08/09/2022

Five Things Black and Latina Women Staff Need to Hear From You

Little is being said about employee retention and engagement

With calls for real strides in workplace diversity following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, many associations started, continued, or advanced and expanded their initiatives in diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, access and accessibility (DEI&A). Today, amid the tight job market, the search for diverse talent is fierce, with many association job listings explicitly encouraging members of underrepresented groups to apply.

While a lot of the focus has been on recruitment, little is being said about employee retention and engagement—the backbone of any successful, long-lasting DEI&A initiative. If you are committed to attracting individuals from underrepresented groups, you should “walk the talk” and invest more time and resources to help these professionals stay, right?

Ideally, yes. Unfortunately, that isn’t what we’re seeing. Instead of looking at the last two years as a successful experiment to develop equitable hybrid and remote work options, to advance DEI&A learning, or as an opportunity for workplace innovation, many leaders are eager to bring teams back to the office as if it’s 2019. At the same time, many members of underrepresented groups are burned out from having shouldered many of the culture and climate issues, such as exclusion, stress, burnout, micro-aggressions, gas-lighting and salary inequity, which intensified by the pandemic.

Please select this link to read the complete article from ASAE's Center for Association Leadership.