A quick conversation on diversity

I am headed out the door, but here is a quick conversation between our friend Jill and me.

Jill commented: “I read yesterday that federal agencies have been ordered by Trump to ensure that contractors and others they do business with have no history of DEI or any programs that support anti-discrimination! And the Department of Education now has a website for the public to report anything remotely resembling DEI in schools! Jim Crow has been reincarnated by this fascist, racist regime.”

I responded: “Quite simply, diversity is strength of America. If we let regressive, narrow-minded elected officials like Trump squelch access to talent, experience and ideas, we will hasten our decline.”

Ideas are precious. They come from all over and from all kinds of people. Often, those closest to the customer or production may have elegant ideas to improve things. If we limit idea creation, then we are only shooting ourselves in the foot.

Some Successful Immigrants to US

Immigrants bring innovation and an entrepreneurial bent to the US. Their efforts also are accretive to our economy. Even illegal immigrants are ingrained in more than several industries. Per an AI Search Summary:

“Successful immigrants in America come from diverse backgrounds and excel in many fields, including tech (Sergey Brin, Elon Musk), entertainment (Arnold Schwarzenegger, Salma Hayek, Mila Kunis), science (Albert Einstein, Mario Molina), business (Indra Nooyi), and politics (Madeleine Albright, Pramila Jayapal), demonstrating significant contributions to the economy, culture, and innovation, with many founding major companies like Google, Apple, and Amazon, notes the American Immigration Council.”

Just focusing on Tech & Business Leaders, the same AI Search Summary reveals the following successes:

“Sergey Brin: Co-founder of Google (Russia).
Elon Musk: Founder of SpaceX, Tesla (South Africa/Canada).
Jensen Huang: Co-founder of Nvidia (Taiwan).
Andrew Cherng: Co-founder of Panda Restaurant Group (China).
Indra Nooyi: Former CEO of PepsiCo (India).
Jan Koum: Co-founder of WhatsApp (Ukraine).

Science & Academia
Albert Einstein: Nobel Prize-winning physicist (Germany).
Nikola Tesla: Inventor of AC motor (Croatia/Serbia).
Kalpana Chawla: First Indian-American astronaut (India).
Gebisa Ejeta: World Food Prize Laureate, geneticist (Ethiopia).”

We could also mix in names like Wernher Von Braun (Rocket Science), Enrico Fermi (Nuclear Science), and John Kenneth Galbraith (Economics) and Steve Jobs (Apple). Von Braun led the development of our rockets for NASA, Fermi was instrumental in the development of the atomic bomb, and Jobs was instrumental in the creation of Apple Computers. Galbraith was a forward thinker in economics.

For those who want to curtail immigration, let me respond with an observation I read – ideas come from unexpected sources. Leaders must allow for the flow of ideas from such sources, as quite often they come from people closest to the action. This observation comes from the CEO of Alcoa, Paul O’Neill who came in and turned around their troubles. Just leaf through the list above and research their contributions.

Finally, there are a few communities in the US who have been dying off with plant closures. After struggling, they advertised for immigrants to come to their communities and offer new ideas. I found this to be a nice counterpoint to a restrictive mindset under the current regime.