Dr. Sandra Upton - Make it Last
Within the last decade, in many circles, the term DEI has taken on a rather unappealing and controversial place in the world of work. What if Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) isn't just a buzzword but an important element for thriving organizations? Join us as we chat with the esteemed Dr. Sandra Upton, a leading DEI expert, to debunk the misconceptions and highlight the real potential of DEI initiatives.
Links and Resources from the Episode:
Click here for Dr. Upton's LinkedIn profile
Click here to purchase Dr. Upton's book, Make it Last
Click here for Dr. Upton's website
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The Bosshole® Chronicles
"Dr. Sandra Upton - Make it Last’”
Original Publish Date: 7/23/2024
Hosts: John Broer and Sara Best
John Broer: Welcome to all of our friends out there in the Bosshole Transformation Nation. This is your co-host, John Broer, and when I say co-host, that means Sara is here. Sara, so good to see you. What's going on?Sara Best: Oh, you too, John. I love it when we get to do this together. It just makes it so much better. Life is good, life is real good John.
JB: Oh, that's good to hear and it's going to get better today. Life is going to get better today because we're going to meet a really remarkable person and get into a pretty relevant topic. Would you please share with our audience what we're going to be talking about today?
SB: Yes, John, today we get to meet Dr Sandra Upton. She is an accomplished DEI consultant, researcher, keynote speaker. I had the privilege of listening to Dr Upton at a regional inclusion conference that happened in this area in the spring and what's pretty fantastic is she has been able to architect a sustainable framework for DEI work inside organizations and it's a really simple roadmap. You know how we like things simple. I need it really simple.
The audience was riveted when she spoke at this conference and her opportunity to kind of spell out the steps of her framework was really rich and powerful and I'll just share with you. She has her own consulting group. She's been at this work for at least 25 plus years coaching, training businesses, educational institutions, governmental agencies and nonprofits. Prior to launching her consulting practice, Dr. Upton was Vice President Global Diversity Practice with the Cultural Intelligence Center and this is where she gained literally global experience with providing strategic leadership to DEI efforts and initiatives. So she is very much an accomplished leader. She is a subject matter expert in unconscious bias training and a frequent speaker and consultant with all kinds of organizations around creating a sustainable DEI fiber in the organization. Today is going to be awesome. We should just dig in. What do you say?
JB: Let's do it. The Bosshole Chronicles are brought to you by Real Good Ventures, a talent optimization firm helping organizations diagnose their most critical people and execution issues with world-class analytics. Make sure to check out all the resources in the show notes and be sure to follow us and share your feedback. Enjoy today's episode.
SB: Dr Sandra Upton, welcome to the Bosshole Chronicles. It is so good to have you today.
Dr. Sandra Upton: Very happy to be here, thank you.
SB: Our topic today is critical. It's important. John and I, in preparation for the opportunity to meet with you today, we're talking about just our experiences around diversity, equity and inclusion, also known as DEI. John, you had some experience and thoughts around that. I think that's a good place for us to start and let Dr Upton dive in from there.
JB: Sure, absolutely. And you know, Dr Upton, I was first exposed to DEI initiatives about 10 years ago, 2014. I was part of an organization and at that time I think we were probably on the leading edge of those discussions. We weren't the first, but it would seem to me in the last decade, DEI has taken on so many different lives. I mean it's been co-opted and sort of hijacked in some way. I mean, those are powerful words, but it just feels like we've lost the true or the original intent of why these discussions began. So, if you don't mind, can we start there and give us some sense of where it is, has it been hijacked and where it's going to be going? And we're going to dig into more details, but let's start there, if that's okay.
