Thread by @HeyChelseaTroy

Often I see execs/directors approach inclusion the same way they approach other business initiatives, and then they're surprised/frustrated when the initiatives don't produce the PR/retention/product quality outcomes they want.

Let's talk about what's happening.

A thread.

1/

Example:

I worked for a company that poured a lot of effort into inclusive hiring: skills rubric, ads in URM Tech spaces, all that. Fast forward two years, all the URMs they had carefully collected had left and they'd backfilled with almost exclusively CHWDs.

What happened?

2/

Another example:

Slack. Talks a massive game about how inclusive and great they are. Got DMing across Slack channels BUILT AND INTO PROD before anybody pointed out that this is, like, a PERFECT harassment and abuse vector.

What happened?

3/

Another example: Basecamp.

Just Google this one.

What happened?

4/

What happens is, companies are approaching inclusion the way they approach a business development effort. They do "research" and focus on the HIGHEST RANKED outcome or the MAJORITY outcome.

Examples below.

5/

"We can't justify that accessibility feature; too few customers asked for it."

"We think we're doing okay culturally because 75% of surveyed employees said they are comfortable expressing their ideas at work."

So, uh, here's the thing about marginalization:

6/

Marginalized people basically never amount to the highest-ranked or majority opinion on something. It's kinda...in the name. They're on the MARGINS. Not at the CENTER.

Keeping focus on the CENTER leads organizations to inclusion efforts that flat out do not work.

7/

Remember last fall when Americans protested the curtailment of the U.S. Postal Service in favor of private options like FedEx or USPS?

Wealthy folks in populous areas don't realize the difference between the USPS and the private options, BUT...

/8

...it's a great example of the difference between government policymaking and business decision-making.

The reason the USPS matters so much is that the USPS delivers everywhere. As in...

/9

...there are places where a postal worker mounts a mule to deliver letters to the most remote house in Montana.

Businesses focus on EFFICIENCIES—doing the things that net them the most money for the least effort.

/10

By contrast, taxpayer-funded public programs are designed and expected to cover everyone—including, and especially, the MOST marginalized. That's why they're taxpayer-funded; so they don't face existential risk be eschewing profit-driven decision-making.

/11

Does this work perfectly? No. But I think about it a lot when people shit on the bigness and slowness of government.

That bigness & slowness is supposed to create space and resources to account for the communities, that a "lean," fast approach deliberately ignores.

/12

Business decision-making tries to approach inclusion by citing data that centers majority opinion, which is not where ideas about inclusion come from.

"But Chelsea, businesses are profit-driven, so they HAVE to do things that way!"

I don't think so.

/13

I think execs are used to, and comfortable with, that kind of decision-making, so they default to it.

That doesn't mean they have to do it, and it doesn't even mean that that's the best approach for them to take.

To return to a previous example, Slack connect...

/14

...that product had to be delayed for redesign and might ultimately be RECALLED over not having valued a marginalized, abuse-informed opinion in the design process.

After what was likely a very expensive development effort. If this thing fails, Slack LOST money building it.

/15

Or take Google's treatment of Timnit Gebru's work on their Ethical AI team. The trust they lost comes with a massive price tag. They'll have to work harder to recruit and they'll have to compensate higher.

Google can pay that price, but most companies couldn't.

/16

So we've talked about a few failures. When has centering a marginalized perspective produced success and riches for a company?

The multi-touch screen that made the iPhone a market-breaking success? Apple didn't invent that.

/17

Instead, they acquired a company called FingerWorks, founded with the express purpose of creating computer input devices for folks who had compromised fine motor function.

In fact, most of the things you love about your smartphone started as accessibility features.

/18

So if garden variety Pareto Principle-style business thinking doesn't work for inclusive decisions, and companies can incur costly failures by mis-applying it, and companies can achieve momentous victories by approaching inclusion differently, then what SHOULD they be doing?

/19

Well, we have this idea in software engineering of starting our software design from the "happy path" (majority use case) versus designing from the edge cases.

As Michael Feathers has a favorite saying: "If you take care of the corners, the room takes care of itself."

/20

The consensus-ish around this among engineers is that focusing on the happy path gets you to market faster and focusing on the edge cases gets you a cleaner, better designed system that's more maintainable over time, probably more functional, and less buggy.

/21

Similarly designing for the edges CAN produce a better business, product, or organization for everyone.

The second most popular post I've ever written discusses five inclusion skills for employee evaluation.

The dirty secret?

/22

chelseatroy.com/2018/05/24/why…

The dirty secret of that post is that teams that have tried it ended up with a more productive, positive work environment for almost* EVERYONE.

*insecure narcissists who have already amassed a lot of institutional power don't like it. That's about it though.

/23

I think about this a fair amount in my classroom as well. When I teach, I focus on providing an accessible learning experience for the person in the class who is going to have the hardest time.

Who that is differs by quarter.

/24

I'm designing for the person whose learning style least matches typical academic pedagogy.

Or the person who has to wade through poor captions on instructional videos.

Or the person whose religious traditions mean they show up to my class having not eaten in 13 hours.

/25

The result? With the exception of 3 or 4 people in six quarters of teaching, just about everyone has been happy with the class.

More importantly, what do the 3 or 4 people say? "I could have learned this on my own."

Great. You don't need me. I teach for those that do.

/26

I cannot encourage any business, team, or org MORE HIGHLY to think about the corners/edges of the problem and START THERE to ideate solutions, rather than starting with the happy-path minimum viable case. And if you don't see any edges/corners, FIND SOMEONE WHO DOES.

/27

The outcome of this approach, done thoughtfully and taken seriously, just might exceed your wildest dreams for a successful outcome.

28/28

For engineers and space nerds: I wrote about some concrete examples of edge consideration in launchpad design and software design.

(For organizational examples, the rubric post linked above is prob the best I got.)

29/28 (yes, a BONUS tweet!)

chelseatroy.com/2020/05/28/les…