"We will not accept a bid that does not include such a minority provision. To my knowledge, this marks the first initiative of this sort in the history of the gaming industry in Nevada. I personally am very committed to the issue of affirmative action and affording opportunities to people of color."
"I'm not here to fire white males."
Few among the 1,500 gathered in a Mirage conference room for MGM Mirage's diversity expo knew what to expect when the tall black man with the familiar face stepped the microphone.
He had apprenticed under Martin Luther King Jr. and become a civil rights champion/controversy magnet in his own right. Leading marches and boycotts, bullying Wall Street about boosting minority access to capital, twice running for president, founding the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, helping free American hostages. When he wasn't uniting his troops, he was dividing everyone else—tagged a racial opportunist, media whore and a philanderer for fathering an out-of-wedlock child.
Eyes locked on him. Was he going to savage MGM Mirage? Would he turn this feel-good affair into a battle? If he did, could Terri Lanni, chairman and CEO, withstand his indefatigable rhetoric? A look of not-quite-worry-but-not-quite-ease splashed Lanni's face.
The room grew quiet as Jesse Jackson's familiar voice—clipped, articulate and musical, each sentence like a song verse—boomed through the microphone.
Looking around at all the hues of skin reminded him, he said, of a meeting King had at Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church. Mexican-American labor champion Cesar Chavez had been there. American Indian leaders, too. You had a little of everything in the house that day—a buffet or races and cultures, a pre-rainbow coalition Rainbow Coalition, if you will.
The first three stages of civil rights were freeing slaves, overturning Jim Crow laws and obtaining voting rights, Jackson told the crowd. He said the fourth stage, access to capital and economic empowerment, was taking place today, in this room.
"I want to congratulate you," Jackson told Lanni. "Diversity is the key to growth. Dr. King and Cesar Chavez would be happy to hear you speak today. I wish you were in the White House."
High praise, considering the source.
And deserved too, if you consider MGM Mirage's turnaround from diversity chump to diversity champ.
Six years ago this month, as MGM Grand Inc. was closing a $6.4 billion purchase of Mirage Resorts, the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People flogged the company for minimal minority business procurement or managerial diversity. Lanni pledged to do better. The NAACP had its own idea: $100 million for diversity initiatives and monies for predominantly black West Las Vegas.
Lanni balked. Activists balked back. The National Action Network, formed by NAACP expats, joined the MGM Mirage-bashing. Its lead activist, Al Sharpton, picketed in front the MGM Grand's lion 2002.
The backlash was not unlike what Denny's faced in the early '90s after black customers sued, decrying poor service (if they were served at all) and being forced to pre-pay for food. Chastened by a class-action lawsuit (settled in 1994 for $54 million), Denny's focused on diversity and, today, is hailed by the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School as one of three diversity exemplars (with Nordstrom's and Xerox), its minority levels at 50 percent or more in the workforce and senior management.
Public ass-chewing, which has convinced companies that discriminate to fess up, pushed MGM Mirage, too. Lanni pumped money, resources and leadership into diversity, recruiting former U.S. Labor Secretary Alexis Herman to spearhead diversity efforts. The results are noteworthy. The company has been named one of Fortune's "50 Best Companies for Minorities" and Black Enterprise's "30 Best Companies for Minorities," and has commendations from the likes of the National Urban League, 100 Black Men of America, National Center for American Indian Enterprise and the National Council of La Raya.
The numbers ain't too shabby. In 2005 minorities comprised 55 percent of the 70,000-plus workforce, 32 percent of managers (42 percent of managers were women). MGM Mirage bought $95 million worth of goods and services from minority, women and disadvantaged business (MWDBEs) and spent $90 million with MWDBEs on construction—both highest-ever totals. Employee contributions to diversity-related causes increased from from $674,979 in 2004 to $1.9 million in 2005, and corporate contributions increased $1.19 million to $2.95 million. And more than 1,200 executives have completed Diversity Champion training, a three-day immersion Bellagio President Bill McBeath called "intense."
"I thought I knew about diversity, but this opened my eyes," he said.
Good as the progress has been, Lanni said the company can and should do more. It'll have to improve diversity at former Mandalay Resort Group properties (MGM Mirage bought the company in 2005). "They weren't as aggressive [as we are on diversity]," he said.
On the issue of immigration, Lanni pledged company support for coherent, humane reform.
One man asked him to consider doing business with disabled veterans.
A lady advised him to promote MGM Mirage's diversity program through corporate America—he said he's starting with fellow gaming industry CEOs through his role as board chairman for the American Gaming Association. Las Vegas NAACP President Dean Ishman thanked Lanni for its support. Lanni encouraged everyone to hold his company's feet to the fire.
"We're not where we should be," he said, "but continue to pester us and make sure we're doing we say."