Corporate executives connected with Augusta National Golf Clubducked the issue of its all-male membership throughout the four-dayMasters Tournament that concluded yesterday.

Their silence persisted even after President Barack Obama'sspokesman and Mitt Romney, the potential Republican Partychallenger, said April 5 that the near 80-year-old club shouldadmit female members. In addition, social media sites includingTwitter.com have been filled with comments calling for an end togender discrimination at the club.

The issue came to the fore because one of the tournament's threesponsors, International Business Machines Corp., is now headed byVirginia “Ginni” Rometty, the company's first female chiefexecutive officer. IBM's CEO traditionally dons the club'ssignature green member blazer at the tournament, as do the CEOs ofco-sponsors Exxon Mobil Corp. and AT&T Inc.

The decision by these companies to associate with anorganization that excludes women may hurt them with customers andother stakeholders, Rakesh Khurana, a Harvard Business Schoolprofessor who has written about governance issues, said in atelephone interview.

“Notions of equality and inclusion determine a company'scapacity to attract the best employees and keep customers,” Khuranasaid. “And in an age when communication happens instantaneously onthe Internet, just saying you have 'no comment' isn't a viableresponse. In fact, doing that for a protracted time often causesmore problems.”

Edward Barbini, a spokesman for Armonk, N.Y.-based IBM, said“IBM has no comment” when asked about the company's Masterssponsorship and whether the statements by Obama spokesman JayCarney and Romney had changed its position. Mark Siegel, spokesmanfor Dallas-based AT&T, said “we are not commenting on this.”Alan Jeffers, a spokesman for Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil, said“that question should be directed to Augusta. We don't have anycomment.”

Steve Ethun, a spokesman for the Masters Tournament, alsodeclined to comment and wouldn't say which executives attended theevent in Augusta, Georgia.

Traditionally the top executives of corporate sponsors,including CEOs Rex Tillerson of Exxon Mobil and Randall L.Stephenson of AT&T, entertain customers at hospitality cabinsnear the 10th hole. IBM also has a nearby cabin where its CEOusually greets clients. Non-members, who don't wear green jackets,must be accompanied by a member to visit the course or play around.

Palmisano on Committee

IBM spokesman Barbini declined to discuss whether Rometty, 54,or Chairman and former CEO Sam Palmisano, 60, attended the event.Rometty eventually was photographed by the Associated Press in thegallery yesterday at the 18th hole — without a green jacket.Palmisano, who serves on the Masters Tournament's DigitalTechnology Committee, was listed on the committees' assignment listfor this year's Masters.

“We don't comment on the travel plans or schedules of our seniorexecutives as a matter of policy,” Barbini said.

Inside IBM's cabin at Augusta National, in a secluded area amongtowering loblolly pine trees on the left side of the 10th hole,Rick Singer, IBM's director of sports marketing, declined tocomment about the sponsorship.

“We're not going to talk about anything,” Singer said yesterday.He and other IBM officials at the tournament over the weekendrepeatedly told reporters to stay away from the cabin.

Rometty, who took charge as IBM's CEO in January, plays golfoccasionally, according to the company.

Palmisano, during his tenure as CEO, saw diversity as central toIBM's performance and growth, Harvard University professor DavidThomas wrote in a September 2004 Harvard Business Review article.IBM's website says the company “has consistently taken the lead ondiversity policies long before it was required by law.”

A petition on the website change.org calling for AugustaNational to make Rometty a member, had gathered more than 7,200signatures as of midday yesterday.

The petition — headlined “Augusta: Give Ginni Rometty the GreenMembers' Jacket!” — was started by Lynne Manley, a high schoolEnglish teacher in Milton, Vermont. She wrote on the site, “when mydaughter grows up, I want her to live in a world where her hardwork is rewarded with a place at the table — not backwards policiesthat date back to the 1930s.”

Companies' reputations may be affected by online protests eventhough executives didn't face demonstrators at Augusta National'sgates, said Jim Andrews, a senior vice president of sportssponsorship adviser and researcher IEG LLC. That was the case in2003 when Martha Burk, who ran the National Council of Women'sOrganizations at the time, led others in calling for an end to theall-male members' policy.

“All you need is a few people who start running with the issuein the social media,” said Andrews, who is in Chicago.

Racial IntegrationSucceeded

IBM and other companies in the past pressured private golf clubsto end racial discrimination. In 1990, IBM joined other corporatesponsors including Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. inpulling TV ads from the PGA Championship when that year'stournament was played at the then whites-only Shoal Creek, outsideof Birmingham, Alabama.

Augusta National subsequently ended its racial barrier. The clubin 1990 extended an invitation to its first black member, GannettCo. television President Ron Townsend.

Augusta National doesn't publicize its membership. A 2010partial list obtained by Bloomberg News and 2004 documentspublished by the Augusta Chronicle and USA Today suggest the clubdoesn't always extend invitations just as new CEOs take over,raising the possibility Rometty may be admitted later.

That may help explain IBM and other companies' reluctance toprotest the all-male membership, said Hayes Roth, chief marketingofficer for Landor Associates, a global branding and designfirm.

“If any of them had aspirations to have their executives joinAugusta National, it's possible that they don't really want toraise the issue,” Roth said. “The glass ceiling seems to have beenbroken inside companies like IBM and Xerox and all the others thathave female CEOS. I'm guessing they probably figure 'We've done ourbit.”'

Even executives who have spoken out against Augusta National'slack of female members in the past have been reticent this year. In2002, Kenneth Chenault, the chairman and CEO of American ExpressCo. who is both a member of IBM's board and Augusta National, saidin a statement that women should be allowed to become members and“I have made my views known with the club because I believe that isthe most effective and appropriate way to bring about a change inmembership policy.”

Last week, in response to a request for an interview on thecurrent situation, Marina Norville, an American Expressspokeswoman, said by e-mail, “Unfortunately Ken will not beavailable for comment, sorry about that.”

Nationwide Debate

Bloomberg News first reported the conflict between Augusta'smale-only membership and IBM's new CEO on March 28, setting off anationwide debate on whether she should be admitted.

Augusta National Chairman Billy Payne, who is in charge of theclub and tournament, reiterated the club's rules at an April 4press conference.

“All issues of membership remain the private deliberations ofthe membership,” Payne said. “We don't talk about our privatedeliberations.”

If Augusta National does decide to extend an invitation toRometty and other women soon, “I think they're going to make itlook like they did this all on their own, in their own sweet time,”said Roth, of Landor Associates

Bloomberg News

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