Inclusive Leaders & CEO Impact Podcast by DIAL Global
Bi-weekly podcast show featuring conversations with inspiring thought leaders of today, unearthing their unique stories of inclusion, belonging, equity, talent, culture and social impact.
Inclusive Leaders & CEO Impact Podcast by DIAL Global
Charting the Course for Diversity and Inclusion at Xerox with Dr. Yetta Toliver
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Discover the transformative power of diversity and inclusion as we sit down with Dr. Yetta Toliver, Global Head of Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging at Xerox Corporation. With a legacy spanning 37 years, Dr. Toliver unravels the rich tapestry of her career, from her origins with the company to spearheading initiatives that carve paths for equity in the workplace. In a candid reflection on Black History Month, she sheds light on Xerox's trailblazing efforts in creating the first employee resource groups (ERGs), revealing how these platforms have become crucial in shaping policies and nurturing a sense of community and strategic business acumen.
Embark on a journey through the corridors of Xerox's corporate culture where allyship and mentorship intersect, giving rise to programs like 'manbassadors' and an AI-driven enterprise mentoring program set to redefine professional relationships. Dr. Toliver shares how executive sponsorship and ERGs contribute to employee retention and engagement, painting a vivid picture of the company's commitment to fostering growth and inclusivity. She underscores how data, paired with the art of storytelling, convincingly communicate the tangible benefits of investing in a diverse workforce, from talent retention to bolstering corporate prosperity.
Finally, step into the heart of Xerox's ethos where leadership and culture blend seamlessly, creating an environment where every employee is encouraged to bring their authentic self to work. With initiatives promoting psychological safety and open dialogue on topics like menopause, Dr. Toliver illustrates the extensive yet often unquantified return on investment in people-centric programs. She provides poignant insights into the importance of a diverse leadership team, drawing inspiration from personal mentors and icons like Maya Angelou, to foster a legacy of belonging that resonates throughout the organization and beyond.
🎧 Check our podcast audio here: www.dialglobal.org/podcast
📱 Join our Membership to access our DIAL Global Community Network app https://community.dialglobal.org/share/ljg71bsbWLspcnU-?utm_source=manual
📩 Contact us at hello@dialglobal.org or www.dialglobal.org/contact-us
🌐 Visit us on www.dialglobal.org
Hello and welcome to Diverse and Inclusive Leaders. This is a show where I speak with the most inspirational and thought-provoking leaders of today and unearth their unique stories of diversity and inclusion to help inspire, educate and motivate others to make the world a better place. Today, I'm so excited to be joined by the remarkable Dr Yeta Toliver, dba, lssbb. I'm glad I got that right there. She is the Global Head of Diversity, inclusion and Belonging at Xerox Corporation. Dr Yeta Toliver, as many of you may know already, is an experienced leader with a rich management background across a plethora of different disciplines. That's everything from customer operations, business transformation, lean, six Sigma you name it. She has done it. Yeta was recognised as one of Mergal's top 100 DEI leaders and more recently named as one of the top 15 influential women in diversity by Diversity Global. She is the Diversity, equity and Inclusion Executive of the Year, and that was by HRRO today and the Women's Alliance for Positive Difference Award. Honoury. Welcome to the show, yeta.
Speaker 2Thank you so much and it is my pleasure to be here today. I appreciate the invitation and I'm looking forward to for us to have an exciting conversation.
Speaker 1It's always an exciting conversation with you, yeta, whether it be in person or whether it be virtually. I feel like it was only the day before, almost, that we were speaking and getting really re-energised and focused, because this is such an important, if not the most important, time for us to be talking, sharing and inspiring others. Before we get into things, I'd love you to give us a little whistle-stop tour as to how you came to be where you are today and being at Xerox as well for such a long time.
Speaker 2Yeah, and talk about being at Xerox for a very long time. This is my 37th year with the company, so a lot of what you shared with the listening audience is my experience coming right out of my undergraduate studies at the university, walking into the front doors of Xerox. So I took the opportunity in being in an enterprise company that had an opportunity for me to grow and accelerate, and that's exactly what I did. As I took the journey to grow my experience and skills throughout the organization. I focused a lot of time in operations and more recently, in the last four years, I transitioned over to HR and all that I had learned in the various areas of operation the time I had spent with Xerox, who has been a part of diversity and inclusion.
