What fashion can learn from the fallout and how the corporate purpose imperative is evolving.
For fashion, which draws so much inspiration from, has such deep roots in and markets so extensively to the LGBTQ community, it’s almost the definition of a must-win topic for the industry.Business hasn’t been silent on the rise of state legislation, which according to The Human Rights Campaign and Freedom for All Americans amounted to 26 anti-LGBTQ bills enacted into law across 10 states last year with more than 160 proposed measures still pending.
But chief executive officers might also be feeling the weight of the world, trying to retreat back into a position that has them focusing on business. Addressing or even articulating the need to fix society’s ills — from LGBTQ and reproductive rights to systemic racism and climate change — is a big job.
The bond between employee and company is especially strong, with Edelman finding that 77 percent of respondents trust their employer. An open letter from a group of Disney employees, or cast members, showed how the rank and file — or a big enough portion of it to matter — clearly wanted more and took the company’s leaders to task, noting their statements “have utterly failed to match the magnitude of the threat to LGBTQIA+ safety represented by this legislation.”
“Employees are not an insignificant stakeholder group,” said Mark Lipton, board adviser and professor emeritus at the Parsons School of Design and The New School. “My gut tells me that if the employees did not mobilize, that if they themselves did not create an internal movement for this to happen, we probably wouldn’t have heard a peep.”
On one hand, CEOs are as busy as ever navigating a complicated business landscape with the stock market in retreat, inflation at 40-year highs, consumer spending uncertain after last year’s buying boom, the continued digitization of style and the rest of it. , proving just how hard such stands are. It wasn’t a surprise to see Levi’s, which has long lead on cultural issues, sign on to the business statement over LGBTQ rights.“Here you’ve got this extra asset of the CEO with a tailwind of a populous who now feels that they’re credible,” Lipton said. “At the same time, the CEOs are putting their hands up and saying, ‘I’m not there.’”
“One of the lessons that is very clear from what’s happened is that time and silence are no longer on your side,” Wheeless said. “Companies have to act quickly and be as decisive as they can on what they’re going to do.” “Transparency trumps all,” she said. “It’s not unusual for a company today to say, OK, let’s use our power behind the scenes to try to impact it. Today, if you don’t tell people what you’re doing, you’re doing nothing.
Figuring out just how to be truly courageous might not be something that CEOs picked up in business school or on their way up the corporate ladder. And that seems likely to only increase as the society splits along new fault lines and people and institutions reset.