While the hardest part of the work might be immeasurable, we must also make our progress tangible. So we will hold ourselves accountable through clear, concrete, public metrics.
As we’ve covered in other Toolkit sections, metrics are important to measure accountability over time. Collecting data on the diversity of your employees will help you understand how well different groups of your employees are or aren’t doing related to others. Understanding how employees in your company are doing compared to your peers can also be meaningful.
Colorado Inclusive Economy members receive training and support on how to collect DEI data, how the data can be reviewed to understand your current situation and set goals for accountability. We will work with you to analyze data across time to understand where progress is and isn’t being made and to identify potential issues. We are also collecting, aggregating, and reporting data across our employers on an annual basis as part of our collective desire to hold ourselves accountable.
Employers should collect data on their current employees and their recruiting, promotion and hiring process. The data must be broken down into the different Diversity Categories. We measure gender, race and ethnicity categories with the Race and Ethnicity options matching the options collected in Census data (Asian/Pacific Islander, Black or African American, Native American / Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, Hispanic or Latino (Latinx), Two or More Races, White (Not Hispanic or Latino)).
We request that our Employer Partners collect and report on the following metrics on an annual basis. Each calculation has a company-wide number and then one broken down into each Diversity Category.
| Metric Description | Data Collected | Calculation (the “/” means “divided by”) |
| Overall Diversity | # of employees | Total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of employees |
| Recruiting | # of applicants | Total number of applicants by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of applicants |
| Hiring | # of hires | Total number of hires by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of hires AND Total number of hires by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of applicants by race, ethnicity, and gender |
| % Terminated or Retained | # of employees terminated | Total number employees by race, ethnicity, and gender voluntarily terminated/total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender AND total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender involuntarily terminated/total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender |
| % in leadership | # of leaders | Total number of leaders by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender |
| % Promoted | # of employees promoted | Total number of employees promoted by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of employees by race, ethnicity and gender |
| Fair Compensation | Median wage | Median wage by race, ethnicity and gender/median wage of all employees |
| # of Apprentices | # of Apprentices | Total number of Apprentices by race, ethnicity, and gender/total number of Apprentices |
| % of jobs below $45K, from $45K-$68K, and above $68K | # of employees below $45K, from $45K-$68K, and above $68K | Total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender within 3 salary groups (below $45K, from $45K-$68K, and above $68K)/total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender |
| % with benefits | # employees with benefits | Total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender with benefits/total number of employees by race, ethnicity, and gender |
Resources:
- CAPE Inclusion can help you establish achievable goals that are unique to your company. By doing this you can better allocate resources to get ROI on your DEI program. It also more accurately holds your company accountable with metrics to show outcomes.
- Read “How to measure the success of corporate diversity work” on Forbes (article, < 10 minutes).
- Read “Remote DEI metrics” on the Remote DEI Toolkit (guide, greater than one hour).
- Read “Meaningful metrics for Diversity & Inclusion” at Culture Plus Consulting (article, 10-60 minutes).