How we turned D&I interest into actionable ideas for a global investment firm
As an international hedge fund and quantitative investment management firm with offices across the globe, our client is laser-focused on building positive company practices and work culture. The challenge lay in getting active input and ideas that are balanced between localised needs and large-scale global implementation.
The mission
As an international hedge fund and quantitative investment management firm with offices across the globe, our client is laser-focused on building positive company practices and work culture. The challenge lay in getting active input and ideas that are balanced between localised needs and large-scale global implementation. The goal was to help create a launchpad for more ownership and excitement amongst team members while nurturing champions for Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) across functions and offices.
The Brain Juice approach
To test our intended approach, we piloted a D&I idea sprint with their Vietnam office to measure the impact of the engagement session within a single country. By tackling the topic of talent acquisition and retention for three broad audiences; youth, women, and mid-career switchers, we helped to facilitate important learning conversations, open sharing and idea sharing across functions.
With the feedback gathered and lessons learned, we then ran a global idea sprint with D&I committee members from across the international offices. The programme was designed for the group to ideate around 5 challenge areas; fair recruitment, effective internal and external communications of D&I initiatives, engaging D&I social media campaign ideas, and better ways to measure D&I progress.
In designing and facilitating both the Vietnam pilot and global idea sprint, we added our signature Brain Juice touch through interactive elements like fun trivia, stimulus presentations with curated case studies and hands-on brainstorming using smart online tools. We also added weight to the programme by structuring real challenges that the organisation is facing, providing a budget and timeframe as parameters for the team’s ideation.
Our role
- Designed and facilitated a customised idea sprint to reinvigorate conversations around Diversity & Inclusion and to give the D&I lead insight into the thought processes of existing employees.
- Designed virtual backgrounds to form a visual identity and connection between colleagues for the Vietnam office.
- Curate a fun trivia segment for the topic as a warm-up for the participants.
- Researched and curated 3 case studies for the participants to learn from and discuss.
- Provided anonymous post-event observations and survey data analysis for the organisation to further improve on their local and global D&I activities.
Our impact
- Vietnam’s Pilot Idea Sprint: 15 employees, 53 ideas generated in 2 hours
- D&I Global Committee Idea Sprint: 22 employees, 118 ideas generated in 1.5 hours
- Discovery of shared expectations of D&I and working goals amongst the attendees
- Open sharing of thoughts about fair and empathetic policymaking that provided the D&I lead with a starting point for future initiatives
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