Speaker 2For nearly six decades Half of my career I've been a part of that living legacy, of what Xerox has done, xerox being known in corporate America for starting employee resource groups or business resource groups. We used to call them caucus groups, but we've been a part of the evolution of change. So I've been a part of being a member of, and also leading, employee resource groups. So that experience lend itself for me to be a part of where I am today being a part of Xerox history to see not just the first woman CEO for Xerox to be put in place and Mulcahy, but watching the first woman to woman CEO succession plan in corporate America when she transitioned the leadership over to Ursula Burns, who became the first African American female of a Fortune 500 company. And in this month of Black History month, we celebrate and acknowledge again Xerox's presence in the United States Black History and in the marks that Xerox has made in that space.
Speaker 2So I landed here four years ago after the killing of George Floyd to bringing all that experience with me and the passion that I have and the drive and the purpose behind diversity and inclusion because the doors that were open for me at Xerox. I wanted to ensure that we continue to move that forward and walking in the footsteps of those that came before me. They left such a large for me to be able to continue this great work because diversity, inclusion and belonging because we do have to be here at Xerox has afforded me this opportunity and now to be in this position, knowing what we can treat every employee with respect, they build value, they know, they've heard that's been a part of my legacy and that purpose and that passion, what drives me and and gave me this opportunity to be sitting in this seat today.
Speaker 1Yeah, thank you so much for sharing, and you know you modestly say that you are walking in the footprints of giants. Yeah, at the same time, you have been such a part of the change that this industry and the world so desperately needs, in particular, around Black History Month and the fact that you know, as you say, xerox created the very first employee resource group, and employee resource groups now, business resource groups, staff networks, whatever different organizations call them are an absolute linchpin when it comes to driving and cultivating talent and engagement in this very arena.
Speaker 2Absolutely. They bring such a value and they are not only for us, our culture champion. They're culture conscious as well. The very first year that was started at Xerox is still thriving today. We now have a collaboration of 10 that are regionally located across over 35 countries. So that's how our expansion grows and when it comes time to understanding the pulse of the business, they're there to support advancing our diversity, inclusion and belonging roadmap.
Speaker 2They are part of that. They take ownership in that. They're proud of that work. They're proud of working for Xerox and what they have the opportunity to do. It's just not driving policy and procedure changes. They are contributing to business decisions and how we need to navigate and drive through the business. So I really appreciate that and I and I know the value behind it because now that I'm sitting in this seat, they are a part of what helps me to be successful and I do not take that for granted, not not one day. I take the relationship I have with them for granted. I really celebrate them and I'm humbled to be a part of the team and have them there supporting me.
Speaker 1I love how you say part of the business strategic objectives, because when we talk about employee resource groups, as you say, this is not just policy or procedure. You cannot put a price on levels of engagement whilst also having them as a sounding board, almost to utilise better business practice, business strategy. We've seen a lot of employee resource groups also be called business resource groups. You watch how that shift has happened over the last decade and beyond. They have a real strategic business imperative. Diversity is as I know. We both believe it is a commercial lever for economic growth and prosperity. Having that heartbeat and that pulse within the organisation is absolutely critical to that success.
Speaker 2They absolutely are. What they do as ERGs, individually and collectively, is amazing around that space, but they've always formed. When I look at their vision and mission statements, they all have the same synergy around helping for our talent to professionally develop and for personal development. So, if I can just double click in that for a second, from a professional development perspective, they really help for me. When we talk about diversifying the talent, making sure that the talent is ready, so they host their own programming and helping in that space.
Speaker 2Just this month we've had conversations about updating your LinkedIn and making sure your resume is ready. So mentoring and building connections form a networking perspective. And we also have had conversation around Lunar New Year, because we began the Lunar New Year, and we also have had conversations about financial wellness. Coming into Black History Month, we wanted to be heart smart and we've had conversations about being healthier from a heart perspective because we know heart disease is one of the number one killers for our African American community and we wanted to make our employees aware of that. So they are definitely driving force.
Speaker 2And when we talk about business, what we're doing with our Enable Law, which focuses on disability and neural diversity, that particular employee resource groups is making sure, from an accessibility perspective, our products and services that we put out on the market.
