we are still following draconian methodologies of reviewing performance. It is one thing to say reviews today are career conversations but another to actually conduct them like one. The entire ‘own your growth’ piece has begun to seem like a scam where some employers want to shed every grain of responsibility. A more ideal setup is open conversations about how much employees are not just growing on their career path but the horizontal addition of responsibilities they take on that do not necessarily align with their goals and rewarding those contributions as well.

- Madana Kumar

Interact with People Matters

Focus on organizational goal achievement vs goal measurement

- Mohit Sethi

Seven critical components of new performance management

In the backdrop of a need to redesign performance management systems, the seven components serve as a hygiene check to ensure all bases are covered. Performance Management today needs to be more holistic, going beyond blocking 30minutes on the calendar. It needs to be a cumulative effort of conversations, tools, and strategies to reflect on the past and plan for the future. Are organizations aware and equipped to factor that in as they up their performance management strategies? Only time will tell! - Rajeev Sharma

2020: The year the mask was removed

A good reflection on how humanity was forced to put on the visible mask and do away with the invisible one, becoming more cognizant of existing realities and inequities. The year was sure a year that brought greater responsibility about our well-being, and despite the global population striving to keep coronavirus at bay, the mental stress that became consequent to the way we shifted our work and home life remained largely ignored. There are thankfully more open conversations about mental well-being, however, it appears to get lost somewhere to work-induced stress, taking away what it truly encapsulates, which appears far-fetched to the human mind that today grapples with adjusting to the new reality.

- Mayur Satyavrat

Soft skills have come to the fore and are intrinsically harder to measure Agree with Mark on connection and transparency being key drivers of morale, especially in a remote or even hybrid setup. There is no discounting the setback of not meeting colleagues and leaders every day and gaining a sense of comfort from the conversations that take place at the workplace. Despite numerous measures to create a digital organizational culture, it is challenging to replicate the confidence that employees find when hearing their leaders speak in-person, be it about feedback, growth plans, or even an informal connect. - S. Viswanathan

Sasha Wight @_sashatweets Today I’m discussing safe return to work strategies with @PeopleMatters2 and @ servicenow ... from the office! Looking forward to it. TheConversationalist @stellarsearch 'Workplace Trends You Must Know About This Year’ featured on @PeopleMatters2 is about how the past year has transformed #HR & #hiring shifts in 2021 Seelan Nayagam @Seelanatwork Love accepts us as us, it creates an environment in which we feel we are understood and accepted. For a leader, it is of prime importance to create an environment in which authenticity is encouraged. Learn more with @PeopleMatters2. #leadership ServiceNow Asia @ServiceNowAsia 2021 will be the year to lock in the gains, @GovTechSG's DN Prasad says to @ PeopleMatters2. Greater priority and focus on mental health also on the radar for organisations: spr.ly/6014H9lNo.

l e t tqeur isc okf r t heea m d os n t h

Shorter milestones and frequent discussions will soon be the way reviews are performed. With agile goals taking precedence over annual goals to meet dynamic shifts of the business climate, it will be crucial to align performance reviews with a similar timeline as well. Such conversations will be crucial to both organizational health as well as employee’s professional growth. The relevance of frequency of customer feedback to adapt products will mirror in sharing and receiving feedback with employees on their performance as well as the functioning of the organization. There is no turning back now.

People Matters values your feedback. Write to us with your suggestions and ideas at editorial@peoplematters.in

Franziska Krueger @KruegerFranzi Culture is key when it comes to attracting and retaining a diverse pool of talent - here are six tips on how to drive a culture of #inclusion via @PeopleMatters2: buff. ly/3p6L7vv Rahul Sharma @Rahul_Achaar Insightful piece in @PeopleMatters2 magazine on how organisations can transition from a Performance Management System to a Performance Development System Sourish Mohan Mitra @sourish247 If you aspire to be a #leader early in life or wondering whether #youngworkers are capable of #leadershiproles roles, take your cues from my article published by @ PeopleMatters2 Very grateful to @Yasminetaj & @neelmaz06 follow

M > @PeopleMatters2

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march 2021 |

Learning & Development

Udemy and Betterworks blend Learning and Performance Betterworks, the strategy execution enterprise software company, announced a new approach to employee development by integrating its OKR platform with Udemy for Business, an enterprise learning platform powered by Udemy, the global marketplace for learning and teaching online. Learning is essential to the employee experience and is a r e a d s

Employee Relations

q u i c k

110,000+ locals hired under govt scheme in 2020

Hybrid Workplace

Salesforce announces new ‘Work from Anywhere’ plan for its global workforce

Cloud computing giant Salesforce declared the “9-to-5 workday is dead” and introduced a new three-part model giving their employees a choice over how and when they return to the office. Salesforce employs around 50,000 people globally and, while the plans suggest most of these workers will return to the workplace in some capacity in the future, there are also different strategies and ambitious approaches regarding these latest models. 8

key contributor to employee and enterprise agility. The new product integration allows employees to search, discover, and launch Udemy for Business courses from within the Betterworks interface as well as link learning progress and outcomes to measurable goals. With this new approach, learning becomes a powerful and visible tool for achieving business objectives across organizations.

| march 2021

The Singapore government's S$1 billion Jobs Growth Incentive Scheme saw a take-up rate of about 110,000 local hires in the first two months of its effective period last year, according to the Ministry of Manpower. Approximately half of them were aged 40 and above, and the largest proportion of hires—about 17,800, or 16 percent of the total—were made by companies in the food services sector. Wholesale trade and professional services accounted for another 9,800 and 8,400 hires respectively.

Employee Engagement

Only 1% of workers want to return to the office: Survey

A survey by GitLab towards the end of 2020 has found that although 56 percent of workers began remote work for the first time last year, only one percent actually want to return to the office once COVID-19 restrictions are lifted. The report attributes this to respondents having been able to successfully optimize their living situations to spend more time with family or community, to improve their health and exercise arrangements, or even to save money. However, it should be noted that the vast majority of the survey's respondents are already wellpositioned for remote work.

Skilling

Pluralsight and Degreed Partner on upskilling programs

Pluralsight, the technology workforce development company, has partnered with the upskilling platform Degreed.

Together, they’ll deliver an integrated experience to help customers better measure and track technology-upskilling efforts within the Degreed experience. Historically, Pluralsight’s leading technology content has been able to integrate into any Degreed deployment. The integrated content experience is now enhanced by incorporating assessment data from Pluralsight’s Skill IQ into Degreed’s skill analytics to give Pluralsight’s enterprise customers enhanced visibility into individual and team technology skills.

The fintech startup Qapita that provides software to manage company's equity, has secured an undisclosed strategic investment from venture investor, East Ventures. The funds will be used to strengthen the team in Singapore, India, and Indonesia, and to accelerate product development and build its client base. The new funding follows a US$1.8 million seed round by Vulcan Capital and other investors such as Koh Boon Hwee, the Kuok family office K3 Ventures, and partners of the NorthStar Group.

HR Technology

Employee lifecycle management software platform WorkStep raises $17 Mn Employee Lifecycle Management software platform WorkStep, announced $17 Mn in funding led by FirstMark Capital, with additional participation from previous investor and strategic partner, Prologis Ventures. The infusion of capital, a combination of Seed ($6.5 Mn) and Series A ($10.5 million) funding, will be used to grow the team and continue to improve and expand its technology.

Skillsoft, a player in digital learning announces it is integrating tools and training with Microsoft Viva, which Microsoft launched recently. The integration of Skillsoft’s content, comprising 180,000+ learning assets, adds a collection of learning experiences, expands the Microsoft Viva Learning library, and empowers Microsoft Teams users to hone their skills by searching for and consuming relevant learning content when and where it matters most – in the context of their work. Organizations can now access and manage their digital content in a single place, directly alongside the work and communications tools their employees are already using. Microsoft Viva also allows managers to assign and track learning progress, while organizations can integrate content from Skillsoft and other learning providers in one location.

march 2021 |

r e a d s

Equity management platform Qapita bags funding from East Ventures

Skillsoft integrates with Microsoft Viva

q u i c k

Training & Development

Work Tech

newsmaker of the month

q u i c k

r e a d s

Ngozi Iweala is World Trade Organization’s new Director-General

igeria's Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala made history as the newly appointed World Trade Organization head. She will be the first female and the first African in the history of the trade body to hold a four-year term as the Director-General. The World Trade Organization is an intergovernmental body that serves as a forum for governments to negotiate trade agreements. It is a place for them to settle disputes and sort out any trade problems.

| march 2021

Iweala’s appointment comes at a time when many global economies have been dealt with a severe blow due to the pandemic. And the WTO also faces criticism over the negative ramifications of globalization and capitalism in the developing world. A former Nigerian Finance Minister, Iweala was also a senior World Bank executive. “The WTO can contribute so much more to helping stop the pandemic,” she said. “No one is safe until everyone is safe. Vaccine nationalism at this time just will not pay, because the variants are coming. If other countries are not immunized, it will just be a blowback,” she said. “It's unconscionable that people will be dying elsewhere, waiting in a queue, when we have the technology.” She also noted that members should accelerate efforts to lift export restrictions slowing trade in needed medicines and supplies. “A very top priority for me would be to make sure that prior to the very important ministerial conference ... that we come to solutions as to how the WTO can make vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics accessible in an equitable and affordable fashion to all countries, particularly to poor countries.” She is a Harvard-educated economist and holds a Ph.D. from MIT. And is viewed by experts as having much “loftier goals” to reform the WTO – from finding ways to ensure that small developing countries benefit from global trade as much as wealthy countries. Addressing challenges with GATT (an international trade agreement that served as a precursor to the WTO) and Climate change related issues – although it isn’t officially in the scope of the agency.

Nigeria's Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala becomes the first female to head WTO

Nigeria's Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was appointed as the first female and first African head of the World Trade Organization. The global trade body called a virtual special general council meeting at which member states officially selected the former Nigerian Finance Minister and World Bank veteran as its new Director-General. HSBC appoints Celine Herweijer as Group Chief Sustainability Officer

KPMG UK has appointed its first female leaders in its 150-year history, replacing boss Bill Michael who was forced to step aside. Bina Mehta has been asked to step in as acting Chairman and Mary O'Connor will take over Michael's day-to-day executive responsibilities as acting senior partner. It is the first time in KPMG’s 150-year history that either role has been held by a woman. Tata Motors names new CEO & MD

Tata Motors Limited has announced Marc Llistosella as the new Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of the

Digital infrastructure conglomerate Vertiv Holdings has named Stephen Liang its Chief Technology Officer, a newly created role responsible for aligning and prioritizing technology strategies with market trends and customers’ needs. Stephen Liang will lead the digital infrastructure giant's technology strategies and coordinate its R&D efforts. Global Wind Energy Council announces new COO

The Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) announced that it has appointed Stewart Mullin, a former global executive of MHI Vestas, as its first Chief Operating Officer. He will lead the industry association's global operations, including its regional offices for Asia, India, and China. GWEC represents the entire wind energy sector worldwide, with members across the supply chain in over 80 countries.

r e a d s

KPMG appoints first female leaders in 150 years

Vertiv Holdings names new Chief Technology Officer

q u i c k

HSBC Holdings announces the appointment of Dr. Celine Herweijer as Group Chief Sustainability Officer, effective July 2021, and reporting to Noel Quinn, HSBC, Group CEO. She joins from PwC, where she has held roles including leading PwC’s Global Innovation and Sustainability capability and acting as PwC’s Global Climate Change Leader. As a partner in the UK firm, Celine has been at the forefront of PwC’s global work on sustainability and climate change for over a decade.

company effective July 1, 2021. He will take over from the incumbent Guenter Butschek, who has preferred to relocate to Germany, his native place. Llistosella was most recently the President and CEO of Fuso Truck and Bus Corporation and head of Daimler Trucks in Asia. He was earlier the MD and CEO of Daimler India Commercial Vehicles Pvt Ltd.

SAP promotes Paul Marriott as new APJ President

SAP SE announced the appointment of Paul Marriott as President for Asia Pacific Japan (APJ). Marriott will be responsible for leading and driving SAP’s growth spanning Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Korea, the Indian subcontinent, and Southeast Asia. He will report to Scott Russell, SAP Executive Board member, Customer Success. Marriott was most recently the region’s march 2021 |

UiPath appoints Rick Harshman to lead company’s Asia Pacific and Japan Region

Chief Operating Officer (COO) where he played a key role in developing the workforce of tomorrow and accelerating cloud growth and customer success.

q u i c k

r e a d s

HKEX appoints JP Morgan CEO as new Chief Executive

The Hong Kong stock exchange on February 9 announced the appointment of Alejandro Nicolas Aguzin as Chief Executive of HKEX, effective from May 24, 2021, to May 23, 2024, and subject to the approval of the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission. The appointment concludes the brief search that followed former CE Charles Li's retirement on December 31, 2020. Aguzin will take over from the interim CE, Calvin Tai. Aguzin is presently the Chief Executive Officer of JP Morgan’s International Private Bank. Prior to this, he was the Chairman and CEO of JP Morgan's Asia Pacific business from 2012 to 2020, and before that the CEO of the Latin America business. Xerox appoints JacquesEdouard Gueden EVP and President, EMEA Operations

Xerox Holdings Corporation announced Jacques-Edouard Gueden as Executive Vice President and President of Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA) Operations, a role he has filled on an interim basis since the end of September. He reports to John Visentin, Xerox Vice Chairman, and CEO. Gueden, a 32-year company veteran, has served in various leadership positions of increasing responsibility in sales and marketing during his career. Most recently, he served as president of France, Belgium, and Luxembourg. Prior to that, Gueden served as senior vice president of EMEA Business Operations and Marketing. 12

| march 2021

UiPath, an enterprise Robotic Process Automation (RPA) software company, announced that Rick Harshman has joined the Company as Senior Vice President and Managing Director of Asia Pacific and Japan, effective immediately. Harshman joins UiPath from Google Cloud, where most recently he served as Managing Director of Asia Pacific. In that role, he led all revenue and go-to-market operations for Google Cloud, including Google Cloud Platform and Google Workspace (Gmail, Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drive, Hangouts), in the Asia Pacific region. Aviva Investors appoints Daniel McHugh as CIO, Real Assets

Aviva Investors, the global asset management business of Aviva plc has appointed Daniel McHugh as Chief Investment Officer of its £47.3 billion Real Assets business 1. This follows the appointment in January of former Real Assets CIO, Mark Versey, as Chief Executive Officer, Aviva Investors. In his new role, Daniel will report to Mark Versey and will be responsible for the strategy and growth of Aviva Investors’ integrated Real Assets business, encompassing Real Estate, Infrastructure, and Private Debt. ING appoints Anne-Sophie Castelnau global head of Sustainability

Anne-Sophie Castelnau has been appointed ING’s global head of Sustainability on 1 April 2021. She will succeed Amin Mansour, who fulfilled the role on an interim basis. Anne-Sophie is currently head of Wholesale Banking for ING in France. Anne-Sophie Castelnau (French) joined ING in France in 2005. Before she became head of Wholesale Banking in France, she held various senior management positions including Head of Corporate Lending and head of Client Coverage.

eleven Questions

Rapid-Fire

interview

Lim Chee Gay

EVP Human Resources, TDCX By Neelanjana Mazumdar

One thing that makes you passionate about HR?

How do you make decisions when you don’t have all the necessary information?

- Impact the lives of others positively - Witness our staff or mentees grow personally and professionally

Data-Driven and ability to balance facts and judgment

What was the turning point of your life as an HR professional? - Ability to transform HR from outside in. - Have the opportunities to influence and transform HR policies and practices in the organization

Dave Ulrich

My advice for aspiring HR professionals is – be passionate in business and employee growth

Touchless processes through digitalization, RPA, and AI. Our tagline is #augmentedHR

3 key talent priorities for TDCX, currently?

Digitalization of all HR Processes – Touchless and Zero Defect Talent analysis, insights, and prediction of the right hire Enhance employee experience

Passionate in business and employee growth

One tech/innovation that will transform HR?

Your advice for aspiring HR professionals?

r a p i d - f i r e

One leader you closely follow and one hallmark of that leader

HR as a business partner or HR as a business driver?

HR as a business driver – addvalue to organization growth

Appraisals based on rating or rating-less performance management?

Continuous performance development and feedback – frequent feedback on performance

One question you ask in every interview?

If I ask your peers and subordinates about your strengths, what do you think they will describe you? What do you know about our company, and why do you want to work here?

What's your favorite holiday destination? One reason why? San Francisco. The weather, scenery, food, and drink march 2021 |

Workpla ce Dive rs ity

Driving a KPI-led diversity agenda 14

| march 2021

The mojo for achieving diversity is no different from the steps necessary to achieve other business goals, according to a research conducted by a Stanford and Harvard professor, David Pedulla By Anushree Sharma

Why are we not making progress?

Despite the heightened commitment, the reason for the dissonance between the efforts and outcomes is the ignorance of organizations to put metrics to Diversity & Inclusion. According to a very popular research conducted by a Stanford and Harvard professor, David Pedulla, “What Works,” argues that the mojo for achieving diversity is no different from the steps necessary to achieve other business goals. In order to change behavior, firms must develop appropriate goals and metrics, share them with stakeholders, and embrace accountability for outcomes. Lorraine Hariton, President & CEO, Catalyst shares, “Measurement is a critical component of

creating an environment of diversity, equity, and inclusion in workplaces that allow all employees to thrive. You cannot improve what you cannot measure.” In fact, recently in September 2020, 56 organizations, including Accenture, Bank of America, Chevron, Deloitte, EY, Google, KPMG LLP, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, PwC, Uber, and Visa, have joined the Gender and Diversity KPI Alliance (GDKA) to support the adoption and use of a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure gender and diversity in their companies and organizations.

While organizations around the world understand the need for diversity and are putting efforts to create a more diverse and inclusive work (workplaces), the progress doesn’t seem to be much

Workplace Dive rs ity

n the wake of major social and political changes over the past decades, leading companies are taking steps to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion. There are several studies that suggest that diverse companies outperform others with more homogenous demographics, have lower volatility, a better return on equity, and have higher degrees of creativity and cognitive conflict during the decision-making process. While organizations around the world understand the need for diversity and are putting efforts to create a more diverse and inclusive work (workplaces), the progress doesn’t seem to be much. Programs designed to increase diversity and inclusion in the workplace often fail.

Why do we need to track data and metrics?

Tracking data and metrics can help organizations not only track the impact of their DE&I programs but also help the relevant stakeholders to stay accountable and create a transparent work culture. Further, it also helps: • Assess where diversity problems are—recruitment, hiring, promotion, pay, and/or retention. • Develop diversity goals and make timelines for reaching them. • Keeping track of discriminamarch 2021 |

tion complaints and outcomes helps firms to develop routines and practices to restore dignity, demonstrate the commitment to equal opportunities, and save on the cost and trauma of legal solutions. • Allow stakeholders to hold top management accountable for outcomes

What organizations should measure to move the needle?

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The above GDKA signatory companies commit to using or working to implement three key performance indicators to evaluate diversity in their organization:

Tracking data and metrics can help organizations not only measure the impact of their DE&I programs but also help the relevant stakeholders to stay accountable and create a transparent work culture

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• Percentage of representation on an organization’s board. • Percentage of representation by employee category. • Pay equality: the ratio of compensation by employee category (e.g., equal pay for equal work). • The KPIs focus on the pipeline of women and underrepresented groups moving through the organization, better enabling organizations to track their progress. However, if one consults BCG’s five key gender diversity metrics– recruitment, pay, representation, retention & advancement, we can frame our KPIs and metrics as mentioned in the table on the next page.

Who should be monitoring the progress?

Organizations need to empower a diversity leader or assemble a DE&I team that will track diversity numbers, identify gender and racial disparities, and devise

Metrics

Recruitment

• Number of female applicants • External female leadership appointments • Number of females hired in different roles, functions, and levels

Pay

• Employee perception on fair pay • Earnings of female and male employees on the same level and roles

Growth

• Number of women promoted in a year • Number of women promoted on top • Number of women joined post maternity break

Leadership

• Number of women promoted to CXO level • Number of external female leadership appointments • Number of women representing the leadership of a function besides administrative function such as Human Resources or Marketing.

Retention

• Attrition percentage of women and men at each role and level • Reason for leaving for different dimensions of diversity

Workplace Dive rs ity

Dimensions

* In this metrics table, we have used females as one of the dimensions of diversity. One can apply these metrics to track the progress of other dimensions of diversity– age, race, ethnicity, gender, physical ability, and sexual orientation.

hiring and promotion plans for addressing them. Once it is someone’s full-time job to monitor diversity and inclusion in the company, that person will help the company make progress toward its diversity goals. If no one is accountable, change is unlikely. Involving managers at all levels to take ownership of diversity goals is an even more prudent accountability strategy, and it is much more effective than threatening them with legal action or treating diversity goals as distractions from core business goals. By collecting and analyzing data on diversity over time, comparing those numbers to the numbers at other organizations, and sharing them with key stakeholders, companies can increase

accountability and transparency around diversity issues. These goals can further be made accessible to key internal and external stakeholders to promote accountability. However, your KPI-led diversity agenda can only work if the data are appropriately analyzed, progress and roadblocks are continually identified, and key stakeholders are able to inspect, measure and explore a way forward. References:

1. Pedulla, D. (2020). Diversity and Inclusion Efforts That Really Work. Harvard Business Review. 2. www.umass.edu. (n.d.). Metrics, Accountability, and Transparency: A Simple Recipe to Increase Diversity and Reduce Bias | Center for Employment Equity | UMass Amherst. 3. Catalyst. (n.d.). Global Corporations Agree to Adopt Set of Key Performance Indicators to Measure and Improve Diversity. 4. BCG. (n.d.). Tracking & Measuring Diversity. march 2021 |

‘Remote work’ is a profound trend that lays the foundations for a new working environment: Our plan for the future is to combine the best of remote and office working to offer our employees a hybrid organization, says Karima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, AXA Group, in an exclusive interaction with People Matters By Mastufa Ahmed

arima Silvent, Chief Human Resources Officer, graduated from Institut d’Etudes Politiques (IEP) in 1995 and from the Ecole Nationale d’Administration (ENA). In 1997, she entered the French Ministry of Employment and Health as Deputy and then Head of the National Fund for Employment, working on employment reforms as well as helping private companies implement HR policies. In 2002, she joined the French state-owned Health Service (Assistance Publique - Hôpitaux de Paris) as Deputy Human Resources Director. In 2007, she moved to Korian, a private health group (clinics, retirement homes), first as Group HR Director and in 2011 as COO for the French Business Line. In

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AXA Group’s Global CHRO

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April 2012, she joined GIE AXA as Global HR Business Partner for COO functions (Operations, IT, Marketing, and Distribution). September 2013, she became Global HR Director in charge of workforce transformation, culture, employer brand, and recruiting and also in charge of talent and executive career management for support functions professional families. Karima was appointed Human Resources Director and Member of the Executive Committee of AXA France in July 2016. Since December 2017, Karima Silvent has been the Chief Human Resources Officer of AXA Group and a member of AXA’s Management Committee since September 2019. Here are the excerpts of the interview.

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There has been a lot of discussions and predictions on the future of work trends --from remote work, decentralized workforce, increased focus on innovation, to employee wellbeing. What trends would you bet on most? The COVID-19 pandemic has been a tipping point in our working methods. This unprecedented crisis has dramatically accelerated the transformation of our working habits, redistributing trends that we thought would take much longer to materialize.

