Business Allyship is necessary to building truly inclusive environments, so how can businesses be better allies? By Katie McQuater Forming alliances F or the past few years, there has been an understanding of the urgent need for greater diversity, inclusion and equity in several industries, and market research is no exception. Increasingly, there is also an awareness that, to invoke this change, the majority must advocate for the minority, practising social justice and recognising their privileged position in the process. Hence, the term allyship has entered the mainstream consciousness. There are various definitions of what it takes to be an ally. In 2018, diversity, equity and inclusion leader Sheree Atcheson, writing in Forbes, defined allyship as a lifelong process of building relationships based on trust, consistency and accountability with marginalised individuals and/or groups of people. Crucially, Atcheson noted, allyship is not self-defined; allyship efforts must be recognised by those you are seeking to ally with. Roshni Goyate, co-founder of The Other Box, which provides organisations with training courses on allyship, cautions that, with so many different definitions, it can become confusing and inaccessible. Its not a straightforward concept or definition, even when boiled down, says Goyate. But heres a definition we use in our Allyship in the Workplace course, adapted from the Rochester Racial Justice Toolkit online: Allyship is a proactive, ongoing and challenging practice of examining, unlearning, relearning and action, where a person of privilege works in solidarity and partnership with a marginalised group of people to help take down the systems that deny that groups basic rights, equal access and ability to thrive in society. So, how can businesses in the insight sector become better allies? For Momo Amjad, senior strategic researcher at The Future Laboratory, allyship itself is an outdated term. It only serves to make people who want to be allies feel better about themselves, says Amjad. What we need are co-conspirators. A co-conspirator is somebody who is with you from the outset, who is contributing to the plan. Because they understand that allyship doesnt go far enough and they understand the system affects everybody, not just the marginalised groups theyre trying to help. There is a difference between signalling allyship being what Amjad calls a vocal beacon and consistently practising allyship. Amjad adds: Its something you need to be doing constantly. Once youre an ally, you have to maintain your allyship role. If you stop practising it, youre no longer an ally because youre only practising it when its convenient. The Future Laboratory has created a long-term strategy, covering the next two to five years, for what its diversity and inclusion initiatives look like, explains Amjad. You can only make structural change happen if everybody participates, so its definitely important to collaborate with other agencies and businesses, because this is a problem that were all facing, and we cant fix it alone. The more we fix it alone, the less effective it is. 42 Impact ISSUE 36 2022_pp42-43 Business.indd 42 08/12/2021 10:12