DSU: Yeah, that's a fantastic question and I think it's very foundational to talking about how do we move the work forward. I like to start by saying, despite what we are hearing in the media and through different voices and all the noise, DEI is not dead. It is alive and well and the backlash that we are experiencing is really not new. You know, if you go back and you look at the history, you know it's been called different things over the years. You can go all the way back to, you know, even before affirmative action. But civil rights really is really where I think we, specifically here in the US, have really began to try and lay the foundation and create a framework for creating equitable opportunities for everyone. And then it's evolved through a lot of different ways, using a lot of different language. But here we are today and we're calling it generally DEI. Different organizations call it different things, Some call it DEIJ, DEIA, and I always say you can call it what you want, as long as you're willing to do the work. But I think where we are today is that there is a lot of misinformation and miscommunication, and some of it intentional to really undermine the work, but the intent has not changed. Diversity, equity and inclusion is all about creating equitable opportunities for everyone, and when we do that, and we do it well, everybody benefits.
It's not a zero sum game. So it's not when you put in practices or encourage behaviors that support me as a woman, as a woman of color. If we get that right, I'm not the only one that benefits. The both of you benefit as well. So it's really about making sure that our workplaces, we have good representation and that diversity is very broad. It includes race and gender, but it also includes generational differences, socioeconomic status. There are non-visible forms of diversity. You've got neurodiversity, you've got disability, I mean the list can go on and on and on. So the question is how are we creating work environments where we are attracting diverse talent? And then that inclusion piece is once we attract that diverse talent, are we creating space where everyone is feeling a sense of belonging, Everyone is feeling like they've got a voice and they've got a seat at the table. And then the equity piece is making sure that everyone is receiving equitable opportunities.
And so it's again it's not about me winning and you losing, it's not a zero sum game but it's about creating a space where everybody is thriving, and there's nothing negative about that.
SB: That's so powerful. I had the opportunity to hear you speak at a regional HR summit on inclusion and I was introduced to you and your book. By the way, the book is called Make it Last. Why I'm referencing the book right here is because in your presentation you talked about how 70% of initiatives around DE&I fail. Hence the reason for your work. You created a roadmap and I think it'd be important to maybe double-click on that 70% for us. You're very well-researched and you use that research data in your strategies. Help us understand that.
DSU: Yeah, you know, I think you know there are a lot of organizations. When I talk about the fact that DEI is not dead, I think that's very true, but I think there, and both of those are necessary if we're going to move the work forward and make it last. And so in my book I've created a framework called the DEI Propel Framework, and it basically outlines eight steps that every organization needs to take if they are going to do the DEI work in a substantive and sustainable way. And so to your point about that 70%, you know when we look at. So what I've done is I've married the change management research.
It is extensive and you have some leading gurus, one in particular, John Cotter, who is a professor at Harvard University, and I have studied his model for many years. I studied it in my master's program as well as in my doctoral program. So it's rooted in that change management research which, again to what you said a moment ago, we know that efforts to create serious change and transformation in organizations, most of those efforts fail. In fact, 70% of them fail. That's significant.
So the question is what is it about those 30% right that allows them to be successful? And again, that's what the book is about. It takes that change management framework, it marries it with DEI and it says if we are going to make the DEI work last, you have to put together a strategy. That strategy needs to be data-driven and it needs to be outcome-driven, and you need to follow these eight steps in order for that framework to actually be implemented and to be successful long-term. Most organizations don't want to do all eight steps. They want to skip over some. They think that they're farther along in the process than they really are, and then again they look up and they wonder why the work isn't sticking.
SB: I have to say, in your presentation, after you outlined the eight steps, sticking. I have to say, in your presentation, after you outlined the eight steps, you actually did a poll around the room to kind of see where and these are HR leaders, very successful organizations all around the region Most people were not off the starting block or they were in that first sort of step. So maybe we should explore a few of those steps.
DSU: I know we probably don't have time to do all eight, let's start it at the top, number one won't be able to go into detail, like you said, with all of them, but the first step is what I call deciding that this can't wait, and that's all about making sure that you have the necessary buy in to do the work. We see organizations all the time attempt to jump into this work, and they've really not taken the time to get the necessary buy in at the top and throughout the organization. So you have to create a sense of urgency, help people understand what the work is, why it's important and why we have to do something about it now. So that's that first step. The second step, then, is, once you've created a sense of urgency and you've gotten the necessary buy-in, then you have to build your tribe again.
