I have worked as a consultant to many Chicago and midwest companies. Some Blacks (both qualified and unqualified) want to take advantage of the affirmative action programs. Some Blacks (and Hispanics, women, etc.) want to be hired on their merit. There is big pressure on the hiring managers to ONLY hire through the affirmative action programs, and to not hire qualified Blacks outside the programs. The reason is simple. These companies are only allowed to claim credit for participants in the affirmative action programs. They need those numbers to be as big as possible. These companies get no credit for minorities who are there, but outside the approved programs.
The Human Resources people are much worse about this than the line managers. The line managers just want to fill a position, and fill it when it needs to be filled. The Human Resource people want to justify their own existence by having redundant and repetitive minority career fairs and conferences and seminars before they will ever let the line manager meet the applicant. So either the applicant stays unemployed. Or he finds a company with a smaller HR bureaucracy...even if it means that the other company requires him to prove a higher level of qualification or take a lower level position.
The Human Resources industry is the winner....and a major drag on the ability of the company to use its money to pay the employees who are actually productive.
Bit of a tangent...but...a point I like to always make -- one huge casualty of "affirmative action" (what a euphemestic society we live in) is BELIEF in the merits of black/minority professionals. Consider -- you're in a doctor's office, and presented with a choice between a white doctor who got into medical school on merit alone (let's assume he's not using connections, etc), and a black doctor who got into medical school on an affirmative action policy. The black doctor may very well be much more qualified than the white doctor, but no matter what, in the back of your head, you'll be wondering -- did this guy get here on his smarts and talents, or did he just get a free pass? And you'll most likely end up choosing the white doctor. It drives me nuts. Often those ideas with the best intentions have the absolute worst effects...and nobody wants to address it because it's too controversial.
--KL