“The scramble to meet this demand led to a number of poorly thought-out initiatives, says Farzana Nayani, a diversity consultant based in Los Angeles. “There are a lot of upstarts in this field,” she says, who may not plan for the emotional impact of their work on participants.

She notes that unconscious bias training, one popular program designed to reveal workers’ preju- dices, can backfire and actually en- hance stereotypes if it doesn’t leave people with tools to manage or eliminate those biases. “These sessions can bring up a lot of uncomfortable emotions, like sadness, anger, frustration...shame and guilt,” she says. “Can they change office relationships? Absolutely.”