Ways in Which White Bosses Suffocate Black Talent

There are several reasons why black people face challenges in climbing the corporate ladder.

A few years ago, I started working for a boss who was almost the same age as me. I was ecstatic. Ecstatic because I naively believed that young people my age weren’t racist. I was in for a rude surprise.

The reality is that it takes more than being of a younger generation to not be racist. It takes having black friends, not a token friend, multiple black friends. It takes unlearning unconscious bias, it takes self-education.

Learning about black excellence

The only way you can learn about black excellence is by taking the initiative to learn about it yourself. The school system which is most times still mired in teaching white supremacist and revisionist versions of history won’t be able to help you.

You need to make it a life’s decision, a self-improvement initiative, and an honest commitment to being anti-racist. Once you start you can never stop, never!

He appeared to be open-minded and friendly

So at the start, this white boss appeared to be open-minded and friendly. He defended me when an airline company wanted to demote me from business class to coach on a long-haul flight.

He sympathized when I was held up in immigration queues or searched at customs. He seemed to genuinely understand. I was beginning to feel secure working with him and started to let my guard down when the microaggressions started.

We were trying to find a partner to implement a project in Africa

We were working on a project in Africa and were trying to identify a partner to implement it for us. I chose a foray of reputable local organizations known to execute projects flawlessly. They also had an outstanding track record in ethics and compliance. We decided to visit to get to know them better.

In one of the meetings, the head of one of the organizations made it clear that he wasn’t interested in an imperialist colonialist-type partnership. What he meant was that he didn’t want to engage in a partnership where we the big multinational would call the big shots and they, the small NGO would simply execute. He wanted it to be a partnership of equals.

Just an arrogant African

Upon leaving the meeting, my boss was furious.

“Who the hell does he think he is? He is just an arrogant African”, he commented with a wistful look on his face.

I was shocked — the words “just an arrogant African”, echoed through my mind. Disappointment must have registered on my face at that very instant, but he didn’t catch it.

“I’m sure they are not an ethical organization,” he went on to say. “ I mean they can’t be — they are African — their programs can’t be that impactful. We’ll need to do a thorough due diligence should we decide to work with them.

I was surprised at how he had so swiftly discredited the organization and its leader. He didn’t even give them a fair chance. Would he have done that if it were an organization led by white people like him?

An Ivy League school academic treated me badly

As time progressed, I became increasingly distraught. His microaggressions toward me grew at an exponential pace. An Ivy League school academic we had hired for one of our projects was extremely rude toward me. This professor openly questioned my competence and on one occasion when I commented on a study we were doing, said:

“I didn’t realize you were that intelligent Rebecca.”

I was shaken. My boss brushed it off as irrelevant, saying I should disregard the comment because the academic was from an older generation and wasn’t too well versed in how to treat women in today’s world.

I knew I could no longer trust my boss

After this incident, I knew that I could no longer trust my boss. I felt that he would never stand up for me or defend me if need be. I felt on my own, and reality is, I truly was.

We had several clashes on the team due to his obvious racism and bias — which was quite clearly a blind spot for him.

All my black colleagues knew about it, but none of them dared speak up — including me. We were scared. We thought we would lose our jobs.

I wondered what he said about me behind my back

On several occasions, I heard my boss make derogatory stereotypical comments about some of the other brown members on the team. I always wondered what he said behind my back.

My take away from this time in my life is that organizations don’t vet their leaders enough to stamp out racism and bias and this can lead to demotivation, disillusionment, and loss of black and brown talent within these organizations.

As corporations rush to increase their diversity numbers in response to Black Lives Matter, they are also going to have to take steps to evaluate whether their leaders are either consciously or unconsciously biased and or racist.

To reap the full benefits of diversity, companies are going to have to make sure they foster environments where black and brown people feel safe and respected and have real opportunities for career progression.

Thanks for reading my perspective.