This paper argues that by placing too much responsibility for interpersonal misconduct on individual actors, organizations fail to address their EDI performance fully. Specifically, while progress has been made on positive EDI issues like workplace diversity, the management of EDI-related misconduct is often transferred to individuals. We use qualitative responses from a large national survey of UK workers to explore how employees experience responsibilization and perceive organizational responses and expectations around EDI-related misconduct. Our findings suggest that, in many organizations, individuals (employees, managers, customers) are placed in a position of responsibility for interpersonal relationships. We connect this to the notion of responsibilization, which sees institutional actors place autonomy and agency for moral issues on individual actors. Our findings contribute by conceptualizing EDI-related misconduct as a failure of responsibilization, whereby routinized inaction and symptom-solving contribute to unsatisfactory outcomes for targets and witnesses.
