Brandi Riggins, Global Head of Diversity, Equity Inclusion at Guidewire Software - DEI is a Marathon

On a recent episode of Reimagining Company Culture, the conversation turned to running DEI as a long-term operating commitment. The guest, Brandi Riggins, brought direct experience to the topic from their day-to-day work, and the conversation moved past the talking points most People teams have heard a hundred times. This recap pulls the practical thread of the discussion together and translates it into the workflows HR leaders are running today.

Brandi's background sets the context for how Brandi thinks about this work. As Global Head of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Guidewire, Brandi Riggins works deeply to embed the principles of equity and belonging across the global employee experience and culture to achieve maximum employee engagement and potential. That experience shapes the perspective the episode brings to running DEI as a long-term operating commitment, and the recap below stays grounded in the workflows leaders are running, not abstractions.

The conversation touches on the basics any People team is already managing, including unconscious bias in the workplace and untapped talent pools. The recap below assumes that grounding and focuses on the operating moves leaders make on top of it.

Most of the framework below holds up across industries and company stages. The specifics vary; the underlying mechanics rarely do.

Why DEI work looks like a marathon, not a campaign

DEI work that gets evaluated on a quarterly cycle disappears in eighteen months. The reason is mathematical, not political. Most of the metrics that matter, representation at promotion, attrition equity, pay gap closure, move on multi-year cycles. Quarterly evaluation pressure produces quarterly fixes that do not survive the next reorg.

Brandi's approach at Guidewire is to set targets on the right cadence. Three-year horizons for representation work. Annual reviews of policy and benefits. Quarterly reviews of complaint patterns and intake quality. The cadences match the underlying systems being changed.

How leaders work through running DEI as a long-term operating commitment

What DEI metrics move on what timelines?

Hiring metrics move in quarters. Promotion metrics move in years. Attrition equity moves on the timeline of the longest tenure cohort that matters. SHRM guidance on accountable inclusive leadership guidance underscores that accountability without realistic timelines produces theater.

The work is to set targets on the right horizon and report on the right cadence. Reporting hiring quarterly is fine. Reporting promotion quarterly produces noise.

How do you sustain DEI commitment through leadership change?

By embedding the commitments in operating systems that survive any individual leader. Compensation tied to multi-year DEI metrics. Board-level reporting cadence. Vendor diversity requirements in procurement. Hiring panel composition standards.

Each of those continues whether or not the next CHRO is as committed. DEI work that lives in one leader's calendar dies when that leader does.

What actually works in practice

The pattern across companies that handle running DEI as a long-term operating commitment well comes down to three operational habits.

• Set targets on the timeline of the system being changed. Hiring targets are quarterly. Promotion targets are multi-year. Mismatched timelines produce gaming.
• Embed DEI commitments in operating systems, not goals. Goals can be reset. Operating systems survive turnover.
• Report progress and gaps with the same cadence. Reporting only progress is marketing. Reporting both is accountability.

None of these are aspirational. They are checklists the strongest People teams run on a cadence, and the consistency is what makes the difference.

What looks like a culture decision from the outside is usually the cumulative effect of those three habits, applied without theatrics.

This pattern shows up alongside familiar tools like workforce analysis fundamentals. The combination is what makes the operating model durable.

Where Employee Relations fits

AllVoices DEI solution programs at scale need infrastructure. AllVoices data and insights dashboard aggregates the patterns. AllVoices anonymous reporting tool captures the signals before they harden into attrition. AllVoices DEI hotline gives employees a named channel.

The companies pulling this off rarely run it on memory. They run it on infrastructure. AllVoices HR case management platform centralizes the case data; AllVoices data and insights dashboard surfaces the patterns nobody catches manually; AllVoices Vera AI co-pilot for ER teams accelerates the response time so the work is finishable. Together they cover the operating layer that this episode keeps pointing at.

How does ER track DEI progress across years?

By keeping case data legible at the cohort level. AllVoices workplace discrimination hotline channels generate the early signals; aggregated case data, by demographics, by team, by tenure, surfaces the systemic patterns that single complaints obscure.

The supporting research is consistent. Independent analysis from Catalyst guidance on genuine inclusion policies points the same direction the episode does. The combination of operating discipline and outside data is what gets People leaders past the slogan stage.

The takeaway holds across companies of different sizes and industries. The teams that turn this episode's lesson into operating practice are the ones that name a target metric, run it on a cadence, and refuse to let activity stand in for outcomes. The metric does not have to be elaborate. It has to be visible to the people who can move it, and reviewed often enough that nothing falls off the radar for a quarter.

The other consistent pattern is that the work compounds. Year one of any of these practices feels like overhead. Year three is when the retention, engagement, and case-data signals start telling a clearly different story. People leaders who hold the line through the early part of the curve tend to be the ones who have the receipts when leadership asks for evidence later.

One more pattern worth naming: the People teams that scale this work fast share a common move. They put the operating habit on the same dashboard as the business metric it supports. Retention sits next to revenue. Case cycle time sits next to pipeline health. Engagement sits next to product velocity. The dashboards reinforce that this work is operations, not enrichment, and the cross-functional partners who see those side-by-side numbers stop questioning the spend within a quarter.

That dashboard discipline is also what survives leadership change. Whoever inherits the function inherits the dashboard, and the metrics keep reporting whether the new leader champions them or not. The work that lives only in personal commitment dies when the personal commitment moves on; the work that lives in shared operating systems keeps reporting itself.

Frequently Asked Questions About Running Dei As A Long-Term Operating Commitment

How long does it take to close a representation gap?

Most companies take three to seven years to close a meaningful representation gap, depending on tenure cohorts and turnover. Shorter timelines usually require either acquisitions or unsustainable churn.

Should DEI be tied to the CEO scorecard?

Yes, on a multi-year horizon. CEO accountability for single-year DEI metrics produces the same gaming pressure as quarterly evaluation. Three-year metrics are the practical cadence.

What's the role of ERGs in long-term DEI strategy?

Insight, sponsorship, and retention. ERGs that are funded and tied to leadership produce both belonging and pipeline data nobody else generates.

Can DEI work survive political pressure?

Yes, when it is framed as performance work rather than ideological work. Companies whose DEI work is grounded in retention, productivity, and case data work through political cycles better than companies whose DEI work depends on external endorsement.

What's the most common DEI sustainability mistake?

Letting the program live with a single leader. The work has to be embedded in operating systems to survive turnover.

The Bottom Line for HR Leaders

Brandi's framing is the one that holds up across cycles. DEI is operational work on multi-year timelines. The companies that internalize that reality build infrastructure that lasts. The ones that don't keep restarting the program every two years.

The marathon comparison is more than a metaphor.

See how AllVoices supports the kind of culture work this episode is about.