Reference: Diversity and Inclusion Question Library and Theory References

For customers who had their Workday Peakon instance created from the 31st March 2026 onwards, unless you opted out, you will be using the Concept: Flexible Listening Question Model and Score. In this question model, we have updated the question library which you can read more about here: Reference: 2026 Question Library Updates.

For customers who had their Workday Peakon instance created before 31st March 2026, you will continue to use the existing Workday Peakon Question model until we make it possible for you to upgrade to the flexible listening question model in the 26R2 and 27R1 release cycles. The question library remains the same for you.

Workday Peakon's diversity and inclusion question set consists of drivers and subdrivers, similar to the Engage question set. It enables you to measure employee perceptions of your organization's efforts to maintain a diverse workforce and create an inclusive environment.

Evidence shows that individuals, teams, and organizations benefit from diversity. Employees in diverse organizations experience greater engagement and trust (Downey et al 2015), report greater job satisfaction (Hofhuis et al, 2016) and fewer incidences of harassment (Kabat-Farr and Cortina, 2014), and are less likely to leave their organization (Ali et al, 2015; Buttner and Lowe, 2017).

Diverse teams demonstrate increased performance (Shoreibah et al, 2019), creativity, and innovation (Lorenzo et al, 2017). Diversity enhances knowledge-sharing (Hofhuis et al, 2016) and decision-making within teams (Galinsky et al 2015).

While diversity benefits an organization's overall reputation, it also enables organizations to perform better in financial measures such as returns, cash flow, EPS, EBIT, margins, investment performance, market value, ROA, ROE, revenue, and sales growth (see: Catalyst, Why Diversity and Inclusion Matter: Financial Performance, 2018).

Standard Questions

The standard diversity and inclusion question library includes 10 questions:

1 main diversity and inclusion question

3 driver questions

6 subdriver questions

Question Library

Category	Name	Question	Consideration
Main question	Diversity and Inclusion	I'm satisfied with [Company]'s efforts to support diversity and inclusion (for example, in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability, socio-economic status).	Measures employee perceptions of an organization's efforts to maintain a diverse workforce and create an inclusive environment.
Driver	Diversity	A diverse workforce is a clear priority at [Company] (for example, in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability, socio-economic status).	Measures how employees perceive the organization’s views on diversity and the efforts that it makes to attract and retain a diverse workforce. This perception is typically based on the organization's recruitment strategies, the process used to select employees for training and advancement, and behavior that is considered acceptable within the organization.
Subdriver	Diversity Recruitment	Recruitment processes at [Company] attract and select a diverse workforce (for example, in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability, socio-economic status).	Measures employees' perceptions of the organization’s efforts to recruit a diverse workforce.
Subdriver	Workforce Diversity	I believe [Company] is a diverse workplace (for example, in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability, socio-economic status).	Measures whether the employee feels that the organization’s workforce is diverse.
Driver	Inclusiveness	At [Company], people of all backgrounds are accepted for who they are.	Employees' sense of belonging with the organization and their team is central their perceptions of the organization’s inclusiveness. This means that employees feel that they can be themselves and that they’re valued for their unique talents or characteristics.
Subdriver	Belonging	I feel a sense of belonging at [Company].	Measures employees' sense that they’re an accepted member of a group or team.
Subdriver	Feeling Valued	I feel like I'm valued as a person at [Company].	Measures employees' belief that their unique characteristics or talents are important and beneficial to the team or organization.
Driver	Non-Discrimination	I'm confident I won't be discriminated against at [Company].	In an inclusive environment, employees feel that they can be themselves without fear of discrimination. The ways in which an organization responds to instances of discrimination, harassment, or inappropriate behavior have a strong impact on employees' sense of safety and their willingness to present their true selves. Without this sense of safety, employees often refrain from making best use of their unique strengths.
Subdriver	Fair opportunities	People of all backgrounds have the same opportunities at [Company].	Measures employees' sense that everyone within the organization is given the same opportunities, regardless of background.
Subdriver	Responsiveness	I believe [Company] would respond appropriately to instances of discrimination.	Measures employees' belief that the organization responds appropriately to incidences of discrimination.

Theory Library

Name	Theory
Inclusiveness Belonging Feeling valued	Individuals want to feel accepted to a group while feeling they can be themselves. In Optimal Distinctiveness Theory, Brewer (1991) proposes that people seek to balance a need for belongingness with their need to feel that their individual characteristics—our uniqueness—are valued. According to Shore et al. (2011), when others actively encourage an individual to express their individuality, they form a social identity that encompasses both a sense of belonging and a sense of uniqueness. This helps make individuals feel included.
Diversity Diversity recruitment Workforce diversity	An employee's sense of inclusion is strongly influenced by whether they feel that the organization values employees as individuals. Employees judge this by the organization's attitudes and behaviors around creating and keeping a diverse workforce. You can observe these attitudes and behaviors in: Intergroup interactions, and organizational culture and structure (Cox, 1990). Policies and processes used to recruit new employees and to award promotions or development opportunities. How managers and leaders behave and communicate.
Non-Discrimination Responsiveness Fair opportunities	Unsurprisingly, experiencing discrimination, both as a victim and witnessing its impact on others, has a profound impact on employees’ perceptions of how inclusive their organization is. Ensher et al. (2001) found that employees’ job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and willingness to go above are all negatively affected by employee perceptions that they have experienced discrimination from a coworker, supervisor, or the organization.

Best Practice

Workday recommends that you add the Diversity and Inclusion question set alongside the Engage question set and measure results on a continuous basis.

You can use editable attributes to collect sensitive attributes so that you can segment diversity and inclusion scores by different employee groups. This enables you to act on the groups that feel less included and have a higher probability of leaving the organization.

Considerations

The evolving landscape of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) has prompted questions about how to approach employee listening programs.

With Workday Peakon Employee Voice, customers can fully control how they configure and implement their employee listening programs. This includes the ability to turn question sets on or off, adjust individual questions, or modify them to suit their organizational context.

While each employee listening program is unique, we recommend organizations follow their internal program and governance best practices, including:

Align with internal strategy, culture, and policies to ensure employee feedback reflects organizational priorities.

Collaborate with internal legal and compliance teams to assess regulatory considerations that may impact how DEI-related insights are collected, stored, and acted upon.

Leverage Peakon’s flexible functionality to tailor question sets, targeting, wording, and data visualization to meet specific needs.

Although social, government, industry, and regulatory landscapes may evolve, we remain committed to providing organizations with tools to gain meaningful insights while maintaining flexibility in implementing their listening strategies.