Giulia Cirillo of PSP Investments explains the process of co-creating an award-winning DE&I policy
Since the Public Sector Pensions Investment Board (PSP Investments) was founded 22 years ago in Canada, it has evolved into a global institution with a responsible approach to fund management. PSP considers the environmental, social and governance impacts of its investments, and is committed to diversity, equity and inclusion across its offices in Ottawa, Montreal, New York, London and Hong Kong. Due to its innovative and wide-ranging DE&I strategy, the organization was recognised for Excellence in Diversity and Inclusion at the 2021 Canadian HR Awards.
In an interview with HRDTV’s Kavita Musty, PSP Investments’ senior vice president, chief human resources and global communications officer Giulia Cirillo describes how her organization developed its DE&I policy through co-creation with its employees.
To design a roadmap, the organization formed “affinity groups” engaged in eight areas: indigenous; anti-racism; culture and religion; LGBTQ+; gender dynamics; veterans; people with disability; multi-generation, multi-background, and diversity of thought. Each group had a leader who collaborated with members to determine objectives and initiatives, and together they set up events that employees could participate in. By expressing their insights and sharing their stories, the employees became advocates of the issues they cared about.
“[The] focus is really to increase awareness, increase the education around certain issues and initiatives, and create a common language within their affinity group and their space … So, there’s certainly an ecosystem that is created by bringing all of our employees to participate in DE&I.”
Cirillo describes the development of this strategy as a learning process, which has been fruitful due to the co-creative instead of prescriptive method used. “At the core of [DE&I is] keeping an open mind, creating curiosity, and adopting different initiatives or change as we go forward,” she says.
Cirillo believes that her industry will succeed in advancing DE&I when organizations form partnerships. PSP Investments itself contributes to panels or educational series in collaboration with the Institutional Limited Partners Association, Women in Capital Markets, Association of Quebec Women in Finance, Onyx Advisor Network, 10,000 Black Interns Programme, and other organizations. She adds that the qualitative and quantitative means of measuring progress in DE&I have been strongly influenced by social events in the past 18 months, such as the experiences of Black and indigenous people.
“The pandemic itself has created incredible societal inequities among different groups within our communities, so that also has created an opportunity for us to challenge our perspectives … and definitely adapt different measurements for that context.”
Cirillo says that the challenge for leaders is to support initiatives where they have an impact and a voice, and to make DE&I programs relevant internationally.
