Foley’s DEI Professionals Author Article on the Importance of Clearly Defining Diversity

Foley & Lardner LLP Director of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Alexis Robertson and Manager of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Dan Sharpe authored the article, “Foley & Lardner: You are Not Diverse (and Neither of Us are Either),” discussing the importance of being clear, thoughtful, and specific when discussing efforts to improve diversity to avoid the confusion and othering that arises when the term is used without clarification.

“Discussing race, gender, ability, and sexual orientation in an open and honest way may be hard and uncomfortable, but frankly, the discomfort that we try to euphemize our way out of can be what helps us make progress,” they write. “Being thoughtful with our language might require seemingly minor changes such as saying things like “we would like to increase the racial diversity of our applicant pool” instead of “we are looking for more diverse applicants,” but the difference between setting out to build diverse teams from the start and sprinkling in some ‘diversity’ for appearances is anything but minor.”