[hn_throwaway_99]

There was an engineer (I think she was the woman at Google who started the spreadsheet about comparing salaries, but not sure) who said something along the lines of "If you have a 'Chief Diversity Officer', you're doing it wrong." Basically the argument was that it's should be everyone's responsibility, from CEO on down, to ensure that you're recruiting people from varied backgrounds, and that everyone is treated with respect. A Chief Diversity Officer basically seems more like a PR job than something that will actually change internal culture.

Now, granted, Uber obviously was failing on their own in terms of having a respectful culture, so not sure what else to recommend, but I agree, the recommendations in this report seem a lot more to do with optics than anything else.

[1dundundun]

The Chief Diversity Officer often operates in a silo and doesn't have the ability to impact things like hiring so yes, it can be a vanity/PR role if not implemented well.