Kirsten Beasley: I am concerned about our industry’s ability to harness the power of DEI and realise the potential benefits. The real business advantage of DEI lies in navigating and synthesising divergent viewpoints, to reach superior outcomes, something only possible in a diverse environment. Yet, it seems our industry struggles to fully capitalise on this. Embracing diversity’s power requires more than mere representation at the table; it demands valuing divergent opinions.

We need to reshape the notion of what a ‘team player’ is. When I first came into the industry, the term implied conformity, but a ‘team player’ in a diverse context brings an important asset—an alternative perspective that challenges conventional thinking.

Speaking from personal experience, voicing dissent in a professional setting, as a woman, still carries a significant personal cost—a burden that I suspect is even more substantial for people of colour in similar positions. The core of our business case rests on effectively embracing diversity, and I believe we are far from reaching that ideal.

Marlon Williams: We’re definitely not there yet. The case for diversity has been made—there are consistent studies on it. The business case has been proven in terms of having gender and racial diversity not just in the company, but at executive levels. The irony for me with respect to our industry is that we make a business based on recognising that diverse portfolios build resilience into our money-making. It’s foolhardy to put all our eggs in one basket. >>>

<<< What we’re trying to achieve—and we recognise it in reinsurance, insurance, banking, in the hedge fund world, all of investment—is built on this premise. And the same intelligent minds who recognise the benefits that diversity brings ignore it with respect to its selection of its people and how it builds a company. We’ll build something largely homogenous in a company and then have that homogenous group try to build something diversified financially. It’s an irony that sticks out to me in our space.

Suzanne Williams-Charles: There are not many other legitimate proposals you can take to a CEO that you could prove will make them money and they say “no, I don’t want to do it”. Many don’t say “no, I don’t want to do it” with their mouths—they say it with their actions or inaction. And maybe not because they don’t want to do it, but because it’s a highly sensitive area and change may not be easy.

Change is hard, but the point I see over and over again is it’s proven that this will improve your results. Why don’t we see the same movement as you would with another type of proposal, that had nothing to do with DEI but was going to give better results? It puzzles me why we don’t have the movement when we have data that shows that this will improve your business.

Tracey Gibbons: One of the problems is that there are senior people for whom the jury’s still out. They say “yes, you’re showing that companies with a more diverse board and more diverse executives are getting better financial results” but they do not accept the correlation. They are saying “you’re not providing a clear link on that”, which is an issue.

Any diversity that leads to challenging opinions, different perspectives or new ideas being put out there, has to be beneficial. Whether acted on or not, they’re planting a seed. I’ve been in senior management for a long time and if you go back 10 years, typically if you had a meeting of the executive or senior management, there’d be a discussion around a particular topic, and people would weigh in.

The CEO would then say “let me tell you what I think”. It could be something totally different, but then generally everyone around the table folds and says: “yes, you’re right”. So the discussion was all a waste of time.

I think that in certain companies that dynamic has changed. We had an off-site meeting at QBE Re last month, and half a day was spent on coaching, for the executives, to be willing and comfortable to challenge. What that requires is trust. Trust that you can challenge and it will not come back and bite you, that you’re comfortable challenging and more importantly, that the person who is being challenged is willing to accept that challenge in the good faith that it was made. There is a big problem with the way executives in our sector think they should behave and it takes courage to admit that you don’t have all the answers and to seek a differing view point.

More and more, companies ask for a diverse group of candidates for job openings. That’s part of taking DEI seriously. But the problem then is that in a lot of cases they still hire the white man, because the person interviewing is often a white man, and there’s a comfort level with somebody who looks like you, thinks like you and with whom you feel an affinity with. We need to ensure we have diverse interview panels as well as diverse panel of interviewees that is one way of getting over this hump.

In our organisation we’re gradually seeing more women in senior positions, and it then becomes self-perpetuating. We need to do what we’ve done for women for other types of diversity. At QBE Re we continue to look for a more equitable gender balance at all levels of the organisation but are also increasing our focus on racial diversity where we have not had such a marked impact.

We’ve done well with gender parity. We do have quotas, and I know they’re controversial, but the quotas have worked. More than 40 percent of our board and 38 percent of our leadership are women. The target for 2025 is 40 percent and I think we will make that, but how do you approach the other types of diversity—neurodiversity for example, which isn’t always apparent? How we recognise and embrace the value of neurodivergent skills in people is also extremely important and can be a real differentiator when we are building our teams—ensuring we have the right balance of skills that makes us fit for the future.

