Question:

I cannot believe what I just read on this page. The answer made some valid points, but I would like to point out (and I am a Black-female "baby boomer") that some whites understood the injustices suffered by Blacks that made the organizations mentioned necessary. The NAACP was founded by Blacks and sympathetic whites who understood the issues. How would you like it if just because more than two white families moved into a neighborhood, everyone else moved? It probably really wouldn't bother you at all. How would you like it if when you went to work, the only other person of your race who worked there was the janitor or the maid? How would you feel if every time you took a class, you were the only white person there? And, finally, how would you feel if you are sitting in a job with more degrees than anyone else there, yet you made the smallest salary? Don't talk about Blacks needing to get over anything. The straight fact is very little has changed, except now employers don't have to give you a reason for not hiring you. They can't advertise "whites only," but when you get to the interview, you know that the job is for "White People Only."

Answer:

Your e-mail points out why proactive, mandatory diversity training with follow-up is absolutely necessary in a business environment. Training will reduce the sense of entitlement that is a natural result of being a member of the majority culture. The natural state of affairs for the majority culture anywhere on earth is to believe that "everything's fine."

For people not in the majority culture, it helps reduce the sense of incredulousness. Your "how would you feel if" scenarios are real, but most white people simply don't have enough life experience to understand them in a realistic enough way to change behavior. Training helps non-majority people to understand that this is due to simple human nature. It also helps surface their own internal biases.

Competent training promotes an "aware" work force. It encourages equitable treatment of customers and coworkers. Training will also surface incorrigible bigots for further action. A company has the right to determine its values and diversity can be held as dear as proper accounting practices. 

By the way, most of the people who e-mail me with their hate rants don't realize that the "white-only" jobs and neighborhoods aren't for them either. Once you get past the easy-to-see differences like race, you can go to the more difficult to discern differences of religion, alma mater and socioeconomic class. (For my supremacist readers, look up "night of the long knives.")

For those companies that don't have mandatory diversity training (one aspect of what we measure in The DiversityInc Top 50 Companies for Diversity^®), please look at the endless loop of "get-over-it" e-mails. This column will provoke more e-mails like this one, which is what provoked the e-mail that heads up this column.

Readers' Comments

Posted: Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 Why Mandatory Diversity Training Is Critical for Business It is extremely important that diversity awareness training be mandatory for all in an organization. While diversity professionals must walk the fine line of addressing the ever so sensitive topic of race and gender on a continuium to their customers through training and cultural emphasis all while promoting an inclusive workplace for all. I must say that it is challenging and it does come they must also say that it comes with both raving accollades as well as rousing criticism. Until the hatred and the prejudice prevent us from working harmoniously together, I will always have a job in diversity. Also, it would be unfair to assume all that needs training are those in the dominant groups. Those subordinates also are in just as much need of continuous diversity training to address issues that promote a positive working enviornment within the races and sexes. I wholeheardely support organizational mandatory diversity training followed up by more training that is mandatory for employees. After all, it will take more than one seminar to appproach issues that took hundreds of years to make. Gracie Spunks

Posted: Thursday, Jul 03, 2008 Why Mandatory Diversity Training Is Critical for Business Certainly I would agree with most of what you said. But your "by the way" paragraph created a few ripples with me. I have always considered the issues of class,religion,nationality,etc. to be "in-house" issues among white people. Because all of those squabbles take a back seat when I enter the room. So naturally what concerns me most is what concerns they have about me most. For me at least, race trumps ALL other issues. It is not a playing card: it is the surface on which the game is played:it is the topography of American culture: the sub-text of ALL liberal arts courses. You're right white people don't have to see color. It is assumed. When they read a novel, ALL characters are white/colorless unless the reader is told to think black, brown, red,or yellow. It is what made ALL the Entertainment News Reporters refer to Obama as the African American candidate and Hillary Clinton the womancandidate without even noticing that they made the "color" distinction for him but not for her. What a blissful existence they must lead! And when my white colleagues repeat the "why don't you get over it" remark, my response is, when they get over Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Lincoln, the War of Secession, WWl, WWII,etc. and when they tear down those Confederate statues in all those southern towns, and turn those battlefields into wild life refuges, then I will consider getting over IT. Anyway, thanks for your advice. If you ARE a white guy, you're a rare own. Donald Williams