For our inaugural episode, we’re turning to one of DiVerity PBC’s advisors, Tara Robertson, principal of Tara Robertson Consulting Inc. Tara is an intersectional feminist who uses data and research to advocate for equality and inclusion. She brings nearly 15 years experience leading change in open source technology communities and corporate spaces, including 3 years leading Diversity and Inclusion at Mozilla. She now partners as a consultant with technology, engineering and media leaders to help drive systemic change. Her work has been included in Harvard Business Review, Forbes and other publications. And, if that weren’t enough, she is an incredibly warm, friendly, and delightful person to talk to!
In this first episode, we’ll be talking through “how to move DEI efforts beyond checkbox exercises” and more specifically, about accountability. Why? Well, when it comes to Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, there is of course “intent vs. impact” but there is SO much more, including discussions we can be having amongst ourselves as DEI professionals, and discussions we can be having with our clients. Stay tuned!
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LINKS:
🦩Tara Robertson Consulting Inc.
🦩Tara Robertson on LinkedIn
🦩Tara Robertson on Twitter
🧑🏽🏫Catherine "Kitty" Susan Genovese
🧑🏽🏫Bystander Effect and Diffusion of Responsibility
🧑🏽🏫Looped Learning
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Transcript:
SPEAKERS
Enrico E. Manalo, Tara Robertson
Enrico E. Manalo 00:04
Hello and welcome everybody. This is our very very first episode of the DEI is podcast, which is produced by DiVerity PBC. Here with me today is our very special guest, Tara Robertson. And we're here today to talk about accountability. So no matter what flavor of consulting accountability is more than a buzzword is what reputations rests on what success is built upon. And frankly, how progress is made. Why then is accountability such a bear to wrestle with, not just for consultants, but for our clients as well. This is especially true for many clients who see that getting better at DEI isn't simply a business fad, but something that has real potential, not only to improve their bottom lines, but to transform the way that we navigate the social sphere. So once again, here today on our first ever episode of "DEI Is:" is Tara Robertson, who is also one of DiVerity PBC's advisors. She is also principal of Tara Robertson Consulting, Inc., which provides assessment strategy and implementation coaching and speaking. So glad to have you here. Tara, how are you?
Tara Robertson 01:13
I'm great. How are you doing?
Enrico E. Manalo 01:15
I'm doing fantastic. And you know, it's been a long road to get here. But thank you so much for sticking with us and making this happen.
Tara Robertson 01:24
And thank you when I lost my voice when we were supposed to first record this. Thank you for being so like understanding and gracious.
Enrico E. Manalo 01:31
No, of course. And just to check in on that. How are you? How is your recovery going?
Tara Robertson 01:37
I'm fine. I had COVID, probably about six weeks ago, it was mild, but like it really, really took my energy. And then a couple of weeks later, I lost my voice. And I've never had that happen. And both of us for work, we do a lot of talking. So it was it was really disabling actually,
Enrico E. Manalo 01:57
Yeah, yeah. I mean, we talk about the kind of figurative loss of voice a lot and actually physically do it is also often kind of a wake up call, right. And so just to make sure that we kind of we drive the point home, I guess, I know that things are opening up, but please, everybody's remember, we are still in a pandemic. And so the best way that we can take care of each other is also by taking care of ourselves. So let's continue to be safe. And you know, while we do have medications that can help us out if we do get COVID as Tara was saying, it does not sound like something that you want to be getting.
Tara Robertson 02:40
Absolutely not. It really sucks.
Enrico E. Manalo 02:43
All right. So, Tara, we're talking about accountability today. And if you could kind of lay the foundation for us, what exactly is "accountability" when it comes to di efforts? And how is that different from "responsibility"?
