Attention please: It is now OK to divide people!

 

Which lane will you travel?

 

Every day, airline passengers make decisions of great consequence to themselves and their fellow travelers.

In many airports, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) allows us to rate our abilities as travelers. It has established three lanes for security checks and screening: one for expert travelers, one for casual travelers and one for families and individuals in need of special assistance. Our job is to consider which category best describes our level of skill and then get in the line with our people.

As I flew from Houston Hobby airport to Memphis, the lines for expert travelers and casual travelers were nearly empty. Since there was no monitor to check credentials or give pop quizzes, I gave my ego an upgrade. I strolled over to the expert line even though I had no clue if I truly had the right to be there.

According to The New York Times, the TSA defines expert travelers as those who fly two or more times a month. A casual traveler (I pictured a person who had not flown in the last five years) is described by TSA as someone who is knowledgeable about TSA’s procedures and regulations. Travelers in need of special help either don’t understand how things work or they can’t adapt to all the changes.

In most situations, I am against assigning people to hang out with the people most like them. But TSA has a fairly interesting reason for dividing us: they are trying to increase our performance and minimize risks.

Ellen Howe, a spokeswoman for the agency, told The New York Times the system seeks to minimize some of the tension and generally help calm security checkpoints. While there has not been a formal study to determine whether the lanes reduce waiting times, she indicated that this certainly seemed to be the case for the experts, whose lane is affectionately titled “the diamond lanes.”

Days later, I found myself still thinking about TSA’s idea of putting people into lanes by skill level. In the diversity business, we travel in lanes as well – though few of us ever recognize this. Workers who have varying degrees of skills and cultural competencies are thrown together, and guess what, tensions arise just as they do at the airport. That slows us all down.

We have got our experts.  Let’s be honest. Some of them get bent out of shape when they encounter those with less experience and practice, just like our frequent fliers. Then, we have the casual folks. These are the competent people who prefer to stay in their comfort zone and face diversity issues only when required. They are at higher risk for a cultural collision because these novices don’t yet realize all the stuff they don’t know. Then you have the folks who need assistance. Wouldn’t it be great if corporations and nonprofits could ask employees to self-assign diversity lanes – if only for an exercise?

They might ask workers to identify people who belong in the expert lane. Who are the high performers? What skills are required to get into this high-prestige group? What advantages do they have over the rest of us as a result of their collective skills and knowledge?

Next, we might examine the casual route. Ask workers to describe the characteristics we might find in the folks in the middle. What are their risks? What will it take to move them into the league of top performers? And finally, there are folks who don’t yet know what to do or how to handle these situations. The goal would be to give them the type of assistance that allows them to get up to speed.

TSA may be onto something here. It’s OK to divide people as long as we do it by skill level and make our definitions and expectations clear.

Though there is no data or hard-evidence to suggest lines are moving faster, TSA sees some benefits. The lanes apparently have helped to reduce passenger tensions. In addition, Howe told The New York Times that officials have noticed a decrease in alarm rates at checkpoints and fewer sick days used by those who man security checkpoints.

The moral of today’s story: Sometimes in life decent folks will find good reason to divide people. A coach has to trade a popular ball player in order to build a championship team. A company has to sell off a small unit in order to focus on its core business. Equal opportunity businesses need to tell workers that they do not all possess the same level of cultural intelligence or math skills. However our managers are assigned to coach us along the way.  

On many days, it’s the skill deficit that sparks tensions and creates delays; not skin color, gender or religion. Just ask any frequent flier. 

Comments

[Jazz]

Wouldn't it be facinating to observe who self-selected which track? And, to know why?

[Lance_K]

Although cultural competence fast-trackers may enjoy spending time with some of their own, it is their presence among the medium-to-slow trackers that offers the greatest promise of benefits. Part of the desired skill set is to coach others. There is only so much to be gained by preaching to the choir.

In the airport security analogy, what would be ideal is if the more experienced travelers coached the less experienced ones while they are both waiting in line. However, it is easy to imagine that the less expereinced travelers would find the attmept to mentor them as an intrustion, but that is only because the defaulted norm is for everyone to keep to themselves. There is a parallel here in business. If I observe a coworker saying something culturally insensitive, am I more inclined to say nothing or to see it as a coaching opportunity? If I choose to coach, how will the coworker respond? A lot depends on the norms at that business. If cultural coaching only ever occurs in a threatening manner (a reprimand followed by mandatory cultural sensitivity training), then spontaneous coaching is indirectly discouraged. If I approach someone with the intend to offer some friendly coaching, they may recoil thinking that I am looking to get them into trouble. I have yet to work in a place where non-threatening correction is the norm. Mostly, "lesser" gaffes are completely ignored, and serious ones treated with a hammer.

[Linda]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Lance. Yet again, your insights have helped me to see this issue from a new angle.

My objective was to move people away from blaming diversity when things go wrong. Blaming diversity for workplace conflict is a little like blaming computers because so many folks have difficulty mastering new technology. It is far better to train workers than to throw away our promising new assets.
I've received that I wish to share with regular readers. Thanks to all the coaches who took time to write:
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Of course it would be great to have diversity taught in the workplace....but you know and I know in the economic climate we live in right now, very few companies will put this into their yearly budget. It is going to have to come from donated time...from offerings from the community. I like your ideas....realistically right now I see people just trying to get jobs, keep jobs and keep their families together. I donate my time to a school in the Third Ward of Houston where it is a struggle to survive in the jungle of drugs, crime, etc...and our school is all about just offering safety to the children.
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. Of course, you correctly note that the airport security lines are based upon a person's level of experience and skill. But learning about and respecting diversity is a much different process. It seems to me that separating the quick learners from others actually benefits the fast-trackers while keeping others mired on their own muddy road. The slow learners need role models from whom they can learn and be inspired to change. That requires them to be mixed together. A community changes when the entirety of its members is lifted up however slowly. It is the responsibility of the strong to raise up and compensate for the weaknesses of others. Otherwise an elitist class forms of those who are "enlightened" (with all the dangers that entails) while the slow learners develop anger and resentment toward the fast trackers as they accentuate their weaknesses.

And here's the Jewish basis for this notion of community: On the holiday of Sukkot (the fall harvest holiday that also celebrates the wandering of the Israelites in the wilderness), it is the custom to shake a lulav and etrog (the lulav is a palm frond and the etrog is a citron/lemon; attached to the lulav is a myrtle branch and a willow branch). They are held together with the lulav in one hand and the etrog in the other.
The rabbis explain that the etrog symbolizes people with wisdom and good deeds (it has smell and taste). The lulav symbolizes people with wisdom but no good deeds (it has taste, the dates, but no smell). The willow symbolizes people with good deeds but no wisdom ( it has smell but no taste). The myrtle symbolizes people lacking wisdom and good deeds (it has neither smell or taste). They are held together representing the awareness that a community is comprised of all these types of people and that the hope is the taste and smell of the etrog will permeate the others and improve the entire community.

Just some thoughts... Thanks for stimulating some thinking on this end.