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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   Edited 2yr ago   34788 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 14, 2022

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Most managers I've asked told me they face no pressure to hire for diversity.

There's enough examples now of a) hiring managers being explicitly told not to hire white men, and b) hiring managers' bonuses relying on meeting diversity hiring requirements that I have a very hard time believing this.

Is the pressure bimodal: extreme in some extremely converged companies and totally absent in others? Or are people just reluctant to admit they're under pressure?

In a world of 750 million people (Europe + US + Canada) that's supposedly dominated by wokeness, there are going to be enough businesses for the 'man bites dog' story of 'we're not hiring white dudes' story to pop up as much as people interested in that story wants, even if 95% of businesses are hiring relatively meritocratically, putting aside diversity initiatives that even the vast majority of right-leaning people would shrug at.

I also think, that most people at a high level in corporations legitimately believe they've missed out on talent due to structural issues, and since they're greedy capitalists, that's costing them money, which is why they're investing in diversity initiatives. Why not find the gay Latinx trans woman who will find a better way to increase production targets by 3% and earn me a bonus?

I haven't spoken to many senior managers, mostly mid-level managers. My impression is that senior elites and execs in companies pay more attention to diversity so it would make sense for the public service to match that as well.

I'm very interested in cases where managers in the canadian public service had bonuses tied to diversity requirements. Do you have any examples you can link to?

Ahh yes, performance agreements. My experience with these is that people don't commit to targets they can't already meet. After all, these objectives are mostly self-imposed, and the exercise is more of a formality. That said, I'm sure it's sometimes the case some execs have to work hard to meet their diversity targets. Thanks for sharing.

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