Power of Employee Networks | Up for Discussion with Tim Macavoy

In this episode of CB Up for Discussion, we are joined by Tim Macavoy, Head of Product at Radius Networks. With a dynamic background spanning the arts, technology, and media, Tim brings a wealth of experience to the world of DE&I-particularly in empowering and supporting employee resource groups (ERGs) across global organisations. Passionate about fostering communities where everyone belongs, Tim shares his unique journey from founding LGBTQ+ youth radio and university networks to leading innovative DE&I solutions for top companies.

In this episode, we delve into:
• The inspiration behind the Radius Networks ERG Impact Report, including how employee resource groups are driving positive workplace change, supporting business strategy, and enhancing careers.
• The unique challenges and opportunities for ERGs in the Asia context, from navigating complex cultural and language nuances to shifting from hierarchical to network-based leadership.
• Key findings from the Radius report, including how ERGs are thriving, fostering belonging for everyone, and contributing to tangible business outcomes.
• The power of partnership, learning, and community in sustaining inclusive ecosystems and driving sustainable change.

Join us as we explore Tim’s insights on the transformational power of employee networks and get practical advice for organisations looking to amplify inclusion through ERGs-across Asia and beyond. Tune in now!

[Jeiz Robles]

Hi, my name is Jeiz Robles and I'm a director of DE&I at Community Business. I will be your podcast host for today's episode.

 

Today's episode marks the launch of our exciting new partnership between Community Business and Networks. This is a partnership that's very close to my heart because in my corporate state as a DE&I professional, Community Business and Radius are really partner organisations that are hugely valued because my advocacy also started as a pride network leader. So now, united by a shared commitment to advancing diversity, equity and inclusion across Asia, this collaboration leverages the strengths of both organisations to empower workplaces to be more inclusive and equitable.

 

At the heart of our partnership is a belief in the transformative power of employee networks and resource groups. By equipping ERG or network leaders with practical tools, insights, and support, we're helping organisations embed a genuine sense of belonging, driving business success and sustainable change. Together, Community Business Network and Radius Networks are building a stronger ecosystem for inclusion where every employee can thrive.

 

So today, I'm very excited to be speaking with Tim. Tim McAvoy is the head of product at Radius Networks. He has helped top global organisations develop their DE&I ecosystem, in particular, employee networks and their leaders for many years.

 

Tim has a broad background in technology, media, and the arts with previous UX design positions at Microsoft and Government Digital Service. He also has a practical experience of founding and leading diversity networks from universities to LGBTQ plus youth radio, Skype to Intertech Diversity Forum. Now, without further ado, Tim, welcome to the podcast.

 

And for our listeners who may not be familiar with your work, could you share a little bit more about yourself, your background, and your passion for DE&I?

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Hi, Jeiz. Yeah, thank you for having me along. It's a delight.

 

First of all, I would just say for anyone listening and not watching, I'm sitting on a roof terrace in the centre of the city of London because it's such beautiful sunshine. For those of you watching, look, it's not a fake background. This is real.

 

It was us all sitting in a cupboard, and it didn't feel like a sitting in a cupboard kind of chat. So, I hope if there's a bit of occasional background or plane going overhead, you'll forgive it for enjoying the atmosphere of the day. Yeah, so, my name's Tim.

 

Radius has been around for about 16 years. We started in the UK, but, you know, now work globally putting ERGs or employee networks, we use the terms interchangeably, really at the centre of DE&I or DEI efforts. I've been here about eight years.

 

It's the longest job I've ever had by far now because prior to that, I was somewhat transient hopping between jobs and industries. I was always a do-gooder, I will say. I've always sort of been quite passionate about, you know, joining forums and groups and networks and things that have something to do with treating people well and creating communities, but I have been through many different industries.

 

I started out in the arts and the performing arts, which is what, and, you know, in some ways, the performing arts is a very inclusive, liberal place to be in terms of cultural attitudes, but actually, in terms of the way you get treated as an employee, as in, you know, having rights and thinking about things like bias and working overtime and all sorts of things, it's terrible. So, it's got this interesting balance of DE&I challenges in the arts, and it was through there that really I got into, as you say, LGBT youth radio, using some of my hosting skills, so that got me in turn into journalism, where I was mostly working in arts journalism, but occasionally I would get the odd interview with a politician or a company, you know, the CEO or HR manager, and would always want to throw questions at them around diversity and inclusion and that sort of stuff, and that led me in turn from media into technology as a copywriter, then as a UX designer, and it was there that I really kind of got stuck into how networks really are for understanding people, making it part of the business, and how it can enhance your whole organisation.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Quite an interesting journey from the arts to technology, and now to employee networks.

