The CEOs of WellPoint and CSX (No. 34 and 23, respectively, in the 2012 DiversityInc Top 50) both serve as prime examples of what true CEO commitment can achieve.

In DiversityInc’s diversity web seminar on CEO commitment, WellPoint’s Chief Diversity Officer Linda Jimenez discusses the visible commitment of Angela Braly, the company’s chair, president and CEO. CSX Chief Diversity Officer Susan Hamilton and Director of Diversity and Inclusion Stephanie Noel share insights into CEO Michael Ward’s ongoing commitment to the company’s diversity management.

Watch the diversity web seminar: Best Practices in Demonstrating and Communicating Top Management Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion.

Best Practices for Diversity Management

Both diversity leaders noted how their CEOs make diversity efforts a priority. Both Braly and Ward attend resource-group meetings on a regular basis, serve on the boards of multicultural nonprofit organizations and seek to integrate diversity management as a key strategy into all areas of the business.

“CEO commitment is all about being a steward,” explains Jimenez, noting Braly’s statement on the company homepage. That includes maintaining an unequivocal position for diversity, being challenging in their approach for and focusing on continued improvement, being visionary in anticipating the future, and being a compelling storyteller to promote diversity management and the company brand (learn about WellPoint’s innovative Ambassador Program).

As an example, Jimenez says Braly was fully supportive of adding gender identity to WellPoint’s EEO statement. “The CEO drives the ship. She may allow me to use, guide and steer, but Braly is unequivocally confident in her role of being a steward for diversity in her organization,” Jimenez says, noting that more information can be found in the company’s corporate-responsibility report at www.wellpointcorporateresponsibility.com.

Hamilton similarly credits CSX’s diversity success to the CEO, who took his position in 2002. “Michael knew the direction he wanted the company to go in. With a dedicated chief diversity officer, he was able to take the company to higher levels of performance,” she says.

“His commitment helped the company get on track,” Hamilton says. They were able to develop a three-year strategy and a multifaceted training program across the company. He was also the lead on developing the annual CSX Inclusion Forum and is a huge supporter of the Wounded Warrior Project.

In the web seminar, Jimenez and Hamilton also discussed CEO involvement and best practices for diversity management in:

• Diversity councils
• Executive compensation
• Setting goals and diversity metrics
• Resource-group funding and sponsorship
• Company communications and events

Research Reveals: Diversity Management Needs CEO Commitment

CEO commitment is one of the four areas of measurement used to determine the DiversityInc Top 50 rankings each year. (This is divided into four sub-categories: Accountability, Personal Communications, Visibility and Diversity Councils.)

DiversityInc Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Barbara Frankel reveals how CEO commitment can be the “make or break” point for a company. In fact, CEO commitment is one of the main reasons this consumer-packaged-goods company significantly rose on the 2012 DiversityInc Top 50 list—and why another consumer-packaged-goods company significantly fell.

DiversityInc data shows that CEO involvement has increased steadily since 2006: 13.9 percent more CEOs sign off on executive compensation tied to diversity goals; 28.6 percent more CEOs chair the diversity council; 90.5 percent more CEOs meet with resource groups regularly; and 20.5 percent more CEOs have a quote about diversity on their company’s homepage.

Additionally, four CEOs presented about their commitment and best practices for diversity at our 2012 DiversityInc Top 50 event.

Watch the diversity web seminar: Best Practices in Demonstrating and Communicating Top Management Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion.

Read about these other CEOs who are setting a tone for diversity management:

• Diversity Management: Training Exposes Execs’ Hidden Biases (Toyota Financial Services’ CEO George Borst)
• Diversity & Inclusion Means ‘You Can’t Afford to Be Dismissing People’s Ideas’ (Ameren’s CEO Tom Voss)
• Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf on Leadership, Corporate Citizenship, Sustainable Business & Accountability

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This philosophy allowed Ward to transform the railroad company (in a very  traditionally white male industry) into an extremely diverse organization and helped CSX earn the DiversityInc 2011 Special Award: Top Company for Diversity-Management Progress.

Ward spoke during a Q&A panel session with DiversityInc CEO Luke Visconti at our November 2011 event in Washington, D.C., on “Why Visible Leadership Matters.” He offered insights on how his personal investment in diversity management has benefited CSX.