Tara Robertson 03:02
Accountability is like, did we do we achieve what we said we wanted to achieve? Did I do the thing I said I was going to do. So I think it can work both on the consultant side and on the client side. When I partner with a company getting clear on what the goals are, first of all, what the strategy is, what the goals are, who's going to do the work, how we know we've got there and who's ultimately accountable. I think that's really important. Often DEI efforts are or sometimes other DEI efforts kind of get put as an "optional" piece like, where you've got a volunteer committee running things, and there's no clear goals articulated and there's no one accountable. So with other business goals, like if we're producing a product, or we're trying to hit certain marketing goals, or financial revenue goals, one of the executive team is accountable. Like, if they hit the goal or exceed it, like they're recognized for it, they're often compensated for it. And on the flip side, if they missed the goal, they put up their hand and say, "That's my miss", like, we're gonna figure out why we didn't achieve that goal. And there's often like, if you keep missing your goals, like, you won't have a job for very long. So I think thinking about DEI, with the same kind of rigor and seriousness that we think about all of our goals and organizations is really important.
Enrico E. Manalo 04:43
Yeah, I mean, it really brings to mind that concept in sociology of diffusion of responsibility, right so very famously. You know, I believe her name was Kitty Genovese, or Kitty Gevarghese or something like that. But a woman was murdered in broad daylight. And people saw it. And they did nothing, because of this phenomenon, Diffusion of Responsibility. So everybody saw it, but assumed that somebody else would take the lead on stopping it, and no one did. Right. And so we can kind of see that if we don't have somebody who can accept accountability for efforts, then everybody can easily shrug their shoulders and say, "Well, I bet somebody is going to step up and do this," which is not always the case. Right. And so if we are being responsible for getting people to push behind diversity efforts, then we have to, we have to use what we know about the human brain, which of course is often contradictory and complex, but that's us, right?
Tara Robertson 05:53
Yeah, I also think things are complicated. And people are really busy, like, I don't know, anyone who's like, "oh, I have lots of time these days," and organizations have really like audacious goals and are getting after them. So when you're working cross functionally as well, it's really important to know, like, who's the owner here? Where does the buck stop? Who is ultimately accountable? Like, who? Who's involved in what what capacity? But being clear about those things, especially when you're working cross-functionally is super important.
Enrico E. Manalo 06:25
Yeah, clarity is hard
Tara Robertson 06:26
And we know that!
Enrico E. Manalo 06:27
Yeah, yeah. And communication is hard. But this is this is the game we're playing, right? So to turn to you, our audience quickly, "what is one thing you would like everyone to know about accountability when it comes to DEI?" So maybe you're a consultant yourself? Maybe you're in an organization or an embedded role, but everybody's got a perspective on this. And I think it's gonna be very helpful if we can if we can tap into that collective wisdom and knowledge. All right. So what would you say, are the ingredients of accountability, particularly when it comes to making real progress on DEI efforts within organizations? And I know that clients are often asking me like, because they get stuck, bright people get stuck and they say, how can how can we get traction back? How can we keep making progress, even when it's tricky, or difficult or whatever?
Tara Robertson 07:18
Um, as an example, like a lot of organizations want to be more diverse. So that's like, first of all defining what that means. Like, are we looking at women in tech roles? Are we looking at racial diversity? Are we looking at age diversity? Are we looking at representation of people with disabilities? Like, what do we mean by diverse diversity? Understanding where you're at right now. So kind of doing that baseline assessment. So for the diversity example, like, who's here right now? who works here? and looking at that data and understanding that, and then understanding who are we hiring, but also who's leaving? If you're hiring a certain demographic, but people are leaving faster than you're hiring them, you're not going to shift things, actually, they're going to get worse. So people quickly think about hiring but often don't think about the retention piece. And then understanding what the goal is like, is our goal to be representative of the industry that we're working in? Is it to be representative of the general population? Where our users are? Is it something else? Like, getting really clear about those things and having measurable goals like, so we're starting say, I don't know 20% women, in our industry 30% women is is like the the representation of women in our industry. So like, what's our plan to increase 10%? But if it's like to think of our users, like, maybe 51% of our users are women. And that's what we're going for, like, so getting clear about what that is.
