DEI Audits: Striving for Growth

What is the purpose of a DEI (sometimes referred to as "culture") audit?

Is it to launch an intentional shift to a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable culture? Why else do it?

Evolving a culture to embrace diversity, foster inclusion, and promote equity takes:

a dream (a vision)

a process

a commitment to unlearning

unlearn: the societal commitments we make to beliefs that keep us silo'd from one another and invested in deficit-thinking about difference

An audit that provokes change must be understood as:

a snapshot

understand an audit is simply a snapshot of health at a moment in time (thank you to my friend and colleague, Alison Park, for this analogy).

a systemic review

understand an audit is the comprehensive review of a current system, not a group's or individual's satisfaction.

The importance of a snapshot:

It's a place to start (the beginning).

Understanding an audit as a "health snapshot" means you accept that your current culture of equity and inclusion is built upon past policies and processes that can be sustained or undone depending upon the audits "prognosis." And, just like any health check-up, it's important to understand that life is long and no one is ever "done" keeping healthy. It's important to take the "doctor's advice" with an open mind and an interest in improving. And, when we feel exhausted or want to reject the advice, we need to pause, regroup, and try new methods to stay on track, because our livelihood literally relies on us to keep pushing.

A well done audit offers up recommendations to meet a "standard of care" and also pushes organizations with questions:

• What if?

• Have you considered?

• This is what's possible if you are willing to consider...

• Have you actually asked?

• Is your [legal, finance, HR....you name it] team certain this isn't possible, or are they trapped by what they have been trained to think is "right"?

An investment in a thorough audit is fully realized when an organization understands it's the beginning, not the end, of a process. It is fully realized when the questions stick around and come up in future meetings, reviews, and visioning summits.

The importance of a systemic review:

Daily experiences are shaped by context and possibilities.

Systemic reviews include both personal reflections on feeling included and heard by the organization and organizational/institutional reflections on intentionally designed processes to facilitate agency and accountability.

A robust audit is inclusive of:

Workshop(s) that introduce the entire community to the concepts (diversity, equity, inclusion, and whatever other language is already being leveraged internally -- i.e. internalized dominance, internalized oppression, belonging, justice)

Surveys that use mutually understood definitions (introduced in the workshops, published glossary, etc.)

Focus Groups that dig into nuances, often introduced by interesting data from surveys

Document Discovery done by equity and inclusion professionals that identifies recommended changes and also elucidates important assumptions inherent in current policies and procedures. Questioning these assumptions introduces opportunities for greater internal DEI accountability and provokes growth and deeper accountability for all.

Timelines for implementation support deep, sustainable long-term growth, ensuring that the urgency of change is acknowledged and the challenges to making those changes over time is understood and internalized as a journey that takes persistence and resilience and time on task.

A robust audit leaves organizations/institutions with:

Understanding of what's possible through cultural change

Recommendations for short-term and long-term growth

Questions that provoke and inspire

Capacities to be curious, humble, resilient, productive over time

In sum, the process of change must recognize context and inspire hope for what's possible. A robust audit can facilitate a culture that is proud of being in the growth zone.

If you're interested in audit work, reach out. And, because we're always smarter as a collective, many thanks to my colleagues and audit partners: Alison Park (Blink Strategic Consulting), Milton Reynolds (Milton Reynolds Consulting), and Abi Karlin-Resnick (Jigsaw Impact Strategies).