Lessons from Beyoncé on Navigating Exclusion

Summary.    In 2016, Beyoncé’s performance at the CMA Awards sparked backlash from fans complaining about everything from her attire to her lack of connection to the genre. This year, she released her first country album, which debuted at number one on the Billboard...

Beyoncé, the globally revered singer, songwriter, and entrepreneur, last month released her new album Cowboy Carter.However, this project is much more than another musical release from a leading star. It offers a case study in how to navigate workplace exclusion.

As Beyoncé wrote in an Instagram postintroducing Cowboy Carter, the album was “born out of an experience” where she “did not feel welcomed.” This was no doubt a reference to the backlash she faced after her performance with the Chicks at the 2016 Country Music Association (CMA) Awards. Many country music fans were outraged that she’d been featured, complaining about everything from her politics to her attire to her lack of connection to the genre. (Never mind that she grew up in Houston, her parents are from Texas and Alabama, she and the Chicks reportedly delivered the highest rated 15 minutes in CMA Awards history, and Justin Timberlake, a (white) pop and R&B artist, had been universally lauded for his appearance at the awards the year before.)

Now, Beyoncé — who has won more Grammys than any other artist in history but never the coveted Album of the Year award — is no stranger to bias nor critiques. As she said at the iHeart Radio Awards earlier this month, “Being an innovator is seeing what everyone believes is impossible [and] means being criticized often, which … will test your mental strength.” But the response to her CMA Awards appearance felt different. Let’s say it plainly: It felt racist. And Beyoncé took her time in responding.

As diversity, equity, and inclusion scholars and practitioners, we believe that her story offers important lessons for workers facing similar exclusionary treatment in their workplaces. According to a 2023 EY survey, 75% of global respondents said they’d at some point fallen into that category. While few people in the world have the power and platform of Beyoncé, we can all benefit from exploring the anatomy of her exclusion, the range of responses open to her, and the efficacy of the path she ultimately chose.

The Anatomy of Exclusionary Experiences

The reasons for Beyoncé’s exclusion by country music audiences generally fell into three categories, mapping to what we see in workplaces:

Historical systems of inequality

Laws and norms that have previously excluded people of marginalized groups from certain spaces — whether country music or the C-suite — perpetuate the problem by normalizing homogeneity and calcifying attitudes about who does and doesn’t belong. The workplace thus becomes a landmine of invisible rules and expectations that affect the potential success of people who don’t fit into the traditional mold.

Bias, discrimination, and hate

This can range from refusing to socialize with an individual to using hateful language or slurs. In the workplace, that might look like a coworker giving less respect to a woman leader or demeaning colleagues for various personal or identity-based reasons.

Fear and resentment

People often resist individuals and ideas that represent difference and change and challenge their way of life or worldview. Fear and resentment often arise when the dominant group feels left out or left behind (e.g. worrying that non-traditional country artists will “take over” the genre or that coworkers of color are more likely to be promoted owing to DEI initiatives).

Responding to Exclusionary Treatment

Exclusion negatively impacts productivity, collaboration, and potential for innovation. While it would be ideal to mandate inclusive and welcoming behaviors in all workplaces, we know that this isn’t realistic. So, when you face exclusion, what are your options for responding?

Exit the conversation.

In other words, pick your battles. Although the CMA Awards experience remained in Beyoncé’s thoughts, she did not directly respond at the time. Instead, she moved forward with promoting her 2016 album, Lemonade, and producing and releasing her 2022 album Renaissance, both of which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart and eventually went platinum. In between, she headlined Coachella, marking her status as the first Black woman to do so by incorporating the symbolism and musical traditions of historically Black colleagues and universities, and she voiced the part of Nala in the new The Lion King movie, releasing related albums in collaboration with Disney and African artists. Instead of assimilating into spaces where she had been rejected, she expanded her representation in Black culture.

In traditional work environments, this type of response to non-inclusive behavior can include asking to transfer to a different project or team where you will be more appreciated, trying to avoid or minimize further contact with the individual or group in question, or making note of the negative experience but not addressing it directly in the moment and instead channeling your energy toward more affirming professional relationships and the work to be done.

Work for change within the system.

Eventually, Beyoncé began to organize a response to the CMA Awards backlash behind the scenes, writing songs in collaboration with many country artists, including four Black women whose existing work she wanted to promote (Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, Brittney Spencer, and Reyna Roberts) and legendary white artists, such as Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson. She also worked to spotlight trailblazing Black artists of the past, such as Linda Martell, who played the Grand Ole Opry in 1974 but was sidelined for much of her career.

Darius Rucker, former frontman of the hit pop band Hootie & the Blowfish, pursued a similar strategy when transitioning to a solo career in country in 2008, working with a noted Nashville producer, visiting country radio stations around the country to personally introduce his new music, and championing Black forebears, like Charley Pride, and up-and-comers, like Kane Brown.

In the workplace, your options for action include speaking directly with the person who has excluded you or your team leader about the experience, reporting your experience to HR and making sure it is documented, asking your organization to put a plan in place to prevent it from happening to others, supporting a DEI council, and enlisting influential senior leaders to champion the need for inclusive policies and practices.

Create your own lane.

Sometimes, the best response is to show what’s possible by moving outside the boundaries of an organization, market, or industry. In her patient and timed response to facing exclusion, Beyoncé modeled inclusive innovation, blending not just old and new country but also input from R&B, gospel, pop, rock, and rap artists like Miley Cyrus and Post Malone. The resulting work resonated with many: Like her previous albums, Cowboy Carter debuted in the top spot of the Billboard 200 and set streaming records on Amazon and Spotify.

“This is not a country album,” she announced. “This is a Beyoncé album.” This suggests that her goal was not acceptance but to show that her work goes beyond the genre-limited thoughts of naysayers.

Issa Rae provides another example of creating her own lane with her critically acclaimed show Insecure, which broke new ground in portraying Black stories and initially garnered millions of viewers on YouTube before being picked up by HBO for five seasons.

In your professional life, “creating your own lane” will involve tapping into your own authenticity and strengths, reframing your marginality, and then mobilizing to generate new ideas and business models that expand the terrain for you and others. Consider the entrepreneurs (and intrapreneurs) behind makeup brands designed to serve people with skin of all hues; body-inclusive clothing lines; and financial products that meet the needs of varying income earners.

While there is no one-size-fits-all approach to dealing with exclusion, Beyoncé’s journey from CMA Awards backlash to Cowboy Carter shows us the options available to us. We should all find inspiration in her strategic approach: from letting the attacks go in the moment to finding collaborators keen to diversify the genre to developing her very own Queen Bey enterprise in country. All the while, she considers the broader impact that her work has on those looking up to her and following in her footsteps. You can do the same in your workplace.