The words in the title of this week’s contribution have become part of the common parlance of the human resources profession. However, some private sector employers shudder at the thought. Their argument is fairly straightforward: how can someone who is taking all the financial risk be expected to adopt the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion in one’s own business decisions?

Their argument would continue on the lines that these are principles which a public sector organisation should adopt. Yet, in my long number of years of involvement in public sector organisations and also the public service, I have also encountered people who claim that since they are expected to deliver to the level that a private sector organisation is expected to deliver, then the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion are a nuisance because they serve as a barrier to good performance.

Let us take the argument further. None of the traditional management theorists has ever argued in favour of such principles and management thinking has not evolved enough to provide a solid theoretical approach of how to embrace these principles in the world of work. These are principles which make sense in many other spheres but certainly not in the highly competitive world of business.

Let us for a moment assume that such argumentation is correct. On the other side of the argument, we need to appreciate that a global survey has found that three out of four employees want to work in equitable, diverse and inclusive workplaces. More than nine in 10 employees want to know what their employer is doing to create such a workplace. Those who promote and seek to foster equity, diversity and inclusion argue there is enough proof to show that companies who promote EDI (as it is referred to in HR jargon) perform better if they embrace such principles.

In the face of such conflicting views, we are likely to get a situation where employers will stay put and let the world pass them by.

Although they would not be against equity, diversity and inclusion, they will not want to do anything about it because they would view it as too risky. As such, if there will be no significant change in the board of directors of most companies, in the structure of their management team, in their HR strategy and policies, things are likely to remain very much the same in the next two decades or so.

Inclusion needs to be all encompassing and not limited to a few elements

I strongly believe we need to define what we actually mean by these three words. For example, equity is sometimes interpreted to be that everyone is treated equally.

This is an impossible because we are not all equal, other than in our right to human dignity.  We are born equal in this sense, but we are not born equal from every other perspective. Some are more intelligent than others. Some are born into wealthy families, while others are born into poor families. Some may fit into the stereotypes we have created for ourselves, while others do not.

We all have our own life’s circumstances and what may apply in one case may not apply in another. Therefore, equity is not equality, but more akin to fairness.

Equally when we speak of diversity, we cannot limit ourselves to gender diversity or ethnic diversity, but also persons from different social backgrounds or neurodiverse persons. And inclusion needs to be all encompassing and not limited to a few elements.

I sincerely hope that the HR profession in Malta takes the lead in promoting the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion in concrete terms and not through bombastic words, and only after they have determined what it really means.