Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Review resumes in the morning
Using data from a large recruitment platform, researchers at ETH Zurich analyzed how recruiters selected candidates. They found that unconscious racial bias was more pronounced by the end of the workday when recruiters were tired or wanted to leave work.
Wow.
So, in addition to other approaches you may already be taking to combat bias during the recruitment process, consider reviewing resumes in the morning when you and your recruiting team are fresh.
Looking for more ideas to be more inclusive during the hiring process? …
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Avoid last-minute schedule changes
July is Disability Pride Month, and I’m starting today’s newsletter with a suggestion that I recently learned: Avoid making last-minute changes to schedules. As Laurie Henneborn wrote in the Harvard Business Review, “advance planning is often key to an employee with a disability’s successful navigation of daily life and work.” Too many last-minute schedule changes can cause harm to a disabled person (as well as to single parents and many others).
India’s Lemon Tree Hotels recommends exactly this in training on how to work with colleagues with disabilities. Employees must also take an introductory sign language course so they can…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Don’t require employees to use personal credit cards
In a recent Washington Post article titled I’m tired of being asked to front thousands in business expenses on my personal credit card, an anonymous reader explained:
“I’m a Black man with not the greatest credit score, living on a tight budget, and although my boss is an ally who tries to drive diversity and inclusion, it feels like a ‘White privilege’ issue that he assumes I somehow have liquidity to cover these purchases.”
In response to the article, journalist stacy-marie ishmael tweeted:
“my personal finances are extremely broken in part because i worked at tech and media companies that…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
When people ask about the backstory of how I came to write my book, Better Allies, I explain how it all started with a Twitter handle and a simple goal: to share simple everyday actions to create more inclusive workplaces. Through my tweeting, I hoped to inspire people to be better allies for people from underrepresented groups. Ultimately, I hoped for more inclusive cultures where my friends, my leadership coaching clients, and my daughter (who had wanted to be a software engineer since she was little) could do their best work and thrive.
Yet, what does it mean to thrive…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Apologize for DEI mistakes with sincerity
Earlier this month, the film adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s “In the Heights” was released. Understandably, some fans were disappointed that the movie features lighter-skinned Latinx actors at the expense of darker-skinned or Afro-Latinx people. (The story is based in the New York City neighborhood of Washington Heights, which is home to a population of mostly dark-skinned Black Dominicans.)
Miranda quickly apologized, and his words are an outstanding example of how to apologize sincerely:
“In trying to paint a mosaic of this community, we fell short. I’m truly sorry. I’m learning from the feedback, I thank you for raising it, and…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Endorse people from underrepresented groups
In a recent edition of “The Broadsheet” newsletter, I read an excellent example of a public endorsement by an ally.
The newsletter summarized a New York Times article about Dr. Rochelle Walensky of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, explaining that her communication about mask mandates led some people to question her leadership. When asked about it, Dr. Anthony Fauci explained that it’s a job with a steep learning curve. He then went on to endorse her with:
“Give her a little time. By the end of one year, everybody’s going to be raving about her. I guarantee it.”
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. If you must interrupt, start with a compliment
One of the more straightforward ways to take action as an ally is to look out for interruptions in meetings and stop them in their tracks. For example, “Hold on a sec. I’d like to hear Emma finish what she was saying.”
Yet, there may be situations when you need to interrupt someone. Perhaps it’s because you have new data for the project being discussed. Or you might have highly relevant insights about the client you’re pitching to. What’s an ally to do?
In a recent Harvard Business Review article, I read about an inclusive way to interrupt. …
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
Because I am on vacation this week, I invited my friends David Smith and Brad Johnson to be guest authors. I’m delighted to share their wisdom with all of you! In this edition, you’ll read about five strategies for showing up as a male ally in everyday interactions with women at work, based on their recent book, Good Guys. You’ll find that their message is akin to the Better Allies approach, albeit with a laser focus on equality for women.
While they write to encourage more men to be “good guys,” I think their advice works for people of all…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
Because June is Pride Month, a month to celebrate LGBTQ members of our communities, I decided to create a “best of” edition for today’s newsletter. Here are five ways you can take action as an ally for your LGBTQ coworkers, from some of our past newsletters.
1. Say “We don’t do that here” to promote an LGBTQ-friendly culture
A few years back, Aja Hammerly, a developer advocate at Google, wrote a blog post with the following story:
“The college I attended was small and very LGBT friendly. One day someone came to visit and used the word ‘gay’ as a pejorative, as was common in the early 2000s. A current student looked…
Each week, Karen Catlin shares five simple actions to create a more inclusive workplace and be a better ally.
1. Be an Upstander with these responses
In Better Allies, I described seven different roles that allies can play to support colleagues from underrepresented groups. (If you don’t have my book, you can read about them in this excerpt in The Muse, 7 Examples of What Being an Ally at Work Really Looks Like.)
One of these roles is the Upstander. For example, a white woman who told me she spoke up when asked to name her “spirit animal” as part of a team-building exercise. She wasn’t comfortable taking part in an exercise that appropriated Native American spiritual traditions.
When an ally takes on the role of…
Better Allies®
Everyday actions to create inclusive, engaging workplaces. Together, we can — and will — make a difference with the Better Allies® approach.
