The 33-year-old founder of Uoma Beauty, a cosmetics company that caters to black women, came up with a social media challenge to test the sincerity of the companies: She launched the #pulluporshutup campaign on Instagram to push brands to reveal the racial makeup of their corporate workforce and executives.
The hashtag has since gone viral, amassing nearly 100,000 Instagram followers in a week. Chuter said it's a wake-up call for many businesses who couldn’t see or didn’t take seriously enough the silent racism and prejudices that hold black people back in their own workplaces.
“Reflection is painful,” Chuter said. “The truth hurts and I just felt like brands didn’t want to do it.”
As protests over police brutality have erupted across the country over the past two weeks, The Associated Press reviewed the diversity reports of some of the biggest companies pledging solidarity with their black employees as well as the black community, and found that their efforts to recruit, maintain and promote minorities within their own ranks have fallen short.
“It should not take the death of Black people at this magnitude to inspire everyone to be an ally,” Terrill is quoted as saying.
Only 4.4% of
″In order to be successful as a business in empowering everyone on the planet, we need to reflect the world we serve," Nadella said.
But the company itself has been accused of hypocrisy for the troubling conditions reported by warehouse workers during the coronavirus pandemic. An AP analysis found that more than 60% of warehouse and delivery workers in most cities are people of color. Amazon’s 2019 workforce data shows about 8% of its managers in the
“As a black woman, I feel like it is empty words,” she said. “They don’t help our struggles. Everyone wants to join in and profit from us.”
In the
Roberts’ research looking at the careers of Harvard business school graduates found black alums got fewer prime opportunities, such as global assignments, than white graduates with the same degree.
“They’re saying, ‘We’ve got the qualifications but we can’t get into the inner circle,’” Roberts said.
Adidas, which responded to Floyd’s death and subsequent protests by crossing out the word “Racism” on an Instagram post, acknowledged its own shortcomings after a growing group of employees called out the company for its lack of diversity.
On Tuesday Adidas unveiled several moves to fight racial inequality, including a pledge to fill at least 30% of all new positions in the
“The events of the past two weeks have caused all of us to reflect on what we can do to confront the cultural and systemic forces that sustain racism,” said Adidas CEO
The
Nike has long been viewed as an “insider” brand among black consumers because of its lucrative and high-profile sponsorship deals with prominent
The
Yet a look at who is leading the corporate business shows a disconnect between what the brand projects and how it actually operates.
Though whites make up less than half — 43% — of its total
CEO
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AP writer Anne D’Innocenzio contributed from
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