You would think that younger companies headed by youthful entrepreneurs would be more forward in hiring minorities as employees. Earlier this year Clayton Rose found that this was not the case.
Rose is an adjunct professor at Columbia University in economics and finance as well as the former corporate executive at JPMorgan and is also a member of the Council of Graduate School of Business at Columbia.
At the Charles M. Harper Center Rose shared his research to a group of students. He gave a different perspective on how businesses are hiring minorities. He highlighted that the Civil Rights movement has been progressive in having businesses hire minorities but for questionable reasons. Rose believes social pressures are the main reason. Companies hire minorities based on social pressures. If they stop feeling the pressure they stop hiring minorities and if they are still feeling the pressure they give minorities leadership positions.
Rose found that big companies are happy with hiring only one or two minorities and stated that many companies consider it a “check the box” process. Rose stated that most businesses will hire one or two minorities and once the social pressure subsides stop hiring minorities.
Rose’s researched explained that from 1980 to 2000 nonwhites in director positions rose from 2.4 percent to 13.5 percent. Only one to two directors per firm were minorities in this study and the majority of these were African Americans.
Rose was more interested in what the future will look like with the increasing minority populations specifically Hispanics. Hispanics are becoming the predominant minority and now make up nearly 25 percent of the United States population.
Some students walked away from the talk interested in the data. One student mentioned he believed Rose’s information was intriguing and that many companies hire minorities to create a diverse workplace but often do not hire minorities at the top.
from U.S. Minorities & Women Corporate Leadership Representation http://gamaalwilson.info/2013/12/27/corporate-america-still-not-catching-up-with-minority-hires/
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