The remote working transformation is not a parenthesis, it is a profound trend that lays the foundations for a new working environment. A global survey of our employees revealed that 90 percent of them now want to work from home regularly The remote working transformation is not a parenthesis, it is a profound trend that lays the foundations for a new working environment. A global survey of our employees revealed that 90 percent of them now want to work from home on a regular basis. But the crisis has also reminded us of the importance of having places in which we can meet and work together. This is why our vision for the future of work at AXA – which we call Smart Working – combines remote working and regular office presence so that our teams can

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get the best of both. All our entities will adopt this hybrid organization by 2023. This crisis also put employees’ physical and mental health at the top of the corporate agenda; a trend that we believe is here to stay. All our entities around the globe are currently implementing a global health and wellbeing program to provide our employees with the best solutions to preserve and improve their health conditions. This includes medical check-ups, free access to telemedicine, vaccination campaigns but also a free psychological platform, accessible 24/7.

The pandemic has posed new opportunities amid challenges. The crisis for sure has also forced organizations to embrace "purpose ". Should purpose be at the core of every sensible organization adapting to a post-COVID world? The COVID-19 crisis has shown that insurance has a critical role to protect societies and drive economic growth. This conviction has become clear to us all in our reflections on our purpose, which we presented during our shareholders’ meeting last June. Encapsulated in one sentence, "Acting for human progress by protecting what matters", it expresses who we are and defines our mission as insurers. As we navigate a complex and unprecedented crisis, this purpose acts as a compass. It reflects our commitment to support our customers and help societies meet the major chal-

lenges of our times. It also expresses our unwavering faith in science and progress, which we believe holds the solution to the pandemic challenges.

diverse workplace is key to our success as a company.

What was the trigger behind your strategy of remote working in the pre-pandemic days? Did the experience help you during this crisis time? Remote working was not new at AXA. Before the COVID-19 crisis, 38 percent of our employees were already working remotely on a regular basis, and in some entities, this rate was as high as 60 percent. Most employees already benefitted from a 100 percent digital work environment, remote access to the Group’s IT systems, and collaborative tools. This experience and digital maturity were key to ensure the continuity of our operations during the crisis. In just a few days, we were able to move our entire 160,000 employees to remote working, while leveraging our digital channels to assist our clients. At the height of the crisis, we recorded nearly three million virtual calls per week and 75,000 simultaneous remote connections to our servers. That's unprecedented.

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It’s widely acknowledged that organizations pursue diversity and inclusion not just for ethical reasons, but also to gain competitive edge. Do you think CEOs and boards globally are not taking cognizance of this in the true sense? Diversity is a strength and an opportunity for companies. It is a key priority for AXA as we want to build an organization that truly reflects who we are and where individual differences are valued. Our top management is fully aligned with this vision, with concrete targets on diversity topics and gender equality in particular. For instance, we have made significant progress these past years in terms of having more women in senior executive positions. We moved from nine percent of women in senior executive positions in 2009 to 34 percent in 2020. We now aim at reaching gender parity by 2023. We also committed to removing all unjustified pay gaps and reach full pay equity across all geographies by 2023 at the latest. Beyond gender, inter-generational bridges, disability inclusion, and diversity of sexual orientations are key to our “One AXA” culture. Throughout the year, our employees across the globe engage in awareness campaigns and positive actions to create an inclusive workplace for all. Creating a supportive and

As we move towards the postCOVID-9 era, I believe HR leaders will have a key role to play to adapt companies to the new world of work. This will mean developing hybrid organizations, but also adapting corporate cultures and catering to the new needs of employees

march 2021 |

We live in a world that’s been built around working from the office. Now all of a sudden, the world of work transitioned to remote work. Can it be sustainable in the long run? If it works out, what would that mean for employers? At AXA we firmly believe in a hybrid organization, keeping the office as an anchor for social interaction and community building. Complete remote working is, I think, not sustainable for a company such as AXA. The crisis has proved the need for human interactions, collective creativity, and team spirit. And I believe there

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Diversity is a strength and an opportunity for companies. It is a key priority for AXA. We have made significant progress these past years in terms of having more women in senior executive positions. We moved from nine percent of women in senior executive positions in 2009 to 34 percent in 2020 is no better place than the office to achieve these. Our plans for the future are therefore to combine the best of remote and office working to offer our employees a hybrid organization.

But having a hybrid workforce with some employees in the office and others working from home can be difficult to manage. It might also put the remote workers at a disadvantage. Do you think managing the hybrid work style will add complexity for leaders? 22

Smart Working is not just an evolution of working habits. We know it is a cultural change that requires adaptation and new management styles. Our Smart Working program includes specific training for teams and managers. Particular attention will be paid to the autonomy and responsibility of teams, and the cohesion and well-being of employees. Inclusion will also be a key focus as we need to create awareness among managers on the importance of including all employees – both working on-site and remotely – in the meetings

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and driving effective collaboration. Based on the early successes of our most advanced entities (AXA France and AXA Belgium for instance are already in full hybrid mode) and the strong demand from our employees, we are confident this cultural change will benefit the whole organization and enable us to thrive in the post-COVID-19 era.

COVID-19 forced organizations to double down on employee well-being. What does the future

In an interview you said, the COVID-19 crisis marks the beginning of a new era for human resources. How does the future of HR look like five years down

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Will the job market heat up soon? Do you see a battle to attract workers as things get normal? Despite the economic context, we maintained our recruitment targets to meet our business needs. AXA France, one of our main entities worldwide, recruited 5,000 people in 2020, mainly in our sales teams. We have also maintained our internship and apprenticeship policies, as we know young graduates are among the worst hit by the crisis.

Inclusion will also be a key focus as we need to create awareness among managers on the importance of including all employees – both working on-site and remotely – in the meetings and driving effective collaboration

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of work mean for our mental health? We know that the lockdown period has been difficult for some people on a personal level. We have paid particular attention to our employees’ mental health condition during the crisis and will continue to do so as we move forward. We deployed specific online training to give employees the right tips to navigate this complex period and launched a global #HowAreYou internal campaign to destigmatize mental health issues and encourage employees to ask for help when they need it. As part of our global health and well-being program, all entities will deploy dedicated psychological support platforms, accessible 24/7, to help employees who encounter difficulties in their personal or professional lives.

the line and what would that mean for a global talent leader like you? The COVID-19 pandemic has been a tipping point in our working methods. As we move towards the post-COVID-9 era, I believe HR leaders will have a key role to play to adapt companies to the new world of work. This will mean developing hybrid organizations, but also adapting corporate cultures and catering to the new needs of employees, with a new emphasis on health and wellbeing. These are exciting times for the whole HR community. march 2021 |

To help women perform, give them flexibility

Carmella Galasso, who runs the Women in Management mentorship program for Australia and New Zealand Banking Group, shares some perspectives on the management practices that help women succeed in the workplace

D i v e r s i t y

By Mint Kang

raditional approaches to productivity have tended to disadvantage women in business, whether by requiring commitments that clash with their family needs or by emphasizing qualities that women are not taught to cultivate. But does it need to work that way? For a perspective on how the system can change for a more equitable approach, People Matters spoke with Carmella Galasso, who heads the Women in Management mentorship program for Australia and New Zealand Banking Group. Galasso leads the small business banking division for ANZ Bank's operations in New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory. Here's what she shared.

2020 forced many of us to change our views of work and productivity. How have you seen that affecting women team members? What last year showed us was that we really need to trust people to get the work done no matter what environment they are in—that people inherently want to do the best they can, no matter what their role is. The traditional view of productivity is about coming into the office, sitting there all day, doing your work, and then going home is just gone. 24

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What are some lessons from last year that really help with performance, especially women's performance? We need to drop the view that people have to be “seen” to be doing a job. We need to reward people for being able to do their job and deliver what we expect of them, regardless of where they are and how they're doing it. And I believe that that shift has happened over the last 12 months because we've all—not just women—had to learn it to work in these uncharted times. Another very important thing—for all of us—is clarity. To improve productivity, you need to give employees clarity. It just doesn't work otherwise. The last year showed us that if you give people too many leads, they can't respond. You have to be very clear

Businesses need to actively talk to their female leaders to understand how they achieve success and how they can be supported. I don't think we need HR to come up with policies. I think what we really need is for them to talk to women and understand

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And a lot of the women on my team are navigating the flexibility of remote work very, very well. I found that they were able to be far more productive in the least amount of time because they had learned how to multitask very early on in their careers when their children first came into their lives. Now with flexible working hours, they're no longer struggling with time constraints around balancing work and caring for their family. Last year, my strongest performers were equally split between men and women for the first time, even though my workforce is very heavily skewed towards men. It's only now that the women have been able to reach their full potential.

on just two or three key deliverables and be consistent about focusing on those. And you will see that productivity will increase. For women, in particular, I think online meetings are one thing that has really helped women become very comfortable to have their voice heard, no matter whether they are in a boardroom or a normal meeting. This type of environment allows performance to be elevated but also allows women the safety to speak up. In fact, I recently heard someone say that having board meetings online has actually given women greater voices march 2021 |

because when you are one of only two women in a room full of men, there is a certain sense of intimidation—it's not that the men do it by choice, but society has simply conditioned women to feel that way. But Zoom and other platforms change that. Women have a voice that is equal to everybody else's voice.

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What can business leaders do to help women really put forward their best foot at work? Give them flexibility. You have to give people, and women particularly, that flexibility,

The women on my team are navigating the flexibility of remote work very, very well. I found that they were able to be far more productive in the least amount of time... last year, my strongest performers were equally split between men and women for the first time and you have to be empathetic around that. There is an infamous story about how a woman who leaves early to go and pick up her children will quietly pick up her bag and slip out of the office, and people will say critically, “Oh, you're leaving early again.” Yet, if it's a man doing this, he proudly announces “I'm off to pick up my children” and everyone in the office responds, “Such a wonderful father!” The fact is, they are both parents, and we as leaders need to recognize that. And we need to also engage

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with our women. Businesses need to actively talk to their female leaders to understand how they achieve success and how they can be supported. I don't think we need HR to come up with policies. I think what we really need is for them to talk to women and understand.

Could you share some experiences around managing and driving performance in a diverse team? One thing I have learned from experience is that in a very diverse team, people deal with transparency very differently. Some people flourish on having large amounts of information, but others struggle with it and become fearful. And so, as a people leader for over 25 years, I have learned to taper what I share. It is our job as leaders to sometimes manage the information according to how much people can handle—to tell them enough to make them confident, but not so much that they lose that confidence. And I also want to share an epic failure—we always like to speak about our successes, but we need to learn from failures as well. I spoke about trusting people to get the work done. Early in my career, I had a male team member who was working from home, and who would stay up all night playing video games and drinking, then call within some of the most outlandish excuses as to why he had not completed his work. Intuition told me not to believe him, but I was a people leader for the first time, and I wanted to be liked. So I accepted his excuses and covered his work for him. And

For aspiring leaders in particular, what do they most need to understand to support women's performance? For any aspiring leader, deliver what is expected of you. Be very clear about what your role is, what your people's roles are, and support them in it. If you have the capacity to take on more, always take it on board, because you are helping the broader business. But remember, meeting expectations is not something you have a choice in. If you are a leader,

Especially for leaders who want to bring on more women, give them the opportunity to have their voice heard. Those who don't always speak sometimes have the greatest insight, because they watch

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one day I realized that I was doing his role and mine, and that was not acceptable. I called him on his behavior, asked for an explanation, and at the end of that conversation, he resigned on the spot. What I only realized later was that the rest of my team had been questioning, all along, why I had accepted that poor behavior and allowed it to continue. You must trust, but you must also learn to draw the line.

you can't say you would prefer to do something else. Especially for leaders who want to bring on more women, give them the opportunity to have their voice heard. Those who don't always speak sometimes have the greatest insight, because they watch. Finally, don't forget that the next group of men and women will be watching. Those 20- and 30-yearolds are watching what we 40- and 50-year-olds are doing, what pathway we are paving for the next generation. And if they don't see something that they feel is valuable, we will lose really talented men and women to other organizations who listen to their people. march 2021 |

Prabir Jha

Rethinking your workforce strategies Some areas where leadership can look to impact and influence workforce strategies

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hether the scourge of COVID-19 is behind us yet or not is still to be confirmed. But surely many corporates have to see this as a potential watershed. The disease disrupted business and life like nothing before it in recent times. Many lives were lost but much more was impacted. Businesses went bust, the livelihood of many went to rust, business models got disrupted, workplaces suddenly looked different and life looked more virtual. And yet the challenges of the times were all the more real. While a lot of the employment and business landscape is pick-

| march 2021

ing itself up, the demands on leadership, beyond titles, have got accentuated, if not redefined. It must see possibilities with a more wide-angled lens. It must demonstrate the courage to lead differently. It also must be more comfortable accepting its own vulnerabilities. It must be willing to align passion and purpose to profit. These sound simple but to be done well it needs immense effort and humility. Here are some areas where leadership can look to impact and influence workforce strategies. Define the new “workplace” and the new “workforce”: I believe that the new workplace will be beyond the confines of the formal limits of the organization. And I am not saying the obvious. It is not just about “Work From Anywhere”. Organizations will need to realize that value creation often happens beyond the formal precincts of its boundaries. And it will need to reimagine and own that workplace more comprehensively than ever before. As an example, car sales are mostly not made by company employees. These are done at a distributed dealership. How does that workplace impact value creation or its

misalignment with the evolving business context. Leaders must consciously scrub their thinking and doing of the risks with their workforce strategies. Is their cost structure overloaded in a more flexible work situation? How is the work design going to make a distributed workforce still feel connected to the larger purpose? How should your performance and rewards structure evolve to both measure and acknowledge better? Are your managerial systems designed to respond well to the new norms of working? The list can be endless. The question is to surface them, honestly take stock, and make the changes swiftly and deliberately.

While a lot of the employment and business landscape is picking itself up, the demands on leadership, beyond titles, have got accentuated, if not redefined

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erosion? How will leadership own this extension of the workplace? How will you lead without direct control? How will you be responsible ‘beyond visual range’? Likewise, the reimagination of the new workforce: What really would be the right constituents of this new workforce? What is going to be a larger eco-system that impacts your business drivers? How will you align education and experience to business impact? Will you be able to break the classical mold of your talent mix? How well will you leverage the “gig power”, across levels and functions? Or would you stay conservative and look at a whole series of boxes to be filled? Would you get leaner? Would you discount years of “experience”? How comprehensively will you nurse your talent catchments beyond immediacy? There will be nuances for various sectors and companies. But there is a huge opportunity of challenging many classical models that leadership may have grown with. Make your enterprise people risk strategy count: Many companies and many leaders have been very poor in their interest and ability to visualize enterprise risks beyond compliance. As the pandemic has demonstrated, there will be many more Black Swans waiting to happen which will impact the workplace. Leadership will need to strategically plot all the people and HR risks to the firm, both hard and soft. Workforce strategies often collapse because we are either unable to spot the growing fault lines in them or their growing

Leadership must ensure strategic alignment of their organizational culture with workforce strategies: One of the biggest demands on the leadership today will be to assess and tweak the culture in their organization. Most leaders admittedly are more left-brained in their orientation. The more grey area of culture is often seen as flaky and non-quantifiable. But if you don’t deal with the issue of culture more strategically you may lose the plot altogether. The way you do business, the demands of the customers, the kind of talent you will attract and march 2021 |

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keep, the outcomes you will celebrate, the way you will knit the various moving parts together are hugely impacted by your definition of culture. What dimensions of your culture will be even more in demand now? What aspects have lived their life? What needs to be repudiated? What needs to be incubated now? These are strategic choices we make. And changing dimensions of culture is possibly the most complex leadership challenge. It has political undercurrents. People read their own versions of it. Does your definition of culture help allow sub-

cultures to co-exist? All of these will have huge implications for your talent eco-system. These are hard choices to make for ensuring your relevance or the lack of it in the New World. Re-architect your organization: As the newer opportunities unfold and the safety of older norms fade, firms must revisit their organization design, both horizontally and vertically. The new digital push will call for greater agility, empowerment, and accountability. Does the organization structure enable that? 30

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Many decisions can be pushed down in the system compared to where they stood a year ago. While the quality of your talent undoubtedly will matter in such cases, agility will demand leaner structures. Personally, I visualize a lot of the middle getting trimmer. More than the span of control, organizational designs must reflect the sphere of influence. Historically, most firms have solidified siloes that don’t adequately work in rhythm. The crisis can no longer afford us that luxury. Organizations indeed will need to become more fluid even as the workforce becomes more liquid. The job of leadership will be to visualize this and take the bold calls beyond their personal interests, their camp-followers, or their desired aggrandizement. New workforce strategies need newer leadership: A leaner and a more digitally savvy but potentially more distributed workforce will demand a new quality of leadership. The historical practice of years of experience, age, and captive employees to control will need to cede space to a new leadership framework. With greater information democracy and agile work environments, leadership will need to be more strategic and enabling rather than interfering and instruction. The best talent will continue to have choices. Gig talent will no longer be only yours. So, many leaders will have to flex their leadership styles given the context of business and the mix of workforce demographics. Leadership will have a lot to unlearn and will need help.

One of the biggest demands on the leadership today will be to assess and tweak the culture in their organization. Most leaders admittedly are more left-brained in their orientation

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Talent Management must become a core leadership ask: The choppiness of the business context will demand greater comfort with ambiguity, more resilience, greater collaboration, and infinite creativity. A more proactive talent strategy is needed to keep your workforce fitfor-purpose through these times. Just the ritual of annual appraisals will prove inadequate. Leadership must discuss and intervene more actively to spot, differentiate and leverage their best talent more real-time. This will possibly be a very different ask of a leader and leaders themselves will get marked out accordingly. Hoarding of talent will be a complete no-no. Newer experiences, greater visibility, and better celebration will keep your best with you. Otherwise, the headhunters are always going to be on the prowl. Leadership needs help to succeed: While leadership must be held responsible for their workforce strategies, in addition to the HR function, my thesis is they need a lot of help. These are difficult times and many need to reinvent themselves to stay rele-

vant. They need newer support as many themselves will go through their cycles of anxiety which may have implications on how they lead their workforce. My own personal experience has been the growing call out by all kinds of firms for strategic advisory and leadership coaching. But not every leader views this as a positive. Some still act as the mule or even the ostrich, to deny their circumstances and much on their yesteryears. This is unfortunate as many leaders in this denial or refusal for help emasculate their HR and workforce strategies further. The years after COVID-19 will be demanding and challenging. But they will bring in their train an altogether new mix of opportunities. Many companies and leadership teams will indeed succeed in reforming and transforming themselves. As many will have their epitaphs written. The situation is the same for everyone; the crossroads are the same. Which turn we take will decide how well we succeed with our workforce strategy. And in that will lie our survival and possible success. Prabir Jha is a distinguished HR strategist and is the Founder & CEO of Prabir Jha People Advisory march 2021 |

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eetu Patel is the Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cisco’s Security and Applications business. He leverages a diverse set of capabilities to lead the strategy and development for the Collaboration, Security, and AppDynamics divisions and owns P&L responsibility for this multibillion-dollar portfolio. A member of the Executive Leadership Team, Jeetu is helping to redefine Cisco's SaaS business and strategy to further accelerate the company's transformation and growth. His mission is to build world-class, subscription-based products that solve Cisco customers’ biggest problems. Prior to joining Cisco, Jeetu was the Chief Product Officer (CPO) and Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) at Box, a role he pioneered. Before joining Box, Jeetu was General Manager and

I believe with certainty that the future of work is hybrid: Cisco’s Jeetu Patel

The pandemic has provided the opportunity for organizations worldwide to evaluate their digital footprints and accelerate their digital transformation plans from years down to a matter of days/weeks, says Jeetu Patel, SVP and General Manager, Security & Applications, Cisco By Mastufa Ahmed 32

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Chief Executive of EMC’s newly acquired Syncplicity business unit, a cloud service for Enterprise File Sync Sharing (EFSS) and collaboration. He currently serves on the boards of HackerRank, a marketleading technical assessment, and remote interview solution for hiring developers, and JLL, an American commercial real estate services company. Here are the edited excerpts.

so that all that matters is a person's ability, drive, and ideas. What about other factors like personality type, familiarity with technology, or stress caused by a homeworking situation? We have AI-based solutions in Webex today (or coming within the next few months) that make Webex more inclusive and easier to use that removes that barrier and bring us even closer to realizing our vision.

I think we need to imagine the possibilities. Now that we have the technology to neutralize geography and language limitations, I welcome the opportunity to hire global talent, paying attention to harnessing potential instead of where the candidate lives A big trend we see is AI – which underpins much of the next wave of innovation by enabling inclusive features that would have been hard to imagine just a few years ago. Think about the power of eliminating the need for notetaking in a meeting so that all participants can stay focused and participate in a conversation. Or adding closed captioning, so the hearing impaired are included and able to actively participate in that conversation. Realtime language translations remove language barriers

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Though the global pandemic has brought many technology challenges to businesses, it has also uncovered opportunities. What trends are you seeing in your business at Cisco? As a technology company, the pandemic has become a catalyst for us to reimagine what we want the future of work to be for the three billion digital workers on the planet. It's unfortunate that today, opportunity is unevenly distributed throughout the world, even though the human potential is not. At Cisco, we are passionate about powering an inclusive future for all – and I believe that technology is THE fundamental element that will help us level the playing field and solve this age-old challenge, no matter a person's geographic location, personality type, or preferred language. We're working every day to create

inclusive experiences on technologies like Webex – and we're rapidly innovating to deliver Webex experiences that are 10 times better than in-person interactions. And when workers meet in person, technology must make those experiences 10 times better, too. These experiences are designed with security and simplicity built-in — all while saving time, our most precious resource.

Given the kind of digital transformations organizations are going through, do you think it's time for big tech companies to innovate faster and play a larger role in helping businesses large and small prepare for the road ahead? The pandemic has provided the opportunity for organizations worldwide to evaluate their digital footprints and accelerate their digital transformation plans from years down to a matter of days/weeks. We have followed a similar path at Webex, massively increasing march 2021 |

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our feature velocity. Since August 2020, we've delivered well over 100 new features that are designed to make the Webex experience 10 times better than in-person interactions. As I mentioned earlier, Cisco's purpose is to power an inclusive future for all, which drives our team to build experiences capabilities that advance that purpose.

How do you think this crisis will change the way we work? Will more of us be remote? I believe with certainty that the future of work is hybrid. Cisco recently released a global survey that found 58 percent of respondents expect to be working from home eight days a month or more – even after the COVID-19 pandemic is over. And 98 percent of future meetings are expected to include at least one remote participant. And Webex currently has 600M participants on Webex a month. We see this as a fair demand signal saying companies are not only surviving but thriving in this way of life and communication. With AI being a focus and time being our most precious asset, how do you see technology helping people manage time and driving more inclusivity? | march 2021

Our People Insights feature within Webex is expanding, building on the foundation of connecting people (which currently helps people understand who they work with) to understanding Patterns (the diversity of those connections) and Intensity (the trends of your connections) – essentially enabling people to coach themselves with real data about their own behavior to inform their own decisions and actions. This information is for the individual to use as they choose – not for their manager. The feature is designed to nurture and drive inclusion (versus inspection). For example, individuals can ask themselves as a manager, "am I speaking equally to everyone on my team", or as a team member, "am I speaking more than I am listening"? Individuals can use this information to improve

their performance and relationships, which leads to influencing overall team performance. This becomes especially important in a hybrid working model of physically distributed teams.

