Elon Musk’s electric car and renewable energy company published its first-ever diversity report late Friday. It said that Tesla has a “majority-minority” U.S. workforce overall, but 83% of employees in leadership roles are men and 59% are White.
According to research by the Boston Consulting Group, companies with more diverse leadership teams report higher innovation revenue. And increasingly, publicly traded companies are required to disclose more information about the makeup of their workforce, and to add people from diverse backgrounds to their boards.
Tesla’s inaugural Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Impact Report offer fewer details than diversity reports from major tech companies including Google and Apple, which began publishing demographic information about their workforce in 2014. However, because Tesla makes cars, software, and energy products, it is difficult to compare it with peers in tech or autos.
Tesla did reveal some big-picture analysis of its current U.S. workforce. Here are some highlights:
- Men at Tesla represented approximately: 79% of the workforce, 83% of leadership, 75% of new hires and 77% of promotions in 2020.
- Women at Tesla represented approximately: 21% of the workforce, 17% of leadership, 25% of new hires and 23% of all promotions in 2020.
- Black and African American employees at Tesla represented approximately: 10% of the workforce, 4% of leadership, 12% of new hires and 10% of promotions in 2020.
- Asian employees at Tesla represented approximately: 21% of the workforce, 25% of leadership, 20% of new hires and 23% of promotions in 2020.
- Hispanic and Latino or Latina employees represented approximately: 22% of the workforce, 4% of leadership, 27% of new hires and 24% of promotions in 2020.
- White employees represented approximately: 34% of the workforce, 59% of leadership, 32% of new hires and 35% of promotions in 2020.
Tesla counted people from Pacific Islander, Native American, Native Hawaiian and Alaska Native communities as part of an “Additional Groups” category.
- Employees in Tesla’s “Additional Groups” category represented approximately: 7% of the workforce and 1% of leadership.
It added that its leadership cohort — which includes directors and above — accounted for a “very small” percentage of total employees, at under 0.4%