Interview with Brigid Moynahan:
Meeting the Challenge of Inclusion

How did you get involved with diversity and inclusion?
When I began my consulting practice I worked in the telecommunications industry where I met many women, minorities, and non-native speakers seeking greater recognition and access. Many of them shared similar challenges. Instead of being valued for their contributions, they were being frozen out of the mainstream, wasting energy adapting to fit the status quo. This limited their ability to contribute and move forward. I began to see that I needed to be working at two levels to advance these leaders. One was to advise, support, and develop them so they could be the best they could be. The other was to teach their organizations to value their talent and diversity. The Next Level, Inc. approaches the challenge of inclusion from both sides – by training organizations and coaching individuals.

Diversity and inclusion – what’s the difference?
Diversity focuses on defining differences while inclusion teaches people to value them. Diversity initiatives usually begin by ensuring adequate representation for women and minority candidates. Unfortunately, executives often confuse increases in head count with evidence they’ve succeeded in creating a diverse culture. Diversity is more than a numbers game. It requires creating an environment where differences are actually valued. Companies who embrace and use the varied talents of all employees are more flexible, innovative, and successful. But, before companies can do this, they need to learn to fully leverage diversity. That’s where The Next Level, Inc. comes in.

With all the pressures companies face today, how do you get them to pay attention?
We emphasize the very concrete benefits of inclusion. In order to innovate we need to incorporate the broadest diversity of talent. In order to perform, we need to value. We’ve learned that the only way to achieve high performance is to deliberately foster diversity and teach people the skills required to leverage it. The most successful organizations are the ones who learn how to value employees, fully benefiting from their diverse experiences.

This is easier said than done. What are you actually doing to make inclusion happen?
We make the business case for inclusion by showing how it fuels growth, innovation, and productivity. We do this through immediate, relevant examples that take the idea from the abstract to the concrete. At the same time, we help people realize that valuing differences is a challenge for all of us. It doesn’t just happen. In fact our natural tendency is to do just the opposite, to move away from the different and towards the familiar. We help people recognize that our preference for similarities causes issues of exclusion to occur all around us. We then work to help people learn to undo exclusionary behavior by greatly broadening the application of a concept called microinequities.

What are microinequities?
Daily discounts and acts of exclusion that build up to wall out differences. Mary Rowe, a professor at MIT, coined the phrase in the 1970’s to describe what she called “the hidden scaffolding of segregation” for women and minorities in organizations. We’ve expanded this idea by arguing that microinequities occur more broadly than this. Anyone can be subject to microinequities anytime that person represents or attempts to introduce difference. By treating this problem as universal we’ve succeeded in making the message of inclusion global rather than US-centric. Our programs are taking hold all over the world. Once people recognize the pervasive impact of microinequities, they begin taking them seriously and start learning how to include. This is the real work of diversity. We don’t experience resistance with this approach because people understand that when we say inclusion we really do mean that everyone takes responsibility.

It’s great to get people to “take responsibility.” But what does that really mean?
One of the worst things you can do is make people aware of barriers without giving them tools to overcome them. We give people skills that help them speak up when they are being excluded or observe exclusion happening to others. We show them how to be more self-aware in observing and changing their responses to difference. We show leaders ways in which they impact the dynamics of inclusion in their organizations. We help everyone weave a web of inclusion by learning to ask questions, connect, include, and value.

If your interest is inclusion, why do you focus on women leaders in so many of your programs? Isn’t that exclusionary?
There’s a direct link between advancing women and inclusion, not only because women are underrepresented in the leadership ranks of most companies but because women favor more inclusive approaches to leadership. It’s clear that we need this sort of leadership today in a world that is increasingly interconnected and where matrixed reporting, multiple levels of ownership, and layers of interdependencies are the norm.

Aren’t you putting women on a pedestal here? There are lots of examples of women who don’t fit this idealized view.
In generalizing about groups we have to be careful not to stereotype individuals. Certainly we can all think of exceptions. In fact, the first generation of women to rise in many organizations often behaved in ways that mirrored or even exaggerated the behaviors of their male peers. Today, however, as more women move into leadership, they are learning to be truer to themselves. We are witnessing major changes as women begin defining leadership on their own terms. The result is a more collaborative, networked, inclusive organization. One expression of women’s leadership is the thousands of women’s networks that are springing up all over the world. These groups are evolving from a focus on advancing women to promoting innovative business practices for all employees. The Women’s Leadership Initiative at Johnson & Johnson is a perfect example.

What’s the most important challenge you see for tomorrow’s leaders? For corporations?
For leaders, it’s developing yourself and others. You need to identify your essential value and what you want, and then go after it. At the same time, you need to act like a leader – inspiring others and creating value beyond yourself. For corporations, it’s finding ways to truly value and integrate difference, so you can thrive in times of rapid change. Like nature, business abhors stagnation. If you can’t grow and adapt, you fail. It may sound simplistic, but in reality it’s a very big challenge. It requires changing attitudes, not just behavior. It’s the difference between flourishing and being marginalized.

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