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Dissertation
Dollars and diversity: the color of corporate losses in the executive suite
Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.), Drexel University
May 2025
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/00011044
Abstract
In 2020, corporations pledged billions of dollars towards racial justice initiatives in the workplace. However, within a few years, those initiatives -- labelled as diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programming -- seemed to wane as firms faced declining financial performance and implemented workforce reductions. From anecdotal stories on the internet to Congress, there have been numerous non-academic reports of minorities being disproportionately affected by layoffs in 2022 (Congressional Black Caucus, 2023). This study aims to understand the relationship among firm financial performance, executive racial diversity, and DEI programs. The findings reveal that accounting losses disproportionately affect Asian and Black executives, but with unexpected outcomes: representation in the executive ranks for both groups increases following losses. Additionally, DEI policies enhance this positive employment effect for Black executives while having the opposite impact for Asian executives. Principal-agent theory and performative activism are examined as frameworks to understand these relationships, offering insights into how organizational decisions about diversity are made during periods of financial stress and how DEI commitments may function differently across various minority groups.
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Details
- Title
- Dollars and diversity
- Creators
- Sharline Y. Rosales
- Contributors
- Curtis Hall (Advisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Drexel University
- Degree Awarded
- Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.)
- Publisher
- Drexel University; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Number of pages
- i, viii, 82 pages
- Resource Type
- Dissertation
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Bennett S. LeBow College of Business; Drexel University
- Other Identifier
- 991022058736504721