What 2025 Taught Us About DEIB

In 2025, the strongest organizations didn’t debate belonging — they designed for it. Culture is shaped in everyday interactions, not policies alone.

Most years quietly shape organizations.

2025 exposed them.

Across industries, diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging did not disappear, but they changed. What became clear this year is that DEIB is no longer sustained by intent, statements, or programs alone. It is sustained, or eroded, by leadership choices, system design, and consistency under pressure.

Here is what 2025 revealed about DEIB, and what leaders must carry into 2026.

1. Progress Slowed Where Systems Matter Most

   
   

One of the clearest DEIB signals in 2025 was not who organizations hired, but who advanced.

According to McKinsey & Lean In’s Women in the Workplace 2025, representation at entry levels remained relatively stable, but advancement into manager and senior-manager roles stalled. The long-standing “broken rung” persisted, limiting the health of the leadership pipeline.

This pattern extended beyond gender.

McKinsey’s 2025 data also showed that the representation of racialized employees declined sharply at each leadership transition. While early-career diversity held steady, progress at the director and executive levels plateaued or reversed, particularly for Black, Hispanic, and Indigenous professionals.

In Canada, the Prosperity Project’s 2025 Leadership Report Card reinforced this signal: women and racialized professionals were significantly underrepresented in “next-up” leadership roles, a leading indicator that future executive diversity is at risk.

Representation did not collapse.

It quietly stopped moving.

When systems stall at key transition points, long-term equity outcomes are already being determined.

2. Return-to-Office Policies Quietly Reshaped Equity

2025 made clear that flexibility is no longer a perk; it is an equity mechanism.

Gartner’s 2025 HR research found that rigid return-to-office mandates disproportionately impacted women, caregivers, and employees from historically underrepresented groups. Loss of flexibility emerged as a top driver of disengagement and attrition risk, not because people resisted work, but because work design no longer reflected lived realities.

Canadian labour data echoed this trend, showing that advancement slowed most sharply in organizations that reduced flexibility and scaled back DEIB investment.

These policies were often framed as neutral or operational. In practice, they reshaped access to visibility, sponsorship, and leadership presence.

Equity wasn’t reversed through policy statements.

It was constrained through design.

3. Belonging Became the Stabilizer — and the Gap

Belonging emerged in 2025 as a stabilizing force in a volatile environment, and a fault line when it was absent.

Gallup’s 2025 workplace data showed that employees with strong workplace connections are significantly more likely to be engaged, resilient, and committed. Yet those same connections continued to erode in hybrid and high-pressure environments.

The gap was not evenly distributed.

Employees from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups consistently reported lower levels of belonging and trust, particularly where leadership communication was inconsistent or opaque.

At the same time, Edelman’s 2025 Trust Barometer showed declining employee trust in institutions and leadership decisions, reinforcing that inclusion is now built on predictability, transparency, and follow-through, not on values statements.

Inclusion without belonging created fatigue.

Belonging without trust created fragility.

4. The External Climate Raised the Stakes for Psychological Safety

DEIB in 2025 was shaped not only by internal decisions but by an increasingly polarized external environment.

According to the ACLU and the Trans Legislation Tracker, hundreds of anti-2SLGBTQ+ and anti-trans bills were introduced or passed in 2025. For many employees, this heightened fear, withdrawal, and vigilance brings external stress directly into the workplace.

In this context, leadership silence became a signal.

Organizations that maintained clarity and consistency helped create psychological safety amid uncertainty. Those who avoided the conversation unintentionally amplified risk and disengagement.

Belonging became less about messaging and more about protection.

5. Consistency Became the Real Test of DEIB Credibility

2025 made one thing unmistakable: DEIB credibility is built, or lost, through consistency under pressure.

Several organizations experienced tangible consequences after appearing to retreat or reverse their DEIB commitments. One of the most visible examples was Target.

Following shifts in public DEIB positioning and reduced visibility of inclusion commitments, Target faced employee concern, public backlash, and sustained scrutiny throughout 2025. While the external pressure was complex and multifaceted, the internal signal was clear: perceived inconsistency created confusion and eroded trust. Coverage throughout the year highlighted not a rejection of DEIB itself, but uncertainty about what the organization stood for and whether leadership would remain steady under pressure.

In contrast, Costco took a different approach.

Throughout 2025, Costco maintained a clear and consistent public stance in support of inclusion, equity, and belonging, reinforced by executive messaging, governance decisions, and investor communications. Rather than reacting to external pressure, Costco emphasized predictability and alignment between stated values and leadership behaviour. That consistency reinforced trust among employees and stakeholders, even amid a polarized external environment.

The lesson from 2025 was not about choosing a side.

It was about coherence.

When organizations retreat, pause, or pivot without clarity, trust erodes quickly; when leaders remain aligned, even quietly, credibility compounds.

Consistency, not volume, became the defining signal of DEIB leadership.

6. DEIB Shifted from Programs to Leadership Capability

Perhaps the most significant lesson of 2025 was this:

DEIB is no longer something organizations do.

It is something leaders demonstrate.

Bersin’s 2025 leadership research found that organizations treating inclusion as a leadership capability — embedded in behaviours, decision-making, and accountability — were significantly more likely to sustain performance, engagement, and retention.

Values without behaviours lose credibility.

Programs without systems lose momentum.

Culture moved from aspiration to infrastructure.

What 2025 Made Undeniable about DEIB

DEIB does not drift toward progress.

It drifts toward erosion unless leaders design for it.

Statements do not sustain representation, belonging, and trust. They are sustained by clarity, consistency, and courage, especially when conditions are uncomfortable.

At Sellar Strategic Advisory, we help organizations design cultures grounded in trust, clarity, and belonging; not as initiatives, but as operating principles.

If 2025 exposed gaps in your DEIB approach, 2026 is the year to rebuild with intention.

Culture by Design. Every Monday.

By the Numbers: a snapshot of what 2025 revealed about DEIB—where it held, and where it didn’t.