Activism within companies is necessary, says human resources leader at Meta

Psychologist Mafoane Odara, 43, managed projects to fight violence against women at the Avon Institute when she was called a year ago for a job interview at Meta, as the parent company of Facebook is known today.

“I said in the interview: I’m an activist and I have a life mission that is bigger than Facebook. I want you to know, because I’m not going to stop doing this in here.”

The vehemence, instead of playing against her hiring, contributed to her being chosen for the job. Today, as head of human resources for Latin America, she encourages other employees to take a questioning stance — at a time when the company faces a string of accusations externally related to its business practices.

One of Mafoane’s attributions is to accelerate processes that make Meta a more plural company. According to the latest diversity report, published in July this year, 37% of the approximately 68,000 employees are women (the numbers are global and regional data are not released).

By ethnicity, the workforce is 46% Asian, 39% White, and 7% Hispanic. Only 4% are black.

“Activism is not only possible within companies, it is necessary,” he says. “It is a powerful tool to make them more human and connected to the transformation of the world. Whether for us or for other companies, there is no other way.”

Before reaching the corporate world, Mafoane worked in non-profit institutions with themes such as labor relations and inequality, youth social entrepreneurship and citizen mobilization.

Currently, she reconciles her duties as a multinational executive with her participation in various civil society movements and organizations – such as the Brazil Human Resources Fund, the Vamos Juntas Institute and RenovaBR.

She also provides consultancy, mentorships and lectures on the challenges facing women, especially black women in their careers, motherhood and institutional policy.

“Imagine a person with my story in a company that reaches 3.6 billion people, with resources and openness to innovate”, he says. “It’s an amusement park.”

Meta is accused of allowing its technology to be used to favor the addiction of young people to screens, the spread of hate speech and the weakening of democracy. How is this experienced internally?

The Goal has a difficult ambition, which is to connect billions of people, each with a different mind. Before Facebook came into being 17 years ago, there wasn’t a proposal in the world that allowed for something on this scale.

As this happened, polarization and tensions came, which has led us to a series of reflections on how we deal with our relationships.

Our technology exists to bring people together and build meaningful relationships. We start from the basic principle that crimes will not be accepted. Even so, it hasn’t been enough in a universe of 3.6 billion users.

We recognize our responsibility. We have more than 40,000 employees looking at network security, dozens of projects discussing and encouraging the responsible use of social networks, among other initiatives. We still don’t have all the answers, but we will be tireless in this construction.

​What is the impact of controversies involving the company on employees? Has it become more difficult to attract and retain talent?

No. And I believe this has been the case because Meta has a very strong culture of recognition and appreciation of people.

We approach all issues very openly, with no prohibited subjects. We offer numerous resources to take care of employees’ well-being, educational development, career journey.

Every semester, we carry out a survey in which 98% of employees participate. We ask how they see the future of the company, the management, how happy they are at work.

The latest edition of this research came out right after the last controversy [o vazamento de documentos internos que ficou conhecido como Facebook Papers]. It showed that people still have a lot of trust in the company and the direction we’re going.

You worked for 20 years with civil society movements and organizations and had never worked with HR. What took you to the Goal?

Here, I don’t need to convince anyone that diversity, equity and inclusion are central to the company’s strategy. This is already given. Because the Target will only manage to connect 3.6 billion people if it has representation from the inside.

Also, imagine an activist with my story in a company that reaches billions of human beings, with resources and an openness to innovate. It’s an amusement park.

Today, 65% of Meta’s leadership is made up of men and the company has only 4% blacks among its employees. How to make it more plural?

We set two big goals. The first is to have, by 2024, at least 50% of the workforce made up of women and underrepresented groups — which includes people with disabilities, people of two or more ethnicities, or veterans of war in the United States, for example.

The second goal is to increase the participation of different ethnic groups in leadership roles by 30% by 2025.

We are advancing on both fronts. In relation to the first goal, we are already at 46% participation of women and under-represented groups. In the last year, we have achieved a 38% increase in black people in leadership roles globally.

