Here’s what inclusivity in action really looks like

There’s a lot of talk about inclusivity in the workplace and achieving better gender equality and balance, but what does this actually look like in practice?

Australia’s biggest companies are doing a better job than the broader corporate sector of appointing female chief executives, with five women now in leadership roles among the top 20, pushing their leadership share up to 25 per cent from 15 per cent a year ago. But we still have a way to go.

As with any kind of sustainable change, small steps add up to big impacts. At Craveable Brands, we’ve embraced inclusivity and championed diversity by design (rather than by luck) to build a workplace where everyone is welcome and where leadership reflects the diversity of our organisation. Here’s how.

Why does inclusivity matter?

At the heart of inclusivity is understanding why it’s important, not just on an individual level, but company-wide.

We’ve all been in workplaces where we’ve had to check our real selves at the door and do our best to impersonate a humanoid work-bot without duties, worries and responsibilities outside of work. If COVID-19 had a silver lining, it was in helping us all to see each other as people with lives outside of the office walls.

At Craveable, we’ve found that encouraging people to bring their whole selves to work means they bring their best selves to work. The talented people in our team aren’t just fitting into the mould they think is expected and accepted. Like walking Venn diagrams, everyone brings their own unique cross-section of life to the workplace, and our company is richer for it.

Inclusivity means opening the door to the broadest possible range of talent – regardless of gender, age, identity, ethnicity, education and background – and questioning our own expectations around the “right” kind of person for the job.

Culture isn’t concrete

In the past, we used to talk about hiring people who were the right cultural “fit”, but we’ve realised this meant we were expecting people to fit an existing culture rather than encouraging them to help influence a new company culture.

So we now look for the culture “add” people might bring, rather than expecting them to fit into our concrete idea of company culture.

This invitation to influence culture means our people are encouraged to contribute openly and honestly, to have real conversations, and to share ideas and feedback in a psychologically safe environment. We can challenge each other’s perspectives in a constructive and collaborative way, and our leaders model this so everyone can see it in action.

Honesty in the workplace also means our people can be open about their mental health struggles or different needs. For example, at least 10 per cent of my team have disclosed their neurodivergence and made clear “this is the best way to work with me, and here’s what I need to do my best work”.

It’s refreshing and makes a real difference to our employee engagement and retention.

The commercial case

From a business perspective, inclusivity isn’t just a nice to have; it’s critical for commercial success.

As a food retail business, having people working for our brands who reflect the community and the customers is really crucial. It helps us strike the right tone and stay in tune with our customer base.

Diversity in our business helps us connect with our customers and reflect their needs. For example, we recognise the significant buying power of women and have made a conscious effort to improve gender representation in our business to better understand the women in our customer base and what’s important to them.

A strategic approach

At Craveable, we have a senior leadership team with an almost equal split between women and men, led by our chief executive, Karen Bozic. But this is by design, not by accident.

We’ve been very transparent about wanting to improve the gender balance at all levels across the company, and we have made strategic hires, as well as nurturing career progression for the female talent already in our team.

For example, we saw an opportunity for there to be more female franchise partners in our business, so we established a women in franchise campaign to nurture talent, fund professional development, and recruit women who had an interest in becoming franchise partners and restaurant managers across the business.

We then showcase these women and share their stories to ensure maximum visibility. As the saying goes, you can’t be it if you can’t see it.

Changing policies and perspectives

As HR and people leaders, we can find ourselves in echo chambers around the push for inclusivity and gender equality. If it’s already a priority in your workplace, it can feel like the job’s just about done.

But many Australians still hold rigid gender views. As pointed out in a report from Deloitte: The Global Institute for Women’s Leadership has found that Australian men are more traditional in their gender attitudes than the global average, with 30 per cent of Australian men agreeing gender inequality doesn’t really exist. This was the highest of all countries except Saudi Arabia.

To continue countering this, we’ve established progressive policies, for example, around parental leave. But we know the proof is in showing these policies in action.

As people in our company see their colleagues take advantage of parental leave – both men and women – we’re working to challenge expectations around caregiving and family responsibilities, an issue impacting all genders.

Flexibility built on trust

At the heart of an inclusive workplace is trust and autonomy. We trust our people to get the job done, and this trust is rewarded with hard work and loyalty.

While we have policies around time in the office/onsite and time at home, flexibility comes first. We trust our leaders to work with their people around the kind of work hours that make sense for them and their families, and if people need to move interstate, we keep an open mind around supporting their choice to work remotely.

In the long term, rigidity in the workplace won’t be rewarded. Flexibility is the way of the future, and so is diversity and inclusion. It’s just a matter of how long it takes us all to get there.

By Kathryn Farnell, chief people officer, Craveable Brands