Another reason why organizations are not successful in this work is because they don't organize themselves in a way to do the work well, and so you have to build a governance structure and make sure that people understand their role in the work. People need to understand that it is a shared responsibility. So, even if you have someone that is providing strategic leadership for the work, everybody has to play a role in this work and when we talk about managers, they have a critical role to play in this work, even if they're not DEI experts.
We're not expecting them to be DEI experts, but there is some upskilling and learning that they need to do in order to be inclusive managers and inclusive leaders so that they can help support moving the work forward.
But that's all part of building your tribe. And then that third step is developing an actual strategy using good, high-quality data right, and making sure that you have metrics that are tied to the strategy. There's nothing worse than having a strategy that's not really informed by any good data and that your efforts are. You have no way to measure whether or not your work is working or not, and so that strategy has to be there, and then from there you have to communicate that strategy. That's all part of phase one of the work, right? Those first four steps, so creating a sense of urgency, helping people understand that it can't wait, building your tribe, organizing yourself. Then actually developing a strategy. And notice you've got to build that tribe and you've got to create that sense of urgency before you develop the strategy. One of the reasons why organizations stay in that 70% is because they tried to develop a strategy but they've not done those first two steps.
JB: They haven't even established what good looks like and understand how to measure that. I'm sorry, Dr Upton, I get pretty excited about that kind of dialogue because at Real Good Ventures we are all about objective data. It's like slowing down. There's a sense of urgency, but let's just stop. Let's gather the data, understand what it tells us, then take action. Then the probability of success is going to be so much higher. But I think people get I don't know what it is if it's an action bias, or they just think well, we kind of know what it feels like and we know, we know our this is what our gut tells us. That never works out well, that's right.
DSU: Or they feel pressure to move quickly. They feel pressure to do something. We got to say we're doing something, so let's just throw something together. Let's close our eyes and throw spaghetti at the wall. And you know, next week we're going to have a multicultural potluck, you know. And then next month we're going to give everybody the day off for Juneteenth and we're good and those are not bad things. But the question again is, you know, are they result-oriented activities?
And so that data piece is so important, so we skip that. And then we have this really soft or performative strategy and then we wonder why we're not seeing the kind of change behavior and systems. And then that fourth step, which is still in that phase one, is communicating the strategy. And, believe it or not, you know you'd be amazed at how many organizations do a good job of putting together a pretty good strategy, but then they do an awful job of communicating it and so people don't know what's happening in the organization. We think we got a strategy, we think I heard the CEO mention it in that last town hall meeting where I think my boss, my boss, right.
So leadership's role is critical in helping to communicate the strategy, but we don't do a good job. And so then when we get an employee survey back and people are slamming the organization for not being committed to DEI and leadership is so frustrated because they're like, oh my gosh, but we're doing this, we're doing that. It's like, yeah, you can do those things all day long, but if you're not communicating that and people don't know, then you're going to have this huge gap in effectiveness. So those first four steps require a lot of work, a lot of commitment and organizations tend to jump around on those or they don't do a good quality job and again, they're struggling even before they get to that second phase, which is steps five, six and seven.
So step five is about what I call equipping DEI superheroes. Again, we're trying to keep managers out of that hole. Part of how you stay out of that hole is you have to see yourself not only as a manager, but you need to see yourself within the context of DEI. You need to see yourself as an inclusive leader.
You also need to see yourself as a change agent. Right, if you're going to help move the DEI work forward, you need to see yourself as someone helping to lead that change. And so it's at that stage five, or that step five that a lot of work often needs to be done in terms of upskilling and equipping managers so we build their confidence.
I work with so many organizations where you have a lot of managers who really do believe in DEI. They want to be great allies. They're very passionate about the work, but I always say passion without competence is really dangerous, and so you need to be passionate and competent to help lead the work. And so that superhero stage is all about equipping managers and giving them the skills to lead. Giving them the skills to have courageous conversations, giving them the skills to identify when biases show up whether they are initiating it or they see it on their team or it's reflected in the systems but equipping them with the skills to actually be able to develop a strategy for their respective areas or department. Whether you're the manager of IT or the manager of marketing. How do I make sure that DEI is integrated into our work? And so there's often a lot of skill building and competency building for managers, so that they can truly become superheroes in the work.
