What Do Pandora, Indiegogo and Ferguson Police Have in Common? Unable to Hire Black Folks!

Both Pandora and Indiegogo released diversity reports today that highlight an absence of African American employees. The companies join a bandwagon of tech brands that have been releasing similar reports throughout the summer.

At Pandora, approximately 3% of its 1,300 or so employees are African American and 4% are Hispanic.  That is the same percentage of African Americans as you find in the Ferguson, Missouri police department ... and we see how that worked out!   The low numbers are notable given that the company is located in Oakland, where about 28% of the total population is African American and 25% is Hispanic. The percentage of African Americans is even lower in leadership and tech roles, where they represent only 1.1 and 2.8% of employees. In contrast 6.3% of Pandora's leadership is Hispanic.

At Indiegogo, a company of slightly more than 100 employees, only 2% of total employees are African American, and the group is not represented in leadership or tech positions.

Read the rest of the TechCrunch article.

Why So Few Black Technology Entrepreneurs Funded by CincyTech?

I joined over 400 people at the CincyTech annual meeting at the Duke Energy Convention Center earlier this morning. I counted 35 start-up companies and community partners participating in the Start-up Showcase. I visited each of the booths and talked to many of the technology entrepreneurs who have enjoyed success with CincyTech.

CincyTech is a public-private partnership whose mission is to invest in high-growth start-up technology companies in Southwest Ohio. The organization provides management assistance, seed-capital investments and connections to partners who share its mission. CincyTech focuses on opportunities in information technology and life sciences. This is a wonderful opportunity for technology entrepreneurs.

After seeing the CNN's Black in America episode,'The New Promised Land: Silicon Valley' I was very sensitive to the issue of racism that impacts Black technology entrepreneurs when it comes to venture capital funding of start-ups. As such I was disappointed to see that less than a dozen of the 400 people in attendance were African American ... and only three (ConnXus, Innovative Card Solutions and SampleSaint) of the 35 booths were filled with technology companies that were owned and operated by people of African descent.

CincyTech President Bob Coy announced CincyTech’s performance numbers during the meeting. CincyTech has invested $10 million in 28 local start-up companies and helped its companies attract another $100 million in private co-investment since 2007. There were no statistics or emphasis mentioned at any point during the meeting about the dearth of Black technology entrepreneurs being supported by the process.

I am glad to see that there are Black leaders on both the staff and executive committee of CincyTech. That is better than what we saw from the movers and shakers in Silicon Valley.

I suggest that BDPA (local, regional and national) become more aggressive in their engagement with entrepreneurial organizations like CincyTech. I plan to follow-up with CincyTech and its portfolio companies to invite them to learn more about BDPA Cincinnati chapter and the BDPA Education and Technology Foundation. There should be speaker opportunities, company tours for our members and students, internships and perhaps even support for BDPA's college scholarship program.

Perhaps the CincyTech Annual Meeting in 2012 will have a growing level of engagement with Black tech entrepreneurs and start-ups!

Apple Shows Its iRacist Underbelly to the Black Community

Soulclap to Your Black World for letting us know about the racist behavior of a white manager at a major Apple store in New York. It turns out that two Black men, Nile Charles and Brian Johnston went to the Apple store to purchase some headphones. The transaction should have been quick and simple.

Not so fast...

The manager of the store is an old white guy. The manager allowed his racial prejudices to run wild in his mind ... and he felt comfortable enough within the Apple culture to let his mouth run wild. He approached the two African American customers and let them know that if they were not buying anything or speaking with a Mac specialist then they would need to leave the store.

“And before you say I’m racially discriminating against you, let me stop you. I am discriminating against you.”

The two young men may not recall the Rodney King incident from back in the day ... but, they had the gumption to begin recording the racist nonsense being spewed by this Apple store manager on their cellphones. Their recording shows another Apple employee joining the discussion,

“Now you have to go. If you want to know why, it’s because I said so. CONSIDER ME GOD. You have to go.”

The two young men left the store ... and went directly to their lawyer. They have brought a lawsuit against Apple. The lawsuit is working its way through the New York judiciary. In the meantime, the folks at Apple may want to become acquainted with BDPA so that they can become exposed to Black people in some context outside of the courtroom!

