What does the highest-ranking corporate diversity officer in America think Silicon Valley firms should do to increase their workforce diversity?
That’s the question I put to David Cohen, who is Comcast NBC Universal’s CDO (corporate diversity officer) and reports to Brian Roberts, Comcast’s CEO.
I recently met Cohen, who was in California to boost the firm’s Internet Essentials program, a low-income discount Internet access program that has connected more than 90,000 Bay Area residents to the Web from home.
Cohen has been the firm’s chief diversity officer since 2011, when Comcast formed its office of diversity and inclusion. What could Silicon Valley learn from the cable giant on how to approach the workforce diversity issue?
Comcast does it, Cohen told me, by setting big goals and being unabashed about getting there.
A few recent numbers:
Comcast’s 139,000-member workforce is 59 percent “diverse,” which refers to the percentage of women and nonwhites in the workforce. (Comcast says it doesn’t double count women of color).
Forty percent of its leaders at the manager level and higher are women. Asians, African Americans, Latinos and other nonwhite groups are 25 percent of Comcast’s leadership.
When it comes to new hires in 2014, 69 percent are “diverse.”
In the next five to 10 years, Cohen said, the firm aims for 50 percent of its leadership to be women and 33 percent “people of color.” The same goals apply for the entire workforce.
“The only way to move the needle is to overindex on who you hire,” said Cohen. If you are male and white, you have the “lowest chance of becoming vice president and above in the next four years.”
Cohen, a white man, isn’t your typical chief diversity officer. A former chief of staff to former Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell, who went on to become the Pennsylvania governor, Cohen wears multiple hats. He is a senior executive vice president and also the head of the cable giant’s government affairs, legal office and communications. He has hosted President Obama at his Philadelphia home for a fundraiser. When Comcast is lobbying Washington for something — whether it is net neutrality or to buy Time Warner Cable — it sends in Cohen.
Granted, Comcast is not a tech company but a complex media, technology and consumer firm, both the country’s largest cable provider and the operator of NBC Universal, one of the largest content companies.
But the company, founded in 1963, has grappled with some of the same issues of how to create a diverse workforce and leadership. Its board, once 10 white men, became one-third diverse in 2013. It has also boosted its supplier diversity to $2 billion in 2014.
Cohen credited Rev. Jesse Jackson for identifying the diversity issue in Silicon Valley, but he also credited the reaction of key tech leaders for moving the discussion forward.
“They didn’t get defensive,” he said. “They didn’t say, ‘Get out of here.’ (Jackson) shined a spotlight, and they said, ‘You are right.’ “
“Diversity and inclusion are one of those things that makes customers better,” he said. “Silicon Valley will be healthier.”
Comcast has achieved its diversity goals through a variety of means, including cash bonuses to “bonus-eligible employees.” But Cohen acknowledges the same approach might not work in the tech industry.
“You should adapt the set of tactics to your corporation,” he said. “Unless you get complete buy-in and embracing, it will not work for your company.”
A few tech firms — Intel, Twitter and Pinterest — have publicly stated their own workforce demographic goals. “There is a certain degree of transparency and accountability they are signing up for,” said Freada Kapor Klein, a partner at the Kapor Center for Social Impact.
But there are risks in setting targets, she said.
“If the company does not manage its culture, there’s incredible backlash if people think the job they were entitled to was given to someone because of their race or gender,” she said, pointing to efforts on Wall Street in the 1980s and 1990s that resulted in a revolving door of diverse talent. “There’s a presumption that that African American or that Latina got that job solely because of the pledge.”
Of course, just setting hiring goals, as Comcast does, isn’t going to solve tech’s workforce demographic issue. Addressing the underlying tech culture and the perception of whether diversity matters are just as critical.
But when it comes down to it, there’s only one way to make tech firms more diverse. And that’s to just do it.
Contact Michelle Quinn at 510-394-4196 and mquinn@mercurynews.com. Follow her at Twitter.com/michellequinn.
