Along with are exaggerated partisanship, big businesses are perceived as evil. The world is not as awful as conspiracy theories portray it.
“… As for the treatment of workers, here too perception and reality part ways. The depredations of a few job cutters have earned Big Business a reputation for heartless streamlining, but employment at large businesses is in fact steadier than at small businesses. In 2015, small enterprises were four times more likely to lay off their workers than large ones. Workers employed by large firms also earned more—on average, 54 percent more than workers at small companies. Companies with more than 500 employees offer 2.5 times more paid leave and insurance benefits and 3.9 times more in retirement benefits than workers at firms with fewer than 100 employees. Large firms are also more likely to be unionized, and they employ a greater share of women and minorities than small firms do, making Big Business an unlikely enemy of progressives. …”
American business particularly has a problem with diversity.
Women account for only 16.5% of the C-Suite (the level reporting to CEO: CFO, COO, CIO, CHRO, etc.), and 5% of the CEO positions in the S&P 500. (https://money.cnn.com/infographic/investing/female-ceo-leadership/index.html)
Particularly in Europe, there have been more aggressive efforts to get women (at least) into the boardrooms: Sweden passed a law requiring 40% of the board of directors to be women; it isn’t quite there yet (it’s 32%, well above the 23% elsewhere in the EU), but it had an interesting side effect: now that many companies are looking to have women on their boards, but refused to take women without board or CEO experience (note the vicious cycle: you can’t get the experience, therefore you won’t get it), Swedish women are showing up on a lot of boards globally. Companies forced to put on women GAVE them the experience they needed. (I’ve co-developed board potential assessment approaches to be used in part to identify women with high potential regardless of experience.)
Women taking over CEO positions have disproportionately been at companies in trouble, which leads me to think that qualified men don’t want the roles, and just take other ones, whereas women aren’t going turn down an opportunity like that, because it’s the only one they can get. That tends to mean you get VERY qualified women taking on these roles which are setting them up for failure.
The good news is that every time we get women into the boardroom, it shows how they are just as good as men, and makes it harder to find excuses not to hire women. Research shows that men and women have NO significant differences in leadership competencies. None. Zip. Zero.
But even incremental bias has huge impact. A 55-45 bias doesn’t sound like much, but after the fourth screening, it becomes over 2:1, and by the sixth it is 3:1. And hiring typically uses two rounds, and each promotion another 1-2, etc…so by CEO…?
Matt left out the last panel where the CEO says “And then I will institute mandatory classes for sexual harassment, diversity training and bribery for all the employees after I have her sign a NDA”.
Scoutmaster77 over 4 years ago
Some serious sarcasm here… :-D
Concretionist over 4 years ago
Is this the old dude talking himself into realizing Jill’s a threat? I’m confused (which isn’t all that unusual).
Night-Gaunt49[Bozo is Boffo] over 4 years ago
Now that is the best way to bring down a corporation thinking like that.
superposition over 4 years ago
Along with are exaggerated partisanship, big businesses are perceived as evil. The world is not as awful as conspiracy theories portray it.
“… As for the treatment of workers, here too perception and reality part ways. The depredations of a few job cutters have earned Big Business a reputation for heartless streamlining, but employment at large businesses is in fact steadier than at small businesses. In 2015, small enterprises were four times more likely to lay off their workers than large ones. Workers employed by large firms also earned more—on average, 54 percent more than workers at small companies. Companies with more than 500 employees offer 2.5 times more paid leave and insurance benefits and 3.9 times more in retirement benefits than workers at firms with fewer than 100 employees. Large firms are also more likely to be unionized, and they employ a greater share of women and minorities than small firms do, making Big Business an unlikely enemy of progressives. …”
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/04/learning-to-love-big-business/554096/
Motivemagus over 4 years ago
American business particularly has a problem with diversity.
Women account for only 16.5% of the C-Suite (the level reporting to CEO: CFO, COO, CIO, CHRO, etc.), and 5% of the CEO positions in the S&P 500. (https://money.cnn.com/infographic/investing/female-ceo-leadership/index.html)
Particularly in Europe, there have been more aggressive efforts to get women (at least) into the boardrooms: Sweden passed a law requiring 40% of the board of directors to be women; it isn’t quite there yet (it’s 32%, well above the 23% elsewhere in the EU), but it had an interesting side effect: now that many companies are looking to have women on their boards, but refused to take women without board or CEO experience (note the vicious cycle: you can’t get the experience, therefore you won’t get it), Swedish women are showing up on a lot of boards globally. Companies forced to put on women GAVE them the experience they needed. (I’ve co-developed board potential assessment approaches to be used in part to identify women with high potential regardless of experience.)
Women taking over CEO positions have disproportionately been at companies in trouble, which leads me to think that qualified men don’t want the roles, and just take other ones, whereas women aren’t going turn down an opportunity like that, because it’s the only one they can get. That tends to mean you get VERY qualified women taking on these roles which are setting them up for failure.
The good news is that every time we get women into the boardroom, it shows how they are just as good as men, and makes it harder to find excuses not to hire women. Research shows that men and women have NO significant differences in leadership competencies. None. Zip. Zero.
But even incremental bias has huge impact. A 55-45 bias doesn’t sound like much, but after the fourth screening, it becomes over 2:1, and by the sixth it is 3:1. And hiring typically uses two rounds, and each promotion another 1-2, etc…so by CEO…?
jdeathlogan over 4 years ago
Matt left out the last panel where the CEO says “And then I will institute mandatory classes for sexual harassment, diversity training and bribery for all the employees after I have her sign a NDA”.