Do Not Trust Employee Resource Groups (ERGs)

They’re no replacement for a union. In fact, they’re often created to distract from collective bargaining efforts.

The top result for “diversity and inclusion” on Unsplash is this photo by Nathan Dumlao. By using a work-fueling stimulant as a vacuous stand-in for actual human diversity, it’s funnily apt here — but probably not in the way the creator intended.

As a public academic who writes about anti-productivity and neurodiversity, I’m often invited to speak at organizations’ Employee Resource Groups (ERGS). In the past year, I’ve given talks at everywhere from Indeed to Nike, from Salesforce to Reverb, and from The University of Michigan to Griffith Foods.

During talks like these, I describe the needs of neurodivergent and disabled workers, and share the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network’s resources on how a company can better accommodate them. I explain how corporate norms of overwork and micromanagement have their roots in white supremacy. I review the robust literature showing that the average worker can only be productive for about three to four hours per day, with any additional hours on the job yielding diminishing returns. And I point to the decades of data showing that flexible work hours, remote work options, and treating employees with autonomy and trust leads to better outcomes for everybody involved.

Usually, these talks are pretty well received by both employees and management — until the moment comes where I suggest that finding a healthy work-life balance cannot be an…