Workplace culture and employment practices

• How do you encourage diversity and inclusion across your organization?
• Is diversity and inclusion incorporated in your hiring process and workplace culture?
• Do you track and monitor diversity and inclusion across your board, leadership team, and employee base?
• Do you measure employee turnover?
• What are the initiatives in place to retain employees? e.g. development and training, flexible working hours, benefits, equity stakes
• Does your approach to management compensation meet stakeholder expectations?
• Do you think about the wage gap and pay equality across your business operations?
• Do you consider strategies or initiatives that make your company more socially accountable? e.g., if your product displaces a large number of jobs working with the communities it is affecting

At Pitango, we are supporting the Power in Diversity Initiative aiming to increase diversity in Israeli funds and high-tech companies. PiD conducts an annual survey and awards for diverse companies, as well as provides workshops for startups in topics related to Diversity and Inclusion. Please check out their website for more information and join the community.

Growth companies, here is a list of advice taken from our portfolio companies

1. Hire an external consultant to provide anti-racism, diversity, equity, and inclusion training to the company team
2. Develop a D&I training program for managers, leveraging both internal resources external D&I consultants
3. Publish an annual company diversity report
4. Improve diversity in your company hiring by:

• Expanding our pipeline generation and sourcing to more effectively source BIPOC candidates
• Review your evaluation criteria to identify and remove potential biases
• Train interviewers to develop skills that mitigate bias
• Review interview feedback to screen for biased language
• Increase referral bonus for candidates from underrepresented groups

1. Expand support for BIPOC employees

• Create specific programs for developing and promoting diverse talent
• Develop optional internal mentoring program pairing BIPOC employees with senior leadership
• Consider partnering with external organizations to mentor BIPOC employees

1. Align your onboarding process with your D&I focus:

• Create separate ‘Culture @ company’ onboarding session

• Train managers on creating an inclusive workplace for new hires

• Solicit feedback from new employees on how you can improve your onboarding to be more inclusive

• Ensure all new employees are aware of all mandatory company D&I and anti-harassment trainings

                                                       **For larger companies:** 
  

1. support and promote Employee Resource Groups (ERG) at the company
2. Introduce ERGs to new employees during onboarding
3. Provide clear process for starting an ERG
4. Create an online resource (intranet) with information on how to join an ERG
5. Facilitate access to wellness and mental health resources: launch intranet with information on all available mental health and wellness benefits in the company location. In addition to your in-person channels with your People Team, facilitate and promote safe and easily-accessible channels for employees to provide feedback on sensitive issues:

• Anonymous employee online feedback form
• Third-party hotline for anonymous feedback

1. Create meaningful mentorship and volunteering opportunities for your Employees
2. Ensure your analytical models and tools are free of bias
3. Work with partners to minimize bias in background check criteria for employees and  Partners
4. Improve onboarding process and offer additional resources to support employees of different backgrounds
5. Provide proactive guidance on service design to ensure anti-racism and inclusiveness:

• Influence partners to create more inclusive services, both early in the sales and RFP processes and after winning new partnerships
• Advise partners on service boundaries to avoid potential exclusion of disadvantaged clients

1. Establish a D&I ranking system or checklist to evaluate new vendors and audit your current vendors to come up with an D&I rating; work across teams to apply evaluation and ranking best practices
2. Ensure diversity among your choices for outside counsel by tracking stats on representation of BIPOC team members on your matters, hours billed, and leadership roles
3. Conduct a comprehensive review of the escalation process for customer cases with Support Ops to mitigate any potential bias
4. Seek out additional pro bono opportunities
5. Provide more opportunities for BIPOC speakers at events
6. Use an inclusive voice and implement an D&I check in your communications and visuals
7. Implement Support Ops-specific anti-bias training, agent policies and documentation; standardize macros to help with handling of customer complaints/escalations related to race
8. Revisit your comms and which holidays you celebrate/acknowledge
9. Publish thought leadership pieces and clear external statements about what your industry should look like
10. Identify best practices for influencing and getting partners’ buy-in to care and take action towards these topics
11. Work to improve the “voice of the customer” and represent all stakeholders