Maybe the lack of talent is at the top of Wells Fargo? Just sayin'...

Last week, Wells Fargo announced a rolling layoff. They're not alone when it comes to pink slipping. A lot of financial services outfits are getting in on that act. But Wells Fargo has had more than its share of troubles, most of them of their own making. (Here's a post from January 2017 (Oh, oh, the Wells Fargo scandals keep a comin') that chronicles, among other things, their firing of whistleblowers.)

Of course, you can't blame CEO Charlie Scharf for those woes of yore. He's only been at Wells Fargo since last October. But he did make a bit of recent news when it was revealed that, back in June, he wrote a memo in which he blamed the bank's scarcity of Black employees on, well, potential Black employees. Here's what Charlie wrote:

“While it might sound like an excuse, the unfortunate reality is that there is a very limited pool of black talent to recruit from.” (Source: WaPo)

Yes, indeed, it does sound kinda-sorta like an excuse.

Scharf has since apologized: 

On Wednesday, Scharf apologized in a memo to the entire company “for making an insensitive comment reflecting my own unconscious bias.”

“There are many talented diverse individuals working at Wells Fargo and throughout the financial services industry and I never meant to imply otherwise,” Scharf wrote. “It’s clear to me that, across the industry, we have not done enough to improve diversity, especially at senior leadership levels. And there is no question Wells Fargo has to make meaningful progress to increase diverse representation.”

AOC's response was, as usual, on point:

“Perhaps it’s the CEO of Wells Fargo who lacks the talent to recruit Black workers,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said in a tweet.

And that's exactly it.

I'm no HR expert, but I do know that people tend to hire in their own image and likeness - the "unconscious bias" Scharf admits to. He did his undergrad at Johns Hopkins. Anyone willing to bet against the up-and-coming young banksters he likes to see being lax bros? 

So, if your pool of hirees are people like you - coming from pedigreed colleges and universities - you may not find as many POC or even white folks from working class backgrounds to jump into your pool, and finding a place for themselves on any fast track. 

But I suspect that, if you asked, say, branch managers who their bright young things are, you might find plenty of talented, ambitious individuals who would just love to get on that management trainee track. Maybe they didn't go to Johns Hopkins. Maybe they went to some no-name community college, then finished up their BA online at the University of Phoenix. Maybe they didn't go to their state's flagship university, but rather to what my cousin calls a "directional school" - a state university with North-South-East-West in its name. (She and her husband are proud - and plenty accomplished - grads of directional schools.) Maybe they didn't go to Princeton or Stanford, but got a scholarship to Our Lady of the Tulips (the sort of school where I got my undergrad degree) and were happy to get a free ride.

There are plenty of good, smart people in lesser schools. I know this up close and personal.

Anyway, if you're only looking in certain places, you may not find what you're looking for. 

Obviously, with a quarter of a million employees - at least before the latest round of layoffs - Wells-Fargo is hiring from multiple sources and for positions at all levels. What I'm talking about in the above is who gets in on the fast track to promotion. The emerging leaders, the high potentials. But the problem and the solution are pretty much the same whether you're hiring for the most entry level position or someone who has potential to go far. If you want a diverse workforce, look for them where there's diversity.

This may mean reaching out beyond your own image-and-likeness network. It may mean taking more of a chance. It may mean trying to make your organization more attractive to a diverse population. And it might help if your organization did something about its rag-ass reputation, i.e., one that didn't have to settle:

...several discrimination cases in recent years. In 2012, the company agreed to pay more than $175 million to settle allegations from the Justice Department that it steered Black and Latino borrowers into expensive loans and charged them excessive fees... [and a] case directly related to its hiring practices. Wells Fargo agreed to pay $7.8 million to settle allegations by the Labor Department that it discriminated against more than 34,000 Black and more than 300 female applicants. 

No liability was admitted in either of these cases. But, ahem...

Wonder if some days the bit mahoffs like Charlie Scharf wake up wishing they were back in the simpler times, when Wells Fargo meant a wagon pulling into the streets of River City (setting for The Music Man) with a load of goodies. 

I got a box of maple sugar on my birthday.
In March I got a gray mackinaw.
And once I got some grapefruit from Tampa.
Montgom'ry Ward sent me a bathtub and a cross-cut saw.

Anyway, seems to me that some of Wells Fargo's problem with talent is a lack of it at the top.