I’ve always kind of thought that social class was the elephant in the room of business think—a glaring reality that is consistently talked around, but never about. You can see some of the gaping holes around this topic with a simple Google search with “social class” plus any other business objective. A few exceptions are diversity and inclusion folks whose primary focus are the dimensions of difference that define various groups. And if 200 years of sociological research has taught us anything, it’s that social class is one of the great gulfs that both divide and differentiate. But I think if we’re honest, even those of us who do diversity and inclusion work are not as loud and clear as we could be about the importance of this marker of diversity. I want to share first why I think this is fruitful ground for the growth of diversity and inclusion work and then several recent examples of companies addressing (or ignoring) the reality of class in the workplace.
First, let me say that I admit that the reality of economic inequality, pay gaps, educational disparities, and global market trends are incredibly complex, and to a large degree, produced “outside” of organizations as much as they are produced by them. But like all dimensions of diversity, organizations carry the burden and reality of either fighting or solidifying all of the ways society divides and marks us. This is not cause for despair; it is a challenging opportunity for change. At least one compelling reason for more focused attention to class differences are the potential untapped talent and perspective that employees along the class spectrum. Several years ago I conducted focus groups for a client and after going through the employee responses there was a stark and gradual change in the tone and honesty as I moved from the higher to lower ranks of the organization. The trend was clear: the higher your position in the company (and salary), the more likely you were to recite company verbiage and support the optimistic goals of the organization. But the most fruitful and honest perspectives about the gaps and areas of improvement consistently came from the hard working folks at “the bottom” of the ranks who felt overlooked and underappreciated—even though they simultaneously loved their jobs and organization—they were committed yet critical. This is healthy—and their perspectives should be embraced as valid and necessary for growth.
Just today I noticed something similar as I left my hotel and asked one of the housekeeping staff about the gym. She looked at me with a friendly smirk, slightly rolling her eyes, and said “I’ll let you see for yourself”—letting me know the gym was nothing to really brag about. We both laughed. Her candid response was actually a breath of fresh air from the scripted customer service that I’ve come to expect. This worker’s voice matters for the growth of the hotel. She is not the director of marketing or public relations, but her perspective on the experience of the guests and the facilities is valuable insight—and she should be valued and compensated accordingly.
Like many other contemporary business phenomena, the tech industry may be shaking things up by waking up the sleeping giant of social class. Technology companies have already challenged and experimented with many unquestioned norms of business (e.g fun work spaces, flexible schedules and unlimited vacation policies). But recently, various aspects of social class and salaries have surfaced that could produce ripple effects for the future. Just this week, several media outlets highlighted Tony Hsieh’s, the CEO of Zappos, unprecedented decision to live in a trailer park in Las Vegas with his fellow colleagues (admittedly this is a modern, luxurious trailer park, but still). The article highlights that Hsieh’s is much more passionate about his work than his money and his decision to live in the park is evidence of his commitment to community with his peers and their work—a visual sign that there is more to business than profits. A more compelling—and a personal favorite—example of addressing social class at work is Gravity Payment’s CEO, Dan Price, cutting his own salary by 90% to ensure every employee at his company makes at least 70k over the next 3 years. Salaries of lower rank employees doubled overnight. In an interview Price says his inspiration came from a study that showed that employee well-being and happiness improved dramatically up to, and then tailored off, around 75k dollars—so he decided to put it to the test. The responses from his employees are both inspiring and instructive. Employees praised the decision—many with tears of joy—and talked about being able to move closer to work, shorten their commutes, help struggling family members, and focus more on work than their financial burdens. Price also mentions his own humble beginnings and challenges other CEO’s take seriously the “moral imperative” of the economic inequality in their organizations.
But Price’s perspective is still more spectacle than sign of reform. Just last week a former Google employee, Erica Baker (a young black woman), tweeted her experience with starting an open-source spreadsheet amongst her peers where colleagues could insert their salaries. Baker said the spreadsheet exposed “not great things” about the income disparities among the ranks of employees. And the open salary spreadsheet was not welcomed from management. This story is indicative of the larger sweeping under the rug of social class in business at large. Are we more comfortable publishing race and gender demographics than we are social class ones? If so, why? Like most elephants in the room, this one is huge, multi-faceted, and complex. But like other elephants in the room, we either face it and grow or ignore it and perish.
