Business 101: Overcoming Unconscious Bias

Diversity and inclusion are no longer just buzzwords — they’ve become a major part of the core values for many organizations. The State Theatre, for example, has an ongoing commitment to making world-class arts programming affordable and accessible for individuals from all ages and backgrounds, working with our partners each year to provide nearly $700,000 in free and subsidized programming.

Cotton Candy Ice Cream

Pink Apple, Purple Background

Nail Art

Manicured Hands

Yellow Rose

Three Boxes

Pink Banana, White Nails

The things shown above are all products of our influences, and our influences often can result in unconscious bias, For example, the best music in the world is the music you heard between the ages of 10 and 20 — a person’s influences can dictate their perspectives.

We’re very conscious of the fact that anything that gets in the way of our ability to innovate and drive business performance is problematic, so, we are relentless in our notion around stamping out unconscious bias, We think it’s a corporate disease, quite frankly, that gets in the way of us being empathetic as leaders and being able to look at what really are serious business issues.

So, we’ve done a lot of original research to understand unconscious bias in terms of the medical implications, both psychological and physiological, and what that means in terms of driving innovation and the ability to collaborate.