Driving Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

Kristina Kohl

• Publisher: Auerbach Publications
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000533675
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Cultura del lugar de trabajo

Navigating the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA) characterizing the business world in the 21st century requires a new paradigm focused on an integrated bottom line – planet, people, and profit (PPP). Global trends include resource scarcity and growing inequities in income, wealth, education, and healthcare. Stakeholders are demanding that organizations address systemic barriers to promote justice and equity within organizations and across broader social systems. Transformational change requires leadership to analyze internal and external systems through a social and environmental justice lens.

Despite a growing focus on justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion, the imbalance of power remains within our institutions, organizations, and social systems. To move the needle, leaders can turn to Driving Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, which explains developing a North Star vision and creating a strategy to redesign organizational process and systems, as well as leveraging tools for data-driven decision-making. It presents a framework to build an inclusive organization as well as a model to engage and support senior and middle management beginning the process of capacity building and systemic change. By layering in AI and other technologies to support data-driven decision-making, the book guides leaders in navigating their organization's journey along the maturity continuum to achieve their North Star vision of becoming a just and equitable organization. The book also helps managers to:

Assess ecosystems and organizational systems that justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion impact

• Take a deeper dive into transformational and operational components to gain insights on the deep systemic realignment of the North Star vision
• Identify and engage with diverse stakeholders to gain perspective and understand issues crucial for transformative change
• Leveragepeople-centereddesign to create a process promoting diversity of voices and to better align outcomes with shared organizational vision
• Use data to drive decision-making and reduce bias by removing intuition from the decision-making process
• Leverage the book'sframeworks to drive collaborative systemic change
• Adapt insightshighlighted in multiple interviews with DEI practitioners
• Benefit from lessons learned andbest practices featured in the book's casestudies

This book features a primer, which is a quick reference guide to key terms, concepts, and definitions. It helps to define justice, equity, diversity, inclusion, and other key terms, such as unconscious bias, stereotypes, and microaggressions.It also featuresa toolkit, which includes checklists to help managers lead organizations to realize their ownNorth Star vision.

Chapter 1 Leveraging ESG on the J.E.D.I. Journey

DOI: 10.1201/9781003168072-2

As we build and adapt organizations to address 21st century challenges, we must consider that models that worked in the 20th century are no longer applicable. We operate in a Volatile, Uncertain, Changing, Complex, and Ambiguous (VUCA) world. Organizations need to be agile and adaptive to build resiliency and thrive. Megatrends impacting organizations include population growth and demographic changes, increasing urbanization and growth of megacities, warming temperatures, rising sea levels, loss of habitat, loss of biodiversity, pandemics, social protests, and increased political polarization, to name a few. Advances in technology and connectivity mean that the world is aware of events both good and bad minutes after they happen. Transparency is necessary to effectively meet stakeholder requirements. In addition, the average lifecycle of a business is shrinking. McKinsey reports that the average life span of organizations included in Standard & Poor’s 500 was 14 years in 2010, and getting shorter, vs. 90 years in 1935.¹ This increased velocity of change heightens the complexity of managing organizations and requires a new framework that values planet, people, and profit to thrive. A new model for success is found in the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which provide a roadmap to build more environmentally and socially just and equitable organizations.

1.1 Sustainable Development Goals

In order to move forward, leaders need to think more broadly about creating organizational value using the U.N. SDGs as a guiding principle. These goals serve as a roadmap for organizations seeking to create an integrated bottom line return – planet, people, and profit. These goals and their interconnectivity are pillars of environment and social justice. While these goals will apply to organizations differently with some being more material than others, we will not achieve success in creating transformative change unless all organizational leaders think deeply about these issues and their role in driving transformative change.

Figure 1.1 lays out each of the 17 goals for improved environmental, societal, and organizational health. These 17 goals serve as a framework for leaders creating a more just, equitable, diverse, and inclusive (J.E.D.I.) organization. The vision is to achieve these goals by 2030, which will require major transformation by both public and private institutions. Table 1.1 provides more details on each of the goals and further insight and information is available through the U.N. Sustainable Goals websites referenced.

Figure 1.1 The U.N. Sustainable Development Goals.²

Table 1.1 U.N. Sustainable Development Goals and Descriptions³

Sustainable Development Goals	Descriptions
SDG #1-No Poverty	Promote inclusive economic growth to provide sustainable jobs and promote equality.
SDG #2-Zero Hunger	Promote development and innovation in the food and agriculture sector to eradicate hunger and poverty.
SDG #3-Good Health & Well-Being	Ensure access to resources to promote healthy lives and promote well-being across all age groups.
SDG #4-Quality Education	Provide a quality education equitably to improve global prosperity.
SDG #5-Gender Equity	Promote gender equality globally by removing legal and societal barriers and creating greater access and opportunity.
SDG #6-Clean Water and Sanitation	Focus on providing clean and accessible water to promote healthy communities.
SDG #7-Affordable and Clean Energy	Develop and expand the use of affordable and clean energy to drive change and create new opportunities for solutions.
SDG #8-Decent Work and Economic Growth	Focus on creating conditions that support quality jobs that promote economic prosperity.
SDG #9-Industry, Innovation, & Infrastructure	Promote innovation and investments in infrastructure to support a more sustainable future.
SDG #10-Reduce Inequalities	Develop policies that are universal in principle and include addressing the needs of disadvantaged and marginalized populations.
SDG #11-Sustainable Cities and Communities	Design cities and communities to provide opportunities for all including access to basic services, energy, housing, transportation, and education.
SDG #12-Responsible Consumption and Production	Revise consumption and production patterns to reduce the destructive impact on natural environment and resources.
SDG #13-Climate Action	Reduce CO2 levels and other greenhouse gas emissions to combat temperature rise and corresponding severe weather events and sea level rise.
SDG #14-Life Below Water	Reverse water degradation and manage this essential global resource sustainably for future generations.
SDG #15-Life on Land	Reverse land degradation, halt biodiversity loss, manage forests more sustainably, and combat desertification.
SDG #16-Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions	Provide access to justice for all and build effective and accountable institutions across all levels.
SDG #17-Partnerships	Leverage public and private partnerships globally to promote sustainable development.

The SDG roadmap is built on foundation of planetary health-SDG #6-Clean Water and Sanitation, SDG-#7-Affordable Clean Energy, SDG #12-Responsible Consumption and Production, SDG #13-Climate Action, SDG #14-Life Below Water, and SDG #15-Life on Land. Building on top of a healthy planet, we look to have a more just and equitable society-SDG #1-No Poverty, SDG #2-Zero Hunger, SDG #3-Good Health and Well-Being, SDG #4-Quality Education, SDG #5-Gender Equity, SDG #9-Industry, Innovation, & Infrastructure, and SDG #10-Reduced Inequalities. Building on the environmental and social platforms, we create economic prosperity for all – SDG #8-Decent Work and Economic Growth, SDG #11-Sustainable Cities and Communities, SDG #16-Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, and SDG #17-Partnerships. Each of these 17 SDGs are interconnected with each affecting the other. For example, access to quality education impacts the ability to find decent work, which in turn eliminates poverty and hunger and promotes health and well-being. This framework functions as a system delivering an integrated bottom line strategy that allows leaders to build regenerative organizations contributing to their business value (Profits) through improved management of natural resources (Planet) and stakeholders (People).

Societal outcomes such as health and well-being are often a function of underlying environmental factors. As we have seen from the COVID-19 pandemic, there is intersectionality between climate change, increased human and animal interactions owing to habitat loss, and the health and well-being of global populations. While COVID-19 is not the first climate-related virus, it has been one of the deadliest viruses. There have been a number of viruses stemming from human and animal interaction such as SARS, Ebola, and Zika. As the human footprint expands, wildlife loses habitat, and human and wildlife interactions increase resulting in viruses morphing and spreading. In addition, as the climate changes, hosts and viruses move into areas that were not previously habituated. As a result, all types of bacterial and viral infections are moving into new populations.⁴ The health of people and the health of the planet are intertwined.

For our most vulnerable populations, we see significantly higher infection rates, hospitalization rates, and mortality rates related to COVID-19. The virus has impacted racial and ethnically diverse groups differently owing to social inequities such as access to and utilization of healthcare, income, wealth, education, housing, occupation, and discrimination. These outcomes are a result of government and private programs that have systematically disadvantaged Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) communities. In the U.S., high density, urban locations where many BIPOC people live were highly impacted at the beginning of the pandemic. In addition, many people in this group take public transportation because they don’t have the means for or access to private transportation further exposing them to the virus. Black Americans are 2.6 times more likely to contract COVID-19, 4.7 times more likely to be hospitalized with the virus, and 2.1 times more likely to die from virus related health causes.⁵ Other inequities come from BIPOC communities’ higher exposure to air pollution and toxic chemicals because of housing stock availability, income inequality, and lack of educational opportunities. All of these factors have contributed to the disproportional rates of infection and mortality for the BIPOC population. While we are seeing it very clearly as it relates to the coronavirus, we have consistently seen BIPOC communities disproportionally impacted by extreme weather events and flooding owing to climate change and sea level rise. While the pandemic has starkly highlighted these inequalities, there have been systemic barriers to the BIPOC community for generations.

Project Drawdown research further demonstrates the intersectionality of environmental and social SDGS. As part of their climate action response, Project Drawdown advocates for education of girls, globally, as one of the most impactful ways to improve planetary health by reducing emissions through controlling population growth. Women with more education have better economic outcomes, ...