5 Things / Embedded
Happy New Year! I hope you're energized and optimistic about 2022. I am. I'm excited to continue supporting our clients towards increasingly big wins and continue sharing stories of what's going right in DEI. As always, please reply and share some of the stories that inspire you.
The first story I read this year that made me stop and think, "Wow, that's so cool!" is about a new hotel in Orlando that was designed with DEI in mind. The Lake Nona Wave Hotel stocks over 200 beverage brands supporting female, black and LGBTQ-owned businesses, offers size-inclusive bathrobes, and has a library of 100+ curated children’s DEIA-focused books which can be read aloud via an in-room tablet.
And yet, these programs aren't promoted on the hotel's website. They just are. DEI is embedded.
That's what's going to be necessary, making inclusion the default...in case you missed it, the new U.S. Census reported there's no majority racial or ethnic group for those under 18. It's time to get to work.
Here are the other good vibes I found this week:
NYC will soon have a law requiring employers to disclose salary ranges in job descriptions. I wrote about this in my book, Inclusive 360, as a tool to reduce gender and racial pay gaps and ultimately reduce the racial wealth gap. Similar laws exist in California and Colorado, but it's far from the norm.
Unilever has a new U-Work program designed to provide employees with maximum flexibility. It offers the benefits of full time employment with the flexibility of contract work. This is partly being used by older employees nearing retirement as a way to scale back on hours, but also by other employees seeking more freedom. This matters because, more than ever, employees value flexibility, which becomes a retention strategy, especially for underrepresented talent.
When Mattel began modernizing and diversifying Barbie, such as providing a wheelchair, their other products had to be redesigned as well. This included Barbie's Dreamhouse which now accommodates a wheelchair. I learned about it on the Reinvent podcast (start around 8:45). It's a fascinating story about how to bring the lens of diversity into product design.
NASCAR has a new partnership with the Carolinas LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce. Their sponsorship will pay to educate non-LGBTQ owned businesses on LGBTQ+ inclusion. This matters because the money is being used for education which will hopefully then encourage more acceptance and inclusion, particularly in those states where someone LGBTQ+ can be legally denied access to somewhere like a store or a restaurant. I love this one.