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The tech industry promised a diversity revolution. It didn’t deliver. And if NGOs aren’t paying attention, they could repeat the same mistakes, with much more at stake.

We’ve spent the last two decades hiring and scaling tech teams for hundreds of companies, from scrappy start-ups to global giants. We’ve seen DEI handled brilliantly, where equity is truly strategic and integrated into every decision. But more commonly, we’ve seen it reduced to a tick-box exercise, disconnected from core operations, where corporate platitudes and shallow gestures have failed to drive change, leaving DEI wide open to backlash.

Buzzword to backlash

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In the mid-2010s, tech giants like Google, Microsoft and Intel branded themselves as diversity pioneers. Bold statements and bias training gave the sense that progress was being made.

Most early diversity work in tech wasn’t in the public eye. It lived in HR, and began with a focus on hiring more women into technical roles, long before anyone talked seriously about intersectionality.

Then came 2020. In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, companies rushed to show they cared. DEI went mainstream almost overnight. It felt like it might be a turning point. It wasn’t.

As DEI shifted from back-office policy to public commitment it became more visible, and more exposed. The shiny acronym became a catch-all, easy to misunderstand and easy to attack. Not because the ideas were new, but because they were now louder, more politicised and increasingly drawn into online culture war frames.

Following Trump’s re-election, the backlash has gained momentum and international attention. A UMass Amherst poll shows 76% of Americans now know the term DEI, but few agree on what it means. Social media has turned it into culture-war shorthand, stripped of nuance and used as a proxy for ideology and grievance. 

But the backlash hasn’t killed the values behind DEI - just the label. Recent YouGov data shows that while the term is divisive, most Americans still support the principles of equity and inclusion. Only 24% of Republicans are in favour of DEI programmes, but 67% say they support equality.

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If even in the US - the epicentre of the culture war backlash - the core values haven’t disappeared, then the global collapse narrative often reported feels overstated. What we’re seeing is a semantics problem: a growing disconnect between the language and the values it was meant to represent.

In Europe, the backlash is meeting resistance. Stockholm called a letter from the Trump administration “unprecedented and bizarre.” France and Belgium denounced it as foreign interference. Spain even warned it could breach anti-discrimination law.

Despite all the noise, the work hasn’t stopped. It’s just being reframed. Across sectors, DEI is being rethought and renamed, in terms that feel less loaded and more human, like “inclusive culture,” “belonging,” “opportunity for all.”

A global resume.org survey of 1000 companies revealed that while 5% had cut DEI programs and 8% planned to reduce budgets, 65% said their DEI budget would remain the same, and 22% planned to increase funding.

This is partly strategic, but it’s also about staying relevant. A Deloitte survey found over 70% of Gen Z workers see a company’s stance on DEI as key to whether they want to work there. In the UK, YouGov found that 78% of 18–24-year-olds prioritise diversity and inclusion when job hunting. By 2030, Gen Z is projected to be 74% of the global workforce. The language may be evolving, but expectations around fairness, representation, and visibility are not going anywhere.

Optics over outcomes

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So why did so many well-funded DEI programmes still fail to deliver real change?

Because good intentions weren’t enough. Much of the work was bolted onto the edges of organisations, led by passionate but underpowered staff. Training became a compliance exercise. ERGs gave voice to staff but were rarely backed with influence or resources. In many cases, the emotional labour only added to the pressure they were set up to address.

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Nowhere was this clearer than in tech. For example, Facebook presented itself as an inclusive employer for women early on. But as Sarah Wynn-Williams writes in Careless People, this was more performance than practice. Internally, she says,“the expectation at Facebook is that mothering is invisible - and the more skilled you are, the more invisible it is.”

Publicly, Facebook leaned heavily on DEI language during it’s high profile scandals like Cambridge Analytica and contribution to the Rohingya genocide. But behind the scenes, Wynn-Williams describes how repeated warnings about hate speech in Myanmar, where Facebook lacked basic Burmese-language moderation, were ignored. These weren’t abstract policy questions; they were matters of safety and human rights. And the signals were missed. 

This was a critical failure in understanding what DEI is for. Instead of seeing it as a strategic function, tied to product design, safety, ethics and risk, leadership treated it as internal culture work. As Wynn-Williams puts it: these weren’t sins of action, but of inaction; “they apparently didn’t care”.

Facebook wasn’t unique. Across tech, DEI was siloed, sidelined, and ultimately expendable. When the political climate shifted and budgets shrank, it became an easy cost to cut.

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Equity that endures 

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Some organisations are doing this well. They’ve moved beyond surface-level metrics and empty mission statements and are tackling harder questions around structural inequality, accessibility, and socio-economic inclusion. 

They take an intersectional view, recognising that people’s experiences are shaped by overlapping factors, and design tailored policies that reflect that complexity, aiming to remove barriers as widely and effectively as possible. This kind of DEI work is embedded throughout the org: in strategy, programme design, hiring, and governance. In how power is shared and how leadership behaves - every day.  It’s slower. It’s less showy, and usually harder to measure. But it lasts, because it’s built for real, structural, lasting change, not for PR. 

As Paige Rinke, VP of People at Multiverse, puts it in a recent report: “The longer you leave it, the more debt it creates. If you build those foundations too late, you erode trust.” She also warns against making EDI its own silo: “There are a lot of initiatives that might not look like EDI on the surface - but they truly are.” 

Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of Reddit, has made similar points, recently criticising companies for walking back DEI commitments. “This isn’t about acronyms or box-checking,” he says. “It’s about building policies that support a wide range of people. And your organisation will be better for it.” 

The companies that built DEI in from the start, especially in their early growth stages, are now seeing the benefits. More diverse boards. More inclusive leadership. Better cultures. People stay longer, show up more fully, and recommend those workplaces to others. That’s what enduring equity looks like, and why it pays to build it early. 

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NGOs face the same DEI risks - with much more at stake

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For NGOs, the stakes are even higher, as many are built around values like equity, justice, and inclusion. But if those values don’t show up internally, in who holds power, in how decisions are made, then credibility is on the line.

Yet NGOs face many of the same pitfalls. DEI roles are often under-resourced. Staff are expected to lead change alongside other jobs, without the backing or time to do it well.

There’s also a persistent myth that NGOs are inherently diverse. But at the top, the data says otherwise:

• 92% of charity trustees and 62% of senior leadership are white 
• Only 13% of the UK’s largest charities have gender-balanced executive teams. Over 10% still have all-male senior leadership.
• Less than 1% of trustees are under 30. More than half are retired. Just 29% are from working-class backgrounds. (Charity Commission Data)
• Large charities average 8–9% ethnic minority representation on boards and in leadership, compared to UK tech boards averaging 12–17%. (Inclusive Boards and Parker Review

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Nearly half of nonprofit CEOs in the UK and US say their boards don’t reflect the communities they serve. Internally, while the context is less corporate, the cultural problems are familiar. Scroll through Glassdoor or speak to staff, and you’ll find stories of toxic cultures and burnout.

The challenge isn’t the moral case; NGOs already have that. The difference is that in tech, DEI is tied to innovation and profit. In NGOs, it’s tied to legitimacy. Without lived experience in leadership, they risk misunderstanding the people they exist to serve. 

This gap between values and reality often feels even more jarring in mission-driven work. These are organisations filled with passionate people, where many join precisely because they believe in creating a better world. But that passion can clash with the practical constraints of limited resources, stretched capacity, and slower moving change. When the internal reality doesn’t match the external promise, it can feel like a betrayal of values, trust and purpose.

But ignoring it doesn’t make it any less visible. If employees can see it, so can the communities charities are meant to serve.

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A path forward

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NGOs can learn from tech’s DEI attempts. Not by copying corporate models, but by thinking carefully about how to build equity into the way decisions are made, resources are allocated and leadership is held accountable.

Here’s where to start:

‍1. Fix systems, not people

Tech often positioned DEI as something to "give" underrepresented groups - mentorship, visibility, support - without removing the barriers that created inequality to begin with. NGOs must take the opposite route. That means rethinking hiring criteria, examining how decisions are made, and ensuring pay, progression, and leadership reflect equity by design.

 2. One-size-fits-all doesn’t work

A gender-balanced team may still lack racial or socio-economic diversity. Hiring more disabled staff won’t shift culture unless the workplace is genuinely accessible. DEI strategies need nuance, not templates. The context matters, and so does specificity.

3. DEI should benefit everyone

DEI framed as something “for” marginalised people is easy to dismiss, especially in polarised political climates. Better to position it as something that creates better outcomes for all. John A. Powell’s idea of targeted universalism does exactly this: set shared goals, then address the specific barriers different groups face to reaching them. If you treat equity as something that benefits everyone, not just a subset of staff, it is much harder to ignore.

4. Measure what matters

Intentions are easy. Outcomes are harder. The organisations that get DEI right are the ones who measure it as rigorously as they do programme impact: representation at leadership level, pay gaps, promotion and retention rates, decision-making equity. If the data isn’t there, the accountability won’t be either.

5. Widen the hiring lens

Tech repeatedly hired from the same places - elite universities, founder networks, and within its own image. NGOs, too, can be guilty of prioritising familiarity over breadth. 

Expand recruitment beyond familiar networks. If the same backgrounds and experiences dominate your organisation, it reflects a choice about where and how you search, not just who applies. Review how hiring works, and who gets to decide what “qualified” looks like. Change won’t come from adding more mentoring schemes if the same barriers remain in place.

There’s no perfect model, but the pattern is clear. Efforts driven by enthusiasm alone, without structure or support, rarely stick. When equity is treated as optional, it’s the first thing to get deprioritised. But when it’s embedded into strategy, leadership and how success is measured, it becomes harder to ignore and harder to undo. 

We’ve supported many NGO leaders through this work. It’s not easy, but it’s essential. It takes capacity, commitment, and courage. And yes, there will be resistance. That’s what makes the work urgent.

So the question isn’t whether DEI matters. It’s whether your organisation truly lives its values.

Ask yourself:

• Who’s in the room when key decisions are made?
• Whose lived experience shapes your strategy?
• What barriers are stopping talented people from progressing?

The stakes for NGOs are higher. But so are the rewards. While tech companies often pursue DEI to drive innovation or profit, NGOs gain something deeper: trust, legitimacy, and stronger connection with the communities they serve. And when that’s done well, it builds the credibility needed to create real, lasting change.

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