Month: May 2022

What is unconscious bias?

Unconscious bias is beliefs about individuals or groups of people that we are often unaware of. When bias exists, your organization will struggle to recruit and retain diverse teams, and workplace inclusion will be hindered.

What are the different types of unconscious bias?

• Affinity bias

This is when we show a preference for people we are similar to in some way, because we find them familiar and easier to relate to. This could be because of shared characteristics such as class, ethnicity, or geography or shared interests or hobbies. 

• Beauty bias

This type of bias is when we base our opinion on someone’s looks. Even when we were taught not to ‘judge a book by its cover’, sometimes, we unconsciously favor attractive people for a job despite the fact that this has no relevance on their talent or skill to perform the role well.

• Conformity bias

This bias refers to our tendency to take other people’s suggestions heavily to arrive at a decision, rather than make our own independent judgment.  Having a diverse team means a broader range of experiences and knowledge. This helps bring awareness to social issues we aren’t aware of and get more ideas before making a decision.

• Gender bias

Gender bias starts when we write job listings. Certain terms have been found to attract applicants of one gender more than another. Gender bias also refers to a male candidate being hired for a physically demanding role, or a senior woman being asked to write minutes in a meeting.

It is important to take concrete and transparent steps like training employees to lessen unconscious bias in your company. This will have positive results in your company such as increased productivity and a healthier balance sheet. Take P2L’s Unconscious Bias course to help your company  implement tools to address bias through practice and long-term learning enablement.

Microaggressions happen everywhere, including at work. We call microaggressions “micro” aggressions, but their overall impact can be measured on a “macro” scale. Microaggressions in the workplace create a huge impact on people’s mental, spiritual, and even physical health.

Microaggressions usually come up from our deeply-rooted biases against those who are different from us. Usually as a result of our upbringing, a lot of people don’t know they have these biases until they come face-to-face with them in a conversation or confrontation.

How to address microaggressions

Collect your thoughts before addressing the other individual

Ponder whether it would be more helpful to talk to them in person or write them an email. Let the individual know what was said, how and why it hurt you. 

Be assertive

Being the recipient of a microaggression can be emotional and stressful. It might be tempting to respond in a passive-aggressive manner. However, in the workplace, the assertive approach is likely to have the best outcome and lead to a constructive conversation. Be assertive but calm. Address the other person through the use of “I” statements. Doing so can help the other person understand how their microaggression has affected you directly in a clear and straightforward way.

Reach out for help

After experiencing a microaggression, consider reaching out to a trusted co-worker, a loved one or mental health professional to process the experience. This ensures that you don’t garner negative and detrimental feelings, which may affect your mental health. 

How to avoid microaggressions?

Expose yourself to diverse perspectives to help you identify unconscious biases and build the awareness necessary to align your actions and words with your values. There are a myriad of resources available to educate yourself.

As you continue to educate yourself and learn, you can share resources and raise awareness among your friends and colleagues about unconscious biases, the different types of microaggressions that exist, and the fact that we are all capable of committing them.

We’re all biased, we all make mistakes, and we’ve all probably committed microaggressions against others. But that doesn’t excuse the problematic or insensitive ways we interact with others. It’s not about accepting your biases as inevitable, it’s about recognizing how they affect others and untangling them from your core beliefs.

Check out P2L’s course on addressing microaggressions and micro-inequities.

It has been proven that a diverse workplace is a successful workplace. Research shows that companies seeking to improve employee recruitment, performance and retention, increase engagement, achieve higher revenue and growth can find opportunities and resources through diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

But being diverse and inclusive in the workplace is not just about the increased hiring of women, BIPOC, non-binary or neurodivergent employees. It’s about genuine inclusion in your company. It’s ensuring they’re involved, empowered and trusted within the business.

In order to fully understand this topic, let’s define each term. 

DIVERSITY means recognizing, respecting, and valuing differences based on ethnicity, gender, age, race, religion, disability, and sexual orientation.

EQUITY is ensuring that everyone has equal access to the same opportunity. In the context of your workplace, do all of your employees have access to the same levels of promotion and retention within your company?

INCLUSION is a set of behaviors that encourages employees to feel valued for their unique qualities and experience a sense of belonging. 

How do you improve DE&I in your company?

• Review how the company recognizes multicultural, religious, and informal holidays/election days

Encourage employees to enjoy days significant to the company and celebrate holidays most meaningful in their own lives. When scheduling meetings or other special events, respect multicultural and religious holidays and election days.

• Broaden recruiting efforts and consider redefining people to hire

Consider providing opportunities to people from underserved communities. Maybe a college degree isn’t as necessary as it once was. Consider hiring people with disabilities or retirees with years of experience under their belts.

• Create a mentorship program

A mentorship program sets clear expectations for both mentor and mentee, A two-way mentorship enables people to learn from each other rather than simply setting up a teacher-student arrangement.

• Let people from different backgrounds share their thoughts

Seek input from all employees and ask speakers of diverse backgrounds to present at meetings, seminars, and new hire orientations.

•  Make leaders accountable

A DE&I strategy will only take hold within an organization if leadership holds space and accountability for it. Employees look to their workplace leaders to guide them, but they’ll only follow and do the same if they see and believe their leaders are making the change alongside them.

Implementing new practices can get overwhelming. It might require more education, thoughtfulness, and courage. In the end it’s always worth the effort since it will support communities who have been underserved and underrepresented. 

The more diverse and inclusive a company is, the stronger it will be, the more customers it will reach, and the greater impact it will have.

Contact P2L today to learn more about DE&I and hos you can implement it in your company.

What is Salesforce?

According to The Street, Salesforce is a cloud computing service as a software (SaaS) company that specializes in customer relationship management (CRM). Salesforce’s services allow businesses to use cloud technology to better connect with customers, partners and potential customers.

The cloud-based software allows companies to track (in real time) analytics, customer success and support, customer complaints and a variety of other CRM functions with the ease of cloud storage and access wherever the users are.

Why are companies using Salesforce?

• Accessible

Since Salesforce is a cloud software, it’s accessible anywhere and everywhere as long as you have access to the internet. Being able to reach your CRM tool through the cloud no matter where you are makes it easier to access important files and stay updated on clients.

• Easy to use and understand

Salesforce CRM targets a broad range of companies, many of whom do not have any background in software and technology. Salesforce meets and exceeds the ease of use requirement by offering a simpler and extremely intuitive user-interface. There is no need to invest time in coding or carefully pour through the information and product updates.

• Security

Salesforce delivers reliable data security and protection. It ensures that no sensitive information is lost or compromised and users can perform in a trusted environment tension-free. Salesforce complies with security and government regulations worldwide, such as TRUSTe, TUV Certificate, PCI DSS Compliance, ISO 27001 Certification, etc. 

• Improved teamwork

The software allows you to connect and communicate with team members from anywhere thanks to the “Chatter” feature. This lets you connect team members individually or as groups and chat about everything from your clients and their information to other work-related topics such as territory and product/service details. 

• Better time management

Time management is a huge benefit of Salesforce and one of the best ways to allow a business to grow and thrive. Thanks to comprehensive customer information and useful planning resources, you have everything you need in one place. No more time wasted searching through logs and files for important info.

Salesforce is a comprehensive software for businesses to manage, maintain, communicate with and grow their customer base and revenue streams.

Contact P2L today to learn more about Salesforce and how it can help you business.