https://www.wsj.com/articles/d...y-inclusion-b4a0d50a

Illegal discrimination is still illegal discrimination even if a corporate HR department wraps it in the language of equity and inclusion. As a reminder of this legal reality, the C-Suite might want to review a recent opinion by a federal appeals court, upholding a jury verdict for a hospital executive who says he was fired merely for being a white male amid a workforce diversity push.

David Duvall spent five years as a senior vice president at Novant Health, a multibillion-dollar medical group based in North Carolina. His firing in July 2018 shocked his colleagues, the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals says in its ruling. Strangely, Novant “had no record of any documented criticism of Duvall’s performance or reasons for his termination.” His duties were given to two women, one black and one white. When a permanent replacement was hired, all three finalists were black women.

The record shows Novant was deeply interested in the demographic makeup of its workforce. At a May 2018 meeting, its Diversity and Inclusion Executive Council saw data showing a decline in women leaders. A report in February 2019 “recommended a ‘3-4 percentage point increase’ in black leaders over the next three years.” Novant also wanted to recruit Hispanics and Asians, going as far as to adopt “a long-term financial incentive plan that tied executive bonuses to closing those gaps.”

Mr. Duvall was given a terse explanation for his firing: Novant was “going in a different direction.” Yet months later, his old boss spoke to a corporate recruiter and said he’d be happy to hire Mr. Duvall again. The recruiter’s contemporaneous notes say Mr. Duvall was let go because Novant wanted “a different point of view,” a different “flair.” It wasn’t only him: Mr. Duvall’s supervisor, the ruling says, went from having “seven white male direct reports in 2018, to two in 2019, to one in 2020, to zero at the time of trial in 2021.”

After hearing from 10 witnesses and seeing 100 exhibits, a jury found that Novant had discriminated against Mr. Duvall owing to his race or sex. He was awarded $300,000 in punitive damages, plus $2.3 million as back pay and $1.1 million as “front pay in lieu of reinstatement.” The Fourth Circuit reversed the punitive part, saying such damages are permitted only if an employer knowingly breaks the law or is recklessly indifferent.

But the appeals court affirmed the award of compensation, as well as the jury’s finding of discrimination. “There was more than sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to determine that Duvall’s race, sex, or both motivated Novant Health’s decision to fire him,” the panel writes. “Novant Health’s arguments to the contrary, which largely seek a reweighing of the evidence, are unconvincing.”

The company told us it disagrees with the finding of liability but is pleased that the appeals court noted “no evidence that Novant Health perceived any risk of violating federal law.” Its statement continues: “We continue to believe having a workforce that reflects the communities we serve allows us to provide the personalized care our patients need to reach their best possible health.”

Agree or disagree with this sentiment, but it isn’t what matters in court. What other CEOs should keep front of mind, during their own equity councils, is Mr. Duvall’s verdict.

In the 1990s I knew an older Caucasian male (Larry) who was a medical supply salesman.

Despite being in the top 3% of the sales force where he worked, he was laid off. His boss, laid off a few months later was kind enough to get Larry copies of the documents that basically said "Get rid of Larry. He's too old, too white, and makes too much."

When he got those documents, boy that pissed Larry off. He managed to find a lawyer who would take his suit against the former employer on a contingency.

As the case dragged on and on, Larry did something I though amazing. At 54, he went to law school.

After he graduated and was admitted to the bar, he joined his own lawsuit as co-counsel.

After, IIRC six years, the company realized it was farked due to having been stupid enough to put into writing blatant age, race, and sex discrimination.

The settlement paid for his other lawyer, all of his legal education, and helped him open his own firm.

He passed a few years ago, but I know he would take cases like this, occasionally pro bono but usually on contingency.

He once said to me "Never take this kind of shit from anyone."

DEI is the devil. I hate every instantiation of it. It's affirmative action on steriods. I'm against discrimination. I'm in favor of merit. That's the black and white of it for me. DEI can fuck off and die.

To actually fire someone who is achieved his position by merit and is performing to expectation solely with the intent to replace them with diversity is just evil, especially if competency doesn't exceed the prior. If you want to hire more diversely, fill in new open positions. But to fire someone in place already is just utterly stupid and evil. The hiring manager should be fired themselves.

I hate the illogical claim that if I resist affirmative action or its metastatic sibling DEI, that I think minorities and women are automatically less qualified. I hate that accusation. It’s designed to intimidate and suppress debate.

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:
In the 1990s I knew an older Caucasian male (Larry) who was a medical supply salesman.

Sounds like a guy I'd like to have a beer with! Good for him and may he RIP.

JP

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:
DEI is the devil. I hate every instantiation of it. It's affirmative action on steriods. I'm against discrimination. I'm in favor of merit. That's the black and white of it for me. DEI can fuck off and die.

To actually fire someone who is achieved his position by merit and is performing to expectation solely with the intent to replace them with diversity is just evil, especially if competency doesn't exceed the prior. If you want to hire more diversely, fill in new open positions. But to fire someone in place already is just utterly stupid and evil. The hiring manager should be fired themselves.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:
That's the black and white of it for me.

That's racist.

Expect a meeting with HR.

Kind of turns truth, justice, and equality on their heads, doesn't it?

Welcome to modern America. Common sense no longer allowed.

Didn't
Earn
It

can

go

ahead

and

D
I
E

I was working at a New Car Dealership and it got bought up by another group in the area. The new owner was a minority. When he took over, he retained all the employees except 5 of us middle aged white guys.

Went to another dealership and had worked there for about 3 years. Opened it up and got it running. Got laid off. Again a minority owner, he hired 2 guys to replace me, a relative and a friend.

