New Zealand’s second annual Dive In Festival has wrapped up in Auckland, and this year, the topic was identifying and challenging your own unconscious bias.
The festival was opened by Jo Mason, CEO of broker group and event co-sponsor NZbrokers, and attendees heard from corporate anthropologist Michael Henderson, who broke our biases down to their basic biological history. The other key speaker was Darren Linton, CEO of marketing company Yellow, who examined the vital role of leadership in creating a diverse and inclusive company culture.
They were then joined by D&I expert Mary Haddock-Staniland for a panel discussion around corporate diversity, the benefits of diversity ‘accreditations’ such as the Rainbow Tick, and some of the subtlest ways that bias can manifest.
The Dive In Festival is an international event taking place in over 30 countries. It has already hosted over 100 events in 2019, and Nigeria, Indonesia, Bahrain and Turkey have each hosted their first Dive In events this year.
“It’s the global participation that makes Dive In a unique, sector-wide event for diversity and inclusion,” Jo Mason said
“The goal is to provide moments of insight, inspiration and knowledge for you to take back to your firms, and help make a difference in building inclusive workplace cultures – which are very good for business.
“This festival now represents a global movement made up of thousands of people who believe passionately in levelling the playing field for talent.”
Mason says that the insurance sector is not always the best at collaboration, and this makes Dive In a truly unique and powerful effort from individuals who are genuinely passionate about what it promotes. The Auckland festival asked the question “this is not us…or is it?” highlighting the subtle patterns of bias that everybody experiences on a daily basis, and asking how we can consciously identify and challenge that bias.
The panel also discussed the need for diversity initiatives to come from the very top, and emphasised the importance of leaders being actively involved in creating an inclusive culture.
“Companies can see diversity as a box-ticking exercise, and yet diverse companies are more successful,” Mason said.
“Diversity often needs to be mandated to introduce it, but this in itself can be one of the biggest hurdles, because our own personal unconscious bias is often the first and biggest challenge. It’s natural that people gravitate towards the similar, so we need to understand where our unconscious bias lives, and how we can overcome it.”
