If you're dissatisfied with this stuff, I wouldn't talk to management to solve this, but instead I'd work on communicating with ESG funds and ask them to change

If you're dissatisfied with this stuff, I wouldn't talk to management to solve this, but instead I'd work on communicating with ESG funds and ask them to change their guidelines for their DEI initiatives. Let me explain. The corporation you work for is just trying to get a better ESG score. The DEI initiative and programs were probably handed down in some quasi-government fashion from Blackrock and other ESG funds who chose investments and even board votes based on that. Your company's HR department might have had all this mandated from Blackrock who has a ton of control on the boards of publicly traded companies. Corporations have to regularly report their DEI initiatives to Blackrock and other ESG funds. "Last week, BlackRock released its 2021 proxy voting guidelines for the U.S. and other major markets ... These updated materials demonstrate how BlackRock intends to pair higher expectations for corporate responsiveness across a number of topics, including diversity, equity and inclusion and environmental risk, with a greater willingness to vote against management where these expectations are not met." "In 2021, BlackRock will expect disclosure of workforce demographics, such as gender, race, and ethnicity in line with the EEO-1 Survey, along with steps being taken to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion. Where BlackRock believes disclosures or practices fall short of market or peer practice, it may vote against members of the appropriate committee or support related shareholder proposals*." https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2021/01/12/blackrocks-2021-proxy-voting-guidelines-prioritize-esg-actions/ https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2021/01/12/blackrocks-2021-p... If you look throughout Blackrock's governance documents they talk about "Stakeholder Capitalism" which is a world economic forum program[1] to bring all sorts of influences into the running of companies besides shareholder value. Thus, the bottom line isn't always the goal and often there are other reasons for all of this, so appeals to corporate profitability aren't even going to work here. [1] https://www.weforum.org/stakeholdercapitalism https://www.weforum.org/stakeholdercapitalism