Feature Stories - April 2011

Industry Focus

Minority-Owned Businesses

 Minority-owned businesses in Nevada face a number of unique challenges.  Recently, executives from minority-owned businesses met at the Las Vegas offices of Holland & Hart to discuss these challenges and whether or not being a minority-owned business today presents the same hurdles it may have in the past.
 Connie Brennan, publisher of Nevada Business Magazine, served as moderator for the event. These monthly meetings are designed to bring leaders together to discuss issues pertinent to their industries. Following is a condensed version of the roundtable discussion.

Is discrimination an issue for Minority-Owned Businesses?

Bonnie Chu: I feel discrimination is reversed. Everybody gets their hair and nails done, but I can’t get the Asian-Americans or African-Americans to come to my salons because it’s conceptual Euphoria. Therefore, we don’t do Asian nails, even though we have 350 stylists. I feel that kind of discrimination within the minority group.
Shaundell Newsome: It is very difficult for me to get a contract with an African American person in a seat of power. It’s actually easier for me to get a contract from a White or Hispanic than it is from our people. Some of us have a different type of confidence about who we are. Being proud means being proud of your heritage and where you came from. There’s a big difference between pride and power. We’re not saying we want power, we want the same opportunities. If I stepped on the football field, the rules are all the same. This is out of bounds, this is a penalty. If that was the same way in business, there would be a lot more people reaching higher numbers.
Ernest Fountain: I don’t have a problem with racism because our capitalistic system breeds racism. Everything in our system is based on competition. White America is competing on a daily basis to maintain power in the system. They don’t call all of us at the table and share their strategy. It’s a free enterprise system based on competition, not on equality.
Chu: There’s a difference between preconception and discrimination. I don’t discriminate because you are Hispanic or because you’re African American and I don’t think people discriminate against me because I’m Asian.
Berna Rhodes-Ford: I was an in-house attorney at a corporation and having come from a law firm you always want to see some diversity in the people that you work with. Whenever I would hire a minority law firm as my general counsel, he would say, “Let’s make sure they’re qualified”. I never got that from a majority firm. So, in order for me to excel at my company I had to give the business to the majority firms, because when I brought a minority firm, if they messed up, even though all the firms mess up, I’m on the hook because I selected a minority firm, even though they were just as qualified. Everybody messes up, but some mistakes get overlooked and some don’t.
James Lopez: A lot of people are talking about the manifestation of discrimination. Discrimination is out there, and we’re dealing with it by being very careful when we hire or work with another minority company.
Vivian Wright-Bolton: I always push my AV techs that are females into job situations, and I always get that second glance. My women work twice as hard and deliver twice the performance as their male counterparts do. So that’s the sexism. We deal with that on a daily basis, especially in the AV world. It’s an old boys’ club, mostly White and there are very few minorities that participate.

Is the level of discrimination the same or worse as it was ten years ago?

   
Joe Hernandez: It’s better because of the understanding of cultures, the country’s diversity, and the media. However, I don’t know that people are really aware that they feel uncomfortable around minorities because of their misconceptions. When you understand other people’s cultures, you realize that the only difference between any of us is just the color of our skin and if you cut us open, we’re all the same inside. We have the same kinds of goals. We want to be successful, provide for our families, and make sure that we are accepted. We want to be the type of person that gives something back, not just a taker.
Fountain: Discrimination is just more sophisticated than it was in the old days. When my father was a young man, he would go into a bank looking for a loan and they would tell him, “William, why would you come down here embarrassing yourself. You know we don’t make loans to Negroes.” So it’s now against the law to decline a person for a loan or employment because of race, creed, color, sex. Now, it’s done differently. If Mr. Lopez was looking for a job they would tell him “Thank you very much for coming in. I’m going to give your application full consideration.” Because of their preconceived notions about Mexicans they say to themselves, “This is a $160,000 job; I am not going to give it to him.” They don’t say that to him though.
Lopez: I don’t think it’s the discrimination of the 60’s that we’re talking about here where people beat you over the head and said, “You’re not white, so we’re not going to give you any work.” It’s the discrimination of the 90’s and the new millennium where they just don’t say that and they just do the action.

What programs are there to combat discrimination?

