Exciting new project underway, subsidized by the Goldschmeding Foundation

How diverse and inclusive are Dutch organizations? And how can they continue to develop their D&I policy? These are the central questions in the project ‘It has to work’, a collaboration between our research team at Utrecht University, Diversity in Practice and the NIM Foundation, for which we recently received a research grant from the Goldschmeding Foundation.

You can read more about it HERE (in Dutch).

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Interdisciplinary collaboration with Industrial Design student Pascalle Ickenroth

Pascalle Ickenroth, Industrial Design student at TU Eindhoven wrote a blog about our recent collaboration. Under the supervision of Daniel Tetteroo, Martine Veldhuizen and myself, she worked on creating the design guidelines for an interactive communication tool that should help employers and employees in starting a dialogue about LGBTI data collection at work. Interdisciplinary work is not easy, but the experience brought us many new insights and ideas for further developing this project.

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Can you hear whether someone is gay?

Is there a relationship between your manner of speech and your sexual orientation? And if so, what do listeners do with that information? These are the questions featuring in the newest podcast of Zeg, created by Hanneke Bax and Tim Bosselaar.

My contribution was to flip the question on its head and wonder why we do not ask similar questions about “heterosexual speech,” and to discuss the apparent heteronormativity in what we consider professional and what not.

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The (non)sense of anti-bias training programs

To facilitate diversity and inclusion in the workplace, organizations often implement anti-bias training programs. But are these actually effective? And if so, how should organizations go about implementing them?

In this factsheet, Melissa Vink, Wiebren Jansen, Naomi Ellemers, Beatriz Monteiro Graça Casquinho, Bedriye Kuyumcu, and myself review the facts and give practical advice for organizations that wish to implement their own anti-bias training program.

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Nominated for the Agnites Vrolikprijs

I had the great honor of being a finalist for the 2020 Agnites Vrolik Award, which was awarded last Monday in the beautiful Masquerade Hall of Utrecht University’s academy building.

Erik van Sebille was picked as the winner for his important and innovative work on plastic-free oceans, but we were all given the stage to present our work; a great opportunity to showcase my work on the Netherlands Inclusiveness Monitor.

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Launching of Academia@WorkplacePride and webinar

***Edited, the webinar can be viewed here***

Join us on August 24th for the launch of Academia@WorkplacePride, a collaboration between the Workplace Pride Foundation and the various educational/research institutes among its member organizations, which deals with the topic of LGBTI inclusion for faculty, staff and students.

The program and this launching webinar will address the many issues specific to academia such as: 

Objectives

  • Are universities sufficiently clear and open regarding LGBTI inclusion for students, staff and faculty?

  • How do administrators include LGBTI topics in their policies and planning and how will they address creating progress when needed?

  • Is faculty sufficiently briefed on what LGBTI discrimination actually looks like and on how to combat it? 

  • Do LGBTI students from locations where homosexuality is criminalised or not culturally accepted feel safe in our institutions? How about exchange students from ‘safe’ countries to high risk countries?

  • Does introducing Diversity and Inclusion policies in an institution conflict with researchers’ freedom of thought?

  • How do LGBTI policies affect the curriculum taught at universities? How to address “Queering the Curriculum”?


Event details:

Event:             Academia@WorkplacePride Launching and Webinar
Date/Time:    Monday, August 24, 2020: 13:00 - 14:00 CEST
Moderator:    Dr. Michiel Kolman – Co-Chair Workplace Pride

Guest Speakers: 

  • Professor Annettje Ottow – Vice President Utrecht University

  • Lyle Muns –  Chair LSVb

  • Professor Jojanneke van der Toorn – Workplace Pride Chair for LGBTI Workplace Inclusion, Leiden University

Audience:      Workplace Pride Members, stakeholders, and friends

LinkWorkplace Pride Live Webinar  
Select Webinar: Academia@WorkplacePride

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Diversity and inclusion still not considered a priority in the workplace

Earlier this week, I gave a web lecture during the Performa HR Trends Congres on inclusive, systematic and evidence-based diversity policy. In it, I also addressed the results from the most recent HR Trends research, conducted among HR professionals in the Netherlands, which indicated that diversity and inclusion are still not considered a priority in the workplace. Curious, since many of the themes that were in the top 10 depend on solid diversity and inclusion management practices (for example, talent management, recruitment & selection, absenteeism and employee engagement and retention).

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