Enrico E. Manalo 09:09
Yeah, I mean, to your point, a lot of time--and you mentioned audacious goal. So sometimes we I end up working with organizations, they have these goals. It's like, okay, great, let's, let's capture this energy. How do we get there? You know, let's drill down to specifics, and you get these blank looks like "specifics? What do you mean, like, can't we just like generally make things better?" Like, we need specific pathways and mechanisms to make that all happen, you know. But the other thing that I really liked about what you were saying is, and we're talking about organizations, right? But these dynamics also map to the individual, right? So it's really important for the individual to know themselves, to know what they're working with, what the goals are, what the clear steps are going to be. The reason being, if they the individuals that comprise an organization don't know those things, then how can the organization know those things? Right? Because that's what, you need that that penetration of knowledge and awareness, otherwise, it's just not going to work. So from your experience, why is it that you know, and, of course, all organizations are different, groups of people are all different. But why is it that "Organization A" might have great accountability measures for DEI work, while "Organization B" might have mostly things like calendar celebrations, diversity statements, and other kinds of outward-facing "window dressing", sometimes people call it but, you know, I guess what I'm getting at here is a lot of organizational leaders have gone through similar educational and professional experiences. So why is there this kind of like "unevenness" that I've observed?
Tara Robertson 10:53
That's a great question. I have two answers. And like, which one do I give? I'll give the the more complex one first, and then I'll give my off the cuff one. There's different models about maturity of DEI efforts. So for me, when I hear an organization has measurable goals, or executive, executive compensation or bonuses are tied in part to the DEI goals. When organizations publish their data, and are have a degree of transparency about what their efforts are, what their goals are, and how they're doing. I, those organizations are further along and more mature in their DEI, kind of journeys, when I hear about organizations that are just celebrating Pride Month, or Black History Month, or Women's History Month, but aren't looking at "are our benefits trans-inclusive?", "What is the promotion rate of black women in our organization? And what are we doing to support caregivers, in the pandemic, who are predominantly women?", then I'm like, you know, like, you're less far on in your DEI journey. And you haven't yet start started to dig down to those substantive systems-level things that you need to change. My kind of want to hear that as well. I'm like, "Organization A" really cares about this and as willing to do the work and "Organization B" is kind of looking for shortcuts. So that's my skeptical view. My more optimistic view is that organization be hasn't kind of done the the tough question about asking themselves, why they're doing this, and what that means and kind of making that long term investment? Because it's, I don't think in our lives, we're going to be done this work. But,
Enrico E. Manalo 13:02
No,
Tara Robertson 13:03
there are different layers that we can go down and look at.
Enrico E. Manalo 13:08
Yeah, definitely. And so I know sometimes when we're deep in the work, it can be discouraging, right? It can be hard, because it's hard to "zoom out" and see the full picture. Right. And so one question that I want to ask to our audience is, "when you're feeling frustrated, or discouraged while trying to support clients and being accountable for their dei work, how do you deal with it?" Right, I think there's a lot of ways that we could deal with it. But I'm really curious to learn from our audience out because I think getting a sense, you know, to your point earlier, getting a sense of what we're working with, as a DEI community of professionals, I think that that can also help us to to support one another in furthering the work with our clients. So to turn out to our next question, on the practitioner side of things, we often get some form of the question, "how are we going to know that what the consultant trainer practitioner, etc, did worked?" And as new consultants, we often have some idea of how to put together surveys that help us to understand employee engagement or maybe a mix of qualitative and quantitative data to give us some insight. But even with that experience, we can be left wondering, so what's, what's your answer to that question, Tara?
