Embracing diversity and creating inclusive workplaces can lead to more innovative and competitive organizations and support recruitment and retention.
Strategy and Organizational Identity - Inclusivity
An inclusive workplace can expand your pool of potential employees, help with retention, and offer richer, multi-perspective workplace collaborations and decision-making. Diversity relates to many aspects: gender, age, culture, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic background, history of substance abuse disorder or other diseases, etc. Inclusivity is about more than diversifying your workforce; an inclusive workplace embraces diversity in every aspect of the organization. Ask why diversity is important for your company – the answer can provide a foundation for all you do to ensure diversity and inclusivity throughout your organization.
LEARN MORERecruiting and Hiring - Inclusivity
We all have biases – to eliminate bias in your hiring process requires education, preparation and new insights and changes for all who are involved in the recruiting and hiring process.
LEARN MORERetaining & Managing Employees for Inclusivity
In an inclusive workplace, every employee (and customer) feels welcome in terms of workplace culture and interactions with coworkers, facilities and amenities. Here are tools some organizations use to create an environment where people can be who they are, valued for their unique talents and perspectives and encouraged to stay.
LEARN MOREBranding & Marketing - Inclusivity
Your external communications are also important tools for supporting inclusivity.
LEARN MORECommunity & Partnerships - Inclusivity
Your community relationships and partnerships also provide multiple opportunities to encourage inclusiveness and extend your organizational culture.
LEARN MOREInclusivity - Resources
Here are some additional resources to help you build inclusivity:
LEARN MORE
Also, use tips in the Family-Friendliness and Finding & Cultivating New Talent and Transportation sections to help create a workplace that accommodates employees from many backgrounds.
Many thanks to the Business Committee volunteers working on diversity and inclusion of REAL (Racial Equity Alliance of Lamoille) for their help with this section of the toolkit.