Take a moment to learn how inclusion can lead to innovation and give companies a competitive advantage.

1. ®
Spring 2016
CEO IN ACTION AWARDS
Exclusive Profiles Inside
SPECIAL DETAILED SECTIONS
DIVERSITY IN:
STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics)
HIGHER EDUCATION
BLACK LEADERSHIP
Women Redefining
Corporate America
GROUNDBREAKING RESEARCH EXAMINES
THE INFLUENCE OF WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP
IN TODAY’S GLOBAL ECONOMY.
Unlocking the Power Of Inclusion
LINKAGE’S INCLUSIVE LEADERSHIP PROGRAM INFLUENCING
THE C-SUITE AND DRIVING THE BOTTOM LINE.
LYNNE DOUGHTIE
JOURNEY OF EXCELLENCE

2. Linkage’s program for inclusive
leadership is harnessing untapped
leadership potential that’s unleashing
workforce potential and generating
bottom line results.
“We’re focusing on the qualities
and competencies of what it takes to
truly lead inclusively across an entire
organization to realize the value it
brings in driving success. Developing
strong leadership just isn’t enough to
achieve success in today’s increasingly
global marketplace. At the end
of the day, it’s about developing
effective leaders who can deliver
the results necessary to outperform
the competition,” Linkage’s Vice
President of Inclusive Leadership
Laura Stone said.
The Linkage Intensive™ on Leading
Inclusively is being taught in several
organizations. One is a $76 billion
company with 110,000 employees
in 80 countries. The curriculum has
been rolled out to 1,400 of its leaders
in the United States and will be
phased-in later this year at locations
in Brazil, China, Europe and Japan.
“While we’re still in the early
stages, the data is showing us that the
program is unlocking a measurable
way for companies to track progress
toward becoming more inclusive,”
Stone said. This work has helped
form a more aligned culture capable
of generating positive results and
effectively influencing the C-Suite.
This parallels research findings which
indicate that inclusive organizations
with more diverse workforces are
performing better financially.
ROADMAP TO INCLUSIVE
LEADERSHIP
The Linkage program is a roadmap
designed for companies looking
for better ways to lead increasingly
diverse workforces. It links strategies
for diversity and inclusion, talent
engagement, organization and
leadership development together
to generate change. Along the way,
it strategically drives inclusive
leadership to create a more engaged
workforce that’s better equipped to
deliver desirable business outcomes.
“We have experienced a growing
number of leaders globally who are
looking for ways to engage employees
from underrepresented groups in a
more conscious and intentional way.
They also recognize the importance
of creating a supportive environment
where all employees feel valued and
can truly innovate—but often times,
they don’t know where to start. We
assess where an organization or leader
is stuck, provide valuable insight via a
team setting and through one-on-one
coaching, facilitate direct problem
solving, and connect the system
and the people in it to the larger
organization strategy,” Stone said.
REALIZING FULL POTENTIAL
Stone says today’s business
leaders are required to be globally
sophisticated, emotionally intelligent,
culturally and politically savvy, self-
aware, strategic, and connected to
the customer; all while maintaining a
focus on business imperatives.
“Inclusive leaders create
competitive advantage—they engage
and bring together colleagues with a
wide array of viewpoints, expertise,
backgrounds, and cultures. Never
before have we had a workforce with
such a range of ages, ethnicities,
cultures and mindsets. The
opportunity is now for us to maximize
this talent” she said.
Linkage identifies some of the
challenges posed by the changing
dynamics in workforces and markets
as the following:
leadership at a clear and
predictable rate.
not getting promotions nor are
they represented in board rooms
or C-Suites, or accessed for
strategic imperatives.
inconsistent, with pockets of
disengagement correlated to
diversity and specific leaders.
employees feel a sense of
exclusion and disengagement
has a larger impact on turnover
and productivity than
more obvious problems
like harassment.
LINKAGE
VICEPRESIDENT
INFLUENCING THE C-SUITE AND DRIVING THE BOTTOM LINE
LINKAGE’S PROGRAM UNLOCKING POWER OF INCLUSION
BY RUTH HAWK - EDITOR
Spring 2016

