In the season 3 finale of HR Labs, Duane is joined by A Cloud Guru's chief people guru Lorraine Vargas Townsend to discuss what belonging means, what it looks like at work, and the positive impacts it has on people. According to Townsend, "The opposite of belonging is a culture where tokenism thrives and where tolerating people wins instead of celebrating people and helping them get to prosperity and growth." Why creating a sense of belonging matters A true culture of belonging is one where you are accepted and celebrated and supports you in a way that can help unleash your true potential. It's why, Townsend explains, “Belonging is not a diversity metric.” It’s about creating a culture where you can be yourself, you can share ideas, fully contribute to team and organizational goals and see a career path in front of you. And belonging has a direct impact on retention, engagement and performance outcomes. Reflecting on her own experiences and those of her mother’s, Lorraine shares key strategies for unleashing people potential through intentional practices and commitments. She also shares what A Cloud Guru is doing to reach its goal “to build the most inclusive company in tech.” When it comes to what we all can do to build a sense of belonging, Lorraine put it best when she said, "That actual human experience is where we're going to find the moments that either create belonging or create exclusion, that either support people or don't, or treat people like humans or treat people like cogs in a wheel." Take a listen to learn why adding belonging to your DEI strategy is critical to driving engagement, retention and outcomes that matter. If you missed any of the previous episodes from season 3, we invite you to catch up on the rest of the season here. On behalf of our season 3 hosts Duane and Jeff, and all of us at Cornerstone, thanks for listening, and be well.   Read Lorraine's story about her mom: My Mom's American Dream Follow Lorraine: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lvargast/ https://lorrainevargastownsend.medium.com/ https://twitter.com/chiefpeopleguru Check out A Cloud Guru: https://acloudguru.com/ Follow Duane: https://www.linkedin.com/in/duane-la-bom/ Follow Cornerstone: https://twitter.com/CornerstoneInc https://www.instagram.com/cornerstoneondemand/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/cornerstone-ondemand/ https://www.facebook.com/csodcommunity/