What's the Diversity Problem??

What EXACTLY is your diversity "problem"? Albert Einstein once said, "If I had an hour to solve a problem I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions." In other words, you need one detailed well-thought-out problem statement before leaping to solutions. Vague diversity problem statements, like "We need to improve Black retention at our company," don't work.

This problem statement can be improved by:

1. including a metric for the problem

2. identifying where the problem is occurring

3. identifying the timeframe over which the problem is occurring

4. describing the magnitude of the problem

5. describing the ideal state condition.

Take a moment to look at your organization's problem statement. Does your problem statement include all 5 components? If not, its time to update your statement. If you choose to keep your vague problem statement, good luck finding interventions and solutions that are effective!

Tomorrow, I'll share guidance on the "metric".