The Illusion Of Inclusion.

I was listening to an interview that Sean Combs a.k.a. Diddy recently did with Charlamagne Tha God, in which he was reflecting on how no matter how successful people like Jay-Z, Oprah and himself are, when they walk into the rooms of corporate companies, they are still treated like N*****. He referred to the few Black people that make it as “an illusion of inclusion,” that he was afraid that the Black community would potentially fall into because they see the Oprah’s and Tyler Perry’s, Dr. Dre’s and Jay-Z’s of the world and think we’ve made it as a people. This made me reflect on my time in the corporate world and how this definitely applied in that setting.

I remember working at this one company where there was one Black female senior manager in their entire Canadian head office operations. She eventually became my boss for a short period of time before I departed that company and we did not part on good terms at all, as she completely threw me under the bus to save her job. I distinctly remember going through that betrayal at the time and speaking to a mentor of mine about the situation. They advised me that there must have been a reason that she did what she did. I did know that at the time, but still felt betrayed, angry and hurt. Now, years later looking back on it, I can of course be objective about it. Her boss, our new Director didn’t like me and put her in a position where she essentially had to choose between staying on his good side to secure her job and all of the things she had worked for, or defend me as the only other Black woman in that entire division in management. Imagine putting a Black woman, who is the only one in her position in the entire country in a dilemma like that? The setup and take down of our relationship was extremely successful and achieved its goal of pitting two Black women against each other, both facing impossible situations. In a crude, grotesque way, it is reminiscent to me of the Mandingo fights of old-except now, those fights are played in the corporate space, with livelihoods as well as lives at stake.

But the corporate world could care less about the plights of people of colour. The corporate world doesn't particularly care about social justice issues unless it is either going to hurt their brand if they don’t say anything, or it will actually affect their bottom line. The reality is, if any of these companies really wanted to change what was happening to Black people, they could have called up all of the same anti-racist educators that have been writing and speaking on this for decades and gotten them involved years ago. However, it wasn’t until the horrific death of George Floyd that they were suddenly called into action based upon the public outcry. We see this on a very micro level in the corporate space all the time. Case and point: I was working at a company and the senior manager position that they had promised to me was reposted as a slightly different position but still a senior manager. A friend of mine at the time had another friend from her old company, a huge Fortune 500 company, apply for the position. She was granted an interview and apparently did quite well. There seemed to be some genuine interest to bring her on board. She took that information back to her company and when they realized that they would potentially lose her, they promoted her to a Director and gave her a HUGE pay day. Now, let’s take this in. This Black woman, who had been loyal to this company and had worked her ass off, went from a manager to a Director at a Fortune 500 company…and the only reason it happened was because she threatened them to leave. Had she not done so, she would have continued in that same company in that same role at that same relative pay and they would have have given ZERO fucks.

This happens so much in the corporate world and is such a pervasive problem. People, typically marginalized people, have to resort to threatening their employers with quitting before they’re recognized at the level they should have always been. And while this is not a fool proof plan because I have personally witnessed where this has not gone well and companies have called a person’s bluff and let them walk, it is a very effective tool when used properly. But in this case with this Black woman, this company knew her worth, but attempted to ride out her ignorance of it for as long as they could. Imagine the rage of knowing you’re being underpaid and overworked and doing more than you should, and the only way it is recognized is with threats. These are all apart of the microaggressions Black people and other people of colour experience in the workplace. The “illusion of inclusion” in the corporate world is this idea that the smattering of Black people and other people of colour in management positions is indicative of growth, change and equality at that company. Yet, their C-suite management team is all white males primarily, with maybe a white woman inserted here or there. I remember working at this one company where the Executive leadership team in the U.S. consisted of two white men, a white woman and a Black man at the time. The CEO of the company, a white man, was stepping down and they were going to be naming a successor in the coming weeks. We knew it wouldn’t be the woman as she was the CFO at the time, so we all knew it would be between the white and Black men. In the end, the Board of Directors chose the white man (not surprising) over the Black man to be the CEO’s successor. The Black man shortly thereafter departed the company and went to become a CEO at another Fortune 500 company. A few short years later, he then became the CEO to the #1 rival of his former company.

I always loved that story because it showed me that what is for you, IS for you. Nothing and no one can take that away from you when that’s what you are called to. However, think about how messed up it was that this man always was a CEO but was kept at a certain level to maintain the “illusion of inclusion” all while never allowing him to truly be great in the way that he was meant to be. It is an absolute shame that so many Fortune 100 and 500 companies have no real interest in being a part of making real changes. A lot of companies are looking for their employees, not their leadership or Board of Directors, to be diverse. It is akin to checking the diversity box and ensuring your fulfilling your quota of diversity, instead of actually being an accomplice and truly wanting to learn and understand why it is so important to have people of colour, and specifically Black people in positions of leadership at every single level and on the Board of Directors. It is also important to note that these people should be diverse in their political and religious/non-religious beliefs, their gender or non-gender choice, and should be pro-Black, period. Nothing less will do. We as Black people unfortunately know all too well that not all skin folk are kinfolk. There are many Black people who do not like Black people. That is a very real thing.

These stories continue to happen and need to be told. But in highlighting the story, there also needs to be change. I was watching a video snippet from Prince’s acceptance speech from an awards show many moons ago. In his speech he was prophesying to the crowd and telling them they needed to get out of their bad contracts in the music industry and that we needed to build our own stuff. We needed to own our own masters and own our own record companies. He knew, even in the music industry that the “illusion of inclusion” existed, where people believed because there was so much Black talent on TV that we were advancing as a people; not realizing, most of them were broke because of shitty contracts, poor spending habits and horrible guidance.

There is so much work to be done and I will continue to tell my stories in whatever ways are relevant to the conversation. The entire system needs to be torn down and rebuilt from the ground up. Black people are no longer asking for a seat at the table. We are building our own table and changing the rules of engagement. Starting now.