Right Now: Three Actions That Meet This Moment - Triage, Strategy and Vision

Three Actions for Right Now…Triage, Strategy and Vision

Recently some clients asked if there were any concrete things they could be doing to address this “DEI Backlash” moment. They’ve read lots of missives and found that some leaned analytical or philosophical but not practical while others were superficial “to do” lists. Interesting, they said, but not really helpful. What they most needed was something equity-based that would appeal to the broadest audience in their organization and had some measure of depth. We know the dilemma - in moments of rapid change and uncertainty, stress levels run high and there is a desire for leaders to “do something, now”. This haste can lead to quick-fix actions that make it seem like “something” is being done but often land as empty or even condescending gestures. Instead, we have been offering nine touchpoints (three skills, three actions, and three pathways) that can help create space and give organizations support in times of confusion, fear, exhaustion and overwhelm. We are sharing those nine touchpoints in this article series (this article being on the three actions) and hope they are as helpful to you as they have been to our clients.

Let me start by saying that these three actions will be difficult to do well if the tools elucidated in the three previous articles have not been picked up. Using triage for example, moments of triage can be so triggering that they leave people either reacting at a frantic pace or freezing. If you are engaging in triage right now, the tool of resiliency will help you be able to do it while not being reactive or overwhelmed. Similarly, critical thinking will assist you in sorting the wheat from the chaff, dismissing the distractions and focusing on the triage in front of you. And finally, communicating in ways that connect allows you as an organizational leader to effectively communicate the steps and decisions tied to this triage time.

Distinguishing Between Actions

When you first shake an etch-a-sketch there is a moment where the faint imprint of what was there can still be seen, and if you stopped shaking you could trace out most if not all of that image. Add a few more shakes, however, and the previous design is unrecognizable. This national moment feels a bit like the latter. With so much being shaken  - government agencies and structures disappearing, educational institutions being silenced and brought to heel, economic disruption and instability, longstanding global allies being abandoned, commitments to social equity and fairness ending, our history and geographical places being rewritten and renamed, and so on – our clients have shared how difficult it is to see the previous plan let alone imagine a new one. As organizational leaders you likely built your strategic plans, budgets, staffing goals, benefits packages, programming schedules, growth plans and the like on what you thought would be some measure of throughline from yesterday to today. Of course you prepare for some degree of uncertainty as all good leaders do, but rarely does the conversation go from “what are our main goals for 2025?” to “will we even exist as an organization?” in such a short period of time.

Triage is conventionally defined as “the preliminary assessment of patients or casualties in order to determine the urgency of their need for treatment and the nature of treatment required” and that feels apt for this moment in time. What is the state of your organization with respect to: a) the casualties, b) the urgency, and c) the immediate treatment protocol required? The energy of triage is intense, the time horizon is short, the fear it raises is acute, the rippling waves of uncertainty it breeds organizationally are substantial. The three tools previously referenced (see articles 1-3) are clearly useful if not necessary in an environment such as this and so use them to continuously raise your organization’s emotional intelligence, thoughtful engagement, and connection as you triage.

Importantly, triage is different than strategy, which has a longer time horizon and sub-levers that are typically pulled in some developmental and timely succession. I am not referring to the structured confines of a “strategic plan”, I mean “okay, once we stop the bleeding how are we going to get to the hospital, what are the next levels of care needed, and how can we best provide them?” Strategy requires focus, experience and wise discernment with a bit higher altitude. Often, it is developed in concert with both internal staff and external partners, and can sometimes be seen as a bridge from this general season to the deeper hopes held in the vision.

And of course, organizational strategy is different from vision, which can be misunderstood as lofty and disconnected form the day-to-day, or mistaken as the easily posted “mission, vision, values” statements on an organization’s website. The vision I am referring to is the view of the future that is intimately tied to the ethical and existential roots of an organization, and also grounded in a social equity commitment. A non-profit that has a food bank and clothing reseller is not just “trying to feed people”, it envisions an end to hunger. Moreover, it wants to be a model for everyone in the community about how we care for our economically vulnerable neighbors and what we should do as a society about basic resource access like food and clothing. These kinds of organizations want to work themselves out of a job. Similarly, the core vision of an architecture firm via a social equity lens might be to leave a legacy of thoughtful, future-leaning buildings that serve everyone in the community and have a positive environmental impact.

The danger in etch-a-sketch times is that the vision starts to seem superfluous to the triage and the strategy gets conflated with triage. Thus, your first move is to create three “lanes” and make sure the issues, decisions and needs of each of the three are separate. Yes, there will be overlap, but they are not the same and while it may feel indulgent right now to hold to an inspiring vision and naïve to think about strategy when the house is on fire, the future health of your organization requires that you hold all three, differentiate them and keep each moving, albeit at different paces.

