WEFugees: Behind Davos Claims of a Toxic Workplace

Wall Street Journal spotlight on Klaus Schwab's WEF.

Jul 01, 2024

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The Wall Street Journal - Exclusive

By Shalini Ramachandran and Khadeeja Safdar

June 29, 2024

World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab. ILLUSTRATION: ELENA SCOTTI, ASSOCIATED PRESS, BLOOMBERG NEWS

Despite its lofty goals, the World Economic Forum has faced numerous accusations of sexual harassment and discrimination against women and Black people.

So he singled out a group of employees over 50 years old and instructed his human-resources chief to get rid of them all, according to people familiar with the matter. This, he explained, would lower the average age of the workforce. The HR chief, a seasoned former World Bank executive named Paolo Gallo, declined, pointing out that there has to be a reasonable explanation for firing somebody, such as poor performance. Not long after, Schwab fired Gallo.

It wasn’t the only example of Schwab engaging in behavior that would violate standard workplace policies of the Forum’s leading corporate partners. One episode still making the rounds among staffers is the time in 2017 he tapped a young woman to lead an initiative for startups. She had discovered she was pregnant, and during her first few days on the job went into Schwab’s office in Geneva to tell him.

Schwab grew upset that she wouldn’t be able to continue working at the same pace, people familiar with the incident said, and told her she wasn’t suited for her new leadership role. She was pushed out after what the Forum said was a brief trial period.

The World Economic Forum, the organization behind the annual Davos gathering of world leaders and chief executives, says its mission is no less than to improve the state of the world.

But under Schwab’s decades long oversight, the Forum has allowed to fester an atmosphere hostile to women and Black people in its own workplace, according to internal complaints, email exchanges and interviews with dozens of current and former Forum employees and other people familiar with the Forum’s practices.