We're All in This Together by Mike Robbins

Author:Mike Robbins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hay House
Published: 2020-02-24T16:00:00+00:00

What Your Team Can Do to Create a Culture of Inclusion and Belonging

Whether it’s the team you manage, the team you’re a member of, or both, there are some specific things you can think about, talk about, and do as a group to enhance your culture of inclusion and belonging. Here are some ideas:

Share your diversity stories with one another. We all have a “diversity story.” Clearly anyone who self-identifies as a member of one or more minority groups has had a lot of experience dealing with their race, gender, orientation, or other aspects of their identity and background. Those of us, like me, who are members of nonminority groups often don’t think we have much to say or share in this regard. However, if we’re each willing to lower the waterline on our iceberg—specifically with respect to diversity, inclusion, and belonging—we find that we all have thoughts, ideas, feelings, and experiences we can share. Every single one of us has experienced feeling different, like an outsider, and a lack of belonging at certain times in our lives. Clearly some of us have experienced this more than others, and in some cases in really painful and scary ways. The more willing we are to be real and vulnerable about these experiences, whatever they may be, the more empathy and understanding we can have for one another. Sharing a bit about your experiences growing up and your family background can also help your teammates understand you better. Your team can do the “If you really knew me . . . ” exercise on pages 30–31, specifically focused on telling your diversity stories and sharing your authentic feelings and experience of being who you are in terms of race, gender, orientation, and anything else.

Have compassion for each other. One of the best things we can do as a team is have compassion for one another, in general, and especially as it relates to inclusion and belonging. These issues are sensitive, and they run deep for many of us, making them difficult to talk about and address in a meaningful and productive way. However, if we engage in these things with compassion, and give people the benefit of the doubt, we’ll almost always be more effective in how we address them. If we’re able to talk about these issues more compassionately, it can allow us to come up with new ideas, suggestions, and solutions that can enhance the inclusion and belonging of our team and organization. The notion of assuming positive intent is really important in general, and especially when we’re dealing with important discussions and dynamics like these.

Be willing to talk about these things authentically. Our willingness to address these sensitive topics with authenticity as a team, can bring us closer together and allow us to truly create a culture of inclusion and belonging. The paradox is that we have to do more than just talk—we have to act. However, if we can’t talk about these things in a real way, it’s almost impossible to take any meaningful action to create more inclusion and belonging.

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