Good morning!
There’s a new phrase permeating the anti-DEI spaces online.
“MEI,” an acronym for “merit, excellence, and intelligence” was coined earlier this month by Alexandr Wang, cofounder and CEO of Scale AI, a $4 billion startup. The “hiring principle,” as Wang put it, means the company will only hire the strongest candidate.
“We hire only the best person for the job, we seek out and demand excellence, and we unapologetically prefer people who are very smart,” Wang wrote. “We treat everyone as an individual. We do not unfairly stereotype, tokenize, or otherwise treat anyone as a member of a demographic group rather than as an individual.”
Wang’s terminology was an instant hit with several business leaders who have criticized corporate diversity and inclusion programs before, including Elon Musk and Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong. “Great!” Musk wrote in a response to Wang’s post on X (formerly Twitter).
But experts who I spoke with about Wang’s new catchphrase say his arguments misunderstand what DEI is actually about, and erroneously define it to mean hiring someone for their identity alone, and ignoring other qualifications. ScaleAI declined Fortune’s requests for comment.
In fact, DEI practices are very much focused on hiring the best person for the job. And experts said that “MEI” doesn’t account for real biases that exist in the workplace, and must be taken into consideration. No hiring manager can be truly objective in selecting the candidate with the most “outstanding talent” for the job.
“People that think that we’re over the hill when it comes to diversity and inclusion, both from a racial as well as gender perspective, are delusional,” says Lisa Simon, chief economist at people analytics platform Revelio Labs. “We’re not in a moment where you can get rid of all these policies and hope they will continue. As soon as you remove these things, people go back to hiring people that look like them.”
You can read my full story here.
Paige McGlauflin
paige.mcglauflin@fortune.com
@paidion
Today’s edition was curated by Emma Burleigh.
Around the Table
A round-up of the most important HR headlines.
- As companies are getting more creative with their team building events, consulting firm Kicksaw is throwing country songwriting parties for its employees. Wall Street Journal
- Chinese businesses are denying employees work-life balance and enforcing long hours, after leaner times following peak market value levels in 2021. Financial Times
- The Social Security Administration will drop more than 100 outdated jobs from its database that is used to determine what workers get disability benefits—a protocol that has been largely regarded as unfair. Washington Post
Watercooler
Everything you need to know from Fortune.
Tech teamwork. A new Bank of America Institute report shows that collaborative industrial robots or “cobots” used to work alongside employees are on the rise among companies. —Sheryl Estrada
Centering creativity. The provost of Paris’ top tech university says that AI is booming in France due to students’ focus on humanities courses alongside STEM classes. —Ryan Hogg
Running late. Nearly half of Gen Z workers say that arriving to work five to 10 minutes late is tantamount to being punctual, but most baby boomer bosses don’t tolerate tardiness. —Orianna Rosa Royle
