Does Diversity Training Help or Hurt?
Corporations have spent millions of dollars on diversity training programs to make managers more sensitive to minorities but these efforts have “roundly failed” to eliminate bias or increase the number of minorities in management, according to a team of sociologists headed by Frank Dobbin of Harvard University. Dobbin and his colleagues Alexandra Kalev of the University of California-Berkeley and Erin Kelly of the University of Minnesota examined a sampling of reports submitted to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission by private sector establishments and surveyed the history of their diversity programs. Touchy-feely programs that emphasize mentoring and networking failed to reduce bias complaints or increase the number of minority mangers. Only targeted programs in which senior managers were held accountable for increasing the number of women and minorities in management worked, they reported in the latest issue of the American Sociological Review. In fact, they found diversity t