SB: As we move ahead, I still am kind of thinking about steps one, two, three and four, this significant phase one. Can I ask just a couple of questions, Dr. Upton?
DSU: Absolutely.
SB: Yeah, this idea of creating that sense of urgency, this cannot wait. Can you share some real examples like what causes the moral and the business case? What should we be looking at that maybe we're not?
DSU: Sure, you know, I think there's two sides to the coin there, right? So we talk about and I talk a lot about this in the book you have to appeal to both the head and the heart, and Carter talks a lot about this in his change management, so you have to. When we say the head, that means the data, that we were just talking about right, so people need to see the facts, you know.
The reality is we have no women in leadership. The reality is, you know, is that when we are attracting talent, they're all coming from the same areas or they're all coming from people who look like us right.
JB: So there's something or sound like us.
DSU: Or sound like us went to the same school as us and you know, or we're recruiting from the exact same sources, but we're wondering why we're not attracting diverse talent. So that's the head data. So that's why again, doing that analysis in that first stage, to say what is our reality around DEI, what is the data telling us in terms of the disparities and the opportunities, and then give people that information. So that's the head data. The other piece is the heart data, right, and that's where you create space for conversation and stories. What are people's experiences? You know, and you might feel like you know you and I work at the same company. You may think it's the best organization ever, but then they ask me well, not so much for me. You know, I don't necessarily feel included, I don't feel like I have a seat at the table, I don't feel like I'm given opportunities. So we may have very different experiences. And so part of that heart data is disaggregating right, the bigger picture data, and oftentimes you'll see a different story.
I work with organizations all the time. Who are actually, you know they boast about awards. You know we were just nominated as, like this year's best organization to work for from a diversity perspective. And I said, says I'll say to them, says who? Because you know, your dominant culture might feel that way, but when I start to disaggregate this data, the women in your organization don't quite feel this way. The people that are part of the LGBT community? They're not quite feeling it either. Or your Gen Zs they're not feeling it either. So who's saying these great things?
Let's again use that data and then use those stories that people are sharing about their lived experiences to help make the case for why this is important. And then I think you need to look at factors externally and internally that help us understand why it's urgent. Sometimes it's looking at your competitors and seeing that they are really committed to this work and, as a result, they have a diverse team of people and, more importantly, that team of people are culturally intelligent and they are seeing growth in their company as a result of this diverse talent that they're leveraging. So if we don't do something, our competitors are going to continue to leave us in the dust, right or? Another crisis might be that you look at your data again and you see that you're losing your Gen Zs at an alarming rate. You bring them in, but then you look up and your retention rates are super low, and then when you do exit interviews with them. They're telling you we don't, like you know, the values are not aligning with our values.
SB: And you know.
DSU: So it's again using that data and seeing internal and external. What are those things that are screaming? If we don't do something about this now, there are going to be consequences for us as an organization.
SB: Oh, that's so helpful. That just brings it right down to boots on the ground. I can't help but think of empathy when you talked about telling stories and people sharing their lived experiences. Like hey, my experience of this place is different than yours. Empathy is so critical at this juncture. It's always been important, but it's so important now and it's it's not just trying to understand a person's position without judging it, it's believing that that is their experience and trusting that that that's the truth for them. I think that's a piece that seems to be very missing.
DSU: Absolutely. Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more and I actually talk about that in the book and I challenge us to even go to the next level and do perspective taking.
