Very often, we find that professional development budget lines are used as a tool to access funding for DEI training because it is admittedly simpler to explain a three-hour training as professional development than a 9 month equity audit! Obviously, QuakeLab would love you to hop into our email and collaborate with us to do some exciting and innovative equity work, however if you’re at the stage where you’re working on a strong case for broader equity work and looking for movement within your current parameters, this is for you!

There is immense privilege in the ability to close your eyes, put your hands over your ears, and claim: I can’t because I’m scared. While we cower in fear of mis-stepping, the world does not become any better. In fact, one can argue that inaction out of fear is just as dangerous as oppressive action. So lean into the fear, step into this work with humility, prepare to do some research and real work (not just reflecting, listening and learning). You’ll be ok, promise!

At QuakeLab, we believe strongly in the importance of collecting and analyzing disaggregated DEI data when identifying and addressing inequity. But make no mistake, this is a loaded statement that should not be taken lightly. The QuakeLab team has dedicated years to learning, researching, iterating and building our approach to collecting data. This is a never ending process based in data ethics, justice and taking guidance from marginalized communities.

Obviously we'd love you to work with us, but what we'd love more is for you to work with someone who will create lasting DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) change and move your organization closer to equity and justice. Here's what to look out for

Our interest in DEI or equity strategies has little to do with semantics, and everything to do with what problem you’re trying to solve, how you’ll be solving it and how you’ll measure and track the effectiveness of these solutions.

When you don’t have really clear ways to evaluate employees, they are left to advocate for themselves without guidelines. This leaves a lot of room for unconscious bias to creep into the performance appraisal and review process. Without clear structures around mobility (upward or lateral), you are leaving attrition to incidences of inequity. This unintentionally drives out talent who may have had the desire to stay, but don’t have access to the proper support.

QuakeCare is a new product being offered by QuakeLab that will help organizations build equity into their work in a meaningful, long term and measurable way.

Part two of our Harm series that focuses on building the mechanisms to respond to harm. This part of the series deals with the mechanisms of reporting, which is one of the most important stage when dealing with harm. This blog post covers the key areas on how to build these mechanics.

Despite the abundance of innovation, capital, and creativity in tech, the industry still has a not-so-secret “diversity problem”. After speaking and working with companies in the tech space, we realized that while all of them have the intention of making an impact, many don’t know where to start. We’ve identified 5 of the common misconceptions that are holding the tech industry back from advancing their equity work.

You might be familiar with the term ‘harm’ and perhaps even ‘microaggressions’, but how well do you know these terms in the context of the workplace and the ways that employers need to be held accountable in creating the right definitions of harm and the reporting systems. This is the first in a series on harm to help you better define harm, building the mechanisms for reporting and more.

We want to help you folks make this process as data driven, human focused, and equitable as possible. With that in mind, we’ve created a free toolkit that includes a survey to share with your team, a guide to analyze the results of the survey, and a guide to creating a safe virtual and physical workplace for BIPOC employees. This toolkit is designed to support informed and open conversations with your workforce to identify wants and needs of employees, as well as concerns and opportunities. Asking these questions can help understand the existing gaps in order to move forward with an equitable framework.

Diversity, Inclusion and Equity work is often discussed in a way that uses blanket statements to describe the problem. DEI is positioned as if it is the problem we’re trying to solve. Non-committal, passive language like “we need to do better” or “we know we aren’t perfect” or “harm is being caused” is often used. But there is often very little in the way of specifics. It’s never articulate what we can do better, where we aren’t perfect, who is being harmed and by what/who.

When you are recruiting, interviewing and making offers you must understand that you are not the only one making a decision. The power dynamics in a recruitment process are skewed in your favour as the recruiter, which means you need to be actively working to ensure every candidate has as much information as possible to make an informed decision.

So by asking people of colour, Black people, Indigenous people, what racism looks like in their organizations, you are asking them to dilute the systemic, colonial roots of an industry, into a quick story of how their manager called them the ‘N’ word.

If you set out to solve racism, or “tackle inequality, and be more inclusive”, you're tasking your small, volunteer team with solving global hunger, curing cancer and solving world peace. It’s important to be realistic about your mandate and cast your net in a way that sets you up for success.

QuakeLab’s model hinges on one central idea: you and your organization want to do things differently. We feel confident that if you’re reading this, you understand that the bare minimum - one that latches on diversity only, is not enough. If you have made it this far, we are assuming that you believe rigorous investigation into historical systems of oppression is necessary.

Trauma mining: the process of creating an environment that demands that Black people, Indigenous peoples, women, Disabled people, members of the LGBTQ2S community share experiences of discrimination. This process is branded as necessary for the moving forward of an organization in it’s journey to become more equitable. However, it serves no purpose to those who are forced to relive their trauma, but attempts to prove to their colleagues that racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. is in fact real.

But on a larger scale, what we are also trying to do is change the culture of diversity, equity and inclusion that demands we continue to work and live in the structures and systems that we know are inherently inequitable. We are working to give folks the space, tools and permission to assess the ways we build our organization - and then shake things up (QUAKELab, get IT :)).

We cannot hoard knowledge and new equitable ways of working for the purpose of ensuring sole ownership. When we learn how to do this work better, and we share that with you, you do this work better and make the world less awful for the folks who need it the most.

As we collectively struggle towards the end of 2020 and move further away from June’s catalyzing public awareness around Black Lives Matter, it’s going to get even more difficult to make the case for dedicating organizational budget and resources towards equity and inclusion.