Performative gesture or genuinely supportive? Workplace responses to the 2020 racial injustice movement

Abstract

In the wake of racial injustice protests, corporations communicated their commitment to diversity and inclusion. The present paper describes textual analyses of organizational anti-racism statements released in the period following the murder of George Floyd and a survey of employee perceptions of communication. The review of statements indicated that strategic ambiguity was employed in describing events, harms, diversity, and planned actions, and organizations seldom addressed their internal initiatives, rarely mentioned internal accountability practices for ensuring racial justice, and many did not specifically mention their Black employees. In the survey study, Black employees felt more negatively about an absence of communication than non-Black employees and held more positive work attitudes in organizations with more credible communication. Implications for research on the credibility of corporate social advocacy efforts as well as practical suggestions for communication around these efforts are discussed.