I'll try to assume good faith, but this is the sort of framing often used in the waning days of unpopular ideas.
That's not what DEI ever was. It fundamentally came down to evaluating disparate impact and then setting targets based on it. The underlying idea is that if a given pool (in the US, generally national- or state-level statistics) has a racial breakdown like so:
10% X
30% Y
60% Z
But your company or organization had a breakdown of:
5% X
25% Y
70% Z
You are institutionally racist and need to pay money to various DEI firms in order to get the right ratios, where 'right' means matching (or exceeding) the population for certain ethnic minorities. The 'certain ethnic minorities' value changed over time depending on who you would ask.
The methods to get 'the right ratios' varied from things like colorblind hiring (which had a nil or opposite effect), to giving ATS-bypassing keywords to minority industry groups (what the FAA did here).
That's not what DEI ever was. It fundamentally came down to evaluating disparate impact and then setting targets based on it. The underlying idea is that if a given pool (in the US, generally national- or state-level statistics) has a racial breakdown like so:
But your company or organization had a breakdown of: You are institutionally racist and need to pay money to various DEI firms in order to get the right ratios, where 'right' means matching (or exceeding) the population for certain ethnic minorities. The 'certain ethnic minorities' value changed over time depending on who you would ask.The methods to get 'the right ratios' varied from things like colorblind hiring (which had a nil or opposite effect), to giving ATS-bypassing keywords to minority industry groups (what the FAA did here).