Amid these fast-tracked tech transformations, the security challenges that organizations face while supporting employees and customers in remote working conditions are humongous. Do you see an increase in spending on cybersecurity solutions? According to Cisco's Future of Secure Remote Work Report, 66 percent of global IT decisionmakers surveyed during the pandemic reported intentions to increase their future cybersecurity investments. The survey also highlighted steps taken by security professionals at the start of COVID-19 that need

to become lasting changes, including increased VPN capacity (59%), increased web controls and acceptable use policy (55%), and implementation of multi-factor authentication (53%)

In this turbulent business environment, leadership requires taking bold steps. How can leaders boost a team's resilience and help them shine in harsh circumstances?

has an equal voice in meetings through one of my favorite features in Webex called Roundtable. It was inspired by the US Supreme Court, where everyone speaks once before anyone speaks twice. This essentially ensures that introverts are included and are not penalized in meetings typically dominated by extroverts. There is also an interesting opportunity for culture change – folks

It remains to be seen what happens as people return to the office, but right now, surveys that we have done tell us that most meetings will have at least one person who is going to be joining remotely. With some people in the office and others at home, leaders must make sure that they don't make anyone feel like they're getting second-class treatment. This starts with security and privacy, which we, at Cisco, believe is a basic human right. In addition, we are doing what we technologically can to make sure that everyone

that are more junior or in more remote locations that did not typically get the chance to speak or express their opinion in a meeting will now have an equal seat at the table regardless of where the table is.

Do you feel confident in your business post-COVID-19? What are your top priorities moving forward in 2021? Yes, we feel confident in our business. Cisco is playing a central role in enabling the world to work safely and securely – while also reimagining the future of work.

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What's your advice for HR and talent leaders to enable their teams to reimagine their organization's future of work? I think we need to imagine the possibilities. Now that we have the technology to neutralize geography and language limitations, I welcome the opportunity to hire global talent, paying attention to harnessing potential instead of where the candidate lives. We can offer employees the flexibility and option to work from home if they needed to because there is not going to be an obsession that everyone must be physically together for progress to be made. We'll also need to more fully embrace working differently, given that there will be people in many locations spread across multiple time zones. Finding time for a synchronous conversation could be a challenge – even if we work 12-hour days, there might only be a few hours we share in common with teammates. We might not always able to connect in real-time, so we'll have to get comfortable connecting asynchronously with our team to ensure people don't burn themselves out. We also want to preserve the richness of the spontaneous interactions we have in the office — the hallway conversations, stopping by a colleague's desk, or catching up in the coffee room — and make them as productive as the planned meetings.

Adapting to automation If employers don’t accept some responsibility for helping their workforce adjust to a world with more automation and artificial intelligence, it is quite likely that they will confront some combination of legislation, regulation, and litigation By Jeffrey Pfeffer & M Muneer

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The unemployment risks will continue to exist and extensive retraining, reskilling, and job rotation will be required to survive in a world disrupted by automation

hether we like it or not, automation is poised to invade our world. The way we work, and how the job market functions currently, will indeed change profoundly. Loss of employment is unavoidable and imminent, but just how many jobs will be lost to automation is debatable. By 2022, over 700000 Indian IT professionals will lose their jobs to automation, according to HfS research. A 2013 Oxford study of 702 detailed occupations estimated that nearly half of total US employment is at risk. One AI expert forecasted that in

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15 years, robots capable of automating tasks could replace 40% of global jobs. Meanwhile, the World Economic Forum brings some cheer that robots will displace 75 million jobs globally by 2022 but create 133 million new ones. In the next two years, over 54 million Indians will be holding jobs unheard of today. What seems clear is that all of the numbers, even the most optimistic, suggest that unemployment risks exist and extensive retraining, reskilling, and job rotation will be required to survive in a world disrupted by automation. Current trends in training by both governments

own almost certainly will leave too many people in dire straits, as we witness currently. Just as the government has tried to mitigate the effects of jobs lost in the unorganized sector post demonetization, so that the economy as a whole could benefit but not at the expense of dislocated workers, public policy should seek to mute the harmful economic effects of automation through training and other policies. Otherwise, people will rationally seek to curtail automation and artificial intelligence.

Focus on human sustainability

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and the private sector are inadequate to cope with coming labor market dislocations. Even in the face of budget stringency, growing unemployment, and the increasing number of graduates entering the job market, more attention to helping the employed will be necessary to avoid economic and political catastrophe. In most organizations, the training budget is discretionary and 2020 has seen a drastic cut on this. Employees didn’t see many training opportunities from the employers. Prior to the pandemic in many companies, training was less than optimal with no connection to the strategic goals of either the employer or the employee. If training is going to help with the transition to a more automated workplace, such long-standing trends will need to change. The Skill India program, launched with lofty goals, ended up making private players richer without actually imparting useful skills. The last budget has allocated a meager Rs 3000Cr for skill development, which is just not enough for anything much for the future needs. An OECD report on countries with active labor market policies aimed at connecting people with jobs, India doesn’t even figure! Even the USA is ranked at 31st out of 32 countries in public expenditure on labor market policies as a proportion of GDP. The implication: government policy needs to step up to invest in training, job matching, and other efforts. A regime that relies on people to acquire training and transition to new occupations on their

It’s time that government and businesses embrace the issue of human sustainability and stewardship of the work environment with much the same vigor that many have embraced environmental sustainability and becoming good stewards of the physical environment – and for many of the same reasons. For instance, there are the benefits of brand-

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ing. Just as companies today tout their physical environmental bona fides, in the future they may need to tout their human sustainability accomplishments. We see this already in various rankings on best places to work etc. Over the past decades, the relationship between companies and their employees has become much more transactional, and that will need to change if companies are to embrace the task of getting their people ready for coming workplace transitions and dislocations. Multi-year careers in companies have transitioned to jobs of shorter duration, and jobs have

Over the past decades, the relationship between companies and their employees has become much more transactional, and that will need to change if companies are to embrace the task of getting their people ready for coming workplace transitions and dislocations

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more recently become “gigs.” With limited attachment between employers and employees, neither party has an interest in investing in the relationship. This explains perhaps why training has declined and is lower here than in countries that have less “flexible” labor markets but also longer-term connections between people and their employers. If employers don’t accept some responsibility for helping their workforce adjust to a world with more automation and artificial intelligence, it is quite likely that they will confront some combination of legislation, regulation, and litigation. This is precisely what happened in the case of the environment, where an environmental movement got laws passed to stop pollution, regulations were implemented to limit dumping, and litigation confronted companies that did not comply with environmental requirements. Social pollution is today, a problem as much as environmental pollution was in the past. Companies will have to voluntarily reduce the economic and social harm they are causing or they will be forced to. The sad part is that in public, many top executives wring their hands over the negative consequences that artificial intelligence and automation could have for workers. Yet, in private, these folks tell a different story: They are racing to automate their own enterprises with little regard for the impact on workers. This disregard for the effects of company decisions on employees is not likely to be a viable

According to World Economic Forum, robots will displace 75 million jobs globally by 2022 but create 133 million new ones. In the next two years, over 54 million Indians will be holding jobs unheard of today

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long-term strategy. Governments around the world, confronting both fiscal deficits and growing unemployment that further require public expenditures, are unlikely to let employers derive the benefits from automation and artificial intelligence, and simply pass the costs of worker dislocation onto the society. Much better would be for employers to do what they once did: understand their responsibilities not just to their shareholders but to their employees and communities, too. Companies face the problem of collective action – few firms want to be the only ones to provide training while other firms freeride on those efforts. Therefore, it may fall to industry associations like CII and FICCI, and other organizations such as the Chamber of Commerce and the National HRD Network to promulgate and possibly enforce guidelines for retraining and upskilling employees. It is almost impossible to predict what will happen as auto-

mation and AI increasingly penetrate workplaces. But it seems fair to forecast that it will not be possible for companies – or governments – to simply continue on the same path as before. The labor market transformations and their economic consequences are simply too large to believe that continuing a relatively hands-off, laissez-faire approach will be politically or economically viable. Dr Pfefferis chair professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University, and Dr Muneer is MD of CustomerLab and Co-Founder of the nonprofit Medici Institute. march 2021 |

Inclusion is not only the right thing to do, it actually pays off: Zendesk’s APAC HR Director In an exclusive interaction with us, Meiyea Neo, HR Director APAC, Zendesk shares her thoughts on how can leaders tap into the value of inclusivity in these times to build stronger businesses By Shweta Modgil

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he COVID-19 crisis in particular exposed how some companies view DE&I as nice to have rather than a core value. Though LinkedIn data has revealed there has been a 71 percent increase worldwide in all DE&I roles over the last five years, but the COVID-19 crisis resulted in a sudden plunge followed by an even sharper spike. It is no secret that companies with diverse boards outperform their peers; diverse teams are more innovative and creative and diversity is essential for businesses to remain competitive. But it especially becomes more important with the current fragmented workplace structure in which most staff is working from home. Emerging from the shadows of the pandemic, how can organizations once again reset the DE&I equation and leverage diversity and inclusion practices as a sustainable competitive advantage for business? In an exclusive interaction with us, Meiyea Neo, HR Director APAC, Zendesk shares her thoughts on how can leaders tap into the value of

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inclusivity in these times to build stronger businesses. Here are the excerpts.

What steps can ensure that your organization has representation from multiple points of view, and can leverage diversity and inclusion practices as a sustainable competitive advantage for your company? Building gender equity in any organization needs to be done across all fronts and all levels - from the hiring process and compulsory interview bias training, to talent management and development practices. It is also crucial to provide employees with communities and safe spaces within the workplace to support each other and, ultimately, build truly inclusive product and customer experiences in the business. The first step is to identify and acknowledge the gaps. The reality is, every industry struggles with representation, including Zendesk. Though we’ve made some great strides, we recognize there’s more work to be done. Gathering data, beyond anecdotal evidence, from every level of the organization

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What do you feel, are DE&I plans slipping down companies’ agendas, or is it actually popping up, in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic? Inequity and prejudice have unfortunately always existed in the corporate sector across many cultures. Because of the scale at which the pandemic has unfolded across the world, these disparities have been brought to the fore and there is an even greater urgency to address them. And it is not just businesses who want a more diverse working environment, but customers too are prioritizing it and expecting it from the brands they interact with. Our latest Customer Experience Trends Report 2021 showed that more than half of customers in Asia Pacific prioritize DE&I with nearly two-thirds wanting to buy from businesses that are socially responsible. The good news is that many companies and governments are now listening and ready to act on the fight for equity and inclusion. There’s much to be gained by having a culture of inclusivity within a business that benefits not just the organization, but also the economy and society at large. Inclusion is not only the right thing to do, but it actually pays off. When employees like going to work and doing the work, then businesses are far more likely to thrive, in decision-making, problem-solving, and in the areas of creativity and innovation.

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will help establish a baseline and guide us to make a step-change improvement in our diversity representation and employee experience globally to be more equitable and inclusive. The next obvious step is to act on the information. Employees want to see words put into action, so the business needs to have long-term KPIs to be held accountable to. This responsibility to act doesn’t just fall on the shoulders of senior leadership. Practicing gender equity has to happen at every level and in everything you do. And we

Building gender equity in any organization needs to be done across all fronts and all levels - from the hiring process and compulsory interview bias training, to talent management and development practices don’t need to overthink it. It can be as simple as ensuring inclusive language is used on individual and company-wide internal communications, to more complex efforts like auditing your hiring and career development practices to ensure better equity.

How can leaders tap the value of inclusivity, especially with the current fragmented workplace in which more staff work from home? Creating psychological safety is the cornerstone to creating an inclusive work culture. In today’s reality where most, if not 42

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all, interactions with colleagues are virtual, communication has never been more important in staying connected. It’s one thing to have communication channels for employees to voice feedback and opinions with their leaders and peers, but ensuring they feel safe and heard is equally important. We take inclusion very seriously at Zendesk, which is why we launched a key initiative called ‘Empathy Circles’. The aim was to provide a safe space for our employees to come together to share their diverse experiences, learn and support each other through this global pandemic and beyond. Senior leaders are invited as ‘active listeners’ into these conversations and we aim to break echochambers and build bridges of empathy across our global and diverse employee bases. Our very first series of empathy circles attracted over 800 employees across the globe. It was an extremely powerful and moving experience for everyone who participated in it, especially in times of crisis, where existing societal prejudices were heightened. Looking back, it reinforces one thing: such conversations were undoubtedly needed, even if employees are sitting far apart from one another.

How can organizations approach the public conversation around inclusion and diversity? The demand for equity and inclusion in the workforce has been a long-standing topic of discussion across the globe.

Yet, many sectors remain maledominated, including the tech industry, and the opportunities for members of the LGBTQ+ community are severely limited due to discrimination. Organizations need to pay close attention to public discourse around inclusivity and diversity because it speaks volumes about what people want in all aspects of their lives, be it their career, companies they work at, and even the products and services they use. They then need to internalize the insights gleaned from listening through the effective implementa-

What is one idea/step that you would #ChooseToChallenge to empower your employees at work in 2021 as far as the diversity front is concerned? I’d like to encourage my colleagues and peers to challenge

Creating psychological safety is the cornerstone to creating an inclusive work culture. In today’s reality where most, if not all, interactions with colleagues are virtual, communication has never been more important in staying connected

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tion of policies and programs that champion people first. Otherwise, we’re just paying lip service to diversity and inclusion. At Zendesk, we believe that equal access, opportunity, and belonging are necessary to cultivate a sustainable and meaningful culture. We do this through programmatic initiatives, both corporate and employee-led, such as mentorship programs among women and people of color, our Employee Communities made up of employee volunteers with shared identity, experience, values, and beliefs coming together to lend their voice to specific causes, and a communication channel through Slack for

people to celebrate their intersectionalities and mental health experiences. Companies simply cannot afford to remain silent on this matter - they must play an active role in examining gaps, dismantling biases, and building an inclusive future.

the old notion of having the right ''culture fit'', which many organizations base their hiring decisions on. The problem with that is it breeds a spirit of divisiveness and the idea of inner and outer circles, however unintended. This can be detrimental to employees and candidates feeling excluded and undervalued. Instead, we should shift our perspectives to one that seeks out candidates that have the potential to ‘culture add’. That way, we celebrate the differences each candidate can bring to the organization that build on the existing culture to make it better and richer. march 2021 |

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Are Diversity, Equity & Inclusion plans slipping down companies’ agendas or are they actually popping up? By Mastufa Ahmed

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and retain top talent; improve creativity, innovation, and performance; and boost a company’s brand among consumers. Companies that champion DE&I are also more profitable, according to World Economic Forum. As the pandemic shifts economic realities for organizations globally and forces businesses to pivot dramatically, workforce needs will also continue to change. Leaders should leverage this time to understand individual needs and design diversity and inclusion programs to meet the changing work environment. This is crucial to the ongoing financial performance of their organization. The shift to new ways of working also creates opportunities. Thoughtful action now can help teams build new habits, strengthen connections, and encourage growth of inclusive cultures that will better realize the full potential of all employees. So, how do you unleash talent, ensure that your organization has representation from multiple points of view, and can leverage DE&I practices as a sustainable competitive advantage for your company? Will workplace diversity initiatives survive in a post-COVID-19 era? Why some leaders are looking to tap the value of inclusivity, especially as the crisis heralds a more fragmented workplace in which more staff work from home. Our cover story digs deep into this to find out the answers.

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he crisis of 2020 has exposed how some companies view Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) as a nice to have rather than a core value. The onset of the pandemic saw businesses shedding jobs across industries including jobs related to diversity roles. While, according to LinkedIn, there has been a 71 percent increase worldwide in all DE&I roles over the last five years, the COVID-19 crisis resulted in a sudden plunge followed by an even sharper spike. Job openings on diversity roles fell nearly 60 percent in America alone when the crisis struck in mid-March. After the racial injustice that erupted following the killing of George Floyd, the same category of job openings bounced back with DE&I postings spiked 50 percent in June on Glassdoor. According to McKinsey, the pandemic has driven as many as two million women —particularly mothers, to consider leaving the workforce or stepping back from their careers. However, the equation is changing. DE&I is back onto the agenda of many leaders and this makes a lot of sense. Of late, we have seen a lot of companies rethinking their approach to the public conversation around inclusion and diversity with several companies hiring their first diversity officers such as SurveyMonkey, JLL, and CSG to name a few. Research from Catalyst and around the world suggests that DE&I helps to recruit

The pandemic has exposed inequities like never before: Bain’s diversity head

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The year 2020 has shone a spotlight on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) that exposed how far we need to go as a society, as well as the role that companies can and must play in addressing these topics, not only inside of our four walls but also more broadly in our communities, says Julie Coffman By Mastufa Ahmed

ulie Coffman is a partner and the Chief Diversity Officer at Bain & Company. She is the head of global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and Organization practices, as well as a leader in our global Healthcare practice. Julie's organization work has been primarily around operating model redesigns to create alignment in organizational structure, processes, and roles/ accountabilities. Major recent engagements have included developing an improved operating model for a mid-sized pharmaceutical company, developing effective leadership team governance and behaviors for a newly public life sciences company, improving decision effectiveness for a healthcare IT & services player, and developing the operating model infrastruc| march 2021

There seems to be an increasing understanding that “doing nothing” around DE&I is not an option and that inaction has historically enabled many of the structural issues that exist today ture for population health management inside of a leading Academic Medical Center. She has also led the development of Bain Winning Culture and has extensive experience in leadership development and employee engagement. Internally, Julie is the founding chair of Bain's Global Women's Leadership Council, which is focused on increasing the number of women in Bain's leadership ranks. Julie was also

recognized as one of the 2011 Women Leaders in Consulting by Consulting Magazine. Here are the excerpts of the interview.

The crisis has brought in many new trends in terms of how and where work gets done. What trends do you think will have significant implications for businesses in the long term? If I take a DE&I lens to your question, I would say that the shift to virtual teaming and remote work has created many great opportunities but has also presented new challenges for all businesses. The pandemic has forced us to be more flexible and more agile out of necessity – with that comes creativity in how we collaborate as teams and work together to solve problems. It’s created an openness and acceptance

In the wake of the turmoil of 2020, do you think the global awareness for diver-

sity, equity, and inclusion has seen a resurgence? How do you see the larger current DE&I landscape globally? There is no question. 2020 shone a spotlight on DE&I that exposed how far we need to go as a society, as well as the role that companies can and must play in addressing these topics - not only inside of our four walls but also more broadly in our communities. I think from a global perspective, the landscape is changing. There is much higher awareness among all of us about the inequities and injustices that persist in so many ways and the systemic factors that are at play. There seems to be an increasing understanding that ‘doing nothing’ is not an option and that inaction has historically enabled many of the structural issues that exist today. People have been motivated to change – there is a sense of responsibility and accountability, at an individual, a corporate, and a societal level, to drive change faster. Do you think the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the fact that some organizations don’t perceive diversity and inclusion as a core value? Or, are things changing? Things are changing. The dialogue is changing. I do think companies are increasingly understanding their role in driving march 2021 |

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racial and social unrest that spanned the globe - exposed inequities like never before. For businesses to operate at their full potential they will need to ensure that they have created an environment that results in equitable outcomes, as well as a culture in which everyone feels they can fully thrive. We see working mothers leaving the workforce, we see COVID-19 disproportionately impacting certain populations, we see entire industries being disrupted and people out of work; as businesses, if we only celebrate how technology brings us together and not address how COVID-19 has also differentially affected those that are disadvantaged, we will have failed.

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to not have to abide by the ‘’traditional’’ model. I believe that this has also created an expanded appreciation for different experiences, skillsets, and backgrounds that individuals can bring to the table and this new appreciation has allowed for people previously not included in conversations to have a seat at the table. I expect that working virtually will continue as an accepted practice for many more companies and roles; this, in turn, will allow many individuals who might not otherwise be eligible for them (due to life circumstances or location) to have the opportunity to take on these jobs that were once inaccessible That said, there are certainly challenges that businesses will need to face longer-term. 2020 – through COVID-19, as well as the

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systemic change. I also think many are beginning to truly understand how valuable a diverse and inclusive workplace is from many different angles - whether that is on principles, from personal experiences, or business outcomes. The evidence on the value of diverse and inclusive teams is clear and well documented – they just perform better. I think the events of 2020 have forced many firms to think beyond traditional ‘diversity’ and have empha-

Different companies are at different points in their DE&I journeys. Leading companies have seen this as a competitive advantage for years. Those that haven’t are fast catching on

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sized the importance of inclusion and equity as well. To successfully recruit and retain a diverse workforce, you must have equitable talent processes and an inclusive culture that enables everyone to bring their unique skills and experiences fully to their work. While things are changing, underrepresented groups still differentially face challenges of bias and exclusion. Those who have a heightened experience of being different from peers at work because of aspects of their identity (race/ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, etc.) face detrimental effects on health, well-being, and the ability to thrive. Companies that fail to recognize this will be left behind.

What are some bold steps that organizations and governments should take to

fill the gaps and inequalities COVID-19 has exposed and create a fairer society? Driving systemic and structural change should be the focus of organizations and governments to help create a more equitable society. With respect to the former, we believe that organizations have a responsibility to bring their collective voice and power to impact their broader societies. COVID-19 has also dramatically affected many families with working parents – the realities of trying to balance working from home with child-care, education, and household tasks have been challenging for many families – and particularly working mothers. • Current policies and benefits were not designed for a world in which working parents are monitoring virtual school or concerned about safe child care while simultaneously adjusting to major changes at work and worrying about the health of family and friends broadly. • This comes with major stress – financial, emotional – and the need for different levels of support from an employer; support that is designed around a more unpredictable environment and one in which traditional institutions of school or child

What initiatives has Bain taken to build a diverse and inclusive workforce culture? Are they paying off? How do you measure the impact? We have taken a multifaceted approach to DE&I. Ensuring that we hire diverse talent is a high priority. Equally important is how we ensure we retain and develop all individuals once they join our firm. We have established a robust DE&I ecosystem within Bain (including a team of employees fully dedicated to DE&I ) to support our efforts

across the firm and in our offices. These teams work in lockstep to ensure all aspects of DE&I are embedded in the fabric of all that we do across the firm – from recruiting, to building an inclusive culture, to training and ensuring that our support and development policies and processes are equitable. We also have formal ERGs focused on under-represented minority groups that focus on building culture and connectivity through a variety of programming and initiatives, including external engagement in our communities. Inclusion is core to who we are and how we engage with each other on a day-to-day basis. While we have made progress, we would say we have a long way to go (and I believe any organization that says otherwise is not telling the full truth). march 2021 |

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Where do you see the DE&I agenda 2-5 years down the line? Do you expect significant changes in terms of how organizations perceive diversity and inclusion practices as a sustainable competitive advantage for their company? Different companies are at different points in their DE&I journeys. Leading companies have seen this as a competitive advantage for years. Those that haven’t are fast catching on. DE&I is not a nice-to-have. It is a business imperative and a dialogue happening at the C-suite and Board of Directors level in nearly all major corporations today. At Bain, our DE&I journey started over 30 years ago

with the formation of our first ERGs and has continued to evolve since then. In the past year, we (along with many other firms), have recognized the need to accelerate and amplify our efforts and have committed to increasing our focus and investment here.

