When it comes to Black C-suite executives, leaders, and visionaries in the workplace, many know that representation counts. But the workplace ideal of diversity does not always equate to seats being filled equitably in the boardroom. BLACK ENTERPRISE recently reported in the 2021 B.E. Registry of Corporate Directors “Power in the Boardroom” report that their magazine editorial research team’s six-month analysis of Black board representation and involvement in the country’s largest publicly traded corporations that the S&P 500 companies were evaluated in their corporate diversity and inclusion.
“Among the S&P 500, there were 425 Black corporate board members at 399 corporations in 2021 compared to 322 such corporate directors at 307 companies in 2019,” according to the article. Also, the number of companies without Black board representation fell from 187 two years ago to 100 this year—a 47% decline, according to the article.
Retired chair and CEO of BET Networks Debra Lee is looking to change the statistics. Lee and her partner, Rabia de Lande Long, in 2021 co-founded The Monarchs Collective, a consultancy that wants to help women and Black executives obtain more board and C-suite positions, according to the article. The racial components of corporate boards still are gaining momentum after the murder of George Floyd and subsequent national Black Lives Matter movements, according to the article.
A B.E. Registry member, Lee has been a force in corporate governance for more than 20 years.
Lee presently serves on the boards of Marriott, AT&T Inc., Procter & Gamble, and Burberry Group plc, told BLACK ENTERPRISE that movement is happening in these fields.
“We are in an environment where companies are still looking for diverse board members. Some of them are fishing in the same pond that they’ve been fishing in for years,” Lee said. “I think some companies are trying harder, but they need to readjust how they approach this issue and where they find these diverse board members, and my view is there are plenty of them out there. You just have to have the network and know-how to reach them, and that’s one reason I started the Monarchs Collective. So, the pressure is going to have to be kept on boards and companies. And we’re going to have to keep raising this as an issue … systemic racism raised its ugly head in the boardroom last year, and boards had to discuss this.”
Another aspect of board representation is white female board representation versus Black male board representation, according to findings from the Missing Pieces Report: A Board Diversity Census of Women and Minorities on Fortune 500 Boards per the article. The Alliance for Board Diversity compiled the study that tracked women executives and the report showed that white women made a very notable increase in board seats gained in the Fortune 100 and Fortune 500, beyond any other group or gender, an increase of 34 seats in the Fortune 100 and 209 in the Fortune 500, per the article.
The report stated that the general improvement rate is still slow, especially for Black men. The data revealed no real gain for minority men in the Fortune 100 or Fortune 500. Like, the report determined that their representation rate in the Fortune 500 had increased less than 0.5% a year since 2010. Also, Black men lost one seat in the Fortune 100 and five seats in the Fortune 500, the article added.
“There is no doubt that the spotlight on racial inequities for Black executives in corporate America last year spurred momentum to diversify corporate boardrooms,” Michael C. Hyter, president and CEO, The Executive Leadership Council, states in the report. “The real question is, are we experiencing a trend, or is this the beginning of sustainable progress? Although Black women continue to gain board seats, the loss of board seats by Black men is alarming. Board diversity in the Fortune 500 is growing at a rate of 2%, which is not quickly enough. On top of that, the recycle rate among Black directors remains high. If corporations are serious about achieving true board diversity, they must be intentional about reaching outside of their traditional networks and tapping the plethora of qualified, Black board-ready executives who are ready to serve.”
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