Waking Up to the Impact of Privilege

I’ve been thinking a lot in the last two weeks about privilege, and the way that multiple dimensions of privilege impact the ways that opportunities are made available, or withheld, from individuals.  It’s a topic that I’ve only begun to explore in my own life, but I know that it’s at the core of the way that power is held in our society, and that has some important implications for the field of Diversity & Inclusion (D&I).

The other day, a video of an eighth grade student named Royce Mann went viral.  He’s reciting a poem that he wrote titled “White Boy Privilege”, and the poem closes by saying “I know it wasn’t us eighth-grade white boys who created this system, but we profit from it every day.  We don’t notice these privileges, though, because they don’t come in the form of things we gain, but rather the lack of injustices that we endure.”

What else is there to say?  He so succinctly answers those who derisively ask, “What privilege?  Where do I go to cash in all this privilege that I have as a white person?”  Privilege isn’t about what I receive or am entitled to receive as a white, able-bodied, traditionally masculine cisgender male born into middle-class economic circumstances.  The lens through which I viewed the world growing up was the only one I knew.  So this isn’t about hating the past, or self-loathing in the present.  It’s about waking up to a bigger world than I knew existed, and seeing that the system that from which I’ve benefited throughout my life is the same system that causes pain to so many others.  It’s about developing an understanding of how I can share the tools and platforms that are available to me today so that others can create a better future for themselves.

But there are social and cognitive barriers that need to be overcome in order to acknowledge, accept, and do something about privilege.  In the August issue of Harvard Business Review, Burrell writes, “If those in power think this world is basically fair and just, they won’t even recognize – much less worry about – systemic unfairness.”  She goes on to quote the work of Robert H. Frank, a Cornell economist and author of a book titled Success and Luck.  Frank discusses the idea that most people don’t see the role that luck, or circumstance, plays in success.  In fact, for many, once success is achieved, there is a tendency to ascribe success entirely to their own hard work.[1]

The dangerous aspect of this paradigm is that if I presume that my success is based entirely on my own talent and hard work, I’m tempted to think of lack of success in others as being due to a lack of hard work or, if I’m feeling generous, the notion that the person caught a bad break.  And all of this ignores the idea of overlapping social systems that work against groups who do not hold institutional or social power.

This has resonance and relevance for those of us working in Diversity & Inclusion in our places of work.  We need the advocacy and leadership of those who’ve achieved in our organizations, and risen to our highest ranks.  If they’re helping us to drive our efforts from a place of self-awareness and social awareness, that’s a great benefit.  But if there’s education to be done, we must be savvy about how we do that, lest we breed defensiveness and half-hearted support.

I’ve been in China this week, and I found myself more aware than I’ve ever been of a different type of privilege.  It’s actually one I’ve never seen described, but I think it’s safe to say that there’s such a thing as linguistic privilege.  It’s the presumption made by those who speak an organization’s primary language that someone who pauses or stumbles over a word in their second or third language is somehow less intelligent, or less fit for a leadership role.  I understand that there’s a practical component to expecting that all leaders at a certain level can communicate with one another in a common language.  In this case, though, I’m talking about a person who perhaps speaks with a thick accent, or occasionally misplaces a word, and the way that this can hold them back.  They might be told that they need additional language training, or perhaps they’re told nothing at all – just left to wonder why they’re not progressing in a global organization that seems to be full of opportunities for skilled leaders.

So privilege has impacts across multiple dimensions and multiple facets of our lives.  The opportunity is to recognize it, identify it for what it is, and raise it as an issue.  I had a fantastic conversation with a member of our team in China who sits on our D&I Advisory Council, and we talked about the issue of language, and how we can address it in our talent and succession conversations, and push back on those who suggest that a minor linguistic barrier denotes a lack of ability or smarts.

I also realize that the topic of privilege can be politically charged.  For some, there is a tendency to disregard the idea of privilege entirely, viewing it as a critique of those in power, or an excuse by those who are adversely impacted by system racism, sexism, ageism, classism, or any other philosophy that seeks to limit a group of people based on who they are.

The thing is this – ignorance of privilege is the default.  The biggest problem with privilege is that those who benefit can go through their whole lives without realizing it or acknowledging it.  And this impacts workplaces and the organizational structures in which we operate each day.  Summarizing research by Ashleigh Shelby Rosette and Leigh Plunkett Tost, Lisa Burrell writes,

“Senior leaders need to recognize their organizations’ inequities – probably more than anyone else, since they have the power to make changes.  But once they’ve climbed into their positions, they usually lose sight of what they had to overcome to get there.  As a result, Rosette and Tost find, ‘they lack the motivation and perspective to actively consider the advantages that dominant-group members’ experience.’”

The risk in recognizing and owning privilege is that now I feel compelled to do something about it.  And I can’t un-see it.  The acknowledgement is a part of me now, and I’ll do what I can to address ways of thinking about and discussing talent that quietly favor the white males in the organization.  It might mean sharing power, and I know that scares people.  It might mean caring differently about those around me who I might otherwise look past.  And that can be a fearful thing, because it feels like uncharted territory.

Which takes me back to Royce Mann, and his poem.  It’s a hopeful and brave thing, I think, when an eighth-grader can see, and speak so eloquently, truths that evade so many of his seniors.  It’s a hopeful and brave thing when Diversity and Inclusion are taught on college campuses, not by faculty, but by students who serve as peer educators to other students. 

So I resolve not to live in fear.  I resolve to do what I can, where I am, to make opportunities available to everyone, no matter who they are.  I resolve to share the platforms and tools that are available to me.  I resolve to be aware, and awake, and to do better. 

I’m in that unexpected and un-looked-for place, where you realize that you have something to learn from the generation that’s coming up behind.  And I’m eager to get started.

[1] Burrell, Lisa, “We Just Can’t Handle Diversity”, Harvard Business Review, August 2016.