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yeah, I mean, I'm a big believer that, you know, in everything you do, you should take all of your life experiences with you. I remember being interviewed for a job at Microsoft, and I'd left off all my kind of years of acting, and the manager who was employing me was like, why have you just got a gap here? Like, what was it?

 

Were you in prison? I was like, well, no, it was acting, and I just didn't think it would seem relevant to you at Microsoft Working Technology, and it was like, far from it, you know, we value all of these skills and all of these experiences, so as random as it seems when you take a step back, when you zoom into every moment, it made sense.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah, definitely, and that's all about bringing your best self to work, right? Bringing the most authentic you. So yeah, Tim, can you, I know Radius has been doing a lot lately, but I know one of the things that you released recently is the ERG Impact Report.

 

Can you talk more about that, like some of the key findings, and maybe things that you find particularly compelling?

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yeah, so as I said, we've worked with organisations for years and years around the world, and you know, when we talk to clients, we have a lot of anecdotal information to give them. We say, oh, you know, well, this company's been doing this, and when I was working with them, they do this. What we didn't have so much was a really condensed way to widely share some information about how brilliant employee networks and ERGs are, so that people could pick it up, quickly riffle through, see some key points, and then share it with other people who know even less.

 

So we wanted something that was very shareable, and obviously a report does that. It's free to download from our website, so please people do go radius-networks.org, and you can see the full thing for yourself. But to give you a couple of highlights, we wanted some numerical data.

 

We sent some surveys out, some, it was like over a thousand organisations, I think we sent it out to, and conducted interviews in our own experience to try and interpret the data and turn it into a narrative, and some of the key things that came out is networks are growing, which is reassuring, not just in terms of the numbers of people joining a network, but the types of network as well. So in some ways it's brilliant, because it has even more opportunities for people to find a network that they want to join, and networks are for everyone. They're not just about minoritised people, you know, they can be for everyone to join.

 

Of course the challenge that comes with that is it makes the governance of them a little more complicated. So we've been working with bigger organisations to sort of try and rationalise the 100, 200 networks they have into some sort of structure where they all get equally, or fairly supported, and they're in some sort of umbrella structures that make sense. We also found that networks are having a positive impact.

 

99% of our respondents, and we spoke to, you know, members and leads of ERGs, we spoke to sponsors, executive sponsors, we spoke to HR leads, we spoke to all sorts of people in industries, but almost everyone agreed that they're having a positive impact, and that they create cultural change. Also that they are shaping EDI and business strategy. An interesting point in the context of talking about Asia-Pacific is that one of the biggest differences in responses from Asia-Pacific came in terms of shaping EDI and business strategy.

 

So whereas we had our lowest mark from the Americas, where 65% said it did, in Asia-Pacific we had about 85% say it did. So much stronger sense that ERGs and employee networks can help you shape your strategies on the ground, and we think part of the reason for that is that because Asia is so diverse, so nuanced, so many languages, you know, it's really important for the people who are working on the ground in business to be able to help land those strategies, which may have come from a global HQ, maybe come from one country, and it's harder to interpret it unless you have those people going, I can help you with this because I understand how it works here. So that's a really big point for us. And the final one I'll just throw in, and then the rest you can read for yourself, is overwhelmingly people said it had enhanced their careers personally being part of a network.

 

That was not just leading a network, which we fully expected, because you learned so many skills being a network leader, but also the reach that you get from meeting people in different parts of the organisation by being part of one. So even just being a network member and even being a sponsor of a network said that it enhanced their careers greatly. So that was wonderful to read.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah, and you know, as you were speaking, I was just like going down memory lane during my times as an employee network leader. It's definitely a huge driver of development and opportunity to be able to connect with different people in the organisation, because not only was I able to drive my advocacy and my passion, but I also was able to build a network with senior leaders, decision makers, and really drive business priorities. I know for a fact that some of the most successful employee networks, and I know you cover this in your development programmes, are those that really look at the end-to-end lifecycle of talent, for example, from the time they're hired to how they're retained and to how they develop and actually become an ambassador for their companies respectively, both as a network leader and more.

