HUMANITY AT WORK

A debut business book offers advice to companies looking to welcome and support employees with diverse backgrounds.

In this volume, Patel provides recommendations to companies seeking to increase the diversity of their staffs, bolster and engage employees, and make the work environment a healthy place for everyone. Drawing on a combination of personal anecdotes and interviews with corporate leaders, the author explores the elements of diversity, explains why it matters in a business environment, and discusses strategies for making workplaces more hospitable. Each chapter includes a section that connects its topic to employees working remotely, a practice Patel encourages companies to pursue not only because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The author contends that this structure appeals to many and makes work more broadly accessible. Sharing stories from Spanx, the Dallas Mavericks, and other companies, the book delivers examples of corporations that have succeeded through a holistic and inclusive approach to employee satisfaction and productivity. Patel, a former lawyer who now works as an editor and entrepreneur, has a talent for memorable phrases (she describes a 1970s car as “a snake that had eerily morphed into a first-generation Transformer”), making the book highly readable. The volume uses well-sourced data to forge a convincing case for the challenges faced by women, people of color, and those with disabilities in the workplace as well as the financial benefits of ensuring these individuals get hired. The information is well presented, although little of it will be new to readers. The author does push back against some popular corporate platitudes (“Too many wellbeing programs are trying to change the worker, instead of changing the work”). But Patel’s vision of diversity and wellness exists within the traditional corporate structure. The volume is concerned primarily with a workforce made up of white-collar employees whose jobs can be performed remotely and flexibly. While the book is not applicable to all employees, for those who fit its vision of the workforce, it provides useful information and strategies for making important changes in the office.

A solid, compelling argument for increasing white-collar diversity.