Washington, DC is home to countless nonprofits and think tanks serving communities around the world through policy and a variety of direct programs. One such think tank focused on financial inclusion engaged us to help them look internally, to explore the inclusivity of their own culture. We dug in, helping them assess beyond the common symptoms of culture challenges to uncover the keys to building a more supportive workplace.
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As challenges are posed to the business case for diversity, equity and inclusion, organizations truly committed to values of belonging and respect prioritize inclusion as a non-negotiable element of workplace culture. In fact, many of us who have been working in the DEI space for some time actually reorder the acronym to reflect how the work starts with inclusion. An international development think tank dedicated to improving the lives of people living in poverty recognized that to improve their work, they had to strengthen their own team culture. They asked The Collective Good to help them develop a clearer picture of their current culture and identify specific opportunities to grow into the culture they wanted.
TCG’s work was to test the organization's hypothesis that issues surrounding psychological safety, workload and DEI were the primary cause of culture challenges. After a series of conversations to better understand the connections that had been drawn between these issues by leadership and a culture committee, we developed a process that included both qualitative and quantitative data gathering directly from the team, through interviews, a robust survey, and focus groups.
Culture is what people perceive it to be, so the only way to figure out what is and isn't working is to ask team members directly and then combine multiple perspectives into one story. With a team of nearly 100 people spread around the globe, where this organization needed our help most was in lifting up the most common and most urgent initiatives.
As with all of our projects, hearing from the people closest to the work is a critical step to truly understand the strengths, pain points, and opportunities to improve systems. In doing so, we captured a range of perspectives about how work is prioritized, delegated, and completed across the organization. This helped us identify areas of greatest alignment and misalignment across AIRA and among the team. We used a congruence framework to analyze our findings through a lens of alignment (or misalignment) between strategy, structure, work and people/culture. We then held deep dive conversations with leaders across the organization, digging into challenges and co-developing ideas for solutions and next steps.
We also mapped out their key partnerships. This helped us understand their impact on different communities and what made them truly special. By the end, our team had a crystal-clear picture of what Equal Measure did, who they worked with, and what everyone had to say.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
Closed and Subjective Decision Making
In organizations it is critical for team members to understand how and why decisions are made. Even if staff don’t ultimately agree with the outcome, they can respect it if there is transparency in the process. Team members discussed not having opportunities to weigh in on decisions, particularly those that impacted their work, or to learn why the decision was made. This perception eroded trust in leadership and contributed to a feeling of voicelessness and being undervalued.
Technical Management Over People Leadership
One of the think tank’s assets was its strong technical leadership, but feedback we heard suggested that leaders (including mid-level managers) were valued for expertise over interpersonal skills. Micromanagement was also a persistent theme, with staff feeling they lacked agency in their knowledge areas. Effective leadership should inspire, guide, and support teams–not by being the smartest analyst in the room.
Lack of Communication About Strategy
There were too many priorities and one-off requests that kept shifting focus; as a result, any overall strategy got lost. A lack of communication and understanding around the organization’s diversity goals and DEI efforts raised questions about the sincerity of those initiatives.
As with all of our projects, hearing from the people closest to the work is a critical step to truly understand the strengths, pain points, and opportunities to improve systems. In doing so, we captured a range of perspectives about how work is prioritized, delegated, and completed across the organization. This helped us identify areas of greatest alignment and misalignment across AIRA and among the team. We used a congruence framework to analyze our findings through a lens of alignment (or misalignment) between strategy, structure, work and people/culture. We then held deep dive conversations with leaders across the organization, digging into challenges and co-developing ideas for solutions and next steps.
We also mapped out their key partnerships. This helped us understand their impact on different communities and what made them truly special. By the end, our team had a crystal-clear picture of what Equal Measure did, who they worked with, and what everyone had to say.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
Given that several of the narratives that emerged revolved around not understanding the "why" behind decisions and inconsistent follow-through, we recommended that leadership start with conversations about the findings from this process. Specifically, we suggested they demonstrate inclusivity by considering the following:
By following this roadmap, we are confident that AIRA can position themselves for success and mature into their next phase as a larger organization.
Most importantly, TCG urged leadership to start right away, showing the team that they were heard and engaging with them before changing policies and structures. We also suggested they spend more time linking their own inclusive culture to their work, showing the team that these internal efforts not only make for a better workplace for the team but also support the work they do for communities around the world.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
The result was a clearer mission and theory of change and a new way of leveraging their influence in the space as evaluators, conveners, and agents of social change.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
The result was a clearer mission and theory of change and a new way of leveraging their influence in the space as evaluators, conveners, and agents of social change.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
If you are in the business of social impact, your work is urgent.
Reignite your team, clarify your strategic path, and grow your collective impact.
The Collective Good is a strategy firm that helps leaders drive social change by cultivating collective insight and turning it into aligned action.
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