Sam Oliver
During a question-and-answer session at Allen & Co.'s annual Sun Valley conference in Idaho, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the iPhone maker will eventually quantify the diversity of its workforce in a public disclosure, but that it is now "more focused on actions."
"We'll release the information at some point," Cook told Bloomberg, referring to diversity data that would likely break down its 80,000-strong workforce by age, gender, and ethnicity. Apple is "more focused on actions" in the meantime, he added.
The company has taken flack in recent months from human rights groups for the lack of diversity in its senior leadership, which counts only two women — board member Andrea Jung and new retail chief Angela Ahrendts. The balance of the company's board and senior vice president-level executives are white men, though African-American human resources head Denise Young-Smith reports directly to Cook.
Among those chastising Apple are the Rev. Jesse Jackson, whose Rainbow PUSH Coalition recently launched a new campaign aimed at drawing awareness to the issue of racial diversity in Silicon Valley. "Technology is supposed to be about inclusion, but sadly, patterns of exclusion remains the order of the day," Jackson wrote in a letter addressed to Apple, Twitter, Facebook, Hewlett Packard, Google, and others.
Apple has responded to the criticism by publicly committing to increase diversity, including a tweak to the company's corporate charter that commits the board to "actively [seek] out highly qualified women and individuals from minority groups to include in the pool from which board nominees are chosen."
The company has also stepped up public demonstrations of support for LGBT equality under Cook. "Thousands" of Apple employees participated in last week's Pride Parade in San Francisco under Apple's banner, including Cook.
AppleInsider Staff
Malcolm Owen
Oliver Haslam
Andrew O'Hara
Wesley Hilliard
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
49 Comments
Uh, what a crock of shit. I'm vehemently against any kind of discrimination, especially in the hiring process and the workforce, but this is fucking ridiculous. What are these "diversity" numbers supposed to show? Should Apple have an even break-down of all minority groups represented in their total workforce #s, as well as ethnicities, ages, sexes, reglious backgrounds, etc to prove that they support "diversity"? How mind-numbing. Does a single person on the planet believes that Apple actually discriminates when hiring? I'm sure they pick the best person for the job, not to fill some "diversity" quota and get a nice looking pie-chart of their employee demographics.
I can see Cook's reluctance to release these #s, as he knows they will be fodder for Apple being dragged through the mud by those with an agenda. They're irrelevant. Apple has nothing to prove in this regard.
Just employ the right person for the job. If they happen to be non white or non straight or disabled then fair enough but don't start giving out jobs on the basis of forced diversity.
"Actively seeking out" women and minorities does not mean that they'll be hired ahead of a more qualified candidate.
Why the hell does anyone need to know this data? And if Apple shows us, then let's have everyone else expose who works for them.
It's a human right to be a CEO? Where do I sign up? I won't even need a corner office, although a private bathroom would be kind of nice.
Honestly, if I was a CEO, anyone demanding information form my company, and it wasn't SEC or other regulatory public required info, would be told to go f*** themselves sideways.
Take Apple private, Cook, and tell all the yahoos, including Wall Street and it's village idiot pundits, where to stick it all.