DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION
The FY 2024 Race Equity Action Plan
To help us better serve our communities and live up to our values, New York Public Radio (NYPR) has set a focused and ongoing practice of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) as core to our strategic vision. This practice will inform all decisions across the organization. NYPR leadership will be responsible for ensuring that we achieve our goals, at every level and on every team.
While NYPR considers “Diversity” in broad terms—including race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, ability, and national origin—this document specifically addresses our work on racial equity.
Our work builds on and accelerates the efforts of the FY23 Race Equity Action that has been underway at NYPR for several years, and it is being driven by concrete plans, transparent goals, and broadly-shared accountability. This updated Action Plan codifies our commitments, goals, and metrics we will use to assess them. We will revisit our goals on an annual basis and set new ones based on our progress.
Strengthening Our Internal Culture
Recruitment, Hiring, Training, and Retention
NYPR will continue to improve key HR structures and build teams of excellent colleagues who reflect the city we serve, and foster a truly equitable and inclusive workplace where they want to stay and grow. We will:
OUR COMMITMENTS
1.
Further develop our talent sourcing strategy and expand our recruitment pipeline for open roles and internships to attract candidates with a rich diversity of backgrounds through job posting and partnerships with local schools, HBCUs, and HSIs, as well as ethnic, LGBTQ+, and disability-inclusion professional organizations.
2.
Commit to securing a diverse slate of qualified candidates for all new and replacement roles to generally reflect the demographic diversity in the New York Metro area. Using the hiring toolkit, working with recruitment partners, managers training/cultural competencies, and ensuring equitable hiring processes.
3.
Develop an Employee Value Proposition (EVP) proposal, led by the HR team, that clearly defines the NYPR external brand, establishes the organization as a great workplace, and embraces our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. This includes continued development of the NYPR careers page by June 2024.
4.
Continue to enhance the talent management program, which includes implementing the 2nd phase of the career leveling framework with job pathing, and train people managers on the formal process for delivering consistent, quality employee performance feedback. Communicate and track utilization of new integrated HR & DEI and Content segments Learning and Development calendar through June 2024.
5.
Continue to expand frameworks, building upon Racial Equity training which facilitates constructive conversations about race, addresses systemic racism, builds cultural competencies, and increases cross-cultural understanding. Equip staff to maintain an inclusive and welcoming work environment enabling everyone to do their best without racist statements, microaggressions, actions, or other forms of misconduct. All employees must attend at least two DEI training sessions during the fiscal year in their performance goals.
6.
Sustain and grow Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) for diverse constituency groups organized to give voice to their communities. Equip leaders to build communities, set strategies for their constituencies, and act as true partners to the organization. Support the building of communities whose activities align with strategic business plans and help promote inclusive practices throughout the organization.
7.
Improve engagement scores in key areas including, pride in working at NYPR, values matching culture, open and honest two-way communications, understanding advancement requirements, and effectively directing resources toward company goals.
8.
Commit to a retention rate for BIPOC employees that is on par with (equal to or higher than) NYPR’s overall retention rate. We will monitor this goal on a quarterly basis and address areas of concern.
Building and Serving Diverse Audiences
Diverse Voices, Research, and Reach
NYPR will transform our existing programming and capabilities, elevating the staff, decision-makers, and culturally competent voices who will ensure that our work speaks to the experiences of more diverse audiences. We will develop equitable editorial processes, leverage research learning, and continue to build capabilities that help us reach beyond our current audiences—so we can better fulfill our mission to serve and represent our community.
OUR COMMITMENTS
9.
Conduct a review of company vendors to ensure an inclusive approach to procurement (Supplier Diversity).
10.
The Source Project is an ongoing initiative to track the demographics of guests and sources featured across the news and content divisions. In collaboration with content leaders and Digital Asset Management, we will develop and implement dashboard tools and automated communications to encourage consistent team data entry and improve quarterly reporting administration. DEI will continue quarterly check-ins to establish and monitor actionable goals across each property based on audience development strategies.
11.
Build specific, ambitious KPIs for reaching new, more diverse audiences into the organization’s strategic plans, along with detailed operating plans for tracking our progress towards them. Those operating plans should include necessary resourcing for gathering new audience data, processes for integrating it into editorial and operational planning, and clear delineations of broadly-shared responsibility across marketing, operational, and editorial teams.
12.
Leverage the FY23 internal evaluation of all policies, practices and programs to implement recommendations focusing on equity in availability to people with and without disabilities. This includes accessibility in services across all content platforms leveraging industry best practices in captioning, transcriptions, sign-language access and streamlining transcription workflows.
Transparency and Accountability
Track, Analyze, Report
NYPR will systematically track, analyze, and report on our performance against these goals—at the organizational, team, and manager levels—to ensure that we are making progress across the entire organization.
OUR COMMITMENTS
13.
Use data metrics, in conjunction with HR analytics, to identify patterns, teams, or departments that need attention, with the goal of addressing issues before they become systemic, and/or lead to attrition or turnover. We will track where BIPOC staff may “fall through the cracks” in the employee life cycle, identify teams or managers with higher-than-average attrition rates and consistently low engagement scores, across BIPOC staff to ensure that the outcomes we are pursuing at the organization-level are equitably achieved across NYPR.
14.
Continue to report on hiring and retention rates, audience diversity, and on-air diversity (through The Source Project) on a quarterly basis to staff and publish an annual DEI report on our website.