Developed by experts and backed by academic rigor.
DES Overview
Academic medicine and health professions recognize the significant advantages of having a diverse workplace. Diversity is considered an institutional driver of operational excellence. Institutions seek high-impact tools to inform diversity and inclusion decisions that can bring about desired change. At the same time, leaders in academic medicine, health care, education, and business have been challenged to identify validated metrics to advance their culture and climate goals. The Diversity Engagement Survey (DES) was created to address this need.
The DES connects workforce engagement theory with inclusion theory and diversity constructs. It was piloted in 2012 with 14 academic medical centers (a sample of 13,694 individuals). It underwent a rigorous psychometric process to establish face and content validity as well as reliability. The results were published in Academic Medicine.
The DES is 22 items long and can be administered to students, faculty, and staff. There is a minimal response burden, and the rich analyses allow institutions to develop a meaningful inclusion scorecard that characterizes their progress toward creating an inclusive work environment.
Ways Your Organization Can Utilize the DES
To build an inclusive culture that seeks to recruit, retain, and promote diverse individuals.
To determine the level of engagement of the total workforce in relationship to specific diverse groups.
To assess baseline strengths and areas for improvement related to inclusion and diversity efforts.
To determine progress toward inclusion goals in an organizational diversity plan
To measure progress in response to regulatory agencies.
To identify salient concerns such as historical baggage from stereotypes, economic constraints, and the impact of few culturally competent role models and mentors for underrepresented groups.
The DES Functions in Three Ways
Descriptive: Describes the inclusiveness of the environment by determining its level of engagement by demographic categories.
Diagnostic: Defines areas of strengths and areas of improvement for the diversity and inclusion efforts through benchmark comparative data.
Prescriptive: Points to the strategic direction for change by identifying which engagement domains and which inclusion factors to target for improvement.
DES Conceptual Framework and Measurement Model
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The 22 items of the DES were developed to capture the essence of the relationship between the institution and the employee rather than capture the employee’s perception about how they and other members who share their group identity are treated. Items are designed to elicit the relationship of the individual to the institution in their multiple group identities versus capturing the individual’s perceptions or beliefs about how persons of a group identity are treated. For example, the DES does not ask respondents’ opinions on statements such as, “Women are valued at this institution.” Or “People of color are treated fairly at this institution.” Rather, women and people of color as groups are analyzed to ascertain each specific identity group’s relationship to the institution as determined by the inclusion factors that support emotional engagement.
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Common Purpose,
Trust,
Appreciation of Individual Attributes,
Sense of Belonging,
Access to Opportunity,
Equitable Reward and Recognition,
Cultural Competence,
and Respect
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Engagement results from establishing conditions within the organization that engage the minds and hearts of its members. Vision/Purpose, Camaraderie and Appreciation are the three engagement domains related to the eight defined inclusion factors.