And there's actually quite a bit of research and I highlight that in the book as well but there's quite a bit of research around perspective taking being a very powerful strategy for combating microaggressions and unconscious bias and moving us forward in terms of creating an inclusive environment and the difference between the two you know empathy is, you know, understanding, being listening, believing. Perspective taking is also about literally putting yourself in that person's shoes yes, in that position and really thinking about the implications and the consequences of you know what that person is going through and experiencing it. So it's not just feeling like, oh, I feel bad for you and I'm so sorry that you feel that way and that's happening, but I'm actually going to put myself in your position and take a different perspective on the situation, and that then better positions me to be able to understand the need for change, whether that's behavior change on my part as a manager or change on my part as a manager in terms of adjusting certain systems that may be causing those negative experiences for some of my team members.
JB: I want to go back to a couple of things really quick. The word performative you used it a while ago, but that just makes me think of the checklist.
You know, it's just like yep, yep, yep, we did this, we had the potluck, multicultural potluck. And I also think about the way we look at change. To Dr. Upton is we say, in our world of behavioral and cognitive analytics, people don't change, circumstances change and people need to adapt. So a big theme of ours right now is reinventing the workplace. When you think about the workplace, you say the word workplace and it conjures up people have an image, some have an image of an office and a parking lot and a building, and nowadays a lot of people are saying it could be in my backyard, it could be in my den, it could be in my home office, it could be while I'm on a plane.
I think the framework, I think we are stuck because all the data would suggest I mean, according to Gallup, we are just coming, you know, still a nine-year high of disengagement in the workplace. What was it? Bamboo HR published a, you know, dissatisfaction at an all-time high. So everything that we're trying is just not genuinely hitting the mark and we believe that this transformation I mean literally means reinventing how we work, where we work and with whom we work. I just want to point out, by the way, I just want to remind our listeners.
Go into the show notes, you will find Dr Upton's LinkedIn information, a link to the book. But something else we'll also post in. There is an episode we did back in September of 22 with Jackie Quarko from Predictive Index when she was overseeing the change at work initiative there, and something I just want to read from our notes in that, because at its core the three tenants of their change at work initiative was around inclusion, transparency and employee-led action. And that third one. They're all important, but that third one, employee-led action and that third one.
They're all important, but that third one employee-led action under an old model of command and control, there was no employee-led action. They were not included, they had no seat at the table. And that's exactly what you're talking about. You already said this, Dr. Upton diversity in every facet, not just the ones we think we're stuck to from what the media would tell us it is. It is a broader perspective. So I hope that's what people are hearing from you is it is literally a new way of looking at work and the people that are around us and the people we bring around us and listen to their voices.
DSU: That's right, and people are oftentimes afraid of change too. There's that dynamic that play.
But I think you know, when you just highlighted those three things, ending with this idea of employee led movements, that's why, again, step one in this process is so important that buy in piece and really understanding what that looks like and what it means at the top. You've got to get full buy-in at the top but then you've got to keep coming down the organization and across the organization so that people believe in what we're trying to do, they understand that, again, everybody benefits from it. But even a benefit sometimes requires some discomfort in the process. But sometimes people are afraid of the change because they don't know what it means for them. So that communications piece, if you jump to step four, that's why the communications piece and step five in terms of educating and upskilling people.
I do a bonus chapter in the book called Resisters, because I get that question all the time. You know how do you handle resistors? And one of the first things that I say when we think about change management is Well, first of all, resistors matter, but they don't matter the most. And what I mean by that is you do want to listen, you do want to try to understand why people are resisting and if you can meet them where they are and bring them along. Absolutely you have to focus most of your energy on those who are allies, who are on board, who see the vision and who want to be a part of the movement. So it's a delicate balance there, but I do.
I dedicate an entire chapter in the book about addressing resistors and I talk about just the psychology behind why people resist and they resist for different reasons. But understanding that can be very valuable again in trying to close the gap and bring as many people along in the work as possible. But it does sometimes get to a point where there are those who are just not interested, not willing and in fact might even try and undermine and at some point there may need to be some consequences for those individuals.
SB: I think that's really important. And if I could just share a quick story, I was working with an ops leader and there were efforts underway to create some behavioral change certainly training and development but after several months of doing this work, the ops leader was kind of like you know what they're still doing this, like it didn't work. Of doing this work, the ops leader was kind of like you know what, they're still doing this, like it didn't work. So that person was a little change unfriendly and maybe not able to see the benefits, but it was their demeanor, that kind of it was the glasses they were looking out of and since they were a decision maker, they had the power to say we're not going to do that anymore. And the reality was no, no, no.
