I wrote an article for The Conversation website about “right to disconnect” laws (laws that give workers the right to ignore after-hours communications from employers) and why these are an opportunity for organizations, rather than a constraint. The full article is available here.
inclusion
Is Organizational Commitment the Reason that Managers Don’t Support Diversity?
Organizational commitment – how strongly a participant feels affiliated with an organization – is a fascinating phenomenon. Strong organizational commitment can be highly beneficial to the organization and to the participant, because strongly committed participants generally contribute positively and helpfully to the organization. These contributions aren’t just in the form of improved productivity, but also in the form of organizational citizenship that improves the quality of interpersonal relationships within the organization, and the overall experience of being part of the organization.
(I use “participant” rather than “employee” because organizational commitment is important in paid employment and in volunteer work. It can be even more important in volunteer-based organizations, because strong affiliations, and the benefits that volunteers experience from them, can be a reason for volunteers to participate in the organization when there’s no financial reward for doing so.)
However, there’s a downside to organizational commitment. It can be so strong that participants tend to overlook or downplay, or even try to discredit, negative information or events. This isn’t necessarily because of any malicious intent, but because the participant genuinely believes that the information is inaccurate or that it reflects poorly on the organization. Addressing this conundrum is where researchers Daniel To, Elad Sherf, and Maryam Kouchaki have made an extremely valuable contribution to the literature on organizational diversity initiatives – by finding that managers having structural power in organizations may actually reduce their support for diversity initiatives.
When pretty much every organization has a statement or policy about the importance of diversity and the importance of supporting it, it may seem counter-intuitive that managers would resist diversity initiatives. This seems especially counter-intuitive when (more…)
Being Woke about “Woke”
Research is intended to move knowledge forward. One of the ways that happens is by putting ideas forward and collectively discussing them.
A new article in the academic journal Academy of Management Perspectives asks the provocative question: Why Do Companies Go Woke? It’s extremely troubling that research mostly based on broad generalizations and selective interpretations has been published in such a high-profile journal – particularly one with the stated mission of “inform[ing] current and future ‘thought leaders’”.
Before anyone starts screaming “censorship” – the authors of the article, like any researchers, have a right to research whatever they think is worth researching, and to write about the results of that research. However, no researcher has the right to have their research published, and journals are not required to publish every submission they receive. The editors of Academy of Management Perspectives have affected the journal’s credibility by choosing to publish this article, thus legitimizing its inaccurate and divisive positions.
Analyzing how companies choose to react to events in society is an extremely valuable research topic. Understanding these reactions can generate further insights, and possibly assist other companies in reacting appropriately or productively. However, one of the many problems with the article’s approach to this topic is the article’s fundamental concepts: the definition of “woke”, and (more…)
I See You: The Effects of Representation
Many organizations think that being inclusive is simply an issue of hiring members of underrepresented groups. But people hired on that basis are not going to stick around if they feel isolated or that they stand out, or that they’ve been hired just because they’re “diverse”. One very important element in inclusivity is representation; people want to see others like them, and also want to see those other people being respected and valued.
Part of a new study by a group of US researchers looks at the effects of representation in a place that isn’t often examined: the readings that students are assigned in university courses. There has been plenty of discussion over the past few decades about “the canon” in various academic fields and what determines whether a work is a “classic” that all students should be familiar with. The researchers investigated whether the gender balance of assigned readings in a political-science course – the number of readings written by men and the number of readings written by women – affected female and male students’ self-efficacy: their confidence in their own ability to succeed. The study looked at (more…)
Using “Blind” Hiring To Increase Workplace Diversity
One of the best-known studies of bias in hiring is the “blind audition” study. This study, conducted in 1997, explored hiring practices at American symphony orchestras – specifically, whether “blind auditions”, when musicians play for the hiring committee while hidden behind a screen, made a difference in how many female musicians were hired. The “blind audition” study demonstrated how bias could affect hiring decisions, even when the hiring process was designed to be as neutral and objective as possible.
However, the study only addressed gender bias in hiring. Now there are suggestions that the findings from that study could be built on to address racial and ethnic bias. Although, like the “blind audition” study, these suggestions are based in the world of symphony orchestras, they have relevance to any kind of workplace.
Claudia Goldin and Cecilia Rouse, the authors of the “blind audition” study, were curious as to why the number of women in US symphony orchestras had dramatically increased from the 1950s to the 1980s, even though the percentages of women graduating from classical music schools did not significantly change during that time.
They suggested that (more…)
Racial Justice Education in Figure Skating — American Ice Theatre
Figure skating is a wonderful sport, but it is not as inclusive as it should be. Thanks to American Ice Theatre for providing this list of organizations that work to make figure skating accessible to all.
We hurt for our broken communities and the pain being felt all across the country. We stand together with the victims of murder, violence, and repression because of their skin color. As inclusion is one of American Ice Theatre’s core values, we believe it is imperative that we speak up and engage the figure skating community…
via Racial Justice Education in Figure Skating — American Ice Theatre
Economics and Change
Esther Duflo has been chosen as one of the three winners of the 2019 Nobel Prize in economics. Duflo, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), was recognized for her research that explores how conditions of poverty can be most effectively addressed using economic principles. For example, a research paper she co-authored looks at whether giving high school scholarships, in a developing country that charges tuition fees for high school education, can affect students’ future educational opportunities and employment income.
In the words of the Nobel award committee, Duflo’s research is exceptional because of its “experimental approach to alleviating global poverty”. Duflo is the youngest winner to ever received the award, and is also only the second female winner.
The gender imbalance between male and female Nobel economics laureates is not surprising, since only 14% of university economics professors are women. But, ironically, Duflo’s win occurred just a few weeks after the release of a troubling report by the American Economic Association (AEA), the largest international association of economists. The report described a problematic “professional climate” in economics.
Several recent events, including a professor being elected to the AEA executive despite being accused of harassing employees and students, caused the AEA, and the economics profession in general, to be (more…)
Sigh…..
Mansplaining Event at PayPal via Francine Lipman (@Narfnampil) Feminist Law Professors
All About Work 