{"id":35282,"date":"2023-10-19T03:43:00","date_gmt":"2023-10-19T03:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=35282"},"modified":"2023-10-31T13:40:47","modified_gmt":"2023-10-31T13:40:47","slug":"what-do-a-black-scientist-nonprofit-executive-and-filmmaker-have-in-common-they-all-face-racism-in-the-gray-areas-of-workplace-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/what-do-a-black-scientist-nonprofit-executive-and-filmmaker-have-in-common-they-all-face-racism-in-the-gray-areas-of-workplace-culture\/","title":{"rendered":"What do a Black scientist, nonprofit executive and filmmaker have in common? They all face racism in the \u2018gray areas\u2019 of workplace\u00a0culture"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Adia Harvey Wingfield<\/a>, Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis<\/a><\/em><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

American workplaces talk a lot about diversity these days. In fact, you\u2019d have a hard time finding a company that says it doesn\u2019t value the principle. But despite this \u2013 and despite the multibillion-dollar diversity industry<\/a> \u2013 Black workers continue to face significant hiring discrimination<\/a>, stall out at middle management levels and remain underrepresented in leadership roles<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a sociologist<\/a>, I wanted to understand why this is. So I spent more than 10 years interviewing over 200 Black workers in a variety of roles \u2013 from the gig economy to the C-suite. I found that many of the problems they face come down to organizational culture. Too often, companies elevate diversity as a concept but overlook the internal processes that disadvantage Black workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I tell several of these individuals\u2019 stories in my new book, \u201cGray Areas: How the Way We Work Perpetuates Racism and What We Can Do to Fix It<\/a>.\u201d While racial disparities were once the result of law and explicit policy \u2013 think of \u201cWhites Only Need Apply\u201d signs \u2013 today, subtle cultural processes lead to unequal racial outcomes<\/a>. It\u2019s in these \u201cgray areas\u201d that racism lurks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three professionals, one frustrating reality<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Take \u201cConstance,\u201d for example \u2013 not her real name \u2013 who is a Black female chemical engineering professor at a major research university. Her university proclaims its commitment to diversity and inclusion, with several offices and initiatives dedicated to this goal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet she told me that most leaders at her school are uncomfortable trying to achieve racial diversity. They\u2019d rather be \u201ccolorblind\u201d \u2013 that is, they\u2019d rather not acknowledge or address racial disparities or the institutional rules and norms that perpetuate them. So their attempts to pursue diversity translate into attempts to hire more women faculty but not more Black faculty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This isn\u2019t surprising, as women generally are underrepresented in STEM fields<\/a>. But the emphasis on gender means that the racial issues Constance encounters as a Black woman<\/a> \u2013 openly racist teaching evaluations, colleagues\u2019 casual stereotyping, additional barriers to mentorship \u2013 go ignored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cKevin\u201d offers another instructive example. He\u2019s a Black man who works at an education nonprofit that aims to help kids<\/a> \u2013 a laudable goal. His workplace touts its culture of collaboration and says that it demonstrates its commitment to diversity by supporting children from all backgrounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in practice, Kevin found that the organization often shunned and patronized Black parents, treating them disrespectfully. And despite his employer\u2019s stated support for diversity, Kevin says his efforts to highlight these problems usually went ignored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there\u2019s \u201cBrian.\u201d A film producer with extensive Hollywood experience, Brian was excited about taking a job with a major studio. He thought it would give him an opportunity to bring more films about the variety of Black experience to audiences. And since studio leaders talked a big game about innovation, creativity and original thinking, this seemed like a reasonable assumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But once he started in this role, Brian learned that the studio was dominated by a market-driven culture, which leaders used to justify<\/a> not investing in films by and about Black people. Importantly, the same logic around Black filmmakers rarely seemed to apply to white ones, Brian said \u2013 those who directed flops were still given multiple chances to keep working. Pointing out this hypocrisy failed to change minds or practices, Brian found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When a DEI statement isn\u2019t enough<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

What do these three people, working in very different industries, have in common? They all work for employers that have a stated commitment to diversity \u2013 and an organizational culture that belies and even undermines it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When these companies commit to diversity but fail to tackle racial diversity specifically, it becomes easy for workers like Constance, Kevin and Brian to find that the issues they experience get overlooked and that there\u2019s no effective way to bring them forward. They get stuck in the gray areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, it doesn\u2019t have to be this way. There are practical steps<\/a> companies can take to address racial diversity: creating mentoring programs<\/a> for everyone, setting goals and collecting data to measure progress<\/a>, and investing in diversity task forces<\/a>, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My research suggests smart organizations will do just that \u2013 moving toward a culture where \u201cdiversity\u201d is a driver of solutions, not just a buzzword.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adia Harvey Wingfield<\/a>, Professor of Sociology, Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Adia Harvey Wingfield, Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis American workplaces talk a lot about diversity these days. In fact, you\u2019d have a hard time finding a company that says it doesn\u2019t value the principle. But despite this \u2013 and despite the multibillion-dollar diversity industry \u2013 Black workers continue to face significant […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":35283,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[277],"tags":[501,14721,453,224,356,498,1538,3828,4169],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35282"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35282"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35282\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35284,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35282\/revisions\/35284"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}