Years ago, a barista drew a smiley face on my coffee cup, and I’ve been loyal ever since.
I had walked into this quiet independent cafe with my partner. As is common for LGBTQ+ people, we were on guard for disapproving looks. The smiling cup was a gesture that said “we see you’re nervous, and you are welcome here”.
Actions like these are where ‘inclusion’ may start in your small business.
If you’ve worked in big companies, ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ (we’ll call it ‘inclusion’) might have looked like:
- Carefully designed hiring practices
- Company-wide religious celebrations
- Anti-racism training
- Disability champions
- Gender neutral dress codes
- Staff equality networks
Not all of these are relevant for our small businesses right now.
So is ‘inclusion’ relevant for our small businesses?
Yes.
Initiatives like the ones above don’t represent all inclusive business behaviours. Think of inclusion as your response to this challenge.
“In a community and economy with people of many ages, genders, ethnicities, sexualities, disabilities, nationalities, family types, faiths, languages, social classes and life experiences, a majority will experience unnecessary, unfair barriers as customers, colleagues and fellow citizens. In what ways will you give people a break from these, as they see and interact with your small business?”
Put like that, it makes sense to strive to be inclusive.
Great businesses always aspire to delight customers and eliminate their frictions - see: contactless payment, free delivery, birthday emails. As consumers opt for quicker, bigger, cheaper, closer, and newer things; many of our customers also opt for businesses that make them feel safe, valued, equal, good about themselves and optimistic about the world. We can take inclusive actions that help achieve that for customers.
Inclusivity matters in our business networks too. When a business owner made sexist jokes about his wife to break the ice at a recent networking event, it put me off working with him and recommending him. We as business people also flock to the people who make us feel safe, valued, equal, good about ourselves and optimistic about the world. We can build beautiful, diverse networks through our inclusivity.
Entrepreneurs may also have personal reasons to value inclusion.
Being excluded or undervalued as employees is a huge driver for people becoming their own bosses in the first place. For example, whilst disabled workers face high levels of discrimination, the number of disabled small business owners actually reflects the disabled population at large[1]. Many of us want to break the negative cycles we’ve been involved in, and treat others better.
In many cases, our businesses are often an expression of who we are. Our products and services are our creative endeavours. We want them to be our legacies.
If that’s how you feel about your business, you should know that inclusive small businesses are helping to build the world we want to see. We don’t need to become charities to do that; we can pay attention to inclusivity in the things we do and the ways we operate. Any of us with personal experiences of racism and prejudice know that actions and gestures of support, from organisations large and small, can be meaningful.
Are there times when inclusion might be particularly relevant to us?
As we saw around the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements, your inclusivity may be a lot more visible or powerful at times of heightened injustice, tension or fear. Right now, there is an upsurge of anti-gay violent crimes in London. LGBTQ+ people in Barking and Dagenham may feel especially vulnerable and unsure who has their back. Could it be you?
Tragedies and news cycles aside, people in minority and historically excluded groups have been around forever. That means there’s never a bad time to think about them.
But I find that most people interested in inclusion have personal moments or reasons why it became so relevant for them. One of mine was a time when I hadn’t really thought about how my new disabled colleague was going to join in a day of company-wide activities I had organised. What I felt from them was frustration, disappointment, embarrassment and the eye-roll of never being thought about enough. From then, I wanted to be proactive about including people, and never make someone feel like that again.
The inclusivity of our small businesses is always relevant. My tip is to find your reason to care about it. That will be your fuel.
