Bidiversity

Interesting article published by Business Week about Deloitte focusing its recruiting efforts on community college, where minority students are plentiful in the hope of innovation through diversity.

Here are some of the highlights. You can read the full story here.

Deloitte CEO Barry Salzberg likes to talk about the value of diversity. But of the 4,500 partners and other top executives at his firm, 92% are white. A big part of the problem, Salzberg believes, is where Deloitte has been looking: in the same pool of top universities that everyone else taps for minority talent.

So this spring, Salzberg directed some of his senior people to focus their recruiting efforts on community colleges. The rationale: The two-year, state-funded programs are where the majority of African-American and Latino students enroll, especially during tough times. While he says the accounting and consulting giant isn’t bypassing universities, Salzberg disputes the notion that community college students are less suited to the job. “Many have the ability and the drive,” he says. “Targeting these schools offers us a unique opportunity to reach another distinct pool of diverse, top talent.”

If Deloitte doesn’t reach out to community college students, it understands a lot of talent is falling through the cracks. Salzberg says the college outreach prevents the firm from missing an opportunity to get students on the accounting-prep track, or worse, losing out altogether as the students forsake further university training for other vocations. “In general, big corporate companies don’t realize the value that can be found in community colleges,” says Stephanie J. Etter, director of the School of Business at Miami Dade College. “When a student chooses a two-year program rather than a four-year one, they are often overlooked.”

Up Against Stereotypes

Still, Deloitte will have to do a fair amount of myth-busting. Many students believe accountants don green eyeshades and plunk away at calculators all day. So Deloitte is sending a brigade of up to eight staffers, including at least one senior partner, to enlighten, mentor, and ultimately guide potential recruits toward an accounting career. In visits to the campus classrooms, the partners plan to share workplace perspectives and explanations of how the industry has broadened to include financial, management, technology, and human capital consulting.

The Importance of Mentoring

Dorri McWhorter, a partner at Crowe Horwath LLP, a top-10 firm in Chicago who became her firm’s first black partner in 2008 and is a member of the American institute of Certified Public Accountants’ minority initiatives committee, applauds Deloitte for its community college outreach. But she says the key to developing those recruits into partners at the firm depends on committed mentoring programs at every level of the firm. “They get through the door but then hit that glass ceiling,” she says. “You need someone to tell you the real deal and get you to those projects to help you stand out.”

Recently, the big firms have begun to institute high-level mentoring. Bouyer says Ernst & Young has launched something called “inclusive leadership,” a six-month program for partners and directors, teaching them how best to lead in this new diverse world by building an inclusive team where collaboration is valued. Similarly, Deloitte has a program designating “breakthrough” minority leaders. In fact, Salzberg has assembled what he calls a “think tank” of these breakthrough accountants of color that he meets with quarterly to deal with everything from communication in the downturn to social media. “It gives me fabulous feedback,” he says.