People of Colour Face Burn Out As Companies Ask Them To Work For Free to Combat Racism

On May 25th George Floyd was killed by a policeman in the US.

One of the most widespread responses by companies and organisations around the world has been to ask Black people to work for free to work out their corporate response to the tragedy, and their general policies when it comes to race.

That is right. A Black man is killed. Black people are traumatised by the episode. And the most widespread response is to get Black people to work for free. 

This phenomenon is not new and even has a name: “Cultural taxation” 

The term was first coined by Prof. Amado Padilla from Stanford University in 1994. It is a  way of describing the extra workload that is placed on people from ethnic minorities to help companies and organisations combat racism, but importantly the individuals are expected to do this extra work for free.   

“Cultural taxation” prays on non-White people’s desire to create a better world when it comes to combating racism but they are made to do it in the service of an organisation, and ultimately bring accolades and benefit to the organisation in question.

In effect non-White people are being asked to do consultancy work, demonstrating knowledge of their cultural group and specific issues, for free. 

The “taxation” is most commonly levied on employees within an organisation but can also be levied on people outside the organisation. 

Almost every non-White leading industry figure in UK I know has been approached by major British media organisation to give them advice on how to shape their corporate response and policies for free. There are a few examples that I’ve come across that do pay for this kind of work, but these are “the exceptions that prove the rule”. 

So why does this matter?

The main problem is that not only is this work unpaid but it is usually on top of a non-White person’s existing “day job”. Research published in the US showed African Americans are more likely to suffer from burnout than their White colleagues and a major part of that is due to the extra workload placed on them.

Publications like Fortune and Nature have even published articles highlighting the real risk of burning out Black and Asian employees for doing this work for free.

The dilemma facing Black and Asian people however is summed up neatly by Dr Carla Figueira de Morisson Faria at University College London; “Unfortunately, if we don’t do this work, no one will.” And anyone interested in diversity, inclusion and equality, knows how important this work is for multinational companies and major organisations to do, so not volunteering to do it often doesn’t feel like a socially responsible option.  

So what is the answer?

First of all organisations need to recognise what they are asking for - consultancy - and they rarely ask for this for free in other areas of their business.

They also need to realise that they are possibly running the risk of compounding the problem of racial bias if they are unfairly loading non-White people with this extra work without either compensating them financially for it, or reducing their workload in other areas.

However the “to do” list for British organisations to rectify embedded racialised practices is long, and so it is unrealistic to think that this will be rectified any time soon (after all the phenomenon was first identified and named 26 years ago).

So what can non-White people do who still want to be socially responsible but recognise the unfairness of doing this work for free?

For me the problem arises because there are two issues which are separate but often entangled. Combating racism is a “public good” and serves to improve society as a whole. Improving corporate policy and governance serves to improve the organisation,

Therefore when I am approached I try and distinguish between the two.

If the advice they are looking for is to improve the company’s corporate policy then that is consultancy work, and they should attach the appropriate value to it by paying the people involved whether they are internal employees or external stakeholders.

If however they are producing a piece of work that will benefit the entire industry and the whole of society can learn from the process, this is a “public good” and I am happy to do this work for free and I think most Black, Asian and people from ethnic minorities feel the same. 

Of course, part of the problem is there is not always a clear demarcation between the two types of work.

We must guard against seeing our lives through a transactional prism. We devalue the quality of our lives if we think we must be paid for everything we do. However we also devalue the importance of our work if we do not sometimes put a financial value on it.

Like most things in life it is a question of balance.

Let’s work together to make sure we get the balance right.