In June 2020, there were challenges on multiple fronts throughout the world and in the US. The COVID-19 pandemic was raging, and social justice issues were in the headlines. The EY US Cleveland office set up a meeting for its Black Professional Network with the managing partners of the Cleveland and Akron offices, as well as local DEI leaders. The goal was simple: to listen.
“We wanted to hear the challenges they were facing, and they wanted us to know about those challenges,” Lindberg said. “We wanted to make that commitment from a leadership perspective to listen and respond. Based on the results from that session, we created a local anti-racism strategy. We put together a plan that had about eight workstreams, some internally focused, others external.”
Partners were aligned to lead each workstream, and an advisory committee of Black professionals in Northeast Ohio was created. The committee meets on a regular basis to maintain that dialogue.
“We’ve made a lot of progress, but we don’t feel like we’re done, and we probably never will be,” Lindberg said.
Two tangible results of these efforts are a mentorship program that pairs individuals with leaders who can share knowledge and experience from their career journey, and a community engagement budget.
“We have a group of partners who look to see if we’re spending money in the right places to meet the goals that have been set through this program,” Lindberg says. “We redirected about a third of our budget in fiscal 2021 to organizations that previously weren’t getting any funds or were getting very little. There was a focus on helping those organizations in Northeast Ohio which had set goals that aligned with EY and could really benefit from the additional support.”
Bringing diverse thinking to complex problems allows for innovation, leverages untapped talent and makes a positive impact on society. The goal is to shape a more inclusive future and create a culture that embraces all identities.