Deshay Caines: The genesis of diversity and inclusion came from a racial perspective. It also came from the perspective of racial discrimination, as well as gender discrimination against women. Historically, black and brown people as well as women have always had to overprove their qualifications—we’ve always had to be over-educated, and I’m talking about this from a person of colour perspective, as well as a female perspective. All the additional qualifications we must have—we are always two to five steps ahead of our peer groups, from a racial perspective.

We have all this data about how diverse organisations are more profitable, but because this started from a racial and gender perspective, we’re going to be in a constant state of having to prove repeatedly that I am good enough, I’m worthy, all these things, through education and exams in whatever industry that you are in, to be at the top of your game.

We’ll have that same mindset when it comes to leadership with proving why diversity is important, and how it makes your organisation better. Until we get to a point where we’re changing the mindset and the bias of the senior men and women, sometimes in leadership, that where we are is better, and the statistics that we have proved this, until they get it into their minds that we don’t need to prove over again that this is the case, we will constantly be in the state of having to say, look at the numbers, look at this, look at that, as opposed to just knowing that we already have the proof.

Tracey Gibbons: To a certain extent, and I don’t know about racially, but as women, we are our own worst enemies for that. When it comes to job openings, personally I would put myself forward only if I was 100 percent certain that I could do every element of that job. Whereas many men, if they could do 20 percent of the job, would think “I can ace that”. That’s what we’re up against.

Marlon Williams: It’s not just because that’s how women are, it’s because that’s what women have had to be to be considered for anything—you had to go above and beyond, juggling being a wife and motherhood and all that comes with it and expected to perform above and beyond, and still make the coffee in the morning. Some of those expectations in women, why they don’t feel like a man sticking his hand up despite only having 20 percent, are formed through experience.

He feels confident doing that. A man will feel comfortable doing that is because society has informed our view that the world will open up to him if he sticks his hand up and shows a bit of initiative, and he is walking into an environment that’s friendly and supportive of him and opens up experiences and opportunities to him. He’ll be nurtured and he’ll grow into something amazing. If that same environment was open and available to everyone, then we will see the kind of diversity that I hope to see in my lifetime—but it doesn’t come from nowhere.

Suzanne Williams-Charles: Unfortunately, the people who aren’t in the highest positions aren’t the ones who can drive things and make change. That’s why it’s great to discuss where we are as under-represented groups, whether it be women or people of colour, but it’s also great to have advocates who are a part of that discussion as well.

When we’re talking about hiring and progression, this concept of sponsorship can be very powerful. It’s unfortunate that this is the case but as a woman or a person of colour you sometimes need someone in a position of power to help you along in the organisation, or to advocate for you.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve changed the way I think about myself. I’ve changed the way I enter the room only because I’ve been put in situations where someone has believed that I can do these things. They said “you can go and speak on that panel, go and do this thing, you’ve got this”, when I would never have raised my hand to do those things. I would have looked at the topics and said “nope, not an expert on that, not an expert on that”. But I did them because I had somebody pushing me, supporting me, sponsoring me.

So those roles for people who would like to be advocates or allies to under-represented groups are very important. It’s not highlighted enough how important allies are to this particular initiative.

Jevon Williams: Diversity, together with the sponsorship and support of senior leadership, is vitally important and necessary for the success of businesses. Once an individual, at any professional level, receives that sponsorship and support, it then becomes their responsibility to turn around and pay that forward. Otherwise, the benefits of the guidance and championship gained in their experience becomes a unicorn moment—an exception, as opposed to the standard.

I want to note a datapoint from the 2022 Employment Survey that underpins some of what we discussed earlier: while the majority of Bermudians are black, only 31 and 11 percent of employees in international business represent black women and black men, respectively. That’s absurd if you think about it.

Relating that back to our current discussion, you must have knowledge and experience transfer to young professionals coming up after us, and not just within the school system. That’s what makes the work of the Association for Corporate Racial Equity (ACRE) so important. What Suzanne experienced in terms of assistance and support isn’t a rare occasion but becomes the expected standard.

My last point is a little academic, but it’s interesting how we’re continuously finding ourselves asking why diversity is important because it then appears as if we’re trying to validate it before getting the opportunity to assess it. It’s a presupposed notion, certainly among black Bermudians, how important it is because it’s personal—seeing themselves represented and having access to opportunities. But when you come to the table and have the discussion, there’s this defensive position where you have to step back and justify why it’s important.