Key takeaways:
- DEI Board Members Jason Clark at Charles Schwab and Jackie Hardt at M&T Bank shared the importance of collecting and sharing DEI data to advance strategies.
- Jason and Jackie shared which metrics help companies understand where efforts should be focused and which demographic data companies are currently reporting out.
- Strategies for internal and external reporting were shared including how you can encourage business leaders to prioritize more data sharing to help advance equity in the workplace.
Reporting on your diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) data allows you to create accountability and transparency into how your company is moving the needle. Collecting demographic metrics and measuring the performance of your DEI initiatives can help reveal where your company has opportunities to address change.
But how are DEI leaders informing stakeholders and employees on how strategies are performing? Which metrics are being tracked and how can you report your data to create accountability?
During a recent DEI Board panel discussion on collecting data to advance your strategies, DEI leaders shared insights on how you can report your data internally and externally to create transparency enterprise-wide. Here are some takeaways from that discussion.
What DEI Data Are Companies Sharing?
DEI Board Chair Jason Clark, Director of Diversity and Inclusion at Charles Schwab, discussed some of the quantitative data that companies need to collect in order to measure their goals.
“It’s usually demographic data,” Jason said. “Any type of demographic data, whether it’s race, ethnicity, gender, generation, veteran status, ability — a lot of that is checked initially in the application or an onboarding process.”
Along with general demographic data, Jason shared how they track information on employees’ life cycle within their company.
“In our data reports, we also talk about attrition,” Jason added. “We show information on promotions. We have quarterly data reports that we share with executives and it includes that information. It also looks at talent, who applies, who’s hired, and who stays within the first 90 days.”
“We have quarterly data reports that we share with executives and it includes that information. It also looks at talent, who applies, who’s hired, and who stays within the first 90 days.”
Jason Clark, Director of Diversity and Inclusion at Charles Schwab
At M&T Bank, DEI Board Member and Senior DEI Analytics Manager Jackie Hardt explained how they’re tracking demographic data.
“In our standard quarterly data, we’re looking at a snapshot of representation across the division or across the organization,” Jackie said. “We look at compensation grades and where they are within the organization officer level.”
She shared how M&T Bank also measures internal moves throughout the company. Using current metrics, Jackie explained how they’re performing assessments around equity and performances to guide predictive analytics.
Which Metrics Get the Most Attention from Stakeholders?
While it’s critical to report on all demographic data, Jason and Jackie discussed how certain metrics gather more attention from stakeholders.
“I think gender demographics get a lot of attention for a variety of reasons,” Jason said. “I think our population is split in the world 50-50, and I think people easily see that as a direction where we all need to focus. Generally speaking, there seems to be a lot of people rallying around gender diversity.”
At Charles Schwab, Jason explained how there’s also a focus around veteran and disability statuses.
“There are federal goals connected to those two demographics,” he noted. “We actually state them in our affirmative action plan, but it’s what the federal government wants us to do.”
He shared how they have a goal of 7% representation of veterans in their employee population tied to a federal mandate. On the contrary, he noted how there’s no federal mandates around gender, ethnicity, and race, so his team doesn’t have specified goals for those demographics.
“Sometimes there seems to be a lot of rallying and an excitement around goals where there are stated federal numbers,” Jason said.
Jackie explained how M&T Bank is sharing demographic information internally based around their goals.
“Because we’ve set internal goals, we get a lot of engagement around how we’re sharing rates of attrition, internal moves, promotions, and performances across race and ethnicity,” Jackie said.
She added how there’s a focus around racial equity in her organization and how they’re sharing information around racial demographics.
“We’ve had a lot of engagement about what that different experience is,” Jackie said. “What do we see in the data? How do we narrow any gaps that we see in terms of our rates across the key employee lifecycle processes? All of that is internal. We don’t share it externally.”
Resources for Industry-Specific Demographic Data
Another key step in sharing your organization’s demographic data is comparing your metrics to others across your industry. Jason described how Charles Schwab being a federal contractor requires his team to establish goals around specific communities.
“We set those goals by comparing to the labor markets that are in our industry, or people who have matched job codes,” Jason said. “There’s different types of jobs and locations. That’s data that anytime we’re showing leaders around their organizations, we’re also showing the benchmark of the market.”
But Jason noted how it’s helpful to also measure data outside of your industry to advance DEI strategies.
“If we’re only comparing ourselves to people with our job codes in our industry, then we’re not going to move the needle any further,” he said.
“We really want to understand what it means to meet the needs of our communities — for our customer community and our internal communities.”
Jackie Hardt, Senior DEI Analytics Manager at M&T Bank
He shared how Charles Schwab leveraged McKinsey & Company’s Women in the Workplace Survey to gain more perspective on gender representation in their company.