Tara Robertson 14:26
I think it's really important to be clear about what the problem is you're trying to solve. And when I get a lot of potential clients contact me asking me, Can you come in and do unconscious bias training? And my question back to them is like, how do you know that that's the problem like because like, there was one organization where we surveyed and found that people of color weren't giving really actionable feedback from their managers. So in that case, it's not really a case of unconscious bias that we need to train on, it's like training on giving good, actionable, detailed feedback, and layering in the equity piece and making sure that if you're managing people who are different from you, either their gender is different, their race is different, they have a different educational background. But you're also being rigorous and making sure that you're giving them actionable feedback to you so that they can grow. So the piece is like, "what problem are we trying to solve?" How do you know that that's the problem? So like, where's what's the evidence. And I've also seen organizations over rotate on a couple of, you know, pissed off staff, people who have legit complaints. But they're going to solve for like a 700 person organization, based on three people who are really upset. And sometimes their concerns are like, "those are the things we need to solve for". And other times, there are definitely problems, but maybe not the first problems that need to be addressed. So I think using data to understand both like how people are feeling through employee engagement surveys, and segmenting them by different demographics, and doing that intersectional weighing is really important to understand sentiment, it's not going to tell you "why", but it's going to highlight areas where there's gaps. And then, like the earlier example, like if you're trying to shift representation, and you have an attrition issue where your your culture sucks, or is toxic, or is unfair, or ineq-inequitable, and people are leaving, like you need to address that. It's not just about what job board do I post on to get "diverse candidates"? And I hate that phrase, "diverse candidates".
Enrico E. Manalo 16:59
Right?
Tara Robertson 17:00
"A person" singular, cannot be diverse. But anyways, that was a bit of a rant! Did I answer your question?
Enrico E. Manalo 17:07
I mean, I think so. Yeah. I mean, so what I heard you saying is that, in order to correctly identify what is going on, we're going to have to look at a variety things and have to be open to that complexity. Because if we're not, then we're just not going to be able to get a read on it. I mean, is that I think that's what you're saying, is that right?
Tara Robertson 17:30
Yeah. And then once you've looked at those things, have some hypotheses about what needs to happen and test those, either with your client, with executives, test them with focus groups in the organization, be really clear about what you're trying to fix.
Enrico E. Manalo 17:46
Yeah.
Tara Robertson 17:47
And then you can assess your efforts, like did that work or not? Instead of going, "Oh, we were kind of messy and trying to do five things at once. Not sure if we did any of them". Like, having some clarity and intention there.
Enrico E. Manalo 18:00
Yeah. And you know, for me, something that I always come back to is that concept of "looped learning". Right? So for those who are unfamiliar, it's like you, you come up with your hypothesis, and you put it into action. And then you're looking through your findings. And then you have to ask that reflective question, like, "Hey, did this work as well for us as we thought it was going to? Or do we need to kind of adjust things and maybe give it another go?" And in doing that, what people will quickly find is we move closer and closer and closer to "getting it right". The frustrating thing is, we might never get it 100% right, but that's not the point, right? Because again, these are moving targets. So if we're not adapting in the moment, to meet the situation, then of course, things are going to get away from us. And that can be tedious sometimes, it can be frustrating, but I think it's deeply necessary. Because if we have this idea that we can "check something off" and move on with their lives, that's where we get into real trouble.
Tara Robertson 19:08
I know that idea, but I didn't know the term "looped learning".
Enrico E. Manalo 19:12
Oh, that's the phrase that that I'm familiar with. I don't know if it's called something else. But yeah, for anybody else. That's something that you can type into Google Scholar and get a whole bunch of hits. One of the authors that's responsible for that is a guy named Argiris, or Argyris? I don't know, but I will, I will drop that into the comments after the after the show for sure.
Tara Robertson 19:35
Ooh, thanks!
Enrico E. Manalo 19:36
Yeah, of course. So just kind of curious here, but what advice might you give to consultants and practitioners whose clients were very happy at the end of the contract, but since then, and despite measures being taken to determine and establish accountability, things might have gone awry, either reverting to the way things were or else transforming into something other than what was hoped for.
Tara Robertson 19:58
That's a hard thing about, that's the hard thing about being a consultant like. They're like, they're as like, as an external expert, your voice carries more weight than if you were internal, often. So like, there's a pro, but also kind of a great responsibility there. But also, you're not around for the implementation often. Which can be tough. Like, I think most of us want, who are doing this work, want to make sure that we're making like lasting impact. And so that's really important for me. I don't have control. But like, I don't have any input once my engagement's over with with an organization. Some people we've kept in touch, but the thing for me then as a consultant, and this has been some hard learning for me is to be really discerning about the kinds of people that I want to partner with. I care deeply about this work, and I want to make a difference. And I want to make a LASTING difference. So I'm getting better at using my Spidey-senses, asking powerful questions to discern if a client is a good fit for me.
