An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Access to talent. We are in a talent war, not just for service jobs but all jobs. Even with an impending recession, employers are struggling to find talent. A focus on diversity and inclusion will provide them with access to a wider array of talent and reduce the time it takes to hire people, particularly for those “hard to hire” roles. But it’s not just the diversity — you need to make sure the workplace is inclusive, or it won’t work. If you hire a person and they hear sexist, racist, homophobic, etc. comments or jokes, they’ll leave in a heartbeat. You need to ensure your workplace is inclusive to both attract diversity and ensure your team not only survives, but thrives.

As a part of our series about “How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Michael Bach.

Michael Bach is the founder of the Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion and president and CEO of CCDI Consulting. He is nationally and internationally recognized as a thought leader and subject matter expert in the fields of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility, bringing a vast knowledge of leading practices in a live setting to his work. He is the author of two best-selling books: Birds of All Feathers: Doing Diversity and Inclusion Right and Alphabet Soup: The Essential Guide to LGBTQ2+ Inclusion at Work.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive into the main part of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit more. Can you share a bit of your “backstory” with us?

Most of my career was spent in the IT field but I always had a passion for what we now call “diversity and inclusion,” specifically in the LGBTQ+ communities and with women and immigrants. I was raised to believe that I had a responsibility to use my privilege to the advantage of others, but to be totally honest, that wasn’t a job that would pay what I wanted to make. Then, in 2006, while working in the IT Consulting practice at KPMG, I had the opportunity to write the business case for the creation of a role in diversity. That moment changed the trajectory of my career because it merged a personal passion with a profession. Those were early days in the D&I space. So, you could call me a pioneer — which is a nice way of saying I’m old.

Can you share the funniest or most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? Can you tell us the lesson or take away, you took out of that story?

I’ve been working for over 30 years, so picking just one isn’t easy. I think the one that jumps out to me is the time that I identified one of my own biases, which happened before I got into D&I as a profession. I was in the process of hiring a new administrative assistant. I went through the interview process and found the perfect candidate — she had everything we were looking for. I went to my boss and said, “I found the perfect candidate, but…” and then explained that she was a larger woman. After my boss stopped throwing things at me, she said, “why on earth would you bring that up? What does that have to do with her ability to do the job?” She was right. And it forced me to examine where that bias came from.

I was a heavy kid. I started high school at 5’3” — and that’s not a height, that’s a diameter (if you get geometry, you get the joke). I have lived with body image issues my entire life. And I didn’t realize that I had a bias against larger people. That moment got me thinking about my own baggage and how I might be applying it to others. Dragging that bias into the light means it’s no longer controlling me. It’s not perfect (I still see the fat kid in the mirror) but it’s a lot better than it was. The moral of the story is that we are all flawed individuals.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you tell us a story about how that was relevant in your own life?

“Shut up kid, you’re not digging ditches” — the immortal words of my maternal grandmother, Doris Kennedy. I wasn’t exactly the toughest child. I was a bit delicate and largely didn’t want to do anything where I might work up a sweat. One day we (my mother, sister, and I) were all working in her garden, and I was complaining about something (I’ve never enjoyed getting my hands dirty), and out it came. That lesson stays with me. Whenever I’m feeling a bit down about something, or like life is too hard, I think of old Doris riding my whiny tween ass. That woman would put any drag queen to shame.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are?

Just one? There are so many. If I had to pick just one, I would say Beth Wilson, who was my boss at KPMG. She’s the reason I have a job in diversity. She gave me a job that I was in no way qualified for, largely because no one really knew what the qualifications for such a job were. But she saw something in me, and she trusted her gut. I hope I’ve done her proud.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

I think there are a couple things that make CCDI Consulting stand out.

1. We have the practical lived experience that so many consultants lack. There are many D&I consultants out there who have never done the work and just make things up as they go, stealing things from the internet. Lived experience matters but so does practical experience. Just because a person is from a marginalized community doesn’t make them qualified to do D&I work. The murder of George Floyd saw a huge increase in the number of D&I roles, many of which went to people because of their lived experience, not because of their skill. I mean no disrespect, and I have supported and mentored many of those people, but the employers were setting them up for failure.

2. We live our values. We’re not perfect, but I believe that anything we’d recommend to a client is advice we follow ourselves. Our values are not just words on a piece of paper. They are who we are, and they guide how we operate.

Are you working on any new or exciting projects now? How do you think that might help people?

Well, I wrote another book. Because… you know… pandemic. It came out on March 29, and it’s called Alphabet Soup: The Essential Guide to LGBTQ2+ Inclusion at Work. I wrote it because, even after working in the LGBTQ+ inclusion space for over 30 years, I still see people struggling to grasp the basic concepts behind gender and sexuality. Beyond that, I also wanted to inspire people to take action. It’s nice that people say they are allied with the LGBTQ2+ communities, but I want people to step up and engage — to use their privilege as straight and cisgender people to the advantage of LGBTQ2+ people. Considering what’s going on in places like Texas right now, action is more important now than ever before. Maybe I need to send a few copies to the US Supreme Court.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I’m in a very unique position in that I often have the ear of very powerful people. Those people listen to me. They turn to me for advice. And as such, I can work behind the scenes to influence situations so that diversity can increase in places it hadn’t previously existed. The specifics don’t matter (mainly because I can’t share confidential information), but I’m making the world a better place in my own way.

