Diversity and Inclusion

Rethinking DEI Training? These Changes Can Bring Better Results

Tailored, practical diversity trainings offered at the right decision points can yield meaningful change, says new research by Edward H. Chang and colleagues.

Row of colorful silhouettes of people representing different identities against a pink background.

Generic diversity training has largely failed to create more diverse workplaces. However, more targeted training offered at key points can bring the changes companies seek, according to new research by Harvard Business School Assistant Professor Edward H. Chang.

For companies serious about improving diversity, they should reimagine their training efforts to be more behaviorally informed.

“It’s the first experimental evidence collected in a company that shows any sort of training on diversity can have consequential effects on behaviors like hiring,” says Chang. “For companies serious about improving diversity, they should reimagine their training efforts to be more behaviorally informed.”

The murder of George Floyd in 2020 led many companies to publicly commit to addressing racial inequities in the workplace, investing millions collectively in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) training. Legal challenges and political pressure have since prompted many companies to back away from such efforts.

Chang says there’s little empirical evidence that broad, awareness-focused programs increase diversity. However, rather than abandoning such measures, reimagining such programs can significantly improve outcomes.

Chang coauthored the research, “Behaviorally Designed Training Leads to More Diverse Hiring,” with Siri Chilazi and Iris Bohnet of Harvard Kennedy School, as well as Cansın Arslan and Oliver P. Hauser of the University of Exeter. The research was published today in the journal Science.

Fixing the flaws in diversity training

In earlier research, Chang found that while corporate diversity training can influence attitudes, the training rarely translates into behavior changes that significantly increase diversity. Why? For two main reasons:

Bad timing

Companies often mandate diversity training at the wrong times, such as when employees are onboarding or to fulfill an annual requirement—but not when managers are hiring new employees or evaluating staff for promotions.

“Often [the training] is not that timely,” Chang says. “It can be very divorced from when you are actually making a consequential decision that impacts diversity or equity."

Generic, murky instruction

The researchers found common shortcomings in current programs, including a failure to tie training to real-world scenarios and a lack of clarity on how managers should employ what they’ve learned.

“A lot of training talks about different concepts,” Chang says, “but it’s not clear to employees or managers how they should be applying these concepts to their work.”

Recognizing these gaps, Chang and his colleagues designed a diversity training program and tested it at a global engineering and telecommunications company—a firm with an 80 percent male workforce that was aiming to hire more women and members of traditionally overlooked groups, such as workers from other countries.

The researchers leveraged behavioral science principles to tailor the training program to meet specific, measurable outcomes. They prioritized timely delivery, asking managers to watch a seven-minute video about inclusive hiring right before they reviewed resumes and identified candidates for interviews. It also featured targeted content that emphasized practical steps managers could take, such as assessing candidates based on their skills and their ability to increase the collective intelligence of their teams.

By making it salient, it activates people’s motivations to align their decisions with their values and the company’s values.

In addition, rather than use a third-party company to produce the video, the program featured two senior executives at the firm who could frame diversity as a corporate core value. In the video, they tell managers:

“We want to be an organization that reflects the diversity of our society, both today and in the future. Try to bring someone into the team with a background, experience, or perspective that is currently underrepresented.”

Chang and his fellow researchers also attempted to address concerns that some employees may resist DEI initiatives by making the training program voluntary. They also tested two different versions: one explicitly promoting diversity and another that urged managers to make decisions that would improve their teams’ effectiveness instead. The comparison allowed researchers to assess whether a more subtle approach that didn’t explicitly mention diversity would yield similar results.

Targeted training led to major changes

Those adjustments made a big difference:

Women got more interviews

Across over 10,000 job requisitions, the explicit diversity training led to a 12 percent increase in the likelihood that managers chose women to interview. The likelihood of women being hired also improved, though not enough to be considered statistically significant.

Applicants who were non-nationals got more jobs

When considering job candidates’ national origin and pinpointing those who found jobs in other countries, again, the diversity training increased the likelihood that managers chose non-national candidates for interviews by 13 percent and boosted the hiring of these candidates by 20 percent.

Non-national women did especially well

The impact of the training was even more pronounced for candidates from multiple underrepresented groups. Women from a different country than the job location saw a 28 percent increase in shortlisting and a 41 percent increase in hiring.

Managers who viewed the diversity-focused video improved hiring outcomes, whereas the video that spoke to increasing a team’s effectiveness yielded less meaningful results.

“Many people want to do the right thing when it comes to diversity, equity, and inclusion,” Chang notes. “By making it salient, it activates people’s motivations to align their decisions with their values and the company’s values.”

Designing diversity training programs

Chang offers these evidence-based suggestions for business leaders:

1. Get the timing right

Schedule training sessions close to when managers make critical decisions, such as before hiring new employees or prior to completing performance reviews.

2. Explicitly state the diversity goal

Don’t shy away from discussing the importance of diversity and inclusion. Instead, emphasize how these values are core to the business.

3. Keep the message positive

Rather than talk about reducing unconscious bias and discrimination, frame the conversation around the opportunity managers have to be a part of the solution in diversifying the firm.

4. Measure the impact of training

The company should track the performance and return on investment of diversity training. Tie the training to specific outcomes to evaluate its effectiveness and guide future improvements.

Chang and his colleagues are conducting similar follow-up studies, applying the behavioral principles to training programs in other industries and other situations beyond hiring, such as when managers are evaluating and promoting workers. Chang is hopeful that a new approach timed just right could transform training into a powerful force for change.

“We find real benefits in making diversity more salient in these important moments,” he says.

Image by Ariana Cohen-Halberstam for Working Knowledge.

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