Equal Opportunity and its implications in Corporate America

Equal Opportunity is great in principle. It’s not so great in practice. Believe me, I’m all for helping individuals who are being discriminated against because of their ethnicity, gender, age, etc. It is imperative that all employees understand the role of Equal Opportunity in the workplace to be able to better gauge their own chances for advancement.

One of my previous employers makes for an excellent case study. They were losing a lot of personnel to retirement, especially females and minorities. In order to maintain their contracts with the government, they had to meet certain race and gender requirements. To help meet this demand, they first looked to advance people that were either classified as a minority, female, or both. They even went so far as to include a special presentation in our annual company meeting which focused on the opportunities for women.

Needless to say, they promoted many unqualified people just to meet the criteria set forth by the government. I remember one female (a new hire) in particular who received three promotions in the span of 18 months. She leapfrogged over other managers that had been with the company for a much longer period of time and were far more qualified. It didn’t matter though, she was a female that fit the right demographic.

You need to know how to work the system to favor your career goals. My wife is working for a company that is in the same situation as I described above. She understands how being a female can help her move up the corporate ladder and will stay with her current employer to take advantage of the government requirements. If she were to leave, she might become employed by a business where this situation does not exist, thereby limiting her income potential.

I also worked for a business where the head of the department was a minority. He was a great leader, but very focused on promoting others who were in his same minority demographic. I worked for him for two years, and by the time I left, I was only one of three managers out of a total of nine that didn’t fit his racial profile. He was also very focused on giving promotions to these same individuals. I greatly respected his business acumen, but knew that it would be difficult to rise up in his department because of my own racial background.

Don’t think that being a great employee will be enough to justify advancement. Sometimes it helps to have the right racial background or gender. Be aware of the implications this has for your career opportunities. Many companies are required by U.S. law to retain certain percentages of people at certain levels (it also helps in the realm of investments, where investors favor companies that are culturally diversified). Use this knowledge to your advantage to find employment with a company that will reward you for who you are.