时代周刊 多元化培训即惹恼了男性也辜负了女性职员(1)

How diversity training infuriates men and fails women

多元化培训即惹恼了男性也辜负了女性职员

DECADES BEFORE ANITA HILL, Gretchen Carlson or #MeToo,

在ANITA HILL性骚扰案、Gretchen Carlson案或#MeToo运动案发数十年前，

American companies dreamed up “diversity training,”

美国各大企业一直渴望开展“多元化培训”，

typically a course that lasts anywhere from an hour to a couple of days,

就是那种持续时间从一小时到几天不等，

with the goal of wiping out biases¹ against women and others from underrepresented groups.

目的在于消除对女性或其他弱势群体的偏见的课程。

For most of its history, diversity training has been pretty much a cudgel,

大多数时候，多元化培训都像一个棍棒，

pounding white men into submission² with a mix of finger-wagging and guilt-mongering.

夹杂着拒绝或兜售內疚感等伎俩来迫使白人男性屈服。

The first training programs surfaced in the 1950s,

第一批培训出现于20世纪50年代，

after men returned from World War II and were appalled³ and perplexed⁴ to find women in their offices.

那时，刚从二战战场上下来的男人们看着办公室里女人们的身影还会觉得胆战心惊，不知所措。

After the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the training took on more urgency.

1964年《民权法案》通过后，开展培训的需要变得更加紧迫。

Within a decade, it had morphed into a knee-jerk response to legal actions,

不到10年，它就已经演变为对法律制裁的一种下意识反应，

after a series of high-profile sexdiscrimination suits,

这期间发生了一系列备受瞩目的性别歧视诉讼案件，

including one by the women of Newsweek magazine, who were stranded⁵ in a pink ghetto⁶.

其中就包括《新闻周刊》女员工因为受到职场天花板的限制而起诉一案。

“Women don’t write at Newsweek. If you want to be a writer, go someplace else,”

“《新闻周刊》的女性员工是没有资格做编辑的。想当一名编辑？慢走不送。”

the bosses told them, according to Lynn Povich, one of the 46 women who sued.

该案46名受害者之一Lynn Povich说，公司的领导们就是这么跟她们说的。

By the time I entered the workforce⁷ in the 1980s, the Newsweek suit and others like it—led by women at TIME,

到80年代我进入这个行业的时候，《新闻周刊》一案及类似的案件 - 这些案件都是由《时代周刊》

the Associated Press and the New York Times—were mostly forgotten.

美联社和《纽约时报》女性带头发起的 - 大多大多已经被人遗忘。

Diversity training had taken a backseat too.

多元化培训也暂时退居二线。

I don’t recall ever hearing the phrase until the 1990s.

我记得，90年代以前多元化培训这种说法我连听都没听过。

By then, it had been reconstituted as a feel-good exercise in consciousness-raising.

那时它已经被重塑成了一种提高自我意识的良好做法。

White men were told they should include women and minorities because it’s the right thing to do.

白人被告知他们应该接纳女性和弱势群体员工，因为那才是正确的做法。

It was all about the importance of “inclusion.”

这一切都是为了体现“包容”的重要性。

But here’s the thing about diversity training: it doesn’t work.

然而，多元化培训有一个问题：它不起作用。

Harvard organizational sociology professor Frank Dobbin and others have since delved⁸ into why such programs have failed.

一直以来，哈佛大学组织社会学教授弗兰克·多布宾（Frank Dobbin）等人都在研究这些计划失败的原因。

Dobbin combed through thousands of data points and found that for white women and black men and women in management positions, it actually made things worse.

Dobbin梳理了数千个数据点，发现对白人女性、黑人男性以及女性管理人员而言，多元化培训只会把事情弄得更糟。

That’s right: companies that introduced diversity training would actually employ more women and black men today if they had never had diversity training at all.

没错，要不是因为搞了多元化培训，很多公司现在肯定已经雇用了更多的女性员工和黑人男性员工。

He singled out three situations in which training is doomed⁹ to fail:

教授指出了多元化培训注定失败的三种情况：

when it’s mandatory¹⁰; when it so much as mentions the law; or when it is specific to managers, as opposed to being offered to all employees.

一是强制推行多元化培训，二是培训提到法律，三是培训只针对经理人而不是所有员工。

Unfortunately, he found, about 75% of firms with diversity-training programs fall into at least one of those categories.

不幸的是，他发现将近75％的推行多元化培训计划的公司至少属于上述一种类型。

1 biases   

偏见( bias的名词复数 )； 偏爱； 特殊能力； 斜纹

参考例句：

• Stereotypes represent designer or researcher biases and assumptions, rather than factual data. 它代表设计师或者研究者的偏见和假设，而不是实际的数据。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓
• The net effect of biases on international comparisons is easily summarized. 偏差对国际比较的基本影响容易概括。

2 submission   

n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出

参考例句：

• The defeated general showed his submission by giving up his sword.战败将军缴剑表示投降。
• No enemy can frighten us into submission.任何敌人的恐吓都不能使我们屈服。

3 appalled   

v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的

参考例句：

• The brutality of the crime has appalled the public. 罪行之残暴使公众大为震惊。
• They were appalled by the reports of the nuclear war. 他们被核战争的报道吓坏了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 perplexed   

adj.不知所措的

参考例句：

• The farmer felt the cow,went away,returned,sorely perplexed,always afraid of being cheated.那农民摸摸那头牛，走了又回来，犹豫不决，总怕上当受骗。
• The child was perplexed by the intricate plot of the story.这孩子被那头绪纷繁的故事弄得迷惑不解。

5 stranded   

a.搁浅的，进退两难的

参考例句：

• He was stranded in a strange city without money. 他流落在一个陌生的城市里， 身无分文，一筹莫展。
• I was stranded in the strange town without money or friends. 我困在那陌生的城市，既没有钱，又没有朋友。

6 ghetto   

n.少数民族聚居区，贫民区

参考例句：

• Racism and crime still flourish in the ghetto.城市贫民区的种族主义和犯罪仍然十分猖獗。
• I saw that achievement as a possible pattern for the entire ghetto.我把获得的成就看作整个黑人区可以仿效的榜样。

7 workforce   

n.劳动大军，劳动力

参考例句：

• A large part of the workforce is employed in agriculture.劳动人口中一大部分受雇于农业。
• A quarter of the local workforce is unemployed.本地劳动力中有四分之一失业。

8 delved   

v.深入探究，钻研( delve的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She delved in her handbag for a pen. 她在手提包里翻找钢笔。
• He delved into the family archives looking for the facts. 他深入查考这个家族的家谱以寻找事实根据。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 doomed   

命定的

参考例句：

• The court doomed the accused to a long term of imprisonment. 法庭判处被告长期监禁。
• A country ruled by an iron hand is doomed to suffer. 被铁腕人物统治的国家定会遭受不幸的。

10 mandatory   

adj.命令的；强制的；义务的；n.受托者

参考例句：

• It's mandatory to pay taxes.缴税是义务性的。
• There is no mandatory paid annual leave in the U.S.美国没有强制带薪年假。