Why DEI Backlash Exists and What to Do About It
By Lauren Park and Lin Grensing-Pophal
Coca-Cola recently encountered online criticism based on leaked course materials from a purportedly required antiracism training course for employees. Coca-Cola issued a statement apologizing to those offended, reports Senior Executive in the article “Bracing Yourself for the DEI Haters.”
Coca-Cola isn’t alone. Others, including Home Depot and Google, have also run into employee resistance or outright rejection of some diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. DEI backlash emerges in various ways – some overt and some subtle, including employees failing to participate in required training initiatives, refusing to use others’ pronouns, voicing concerns about a perceived loss of opportunities, expressing resistance to DEI efforts, and even filing reverse discrimination lawsuits. This is, of course, taking place in an environment where the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling striking down affirmative action in higher education admissions is capturing the attention of both education and corporate leaders.
A 2022 global Gartner survey of DEI leaders indicated that one of the top challenges they face (according to 23%) is addressing employees who resist DEI-focused change efforts. This data resonates with 2021 Gartner research of 3,516 employees, which found that 42% of employees resented their organizations’ DEI efforts, 42% viewed those efforts as divisive, and 44% agreed that a growing number of their colleagues felt alienated by DEI efforts.
These feelings of resentment and alienation can – and do – lead to backlash from employees from historically advantaged backgrounds, which can hamper companies’ efforts to reach their DEI goals and objectives.
In 2022, nonprofit benchmarking association APQC surveyed 312 DEI leaders from organizations across industries and around the globe, and the results point to factors that could be contributing to DEI resistance from employees. Elissa Tucker, APQC’s principal research lead in human capital management, says the research was prompted because “we were seeing so many companies make really very public commitments to DEI, and we really wanted to gauge how they were doing in terms of delivering on those commitments.”
Tucker says while the research indicated that most organizations are sincere about acting on DEI commitment, APQC found that results are lagging. For instance, APQC’s research indicated that only 26% of respondents had DEI measures in place for the HR function; only 29% said that senior leaders’ compensation was tied in part to achieving DEI goals; and just 25% said managers’ compensation was tied in part to achieving DEI goals.
Some of the lag may be related to resistance from employees who feel excluded from the DEI focus or who simply aren’t committed to those efforts. The negative reaction to DEI can hit a business’s bottom line. A BCG study of more than 1,700 global organizations found that “diversity increases the capacity for innovation by expanding the range of a company’s ideas and options, leading to better financial performance.” Less diversity, then, means less innovation and lower performance.
Understanding the reasons for this backlash – including employees’ concerns about loss of control, their ideologies about diversity, and disagreement about the need for these efforts – is a vital first step. Then organizations can reduce friction and increase DEI program effectiveness by taking actions, such as ensuring that business leaders take control and communicate the why behind DEI efforts, focusing on the positive role all employees can play, and doing a better job of listening to and addressing employee concerns. Armed with these strategies, companies can make faster progress and better unify their workforces.
Three factors behind the pushback
DEI experts point to common sources that underlie resistance, including a feeling of loss of control or autonomy, a misunderstanding of the virtue of “colorblindness,” and a belief that social equalities have already been addressed. As DEI consultant Lily Zheng suggests in an article for Harvard Business Review, backlash can be a risk because “people are strongly motivated to protect their own sense of self-esteem, competence, and ‘inherent goodness.’ When any of these things are challenged, their gut reaction is to resist and reject.”
1. Feeling a loss of control or autonomy
When people perceive that their independence or autonomy is restricted – because they need to change behaviors or terminology, for example – resistance is common. This is especially true in the United States, where independence is culturally very important. But regardless of region, a sense of autonomy is an important psychological factor at work. Backlash can occur when DEI initiatives roll out and people feel r they can no longer reach their personal or professional goals and that they’ve lost power.
2. Colorblindness versus multiculturalism
Another contributing factor is the idea of colorblindness – an often well-intentioned but misinformed attempt to discount or dismiss differences. People who hold a colorblind ideology assert that they do not “see” others’ identities or pay attention to them, making it impossible for them to treat others differently based on those identities. They may think differences in identity are best ignored and that it’s unfair or divisive to give them any attention or importance.
However, a colorblind ideology does not account for the reality that all humans do unconsciously see and pay attention to these identities, and this often shapes their behavior in subtle ways that they might not even notice. As Heather McGhee points out in an article for Ideas.Ted.Com, "Instead of being blind to race, colorblindness makes people blind to racism, unwilling to acknowledge where its effects have shaped opportunity or to use race-conscious solutions to address it."