Enrico E. Manalo 21:23
Yeah, I feel like that point about fit is so important. And already, like, sometimes our timelines are gonna say, well, sometimes we get this idea that we have to finish things by a certain time. And that's just not possible. So I think what you're saying is very worth keeping in mind for sure.
Tara Robertson 21:49
Can I loop back to accountability? Because
Enrico E. Manalo 21:51
Yeah, please,
Tara Robertson 21:52
As we talked about it from the the client side, but as a practitioner I, if I say I'm here for systemic change, and I continue to partner with people who aren't like, there's a misalignment there, and my reputation and my integrity starts to kind of get eroded. And
Enrico E. Manalo 22:18
Yes
Tara Robertson 22:19
people say, oh, like you, you say you're about this, but the work you do out in the world isn't actually making that impact. So I think there's a tough piece as consultants. And it's really scary to say to a client, "no, I don't think we're a fit."
Enrico E. Manalo 22:32
Yeah.
Tara Robertson 22:34
But it's important, I think, if an organization wants to partner with you on like, "What's the best, what are the best three celebration events for this year," and you want to do lasting work that is going to change systems? It's different work. So there's, there's a misalignment there. So it's hard and can be scary. But I think we owe it, we have our own integrity and like accountability to say no.
Enrico E. Manalo 23:06
yeah. And sometimes it's hard to do that long-term thinking when you've got bills staring you in the face, when you are trying to keep the lights on, when you're trying to keep your team paid. But, you know, talking, if we're kind of meditating on that idea of "fit", I think we all know what it's like to get a pair of shoes that fit poorly, right? They might look great on our feet and everything, but we're walking around in them and before too long, we noticed that our stride is actually changing. And so that can have real long-term impacts. But yeah, it's already very difficult to get through the RFP process, which is common to our field. And then to stretch it out even further by determining "are we actually a good fit now that we've determined that maybe we are people that can work together?" that can be frustrating, but, as you say, deeply, deeply necessary for us to consider as we're moving forward if we want to maintain our integrity. So yeah, a very salient point for sure. My question to the audience now is "what would one clear indicator be that client organizations have what they need to succeed in their DEI efforts?" And so you know, if you're watching
Tara Robertson 24:23
Ooh, that's a great question!
Enrico E. Manalo 24:25
an organization or you're a consultant yourself, I'd love to tap into your perspective here. I don't know. Is that sparking something for you, Tara?
Tara Robertson 24:35
I'm just I, the clients that I like, where it's been like a "YES!" and like, I still look back and I feel chills, like there's been alignment, there's been resources. It's definitely been like co-designed where I'm bringing the subject matter expertise that I have, and they're bringing their expertise about the business and we're meeting in the middle to figure out Some things that are new. I LOVE that. And I also love, like, when people are excited and willing to commit time to doing this work. People, everyone's really busy. But if you and people in the organization, if they're not allocating time, to make the change to be involved in these things like, stuff's not going to happen. We allocate time and money to things that we think are important. So if you're doing neither, yet saying "DEI is very important here", I'm gonna say like, try not to swear, I'm gonna say "that's not really true."
Enrico E. Manalo 25:40
Yeah. Thank you for that. And we've also got a comment coming in here. So "the willing" and this was in response to the audience question, like "the willingness to say, I don't know and I want to work on it both explicitly and otherwise". I love that. And I'm so sorry, I'm not sure how to pronounce your name correctly, so I won't, I won't try to read it out loud. But this is one of the consultants from the DiVerity Network, so thank you so much for joining this discussion. And for your contribution. You have a response for this comment or some some thoughts?
