Coca-Cola has pressed pause on a controversial “diversity plan” after what Fox News described as an “intense backlash,” and the company’s general counsel, Bradley Gayton, who authored the plan, has now abruptly resigned.
As The Daily Wire reported back in February, “Coca-Cola debuted a new policy this year implementing a diversity quota for the outside counsel it retains, saying it will only hire law firms that commit to providing 15 percent of billed time from black attorneys, higher than the percentage of African Americans in the U.S. population.” Law firms working with the soft drink giant, were also required, under the new policy, to “commit that at least 30% of each of billed associate and partner time will be from diverse attorneys, and of such amounts at least half will be from Black attorneys.”
The soft drink titan also passed the “diversity” on to its employees. In a series of slides leaked to media, a company working with Coca-Cola to provide corporate training encouraged Coke employees to “be less white” in an effort to create a more welcoming and racially diverse workplace.
Gayton reportedly authored the law firm diversity plan after viewing websites for firms providing Coca-Cola’s outside counsel and seeing mostly white headshots.
“I write you with a heavy heart,” Gayton said in a letter to outside counsel firms, according to The Daily Wire. “Gayton declared that Coca-Cola’s previous efforts to promote diversity ‘are not working’ as apparent from the ‘alarming number of new partner headshots’ with an ‘obvious lack of diversity.’” – READ MORE
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