The height of the Black Lives Matter movement in June last year brought a much-needed spotlight to the racial biases that bring emotional, mental, and physical harm to the BIPOC community. We have been in a diversity crisis for too long, and change is far past due.

When you consider the slew of layoffs and CEO resignations across industries (from Audrey Gelman to Greg Glassman) due to racial insensitivity and inequity—and surveys reaffirming that BIPOC employees often feel unheard and unsafe at work—it’s clear that noninclusive work environments are both pervasive and damaging. So why are companies still struggling to provide effective diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) training?

Scientific research has shown that the way our brains build associations and categorize behaviors actually makes it very difficult to quickly unlearn well-developed behaviors and thinking patterns. Unfortunately, most workplace training glosses over this fact and fails to provide effective learning structures. That being said, if we use learning research and new technologies to reconstruct how we approach DE&I training, we may be able to achieve lasting, positive change.

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