The right set of data and metrics can shape the talent strategy by offering actionable insights on on-ground realities and existing challenges

Diversity of perspectives helps organisations innovate, connect better with their consumers, balance risks, and ultimately unlock growth. HR leaders play a key role in enabling this diversity within their organizations, and it starts with embedding equality into talent strategy. 

Let data and listening guide change

Data and analytics are fundamental to the diversity agenda because what gets measured, gets done. The right set of data and metrics can shape the talent strategy by offering actionable insights on on-ground realities and existing challenges. For example, analyzing the data on career growth and promotions can help identify gender biases and determine specific areas of improvement.

It is equally important to regularly listen to what our people need, in particular our diverse groups. This can be done through in person conversations or by leveraging technology such as bot-led interactions or surveys. Leveraging technology can enable HR teams to understand the challenges for specific groups of people, particularly those at intersectionalities. Example, are there specific challenges that women who identify as LGBTIQ+ face at work? Are women dropping out because of caregiving responsibilities towards not just children but also for their elderly family members?

Make talent strategy inclusive by design

Diversity cannot be a standalone metric; it needs to be woven into how we manage talent in the organization. In other words, we need diversity and inclusion by design.

It starts by setting meaningful diversity goals and ensuring every talent management process is audited for inclusion by design. Example, are we considering a diverse slate of candidates for every position, are the job descriptions gender agnostic, are our promotions gender balanced and are we measuring attrition differences between men and women.

We need to institutionalize support structures such as flexible work options and programs that offer skilling and integration support to returning mothers or women looking to re-enter the workforce after a career break. And we need to curate benefits such as caregiving support, gender-neutral parental leave and programs that prioritize holistic wellbeing of women. We also need to ensure that we design learning and development programs that address the specific needs of our women, and we are deliberate when it comes to succession planning and leadership pipeline development.

Focus on culture-building

An inclusive talent strategy ultimately helps in creating an overall culture of equality which is imperative to driving sustainable change. However, to begin with, we need leadership advocacy and business alignment to ensure diversity goals are treated as a business priority. This then gives the right impetus to HR’s efforts around sensitizing leaders and front-line supervisors about unconscious biases, creating a network of gender advocates and ensuring the talent strategy is implemented in spirit.

Another key element our HR leaders need to focus on is around creating access to networks, sponsors and mentors so that there are different avenues for our women leaders to tap into as they continue their leadership journey.

Create skilled talent pools from local communities

Finally, as HR leaders focus on building and growing women within their organization, they also have a responsibility to ensure that their organisations are creating a diverse pool of talent in the communities they live in. We need to consider extending our learnings from within the organizations to local communities so that it not only drives social impact but also creates diverse talent for the industry. We can do this by introducing skilling and inclusive apprenticeship programs that empower diverse and under-served groups to develop workplace skills for the digital economy.

Equality and equity

Over the last two decades, we have made significant strides towards gender equality at the workplace, more so in the IT industry. However, when you look across industries, representation of women remains low, in particular at leadership levels. Solving for this by only setting and working towards aggressive diversity targets may lead to the spirit of inclusion getting replaced by mere tokenism, real or perceived. Organisations, need to be mindful of creating a true culture of inclusion by fostering both equality and equity. HR leaders need to focus on building a culture where everyone is seen and heard.

(The article has been curated By Lakshmi C, Managing Director and Lead – Human Resources, Accenture in India)

Disclaimer: The views expressed in the article above are those of the authors' and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of this publishing house