5 Ways DEI Has Been Ineffective And How We Make It Better

If you listen to critics, the field of diversity, equity, and inclusion, known by its initialism DEI, is racist, anti-white, and should stand for “discrimination, exclusion and indoctrination.” Anti-DEI sentiments have gained more traction since the ending of affirmative action, with Elon Musk fanning the flames recently when he tweeted that “DEI must DIE.” Despite the many straw man arguments employed by the loudest anti-DEI voices, there are several valid critiques of the field. This article explores these critiques in more detail and highlights strategies to improve the field.

1. Lack of institutional power. One of the reasons for DEI’s ineffectiveness has been the lack of institutional power that DEI heads and DEI departments actually have to create organization-wide changes. Many DEI leaders are made the sacrificial lambs within their organizations when things go wrong but are not given the resources or even the team needed to actually move the needle. Many workplaces hire DEI practitioners and give them fancy salaries and fancy titles but require them to report to the human resource department or the chief human resource officer, and when DEI leaders try to make changes, they often experience barrier after barrier. In many workplaces, those engaged in much of DEI work are junior-level employees serving on DEI councils and committees or those in employee resource groups. Failing to give these individuals the institutional power they need to create changes sets DEI up for failure.

Overcoming the lack of institutional power that DEI practitioners often have requires workplaces to grant those doing DEI work the ability to make systemic changes. DEI should not be reporting to human resources. DEI leaders should have access to HR data and should be granted the same level of decision-making power as chief executives. In addition, we must understand that one person can rarely change an entire organization, so there should be a DEI team with the power and resources to make organization-wide changes without having to jump through a bunch of hoops.

2. No accountability. When DEI programs are created, they are often done with the best intentions but no matter how well-intentioned these programs are, they fail to achieve their desired results because of a lack of accountability. Regardless of how many sponsorship programs are created and how many affinity groups are implemented, DEI will fail when those in positions of power aren’t held accountable for their actions and when those same people in power aren’t held accountable to DEI objectives. What’s the point of setting DEI goals with zero intention of accomplishing them? It’s all for the performance. Many organizations have zero intentions of achieving DEI objectives but simply hire folks into DEI positions and make company-wide proclamations to virtue signal and convince the public that DEI is something that is valued.

Accountability is one of the missing links in DEI. Ask yourself who holds executives accountable for the environments they create for others. Can executives, leaders, managers, and those with organizational power be evaluated by their direct reports? What happens to those who are actively engaging in workplace harm? Is everyone held to the same standard? A DEI program will be bound to fail if leaders can evade responsibility and without strong accountability measures addressing those who contribute to hateful and toxic environments.

3. Surface-level DEI initiatives. Many DEI initiatives are surface-level and don’t address systemic issues. Celebrating cultural heritage months, having safe space conversations, and book clubs are nice, but these activities don’t address systemic problems. A popular DEI initiative that has been the go-to for many organizations, especially following a public faux pas, misstep, or blunder, was the almighty unconscious bias training—but this type of training and other DEI initiatives often fail to address the systemic issues workplaces are plagued by.

In an ideal world, DEI would never be a reactionary measure; workplaces would be detailed, thorough, and thoughtful with DEI implementation, and structures would be put in place to address inequities. But in the real world, DEI has often been instituted haphazardly and with little consideration for the best interventions to resolve a given issue. Successful DEI efforts will address the root cause of inequities while providing the tools to report and address workplace inequities. Organizations must be willing to overhaul policies and practices that are actively causing harm in order to adopt equity and justice-oriented systems.

4. Refusal to address systemic issues. As mentioned, workplaces often implement surface-level DEI initiatives as a way to avoid addressing systemic issues. Many organizations, for example, refuse to acknowledge the ways that the system of whiteness impacts the workplace. Discussions about whiteness and anti-blackness have become “off-limits” and there is instead a push for conversations about more sanitized topics like allyship, colorblindness, and equality. Effective DEI considers how different systems of oppression (e.g., transphobia, fatphobia, colorism, ableism, etc.) impact employee experiences and results in the development of specific interventions to dismantle and deconstruct these systems in the workplace.

There are several ways to address systemic issues. Inviting educators into the workplace to provide insight into the history and outcomes of different forms of oppression can be a helpful first step. Second, workplace practices must be frequently audited by a neutral party, like an ombudsman or an external consultant, to assess how inequities are able to persist and to provide recommendations for changes. Lastly, leadership must be willing to address systemic issues head-on and make changes when necessary. This can include getting rid of exclusionary practices, instituting a zero-tolerance policy for workplace harm, and consistently applying feedback from employees into workplace structures.

5. Upholding the status quo. It is imperative to have an honest discussion about how, in some cases, DEI practitioners uphold oppressive systems by remaining silent and not pushing back against the status quo in order to maintain their position and power. As stated in a 2022 Forbes article exploring this topic in more detail, “There must be a conversation about the DEI practitioners whose desire for money, power, and prestige supersedes the need to prioritize, center and liberate the most marginalized.” In every industry, there are individuals who have nefarious intentions and DEI is no different. These bad actors do not and should not represent the majority of practitioners who enter the space to be instrumental change agents.

It’s difficult to tell who’s really invested in dismantling the oppressive systems that harm us all versus who is more comfortable upholding the status quo. One of the challenges that DEI faces is that there is no governing body presiding over the field so there isn’t always agreement on best practices or the best way to approach DEI. Those who engage in DEI work should not be exempt from interrogation, critique, and criticism. Just like organizational leaders, those who have committed to this work should also be held accountable and are not above reproach if DEI is ever to become a catalyst for workplace change and transformation.