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care are not working in the same way. Most research would suggest this burden is disproportionately falling on working mothers, who are leaving the workforce or – if they are unable to – certainly struggling to thrive. • As organizations, we need to recognize that we cannot lose focus on our women right now, and in fact, need to be more creative in the ways that we can support working families with flexible arrangements, expansive benefits policies, and other types of structures to ensure that there is not an irreversible brain drain of female employees.

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Companies with people-focus will win: Global CEO, IT By Design

In times of crisis, companies with a people-focus win. When people’s needs change, it is essential to adopt a more “people-focused” approach to change management rather than simply exerting authority, says Sunny Kaila, Founder & Global CEO at IT By Design By Mastufa Ahmed 50

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he pandemic has changed our lives and forced businesses to adapt to changing times dramatically. At the onset of the pandemic, many businesses started shedding jobs across industries as per the diversity and inclusion thumb rules. With unexpected lay-offs and unplanned re-hiring, the crisis also exposed whether some companies view DE&I as a "nice to have" thing or a business necessity. If DE&I-based hiring thrived during the crisis, did it also open up new avenues for opportunities? To discuss how the ongoing crisis shaped the DE&I landscape, we spoke with Sunny Kaila, the Founder & Global CEO at IT By Design (ITBD) – an IT consulting firm that offers MSP staffing, outsourced NOC, RMM virtual admin, Helpdesk, and Professional Services. As the founder, visionary, and driving force behind IT By Design, CEO Sunny Kaila pairs an unquenchable entrepreneurial spirit with an inspiring point of view and innovative, inquisitive mind. From his roots as an IT manager in an NYC company, Sunny has built a thriving IT services business in the U.S. alongside his wife and business partner Kam. Sunny leads ITBD with a mindset that sees hurdles as opportunities. He challenges his team to seek innovation in every aspect of the business—from marketing to customer experience to operations. Such efforts have turned Sunny’s baby steps into the world of entrepreneurship into a global company with nearly 500 employees servicing small and mid-sized companies across a variety of industries. Here are the excerpts of the interview.

ensure that their leaders are ready to lead the distributive workforce.

With companies looking to the post-COVID-19 future, the vision for many is a model that combines remote work and office time. What’s your take on the sustainable model as we come out of this crisis? The remote mode of work is here to stay. Understandably, a bigger percentage of the world's workforce will want to work from home. So, going forward, businesses will have to embrace a remote work model. After all, flexibility is important for the higher retention of

top talent. Thus, organizations need to be able to make sure that they have programs in place that can allow their people to work just from home or follow a hybrid model. I think the hybrid model will thrive alongside the remote work model in years to come. Some employees are fatigued from work from home. These are the ones who love socializing and are social animals. What we have noticed internally is that many employees ask if they can come to the office once or twice a week. They miss the social interaction at work, but like the convenience of working from home.

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With remote work in place, the world is getting smaller with Zoom becoming probably the fastest transportation vehicle. With this, we all learned the possibility of working from anywhere and anytime

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The pandemic is unprecedented in its impact on IT organizations and service providers worldwide. What can IT organizations expect for a COVID-19 recovery? At a time like this, it is of utmost importance for businesses to have their teams stay focused on innovation simply because the world is changing faster than ever. And in the new world, we are living in, companies will have to pivot quickly to continue to create ‘’value’’ through innovation. However, in order for the innovation to happen, you need to have a collaborative team and measures to engage all team members. At the moment, some industries are going down while some are thriving because they challenged the pandemic. The technology sector is doing relatively well. When the pandemic hit us, all businesses in the US were really not ready for remote work set up. They didn’t have a cloud infrastructure for businesses in place. That’s where technology companies had an advantage. They had the technology to allow their employees to work from home. Though such companies continue to do well, they still need to stay focused on innovation, employee engagement, and leadership development. Remote leadership is new to a lot of people. So, companies will have to

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In the new normal, do you think people will matter more than ever? Will organizations have to focus on the changing needs and behaviors of their employees? In times of crisis, companies with a people-focus win. When people’s needs change, it is essential to adopt a more “people-focused” approach to change management rather than simply exerting authority. What all businesses already know that great customer experiences drive business growth and success. What most of them fail to understand is that the people behind the delivery of that customer experience must come first. Focusing on employees isn’t only the right thing to do; it’s good for business too! How do you see the state of larger diversity, equity, and inclusion globally in the wake of a global awakening concerning their efforts around diversity and inclusion? With remote work in place, the world is getting smaller with Zoom becoming probably the fastest transportation vehicle. With this, we all learned the possibility of working from anywhere and anytime. Going forward, I do see that diversity will continue to shoot up and businesses will continue to bring a diverse team and diverse perspectives with complementary | march 2021

Understandably, a bigger percentage of the world's workforce will want to work from home. So, going forward, businesses will have to embrace a remote work model. However, the hybrid model will thrive alongside the remote work model in years to come strengths that come from different walks of life. In India, now we have also started hiring from Bengaluru, Pune, and Vijayawada other than our conventional centers of Chandigarh and Noida. The idea is to expand our talent pool and enrich our ability to hire top-notch talent. With that, more diversity comes in. Before the pandemic, the majority of our reporting staff were from North India and now the bigger percentage of the same comes from South India. This has only helped us be an even more diverse company. This openness has enabled us to hire a team in the Philippines, some-

thing that added more to our cultural diversity.

How do you unleash talent and ensure that your organization has representation from multiple points of view, and can leverage diversity and inclusion practices as a sustainable competitive advantage for your company? We have successfully transitioned from a Managed Service Provider to a master MSP of great repute. It's our openness to think differently and embrace diversity & inclusion that has helped us thrive throughout this journey. When I started IT By Design in 2003, we were

as a leader. You should also reflect on questions such as “do I have the right leadership program to develop my leaders, to lead the distributed workforce?”, “How can I better adapt the KRAs, KPIs, and company structure for a remote worker?” Our leadership team continues to brainstorm around important questions such as "How can we collaborate effectively?", "How can we empower our leaders?", "What all tools can we give to our resources so that they can collaborate better?" We know that during a crisis and beyond, teams

created new trends in terms of where and how work gets done. What questions should leaders ask and act on for a better future of work? Do I have the right strategy to pivot faster, better, and cheaper? Am I positioned to innovate quickly, faster than my competitor? Do I have the time, talent, and treasure to innovate better, faster, and cheaper than my competitors? It’s time to address and reflect on these questions

With shifting business priorities and changing customer needs, how are you gearing up to come out stronger on the other side? What’s your long-term plan? How do you measure the impact of your new initiatives? When your people are engaged and productive, your customers are satisfied. This helps you earn higher profits and enables you to grow. With a focus on your people first, satisfied customers and organi-

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At a time like this, it is of utmost importance for businesses to have their teams stay focused on innovation simply The pandemic has elevated because the world disparities and gaps in our is changing faster societies and it has also than ever

with effective communication and collaboration do better. Achieving a great collaborative spirit in a remotely distributed workforce is where the majority of your competitors will have a hard time. If you can figure out the system and processes to stay focused on collaboration and communication, you will do much better and weather any storm.

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only hiring in NYC. IN 2008, I went to India to open up our 24x7 center and that was just for our own MSP. We embraced diversity from day one. Our competitors didn’t. As a result of us being open to bringing in more talented people, no matter which geography we could find them, we are now serving our competitors as the expert of experts. Our competitors have started to come to us for advice. Today, there are over 60000 MSPs in the US and the majority of them have 100 people. On the contrary, we have a headcount of 500, which makes us the biggest privately held MSP in America. When I look back and reflect on our business journey, there’s one thing that stands out. And, that was embracing diversity and inclusion as a business philosophy.

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We embraced diversity from day one. Our competitors didn’t. As a result of us being open to bringing in more talented people, no matter which geography we could find them, we are now serving our competitors as the expert of experts zational success follow. We clearly understand such linkage between a great workforce and a great balance sheet. People are the most expensive assets any business can have and also the most valuable ones. And, a strong people-oriented culture is our best way to maximize their value. When we continuously invest in recruiting, rewarding, and managing great talent, it automatically gets reflected in our business metrics.

IT By Design offers a variety of solutions, including dedicated staffing, Helpdesk Services, NOC services, and more to small and medium IT companies. What makes ITBD different? What sets us apart is our 54

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people-centric approach. We invest a large chunk of our business budget into the well-rounded development of our people. The intention is to build a community of passionate employees – something I like calling the "internal community." This only helps us build a culture of family where everyone looks after each other. This keeps our internal community happy. When we take care of our community members, they take care of our customers.

What’s your larger India expansion plan and top priorities moving forward? Our workforce expansion plan includes hiring 300+IT Infrastructure engineers in India. We are actively hiring

engineers in India with expertise in cloud computing, cybersecurity, and managing IT infrastructure. We are also planning to open two new offices in Bengaluru and Pune. We have started hiring people from Bengaluru and Pune already, providing them with the hybrid model and flex days. They can either work from home or come locally to our offices. Right now, we have our presence in Chandigarh and Noida - the locations we actively hire for, all year long.

Can you talk about your top challenges and how do you plan to tackle them now? Going forward, our major challenge is going to be keeping the ITBD community healthier and safer as many of us continue to work from home. The "war for talent" is making hiring and retaining talented employees challenging than ever. To address the elephant in the room, we focus on our "people" strategies and are continuously working on creating a culture of WOW. In the post-COVID economy, keeping employees engaged is a huge challenge. Many people working with us are the ones who come to metropolitan cities in search of employment. Our focus is to keep them engaged and look after their well-being with our wellness programs.

People who were constrained – primary caregivers, differently-abled, older generations - can opt in to work now. If we continue on the momentum we gained during this time, the impact will be far-reaching in driving innovation, enabling economic growth and parity, believes Dr. Ritu Anand, Chief Leadership & Diversity Officer, Tata Consultancy Services By Mastufa Ahmed

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We have a level playing field for marginalized groups today: Dr. Ritu Anand

How do you see the work dynamics change in the coming days as we come out of this crisis? I see a lot of positives for businesses across industries in the long term; for some industries, the positive changes are right here and right now. Till 2020, people practices, and policies governed the workplace culture- all that changed in 2020. In the coming years, I foresee a lot more power in the hands of employees. While every company may not be a

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r. Ritu Anand is a pioneer in the field of Human Resources with a career spanning 25+ years. She is a Senior Vice President at Tata Consultancy Services and spearheads TCS' Workplace Diversity initiative and is a member of the Group Diversity Council and the HR Steering Committee at the Tata Group. Her various advisory roles include: Member of Worldwide ERC Global Advisory Council and Advisory Board member of the National HRD Network in Mumbai. She is the Governing Board Member of WILL (Forum for Women in Leadership), which aims at bringing together the collective aspirations, talents, and mentoring of women across corporate India. She is on the Board of Directors at two Tata Group companies and has a doctorate in Psychology. Here are the excerpts from an interview with People Matters.

Equality and equity balance has been skewed for years and decades. COVID-19 has exposed it and brought it to the front stage. The companies which will continue to focus on equality are going to remain behind in the race of equity march 2021 |

to remain behind in the race of equity. We need to create equitable workplaces. Institutions need to understand the differences which make us the unique individuals we are. When this diversity is understood, it will enhance the race to make this society an equitable place to live and work. From the perspective of governments and organizations, several measures can be taken to change. From partnering to identify underCOVID-19 has exposed several gaps and inequalities. served sections of society, What are some bold steps that access to demographic data, that can inform skilling and organizations and governreskilling programs to build ments should take to fill the workforces of today and for gaps and create a fairer socijobs of the future. Publicety? private sector partnerEquality and equity balance has been skewed for ships have the power today years and decades. COVID-19 to foster greater economic has exposed it and brought it growth, equity, and parity to the front stage. The compa- across multicultural, multigenerational diverse worknies which will continue to forces. focus on equality are going

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technology company, every organization is a people’s organization. Organizations will see a shift in the work dynamic, with people having the flexibility and opportunity to guide job content, the way they work, and the work they do. Progressive companies that invest in the right infrastructure will enable individuals and teams to succeed against constantly shifting realities.

The crisis has exposed how some companies view diversity, equity, and inclusion. How do you see the current scenario globally? Companies reeling under financial pressures adopted several short-term measures to fight the crisis, including shedding jobs across departments. Various incidents throughout the last 12 months also revealed the cracks in our societal and corporate outlook on diversity. But it also created opportunities for active dialogue, for individuals and diverse segments of society, to get involved and have a voice, and for leaders across the public and private sectors to recognize the need for these conversations, actively acknowledge biases, review processes, and policies, form partnerships to

Companies reeling under financial pressures adopted several short-term measures to fight the crisis, including shedding jobs across departments. Various incidents throughout the last 12 months also revealed the cracks in our societal and corporate outlook on diversity. But it also created opportunities for active dialogue 56

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commit to and drive change, and accelerate the implementation of programs to counter systemic inequality. The admittance of uncomfortable truths is often the first step towards change and 2020 certainly was the year that saw this on multiple fronts.

in favor of diversity across leadership segments both in the public and private sector space. The sooner we blur the segmentation of the leadership lens, the better it would be. Remote work, beyond being effective, has opened up opportunities to fill gaps. How do you see the larger opportunity and how leaders harness this to their advantage? In the last 12 months, the definitions of workspace, work, and workforce have changed significantly. The opportunities that remote

work has opened up are limitless. From an organizational point of view, with the use of connectivity, technology, and collaboration tools, companies now have access to a multicultural, multigenerational global talent cloud, no longer constrained by physical location. The same goes for individuals. All of a sudden we have a level playing field for marginalized groups. People who were constrained – primary caregivers, differently-abled, older generations - can opt in to work. If we continue on the momentum we gained during this time, the impact march 2021 |

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Often Diversity and inclusion strategies and performance goals are relegated to the realm of HR and not closely interlocked with business priorities. That is a fundamental change that needs to be driven across institutions

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Some of the leaders whose approach to the pandemic has been extraordinary are women. For the postpandemic world, do you think, we need leadership that recognizes the potential of diverse talent and understands its implications on inclusion and culture? The need for diverse leadership was relevant even in the pre-pandemic world. We saw a lot of women leaders, in companies and the government sector, respond with agility and empathy to the needs of people. Having said that, it would be incorrect to segment responses as those by “women” – these were responses and strategies by phenomenal leaders, several of whom were women. The pandemic has been a great equalizer. None of the previously established “rules of success” worked in this situation. Oftentimes, the best responses were an outcome of collaboration and innovation, driven by diverse teams and progressive enterprises. Certainly, these have further strengthened the argument

will be far-reaching in driving innovation, enabling economic growth and parity, and empowering underserved segments of society with new opportunities. There are ample studies that demonstrate a strong correlation between diversity at a leadership level and business results. But not much is changing in the real world. Why are we failing?

standing of diversity objectives, visibility into areas of contribution, access to the relevant data, allies, and networks, and accountability for diversity outcomes so they can contribute to and collaborate to build an inclusive enterprise.

What initiatives has TCS taken to build a diverse and inclusive workforce culture? Are they paying off? How do you measure the impact? First, we debated and How can organizations embed diversity and inclusion defined our success measures and then embarked in their business strategy? The crisis proved that on the journey of diversity,

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First, we debated and defined our success measures and then embarked on the journey of diversity, equity, and inclusion @TCS – gradually but with a vision to be sustainable forever

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diverse teams and inclusive culture, DE&I needs to be embedded across the board and the business.

I am a firm believer in the fact that what gets measured gets done. Often Diversity and inclusion strategies and performance goals are relegated to the realm of HR and not closely interlocked with business priorities. That is a fundamental change that needs to be driven across institutions. Business leaders, mentors, and individuals within the organization need to be enabled and empowered with an under| march 2021

collaborative, innovative, and inclusive enterprises will be ones that can build resilience and drive sustainable growth. From talent management – recruitment, compensation, and benefits, mobility, transparency in opportunities- to diversity linked business performance goals to partnerships within the business ecosystem with organizations to support, collaborate and enable the building of

equity, and inclusion @TCS – gradually but with a vision to be sustainable forever. We believe in bringing the inclusion mindset into our workstyles rather than setting diversity targets. We ran campaigns to create awareness, shared metrics, inspired leaders to be champions of equity, be allies of diversity, showcased diverse role models, had courageous and meaningful conversations, focused on the diversity of the mind and development of leaders. The impact will be seen when the core organizational metrics show a positive trend.

Flexible working options can help level the playing field: BCG's DE&I AND LEADERSHIP CHAIR

Business initiative. Matt has received recognition for his advocacy including: HERoes Advocate Role Model in 2019 and 2020, OUTstanding LGBT+ Ally Executives Role Model in 2020, and Global Champion of Women in Business, Financial Times in 2018. Here are the excerpts of the interview. In the wake of the turmoil of 2020, global awareness for diversity and inclusion and embedding tolerance into the company culture has taken on new urgency. How do you see the larger current DE&I landscape globally? Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DE&I) is more important than ever. A

confluence of crises: demands for racial justice, #MeToo, BLM, COVID-19, and an economic downturn, makes this a critical moment for corporate DE&I. In particular, we see an urgent need to support our employees who are caregivers. In most societies caregivers are women. We’re seeing women dropping out of the workforce in the millions in order to be able to educate and care for children and elderly families. Since April 2020 our research found that parents now spend an additional 27 hours each week on chores, childcare, and education. And women are spending 15 hours more each week on domestic labor than men. march 2021 |

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att Krentz is the Managing Director & Senior Partner, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, and Leadership Chair, Boston Consulting Group, Chicago. He is responsible for developing BCG’s DE&I offering for clients and advising chief executives and senior management on their diversity and inclusion strategies. Prior to this role, he served as the firm’s Global People Chair and was a member of the Executive and Operating Committees. Matt currently sits on the Board of Advisory of Catalyst; the Business Round Table Diversity & Inclusion Working Group, the World Economic Forum’s Partnering for Racial Justice in

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A confluence of crises — demands for racial justice, #MeToo, BLM, COVID-19, and an economic downturn, makes this a critical moment for corporate DE&I, according to Matt Krentz, the Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion and Leadership Chair at Boston Consulting Group By Mastufa Ahmed

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Over half of parents surveyed—both women and men—said their home responsibilities had increased during the pandemic while their ability to perform their work had decreased. Besides, parents were concerned about being at a disadvantage compared to other employees. Without a long-term strategy to support caregivers, companies may lose much of the hard-fought progress of the last decade. Leadership pipelines will become less diverse and that will impact innovation and resiliency. In addition, the call for social justice in the US, and around the world, was also a defining moment for many organizations in 2020. It’s encouraging to see many organizations stepping up and using their influence to dismantle systemic racism. For example: Pepsi| march 2021

Co’s $350M commitment to supplier diversity initiatives, BBC has announced that 15 percent of on-screen talent must come from BAME, and Sephora has pledged 15 percent shelf space to Blackowned brands. It’s certainly an incredibly challenging moment for company leaders but I’m optimistic that 2020 was a catalyst for change that has been long overdue. Do you think the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the fact that some organizations don’t perceive diversity and inclusion as a core value? Or, are things changing? I think the business case for DE&I is widely known and accepted, and company leaders have good intentions. But often DE&I isn’t treated with the same rigor as other business priorities—which get leadership attention, systems to track progress,

and strong implementation. We surveyed 16,500 people worldwide and found that while nearly all companies have diversity programs in place only about a quarter of employees in diverse groups said that they have personally benefited. Leaders have good intentions and launch programs that they think will yield improvements, but their decisions are based on gut instinct rather than proven results. Unless they acknowledge their blind spots, these leaders won’t make meaningful progress. What are some bold steps that organizations and governments should take to fill the gaps and inequalities COVID-19 has exposed to create a fairer society? The main goal for companies should be to continue devoting time, capital, and management attention, and to ensure that they run DE&I not as a separate initiative but as an initiative integrated into everything that the company does and every decision that its leaders make. A holistic DE&I strategy requires attention to business drivers, along with internal and external factors. A sound strategy should involve (1) deploying resources for social and systemic change (e.g. philanthropy, investments), (2) taking a critical look at your own teams and culture with

We’re seeing women dropping out of the workforce in the millions to be able to educate and care for children and elderly families. Since April 2020 our research found that parents now spend an additional 27 hours each week on chores, childcare, and education

With leaders in every industry working hard to protect employees and build resilience, what according to you, should be their strategy about embedding a culture of inclusion across their organizations? Companies are making steady progress in diversifying their workforces, but diversity without inclusion is just a numbers game. The combination of diversity and inclusion is what unlocks real value. An inclusive culture means all team members have the opportunity (and are expected) to contribute their points of view, their opinions are

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hiring/rehiring policies that evaluate women who return to the workforce based on their pre-leave track record. Without factoring in COVIDcaregiver status, women will face an unfair burden of a “COVID-tax” on their careers.

valued. But when employees from diverse groups don’t feel they have opportunities to speak up and be heard, or they don’t see role models like themselves, they fall off the track to more senior management and leadership positions. Then, employers miss out on the benefits of diversity. In our research, we found that the more dimensions of diversity a person has, the less likely are to feel included. For example, someone who is a lesbian of color is 15 percentage points less likely to feel included than white, heterosexual men. We think there are five success factors for achieving a more inclusive culture: 1. Change needs to start at the top, with leadership/ CEO highlighting DE&I as equally weighted priorities 2. Involve frontline leaders who directly manage line employees – it can make or break transformation efforts 3. Identify successful leaders and what they do differently; observations help to develop standardized tactics and tools that others can apply 4. Publicize values, antidiscrimination/harassment policies, and codes of conduct; take all complaints seriously 5. Objective results need to have consequences – rewards for top performance and additional

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an eye to mitigate bias, and (3) improving representation and inclusion and serving broader market segments and increase supplier diversity. Each organization will need to look at its own unique challenges but one specific way an organization can level the playing field between male and female employees, and between those with children and those without, is to offer flexible working options. In some industries and sectors that may not be possible, but where feasible it should be considered as part of the “new reality”. Flexible working options (choosing, when, where, and how much you work) are ranked by both men and women in our research as one of the most effective interventions for recruiting, retaining, and advancing talent. Flexwork programs need to be available to and utilized by both women and men. They should not be gender-specific or designed to support one particular situation (such as a woman’s return to the workforce). Men should be actively encouraged to use the program, which will help remove any gender-based stigma associated with it. In addition, with women leaving the workforce by the millions because they are supporting online learning and child/eldercare, organizations will need to establish

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training/attention for leaders of teams not meeting the new standard. Only by cultivating a more inclusive culture, companies can unlock the potential of all of their employees. Large companies are viewing remote work as a viable option as it broadens the talent pool and creates more opportunities for inclusive working and hiring practices. What if remote work does not turn out to be sustainable as we come out of this crisis? Remote work won’t work for everyone in every industry, especially shift-workers, frontline workers, and those in service industries. But for other organizations, this huge global experiment we’ve gone through during the pandemic has shown that remote work does work for many organizations. However, it’s important to consider that not | march 2021

everyone can or wants to work from home five days per week. Leaders should involve employees in the creation of policy and offer flex options that involve a hybrid model and consider satellite workspaces like WeWork, for instance.

ity, their stocks rose by 14 percent. Now is the time for leaders to step up their DE&I game—not despite, but actually because of, the pressures they currently face. Greater diversity fosters innovation, but it can also strengthen resilience—the capacity to survive the unexpected—which is critically important right now. Organizations equipped with a range of voices and perspectives throughout the ranks are better able to innovate, take risks, solve problems creatively, and turn challenges into opportunities.

