Famed German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun has been quoted saying that his V2 rocket worked perfectly except for one small detail … it landed on the wrong planet (Goodreads, 2019). In many cases, sexual harassment and discrimination prevention training is industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology’s V2 rocket, designed to perform perfectly but consistently missing the mark with its target audience. In other words, a good portion of the training programs designed by I-O psychologists to prevent sexual harassment and discrimination has ignored the organizational stakeholders most likely to affect meaningful change (i.e., board members, C-suite executives, front-line managers, employees). Although the focal article by Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) brings forth many insights and provocative research questions regarding how applied psychologists can best design and implement sexual harassment and racial discrimination prevention training, we believe there is one critical oversight.
Throughout their article, Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) present their recommendations to other I-O practitioners and applied psychologists on designing and implementing effective antiharassment and antidiscrimination training without providing discussion or recommendations on how to obtain support and commitment from key organizational stakeholders. Although I-O researchers and applied psychologists are a critical part of the effort to increase antiharassment and antidiscrimination training effectiveness, we believe that the I-O psychology community as a whole needs to also directly communicate with organizational stakeholders. Those stakeholders can shape the culture and strategy of the organization to be more receptive to these trainings and move the needle from compliance to inclusion. In this commentary, we discuss why this change is needed and provide actionable recommendations on how I-O psychologists can best communicate and garner buy-in with the key stakeholders to maximize the impact of trainings.
The importance of directly communicating with organizational stakeholders
According to social learning theory (Bandura & Walters, Reference Bandura and Walters1977), people learn by observing the behavior of people whom they believe to be credible and knowledgeable. It is essential for top leadership, rather than HR, to model the desired behaviors they would like to see from their employees by championing the training themselves in order to set the training climate (Smith-Jentsch et al., Reference Smith-Jentsch, Salas and Brannick2001). It is demonstrated throughout the literature how imperative it is to garner commitment and support from leadership prior to implementing the training. For example, a positive training climate and support from leadership, such as front-line managers, can serve as a powerful qualifying condition for employees’ motivation to learn from the training (Colquitt et al., Reference Colquitt, LePine and Noe2000), their training transfer (Blume, Ford, Baldwin, & Huang, Reference Blume, Ford, Baldwin and Huang2010), and for the training to having an effective impact on employee outcomes (Hammer et al., Reference Hammer, Wan, Brockwood, Bodner and Mohr2019). Although Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) emphasize the need for ongoing executive commitment and organizational support, they do not discuss how to obtain executive commitment and organizational support.
Additionally, the authors suggest that applied psychologists are “middlemen” between I-O researchers and organizations and should work to align organizational goals with their goals to demonstrate effective outcomes (Hayes et al., Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020). Although goal alignment is important, it is the board members and c-suite executives within the organization who craft organizational goals and strategies, not the applied psychologists. Furthermore, it is the front-line managers and employees who will be contributing to the goals and strategies. If the organizational strategies do not include viewing anti-sexual harassment and antidiscrimination as a business responsibility in which all levels of organization are held accountable, these trainings will continue to be compliance, “check-the-box” types of training (Bourke, et al., Reference Bourke, Garr, van Berkel and Wong2017). Thus, directly engaging with executive stakeholders is critical for shifting the organizational climate from compliance to a climate where the organization is receptive to the prevention trainings, is actively engaged, and holds its employees accountable. So, how do we get those key stakeholders’ attention?
What are some recommendations to best get buy-in?
Recommendation #1: Combine data with the power of storytelling
Using data and insights from workforce analytics can be a persuasive way to get stakeholder buy-in. For instance, being able to present data that demonstrate how the effectiveness of antiharassment or antidiscrimination training improved retention and reduced organizational litigation costs and reputation costs can be extremely powerful. However, recent studies have shown that presenting data by itself can limit its persuasiveness and using storytelling can ensure that the central message is memorable and is more likely to elicit behavioral change (e.g., Zak, Reference Zak2014; Zhang et al., Reference Zhang, Zhu, Ritter and Thiele2019). Being able to incorporate character-driven stories that clearly show the impact of the prevention trainings and elicit emotional responses from the listeners can go a long way for organizational stakeholders to understand the analytics as well as personally react to the message (see Chapter 17 in Guenole et al., Reference Guenole, Ferrar and Feinzig2017, for best practices on storytelling with data).
