Axed ‘diversity’ executives struggle to find work
“Diversity” executives who are part of large-scale layoffs due to a slipping demand for diversity are having difficulty finding new careers.
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), an ideology which advocates hiring employees based on their pigmentation or genitalia, exploded into a multimillion-dollar industry following the death of George Floyd in 2020. That year, 39% of companies began offering “diversity programs,” a 10% increase from the year before. The figure rose to 43% in 2021, but then petered out at 41% in 2022 as corporations began to feel the impact of inflation.
According to an estimate from Glassdoor, chief diversity officers (CDOs) who divide a company’s workforce into colors and genders can pull in from $132,000 to $219,000 a year. But as corporations such as Meta, Twitter, Salesforce and Microsoft began looking closely at their bottom lines last year, DEI teams became among the first to go. Diversity executives are being laid off at a rate about 40% higher than their colleagues, according to an analysis by Revelio Labs. According to Hanold Associates Executive Search CEO Jason Hanold, there has been a 75% drop in searches for CDOs.
Now as CDOs look for other work, many are coming up empty handed.
Drezly’s diversity chief Stephanie Lubin,was laid off in May after the company was acquired by Uber. Lubin told the Wall Street Journal she submitted at least 300 applications for diversity jobs. For one position, she went through 16 rounds of interviews and was still rejected. Now she’s considering leaving the diversity industry.
As of February, Amazon, Twitter and Nike each shed 5–16 DEI employees and, given the fact that the median DEI team size is three employees “these outflows likely amount to the exodus of entire diversity teams”, reported the Daily Wire.
During the pandemic, some companies appointed employees to be diversity executives simply because they had the “right” skin color. But now Hanold says that 60% of diversity roles are being combined with other positions in the same company, a 10% increase from last year. Many CDOs, seeking to branch out of DEI, are looking for hybrid roles that will transition them into other positions.
According to an analysis of 575 earnings calls between April 1st and June 5th, mentions by executives of “diversity, equity and inclusion,” “DEI” or “sustainability” have dropped 31% compared to the same period last year. Most of the executives who have grown silent are chief financial officers.
