DE&I | Jennifer McClure`

Get ready to reshape your HR practices with my guest on episode 88 of the Impact Makers podcast – Noah Warder!

Noah has been leading people teams across Canada and the US for over 10 years, and now leads the People Team at Guusto, a company that provides a recognition and rewards platform focused on both front-line and office employees. In this role, he gets to marry his passion for building a people-first culture that focuses on creating purpose, opportunity, and well-being for every member of Guusto team.

He’s also the Principal Consultant and Founder of PeopleOps Consulting, where he helps early-stage Founders to build people-first cultures in rapidly growing organizations, and he brings a fresh perspective to the role HR should play in advocating for a culture that stimulates open dialogue and forethought.

In our conversation on the podcast, Noah shares his thoughts on how to balance daily tasks and strategic initiatives while also debunking the misconception that effective people practices need to be intricate or costly. We also chat about the vital role of diverse leadership teams in recruiting a diverse workforce, and the significance of tying DE&I strategies to business objectives.

Finally, Noah share his views on trust-building within HR, and his strategies for providing constructive feedback, including the challenge of communicating with those skeptical of HR. He firmly believes that transparency in leadership leads to more openness and clear communication that can empower employees and foster greater engagement.

I think that you’ll enjoy our conversation, and will leave it with some actionable takeaways to create, or further build a people-first approach in your own workplace.

Topics Discussed in Today’s Episode:

Why HR leaders should get more comfortable with starting small, making mistakes, and avoiding perfectionism.
Strategies for prioritizing people initiatives when HR leaders have so much on their plates.
How to approach making a business case for important people strategies when the ROI is hard to quantify.
The importance of building influence and trust as a people leader, in order to get things done.
Why it’s important – and healthy – to embrace conflict in order to reach better outcomes.
Why transparency is so important for company culture and trust in organizations.
The importance of being intentional about adding diverse voices and perspectives to the people you listen to, follow and learn from.
Suggested communities and resources for people leaders to share ideas and best practices, and gain support from others facing similar challenges.

LISTEN TO IMPACT MAKERS PODCAST – EPISODE 88

Listen on Apple podcasts, Google podcasts or Spotify

People & Resources Mentioned in This episode:

Noah Warder – LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/noahwarder/

Noah Warder – Twitter: https://twitter.com/NoahWarder

PeopleOps Consulting – https://www.peopleopsconsulting.com/

Guusto – https://guusto.com/

Lars Schmidt – LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/larsschmidt

Amplify Academy – https://amplifytalent.com/academy

ChartHop People Ops Community – https://www.charthop.com/the-people-ops-community/

The People People Group – https://thepeoplepeoplegroup.com/

My guest on Episode 51 of the Impact Makers podcast is Jennifer Ingram.

Jennifer is the Founder and CEO of Calibrated Lens LLC,where she specializes in helping organizations to enhance their performance, productivity, and brand presence by centering equity and inclusion.

Jennifer has previously served as the first Vice President of Diversity Equity and Inclusion at the United Way of Greater Cincinnati, which is the sixth largest United Way in the nation, and has also led DE&I strategies at two nationally ranked academic medical centers – The Mayo Clinic and Henry Ford Health System.

She’s passionate about her work, and describes herself as an Equity & Inclusion Evangelist.

I think you’ll learn a lot from the fresh perspectives she shares in this episode.

Topics Discussed In This Episode:

What Jennifer learned by being a member of a Diversity and Inclusion committee back in elementary school, and how those experiences still impact her today.
How diversity should be an outcome of our work, instead of the driver of it.
Why the head of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion should be a member of the executive team, reporting into the CEO.
The importance of clarifying how diversity programs have changed as a result of introducing equity into the equation.
What does equity look like from a strategic perspective?
Where many organizations miss the mark when trying to improve their diversity recruiting efforts.
Creative approaches to establishing equity programs in your organization.
How we’ve created a false sense of inclusion within organizations, and perpetuated that with diversity and inclusion programs.
Is it possible for a white person to be the head of diversity and inclusion?
Thoughts on incentivizing DE&I efforts for leaders of organizations.

IMPACT MAKERS PODCAST – EPISODE 51

(Email subscribers – click HERE to listen to the podcast.)

Key Quotes From This Episode:

“If you have a head of D&I that is not a member of the executive team, you’re missing the mark. Not to say that you can’t do good work, but it won’t be as deeply impactful at achieving some of those desired outcomes as it could be.” ~ Jennifer Ingram

“What does equity look like from a strategic perspective? Diversity is happening, inclusion in intentional, equity is deliberate. It’s taking a deliberate look at your systems and understanding where you may be producing disparity.” ~ Jennifer Ingram

“Equity work is deliberate. It won’t just happen.” ~ Jennifer Ingram

“Folks love to say that diverse teams outperform more homogeneous teams. That’s not true. Well-managed diverse teams outperform teams that lack diversity.” ~ Jennifer Ingram

“Oftentimes we confuse the goal of reaching this kumbaya state, it’s not. The desire is not always to change everyone’s beliefs. That’s not success. It’s teaching how to be mutually respectful of differences and understanding and seeing and valuing those differences in others, and understanding that those are the things that make us better – not everyone singing from the same hymn book of sorts.” ~ Jennifer Ingram