Here's how you can foster diversity and inclusion within your venture capital team.

Hire people different than you. Hire people smarter than you. Hire people who challenge your assumptions. Hire people from different backgrounds for enrichment of all. This should not be hard, but somehow it is. Use your head and heart.

Meet people where they are and understand: 1. Is there a common awareness and understanding of diversity and inclusion 2. Is there differences in opinion on its effectiveness 3. Are there any fears/ challenges as individuals consider what does it mean for me. Don’t make assumptions, start by understanding the teams perspectives before co-creating a diverse and inclusive future together.

Diverse teams bring a variety of perspectives, experiences, and ideas to the table. This variety leads to more thorough and creative decision-making processes, as different viewpoints can challenge biases and status-quo thinking. Research has shown that diverse teams are more likely to outperform their homogeneous counterparts because they examine a broader range of solutions and are better at solving complex problems. Firms that embody diversity internally are better positioned to understand and tap into a wider array of markets. With team members who can relate to different consumer bases or foresee market needs from various perspectives, a firm can better assess the potential of startups targeting underrepresented or niche demographics.

Starting with the data is always great. Yet, make sure that you are not only measuring the obvious diversity KPI: gender, race and age. Try to achieve diversity of mindset. Tests like the Clifton Strengths Finder support a better understanding of each other's strengths.

This baseline description is missing a critical consideration - values! To be sure, one could argue that the values are embodied in the culture but, that is often one of the harder things to do. Explicitly stating your team's values then auditing your performance against those values in each aspect of your business is a powerful way to ensure you recognise your opportunities and challenges for the diversity and inclusion you seek.

Set IMPOSSIBLE goals! That’s right! Set goals where it’s impossible for the team to achieve unless they come together! Impossible to make it happen unless they are able to look further from gender bias and develop a true sense of diversity! Impossible! When an impossible goal is achieved together, it’s fosters a team bond like no other. Look at the dream SEAL or marines team who embark on a mission and achieve success, a sports team or an impossible start up that made it big! That’s a great way to achieve diversity! Be IMPOSSIBLE and set impossible goals!

Setting clear diversity and inclusion goals is crucial after assessing your baseline. 🎯 Here's how to ensure they're SMART: -Specific -Measurable -Actionable -Relevant -Time-bound Examples: Increase representation of underrepresented groups within a specific timeframe. Implement mandatory bias training for all team members. Clear targets provide direction and a way to measure success.

Examples of diversity and inclusion goals could include increasing the representation of underrepresented groups within a certain timeframe, implementing mandatory bias training for all team members, or establishing mentorship programs for diverse talent. By setting clear, SMART goals, you provide a direction for your efforts and a way to measure success. You empower your team to take purposeful action and drive meaningful change in the pursuit of a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable workplace. #DiversityandInclusion #SMARTGoals #ActionPlan #Equity #ChangeManagement

You have to have a specific strategy for success that includes the axes of diversity that are relevant for your team. Then you can be specific about what you are seeking and measure the contributions across multiple axes made by each person. That, in turn, will guide the actions you must take to secure relevant additional team members. For all of this your process, management and culture must be inherently inclusive across all those axes of diversity. It is no good recruiting a team member for a diverse contribution if the team experience doesn't allow for that team member to make that contribution. Don't confuse equitable with equal. Someone is the boss/leader and carries the accountability which needs to be respected by team members.

Develop a Clear D&I Strategy Set Goals: Define specific, measurable objectives for diversity and inclusion (D&I) within the team. Commitment from Leadership: Ensure that the commitment to D&I starts at the top, with leaders advocating for and modeling inclusive behavior.

Don’t DIY this. Engage authentic and effective outside resources to advise on and implement action and then evaluate effectiveness. If you are not already a diverse team, and you don’t have significant diversity in your leadership suite that is trained on how to do this kind of work, thinking you’re going to build an inclusive culture de novo and on your own is a fools errand.

Don't confuse inclusive with consensus. Most business environments require clear responsibility and accountability for decisions. Inclusive means everyone can be heard and can see that they have been heard, that their diverse input has been reasonably considered. However, the decision-maker must be free to make what they consider the best decision having taken into account all the input. I have been fortunate to have had well-structured, diverse and inclusive work enviroments in my younger years and pleased to have created such enviroments in all the ventures I have started/managed. It is relatively easy if the one aspect of diversity you avoid is recruiting individuals who are inherently at odds with your values and culture.

Create an Inclusive Culture Training and Education: Provide ongoing training on unconscious bias, cultural competence, and inclusive leadership. Mentorship and Sponsorship: Establish mentorship and sponsorship programs to support the career growth of underrepresented team members.

Inclusivity is about allowing people to be their authentic selve. Create a room, where everyone can show her or himself as they are. Allow for quirkiness. Show what makes everyone special. This ist the base of an inclusive culture.

