From Cross-Functional to Cross-Cultural: The Overlooked Entry Point to DEI Skills
If your leaders know how to collaborate across departments, they already know how to practice inclusion. They just don’t call it that yet.
When we talk about DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) it often feels abstract. Heavy. Politicized. Executives start squirming. Managers shut down. Teams disengage.
But here’s the truth: If you’ve ever worked on a cross-functional team, you’ve already practiced the core skills of inclusion.
Same Skills, New Context
Let’s say you’re in marketing, and you’re working with engineering.
You already know:
You have to listen differently.
You need to translate your language.
You have to adjust your expectations.
You probably won’t get it right the first time but you’re committed to the collaboration.
That’s not just project management. That’s inclusion in action.
Now replace “engineering” with “a colleague from a different culture.” Or “a woman navigating a male-dominated room.” Or “someone who’s neurodivergent or LGBTQ+.”
The skills are the same:
Decentering your perspective.
Listening for what’s not being said.
Adapting your communication style.
Creating space for other voices to shape the outcome.
Inclusion isn’t an HR initiative. It’s a professional skillset. One we’re already using, we just haven’t named it as such.
Why This Reframe Matters
Many leaders resist DEI because it feels like “extra” work. But when you show them it’s the same skillset they already use to collaborate across disciplines, they stop resisting and start recognizing.
This reframing turns theory into action. It moves inclusion from “a value” to “a behavior.”
It also makes it scalable. Because now you’re not waiting for everyone to become a social justice expert, you’re just teaching them how to be better teammates.
So How Do You Make It Stick?
Here’s how you can start translating cross-functional skills into cross-cultural ones:
🎯 Teach Transferability: Help leaders map what they already do (e.g., navigating product vs. legal) onto more human-centered contexts (e.g., navigating gender or culture differences).
🎧 Normalize Listening as a Strategy: Treat listening not as passivity but as an active, essential leadership function.
🔁 Practice Decentering: Shift the lens from “how I see it” to “how they might experience it”, a key move in both team and identity inclusion.
💬 Make Feedback Loops Inclusive: Create channels that allow for diverse perspectives to shape process, not just react to outcomes.
Inclusion Isn’t a Leap. It’s a Lateral Move.
If your team knows how to navigate the friction of finance vs. creative, or compliance vs. customer experience, they already have what it takes to build inclusive teams.
They just need help seeing it.
P.S. I’ve been working with leaders across tech, pharma, education, and consulting who are burned out on theory but hungry for real tools. If you’re building leadership programs that want less jargon and more skill, let’s talk.
