#258
Border|Land essay: The reality of Equity, Diversity & Inclusion; Companies don't have a culture. Culture has companies.
“Jed Bartlet: Social Security is the third rail of American politics. Touch it, and you die.
Toby Ziegler:That's 'cause the third rail's where all the power is.”
Geopolitics is the third rail of Business.
In light of recent events in the Middle East and its ripple effects across the western societies, the below essay might shine a light on difficult conversations that traditional progressive partners will have to have.
The biggest movie of 2008 was The Dark Knight. The second Nolan Batman was the most anticipated movie of the year, in large part driven by the instantly classic Heath Ledger performance as the Joker.
Audiences got to see it just months after he died from an accidental overdose of prescription drugs, pushing the movie to critical and over $1B commercial acclaim.
The same weekend when Batman hit the cinema, another “to be acclaimed” movie hit theatres: Mamma Mia! Phyllida Lloyd’s adaptation of the ABBA musical with Meryl Streep.
A classic case of counterprogramming, Mamma Mia! offered relief from the darkness of Batman. And it worked. Mamma Mia! eventually earned $608 million.
Counterprogramming is the act of broadcasting a piece that stands in stark contrast to another, simultaneous offering. This is orchestrated with the ambition of captivating an audience's attention.
At its core, it's playing with cultural tension, where one studio crafts a narrative that serves as an antithesis to the spectacle presented by its competitor. It’s less about opposition and more about providing a diverse palette from which the audience can paint their own media experience.
As it turns out, it would be a long time before we’d see it happen again. Because also in 2008, Marvel released their first feature film, Iron Man.
The movie smashed it and started 15 years of Marvel/superhero blanketing cinema’s and reigning supreme at the box office and in culture.
More and more movies became part of an ever-expanding Marvel universe. This momentum also created space for new ideas and definitions of what it meant to be a superhero. To critical and commercial success.
At the same time as Marvel was gearing up to dominate, in the business world post the ‘08 crisis, DEI was beginning to build its narrative universe that would blanket business discourse for the next 15 years.
DEI 1.0
In the 60's–70's the dominant business metaphor was war. Baby Boomers growing up with G.I parents, and then entering the workforce saw to that. How we thought about business (hierarchically), what managers were seen like (drill sergeants) and more was seen through the lens of combat. For good and bad.
In the 80's–90's the dominant metaphor and language was sports: competition, star-players and coaching all became the way we saw, did and thought about business.
The last decade, along with the rise of DEI, had as the dominant metaphor trauma/therapy. Safe spaces, reflecting, empathy; all terms most employees will have heard or said.
A “new classic” business book of this era, Never split the difference, tells the story how the FBI hostage negotiation team transitions from MBA-based tactics to ones rooted in psychology. We even have a word for this type of communication: therapy speak.
Now, anybody who has ever been to therapy (even better, group therapy) will recognise that a big part of therapy initially, is regulating your emotions.
For the first time hearing yourself say everything you kept hidden. In front of others. Without holding back. Letting all the anger out [there are other emotions of course, but for the majority, anger is most suppressed].
And with the omnipresence of social media, the DEI era of 2010-2022, felt much like that initial phase of therapy. Repressed anger at others finally and unfiltered, being expressed. Messy, and very much needed.
Also often loudly and for many on the receiving end, confusing, uncomfortable and hopefully clarifying [as anybody who's been on the receiving end of therapeutic anger can attest to]. With HR as the corporate Chief Therapy Officer.
But the role of good therapy, as much as it is to let the anger out, is also to get you to a point where you move on from just being angry at others. To not be stuck in victimhood, but to overcome it. And that means having difficult, tough conversations with others, but also within.
Harvey Dent said, “you either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain". Around 2022 that sort of happened to Marvel superheroes. And DEI.
Superhero fatigue became a thing; lower (but still great) sequel revenue, stale story telling, poor reviews, over saturation and spinoffs on big and small screen, created that impression and conversation.
Followed on, quietly at first, but louder as wider cultural conversations changed, by complaints of over-politicising, moralising and social engineering of what in essence is escapism.
Around that same time (‘21-’22) media coverage/conversations around DEI started to change. Terms like diversity fatigue, peak-wokeness became more pronounced in narratives.
Along with less front page attention, journalists - when revisiting DEI related stories - often would delve deeper, writing and analysing issues with layers of nuance not evident before.
Media institutions, once in close alignment with the aspirations of progressive champions, seemed to delineate their journalistic purpose from the sociopolitical ones of activists.
DEI 2.0
There is no point denying the conflicts around issues of gender, free speech, race and culture. But the nature of the conflicts has started to change. Many remain firmly rooted in progressive vs conservative narratives. However, some conflicts have started to feel more like civil war.
The transgender debate is pitting self declared progressives against each other. And in the wake of the transgender debate, Muslims (longtime, if silent partners of progressives in the West) are standing up for their views.
Throughout North America and Europe, Muslim parents, kids and leaders are finding their voice and also finding their place in the progressive universe being questioned.
Teenagers and young adults seem to yearn for subversion and fun. Smoking is making a comeback. The grand narratives of cultural battles have left them a bit shell shocked. Too serious, too soon. Social Justice nonprofits getting caught up in scandals and eroding the trust people had placed in them.
And as the plates of culture shift, so too do the structures of corporate power. Corporations [see BlackRock CEO Lary Fink’s ESG remarks], appear to be reconfiguring their talking points, often to the dismay of stakeholders. The once sought-after role of Chief Diversity Officer seems less en vogue.
Now, as we’ve seen, part of this reconfiguring is driven by new emerging geopolitical superordinate goals. But is everything due to that?
Polarity saves relationships
Barbenheimer broke the superhero’s back. It grossed over $2 billion at the worldwide box office, proving that audiences are captivated by vastly different films, narratives, subjects and points of view.
Cynics will dismiss this as just a ‘movie’ moment. But can we dismiss that Hollywood trusted and financially backed the hunch that audiences are at a point where cultural tension is not just tolerable, but again a desirable respite from the monolithic MCU narrative?
So, because we’ve just had the first major counter-programme since 2008, does this mean we’re reverting back to pre-2010 cultural thinking and doing? No.
The best thing about DEI 1.0 anger is that we can’t unsee or unhear what has been exposed. Nor should we want to. The bad/good thing about DEI 2.0 is that going forward, won’t be straight forward. Realignments are happening and will probably create new aesthetics that will confuse and/or offend all at some point.
From a corporate point of view DEI counterprogramming would not be about inviting more voices to find their place within preset DEI narrative and ERG structures.
It would be about having internal, senior lead discussions on if HR wants to keep reflecting or move to suppressing wider cultural sentiment, now that more sentiments don’t fit old narrative and agenda’s.
To investigate how much of DEI 1.0 support was based on alignment vs self-censorship. To harness the polarity to strengthen bonds, so employee trust and talent is not [further] lost.
The business of culture is getting more complicated and employees (like citizens) will find the ground beneath them less and less certain as new changes embrace us. Negative capability will become a must for all of us.
The good news?
Well, what doesn’t kill us, will only make us stranger..
For more on the topic of how GeoPolitics is fast becoming the third rail of business (and human resources in particular) go read Border|Land issue #1 here.