Diversity Intelligence FAQ

Diversity is everything that makes us different from one another. Inclusion is whether those differences are actually able to contribute. You can hire a diverse workforce and still run a culture that quietly pushes people out — and when that happens, the effort produces no return.

We measure inclusion along two dimensions. The first is belonging: do people feel they belong in the organisation or their team? The second is equity: do people experience fair and equal opportunities regardless of the different skills and identities they bring? Together, belonging and fair opportunity tell you how included people really feel — and they are what turn a diverse headcount into better decisions, stronger retention and higher performance. Raising representation without raising inclusion does not work; it usually backfires.

Three reasons recur. First, initiatives are built on assumptions rather than data — beliefs like “women are not ambitious” or “we already have equal opportunities” that turn out to be false when measured, but that lead to expensive, counterproductive programmes (such as “fixing” women with leadership courses instead of changing how the whole organisation operates).

Second, the work is anchored in the wrong place. When responsibility sits in HR without real power, or is handed to a single appointee with targets but no budget or authority, it stalls. Culture change has to start at the top and be owned in the C-suite.

Third, leaders fail to walk the talk. If the executive team is not aligned, employees quickly conclude it is “the flavour of the month” and disengage. Money gets spent, nothing moves, and the organisation grows tired of yet another half-hearted attempt. The pattern is avoidable, but only if the work is set up correctly from the start.

An inclusion survey is a perception gap analysis. It shows how included different groups feel and how differently they experience the same culture — then you use that gap as the basis for your strategy. Without this data, organisations build on a subjective foundation of assumptions and anecdotes, where your view of the workplace depends largely on your own background.

Our inclusion surveys combine three elements: an online questionnaire (quantitative), interviews and focus groups (qualitative). They look at four areas that directly affect performance — belonging, wellbeing and psychological safety; level of inclusion; engagement; and how long people intend to stay. The value comes from segmenting respondents correctly and cross-tabulating the answers, so you can see the real gaps between groups and levels. The results are routinely a turning point: leaders discover the actual problems were not what they assumed. We recommend running the survey annually, much like an engagement survey, so you can adjust and measure progress over time.

It has to start with top management. HR is essential to support and drive the work, but the agenda cannot be delegated to HR and forgotten. The CEO’s job is to align the leadership team, build an ambitious strategy with clear goals and timeframes based on the organisation’s own data, anchor it in the C-suite, and appoint a capable task force to implement and monitor it.

Alongside the CEO, the board matters — often the urgency comes from there. And the work is carried by internal champions: people with genuine expertise who are given the power and budget to change recruitment, promotion and leadership practices. Appointing someone to “fix culture” without authority is a recipe for failure, and frequently penalises the person given the task. This is why our work begins with Strategy & Synchronization — aligning top management before anything cascades down.

It can, but only under specific conditions. Unconscious bias is the brain taking mental shortcuts based on what it already knows, which means we tend to reproduce the past in our hiring and decisions. Good training helps people recognise these patterns, gives them language to discuss bias without blame, and offers practical tools to slow down high-stakes decisions — what Daniel Kahneman calls thinking slow rather than fast. Better awareness here means better control over the business decisions you make every day.

The caveats are real. Training alone changes little if the surrounding culture, structures and processes stay the same. Poorly delivered training can even reinforce the stereotypes it set out to reduce. And resistance is common — the “über bias” being the belief that others are biased, not me, with research showing the better educated are often more in denial. Done well and paired with structural change, bias training is valuable; done as a standalone tick-box, it disappoints.

Cultural intelligence (CQ) is the ability to function effectively in culturally diverse settings without being thrown off course — to turn differences into strengths rather than friction. One definition we like: you know you are culturally intelligent when you get the reactions you expected, again and again over time. If you keep being surprised, there is something about the context you have not yet adapted to.

In a global market for talent, the best people are rarely all from the headquarters’ culture. We consistently see that culturally diverse organisations which are also culturally intelligent outperform those that have diversity but lack the intelligence to use it. CQ is a measurable skill — like IQ or EQ — built on mental flexibility and on awareness of parameters such as power distance, time perception, direct versus indirect communication, and individualism versus collectivism. The practical lesson for multinationals: what works in Rio does not necessarily work in Stockholm, so adapt to local norms.

Unlike most corporate strategy, this is not a purely rational exercise — it carries feelings, uncertainty and resistance, and leaders often “don’t know what they know.” So a slide deck and a set of Post-it notes will not create real alignment. You need a method that reaches the tacit, subconscious knowledge in the room.

We use the LEGO® Serious Play® methodology for this. Over a one- to two-day workshop, the executive team and ideally the board build models of how the culture is now and how they want it to be, then align on the initiatives that bridge the gap. In our experience this saves around six months of circling, and produces a shared narrative everyone owns — which is what makes leaders credible when they later speak about the agenda. Aligning top management is more important than most teams expect: without it, the contradictions between leaders give everyone permission to disengage.

Faster than most organisations assume, provided the work is set up correctly. We talk about a sprint, not a marathon. Younger talent has run out of patience with decade-long programmes that go nowhere, and companies that were once the most attractive employers are finding that top graduates no longer want to talk to them.

The pattern that works is consistent: anchor the agenda at the top, align the leadership team, base the strategy on your own data, empower expert internal champions, and make inclusive leadership development mandatory rather than optional. Measured annually against your own data, progress is visible and you can adjust as you go. The aim is to move the needle on culture and performance quickly — and to keep moving it.