Ok. Thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the main part of our interview. This may be obvious to you, but it is not intuitive to many people. Can you articulate to our readers five ways that increased diversity can help a company’s bottom line.

1. Access to talent. We are in a talent war, not just for service jobs but all jobs. Even with an impending recession, employers are struggling to find talent. A focus on diversity and inclusion will provide them with access to a wider array of talent and reduce the time it takes to hire people, particularly for those “hard to hire” roles. But it’s not just the diversity — you need to make sure the workplace is inclusive, or it won’t work. If you hire a person and they hear sexist, racist, homophobic, etc. comments or jokes, they’ll leave in a heartbeat. You need to ensure your workplace is inclusive to both attract diversity and ensure your team not only survives, but thrives.

2. Increase in employee engagement. A great research paper from Deloitte called “Waiter, is that inclusion in my soup?” found a direct correlation between employee engagement and diversity and inclusion. Employers with a high focus on diversity, whose employees feel included, can see a lift in employee engagement by as much as 101 percent. High levels of employee engagement leads to higher levels of productivity, which leads to higher levels of profitability. If a person genuinely cares about their job (because their workplace is one that people can bring their whole selves to), they will be more engaged.

3. Increase in innovation and creativity. There’s a bit of a legend in D&I circles about a certain aviation company that attributes diversity and inclusion to the building of one of the most fuel-efficient airplanes ever built. Apparently, when putting together the teams to build this plane, they placed a particular emphasis on the diversity of the team members to ensure they had the skills they needed, but also a diversity of perspectives too. The team discussed their diversity at the project kickoff, and lo and behold, they managed to produce a revolutionary design. Diversity can lead to increased innovation and creativity, provided it’s done properly.

4. Access to different markets. There’s another famous story in the D&I world — but this one is verifiable. Frito-Lay (yes, the chip company) wanted to get into the Latinx/Hispanic market in the US. It’s worth billions, and they recognized they were missing out. They had tried a few different products, but they’d had little success. Then they turned to their Latinx/Hispanic employee resource group, called Adelante (which is Spanish for “ahead”), leveraging them as a de facto market research group. As Frito-Lay employees, they had a vested interest in the successful launch of a new product. Long story short, thanks to the input of the Adelante members and their family and friends, Frito-Lay launched Doritos Guacamole Tortilla Chips, generating $100 million in sales of that product in the first year — one of the best product launches in the company’s history.

5. Improve brand and reputation. A focus on diversity and inclusion can have a positive impact on an organization’s brand and reputation. Nowadays, if an employer doesn’t have a focus on D&I, they’re seen as out of touch at best. The world is changing, and people are concerned about who they work for. Research shows that employees want to work for companies whose values they connect with. Gone are the days of “a job for a job’s sake.” People want purpose and they want to know that who they’re working for aligns with their beliefs. A serious focus on diversity and inclusion can lead to an improved brand and reputation, which will help to attract talent and customers.

What advice would you give to other business leaders to help their employees to thrive?

Do everything you can to be an inclusive leader. Deloitte published another great report called the “Six Signature Traits of Inclusive Leadership”. In it, they summarize six traits of inclusive leadership (hence the name). One of my favorites is courage. But not courage like running into a burning building; courage like being open and honest and admitting you don’t have all the answers. As business leaders, we’re often told that we need to appear to know everything, and never let people see our weaknesses. But that’s ridiculous and exhausting. Courage is about a willingness to be vulnerable — to not know everything and be honest about that. We need more of that.

What advice would you give to other business leaders about how to manage a large team?

Practice the Platinum Rule: Treat others how they need to be treated, not how you want to be treated. Recognize that every person is unique and will have their own needs and expectations. Get to know your people and what they need. As a leader, I’ve always felt that it was my job to make sure others can do their jobs. But to do that, I need to understand what my people need. Figure it out and create the workspace that allows people to grow and develop. The result will be high levels of engagement, high productivity, high innovation, and high levels of loyalty.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this 🙂

It’s a toss-up between Dr. Cornel West and Dr. Kimberlé Crenshaw. They’re both such inspiring, thoughtful visionaries. I’ve heard them both speak at different events and they’re just amazing. Listening to Dr. West speak is like being hypnotized. And Dr. Crenshaw is the mother of the concept of intersectionality. I’m not impressed by celebrity. I’m impressed by people who give their lives to help make the world a better place. Dr. West and Dr. Crenshaw have done just that.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

They can visit my website at michaelbach.com and they can connect with me on social media: I am @TheMichaelBach.

Thank you for these excellent insights. We wish you continued success in your great work.


Michael Bach Of CCDI Consulting: How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

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