Last week we talked about the foundational concept of equal opportunity using the metaphor of the great race. This concept is based on the principle that every job opportunity be competitive and fair to everyone who chooses to compete, but while this concept really hits home for a person trying to join an organization, this week is more about the interactions that happen after you get the job. For instance, for many, after initially joining our organizations, we usually go through a honeymoon period. That time when we see everything through a rose colored lens. Then at some point the honeymoon ends and we start to view our interactions with other coworkers through our true lens. Our true lens is filtered with all of the experiences, beliefs, and values that we've collected throughout our lives. Our true lens influences our comprehension and reaction to the things we see and experience in the present. In short, our responses are usually instinctual and our instincts are based on our biases. Bias is at the center of our discussion today. We all have preferences, so that alone does not make you a bad person. Not every bias is a negative or harmful. If you're honest with yourself, you can admit that your preferences define you in many ways, and that's okay. Nothing I say in this video should change that. But if you continue to be honest with yourself, you have to admit that you have preferences related to your feelings about race and other aspects of give grands, and sometimes those preferences also show up in your filter or lens when you're making decisions. Now, if you use give grands to make an employment decision, then the rules of equal opportunity are violated because your decision was biased or influenced on prejudice or stereotype. A prejudice is an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand, causing a disadvantage for the thing not preferred. For example, although I have never eaten vegan meat. I know that I prefer actual meat over plant-based meat before I've actually tried it. That's an example of prejudice. A stereotype is a set of widely held but fixed generalizations or an oversimplified image of a social group. Stereotypes are so powerful because we often consider them to be true reflections of the group and stick with them even if we are presented evidence that suggests our stereotype was wrong. Why? Because stereotypes are the social scripts we learn to make sense of the world. They are the box that we put each group in to explain how they are supposed to act, think, or behave in a certain situation, in congruence with our own viewpoint. The problem is worsened when other people we trust share the same biases we do about others because it further affirms our bias to be true. While we may conceal our biases and hide them from view in fear of being canceled for having socially unacceptable thoughts, we know that those biases are still there. The biases that we know about are called explicit bias or preferences that we endorse overtly and consciously. With explicit bias, we say to ourselves, I know I think this way about the other, I know I prefer this over the other. Explicit bias is the filter we know is a part of our lens. But what if there's a filter we didn't know about? Aversive or implicit bias is a more ambiguous and nebulous form of bias because it operates at a level below conscious awareness and without intentional control. Said another way, implicit bias describes the automatic association and stereotype that people make between groups of people without intent. Using vegan meat as an example, if asked why I don't eat vegan meat? I may say because I prefer real meat and really believe that that is the reason. However, I may not realize that the other influences on my preference is that I have a bias against things imitating other things or against vegetarians. The point is that implicit bias is harder to manage because you don't realize it's on your lens subconsciously influencing your decisions. Part of the reason people are not aware of their implicit biases is because they arose from messages you received throughout your life and sometimes from people you trust. Think about the messages your parents gave to inform and shape your character. They told you, this is who we are and this is what we believe, which means this is who you are and what you believe. This is what's right and this is what is wrong. They may do something different, but this is what we do. These are powerful messages and they never really go away, even if you disagree with them, the messages are still there influencing your lens in some way. But can I help you here? In order to address bias, considered the concept of cultural competence. Cultural competence refers to ability to successfully, meaning effectively, negotiate cross-cultural differences in order to accomplish a practical goal. Being culturally competent means that you have the skill to effectively work between cultures different than your own. When you think about cultural competence, think about driving a car in England. While you may be accustomed to driving the car on the right side of the road, when you're in England, the rules are that you drive on the left side. It may not be consistent with your belief about which is the right way or wrong way to drive, but if you wanted to be successful in driving in England, you've learned to move with that car on the left side, you become culturally competent. I use cultural competence as a way to confront my biases by doing the following. Anytime that I'm triggered, meaning anytime that I have a sudden reaction to something like something that makes me upset or unsettled, I realize that I'm triggered and I immediately ask myself, why do I feel so strongly about this? Since the first step in being culturally competent is being aware of your own biases, the first thing I do when I'm triggered is explore the filter on my lens, what are my beliefs, values, and so on. The next thing I do is attempt to understand the viewpoint of the other. What are their values, what point are they trying to make, and ultimately, what would I need to hear from them to change my mind. To the best of my ability I want to see it from the other person's point of view so I know what they're needing from me. That is how I grow competence about the other to achieve the desired result. Now, from a DE&I perspective, you must connect this effort to something strategic or tactical, and I have a true story about how I helped a group figure out how to do that. I have trained thousands of police officers over the years, and although it took me awhile, I eventually understood that they were more interested in implicit bias training when they saw it from a tactical standpoint. After listening to them and their concerns about how critical it is for citizens to comply with their directives for everyone's safety, I asked them, "If you knew more about the citizens you are policing, if you had a better understanding of who they were or how they communicate or what types of communication was effective or not, do you think that would increase your ability to get citizens to comply better than if they remained strangers to you?" When cultural competence was pitched as a tactic, they had more interest than if it was just an exercise of empathy. My point is your employee should learn to be culturally competent because it will make them more effective when they're working in diverse teams. There cannot be a one-size-fits-all type of workplace culture because everyone is motivated in varied self-interested ways influenced by our own biases. But if your team took the time to be culturally competent, everyone will be better equipped to motivate and positively affect productivity and morale over those who devalue it. Cultural competence is about organizational effectiveness because by understanding each other, they will become a better functioning team. I hope you feel better equipped about this topic. Reward yourself with something nice. I think I'll do the same. I'll see you next week.