Speaker 2We're looking through the lens of ensuring that accessibility is there. So they take ownership of that. And our young professionals our employee resource group, host every year an ideation challenge where teams form across the globe to come up with ideas that the business can implement, and at the end of the competition we get to the top three. They come before the senior leadership staff, they present out and they're awarded a gift that they each get a cash award as well as they get to donate to a nonprofit, a charity of their choice. But we take their idea and we implement it into the business. So this is just talking about how powerful that they are and what they do, and they really do contribute to business. They go beyond supporting just their community as well as supporting the business of Xerox, and I really appreciate how they take that concerted effort to make that happen.
Speaker 1How fantastic as well that you cash reward the employee resource groups, and I love to spend a little bit of time actually talking around reward and recognition because clearly the maturity of your employee resource groups is really rising. I mean, we do a lot around kind of employee resource group maturity models and you mentioned that the professional development, the visibility and exposure they also get to the exec, which is key why would employee resource groups and these programs be any other any? Why would they be viewed by businesses as anything other than something which is personal and professional development is what I'm trying to do. That is really inspirational for other organizations I think to here, because as these employee resource groups go on that journey, you look at how many people are within these groups within any other function within a firm. At what point would there need to be the influence and leadership and management of multiple, multiple people? I mean the professional development piece is absolutely huge.
Speaker 2Absolutely, and that's one of the things that I do enjoy with from my personal experience when I was actively in our employee resource groups and being a part of the leadership team, because our employee resource groups are definitely independent, employee led. They are their own nonprofit charity organizations, recognized as a nonprofit's organizations, so they get to build their own sponsorships and their own connections outside of Xerox as well as inside of Xerox. What we were able to do when I was sitting on the board or leading the various ERGs is working with our executive committee members, members of our C-suite, working with our CEO, because you do have those cadences of meeting with them, as well as aligning with other organizations and their senior leaders, because they were interested in how we were navigating through with our ERGs. We did executive interviews to prepare us and making sure we were ready. We also would sit down and learn what were the skills we needed to improve. So as opportunities became available for us to fill the positions inside of our company, we were ready to step forward because we had work to develop those skills collectively. So it is really a unique way in which we work and we find the value inside of our ERG.
Speaker 2So when I transitioned out of operations into this role. A lot of what prepared me was how I navigated in the circles of our employee resource groups and how I built a strong network there and I took on stretched projects because I met senior leaders inside of other operations and I had an opportunity to go and see if that was a place I wanted to go and work while I was doing that stretch project but, of course, aligning all of that with my direct manager and making sure that I was good at doing my day job, because our employee resource groups leaders are appointed by the body of their committee. They're not appointed by anyone within their office, so they select who their leaders are and then their leaders are then aligned and work with me and our council that we meet and then they identify their global president, who then reports out along with me at a quarterly review, not just with the CEO or CHRO, and along with every member of the executive committee, so they really get an opportunity to have some great exposure.
Building a Sustainable Employee Mentoring Program
Speaker 1And exposure is so important as you're working your way up that corporate hierarchy. Specifically, I know that you are keen to talk around mentorship and enterprise-wide mentoring programs as well, as I'd love to talk about next. But whilst we are talking about executive sponsorship, I think it's worth noting as well for others who are listening in that it is worth getting involved in groups like this because exposure to senior executives that doesn't come around in really any other function there is that ecosystem to get to exposure to the top and obviously you have to have a CEO, as you do, and brilliant C-suite and exec leaders who are really, really brought into this agenda. It is an opportunity. Talent is everywhere. An opportunity is not.
Speaker 2Absolutely, and to be seen at that level is just very important. And one of the things I will say and I love to transition into mentoring because of where we are today is something that came from the employee resource groups. But what I will say with the executive team when we host that quarterly meeting. The executive team look forward to being at that call and each of them are aligned to an ERG, but it's almost like they become so proud of what their employee resource group is reporting out on to their peers so they share it out and they highlight that and it becomes. There are sometimes some tough conversations, especially when we start talking about funding needs, right Resource needs. Those are always a challenging conversation. But when they talk about the things that they've done and the programming that they've delivered and the engagement because one of the things I will say our highest retention in employees sits within side of ERGs, and what I mean by that is our employees that are members or leaders of our ERGs have a higher retention rate than any other if you look at our employees in any other lens, but through the lens of ERGs, that's where we have the highest retention rate. They help us to retain our employees. So what I'd like to share about our mentoring program as you did mention that one, our ERGs were running their own mentoring programs, again helping to grow and develop the resources that are aligned in the communities. And they're communities and I just wanted to highlight this are not necessarily those that or who recognize or a part of those different diversity facets. Their community consists of their allies and advocates. What I mean by that are women's ERG, the men who become members. They call them men bassitors. Talk about an ally ship man bassitors. Okay, so these are the men who sign up to say they're going to advocate for the women they work with them. Two of the man bassitors are appointed out of their population or appointed to be board members, to be the voice and they do programming, and these are senior leaders that are signing up to be man bassitors, just to give you examples. So when I talk about that community as an intersectionality of representation from an ally ship advocacy and those that are actually members of that community, that identifies being members of that community.
