Sanctus Update: Diversity & Inclusion
In response to the Black Lives Matter movement we committed as a team not to let our intentions fizzle out and not to tick any boxes or rush through guilt to plaster over cracks in our approach to Diversity and Inclusion across Sanctus.
We are committing to taking time to do the deep work to either fill in the cracks properly, or do some dismantling and putting back together again.
At our all-hands every Thursday we create time to discuss our D&I initiatives so that they are on the agenda for the entire company every week.
Where we are right now is in the process of working with a D&I practitioner who specialises in working with mental health organisations and is a psychotherapist.
We’ll be working through all levels of the company; the Board, management team and all employees will be entering facilitated workshops for us to discuss race and diversity. These will be experiential and likely uncomfortable and we’ll be holding these in the next month.
The outcome here is for us as a full time HQ team to become more aware of our own biases and go deeply inwards so that we are able to create our own solutions for creating a more diverse and inclusive organisation.
We are also making far more of an effort to diversify our networks from which we hire to our HQ team.
In the past, we have shared job roles across our social media and believed that was enough. We won’t be making the same mistakes again and for this new role on our HQ team we will be posting the role across numerous different Black and POC communities including:
https://byp.network/
https://www.diversifytech.com/
In tandem, we are searching for a D&I practitioner to work directly with our Coaching Team. Given Sanctus Coaches are in a sense our “Product”, our need to have a diverse range of Sanctus Coaches is absolutely paramount to our accessibility.
Our intention here is threefold:
1) Partner with and outreach to other mental health communities and organisations with practitioners from diverse racial and ethnic background
2) Create a Diversity module as part of the required training for all Sanctus Coaches and tie this into our ethical best practices for becoming a Sanctus Coach.
3) Review and iterate where necessary our recruitment practices and processes for a fairer and more inclusive recruitment process.
I wish I was sharing more results and quick wins, yet I don’t believe there are any and we are of the possibility of tokenism and continued slippery forms of systemic oppression that we could easily continue to uphold and fall into.
I do believe though that we are making the right choices for the long term sustainability of a diverse and inclusive culture, by doing the deep work first and letting that lead to our own organic and creative solutions, rather than cherry pick what other companies seem to be doing.
James