Diversity Brand Summit, Francesca Vecchioni: “People reward aware companies”

Netflix And Amazon are the winners of the Diversity Brand Awards 2022, the awards recognized to companies capable of conveying their real commitment on the Diversity & Inclusion front to the final market. The awards were awarded during the fifth edition of the Diversity Brand Summit, Planet-D: a diversity transition and they saw Overall Netflix winner for its extensive multi-pronged commitment to D&I e winner «Digital» Amazonfor the project Hour of Code – Coding workshops for young students and female students.

“The Diversity Brand Awards for us is a new activism”, explains Francesca Vecchioni, founder and president of the non-profit Diversity. “A way to try to change society by using the language of business, therefore data and research”.

The winners were identified from the summary of the results of a web survey and the assessments of the Scientific Committee, made up of University Professors and Experts on branding, trust and marketing issues, and by a Security Check Committee, made up of experts * specific forms of diversity.

Let’s start from the base. What is Diversity?

«Diversity is the concept of diversified reality. We live in a world made up of people who are all different from each other and diversity reasons on a series of areas that are defined academically as “categories” that tend to create possible discrimination. Characteristics such as gender, age, religious belief, emotional sexual orientation, ethnic origin. Thus, diversity & inclusion is the way in which the lesson of inclusion is to be taken from reality. We try to show how being able to create an inclusive environment is an enrichment for the whole of society “.

This is the goal of the Diversity Brand Summit?

«The aim is to show how much communication and the way brands make choices can have an inclusive impact on society such as to increase the business of companies. When you manage to communicate well on some issues such as those related to diversity you are actually increasing the perceived value of your brand. An ethical and moral value, not just for business “.

How do you evaluate the real commitment of companies?

“The Diversity Brand Index measures in two steps how well brands are able to be perceived as inclusive by society. The first step is to analyze the perception of people, subsequently, on the basis of the brands that are cited, the same brands are asked for the initiatives they have taken to be cited as inclusive brands. From here starts an analysis phase that goes to make a real verification of what companies are doing, to unmask any Diversity Washing. The words and the register used are verified, for example a positive and not paternalistic register is rewarded. This second step is the one that gives the consistency score with respect to people’s perception. The award does not analyze the internal activities of the brands but the concrete impact on people and therefore on the business ».