This year marked the official launch of a designated DIBE committee, as we understood we had to start being more intentional about our efforts. Our goal is to share what we have been doing to hopefully start the conversation with other keen changemakers and become better together!
Understanding TrackTikers: Launching our first DIBE survey
For three weeks, we ran an anonymous and voluntary employee DIBE survey. We were honored to collect a 67% response rate for this first year, especially given that the survey was launched during the summer. We broke down the survey in three sections from which we only include some of the many facts we found insightful.
Demographics
The survey helped us discover many things about TrackTikers including but not limited to the following:
- 40.6% of respondents identify as belonging to a visible minority group and 44% are not borned and raised in Canada.
- 9% are comfortable identifying as homosexual, bisexual or pansexual. A respondent even commented: “I was open about my sexual orientation during the interview and felt immediately welcomed and comfortable – and was hired”.
Belonging
We couldn’t be prouder of some of our statistics including the fact that:
- 88.8% of respondents feel like they have opportunities to learn and grow here;
- 87.7% answered that the TrackTik culture makes them feel like they belong;
- 80.2% see strong Leadership support of diversity and inclusion.
We do not want to stop here and are aiming at maintaining and, when possible, even increasing the percentage of respondents who identify with these statements and related ones.
Interests
Survey respondents selected mental health and wellness, unconscious biases and pay equity as their top topics of interest. Other topics which were mentioned include: anti-racism, women in technology, religions and cultural events, immigration and xenophobia, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability / accessibility and neurodiversity.
Educating ourselves
Throughout the year, we offered employees various opportunities to educate each other about DIBE, whether the initiatives focused on giving a voice to each other or welcoming external speakers.
Lunch & Learn
- In June, we had the pleasure to welcome Ricardo Assemat, Chair of Shine, LGBTQ2+ employee and allies network group for a Lunch and Learn titled “LGBTQ+ Coming Out & Beyond – Being LGTBQ+ in the Workplace”.
- “Let’s Talk about Autism” in October 2020 made it possible for TrackTikers and experts from Auticon to start the conversation about neurodiversity at work.
Roundtables
On December 1, we hosted our first DIBE roundtable, the first of a series of interactive respectful conversations to exchange questions and experiences with peers in relation to diversity, inclusion, belonging and equity. Some of the questions we sought to answer during this first edition included:
- Why do we sometimes feel uncomfortable talking about certain personal characteristics?
- Where does anti-racism come from and what does systemic racism mean?
- What to do about unconscious bias and microaggressions?
Some participants took the time to share feedback with the organizers after the event. One commented:
“Thank you to everyone who had the courage to share their stories. I was a silent participant but this caused me to reflect so much”.
Another added:
“I am immensely grateful that we can have a platform for us to engage in a free and unjudged conversation. This is a valuable step towards making a difference. Sharing our experiences and seeing the responses was immensely validating and I couldn’t be more touched about our leaders not only attending but taking a stance. I can’t wait to participate in another edition.”
Internal communications
- Eid-al-Adhna, Yom Kippur and Diwali are only a few examples of celebrations which we have recognized and learned more about as an organization. Volunteer TrackTikers were invited to share about their experience, including special dishes and traditions, and presented them at our weekly company gathering, Cardio.
- About a third of our employees have proactively joined our dedicated #diversity-and-inclusion Slack channel to share articles and thoughts about DIBE topics. Every two weeks, they also receive tips for DIBE in our internal Talent newsletter.
Auditing our internal processes impacting the employee journey
With COVID-19, the availability of an Employer Assistance Program (EAP) and the possibility to have some flexibility in working hours became a great asset for TrackTik employees. We took the opportunity to emphasize that sick days could also be used for mental health, empowering our employees to catch their breath when they need it the most.
In September 2020, we joined The Collective, an initiative spearheaded by one of our partners and investor, Georgian. The Collective is a group of 16 companies from the Georgian family who agree to collaborate through a weekly working group to optimize the efficiency and impact of individual companies’ DIBE initiatives through collective action. The topics we have started tackling together include policies, training, volunteerism and charitable donations. We will be looking to pursue our efforts to further remove potential unconscious bias in all of our employee journey processes.
Increasing our community impact
- For the past few years, TrackTik has partnered with the Marie-Vincent Foundation which supports children and teenagers who have been victims of sexual violence. Due to COVID-19, the organization’s main fundraising event was cancelled, potentially putting them at risk financially in a time when their services are the most needed. We are proud to have maintained our donation this year too, because we believe in the importance of their work.
- We had the pleasure to offer holiday gifts to our employees and ensured that we used it as an opportunity to include some local products to support local business owners. We’re not making it specific to not give away the surprises before TrackTikers receive their holiday boxes!
- This year is not over yet: stay tuned to hear about our involvement with the Lutins de l’Ecole St Vincent-Marie for the fourth year in a row!
Consistently and proactively maintaining transparency and accountability
On December 7, our whole Leadership team presented our 2020 DIBE actions and our commitments for 2021. They are not limited to but include:
- Reinforcing inclusiveness across the employee journey: In January, we will start offering candidates to disclose demographic data on a voluntary basis as well as potential accommodation needs. Our objective is to recognize strengths and weaknesses of our DIBE efforts and ensure this starts at the recruitment stage.
- Further opportunities for educational conversation: Since receiving the results of our DIBE survey, we have only been able to cover a fraction of what TrackTikers mentioned being interested about. Stay tuned for more exchange and education on topics such as mental health and women in technology!
- Encouraging volunteerism: Starting 2021, we have the pleasure to announce that every TrackTiker will be able to volunteer for one full business day.
These are only some of the main initiatives which we are the pleasure to implement in 2020.
We did not know where to get started either and we do not ever feel like we are doing enough but we try our best. We are no experts and we know we will always be learning: we are committing to that continuous learning.
Want to help improve our practices or exchange about yours? Please get in touch with our DIBE committee through [email protected]!