Equity and Inclusion Roundtables

Last updated February 27, 2023

Equity and Inclusion Roundtables are an initiative I started when I worked at Vista as a way to prompt thinking and discussion about equity and inclusion and to raise awareness about challenges that minority groups may encounter, since I believe that the best way to foster a diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment is through equitable and inclusive people who attract and welcome all people and ideas.

Why equity and inclusion roundtables? Don’t we also care about diversity?

Yes, we also care about diversity. However, the name “Equity and Inclusion Roundtables” reflects the goal of this initiative. This initiative’s goal is to focus on individuals and make change at the individual level by improving awareness and therefore improving our micro-interactions with each other. Individuals have everything to do with the inclusiveness and equitability of a team. Individuals have less of a say in the diversity of their team. Diversity can be mandated by leadership via the hiring pipeline. Making improvements to diversity is equally important as making changes to equity and inclusion, but requires a different approach, different audience, and different goals.

Format

Each roundtable is a single 1-hour meeting with 4 or 5 participants. It’s kept intentionally small to encourage everyone to have a chance to talk. One of the participants is designated as facilitator ahead of time, and aside from participating in the discussion, their role is just to run the meeting, follow the instructions in the meeting invite, and prompt discussion with the provided questions as needed.

The meeting invite contains a link to a 10-20 minute YouTube video; usually a TED talk or something similar, and a set of discussion questions. The discussion questions are optional, but intended to stimulate discussion if conversation stalls.

The first few minutes are spent watching the video; everyone watches individually with their mic muted and video off, then when they’re ready they turn their video on so the facilitator knows when everyone’s ready. The rest of the meeting is left for free-form discussion, people can share any thoughts and reactions to the video or refer to the discussion questions as needed.

Maximizing participation

My philosophy for maximizing participation in this initiative is to make it as low effort to participate in and benefit from as possible. Therefore, by default I invite everyone in the tribe, require zero pre-work, and limit the time investment for each round to a single one-hour meeting at a time convenient for each person’s schedule.

Process

This is the process I follow when running this event:

• Select a video and questions
• Announce the roundtable
• Select Groups
• Send the meeting invite

Select a video and questions

I take some time to watch a bunch of videos and select one I think is good and then write up some discussion questions I think are appropriate for the video.

I have an informal review process for the video and questions I come up with, to ensure they’re appropriate. I just send them to a few people and ask them to watch the video and provide feedback.

The videos and questions I’ve used are all on subpages of this one, so others can look through and decide whether or not to use them.

Announce the roundtable

Ahead of each round, I send out an announcement so people know to expect a meeting invite and what it is. Here’s an example message:

Equity & Inclusion roundtable discussion round 2 I got positive feedback for the first round of the E&I roundtable discussions that I scheduled back in November, so I’m working on scheduling another round! I hope to do this semi-regularly, assuming it continues going well. What should I expect? I’ve selected a YouTube video (TED talk) and set of discussion questions. I’ll organize everybody into small groups (~5 people per group), and schedule a separate meeting for each group at times appropriate for that group’s time zones and schedules. I will not attend every discussion, so I’ll invite one person from each group to be mediator in my stead. During the meeting, the first ~15 minutes will be set aside to watch the video, then the remainder will be left for open discussion. The discussion questions are provided to stimulate discussion if needed, but are not required. How do I participate? Just accept and attend the meeting invite I send you! I’ll be inviting everyone in the tribe automatically. Participation is optional but highly encouraged. The time commitment is just one hour, no pre-work needed! Thanks, and I hope everyone enjoys the discussion! I plan to send out meeting invites later this week.

Select Groups

I then divide people into groups. I do this manually, because I want to ensure every group has:

• A facilitator
• Compatible time zones
• Representation from a variety of view points, for example things like gender, age, level, location, and team.

I like to use different groups each time, so people get a range of perspectives.

Send the meeting invite

I schedule every group’s meeting. Since each group is relatively small, I can usually find a time when everyone is free and is within their business hours. I just mark all the meetings I don’t intend to go to as “free” on my own calendar after sending it, so it doesn’t clutter up my schedule.

Sample meeting invite body:

This is a roundtable discussion to get us thinking a bit more about equity and inclusion. [Zoom meeting details] Joe, please facilitate this session. I will not be attending this session. Agenda:

• Intros (~5min)

• Watch the TED talk (17 minutes): How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias

  Valerie Alexander

  TEDxPasadena

  • Please mute yourself and turn off your video while watching the talk. When you have finished the talk, turn your video on.
• Discussion (remainder) Below are some discussion questions to help get the conversation going:
• Did anything Valerie said stick out and resonate with you?
• What did you picture during the exercise at the beginning?
• What did you think of what Valerie shared about the different perspectives that men and women might have?
  • What did you think of the male CEO’s worry: Is this one of those phrases I’m not supposed to use with you?
  • What did you think of the female attorney’s point: It’s easier to do someone else’s job than to make them do it
• Think about a time when you did examine your own behavior. How did you feel after doing so?
• Did you like/do you think you’ll try the three things Valerie suggested? Why or why not?
  • Visualize things before they happen, then change it to open yourself to different possibilities
  • Have the courage to examine your own behavior - Is this how I would handle this interaction if this person did/didn’t look like me?
  • Make a conscious effort to expose yourself to the unexpected - normalize things by making them expected

