“I’m the bandleader. I’m a person of color, and that adds a fascinating dimension to our story,” says Mellody Hobson of her new role as chairwoman of coffee giant Starbucks. The company announced new management diversity goals in 2020, and 51-year-old Hobson, the only black chairwoman of a Fortune 500 company, is now responsible for turning those goals into reality.
For that, she is the perfect candidate. Hobson is co-CEO of asset management company Ariel Investments, one of the most important black investors in the U.S. “It’s going to be super hard to be a Fortune 500 company without a diverse person on your board,” she told The Wall Street Journal.
Hobson also believes that managers have to be made accountable for driving diversity and that their pay needs to be tied to achievements in this area: “That’s where the rubber meets the road,” she says.
| Word | Translation | Phonetics | SearchStrings |
|---|---|---|---|
| person of color | Nicht-Weiße(r) | person of color | |
| chairwoman | (Vorstands-)Vorsitzende | chairwoman | |
| asset management | Vermögensverwaltung | asset management | |
| board | Vorstand, Geschäftsleitung | board | |
| accountable | verantwortlich | accountable | |
| to drive sth. | hier: etw. voranbringen | ||
| to be tied to sth. | an etw. gekoppelt sein | tied | |
| where the rubber meets the road (US) (ifml.) | worauf es ankommt | where the rubber meets the road |