“Silicon Valley has a long way to go on diversity, but most tech companies would argue that they’re making progress,” Jacob Kastrenakes reports for The Verge. “Apple also claims to have removed pay disparities and has made slight gains on hiring women and people of color. It’s even launched an ‘Inclusion & Diversity’ page with visualizations of its hiring data.”
“But a small group of Apple investors believe the company isn’t making progress fast enough, and they’re trying to force the company to pick up the pace. ‘Some of the excuses given by Apple and others — there’s not sufficient people in the pipeline, this and that,’ says investor Tony Maldonado. ‘Excuse my language, it’s bullshit,'” Kastrenakes reports. “Maldonado is leading an effort to mandate that Apple accelerate its work toward becoming a more diverse company. For the second year in a row, he’s submitted a shareholder proposal asking that Apple ‘adopt an accelerated recruitment policy… to increase the diversity of senior management and its board of directors.'”
“Maldonado says that could include tying executive pay to diversity goals, as Intel and Microsoft have done, or adopting a board refreshment policy, requiring the company to regularly explore potential new board members from diverse backgrounds,” Kastrenakes reports. “In a filing with the SEC, Apple’s board wrote a note recommending that shareholders vote against the proposal. The company argues that it already has ‘much broader’ diversity efforts at work and, in the past three years, has made ‘steady progress in attracting more women and underrepresented minorities.’ The proposed policy, Apple concludes, ‘is not necessary or appropriate because we have already demonstrated our commitment to a holistic view of inclusion and diversity.'”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote back in July 2014:
Diversity is good, but getting the absolute best should remain the goal. Forced diversity carries its own set of problems. Would the group be comprised of the best-qualifed people possible or would it be designed to hit pre-defined quotas? Would some employees, consciously or unconsciously, consider certain employees, or even themselves, to be tokens meant to fill a quota? That would be a suboptimal result for all involved.
The best and desired outcome is for this to work in Apple’s favor. Truly looking at qualified people from a larger pool would result in delivering different viewpoints and new ways of looking at things and tackling problems than a more homogenized workforce would be capable of delivering.
Regardless and of course, someday it sure would be nice for everyone to just be able to evaluate a person’s potential, not measuring and tabulating superficial, meaningless things like skin color and gender.
Apple’s “Inclusion and Diversity” page is here.
SEE ALSO:
Apple’s Board of Directors says a call for diversity is ‘unduly burdensome and not necessary’ – January 15, 2016
Apple leads Facebook, Intel, Cisco, Google on gender diversity among Bay Area companies – November 17, 2015
Apple’s latest diversity report shows progress – August 13, 2015
Tim Cook is ‘personally involved’ in improving diversity at Apple Inc. – July 14, 2015
Apple donates over $50 million to diversity efforts – March 10, 2015
Apple CEO Tim Cook met privately with Jesse Jackson regarding diversity – December 9, 2014
Apple adds Vice Presidents, more diversity to Executive Leadership Team – August 15, 2014
A message from Apple CEO Tim Cook on diversity – August 12, 2014
Jesse Jackson calls on Obama to scrutinize tech industry’s ‘lack of diversity’ – July 28, 2014
Tim Cook: Apple will release diversity data ‘at some point’ – July 9, 2014
Jesse Jackson targets tech’s lack of diversity; sends letter to Apple, Google, HP, others – March 19, 2014
Apple changes bylaws after facing criticism about lack of diversity on board – January 9, 2014
