The Human Rights Campaign Foundation (HRC) has announced the results of this year’s Corporate Equality Index (CEI), which rates workplaces on LGBTQ equality. The findings, released at this week’s WEF meeting, revealed that 1059 US firms have committed to LGBTQ equality and inclusion. Of those firms, a record 686 earned a top score of 100 and crowned Best Places to Work for LGBTQ Equality for advancing ‘vital and rigorous’ policies and practices’ to protect LGBTQ workers, both at home and abroad, confirmed HRC.
Founded in 1980, HRC is the largest civil rights organisation in the US working to achieve equality for LGBTQ+ people. Its annual CEI evaluates businesses based on LGBTQ-related policies and practices across several metrics including non-discrimination policies, employment benefits, supporting an inclusive culture and corporate social responsibility, and responsible citizenship.
“These companies know that protecting their LGBTQ employees and customers from discrimination is not just the right thing to do, it is also the best business decision. In addition, many of these leaders are also advocating for the LGBTQ community and equality under the law in the public square,” said HRC Foundation’s President Alphonso David. “From supporting LGBTQ civil rights protections in the US through HRC’s Business Coalition for the Equality Act, to featuring transgender and non-binary people in an ad in Argentina, to advocating for marriage equality in Taiwan, businesses understand their LGBTQ employees and customers deserve to be seen, valued and respected not only at work, but in every aspect of daily life.”
TOP PERFORMERS
For the first time, HRC is giving special recognition to 11 companies that earned top marks on all three of HRC’s Corporate Equality measures: the CEI, Equidad MX and Equidad CL. The Equidad programme recognises Latin American companies and US multinational companies for their work in Mexico (Equidad MX) and Chile (Equidad CL). The companies that have earned top scores on all three measures include Accenture, Boston Consulting Group, Deloitte, IBM, JP Morgan Chase, McKinsey, Procter & Gamble, SAP, Sodexo, Uber Technologies and Walmart.
“Promoting respect, inclusion, diversity and equity. That’s the culture we’re striving to foster here at Walmart. It’s also the acronym that makes up the name of our PRIDE Associate Resource Group (ARG),” stated Walmart’s SVP and Chief Culture, Diversity & Inclusion Officer, Ben-Saba Hasan. “Through the years, PRIDE has advocated for same sex domestic partner benefits, transgender workplace transition guidelines, confidential self-id and so much more. PRIDE has helped make Walmart a more respectful, inclusive, diverse and equitable workplace for LGBTQ associates and allies. These initiatives have led Walmart to once again earn a top score of 100 on HRC 2020 Corporate Equality Index.”
KEY FINDINGS
Over the last several years, CEI-rated companies have dramatically expanded their support for transgender workers. This year 89% of companies participating in the CEI offer at least one health care policy that is inclusive of their transgender workers, and 85% met stringent criteria that requires all blanket exclusions of medically-necessary care for transgender workers to be removed from all health policies the company offers, up from 73% last year.
Other key findings in the 2020 CEI, include:
- The 686 companies who earned a 100 on the CEI represent 12.4 million employees nationally, 11.9 million globally and earn a combined estimate of $12.9 trillion in revenue.
- 83 companies participated in the CEI for the first time in 2020 with 36 debuting at a score of 100, including Etsy Inc, Peloton Interactive Inc, Stop & Shop and Warner Music Group.
- Of all Fortune 500 companies, 93% have sexual orientation in their US non-discrimination policy and 91% have gender identity.
- The average CEI score for all Fortune 500 companies increased from 67 to 71 in the past year – with actively participating Fortune 500 companies having an average score of 90, up from 88 last year.
More than 260 top businesses, including 191 that earned top scores on the CEI, are also corporate supporters of the Equality Act. This is a critically important bipartisan legislation that would finally add clear, comprehensive non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people to the US civil rights laws, pointed out HRC. While the Supreme Court decides whether LGBTQ people are protected by federal employment non-discrimination law, these companies are holding the line for their employees and their families, it added.
100% PERFORMANCE
Microsoft is one of the 686 companies that received the top score of 100% in the CEI again this year, repeating last year’s high performance. “Transforming industry and society takes more than any one organisation alone. It takes consistent and sustained effort to overcome longstanding injustices that are codified in bodies of law or embedded in dominant cultural norms,” stated Lindsay-Rae McIntyre, Microsoft Chief Diversity Officer. “The Corporate Equality Index sets forth a common standard that I hope all organisations embrace — challenging us to constructively disrupt systems, drive change within our business and the places where we do business to be more fair, more caring and more human.”
Law firm Fish & Richardson also “received a perfect score from the HRC again for its ‘steadfast’ commitment to LGBTQ rights, which reflects our core diversity and inclusion values”, said Peter Devlin, President of Fish & Richardson. “As a global law firm, we need diverse teams to serve the wide-ranging needs of our clients around the world. Diverse teams often achieve better overall results, which makes the business case for diversity and inclusion even more compelling.”
Goulston & Storrs, is another law firm which boasts a top score in this year’s CEI. “We place great value on diversity, inclusion, and belonging at our firm, which we believe is essential to establish and strengthen a collaborative, collegial, and successful workplace,” said the firm’s Director Chris Regnier, who co-chairs the firm’s Inclusion Advisory Committee. “We are honoured to receive this recognition again, and will continue to work hard to make sure all our colleagues feel welcomed and accepted at our firm.”
Click here to see the complete HCR Corporate Equality Index and report.
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