3. Linkage’s program addresses these
challenges in part by exploring the
thought processes that drive how
leaders show up. “Our work indicates
that understanding their own blind
spots is what leaders struggle with
the most when it comes to leading
inclusively and effectively creating an
environment where each individual
can contribute fully in their role,”
Stone said.
It also blends case studies, role
playing, and peer learning to help
leaders build awareness and modify
their own leadership style. One of
the interactive discussions features a
maturity matrix, which is designed
to ignite dialogue around how to
track and measure the behavioral
competencies of inclusive leaders.
INCLUSIVE LEADERSHIP
Inclusive leadership recognizes
all employees, especially within
underrepresented groups, for
their uniqueness, talents, and
gifts, making them feel welcome,
accepted, and valued.
For decades, Linkage has been
supporting line leaders as well as
talent and diversity professionals. Its
Inclusive Leadership Assessment™
materialized from trends that emerged
from the Institute for Diversity and
Inclusion™ an immersive learning
event that the company sponsored for
17 years. They found that line leaders
wanted to engage all of the different
populations in their organizations,
not just D&I specialists. They then
set out to get a better understanding
of the market through an in-depth
interview process with senior leaders
at organizations globally to ultimately
answer the question: What makes
a leader lead inclusively? Linkage’s
research finds most leaders want to
engage everyone, yet many of them
unintentionally cause others to feel
excluded, leading to disengagement.
While there is positive intent; there
is negative impact. To bridge the gap,
the Linkage Intensive™ on Leading
Continued on pg. 64
LAURA STONE
Read more at DIVERSITYJOURNAL.COM 63

4. Continued from pg. 63
Inclusively maps the behavioral
competencies essential for building
an inclusive culture, increasing
employee engagement, and advancing
strategic imperatives.
A primary part of the program
frames key questions for leaders:
not limited by my unconscious
biases and inherently
limited worldview?
to be fully engaged in the work
of the organization and contribute
all of their talents, worldviews
and discretionary effort?
Linkage’s initial journey initiates
clients through strategic conversation
that:
interviews from a number of
projects, levels, functions) –
What is going on?
What really matters?
What are priorities?
What else do we need to
better understand?
what are the potential approaches
to addressing what really matters?
It evolves into assessing:
understand their role in
creating inclusive cultures?
of their impact vs. their intent?
connect why and how having
an inclusive organization is
integral to the success of
the business and winning
in the marketplace?
are successful?
CORE COMPETENCIES
Linkage addresses these questions
through behavioral assessments,
organization development, action
learning and skill-building practices
that probe into competencies needed
to excel at inclusive leadership. The
program focuses on the following
competencies:
At the core, inclusive leaders:
Are focused on results: They focus
on results and the common good,
as opposed to the personal style or
methods for achieving the results.
Understand how to leverage
diversity and talent: They execute
goals, strategy, and operations by fully
leveraging the organization’s talent.
They lead themselves by:
Being Courageous: They tactfully
acknowledge and discuss differences,
such as strengths and weaknesses,
performance, style, and motivators
as well as differences such as race,
gender, and background.
Being Authentic and Open: They
appropriately share their own identity
through effective storytelling and
acknowledge their own fallibilities.
Valuing Other Perspectives: They
recognize that all individuals have
unique and valuable contributions.
They lead culture by:
Allowing for Differences: They
recognize how others are different
and how this can reflect in working
style. They appropriately adapt to
these differences.
Sharing Authority, Power, and
Credit: They empower others to
autonomously pursue their goals,
appropriately allocate individual
praise and recognition, and
enable others to contribute to
decisions regardless of their level in
organizational hierarchy.
Building a Climate of Trust and
Respect: They establish a culture of
civility where individuals are free
to self-disclose without concern of
reprisal, judgment, or gossip.
“Today, good intentions are no
longer enough,” Stone said. “New
language, awareness and insight are
just the start. Deeper understanding
of unconscious bias, identity,
privilege, and power are now the new
baseline in inclusive leadership,”
she added.
With the program, Linkage is
creating the “linkage” between
diversity and inclusion strategy and
applying it to talent engagement and
leadership development. It is helping
clients self-diagnose their own
journey in creating inclusive cultures.
Laura Stone is a Vice President, Executive Coach,
and Principal Consultant at Linkage. She is an
expert strategist, speaker, and top team facilitator,
and has extensive experience working with leaders
and leadership teams to drive bottom-line results.
At Linkage, Ms. Stone oversees the development and
codification of the firm’s work in Inclusive Leadership.
She has more than 25 years of expertise as a strategic
leadership consultant, advisor and executive coach
with organizations such as Pfizer, Harvard Vanguard,
AstraZeneca, Harvard Business School, GE, Fidelity
Investments, and Unilever. She’s also adept at working
with organizations of every size (from start-ups to
the Fortune 100). She holds a BA in both English
Literature and French from the University of
Wisconsin, and studied International Relations
and Art History at the L’Institut D’American in
Aix-en-Provence, France, as well as energy medicine
at the Four Winds Society. She is a former U.S.
Coast Guard 50 Ton Captain as well as a former
contributing editor to HRO Today in the area of
leadership and organization development. PDJ
Spring 2016