Cultivating An Inclusive Work Environment
Yes, you read the title correctly. We have to teach and make a conscious effort to practice inclusive business practices. Unfortunately, one too many businesses operate smoothly with little regard for inclusivity and equity.
Though every organization has its own heartbeat, it’s important for creative industries, or really any industry, to establish some core values and expectations.
An employer shouldn’t include a blurb about being an equal opportunity employer and ask applicants to self-identify as disabled, yet refuse to hire candidates with disabilities. Similarly, an employer shouldn’t pride itself on supporting social justice movements, yet continue hiring employees as tokens rather than prioritizing a mission to amplify marginalized voices.
I could go on for decades on this topic, but at the core of developing the “heartbeat” of your business, it’s important to align your approach to collaboration with your company’s vision and brand messaging.
If you want to exude a sense of sophistication and progression, include voices from different communities in your company’s core circle. Ensure each voice is given an opportunity to speak on issues that matter to them, rather than allowing the majority to speak on issues of inequity.
It’s In the DNA
When forging the “DNA” of your business, you need to include factors such as employer responsibility, anti-discrimination policies, resources for employees of color, standard expectations for employees, expectations of relationships between employer and employee, and other seemingly monotonous but extremely important pieces of information.
For a business to truly blossom into a thriving, inclusive entity, you have to start from the bottom. You have to take a microscope to every move your company makes, especially in the beginning stages if you’re working on a start-up or side hustle. Sure, you’re operating on a small scale and likely don’t have all eyes on you. But if you want to manifest a thriving business—or a “household name,” if that’s the goal—you have to always act like someone is watching. Because the truth is, someone is always watching.
And that’s how you build a “buzz” about your brand.
All it takes is one person with connections to notice. The power is in the details—and the details don’t lie.
Create Opportunities for Education
I’ve heard one too many times a story of a corporation, small business, or start-up hosting a “cultural” event as an effort to mend any cultural atrophy in the workplace.
A friend of mine, a woman of color and creative at a nationally-recognized agency, expressed her dissatisfaction with the monthly “diversity panels” hosted by her agency.
These panels, while covering hot-button topics like the lack of representation in the advertising scene, or the lack of representation of trans folks in media, were often led by the majority, rather than individuals from these communities.
My friend expressed she felt conflicted because she appreciated her employer’s effort to “educate” the team, yet felt the execution of the idea was severely lacking. If only her employer had asked one of the many BIPOC on the team what they were feeling on the subject, or to share personal experience, these panels would have been all the more powerful.
Not everyone feels safe or comfortable speaking before their peers, and that’s OK. The key to creating a truly welcoming work environment is to ensure all employees know they even have the option to voice their perspective.
The severe lack of representation and failure to step aside and leave more space for different communities to speak for themselves is a severe problem in many businesses’ efforts to implement ethical and culturally-conscious business decisions.
Do Not Single Out BIPOC—Let Them Step into Their Space
If we’ve learned anything from any of the Industry Collective Instagram Live panels with first-gen creatives, Latinx creatives, Black women, or any other specific communities, it’s that these communities should have the freedom, the space, and the first say as to how they want to identify, how they wish to be recognized, and whether they’d like to be brought into a space or not.
The issue with many non-BIPOC owned businesses (or basically any business that is owned by a person identifying with any majority whether it’s race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc.) is the majority leadership of these companies want to dive into the inner depths of their core values, practices, and ethics, yet sometimes lose sight of the motivation behind the effort.
Let’s say an experimental fashion brand wants to create clothing specifically targeting women of color, and the owner of the company is a cisgender straight white female (for the purpose of this hypothetical). The owner of the company, as the key stakeholder, wants to hire BIPOC solely to work for and design the clothing for the brand.
This is a test. Where is the issue? The entrepreneur is clearly devising a business plan to uplift women of color and other communities underrepresented in the fashion industry, right?
At first glance, yes, the brand owner is trying. You can tell the intent is there, but the execution is still faulty. Why? Isn’t the brand owner, who identifies with communities considered the majority, in the right by employing BIPOC and creating fashion to target BIPOC?
If you were skeptical, you don’t even need to read on for the answer. You already know. This woman devising this brand is failing to recognize several important points. First and foremost, instead of being the sole stakeholder of the company, she could make BIPOC the leadership board of the company, and allow them to act as stakeholders and directly make business movements according to their perspective.
By allowing BIPOC to take the reins of the business, this brand owner is allowing these creatives to step into a space they feel comfortable in. A space they created.
As non-BIPOC, we have a duty to free up the “space” we’re freely occupying and then allow communities of color, the LGBTQ+ community, women, and so many others to define their space. And if these communities don’t want to define their space, the last thing they need is for someone outside of the community to define the space for them.
A Space for the Undefined
At Industry Collective, we don’t want to create any spaces with definite boundaries or exclusivity in the sense that any group feels unwelcome.
Undefined space can have different interpretations, depending on your point of view. “A space for the undefined” is a phrase we coined to basically say, “We’re here for you.”
We will take you as you are. Because you should come as you are. You can choose to be part of a community and claim it as your identity, or you can choose not to. You can choose to align more with one space than another, or not. You can refuse to be pigeonholed and put into a box creatively, or not.
Creating space is just one step in the never-ending journey toward equal representation for all, whether in work, in relationships, in leisure, or in media.
If you’re a person with privilege and have the ability to take up space without your presence questioned, you can afford to free up some space for other perspectives, ideas, and individuals. Instead of speaking for all communities, let’s just take our seats and listen.
Instead of putting ourselves at the forefront of major issues of advocacy and representation, why don’t we look behind us to see if anyone struggling would like to cut us in line?
The disparities in careers of all kinds are far too obvious and far too close to home for so many professionals. To look at how far we’ve come is a beautiful thing, but also bittersweet at the same time. With everything we all go through in day-to-day life, it’s shocking we are still having to unlearn outdated ideals and standards set in professional settings.
There’s no rule book. And there really isn’t a step-by-step guide on how to forge the perfect company. However, acknowledging your faults as an employer or person of privilege and power, you’ve already taken one step in the right direction.
All you have to do is keep moving forward, and checking behind you to see if anyone needs a push.
Books on Gathering, Representation, & Diversity
The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker
The Memo: What Women of Color Need to Know to Secure a Seat at the Table by Minda Harts
About the Contributor
Cassandra Arrigo-Pastore is a writer and editor based in NYC, passionate about mental health advocacy, work/life integration, and neurodiversity. Born in Arizona and raised in Florida, she received a bachelor’s degree in advertising and public relations from the University of Central Florida, and post-grad remains actively involved in ethical branding and the global advertising space. Aside from her freelance and agency work, you can find Cass at your nearest aboveground train, with the New Yorker mag in one hand and an iced dirty chai in the other.
