There was a point in my career when I struggled to be heard. (People who know me now will not believe this!) From a cultural standpoint, it didn’t feel right for me to speak my mind or voice my perspective. I believed in doing great work and letting the output speak for itself. Meanwhile, business carried on. I continued my diligence and progressed in my career.

Over time, I began to realize something. The more I grew in my career, the more I started to see gaps in our team’s thought process. There were perspectives being missed. Meaningful ideas that could drive impactful results weren’t being considered. I saw limitations in the range of thought from like-minded leaders. Business-critical solutions were being generated from narrow perspectives. And, this was not their fault — you can only pull so much from your own experiences. I knew I had a unique perspective to contribute. I was also worried that we could be missing big opportunities. So, I began to speak up. And sure enough, my colleagues began to listen.

I’m likely not alone here. It can be uncomfortable to assert your thought when your race, ethnicity or gender doesn’t match the majority. You may be working against unconscious biases which make you reluctant to speak due to fear of ridicule, judgement, or worse, punishment. But the truth is, your business’ future may be counting on your voice being heard.

Fostering diversity in leadership doesn’t just reflect on a diversity score, it has shown to have major implications on business performance. Companies with high gender diversity in their leadership team are more likely to outperform on profitability and report higher revenue from innovation. Concurrently, leadership teams with narrower perspectives may struggle to adequately respond to change or uncertainty. Pair that notion with today’s constantly shifting market landscape and you have a situation where lack of diversity may put a company’s long term survival at risk.

Cliques vs Collaboration

Despite growing awareness of the importance of workplace diversity, why do some teams (and companies) still fall short? I believe it starts with basic human nature. It’s natural for us to want to create an environment where we feel safe. Therefore, we surround ourselves with what’s familiar, including people and perspectives. This may subconsciously influence how we select our peers and who we look to for recommendations. We may be more comfortable listening to ideas from people of similar backgrounds and therefore, view them as our preferred advisors. In such an environment, how will “new” ideas get formed? After all, we’re trying to solve complex problems, not form a clique.

The problem with picking our business partners like we do with social peers is that we may be missing a crucial component to high-performing leadership teams — critical internal evaluation. If everyone in the room defaults to a common idea or perspective, we’re already constraining our ability to think outside the box. We also run the risk of isolating new ideas from coming in.

Creating a truly inclusive environment may not come naturally, but rather from a purpose-driven mindset. It’s our duty, as business leaders, to lead the charge for inclusion, where values are shared and difference is encouraged. We demonstrate our charge by pulling in those who are different, empowering them to voice their perspective, and rewarding them for taking risks. In order to drive change, we must first create conditions for it and that starts with leadership.

Filling the Idea Gap

If your customer base spans multiple cultures, genders, ages, and ethnicities, how could a single group with a common background fully comprehend their unmet needs? The simple answer is, they wouldn’t. Their perspective would be narrow and ideas, limited. Decisions will be based on speculation and consensus rather than critical evaluation and analysis. This is a great way to stall innovation.

No one likes having their ideas challenged but, it’s the only way we can ensure a comprehensive approach to solving some of our biggest problems. Growing complexity in the marketplace, finicky customers, disruptive competitors — there’s no end to the shifting tides. And while commonality and consensus may instill harmony, it often results in oversight and subpar solutions. A team of diverse backgrounds can bring a wider range of thought, perspective, and ideas that keeps us adaptable to frequent change. It allows us to challenge our own thinking and critically vet our solutions before further investment.

While this enablement starts with the leadership team, it should percolate down to the rest of the organization. We must cultivate an environment for teams throughout the organization to be better heard. Let’s be open to sponsoring new and, sometimes, unconventional ideas. Let’s better enable team leaders to evangelize new proposals from the bottom-up. If done well, this becomes more than a culture-setting principle, but a company’s competitive edge.

Diversity as an Imperative

One of the many things that excites me here at Nutanix, is the strong emphasis our company puts on hiring often and hiring diverse. This includes a number of employee-led programs to foster inclusion and celebration for diverse employee backgrounds including ethnicity, nationality, gender, and military status. This also includes the leadership team taking responsibility for making diversity and inclusion an imperative in how we conduct business.

We’ve recently started working with Rewriting the Code, a program dedicated to helping women build their careers in technology. Our goal is to bring more women into technology roles by creating early connections with diverse and talented communities and facilitating a path to opportunity. Our work with RTC will help us further diversify our hiring process and help us build a foundation for on-going success.

It’s not enough to just nod and smile at new ideas. It’s our job to set change in motion. We must take personal responsibility in creating a safe environment for all members to bring new ideas to the table. We must work to understand and validate different points-of-view and demonstrate our willingness to implement new perspectives into our decision-making. Most importantly, we must encourage our teams to embrace uncomfortable situations and reward those who are willing to take risks.

Diversity and Inclusion is not just a “good to have”, it is a “must have” for businesses and communities to thrive.

I would love to hear your thoughts.

Note: In honor of upcoming #InternationalWomensDay #IWD2020 #EachforEqual

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.