DEI
Despite Billions In Backing, Studies Show Diversity Trainings Just Aren’t Working
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
A number of corporations are beginning to retreat from their diversity initiatives, with American Airlines, BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase and Lowe’s all editing their DEI policies to be less racially focused following lawsuit threats from conservatives.
A wealth of research suggests that the billions of dollars corporate America, academia and government agencies have spent on diversity training have done little to impact people’s behavior.
What impact diversity trainings do have is often short-lived or purely influences beliefs without impacting actions, according to a review of multiple meta-analyses, a type of research that summarizes the results of hundreds of studies. American businesses alone spend roughly $8 billion a year on the same diversity trainings research suggests are ineffective, according to the Harvard Business Review.
On top of the billions corporations spend on diversity trainings, hundreds of millions of dollars worth of public funds flow to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives through state universities and the federal government.
A 2020 meta-analysis synthesized findings from 492 different studies and found that trainings designed to reduce implicit bias, a term used by academics to refer to discriminatory attitudes people hold but are not consciously aware of, “generally produced trivial changes in behavior.” Per the study, the trainings had “relatively weak” effects on measures of implicit bias, however, it also found that changes in implicit biases didn’t necessarily translate to behavioral changes.
Many nonprofits, like the National Equity Project, provide diversity training services to public and private clients like businesses.
“Nonprofit spending on the left, roughly defined, swamps the center-right by a factor of three or four to one depending on the year … and yet the country hasn’t really moved much,” Capital Research Center Senior Investigative Researcher Ken Braun told the Daily Caller News Foundation, speaking on diversity training spending. “The very fact that DEI was ever created demonstrates the abject failure of decades of spending and messaging on what we used to call ‘affirmative action.’”
Diversity trainings may influence the stated beliefs of participants, but cause little change in day-to-day behavior. A study conducted by a team of University of Pennsylvania researchers in 2019 surveyed 3,000 employees at a multi-national company and found that the impact of anti-sexism training led to employees acknowledging that women face discrimination, but not changing the way they behaved.
The apparent inefficacy of diversity training hasn’t stopped bureaucrats from spending public funds on it, with a number of school districts and public colleges paying Ibram X. Kendi, the academic famous for popularizing the idea of “anti-racism,” tens of thousands of dollars for presentations. Roughly two-thirds of American colleges in 2016 had diversity training for faculty, and 43% of those trainings were mandatory, according to a survey conducted by researchers Frank Dobbin of Harvard University and Alexandra Kalev of Tel-Aviv University.
President Joe Biden signed an executive order in June 2021 ordering federal agencies to increase their diversity programming, asserting that “such training programs should enable federal employees, managers and leaders to have knowledge of systemic and institutional racism and bias.”
Questions surrounding the effectiveness of diversity trainings have existed for some time, with a 2009 analysis of hundreds of studies published in the Annual Review of Psychology failing to find evidence that diversity trainings are effective at reducing prejudice or influencing behavior in the ways intended.
Despite academics struggling to find evidence to support the efficacy of diversity trainings, many corporations leaned into such initiatives after the consulting firm McKinsey and Company published a report in 2015 claiming that companies with more diverse executives saw higher profits, according to the Wall Street Journal. Multiple academics, however, failed to replicate the results of the consulting firm’s study.
Repeating the studies of others is a common practice used in academia to determine if a result is reflective of reality or if it was the product of poor methodology or dumb luck. Econ Journal Watch (EJW), a publication run by economics professors, was among those that attempted to recreate McKinsey’s findings only to discover no statistically significant link between executive diversity and profitability.
“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,” EJW’s report reads. “We are unable to replicate the same statistically reliable association between firm financial performance and executive race/ethnic diversity as they report.”
A number of corporations are beginning to retreat from their diversity initiatives, with American Airlines, BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase and Lowe’s all editing their DEI policies to be less racially focused following lawsuit threats from conservatives.
Braun called the apparent movement of corporate America away from DEI initiatives “encouraging” but laughed when asked if academia and the federal government might follow suit.
Other studies have found that diversity trainings don’t only fail to alter people’s behavior but sometimes produce backlash effects that make people more prejudiced. Dobbin and Kalev, in a book they co-authored, found that after implementing diversity trainings, firms saw a decrease in women and minorities in leadership positions.
“If diversity training has no impact whatsoever, that would mean that perhaps billions of dollars are being wasted annually in the United States on these efforts,” journalist Jesse Singal wrote in 2023. “But there’s a darker possibility: Some diversity initiatives might actually worsen the DEI climates of the organizations that pay for them.”
Featured Image: Benjamin Child/Unsplash
From LifeSiteNews
Trump’s shuttering of federal DEI programs is in keeping with his promise to ‘forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based.’
President Donald Trump has ordered all federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) staff to be placed on paid leave by Wednesday evening, in accordance with his executive order signed on Monday.
The president pledged during his inaugural address to “forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based,” which is the impetus behind his efforts to abolish DEI programs that prioritize race and ethnicity above merit when hiring workers.