Recommendation #2: Define your target audience and consider adjacent populations
It is an all-too-common phenomenon where organizational interventions fail because they target the wrong audience. With this in mind, we advise I-O psychologists to consider their targeted audience for change upfront and then broaden it by at least two degrees of separation, as well as design their trainings with the broadest possible audience in mind (see figure 2 in Kurtessis et al., Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017). As Kurtessis et al. (Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017) note, true science-to-practice translation is achieved when you extend beyond the applied scientists (aka “middlemen”) and impact the workforce at large. Building upon this analogous situation, true transfer of training resulting in significant change will only occur when we design training programs beyond the applied scientists’ perspective with organizational stakeholders in mind.
Recommendation #3: Leverage communication and awareness as much as principles of learning
Although training represents a key lever in shifting behavior, a large portion of transfer is attributable to the organization’s continued commitment to change or their transfer climate (Neal et al., Reference Neal, Griffin and Hart2000). The clearest way to sustain change is continued communication following training as a key condition for transfer. If we are to learn anything from the principles of behavioral change, it is clear that awareness among adult learners represents the first obstacle when ensuring learning. The more communication we can provide about our intended behavioral changes from learning programs, the more likely we are to affect behavioral change from compliance to inclusion.
Recommendation #4: Accountability is the best lever in learning
Accountability is better than mandatory or compulsory participation. Seventy-five percent of diversity and inclusion training programs fail because they are pitched to the wrong audience, are always mandatory, or are solely focused on compliance (Dobbin & Kalev, Reference Dobbin and Kalev2018). In her testimony before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, King (Reference King2018) provided a set of key conditions needed for moderately successful outcomes from diversity training and stated that a better approach to training transfer is to hold people accountable. The most influential factor in affecting the behaviors of others was face-to-face training led by a supervisor where accountability was evident. Accountability plays an important role in ensuring desired changes, but it is not derived from mandatory participation; however, it is derived from building buy in, including learning led by one’s supervisor. Needless to say, we advise I-O researchers and practitioners to focus on the development of their training programs with supervisors in mind, as they are the first line of defense when it comes to educating others in organizations in an accountable way.
Recommendation #5: Avoid falling into the navel-gazing trap
Kurtessis et al. (Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017) said it best when focusing on the nature of I-O psychology—we are missing the trees for the forest when thinking about the impact of science in the workplace. The same principle holds true when considering training programs like antidiscrimination and antiharassment training. Too often, our natural tendency is to develop training by assuming that the target audience will be 100% receptive. If we are fortunate enough to have applied experience, we develop training programs without leveraging the principles of adult learning as best possible. Our challenge to all I-O psychologists finding themselves in this situation is to stop designing training like we are trying to be the best educator possible. Design it like we want people to avoid making the same mistake over and over and become aware of their blind spots. This will shift our perspectives and help us activate change.
Conclusion
We encourage I-O researchers and practitioners to work together to maximize the impact of I-O psychology in organizations by engaging with their executives, as there is meta-analytic evidence that teams composed of both academic and practitioners produce more effective program results (both for learning and training transfer) compared to teams that comprise only academics or only practitioners (Lacerenza et al., Reference Lacerenza, Reyes, Marlow, Joseph and Salas2017). A cautionary tale exists for us all when thinking about training programs built upon the greatest scientific principles without contextual consideration of its audiences. Imagine the scenario at an organization such as Google or Facebook, where discriminatory practices have been trained against repeatedly and with great impact (Harris, Reference Harris2019). Even in these settings, training has fallen short of its intended objective, where ageism, political affiliation bias, and other blind spots have begun to rear their heads. If organizations such as these feel the effects with extensive learning resources, imagine the blind spots lurking in other places waiting to affect us all.
