Keep, Kill or Fix: “You Can’t Ask That” Panels and More
About this Episode
Some DEI practices deserve another chance. Some don’t.
In this solo episode, Bree launches a new format: Keep, Kill or Fix, putting five common DEI practices on trial.
Bree works through unconscious bias training, Pride logo swaps, anti-racism strategies, “You Can’t Ask That” panels and the “bring your whole self to work” movement, giving each a verdict, and inventing a new one along the way.
The episode questions what each practice was meant to achieve, what it has turned into, and whether it’s creating real change or just activity.
Bree closes with a reminder that the success of DEI work isn’t measured by how many activities we run, but by the quality of what we design, evaluate and build on over time.
What You'll Learn
Why most unconscious bias training doesn’t change behaviour, and where the focus should go instead
How name bias shows up in recruitment, and how process design can reduce it
Why Pride visibility without systems change can do more harm than good
Why anti-racism and cultural inclusion aren’t the same thing
The risks of asking employees to share lived experience on “You Can’t Ask That” panels
Why “bring your whole self to work” should be a choice, not an expectation
Resources Mentioned
Keep Learning & Connect With Bree
Want practical strategies for navigating resistance and building real momentum in your DEI work? Attend Bree’s free webinar on Why DEI work stalls, you’ll get their insights and then an opportunity to talk to them about your context and challenges at the end! The next one is on November 19th at 1pm AEDT.
If this episode sparked ideas or questions and you want to talk more about how I can support your team or organisation, book a free 20-minute call with me. I’d love to hear what you’re working on and explore how we can move the work forward together.
And don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter for fresh insights, events, and tools to support your inclusion journey. Because real change doesn’t happen in silence.
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Keep, Kill or Fix: "You Can't Ask That" Panels and More
DEI Will Not Die with Bree Gorman | Transcript
Sometimes the most challenging situations create the most wonderful innovations, and I'm hoping that's what's happening today. You'll be the judge of that by the end of this.
I've had a sick child for the last week, and as a result, work has completely gotten beyond me and I forgot I needed a new podcast recorded. So I was thinking, what can I whip up this afternoon that will still be engaging and interesting? I came up with the idea of starting a new little series that'll pop up every now and then, if you like it, called Keep, Kill or Fix.
Obviously it's not my own idea. I've seen it on many podcasts I follow, and I love it. What I'd like to do is go through five things that are happening in the DEI world and say whether I would keep, fix or kill that initiative. So let's jump into it. And if this works for you and you enjoy it, send me some things you'd like me to review, and I'll make sure I do another episode in this style.
1. Unconscious bias training
The first thing we're going to tackle won't be a surprise to many people who listen regularly. Number one is unconscious bias training.
What will I do? Well, I'm killing it. No, actually, I'm going to say fix for this one. The reason I say fix is because there is value in understanding our biases. But more importantly, there's value in understanding how bias is built into our systems and processes, and how bias gets amplified and exaggerated by those systems and processes, particularly if we leave our biases unchecked.
One great example of this is the research around name bias in recruitment. We know in Australia, and in many Western countries around the world, it's been proven time and time again that if your name is anything but an Anglicised name, you're going to have to apply for significantly more jobs than people with Anglicised names just to get through to the interview stage.
There was research a few years back that showed, I think, if your name was Emily White and you got 10 callbacks from applying for jobs, and your name was Fatima Khan and you applied for the same jobs with the same CV but a different name, you'd only get maybe four callbacks. Don't quote me on that. I'll put the link to the research in the show notes.
We know that's an established way bias comes into the recruitment process. And that bias is amplified and exaggerated by a recruitment process that doesn't actively seek to mitigate it. So if we deal with the process, change the process and account for that inequity, then we can mitigate that bias.
That stuff is really important to teach, and we need to teach it to more people who own recruitment processes, but also to hiring managers, who in many organisations hold almost all the responsibility for how the recruitment process rolls out for each vacancy. So it's really important that we understand those things. It's important that we understand how bias works.
But most of our unconscious bias training is just awareness training that doesn't shift behaviour at all. In many cases it's been shown to actually have us lean into our biases more, and in other cases it's just a waste of time.