What’s your DE&I mantra? How do you measure the impact of your initiatives? Measuring and tracking is one of my DE&I mantras. You’ve probably known of Pearson’s Law: "When perforWhere do you see the DE&I mance is measured, performance improves. When agenda 2-5 years down the performance is measured line? Do you expect significant changes in terms of how and reported back, the rate organizations perceive diver- of improvement accelerates." I truly believe that if organsity and inclusion practices izations want to improve as a sustainable competitive advantage for their company? the effectiveness of their DE&I is not going away. DE&I programs, they need to It’s part of the new employee put performance goals and value proposition and busimetrics in place and hold nesses understand that DE&I leadership accountable. I also improves the bottom line, firmly believe that employincreases innovation, and ees in diverse groups cannot move the needle on their drives resilience. own. In most organizations, When we look at the great leadership teams who craft recession of 2007 – 2009 policies are predominantly we saw that the S&P index male. So in order to make declined by more than 35%. meaningful progress, men But in organizations that must be involved. scored hirer on inclusiv-

Why you need a workplace culture that values Diversity & Inclusion

In many ways, the pandemic might have undone several years of progress towards diversity & inclusion in the workplace, which requires significant course correction in 2021 By Dorothy Yiu

Understanding the definition of diversity, beyond gender

Conversations around diversity in the workplace traditionally tend to revolve around gender equality. There are two reasons for this – first, gender is easier to measure, requiring lesser efforts from an organization when conducting surveys and internal assessments. Also, gender inequality in the workplace has long been

recognized as a pernicious issue, meriting the attention of corporates, activist groups, and governmental bodies. However, in 2021, the conversation needs to go beyond gender to cover other vulnerable groups. The employee experience in the workplace can be influenced by as many as 34 parameters, meaning that there are 34 possible types of diversity you need to consider. From cognitive disabilities to neurodiversity, from cultural backgrounds to age and upbringing, from gender expression to biological sex – the definition of DE&I must factor in all the myriad nuances of the employee experience. Legislation around gender equality already exists, march 2021 |

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force by redesigning jobs and introducing new practices. Multiple biases are being diminished in favor of a more balanced workforce, enabling previously untapped talent to contribute to the economy and allowing organizations to tap into a broader range of potential candidate pools.

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culture of diversity and inclusion (DE&I) isn’t just a feel-good initiative for organizations. DE&I values are strongly correlated with organizational health, performance, resilience, and are a worthy business investment with tangible returns. A study carried out by McKinsey suggests that companies in the top quartile of gender diversity on executive teams were 25 percent more likely to experience above-average profitability. This data indicates a trend that is too important to ignore – diversity & inclusion is vital for your company to succeed in the modern market environment, particularly during and after a crisis period. COVID-19 is opening the door to a more diverse work-

e.g., wage equality laws in different parts of the world. In other areas of possible discrimination, companies must step up with internal governance policies, anti-harassment and antidiscrimination norms, and awareness training.

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The impact of the COVID19 pandemic on DE&I

The values of DE&I were already inconsistently enforced before the pandemic. Some sectors like technology or the armed forces had a disproportionately low representation of women, employment of people of color rarely reflected the local demographic composition, and unconscious biases like confirmation bias or similarity bias still overwhelmingly shaped workplace decisions. While companies and their leaders thought they

were doing well, employees disagreed. PwC found that 63 percent of business leaders felt they were regularly speaking about DE&I and sharing DE&I-related information, but just 42 percent of employees agreed with this statement. The pandemic has widened this gap even further. Companies are looking for experienced leaders to guide them in a crisis, and the experienced tend to look the same. In the search for experienced leaders, it is easy to fall back on the assessment parameters you have traditionally preferred, like an Ivy League education, aggressiveness/confidence, a history of working in developed economies. In other words, parameters associated with some sort of privilege. The number of women appointed to CEO positions during this time dipped from 12 percent

to five percent. In many ways, the pandemic might have undone several years of progress towards diversity & inclusion in the workplace, which requires significant course correction in 2021.

DE&I is central to organizational growth during the rebound Making DE&I part of your workplace culture could provide your company with a competitive advantage in 2021. To begin with, the top talents now look for a diverse, inclusive, nondiscriminatory, and zerotolerance workplace as a necessary trait when choosing an employer. 90 percent of millennials and Gen-X professionals say that a commitment to DE&I will affect their decision to work for a company. For this

Making DE&I part of your workplace culture could provide your company with a competitive advantage in 2021. To begin with, the top talents now look for a diverse, inclusive, non-discriminatory, and zero-tolerance workplace as a necessary trait when choosing an employer 64

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Driving change through transparency and open communication

To drive a successful DE&I strategy, you need buy-in from every stakeholder – from the newest frontline employee to the most loyal C-level leader. Today, 1 in 3 employees still believe that diversity could block their progression in the company indicating a chronic lack of effective two-way communication. Only 22 percent of

them say that they are aware of any efforts currently being undertaken by the company to drive a more inclusive culture. 2021 must be all about addressing these missing pieces, advocating for DE&I within the workforce, transparently speaking about the drivers for transformation, and gathering inputs from employees – who are, after all, the intended beneficiaries of DE&I initiatives – on what can be done better. This will ensure that achieving a culture of diversity is a truly organic process, designed for the long-term and not skewed by shortterm goals, hype, or compliance enforcement.

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impossible to create a workplace conducive to productivity and realizing their full potential. Finally, no matter your internal success, more than 1 in 3 consumers will factor in your commitment to DE&I when making a purchasing decision. Clearly, there are ample pull and push forces that make it crucial to imbibe the values of DE&I in 2021.

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reason, job aggregator Glassdoor even introduced DE&I ratings for job listing last year. Further, a diverse team is likely to encourage creativity, foster innovation, and drive overall performance. Academic research finds concrete evidence that culturally-diverse teams have greater potential for creativity than culturally homogeneous teams. Similarly, 85 percent of business leaders in a Forbes Insights survey agreed or strongly agreed that a diverse and inclusive workforce was central to cultivating different perspectives and ideas for meaningful innovation. As a result, without prioritizing DE&I, you are unlikely to acquire the quality of talent you need to maximize the upcoming rebound stage. And even if you do, it will be next to

Dorothy Yiu Co-founded EngageRocket in 2016 intending to use human analytics to create better workplaces. She leads product development, technology, customer success, and design. march 2021 |

Now is the time to double down on ‘diversity’:

Twitter’s Preet Grewal

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Just as we’ve seen a dramatic pivot towards digital transformation, there’s absolutely room for the same thing to happen in terms of diversity and inclusion in the workforce, says Preet Grewal, Head of Inclusion & Diversity, JAPAC, Twitter By Mastufa Ahmed

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The pandemic has affected all of us, but not equally. People who have been hit the hardest are women employees in the workplace. How do you see the current diversity landscape? It’s no secret that the most vulnerable among us were the ones most impacted by COVID19. Unfortunately, in many cases, this included working women who even in pre-pandemic times, would regularly face unique challenges in the workplace compared to their male counterparts, such as pay inequity, access to career growth opportunities, actions rising from conscious and unconscious bias or struggles associated with managing work-life balance. Prior to the pandemic, many organizations around the world had been making strides in Diversity and Inclusion (DE&I) programs, but that didn’t necessarily mean they were all psychologically ready for the immediate changes that would need to take place when the virus struck. For instance, DE&I training typically relies on small, in-person meetings or participation in events and that’s obviously not happening at the moment. However, I would argue that despite the challenges, there are a number of positives that have come to light given the current climate - some of which could even help to accelerate DE&I conversations in the coming months. For one, with employees now all working remotely, there is a strong feeling of solidarity in this disconnect. We’re in

it together, we’re pushing forward together, and we’re becoming far more understanding of the different balls our colleagues have to juggle in their day-to-day lives and acknowledging unique personal challenges. For example, some who may have once questioned a working mum’s commitment to her career just

Do you think the damage to women workers postpandemic is set to intensify — unless we intervene now? I definitely think this is a step-up call for businesses and society at large. There is a clear need for the public and private sector to ensure the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on women globally is not ignored and we remain committed to

With women still underrepresented in leadership positions, companies have march 2021 |

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because she wanted to work flexibly, are now doing so themselves. They are realizing that working away from the office does not lower an employee’s commitment to their team and organization. So in a nutshell, while the overall logistics of DE&I have been impacted, the very essence of supporting unique individual needs during these times is heightened - and hence a continued focus on DE&I needs to be a priority in all organizations.

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This is a step-up call for businesses and society at large. There is a clear need for the public and private sector to ensure the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on women globally is not ignored and we remain committed to driving gender equity in our companies and society

driving gender equity in our companies and society. For organizations, it’s important they take this opportunity to consider a shift in mindset and double down on DE&I - Have you ever asked your employees if they feel excluded, and explored the reasons behind why that is? Are you providing learning opportunities and safe spaces so people can share their challenges? Could you be doing more to hire from talent pools you’ve previously excluded? Meanwhile on an individual level - are leaders, teams, and managers supporting women and caregivers during these times? Do you know who from the team is leaning in more at home? In some cases, I suspect people have rushed to solve the problems they had immediately in front of them when the pandemic struck - but now is the time to assess and demand change. All that said, I lean toward optimism - while damage has been done, I think just as we’ve seen a dramatic pivot towards digital transformation, including from industries that were very rooted in certain ways of operating, there’s absolutely room for the same thing to happen in terms of DE&I in the workforce.

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While the overall logistics of diversity and inclusion have been impacted, the very essence of supporting unique individual needs during these times is heightened and hence a continued focus on it needs to be a priority in all organizations been launching programs aimed at promoting diversity even before the protests that were ignited by the death of George Floyd. How do organizations make sure the promises lead to tangible outcomes? Setting goals and making sure you are accountable for those goals is of course one way of ensuring tangible outcomes. In Twitter’s latest Inclusion & Diversity report update, we announced where we’re at with our 2025 goals. One of them is to have half of our global workforce be made up of women. At present, more than 42 percent of our employees are female. | march 2021

But of course, setting goals for the sake of setting goals isn’t enough - hiring or promoting more women can’t just be a token gesture. Unless people feel heard and included within the fabric of an organization, you could very well end up in a position where you’re simply fighting to retain the talent you have, let alone expand. Do you think the remote mode of working is sustainable? We hear a lot about the importance of creating a sense of inclusion. What, according to you, should be the strategy to make this a reality in a remote working world?

The current climate has clearly shown us that remote work is more than sustainable, which is why we have announced that if our employees are in a role and situation that enables them to work from home, they are welcome to do so forever. But equally, if they prefer an office environment, we’ll be ensuring our spaces stay warm and welcoming, with some additional safety measures in place of course, to enable a gradual return. Singapore is currently our pilot for this. Of course, one of the big potential losers of remote working though is company culture - so organizations must have a strategy in place for bringing their people together to celebrate and commiserate. What, according to you, are the biggest challenges organizations face implementing DE&I strategy? How can the challenges be surmounted? DE&I is not a one-time event, it requires consistent and sustained effort and commitment throughout the organization, starting at the top. Leadership has to be accountable with a clearly defined share of the responsibility for driving progress. A policy is also worth nothing without a firm understanding of the reasons behind certain implementations. Other-

wise, it’s very challenging to get a commitment from the workforce, which inevitably hinders progress. To do that, you need to offer forums where your people can speak up about their concerns. However, I think the biggest "mistake" that organizations make when it comes to DE&I is thinking that it’s in the big acts. In reality, to truly cultivate an inclusive environment, it’s all about the small and daily interactions - for example, in team building and business meetings. Diversity and inclu-

sentation, and even have an internal diversity dashboard that lets Tweeps track our performance against our workforce representation goals. We’ve also implemented a Diverse Slates initiative for open managerial and above roles requiring that at least one woman (global) and one candidate from an underrepresented community

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sion is not a one-time event, it requires consistent and sustained effort and commitment throughout the organization, starting at the top. Leadership has to be accountable with a clearly defined share of the responsibility for driving progress

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Twitter’s 2020 Diversity Report showed modest gains. What’s your plan moving forward? Twitter is committed to becoming the world’s most inclusive and diverse tech company and I’m really proud of the progress we’ve made to date - through a combination of increased efforts to attract talent from diverse backgrounds and doubling down on programs that ensure a culture where everyone can be their authentic selves and belong. For example, we’ve doubled down on transparency through greater leadership accountability for diversity. Executive teams now have clearly defined proportional share of responsibility for driving progress (in addition to company-wide goals). We’ve shifted to quarterly public reporting on repre-

(specifically Black/Latinx, US) be considered by hiring managers. We have a bold vision for workforce representation by 2025 and remain steadfast in our efforts to achieve these goals, which include: • Our global workforce will be at least 50% women (at present, women make up more than 42% of our global workforce). • We’ve also set targets for women representation across technical (42%) and leadership (41%) roles by 2025. • Meanwhile, specifically in the US, our commitment is that at least a quarter of our workforce will be under-represented minorities. It’s a journey - and I believe we’re headed in the right direction, but of course there can be no rest #UntilWeAllBelong. march 2021 |

Getting realistic about achieving diversity & inclusion There’s a need to clear the air about unconscious biases and a need to move away from overly simplistic explanations about biases. Here’s what you need to know

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By Clinton Wingrove

t the start of 2021, we are way past when we need to explain the importance of achieving both diversity and inclusion in the workplace. Study after study has shown that organizations with broadly diverse workforces, all members of which feel included, are more productive, more creative, more innovative, and more sustainable. So, why do we still seem to have a mountain to climb to get to that state in most if not all organizations? In part, for the same | march 2021

reason that most of us are not fit and healthy, despite understanding what to do to achieve it, and having the resources needed to do so! On a second-by secondbasis, our brain tricks us into making bad decisions. Whilst it is useful to know the highly complex and detailed neuroscience explanation, a more simplified one aids understanding. From the second we are born until the second we die, our brain is detecting patterns around us. When it does so, it locks them into memory – it creates mental shortcuts, “When you experience similar circumstances again, this is how you should respond - the thought to have, the thing to say, the action to take.” When faced with matching circumstances, it pulls that memory back and applies it … in almost an instant and without conscious thought. And, the more commonly and forcefully the pattern arises, the more ingrained

Negative framing of a problem can lead people to address the wrong problem and take inappropriate risks

the defined response becomes … and the more automatic, unconscious, and rapid the response to recurring similar circumstances. That is how, for example, we learn to walk, speak, and drive. Can you imagine driving if you had to consciously process every bit of information before being able to accelerate, change gear, stop at traffic lights, etc.? Once we have practiced, when we see a red light, the physical movements needed to stop are virtually all performed without conscious thought! In simple terms, our brain creates unconscious preferences or, now unfortunately named, ‘Unconscious Biases’. This instinctive response mechanism is human, normal, and necessary. But, it is what makes tackling diversity and inclusion so challenging. We may even be born with some of these unconscious biases such as the affinity bias (the preference for people just like ourselves, which in our early existence may have driven tribal behavior, so necessary for survival). Earlier, I used the phrase, “unfortunately named” because the word “bias” itself has an immediate negative unconscious

sciously” and “unconscious bias” which, because of the penalties attached, has led some bodies to immediately cease providing staff and managers with any valuable unconscious bias training – training that genuinely helps to identify such unconscious preferences that they have, and to take action to inhibit their impact. Even very recently, the UK chairman of KPMG resigned over comments that included “there is no such thing as unconscious bias”. He did go on to say “unless you care, you won’t actually change” but denying the existence of unconscious bias …really?

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connotation. This inhibits some people from attempting to understand the origin of such biases, how they work, and learn how to detect and respond to their adverse effects. Indeed, on September 22, 2020, the former President of the USA signed an executive order, running to nearly 3500 words, banning certain “Unconscious bias training” in federal agencies. It’s intent was expressly honorable - seeking to stamp out any training that legitimizes stereotyping. Unfortunately, it’s wording included the phrases, “whether consciously or uncon-

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Unconscious biases do not just affect recruitment, promotion, and collaboration. They also affect many aspects of how we work, especially the critically important skill of operational decision making

Back to the challenge of addressing diversity & inclusion: most organizations’ initial response is rightly to address diversity first. This is the essential first step and, whilst challenging, the easier task. Attraction, selection, and promotion processes can be reviewed and modified; monitoring of these implemented; metrics compiled; targets set, and regular reviews and corrective actions taken. Whilst it takes time, the numbers will eventually show increased diversity. But aggressively addressing diversity first makes the situation worse! Why? Because, those who would previously not have been employed or promoted now find themselves employed or promoted … but generally ignored, not taken seriously, and frequently ostracized or patronized. Idealists defend the action by extrapolating the concept, “We progressively become like the average of the people with which we surround ourselves,” and argue that this is a temporary state and that, over time, the frequent exposure to a more diverse workforce modifies unconscious biases and greater acceptance or inclusion then arises. I’m sure it does! But, how long does it take? A long, long time! In some cases, outside of organizations, we are talking generations. Hence much of the global frustration.

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How long is it going to take for diverse experiences to modify or eradicate common, ingrained, unconscious preferences which have been experienced, remembered, and reinforced over decades before we were even employed? It’s about as overly simplistic as saying, “Surround yourself with skinny people and you’ll lose weight!” Magazines and media that focus on a certain body image have proved for years that this doesn’t work and can lead to very negative outcomes. Even more concerning is that unconscious biases do not affect only recruitment, promotion, and collaboration. They also affect many aspects of how we work, especially the critically important skill of operational decision making. There are tens of unconscious biases that trigger instant responses (thoughts, words, and actions) which may be quite different from those made with conscious thought. These can have dramatic operational, financial, and even life-threatening consequences e.g., • Negative framing of a problem can lead people to address the wrong problem and take inappropriate risks. • Anchor bias can lead us to make poor decisions like paying way too much for things. | march 2021

Once we have a diverse workforce, we then need to take deliberate action to ensure that they are genuinely included i.e., proactively involved, listened to, taken seriously, empowered, resourced, supported, and recognized

• Availability bias can mislead us into addressing the wrong problem or failing to explore suitable options by misjudging the relative importance of different factors. • Optimism bias can lead us to believe that we can do more than we can with the resources available, that we can do things faster than we can, and even that we can do things that are beyond our capability. • Confirmation bias leads us to believe data or people’s opinions that confirm our own beliefs more than those that challenge or inform them. • etc. If we are to achieve genuine inclusion, of course, we need a diverse workforce. But it is far better if that is achieved because those recruiting and promoting others are conscious of the factors that inhibit diversity and inclusion and take

specific corrective action. To achieve that, they need more than mere process training and exhortation to pursue diversity and inclusion. Once we have a diverse workforce, we then need to take deliberate action to ensure that they are genuinely included i.e., proactively involved, listened to, taken seriously, empowered, resourced, supported, and recognized. That demands that all of us, including those who are different from us, are educated in the factors that inhibit our thinking - the sources of, symptoms of, and the impacts of Unconscious biases. We all also need to be equipped to detect their presence and take conscious action to prevent or mitigate their impact. Unconscious bias training can and should be delivered under the banner of addressing diversity & inclusion. But, it should also be delivered under another banner – enhancing the quality of our operational decision-making. Let’s not shy away from the fact that addressing unconscious biases is a business imperative, not merely a social, moral, and ethical issue. Clinton Wingrove is the Director of www.WantToBeGreatManager.com and www.ClintonHR.com, Email: clinton.wingrove@WantToBeGreat.com

Organizations need to be cautious that DE&I does not just become about numbers: Margot Slattery

It’s hugely encouraging to see more investment in diversity programs. However, organizations need to be cautious that diversity and inclusion does not just become about numbers, says Margot Slattery, Global Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer, Sodexo Group By Mastufa Ahmed

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argot Slattery is responsible for the strategic direction, implementation, and alignment of Sodexo’s integrated diversity and inclusion initiatives across five global dimensions; Cultures & Origins, Disabilities, Gender, Sexual Orientation/LGBT+, and Generations. Margot also represents Sodexo in global diversity & inclusion forums such as the UN Global Compact, UN Free & Equal initiative, the Valuable 500 initiative, and Catalyst, a global non-profit organization that promotes the professional advancement of women. She is a member of the Catalyst European Council, the Workplace Pride Council, and the ILO Council, through which she engages with other large global organizations that are looking at the present and future challenges surrounding DE&I. Irish-born Margot has spent most of her career at Sodexo, joining in the early 1990s as a junior manager and moving up the career ladder to become country president for Sodexo in Ireland in 2015. She remained in that position for four years before taking up her present role in 2019. Here are the edited excerpts. march 2021 |

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What are your major learning from this pandemic as a global diversity and inclusion leader? Can you share some insights? One of the biggest areas where we’ve seen an impact as a result of COVID-19 aside from the sanitary impact, of course, is on mental health and well-being. As a business, we’ve really tuned into our people during the last 12 months - more so than we ever have before and mental health and well-being has been a hot topic of conversation and focus as we look to support our teams through the crisis. We always say that people are the alpha and omega of our business. During the crisis, the focus on our people has been even further heightened. When many of our teams were unable to work due to client sites closing, we came together as a business to create a fund to provide them with financial support. When office-based employees had to change their working styles to work from home, we provided them with access to training and tools to help them manage the change, while also finding more opportunities to keep our teams connected through virtual meetings, team get-togethers, and more frequent oneto-ones. What we’ve discovered through all of this is that every dimension of diver| march 2021

sity is affected, albeit to very different degrees. The positive that we can take from the last 12 months though is that we have a far greater appreciation for our colleagues as people; people with a life outside of work. Do you think the remote work will open up new opportunities for DE&I? Remote working implies that people are working far from others and it’s difficult to connect. Thanks to technology, it is now much easier to stay connected, wherever you’re working. I think the debate is less about remote working and more about flexible working. What we’ve found during the last 12 months is that people have had to adapt their ways of working. For those people working at home where they might have children at home too, they’ve had to adapt their working styles to accommodate the work-life continuum. That might mean working earlier or later, but with the acceptance that at certain periods during the day, it might be more difficult. The same applies to those people in roles where they need to interact with colleagues from all across the globe. With the current inability to travel so much, people have had to flex their working patterns to accommodate different time zones. Flexible working works; perfor-

mance has not been affected and our continued commitment to people’s health and wellbeing has made it far more acceptable for people to manage their time in a way that works for them. I think that post the pandemic we will see much more of a hybrid model, particularly for office-based employees. We know that working from home is possible and does not affect performance, but equally, many of us crave the human interaction we get from working in an office with colleagues. How diversity heads are steering their companies through the crisis globally? Is it important to have a synergy of initiatives and collaborations to make an impact globally? From my point of view, it’s strong leadership that is helping companies steer through the crisis, and it’s the armory of leadership skills and leadership behaviors that make the difference. Within that armory, of course, is an understanding of diversity and inclusion and a recognition that everyone is experiencing the crisis, but to varying degrees of severity. A good leader is in tune with his or her team, listens to their challenges, and supports them through difficult moments. At the beginning of the crisis, our global HR team developed a suite of tools

to support our leaders in managing themselves and their teams through the crisis. The uptake was phenomenal and I think we can see the fruits of that investment really paying off.