Trump’s Executive Order on Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing stated, “Americans deserve a government committed to serving every person with equal dignity and respect, and to expending precious taxpayer resources only on making America great.”
“President Trump campaigned on ending the scourge of DEI from our federal government and returning America to a merit based society where people are hired based on their skills, not for the color of their skin,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Tuesday night. “This is another win for Americans of all races, religions, and creeds. Promises made, promises kept.”
The Office of Personnel Management issued a memo to the leaders of federal departments instructing them to inform employees by 5 p.m. ET on Wednesday that they will be placed on paid administrative leave as all DEI offices and programs prepare to shut down, according to NBC News.
It is unclear how many employees will be affected by the erasure of federal DEI programs.
Diversity training has “exploded” in the federal government since Joe Biden took office in 2020, the Beacon noted, with all federal agencies having mandated a form of DEI training before he left office.
DEI initiatives have long been widely denounced by conservatives and moderates as divisive, but they have been coming under increasing fire for undermining the competence and most basic functioning of public institutions and private corporations, even putting lives at risk.
For example, some commentators have blamed growing – and at times catastrophic and fatal – airplane safety failures in part on DEI hires and policies. Upon the revelation that a doctor at Duke Medical School was “abandoning… all sort(s) of metrics” in hiring surgeons in order to implement DEI practice, Elon Musk warned that “people will die” because of DEI.
Conservatives have also criticized DEI for stoking rather than curing division. A recent study shows that DEI programs actually breed hostility in businesses and schools.
DEI
Trump signs executive order banning men from women’s prisons, gender-confused troops in military
From LifeSiteNews
By Matt Lamb
“I will end the government policy to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life”
President Donald Trump rescinded an executive order that allowed gender-confused people to join the military.
Trump rescinded 78 of former President Joe Biden’s executive orders, including a handful that pushed the LGBT agenda. The decision drew praise from conservative groups.
One of the rescinded Biden directives is “Executive Order 14004 of January 25, 2021 (Enabling All Qualified Americans To Serve Their Country in Uniform),” according to the White House website.
The Biden order made it “the policy of the United States to ensure that all [so-called] transgender individuals who wish to serve in the United States military and can meet the appropriate standards shall be able to do so openly” and without alleged “discrimination.”
It revoked President Trump’s first-term decision to prohibit gender-confused individuals from enlisting in the military.
Trump also rescinded other Biden orders on transgenderism and homosexuality, including several relating to “gender identity” and “sexual orientation.”
The president also made it a policy of the United States that there are only two sexes, male and female. “I will end the government policy to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life,” Trump promised during his inauguration speech, as reported by LifeSiteNews.
Trump fulfilled that promise on Day One, with an executive order titled “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
The order states, in part:
Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being. The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system. Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself.
Accordingly, my Administration will defend women’s rights and protect freedom of conscience by using clear and accurate language and policies that recognize women are biologically female, and men are biologically male.
The executive order also affirms that sex is immutable.
It also took aim at the Supreme Court’s Bostock v. Clayton County decision. This decision, authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch, read into federal law a “right” to cross-dress at work. Trump said the decision should not be used to eradicate single-sex spaces, such as in education and prisons. Transgender activists have tried to use it to block laws against drugs and surgeries and used it to sue a Catholic hospital for not removing a gender-confused woman’s healthy uterus.
The executive order also rescinded various guidance documents and letters promoting Transgender ideology.
The order also states:
Agencies shall remove all statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications, or other internal and external messages that promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology, and shall cease issuing such statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications or other messages. Agency forms that require an individual’s sex shall list male or female, and shall not request gender identity. Agencies shall take all necessary steps, as permitted by law, to end the Federal funding of gender ideology.
Conservatives praise Trump’s support for biological reality
Trump’s swift action to uphold the two sexes and to ensure women are not housed in prisons or have to share locker rooms with men drew praise from conservative groups.
“Today, President Donald Trump has begun the effort of restoring our nation to the principles that made it great. He’s off to an excellent start,” American Principles Project President Terry Schilling stated in a news release.
“With the hundreds of executive orders signed today, President Trump has taken important steps to eliminate gender ideology and DEI from our government, depoliticize our military and justice system, and reinstitute protections for free speech and religious liberty,” Schilling stated.
The president “has made clear he understands and is prepared for the task ahead,” Schilling said, noting there is more work to be done. “We look forward to working with the incoming administration to ensure the president is able to deliver on his ambitious, pro-family agenda.”
Christian legal nonprofit Alliance Defending Freedom also celebrated the sex definition order, calling it “momentous” and a return to “reality and common sense.”
‘The fight against gender ideology is far from over, and Alliance Defending Freedom is committed to seeing it through to the end,” CEO Kristen Waggoner stated in a news release. “But today, the U.S. government switched sides in that conflict—from promoting the lie to defending the truth.”
She said ADF plans to work with Trump to “restore common sense in American policy.”
Independent Women’s Forum also thanked President Trump for ensuring biological reality is recognized in law.
“The lie that sex is fluid erases and endangers women,” senior legal advisor Beth Parlato stated.
She also said Trump is “bring[ing] back sanity and common sense.”
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