A diverse and inclusive team is integral to our mission to harness data to make healthcare more accurate, efficient, and affordable
In 2021, EnsoData established a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) committee with a number of specific and overarching goals. As EnsoData is growing rapidly, more than doubling our total staff size in 2021, our team understands the importance of prioritizing diversity, equity, and inclusion as we continue to lay the foundation for our company.
We broke DEI initiatives down into the following areas: internal education, community engagement, internal and community communication, and hiring/recruiting. With that in mind, let’s look at some of the specific actions we are taking today.
Internal education
To spark meaningful conversations around DEI within our team, our committee prioritized internal education activities, including presentations, bias testing, and content sharing. The team has added Diversity and Inclusivity training for all current employees and new hires, provided by our HR partner JustWorks.
It’s not enough just to talk about DEI for an hour each month and check a box, we make it a priority to leave these discussions with actionable next steps to help guide future initiatives. That’s why we’ve scheduled regular company-wide DEI activities and discussion groups.
Our most recent discussion on sleep health equity sparked the idea to partner with other organizations in the sleep field to assist in racial and ethnic disparity research, which the committee will be diving into at the top of 2022.
Community engagement
Last quarter, we engaged in the community by participating in the PEOPLE program. EnsoData hosted two virtual sessions with the PEOPLE scholarship program which connects underrepresented high school seniors to community partners for in-depth exploration of their top choice academic majors and careers.
These 75-minute sessions were led by members of the EnsoData team, including: Connor Sheedy (software engineer), Xica Wiltgen (executive assistant), Nick Glattard (CTO and co-founder), Andrea Ramberg (customer success manager), and others on the team, with the focus of sparking interest in the intersection of technology and sleep medicine.
This quarter, EnsoData’s women partnered with the University of Wisconsin’s Women In Business club to share work experience and professional development tips with students. We plan to share more information on this front in the future.
Internal and community communication
Our DEI mission statement is published on our website to share our initiatives as transparently as possible with our teammates, partners, customers and others. This year, we started gathering data via voluntary anonymous surveys, and we’re planning to share the data publicly on our DEI page shortly, so we can continue to set goals as we grow.
Hiring and recruiting
Hiring is one of our highest priority ways to make an impact on DEI at EnsoData. After prioritizing auditing job listings for inclusive language and requirements, finding some job boards to target underrepresented candidates, and educating ourselves on diversity hiring and recruiting best practices, we’re now focused on diversifying our interview panels, and continuing to bolster our internal culture to create a company where candidates want to apply, accept an offer, and stay.
The EnsoData Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee
The DEI committee is composed of team members from all different areas of the company, each playing important roles in the above highlighted initiatives. The committee consists of the following members:
DEI Committee members
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- Xica Wiltgen, Executive Assistant: Xica serves as the primary source of internal education for the committee and our EnsoData team.
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- Connor Sheedy, Software Engineer: Connor is one of our community engagement leaders, serving as an internal and external ambassador.
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- Emma Garton, Sales Development Representative: Emma spearheads the hiring focused DEI initiatives and also represents the team internally within the organization.
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- Mark Kaiser, VP of Business and Partnership Development: Mark supports the team with communication efforts both internally and externally.
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- Andrea Ramberg, RPSGT, CCSH, Customer Success Manager: Andrea uses her years of clinical sleep experience to help provide the team with internal education opportunities and support the community with external education.
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- Nick Glattard, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer
Among other 2022 initiatives, our committee is looking forward to bringing in a guest speaker to talk with our team about the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion. The committee is looking forward to sharing additional results and future initiatives in the coming months.
As EnsoSleep expands into more sleep centers, we understand the impact we can have in making sleep healthcare more accessible to rural and underserved populations. To follow along with the changes we are implementing to prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion, you head over to our DEI page for more information on diversity, equity, and inclusion.