Corporate Board Census Shows Significant Decline in Seats Held by African Americans

I have served on a number of nonprofit boards in my time. I have not had a chance to serve on a corporate board in my career. It appears that very few people of color are getting the opportunity to serve on corporate boards.

At least that is the conclusion reached in the corporate board census by the Alliance for Board Diversity (ABD).


ABD reported a surprising decline in the combined number of seats for women and people of color on the boards of the nation’s leading corporations. The largest decline was among Blacks. This year’s report found that in the Fortune 100 between 2004 and 2010, African Americans lost over 40 board seats while white men increased their presence on corporate boards, adding over 30.

Overall, women did not see an appreciable increase in their share of board seats. The Executive Leadership Council (ELC), an independent, non-profit corporation founded in 1986, is a founding partner in the Alliance for Board Diversity. ELC members are African American senior executives of Fortune 500 companies and equivalents. Considering the hundreds of board seats that became available during the six year period, ELC sees the combined decrease for all underrepresented groups and the steep decline for Blacks as disconcerting.

“It is troubling groups already severely underrepresented on corporate boards have collectively experienced a decline over the last six years,” ELC president and CEO Arnold W. Donald remarked in his assessment of the available data. "Most business leaders recognize that inclusion and the diversity of thinking that results from it creates real value. Shareholder value for most of the companies listed in the census is being compromised by the lack of board diversity. A decline in any single group of minorities or women is not good, a collective decline is troubling."

The ABD has worked collaboratively for more than six years to encourage corporations to increase the diversity of their boards. Catalyzed by sponsoring companies Altria and Kraft, the ELC has recently begun its own Corporate Board Initiative. ELC identifies and offers development opportunities to its members who are “board ready” and those who are nearly ready to assume the rigors of corporate board responsibilities. The organization has assembled an elite cadre of members prepared for board leadership and has worked with leading search organizations such as Heidrick & Struggles to prepare candidates and match them with opportunities.

Recent U.S. Census data shows that women and men of color comprise 66 percent of the U.S. population. Yet the ABD report indicates that more than 325 of the Fortune 500 have less than 25 percent representation, nearly 100 have less than 10 percent, and 37 companies have no women or minority representation whatsoever.

"Few will debate that inclusion and the diversity of thinking that it brings to business challenges creates real shareholder value," further stated Mr. Donald of ELC. "That's why the decline in the collective presence of underrepresented groups on the boards of America’s largest corporations as reported in this study is more than a little concerning. We at ELC, together with our ABD partners, plan to make a meaningful contribution in helping America's corporations address this missed opportunity."

Of course the first step towards serving on a corporate board is becoming a corporate executive. BDPA members who are currently serving in management positions within Corporate America are encouraged to consider applying for the Executive Protege Program *or* seeking out elected office at local, regional or national level within BDPA.

Do you have any thoughts on why there are so few African Americans on the corporate board of directors? It would seem that Corporate America could do better in the 'age of Obama', don't you think?

Black Faces in White Places: Becoming a Game Changer in a Competitive World

Randal D. Pinkett, PhD, MBA, and leaders in philanthropy, education, community building, and social entrepreneurship gathered earlier this year to discuss strategies for Black men and boys to "redefine the game" at work, at home, and in their communities.   Here is a video of the entire event:





The event was hosted by the Open Society Campaign for Black Male Achievement, in partnership with the Association of Black Foundation Executives, the 21st Century Foundation and the Schott Foundation for Public Education Black Male Donor Collaborative.

In their book Black Faces in White Places, authors Randal D. Pinkett and Jeffrey Robinson seek to answer the question "What happens once you break past the glass ceiling?" Based on interviews with dozens of prominent African Americans and the authors' considerable experiences in business, in the public eye, and in the minority, the book offers 10 "game-changing strategies" for learning, playing, mastering, and redefining the game for the current generation. Ultimately, it is about changing the very concept of success itself.

Panelists

• Nicole Sharpe, Director, Schott Foundation for Public Education Black Male Donor Collaborative (moderator)
• Susan Taylor Batten, President/CEO, Association of Black Foundation Executives
• Chandra Anderson, Interim President, 21st Century Foundation
• Roger Blissett, Managing Director, US Strategy, RBC Capital Markets
• Michael Lewis, Member, Hunter College's Black Male Initiative Program

Racism in the IT Industry

ComputerWorld's Don Tennant continues to discuss the issue of racism in the IT industry on his blog. I encourage BDPA members to read his latest blog entry. He shares two e-mails that he received in response to his editorial about the race issue in IT, titled "Destructive Labels." These two e-mails highlight the disconnect that exists between people who have dramatically different outlooks with respect to racism.

