At CSIS, we believe that our employees are the driving force behind CSIS’s position as an industry leader in national security and foreign policy. We value our employees' unique experiences and perspectives and strive to create an environment where people of all backgrounds are heard and included. We continually invest in our people and offer year-round professional development opportunities through our in-house Abshire-Inamori Leadership Academy. We pride ourselves in creating a supportive, fair, and innovative culture that strengthens our core mission to advance practical ideas to address the world’s greatest challenges.
Diversity has become a politically-charged word in Washington. Many champions of diversity (and equity and inclusion) believe these policies and initiatives are needed to correct historic injustices. Many critics of DEI see the diversity agenda as reverse discrimination, favoring lesser qualified individuals for jobs or opportunities.
CSIS does not subscribe to either of these approaches. We are not trying to correct historic injustice. We do not hire or promote for any reason other than merit. We have never had quotas nor administrative mandates. But we do believe CSIS is stronger if we have different backgrounds, perspectives, and ideas.
Diversity is not a political issue for us. Rather, we see it as an investment in CSIS’s future.
CSIS is an institution that has a mission to help the Government develop better policies. Living in this complex world, we need a wide range of intellects and perspectives to create balanced recommendations. CSIS has always favored a diversity of ideas. That is core to our identity as a nonpartisan think tank.
We also are an international think tank. Understanding the dynamics of another country without having any life experiences is confining and self-limiting. We want staff who have a diversity of experiences and who come from a diversity of countries and backgrounds.
CSIS views diversity as an essential investment in our success. If we are to lead the ideas community in Washington in developing stronger and more innovative ideas, we need a diverse work force in every meaning of the word, both to better understand developments in other countries and to challenge ourselves as we deliberate recommendations for public policy.
Diversity is an important attribute of our success and a strength of our institution. For that reason, we invest in it. For over a decade CSIS has sought to develop a wider perspective and deeper understanding within the CSIS community of scholars and researchers. The popularity of this effort has led us to develop programs for rising scholars to participate in our leadership development work.
We sponsor staff language clubs, peer mentoring programs, and leadership accelerator programs. These are open and available to all of our employees. There is no single group that is prioritized or conversely, left out of these opportunities.
This is why we prefer the term “enrichment” to diversity. Diversity is a precondition for our effectiveness—enriching our staff is the goal.
Diversity is now a raging debate in Washington. But it is not a debate at CSIS. This is a source of strength and we will continue to develop ways to enrich our analytic depth by nurturing a wider range of talent and perspectives.