• 357-01-005 Affected groups
• 357-01-010 Affirmative action program.
• 357-01-015 Affirmative action plan.
• 357-01-115 Disabled veteran.
• 357-01-235 Persons with disabilities.
• 357-01-350 Underutilization.
• 357-01-355 Vietnam era veteran.

• EEOC Information for Employers

• US Department of Education (Office of Civil Rights)
• US Department of Justice (Civil Rights Division)
• US Department of Labor (Office of federal Contract Compliance Programs)
• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

• Presidential Executive Orders 11478

• Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Title 41 60-2
• Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Title 41 60-250
• Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Title 41, Part 60-741
• Vietnam-era Veterans Readjustment Act of 1974

• WA Human Rights Commission

This directive provides direction to state agencies to meet standards for employee diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) training. Please see the DES training webpage for more details about this training.

All executive branch employees.

February 1, 2023.

The anticipated start time is March 2023. Prior to the start date, DES will release information for scheduling and training delivery.

Each employee must complete the training, which is grounded in statewide foundational competencies that promote diversity, equity, and inclusion to support workplace culture change and service delivery improvements. There are two requirements:

Phase 1 – Prerequisite

The viewing of “Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America,” a two-hour documentary by Jeffery Robinson available to state employees in the Washington State Learning Center. Many state employees may have already viewed this documentary prior to the release of the directive.

Employees who have viewed the documentary outside of the Learning Center will need to have their completion recorded in the Learning Center. Agencies are responsible for verification.

Phase 2 – Training

DES is in the process of finalizing the training. In partnership with DES, we will continue to provide updates. Agencies are expected to meet the directive’s requirement by ensuring all employees complete the foundational training within five years after DES begins delivering the training.

In April 2018, Gov. Jay Inslee called on agency directors to take action to create inclusive and respectful workplaces through a memorandum, Inclusive and Respectful Work Environments. In 2022, Gov. Inslee issued Executive Order 22-02, “Achieving Equity in Washington State Government,” which also calls on OFM State HR to issue a directive requiring all executive cabinet agency employees to complete DEI training developed by DES.

As a result of the governor’s direction, a statewide DEI Training Committee developed recommendations for foundational DEI training for the state workforce. The executive sponsors of this work – DES, OFM, and the Office of Equity – have worked collaboratively to include these recommendations in the enterprise course, A Path Toward Equity: Disrupting Structural Racism through Awareness and Belonging.

The course aims to develop shared understanding and language around DEI and help employees gain skills necessary for a respectful and inclusive workplace.

Any waivers from this directive for individual employees or for approval of an equivalent non-cabinet agency-provided training must be approved by DES/OFM/Office of Equity – Director of State Human Resources and the Director of Office of Equity or their designees.

The purpose of Washington State’s diversity program is to proactively build a diverse, inclusive, and culturally competent workforce by eliminating barriers to growth and opportunity, allowing each employee to contribute his or her full measure of talent, and building our capacity to deliver innovative, effective, and culturally relevant services to all the people of Washington.

While the OFM Assistant Director for State HR, serves as the Governor’s Chief Diversity Officer, diversity and inclusion cannot be achieved in isolation. So instead of a unit or program within a state agency, the State HR division of OFM works collaboratively with the Department of Enterprise Services (DES), and state agencies through the State Diversity Council to develop policies and strategies to create a diverse, inclusive, and culturally competent workforce.

Diversity is the collective mixture of differences and similarities that includes, for example, individual and organizational characteristics, values, beliefs, experiences, backgrounds, and behaviors. In addition to commonly accepted attributes such as race, gender, and religion, our diversity encompasses a wide range of attributes we bring to the workplace such as our personal and professional history that frame how we see the world, collaborate with colleagues and stakeholders, and serve citizens.

Inclusion is the achievement of a work environment in which all individuals are treated fairly and respectfully, have equal access to opportunities and resources, and can contribute fully to serving their agency and Washington’s citizens.

Cultural competencies are a congruent set of knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors that enable individuals to work effectively in cross-cultural situations. It promotes respect and understanding of diverse cultures and social groups, and an appreciation of each individual’s unique attributes. Cultural competencies enable employees to respond to others in a manner that demonstrates an effort to understand subtle differences such as communication style, problem-solving, values, and conflict resolution styles.

For an example, see the DSHS Cultural Guidance Planning Guide

Diversity and inclusion efforts are about building the capacity of our workforce to serve the public. Today, private industry is making significant investments in workforce diversity and inclusion initiatives to improve the performance of teams, create new markets, and drive customer engagement. In the public sector, we face similar challenges. While public budgets and other resources have declined, the demands on our services have become more complex, requiring us to work across agencies, jurisdictions, and sectors in order to meet the needs of ever more diverse customers and stakeholders. The ability to respond to public demands with agility and insight is critical to our performance.

