‘Diversity quotas don’t address the root of the problem – we need leadership transformation’

True industry diversity requires a ‘cultural reformation’.

That’s according to Megan Gaiser, CEO of Spiral Media and former boss of Her Interactive. Gaiser was one of several panelists discussing the relationship between creativity and diversity during the recent GamesBeat 2016 conference.

When pondering the idea of ‘diversity quotas’, ensuring your company has X amount of certain demographics among your staff, Gaiser recognised that this can help but more is needed.

“It doesn’t necessarily address the root of the problem, which is the need for leadership transformation,” she told attendees. “People want to be a part of the community, not a work force. Unconscious bias is holding us all back. It requires that we first become conscious of our biases so we can recondition the way we think to act differently, to lead more inclusively.

“True diversity requires a cultural reformation. And so not only do we need to ensure that diversity is hired, we also need to ensure that we put diverse people in leadership positions, so they’re in the room also making those key decisions. We need to ensure that the current leadership team — we invest in them to make sure they’re also diverse thinkers.

“The call to action is to reimagine how we fundamentally do business. In order to do that we need to tap into our creative intelligence, or rather re-learn it, since we were all born with it. That’s when we’re going to inspire collective intelligence, which is actually what diversity brings.”

You can read the full transcript of the panel session at VentureBeat. 

Image credit: Michael O’Donnell/VentureBeat