Читать книгу Hiring for Diversity - Arthur Woods - Страница 12

It took a series of unthinkable events, in a stunningly brief period, to force us all to reckon with injustices we'd been conditioned to tolerate.

We witnessed the murder of George Floyd and its aftermath, the agony of oppression erupting in massive, anguished protests. We watched the rise of Black Lives Matter, a global movement giving voice to people unwilling to remain disposable. We saw the COVID-19 pandemic force marginalized communities into even greater hardship and disparity. If our eyes were closed before, they have now been pried open. We are no longer willing—or able—to ignore the inequality and racism that surrounds us.

In a handful of months, the world discovered an urgent desire for change, and no facet of life has gone unaffected, especially the workplace and the makeup of our workforce. Most management teams and boards for the first time looked around and noticed the lack of diversity in the room. And employees across organizations demanded response and action from their employers.

Leaders were left asking, “Will things ever go back to the way they once were?” But the world as we know it has forever changed. Our new world calls us to move forward in innovative ways and to solve problems we've ignored for far too long.

So what changed? We've always had the intent to do better, to be better. And for the last decade, we have signaled how little diversity, equity, and inclusion is present in the workforce today, but that has yet to translate to real changes in our systems. There has been little impact from our efforts. We are now at a critical juncture. We can no longer tolerate our own lack of progress.

Our personal frustration is a direct indication of our desire for personal engagement. We can no longer say this isn't our responsibility, that this is someone else's problem. Each of us—from chief executives down to entry-level employees—has a sphere of influence in advancing diversity on our teams and our organizations. We each have the opportunity to build awareness of the need for diversity because of the systemic inequities across our hiring process. We have the chance to model new behavior for inclusive hiring in our own work personally, and we can play a role in influencing changes to the way our teams and organizations operate.

We also have more transparency around the lack of representation than ever before. Black individuals make up 13 percent of the U.S. population, yet only in four of the nation’s 37 largest employers do they occupy 10 percent or more of the executive and management roles, according to Bloomberg. Hispanics make up 18.5 percent of the U.S. population, yet in only four of those companies do they occupy 15 percent or more of executive and management roles. Meanwhile, white people make up 60 percent of the U.S. population, and all 37 of the largest employers have at least 50 percent white representation at the executive and management levels.

To advance diversity in the workforce, we have often looked to changes we can influence in public policy. In June of 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court made history by declaring that the 1964 Civil Rights Act protected gay, lesbian, and transgender individuals from discrimination based on sex. For the first time in American history, employers were prevented from firing employees because of who they loved or how they identified. Although this was a victory, it shed light on the cruel reality that the LGBTQ+ community had always faced. It took 56 years for them to be granted the protection under law that their heterosexual and cisgender coworkers had all along.

Slowly but surely, progressive lawmakers are pursuing legislation to grant individuals access to the most basic protections in the workforce. But we can't wait for changes in the law alone to ensure equity for everyone at work. We all need to focus on what we can change, and that starts within our own organizations.