DEIB Awareness Is Skyrocketing: Here’s How To Create Meaningful Change

From visibility to value

If all press is good press, then diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEIB) activity is enjoying a media-darling moment. Although much of the news coverage has skewed negatively over the last year, increased attention to the topic has had at least one positive outcome. According to our 2024 survey of more than 3,100 employees, awareness of DEIB terminology and initiatives are both up dramatically year-over-year.

Our 2024 State of Workplace Empathy study, now in its ninth year, revealed that employee familiarity with the term “DEIB” is up a full 32 points since 2023. In terms of the efforts going on around them, 68% of employees agree with the statement “DEIB initiatives have become more visible at my company.”

While it may be tempting to high-five at the good news of increased awareness, digging deeper into the data shows that the success of workplace DEIB is a bit more nuanced.

Acknowledgment of DEIB Importance at the Highest Levels

CEOs, in particular, seem to have observed that awareness alone is not enough to affect meaningful change. Eight in ten (83%) of these top leaders say their company spends more time talking about DEIB initiatives than implementing them. Interestingly, though, 63% of CEOs rank their company’s DEIB efforts as excellent, which seems to indicate that when DEIB programming is deployed, CEOs believe it is done well. They simply want more of it. Indeed, 84% of CEOs want their company to do more to foster a diverse and inclusive environment.

While awareness alone may not be enough to affect meaningful change, it’s a really good place to start. The question now becomes how to leverage a growing collective consciousness to improve DEIB outcomes—outcomes that cultivate workplace belonging for all employees.

The opportunity to do so is great. A shocking 52% of CEOs said their company culture is toxic, up 10 points from 2023. It’s no surprise then that feelings of belonging are sinking. Year-over-year, the percentage of employees who say they feel they belong fell 14 points to 65%; the percentage who said they feel connected to their peers dropped even further, by 17 points to 62%.

Leveraging Best Practices to Enhance DEIB Efforts

While it would be foolish to suggest there is one clear path forward, several data-backed best practices for DEIB program success have emerged in recent years. Serving as guideposts on the corporate journey to increased belonging and connectedness, one or more of the following six practices may offer leaders of DEIB strategy some new tactics to incorporate into their plans of action.
 

1. Tie DEIB to broader business goals: With a renewed focus on efficiency, executives need to ensure as many resources as possible are going directly to the bottom line. Articulating how DEIB goals accelerate the achievement of broader business goals elevates their importance organizationally. The groundwork for this already exists; 82% of CEOs agree that financial performance is tied to workplace empathy, a core outcome of DEIB strategy.
2. Prioritize belonging and inclusion: Healthy feelings of belonging and inclusion are the lifeblood of DEIB programming. When employees are encouraged to come together and forge new connections, satisfaction and retention increase, sustaining commitment and support for DEIB efforts. Sixty-two percent of employees say that their companies’ DEIB efforts make them feel connected to their peers.
3. Decentralize DEIB: Successful organizations have resisted the urge to hire one person or to create one division that is wholly responsible for DEIB. Instead, they focus on horizontal implementation with an intentional focus on helping supervisors get involved. Momentum on this front is growing. Although just 29% of employees believe DEIB initiatives are very important to their manager, that number is up a significant 10 points from 2023.     
4. Empower participants: The most successful DEIB initiatives are clear about the “what” and “why,” but leave room to experiment with the “how.” In these circumstances, employees are empowered to use their creativity, energy, and empathy to bring about real change. An example of a clear objective is to improve employee soft skills for a more inclusive workplace. Teams pursuing this goal could take any number of paths, from coordinating workshops and training to establishing mentoring and coaching programs.     
5. Train, develop, educate: In increasingly remote working environments, anything organizations can do to demonstrate their commitment to employee growth and advancement is crucial to retention. DEIB presents myriad opportunities for education and professional development, not the least of which is empathy-focused training for executives. Fifty-five percent of CEOs think they lead with empathy at work, but only 28% of employees share that view.     
6. Communicate often and consistently: One of the pandemic-inspired enhancements to today’s workplace is better organizational communication. Team members have gotten used to hearing from leadership more often about more things. A key element of DEIB success is internal communication. It’s especially important to ensure all employees understand their place in DEIB practice. With just 68% of employees feeling they can be their true authentic selves at work (down 9 points since 2023), it’s clear there is a need for stronger connections between employees’ unique talents and their roles in moving DEIB forward.   

Leveraging Employee Familiarity and CEO Interest for DEIB Success

While media reports show DEIB divestment among some high-profile companies, data suggests these cases may be more outliers rather than benchmarks. According to a recent survey by the Association of Corporate Citizenship Professionals, the vast majority of corporate social impact professionals in 125 major companies say DEIB commitments have either stayed the same (83%) or increased (13%).

Yet increased awareness for DEIB initiatives has not yet changed the way most employees and executives feel about their companies’ legitimate fostering of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. There is plenty of space for optimism, however. By leveraging heightened employee familiarity with and CEO interest in DEIB, teams leading the DEIB charge will begin to cultivate enviable cultures of belonging that see all people thrive.

Author Bio

Rae Shanahan is the Chief Strategy Officer for Businessolver, empathy advocate, and sponsor of the annual State of Workplace Empathy study, now in its ninth year. For more on the study, including the DEIB data carveout on which this article was based, visit businessolver.com/workplace-empathy.