Colorblindness also implies that people’s identities are simply not important – which is not the case for many who feel their different identity attributes are central to their sense of self. This is in contrast to the concept of multiculturalism, which seeks to acknowledge, understand, and accept differences.
3. The belief that inequalities have been addressed
In a similar vein, another belief underlying backlash is that the social inequalities that DEI aims to solve don’t exist anymore. In this view, DEI efforts are not correcting historical injustices but are rather swinging too far in the other direction, causing a new set of people to feel disadvantaged or marginalized.
Inequalities still exist, of course. Consider the continuing, and even increasing, claims levied against companies for various types of discrimination or the 2023 research suggesting that job candidates are evaluated in part based on race as suggested by their names.
What to do: Five steps to overcome DEI backlash
Organizations can’t – and shouldn’t – step back from their DEI efforts. DEI makes a difference for employees, customers, organizations, and society. But to address DEI backlash, organizations can consider the following strategies to unite, rather than divide, their audiences.
1. Ensure that business leaders take ownership.
Gartner reports that the top challenge facing DEI leaders is the failure of organizational leaders to take ownership for DEI outcomes, as cited by 51% of respondents to a survey of 181 DEI leaders conducted in October 2022. The survey further revealed that 70% of DEI leaders agreed that senior leaders are the most important DEI stakeholders.
APQC research found that DEI leaders perceive that key organizational players are not providing adequate support:
- Only 43% said senior leaders do their parts.
- Only 36% said managers do their parts.
- Only 33% said HR does its part.
“You need to have unwavering support from the CEO and the entire C-suite,” says Bertina Ceccarelli, who, along with Susanne Tedrick, is a coauthor of the book Innovating for Diversity: Lessons from Top Companies Achieving Business Success through Inclusivity. “The DEI goals need to be clear to the organization, and you need to be transparent about how the company is performing against those goals.”
One way to generate greater leadership commitment is to put those DEI goals into the performance plans of leaders and managers and to make those measures and the results public, according to Tucker. “The absence of that transparency around accountability really opens companies up to being vulnerable to pushback,” she says.
2. Ensure that leaders communicate the why.
In addition, Tucker says, it’s vital to clearly explain why these goals are important and how they contribute to the overall health and success of the company. “It’s not just about the optics; employees have to believe and understand that this is good for the company.”
That why can lead to significant positive company results, like the benefits of diverse teams on innovation, Tedrick says, pointing to the BCG research finding that “companies with more diverse teams are able to monetize those innovations and improve profitability.”
DEI is not, Ceccarelli stresses, “just the job of the chief diversity officer or even the CEO or head of HR, but it’s really a business practice that everybody needs to embrace for really thoughtful DEI strategies to be sustainable.” Without understanding why it’s valuable, employees are less likely to pitch in.
3. Represent everyone in diversity and inclusion.
Sometimes backlash stems from some employees feeling that their interests or concerns are not being addressed or that their viewpoints are not being included. That’s not the intent. DEI efforts should address all employees’ concerns and offer opportunities for input.
Part of the issue, says author and DEI advisor Rohini Anand, is the way that DEI efforts are often framed or communicated. Anand, former global chief diversity and corporate responsibility officer with Sodexo, says aspirational targets often are interpreted as quotas if not communicated appropriately. Rather than simply hitting a quota, Anand says, “the whole idea is to incentivize people to broaden the pool of candidates and then select the best qualified.”
She also suggests focusing on communications about what actions and behaviors individuals can engage in to reach the targets. For example, she says, “As allies, you can mentor or sponsor women in P&L roles and focus on identifying and developing a female successor pool for key roles to help achieve targets.”
Experts agree that it’s vital for DEI work to be inclusive of everyone. Sounds like a reflexive truth, given the DEI name itself, but the programs aren’t always positioned that way, says Chely Wright, chief diversity officer at Unispace, a global interior design firm, and a female member of the LGBTQ+ community. “By virtue of the way many DEIB [diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging] strategies are built, launched, and talked about, I can see why a lot of white straight men may feel like there’s no place for them in these initiatives, and that should not be the case,” she says. “In DEIB work, diversity means everyone, not just people of color, or women, or the LGBTQ+ community.”
Employee resource groups (ERGs) are one tool that Unispace has used to ensure true inclusivity. ERGs, also known as affinity groups or business resource groups, are voluntary employee-led groups that bring together individuals who share a common characteristic, background, or interest. They’re formed to promote inclusivity, support, and advocacy within an organization, providing a place for employees to connect, share experiences, and address issues related to DEI.
