Leaders at all levels are now being asked to achieve a common goal: to make sure that everyone on their team feels like they belong. There is widespread recognition that, if they don't, employees will walk. On the other hand, if people do feel like they belong, they will not only stay and feel valued, they will perform better. The author, a Chair in Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Toronto, shows that belonging relates to many personal characteristics: racial and gender representation and sensitivity, sexual orientation, physical appearance and disability, to name a few. Going forward, she shows that senior leaders need to empower managers to address belonging by celebrating employees, creating space to let people show their whole selves and making time to hear about their negative experiences. Together, such actions can remove the burden of 'code switching' - of people feeling like they have to adjust the way they speak, dress, act, etc. in order to be accepted at work.

In a world plagued by information overload, it is not surprising that we often resort to categorical thinking to simplify incoming information. The problem is, this habit can manifest itself in a tendency to group individuals on the basis of social categories including race, gender and age. Further, such categories are often imbued with associations and expectations - a.k.a. stereotypes. One little-discussed sub-category of stereotypes is 'occupational stereotypes' - collections of traits or attributes with which individuals associate members of different occupations. The authors describe their research into these stereotypes, showing how they lead to occupational segregation and impact vocational choice, recruitment and selection.

Modern organizations continue to play a key role in perpetuating economic inequality in society. Despite the proliferation of equal opportunity and diversity initiatives, discrimination on the basis of race remains particularly pervasive in North American labour markets. The authors show that even companies that publicly espouse an inclusive environment continue to discriminate against candidates who appear to be from non-white backgrounds. Worse yet, many non-white job candidates are proactively 'whitening' their resumes in order to hide their racial identity.