A great New York bastion of overwhelmingly white elitism is reeling, wracked by recrimination, resignation and soul-searching in the aftermath of the George Floyd’s killing by police. Another has, uh, not. And so while the media—necessarily if also endlessly navel-gazing as it is—spills millions of gallons of figurative ink handwringing, Wall Street has been content to say the right things and make the right promises and accept the plaudits and grateful thanks (and the fulminations of racists) that come with them.
Well, Marilyn Booker is, shall we say, a touch skeptical, since Morgan Stanley decided after 16 years that it didn’t need a chief diversity officer… in December.
She believes she was fired because she pushed too hard to get senior executives in that division to embrace her plan to restructure a program for training black financial advisers. She thought the restructuring would help more recruits succeed….
“My story is the same story as those of many black people on Wall Street,” she said in an interview. “Our fate has been tied to the goodness of whatever white person is in charge. That is no way to have a career…..”
“Morgan Stanley made $41 billion last year — that’s a drop in the bucket, it’s not even a rounding error,” Ms. Booker said of Mr. Gorman’s $25 million pledge. “People have to put these things in context. If there’s a real business initiative that they’re focused on, he’d put more than six basis points into it.”
She Spent 16 Years as Morgan Stanley’s Diversity Chief. Now She’s Suing [NYT]