 

So it's definitely very good ground to develop in terms of your career. That said, you talked about Asia and Asian context and how the results are kind of different. Do you have some unique challenges and opportunities that you find for ERG specifically in the Asia context, particularly any cultural nuances or organisational nuances or the like?

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yes, we do. I think I'll preface it by saying that as someone who works in diversity and inclusion, I know full well that when we make assessments or perhaps stereotypes about different cultures or different regions, while they can be partly true on the whole when you take a step back, I also know that the differences between individuals within a culture is greater than between cultures. So I just want to preface it by saying I do realise that everyone's the same in every culture.

 

I don't constantly drink tea as an English man. I only have it six or seven times a day. But that said, I think there are some things that we do commonly see.

 

One is around the communication style. So aside from the language diversity, which obviously is huge in Asia, and language diversity can be a real challenge in diversity and inclusion because we have so many similar and different words that get, you know, moved in and out all of the time. You're using one term in one place and then you discover that it means something completely different or in another word it's become taboo for some reason.

 

And the, you know, the challenge of translating terms that are so loaded is really complicated. So I think in terms of language diversity, first of all, what's important is to try and communicate your meaning as clearly as possible without relying on one word meaning the same to everyone. Understand that you might need to spend a bit of extra time discussing key terms and say, ask people, what is your understanding of that?

 

How would you paraphrase it back to me? You know, we would call that active listening of being able to paraphrase things that people are saying. And also just accept that there may be difference.

 

So we, you know, I even have this between the UK and the US, for example, that there are terms we sometimes use that the US might even find offensive. And I think rather than assuming that everything's offensive and trying to align just to the one agreed culture, we can sometimes accept that things are different in other cultures and let it be, you know. And on that note, I think another difference is the approach to confrontation and open disagreement.

 

I would say in my experience, from what I've seen anyway, is that it's much more common in Western ERGs for me to see open confrontation, disagreement, anger even, directed at HR, directed at sponsors. You know, oftentimes we have to work with the whole team and say, you know, you're on the same page here. You might have slightly different priorities or ways of communicating, but it's going to be better if we come together.

 

I find that happens a lot less in Asia Pacific, that there is open disagreement in that style. It's more carefully phrased. I think there's more of a, whether the term is respect or hesitancy, to speak to people who are more senior.

 

And so, the opportunity of that is it's great because there's, I think, a much deeper sense of respect often and a sense of community. But it can be a challenge to sometimes draw out some of the observations of what's not going well on the ground from people, which is where ERGs really thrive. It's by telling those stories that would otherwise go unheard.

 

So sometimes it can be a bit of a challenge to draw that out. I was just going to add, I think, that also goes on to the nature of networks and the structure of them is that hierarchy can differ in quite a lot across the globe. And I think, you know, perhaps it's changing more with the modern age as people are so used to networked communication with social media, et cetera, online working.

 

But I think networks thrive when there is less of a centre of power. And, you know, that can apply to anywhere that a chair of a network doesn't hold on to all the knowledge. They don't do everything for themselves.

 

The point of a network, if we think of it in terms of technology, is you should be able to remove any single points of the network, any node, and it still works. It's the way the brain works, right? We can get a little bit of brain damage somewhere in the brain and it works around it.

 

And that's the structure we're really looking for, to make it resilient and agile. And when it turns into, you know, a pyramid or a wheel with a central spoke or whatever it is, I think it doesn't work as well. And the sense of hierarchy, I think, can also be a challenge.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah. I definitely relate to that, Tim, because I did go through the RADIUS development programme. I think it was stage two at the time.

 

And I was really relating to how the structures look like of successful ERGs, for example. And I remember at the time that I joined the employee network, we did have a chair, but then eventually we saw that maybe a co-leadership style would work better for the network. Because in that way, any time that you become, for example, busy with your day job, your co-chairs can pick it up.

 

And we also looked at how we can, for example, position quarterly recommitments so that, as you said, power is distributed and decision making can also be distributed in that sense. I wanted to highlight how you mentioned hierarchy is very different, really, here. And how I think from a conscious standpoint, we would often make decisions and speak up as Asians.

