We Should Do Better

I have to say it: I'm a little disappointed in us, as a community. Myself included. We've let the political winds of the country push us and we seem to have lost our focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion. I'm pretty ashamed about it. I think we can—and should!—do better. We used to.

Not that long ago, if you were browsing the Trailblazer Community, or on Ohana Slack, or attending one or the other event, there would be a better-than-average amount of discussion about increasing diversity. From talk of how to increase representation of women in tech, community-presented sessions at Dreamins and Dreamforce about allyship, the formation of WITness Success and Dreamin' in Color, public celebration of employee resource groups from BOLDforce to Outforce, to promotion of the issue in official communication like the Salesforce Admins blog and podcast, it was possible to argue that the Salesforce community was more focused on needed change than many sectors of society, an especially welcome situation in business and tech.

Were we groundbreaking revolutionaries? No. Were we necessarily even moving the needle? Also, unfortunately, no. Most of the time most of us were just going along doing our jobs, building and maintaining technology systems for businesses. Fundamentally, we were (we are) cogs in a capitalist system doing massive harm to people and planet. I know that. But it's possible to make positive change within the system so some peoples' lives are better even if all isn't perfect. I believe that talking about DEI at all is an important way to begin change. The fact that we talked about the need for change opened up room for change in small and larger ways.

I remember being so pleasantly surprised to see packed sessiosn at my first Dreamforce about women being underrepresented in tech. On the one hand, the content was extremely basic and "old news" if you'd been paying any attention to women's equality issues. But it was clear to me that for hundreds of women in those sessions it was a revelation to even learn how underrepresented women are in the tech sector. The women exiting that session didn't suddenly reach pay equity with their male peers. But some of them probably started asking some pointed questions.

I remember Marc Benioff talking in the keynote (at probably that same Dreamforce) about how the company had done a huge HR audit to determine if women were being underpaid relative to men in similar roles because Leyla Seka raised the issue. Surprise! They were. So (he claimed), they went about fixing it. And then the next year they found the problem had returned, whether due to bias at hiring and promotion time or due to employees gained by acquisitions. So he'd realized that they would probably have to go through the exercise every single year. At the time, he seemed committed to the kind of work it would take to try to erase the gender pay gap at Salesforce.

Those were some of my earliest introductions to the Salesforce world. Later there was a community sprint group thinking about how to increase representation at events. And there were initiatives to support women- and black-owned businesses. And there were Dreamin' event speaker committees talking about first round blind session submission ratings and publicly talking about striving for diversity on the stages.

I just don't see those kinds of things happening nearly as much anymore. Not zero, but a whole lot less. On the big scale, Benioff has joined the rest of the billionaire class on the regressive and authoritarian side of a culture war. Big companies are facing pushback from MAGA claiming that DEI is some kind of conspiracy to undermine fundamental rights. (Rather than actually being a movement to protect those rights for everyone.) OK, so Salesforce as a company isn't going to be a leader in DEI.

But where are the rest of us? Why have we let this anti-equality backlash from a minority of voters change our behavior?

That's it. That's today's post.

I don't have answers, just questions to raise.

Let's recommit to doing better.

I'll be around, both in the virtual spaces and at events. Tell me what you're doing to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in the Salesforce (or wider) community. Let me know how I can help. Challenge me on what I should be doing differently.