If we look at gender alone, 55 percent of our total workforce is female. However, that drops to 40 percent when we get to the senior executive level. A similar trend applies when we look at other streams of diversity. However, we’ve been focused on driving diversity and inclusion in leadership roles for some years now and we are seeing improvements both in terms of balance, metrics, awareness, and understanding.

How can businesses identify specific initiatives that offer the greatest payoff and get the most from the diversity investments? Every organization will have its own challenges and opportunities when it comes to DE&I, but for Sodexo, the greatest payoff of our DE&I investment is the level to which it is authentically felt in our business. We can launch initiatives, run campaigns, and crunch numbers but if those people within our business do not feel the impact of that activity, then it’s worthless. With the large majority of our employees being based at our client sites, our focus on diversity and inclusion has to be felt at every level of the business if it is to be authentically felt on the frontline. As such, our investment is in training our leaders and managers, celebrating our many different voices from across the business, championing role models across all diversity streams and regularly monitoring sentiment at every level of the business, and flexing our approach to ensure we maintain our focus where it will have the most impact on our teams. march 2021 |

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It’s easy to get hung up on numbers, but they only tell half the story. You might have a genderbalanced team with people from different ethnic backgrounds, but does everyone feel included and valued?

Of course, we need to do much more, as most companies do, both as an organization and as part of the local communities in which we operate.

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What are some of the key metrics they should follow to make their diversity initiatives thrive post the pandemic? It’s hugely encouraging to see more investment in diversity programs; we need this leadership and sponsorship from organizations to help move the needle within society. However, organizations need to be cautious that diversity and inclusion does not just become about numbers. It’s easy to get hung up on numbers, but they only tell half the story. For example, you might have a genderbalanced team, you might have a team with people from different ethnic backgrounds, you might have people in your team who are gay, but does everyone feel included and valued? Our focus is on measuring inclusion. How do people feel? Do they feel valued? Do they feel respected? Do they feel that their opinions and views count? Do they feel they can bring their whole selves to work? Do they feel part of a team? One of how we measure this sentiment is through our annual engagement survey.

There are ample studies that demonstrate a strong correlation between diversity at a leadership level and business results. But not much is changing in the real world. Why are we failing? At Sodexo, we believe that there is a strong correlation between diversity and inclusion and business performance; it’s one of the reasons we’re so focused on building a diverse and inclusive culture!

Inclusion and belonging: Two sides of the same coin

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The focus on inclusion cannot be just about numbers, there’s a need to align the company culture and build inclusive leadership By Richard Smith, Ph.D

oo many corporate diversity efforts become numbers games as HR managers count the numbers of people by various categories of gender, race, religion, citizenship, and other such areas. I once asked a senior manager in a technology company about diversity efforts in their organization and he promptly showed me a fancy chart depicting the

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number of people from minority groups employed. When I asked what roles these people were assigned, he simply said that these people worked in critical roles in the headquarters – it was only later that I discovered that those people served as the night shift cleaning staff ! Unfortunately, this view of diversity is all too common! With all the challenges, complexity, and global

nuances associated with diversity, it is not surprising that many business leaders might not have a holistic view. Research clearly shows the value of diversity with results such as improved decision-making, innovation, and psychological safety, but achieving the benefits of a diverse workforce can be a challenge in Asia. Through my research on this topic with the Great Place to Work Institute™ team in Asia, we uncovered the importance of both Inclusion and Belonging in actually making a difference with diversity initiatives. Many companies are now focused on DE&I initiatives (Diversity and Inclusion) as most have recognized the importance of creating an inclusive work environment. Professor Quinetta Roberson at Michigan State University defines inclusion as: “The degree to which a work envi-

If we bring diverse talent into our organization but we don’t have an inclusive environment or culture, then we don’t really accomplish the aim of having a diverse workforce entire organization, each leader can take actionable steps regardless of where they sit in the organization. Here are five actions to be a more inclusive leader: 1. Commit to inclusion – Making diversity and inclusion a personal priority is where things get started. Leaders who state their commitment and enlist the help of others to create an inclusive environment make a bold step forward. Through this commitment, they can challenge the status quo and hold others (and themselves) accountable. 2. Practice humility – While many are drawn march 2021 |

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10% difference (men feeling more included than women). However, when we ask about belonging, the gender differences are much more pronounced (men feeling more of a sense of belonging with the group than women). How can companies create more of a sense of belonging? Professor Paul Green at Harvard highlights that the tenor of day-to-day interactions with colleagues in an organization can shape the individual’s sense of belonging. An employee’s sense of belonging is influenced by factors such as their perception of being valued for their unique contributions and being appreciated. In other words, belonging is fostered when one is feeling included. So, companies cannot create belonging directly – only through an inclusive work environment. In this way, ''inclusion'' and ''belonging'' are two sides of the same coin. While there are many aspects to diversity for the

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ronment or culture is open to individuals of all backgrounds – not just members of historically powerful identity groups – so that everyone is fairly treated, valued for who they are, and included in core decisionmaking.” In other words, if we bring diverse talent into our organization but don’t have an inclusive environment or culture, then we don’t really accomplish the aim of having a diverse workforce. How do we know if we are creating an inclusive work environment? Research tells us when people are included that they will feel a strong sense of affiliation or belonging. Professor Lynn Shore at Colorado State University and her colleagues define belonging as “An individual’s perception of connectedness and the extent to which they feel that others care about their well-being as an equal part of the group.” In other words, if managers and the organization can create a practice and culture of inclusion then we will know that it is working if people feel a sense of belonging. The tricky part is that managers must be true in their intent for inclusion to create a sense of belonging. If we examine inclusion measures by gender across Asia from the Great Place to Work® studies, we note that there is often about a

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to the charismatic leader, it is actually the modest leaders who are more likely to create an inclusive environment. By listening to others, admitting their own shortcomings, and being open to the contributions of others make a big difference. 3. Show curiosity – When leaders are interested in others they demonstrate an open mindset and are able to listen without passing judgment. Curiosity is not only great for learning, but it is also essential to opening new doors with others. 4. Collaborate openly – Finding ways to engage others as a leader helps to create a sense of empowerment, which can help create a sense of psychological safety. When people feel safe to contribute ideas freely they are more likely to feel a part of the team and a strong sense of teamwork. 5. Uncover bias - As leaders, | march 2021

When we listen and celebrate what is both common and different, we become wiser, more inclusive, and better organization we all have blind spots and unconscious biases. The more that we are able to reflect on these personally and help others to recognize bias, the more likely we are to ensure equality in our dealings with others. This can take time and can only come with strong personal awareness. Of course, these are not easy to do or master as a leader today. However, research tells us that managers that have demonstrated these actions have been able to make significant steps to creating a more inclusive environment. It has been said that when we listen

and celebrate what is both common and different, we become wiser, more inclusive, and better organization. Creating an inclusive environment is critical to harnessing the power of diversity. The next time I am speaking with a corporate colleague about diversity, I hope we are not talking about diversity in terms of the number of minority groups. I would much rather have a spirited discussion about inclusive leadership and the promise of creating a greater sense of belonging for all people. After all, we cannot expect people to feel like they belong until we create a more inclusive workplace.

Richard R. Smith, Ph.D. is a Professor at Johns Hopkins University where he also serves as Vice Dean, Corporate and Global Partnerships at the Carey Business School

We should build a workforce that champions racial equity: Eric Goh

Given the current remote work setting, leaders must prioritize transparency and set performance expectations for employees to continue to feel connected and included, says Eric Goh, VP & MD, Singapore, Dell Technologies By Mastufa Ahmed Here are the excerpts of the interview.

continue to drive innovation while embracing a flexible and resilient culture. The remote learn and work trend will continue to generate demand for products and solutions delivered by the tech industry, but it will take more than technology to ensure productivity and collaboration continue in the new economy. From our ten years of experience as a connected workplace, march 2021 |

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How has the impact of the pandemic been on the tech industry? How are tech companies strategizing to bounce back? How do you see the overall industry scenario? As a technology company, we’ve had a front-row seat to the overnight acceleration in digital transformation and changes to how we work. We have seen significant digital acceleration due to the pandemic and companies seeking more solutions to address remote work, business continuity, and demand for talent. The post-pandemic economy will likely experience continued momentum brought about by increased digital transformation initiatives. In approaching the post-pandemic economy, the tech industry must

The World Economic Forum reports that talent, not technology, is the key to success in a digital future. Hence, we need to create an environment that is inclusive and welcoming for people to share their ideas without the fear of any judgment

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he tech industry in Singapore is still grappling with achieving balanced gender representation, but it has the right ingredients to encourage and nurture gender diversity, to create an environment where women can thrive and contribute, says Eric Goh, Vice President & Managing Director, Singapore, Dell Technologies. Our goal should be to build a future workforce that champions racial equity, values different backgrounds, and celebrates unique perspectives, Eric adds. In an exclusive interaction with People Matters, Eric, who is a passionate advocate for gender inclusion, throws light on the current diversity, equity, and inclusion scenario, the remote working world, challenges organizations face when it comes to embracing bold steps around DE&I, and more.

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we have learned that it is a combination of technology and the right tools for workforce enablement and culture that will keep talent engaged and help to grow business. The tech industry is wellpositioned to help companies reimagine work not as a place and time but as an outcome. And leaders must invest in emerging technologies and a flexible culture so that these combined elements can unleash innovation and build resilient teams in the face of future obstacles.

Do you think a new postpandemic world is emerging? How are things going to change especially in the context of work? How do you see the role of new-age technology? As our economies become accelerated by digital technologies, we are going to experience an increase in data. Every business today is powered by data in some ways. They are harnessing it for insights to create

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better customer experiences. As digital transformation continues, business leaders will be prioritizing ways to extract value securely. The potential to drive change and leverage new technologies will also be compelling in the new economy. Organizations in the region are making some level of investment in newer technologies, with the top five according to our GDPI Snapshot 2020 being cloud-native applications, Software-as-aService (SaaS) applications, Artificial Intelligence (AI)/ Machine Learning (ML), 5G/ cloud edge infrastructure and the Internet of Things (IoT)/ endpoint. You are a passionate advocate for gender and inclusion.

How do you see the larger diversity, equity, and inclusion scenario today globally? I believe that diversity is power. As an organization, Dell Technologies acknowledges that a diverse and inclusive culture is necessary to power innovation and drive business growth. The World Economic Forum reports that talent, not technology, is the key to success in a digital future. Hence, we need to create an environment that is inclusive and welcoming for people to share their ideas without the fear of any judgment. Our goal should be to build a future workforce that champions racial equity, values different backgrounds, and celebrates unique perspectives. The

The biggest challenge that organizations face is in ensuring that DE&I initiatives are demonstrated consistently across the company and embedded in day-to-day operations. This requires all employees to understand that DE&I is not a “nice-to-have” but a “must-have”

tech industry in Singapore is still grappling with achieving balanced gender representation, but I believe that it has the right ingredients to encourage and nurture gender diversity, to create an environment where women can thrive and contribute.

nities for DE&I. With large companies viewing remote work as a viable option, this may create more opportunities for inclusive working and hiring practices, but only if remote work stays longer. How do you see this? The reality is that cultivating greater DE&I requires mindset sync by both employers and employconsider strategies and initi- ees. Widespread remote work has demonstrated atives that build an environthat work is not locationment where differences are specific but outcomes-based. respected - and where these While some organizations differences can help drive a company’s long-term success. embraced greater flexibility and technologies that have At Dell Technologies, for helped bring people closer, instance, we demonstrate there have been others with our company-wide commitment to creating an inclusive employees who faced challenges in working out the culture via our Employee expectations of remote work Resource Groups (ERGs). with their leaders. Inclusive More than 40,000 team working and hiring practices members participate in one of our thirteen ERGs globally. must be a board-level agenda item that is emphasized Remote work has opened regardless of the existence up some amazing opportuof long-term remote work. march 2021 |

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What, according to you, are the biggest challenges organizations face when it comes to embracing bold steps around DE&I? How can the challenges be surmounted? The biggest challenge that organizations face is in ensuring that DE&I initiatives are demonstrated consistently across the company and embedded in day-to-day operations. This requires all employees to understand that DE&I is not a “nice-to-have” but a “must-have”. Leaders must

Leaders must consider strategies and initiatives that build an environment where differences are respected - and where these differences can help drive a company’s long-term success

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Do you think, bias, both unconscious and conscious, will still be in play in the remote working world? Certainly. Bias – whether about people, places, or situations – occurs often based on mistaken, inaccurate, or incomplete information and can include personal histories that we bring to the situation. The same can happen in a remote work setting, so leaders of remote teams must prioritize transparency and set performance expectations for employees to continue to feel connected and included.

Why DE&I is crucial in times of disruption

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There’s a need to expand the inclusion agenda in order to help employees feel like they belong at the workplace. Here’s how By Sreekanth K Arimanithaya

hile every organization can have a signature strategy or a technological vision – these can be easily emulated. Culture is what sets us apart and there is simply no shortcut to it. Therefore, my favorite motivational quote remains “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”. In short, we can be certain that people are the X factor in the success of every organization. They are the soul, spirit, and life force that drive the vision. How we bring EY people together is diversity, how they come together, in reality, is the culture, the effec| march 2021

tiveness of this is a measure of success, especially in a world that is disrupted.

People story

People, including you and me, want a workplace where our point-of-view matters, we feel embraced and, have a profound sense of belonging. Where we feel empowered and heard every day. Organizations want their people to feel like they are a part of the company. At EY Global Delivery Services (GDS) too, we want our people to feel belongingness because their uniqueness helps them and us stand apart.

Therefore, organizations should look at democratizing the process and encourage everyone to take ownership in building a safe space

The layers of our diversity fabric

An unwavering commitment to diversity and equality should and must be a priority for all. Organizations — which have a strong commitment to a culture of diversity and equality —enable their people to grow and innovate. This creates an environment where everyone has an equal opportunity to advance and thrive in the workplace. At EY GDS, as we enable every one of EY people to be and bring their authentic selves to work, we have constantly pushed ourselves and our understanding to evolve. The diversity dialogue: Diversity and inclusiveness should be at the core of every organization and how they operate. We did, like many others, start by measuring diversity as statistical evidence of our commitment. It remains a critical yardstick, even today. For instance, we have a healthy gender ratio within EY Global Delivery Services. As we bring in more women into the workforce, we are able to consciously do so across the skill pool. It helps us push for parity in newer ways – like, we recently

introduced gender-neutral job descriptions to address unconscious biases we tackle in certain skill pools like technology. It helps us level the playing field in our own ways. When we hire today, we give a gender representative talent pool – for every single role.

Expanding inclusion agenda

Inclusion is more than just a bunch of programs and policies. And meaningful career conversations are not just about putting someone on a leadership trajectory

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ing networks to prepare the women and their counselors for the change, diversified the scope when we rolled out the same benefits for adopting mothers or when we acknowledged benefits for the same-sex partners in primary caregivers. The radical decisions test our commitment, as we disrupt our own practices, and this requires both unflinching leadership commitment and organizational intent. From experience, the most challenging one was when we introduced a decision to address unintended inequities in pay for all EY women employees. The decision was bold, as we extended it to existing

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Greater diversity and inclusive environments drive better decision-making, stimulate innovation and increase organizational agility – crucial to helping stakeholders respond to the now, prepare for the next and reframe their future. Inclusion moves beyond statistics, to culture. As we onboarded more women and analyzed the data – we landed on the most obvious question of representation – qualitative versus quantitative. This is how we started a journey of using the gender lens across all people decisions – hiring, learning, growth, to even compensation. Here we made a combination of fundamental to radical decisions. The fundamental would be the policies and programs that we have in place. It could be something as simple as maternity leave. How do we elevate it to be truly inclusive? We added coaching for counselors to address the break from work, created formal and informal mentor-

and new hires. Today, when you join EY GDS, your pay is influenced by role and skill more than any other factor. While the above two examples come from different spectrums of the inclusion conversation – most of the story and action lie in between. Meaningful career conversations should be driven by programs designed specifically to accelerate women in the leadership pipeline including learning programs, experience opportunities, access to networks, mentoring, etc. Of course, inclusion is more than just a bunch of programs and policies. And meaningful career conversations are not just about putting someone on a leadership trajectory, as much as it is to empower them to own and define their career. It means real conversations on flexibility, work-life balance, varied opportunities, support circles, etc. Belonging at the workplace: Organizations also need to be cognizant about consciously creating a culture that’s truly inclusive of differences, wherein everyone feels welcomed, and accepted. This will enable people to be their true self in the workplace. And this can be achieved by ensuring collective ownership. Like in any evolution story, in diversity too, the biggest push comes when one’s own understanding is disrupted.

For instance, organizations should acknowledge gender beyond its binary definitions – letting their people express their gender identities and sexual orientation with more confidence. And along the way, new dimensions should be added – ability, generations, race, and even thought. The bottom line—to enable every single person to bring their true selves to a safe workplace—you need a cultural empathy that can be defined as a sense of belonging.

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Advocating disruption

We know that traditional resilience planning doesn’t do enough to prepare for a pandemic. And let me state up front that what we saw last year is a black swan event, that we were all prepared for in theory but never thought of having to deal with. What are the ground realities? We are increasingly working in a virtual environment, teaming together to create solutions to real-time challenges. The cultural fabric is stretched with limitations to social interaction and the very definition of the workforce continues to change. Today, we see a democratized workforce, with both a clear vision and a voice. People, especially in the postpandemic era, are contemplating work-life balance. It is no wonder that hybrid work | march 2021

How do we bring together such a diverse set of people, scattered virtually, to come together and deliver on a shared purpose? This is the question that drives all our decisions in this dynamic environment models like gig working are coming out strongly as we see a rise in digital nomads. We have an agile workforce, working in a very dynamic marketplace as the business continues to change with technological leaps. How do we bring together such a diverse set of people, scattered virtually, to come together and deliver on a shared purpose? This is the question that drives all our decisions in this dynamic environment. What determined the success, and continues to? The organizations which had already adopted flexibility, agility, and innovation

fared better. This does not mean just virtualization of the workspace. It means EY people are equipped to work remotely while balancing work-life, and the cultural sensitivity to work with diverse teams, spread across geographies. A culture of empathy, gratitude, and belonging is what brought people together as we continued to help deliver on our shared vision at work. Even in the future workplace will have a hybrid definition that continues to emphasize on flexibility.

Future predictions

My instinct and the data we see indicate that our workplace genetics have changed. More so in the last year, where several latent trends emerged to the forefront, like remote working, gig working, mobility, personalized career paths, the realization of individual purpose before aligning it to an organization one, and wellness – both physical and mental. Adapting to this changing environment will be essential for any organization. (The views reflected in this article are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the global EY organization or its member firms.)

Sreekanth K Arimanithaya leads the Global Talent and Enablement Services for EY Global Delivery Services (Argentina, India, Poland, China, Philippines, and the United Kingdom). He is also part of the GDS Executive Committee and the Global Talent Committee

India is striving hard to get diversity and inclusion right: Director HR, Flex

Organizations in India are still struggling to navigate and understand the real meaning of an inclusive culture, says Sandra Andrews, Director HR, Flex By Mastufa Ahmed

What have you learned from this crisis in terms of talent management and the role of technology? Technology has deepened human connection during this pandemic. The crisis actually accelerated the use

of technology in all areas of talent management from hiring to performance and building culture. Technology has untethered talent from location. Human resource being the most valuable commodity, HR professionals now have a larger pool of talent to choose from and are not limited to the employees who live in the city that the company is located in. Flex is primarily a manufacturing company, hence the majority of our employees had to physically work at our facilities, adhering to social distancing and other precautionary measures during this period. We have deployed technology at various intersections of the employee engagement /management journey. One such example is our HCM (Human Capital Management) tool which has moved to a manager selfmarch 2021 |

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COVID-19 has brought in many new trends in terms of how and where work gets

done. What trends do you think will matter most in the long run? For the immediate future, we see that safety measures will have to be maintained until we enter a new stage where the virus is not such a looming threat to us, in our day-to-day lives. People who can work remotely will most likely continue to do so. We anticipate that the workplace of the future will be hybrid. In the post-COVID-19 era, we will focus on increasing productivity, enhancing manufacturing processes, and overall operational efficiency.

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andra Andrews is the Director for Human Resources, at Flex India. In her role, she oversees Human Resources for four manufacturing sites along with Global Service Solutions (GSS) and NEXTracker (a Flex company that provides intelligent solar tracker solutions). She is an empathetic leader and has shaped highperforming cultures at major brands with progressive technical resources, prolific communications, and robust development programs that improved productivity and profitability. She comes with over 25 years of work experience across FMCG, hospitality, and automotive sectors. Here are the edited excerpts of the interview.

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service system that provides access to workforce data for quicker decision-making. Key learning from this crisis would be: • Upgrade and invest in technology to stay with the Volatility Uncertainty Complexity and Ambiguity (VUCA) world • Communication is key to get work done smoothly • The importance of virtual collaboration and learning was a key take away • Keeping employees engaged and motivated became a critical area of focus • Employees get more organized with tools such as Microsoft calendars • Regular online surveys are a great way to gauge employee well-being and productivity How do you see the current diversity, equity, and inclusion scenario in India?

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India is striving hard to create a footprint in the diversity and inclusion bandwagon. While we are as a country are striving to increase the diversity percentage, organizations are still struggling to navigate and understand the real meaning of an inclusive culture. The crisis has set a reset button to the diversity and inclusion concept which needs to go beyond gender. Organizations need to create an open and inclusive work environment removing the stigma and discrimination barrier to embrace diversity and inclusion at the workplace. Flex takes great pride in creating an inclusive, diverse, and equitable workforce because it’s the right thing to do and we also acknowledge the undoubted benefit to our company that diversity of thought and talent brings. Our PwD

(person with disabilities) employees are a source of great pride and joy to us. We have over 100+ PwD employees in India and have them represented across HR, IT, engineering and finance, and procurement verticals. Our focus was on empowering our workforce. We ensure to not only include a diverse workforce but also go beyond to analyze if we are paving a career path for them. The Individual Development Plans (IDP) have helped HR professionals and managers have regular engagement with PwD employees to discuss their careers and the direction they would like to go ahead in. Inclusion and diversity strategies have managed to get a second wave of focus amidst this crisis. We are witnessing a paradigm shift especially in the Indian context where work from home and flexi working hours were previously considered as perks instead of normal modus operandi for an organization. In the post-pandemic world, do you think, we need leadership that recognizes the potential of diverse talent and understands its implications on inclusion and culture? Definitely. Companies have become more cognizant of the fact that more diversity supports stronger growth. Diversity is more of a continuously evolving process

Inclusion and diversity strategies have managed to get a second wave of focus amidst this crisis an affront to another. Unconscious biases are another challenge in creating a truly diverse workforce. This again needs to be addressed by educating employees on what unconscious bias is and how employees can be more aware of how they interact with peers. A great way to deal with these challenges would be that companies create a clear rule book that defines the company’s stance on diversity and inclusion and then cascade those messaging to employees, to adhere to. Defining culture is the onus on the company. We had rolled out our company’s new vision, mission, purpose, and values last year and as part of the communication plan to reach out to employees we ensured to include sign language interpretation for

What initiatives has Flex taken to build a diverse and inclusive workforce culture? Are they paying off? How do you measure the impact? Flex India is a proud employer of 100+ PwD employees. Right now, our focus is on hiring orthopedically challenged and hearing and speech impaired employees. At Flex, we train the manager and assign a buddy (help guide) while enrolling a PwD employee to ensure comfort and communication for them. Across sites, not only the manager but every employee on the shop floor is made aware of where a PwD employee is seated, to help in case there is an emergency evacuation or even otherwise. Every employee (Director and above) has a personal goal attached to their goal setting for the year 20202021 to improve Flex Diversity and Inclusion. Our talent review process this year has specific actions to develop diverse employees. Increasing female leadership is another initiative with focused groups working towards creating a measurable impact. march 2021 |

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What are the biggest challenges in embracing diversity and inclusion at a strategic level? How can the challenges be surmounted? One of the major challenges in embracing a diverse workforce is overcoming communication barriers. With a diverse workforce, there comes a responsibility to ensure that miscommunication does not create conflicts in the work environment. It is important to sensitize employees to the fact that what is considered innocuous to one culture, could be considered

the corporate key messages in our presentations, through videos displayed on LED screens at our sites as well as through Zoom calls sessions for our PwD employees.