 

I mean, I'm not trying to generalise, but in the sense that we're thinking about the collective impact of what we're going to say, as opposed to, I guess, other cultures where there is a more individualistic approach to the responses or to confrontation even. And so I think while Asia is really vast and have its own drivers from a cultural standpoint, we do share that level of collectivism whenever we would handle interactions within the networks and beyond.

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yeah, absolutely. And that can be, you know, a challenge in terms of speaking up sometimes, especially if you don't have many people like you around you. Which is, you know, what ERGs is for, is to try and get people who have more similarities together to kind of form a bit more strength in collectivism.

 

So it can also be a benefit, that sense of, well, we want to do this together. We want to include people and we want to do it in a respectful way. We don't just want to be an outsider protest group.

 

So there's pros and cons, I think, to both of those cultural situations.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Speaking of, could you tell us more, Tim, about high-impact ERGs? I know you're in the business of really creating high-impact ERGs.

 

What are some of the key characteristics of these employee networks and how can organisations actually cultivate them?

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yeah, so this is a question really that we could talk forever about because that is the core of our, that is the core of our business. And what I want to say, first of all, I think is it's different for everyone what high-impact is, you know, because it depends on the maturity of your organisation, where your network is at, the skills you have, what's going on in the world. There are so many things that can change what your priorities and your approach should be.

 

So with our training and development, we try not to be too prescriptive, for example. What we want to do instead is give inspiration, guidance, examples, exercises for you to put into your own context. I try to think of it much more like university learning, where you learn how to learn about the subject as opposed to here's the steps you should follow to be successful, because that's just not a thing in this field.

 

It's too varied and changeable. But I think some things that are very common that I'll go through, just to be practical as well, is making sure that your ERGs, your employee networks, are properly integrated with your D&I strategy. So make sure that the ERGs have a clear mandate from the business.

 

They understand how they contribute to the broader D&I goals and also the organisational goals. I think that's, it's really important to see them at the heart of the business rather than on the side. So you should look for where they're specifically mentioned in your strategy.

 

They should have resources and support. Some of these things seem really obvious, but they're conversations we have all the time. So that includes potentially having dedicated budgets, having time for meetings, having some administrative support, whether that comes from the comms team or the D&I team, access to relevant training and development opportunities as well, whether that's us or someone else.

 

So, you know, providing support shows that it's a legitimate thing, right? The organisation believes in it. We've seen it enhance its careers.

 

We know it has a positive impact on the organisation. So organisations should be actively supporting it and not expecting people to just think of everything themselves. It's exhausting and it's not practical.

 

Having an executive sponsor, this is also really important. And I would say from my observations, even more so in Asia Pacific, having an executive sponsor, and it goes back to that thing about, you know, the sense of hierarchy when you've got someone more senior in business saying, you can speak up. We believe in you.

 

I'm going to also enhance your voice. It, you know, encourages a little bit more. But for everyone, having a sponsor is important because they have insights into the business that you don't have.

 

They will be able to advise you on what strategically is going to be a priority and likely to pass. They can mentor you personally on leadership skills they've learned along the way. They can take your voice further than it otherwise would.

 

I've got some more. I've got a few more. Goal setting and measurement.

 

I think the most important thing about kind of setting a goal is just knowing what direction you're headed in and also being able to pause regularly to say, are we heading in that direction?

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah.

 

[Tim Macavoy]

So I'm not, I don't necessarily have specific metrics that you should follow. I'm not saying everyone should have X number of members or you should do this many events per year. I think that's sort of redundant to the mindset of do we, are we doing this purposefully or are we just doing it because everyone else does an event?

 

And have we paused afterwards before we move on to the next thing to go? What was the impact of that and could we have done it any better? Two more things I will say are really common to set you up for success.

 

Collaboration. Work with the other ERGs. Don't do things on your own because you'll all be creating stuff that you can use across the network.

 

So don't create them seven times. Create them once and share them and adapt them. Share your best practises with each other.

 

Share your resources. And, you know, perhaps I'll put a pin in that to talk about intersectionality in a moment. But on a practical level, collaborating with each other means you have less work to do, which is always a bonus when you're in an ERG.

 

And finally, and actually in our report, this is the thing we found was kind of ranked the lowest or the most negatively that people were not doing. Everyone else was really super positive. This was the one that were like, we don't think this is going very well, is recognising and celebrating success, which is a shame because ERGs are doing amazing things all over the place.

