• by Tony Silber , Staff Writer, February 11, 2022

It’s become a truism that organizations tout their diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I)  efforts. They put up fancy language on their websites, and assure employees of their commitment at Town Hall gatherings. And then, mostly, nothing substantive happens.

Last year, survey after survey demonstrated that employees want action, and not just talk, in 2022. So it’s encouraging that a new study by Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications found that journalists are reporting significant changes in their organizations, and that more than half of the respondents said their organizations have formal positions tasked with implementing DE&I initiatives.

The survey, Medill’s second annual media-industry study, was conducted in November and December of 2021 by Associate Professor Stephanie Edgerly of Medill, and Danielle K. Brown, the Cowles Professor of Journalism, Diversity and Equality at the University of Minnesota. More than 1,500 members of the U.S. news media responded.

Asked to identify the changes in their organizations related to DE&I, 60.5% said there were new policies around language use related to communities of color. Fifty-eight percent said their organization had DE&I training and workshops, and 51.6% cited changes to hiring practices.

And while respondents overwhelmingly (three-quarters to four-fifths) said DE&I efforts have positively impacted the industry, far fewer perceived DE&I efforts to be comprehensive. In the magazine vertical, just 36.1% felt the efforts were comprehensive, and the number hovered around 50% for the radio, digital and newspaper sectors. Only those working in television had a widely shared perception that DE&I efforts are comprehensive, with 67.7% reporting that.

And for the most part, fewer than 50% of respondents (again with the exception of the television sector at 61.6%) indicated that they were satisfied with their newsroom’s DE&I efforts. The TV vertical far outpaced the other sectors when asked whether their organizations have a formal DE&I position or department. In TV, 72% of respondents said they did. At the other end of the spectrum, only 44.2% of magazine-industry respondents reported that they had formal staff dedicated to diversity and inclusion.

In the end, the survey demonstrates some progress, but in many instances still points to the need to get results, not rhetoric.

Read the full report here.