The first e-mail came from a reader who holds the view that Tennant's columns on the subject, which have advocated a healthy discussion of the race issue in light of the experiences of many African Americans in IT, "play into the hands of those too lazy to work for what they want."

The second one came from Dr. Victor Onafuye, president of Pixel Information Technology Corp. in Homewood, Ill.

Please take a moment to read both emails.

I am interested in your thoughts on racism in the IT industry? Does racism still exist in your view? Will racism impact on the ability of African Americans to advance their careers in the IT industry from the classroom to the boardroom? What, if anything, should BDPA do about it?

Q&A: Tech Pioneer Earl Pace on Racism in the IT Workplace

Earl Pace is BDPA Foundation board chairman. Early in his career, while working as a programming manager for a financial services company, Earl A. Pace, Jr. attended a computer conference where he was the only African American among the 200 attendees. He decided that needed to change.

Pace spoke with Computerworld about the obstacles in the IT workplace that African Americans have worked for decades - and are still working on -- to overcome.

Read the full Q&A session here.

Race And The Web: Going After Niche Markets Or Practicing Digital Segregation?

I met Angela Benton and Markus Robinson at the 1st annual Blogging While Brown conference. They are co-founders of Black Web 2.0, a site that covers the Internet industry from an African American perspective. TechCrunch published an interesting article from Angela and Markus that I thought BETF-Blog readers would enjoy:

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The release of Blackbird, an African American focused web browser sparked quite a bit of controversy this past week. The TechCrunch post about it elicited reactions from both sides of the aisle (it has 275 comments and counting). Some argued for the value of niche audiences while others debated that the idea of a Black browser is in and of itself separatism, racist even. But catering to niche audiences online is nothing new. In fact, browsers that focus on a specific market segment isn’t all that new either. For example there’s Gloss, a women focused fashion and beauty browser created using Flock, the social media browser. But what makes the launch of Blackbird both a controversial and sensitive topic, is that it is focused towards an ethnic segment versus a special interest group. Race is still an extremely touchy subject in America, and the Internet and web are not immune to this sensitivity regardless of how open it is. But aren’t most businesses, especially web businesses, started in this “Web 2.0″ era defined by catering to a particular niche?

Really, if race-based niche sites are racist, then this inflated “Web 2.0 bubble” has played a major role in the segregation of the web overall. Many of the sites we all follow right here on TechCrunch, like Digg, Techmeme, and Mixx, were built and launched to service a niche, therefore fragmenting the web making it so we all think it’s “more personal” and “more authentic.”
Remember when Global Grind was once the more authentic counterpart to Pageflakes for the hip-hop culture? Or how about the collaborative advice site for parenting Minti that was described by Mike Arrington as a “walled garden” even though he “…like(s) to see niche content sites spring up that use Web 2.0 ideas - these services will help the masses start to use and understand things like tagging, ajax, etc.”

Read the rest of this article here.

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Any thoughts about this article that you care to share with us in the COMMENTS section below?

Does Racism Still Exist in IT Industry?

Don Tennant is editor for Computerworld who shared disturbing news from the results in Computerworld's 2008 IT Salary Survey. Mr. Tennant wrote about the survey last year. He noted that African Americans were underrepresented in the IT profession, with only a 3% showing, and that their compensation was significantly lower than that of their white counterparts.

Unfortunately, Mr. Tennant points out in his editorial entitled, 'Hoping for equality in the IT profession' that the 3% figure is unchanged, and if anything, the compensation gap is even wider. Last year, African-American IT workers made just 86.4 cents for every dollar white IT workers made (average total compensation of $78,582, compared with $90,901). This year, it was 85.9 cents ($80,733 vs. $93,977).

Maybe the issue is deeper still. There are so many in our industry who feel that racism no longer exists ... after all, didn't we just elect a Black man to be our president?

What is your take on the standing of African Americans in the IT industry as we move into the new year?