Tara Robertson 26:18
Oh, it resonates with me, like the "both explicitly and otherwise." And you gotta test your Spidey-senses in your gut sometimes, like, there was one client I said "no" to and on paper, a lot of the things were great. And I just came out of each of our meetings, like not feeling good, and like not feeling respected and feeling a little gaslit. And I was like, oh, like it was a really hard contract to turn down. And I'm really glad I did it. Because if that's how we're starting off together, like it's not gonna be a good partnership.
Enrico E. Manalo 26:53
Nice. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. We've got a follow up. "We often forget that a huge part of the population is between "performative" and "strong advocate + know what to do. Not all who are are taking obvious actions = performative/disinterested." I think that's an important point to add here, for sure. For sure, so
Tara Robertson 27:19
our role as consultants is to meet people where they are and yeah, help them move forward. So I'm happy. Like, if people on that journey need to take a break, they need a water break, they need a stack, they need to sit down for a moment. But if you've hired me to come in and help you move your organization, like, we got to keep moving.
Enrico E. Manalo 27:40
Right? Yeah.
Tara Robertson 27:41
So I think that's one of the one of the things that resonated in that comment.
Enrico E. Manalo 27:46
For sure, we only have a couple moments left here. So to close out, I would like to ask one last question, which is, from your perspective, what can DEI consultants and clients be doing to improve that provider/client relationship on the whole? And one of the reasons for diversity existing is that there's a there are very real equity issues in that consulting client relationship, which are often skewed towards the client rather than the consultant. So, you know, this is one of the things that we're really hoping to address through the DiVerity platform and community.
Tara Robertson 28:26
It's tough from on the organization side, like you often don't know exactly what kind of help you're looking for. And like, I personally hate the RFP process, and I won't do it. I've had people reach out to me and say, "we'd love to partner with you here, please fill out this 20 page application." And it's like, "no," like that doesn't I don't have time for that one. And two, I really believe in co-design. So we're going to need to work on these things together. So just trying, again, if you are going with an RFP, I think the research that Minsun (co-founder of DiVerity) did around having budget in there and having a clear timeline is important, because otherwise you're just asking people to sort of write plans about who-knows-what.
Enrico E. Manalo 29:17
All right, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, unfortunately, that is our time, Tara, and thank you so so much for joining us and making this happen. Any kind of final thoughts as we close out here?
Tara Robertson 29:31
This was a lot of fun. Thank you for hosting this conversation. And thanks to people who tuned in. Yeah. Have a great Wednesday.
Enrico E. Manalo 29:39
Yeah. Thank you so much, everybody. Just a couple things before we end here: on June 30. If you are a part of the DiVerity Consultant Network, and I am going to be leading a leading a Community Event, which is called "Accountability: Intentional Friendships for Collective Care", so that accountability theme is really coming through. So if you are a part of our network or would like to join, well then you can follow this link that I am having scroll across the bottom now. So you can join us at bit.ly/JoinDiVerity to see if diversity is the community that you're looking for assuming that you are a consultant. Another thing I'd like to mention is that next time (that is in two weeks), we will actually be going alive with another one of DiVerity PBC's advisors, that is Valerie Williams, and we don't have a title yet for that, but we will announce that as soon as we are able, and of course, if you are looking for help with moving the ball forward in your DEI efforts, then Tara Robertson is a fantastic person to ask. And she of course is once again the principal of Tara Robertson Consulting Inc. Anything you'd like to plug here Tara?
Tara Robertson 31:06
I'm, I'm doing more coaching and I want to help women of color in corporate spaces go from being "underestimated and overworked" to "unapologetic and wildly successful" so even if you're an individual in an organization or a leader who wants that kind of help, hit me up.
Enrico E. Manalo 31:25
That is super cool. And I I wish I was a woman but I'm happy being a man. All right, thank you so much, everybody. This was the very first episode of "DEI is:" My name is Enrico E. Manalo and I will see you in a couple of weeks. Thanks so much!
Tara Robertson 31:44
Thanks, bye!
Enrico E. Manalo 31:45
Bye!
DEI is: "Accountability" with Tara Robertson