SJF’s Guide for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Best Practices

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Best Practices

SJF Ventures has curated a list of actionable steps and resources to consider in working towards improving Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) practices.

Understand company culture around DEI and identify goals:

• Evaluate the established practices at the company and consider how they can be expanded upon. Is there a diversity statement or policy in place?
• Take the pulse of DEI at the company, with particular attention to hiring practices and advancement. ImpactAssets’ “Sample Diversity and Representation Survey for Internal Staff” provides a good starting point.
  • Suggested resources include:
  • SurveyMonkey: provider of free survey software to create
    and track customizable surveys.
  • 60 Decibels: provider of corporate, impact-oriented surveys and data analytics. SJF has worked with 60 Decibels on employee engagement surveys at portfolio companies.
• Set DEI goals within the company, commit to DEI targets through talent acquisition, and track progress.
• These goals should be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-based) to ensure they are clearly defined and trackable.
  • Suggested benchmarks include:
  • Matching corporate diversity with distributions in the larger population, e.g., 50% of the U.S. population is female.₁
  • Targeting at least two diverse candidates in final round interview processes. This has been shown to increase the odds of a female hire by 79x and the odds of a minority hire by nearly 194x.₂

Expand the company’s network:

• Do targeted outreach via social media, university groups, membership associations, career fairs, and anywhere else diverse candidates build networks, search for jobs, and identify mentors.
  • Suggested resources include:
  • AboveBoard: platform offers executives unprecedented access to opportunity and gives companies unparalleled access to new networks of talent.
  • CEOX: executive search and placement platform that connects highly qualified, executive-level female candidates to CEO and board roles.
  • Fairygodboss: online community for women, providing career connections, jobs, and advice.
  • Him For Her: social impact venture aimed at accelerating diversity on corporate boards.
  • Honest Jobs: fair-chance hiring marketplace for people impacted by the criminal justice system.
  • Inclusively: professional network transforming the way candidates with disabilities, mental health conditions, and chronic illnesses find jobs and connect to inclusive employers.
  • Jopwell: career advancement platform designed for Black, Latinx, and Native American students and professionals. Jopwell is an SJF portfolio company.
  • Shift: career advancement and discovery platform for current and former members of the military. Shift’s Defense Ventures Program sponsors fellows for 8-week immersion programs at tech incubators and startups. Learn more here.
  • StartOut: community of LGBTQ+ founders, professionals, and Allies dedicated to increasing the number, diversity, and impact of LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs.
  • The Boardlist: platform that connects diverse candidates with board opportunities globally.

Address bias through the interview process:

• Conduct blind resume reviews.
  • Suggested resource:
  • Career.Place: online platform for anonymous candidate screening.
• Assemble diverse interview panels.
• Standardize interview questions.
• Eliminate talk about “culture fit;” instead, focus on “culture add” and “community.”₃
• Conduct ongoing bias / diversity training for interviewers and the company broadly.
  • Suggested resources:
  • Kirwan Institute: offers free online video course by Ohio State University’s Kirwan Institute for the study of race and ethnicity on implicit bias.
  • Hone: offers online, interactive classes on leadership and management topics including DEI.

Increase accountability:

• Share DEI goals with the company and encourage collaboration on meeting those goals.
• Employ systems such as fixed candidate-review timelines and develop a process for pivoting candidates to appropriate, open positions. This helps to propel candidates “through the funnel.”
• Track and report progress towards DEI goals.

Additional Resources and References:

• “Inclusive Hiring Practices: The Third Oar in a DEI Framework” Brighter Strategies
• “How to spend your D&I budget?” Diversio
• “10 Recruiter Strategies To Improve Diversity And Inclusion In Hiring” Forbes
• “How To Measure The Success Of Corporate Diversity Work” Forbes
• “A Data-Driven Approach to Hiring More Diverse Talent” Harvard Business Review
• “If There’s Only One Woman in Your Candidate Pool, There’s Statistically No Chance She’ll Be Hired”
  Harvard Business Review
• “Sample Diversity and Representation Survey for Internal Staff” ImpactAssets
• “How to Build Sustainable DEI Practices from Within” Jopwell
• “5 Concrete Ways to Reduce Bias in Hiring and Promotions” Jopwell
• “Four Concrete Ways to Prioritize POC Advancement” Jopwell
• “Why You Need to Hire More Black and POC Recruiters” Jopwell
• “Diversity Hiring is More Than a Checkbox. Building A Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Recruiting Strategy” Mac’s List
• “Diversity and inclusion survey templates” Survey Monkey

This list is meant to be dynamic and SJF will continue to make updates over time. The SJF team welcomes all feedback and suggested additions.

For a downloadable pdf file of this page, click the link below:

SJF DEI Best Practices (2022)

Notes: 1) Forbes 2) Harvard Business Review 3) Mac’s List