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LeadershipraceAhead

Do You Work At A Great Place?

Ellen McGirt
By
Ellen McGirt
Ellen McGirt
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Ellen McGirt
By
Ellen McGirt
Ellen McGirt
Down Arrow Button Icon
March 9, 2017, 10:18 AM ET

Today marks the 20th anniversary of one of Fortune’s most beloved and increasing important lists, The 100 Best Companies To Work For. For the eighth time in eleven years, Google is number one. Well done.

This is the list where the people doing the work speak for themselves. To create it, Fortune partners with the folks from Great Place to Work, who assess detailed feedback from more than 230,000 employees, in what is considered to be the most extensive employee survey in corporate America. Have fun with the list online – you can sort by compensation, paid time off, perks and of course, diversity. Number one in that spot is Baptist Health South Florida. Interesting pattern alert: Of the top 10 corporations with the greatest diversity, five are hotel/hospitality companies, including Hilton, Hyatt, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Marriott International, and Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants.

What makes a best company? Says Michael Bush, the CEO of Great Place to Work, it’s understanding how to unlock the real human potential of the people who work there. “Here’s what we know: That treating people with respect, credibility and fairness gives you a significant edge,” he says. “We can link those leadership behaviors to economics, but those behaviors have to be real.”

If you’re free tonight, follow Fortune Magazine on Facebook and tune in at 6pm Eastern a live stream event celebrating the list. In addition to learning more from Michael Bush, you’ll get to hear some inspiration from leadership titan Marcus Buckingham and a panel starring Anthony McBride, Chief Human Relations Officer from Edward Jones, Julie Sweet, CEO of Accenture North America and Mike DeFrino, CEO of Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants. Just how does one turn a good company into a great one? Tune in to find out.

On Point

How the world celebrated International Women’s Day 2017As this short video shows, women around the world took to the streets, dancing, marching, singing - and in the case of Tbilisi, Georgia, stomping on an actual glass ceiling. In NYC, while some protesters were arrested outside of a Trump hotel at Columbus Circle, the statue of the little girl staring down the Wall Street bull became a popular selfie spot. (Here is some excellent coverage of how African women marked the day.)Fortune

Georgia Republicans pass a race-based gerrymandering scheme
As Georgia begins to look more and more like a swing state, Republicans would like to maintain what amounts to a near super-majority in the Georgia state house. So last week, reports Slate, the House passed a bill that would kick black voters out of several GOP districts in the hopes of maintaining a Republican-friendly white majority. The bill was passed with no prior notice and breezed through in two days. It is expected to pass a Republican majority Senate. “The biggest changes strengthen Republican districts that have become more competitive,” says the Atlanta-Journal-Constitution.
Slate

Chance the Rapper to Chicago governor: You don’t want no problem with me
Last week Chancelor Bennett, better known as Chance the Rapper, met with Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner to discuss the poor state of the city’s public schools. The much-hyped meeting ended in disappointment. (The meeting and aftermath actually became a Twitter moment.) Chance reached out after Rauner vetoed a $125 million funding bill that the school system was counting on. “I grew up two blocks from here,” said the 23-year-old rapper at a livestreamed press conference at the Westcott Elementary School, on Chicago’s South Side. But ultimately, “our talks were unsuccessful,” he said. Undeterred, the artist pledged $1 million in arts and enrichment programming to the Chicago Public Schools, which will come from future ticket sales. The crowd went wild.
Fortune

Nike develops a new line for Muslim women athletes
After top athletes like female weightlifter Amna Al Haddad expressed frustration wearing traditional hijab while competing, the designers at Nike HQ decided to expand their sportswear offerings, “to make a performance hijab similar to Nike Pro’s other products: inconspicuous, almost like a second skin." The announcement came shortly after a viral video campaign called “What Will They Say About You?" which prominently features Arab and Muslim women athletes. “When an ad touches on the insecurities of women in a society, digs deeper & becomes an empowerment tool rather than just a product,” tweeted Sara al-Zawqari, a spokewoman for the International Red Cross in Iraq. FYI: More than half of Nike employees are ethnic “minorities.”
Fortune