Executive Order 12-02 does not explicitly change any affirmative action requirements. It does direct the State HR Director to:

• Establish streamlined agency, institution, and statewide workforce diversity reporting requirements;
• Review, evaluate, and approve agency and institution workforce diversity plans, policies, and strategies; and
• Develop and deliver an annual report to the Governor on the state’s progress towards creating a diverse, inclusive, and culturally competent workforce.

Initiative 200, which passed in 1998, prohibited giving preference on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in public employment and other areas. It did not preclude the state from analyzing and reporting the composition of the state workforce, or engaging in targeted outreach and recruitment.

Additionally, most of the tools that were in conflict with I-200 disappeared under personnel system reform with elimination of job registers and use of underutilized candidates listings, known as ‘+3’, and similar tools. Many agencies also have federal contracts that require them to develop plans for eliminating barriers to equal employment opportunity for persons from groups that have previously been excluded based on race, ethnicity, gender, age, disability, and veterans status.

Prior to January 2020, the form had not been updated in several years. This past winter we made a number of changes, adding a Gender X option and the LGBTQ+ question to be more inclusive. Executive Order 19-01 also directs state agencies to provide support and resources to military spouses, but until January we had no way of collecting status as a military spouse, so that question was added. We also had two forms that were being used somewhat inconsistently by agencies and had an interest in simplifying collection of this information by having only one form. It was time to modernize the form for all these reasons.

We are updating the form again for two main reasons:

1. Amendments to the public records act during the legislative session resulted in a change of circumstances. As of June 11, 2020, a large part of the personal data gathered by this form is exempted from public disclosure requests on an individually identifying level. We will still be using it for aggregate reporting on the make-up of our workforce. The language at the top of the form now reflects this new public records environment. See HB1888 Session Law for more information.
2. Ongoing engagement with HR leaders and members of the LGBTQ+ community through RAIN Best Practices have prompted State HR to improve and clarify the language describing the binary gender data field. We are attempting, bluntly, to call it like it is. We must continue to collect this data because of various health insurance systems and reporting requirements. We’ve also included explanatory language in the definitions section to be even clearer in this area.

Yes! This is new – as mentioned above, the Public Records Act (Chapter 42.56 RCW) was amended during the 2020 legislative session to exempt certain types of demographic information from disclosure. Data in the following categories is now exempt (protected) from disclosure on an individual or personally identifying basis:

• Birthdate*
• Salary deduction information
• Race and/or Ethnicity*
• Gender and Gender Identity*
• Sexual Orientation*
• Immigration status
• National Origin
• Disability status*

The categories with a * are the ones the EAADD form collects. Individual or personally identifying basis means that your name and demographic details will not be released together. Military, veteran and National Guard or reserve information is not exempted from the Public Record Act.

Government agencies provide state and federal periodic reports about the state workforce for equal opportunity and affirmative action efforts. The demographic information from this form also helps us make better decisions about how we increase representation of underrepresented groups and make our workforce more inclusive, so that we can serve Washingtonians better. We need a clear picture of our current workforce to understand how we can create policies and make business decisions to support and welcome everyone.

The Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) fields gather data in alignment with other state agencies, and to ensure our Human Resource Management System recognizes the identities of all our employees and creates visibility for non-binary individuals.

The binary field that is now labeled “Gender designation for health insurance purposes” was previously labeled “sex assigned at birth”. We are changing the label and description of this field based on feedback and ongoing dialogue with the Health Care Authority and employee stakeholder groups like RAIN, as well as a desire to be clearer with employees about how that data is used.

There are various reasons why our health care system and insurance system continue to require binary sex/gender information. The field within HRMS must contain information – it cannot remain blank – and the information is reported to the Public Employee Benefits Board at HCA to ensure that state employees have access to their health care services.

The data from this field on the form is then used to meet current requirements for Medicare federal reporting and eligibility determinations, meet health plan vendor requirements, ensure coordination of benefits and efficient claims processing. We encourage employees to choose the option in this field that you would like your medical provider(s) to use to determine insurance coverage and facilitate claims processing for your health care services.

No part of this form is required. The form is completely voluntary. If the form is not completed, in some of our statewide systems such as Washington Workforce Analytics (WWA) a blank field will default to one of the listed options. However, in the gender identity field and in the LGBTQ+ field we have included a new system option for “undisclosed,” which will be the default if those categories are not completed by the employee.

**The only exception to gender identity being optional may be if your job is one of the few in the state that has Bona Fide Occupational Requirements (BFOQs) that include gender. Some jobs within the state have gender related requirements; these jobs exist primarily in our correctional facilities and social service institutions. Our approach to BFOQs for individuals who identify as non-binary is currently being explored.

