How to respond to resistance towards equity efforts
Not every employee will embrace your organisational efforts towards diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Yet it’s still bewildering when employees we thought supportive, instead either deny the problem or feign support with inaction and inertia. And why wouldn’t they?
For example, a successful CEO may feel personally attacked when faced with the argument their success has had more to do with their maleness and whiteness and not their years of study or the effort and sacrifices endured moving up the corporate ladder.
Your role as an advocate for DEI, is to anticipate, recognise, engage and effectively deal with this expected employee opposition. But let’s be upfront, these are tough conversations. They can be emotional, personal, traumatic even hazardous if not handled well.
preparation to identify and effectively deal with common forms of employee resistance. You can also share employee resistance you’ve experienced and in return we can offer some advice. It might also help others.
In June 2021, MIT Sloan Management Review categorised three ways employees try to oppose change towards DEI- denial, distance, and distortion. Being able to identify the source of the opposition allows you to systematically and therefore confidently respond.
This form of opposition is where employees fail to acknowledge the existence of any forms of bias, prejudice or discrimination.
How to Respond
| “You’re right, we have made progress but to keep progressing ongoing effort is required. The changes you refer to, were implemented quite recently in the scheme of things. Let’s just look at a brief history,
– In 1943 women were finally being elected to the Commonwealth Parliament. Yet in 2021 only 38% of women make up the Parliament – In 1972 Equal pay for equal work became law. Yet women have to work an extra 64 days a year to get the same pay as men doing the same work. So whilst progress has been made, we haven’t yet been able to undo the centuries of inequality. Despite laws and policies designed to promote equality these alone aren’t sufficient to achieve genuine equality for every person regardless of class, race, and gender. How can women be considered equal to men when statistics like these persist? o Only 10% of CEOs of ASX200 listed companies are female o Women spend substantially more time on unpaid work than men and this reinforces gender stereotypes such as ‘men as the breadwinner’. Redistribution of unpaid care could reverse this societal construct. o Only 1 in 5 culturally diverse women felt their workplace was free of culture diversity or gender-based biases and stereotypes This workplace recognises there is much work to be done to create genuine equality for all and we hope you will be part of the change.” |
How to Respond
“I like to think of Affirmative action policies less as preferential treatment and more as attempts to promote equality and giving everyone a ‘fair go’ by affording members of marginalized groups a fair chance to effectively participate in this workplace. To think that right now our systems are fair – the way we hire, promote and pay everyone, flies in the face of years of research which clearly demonstrates its infected with bias. For example the recent study where when 1,500 identical resumes resulted in different call back rates depending on how foreign a names sounded and how you looked.
We often engage in ‘word of mouth recruitment’, but this narrows the pool to the existing labour pool of (often) white males reducing the chances that women or people of colour can apply. It’s these invisible but pervasive organisational criteria and practices, which are not deliberately designed to favour the majority but, in the end, do so. Our organisation is committed to redesigning many of our people processes such as the way we recruit, promote, and pay to ensure we’re not advantaging one group over another. Are you with us?” |
How to Respond
| “It might help to think about how we think. Our brain thinks a little like Google’s autocomplete. Remembering past searches or online forms you completed helping to finish what you started typing. Sometimes this is a helpful shortcut other times it’s not – particularly when it involves making decisions about people.
We make assumptions based on social norms and heavily impacted by our lifetime of experiences, some conscious many unconscious. This impacts what we believe and how we act towards others. Many times, we’re not even aware we’re of what we’re thinking or doing eg side stepping a person of colour, or making a sexist remark about a female colleague. But those on the receiving end do. These thoughts and actions can be at odds with how we see ourselves. The reality is we all have biases, it’s normal and how the brain works. However that doesn’t excuse it. We need to be aware of the stereotypes we have and be on alert when faced with them to ensure we don’t fall victim to them.” |
How to Respond
| “If we can’t talk about a problem, how can we be part of the solution? Learning more about other cultures, which can be as simple making the effort to get to know a colleague from different background, can help challenge our often unconsciously held stereotypes and make us think about ways we can behave more inclusively. Side stepping conversations about race means your racially diverse colleagues feel they can’t be themselves at work because they have to leave their race and culture at the front door. I understand it feels safer to not say anything, but no action is an action, and one that doesn’t progress our organisational goals. Respectful and enriching conversations start not from judging but seeking to understand and testing the validity or our judgements.” |
How to Respond
“Does this mean you don’t see skin colour? Or is it you don’t see differences between racial groups? Firstly, it’s visually impossible for us to not see differences in skin pigments. Whilst I’m sure it’s not deliberate but the term Colour-blindness implies that everyone is equal regardless of race. This denies the past and how it has shaped racial disparities over time. Whilst overt racism is illegal in workplaces, workers continue to feel subjected to more subtle forms of racism – According to Australia Talks data, around four in five Australians with non-European ancestry (79 per cent) experience minor slights or subtle forms of discrimination compared to 44 per cent of Australians with European ancestry. Also, close to two-thirds of respondents agree they have relatives, friends or colleagues who make racist jokes (61 per cent). The challenge is to be able to see race again, and to not treat everyone the same but instead find ways to ensure fairness and equity so that everyone can fully participate regardless of race.” |
Whilst employees accept that inequities occurs, they do not see themselves as part of the problem. Distancing themselves from the privileged majority helps hold on to the belief that their success is in fact a result of their hard work and not who they are. By citing hardships, even discrimination employees attempt to discount the systemic inequities that burden minorities.
