Hey HR Pros and Leaders! 👋
How should HR teams handle all the drama around DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) right now? With political pressure, legal threats, and general skepticism swirling, some companies feel like they need to dial back their DEI efforts, which could hurt employee opportunities.
HR managers are stuck in the middle, trying to hire and keep good people. We think there’s a way forward that everyone can agree on: reframe the conversation. Stop focusing so much on the political noise around DEI, and start talking about a bigger, less controversial topic: wellbeing.
The Problem with DEI (and the Power of Inclusion)
Lately, DEI has faced some serious backlash. People are talking about the “death of DEI” due to political heat and potential lawsuits. Even before that, support was struggling.
The competing opinions have created a weird battle between diversity/equity and meritocracy. Diversity still gets some love. But equity—the idea of leveling the playing field—is seen by some as undermining high achievement. (Though, let’s be real, “meritocracy” has its own issues too.)
This leaves us with inclusivity, which we can totally reframe in a way that helps everyone. This approach steps beyond the political hot potato of DEI and highlights how being inclusive helps not just individuals, but also teams. Inclusivity is the glue that creates belonging and cohesion, making it a critical part of overall workplace wellbeing.
🚨 Our Wellbeing Crisis
We all know that when people feel good at work, they’re engaged and productive. But engagement is in the toilet! Research shows global employee engagement dropped to just 21% in 2024. That’s a huge flashing warning sign for companies already struggling to get stuff done.
Things like presenteeism (showing up but not working) and quiet quitting are two sides of the same coin. Plus, many people (especially younger workers) are struggling with focus and critical thinking skills.
When we looked into why engagement is so low, we found four main culprits that often get ignored:
- Doing More with Less: Ever since the 2007/08 financial crisis, budgets and staff got slashed, but the workload (and hours) didn’t. This mindset still lingers today.
- The Humanity Drain: When companies focus ruthlessly on efficiency without any consideration for human interaction, people feel alienated, disinterested, and—ironically—less efficient.
- Tech Overload: We’re more connected than ever thanks to messaging and online platforms, but they trash our attention spans and make people feel isolated and disconnected.
- No Autonomy: Workplaces full of heavy processes, micro-management apps, and even spyware take away the sense of agency—that feeling of being in control—that people need to thrive.
Why Your Current Wellness Program is Failing
How can HR convince the bosses to invest more in protecting people? First, leadership needs to wake up and recognize how bad the problem is.
Studies show that 92% of workers want to work for a company that values their emotional and psychological health. Large companies spend a fortune (around $11 million per year) on wellbeing initiatives! Yet, it’s not working. In the US, engagement recently hit its lowest level since 2013.
Why are these programs failing? Probably for two reasons:
- Only a tiny number of employees actually use them.
- One study of 90 typical programs (like mindfulness, yoga, gym discounts) found that all but one (volunteering) were ineffective at boosting wellbeing.
We can’t treat wellbeing as a “nice-to-have” perk for the few gym rats on staff. Things like yoga or fitness sessions are fine, but they are not an effective wellbeing strategy for the entire organization.
The current system basically forces individuals to manage their own stress, even though the stressful environment is often the company’s fault. Instead of leaving it up to individuals, we need to embed wellbeing into the company culture—that benefits everyone.
🧠 Meet: Social Wellbeing
To figure out what a truly beneficial company culture looks like, we studied three decades of research (from Google’s Project Aristotle to work on trust). We wanted to know how to effectively boost wellbeing, engagement, and productivity.
The findings had an amazing overlap! They all pointed to a small set of core values: trust, respect, psychological safety, and belonging.
These values form an approach to wellbeing that focuses on bringing people together—a concept we call Social Wellbeing.
Social Wellbeing creates a sincere sense of belonging, cohesion, and teamwork. It fixes bad working practices and boosts engagement. It requires buy-in from everyone (from the board to the interns) and, in turn, benefits everyone involved—which is the very definition of inclusive!
For us, genuine inclusivity means:
- Everyone feels safe to give their opinion without fear of humiliation.
- We ditch annual appraisals focused on past mistakes and commit to ongoing feedback about future objectives.
- By encouraging psychological safety and emotional intelligence, we allow the group to benefit from everyone’s input, which boosts our collective intelligence.
Courses that train people to be inclusive leaders should be marketed by explaining their value to the business, keeping them out of the political mud. Without true inclusivity, businesses risk losing the confident input of the talented people they hired. With it, stronger collaboration and cohesion boost your competitive edge—which, regardless of anyone’s politics, is always a sound investment.
