MAPS

DEI Decisions Are Dividing Corporate America

In last week’s post we looked at how decisions around DEI are impacting the reputation of many of the US’s largest companies. Amazon, Meta, Target and Walmart and others have scaled back their DEI commitments, citing regulatory pressures, economic challenges, or shifting stakeholder expectations. Apple, Cisco, Costco and others have doubled down.

However, the decision itself isn’t the only factor that affects a company’s reputation – how these decisions are communicated can be just as important.

The latest MAPS research shows that some of these companies are coming out of this with relatively minimal reputational fallout, while some are now facing significant backlash. What separates them?

In this post we’ll have a close look at the communication strategies in play here, and distill these into five key principles that can make all the difference from a reputational standpoint.

Rollbacks and Defenders

We looked at 18 major US companies that are front-and-center in the news and social media around their stances on DEI. These are:

• ‘Rollback’ companies i.e., those scaling back DEI: Alphabet, Amazon, Ford, Lowe’s, McDonald’s, Meta, Morgan Stanley, PepsiCo, Target, Walmart, and Walt Disney.
• ‘Defender’ firms, i.e., those reaffirming DEI commitments: Apple, Cisco, Costco, Johnson & Johnson, JPMorgan Chase, and Microsoft.

We then mapped these companies in terms of the percentage of positive and negative sentiment each received in media coverage and social media commentary.

How Major US Corporations Are Perceived on DEI…and Why Polarization Is So Important

There’s one important point to introduce before we look at the scores. DEI decisions are inherently polarizing; conservatives appear to be more likely to view a recommitment to DEI negatively, while liberals may see rollbacks as a step backward.

Because of this dynamic, the companies that generate the least negative sentiment aren’t necessarily those that either maintain or eliminate DEI programs – but are those that communicate their approach in a way that minimizes polarization.

Here’s what we found:

Several key takeaways emerge when we look at the data:

• Cisco and Microsoft saw very different reactions to their DEI approaches. Cisco, which positioned its DEI efforts as integral to its business strategy, had only 6% negative sentiment and 12% positive sentiment, significantly outperforming the other companies in the dataset. At the same time, Microsoft – despite recommitting to its DEI initiatives this year – received 35% negative sentiment and only 1% positive sentiment, likely related to perceptions of cuts to its DEI team in 2024.
• Target’s reputation was dragged down by inconsistency. The company’s shifting stance – initially defending its Pride merchandise, then scaling back under pressure – alienated consumers across both sides of the ideological divide. As a result, over 50% of sentiment toward the company was negative, with just 1% positive, making it one of the most criticized companies in the dataset.
• Meta’s DEI positioning also created a reputational liability. With 35% negative sentiment and only 1% positive, Meta faced one of the highest rates of negativity in the dataset, which may come from how the company communicated its rollback: rather than framing the rollback decision as solely driven by business strategy, Meta’s internal memo positioned it as politically reactive, stating that DEI had become “too charged.” This may have made the decision seem more like a retreat than an operational adjustment or change, driving criticism from stakeholders viewing it as a concession to external political pressure.
• Alphabet mitigated backlash by framing its DEI rollback as a legal obligation. By positioning the move as a necessary adjustment to comply with federal contractor requirements, Alphabet saw 19% negative sentiment and 2% positive sentiment – a much lower level of negativity than other companies that scaled back DEI.

Five Principles for Communicating DEI Decisions Effectively

Analysis of the companies that are emerging from the volatile environment around DEI without major reputational damage – or at least with less reputational damage than many of the other firms we looked at in the dataset – gives us five communication principles:

Transparency

• The firms that explain clearly why they are making changes – whether these are due to potential regulation or business strategy – keep control of the narrative; silence, or vague messaging, creates an opportunity for detractors and/or activists to define the story.
• Note of course that this implies a joined-up approach between internal and external comms (see the last point below).

Business Imperative

• The companies with less damage to their reputation in this dataset present their DEI decisions as business-driven rather than ideological, and this applies whether they are rolling back or recommitting to their DEI initiatives.
• For example, talking about DEI as a workforce investment, or making changes as a compliance obligation, appears to minimize polarization.

Core Business Values

• Stakeholders expect corporate decisions to be consistent with a company’s broader identity and existing brand values.
• Whether DEI programs are scaled back or recommitted to, the rationale should be tied to long-term company values, rather than driven by a changing political or ideological environment.

Proactivity

• Companies that engage different stakeholder groups – including employees and investors – before making public announcements appear to reduce the likelihood of backlash.
• In parallel, as we saw with several of the firms in our dataset, restricting comms to internal audiences only risks leaks, misalignment, and a loss of narrative control once the story breaks – as it invariably does.

Consistency

• Mixed messaging creates controversy. Companies that say one thing internally and another externally – or indeed pivot under pressure – risk alienating all types of stakeholder; aligning internal and external messaging is critical to maintaining credibility.

Own the Narrative

DEI is a reputational flashpoint right now. The companies that communicate clearly, proactively and consistently, framing decisions as aligned with business strategy and obligations to their stakeholders, are best positioned to manage risk around this issue and protect their brand – as far as it’s possible.

MAPS is doing tons of work around DEI right now – ping us for more details. Also, stay tuned for more analysis as the DEI landscape keeps moving – both in terms of the decisions that are being made and also from the perspective of how major corporations are handling DEI-related communications.