Another important lesson that you should convey to all of your employees — but again, especially those under the glass ceiling — is to look at job- and career-related matters in the long term as well as in the short term. As we've seen time and again, coaching and mentoring attempt to bridge the short- and long-term goals of the workplace. Coaching pays very close attention to the job at hand but links the lessons learned to employees' long-term goals.

Women and minorities who feel they must work harder to climb up the career ladder sometimes devote all their time and energy to succeeding beyond their wildest imaginations in the present, and give short shrift to planning in the longer term. This is understandable behavior that your coaching can more properly align, leading, of course, to more opportunities for advancement.

You should drum into your employees on the diversity frontier that they should indeed keep focused on improving themselves in the here and now. But that they should also be thinking about where they want to be in one year, five years, and 10 years. The bottom line is that if you insist on your people perpetually learning and growing their skills, their futures will shine bright — guaranteed.