High performance = inclusion by design

6 min readMay 15, 2024

🥂 We set inclusion goals like they’re New Year resolutions
🏁 The steps toward sustained, measurable improvements
💡 For example
✊ It’s not about intentions: it’s about results

🥂 We set inclusion goals like they’re New Year resolutions

On New Year’s Day we say “It’s time to get healthy!” At best we stop going to the gym after 3 weeks, at worst we forget about it the next day.

A few weeks before [insert DEIB landmark], we say “It’s time to think about them!” At best, we roll something out that lays dormant until the next year. At worst, we forget about them the next month.

We should do the work because belonging is a must for people to thrive irrespective of their background & identity, and so everyone has a more equitable shot — at work, and in life.

Don’t do some work just because it’s “the right thing to do”, to look good and skip any spicy guilt — this isn’t about pity parties or lip service. It’s about people’s lives. And diverse teams perform better*

So let’s stop treating these landmarks like sloppy New Year resolutions 💀

*(even though they shouldn’t have to IMHO)

🏁 The steps toward sustained, measurable improvements

🏆 Start with why
Define what you’re trying to achieve and why.

🏋️ Inclusion by design
Turning inclusion from an after-thought to a core design principle.
In a scaling start-up, everything you do must be scalable, agile, rooted in data — and inclusive.

📈 Measure what matters
If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it!

Let’s get practical:

🏆 Start with why

You’ll know you’ve succeeded when a diverse* range of people:

Are attracted to your company
Get hired into your company
Want to stick around aka are retained**

You’ll need all of the above to be true to have a diverse team, where everyone feels like they belong for being included.

*(diverse /dʌɪˈvəːs/ adjective: showing a great deal of variety; very different. Spans across and is not limited to social and ethnic backgrounds, neurodiversity, age, gender, orientation, and more.)

**(Retaining employees also means they’re equipped to perform at their best, have, and take advantage of the same career opportunities and are as engaged as any other group — especially the dominant group — meaning the needs related to their specific experiences are met.)

🏋️ Inclusion by design

Put your work to the test every step of the way, and ask:

Have we deliberately mitigated unconscious bias? Put clear processes in place?
Have we tested our work with a wide range of people? Got their feedback?
Have we iterated accordingly?

It’s just as critical as being scalable, agile, and rooted in data by design: it’s not about doing “extra work” — it’s about doing “the best possible work”

📈 Measure what matters

If the work we do for those landmarks leads to sustained, measurable improvements, that’s how we know it’s not performative.

What’s your starting point? Where is your organisation at today?
What’s your goal? Why?
How does any given group’s experience differ from others? At what point? Why?
How will you track progress and know you’ve achieved your goal? What does success look like and how do you measure it?

💡 For example

Let’s unpack what 🏋️‍♀️ inclusive by design looks like across the attract-hire-retain trinity.

For each example below, start by defining why you’re doing it and how you’ll measure success.

🫱🏼‍🫲🏾 Hire

Unfortunately we live in a society full of injustice, where everyone has a different starting point & baggage in life.

That means some groups are less likely to even get to the point of being qualified for a given role.

If you really want to hire the best person for the role (and get a diverse workforce), you’ll need to put your money where your mouth is and make sure your pipeline and hiring process are reflective of that goal.

For more senior roles, it includes sourcing a variety of competent profiles and that will take time and money (which will be worth your while).

For more junior roles, what’s holding you back from investing in high-potential people who don’t come from dominant groups?

If you don’t, you’ll miss out on the best talent. Unless you think talented people = people who are already in power, but that sounds like a narrow talent pool so good luck I guess 🤷

🚀 Retain

⚖️ On equality… Having a Career Framework with clear role levels and expectations, benchmarked salary bands aligned to those levels, a reward strategy and salary increase formula helps make sure that everyone gets paid fairly for doing equal work.

That should help engage and retain people who statistically get lower salaries because of who they are.

⚖️ On equity… Think about how, if someone’s sick, they can take a sick day because they need it. So they can come back feeling valued, respected, and well-rested.

In all likelihood they’ll feel less resentful and exhausted than if they’d worked through the sickness and ruined their weekends trying to rest. They’ll come back more engaged, and perform better.

Apply this thinking to other types of time off. Carer leave days, so you can look after a loved one who needs you. A “important life day” people can invest however they need. And more.

Apply it to benefits. Some people need to use their private medical more than others. Some need support through transition. Some, parental leave — others, fertility support: offering benefits that are inclusive by design helps diverse people thrive.

⚖️ On DEIB Landmarks… They exist to remind us that there’s still a lot of work ahead. They’re necessary at this point — I’m not saying having Salary Bands means we can forget about Pride initiatives altogether.

I’m saying that an approach to pay that’s equal is also effective, and that landmarks are a place to start, not an end in themselves.

Here’s an example of framing I’ve used in the past, giving context to the launch of initiatives like ERG Groups, and more.

The initiatives we’re launching this month are not one-offs. We’re leveraging this landmark to kick-off work that’ll live on all year round, and all year round we do the work for everyone here to have an inclusive and equitable experience.

👀 Attract

This one’s last because if you do all the work above, talk about what you do, why and attach your success metrics, that’s your marketing material to attract a range of different people.

QED 💁

✊ It’s not about intentions, it’s about results.

The key to success is to start with the 3 steps above: 🏆 start with why, 🏋️‍♀️ inclusion by design, and 📈 measure what matters.

Apply them to your company, to your HR strategy, to drive your initiatives.

🎯 The ultimate goal: make DEIB landmarks a memory of the past

DEIB landmarks shine a light on important issues, and if they’re so necessary… it means they’re also a painful reality check.

It’s not always easy to be a woman, even when it’s not International Women’s Day but perhaps especially when it is. It’s not always easy to be black, even when it’s not Black History Month but perhaps especially when it is. To not be cisgender or heterosexual when it’s Pride… you get the gist.

It’ll take a lot of work to make that change happen and level the playing field, so we better lift each other up and get started now.

Thank you for sharing constructive feedback on my drafts, Lauren Gomes, JooBee Yeow, Sara Hoxhaj, Brenda Wong, Joseph Lemien, Cynthia Aliaga, Alex Gordons Perkins, Christelle Vaugelade-Kalipé, Clément Lemainque, Laila Jaleel, Lucy Mooney.

If you have feedback, please ping me here.