Case Study

Reaching Equity with Inclusive Communication

Project Data

Responsibilities: Needs Analysis, Instructional Design, eLearning Development, and Visual Design.

Type: eLearning

Date: March 2021

Target Audience: A Fortune 500 company's newly hired employees

Tools Used: Articulate Storyline 360

Challenge: Unconcious bias

Action: Assessed needs, designed and developed an onboarding solution that established the norms for open, welcoming communication.

Results: Raised awareness of unconscious bias and microaggressions and promoted an open and inclusive culture.

Summary

This concept project is an onboarding training solution is to help an organization clarified its commitment to diversity and inclusion by establishing its norms for an open and inclusive culture and help new hires develop inclusive communication skills.

Challenge

Inclusion is a challenge for companies that are even recognized for embracing a systematic approach to diversity by hiring and promoting a diverse workforce.

Companies regularly struggle with:

  • Equality

  • Equity

  • Bias

  • Discrimination

  • Belonging

"Hiring diverse talent isn’t enough—it’s the workplace experience that shapes whether people remain and thrive."

McKinsey & Company

Action

To create this course, I researched the challenges involved in diversity and inclusion (D&I). I was moved by the McKinsey and Company 2020 report, "Diversity wins: How inclusion matters", which is the third report in a series that investigates the business benefits of diversity. I was most intrigued by the analysis of data pulled from employee reviews posted on Glassdoor and Indeed. The report recognized that although the approach was not conclusive, the research may have generated more candid results than internal company surveys.

The report highlighted D&I best practices:

  1. Ensure representation of diverse talent

  2. Strengthen D&I leadership accountability and capability

  3. Enable equality of opportunity

  4. Promote openness and tackle microaggressions

  5. Foster and assess belonging

In addition to researching, I also examined my own biases of white privilege. Even though I am a first-generation American, my life growing up in the white suburbia of Chicago was significantly different than my friend's life who is Filipino and Mexican and grew up in the city of Chicago. Even though she is better educated, how many more opportunities have I been given based on my appearance?

I created this course to:

  1. Increase awareness of unconscious bias

  2. Help an organization establish its norms for an open and inclusive culture during onboarding

  3. Offer viable solutions that are simple to implement and scale

To create the storyboard, I designed the learning objectives and outlined the course. A design challenge I encountered was making the course engaging and clarifying the animation instructions while learning the program. I overcame the challenge by completing a Storyline course while developing, incorporating choices, interactives, and variables, and continually iterating as I developed.

Results

As a result of this onboarding training, my hypothetical Fortunate 500 company clarified its commitment to diversity and inclusion by establishing its norms for an open and inclusive culture. It helped new employees increase awareness of unconscious bias, and helped develop an inclusive culture that embraces a diverse range of perspectives and fosters a sense of community and belonging.

To measure the success of this project, I would evaluate the assessment results to find the most common forms of unconscious bias. I would also continually assess the company's culture through a quarterly diversity and inclusion survey that addresses openness and belonging and use the metrics to make informed decisions to continually improve diversity and inclusion.