Organisations around the world are getting serious about DE&I: not just investing resources in it, but also upgrading their entire DE&I strategy to a more strategic, long-term, and data-driven approach. What's more, the more progressive organisations are acknowledging it as a moral responsibility, much as sustainability is recognised today.

Rachel Scheel, Senior Vice President of Global Diversity Equity, Inclusion and Sustainability at adtech firm Criteo, described this shift – which is also illustrated by her own role – in a conversation with People Matters.

What broader trends have you seen in the way DE&I is discussed and approached in recent years?

Firstly, more organisations are shifting their focus from short-term executions to long-term, data-driven strategies to foster a stronger DE&I culture.

Secondly, as DE&I becomes as much a moral imperative as a business priority, we can expect more organisations to invest in hiring new leaders and creating new roles to strengthen the company’s DE&I focus and direction. LinkedIn data revealed how the number of people with the title ‘head of diversity’ has more than doubled worldwide between 2015 and 2020, while the ‘director of diversity’ title rose 75% and ‘chief diversity officer’, 68%. I personally joined Criteo last year as its first leader dedicated to DE&I to drive our DE&I programme and focus on strategic initiatives that can foster a more diverse and inclusive culture.

Thirdly, more organisations are investing in learning and development programmes to educate employees on contributing to a stronger DE&I culture in the workplace. Common practices include DE&I training and workshops to help employees correct biases and help create a more inclusive work environment. We have been doing this at Criteo, focusing on learning paths to guide employees on being allies and demonstrating inclusiveness. We’ve also been strengthening a DE&I learning culture through ongoing mentoring and sponsorship programmes. 

Lastly, there have also been more DE&I tools and solutions developed to quantitatively measure programme success and progress – especially amid remote and hybrid work. To measure our employees’ sense of belonging, authenticity, and psychological safety, we have similarly introduced our own Criteo Inclusion Index last year. We will continue to use this index to uncover best practices and guide progress in a data-driven manner.

You've worked in quite a few different industries - do you see some commonalities in how the various industries approach DE&I?

Regardless of industry, the key to driving an effective DE&I approach within an organisation lies in the support and sponsorship at the C-Suite level.

Many companies hire a head of DE&I, but the role is hidden two to three layers below the C-Suite, making it challenging to drive real change.

The DE&I role should not be seen as a title that is created just for sake of representation. Rather, it should be seen as a role that embraces the entire employee experience, with the goal of driving company-wide representation, awareness, education, allyship and sponsorship.

Change is difficult to drive when you don’t have the topline buy in and engagement on the topic, and I’ve seen and worked with companies where it either wasn’t a priority or it was only a Human Resources priority.

DE&I needs to be a business priority for leaders, with clear and measurable goals that are visible throughout their teams. This is where I see companies taking the lead, regardless of industries, to drive a real difference and support consistent and sustained improvements. 

Tell us a bit about how the DE&I approach in AdTech, and specifically Criteo, has evolved.

As an AdTech company, we understand that tech tools have an immense power to close the diversity gap, but they can also perpetuate stereotypes if non-inclusive language is not corrected. One good example would be coding terms – we recognise how crucial it is to correct coding language that might perpetuate stereotypes. 

Therefore, we launched new inclusive language guidelines this year to challenge some of the coding terms like “blacklisting” and “whitelisting” to mitigate bias and stereotyping. These are small steps that an AdTech firm like Criteo can take to make a great difference, and we will continue to identify these opportunities for change, ultimately empowering our customers and partners to foster a more inclusive culture. 

In terms of our broader DE&I strategy, we are continuing to learn from past programmes, as we recognise that there’s is always room to do more. Since I joined Criteo last year, we have been adopting a four-pronged approach to help bring our DE&I strategy to life. 

This includes introducing focused hiring programmes to increase diverse talent opportunities, strengthening our culture of inclusion and supporting awareness, increasing our DE&I employer branding, and creating a clear governance and frameworks to support our DE&I strategy. For each of these pillars, we have detailed quantifiable goals to be met in 2022 and will continue to work on monitoring and accelerating our progress.

Your remit aligns DE&I with sustainability – how are you bringing the messaging around the two together?

Driving positive impact and leveraging our assets in support of our society and planet is one of Criteo’s five core values. We believe that building a diverse and inclusive culture is the cornerstone for driving creative collaboration and sustainable change across the industry.

This is because a commitment to DE&I will help bridge hierarchies within an organisation, connecting different generations and communities to develop new business solutions – including sustainability.

In addition, there is a strong link between being a sustainable organisation and a diverse and inclusive employer as both topics are becoming increasingly relevant and important to current and prospective talent. We have a clear obligation to not only offer a great place to work, but also to be a responsible employer and organisation.

Therefore, offering equitable opportunities, and a working environment where our employees can contribute and make a difference and support relevant societal and environmental causes, is critical to our success. We currently have seven active Community Groups (Employee Resource Groups) that contribute to diverse communities, supporting education and wellbeing, and the environment. And the intersectionality of these groups working together is extremely powerful. 

By fostering a diverse and inclusive environment for our people, we empower them to advocate diversity and find purpose in giving back, ultimately becoming more aware of their surrounding society and the environment.

Given the evolution of the DE&I conversation, what misconceptions do you think are still holding companies back from actively pursuing stronger DE&I strategies?

While more organisations are seeing DE&I strategies as part of their core business priorities, some organisations are still viewing DE&I as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) effort. 

This cannot be further from the truth, especially since stakeholders across the business recognise the need for DE&I to be a greater business priority. This is especially true for employees, with 76% of job seekers and employees reporting how having a diverse workforce is an important factor when evaluating companies and job offers. One in three consumers also considering a brand’s public commitment to DE&I when making a purchase decision. In a recent survey, 60% of private equity investors have also requested for DE&I demographic data.

If DE&I is not regarded as a business imperative, there will be a lack of resource and strategy allocated to programmes that can drive meaningful, long-term, and consistent change. Rather, organisations may instead focus on sporadic DE&I programmes which would not be able to equip them to develop a tangible DE&I culture and change within the organisation.

It is thus crucial that organisations overcome the misconception that DE&I is a “nice-to-have” and start incorporating this into their business priorities.

If a company is out to improve its DE&I approach or even launch a DE&I strategy for the first time, what should its first steps be?

Organisations should first set clear definitions for the key aspects of DE&I that they want to champion within the organisation. This would be key in framing a consistent point of view which they would then need to communicate across the organisation to provide everyone – from senior leadership to frontline employees – a strong understanding of what the organisation’s stance is on DE&I, and how this will look like in action.

Secondly, they will need to have a measurement framework in place, for DE&I leaders to evaluate the success of their programmes and initiatives, and as they continue to access potential initiatives to introduce within the organisation.