Wealth services firm Aviso is maintaining its diversity, equity and inclusion efforts amid geopolitical uncertainty, trade wars and DEI rollbacks by other employers, says Sherri Evans, the company’s senior vice-president and head of service, operations, compliance and talent.
“I said, ‘unequivocally yes.’ I think the thing they get wrong in the U.S. is when [DEI] became more about quotas and less about understanding the importance of diversity of thinking.”
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That diverse thinking stems from employees, she says, maintaining DEI is more than simply acquiring talent. “It’s about how you engage and retain that talent. And if you’re going to have a diverse talent base, why wouldn’t you take advantage of the various life experiences and opinions people have gathered through the course of their lives and careers and capitalize on all of that?”
Aviso gathers these viewpoints through its many employee committees and because there’s a large level of engagement through these programs, this creates a more positive sentiment inside the organization.
“We get a lot of good bottom-up ideas about what’s going on in the organization. It’s all about understanding where it is we want to go, helping employees set the agenda, and making them part of the execution of these initiatives.”
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As for employees’ anxiety amid the current economic climate, Evans says it’s about engaging employees and reassuring them the organization has a strong business model and will continue to focus on diversity.
“We needed to make sure we underlined for people that this wasn’t going to change. In fact, we are going to continue and deepen the [DEI] journey by getting more information from people so we can apply it more formally as opposed to some of the more ad-hoc things that we had been doing.
“It made sense to double down on our commitment, by making sure people understood these are formal programs, approved at the board level. This is important to who we are and our success.”
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As part of its DEI commitment, Aviso has partnered with Rise, an Indigenous-led consultancy that’s helping the firm through its reconciliation journey. “A big part of that journey is inviting employees to participate in webinars, walking them through the history of colonization.”
Employees also join sharing circles in which they’re asked to consider what Aviso needs to do as an organization to support reconciliation efforts. “This helps to underline for people that we mean it. It’s not just a passing fad.”
Cultural observances play a role, too. The company provides employees with access to a prayer room and, for Asian Heritage Month, Aviso held a tea-tasting day. “When you work in the investment business, your portfolio managers say, ‘Diversify your portfolio.’ Why wouldn’t you diversify your employment roster as well? It just makes sense.”
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