One ERG at Unispace focuses on parents and caregivers – groups perhaps not always considered in DEI work – and this was an intentional choice. “We wanted to mindfully create a space that would naturally include a diverse range of people,” Wright says. “When looking at the composition of our workforce, we actually have more people who identify as fathers than as mothers.” She says the group “was a way for us to include people in a conversation about DEIB who may not have otherwise felt it applied to them.”
Anand seconds this approach and also recommends creating ERGs for groups such as veterans, different generations of employees, or individuals with disabilities to be inclusive of those who may not see their identities reflected in DEI efforts.
4. Help detractors gain new perspectives.
Some DEI detractors are more vocal or more resistant than others, but persistent effort can produce surprising results, Anand says. “I really don’t think we should write people off. You have to understand their belief systems and meet them where they are and figure out strategies to bring them along,” she says. This can be done by helping detractors gain new perspectives, she says. We don’t know what we don’t know, she says. That includes our awareness of others who are not like us and their lived experiences. If we don’t interact with these individuals and really listen, if we don’t take responsibility to learn, then we will be unable to gain new perspectives, she says.
Anand shares her experience at an organization where one leader was “pretty homophobic.” She suggested to him that he sponsor the Pride ERG. He was a bit surprised, she said, but he did it. “And to the credit of the PRIDE ERG and the sponsor, they worked together.” She says that when he left the organization, he told her that “the single most important growth opportunity for him was being the sponsor of that ERG.” It gave him the opportunity to “listen to the lived experiences of the LGBTQ+ employees, and he got to know them in a different way that really disrupted his worldview.”
5. Focus on the positive roles that all can play.
Too often, DEI efforts focus on what managers and employees shouldn’t do – how they need to stop taking certain actions or exhibiting certain behaviors to build a more supportive climate for marginalized employees.
There can be a sense for some people that when the “focus is on all of these other diverse groups, that means there’s probably going to be less for me – there’s no space for me to exist,” says Tedrick.
In the process of attempting to bring more people of different backgrounds to the table, some may have felt excluded, Tedrick says. It can feel to these people like they’re “the enemy,” she says, when instead, they should feel like they’re part of a collective effort to use diversity for the benefit of the organization. “That’s where we see friction,” she says.
According to psychological research and theory, people can feel more motivated when goals are framed as promoting something good rather than preventing something bad. For DEI initiatives, this means employees are likely to feel less defensive and more engaged when DEI initiatives are framed not as “don’t be racist” or “don’t discriminate” but rather “be fair” or “be an ally.”
In a working paper by UCLA Anderson’s Kaylene J. McClanahan and Margaret Shih, which is based on racial diversity initiatives, the authors suggest that white people may be hesitant about getting involved in DEI efforts for a very basic reason: “They are unsure whether they belong or can meaningfully contribute.” They propose that White people could feel more included in organizational diversity efforts if diversity messaging explicitly welcomed them along with Black, Indigenous, and other people of color as allies. Experiments with more than 5,000 participants showed that White people responded favorably to ally invitation messages.
“It’s really about reframing conversations to say this isn’t about taking things away from people; it’s about making more space so others can participate with us versus purposefully trying to crowd out particular groups,” Tedrick says. It’s moving from a deficit mentality to more of a growth mindset.
“It’s essential that DEIB leaders consider how they can do this work in a way that doesn’t make anyone feel like they are losing something or are maligned as an oppressor or an inherently bad actor based on their identity,” Wright agrees.
Ongoing communication and education pay off
Companies that are achieving results with their DEI efforts are “doing a lot more to understand their employees,” says Tucker. This may be through surveys as well as conversations with HR and other parties, creating a safe environment where everyone feels free to express their viewpoints. It’s important, she says, “to stay in touch with how all employees are feeling when it comes to diversity, equity, and inclusion.”
It takes time to build the kind of transparency and trust that will lead to people coming forward with their thoughts and concerns, but there are telltale signs when this is happening.
After launching Unispace’s first ERG, focused on women in the workplace, Wright says, “I received several calls from men in the company who were interested in having a conversation with me about their concerns and, in some cases, their fears.” They wanted to know where they fit.
At first blush, that might not appear to be a big win, but to Wright, it was. The dialog is important, she says, and the result was productive and positive. It’s important for DEI leaders to listen and learn when they get resistance. “Many of the people I spoke with have become incredible champions and supporters of the work,” she says. “These are real people with genuine perspectives, and they deserve real, plain-spoken conversation. I sincerely believe that when people know better, they do better. That includes me. I’m grateful to be engaged in these conversations.”
Anand says that DEI is fundamentally about “good, inclusive leadership that helps you engage and retain your team.” When people see DEI as part of good business practice, they’re more willing to work together as allies or partners to help their organizations become more diverse, inclusive, and equitable.
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