In the wake of last week’s violent attack on the US Capitol containing acts of domestic terrorism and insurrection, it was noted by many that the perpetrators were met with more leniency, compared to peaceful Black Lives Matter protests last summer that were met with brutal force.

We recognise that accountability and justice are required and necessary,  before any healing or inclusion work can begin. Systemic change is required. However, we cannot become complacent, or let the conversations and required actions slip away, when it comes to the matter of race and racial inclusion. We want to use our platform to highlight resources and information that help tackle bias, microaggressions and racial privilege. The continual existence of these matters and the failure to tackle them has a profoundly harmful effect, particularly in workplaces, on underrepresented groups.

We hope the following articles help in continuing conversations, and more importantly, continue the learning process and drive much-needed action and meaningful progress when fostering workplace inclusion.

How Do We Sustain Organization Diversity?, by James Heskett at the Harvard Business School – “When I think of diversity and inclusion, I think of them in that order. That’s the way they are typically stated. It implies that you first set out to achieve diversity by bringing in more people of color, and then take steps—through inclusion training, mentoring, fast-tracking, or whatever—to plug the proverbial “leaky bucket” of minority employees who leave an organization.

Is it possible that I have that sequence wrong? Or that it might be wrong to even think of it as a sequence of priorities?” 

One size does not fit all: Why diversity and inclusion efforts fail in the nuclear community, and what can be done about it, by Mareena Robinson Snowden for The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists – “In a field long dominated by white men, the predominant minority identity among historically disadvantaged groups has been white women. It is thus no coincidence that white women have been the major beneficiaries of collective diversity and inclusion efforts in the national security field. Going forward, instead of defining outcomes in terms of the most in number, the nuclear field should shift its definition of success to improve representation of the most historically impacted groups, particularly Black and Brown communities.”

There Is No Race Card To Play Because Race Is Intertwined Into Everything, by Sheree Atcheson for Forbes – “Last year unearthed a lot of white guilt. For progress, we need more than that. Guilt is not useful if it simply remains and festers. Unsurprisingly, white guilt can cause white people to gaslight people of colour when issues of race come to light, because it highlights 1) treatment they have not and will never experience and 2) that they have benefitted from systems and societies that are ingrained with racism.”

Mental health and race toolkit launched by CMHA, by Adam Saville for Cover – “The toolkit, launched [by the City Mental Health Alliance] to help businesses protect and support positive mental health for those who are black or from a minority ethnic background, spells out strategic actions for organisations to take. They include challenging all forms of racism in the workplace (aka anti-racism); building inclusive and representative mental health and wellbeing support; allocating board level responsibility and measuring progress.

Don’t Just ‘Move On.’ Here’s How To Talk About The Capitol Riot At Work, by Monica Torres for Huffpost – “Repercussions from the violent assault on the U.S. Capitol last Wednesday are still being felt… Repercussions from that day may be following you to your job, too. Days and weeks after the event, you and others may be haunted by the horror of what you witnessed and experienced.”

Inclusion isn’t free: make 2021 the year of accountability, By Mordecai for Campaign Live – “The quest to be inclusive has been diminished to the point of becoming a buzzword. Agencies are becoming prey to a “make it happen” system that lacks understanding and nuance in its urgency to tick a box. When it comes to diversity and inclusion, this attitude is unacceptable. The year of accountability requires all of us to set ourselves up for long-term and permanent change, so when it comes to empty gestures, we need to call these out and do the real work that is needed.”