Last year, following the murders of George Floyd, Tony McDade, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery World Animal Protection released a statement committing to being better allies in ending racial injustice.
Since then, we have taken a number of steps as an office to create a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace. Unfortunately, it took the public murders of these Black individuals, for us to examine our own behavioral values within the workplace. A failure I own, as the interim leader of this organization and as a person benefiting from systems that uphold white privilege.
I am very proud of the work our team has taken on to date. We still have a long ways to go, and this is in no way an exhaustive list of our actions, but it is an important step forward. Below are some of the steps we have taken thus far (Target date of completion Dec 31, 2021).
- Formed a DEI Advisory Group made up of non-leadership colleagues and aims to avoid the placement of responsibility around this work on our BIPOC colleagues.
- Drafted and agreed to DEI values that guide our employees and workplace.
- Collaborate with our peer market in Canada on DEI initiatives by partnering and communicating with their DEI committee.
- Committed to conducting and executing an annual demographic survey of staff members and board members to be reported publicly on our charity profile on Guidestar.
- Provide quarterly training and resources to all staff annually to provide further education on unconscious bias, including mandating training and testing around implicit bias for all hiring managers.
- Hosting facilitated conversations as a US-based team around DEI work and education opportunities.
- Committed to posting salary ranges on all new job postings to be transparent about the pay range for each position.
- Required training for our senior management team (directors and up) on Managing for Diversity – Expert Insights on Diversity & Inclusion.
- Reviewing, changing, and reforming our hiring and recruitment policies to promote diversity and equity within hiring practices, including partnering with DEI lead external recruitment firm Koya Partners for our executive director search and piloting blind resumé screening in the organization in an effort to remove unconscious bias.
- Creating a due diligence checklist for external partnerships and contractors to assess others’ commitment to DEI practices before partnering/aligning with them.
- Using our platform to acknowledge and support initiatives and communications that uplift marginalized communities in the programmatic work we do.
- Conducting a benefits audit and survey from our staff, including reviewing our healthcare provided to employees to ensure adequate resources are provided around mental health support and particularly recognizing the impact of traumatic external events and ongoing lived experiences for our BIPOC colleagues.
- Being a leader in our global organization on DEI issues and advocating for change to international policies and procedures.
- And more……(this is a living document)
Click here to read our original statement.
Steps we have taken and committed to for creating a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace.