Tuesday, April 16, 2024 | 2 a.m.
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At the end of this month, the NFL will put on its annual spectacle, the NFL Draft. Over the course of three days and seven rounds, teams will select players who they believe will contribute to their franchises. I say “believe” rather than “know” because none of the players that they will ultimately select have ever played in the NFL before.
Said another way, NFL teams are selecting players on faith. However, if you let the teams tell it, their faith is not blind. They might call it calculated.
Teams hire scouts to watch players’ games and collect video footage. They talk with players’ coaches, teammates, families and friends. They review social media accounts. They attend the NFL Combine, where players are subjected to all manner of probing, measuring and testing. They attend “pro days,” where players show off their skills in a controlled environment. They take all this “data” and compare it with data obtained from past players who went on to become successful NFL players.
Before the draft, they develop plans on whom they would like to draft. During the draft, team executives and personnel gather in “war rooms” to sift through their data in real time, discuss potential trades and make final decisions. With so much going on, it helps that a team’s decisionmakers are together in a room.
In short, a lot of work goes into the NFL Draft. Teams gather a wealth of information through a variety of means. Dozens of staff work hundreds of hours to organize this information. Team executives then use this information to make decisions.
Teams draft primarily based on two things: 1) team need and 2) the best player available. If a team has a glaring positional need, such as at wide receiver, it may use the draft to select one. Other times, teams simply pick who they believe is the best football player available, regardless of position.
Most often, the selection is some combination of the two. A player is selected because he fills a team’s need, and the team believes he is the best player available at that position. In short, teams select who they believe is the best player for the job.
The thing is, despite all that work, teams still get their picks wrong on an annual basis. Every year, players selected early in the draft turn out to be “busts.” And every year, players drafted later in the draft turn out to be pro bowlers.
Empirical studies support the conclusion that teams are nearly as likely to get a pick wrong as they are to get a pick right. A 2013 study found that “top draft picks are significantly overvalued in a manner that is inconsistent with rational expectations and efficient markets.” Another 2013 study found that running backs and wide receivers taken in later rounds (rounds three through seven) were more likely to outperform running backs and wide receivers taken in the first and second rounds.
As you all know, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs and offices are being eliminated all over the country. The rationale for doing so is often explained as some version of “we should instead be focusing on trying to find the best people for the job.” The unspoken assertion is that these programs reduce the quality of the workforce.
However, what was previously unspoken is now more likely to be said out loud. Boeing has recently faced allegations of defective manufacturing. In response, the Texas attorney general has announced an investigation into its DEI initiatives.
What DEI opponents fail to see is that everyone, including and especially DEI proponents, want employers to focus on trying to find the best person for the job. From large corporations like Boeing to your mom-and-pop small bed and breakfast, every business desires to find the best person for the job. That much should not be in question.
The question is, and has always been, how do you find the best person? What data are you using? Where are you looking? In that vein, I submit that hiring an employee, whether it be the CEO or the janitor, is very much like selecting a player in the NFL Draft.
A company will gather information. A résumé and cover letter highlight an employee’s skills. Depending on the position, the company may seek references to call for additional background. The company will then perform an interview (or several), during which it can metaphorically probe and test the prospective employee.
This “data” from prospective employees is organized, then a decision is made by the executives. At the process’s conclusion, the company believes it has selected the best person for the job. Again, I say “believe” rather than “know.”
Ask any business owner. Employees who they believed would excel, instead flamed out. Employees hired on a whim, or begrudgingly as a favor, end up becoming vital pieces. You try your best to predict the future, but you never know how an employee will perform until they are put in the game.
Employer surveys tell us that, like NFL teams, businesses are not that good at making quality selections. A 2019 CareerBuilder survey found that 75% of employers say they’ve hired the wrong person for a position. A 2022 Robert Half survey found that 46% of senior decision-makers believed they had made a bad hire in the prior 12 months.
The prototypical quarterback has historically been tall, white, with a cannon for an arm, and stands in the pocket. Think, Peyton Manning. He fit this description “to a t” and was therefore highly regarded at every level. He also met expectations at every level.
But what we know is that elite quarterback play is not required to come in that package. Tom Brady, though tall and white, did not possess an arm cannon. Patrick Mahomes brings an entirely different skill set in that he can kill you with his feet as much as he can with his arm. The league MVP, Lamar Jackson, is a similar dual threat.
DEI programs do not reduce the quality of the workforce. Nor do they deter us from finding the best person for the job. What they do is remind us that greatness comes in a variety of packages. While someone who “looks like a CEO” is generally a tall, middle-aged white man, that does not mean that capable CEOs must look like that.
DEI programs remind companies that there is no height requirement for excellence. No race requirement. No gender requirement. They do not advocate for the less-qualified. They advocate for the qualified but overlooked. It is only through that advocacy that companies can discover the Tom Bradys, Pat Mahomeses and Lamar Jacksons of the corporate world.
In eliminating DEI programs, people believe that they are course-correcting, returning things to their proper focus. What they should see is that they are hampering their organizations’ ability to discover greatness by narrowing the lens that is used to perceive it. This will only result in a lifetime of poor selections.
Any football fan will tell you, you don’t want that.
Eric Foster, is a lawyer in private practice and columnist for The Plain Dealer and cleveland.com.
