Our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion helps our work community thrive and strengthens us as a team

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are vital to our success as a company; research shows that more diverse teams outperform less diverse ones.1 More importantly, social injustice perpetuates a lack of equitable outcomes, resulting in disproportionate barriers to the success of systemically marginalized groups.

Here's how our DEI journey has progressed over the past year.

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1 David Rock, and Heidi Grant. Why Diverse Teams Are Smarter. Harvard Business Review, November 4, 2016.
https://hbr.org/2016/11/why-diverse-teams-are-smarter

As a company that values continuous improvement of ourselves and our world, we consider the work and commitment to DEI to be our collective responsibility. Not only is it the right thing to do for our business, it's the right thing to do—period.

– Liran Belenzon, CEO
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Our three-fold approach to DEI

Educate

We believe education and practice is integral to catalyzing systematic change at the individual level. To facilitate this, we work to develop informative DEI resources for our team, including:

  • Foundational DEI workshops exploring topics of identity, intersectionality, privilege, and inclusive behavior inclusion
  • Action Learning for all senior leaders
  • Inclusive hiring training for hiring managers and recruiters
  • A centralized resource (internal wiki) of information that promotes inclusivity
  • Leveraging Blue Ocean Brain and LinkedIn Learning for self-directed learning and leadership development
  • A $2,000 Learning and Development budget to be used to grow yourself personally and professionally
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Engage

We are building a culture where everyone feels like they belong. To this end, we are actively and deliberately having conversations and encouraging inclusive behaviors by:

  • Acknowledging and celebrating heritage months and commemorative dates throughout the year
  • Hosting events and discussions centered on identity to increase the cultural competency of our team members
  • Supporting Employee Resource Groups that contribute to creating an inclusive culture for all BenchSciers
  • Holding DEI “Office Hours” for supporting individuals and teams who have questions or are seeking support with how to embed DEI into their work

Elevate

A diverse team that is reflective of the world we live in is important to us. To accomplish this, we are intentionally focusing our efforts on hiring, promoting, and developing talent in an inclusive manner by:

  • Partnering with our Talent Acquisition team to ensure we are mitigating bias at every step of the hiring process
  • Launching BenchSci Forward, our platform for change and social responsibility focused on the advancement of social issues such as diversity in STEM, mental health, and climate change
  • Offering a bi-weekly circle for parents and caregivers to connect, seek and offer support
  • Providing flexible parental leave, with the option of 75% top-ups for 20 weeks or 15 designated Parental Leave Days
  • Providing mental health benefits for all team members, including mental wellness coverage up to $2,500, personalized executive coaching, regular mindfulness sessions, and extra vacation time
  • Conducting a pay fairness analysis to ensure our compensation practices are equitable
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We have a duty to help make the world a better, more inclusive, and more equitable place.

By investing in DEI, we all benefit.

Throughout our journey, it is essential we align with our core values, one of which is transparency. We collect demographic data on an ongoing basis, and we include questions on our annual culture listening tour to help us understand the lived experience of everyone at BenchSci. We will share an annual year-in-review reflecting on our opportunities, and sharing our progress.

 

Learn about our accessibility commitments and our long-term plan here.

Curious about our culture?

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