Good things are happening, small but very good things and multiple small, very good things are happening. You cannot stop now and I think so that resistance can be sometimes just a person who's pessimistic and skeptical and if it isn't a hundred percent, it doesn't work. We have to watch out for that and I also think people being change unfriendly there's about 30% of every team that we tend to focus our efforts there. We try to devise our strategy for teaching and training around that, when it's the 70% you're referring to, Dr.
Upton the allies, the people who are change friendly or the people who are kind of like on the fence. Hey, if give me the good, why? If you help me understand what I'm supposed to do, I'm in. Otherwise but that 30% those are. Those would be like the actively disengaged people who probably would do better somewhere else. They're probably not in the organization. So thank you for reminding us that that's not the group we need to be. This is not what this initiative is directed toward.
DSU: Yes, listen to them, yes, good, yeah, I think that's a really important point, and I think too and I talk about this in that step one but there are layers to it, so there are different expectations depending on where you are in the organization. So, if we think about this from a leadership perspective, you know, if you're going I tell organizations all the time if you're going to do this work in a way that truly is substantive and sustainable and it lasts, you have to have a hundred percent commitment at the top. There's no way around that now.
And when I say at the top, I'm talking CEO, c-suite, yeah, and so that includes a lot of managers that might be listening in to this, you know. And then some people will come back and say, well, what if we don't have a hundred percent commitment? Do we just, you know, do we just forget it? Like no, you still can try to move forward.
But you have to then understand the reality is that you're not going to be as impactful as you could be. So if you're okay with sort of a mediocre, some progress, then you know that's just your reality. But if you truly want to make the work substantive and sustainable, you have to have 100% at the top. And then I kind of break it down when you get to the next level and give strategies around that. But it is this delicate balance of holding people accountable, being willing to work with them to some extent, but not allowing it to consume all of your energy. And at some point, if people don't come along, there may need to be a conversation around whether or not this is the best organization for you to be a part of.
SB: Absolutely. That makes so much sense. Well, in the interest of time, I do want to ask you one final question, if that's okay, and, as John emphasized, all the details will be in the show notes. We encourage you to seek out Dr Upton's book, Make it Last, for the eight steps, and the DEI Propel Framework is outlined there. You're jet-setting literally around the globe. You are talking to companies, Fortune 500, Fortune 20. You're talking to companies. What's up next for you? What do you see on your horizon? You have your consulting company that you founded. What's up next for you?
DSU: You know what it's really. Just, you know I go, I go always go back to my- If you look at my mission statement as as a company, as an organization, you know I, I'm just all about I want to make the world a more just place, one organization at a time, and so what's next for me is to get this book and the contents in front of as many organizations and leaders as possible.
Again, the biggest gap that I have seen in this work is, I think we meaning thought leaders like myself and practitioners like myself we've done a good job of telling organizations what to do, but not how to do it. And so I just, I'm just really excited about the fact that if an organization is really serious about DEI and they purchase this book and do what's in it, you know it will tell, it holds their hand. And so my you know my plans over the coming months and years is to just continue to emphasize the principles in this book in the practical application that any organization can use, regardless of where they are in the journey. So that's keeping me quite busy with my current clients as well as those that are coming to me interested in partnering.
SB: Nice. Well, it's been an honor to have you here today. You're very busy, so we're grateful that we got to grab an hour of your time today. We wish you the very best and we will stay tuned, for sure Sounds good. Thanks so much for having me.
DSU: I appreciate it, it's been fun.
SB: Okay, friends, we'll see you next time on the Bosshole Chronicles.
JB: We'd like to thank our guests today on the Bosshole Chronicles and if you have a Bosshole Chronicles story of your own, please email us at mystory@thebossholechronicles.com. Once again, mystory@thebossholechronicles.com. We'll see you again soon.