Speaker 2What we found? We had multiple mentoring programs. We also run mentoring programs for leadership development programs and inside of operations. So we started a pilot last year of having an enterprise mentoring program. So we would have a platform where everybody who wants to be a part of a mentoring program be it mentee or mentor of both they set up a profile and we use because using artificial intelligence is very key for me on my roadmap and not just to diversify our talent and using AI to help to bring in different types of talent. This is another way we're leveraging AI. When you create these profiles, it goes through a matching algorithm to kind of do the best match. So now we have, as we go through this pilot, we're trying to now really help with our resources to to make sure that we include those that participate in the ERG's because membership has its privileges those that are in a leadership program, those that may be in an operations that they'd say, when they go through their career mobility with their, with their manager, to say that they're having an opportunity to be mentored. We put all of them in to the platform right now in the pilot because we wanted to try that variation and then see if we can have an effective one resource, one platform that's managing all of our mentoring programs.
Speaker 2As I talk with my other practitioners, in this space, mentoring is really rising up to the top. A lot of focus is being made on mentor mentoring programs along with coaching, because the workforce, that's what they're looking for right now. So that's why we wanted to go ahead and take that as a concerted effort to see right now it's going really, really well the preliminary satisfaction around the platform itself, the programming of how the mentoring relationships are coming together. It's looking very, very positive. So if we are successful with the pilot, then we'll be ready to start building it to scale to bring in additional operations, bringing in different development programs as well. We're excited about that. That's just one of the things that we wanted to bring forward into 2024 to really help us develop our employees but also help with our retention and employee engagement.
Speaker 1As you've been speaking and I can see how excited you are about this. I can see the broad smile across your face, which is just wonderful is that you are bringing together the data and the signs whilst also amplifying the voices and the stories, and you can't have success without both of the two. So, having you know the data and the proof points, you know clearly that is an abundance of ROI. I know sometimes as practitioners, there is a frustration of you know leaders saying what's the return on investment, and we'll often say what's the impact of inaction. Actually, the return on investment here is that there is significant talent retention because of the employee resource groups, whilst at the same time campaigning, getting everyone excited about their unique idiosyncrasies.
Speaker 1Ambassadors what a great name. I'm going to have to use that one. I think it is absolutely brilliant. But really investing back in to the people and watching them flourish is one of the wonderful things about this role and the work that is done by diversity practitioners. And that leads me nicely into us talking about the ebbs and the flows, as you articulately put it, within the world of diversity, inclusion, belonging, empty culture. We call it dieback. I know that you have the being that, which I think is so. So important is that belonging piece. Talk to us a little bit about how you are able to sustain ebbs and flows within what is quite a emotional roller coaster at times of an environment to be in.
Speaker 2Well, I appreciate that. One and one thing, as you were building them up for the extra question I thought about back when I stepped into this role and I was constantly reminded people that in 2021, diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging is not a sprint, it's a marathon. So people had to visualize that because at that time and the reason I want to take us back there after the killing of George Floyd and a lot of organizations who had not been in this space wanted to get into this space and it's in looking and as you were talking about ROI is like, yes, I'm going to invest in it, so what's going to be my return on it? But you're not going to see a return like you would if you were to go in and put in a new infrastructure into your business, so you're not going to see that immediate return. It's going to take a period of time, which leads me to Xerox's historical timeline. That was something by my second year, as I was sharing out. You know these things about Xerox and what we've done in this space since 1960s, and that's when it reminded me that we've gone through this season of Epson flows.