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rather than a promotional step. It demands that the organization bring in multiple dynamics and thoughts from within the team on how best to identify, adopt and deploy the right diversity and inclusion guidelines. We need to have thought leadership that recognizes the potential of the existing pool of diverse employees. Championing diversity and inclusion would need to be the core leadership competency to be a differential organization. We are today one of the leading employers of PwDs in India in the electronics industry, and Flex India has been recognized as the "Best Private Employer Award for employing Specially abled" by the Government of Tamil Nadu in 2015.

COVID-19 has forced everyone to rethink diversity and inclusion: Andreas Sungaimin

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The pandemic has played a key role to rethink our approach to diversity and inclusion. Fundamentally, we need to develop a structured framework to guide how we hire and train, says Andreas Sungaimin, SVP, Human Capital & Development, Pan Pacific Hotels Group By Mastufa Ahmed

ndreas focuses on talent acquisition and management, learning and development, service culture, employee engagement, as well as compensation and benefits at Pan Pacific Hotels Group. He has over 30 years of human resources experience in the hospitality industry as well as from private and public sector organizations.

COVID-19 has redefined how and where work gets done. How are you gearing up to rebound and come stronger on the other side? The pandemic has accelerated the transformation of the hospitality industry. To cater to the changing business landscape and demands, there is a need to rethink traditional structures and roles within an | march 2021

organization, and these changes are set to put the industry ahead in the new normal. They will work in line with the overall digital and technology innovation of the industry, consumers’ demand, and job enlargement to refine resource capabilities. At Pan Pacific Hotels Group, we have commenced our workforce transformation last year, as we systematically worked out job redesign and clustering arrangements to ensure that our associates are placed in capacities with the relevant skill set and work scope to prepare them for the long run, and also for meaningful career development. These efforts extend to all functions including operations, engineering, F&B, procurement, sales, and marketing,

with the appropriate training, reskilling and upskilling opportunities. What have you learned from this crisis in terms of talent management and the role of technology? The Group has harnessed technology as an enabler for talent growth during the pandemic, leveraging on technology platforms for employee engagement and training. To allow our associates to future-proof their careers by being technologically savvy and prepare for the advancement of workplace technology, relevant courses are offered via our e-learning academy, U@ PPHG. These courses incorporate knowledge and knowhow of technology and digital platforms to allow the associates to manage

Diversity in a workplace brings about a global work culture, binding people of different genders, races, ethnicities, The crisis has exposed how ages, religions, etc. It is about overcoming some companies view diverthe mindset about not sity and inclusion. How do you see the overall scenario? being able to embrace The current crisis has differences and forced everyone to rethink coming together as a how we manage our inclufamily

future skills at their workplaces such as managing back-of-house systems, digital concierges, keyless checkin, handling of RFID equipment, and many more.

How can boards ingrain inclusion into their organiza-

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What, according to you, are the biggest challenges organizations face when educating employees on diversity and inclusion? How can the challenges be surmounted? Diversity in a workplace brings about global work culture, binding people of different genders, races, ethnicities, ages, religions, and social statuses. Hence, it is about overcoming the mindset about not being able to embrace differences and coming together as a family. Many are too encumbered by existing operations to explore the changes that need to be made to nurture an inclusive workforce. At Pan Pacific Hotels Group, we celebrate the different cultures of this vibrant workforce that we have, placing a clear emphasis on team spirit and being mindful of cultural sensitivities.

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sive hiring program as an organization. Fundamentally, we need to develop a structured framework to guide how we hire and train. We believe that we can stay resilient against a crisis if we possess a strong inclusive employment policy. In the face of the pandemic, the Group has been establishing strong partnerships with schools and agencies to secure internship opportunities and develop training programs to ensure that our inclusive hiring program is sufficiently robust such that we are able to avoid any shedding of jobs for our inclusive hires. Our strong inclusive hiring policy is fundamental as we look to retaining the right talents for the right jobs, with inclusion and diversity as our goal. As an organization with a presence around the world, we encourage the development of our local talents where we operate, maximizing their potential to advance further.

tional strategy? How are you doing it? As part of Pan Pacific Hotels Group’s diversity and inclusion strategy, the focus we are taking is on our disability-inclusive hiring efforts. We started by taking small steps, by first participating in job shadowing initiatives, then internships, before we started to look into hiring on a structured basis. Partnership has also proven very critical in this journey. In Singapore, our community partners such as SG Enable and special education schools have provided resources where we are lacking as a corporate. They train our existing associates on working alongside persons with disabilities, and their job coaches assist with job matching, job redesign, and easing persons with disabilities into their roles. Other than hiring persons with disabilities within our properties, we also influence our supply chain to hire inclusively. Additionally, we volunteer our expertise such as in Noodles for Good, where we collaborated with Autism Resource Centre and Central Singapore CDC by imparting our recipes and business consultancy skills, so that families with special needs individuals can operate their own noodle kiosks. As a result, three beneficiary pairs are selling Si Chuan Dou Hua Restaurant’s noodles and dumplings as a means of livelihood. march 2021 |

COVID-19 offered opportunities to promote DE&I agenda: Schneider Electric's Karen Lim

Schneider Electric has frequently been in the news for its ever-increasing diversity goals. In a short conversation, Karen Lim, Schneider Electric’s Head of HR Resources for Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei, gives a few quick pointers on how the company views gender equality

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By Mint Kang

nergy and automation multinational Schneider Electric has for several years been steadily increasing its gender equality statistics and goals: from women representing 40 percent of all new hires and 21 percent of global leadership in 2019 to 50 percent of new hires and 30 percent of senior leadership by 2025. How did this happen so quickly, though? People Matters asked Karen Lim, Schneider Electric’s Head of Human Resources for the Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei Cluster, for a quick rundown of how the goals have been able to evolve over time and how the challenges and solutions changed in tandem. Here's what she shared.

Could you share how the diversity goals have been able | march 2021

to constantly increase over the last few years? Our diversity goals have gone up over the last decade in response to an evolution in the workforce demographics. Schneider Electric has a “bold-bet” talent development initiative where we target potential leaders early on in their careers before they are 35 years old. This raised the bar for HR and our Talent Acquisition Team as we needed to actively source for the cream of the crop across an entire cohort regardless of gender. We provide equal opportunities to everyone, everywhere. We emphasize empowering women to take on leadership roles by groom-

ing them during the early parts of their career, with Schneider Electric being the first multi-national corporation to have all its Country Presidents commit to the UN Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEP). Established by UN Global Compact and UN Women, the WEP is a set of principles offering guidance to businesses on how to promote gender equality and women’s empowerment in the workplace, marketplace, and community.

With the change in diversity goals over time, how have the challenges evolved? What's a good way of tackling them? The change in diversity goals meant that we needed to ensure that diversity and inclusion are present in the workplace. One of the chal-

lenges we encountered was attracting more female talent to Schneider Electric. Age is a critical factor due to our “bold-bet” talent development initiative and for a challenge like this, possible approaches can include working with tertiary institutions to develop the curriculum, or for the institutions to introduce business or non-engineering minor degree as part of the engineering undergraduate degree so more female students will consider taking up engineering as their main discipline.

Finally, do you think the way forward for DE&I in your industry has changed? What efforts need to continue and what efforts need to be stepped up? There is a continued emphasis on the usual D& metrics such as nationality, ethics, gender, and age. However, in 2021 we are also looking to include supportfunction roles that open possibilities for the disabled community workforce in Singapore. We have started talks with SG Enable, a government agency dedicated to enabling persons with disabilities. march 2021 |

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What do you consider the “ultimate goal” for diversity to be? Our “ultimate goal” is to future-proof the organization and remain the industry leader. This means that we need to actively drive business growth and foster innovation. To achieve this, we are constantly looking for young talent and grooming them during the early years of their careers as part of our plan to ensure that we solidify ourselves as the leading energy management player in the marketplace.

To actively drive business growth and foster innovation, we are constantly looking for young talent and grooming them during the early years of their careers

From your perspective, how did 2020 change the case for diversity? While the pandemic has caused many challenges, we have also seen many opportunities for implementing initiatives that promote diversity and inclusion. We recently deployed a 2-day Work from the Home policy for the Singapore office, which allows parents to better plan their working schedule to accommodate their need to look after children during home-based learning. This hybrid work environment promotes a positive employee experience by promoting equality at work and allowing employees to actively contribute during the pandemic period.

‘Diversity cannot exist in isolation from inclusion and meritocracy’ In this exclusive interaction with People Matters, AB InBev’s People Director – India & South East Asia, Tanushree Mishra encourages DE&I champions to move to measurable initiatives, reflects on the company’s proudest accomplishments as an employer, highlights diversity concerns for the APAC region, and advises diversity advocates on breaking down ceilings and myths In t e r v i e w

By Bhavna Sarin

anushree Mishra is People Director – India & South East Asia at AB InBev. Tanushree has worked with some of the most wellestablished global brands in the likes of Network18, Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Motors, where she led total rewards and HR transformation. She joined Ab Inbev in 2016 and rose through the ranks. In conversation with People Matters, Tanushree reflects on Ab Inbev’s proudest accomplishments as an employer, highlights diversity concerns for the APAC region, and advises diversity advocates on breaking down ceilings and myths. Here are excerpts from the interaction.

How has the beginning of 2021 been so far? What are some goals and expectations you are moving forward with? 2021 has had a turbocharged start for our big ambitions. Our business results have started reflecting the buoyant market scenario, 92

| march 2021

With greater awareness, advocacy, and assessment of inclusion efforts, what does AB InBev have in store for DE&I in 2021? In a true spirit of dreaming big, we have some bold, and ambitious initiatives planned in 2021 including some industry-firsts that we are excited to unveil. With a strong belief in making a difference where it matters, we are improving representation at every level in every part of the business. For 2021, we have in the pipeline an outstanding Women's Leadership Development Program and Dual Mentorship program with all genders participating in

The business case of diversity is obvious and DE&I champions need to move to tangible and measurable initiatives that will take us closer and closer to an equal world this, to help us develop our female talent pool. Apart from this, we also have crucial policy rollouts that strongly exhibit our commitment to building a best-inclass diverse, and inclusive organization.

What are some of your proudest accomplishments as an employer when you think of inclusion and belonging? In a remarkable manifestation of our commitment to diversity agenda, one of our factories in Maharashtra has achieved a 50:50 gender ratio on the shop floor. We set this commitment in early 2020 and worked along with educational institutes, parents, and the local community and educated them about our company, our products, our culture, workplace, and policies. In parallel, we worked on providing best-in-class infrastructure and policies to foster inclusion. Now, we’re

so proud to have ambitious, talented young women who are deemed to be leaders of tomorrow and set the path for many more to come.

Much like soft skills, DE&I is often looked at as the softer aspect of talent management and culture, and unsurprisingly that deters the growth and dims the significance. How can diversity advocates break through this ceiling? I am a believer in Peter Drucker’s management principle of “What gets measured gets managed”. The business case of diversity is obvious and DE&I champions need to move to tangible and measurable initiatives that will take us closer and closer to an equal world. It is possible to break down a concept like an inclusive culture into elements and measure progress over time. At AB InBev we are obsessed to track metrics like equal pay, equality in performance ratings, and growth opportunities to ensure we have an environment that truly fosters meritocracy and diversity in equal measure. It has helped us to stay true to our commitment, diagnose challenges in time, and create action plans to get back on track. We also ensure that we share our progress with our leadership committee and employees. AB InBev partnered with app-based coaching platform march 2021 |

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driven by positive consumer sentiment and the gradual upswing of the country’s economy. Our key focus areas for talent are capabilities and the workplace of the future, significantly improving the diversity of our teams along with championing inclusion like never before. In 2020, we invited all employees to participate in a DE&I committee to work along with the leadership team on this important agenda. About 60+ colleagues worked together to diagnose problems and crafted solutions in the areas of talent attraction, talent development, and nuances in the work environment that we are excited to launch in 2021.

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BetterUp in 2020 to foster inclusion and diversity. With a focus on coaching leadership in this direction, what triggered the need for such association? Can you share some noteworthy changes since introducing the platform? We have become leaders in the beverage industry by putting our people front and center. As the world’s leading brewer, we are dedicated to becoming a more diverse and inclusive company, in line with our 10 Culture Principles. We bring this commitment to life through various programs, one of which includes crafting strong women leaders. Through the BetterUp coaching program, we continue to raise the bar to achieve an even more supportive, inclusive, and innovative workplace. We had 150 female leaders from over 18 countries at various career levels participating in

the BetterUp program. The program tailors each participant’s coaching journey to suit individual preferences and learning styles. This has helped create a climate of trust, positive relationships, and high performance while assisting employees to navigate the uncertainty and difficult circumstances associated with the current health pandemic.

With tech being the enabler for a multitude of HR functions today, it has started making a way into the DE&I space as well through providing avenues for biasfree hiring, eliminating the scope of bias at the stage of resume screening. Do you see tech playing a greater and more integral role in the DE&I space? Like all other parts of our life, I am counting on Tech and AI solutions to

give solutions that will support progress for DE&I. Tech can be a big enabler to provide equal opportunities to everyone. A great example is a tech-led intervention that has helped us to remove gender-coded words in job descriptions. We have also incorporated an AI tool for our campus programs that uses machine learning to screen candidates and removes unconscious bias during hiring. Tech will have a major role to play in this journey and that day is not far away today whenAI will validate all human decisions and help us reach a stage where we truly eliminate bias.

Have you come across any region-specific diversity concerns in the APAC region? What is your approach to addressing those challenges? The levels of gender inequality in the Asia

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What myths continue to exist and dampen the growth prospects of diversity, inclusion, and equity? While in general the advantages of having a diverse workforce are widely understood, there are some

barriers that, if not understood and addressed, will threaten to derail any wellmeaning effort. First, we need to be clear that diversity cannot exist in isolation from inclusion and meritocracy. Too often, leaders get mired in the goal of increasing their diversity targets – it is certainly important to set tangible goals and targets to guide action. But diversity should not be the only metric. It is imperative to create an inclusive culture, where all employees feel respected, valued, and empowered. There should be an equal focus on providing equitable opportunities based on meritocracy for employees to learn and grow. Diversity and inclusion should be embedded in a company’s ways of working and should not be looked at as a check-the-box initia-

tive. It is also important to advance DE&I not just in the workplace but also prioritize it in other areas of the business such as the supply chain and customer demographic. There is also a tacit perception that steering diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts rest solely with the Human Resources department. DE&I is everyone’s responsibility. It should be spearheaded by the leadership–which has the onus to articulate the company’s beliefs and set the direction, aligning such initiatives with the organization’s strategic priorities– and it should be embraced by all. Every employee at every level has a role to play in building diverse and inclusive teams. march 2021 |

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Pacific region continue to remain discouraging. Especially in India, the labor force participation is dismal. We need to work together as a society to combat this at every level. We want to approach this problem starting from the people whose lives we can directly influence, i.e. our employees, their families, prospective talent, and the larger community. Across our company, we have Diversity & Inclusion committees led by senior leaders, who help us catalyze change through programs, initiatives, and external partnerships.

DE&I should be spearheaded by the leadership— which has the onus to articulate the company’s beliefs and set the direction, aligning such initiatives with the organization’s strategic priorities—and it should be embraced by all

Visty Banaji

Fair is foul – if profit’s the purpose

The road less travelled

The justification for fairness, ethical business practices, diversity, and environmental friendliness cannot be that they improve financial performance. What is right must be done and leaders need to find ways to make it profitable

he discussion was getting heated as it tends to do when I express my anguish about the hypocrisy of Indian industry which talks about being fair and ethical while using (and underpaying) hundreds of thousands of contract workers for permanent jobs.1 A wellmeaning friend of mine (who is among the most respected stalwarts in the HR profession) sought to calm the storm of vituperation by suggesting the discussion be deferred till we had data to prove that companies using employees with durable tenure for permanent jobs actually performed better (both financially and reputationally) than those that didn’t. I feel strongly that is exactly the wrong question to be asking. Before pointing out the fatal flaw in my friend’s idea, let’s broaden our survey of other respected thinkers and analysts who seek to justify ethical behavior because it is profitable | march 2021

in the long term. I call this approach the new MBO (Morality By Results).

Morality By Results

There is a whole industry of academicians, researchers, NPOs, and professional bodies that have devoted their working lives (and, sometimes, well past their 'best use by' dates) to proving that corporations do well by doing good. The range of desirable behaviors they cover is so wide that only an extreme extropiant can cover it at a glance. Start-

ing with ethical corporate behavior, we have plenty of references to the correlation between it and corporate stock or financial performance. Here is one from SHRM: "According to the most widely used measure of ethical workplace culture, the stock price growth of the 100 firms with the most ethical cultures outperformed stock market and peer indices by almost 300 percent."2 Hang on: the bandwagon is just starting to roll. "… [B] usiness ethics actually add value for customers and

social performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP). In the most comprehensive review of this research to date, we conduct a meta-analysis of 251 studies presented in 214 manuscripts. The overall effect is positive but small …, and results for the 106 studies from the past decade are even smaller."7 Disappointing as this conclusion maybe for some, I think much of this research is mispurposed. Is mammon really the strongest defense we have for morality? I have no problem listen-

If our ways of doing business and providing superior returns to shareholders conflict with either the core values we have declared or those implicit in the permission society has given businesses to operate, it is not these values that must cede way. The values don’t need to demonstrate their financial returns in order to exist Unfortunately, not all the research is as stridently convincing as the studies quoted above. Margolis, Elfenbein and Walsh summarized their findings in these terms: "Does it pay to be good? For thirty-five years, researchers have been investigating the empirical link between corporate

ing to uplifting stories of corporates that have done well while following the moral imperatives they set for themselves. I also applaud the rectitude that makes the research-minded among us hold back their sense of pious thrill till empirical statistics back up the anecdotes. It’s wonder-

ful that good deeds get their reward in the here and now. It is as edifying as seeing the worthy and wise Archbishop of Canterbury get respect and reverence from the monarch of Great Britain. But I think far more highly of Thomas Becket (than of the current Archbishop) because his King prompted some overeager barons to murder the prelate for sticking to his beliefs. In fact, Becket’s name rings down the ages because he made the supreme sacrifice for his principles. By the same token, organizations that remain ethical when there is a cost to be paid for doing so are the ones that we need to admire and emulate.

Consequences do matter

Let me make it clear: I am not proposing that the anticipated or actual outcomes of corporate actions should play no role in judging their moral worth. On more than one occasion in this column, I have taken a view that might not appeal to strict deontologists (i.e. those who believe that the morality of an action should be based on whether that action itself is right or wrong under a series of rules, rather than based on the consequences of the action). Interested readers might refer to my advocacy of aggregate people happiness as a goal8 or my plea for mitigating punishments dependmarch 2021 |

The road less travelled

result in increased profitability and performance for the firm.3 Then there is a slew of studies on the connect between CSR spending and sustainable profits, with a variety of independent variables seeming to strengthen or weaken the relationship.4 Some studies extend the domain of investigation for CSR to customers as well as suppliers and come to the same cheerful conclusions.5 Compared to the high tide of research pointing out the advantages of CSR, those extolling the benefits of diversity (mainly relating to gender) are a Tsunami.6

wellbeing of others – their happiness – to the extent we are able. Thus, by accepting barrier rights we ensure that persons are not treated as means, and by promoting happiness we treat them as ends in themselves."10 Having different justifications for making ethical decisions and making efforts to find a synthe-

approach and there have been several attempts to reconcile them. Here is one such in the context of Business Ethics: "… [W]e adopt as a basic principle, first, that no one be treated as a means and, second, that as far as possible everyone be treated as an end in themselves. And suppose we take the first to imply that persons have, at a minimum, barrier rights that can justifiably be overridden only in extreme circumstances. And we take the second to imply that we should enhance the | march 2021

sis between them are all welcome. However, we cross the bounds of acceptability when we take the matter out of the moral register altogether and place value justifications in the realm where ROI rules and everyone has a severe case of stockholderitis. Authors far more competent than I have debunked the legal and practical justification for maximizing shareholder value. Perhaps none have made the case as powerfully as Lynn Stout who recalled the recantation of an earlier

The road less travelled

ing on the seriousness of the damage caused by transgressions.9 There are and will continue to be debates about the desirability of evaluating moral worth based on consequence or some other standard such as a universal imperative or the attainment of virtue. There is much to be said for each

devotee of the shareholder value myth and wrote: "Even former champions of shareholder primacy are beginning to rethink the wisdom of chasing shareholder value. Iconic CEO Jack Welch, who ran GE with an iron fist from 1981 until his retirement in 2001, was one of the earliest, most vocal, and most influential adopters of the shareholder value mantra… several years after retiring from GE… Welch observed in a Financial Times interview about the 2008 financial crisis that 'strictly speaking, shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world.'"11 It is strange then that ethical behavior and fairness, which we announce to be (and indeed should be) among our most fundamental values, need to be buttressed by reference to a far more questionable goal like shareholder returns. The very definition of an end value is that it stands on its own selfevident worth and does not need propping by another. What I am proposing here should not sound alien to Indian managers brought up in the KV (Karmanye Vadhikaraste ma phaleshu kadachana) Gita tradition of action untainted by the desire for reward. At least at the times when they attend discourses by their gurus with pious attention and upper bodies bare. How they can reconcile this part of their lives with the 'Geckoish'

worship of greed during their workday is a dissection of schizophrenic behavior that will have to await another column.

Does it matter?

