Rooted + Heard Diagnostic

  • Rooted + Heard Diagnostic

    Assess your organization’s inclusion and culture. Answer each question honestly. Your results will provide scores, feedback, and an overall interpretation to guide your next steps. Best completed by board members, executives, or senior leaders who have direct insight into what reaches — and is acted on at — board level.

  • Inclusion Score

  • The board regularly reviews whether people from underrepresented groups are advancing equitably through the organization — not only entering it.*
  • The board explicitly includes inclusion outcomes in senior leader performance evaluation, treating it as a leadership competency rather than a reporting obligation.*
  • The board commissions or reviews evidence of how inclusion is experienced differently across groups — and expects action on what it finds.*
  • The board satisfies itself that the voices shaping major strategic decisions reflect the full diversity of the organization, including those who are least often heard.*
  • The board treats persistent gaps in access, voice, or equity as indicators of organizational risk — alongside financial, operational, and reputational risk.*

  • Inclusion Score 
    EMERGING (5–11): Inclusion is mostly ad hoc or limited; early-stage efforts; need to build foundations.
    DEVELOPING (12–18): Some consistent practices; progress is visible but uneven; need to systematise and scale.
    LEADING (19–25): Inclusion is intentional and embedded; strong practices; focus on sustaining and refining.

  • Culture Score

  • The board has articulated what kind of culture is needed to support strategy and long-term value creation.*
  • Our board has enough visibility into the organization’s lived culture, not just stated values or polished leadership updates.*
  • When evaluating senior leadership, our board pays attention to how results are achieved, not just whether results are achieved.*
  • Our board reviews signs of trust, inclusion, speaking-up, and employee experience as indicators of culture health, not just operational metrics.*
  • Our board regularly discusses whether the current culture is helping or hindering long-term performance, risk management, and organizational resilience.*

  • Culture Score
    EMERGING (5–11): Culture is fragile or inconsistent; values not reliably lived; need to clarify and align.
    DEVELOPING (12–18): Some cultural strengths; still patchy; need to embed behaviours and norms.
    ROOTED (19–25): Culture is strong and lived; clear alignment between values, behaviours, and systems.

  • Final Quadrant Interpretation

    Your Inclusion Score and your Culture Score together place your organization into one of four quadrants.

    How to read this: High/Low is determined by your section score. Scores of 15–25 = High. Scores of 5–14 = Low. Your combined position tells a story about where your organization needs to focus first.

      Inclusion: Low Inclusion: High
    Culture High Rooted, but Not Yet Heard
    Strong culture. Inclusion gaps.
    Your organization has something real — a shared identity, strong values, and a culture people feel connected to. But not everyone is experiencing it equally. Some voices are being missed, sidelined, or unseen. Culture without inclusion can quietly become a closed circle, protecting the majority while leaving others behind.
    Focus: Widen the circle without losing the roots.    		 Rooted and Heard
    The gold standard. Keep building.
    This is what Rooted + Heard is named for. You have built a strong, healthy culture AND ensured that people from all backgrounds are genuinely heard, valued, and able to contribute. This is rare. It does not happen by accident — it is the result of sustained, intentional leadership. Your challenge now is to sustain it, protect it through change, and bring others with you.
    Focus: Sustain, scale, and share your model.
    Culture Low Neither Rooted nor Heard
    The honest starting point.
    Neither culture nor inclusion is yet working for your people. This can feel daunting — but organisations that face this moment honestly make the most transformative progress. The risk here is not the gap itself; it is denial, or change fatigue, or piecemeal fixes that address symptoms without touching the system. You do not have to solve this alone.
    Focus: Start with honest diagnosis. Build from the ground up.    		 Heard, but Not Yet Rooted
    Inclusive intent. Cultural fragility.
    There is genuine energy around inclusion here — people feel seen and want to contribute. But without strong cultural foundations, that inclusion can feel inconsistent, dependent on individual champions, or vulnerable to leadership change. Inclusion that is not embedded in culture does not last. The intent is there. Now the roots need to go deeper.
    Focus: Anchor inclusive practices into your culture and systems.
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