For once I liked something I read in Harvard Business Review. Christine Riordan’s article has it right: diversity without inclusion is useless.HBR Diversity is Useless

I have no time at all for the political socially correct form of diversity. The issue is far too important for that.  We need difference, real difference. And we need it profoundly and with urgency.

The problems we face as western industrial society, and as leaders in the kind of organisations that this society tends to create, simply cannot be solved from with the frame that created the problems in the first place. 

Unfortunately the frames are deeply held in our socio-cultural and neuro-psychological fabric: we can’t just “snap out of them”. We need the insights that come from engaging people with really different life experience, socio-cultural norms and different framings to join together in real collaboration to address these issues.

But that is where it gets hard: because we tend to celebrate difference only to the point where it is sufficiently familiar to us to be recognisable as valid.

Real difference runs the risk of rejection and exclusion because it references evidence and experience that lies outside our framing. It can sound off-beam, irrelevant and just plain wrong. We may want real difference, we may need real difference, and we may still drive it away despite our best efforts. 

To see how pervasive and powerful this is, just take note of Henri Tajfel’s work on social identity theory and “minimal groups”.  

Tajfel’s 1971 work showed just how minor an affiliation we need to feel to a group to begin to be prejudiced against other groups. Minimal groups were called that because they were formed on the basis of things that didn’t matter. But still, based on inclusion in such a minimal (apparently trivial) group, people will exclude, reject, ignore and harbour prejudice against members of other equally minimal groups.(For more on this listen to the BBC Radio programme podcast at  Tajfel on Mind Changers  )

At a more playful level, look at Jeff Milner’s “backmasking” site.  Backmasking

Play Stairway to Heaven backwards and try to make sense of it. Then read the reverse lyrics and listen to it again. You’ll hear every word. This “top down” processing is a powerful part of our neuro-cognitive make up. We hear what we have a filter to hear, we see what we have filters to see. And often these “top down” filters will be provided by the in-group of which we are part. 

Someone from a really different group will sound like they talk nonsense because they won’t fit our filters.

Watch out!! Because this is where we destroy real diversity and lose cognitive complexity. This is essentially dumbing down on seeing and conversation to the norms of the in-group. It is the ultimate societal risk and squanders much intelligence and talent.

OK, So What Can I DO?

Well, we run a two years MSc program to help people experiment with seeing and being different, and becoming open to rich and diverse ways of knowing, seeing and being.  

But if you can’t do that, at least do this: STOP!!

• Stand Still and Notice when you need some diversity. The more you are facing a strategic challenge the more you need cognitive complexity and diversity of framing.
• Take Time to notice your own assumptions and be aware about where they come from. Why are you so sure that this is the right data, the right way of seeing? On what authority are you accepting this source of expertise?
• Open your eyes, ears and mind to other stories, especially the ones that are the most difficult to hear and see, as these will be the ones of diversity most at odds with your own framing
• Privilege participation, become biased in favour of processes that “greenhouse” and protect dissident and diverse views. It is easy to kill them off: don’t allow diversity to die on your watch, don’t allow the subtle bullying by the majority culture. It is a leadership act to pay attention to real participation. Privilege real participation and collaboration.

Strong cultures make great organisations great, but they also blind great organisations to real difference. Superficial diversity won’t do the job. 

Make the most of every bit of complexity, intelligence and difference you have. 

It’s a real leadership act to do so.