Speaker 22021 was us coming up, the you know, going up, ascending up. We were coming out of our drought, our valley, because everyone was so focused on it. So we were building on the momentum of that and one of the things we had done was because we had been in this space for so long. When we talked about it being in our DNA, we thought it had definitely infiltrated throughout our entire enterprise. Everybody got in, was doing it, but we what we thought it was like on autopilot, if you will we didn't have anybody leading it. And that's when the voice of the employees spoke out and said you need to put somebody back over leading diversity, inclusion and the longing had come. And so that's when I stepped into the role to kind of get us going again, because we had hit our apps. At that time, we had lost our focus. We were still recognized, but as being a gold standard in certain things, but we weren't doing things to keep our employees excited about it. And so, as I stepped into this role, with a global focus and what we needed to do and re-energizing our ERGs because they were struggling, trying to make it happen, we didn't have a focus on well-being at that time, right, but it was at the beginning of how important we were in the pandemic. That's when we're starting to see the impact of our on our resources in these remote spaces and not being able to be connected, and they were losing their engagement. So we let organically a program get into play for well-being, but just let them organically.
Speaker 2In the UK and Ireland, the team did amazing work over the two years that they were forming and making that happen and I realized that was our season of excitement and we were. We were able to then move forward and, coming through it, realize this it's a marathon and not a sprint. Okay, we were having some moments where we were looking for additional investment to make things happen. There was a little uncertainty about that, but we're like, let's continue to move forward. Right, we may not be able to make everything happen, but what are the great things that we can do? And we, we developed this historical timeline and we were so excited and we were refreshed to remind it look at all the great work Xerox has done and let's continue to move forward. So, as we started going through understanding changes inevitable, we're going to always have change, but what can we do to be up, be the change makers and be able to manage our change better? And that's kind of how we started looking at it to ensure, when we do hit the moments like we did after in the US after the Supreme Court ruling with Harvard and North Carolina admissions practices we had to then learn how to make sure we audit what we were doing in the diversity, inclusion and belonging space.
Speaker 2What I mean by that. We had to put together a program to ensure now we were not putting ourselves at risk when we were setting certain targets and when we were communicating out publicly how we're presenting ourselves on our website pages, because in the past we didn't have to do that. We did what we wanted to do. What I also realized at that time Diversity, inclusion, belonging it is not a strategy, it is a philosophy.
Speaker 2That's a huge difference in how you present that, because if you presented it in a way with philosophy, it's gonna sustain the change of time because it's embedded in what you do. It's in your culture. Strategies are like programs they can decide at any time. We're not gonna move forward. So we wanted to make sure our DIP philosophy diversity, inclusion, belonging philosophy aligns with our core values, because that's who we are and that sets the stage for what we're going to do as we sustain the periods of ebbs and flows. So that's how we were that, from where I sit in sustaining it, and when I talk about Xerox having a sustainable model, to say you've been in this space for 60 years and you started. Just the first thing we started was diversity. That was the number one thing how you diversify your workforce, you making sure you have that right representation.
Speaker 2Around the 90s, we were all into inclusion. We stayed there for a couple of decades and then, in 2020, we brought in belonging. It is about being innovated and evolving, even in this space. So we, when you look at our historical timeline, we're still casting out to the future Our current CEO. He still has big dreams around what we can do, around diversity, inclusion and belonging. So we just want to know that it's going to be moments where it's going to be hard. It's going to be tough. Then there's going to be moments where we're going to be excited and we're going to be moving along, but as you continue with that flow and you have built it from a sustainable perspective. Just like Xerox is an iconic brand, we've been here over 100 years. We haven't been here over 100 years if we didn't continue to raise innovation right. And then that's a part of what we do. Even in the work I do every day. We embrace innovation. We know we're here to evolve, we are change makers and we are accepting that change.
Building a Culture of Belonging
Speaker 1I just love how you talk about this being a philosophy. I am quite biased, I have to say, but I honestly believe that the works, that diversity, inclusion, belonging, equity, culture, hr professionals, what they do this is mile wide. It is mile deep the amount of tenacity, resilience and energy that goes into this role. It is off the rick to scale, it really is. And so, going through those abs, those flows and, as you say, remembering that these are the core values, things like that don't change the world around us may, things that we read in the press often very polarizing and frustrating at times, but the philosophy and the core values they do not change. And brands that care, like Xerox, with leaders that care like you, you can't, you know, you can't put price on that really.