Roundtable discussion topics

Below is a list of discussion topics I have used for these roundtables

How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias

How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias: How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias | Valerie Alexander | TEDxPasadena

Questions

• Did anything Valerie said stick out and resonate with you?
• What did you picture during the exercise at the beginning?
• What did you think of what Valerie shared about the different perspectives that men and women might have?
• What did you think of the male CEO’s worry: Is this one of those phrases I’m not supposed to use with you?
  • What did you think of the female attorney’s point: It’s easier to do someone else’s job than to make them do it
  • Think about a time when you did examine your own behavior. How did you feel after doing so?
• Did you like/do you think you’ll try the three things Valerie suggested? Why or why not?
  • Visualize things before they happen, then change it to open yourself to different possibilities
  • Have the courage to examine your own behavior - Is this how I would handle this interaction if this person did/didn’t look like me?
  • Make a conscious effort to expose yourself to the unexpected - normalize things by making them expected

Privilege and Allyship

The format for this roundtable is slightly different than the first. There are two videos to watch, and then a short self-reflection exercise before we start the discussion.

Agenda:

• Intros (~5 min)
• Individual reflection - watch videos and self-reflection exercise
  • Please mute yourself and turn off your video while watching the videos and doing the exercise. When you have finished everything, turn your video on.
  • What is Privilege? (4 min): What is Privilege?
  • What is Allyship? (4 min): What is Allyship?
  • Self-reflection exercise (~5 min): https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVOVqr9_c=/?invite_link_id=68198630749
    • Identify where you fall in each of the categories of the wheel (eg, for myself: National Origin - USA, Gender Identity - Male), then rank how privileged that makes you in each category.
    • The results of this exercise are private. There is no need to share anything.
• Discussion (remainder)

Below are some discussion questions to help get the conversation going:

• Did anything in the videos stand out to you? Did anything surprise you?
  • Are there aspects of the definitions of Privilege and Allyship that you hadn’t thought about before?
• What did you learn about yourself by doing the social identity wheel self-reflection exercise?
  • Were there any aspects of privilege/lack of privilege you didn’t realize you had?
  • How did these recognitions make you feel?
• Have you seen any examples of an active ally? Can you think of times where you might have been ally? Or wished you had been an ally?
• Are there any questions you have after watching the videos? Is there anything that is still unclear?
  • Is there anything you need to be a more powerful ally?

Trust and Unconscious Bias

This roundtable first has a personal exercise, then a short video, then part two of the personal exercise, then discussion time.

Agenda:

• Intros (~5 min)
• Individual reflection - Do part one of the self reflection exercise, watch the video, then complete part two of the self reflection exercise.
  • Please mute yourself and turn off your video while watching the videos and doing the exercise. When you have finished everything, turn your video on.
  • Self reflection exercise, part 1 (4 min):
    • Identify 10 people you trust, try not to include family. Use any definition of trust that feels right to you.
  • Watch the video (4 min): Unconscious Bias Exercise from Diversity Consultant Scott Horton
  • Self reflection exercise, part 2 (4 min):
    • Copy the sheet from the video, then fill it out
    • The results of this exercise are private. There is no need to share anything.
• Discussion (remainder)

Below are some discussion questions to help get the conversation going:

• What did you notice about the diversity of the people in your trusted ten?
  • Were they more or less diverse than you were expecting?
  • Were they diverse in some ways but not in others?
• What factors influence who you trust?
• Do you have ideas about how you can limit your own bias?

Study finds 75 percent of workplace harassment victims experienced retaliation when they spoke up

This is a roundtable discussion to get us thinking a bit more about equity and inclusion. This is one of several duplicate sessions, there is no need to attend more than one. For more information about what this is all about, see this confluence page: https://vistaprint.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/~192627428/pages/2443674093/Equity+and+Inclusion+Roundtables

Feel free to forward this meeting to anyone else who may be interested.

Agenda:

• Safe space & ground rules for discussion
  • This topic can be deeply personal for some, so please be mindful of that and do not put anyone on the spot. Make space for folks to share if they want to, but avoid asking if they’ve experienced X or Y.
  • Additionally, everyone should feel free to turn their camera off at any point during the discussion.
• Read the article: https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/10/15/16438750/weinstein-sexual-harassment-facts (10-15 mins)
  • Please mute yourself and turn off your video while reading the article. When you have finished, turn your video on.
• Discussion in breakout rooms (remainder)

Discussion questions:

• What comments or statistics from the article stood out to or surprised you most?
• Do you think some of the statistics in the article speak to even larger problems? If so, which ones? For example, “75% of harassment victims experienced retaliation when they spoke up” might suggest that speaking up about other injustices could also risk retaliation.
  • Do you think some might find it difficult to talk about things like discrimination, disabilities, and/or mental health in the workplace for similar reasons?
• The article paints the picture that companies are primarily focused on avoiding legal liability to avoid the millions that sexual harassment allegations can cost. What else could companies be doing to avoid these costs?
• The article mentioned that when harassment is specifically defined, the number of people who reported experiencing it increased from 25% to 60%. Why do you think that is?
• This article is focused on the US, but do you think it could be representative of work environments in other countries as well? Why or why not?
• This article was written before covid and the rise of remote work. How do you think remote work impacts workplace harassment and the issues described in this article?