Mellody Hobson has seen corporate pledges to increase workplace diversity come and go over the years. Starbucks Corp.’s new chairwoman believes this time is different.
As co-CEO and president of minority-run, asset-management firm Ariel Investments LLC, Ms. Hobson is one of the country’s most prominent Black investors. As of Wednesday, she will also be the only Black chairwoman of an S&P 500 company, when she assumes that role at Starbucks.
She’s one of a handful of Black women to recently take on a leadership position in the highest echelons of American corporations, where Black female bosses are few and far between. Another is Rosalind Brewer, a longtime friend of Ms. Hobson, who left her role as Starbucks’s operating chief and will become chief executive officer of Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. on Monday.
Ms. Hobson says roughly 20 other women of color in her orbit have been elected to corporate boards recently. Companies face more investor and regulatory pressure to diversify board rooms, and the death of George Floyd in police custody, the killing of Breonna Taylor and other prominent cases involving Black Americans and police have pushed many to redouble efforts to help Black workers advance. “I joke, we have to be headhunters in our spare time at Ariel,” she says.
Ms. Hobson, 51, rose from intern to the top of Chicago-based Ariel, which manages $15 billion in assets. She joined Starbucks’ board nearly 16 years ago and counts former CEO and chairman emeritus Howard Schultz as a friend and mentor. She recently spoke to The Wall Street Journal from the southern California home she shares with her husband, filmmaker George Lucas.
