In the first season of the Vincit Talks vodcast, female leaders in the IT industry will talk about important topics affecting organizations. Listen in to get insights, inspiration, and tips for developing and renewing the IT industry.
We sat down with Katja Toropainen, the founder of Inklusiiv, a global DEI consultancy that helps organizations build more diverse, inclusive, and equitable workplaces.
The starting point was to discuss what diversity and inclusiveness even mean in the first place. Broadly defined, diversity is about differences – including obvious ones like age, skin color, or gender expression, but also less obvious ones like neurodiversity (differences in how our brains work).
An inclusive and participatory culture means, simply put, that all team members feel that they belong to the group. Equity means that all people are treated equally and have equal opportunities to succeed.
DEI in the IT industry
There is a recession in Finland at the moment, which begs the question: did companies abandon DEI as soon as the going got tough?
According to Katja, there is some evidence that this could be happening. But awareness of DEI issues is still rising and has made big leaps forward in the past 5 years. DEI is a long journey and not something that organizations can assume happens overnight.
The IT sector has a strategic advantage when it comes to DEI. These policies help to attract qualified people from different backgrounds and nationalities.
DEI advice for companies
While it’s hard to generalize, some common themes emerge that can support DEI initiatives. The first is the importance of leadership from the top – the commitment of management and also the board and the owners help to advance DEI.
Because DEI themes affect every person in an organization and are so strongly related to leadership and culture, the management team needs to lead on this issue.
The pair then discussed an important area for DEI and IT: the role of women. While numbers from Finland aren’t available, in the US Accenture and Women Who Code conducted a study and they found that up to 50 percent of women leave the IT tech field by the age of 35. One of the most common reasons was a non-inclusive culture. So working on DEI can really help companies to retain talented employees – which is key to thriving in tough times.
Watch the interview to learn more! 👇
