Moving Beyond the Diversity Conversation to Drive Systemic Change

We have all read or heard the corporate statements in support of Black Lives Matter. We have participated and/or seen the protests. As a nation, we have been here before. How can we deliver a different outcome this time?

Working in the field of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, I am all too familiar with organizations taking a check the box approach to DEI. Many companies provide annual sexual harassment and diversity training. Check! Moving on.

Driving organizational systemic change requires a much deeper dive and takes significant time and resources. I recommend the following approach:

1. Assess you current culture, policies, processes, and outcomes.
2. Leverage your human capital management systems to dive deep into to your data to really understand how your organization hires, retains, and promotes diverse talent.
3. Make a Board and C-suite commitment to change and provide tools, resources, and time to achieve these goals. 
4. Engage experts to facilitate developing and implementing a DEI project plan.

A recent WSJ highlights the need to conduct a comprehensive audit of your operations, recruitment, investments, and suppliers. This assessment begins the process of shining a spotlight on how your organization is impacting BIPOC through its daily activities.

The talent pipeline is another area for significant improvement. Using our human capital system expertise, we help organizations better understand their recruitment strategy and how that impacts the diversity of the talent pool. Drilling into your HCM data provides details on talent at each level of your organization by level, function, and senior management. 

Leadership development and competencies are another area to peel back the layers. How are candidates selected for leadership development? Is it meritocracy? What does meritocracy mean if certain people are given the big projects and high profile clients and others are not? Are you practicing allyship and sponsorship or are you still using a mentorship model?

While Chief Diversity Officer roles have been on the rise, turnover in these positions remains high as many positions are more figurehead than change agent. If you want to drive meaningful change, it requires significant commitment to changing the staus quo including engaging  a DEI consultant to help support and guide your internal team.

In my next article, I will share some of our techniques to design for diversity, equity, and inclusion. 

We have been able to have impact and success working with clients remotely. If we can be of help, please reach out to Kristina Kohl at Kris@HRComputes.com

Until then, stay safe and well. 

HRComputes Sustainability Report

Sustainability Policy

We believe in being a responsible corporate citizen and as such we consider the environmental, social, governance and economic impacts of our decisions. We believe that everyone has a role to play in protecting natural and social capital and that all of us need to be concerned with ensuring that the earth’s resources are available to sustain future generations with a similar quality of life. We believe in business and social ethics and acting in accordance with all laws. We believe in the human rights of our employees and contractors and seek to provide a workplace free of discrimination and to provide wages and benefits in accordance with applicable laws.

Environment

1.     Measure carbon footprint data annually.

2.     Track resource usage water, electricity, natural gas, mileage

3.     Utilize renewable energy resources.

4.     Employees are encouraged to conserve resources through reusing, recycling, energy conservation.  

5.     Disposable water bottles are not used in our office. We offer guests glasses of filtered water.

6.     Employees are encouraged to minimize carbon emissions from travel through the use of flexible work arrangements where permitted by clients.

7.     We seek to identify suppliers that have sustainable standards.

8.     Total Carbon Footprint 6.4 tonnes CO2e

9.     Carbon Intensity: 1.6/ employee compared to 3.5 for office based employees

Voluntarism

1.     Our employees are involved in community, professional, and board service focusing on governance, leadership, skills development, and mentoring.

2.     Firm volunteer hours are 320+ valued at $80,000. 

People

1.     We value our people and our wages, benefits, and work standards comply with applicable laws.

2.     We seek to provide an environment that respects employee diversity.

3.     We do not use child labor, forced or bonded labor, and we provide a workplace free of harsh or inhumane treatment.

4.     We encourage community and professional voluntarism.

5.     Feedback from employees to promote sustainable solutions is encouraged.

Business Ethics

1.     We employ fair business practices and all corruption, bribery, and embezzlement are prohibited.

2.     Information has been distributed to employees on our policies and those of our clients including codes of conduct, confidentiality agreements, and corporate citizenship policies.

     

Highlights 2019 Sustainability Report

We continue to meet our goals of reporting on our environmental and social impact. In addition, we continue to promote sustainable practices through education and speaking opportunities. In addition, we work with students to encourage sustainability ideals in our future generations. We also to provide volunteer opportunities and allow our employees time to pursue volunteer interests.

1.     Kristina Kohl is on the faculty at the Bard MBA in Sustainability Program teaching “Employees and Organizations” focusing on embedding environmental, social, and governance standards into organizational culture.

