The Case of the Religious Network Group

GenCorp is an American technology firm that encourages its staff to create communities to facilitate the integration of minorities. The initiative started at the end of the 70’s when the first Afro-Americans were recruited and felt isolated. Setting up a community enabled the creation of a mutual support and mentoring relations network. Other communities were then created, according to different affinity criteria. But management felt helpless when it discovered that an employee intended to create a community of Evangelical Christians. Did this correspond to the minority-insertion spirit of the communities? Was there a risk of proselytism drift? Yet, in the name of what could this community be forbidden? This article illustrates the hesitations that managers can have when facing religious affirmation in the workplace and proposes concrete elements of response.