Jackie explained how M&T Bank has leveraged external benchmarks to report their demographic data internally. She said they participated in Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index and several other partnerships for external benchmarks around employee experiences, but noted how M&T Bank is focusing on internal efforts.
“We’re focused on our own culture,” Jackie shared. “We’re focused on where we’ve set some internal goals, and where we want to be. We’re focused on internally meeting those goals rather than frequently comparing externally, at least at this point.”
She added how there’s a focus to support internal communities within their organization.
“We really want to understand what it means to meet the needs of our communities,” Jackie said. “For our customer community and our internal communities.”
Reporting the Progress of DEI Goals Externally Versus Internally
External DEI Data Reporting
Sharing data around your employee populations and how your company is performing around DEI topics can be complicated. It requires all business leaders to be dedicated to your efforts and constant communication around how your strategies are advancing your goals.
Jackie shared how DEI leaders can externally report on the progress of goals in partnership with executives and stakeholders.
“I would say have conversations with all of your key stakeholders when you’re thinking about what you want to share externally and what you want to keep internal,” Jackie said. “We have great partners in our legal team who give guidance on what we can share.”
She explained how working with legal teams helps protect employee privacy when sharing data and how M&T Bank collaborates on reporting demographic data to protect sensitive information. Jackie also shared how she works with their ESG team for external reports.
“We work closely with our ESG office, and we think about what is going on in our ESG report,” Jackie said. “How does that align with what we put in a DEI report? How does that align with what we share externally in a lot of different benchmarks? If you’re lucky enough to have stakeholders and other departments so it’s not just falling on you, I’d say work with those folks.”
“I would say have conversations with all of your key stakeholders when you’re thinking about what you want to share externally and what you want to keep internal.”
Jackie Hardt, Senior DEI Analytics Manager at M&T Bank
Jason shared sentiment in partnering with ESG teams and peers for external reporting.
“This is also a good benefit of the DEI Board, you get to hear other ideas,” Jason said. “We also have an ESG report. I think this was the first year we had one, in 2022. That was the first time we put a lot of DEI demographic information out there. We also list our EEO-1 data reports for people to get a sense of what our demographics look like.”
Internal DEI Data Reporting
Jackie explained how internal reporting helps shed light on the complex and sensitive employee information.
“Internally, I think it’s a little bit easier because we have some general guidelines,” Jackie said. “We won’t share out specific numbers if it’s under a certain threshold, but we show everything in aggregate or percentage-wise.”
She noted how collaborating with HR teams and DEI leaders across the organization helps communicate the expectations of how information is from a privacy perspective.
“We don’t make these decisions in a vacuum,” Jackie said. “I think you have a lot of people who weigh in on this, and I’d say leverage those people.If you’re just starting out, figure out who’s been doing your EEO reporting. If you have somebody that’s been handling that, figure out what they’re doing already.”
Encouraging Business Leaders for More DEI Data Reporting
Sharing data within your organization’s employee population and representation across business lines creates accountability. While data sharing can be complex, Jackie and Jason noted why DEI leaders should encourage executives for more and frequent reporting.
“We have open conversations with our leaders about the benefit of sharing data,” Jackie said. “Here’s the benefit of putting this out there. Here’s the benefit of sharing internally. Here’s why we want to keep it to our business line leaders. I think you have to make that case of, ‘This is going to be good for our organization to put this out there. This is going to show our commitment, and this is going to show our progress.’”
Jason noted how Charles Schwab is in the midst of one of the biggest financial acquisitions in history, and their focus on reporting has paused. But he shared how there is still a priority to improve reporting moving forward.
“We’re still trying to figure out what our story is,” Jason said. “We realize we have an opportunity to share some of the great progress we’re making, but the people won’t know that if we’re not sharing it. So we know we need to share some stories both internally and externally. We’re still trying to navigate the waters of the high regulation that we’re in right now in the process of being in an acquisition.”
“We realize we have an opportunity to share some of the great progress we’re making, but the people won’t know that if we’re not sharing it. So we know we need to share some stories both internally and externally.”
Jason Clark, Director of Diversity and Inclusion at Charles Schwab
Learn more from your peers leading diversity, equity, and inclusion
Jason Clark and Jackie Hardt are both DEI Board members and shared more insights on collecting data to advance your DEI strategies during a recent live panel discussion. They discussed the importance of DEI reporting at the enterprise level, publishing DEI data for transparency, and more.
In the DEI Board, members are discussing collecting demographic data, including metrics to measure ERG performances, best practices for implementing self-ID campaigns, and more.
If you lead DEI at a large company, you can apply to the DEI Board to learn how the community for senior diversity, equity, and inclusion leaders at the world’s largest companies can help you advance your strategies.
