If you asked your colleagues to explain the meaning of diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, when it comes to your workplace, how would they do?

Most of us can articulate what it means to have both a diverse and inclusive workplace. But what about equity?

Equity in the workplace is about creating fair access, opportunity and advancement for all. To do so requires recognizing that each person in your workforce has a different starting point. How do you ensure people with different starting lines receive the same set of resources, relative to where they are? How do you bridge that gap from an equity standpoint?

Answering these questions and pushing your workplace to become more equitable requires both commitment and action. Too often, companies put energy into their establishing their commitments — creating a DEI division, programming, etc. — and then call the job done.

But that’s only the beginning of the work. In an excerpt from the book “Bias Interrupted: Creating Inclusion for Real and for Good,” author Joan C. Williams explains the problem well:

“If a company had a problem with sales, you wouldn’t hold a deep, sincere conversation about how much everybody values sales, dedicate a ‘National Celebrate Sales Month,’ and expect anything to change. Unfortunately, that’s a lot of what we’ve been doing in the DEI context.

"Businesses need to use basic business tools to solve this business problem — the same ones they use to solve any business problem: evidence, metrics and persistence, until they achieve their concrete, measurable goals.”

True progress requires action. It requires the hard work of taking apart your systems, putting them under the equity microscope, and making many small changes that begin to add up to an improved, more equitable process.

In driving toward a more equitable workplace, it’s important to candidly determine your own collective starting point, recognizing that individuals are all at different places on their own journeys. What can you do to get everyone to the same baseline when it comes to resources and opportunities for individuals?

At Hilton, we recently reevaluated our job descriptions and opted to remove the requirement of a four-year college degree for most roles. The reason for this is equity: Some individuals have 30 or 40 years’ of work experience, having begun their careers at a time or in a place where access to college wasn’t as common as it is today. By removing this criterion from job descriptions, it creates a more equitable opportunity for more individuals to be considered for roles. The standards remain just as high. We just modified the baseline to be more equitable.

Equity also adjusts for the particular moment of time. If we don’t have the ability to realize that every person is an individual and comes with a different set of circumstances, it’s impossible to create truly inclusive environments. Conscious inclusion requires us to understand that different sets of circumstances exist. The equity portion is making sure we are not only considering those sets of circumstances, but also offering resources that will compensate for that gap.

Take cultural dexterity. If you work for a global company, you need to be familiar with all cultures. Even though someone can take cultural training, someone who has never traveled to another country will not have the same experience as a person who has left their home country and had immersive experiences in other places. The way you interpret that learning is going to be different — their experiences are not comparable.

Taking action begins with recognizing and addressing the barriers that create inequities in the workplace. Some are obvious and others are more subtle. But recognizing them all is the first step.

Here are some ways to both address and remove those barriers:

• Analyze your data. Identify where there are significant gaps in representation, assess the themes and determine if bias exists within your processes. How is talent identified for promotion? How are they selected for leadership development opportunities? Ensuring diversity throughout the identification process is critical to ensuring diversity in the outcome. This approach should be consistently used throughout all your talent processes — everything from performance management cycles, to promotions to internal mobility discussions.
  
• Evaluate the accessibility of your workplace. Far too often, diversity centers on gender, race and sexual orientation overlooking those with disabilities. The goal should be to make sure your workplace is accessible for all, and this goes beyond the structural changes. A wheelchair ramp and automatic door openers can assist those with physical disabilities, but technologies such as screen readers and closed captioning can increase the efficiency of many employees, even if they don’t identify with a disability. Take time to educate your leaders on reasonable accommodations and remove the stigma that disability is a disadvantage — it’s not only the right thing to do, but it could also be your competitive advantage.
  
• Examine your hiring practices. What strategies, platforms, and organizations are you leveraging to attract new talent? A lack of diversity in your recruiting funnels will yield a lack of diversity in the candidates. Think about how to cast a wide net when it comes to sourcing talent. Hint: A referral program and leveraging your ERGs and their networks is a sure way to attract diverse talent. Watch for ways in which faulty assumptions and implicit biases and stereotypes may cause you to be inequitable to candidates, such as assuming a new parent may not want to pursue a job that requires travel.
  
• Promote gender equality. Per a report, “Despite small gains in the pipeline, women remain underrepresented across the corporate ladder.” Equity starts within your hiring practices and must extend through the talent life cycle. Advocate for a culture that values work-life balance, implement a zero-tolerance policy for discrimination and harassment, and ensure women are given opportunities to advance and grow at every level. Equal opportunity benefits the business by increasing productivity, engagement and profit.
  
• Lean into multiple lenses. Inequity finds its way into the workforce because we all naturally look through our own limited set of lenses. Find ways to expand your lens set. Seek out new perspectives that can help you chip away at those inequities, such as microaggressions and age discrimination. In most cases, discrimination and causing inequitable experiences are unintentional. Becoming intentional in looking for it in new ways will surface potential problem areas.
  

If you proactively begin implementing these changes into your processes, even in small ways, you will ignite the momentum required to begin building not only an inclusive workplace, but one that is truly equitable for all.
DeShaun N. Wise Porter is Hilton’s Global Head of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Engagement. Prior to this appointment, she served as the Vice President, HR Consulting, where she partnered with C- Suite leaders to drive transformational talent initiatives focused on attracting, developing and retaining high potentials and top performers.

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