The tools and metrics you need (through a five-step cycle) to measure, analyze, and improve diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Join us on Zoom for A New Way Forward Virtual Series: Data-Driven DEI
Any effort to mitigate bias and grow inclusivity within an organization must begin with people. DATA-DRIVEN DEI: The Tools and Metrics You Need to Measure, Analyze, and Improve Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (Wiley, March 14, 2023), centers first and foremost on personal transformation, presenting a five-step cycle that enables individuals and their organizations to measure, analyze, and improve their DEI.
DEI represents a unique and unparalleled opportunity to break down the walls that can separate us in our personal lives, within our organizations, and throughout our society. Dr. Pinkett has spent the past three decades helping people and organizations across the globe become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. His approach relies on using data to measure, analyze, and improve DEI. This entails assessing the current reality; establishing objectives and goals; developing strategies with defined measures; and using data to gauge progress, evaluate results, and demonstrate impact.
For each step of the process, Dr. Pinkett covers both the personal and organizational levels of DEI improvement, while discussing the role of “the DEI Council” – a diverse and inclusive body representing different functions, levels, roles, and responsibilities throughout the organization. The five steps include:
Step 1: DEI Inventory – Your DEI strategic plan will only be as good as your DEI assessment. Dr. Pinkett details how to measure preferences – things people think, feel, or do – and competences which are a combination of knowledge, skills and attitudes/attributes. He points out that preferences – developed over years due to life experiences – are also biases. “The objective when it comes to improving DEI is to shift, stretch, or expand into areas outside your preferences and mitigate blind spots,” he says.
Step 2: DEI Imperatives – Once you’ve established your starting point, the next step is to determine where you want to go (DEI objectives) and how you will know you have arrived (DEI goals). Dr. Pinkett explains how to set objectives and goals, and includes dozens of illustrative examples. DEI objectives might include “Increase my awareness of intercultural conflict styles to resolve conflicts effectively” or “Be an effective and supportive mentor to women within my division.”
Step 3: DEI Insights – Before moving on to developing strategies, Dr. Pinkett suggests pausing to see what has worked in other contexts that might work for you and/or your organization. “The ‘What Works’ models outlined here are all flexible and can be adapted to your unique journey,” he writes.
Step 4: DEI Initiatives – Here Dr. Pinkett provides frameworks to guide you in turning your DEI objectives and goals into specific and effective DEI initiatives (DEI strategies) and the metrics to gauge progress (DEI measures). This step concludes with examples of both personal and organizational DEI strategic plans. Dr. Pinkett points out that people often rely on training to foster behavior change. Instead, he recommends a “Personal DEI Learning Journey” – a series of activities and experiences designed to achieve change, learning, and new performance outcomes.
Step 5: DEI Impact – The final step explores how to determine DEI impact. Dr. Pinkett discusses data analysis and reporting using scorecards and dashboards. Re-administering the DEI assessments from Step 1 is a key component of evaluating results – and establishing new baselines as you continue to improve. He also addresses the power of “DEI storytelling” – integrating results and findings to craft and communicate compelling DEI stories. “DEI storytelling enables you to personalize the DEI journey, contextualize data, chronicle progress, synthesize findings, integrate results, and comprehensively demonstrate impact.”
Dr. Randal D. Pinkett, Co-founder, Chairman and CEO, BCT Partners
Dr. Randal Pinkett has established himself as an entrepreneur, innovator, speaker, author, media personality and DEI expert who is leading the way in business, technology and equity for all. He is the co-founder, chairman and CEO of BCT Partners, a global, multimillion-dollar research, training, consulting, technology, and data analytics firm whose mission is to leverage diversity, insights and innovation to transform lives, accelerate equity and create lasting change. The company has been recognized by Forbes as one of America’s Best Management Consulting Firms, Ernst & Young as EY Entrepreneur of the Year, Manage HR Magazine as a Top 10 Firm for Diversity & Inclusion, the Black Enterprise BE100s list of the nation’s largest Black-owned businesses, and the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in America.
Dr. Pinkett is an expert in several areas relating to emerging technologies, “big data” analytics, social innovation, culture, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), and is a regular contributor on MSNBC, CNN, and Fox Business News. An international public speaker, he is the author or co- author of several books including Black Faces in High Places, Black Faces in White Places, Data- Driven DEI, Campus CEO, and No-Money Down CEO. He holds five degrees including: a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Rutgers University; a M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Oxford in England; and a M.S. in Electrical Engineering, MBA, and Ph.D. from MIT. Most notably, he was the first and only African American to receive the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship at Rutgers University; he was inducted to the Academic All-America Hall of Fame, as a former high jumper, long jumper, sprinter and captain of the Rutgers men’s track and field team; and he was the winner of NBC’s hit reality television show, “The Apprentice.”
Born in Philadelphia and raised in New Jersey, Dr. Pinkett is a proud member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated and First Baptist Church in Somerset, NJ, where he resides with his family, including a daughter and two sons. Dr. Pinkett firmly believes that “for those to whom much is given, much is expected,” so throughout his endeavors, he places great emphasis on his responsibility to give back to the community.
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