It's like if I sat here and talked to you about how it's a really good thing to eat healthy. Just hearing that message doesn't change your behaviour. You've got to do a fair bit of work to change your practices: the way you shop, the way you cook. So much work goes into improving the quality of the food you're eating or how healthy your diet is. That's behaviour change that actually needs to be facilitated by the systems and processes around you.
It's the same for unconscious bias. We can't just expect people to go, "I know all about bias now, I'll never make a biased decision again." It's rubbish. It's ludicrous.
So I'm going with fix for unconscious bias training. Inside my inclusive leadership workshops, I still teach about bias, but I teach more about systemic bias. I might spend one minute on unconscious bias, and then a good half an hour or more with leaders identifying barriers that exist within the systems and processes in their organisation, and workshopping how they might address those barriers. How they might put things in place that will actually mitigate bias and provide equity. That's where the focus of that training needs to be for me.
2. Pride logo swaps
All right, number two. Number two is Pride logos: where for Pride Month, or Midsumma, or Mardi Gras, whatever it might be, organisations pop out a whole bunch of rainbows. And then when that month or event finishes, the rainbows disappear.
This is a hard one, because there is value in visibility. But we saw what happened in the US after Trump's re-election, where organisations that had really led the way in rainbow washing their brand at particular moments immediately backtracked when it was no longer favourable for them from a government perspective. That harms. That reduces trust.
And what's it for? Why are we swapping our logo out? Is it just to sell more products that week? We're going to have our Dunlop Volleys with a rainbow on them. I shouldn't name particular brands, because lots of brands do it and I don't know how good or otherwise Dunlop itself is, but you know what I mean. We've seen all of these brands rainbow wash something, and if it's not backed by sustainable, meaningful, impactful systems change, then it's a waste of time, and it's actually harmful.
I've seen situations where organisations have gone all in on Pride Month, only to create an environment where employees thought they were safer to come out. So they did. And then they had really horrible, negative experiences afterwards, when the rainbows were gone and everything was back to normal, and they realised that perhaps it wasn't the best thing they could have done, because the workplace wasn't ready.
So visibility is important, but we do the visibility work once we've got our systems in place. Once we've trained our leadership. Once we know our complaints processes are operating in a queer-friendly way. That's when we can throw the rainbows out, because we've actually created an environment where we're actively managing the experiences of LGBTIQA+ employees, customers, clients, students, whoever it may be.
So for this one, what were my options? Keep, kill or fix? I'm going to add a fourth option. Can I do that? It's my show, right? I can make the rules. Delay.
Maybe it fits into fix. I think there's value in visibility. We want rainbows to give us a sense of safety when we engage with organisations, so we know they recognise that we exist and that we're welcome. But that can only happen after the real work of creating an inclusive and safe environment has been done.
3. Anti-racism strategies and frameworks
All right, number three. Anti-racism strategies and frameworks.
I feel like there was a moment in time where these became a little more common in organisations. We've seen some work from the Australian Government around anti-racism. The higher education sector has some frameworks out and some research that's been released. We saw a bit of momentum.
I'm not sure what others are seeing, but I've seen that falter a bit and go back to more cultural inclusion type language. I've seen it back off a little.
So when it comes to anti-racism strategies and frameworks, although they're not my core area of expertise, I'm absolutely saying keep. I'm saying push harder. Advocate to make sure your organisation is taking a holistic, systemic view of how to tackle racism, particularly in this day and age. That's where we need to be moving. Cultural inclusion is actually quite different, and it's not tackling the racism people are experiencing.
If you didn't catch the episode with Professor Nareen Young on the Gari Yala report, I'd recommend you go and have a listen. Nareen really talks us through some of the outcomes of that report, and people trying to create safe, supportive and inclusive workplaces really need to read it.
So for me, anti-racism strategies are an absolute keep, and a place to start if you really haven't been focusing there yet.
4. "You Can't Ask That" panels
Number four is one I've had trouble articulating my issue with. Number four is "You Can't Ask That" panels. You know the thing?
They've been a fad, I reckon, ever since I started doing this work. And every time somebody suggests one, they suggest it as if it's the first time anyone's ever suggested it. "Let's do one of those You Can't Ask That panels." And everyone's like, "Yeah, yeah, that's a great idea."
I do not think it's a great idea. I don't like them.
