Page 93 - Forbes - USA (October 2019)
P. 93
ELC 2019 Board, front, l to r: Greg Deavens, treasurer; Tonie Leatherberry, chair; Leilani Brown, secretary; Crystal Ashby, vice chair;
Skip Spriggs, CEO; top row far right; Orlando Ashford, immediate past ELC Bord chair and president, Holland America Line
action steps to move corporations along peers,” says Satonya Fair, The ELC’s new /HDGHUVKLS (GXFDWLRQ IRU $VLDQ 3DFLŻFV
with The ELC on its North Star journey. vice president and chief philanthropy /($3 'LYHUVLŻHG 6HDUFK LV DOVR D VWUD-
Robert F. Smith, recipient of The ELC’s 2019 RIŻFHU Ř([SDQG \RXU WKLQNLQJ ř )DLU VXJ- tegic ABD partner.
Achievement Award and founder, chair gests, or “you are leaving both money Percentages, however, can gloss over
and CEO of Vista Equity Partners, gave and talent on the table.” a more complicated reality. The ABD
the keynote address. The discussion that “All these CEOs, with their awesome Census demonstrates in numerous
followed was based on what CEO Spriggs responsibilities, spending significant charts, figures and the appendix that
calls “groundbreaking research from Korn time with us to come up with game plans the increase is heavily skewed toward
Ferry, identifying the skills and competen- is really a testament to what they think one category: white women. “The total
cies of black leaders and the value they of The ELC,” says Leatherberry. “This number of minority board members is
bring to corporations.” event was quite literally a game changer, moving,” says Spriggs, “and I applaud
Michael Hyter, a former ELC Board going deep on actionable items, not just the progress of women. But when you
member and Korn Ferry managing another discussion.” disaggregate the data, there’s one
partner, walked participants through the underrepresented group that’s barely
data. “We were able to quantify the driv- THE ELC’S NORTH STAR: moving at all, and that’s blacks—men
ers and traits of a sizable pool of current BLACKS AT THE TOP and women.”
black P&L executives at major corpora- “Since 2012, the number of [leading 500 With regard to CEOs, no detailed
tions, each of them already responsible companies] with greater than 40% diver- FHQVXVŔQR FKDUWV QR ŻJXUHV QR DSSHQ-
for budgets of tens of billions of dollars,” sity [on their boards] has doubled…. At the dix—is needed to demonstrate the reality.
VD\V +\WHU Ř,WŖV QRW DERXW ŻQGLQJ D XQL- current rate of progress, we predict that “We’ve got only four black CEOs in the
corn. This level of talent already exists.” we would see the number of women and top 500 companies—less than 1%—and
7KH UHVHDUFK VD\V +\WHU LGHQWLŻHV WKH minorities increase to 40% [across all the there is no guarantee there will be black
behaviors that powered their success: leading 500 companies] by 2024.” This successors,” says Spriggs. “There were
“willingness to go all in, not easily shaken, is the promising declaration of Missing more just a couple of years ago. Unless
need to overperform and outperform, Pieces: The 2018 Board Diversity Cen- we are really proactive, we may find
beating the odds and—always crucial— sus of Women and Minorities on Fortune more backsliding. That’s unacceptable.”
leading others. Why wouldn’t you want 500 Boards (January 2019), prepared
more of those star players on your team?” by Deloitte and the Alliance for Board CORPORATE BOARD INITIATIVE
asks Hyter. Diversity (ABD), a collaboration between It is not a lack of candidates that keeps the
These candidates don’t need or want The ELC and three other organizations: needle from moving. For almost a decade
special treatment. “They stack up very Catalyst, the Hispanic Association on The ELC has heavily invested in filling
well against their best-in-class white Corporate Responsibility (HACR) and the supply side of the equation. “We’ve
DIVERSITY | 3
