Applying Lessons Learned From COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic put a proverbial magnifying glass on many societal and business issues. Business leaders were not as prepared as they would have liked to have been to address the issues and as a result learned multiple lessons, in particular, how to navigate increased need for attention to workplace diversity and inclusion (D&I). With these lessons in mind, understanding opportunities to expand how we think about and define diversity, the need for belonging/inclusion, how changing workplace demographics are becoming more influential, and the critical role organizational leadership plays in the D&I journey are essential as we move through the COVID-19-pandemic era. Leveraging transformational leadership as a mindset and an emerging model, reflect-forward framework, practical strategies are presented to help leaders reflect, assess, and set the stage to move forward. Due to the evolving nature of the topic, resources include a combination expertise of the authors, research data, popular press, and scholarly articles.