Hayley Barnard: Driving Diversity, Inclusion and Gender Balance in Business

Diversity and Inclusion are the new buzzwords today in all business arenas, and of course, for a good reason. However, these concepts are no longer just trendy terms or compliance checkboxes; they now play a strategic role in business. Before diving deeper, let’s clarify what diversity and inclusion (D&I) actually mean.

Talking individually, Diversity refers to the differences in any given setting. For the workplace, these differences refer to the people with different characteristics, ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic background, disability status, and education level. Inclusion refers to creating a workplace environment where every individual, regardless of his/her differences, can thrive, feel valued, empowered, and respected.

So, basically, every business organisation, big or small, has started focusing on Diversity and Inclusion in their workplace to recognize and appreciate differences among individuals and create an environment where everyone feels included.

But Why Has It Become So Important in The Global Workplace?

There are several reasons for that, including:

• It fosters innovation as diversity in the team brings unique perspectives, giving you better ideas for problem solutions.
• It improves employees’ morale and turnover rates, as when employees feel valued and included, they gain trust in the organization.
• It enhances the company’s reputation, loyalty, and trust in the market
• It promotes better decision-making due to a wider range of perspectives

Implementing Diversity And Inclusion Culture In Your Work Environment

For all the good reasons, nowadays, there has been a shift in the D&I discussions from why it matters to how to make it real. Many companies adopt unique strategies to foster a culture of openness. One good example of a comprehensive D&I strategy is Microsoft. Microsoft has an accessibility team of employees with various disabilities. This team has helped in the development of more inclusive products, like the Xbox Adaptive Controller.

If you are looking to bridge the gap between the importance and real effectiveness of D&I, it’s good to connect with a D&I strategist like Hayley Barnard. Hayley is the CEO of Mix Diversity and the innovative Mix Learn DEI online learning platform.

She is a leading Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) strategist and keynote speaker, capable of transforming good intentions into effective business outcomes. She is a consultant to executive boards throughout the US, the UK, and Europe.

As already said, she is a leadership speaker; her sessions help build inclusive cultures, correcting gender imbalances, and equipping leaders to reduce biases in everyday decisions. Her sessions help organizations build stronger teams, sustained performance, and smarter products.

What is Hayley Barnard’s Approach?

Hayley’s main approach is focused on “pragmatism”. She tries to bring attention to all those moments that lead to the biases, such as performance calibration, recruitment shortlists, meeting dynamics, promotion slates, and project staffing.  Here are three main concepts that support her method.

Bias to Behaviour

Only making people aware of their biased behaviour won’t help. For real change, this awareness must be clubbed with practical steps. For this, leaders need to step in. They must focus on conducting structured interviews, clear promotion criteria, skill-based tests, giving fair speaking time in office meetings, and decision-making checklists. Implementing these simple measures can help leaders to act fairly with their staff.

Data with Context

Hayley Barnard first focuses on numbers in any business setting. For example, pay gaps, feedback after interviews, promotion rates, engagement scores, etc. She breaks these numbers on the basis of gender and other groups. However, she also understands that numbers are not enough to access equality and inclusion in any place. One needs to consider the human side as well. For this, she tends to focus on open conversations and leader interviews. This helps her know the people’s experiences in a better way.

Leadership As a Team Effort

Barnard believes that only associating with top executives cannot make one understand the workplace culture. That’s why she also focuses on middle managers. Through her sessions, coaching, and workshops, she trains managers so that they can give genuine feedback, run inclusive and productive meetings, and support ignored talent. She believes that focusing on small and consistent habits can lead to big cultural shifts.

Gender Balance in Business

Hayley Barnard is also well-renowned for her gender balancing strategies, and this is not only about setting women quotas in the hierarchy. She closely looks at the talent flow to understand the key stages where women generally slow down or leave.

• Hiring: Barnard focuses on making job ads easy to comprehend and free from gender bias. Further, she believes in having diverse shortlists of interviews and conducting structured interviews so that companies can select the real talent, irrespective of gender.
• Career Growth: Barnard’s strategies help in connecting women with senior sponsors who can give them opportunities when required.
• Performance and Pay: She ensures a fair review process, consistent evaluations, and regular checks on pay gaps.
• Flexibility and Well-Being: Her strategies always focus on encouraging flexible work for every person in the organization, so that it is not only considered as a “women’s issue.”

Conclusion

Hayley Barnard is a well-known name among leaders and organizations as they get inspired by her ideas and strategies towards implementing diversity, inclusion, and gender balance in business. As a coveted speaker, Barnard’s strategies are often a blend of her personal experiences and practical ideas. In this way, she helps companies to blend diversity in every layer of their culture. She always strives to build fair systems and foster workplaces to make them inclusive for everyone.

If you are looking to get in touch with Hayley Barnard's DEI strategies, you need to listen to her inclusive leadership keynote speeches and implement Hayley Barnard's diversity solutions to bring genuine change. In every speech, she tries to be practical and demonstrate that small actions are enough to make any workplace inclusive. The best part is, she handles unconscious bias and inclusiveness with great humour so that her ideas bring real values for her audience.