Speaker 2You can't, you cannot, and that's one of the things that I enjoy and you complimented me on it. You can sit in my small and I wake up every day doing my passion and understanding my purpose, because some days it's hard, it really is hard, but all it takes is one employee to say I'm being seen, I'm valued and thank you for that, and I'm like, okay, my work is done. It only takes one, and I appreciate that. We've had conversations with parents that are dealing with their kids with transgender, going through their transgender, and to be able to have those conversations and I practice active listening I now tell them I mean, can I do anything for you, but I can listen, and to know that they find a community here at Xerox that can help them have that conversation safely and they feel good about it, knowing that if it's something that when we talk about our wellbeing team to help because we got accredited for this by the Kepwell Mark group and knowing that our employees can have mindful meditation at work and be able to take a few minutes just to go online and inside of our internal website and be able to find some mindful meditation to help them. We're having open conversations with leaders about menopause now and how that impacts women and now their understanding. Oh, my goodness, this is what's going on, because that's impacting their wellbeing, their mental capability, and we can remove these barriers and then allow our employees to be authentic, bring their whole self to work, and now we've helped ourselves to be productive.
Speaker 2That's the end game, because we'll see that on our bottom line. So those are the things that get me excited about this work we do, and it's hard one. Going back to the ROI, you can't really put an ROI around that, but when you look at a company like Xerox and we actually did this certification for being an age-friendly company and our average tenure came out to be 23 years of service a company with five generations and workforce, we have silent generation workers that are still here. We have over 20 employees that are in the silent generation, while we still have Gen Z coming in our apprentices positions and our interns position. So that says a lot about the company when you think about that. So it's not all about the work, it has to be something about the culture.
Speaker 1The thing about culture and, as you've been talking about all the generations and the workforce, it makes me think about this it's living, it's breathing, it is eating, it is sleeping, and the psychological safety, almost, that you have described through allowing people to bring their tree cells to work, and it's something that is easier said than done really.
Speaker 1It is a wonderful commitment to the people within the business, that belonging piece. It transcends far beyond many things. We can feel that sense of belonging. We walk through the doors of somewhere that wants to welcome us. We feel the unbelonging where we step into a room and it feels that we want to be there. But there's so much research around the impact of that on engagement and retention rates. We talk a lot about ROI, but also there is the impact of inaction and so not putting these things into place and hearing the links back to retention rates, that is, we said it before but it's this ROI on steroids actually.
Speaker 2It is. It is, and Gallup released a report earlier this month that said employee engagement was around 33%, so that's very, very low. That's my favorite. You got more people disengaged than you do engaged, and I'm just looking at the season of time with going back again to our employee resource groups, who have done a lot of programming. As I stated earlier, we're just in the February, so we're six weeks in, and they've hosted several programs, from, again, professional to personal development, and now this year we're tracking their level of satisfaction for those that are attending, and it's tracking right at about 4.9, aggregated of all 4.9.
Speaker 2People are so excited to have those conversations, to be engaged, so I am excited about that piece, because we have quite a bit of our workforce that's global. How do we connect with our employees across multiple countries? Finding that time, though, is a sweet spot, but having that, and so they record the sessions for playback purposes, so that's kind of how we can remediate that. So they and what they've also have learned is collaborating, so they open their events, not just for their members of the ERGs, but all of our employees. So we're looking at ways to ensure that they have that information available and what we can do with our very remote workforce, because you have a lot of companies that are looking to bring employees back into the office for their engagement.
Speaker 2I have an opinion about that if that's gonna really make a difference.
Speaker 2But you have to meet people where they are and that's another part of just my leadership philosophy. When people ask me about my role and how do I do it being in this position and that's been a part of what I say I meet people where they are Because that helps people with that psychological safety. When you allow them just to come to you just as they are and you're not looking for them to come in to fit some kind of pre-described form, then that takes some of that pressure away. So that's what we're also trying to do, and just meet them right where they are and give them what they need and then let them grow right where they're planted. So, be it working from a home office or if they're working on a client side it's one of our client associates or if they're in sales, wherever they may be, we want to meet them where they are and let them know we hear you, we are respected, we value you, we want to be here to support you in whatever way that we can.
Diverse, Inclusive Leadership and Inspiration
Speaker 1Yeah, I said that the podcast would be 30 minutes, didn't I? Well, maybe 20 minutes, and we have gone so over. So I and I've just realized that I'm enjoying the conversation so much I would love to get into a couple of lightning round questions before we come to a close. First and foremost, what does diverse, inclusive leadership mean to you personally?
