Netflix cuts leads to discussion about diversity
Two rounds of personnel cuts by Netflix within two months this spring have fuelled a heated debate whether the leading subscription streaming service platform with 222 million global subscribers, is in parallel changing course on diversity.
Many of the 150 employees being let go recently were members of marginalized communities or leaders in diversity initiatives who had helped build Netflix’s image in recent years as an inclusive company, according to a laid-off staffer who had been active in promoting diversity and inclusion.
A bit more than half of Netflix’s global staff are women, the company said earlier this year in an updated diversity and inclusion report. 51.7% were women, up from 48.7% in 2020.
Managers cited slow user growth and reduction in paid subscriptions for the layoffs, but former employees, representatives of the LGBTQI+ community, people of colour and third-party observers point to a shift on diversity which has started several months ago.
As the company fights to maintain its leading position in the streaming world there are questions whether diversity efforts are becoming collateral damage, Los Angeles Times noted in an article.
“Nearly everyone I see on LinkedIn posting about being laid off worked on diversity, equity and inclusion across the company. These are not the only people being laid off, but they comprise too many of the 150 for it to be coincidence”, Evette Dionne tweeted last week.
Since last December Dionne was leading a team of writers for Netflix’s website Tudum, with an editorial strategy around promoting dialogue on inclusion and representation. Four months later, she and other members of the team were fired in the first round of cuts.
According to critics such cuts had a clear impact on the platform’s diverse content. Many of the former employees were involved in diversity communications initiatives, including Black community-focused Strong Black Lead, Latinx-focused Con Todo, Asian American-focused Golden, and LBTQ-focused Most, Time noted.
“It started last October, when Netflix employees protested the company’s defence of a highly popular special by comedian Dave Chappelle, who made remarks some viewed as offensive to the transgender community. Co-Chief Executive Ted Sarandos said he ‘screwed up’ in his efforts to communicate with upset employees but defended the show”, according to Time.
A few days before the announcement that Netflix was cutting about 150 employees, about 2% of its workforce, the company had released a memo updating culture guidelines. “Depending on your role, you may need to work on titles you perceive to be harmful. If you find it hard to support our content breadth, Netflix may not be the best place for you”, the memo stated, limiting expectations for how responsive the company would be to employees’ views on societal and political issues going forward, Time stressed.
A Netflix spokesperson responded that the company had been discussing the issues related to the memo for over 18 months, invited all employees to give feedback and received over 1,000 comments that helped improve the draft.
Regarding the layoffs in its latest statement Netflix disputed that it was retreating from diversity and inclusion efforts. Audience-focused channels, such as “Strong Black Lead”, remain a priority and about half of Netflix’s workforce still comes from an underrepresented ethnic group or race, it said.
“As we explained on earnings, our slowing revenue growth means we are also having to slow our cost growth as a company…These changes are primarily driven by business needs rather than individual performance, which makes them especially tough as none of us want to say goodbye to such great colleagues”, the press statement read.
Netflix is one of many Hollywood players that touted diversity and inclusion efforts following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, Los Angeles Times noted. Last year, the company said it was committing 100 million U.S. dollars over five years to organizations that help underrepresented communities find jobs in TV and film. It also pledged to allocate 2% of its cash holdings to Black-led financial institutions and work with fist-time filmmakers that include women and people of colour.
Laid-off employees say that was just window dressing and the decision to make Netflix’s content more homogenous had been made long ago.
“They had hinted around at the audience channels being decimated, and that was before the [quarterly] call. So, the call seems to be the way that they are framing to justify the layoffs, but it was something they were going to do anyway”, a former employee told The Daily Beast, speaking on condition of anonymity.
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