How to Respond
“Whilst there are certainly still individuals who display overtly racist or sexist behaviour which must be appropriately sanctioned, it is the systemic discrimination which must be overcome and we all have a role to play to address these inequities. The core of the issue is that it’s – where you’re born, – the colour of your skin, – your socio-economic status and – gender that determines if you’re hired, promoted or how much you’re paid and not if you’re qualified or capable. But mistakenly we don’t see this because these ‘unfair’ processes are subtle even invisible. But when we look to research, we find in fact those in majority are advantaged by the current system – so people could work just as hard, achieve the same results, yet their outcomes are very different purely because of demographic factors. As an organisation we take responsibility to level the playing field.”
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How to Respond
| “I can appreciate this, we all have a story and some have lifelong ramifications. These conversations are in no way meant to undermine personal hardship. But respectfully it’s not about pitting one hardship against another to cancel each other out. The fact remains despite the same amount of effort and hardship majority group members receive an underserved advantage when it comes to who gets hired, promoted, and paid more. As an organisation we feel this is important to redress.” |
How to Respond
| “It’s disheartening to hear of the discrimination you’ve received. We are working towards building a workplace where discrimination doesn’t happen. We should also be mindful that some groups, particularly those of Asian descent, are the largest recipients of discrimination which is commonly packaged not as overt discriminatory behaviour but more subtly as microaggressions which affects who gets hired, rostered, promoted and how much pay they receive.” |
Whilst there is acceptance of inequities, employee’s display their opposition to efforts to address inequities through criticisms of ‘system-wide’ approaches to change. For example hiring and promotion processes. This manifests itself as unwillingness to participate in training or new procedures and to perceive themselves (despite being a majority) as being discriminated against. Their concern is that changing systems will remove their unearned advantage.
How to Respond
| “We acknowledge that the world has made progress towards becoming more equitable. But let’s not kid ourselves, the unfair and underserved treatment of minorities throughout the ages is harrowing. And whilst there are now laws preventing overt discriminatory behaviour, these have only been around recently (last 50 years). We cannot expect to immediately undo centuries of discrimination.
In fact we are still a long way from achieving equality – for example, in the last 30 years more women (54%) have graduated from university than men (45%) but women are less likely to be promoted into management than men. Currently only 10% of CEO’s of ASX200 listed companies are female. It’s clear that well- meaning legal frameworks don’t work to dismantle the more subtle forms of bias and discrimination in our workplaces – its these we need to shine a light on and make plans to address. So yes, we absolutely do need these initiatives, and urgently.” |
How to Respond
| “As a non-minority you are advantaged by many of the decisions made at work. These aren’t deliberately set to advantage you, nor do you necessarily see them at play. Yet they are so ingrained in the way we work that they are mostly invisible.
Yet we know through research: – When women conform to gendered norms by acting communally (caring and sensitivity) they are not considered leadership potential. Yet when women violate gender norms and act more male and agentic (competitive and determined) they are considered too aggressive and again rejected, – Where minorities commonly experience indignities that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults this results in disengagement and underperformance – Minorities opinions are overlooked or misattributed and – Career influencing networking event are held at times working mothers and unavailable due to the demands of home life. The goal here isn’t to advantage anyone. It’s about fairness. We are trying to level the playing field which currently is tipped in favour of you as a majority. Instead, we want everyone to feel their successes are attributed to their hard work, instead of systems advantaging one group over another, which is currently the case.” |
How to Respond
| “That sounds like a difficult experience. Perhaps it’s not surprising, that diverse times are more likely to express difficulties. Having a diversity of representation doesn’t directly translate into an inclusive team especially where differences aren’t embraced to optimise organisational performance. But as an organisation we are deeply committed to our values – embracing diversity and helping everyone be their best by giving everyone a ‘fair go’. We’re not there yet but we believe it is absolutely the right thing to do.” |
How to Respond
| “A gender equal workforce is a major achievement, particularly in a gender dominate workforce. But unless we have women equally represented in leadership roles that comes with influence and impact we still have work to do.” |
Share other types of opposition you’ve experienced, and we’ll get back to with a suggested response.
I hope these responses inspire your thinking and confidence in ways to productively respond to employee opposition to your gallant attempts to help your workplace strive for equity.
Let’s keep this an ongoing conversation to help build our collective understanding of the types of opposition employees throw up and how we can best respond, it’s in everyone’s interest. Please feel free to comment here or message me directly.