Speaker 2Oh, my goodness, it means I said this one earlier. Right, it's a philosophy, it's not a strategy. To me, it is about creating this tapestry. I believe everyone owns the first inclusion belonging at Xerox. Everyone has a thread for it, and pulling these threads together creates this beautiful tapestry. And that beautiful tapestry could be the result of your, what your culture means, and people can feel it whether they're in an office space or in a remote space. That's what it's about For me. I believe in meeting people where they are and creating that safe space so they can be their authentic selves, they can thrive and reach their full potential.
Speaker 1And what's your secret to success? Or is that one?
Speaker 2Drive, focus and commitment. It takes a combination of all of that to keep it going.
Speaker 1And your drive is off the rick to scale. I love it. How about if you could go back in time and speak to the much younger pre-doctor? Yes, her, she was walking through those office doors. What would you say to yourself or someone who's in a similar position?
Speaker 2I would say dream bigger. I didn't dream big enough. If I would have dream, dream bigger. But I still have some runway left. I would tell her just dream bigger.
Speaker 1Finally, I wonder who has inspired you the very most throughout your career, or indeed your life.
Speaker 2Well, there are two and they're my man Bassiders. How about that? I have a mentor. He's now retired from Xerox. He's my mentor now in life, but he was my sponsor as I went from the LSSBB, which is Link Six Sigma Black Belt. He saw me present out and I was on this phenomenal project that yielded about a 23 million profit before tax when we were done and he saw me navigate and he said wherever you wanna go, I wanna get you there in the company. And he opened doors and windows and everything for me and we still have a lifelong relationship today. But who feeds me every single day from heaven is my father and my sister, and I laugh. It's like the things that dad said that were so important for us in our adult life, as he told us in children. But talk about planting seeds. His inspiration guides me every single day.
Speaker 1It brings tears to my eye when I hear you say that I have my dad here with me, next to you.
Speaker 2Yeah, I'm definitely daddy's girl. I'm a daddy's girl all the way.
Speaker 1And even though they're not with us, they're still there, right, aren't they? Yes, you cannot have a better North star in a guiding light.
Speaker 2He would be very proud. Right now he would be very proud. I can say that.
Speaker 1Oh, he's listening to this podcast right now. Yeah, so go and come on, I love it. Any final words before we wrap?
Speaker 2Yeah, I would just like to leave you with something that kind of builds into the whole tapestry conversation. My Angela is an American poet. She is definitely a civil rights activist in her day. That continue the power of words that she did. It really helps with this, and she has a point that talks about. We all shall know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry and we must understand that all the threads of the tapestry are equal in value, no matter what their color. That one inspires me in my day job, but the one that still I rise to is what has inspired me throughout my life and those two shoulders I stand on. And the part that I love the most is when she says bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave. I rise.
Speaker 1Yeah, so thank you so much. Thank you so much, You're welcome. I'd normally do a summary, but I kind of I feel like where? Do I start, because some of the words that you have, some of the words that you have spoken, I think I actually personally needed them a lot today and I think there's many people out there that who are listening in, thinking do you know what this is exactly?
Speaker 1why I do what I do every single day?
Speaker 1Because the resilience and the tenacity that is shown by people like you and the journey, the marathon, as you say, is absolutely key. This is not a sprint, this is a marathon, and actually seeing people who have risen to the top in positions of leadership, who are continuing to be the beacon, the living legacy of many people and other leaders that have been before them, is absolutely critical. And I finally will just say as well for other people that are listening in is invest in your diversity or HR leaders. This is about the future generations now to come, and this is such important work. Forget about, you know, not saying forget completely about return on investment, but the impact of inaction and the impact of not having people feel that they belong is so incredibly profound, and it is deep rooted in who we are as people and who we are within the organization, where we spend more time at work than we do at home with friends and loved ones. And so thank you, Yeta, so much for being on the podcast. You've been absolutely tremendous.
Speaker 2Thank you so much. It's been my pleasure.
Speaker 1My name is Layla McKenzie-Dellis. I'm the founder and CEO of Darglobal and you've been listening to the fantastic Dr Yeta Tolova. If you've been affected by any of the issues in today's podcast, please make sure that you reach out. Do not be a stranger. Connect with Yeta. Get in touch with Xerox, get in touch with us here at Dial. You can download the podcast on your favorite podcast app, be it Apple, spotify or visit us directly at wwwdarglobalorg. Forward slash podcast. Do take care and we'll look forward to seeing you very soon. Music.