Get Intrigued. We
treated this effort the way we would any other strategic project. By
facilitating group and individual interviews to define the current state. It was important for us to create a safe space where everyone could talk openly and
freely about their real concerns. After composing interview questions to gauge colleagues accessment of
the company’s commitment to diversity, we realized the same thing that most tech companies faced.
That there was room for improvement. Although some people were uncomfortable talking about diversity,
most colleagues supported the need to improve and foster it. They wanted to talk openly about important
issues and become involved.
We synthesized interview findings and identified key areas of opportunity.
A core group of passionate and
diverse individuals across various disciplines within the company volunteered their time to break down
what was heard into key themes. We also devoted much of our time towards research to identify how
diversity effected businesses across industries and understand what other companies had done well to
support growth. Most importantly, we wanted to understand how others had failed.
After interviewing our peers, gathering feedback and synthesizing the findings, we turned to our company
leads to inform them of our opportunities and infuse them into business objectives.
Our
efforts were met with extreme support, but we needed to ensure
that we were doing this the right way. So with the support of our company co-founders, we enlisted the help of
professionals to consult us on proactive actions and tactics. An established roadmap allowed us to
forge a plan to infuse diversity and inclusion into the culture and after a long wait, brought on
new team members and developed a team dedicated to diversity and inclusion efforts. Since then, a
number of events have been flourished in combination with the companies Compassion Crew
(volunteering) and Culture Club (social initiatives).
Since then, we’ve increased design training for accessibility, revised our interview guidelines to
be more inclusive, broadened our recruiting efforts, informed colleagues across geographies on important
issues and learnings, and coordinated a number of events in celebration for Black History Month,
Women’s History Month, Pride Month and more.
Outcomes While most of the remaining work is confidential, we continue to create a
culture where diversity and inclusion is part of our design research and strategy. Contact me if
you’d like to see more of the work I’ve personally contributed towards teaching accessibility, unconscious bias and the many culture events
I’ve supported at Rightpoint.
Aja Shamblee
Experience Design