2.     Kristina Koh spoke at number of events and webinars for groups such at Great IT Pro, Wharton Alumni Social Impact Club, Wharton Club of NJ, Ultimate Software Women Leaders Forum, and PMI.

3.     Served on the Wharton People Analytics Start-up Competition Judges Panel.

4.     Morris was featured guest on RT TV talk shows informing the audience about  corporate social responsibility, sustainability and the impact of human capital management for driving employee engagement.

5.     Served as mentor for local middle school students as part of a competition for their capstone sustainability project.

6.     Served on local community and professional boards. Provided mentoring and job counseling assistance.

7.     Reduced Landfill Waste:

a.     Paper Recycling

b.     HP Smart Ink and Cartridge Recycle

c.     Reusable Water Bottles

d.     Electronics Recycling

8.     Identified Additional Key Suppliers and Highlighted Sustainability Information

9.     Maintained NJ Registered Sustainable Business Status

2020 Goals

1.     Continue to report on ESG performance

2.     Continue to promote sustainability initiatives through education, activities, and speaking

3.     Continue to promote voluntarism among employees

4.     Consider additional hybrid vehicle

5.     Consider purchasing carbon offsets for client travel

6.     Assist clients address COVID19 challenges through education, webinars, partnerships and services.

Key Suppliers

a.     Sprint

                                               i.     http://goodworks.sprint.com/

b.     Staples

                                               i.     https://www.staples.com/sbd/cre/marketing/about_us/corporate-responsibility.html

c.     Horizon Blue Cross

                                               i.     https://www.horizonblue.com/brokers/news/broker-news/horizon-bcbsnj-invested-over-7-4-million-healthier-communities-2017

d.     Hilton

                                               i.     https://cr.hilton.com/

e.     Wells Fargo

                                               i.     https://www.wellsfargo.com/about/corporate-responsibility/

f.      HP

                                               i.     https://www8.hp.com/us/en/hp-information/global-citizenship/index.html

g.     Apple

                                               i.     http://www.apple.com/environment/

h.     American Airlines

                                               i.     http://news.aa.com/crr/

i.      Go Daddy

                                               i.     https://www.godaddy.com/godaddy-for-good

                                                                                          

Embedding Sustainability and CSR into Projects, Programs, and Portfolios

I had the opportunity to both present and attend Boston University's Project Management in Practice conference. While we had to be virtual this year, it was a well attended event with many experts presenting on both research and actual projects. My presentation entitled, Building a More Sustainable Project Outcome, was well received and generated a great deal of conversation around embedding the Sustainable Development Goals into project, program, and portfolio management. While it has been several years since I published my book, Becoming a Sustainable Organization: A Project and Portfolio Management Approach published by CRC Press, the conference reinforced the importance of the topics, tools, models, and cases outlined in the book. My focus is to help leaders embedded the sustainable development goals into their organizations' mission, vision, and culture.

I was recently reminded of the impact of my book when I came across a link showing more than 100 libraries globally offering it as a resource for their members. Included in that number are some of the most prestigious research institutions in the world.

As a refresher on the content, I am sharing its Table of Contents.


Chapter 1. What is sustainability? Why does it matter?
Chapter 2. Building the business case for sustainability
Chapter 3. Gaining stakeholder and c-suite support and sponsorship
Chapter 4. Alignment of business and sustainability strategy creates sustainable strategy
Chapter 5. Project management techniques inform sustainable strategy development
Chapter 6. Creating a culture of sustainability
Chapter 7. Portfolio management supports strategic sustainability alignment
Chapter 8. Identifying and engaging external stakeholders
Chapter 9. Leveraging organizational relationships and assets
Chapter 10. Leveraging human capital professionals
Chapter 11. Adopting a culture of change to unlock the benefits of sustainable strategy
Chapter 12. Sustainable strategy as a lever to attract, engage, and retain the workforce
Chapter 13. Tools and techniques to embed sustainability
Chapter 14. Selecting goals and metrics that matter
Chapter 15. Celebrating success

Becoming a Sustainable Organization is available for sale from any of your favorite book retailers. It can also be borrowed from the following libraries . In case you are wondering, yesBoston University Libraries have a copy of my book!

I hope you find my book inspirational and useful as we transition to a post COVID-19 world in which both environmental and social issues are increasingly part of our business and governmental policy conversations.