Why Do Boards Have So Few Black Directors?
Why Do Boards Have So Few Black Directors?
Why Do Boards Have So Few Black Directors?
by J. Yo-Jud Cheng , Boris Groysberg and Paul M. Healy
August 13, 2020
.....The underrepresentation of Black professionals is especially bleak in the highest echelon of corporate America: boards of directors. Although newly-appointed directors are increasingly diverse, 37% of S&P 500 firms did not have any Black board members in 2019 and Black directors comprised just 4.1% of Russell 3000 board members that same year. In light of these persistent racial inequities, Reddit’s co-founder and executive chairman of the board, Alexis Ohanian, recently stepped down, stating: “I’ve resigned as a member of the Reddit board, [and] I have urged them to fill my seat with a Black candidate.” Reddit has since appointed its first Black board member: Y Combinator CEO Michael Seibel.
..To answer those questions, we draw upon a survey we previously conducted of over 1,000 U.S. board directors between 2015-2016. We note that only 24 of our survey respondents identified as Black/African American, reflecting our own shortcomings in engaging a diverse set of survey respondents as well as the state of board diversity in the U.S. today. Our small sample size necessitates that we be careful in interpreting our results....
Interviews with 59 Black Female Executives Explore Intersectional Invisibility and Strategies to Overcome It
Interviews with 59 Black Female Executives Explore Intersectional Invisibility and Strategies to Overcome It
....Black women continue to be sorely underrepresented in leadership roles in corporate America. Currently, they make up 12.7% of the U.S. population, yet they represent only 1.3% of senior management and executive roles of S&P 500 firms, 2.2% of Fortune 500 boards of directors, and in a post-Ursula Burns world, there is not a single black female CEO in the Fortune 500.
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