 

And they're not pausing long enough to, I think, acknowledge their successes, to take time to celebrate them, raise the visibility of what you're doing and also kind of the opportunities of being in an ERG committee. Sometimes when I talk to leaders, they don't want to celebrate their own success because they think it's like too egotistical. It's like blowing their own horn.

 

They think they're just doing it for the common goods. And what I have to say to them is, you know, there are people out there who don't know what you do, and this is part of your brand building. It's part of going, look at the opportunities you have if you come along, if you contribute, what you can learn, that sense of achievement you can feel.

 

So it's important for your, the sustainability of your network, for your resilience, for your succession planning, to celebrate as much as possible your achievements.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah. That reminds me of what we call, when this was still a term, the FOMO energy, or fear of missing out. When we do anything for the network, we would make sure that, like, we posted in the group chat, that people see what we did.

 

And it's actually more, it's more about showing the world the impact that we're driving. But at the same time, that's also speaking to the personal eminence of those people leading the employee network. So I definitely relate to that.

 

So, Tim, another thing. The report touches on the importance of collaborating with others. And you mentioned it earlier, right?

 

How to address intersectional issues, for example. Can you give more examples on that?

 

[Tim Macavoy]

Yeah, absolutely. So just quickly, for anyone who's not super familiar, we use the term intersectionality a lot. It means when you have intersecting identities, like, let's say, for example, you are a Black disabled woman, you might find there are certain things that you face that just a Black woman wouldn't, or a disabled woman wouldn't, or just a woman wouldn't.

 

You know, there are unique kind of oppressions. Now, we can go into where that comes from legally, but we're not going to do that today. What we're going to talk about is what it practically means for ERGs, for networks.

 

And what it means is resisting a single identity. So people might think you just deal with one topic in your network, because that's what they've seen in the headline, you know, you're a disability network. So perhaps you are only for people in wheelchairs, as opposed to, you know, the plethora of disabilities, or access needs, or neurodiversity that it could cover.

 

So for one thing, it's about resisting a single narrative and showing that really, almost anything can come into your network and be part of it, it makes it more inclusive, it makes it more inviting. But what it most often means is networks collaborating with each other to discover what those stories are, those intersectional opportunities. So that's why as networks, we need to put most of our effort into collaborating with other ERGs when it comes to events and panel discussions and calendar days.

 

So, yes, host joint events and initiatives. I think be aware of what you want to achieve and how your audiences interact with each other. Some are very used to interacting, some are not so used to interacting.

 

So you might need to hold people's hands a little bit, think about how you create those inclusive conversations, do a bit of myth busting. You absolutely should be sharing resources and best practises. So perhaps, as an example, you have collaborated on a guide to allyship that all the networks can share.

 

What does it mean to be an ally to your network? You can all have a common approach to that and collaborate. Have you got joint training programmes?

 

So I do think that if one of your ERGs is going to go on a training development programme, you might as well all go on it because then you're speaking the same language. If you do separate training, you may kind of learn different terms and different approaches, which take extra time to explain to each other. So if you take the same approach, it means you've already got a common language that you're speaking.

 

I think do be aligned on your strategic goals. So there will be things that come from the D&I strategy, which let's say it's about addressing the workplace environment. All of your ERGs can do something towards that, and it means that you kind of create that synergy of conversation.

 

Make sure you can communicate with each other practically like you're using the same channels, whether it's Slack or Teams or Trello or whatever it is. You've got a common collaboration space. Now, to you and I coming from tech, that seems very common sense, but there are a lot of organisations out there, I can tell you, that do not do this.

 

They all communicate in their own way. They do it through private WhatsApp groups and you just go, wow, okay. What can also be really useful, it depends on the size of your organisation, the number of ERGs you have, but it's to establish some sort of cross ERG council or committee, a forum where they can all be represented and meet regularly to share updates, discuss their common challenges, identify opportunities for collaboration.

 

Most commonly, that means the chairs meeting once a month or once every three months or whatever it is with the D&I team, and they all just get a bit of alignment going on. But it's better if you can find some opportunity for you all to come together periodically just to share what's going on and look for those opportunities than be off in your own silo.

 

[Jeiz Robles]

Yeah, thanks, Tim. And not to mention, we can also always make it fun, right? And we have to make sure that we have fun while we're doing that.

 

I remember one of our golden years was when we did the strategic planning with all of the different employee networks or the business resource groups, and we did it on a Saturday.