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Famed German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun has been quoted saying that his V2 rocket worked perfectly except for one small detail … it landed on the wrong planet (Goodreads, 2019). In many cases, sexual harassment and discrimination prevention training is industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology’s V2 rocket, designed to perform perfectly but consistently missing the mark with its target audience. In other words, a good portion of the training programs designed by I-O psychologists to prevent sexual harassment and discrimination has ignored the organizational stakeholders most likely to affect meaningful change (i.e., board members, C-suite executives, front-line managers, employees). Although the focal article by Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) brings forth many insights and provocative research questions regarding how applied psychologists can best design and implement sexual harassment and racial discrimination prevention training, we believe there is one critical oversight.
Throughout their article, Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) present their recommendations to other I-O practitioners and applied psychologists on designing and implementing effective antiharassment and antidiscrimination training without providing discussion or recommendations on how to obtain support and commitment from key organizational stakeholders. Although I-O researchers and applied psychologists are a critical part of the effort to increase antiharassment and antidiscrimination training effectiveness, we believe that the I-O psychology community as a whole needs to also directly communicate with organizational stakeholders. Those stakeholders can shape the culture and strategy of the organization to be more receptive to these trainings and move the needle from compliance to inclusion. In this commentary, we discuss why this change is needed and provide actionable recommendations on how I-O psychologists can best communicate and garner buy-in with the key stakeholders to maximize the impact of trainings.
The importance of directly communicating with organizational stakeholders
According to social learning theory (Bandura & Walters, Reference Bandura and Walters1977), people learn by observing the behavior of people whom they believe to be credible and knowledgeable. It is essential for top leadership, rather than HR, to model the desired behaviors they would like to see from their employees by championing the training themselves in order to set the training climate (Smith-Jentsch et al., Reference Smith-Jentsch, Salas and Brannick2001). It is demonstrated throughout the literature how imperative it is to garner commitment and support from leadership prior to implementing the training. For example, a positive training climate and support from leadership, such as front-line managers, can serve as a powerful qualifying condition for employees’ motivation to learn from the training (Colquitt et al., Reference Colquitt, LePine and Noe2000), their training transfer (Blume, Ford, Baldwin, & Huang, Reference Blume, Ford, Baldwin and Huang2010), and for the training to having an effective impact on employee outcomes (Hammer et al., Reference Hammer, Wan, Brockwood, Bodner and Mohr2019). Although Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) emphasize the need for ongoing executive commitment and organizational support, they do not discuss how to obtain executive commitment and organizational support.
Additionally, the authors suggest that applied psychologists are “middlemen” between I-O researchers and organizations and should work to align organizational goals with their goals to demonstrate effective outcomes (Hayes et al., Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020). Although goal alignment is important, it is the board members and c-suite executives within the organization who craft organizational goals and strategies, not the applied psychologists. Furthermore, it is the front-line managers and employees who will be contributing to the goals and strategies. If the organizational strategies do not include viewing anti-sexual harassment and antidiscrimination as a business responsibility in which all levels of organization are held accountable, these trainings will continue to be compliance, “check-the-box” types of training (Bourke, et al., Reference Bourke, Garr, van Berkel and Wong2017). Thus, directly engaging with executive stakeholders is critical for shifting the organizational climate from compliance to a climate where the organization is receptive to the prevention trainings, is actively engaged, and holds its employees accountable. So, how do we get those key stakeholders’ attention?
What are some recommendations to best get buy-in?
Recommendation #1: Combine data with the power of storytelling
Using data and insights from workforce analytics can be a persuasive way to get stakeholder buy-in. For instance, being able to present data that demonstrate how the effectiveness of antiharassment or antidiscrimination training improved retention and reduced organizational litigation costs and reputation costs can be extremely powerful. However, recent studies have shown that presenting data by itself can limit its persuasiveness and using storytelling can ensure that the central message is memorable and is more likely to elicit behavioral change (e.g., Zak, Reference Zak2014; Zhang et al., Reference Zhang, Zhu, Ritter and Thiele2019). Being able to incorporate character-driven stories that clearly show the impact of the prevention trainings and elicit emotional responses from the listeners can go a long way for organizational stakeholders to understand the analytics as well as personally react to the message (see Chapter 17 in Guenole et al., Reference Guenole, Ferrar and Feinzig2017, for best practices on storytelling with data).
