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Pinterest announced this week that it would pay more than $ 20 million to resolve a gender discrimination lawsuit filed by a female executive. But for two former black employees who had previously filed similar complaints, the deal represents a “slap.”
Ifeoma Ozoma and Aerica Shimizu Banks had become public protagonists of Pinterest after leading generally announced policy changes, including data verification functions to vaccination content, that were prior to those of technology rivals such as YouTube and Facebook . But internally, the two former employees said, they were facing a setback.
In June 2020, after leaving work on the Pinterest policy team, they was made public with claims they had to fight to be paid fairly and were retaliated against to defend change. Ozoma also said the company did not protect her when a colleague shared her personal information with hate sites.
Ozoma and Banks ended up leaving the company with half a year of severance pay. But her public comments laid the groundwork for other women and people of color in the company to present similar experiences.
Two months after she left, former Pinterest CEO Françoise Brougher sued the company for gender discrimination, a case that resulted in the $ 22 million settlement this week.
For Jade Magnus Ogunnaike, senior campaign director for the civil rights organization Color of Change, the deal is the latest example of a Silicon Valley company showing unfair treatment to its black employees.
“It shouldn’t go unnoticed that Pinterest has yet to offer an apology or line of action for accountability to Ifeoma and Aerica, two black women whose courage sparked a public scrutiny of culture of the company’s toxic work that probably influenced this week’s deal, ”he said.
Banks said she and Ozoma decided to show up in June because Pinterest, like many companies this year, made public statements in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.
“I couldn’t stay on the sidelines and let a company come out with the release of Black Lives Matter when they weren’t acting like they cared about black lives in the negotiations they had just concluded with us,” Banks told the Guardian. “It was about integrity and not letting the company be painted as a space for kindness and positivity when we had been completely denigrated, mistreated and retaliated against.”
Meanwhile, these women’s accusations about Pinterest’s working conditions have shaken the reputation of the tech company, which has a predominantly female user base and has long been seen as a “nice” alternative. to Silicon Valley’s highest-tech companies — culture bro.
Brougher made his lawsuit against his former employer public in August in a blog post titled The Pinterest Paradox: Cupcakes and Toxicity, in which he wrote that while 70% of Pinterest users are women, the company is “Led by men with little input from women executives.”
“Pinterest’s executive women, even at the highest levels, are marginalized, excluded, and silenced,” she said.
Following initial complaints from Ozoma and banks, a group of Pinterest shareholders filed a lawsuit against company executives, including CEO Ben Silbermann, alleging that they enabled a culture of discrimination. The complaint also alleged that culture of discrimination that has damaged Pinterest’s reputation and end result. He alleged that Silbermann did not act on the allegations.
“He repeatedly stood in front of the company, surrounding himself with men and marginalizing women who dared to challenge Pinterest’s male-dominated white clique,” the lawsuit says. This case will be heard in 2021.
A Pinterest spokeswoman said the company does not share details about employee-specific situations “out of respect for the privacy of those involved.” He said Pinterest posted an independent review of its work culture five months ago, which it concluded this week.
That board recommended that Pinterest require unconscious bias training for all employees, provide more transparency and standardization around roles and their requirements to ensure that diverse candidates are not promoted, and create a centralized team to investigate job issues. .
In response to concerns about diversity, the company has “added diversity” to its board of directors by promoting diverse people of color and “renewed and expanded” inclusion training for employees. The company also announced a partnership with the NAACP to form an Inclusion Advisory Board.
“Pinterest is fully committed to making the changes recommended by the Council’s Special Committee,” the spokeswoman said. “We value our employees and know it’s our responsibility to build a diverse, equitable and inclusive environment for everyone on Pinterest.”
Banks said what they faced with Pinterest and Ozoma on Pinterest has become commonplace for women in color in the tech industry, who are hired to increase diversity and then fired for calling the same problems who had been hired. He compared her experience to the controversy that arose at Google last week when a prominent black scientist studying the ethics of artificial intelligence said she was fired after the company tried to suppress her research and went criticize their diversity efforts.
“That’s why diversity isn’t enough,” Banks said. “Therefore, the representation in technology must be equitable. It is not enough to have a person of color on a blackboard or in suite C. We need a representation in technology that reflects the current demographics of our country. “
The problems Pinterest faces come at a time of renewed focus on technology companies, from their diversity issues to their economic power and the lack of regulation that is being reviewed. Google has faced three consecutive antitrust lawsuits this fall and Facebook is facing calls that must be broken.
“The era of self-regulation in the tech industry is over,” Banks said. “Now is the time for external forces to enter and manage the industry in a way that the industry has refused to do on its own.”