Watch the exclusive, full-length  “Why Visible Leadership Matters” video below.

The railroad industry is one of the oldest industries in the nation, founded in 1827. Ward first realized the importance of a diverse workforce when CSX came out of a 20-year hiring freeze following the industry’s bankruptcy in the 1970s. About of a third of the older workforce was retiring, and an imperative need for talent arose.

CSX needed to tap into all potential talent, but railroads carried a stodgy stigma. “We had to transform it and make it an attractive place for diverse people to come to. We had to make ourselves a welcoming place, show others that ‘there are people like me succeeding in this company,’” explains Ward. “It doesn’t happen overnight, but we’re building a lot of momentum.”

Ward reports that their transportation department is headed by one woman, Cindy Sanborn, while the HR law departments are also headed by women. A majority of people running the railroad on a daily basis, as well as the sales and marketing, are Black. For more on CSX’s talent-development strategies, watch our Diversity Web Seminar on Talent Development with Susan Hamilton, assistant vice president of diversity at CSX.

1.    Enhancing skills: To facilitate better diversity throughout the company, some employees were reassigned to new disciplines and areas of the company. It took them out of their comfort zone so they could learn new skills and other areas of the business.

Ward notes that diversity at CSX is more about ways of thinking than ethnicity. He says, “If you do right by your people and customers, you will last—it’s a byproduct. If you don’t do the right things, you don’t get the results.”

2.    Community outreach: It’s important to relate to the communities your organization operates in, and CSX has been more focused in the last eight years on its role. “A lot of these communities formed because our railroad was there,” Ward says. “People want you to be responsive to their concerns, so we need to reach out and make sure we are relating to them.”

CSX engages in several methods of corporate philanthropy within the 23 states its rails run through, and it seeks to make a difference there. For example, CSX hosts a service day where its executives interact with the community (this year in Norfolk, Va.) by painting the trailers together.

3.    Supporting veterans: CSX is the only two-time recipient of the Department of Defense’s Employer Support Freedom Award, and Ward has a personal commitment to veterans (he gave $1 million to the Wounded Warrior Project).

About 25 percent of CSX employees are currently in the service or are veterans. “It’s a great match for what our business does, as we are extremely focused on safety,” says Ward. “We as a company make sure their pay is constant and health benefits are maintained. Recruitment of women and Blacks in particular is a focus.”

The company has a military employee-resource group and is involved with Wounded Warriors and the Warriors to Work program. CSX transports a lot of military materials each year to ports for deployment as well. Hear more about CSX’s military recruiting strategies in our Diversity Web Seminar on Veterans in the Workplace with Margaret Downey, military and diversity recruiting, CSX Transportation.

4.    Accountability for diversity: CSX sets goals that  focus on initiatives to ensure that key opportunities come up for a diverse candidate pool, such as maintaining continuous recruitment with schools.

“Diversity is a longer-term game,” says Ward. “The differentiator for you is your people, and we are making that investment so it’s a part of our longer term.”

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Read more about these best practices in our event coverage, 4 Ways CSX Increased Its Diversity-Management Progress.

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CSX Corp. has remarkable CEO commitment and has made huge strides in diversifying its workforce and management ranks by race/ethnicity and gender, which is particularly tough for a railroad company headquartered in the South. CSX also has a remarkable record of community philanthropy. Some specific achievements:

• Major efforts to diversify workforce and management. Of managers with less than five years of employment, 42 percent are women, Blacks, Latinos, Asians and American Indians. Two of the top six executives now are women, and CSX has the first woman chief transportation officer in the rail industry.
• Growing emphasis on employees with disabilities, including having a website designed for people with disabilities and being the first company in Northeast Florida certified as disability-friendly.
• Close affiliation through Chairman, President and CEO Michael Ward and the company with the Wounded Warrior Project as its first corporate partner.
• Strong veterans employee-resource group and overall program for veterans, including support of the National Guard and reserves, recognized recently with the Freedom Award from the Department of Defense. CSX is the only company to win this award twice.

Award accepted by Michael Ward, CEO, chairman and president, CSX:

“This is a tremendous honor, on behalf of our 30,000 employees, to receive this award from DiversityInc. As I look around this room, my guess is everyone’s looking to make a positive difference in the lives of others. I want to thank you all for this award and I assure you we will continue to work hard, and we expect to be here every year in the future.”

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