Instead of recruiting employees who are a “culture fit” to reach benchmarks for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I), experts say some introspection might be a better use of your time in the new year.

“It’s important when you look at inclusivity to look not just at the demographics, but also the way people want to work–and how they want to work,” said Darren Chiappetta, VP and global head of employee relations and policy for Sony Pictures Entertainment. “The workforce has expectations that senior leadership might not share. The workforce wants to be respected, and emerging workers are a lot more supportive and curious about diversity and belonging.”

Clear DE&I initiatives are increasingly important for companies as they try to attract and retain the next generation of top talent. Four out of five members of Generation Z, the segment of the population born between 1997 and 2012, say it’s important for companies to address DEI, according to a survey by the market-research firm Quantilope. Experts say the priority needs to come from the top down.

“If you have an organization where leadership is not committed to using DE&I tools to run a better business, you’re not going to succeed,” said Mason Williams, global head of DE&I for toymaker Mattel. “So you have to hold your leaders accountable. We’re in an age now where we can hold leadership accountable,” he said in a panel discussion titled, “Is Your Company Developing an Inclusive Culture?” part of From Day One’s recent conference in Los Angeles. Among the highlights of the conversation, moderated by reporter Jonathan Landrum Jr. of the Associated Press: 

Incorporate Inclusion Effort Into All Departments 

Inclusion metrics are often siloed into numbers related to headcount or advertising. The experts urged company leaders in attendance to go deeper and look at ways to weave diversity into the very fabric of their company culture. “Studios are the factories that build content,” said Chiappetta. “The [entertainment] industry has not always been the easiest place to break into. So for us, part of this is making sure the stories are more varied and inclusive. That means bringing people who have these lived experiences into the writer’s room. It includes the camera people, the hair and makeup artists, everyone.”

Stacie de Armas, the SVP of DE&I, diverse insights, intelligence, and initiatives for the audience-measuring company Nielsen, challenged attendees to go even further with how they define and incorporate inclusion. “At Nielsen, one way we approach inclusion is to take those same DE&I principles and apply them to our products and services. When we think about something like inclusion in content, one of the things we wanted to do was operationalize inclusion, so that it doesn’t need to be counted manually. We asked ourselves the question: ‘Could we build this into our work streams?’ This idea of taking DEI and operationalizing it means that everyone can evaluate more effectively, and this also helps brands objectively look at content output.”

Several panelists noted that younger workers may be too intimidated to speak up, but that they have ample data at their fingertips to form perceptions and opinions of company culture for themselves. “There’s this discomfort with telling the truth,” said Odessa Jenkins, president of Emtrain, a workplace culture e-learning and analytics company. “These new generations of workers are enabled with data in a way that past generations were not. They are born data-literate.”

External communications on online forums like Glassdoor and Fishbowl, an app where professionals can go to have semi-anonymous workplace conversations, can also shape company perception in the eyes of younger employees. Jenkins emphasized that, to deal with these outside reviews, companies must take control of the conversation via clear and demonstrable messaging.

“If you don’t define what your components of culture are, you will be beholden to that external information,” she said. “The other thing that’s really important is this: What are your mission and values? And are you allowing those to be cannibalized by these external things? If you have a strong position on who you are, what your core values are, and what your objectives are, that will drown out external noise.”

Panelists emphasized that a company’s approach to inclusion can’t be cookie cutter, and must integrate well with current company culture. “I don’t think it’s a one-size-fits-all,’” said Deborah Kuness, senior business psychologist for Workday, which provides enterprise cloud applications for HR and finance. “The important thing is to not be afraid to open up these conversations with our own people. As Mason said earlier, it doesn’t need to be complicated.”

Connect DE&I Back to Business Outcomes

“Do leaders respect the data behind DE&I?” Landrum asked. “Or is there skepticism about it?”

“You align it to their business outcomes,” Jenkins said. “The truth is that most leaders don’t have a great understanding of what’s happening deep down in their organizations. And really, they shouldn’t. I think we sometimes lose sight of the fact that we are still running a business, that we are still for-profit, when we try to prioritize diversity. Be fair to your board of directors, and your C-Suite, and show them what you’re out to do.”

De Armas agreed, citing the shift in how consumers shop. “Consumers want to invest in brands that are doing good, and this wasn’t a priority before 2020 and before George Floyd. In 2020, everyone began to care about who they were spending their dollar with. In that moment, DE&I changed; it moved away from something about [employee resource groups] and supplier diversity and into the spotlight.”

Acknowledging the work still to be done can be a productive step toward a more diverse and inclusive workplace, said Kuness. “It’s about evoking a culture change–not just checking boxes.”

Nick Wolny is a senior editor at NextAdvisor, in partnership with TIME. He has previously written for Fast Company, Fortune, Business Insider, Entrepreneur Magazine, and OUT Magazine, and was named a “40 under 40” by the Houston Business Journal in 2021.