Does it matter why people or organizations are ethical, as long as they are? I think it matters hugely. Elizabeth Barrett Browning conveys the prime problem with secondary motivation in verse of great beauty (though she does it for another fundamental value – love):

In our context, it is not difficult to imagine the empirical (mainly financial) justifications for each of our fundamental values (whether fairness, diversity, environmental sustainability or any other) throwing up negative correlations. Would we then be prompted to jettison these founda-

Does it matter why people or organizations are ethical, as long as they are? I think it matters hugely in a profit-first scenario.13 What is perhaps not so generally realized is that the whole move away from durable employment has been prompted, not by the fictitious need for seasonal flexibility, but by a desire to cut BOP costs to the bare bone – and even lower. Here is a glaring instance of a decimal improvement in bottomline tail wagging the peoplefirst value dog. Another phenomenon that illustrates what happens when shareholder returns become the justification for (what should be)

fundamental values is the rampant resort to downsizing.14 Here is an extract from Macy’s statement of values, emphasizing the importance of collaboration: "In this company, innovation is a critical value to ensure the company stays abreast of the changing world. It is something that Macy’s recognizes can best be an achievement by promoting collaboration among its employees and other players."15 Readers are left to decide how far employee collaboration was augmented by its announcement to cut 3,900 jobs while awarding top management $ 9 million in bonuses.16 Environment friendliness and energy saving have rightly been prioritized by many corporates as fundamental to the future of the planet and to their own survival. When these goals are treated simply as appendages of the drive to get better financial performance, things are fine only so long as the two variables operate in tandem. When, for example, petroleum prices crashed, it was easy to spot companies that had adopted energy conservation only as a means to raise profits. They put a hold on conservation efforts and permitted their energy consumption ratios to slip negatively. It bears repeating once more. A truly valued ethical behavior is one that the organization will carry out march 2021 |

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If thou must love me, let it be for nought Except for love’s sake only. Do not say, "I love her for her smile – her look – her way Of speaking gently, – for a trick of thought That falls in well with mine, and certes brought A sense of pleasant ease on such a day" – For these things in themselves, Belovèd, may Be changed, or change for thee – and love, so wrought May be unwrought so.12

tional beliefs? Performancedriven criteria for ethical conduct are two-edged swords which can turn traitor at any moment. Let’s take a few examples to drive this argument home. The recent Covid crisis and the heart-rending sight of tens of thousands of migrant workers (many of whom had been engaged on contract and terminated with almost no notice) focused public attention on the plight of the precariat and the way they are treated

regardless (and, preferably, with even greater diligence) when there is a cost attached to it.

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Core values are the immovable object

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The central thrust of this column is very simple: If our ways of doing business and providing superior returns to shareholders conflict with either the core values we have declared or those implicit in the permission society has given businesses to operate, it is not these values that must cede way. The values don’t need to demonstrate their financial returns in order to exist. That is not to say, of course, that we must passively accept sub-optimal performance or returns. To my thinking, there are at least three paths open to an enterprise that is caught in such a dilemma. They are: Inge-

| march 2021

nuity, Repurposing or Abandonment. By far the most advantageous way to come out of a principles vs. performance conflict is through the use of Ingenuity which permits organizational goals to be met without sacrificing values. Though not brought about through car companies’ commitment to environment issues, their ability to turn to more energyefficient and less polluting engines happened with a speed and totality that would have been unimaginable before Governments gave them no choice. The point is that if a constraint is taken as non-negotiable and inescapable, corporates can creatively marshal resources to perform in that situation as well as if not better than previously. Prospectively speaking, if, as is my hope, durable employment

becomes the general norm, corporations will turn in even better performance once they have detoxified themselves from their addiction to contract labor. Sometimes, when all the ingenuity in the world is not sufficient for preserving the viability of the core business model while adhering to ethical standards, Repurposing might be the only option. As some old-timers might remember, Telco (now Tata Motors) was set up to manufacture steam locomotives. The company was not permitted to get into diesel locomotive manufacture and realizing that, in any case, having a single customer (and one as powerful as the sovereign state at that) might make adherence to the Tata code of business ethics a challenge, it entered commercial vehicle manufacture in collaboration with Daimler-Benz. Here again, it found State Transport Corporations taking into account factors other than product performance and price while awarding contracts. For a second time the company re-cast its strategy to focus on load carriers. Both decisions, though partly forced by a keenness to stick to principles, also worked out extremely favorably in the long run. But it was the fear of slipping off the straight and narrow ethical path, rather than those financial hopes,

Notes: 1.

2. 3.

which made the company reorient itself. If the chasm between the firm’s strategy and what is ethically (or legally) permissible is too broad to be crossed by a leap of Ingenuity or avoided through Repurposing, the time may have come to Abandon the enterprise altogether. Several companies (some chartered by the monarch) in Europe prospered mightily on the slave trade between the West coast of Africa and the Americas in the 17th and 18th centuries. With the legal and other sanctions

on the slave trade in the19th century, their days were numbered. A few did transition to the trading businesses but the majority were wound up in one way or another. There is no heaven-granted right that gives companies the right to continue existing – especially if they are doing wrong in order to survive. Their demise should be one of our least reasons for regret. Let me sum up this column with a single sentence Kant wrote: "Do the right thing because it is right"17 – and for no other reason.

10.

11.

12. 13.

14.

15. 16. 17.

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If the chasm between the firm’s strategy and what is ethically (or legally) permissible is too broad to be crossed by a leap of Ingenuity or avoided through Repurposing, the time may have come to Abandon the enterprise altogether

Visty Banaji, Udta Udyog – Industry’s addiction to contract workers, People Matters, 15 September 2016, (https://www. peoplematters.in/article/temporary-andcontract-staffing/udta-udyog-industrysaddiction-to-contract-workers-14090). Steven D Olson, Shaping an Ethical Workplace Culture, SHRM Foundation. Robert C. McMurrian and Erika Matulich, Building Customer Value And Profitability With Business Ethics, Journal of Business & Economics Research, November 2006, Volume 4, Number 11 R Fisman, G Heal and V B Nair, Corporate Social Responsibility: Doing Well by Doing Good? Working Paper, Columbia University, New York. Vanina Forget, Doing well and doing good: a multi-dimensional puzzle, cahier de recherché 2012-04. 2012. <hal00672037v1>. Vijay Eswaran, The business case for diversity in the workplace is now overwhelming, The World Economic Forum, 29 April 2019. J D Margolis, H A Elfenbein and J P Walsh, Does it Pay to Be Good? A MetaAnalysis and Redirection of Research on the Relationship between Corporate Social and Financial Performance; The Stakeholder Marketing Consortium, Boston University, 2007. Visty Banaji, HR’s business should be happiness raising, People Matters, 24 September 2019, (https://www. peoplematters.in/article/life-at-work/ hrs-business-should-be-happiness-raising-23175). Visty Banaji, Dealing with misdemeanor at work, People Matters, 27 July 2019, (https://www.peoplematters.in/article/ life-at-work/dealing-with-misdemeanorat-work-22462). W Michael Hoffman, Robert E Frederick and Mark S Schwartz (Editors), Business Ethics: Readings and Cases in Corporate Morality, John Wiley & Sons; 5th edition, 2014. Lynn Stout, The Shareholder Value Myth: How Putting Shareholders First Harms Investors, Corporations, and the Public, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2012. Elizabeth Barrett Browning, If thou must love me, Sonnets from the Portuguese. Dover Publications, 1992. Visty Banaji, Is HR too fragile?, People Matters, 12 May 2020, (https://www. peoplematters.in/article/strategic-hr/ is-hr-too-fragile-25630). Visty Banaji, People are not beans, People Matters, 13 July 2016, (https://www. peoplematters.in/article/talent-management/people-are-not-beans-13660). Macy’s Mission and Vision Statement Analysis, statement https://missionstatement.com/macys/ Walter Loeb, Macy’s Grants $9 Million In Bonuses To Top Execs After Cutting 3,900 Jobs, Forbes, 17 July 2020. Immanuel Kant, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Broadview Press, 2005.

Visty Banaji is the Founder and CEO of Banner Global Consulting (BGC) march 2021 |

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Make use of this time to reboot learning: S V Kiran, Apollo Hospitals As the Healthcare sector went through tremendous change over the past year, there was a need to learn and grow quickly. In this interview, S V Kiran of Apollo Hospitals outlined the key lessons that are shaping their learning strategies By Jerry Moses

In t e r v i e w

Here are excerpts from the interview.

r. S V Kiran is the Senior Vice President & Head - Human Resources, Apollo Hospitals. Over the last couple of decades, he has worked in multiple HR roles across a number of healthcare companies including Medanta, Fortis, and Takshashila. In this exclusive conversation with People Matters, he talks about the key lessons that transformed the healthcare sector, the formalization of new learning priorities, and engaging employees by building meaningful connections and giving them choice.

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The healthcare industry was at the forefront of the pandemic. What have been the topmost shifts from a learning perspective according to you? With COVID19, the healthcare industry had to relook at the entire learning agenda and how we look at the learning function. The biggest shift was the move away from a familiar learning environment – which was most often a classroom or a theatre/ auditorium setting. Learning on the job and within a lab setting was a key feature of learning– whether it was for learning how to do CPR or infection control training. They were mostly instructional. And online training and pre-recorded content were very minimal. Since COVID19 mandated physical distancing. There were reasonable restrictions on capacity to deliver training – since the size of the class was reduced to 1/6th capacity. That’s when we boosted technology-based training. We are

currently upgrading to Fusion Learn from Taleo. During the pandemic, we wanted to teach our doctors and nurses a number of things: how do you wear masks, how do you protect yourself and your team when there are suspected cases? And technology was the first lever to impart this information – that could then be transmitted to everyone in the system. And the reach is significantly higher with live sessions/ pre-recorded sessions– with multiple people connected.

Today, people want to learn – and they realized that specialization may not work in their favor if it becomes irrelevant suddenly. There’s a need to be relevant to the market

In t e r v i e w

The move away from familiar modes of learning to new ones would have been tough. What were some new opportunities that came from it? Technology-enabled an anytime, anyplace learning flexibility. There was the opportunity to learn when one was traveling when they’re at their homes and at a time of your choice. Secondly, we had control of the quality of training, because you have one expert trainer and everyone had access to the same content, unlike a classroom scenario, where you have ten different trainers across different regions. Third, we could make learning interactive. And people tend to open up and ask more questions when they’re learning virtually as opposed to a classroom setup. This period also taught us the importance of learning. Traditionally, people do the same job throughout most of their careers – only with greater quality over a period of time. For example, a lab technician may see a change of

technology and terminology but would more or less be doing the same job. We also realized that we need to engage in multi-skilling because there was a need to operate with minimum possible resources. There was also a need to unlearn and re-learn processes. Due to the rise of digital consulting, there was also the digitization of medical resources and access. There was a need to reskill people to do something else. And while you are doing that, you are protecting the job and equipping employees with new skills. With this in mind, we identified new jobs, brought clarity around what needs to be march 2021 |

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done, and communicated it with employees. This was followed by a pre-questionnaire to understand how much you know of that role was familiar to do. Doctors had to get used to checking medical records online. And this brought about a paradigm shift in the approach to learning or the thought to learn. Today, people want to learn – and

they realized that specialization may not work in their favor if it becomes irrelevant suddenly. There’s a need to be relevant to the market.

How are all these insights informing your future learning roadmap? I’m creating a learning strategy for the next financial year. And the focus is to take learning up by a notch - where we define competencies, identify gaps, bring in simulations, and we will make it mandatory to actually qualify for a particular skillset to occupy a role and seek growth. We are 104

| march 2021

working with EY on some of these items already.

How did you think about engagement with a whole new host of priorities with digital consulting etc. that needed continuous communication? There was a need to engage with employees on a personal level and it subsequently had an impact on their workplace performance and learning. There were a number of steps that the management looked into. Since there was fear around COVID-19 and risk of contracting the virus, people had to choose as to whether they wanted to continue working or take a professional break. They had to choose between treating COVID19 patients and non-COVID patients. The most important thing we had to do was engage with employees, to make them feel important and contribute their best. Particularly, one set of people who were living in hostels, senior leaders met them personally to instill a set of confidence. We also engaged with the families of the staff to assure them of the safety at work, and if they contracted the virus, we assured them that will take care of them. We also insured them for additional cover. The engagement with the family built an emotional connect with the brand. Hospitals were also equipped with vegetable kiosks, barbers, etc., to make the lives of employees better. Recognition was one form of engagement that helped motivate employees and we also certified their contribution during the

pandemic. So it gave people a real sense of purpose and they recognized that they helped mankind at large.

How are you thinking about the role of technology in instilling the right habits and behaviors for learning? Technology can play a critically important role here. During this time, we’ve brought in a lot of technology to digitize HR. In fact, we are working towards operating on a paperless HR model and we’re confident that we will achieve it. There is no way we could have navigated learning without technology. And it has a real impact

Life is not going to become suddenly normal. And therefore, it is important for the organization and the talent to relook at learning from the perspective of relevance and fun on the employee experience as its focuses on the pull factors and not just top to down’ push factors. Technology helps us with the range of courses, it builds convenience, aligns counseling and keeps up consistency, captures data, and helps map future aspirations.

In t e r v i e w

When you spoke about multiskilling, reskilling. How are you formalizing some of this learning? We are categorizing them into job categories – one for doctors, then nurses followed by paramedics. We have now developed focused online learning for the majority of our staff including courses that cater to their reallife work experience. Including how to write notes, what are the nuances in reading an ECG, and everything that one doesn’t learn in medical school. Similarly, there are staff who engaged in technical/ statistical work who want to understand the clinical aspects of work – so we gave them access to simulations labs and online demos, and that made a huge difference. There are a whole host of courses mapped to the level of their careers. It helps foster career, helps them perform better.

What is your advice that you’d like to share with HR leaders embarking on a similar transformation journey? I would tell leaders that this is the right time to reboot their strategy. Life is not going to become suddenly normal. And therefore, it is important for the organization and the talent to relook at learning from the perspective of relevance and fun. march 2021 |

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Past Month's events Preparing for the upcoming 'Skills Shift'

Knowledge + Networking

People Matters

& Degreed 26th February, 2021 Online How will organizations look at the shifting nature of skill development? Is learning and development your top priority for your employees? With the onset of 2021, offices have slowly started to resume, will skilling still be a major priority for us? Join us to find out more about the major developments in this space and how you can prepare for the best.

Workplace readiness for a seamless return to work strategy People Matters & ServiceNow 24th February, 2021 Online In this exclusive webcast brought to you in partnership by People Matters and ServiceNow, we discussed the key challenges executives and employees face in the remote work vs return to work dilemma, the required workflow changes to adapt to the changing work paradigm.

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Talent mobility: Lessons from 2020 and what's ahead in 2021? People Matters

& Sirva 24th February, 2021 Online The wave of the pandemic has brought up several instances wherein the organizations are bound to relook at their existing policies and strategies. Talent mobility is one of those crucial pointers which took a 360 shift. With WFH and remote working becoming the norms for each one of us, what does 2021 entails? How will organizations look at ‘return to the office’?

New Workplace Operating Models in HR People Matters & Oracle 18th February, 2021 Online The new world of work that we are catering to is seeing new shifts every day. Organizations need to be all armed for these shifts and ensuring that it does not affect the business continuity and employee productivity. The operating model across industries and organizations need to take a 360-degree shift. But are organizations game for it?

What’s next: How advances in English screening is a recruiting game-changer People Matters

& Pearson 25th February, 2021 Online In this webinar, we discovered how innovations in English language testing—like measuring intelligibility, fully automated remote monitoring, and customized benchmarking—are helping to drive new efficient, fair and reliable recruitment processes that will help to improve your acquisition efficiency and quality of hires. We’ll also looked at results from Pearson English’s 2020 Global Snapshot Report and examine key offshoring destinations, including India and the Philippines, to reveal what the level of English proficiency is really like right now and the impact automated English testing could have.

Upcoming events People Matters LnD SEA Conference

People Matters & ServiceNow 11th March 2021 Online As employers strive to enable work, productivity and wellbeing in the new now of work, experience remains the centre of it all, to ensure sustainable recovery and exponential growth. So how can leaders build a smooth and seamless experience focused on empowering a distributed workforce across a hybrid workplace? Addressing such concerns and more, People Matters and ServiceNow invite you to a Virtual Roundtable to take stock and gear up as the world of work builds up a plan of action to return to the workplace.

People Matters TechHR SEA 2021: The Great Emergence People Matters 5th May 2021 Online With everything disrupted, considering going back to the old ways of working is not at all a winning strategy. Companies have accelerated their business agility & speed by adopting new ways of working. People Matters TechHR 2021’s theme, The Great Emergence will answer the question that stares us in the face - WHAT NEXT? It marks the beginning of reimagining the possibilities presented by our new reality. A perfect opportunity for you to network with 2500+ delegates and discuss how HR continues its quest to become more digital, data-centric, and business-driven than ever before, with execution being at the core.

march 2021 |

Knowledge + Networking

People Matters 4th March, 2021 Online In the digital transformation journey, having a detailed talent development roadmap will be as critical as having a technology one. Articulating critical skills for recovery, building the base of future digital skills, reimagining training at a scale in a distant world, and bringing on an experimentative mindset is the base to rev-up growth for individuals, organizations, and economies. This conference will bring our community together to help us reflect and find collective answers to one big question: How do we Rev-Up Growth through capability, through change interventions, and through culture in a time of uncertainty, chaos, and disruption? In that exchange, we will charge up clarity, shed light, and uncover a new roadmap to build the foundation of a capability-driven business strategy for growth.

EX for a High-Performing Distributed Workforce

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Blogosphere

>> Julie Diamond

To be powerful, you have to feel powerful

b lo g o s p he r e

One of the most important things we can do in a position of power is to develop our personal power. Without it, we’re at risk of misusing, or even abusing, our power

Have you ever: • Avoided giving critical feedback because it felt awkward and hard? • Been asked a question you weren’t prepared for and tried to fake it? • Avoided dealing with a conflict between team members and just hoped it would work itself out? What do these scenarios have in common? You’ve sidestepped your responsibility because you didn’t feel up to the task. This points to a key paradox about power: To act powerfully, you need to feel powerful! Whenever we’re faced with challenges that trigger us, that produce an emotional response, positional power doesn’t do much to help us. We need something more robust; we need personal power. While positional power gives us

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a license to act, it’s our personal power that gives us the capacity to act. Personal power emerges out of your skills, characteristics, intelligence, and life experience. It’s inalienable. It can’t be taken from you, though you can sometimes lose connection to your personal power under situations of distress or despair. Personal power helps you

deliver difficult feedback, face a skeptical audience, challenge the status quo, and be challenged by others. It’s your inner sense of stability, self-regulation, and selfconfidence that allows you to respond to the moment with your best thinking. The greatest achievements in our world have come from social activists, innovators, and change agents

3 Critical components of personal power

No matter where our personal power comes from– life experience, emotional intelligence, social skills, personal traits, and characteristics–it contains three critical components which

can be developed: courage, attention, and purpose. Using the analogy of a sailboat, let’s look at each three in turn: Courage: A key component of personal power is courage. Courage doesn’t mean bravery or taking risks or putting yourself in danger. Courage means facing difficulties because you know that growth only comes through facing your challenges. As Joseph Campbell says in the Hero’s Journey, “In the cave, you fear to enter holds the treasure that you seek.”

The greatest achievements in our world have come from social activists, innovators, and change agents who lacked positional power and social status but had profound personal power Courage can be developed by making learning your goal, by developing a growth mindset. When challenges happen, you don’t feel victimized, blame others, or give up because you know you will learn from them. You will get stronger, smarter, more competent

through wrestling with obstacles. This attitude is best captured in the quote by Epictetus: “On the occasion of every accident that befalls you, remember to turn to yourself and inquire what power you have for turning it to use.” A courageous leader isn’t afraid of telling the truth, even when the truth is bad. They know that rumors, conspiracy theories, and misinformation abound during times of uncertainty, which can be more deadly than the reality of the crisis itself. An example of courageous leadership is German Prime Minister Angela Merkel’s response to the COVID-19 outbreak. In a remarkably honest and blunt press conference, she told the German people, “The situation is serious. Take it seriously.” Up to 70% of us will be infected she cautioned. And due to her courage and truth-telling, Germany was able to contain the pandemic better than many other countries. Courage is the crew of your sailboat. Attention: The second core component of personal power is attention. You might have the courage to face challenges, but without attention, you might face the wrong set of challenges. Attention is the presence of mind, ability to concentrate, the mental focus to know what has to be done. You— march 2021 |

b lo g o sp he r e

who lacked positional power and social status but had profound personal power. Consider Nelson Mandela. Mandela spent twenty-seven years as a political prisoner during South Africa’s apartheid regime, living in an 8x7-foot cement cell furnished only with a straw mat. Verbally and physically abused by prison guards, he nonetheless saw himself as a teacher and moral guide– to other prisoners, to guards, and the government. Mandela felt powerful. He considered himself a leader, even though no one else ratified it. He had no social status, no positional authority, nothing but his own deep well of insight and wisdom. What he had was personal power. Research highlights how crucial our sense of personal power is for leading effectively. Under stress or pressure, or in moments where we lack self-confidence, we’re at risk of reacting emotionally, of using our positional power to protect and defend. Reacting poorly from a position of power has dire consequences.

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wind on your sailboat. Purpose: Courage and attention are central but meaningless if they’re not aimed at the right goal. Purpose is the third, and final component of personal power. Being connected to a greater purpose enables you to use your power effectively. The sense of meaning and mission in life means you don’t get caught up in momentary dramas. Your day isn’t a matter of ticking

the wind, blown about every which way. You respond to everything but accomplish nothing. To develop attention, you must quiet the inner and outer voices and develop your emotional self-regulation, so you don’t react to every little thing. And above all, you must set boundaries to have time to think, reflect, and contemplate. Attention is the sail that captures and directs the | march 2021

items off your to-do list, but of connecting your every action to your greater goal. Having a purpose gives you resilience; you’re more able to reset after failure because you have a north star guiding you. Purpose directs us under crisis and extreme stress. Consider the actions of the leader who led the rescue of the 33 miners trapped in the mine in the 2010 Chilean mine accident. Laurence

b lo g o s p he r e

and not your device, other people, or your calendar— determine when what, and how you focus. Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, says that the most important leadership attribute is clarity of focus, and the chief task of a leader is to “bring clarity into a situation where none exists.” Harnessing your focus gives you power. Without the capacity to direct your attention, you are a leaf in

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Golborne, beset by pressure from all sides, and performing under the glare of the global media, had to walk to his place of work every day through throngs of weeping family members, television cameras, and reporters. What helped him stay calm and kept his anxiety in check was keeping his eyes on the ultimate purpose and reminding himself daily of his mission—to rescue the men. And this, above everything else, kept the distractions, stress, and anxieties at bay. To develop purpose be like the Stoics who used death as their guide, making it a practice to contemplate every choice, every action from the perspective of mortality. What, if anything, do you want your life to be about? What will stand out to you as meaningful from your death bed? Purpose is the rudder on your sailboat. People may obey your positional power, but they are inspired by your personal power. Personal power is the difference between mere compliance and enthusiastic commitment. It’s your courage, attention, and connection to the purpose that allows you to use your positional power to the greatest advantage. Julie Diamond, Ph.D. is the CEO and founder of Diamond Leadership, an international consulting firm

RNI Details: Vol. XII, Issue No. 3, R.N.I. No. HARENG/2010/33504. Price Per Copy: Rs. 150/- Printed and Published by Mahesh Kumar on behalf of People Matters Publishing Pvt. Ltd. Published at 501, 5th Floor, Millennium Plaza, Tower A, Sushant Lok-1, Sector-27, Gurgaon - 122009, Haryana, India. Printed at Polykam Offset, C-138, Phase - I, Naraina Industrial Area, New Delhi - 110028. Editor: Esther Martinez Hernandez

People Matters' People Matters' Digital Platforms Digital Platforms Engaging talent Engaging 300K+ 300K+ talent professionals in Asia Asiadaily daily professionals in

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