Is Your Executive Team Committed to Leading More Inclusively?
Is your executive team committed to leading more inclusively? Here’s why it should. McKinsey is finding consistent correlations like the following:
“Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 21% more likely to outperform on profitability, and 27% more likely to have superior value creation.
The highest-performing companies on both profitability and diversity had more women in line roles (i.e. typically revenue generating) than in staff roles on their executive teams.
Companies in the top quartile for ethnic/cultural diversity on executive teams were 33% more likely to have industry-leading profitability.
That these positive correlations continue to strongly suggest that including a robust mix of people across levels and differences can be a key differentiator among companies.
The penalty for bottom quartile performance on diversity persists. Overall, companies in the bottom quartile for both gender and ethnic/cultural diversity were 29% less likely to achieve above-average profitability than were all other companies in the McKinsey data set.”
Keep in mind: data does not have to be causal to be true and powerful.
Here’s how inclusive executive teams are engaging diversity, equity, and inclusion with this data in view:
1. Executives are taking personal responsibility for centering diversity, equity, and inclusion in their point of view.
2. Senior leaders are building reciprocal relationships of accountability and trust with colleagues across difference, so mentoring grows into sponsoring.
3. Executive teams and their direct reports are energetic in their focus on removing bias and generating opportunities from talent systems and the customer experience.
Your executive team can choose to invest in DEI. The RoI will show up in new credibility and influence for each senior leader, in substantive progress in producing a new mix of great talent at every level of the organization, in an inclusive culture that motivates employees to produce and stay, and in a revitalized brand with customers and other external partners who want to see your company get DEI right.
What will the data correlations in your company say about DEI as a source for executive performance in your company this year?