No. However, if the form is not completed, in some of our statewide systems a blank field will default to one of the listed options. For instance, if an individual does not complete the form, a non-response to the Racial and Ethnic Background questions may result in that employee’s information defaulting to “White.” This is an issue we are exploring ways to address in a future system update.

Gender X is intended to be an inclusive category to recognize the real diversity of gender identity. Gender X means a gender that is not exclusively male or female.

The Washington Law Against Discrimination prohibits discrimination against people because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. There is substantial research suggesting that LGBTQ+ individuals experience discrimination and marginalization in the workplace, particularly trans people. However, since we have not historically asked employees to report their sexual orientation or fully and accurately claim their gender identity, we are not able to measure the representation of this diverse community in our state workforce. Being blind in this area has made it difficult to target resources and policies to address gaps in the representation or experience of LGBTQ+ state workers.

Governor’s Directive 16-11 speaks to our commitment as a state to making our agencies and communities safe for LGBTQ+ people. Within that directive, State HR is directed to partner with the LGBTQ+ business resource group (BRG) – the Rainbow Alliance and Inclusion Network (RAIN) – to identify strategies for creating safe, diverse, and inclusive workplaces for our LGBTQ+ employees and customers. The creation of a third gender option and a new field for collecting sexual orientation information came about as a result of recommendations from RAIN, State HR policy staff, and other stakeholders.

The RAIN Best Practices subcommittee is considering whether to develop content for a training on LGBTQ+ issues in the workplace. There is also work underway by the Statewide DEI Training Committee to identify necessary diversity, equity and inclusion topics to build training around. Although a specific resource for state agencies is not available today, there may be training on this topic in the future. For specific questions, please contact State HR or the RAIN BRG leadership.

State HR reports out on the representation of diverse and underrepresented groups in the state workforce. Currently we lack any information about the representation of some groups, such as members of the LGBTQ+ community and military spouses. Without that information, it is harder to identify gaps in representation, and whether we need to create policies, strategies or resources to increase access and representation for these groups. In order to be an Employer of Choice where all people feel included, welcomed and seen, we need to provide people the opportunity to identify themselves in our system. We also need to be able to measure the effectiveness of our efforts to improve. This data is crucial to our ability to measure our own success and where we still have a lot of work to do.

I’m so glad you asked! Simply fill out the latest version of the form and submit it to the human resources staff at your agency! The form has been sent out to all HR Directors and is also posted in the OFM State HR forms area here.

Some large agencies are also collecting updated demographic information for their employees via a survey that asks the same questions that are on the form. They will be compiling all employee responses and that data will be uploaded all at once as part of a winshuttle script process that OFM will run. This process (the data collection and running the upload scripts) will happen in June and July 2020.

We are strongly encouraging all current employees of the state of Washington to update their information if they are invited to by their agency as part of a resurvey effort. Some of the questions are new and some of the definitions have changed. Even if a particular new category doesn’t apply to you, having your current response improves our workforce data. In some cases, employees who have worked for the state for years may not have completed the old form, so we’re also hoping to gather information from those individuals who didn’t complete the form in the past.

This information is visible on an individual employee level to only two authorized groups.  First, human resources employees within your agency who have access to the Human Resource Management System, and second, to individuals with system access at the Office of Financial Management in the State Human Resources division.

The information is used for federal Equal Opportunity Commission reporting. It is also used to develop reports that show the overall diversity of our state workforce and of an agency’s workforce. It supports the development of policies to improve fairness, representation and access for employees from all backgrounds to the State of Washington.

The information provided on this form is kept confidential to the extent allowable by law. The data is used to develop aggregate reports and shall not be used for any workplace decision-making for individual employees. As described above, much of the information collected by this form is now protected from public disclosure by law.

“SOGI” is short for sexual orientation and gender identity. We have not collected information about an employee’s sexual orientation in the past. Previously, we did collect gender information, but the options in the gender box were limited to male and female. This field is now called “Gender Designation for Health Insurance Purposes” explained above, and is used only for health insurance related reporting. In January we added a new field titled Gender Identity, which includes a third option for employees who identify as Gender X/non-binary. This is now the main field that our statewide diversity reporting relies on, and what is included in periodic agency reports on demographics and affirmative action categories. Additionally, the form asks if someone identifies as LGBTQ+ (yes/no), for reasons explained above.

If you have suggestions for the form or questions about its current content, you can send those questions to SHRPlanning@ofm.wa.gov. However, due to some federal reporting requirements, there are parts of this form that we are not able to substantially change at this time.

Yes, this form is completely voluntary. However, we strongly encourage you to complete it so we can implement data-driven strategies to improve our workplace culture and serve Washingtonians better.

According to Executive Order 19-01, a military spouse is anyone who is currently or was previously married to a service member during their time of active service, reserve or National Guard duty. If this describes you, you are considered a military spouse for our purposes.