Amina Colter Jones, Senior Vice President, on Edelman’s Health and Multicultural teams, explains how safe spaces can lessen the divide between executives and associates when it comes to racial justice progress. Amina shares the impact of affirmative action and explains why communicators should research the policies. Amina also shares her advice on how companies can be more inclusive in their hiring process.

>> Listen to the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and others.

TRANSCRIPT:

DOUG: Are organizations making progress on racial justice? It turns out, from this new business and racial justice report from Edelman that it might depend on who you ask. So, Amina, one of the things that surprised us was the tremendous gap between what the C-suite thought in terms of progress being made, as well as what general employees felt.

AMINA: This is our fourth year producing this report, and we’re continuing to see some really interesting findings. The gap is significant, 60% of executives felt that, you know, there has been progress compared to 18% of associate or entry level and that is a huge gap. And I was surprised by that. It validates that there’s work for us to do and there’s an opportunity for us to really bridge that gap.

DOUG: What are some of the things that can be done to bring their view closer together? Clearly, the executive suite is overconfident about the progress. Are the other members of the team getting it right or not? But actually, it really doesn’t matter because if that’s what they feel it’s real there.

AMINA: There’s really an opportunity for some learning and discovery here, really bringing both parties together. One, some acknowledgement of the work that needs to be done, but really creating a safe space for employees to share how they’re feeling, what they expect, what they need to see, what they want to be a part of in terms of change at the organizations they work at and I think creating that safe space and that opportunity for both parties to listen and learn is, is how we’ll be able to drive impact to really create DE&I initiatives that allow the culture of our organizations to evolve.

DOUG: One of the other disparities that you really uncovered in this fascinating and valuable report is that while many are saying the CEO needs to take a stand and engage in these issues, they’re by far in a way the least trusted messengers within an organization. So how do you get around that? Do you have the CEO talking with leadership and other speakers across the company? How do you navigate that when people want the CEO to take a stand but no one’s really believing them when they do?

AMINA: Yeah. Think CEOs and businesses, we really need to prioritize expectations that while there may be work to do and that the CEOs being held accountable that we need to listen again to employees. It’s the listening and learning, bringing together, you know, the DEI leaders, the ERGs, the employee resource groups and really DEI council members to talk about what commitments we’ve made as an organization, what actions are actually being delivered from those commitments, and how do we create progress and change together. I think that measurement piece, that acknowledgment of the CEOs not alone in this, they are at the helm. But there is a whole organization of people who are willing and interested to do the good hard work. And so, think bringing those people together at the table to talk about the shifts and change that that need to happen is really our best way to educate the CEO on the progress that needs to happen and then pull this group together.

DOUG: In the report, you offered two definitions of what affirmative action meant, and there was a split in the people who responded. Can you share what that was and what the correct answer is of the actual meaning of affirmative action?

AMINA: I want to get this stat right, but 57% of people believe that when organizations use race as one of many criteria in deciding who to hire, some unfairly benefit at the expense of others. But when you look across parties, we found that 71% of Republicans versus 45% of Democrats had the same belief. And as we all know, you know, affirmative action is highly debated. It’s often misunderstood and right now it continues to be heavily politicized. But really, affirmative action is about increasing opportunities for underrepresented communities across our society. This can be everything from gender, race, sexual orientation, nationality, and we, you know, it helps ensure that there’s equal opportunity to seek out education and resources.

DOUG: Even for those who did understand the proper definition. There seemed to be a concern that was unnecessarily helping one group or another. How do you address that from a business and communications perspective?

AMINA: Again, this goes back to education. We got to ensure that people truly understand what affirmative action is, the impact that it’s had, and understand that there are other forms of affirmative action. Legacy Admission. There are so many different criteria that I think we need to be thinking about as we, not just for businesses but from an education perspective as well.

DOUG: So, what do you hope communicators will take away from this report, since that’s our primary audience?

AMINA: For me, its action earns trust. We want to make sure that as communicators we are partnering with our C-suite, we are partnering with our teams to build again, not just the commitments but the actions, the opportunity to drive impact, to create a culture of inclusivity and really bringing people along on the journey. We can’t create these programs in silos. We can’t. We need everyone at the table and allowing space and opportunity to hear what’s going to encourage people to stay at your organization. To be part of those initiatives is really what’s going to allow us to bridge the gap and educating our C-suite and really creating a safe space and a place that people want to come every day for work.

DOUG: I hope this isn’t a trick question, but do you think it’s more important that the C-suite is educating the communications teams about the importance of DE&I at the organization as a business imperative? Or is it more the burden falls on communicators to be educating the C-suite and to make it easier since you don’t necessarily have to make a false choice? Maybe it’s both. And how do you navigate that best?

AMINA: It’s both. I think, you know, CEOs need to make the personal and professional commitment to inclusivity, but they can’t do it alone. They have to have the right people and teams at all levels, willing and able to do the good hard work for us to have an impact, for us to drive change, for us to see the benefit from. You know, if we have a diverse workforce that is reflected in the business, that is reflected in our profit. And so, ensuring that we have people at every level of organization willing and able to create change is going to be critical.

DOUG: Your data showed that there were significantly more positive outcomes from companies where the employees perceived that the company was making progress on these important issues. Any advice maybe during the interview process, before you’re joining a company or as a company looking to hire employees, how you can communicate that from both sides or address questions? First, as a prospective employee, that might give you a better understanding.

AMINA: Those questions are now table stakes. Employees are coming asking, What are our numbers? What are we doing to address systemic racism? How are we creating and evolving our DEI initiatives, particularly now that affirmative action has been overturned. And so, I think we know that potential employees are going to ask it. So as employers, we want to make sure we’re armed with the latest and greatest. How have, what are the initiatives, what is the good hard work that we’ve been doing that we can proactively share, not just on the website, but in conversation. We want our employees to really be the buzz, be able to share all the work that’s happening both in and outside of our work.

DOUG: And I would think that you then need to walk the talk, so to speak, once they join, because that’s a quick way to disillusion someone. If you talk a big game and then you don’t really have those processes in.

AMINA: Exactly, we can’t be glasshouses, we need to make sure that we’re not just talking about initiatives that happened ages ago, but we are continuing to reevaluate our plans, our structure, our DEI initiatives, so that one, they’re evolving with the changing time. But two, so employees who do and are excited about the work we’re doing, have them join forces with us, be a part of that continuous change and allow us to rethink what diversity, what inclusivity really means and looks like for our organization, our industry, our sector, our work.

DOUG: Congratulations to you and your team and the teams at Edelman who participated in putting this really important report together. We’ll definitely have a link to it on the page so folks can access the information. Thanks so much for spending time with us.

AMINA: Thank you so much for having me.