I would like them if the people on the panels being asked the questions were professionals in the diversity, equity and inclusion space. I do not like them when the people sitting on those panels are internal employees of an organisation, being asked to share their personal stories and experiences in a workplace that may or may not be safe for them to do that.
When I challenge this with organisations who say they're going to do it, that they've got people who really want to, and that those people are aware of the risks, I wonder if they actually are aware of the risks. Because the reality is, the majority of employees in an organisation don't see all the crap that comes through to the DEI practitioner or the workplace relations team. They don't necessarily understand the pulse of the organisation and know what they're exposing themselves to, or, from a personal perspective, what kind of position they're putting themselves in. Are they likely to overshare and then regret it in the next few days?
Yes, we have to give people agency. And yes, we want lived experience out there. But I think the "You Can't Ask That" format really asks participants to push the boundaries on the questions they ask. And maybe those questions aren't appropriate to ask of your colleagues in a workplace.
So can they be done well? Yes. Can they be engaging? Yes. Will they create long-term impact? I haven't seen an evaluation of one of these events, and that's a problem. We're not really understanding whether they're having an impact or not.
I'm not sure there's good follow-up with the people who sit on the panels: in three months, or six months' time, are you still happy you did that? And I'm not sure we're critically analysing the advice and information shared at these events. Is somebody who's inexperienced at talking on the issue sharing their own personal ideas and opinions that may not actually be shared by the community they're seen to be speaking for? What professional development is being done to make sure the people on the panel are giving useful, practical, impactful advice that is safe?
I have so many issues with it. I know the risks are seen as relatively low, but I think there are so many risks, and there are better ways to raise awareness than placing that labour on employees with lived experience, and not necessarily professional experience in creating inclusive workplaces.
So for me, "You Can't Ask That" panels are a kill. I honestly just wouldn't be doing them. I can't see a clear situation where they'd be the best intervention.
If you know you've got a problem around awareness, for example when it comes to disabled employees, then find out what the particular issues are that you need to work on in that area of inclusion. Target events with skilled educators to teach or share stories. Or with people who share lived experience professionally: you pay them to share it, they've done it time and again, and they've honed their craft. Or find other ways to capture lived experience and share it, without using your employees as the bait for the entertainment. It feels a bit ick to me.
5. "Bring your whole self to work"
All right, the last one I'm going to talk about today is the "bring your whole self to work" movement.
I think most of us have moved past that kind of language. We don't expect people to bring their whole selves to work. You shouldn't have to at all. That should be a choice. It is a privilege, and we should remove the privilege around it.
By that I mean it's an organisation's job to keep working to create an environment where all people can bring themselves to work, so that they can feel safe to be themselves. But they don't have to. It is not on them. It is on the organisation to create a space where people can feel safe to be authentic. It is not on individuals to just be open, bring all of themselves, be super vulnerable and put themselves out there with their teams when it may not be a safe space to do that.
I do talk to leaders about being more authentic, and authenticity can have boundaries. Even when people quote Brené Brown on authenticity in the workplace, Brené talks about having boundaries around your authenticity. So we need to make sure people have space for that, and are encouraged and enabled to do that. The organisation's job is to create the safe space for people to share.
If you're in a leadership role, you need to be authentic and vulnerable at times to allow connection to happen with your employees. That's super important from an inclusion perspective, as well as for engagement, productivity and everything else. But the amount of authenticity, the amount of yourself you bring to the workplace, doesn't and probably shouldn't ever really be your whole self. I think there are parts of all of us that are perhaps better kept outside the workplace. Maybe that's a controversial take.
So would I keep, fix or kill? I would kill the phrase "bring your whole self to work", and I would introduce a focus on creating an organisation that is safe for people to bring whatever parts of themselves they'd like to work. I know it's not as catchy. It's not a nice little catchphrase. But I think you get where I'm going, and maybe you can come up with your own catchphrase for it.
Wrapping up
So what I'd say at the end of all of this, and it's something I've been talking about a lot recently, is that the success of DEI work is not dependent on the quantity of activities we do. It's the quality of the initiatives we implement: how we design them, how we evaluate them, and how we continue to implement them and build on them year after year. So take those thoughts with you.
If you'd like to see another episode like this one, send me through some topics you'd like me to comment on. You can find me on the website, breegorman.com, and send me a note through the contact page. And I'll do another one of these episodes, hopefully shortly.