In Brazil, our biggest challenge in Brazil is to bring more black people into the technology area. In Latin America, bring in more women.

However, more than chasing metrics, we want to transform the system. Because when it comes to diversity, numbers are just the tip of the iceberg.

What does it mean to transform the system?

It’s about creating processes that prevent bias when selecting, promoting or developing people. Women and blacks, for example, are often valued much more for their style than for their performance.

Before undertaking any recruitment process, employees have to undergo training against unconscious biases.

See what happens to the issue of motherhood. In the last year, we’ve hired several pregnant women. How do I prevent the fact that a candidate is a mother from being a decision-making factor for her hiring?

We have to teach people that there are questions that cannot be asked in a selection process. How many kids do you have? Are you married? Where will your child stay while working?

If the professional is a mother and has certain needs, it is our role as a company to create the conditions for her to work well. Offer flexibility, spaces to think about the strengthening of relationships, the development of children. She doesn’t have to adapt to the company, it’s the other way around.

Are companies really making progress in promoting diversity?

They are being pushed into this place. Whether by opportunity or opportunism, they understood that there is no turning back. Those who go for opportunism have suffered the most.

The central issue is to accelerate the arrival of women, black people, people with disabilities, LGBTQIA+ population in leadership spaces. The women’s agenda is the most advanced. The most difficult one is the racial discussion, because there is still resistance to bringing the topic inside.

What has Meta been doing on this front?

In partnership with Feira Preta, the largest black culture and entrepreneurship event in Latin America, we created the Jornada Preta. These are conversation circles with black talents around Brazil to discuss topics such as “the future is black and it cannot be built alone”, Afro-entrepreneurship and the presence of black women in decision-making spaces.

Giving visibility to these experiences and trajectories is important so that it is possible to recognize talent from different perspectives.

We also created a project collaboratively with EmpregueAfro consultancy and our biggest clients to accelerate the career of black people, through mentoring processes.

Because one thing that appears a lot in the trajectories of people from underrepresented groups is the difficulty of being understood, since their language is not the same.

You often say that you discovered your mission as a child. How was that?

My life mission is to build a better world for all people, which necessarily involves helping to make the world less unequal.

I was two years old when my father was invited by a UN mission to build schools in the conflict zone between Angola and Namibia. My mother, who at the time also had a four-month-old baby, wanted to go too.

We went and stayed there for four years, but when I returned to Brazil my war started.

When I was ten years old, I faced a lot of problems at school because of the color of my skin and hair. So I arranged with my mom that every day we would do different hairstyles so I could show that my hair was good.

At that time, I learned two things: that I didn’t have to hit people to change their minds, and that I knew how to provoke them. I realized that when I was in an environment, nothing was the same.

From then on, no one held me back. I started creating associations in schools, participating in social organizations, doing volunteer work. I understood that I needed to create spaces to be able to negotiate the things I considered important.

Living in a country at war helped me to develop a sense of solidarity and the understanding that only the collective helps us to get out of very adverse processes.

You lead the HR area. Do you encourage other employees to be activists like you?

Very. Activism within companies is just not possible. It is necessary. Because it is a very powerful tool to make companies more human and connected to the transformation of the world.

I learned from a great activist named Jurema Werneck that to be an activist is to set hope in motion. I believe there is no single way to do this. At Meta, I try to help people discover theirs.

X-ray

Mafoane Odara, 43, is HR leader at Meta (new name of the parent company of Facebook) for Latin America. Psychologist with a master’s degree in social psychology from USP, she is chairman of the board of directors of the Brazil Human Rights Fund, member of the diversity board of FGV-SP and of the advisory boards of Instituto Vamos Juntas and RenovaBR. It is also part of the networks of political leaders of the RAPS (Political Action Network for Sustainability), the Lemann Foundation and the Agora! Movement. She is the mother of Mudrik Diop, 8, and Makini Niara, 4.