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Making diversity a given within a company is crucial, even vital for its health. Leïla Grison, the Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Publicis France, shares her solutions with us.
As part of the summer break, the impact.info team invites you to (re)listen to one of our episodes published this year.Leïla Grison , Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Publicis France.
Enjoy listening!
Juliette Boulegon
impact.info journalist
Published on 31 July 2024
Transcript Audio in Français — text automatically translated· AI-generated transcript
0:00 Hello, this is Juliette and welcome to the podcast for those who want to make things happen 0:09 within their company. Birds of a feather flock together. Too often, 0:14 companies, big or small, integrate little to no diversity. So how can we avoid 0:20 discrimination at work and value differences? Saying it is good, doing it 0:25 is better, it's even vital for the health of a company. Leïla Grison works at 0:30 Publicis specifically on these inclusion topics and shares her solutions with us. Hello, 0:36 so my name is Leïla, I'm 44 years old, I was born in Paris and after the first part of my career 0:43 in communication, I am now the director of diversity, equity and inclusion 0:48 for the Publicis group in France. Can you explain to us what your 0:52 job consists of at Publicis? So my job actually involves driving change, 0:59 initiating it, leading and supporting it. My job is about the cultural 1:03 transformation of the company. And what does it apply to? So as the director of diversity, 1:08 equity and inclusion, it means my task is to work on five main pillars that are quite 1:13 classic, which are gender equality of course, but also the issue of sociocultural diversity 1:19 in our companies, better inclusion of disabilities and health issues, LGBTQI 1:24 and A+ equality, as well as the place, recognition and support of our experienced employees, 1:30 intergenerationality. That's the scope of my work and my job ranges from raising awareness, 1:36 to implementing measures and recruiting in a slightly more diverse way than we have 1:41 done so far. And why is it so important to have diversity within a 1:46 company? It's more than important, it's crucial. First of all, we apply 1:51 it just to the notion of diversity. A company that is not diverse is therefore a company 1:55 that is completely homogeneous. And just like in nature, an environment or an ecosystem that is completely 2:01 homogeneous and not diverse is an environment that is destined to die out. What applies to 2:06 biodiversity also applies to the business world. And what does diversity in business allow? It allows for 2:10 different viewpoints, sharing different experiences. It ensures that by combining different experiences and expertise, 2:13 you remain, if not at the forefront of innovation, at least capable 2:19 of innovating. You remain creative. Whereas, when there is no diversity or too little diversity 2:24 represented at all levels of a company, you tend to go around in circles, satisfied with 2:32 yourself since you are talking to your clone. I think companies tend to 2:39 recruit people who look alike. The company reflects who we 2:44 all are, meaning we have group biases, which means that as 2:48 human beings and because our brains tend to go slowly, they like to go 2:53 fast and sometimes too fast, which fosters stereotypes. But group biases 2:57 are those that lead you to recognize in someone who looks like you a 3:01 value that feels a bit more secure than in someone who doesn't look like you, simply put. There isn't 3:06 necessarily judgment or intent to exclude in those moments, but it is true that the 3:10 human reflex is this, and when we let it persist too long, we end up 3:16 becoming consanguineous. How do we break these reflexes and habits? It's 3:21 very easy to have a discourse on inclusion, it's very easy to have a discourse on the 3:27 3:31 Diversity, it's very easy to talk about representations. Most often, by the way, 3:35 the first people concerned are not invited to the table to discuss it. It's all very easy. However, 3:39 what is more demanding and more intelligent is to transform ourselves. Transforming 3:46 obviously involves a phase of awareness, of education about the risks 3:51 of not diversifying. When we all look alike, we are not necessarily aware of what the 3:57 least represented people might suffer in their flesh from being excluded from paths of 4:02 success. So, these kind exchanges, without judgment, but to move forward together, allow 4:07 for an awareness that opens the doors to inclusion. But right after, right after, 4:13 the subject is recruitment. The subject is diversifying recruitment. The subject 4:17 is diversifying the pools from which we recruit. The subject is opening up to students 4:22 interns, other than the top 5 business schools. So, that's how 4:28 a company becomes more inclusive. I don't have an ideal recipe. However, we must start 4:32 by preferring action over nice intentions. Then, as you just said, 4:38 companies are a reflection of society. So, why is this a topic at Publicis? 4:43 It's a topic at Publicis, as it is in many other large companies. But at Publicis in particular, or at least, we have chosen to address this topic, 4:47 because our job is precisely to create imaginations. So, our role, when we 4:51 are a group like Publicis, is to ensure that what we build as 4:56 imagination has the right image, has the right representation of what society is, 5:01 that it is inclusive. And for that, again, it's not just about working on 5:05 representations, but on who composes and designs these creations, the necessity of transforming ourselves, 5:09 internally. That's why it's important. Both, obviously, for ethical and 5:17 responsibility reasons, but also for a performance boost. The Publicis group in France has 5:22 signed its first disability agreement, and to be eligible for an approved agreement with Adrieste, 5:29 well, it requires really having put in place all the conditions to become and to 5:34 be a daily inclusive company, both with the group's employees and 5:40 collaborators, but also with the talents we recruit. And it took a year of 5:44 work to obtain the agreement, and since the agreement, there has also been a considerable transformation in the 5:49 level of trust, in the level of well-being, of people who finally allow themselves to talk to us 5:55 about their disabilities. Another example, I don't know yet if it's a success or not, but it's 6:00 a source of pride in any case, it's the way we approach the topics. Obviously, when we act 6:06 on issues of professional equality and gender equality in a company that 6:10 is clearly favorable to women and their careers and their place, however, 6:15 there still exists this feeling among some women of not having control over 6:21 their trajectory, of being trapped in limiting beliefs that hinder them. There are 6:27 two options, again, it's either you choose to speak up, to raise awareness, or you choose 6:32 to give them the keys to empower themselves. And so what's happening is that we are 6:37 indeed setting up a network that will allow women to take back control over their own 6:40 limiting beliefs and, above all, to take control over beliefs of super performance. 6:46 Impact.info, doing business differently. And Leïla, did you imagine at 16 years old that you would occupy this position? 6:52 7:02 So, at 16, I absolutely didn't imagine myself in this position. However, at 16, I dreamed 7:08 of being a documentary filmmaker and making documentaries specifically on topics that 7:14 I thought were important to highlight. So, I didn't see myself in these 7:19 roles, but very clearly, I believe I'm not very far from the dreams I had 7:24 at 16. And probably because when you listen to your little inner voice and your big 7:30 mouth, your big ideas eventually realign. Thank you very much, Leïla, for this interview that 7:39 you can also find on our website Impact.info, in our HR section which 7:45 brings together all the episodes focusing on concrete solutions for more engaged teams. 7:50 This was Impact.info, doing business differently. 8:00 Subtitles created by the Amara.org community. Embed this interview on your site
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