Corporations Often Use Ineffective Strategies to Tackle Essay

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Corporations often use ineffective strategies to tackle workplace diversity issues. For example, many attempt to utilize affirmative action policies prescribe hiring by quota. Such policies are doomed to fail when a company finds itself hiring unqualified people for managerial roles. If that happens, it benefits nobody. People in senior management lose faith in hiring women and minorities and this has a knock-on effect on attitudes throughout the organization as well.

In general, corporate diversity practices emphasize the superficial, be it head counts or some other means. Even more in-depth diversity programs such as having work groups to meet and discuss issues that pertain to that group do little to change the status quo. Such groups may be able to raise specific issues, but they do not inherently address issues of promotion, mentorship, and training that would bring about more meaningful change to the workplace.

Collins describes the current situation as "a new institutional form of racism" and I could not disagree more. The first thing is that these barriers are not new. If Collins thinks there was a magical time in the past where such barriers to women and minorities did not exist and the issues today are therefore new, that would be highly erroneous. The second issue I have with that statement is simple -- it is not the corporation that is responsible for outcomes. Nobody is entitled to a position of power and authority (and wealth, since that is what the issue is really about), and that goes for white males as well. Most white males are also not going to be considered for the executive suite.

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I take the Milton Friedman view that the role of the corporation is to create products and services, and then sell them. Corporations can be agents of social change, but that is not their primary role in society. They have an obligation to their stakeholders to hire the best people possible, regardless of what privileges and opportunities have contributed to creating that particular pool of applicants.

I also disagree with Collins in that I feel the issues of opportunity go much deeper than the corporate world. If somebody in their forties, fifties or sixties is overlooked for a more senior position, that usually relates to their experience and their abilities. Choices made by people in their twenties or even teens with respect to education and training often dictate their paths later in life. This raises two key issues. The first is that when minorities and women are steered away from programs that eventually lead to well-paying jobs, such as accounting & finance, or engineering, and into subjects of study that lead elsewhere, they will never be considered for a senior management position. While more women are now attending business school and science programs, that was not the case in the 70s and 80s when today's business leaders were studying. What we see today at the executive level reflects….....

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