MIT Media Lab offers a new Disobedience Award with a $250,000 cash prize
The announcement starts with a bold statement from Joi Ito, the lab’s director: “You don’t change the world by doing what you’re told.” The award is designed to support the work of people or groups who are engaged in extraordinary acts of disobedience that will benefit society, people who are disrupting systemic order to create a better world. “This disobedience is not limited to specific disciplines; examples include scientific research, civil rights, freedom of speech, human rights, and the freedom to innovate,” they say, and must adhere to strict principles of non-violence, creativity, courage and responsibility. Click through to read the application, and ask yourself: What have I disobeyed lately? Applications accepted until May 1, 2017.
MIT

Banksy opens a hotel in the Palestinian city of Bethlehem
It has an odd boast: The worst view in the world. The ‘Walled Off Hotel’ is clearly designed to make a point, every room has a close-up view of the concrete wall that Israel has built in some parts of the occupied West Bank. The entire hotel has been designed as a “concept,” says Essex University professor Gavin Grindon. “Not for the great views, but for other reasons which are more artistic.” Built in secrecy over a period of 14 months, it’s designed to look like a colonial-era English gentleman’s club, but with Banksy’s provocative graffiti framed and hanging on the walls. One shows an Israeli soldier and Palestinian youth having a pillow fight; nearby, sculptures “choke” on tear gas fumes. The fully functioning hotel is set to open for online bookings on March 11.
Open Culture

The Woke Leader

Ten tips for leaders to support workplace diversity
There are some great tips here, including a shout-out to raceAhead in tip number three, for which we’re very grateful. But diversity experts Paolo Gaudiano and Ellen Hunt offer an important reminder that diversity is a journey, not a destination. Start by diversifying your networks, change up your sources of information, advocate for more diverse speakers at business events (you can dig into your new network for that) and enjoy the big wide world of literature and film. “Aside from the entertainment value, you will learn to see the world from the point of view of those who are underrepresented.” Amen.
Forbes

Do millennials need adulting school?
This is an odd story, particularly if you are not sure what to believe about millennial hype. On one hand, they’re not narcissistic, checked-out or entitled as some would have had us believe. But on the other hand, says Rachel Weinstein, a psychotherapist, the young professionals she sees are “feeling isolated, overwhelmed, and paralyzed by their dearth of skills and abundance of choices.” She and a colleague started the Adulting School, a place where people can gain skills like personal finance, goal-setting, how to hang a picture, bed-making, career and relationship advice, the sort of stuff that YouTube, books, and magazines provide now, all for $19.99 a month. The school opens later this spring, but to date, the number of teachers pre-enrolling is outpacing the students. But critics say these anxieties are par for the course for this phase of life. “This is not a new phenomenon: What makes it stand out now is the existence of a hashtag,” says anthropology professor Holly Swyers.
Quartz

Men and women use cities very differently so we should design them that way
Since most humans live in or near cities, it seems like a fairly important question: What do you use public transportation for? When Vienna asked the question in 1999, they got very different answers. Men went to work and came home. Women, however, used transportation for a wide variety of things, including shuttling kids, helping aging parents with errands, going to various appointments and the like. The answers led to some important design changes – like wider pavements and ramps – but also lead to a bigger question. Why don’t we do a better job assessing how planning and policy decisions will specifically affect men and women?
FastCo Exist

Quote

I can imagine myself blurbing a book in which Brian Aldiss, predictably, sneers at my work, because then I could preen myself on my magnanimity. But I cannot imagine myself blurbing a book, the first of a new series, which not only contains no writing by women, but the tone of which is so self-contentedly, exclusively male, like a club or a locker room. That would not be magnanimity, it would be foolishness. Gentleman, I just don’t belong here.
—Ursula Le Guin
About the Author
Ellen McGirt
By Ellen McGirt
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