Dear CEOs, I hereby place you on a Performance Improvement Plan. #BlackLivesMatter

Diversity and Inclusion starts at the top. People need role models who look like them at the top. When the C-suite reflects the demographics of the country, that ultimately sets the tone for the entire company. This change will cascade from the top down and help build the next generation of corporate leaders.

Dear CEOs - If less than 14.6% of your direct reports are Black, then I hereby place you on a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). A Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) is a tool to give to employees with performance deficiencies the opportunity to succeed. 

Why 14.6%? 

The CEO’s #leadershipteam needs to reflect the demographic makeup of the marketplace. The halls of corporate power and guardians of shareholder value need to be better represented with black professionals. According to the 2018 Census Bureau, 14.6% of the total American population of 327.2 Million is Black. Time to walk the talk. 

Why a PIP?

Those of you in the Club of CEOs with <14.6% Black executives in the C-suite, have failed in driving #Diversity, #Equity & #Inclusion within your #leadership teams. If you are not leading diverse teams, you're driving #exclusion. Then it's no wonder most upper and middle management leaders in your organization are also lacking #blackleadership; it starts at the top. 

How much time?

Most employees get 1-3 months when placed on a PIP, and often these employees get put on a #PerformanceImprovementPlan for inconsequential reasons (for example, failure to make quota for 2 months). Many CEOs are successful and leading profitable companies, founders, innovators, disruptors, millionaires, billionaires, and/or have changed society for the better. You all get a reasonable amount of time to make the necessary improvement changes: 6 months (end of 2020).  

Corrective Tangible Action Required:

• Promote high potential Black Talent from within your business into the C-suite and to be named on boards
• Look externally for accomplished Black leaders including outside the social networks often used to vet candidates
• Advocate for C-suite diversity and board diversity
• Develop a pipeline of black talent to promote into the C-suite and to be named on boards
• Establish a black mentorship program and access to senior leaders for Black Talent company-wide, and invest in your Black Employee Resource Group

Who am I to have the audacity to want to place CEOs on a #PIP? 

I'll get to that.

Imagine what can happen to your organization's #performance and brand after you make an effort to actively promote and hire Black leadership to your C-suite. Improvements? You got that right!

Ask any #D&I leader for the data that shows how a #diverse and #inclusive workplace #culture is a business imperative, competitive advantage and drives a sense of #belonging. Aaisha Joseph, Jennifer Brown, Brian McComak. Ruben Cantu, Angela Shaw, Muna Hussaini, Chela White-Ramsey, Elizabeth Lam, Christine McCarey, Mary Flanagan, Eugene Sepulveda, Angelica Erazo, Norman Jester

So coming back to your question. Who am I to have the audacity to want to place you, the Club of CEOs with <14.6% Black executives in the C-suite, on a PIP?

It doesn’t matter who I am. But since you asked...

I am someone who's experienced racism.

I am an #Ally of the Black community.

I am ____ (a friend, an acquaintance, a neighbor, a business colleague, a family member) of someone that works or has worked at many of your firms.

My voice matters.

Why should you care about who I am?

I am a customer.

I am a shareholder.

I am a Person of Color.

My voice matters.

It's been:

• 157 years since Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (January 1863)
• 155 years since #Juneteenth (June 1865)
• ~57 years since MLK had a dream (August 1963)
• ~7 years since Black Lives Matter first started (July 2013)
• 6 years since tech firms started to reveal its (lack of) diversity numbers (May 2014)

Those of you in the Club of CEOs <14.6% Black executives in the C-suite may not have been around during those movements highlighted above, but you must be held #accountable to add (more) black voices in the C-suite.  

It’s time to get on the right side of history now to achieve real change.

The world is watching. 

The clock is ticking. 

Countdown: 6 months (end of 2020). After 6 months, if you haven’t made the necessary changes, then you are not listening, you are not paying attention and frankly your company’s products and services are not worthy of my purchasing dollars.

Link to #petition in comments.

#BlackLives Matter #Leadership #LetsActNow

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