Many companies now recognise that progressing their diversity and inclusion goals may require specialist support along the way. But how do you choose a credible external partner?

It helps if you can first articulate what you’re trying to achieve, and why that’s important to your organisation. For example, are you wanting to encourage diversity of thought to lift innovation? Is gender-balanced and culturally diverse leadership important to reflect your customers?

We recognise that identifying those objectives is not always straightforward either, and engaging a consultancy can help at this early stage.

We know you want to be confident about the quality, credibility, and experience of the consultancy you choose as your D & I partner, so we’ve put together some questions you might like to ask prospective consulting firms to get the best outcome from your investment.

Some are about experience in developing strategies and embedding inclusion; others are about approaches to leadership development.

Questions to ask potential partners – developing strategies and embedding inclusion

1. What skills and experience does your consultancy offer to support diversity, foster inclusion and reduce bias in organisational cultures?

2. What is your consultancy’s evidence-based knowledge of the business case for diversity and inclusion and global best-practice, particularly relating to creating strategic linkages with business strategy and objectives?

3. What practical experience do your consultants have in embedding strategic programs of work for diversity and inclusion across a range of organisation types and sizes? 

4. What’s your experience in identifying diversity challenges and organisational biases? What analytical methodologies do you use? 

5. How do you go about developing a customised strategy to progress diversity and inclusion?

6. What are the types of diversity and inclusion-related cultural challenges and opportunities you typically identify? Does this differ across industries and what have the impacts of your previously recommended client strategies been for their business?

7. What’s your experience in navigating organisational resistance to diversity and inclusion efforts?

8. What tools do you offer to build the capability of leaders in making diversity and inclusion part of the overall business culture and how do you know these work? 

Questions to ask potential partners – leadership development

Helping leaders to build awareness and skills to lead inclusively and challenging bias requires facilitators who are experienced in dealing sensitively with the range of issues usually raised in discussions about diversity and inclusion in companies. It’s important that, along with a passion or interest in the topic, facilitators have skills to lead meaningful conversations and encourage participants  to reflect on their responses and behaviours in real time.

You might have someone in the company who’s passionate about safety, but that doesn’t automatically make them an effective facilitator to influence leadership mindsets and behaviours. It’s the same for diversity and inclusion. 

Some questions you might like to ask potential partners are:

1. How do you apply adult learning concepts in the design and delivery of your workshops?

2. What learning outcomes do you aim for in your workshops and how do you know you’ve achieved this?

3. How do you facilitate open and meaningful conversations about diversity, particularly with participants who may be resistant to the concepts being discussed?

4. How do you handle questions that may be sensitive for some in the group? Can you give examples of when this has occurred and what your response has been?

5. How do you recommend organisations cement learnings beyond the workshop?

6. What tools do you use to coach leaders to build inclusive leadership capability?

If you’d like more information about the types of services provided by Diversity Partners, please contact us at info@diversitypartners.com.au or call our office on 1800 571 999.