Doctor E. wants to talk more about the acronym DEI and why he thinks it should be diversity, inclusion and equity. Diversity is about difference. How you allow difference to inform and influence what you do as an organization. He will talk about equity next.
Hello Doctor E. Hope you are doing well. Back to talk more about the acronym DEI and why I think it actually should be diversity, inclusion and equity. But I understand fundamentally why we don't want the acronym die, because obviously we want to give life to work, we want to give energy to the work. And so an acronym that actually says and spells die would be counterproductive to that, which I totally understand. But I want you to think about this progressively. Diversity is the first stop. Diversity is about difference.
How you actually begin to see, embrace and engage difference, and how you allow difference to inform and influence what you do as an organization, as a team, as a leader that lends itself to inclusion, because inclusion, in my definition, is the ability to affect, the ability to affect decisions, the ability to affect outcomes, the ability to affect how we look at what we look at what we do, how we do, all of those procedural, practical and policy kinds of things that really, if you fundamentally change the seats that are at the table and who's sitting in those seats at the table, hopefully that leads to more robust discussions, the ability to challenge and change, but also more importantly, the ability to raise up perspectives and experiences that maybe historically have not been in that space.
Just having a seat at the table doesn't necessarily mean you can inform and influence what's happening at the table. And I want to say that again, because that is so important. Just having a seat at the table does not mean you are able to inform and influence decisions that are taking place at the table. Conversations that are taking place at the table, all of those kinds of things that actually affect what organizations do, decisions that organizations make, how perspectives are looked at, what perspectives are looked at.
And so inclusion is about that in and of itself, the ability to affect. So if you have a diverse organization, that doesn't necessarily mean you are an inclusive organization. Think about that for a minute. Just because you have diverse folks in your organization on your team, doesn't necessarily mean you are allowing their voices and perspectives to be heard, doesn't mean you are allowing their voices and perspectives to be shared. And more importantly, doesn't mean that you are allowing their voices and perspectives to shape what you are doing moving forward.
That is what inclusion is. How are you bringing those voices to the fore so that they have the ability to affect and impact what you're doing as an organization? That is inclusion. In a nutshell, diversity inclusion. And I will talk about equity next.
