7630: Delayed WTF 5—Diversity Lacks Dollars.

Over the past few months, MultiCultClassics has been occupied with real work. As a result, a handful of events occurred without the expected blog commentary. This limited series—Delayed WTF—seeks to make belated amends for the absence of malice.

In March, Advertising Age published a fluff piece on the lack of funding for industry diversity efforts. The insightful revelations were the equivalent of reporting that the sky is blue, the grass is green and Madison Avenue is White.

The story spotlighted a minority mouthpiece from Publicis Groupe who claimed the ad giant “sends dozens of employee women of color, as well as some clients, to a conference to develop leadership skills.” Um, has anyone visited a Publicis-owned shop lately? It’s the White honchos that are in dire need of leadership development. Additionally, Publicis boasts about 44,000 workers worldwide. Sending “dozens of employee women of color” sounds pretty pathetic—unless it’s an admission that there are only a few dozen female minorities among the 44,000.

Why do White adpeople always believe minorities require extra mentoring and training? Honestly, when did the business become rocket science that only Caucasians could master? Walk the halls of any White agency and try to find people with superior intellect or some mystical talent. Most of them are barely qualified to staff the mailroom.

This excerpt is particularly laughable:

At Interpublic, failure to meet diversity objectives on hiring, promotions and retention means cuts in executive incentive pay—and that’s meant real money lost for a number of execs.

OK, but where does that “real money” ultimately go? Does Interpublic funnel it back to hire minorities or even make charitable donations to, say, the United Negro College Fund? Besides, cuts in bonuses don’t hurt highly compensated executives. IPG should cut the managers’ base salary instead—or better yet, terminate them.

Finally, it’s ridiculous to argue that a core problem is a lack of funding. No, the true issue involves a lack of interest, commitment, credibility, etc. As well as a total abundance of exclusionary arrogance, discriminatory practices and outright lies.