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Triage - DEI Backlash

The obvious casualty regarding DEI backlash is, well, DEI (note: HCG does not use this term and refers to our work as “social equity” or “social justice”). The last year has been brutal for this enterprise. As one of the presidential campaigns stepped up its rhetoric throughout 2024, the migration away from DEI work become increasingly visible across a range of industries. Capped off by a spate of Executive Orders, which are not law by the way, backed by the full force and power of a leader’s vengeance and willingness to punish those who disagree, the DEI movement in this country, at least as it has existed up to this point, has effectively been kneecapped. National Public Radio recently ran a story about the number of Chief Diversity Officers who have lost their jobs and noted that this was merely an institutional metric of the larger organizational abandonment of this type of work. It will take concerted effort to maintain social equity organizational change work that creates a welcoming space for everyone regardless of who they are, but it can and will absolutely be done.

Leaders doing DEI triage right now may think that the work needs to halt momentarily while those who care for the work can figure out what to do. This is a mistake. There are ways to continue the work and the ability of leaders to see the path forward corresponds to their knowledge, skill and capacity in this work. Fighting for something does not mean confrontation, it simply means that you are undaunted and will find another way. Your staff, community and client base are not going to suddenly revert back to the “good old days” and so letting go of your commitment to DEI will alienate and sow mistrust among these three constituencies; making a long-term bad move to accommodate a short term reality is a misstep. In short, DO NOT STOP.

Triage Actions To Take…

1. Pick one aspect of the work that will pass muster in this current climate and focus only on that (for the next quarter). For example, you could choose “communication” and focus on how to “communicate across various styles, backgrounds and life experiences”.

2. Run 1-2 short programs focusing on this topic as a signal to your organization that you will continue the work.

3. As a leader you need to MMAA – Message the work in ways that help folks understand your continuance is not lip service. Model the work in your own actions in the work place. The more positional power you have the more risk tolerance you should have as well. Advocate for this work in every aspect of the organization you interface with (every meeting, call, event, etc.). Act when needed to show that this work will still translate to concrete improvements in organizational culture and climate.

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Strategy - DEI Backlash

Strategy work around social equity right now means that you are seeing the landscape a little more clearly and determining how you want to execute a stronger, more coordinated focus on social equity knowledge acquisition and skill development. Avoid any high theory and instead make the work accessible and applicable. This will help you navigate resistance more easily because the organizational benefits are obvious and harder to dispute. The time horizon for this work could be the next 12 months so that you have room to read the landscape, be creative, and scaffold the work so no effort is wasted.

Strategy Actions To Take…

1. Refine your “why” for this work to meet this moment – The stronger your why, the more able you will be to weather this storm. It should include things like: staff (recruit and retain), deliverables, clients, communities, company values, “it’s the right thing to do”, industry leadership, etc. Elaborate and use only for internal communication at first.

2. Get clear on what you are doing – You cannot “do” DEI work. Diversity and Inclusion are outcomes of social equity work. Thus, you need to commit to social equity in order to achieve the DIB goals.

3. Get clear on how to do it – Take time to explore what social equity work entails, even if what you are learning seems unfeasible right now. This is much more than mere implicit bias training and so as a leader do the homework in order to have a strong understanding of this.

4. Identify what to do now

a) Identify the core components of social equity work that most apply to your organization and remove any problematic descriptors that could raise flags right now.

b) Refine your message to address those in terms of knowledge and skill – For example, HCG has developed alternative tracks of work called Seeding Change™ and Future Ready Now™ as a way to avoid the terminology traps while still being able to do substantive work toward a more inclusive and equitable organization. Please go to the Services page if you would like see those examples.

c) Conduct much smaller, shorter, but also more consistent trainings, etc. to build your team’s knowledge and skill around social equity work

d) Apply this learning much more locally (interpersonally, teams) – Rather than do “organization-wide” work, let the changes be very small scale and steadily build to cumulative organizational growth and change.

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Vision - DEI Backlash

The vision for this work represents your organization’s deepest values, commitments and aspirations. You might need to refine this not in order to conform to the constraints of the time but to grow beyond it. Many clients have done just that – they have been even more bold in their vision as a response to what feels like a regressive and painful time. Let the time horizon for this be the next 5-7 years. As a reminder, this work needs to be happening simultaneous to the other two actions so as to help your team know that this is but a moment in time and the larger vision of who and what you all can be with regard to social equity is still part of your organizational life.

Vision Actions To Take…

1. Backward design from the kind of workplace where social equity was embedded in your DNA to what it takes to get there (barriers that need to be addressed and opportunities that need to be accessed) to right now and use that to identify next steps. Here is a link to a video we use to explain backward design.

2. Temperature map what areas of your organization are green (supportive), yellow (cautious) and red (resistant) regarding their attitudes toward this work and strategize how you will both utilize and address those as you look at your backward design series of steps.

3. Power map your organization and see what strength and positional power (people, teams, divisions, etc.) you can leverage to support getting to the vision.

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Summary

This is a challenging time to do social equity work, but of course it is not impossible. Differentiating between triage, strategy and vision and then engaging in the three actions in a separate ways while recognizing the inevitable overlap will help you navigate this moment in concrete and thoughtful ways. Please feel free to reach out if you have any additional questions or need support.

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