I have almost 1000 connections on LinkedIn but I didn’t see a single post on the #blacklivesmatter movement or talking about one of the biggest worldwide news stories of the year.
Why is that?
The obvious defence is that LinkedIn is not Facebook. That it’s somehow more appropriate to talk about these issues on Facebook or Instagram. I reject that notion and think we have to talk about it on professional platforms because racial inequality and lack of social mobility is a systematic issue that flows into the workplace.
In the UK for example:
- A person from the poorest 20% of the population has only a 9% chance of making it to the richest 20%, while those born into the richest 20% have a 22% chance of staying there;
- Unemployment rates for ethnic minorities are significantly higher at 12.9 percent compared with 6.3 percent for white people;
- Black workers with degrees earn 23.1 percent less on average than white workers;
- In Britain, significantly lower percentages of ethnic minorities (8.8 percent) work as managers, directors and senior officials, compared with white people (10.7 percent);
- Black people who leave school with A-levels typically get paid 14.3 percent less than their white peers;
- Without positive action, it will take 120 years before disadvantaged teenagers are as likely as their better-off counterparts to get equivalent qualifications.
Is the silence due to the fact that, in aviation in particular, we all work in international businesses so we can’t possibly be racist? Maybe, but it’s not enough to be not racist. We have to be anti-racist.
Or are we so obsessed with our own big important topic, our COVID problems and the impact it has on air traffic, that we can’t see beyond our own (first world) problems?
At Think we have an international workforce and as a proud EU citizen (still!) and economic migrant myself, I’m proud of that. But essentially we are nearly all from similar ethnic backgrounds. A quick look across the team galleries of other consultancies shows that it’s no different. How come? Is there a less ethnically diverse industry in the world? At the same time, we and many others in our industry have been quite forthcoming on gender diversity and the Women in Aviation movement is something we all find very easy to get behind. We are much less silent on that issue.
So what is going on? Are we keeping quiet because we’re scared that making views like this public might be bad for business? Is it not “on brand” to speak out about these things? I think being a good human is very much part of being “on brand”.
I was born into a civil rights movement in Northern Ireland in the 1970s. My parents’ generation marched in civil rights demonstrations to try and achieve equality in an unequal society. They were marching about many of the same things people today are marching about: feeling powerless; better access to decent housing; better jobs; and the right to vote. With painful similarities to today’s world, we also had politicians who thrived on division. It took 30 years of killing and unrest before more peaceful dialogue and negotiation halted it and in the meantime – yes back to why stuff like this should be on LinkedIn – investment in the area was limited, good jobs were scarce and many people like myself had to move abroad for any real professional opportunity.
Racism or prejudice is learnt behaviour. Even if we don’t teach it, by not speaking up against it or not acting to show we are against it, we are enabling it.
I don’t have a magic answer to how we address it but I do think we have to speak about it. So this is me saying something and that’s better than saying nothing.
Author: Conor Mullan, Managing Director
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