My level of disgust with the Washington Post has reached a new high.
Generally, I find their technology and business writing to be hostile to my employer. I don't usually find it to be completely untrue, but it does always put the company in the worst light possible. AOL certainly did get up to some hijinks with their accounting, but the amounts paraded out by the Post like heads on pikes are only a tiny fraction of the company's revenues. But I digress.
Today, they have published this gem by David Vise: Women, Minorities Feel Left Out at AOL. This article contains this bit of stupidity:
AOL had "no people of color" among senior executives in 2002, the report said.
Interesting that this report manages to miss the CEO of the whole she-bang, Dick Parsons, who happens to be a black guy.
Also, I have no idea where the people quoted here could be working:
One African American employee referred to Dulles-based AOL as "a plantation, a digital plantation," and another worker said she and other women have been relegated to support roles, "like baby sitters."
Sure, AOL has done a lot of stupid stuff strategically, especially since the merger, but it's a great place to work. The staff in my division appears to be, like the workforce of the United States, mostly white men. Based on other jobs I've had, however, the staff at AOL is unusually diverse. There are not a lot of African American folks, although I can think of one manager right off the top of my head. I think about 40% of the staff in my entirely technical organization is, in fact, NOT made up of white males.
The fact is that the field of people with C.S. degrees and/or advanced technical skills consists in large part of men. Hispanics and African Americans are not very common (like women), but non-whites are well represented, in general. Apparently, Asian does not equal diverse. It is not the fault of AOL that women and African Americans don't seem to enter the field in large numbers.
The article points out that Microsoft is doing the following, lest they be accused of running a "plantation" in Redmond:
Many firms, including Microsoft Corp., argued that the pool of candidates from top engineering and science programs tended to be shallow and they have since poured money into minority student associations and other recruitment efforts.
This is further evidence that the women and minorities with the skills required are simply not available. Vise even contradicts himself here:
...the report notes that AOL hired a slightly higher percentage of women and minorities in 2002 than had been represented previously in the workforce.
This is shoddy journalism at best. It's as if he talked to a few disgruntled workers, perhaps laid off workers, and didn't bother to ask anyone else. Many facts were ignored to write this piece of muckraking.
There is a valid point made about ineffective management tactics:
"Today, everything at our company is a sports metaphor," one woman said. "Miller's main agenda is 'Win every week. Play your position.' There were a series of classes -- coaching for success, and they were based on books written by former football coaches...
But then Vise goes and drags diversity into it:
...This may disenfranchise women."
This is actually quite insulting to women. I know this is a quote from a woman, but he chose to include it in the article even though it perpetuates a stereotype. Are there no women who like sports, football in particular? Of course there are (I can think of some that I know without stretching my brain at all), but in his world, women are a sports-widow monolith.
I find sports metaphors are used all over corporate America. I find this amusing, ineffective and annoying, but not "disenfranchising." In fact, I find AOL's culture to be the most inclusive corporate culture I've experienced since I've moved to Washington.
This is also a valid point:
Employees of all demographic groups complained that senior management overlooks internal candidates for jobs in favor of outsiders and places little value on institutional knowledge.
This is true, but you'll notice that this has nothing to do with diversity. The Time Warner folks don't trust the AOL people. They seem to see us as a bunch of backwoods hillbillies who couldn't possibly know what we're doing. I mean, who would voluntarily run a company out of Virginia, after all?
The loss of intitutional knowledge will contribute to the demise of AOL far more than any lack of diversity in it's workforce. Our Time Warner-centric management certainly needs a kick in the pants, but this particular kick is poorly aimed and sensationalist at best.
Shame on you, David Vise, and shame on the editors of the Washington Post.