Didn't really care, I was ready to get out. They ended up closing down about 6 months later. Two brothers that were running it for their Dad and neither knew anything about running a business. In fact one of the brothers had run a Honda dealership into the ground, takes quite an effort to do that.

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:
In the 1990s I knew an older Caucasian male (Larry) who was a medical supply salesman....

Now that's the type of story that could be made into a movie!

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:
In the 1990s I knew an older Caucasian male (Larry) who was a medical supply salesman.



He passed a few years ago, but I know he would take cases like this, occasionally pro bono but usually on contingency.

He once said to me "Never take this kind of shit from anyone."

My hero.

Remember the BS assertions from McKinsey that assured everyone that racial/ethnically-diverse leadership results in increased earnings?

Excerpt from the recently released report:
McKinsey’s Diversity Matters/Delivers/Wins Results Revisited from Econ Journal Watch

quote:

Conclusions
In a series of studies that are highly influential in the business world,
McKinsey (2015; 2018; 2020; 2023) report finding statistically significant positive
relations between the industry-adjusted EBIT margin of global samples of large
public firms and the racial/ethnic diversity of their executives. However, when we
conduct a quasi-replication of McKinsey’s tests using data for US S&P 500®
firms as of 12/31/19, we find a not statistically significant relations between McKinsey’s
measures of executive racial/ethnic diversity and not only industry-adjusted EBIT
margin, but also industry-adjusted sales growth, gross margin, return on assets,
return on equity, and total shareholder return.

Our findings lead us to two main conclusions and an emphasis. First, we
conclude that caution is warranted in relying on McKinsey’s findings to support
the view that US publicly traded firms can deliver improved financial performance
if they increase the racial/ethnic diversity of their executives—not only because
we are unable to replicate the same statistically reliable association between firm
financial performance and executive race/ethnic diversity as they report, but also
because the structure of McKinsey’s tests are such that by measuring firm financial
performance over the four or five years leading up to the year in which they judge
the race/ethnicity of firms’ executives, the default direction of causality that
McKinsey capture in the positive correlation they report is that better firm financial
performance causes firms to diversify the racial/ethnic composition of their
executives, not the reverse.

Second, we conclude that in light of the prominence of the connections
between firm financial performance and the racial/ethnic composition of their
employees, not just in the US but around the world, there is great value in future
research that would seek to empirically test for the presence, sign, magnitude, and
direction of any causal relations that exist. Such longitudinal and causality-oriented
studies may also help bring into sharper focus the identities and sizes of the costs
and benefits, as well as the risks and returns, that are associated with higher or
lower racial/ethnic diversity, not only in firms’ executives, but in their Boards of
Directors and rank-and-file employees. In this regard, we believe that our own
work, published in a separate paper to this (Bermiss, Green, and Hand 2024),
represents a useful beginning.

Lastly, we emphasize that in light of the challenging nature of matters to do
with race/ethnicity in the US, our findings, like those of McKinsey, are limited.
While our results do speak to the lack of robustness of McKinsey’s studies vis-àvis large public US firms, they do not speak to the connections between racial/ethnic diversity in employees and/or boards and either firm financial performance
or non-financial firm goals, nor to intrafirm activities. Nor do they speak to any
social or moral contributions that racial/ethnic diversity in US executives provides.
Such research is worthwhile and important, and we hope that it will be undertaken
and well so by business scholars.

https://econjwatch.org/article...ns-results-revisited

Link to full report. https://econjwatch.org/File+do...024.pdf?mimetype=pdf

quote:

Originally posted by Edmond:

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:
In the 1990s I knew an older Caucasian male (Larry) who was a medical supply salesman....

Now that's the type of story that could be made into a movie!

That's basically "Erin Brockovich", except with a middle-age guy and nobody was poisoned.

last mayor fired a white lady years ago and hired one of his black friends. she sued. showed that in one year he hired 52 black people and skipped a bunch of white people. she won a few million and the city was made to get an hr dept and knock the mayor out of the hiring process.

Diversity just means anti white.

Back in the 80's I was laid off, so applied to the Post Office for a mechanic job that they posted. Did great on the test, had veteran's preference, went to interview with the shop supervisor of the local maintenance shop. He said I was the most qualified applicant he had, would love to hire me. Then he said "look around my shop. What do you see?" I had no clue. He said " Look at all the blond hair out there. I have orders to change that". Thus ended my PO job.....

Obviously, jobs should be filled based on knowledge training, and experience. Anything else lacks efficiency and opens the door to failure. Applications should be devoid of any personal information whatsoever, but that would be… racist? Sexist? I prefer “realist”.

quote:

Originally posted by Ryanp225:
Diversity just means anti white.

Not long ago it just meant anti-white men. I’ve come to understand that increasingly, it does indeed just mean “anti white.”

I have worked almost 45 years now, both part-time (while in school) and full-time. I have worked closely with several different ethnic classes throughout the years. People who want to work will work, regardless of "color".

Sadly, since the early 1990's, this "color" issue has been brought to the forefront. In a frenzy to achieve "equality", overall quality itself has suffered in my personal experience. Any criticism of performance now brings out the HR people, "race card, etc.

I worked as a government contractor for over 21 years and saw the degradation within when people were assigned and / or promoted because of personal characteristics / demographics, rather than Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities (KSIs).

Now I work in water and wastewater industries, and I see several public, municipal, and industrial water and wastewater systems failing, because in their rush to install and promote "equal minorities", the end result often times are people who love the title, pay, and other benefits of a position, but don't want the responsibilities or lack the abilities for the position. Then these same people bitch and moan when we have to charge them for work required to get their systems back up and running.

I saw this online - DEI is like having a flat tire, and then deflating the other tires to be equal. It's as simple as that.

JMHO, YMMV.