Recommendation #2: Define your target audience and consider adjacent populations
It is an all-too-common phenomenon where organizational interventions fail because they target the wrong audience. With this in mind, we advise I-O psychologists to consider their targeted audience for change upfront and then broaden it by at least two degrees of separation, as well as design their trainings with the broadest possible audience in mind (see figure 2 in Kurtessis et al., Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017). As Kurtessis et al. (Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017) note, true science-to-practice translation is achieved when you extend beyond the applied scientists (aka “middlemen”) and impact the workforce at large. Building upon this analogous situation, true transfer of training resulting in significant change will only occur when we design training programs beyond the applied scientists’ perspective with organizational stakeholders in mind.
Recommendation #3: Leverage communication and awareness as much as principles of learning
Although training represents a key lever in shifting behavior, a large portion of transfer is attributable to the organization’s continued commitment to change or their transfer climate (Neal et al., Reference Neal, Griffin and Hart2000). The clearest way to sustain change is continued communication following training as a key condition for transfer. If we are to learn anything from the principles of behavioral change, it is clear that awareness among adult learners represents the first obstacle when ensuring learning. The more communication we can provide about our intended behavioral changes from learning programs, the more likely we are to affect behavioral change from compliance to inclusion.
Recommendation #4: Accountability is the best lever in learning
Accountability is better than mandatory or compulsory participation. Seventy-five percent of diversity and inclusion training programs fail because they are pitched to the wrong audience, are always mandatory, or are solely focused on compliance (Dobbin & Kalev, Reference Dobbin and Kalev2018). In her testimony before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, King (Reference King2018) provided a set of key conditions needed for moderately successful outcomes from diversity training and stated that a better approach to training transfer is to hold people accountable. The most influential factor in affecting the behaviors of others was face-to-face training led by a supervisor where accountability was evident. Accountability plays an important role in ensuring desired changes, but it is not derived from mandatory participation; however, it is derived from building buy in, including learning led by one’s supervisor. Needless to say, we advise I-O researchers and practitioners to focus on the development of their training programs with supervisors in mind, as they are the first line of defense when it comes to educating others in organizations in an accountable way.
Recommendation #5: Avoid falling into the navel-gazing trap
Kurtessis et al. (Reference Kurtessis, Waters, Alonso, Jones and Oppler2017) said it best when focusing on the nature of I-O psychology—we are missing the trees for the forest when thinking about the impact of science in the workplace. The same principle holds true when considering training programs like antidiscrimination and antiharassment training. Too often, our natural tendency is to develop training by assuming that the target audience will be 100% receptive. If we are fortunate enough to have applied experience, we develop training programs without leveraging the principles of adult learning as best possible. Our challenge to all I-O psychologists finding themselves in this situation is to stop designing training like we are trying to be the best educator possible. Design it like we want people to avoid making the same mistake over and over and become aware of their blind spots. This will shift our perspectives and help us activate change.
Conclusion
We encourage I-O researchers and practitioners to work together to maximize the impact of I-O psychology in organizations by engaging with their executives, as there is meta-analytic evidence that teams composed of both academic and practitioners produce more effective program results (both for learning and training transfer) compared to teams that comprise only academics or only practitioners (Lacerenza et al., Reference Lacerenza, Reyes, Marlow, Joseph and Salas2017). A cautionary tale exists for us all when thinking about training programs built upon the greatest scientific principles without contextual consideration of its audiences. Imagine the scenario at an organization such as Google or Facebook, where discriminatory practices have been trained against repeatedly and with great impact (Harris, Reference Harris2019). Even in these settings, training has fallen short of its intended objective, where ageism, political affiliation bias, and other blind spots have begun to rear their heads. If organizations such as these feel the effects with extensive learning resources, imagine the blind spots lurking in other places waiting to affect us all.