Fostering Inclusion: A Closer Look at Ariad's Approach

Alaina Ferretti, Marketing and Communications Manager walked us through Ariad’s inclusive practices and shared practical insights to reach a healthy and inclusive work environment.

Approaching Inclusion at Ariad 

When we look at the scope of DEI, “inclusion” might be the hardest one to define and therefore to measure.  

Reaching an inclusive workplace is first making sure that our practices allow people to equally participate, be authentic, and feel that they belong and can grow.

For us, this is part of our culture, but we also believe that we have to be proactive about inclusion. This looks like becoming aware of bias or privileges in our interactions, looking for opportunities to be more inviting, challenging limiting practices and beliefs.

Making Recruitment Inclusive 

I began our Inclusive Recruitment project as a personal project, because I really believed in it and when I brought it to the rest of the leadership team, we were quick to agree on the value. 

Ariad helps bring talented digital marketers to some of the most powerful companies in Belgium and in Europe -- meaning that the work of these people is impacting millions. 

When you put it this way, you can see we have a lot of responsibility. We want to make sure we’re working with the absolute best talent, and if there are potential obstacles, like unconscious bias, we need to work to remove it. We owe that to our talent, we owe it to our clients and at Ariad we also think we owe it to ourselves to build business practices that we want to be a part of.

We really looked at each step of our recruitment process to identify potential biases, and actively work to remove them. Of course like all inclusion work, this is a process which can be continually approved, but we’re committed to this work not only because we believe in it, but we’ve seen in a business sense that it works.

Reaching a Healthy and Inclusive Workplace 

To be more inclusive in your organisation, the first step is to start. There are a lot of small wins you can do alone in the beginning, and you can lead by example:

• Put your pronouns and name pronunciation on your LinkedIn page - it takes about 90 seconds, might seem like nothing, but it allows for others to feel comfortable doing the same.

Don’t do it alone. If you don’t know where to start, get support -- work with specialists, get training, listen to leaders in the space, but also within your company. Ask for input and feedback.

For our extracurricular DIB committee (Diversity, Inclusion, Belonging) I assembled a team of passionate people, who came with their own ideas and perspectives. Together, we accomplished some great projects together. 

It was helpful in defining what we needed in our business and our culture. It was a super energizing team because we all really believe in the work.