5 ms·

How do the companies justify spending money on diversity executives to their shareholders? Genuinely asking. Do they say it will make them more money?

by Paul_S 3y ago

programmer_dude 3y ago
"It will help us not loose money due to bad optics"?
- commandlinefan 3y ago
  “Let me in so I can save you” “Save me from what?” “From what I’m going to do to you if you don’t let me in”
jl6 3y ago
1. Companies whose staff are not representative of their customers risk becoming out of touch with their customers. 2. ESG credentials attract investors with ESG goals. 3. Diversity is associated with positive goodwill, so it can be exploited to gain an edge in marketing. I’m not saying I agree these are valid justifications (#1 particularly could be spun as an argument against diversity), but these are some of the reasons that get deployed.
- akomtu 3y ago
  2 is a big one. There are large ESG funds with very political agenda. Shareholders don't care about the agenda, but want the ESG money, and if all it takes is creating a "diversity officer" role, they'll do it. But right now the ESG funds are experiencing financial difficulties, and so the shareholders are dumping them.
- karmakurtisaani 3y ago
  It also doesn't cost that much compared to other things, so there probably isn't that much to justify.
enteeentee 3y ago
I hate all these oh they’re just being a woke company articles, blah, blah, they completely misunderstand the point of diversity from an HR perspective. Yes there is a good reason to promote diversity in a company that isnt necessarily an immediate make more money thing, but does contribute. Basically companies have a lot of problems with recruiting and retaining talent, having good talent will increase performance. Showing you are accepting of a diverse set of people is on some levels a recruitment marketing exercise. The amount of money spent on diversity executives, well yeah probably a bit high, but about the amount you’d pay an HR exec at that level As a gay man, if I have 2 similar job offers, one with a company that shows they are accepting and dont accept prejudice, and another that says nothing. Which one do you think I’ll choose? Not just in diversity, but I’d far more prefer to work for a company that has values that align with me, eg I wouldnt want to work for a company that is involved with arms dealing, sure this will make you a lot of money for shareholders, but do you want to hand out pain, misery and death? Not all of us work for the bottom line. I recognise I am working for a business, but Id much prefer to think of my job as creating something, making things easier for people rather than just making money as a mission, that sounds like a miserable way to live.
- epups 3y ago
  > As a gay man, if I have 2 similar job offers, one with a company that shows they are accepting and dont accept prejudice, and another that says nothing. Which one do you think I’ll choose? I honestly don't know. Do you seriously think that a company that has a diversity officer "believes" anything differently than one that doesn't? We should not confuse promoting diversity with enshrining this into bureaucracy in a very specific and, in my opinion, misguided way. There are plenty of examples of these officers making the problem worse.
  - pg_1234 3y ago
    I'd go with the one that hasn't lied to you yet ... ... the one that said nothing.
    - projectazorian 3y ago
didntknowya 3y ago
it's pretty much just another HR role. I don't think you'll get much pushback if HR isn't making money, most people ignore it to be avoid being cancelled.
jncfhnb 3y ago
Yes. There’s enough stats out there showing diverse companies do better. Stock price is a commonly cited metric. It’s not hard to find. That is the justification. What isn’t clear is whether these analyses are well controlled. E.g. is it over indexing on companies flourishing in wealthy coastal cities. I doubt it’s a causal effect personally. But I don’t have numbers either way.
- commandlinefan 3y ago
  I tried to look into this once, and it’s hard to find these studies. It’s easy to find studies that _cite_ these studies, but it’s hard to actually find the studies themselves, and even harder to figure out exactly what they mean by “diversity”. Where I could find data, it was significant that the studies took place before diversity included sexual orientation (and _long_ before it included gender identity), but those both seem to be the main driver of diversity initiatives these days
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    Eh… I don’t think there’s anything to say there. Companies tend not to have data on the sexual orientation of their employees. Such studies are not possible to do. Promoting inclusivity for sexual orientation and gender is different from trying to improve diversity. I think it’s pretty rare to see the latter relative to racial diversity efforts.
    - dolni 3y ago
      It sounds to me like what you're saying is "data isn't important as long as I agree with the conclusion." These diversity "studies", as the grandparent points out, are light on data and heavy on marketing. Several years back when I looked up the McKinsey 2012 (or 2013, whichever) study that started all this, it was a marketing flyer with zero data. It's really convenient you can make such a hefty claim and provide essentially no evidence to back it up.
      - jncfhnb 3y ago

