The business case for inclusive leadership

- A leader is not simply someone with a title or a position or someone who creates followers. A leader is someone who builds more leaders through vision, inspiration and inclusiveness. One of my best bosses was this kind of leader. His model for me was, Shirley, I don't care how fast you're going. Just tell me where you're going and I'll help you get there. In other words, he wanted me to be me and to do me in a way that I could be my unique and authentic self. It was under this inclusive leader that I thrived and I did my best work. Do you consider yourself an inclusive leader? Why or why not? There's no question that numerous demographic disruptions have occurred over the past decade in the workforce, the marketplace and the workplace, and will continue into 2030. We're living in a more global, diverse, multi-generational, virtual, mobile and hyper connected society and in a gig economy. And here are just a few of the realities. Census data and numerous demographic reports reveal that today and by 2030 women will make up 51% of the global workforce. There are already five generations working alongside each other, a first in the history of our workforce, all with different thinking, and learning styles, and personalities and different approaches to work. Minorities, also known as people of color, will comprise 54% of the U.S. population. Nearly 37 billion things will be connected via technology. Things like your home, your car, wearable accessories, et cetera. And over 40% of the workforce will work remotely, flexibly and part-time due to the digital age, and aging society and the gig economy. It's a clear and compelling business case that with all of these differences coming into the workplace at the same time, inclusive leadership is required in order to fully maximize and to capitalize on all of the diversity in our workplaces. As just discussed, diversity is much more broadly defined than just race and gender, as it has been historically the focus. As a 20 year diversity and inclusion officer and HR veteran, I define it as the mix of differences and similarities that make us unique. They can include our values, preferences, beliefs, backgrounds, experiences and certainly our obvious physical attributes such as race, and color, age, and gender, height, weight and behaviors. So think about diversity like an iceberg. 90% of what makes up an iceberg is beneath the surface. And only 10% of it is what we can see. So just like diversity, 90% of what makes us unique and diverse is below the surface. Unfortunately, we make snap judgements and assessments about people based on the 10% of what we do see. Inclusive leaders embrace visible and invisible aspects of diverse talent. And they recognize that talent comes in all shapes and sizes, colors, ethnicities, personalities and the like, and they embrace it as a new normal for achieving competitive advantage, high performance and business success. I began this segment by asking you if you considered yourself an inclusive leader. After hearing a bit more about the changing workforce, how would you answer that question now? Would you change your answer in any way? The workforce will continue to shift in dramatic ways over the next 15 years. The ability for leaders to lead amidst these disruptive forces, across differences, and create more inclusive work environments in a wide variety of context, cultures and complexities will be a key lever for attracting, engaging and retaining top talent. Becoming an inclusive leader is not as easy as it sounds. It requires a paradigm shift and openness to different ways of doing things, leaning into some discomfort and demonstrating courage to embrace the unknown and the unfamiliar. But when achieved, inclusive leadership does have great rewards and benefits.