By way of introduction, I’ve spent the last 16 years of my career within the product discipline at travel companies, starting as a product manager at Orbitz in 2005. I’m now the chief product officer at Journera, a travel startup focused on making it easy for travel companies to use data across the industry to enrich their customers’ travel experiences. In addition to my product responsibilities, as a person passionate about diversity, equity and inclusion at a small (but mighty!) technology startup, I have the opportunity to build, grow and sponsor our DEI program at Journera. I mention this because on this particular topic, my good intentions outweigh my practical experience, so this has been a journey of personal growth.

One of the first obstacles I encountered is that many, but not all, resources that I found on DEI are centered around large enterprises and don’t directly apply to startups. For example, at a startup of about 30 employees, we can’t have multiple employee resource groups (ERGs) for each of the communities represented at our company. Instead, we’re hiring “the first” employee that identifies with a given community. We have to learn and adapt the best practices out there for a company of our size and build a culture that welcomes and supports all people.

However, most of what I’m learning applies to companies both big and small. While I’m happy to share more about the specific initiatives we’re undertaking, I’m focusing here on some of the most important lessons learned.

  • Don’t fear making a mistake. This falls into the category of easier said than done, but making mistakes is truly one of the best ways you’ll learn. People too often say or do nothing for fear of using the wrong words. I would argue that engaging, participating and learning from your mistakes will take you much further on this journey. Training will also help.
  • Engage and listen. Our first order of business when we launched our DEI committee was to conduct an employee survey to hear from everyone on what’s most important to our employees. We also held discussion sessions on employee benefits, inviting all employees to discuss and give feedback on how our benefits do or don’t meet their needs. We listened, took notes and then took action. Don’t guess what’s important; ask what’s important.
  • Walk the walk. As a leadership team, our commitment to diversity must be genuine. We can’t pat ourselves on the back for small wins or choose to just celebrate holidays. We must make lasting change. To that extent, we’ve included DEI as part of our strategy and planning sessions at the executive level. We committed to and conducted our first annual pay and benefits reviews for fairness and equity. We’re not exempting ourselves from training. We acknowledge our room for growth in leading and developing a diverse workforce. Make sure you show up and engage.
  • Promote your values externally. We’re primarily focusing our DEI goals on recruiting for 2022 as we look to hire significantly in the next 12 months to 18 months. What we realized as we self-assessed is that while our employees understand our values, we were falling short on promoting those values externally to job candidates and partners. We’ve since updated our website, our job descriptions and even the questions we ask our candidates to reflect the value of and our commitment to DEI. A few simple questions to ask yourself: Does the imagery you use on your website, in your ad campaigns, and in your presentations reflect the diverse world in which we live? Is the language you use biased towards particular communities or inclusive to all? Are you inviting candidates from under-represented communities to apply? Candidates, customers and partners will notice.
  • Get data. Ask candidates and employees to self-identify in optional, confidential surveys. You need data to evaluate your recruiting sources, to understand where candidates fall out in the pipeline, and identify interviewers or hiring managers that may have an unconscious bias. Similarly, you need to understand metrics amongst your employees. Aggregate data to evaluate teams, departments, roles, brands, promotions, etc., and set intentional goals, including training, to reflect the needs of your organization.
  • Leverage your network. While the travel industry as a whole skews towards white men in leadership roles, there are so many talented, inspiring, diverse leaders in our industry. It’s important that our teams have exposure to these people. At Journera, we have a guest speaker series where we leverage our networks for hour-long discussions with leaders and entrepreneurs both inside and outside the travel industry. We’ve been so fortunate to include Alison Taylor from American, Michelle Brown from United and, most recently, Oral Muir from Hilton amongst our guest speakers. Reach out to your network. I think you’ll find most people are more than willing to help.