This is key and reaches what I wrote earlier (1) : it is your state of mind which will make your team diverse, not the method !

In the quest for diversity and inclusion, one of the most significant barriers we face is bias – both conscious and unconscious. Bias training isn't about pointing fingers or assigning blame. It's about fostering awareness and understanding, empowering individuals to recognize their biases and understand how they can impact decision-making processes – from deal sourcing to investment decisions. Because in the high-stakes world of venture capital, where innovation thrives on diverse perspectives, bias can hinder progress and stifle creativity. By addressing bias head-on, you pave the way for a more inclusive culture where every voice is heard and valued.

It definitely helps to understand each other's deeply hold yet unsupportive beliefs. Within high performance organizations, there is usually a jointly hold belief that equals hustle with performance. Creative and room for thought are usually not allowed. Organizations become much more creative and effective if they get rid of these beliefs

If you want diversity in your ventures, then invest in diversity in your team. For instance, research tells us that female-founded ventures are less likely to be (re)called, to get funding, but - controlling for that - are at least as likely to succeed, and less likely to fall flat. A team that appreciates this blind spot, and that shows actual attention and effort to under-recognized entrepreneurs, will pick up these extra opportunities and returns. The gap is even more consequential when it comes to foreign ventures, the more distant (geographically, culturally, politically) the worse the loss to the VC firm that does not recognize its blind spots and fill its ranks accordingly.

Again: It's all about diversity of mindset. If you hire people that are really different to each other, the general diversity will follow. VCs are usually driven by people that are both hyper-performers and hyper-rationals. Hiring women with the same mindset will not change anything at all. Look for people with a diverse mindset, and your organization will be much more creative and effektive

Don't sacrifice essential skills and knowledge for the sake of an abstract approach to diversity in recruitment. Make sure you build those essential requirements into your recruitment process without making constraining assumptions about how your candidates acquired those skills and knowledge. For VC team members who work with portfolio comapnies, ensure yu focus on recruits who have the appropriate abilities and empathy to transfer their skills and knowledge in the highly pressured context of a start-up venture. Having a smart person who can't effectively share their smarts is of little real help in creating value in a high growth business.

Inclusion and diversity are definitely core elements of your strategy so, yes, not one-time efforts. When measuring, put less emphasis on the simplistic numbers and pay more attention to the evidence that appropriate and relevant diversity combined with effective inclusion are driving significantly enhanced performance. If you are not getting those results something about your system isn't working as it should.

In the journey towards fostering diversity and inclusion, one of the most critical steps is regular monitoring and reporting on your progress. Regular monitoring allows you to track key metrics, from representation in hiring to inclusion in decision-making processes. By analyzing this data, you gain insights into areas of strength and opportunities for improvement, empowering you to adjust your strategies as needed. But it's not just about the numbers; it's about the stories behind them. Regular reporting provides a platform for sharing successes, celebrating achievements, and highlighting areas where further action is required.

Consider partnering with organizations like Vencapital, DiversityVC, VC Unleashed, and others to enhance inclusion efforts within your VC team (each of these address the problem in different ways). These groups provide targeted resources and support to improve representation and inclusivity in the VC sector. Collaborating with such organizations can directly augment your existing strategies and help access a wider pool of talent.

As a British Asian woman - I feel this is a bit of a loaded question . Diversity and inclusion comes naturally as we are that living and breathing diversity and inclusion . All partners are female in our firm but we all grew up in different countries , have different educations , made different lifestyle choices hence we have diverse opinions and thought processes and we come together as a wonderful eclectic mix. In my humble opinion if you want to really have a diverse workplace and diverse thoughts to create the strongest team this starts much earlier ; schooling needs to be diverse and inclusive , education needs to be diverse and inclusive , friends need to be diverse and inclusive , networking , relationships etc etc

Maybe just choose to work with and employ people with different views, backgrounds and working histories? ask for video applications instead of CVs and cover letters so you can find out more about the human ahead of finding out about their schooling.

Supportive Policies and Practices - Flexible Work Arrangements: Support work-life balance through policies like remote work, flexible hours, and parental leave. This can help retain employees who might otherwise leave due to rigid work environments. - Employee Resource Groups (ERGs): Support and fund ERGs for different groups, such as women, LGBTQ+ employees, people of color, etc. These groups can provide a supportive community and a platform for voices typically underrepresented.

In the fast-paced, ever-evolving landscape of venture capital, success often hinges on our ability to embrace the unconventional – to think outside the box, challenge the status quo, and innovate in ways that defy expectations. It's about recognizing that the most groundbreaking ideas often emerge from the intersection of diverse perspectives and experiences. So, let's celebrate the outliers, the disruptors, and the trailblazers who dare to chart new paths and redefine what's possible. But it's not just about forging ahead; it's also about looking back and learning from the journey. Each setback, each failure, is an opportunity for growth and reflection. It's about resilience, adaptability, and the relentless pursuit of excellence.