Читать книгу Employee Resource Group Excellence - Robert Rodriguez - Страница 19

Employee resource groups are struggling to deal with two goals that appear to be mutually exclusive. On the one hand, employee resource groups have been expanding their value proposition beyond just social activities. Employee resource groups now have robust career advancement initiatives; they strive to elevate the cultural competency within an organization; they support community outreach and as mentioned previously; and they desire to make a larger business impact.

But employee resource groups' budget resources have been depleted due to the changing work landscape that began in 2020. ERGs membership numbers took a dip as overall employment levels dropped. Some companies reduced the budget dollars they had previously allocated to their ERGs, citing reduced budget cuts across the organization as the reason. And with employees now working from home, many previously planned ERG events and gatherings simply were not feasible. The result is employee resource groups with big ambitions being confronted with the reality of a new workplace. The bold plans and activities that ERGs had at the beginning of 2020 have been reduced. Employee resource groups have had to pivot in an environment that now places greater emphasis on prioritization. “Underpromise and overdeliver” is the new mantra being embraced by employee resource groups under this new reality.

Some employee resource groups are handling this transition effectively. They eliminated events that did not align with the overall mission of their ERG. There is increased collaboration amongst the employee resource groups as they partner to do events jointly in an effort to reduce the redundancy that results when ERGs operate in silos. Employee resource group leaders have become better skilled at saying “no” or “not now” when ideas for future activities are given by ERG members. And ERG leaders have improved at delegation, resulting in a broader array of members contributing to doing ERG work. Yet the question remains that when things go back to normal, if they ever will return to how things were before, will ERGs continue with the less‐is‐more mentality? Will they be successful in having a broad value proposition while being more selective in their pursuits? I believe the answer is yes, but only time will tell how employee resource groups will operate after the effects of the pandemic have passed.