Diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives—aka DEI—play an important role in every industry, but especially in healthcare.
That’s because DEI programs do more than help hospitals burnish their brand (although they accomplish that, too). At the end of the day, DEI benefits patients, communities, and employees. As it happens, it’s an effective business strategy, too.
It’s a given: research has shown that patients relate better to providers who look like they do—i.e., who belong to the same racial/ethnic demographic. The more diverse your hospital staff, the more ably you can serve a diverse patient population.
Plus, when healthcare employers bring professionals with different approaches and backgrounds together, it enriches the staff’s collective knowledge. The resulting exchange of ideas fuels creativity, sparking more innovative treatments.
Healthcare innovation leads to more positive outcomes, so multiple studies have found that hospitals with diverse staff are more profitable than their less-diverse counterparts.
So, at a time when hospitals’ operating margins remain alarmingly low, accelerating DEI efforts makes sense on every level.
It’s not enough to make a commitment to DEI, you need an action plan—ideally, one that incorporates these four steps.
Chances are, you’re already tracking your workforce demographics by race, gender, etc. Make sure that you’re tracking by various positions and levels, too—from C-suite executives and physicians to hourly-paid cleaning and food service staff.
Then, compare your diversity ratios to both national averages and your specific patient demographics, especially with regard to management and direct care providers. You may find that your overall diversity rates are in line with your community’s—but not across the board.
Whatever your metrics reveal themselves to be, this allows you to target key areas for improvement, as you continue to measure your progress toward those goals.
We all have unconscious biases—deep-seated prejudices and stereotypes targeting those unlike ourselves. The problem is, these biases are so insidious, we can’t see them in ourselves. And yet, historically, such biases have limited the hiring and promotion of quality minority candidates.
In fact, according to one Deloitte study, a full 39% of employees reported experiencing bias at least once a month. For this reason, it’s important to provide your staff with vigorous anti-bias training, especially for those in HR, management, and talent acquisition roles.
Similarly, it’s essential to require diversity in your search committees and candidate slates, while ensuring an objective and transparent evaluation process.