An ally by any other name: Examining the effects of racial minority leaders as allies for advancing racial justice

Abstract

We investigate employee evaluations of racial minority leaders who engage in allyship behaviors aimed at advancing racial equity. We argue that when racial minority leaders engage in racial allyship, perceptions of them as effective allies and leaders vary based on the target beneficiary group (i.e., who the allyship benefits) and the language utilized to explain their allyship (i.e., how the allyship is framed). We hypothesize and find empirical evidence across three experimental studies that suggests that when racial minority leaders engage in allyship behaviors that benefit their own racial group (i.e., same-race allyship), as opposed to another racial minority group (i.e., cross-race allyship), employees view them as displaying more ingroup favoritism, which lowers perceptions of allyship effectiveness. Additionally, we find that decreased perceptions of allyship effectiveness results in reduced employee perceptions of overall leader effectiveness and employee intentions to support racial equity efforts. Finally, we introduce voice amplification framing—a novel framing tactic in which racial minority leaders publicly highlight the ideas and voices of lower-level employees within their allyship—and we show that using this framing reduces the negative effects of same-race allyship. Our theory and findings have several implications for literature on allyship, message framing, and leadership.