Rhodes-Ford: There are companies that have specific criteria. About 15 to 20 years ago they would outsource legal services and ask for minorities to get the work. The firms would put my name on it, but I wouldn’t get the experience. I wasn’t going to advance as a legal professional or become a partner without the experience. So now they ask to see a minority working actively on the case and whenever possible taking a lead role. It’s not until the companies start demanding minority representation that they get it. From a legal perspective, that’s access to capital. I know a lot of companies now have diversity initiatives. It’s more than just complaining about the fact that we don’t get it. We have to do our part and do what we have to do to get the business.
Hernandez: I agree. Because when we started working with MGM it was as a subcontractor. I said, “We don’t want to be a token minority that you just pay to say we’re part of this process.” Eventually, because of our tenacity to really learn and grow the business, we got a reputation as being one of the suppliers for this particular type of administration. When it comes to diversity, companies have beautiful internal diversity. They hire diverse people, have diversity fairs, training courses, but they don’t externalize it. They don’t say “let’s take these tents of diversity and utilize them by hiring minorities to do external work because we truly embrace diversity.” A lot of times those initiatives are just for the feel good of the corporate level people, not really for the external use.
Fountain: The nature of capitalism itself tells me that diversity is just a strategy, to make us think that if I follow this protocol I can get opportunities. I can guarantee most of us don’t get opportunities through the diversity process. That’s the problem I’ve got. It’s based on competitive strategy. What we can do is create more minority banks and do the same things as banks do for White people.
Wright-Bolton: I am a trifecta minority. I am a woman, Latina, I’m also gay. I’ve learned that the gay politics aren’t for equality. So we do it with our money. We spend our gay dollars in companies that endorse our equality measures and so forth. That has to come. Those initiatives have to come from our communities. Those are the lessons learned from that type of history.

Why do minority-owned companies not support other minority-owned companies?

 
Fountain: The Commerce Department reported that in 2007 there were 1.6 million Asian businesses that generated $543 billion in total revenue, 2.3 million Hispanic businesses that generated $343 billion, and 1.9 million African American businesses that generated $135 billion in total revenue, even though Black consumers spent $900 billion. That substantiates that we are deliberately not doing business with one another.
Lopez: It’s so systematic that it’s how we’re responding to discrimination. It’s the same idea as socialization. It’s not because we don’t think they can do the work, it’s because we’re taught that they can’t do the work. If you’re a minority and you mess up a job, you’ve given a black eye to the whole community.

How do we level
the field?

Rhodes-Ford: We have to create networking groups and refer businesses.  We’ll get to know each other and over time we’ll trust each other’s work. We have to take it upon ourselves to have deeper relationships with people, that’s one solution.
Chu: Discrimination or reverse discrimination is always going to be there. That’s a fact of life. Sometimes I do it unknowingly, but when I first see you, I wouldn’t think you’re Hispanic or you’re gay. The first thing we need to do is remove ourselves from the thought that we are minority and make ourselves mainstream, just like Caucasians. Why am I different from a Caucasian? If we remove ourselves from that, maybe we’ll make a difference.
Newsome: A lot of us have. I can walk into a country club and play golf and drink wine with the best of them. I don’t think it’s us that we’re really talking about. We’re talking about those people that can’t do that.
Chu: So what if they’re not going to do business with us, we’re just going to go where people understand. When I first came to this country, my parents said “Because you are a foreigner, you need to work twice as hard to be recognized. If somebody takes an hour to read a book, you have to take two hours.” We need to look more inward. It’s a different approach. That’s how my culture would teach me.
Hernandez: I know we all have to work harder. I’ve been in several social situations with my business partner and when we look around the room people are looking at us because we’re the only two people of color. When I walk into a room of people, I’m not Hispanic he’s not Black and she’s not gay, everybody is just everybody. We’re in that position, we’ve accepted that, but you can work as hard as you want, and assimilate yourself into the culture, but it doesn’t matter, you’re still the minority. It’s not us that feel that way; it’s the people that are not minorities.
Wright-Bolton: Confidence also matters. When you come into a room and you’re very matter-of-fact and say this is a non-issue for me everybody will say “just follow their lead,” and they accept it as a norm after a while. When you are coming in a room initially you know that you have to come in very poised and very confident with your pitch and just overcome it, whatever it is. It’s there. It’s always the big elephant in the room. We have all worked twice as hard to get half the respect and half the credibility of our Anglo counterparts. It is about that confidence, about how you use your presence in the room and how you carry your business. I think we have to have the initiatives that aren’t just the diversions.
Will we ever get to the point where we don’t see color anymore?
 
Fountain: I don’t think we’re going to get to that point, period. I believe in the Book of Revelation. It doesn’t say anything in there about everyone loving one another and holding hands before Jesus returns.  Nobody can convince me that it’s going to happen, especially because of the nature of our competitive system.
Chu: I think there’s a trend, though, which is very encouraging. If you look at the interracial marriages they don’t see it.
Fountain: When I was going to school here in Las Vegas, I did not see discrimination. I had White and Hispanic friends who I hung out with. Then when we got about 19 years old it all changed. Everyone assumes their rightful place in the infrastructure or power in the system.
Rhodes-Ford: The interracial marriages and the cultures are blending a lot more now. The west coast is very different. My kids really do not see race. When we mention issues of race, our kids go, “Mom, dad, what are you talking about?” They don’t get it.  
Newsome: One simple thing my mother taught us was to understand each culture and this is why some of us don’t see it. The more cultures I understand, the better off I am. My daughter didn’t think about race until she was at school and said she wanted to celebrate Madam CJ Walker. They told her she wasn’t diverse enough. That’s when you’re reminded of color.
Wright-Bolton: I have four children as well and they don’t see discrimination the way we see it. My two oldest consider themselves Latino, they consider themselves Cuban-American, and obviously, they’re very patriotic.