MIRROR Building a Better
Crunching data methodically provides clearer image of organizational diversity.
by Mr. Thom Hawkins Y
ou can never be sure, when you look in a mirror, that what you see is what other people see. For an orga- nization, measuring diversity can elicit the unsettling images of a funhouse mirror, and standing too long in
front of the mirror that makes us look tallest or laugh hardest will not reveal how we truly look. So, how do we know if our ideas of diversity mirror those of others? How can we create the healthiest, most genuinely and appropriately diverse workplace possible? What is the right mirror to use?
According to U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Com- mission (EEOC) Management Directive 715, an organization conducting a self-assessment “shall compare their internal par- ticipation rates with corresponding participation rates in the relevant civilian labor force. Geographic areas of recruitment and hiring are integral factors in determining ‘relevant’ civilian labor force participation areas.”
Oh, shall we? Examples, please! Except that no examples are forthcoming from the EEOC, and our review of Management Directive 715 reports from across the federal government found that even when an agency is relatively centralized geographically (for example, the National Institutes of Health), it used the U.S. Department of Labor’s National Civilian Labor Force (NCLF) data as a point of comparison, and applied the term “relevant” only to limit the occupations considered, not the region.
Te U.S. is hardly homogeneous, from a demographic per-
spective. Te population of Washington state, for example, is considerably different from that of Washington, D.C. Tere’s more than just two letters separating Kansas and Arkansas. And while Hawaii and Rhode Island are both small states, it’s safe to assume that there’s a much higher percentage of native Hawai- ians or Pacific Islanders in Hawaii than in any other state—and probably very few actual islanders in Rhode Island. So, adjust- ing a single organization’s demographic makeup to fit a national profile is like going on a diet because a curved mirror is making you look fat.
It’s not you, it’s your mirror.
FINDING THE RIGHT MIRROR Some organizations may indeed have so many employees dis- persed across the country that using the NCLF data is the only appropriate comparison. However, short of rapid advances in plate tectonics, we are not going to radically shift a region’s demographic makeup—but we can adjust our recruiting to ensure a representative selection from the surrounding area.
Te Program Executive Office for Command, Control and Com- munications – Tactical (PEO C3T) is based at Aberdeen Proving Ground, in Harford County, Maryland. To identify the area from which we might expect to draw our workforce (for example,
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