Survey: What Diversity and Inclusion Policies Do Employees Actually Want?

Research from BCG found that around three quarters of employees in underrepresented groups—women, racial and ethnic minorities, and LGBTQ employees—do not feel they’ve personally benefited from their companies’ diversity and inclusion programs. A survey of over 16,000 employees in 14 countries around the world found that members of majority groups continue to underestimate the obstacles – particularly the pervasive, day-to-day bias – that diverse employees face. Half of all diverse employees stated that they see bias as part of their day-to-day work experience. Half said that they don’t believe their companies have the right mechanisms in place to ensure that major decisions (such as who receives promotions and stretch assignments) are free from bias.

It’s no surprise then that when employees ranked the efficacy of diversity interventions, there was consensus about getting back to basics and rooting out bias. The top-ranked interventions included robust, well-crafted, and consistently followed antidiscrimination policies; effective training to mitigate biases and increase cultural competency; and removing bias from evaluation and promotion decisions. These should be priorities for any organization that wants to improve diversity. The survey also revealed a set of “hidden gems” for each diverse group – policies they thought were effective, but were undervalued by employees in the majority group.