How do the companies justify spending money on diversity executives to their shareholders? Genuinely asking. Do they say it will make them more money?

by Paul_S 3y ago

How do the companies justify spending money on diversity executives to their shareholders? Genuinely asking. Do they say it will make them more money?

programmer_dude 3y ago

"It will help us not loose money due to bad optics"?

commandlinefan 3y ago
“Let me in so I can save you” “Save me from what?” “From what I’m going to do to you if you don’t let me in”

jl6 3y ago

1. Companies whose staff are not representative of their customers risk becoming out of touch with their customers. 2. ESG credentials attract investors with ESG goals. 3. Diversity is associated with positive goodwill, so it can be exploited to gain an edge in marketing. I’m not saying I agree these are valid justifications (#1 particularly could be spun as an argument against diversity), but these are some of the reasons that get deployed.

akomtu 3y ago
2 is a big one. There are large ESG funds with very political agenda. Shareholders don't care about the agenda, but want the ESG money, and if all it takes is creating a "diversity officer" role, they'll do it. But right now the ESG funds are experiencing financial difficulties, and so the shareholders are dumping them.
karmakurtisaani 3y ago
It also doesn't cost that much compared to other things, so there probably isn't that much to justify.

enteeentee 3y ago

I hate all these oh they’re just being a woke company articles, blah, blah, they completely misunderstand the point of diversity from an HR perspective. Yes there is a good reason to promote diversity in a company that isnt necessarily an immediate make more money thing, but does contribute. Basically companies have a lot of problems with recruiting and retaining talent, having good talent will increase performance. Showing you are accepting of a diverse set of people is on some levels a recruitment marketing exercise. The amount of money spent on diversity executives, well yeah probably a bit high, but about the amount you’d pay an HR exec at that level As a gay man, if I have 2 similar job offers, one with a company that shows they are accepting and dont accept prejudice, and another that says nothing. Which one do you think I’ll choose? Not just in diversity, but I’d far more prefer to work for a company that has values that align with me, eg I wouldnt want to work for a company that is involved with arms dealing, sure this will make you a lot of money for shareholders, but do you want to hand out pain, misery and death? Not all of us work for the bottom line. I recognise I am working for a business, but Id much prefer to think of my job as creating something, making things easier for people rather than just making money as a mission, that sounds like a miserable way to live.

epups 3y ago
> As a gay man, if I have 2 similar job offers, one with a company that shows they are accepting and dont accept prejudice, and another that says nothing. Which one do you think I’ll choose? I honestly don't know. Do you seriously think that a company that has a diversity officer "believes" anything differently than one that doesn't? We should not confuse promoting diversity with enshrining this into bureaucracy in a very specific and, in my opinion, misguided way. There are plenty of examples of these officers making the problem worse.
- pg_1234 3y ago
  I'd go with the one that hasn't lied to you yet ... ... the one that said nothing.
  - projectazorian 3y ago

didntknowya 3y ago

it's pretty much just another HR role. I don't think you'll get much pushback if HR isn't making money, most people ignore it to be avoid being cancelled.

jncfhnb 3y ago

Yes. There’s enough stats out there showing diverse companies do better. Stock price is a commonly cited metric. It’s not hard to find. That is the justification. What isn’t clear is whether these analyses are well controlled. E.g. is it over indexing on companies flourishing in wealthy coastal cities. I doubt it’s a causal effect personally. But I don’t have numbers either way.

commandlinefan 3y ago
I tried to look into this once, and it’s hard to find these studies. It’s easy to find studies that _cite_ these studies, but it’s hard to actually find the studies themselves, and even harder to figure out exactly what they mean by “diversity”. Where I could find data, it was significant that the studies took place before diversity included sexual orientation (and _long_ before it included gender identity), but those both seem to be the main driver of diversity initiatives these days
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  Eh… I don’t think there’s anything to say there. Companies tend not to have data on the sexual orientation of their employees. Such studies are not possible to do. Promoting inclusivity for sexual orientation and gender is different from trying to improve diversity. I think it’s pretty rare to see the latter relative to racial diversity efforts.
  - dolni 3y ago
    It sounds to me like what you're saying is "data isn't important as long as I agree with the conclusion." These diversity "studies", as the grandparent points out, are light on data and heavy on marketing. Several years back when I looked up the McKinsey 2012 (or 2013, whichever) study that started all this, it was a marketing flyer with zero data. It's really convenient you can make such a hefty claim and provide essentially no evidence to back it up.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago