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Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

While the issues of racial inequity and systemic racism are not unique to Houston, we have an opportunity as Houstonians to lead the way in reforming broken systems, partnering with communities, offering support and removing barriers. We often speak with pride of Houston being "America’s most diverse city." Now we must work to make Houston "America’s most inclusive and open city", one that does truly offer "opportunity for all." The Partnership and the 900 member companies and institutions we represent are committed to this endeavor.

One Houston Together is a data-driven effort of 100+ businesses, institutions, and nonprofit organizations to advance people of color into senior management roles, increase racial diversity on corporate boards, and grow spending with Minority Business Enterprises.

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Houston Regional Equity and Inclusion Assessment

The regional assessment is an important tool for business planning and advancing progress on DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion). In 2023, the Partnership will reopen the regional assessment from April 1 – June 1. The inaugural assessment was conducted in summer 2021. Please click the link for key findings, a list of 2021 participants, details on this year's assessment and the actual questions. 

Best Place for Working Parents Assessment

Houston has joined the national Best Place for Working Parents® partnership, offering real-time designations to businesses of all sizes whose family-friendly policies qualify through a first-of-its-kind, 3-minute online self assessment. 

Houston Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) Impact Analysis

This report is a joint effort of the Greater Houston Partnership’s One Houston Together and the Houston Minority Supplier Development Council (HMSDC). The following tables summarize the economic impact of HMSDC-certified Minority Businesses Enterprises in the nine-county Houston MSA. While there are many other MBEs throughout the region, HMSDC data is used as a proxy to estimate the growing economic impact of MBEs across our region.

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Racial Equity Principles

The Partnership’s Racial Equity Principles are a framework to communicate the Houston business community’s pledge to reforming systems of bias, strengthening underserved communities, advocating inclusion, and removing barriers to achievement. Although many businesses have made their own individual statements and pledges, this unified approach sends an important signal about the Houston business community’s collective commitment. The Principles articulate how the Partnership and individual businesses can commit to advancing racial equity within their organizations and throughout our community.

Racial Equity Committee

In 2020, the Partnership established a board committee to guide the organization's actions in addressing racial equity and racial justice issues in Houston. The mission of the Racial Equity Committee is to harness the collective commitment and resources of Houston’s businesses and institutions to advance bold solutions to strengthen Houston as the most diverse, inclusive and equitable city in the United States.

This committee operates at the level of our two other “board-member only” direction-setting committees, the Public Policy Steering and Economic Development Steering committees. The committee is currently co-chaired by Gretchen Watkins, President of Shell Oil Co., and Melanie Johnson, President and CEO of Collaborative for Children. Click the link below for the full roster of committee members.

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One Houston Together Overview

Download this PDF for an overview of the activity and goals of the Partnership's One Houston Together effort. 

Racial Equity Conversations

Understanding Racism

Defining and understanding systemic and individual racism.

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Education and Racial Inequities

How does race affect the educational opportunities afforded to individuals and communities in the Houston area? What can we do to ensure quality education is accessible to all?

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Health and Racial Inequities

A look at why race-based disparities remain in outcomes, access, cost and quality of care.

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Developing Equitable Communities

Today, a person’s zip code remains one of the best indicators of their health and wealth. But there are renewed efforts to close the gaps in equity in our region’s communities.

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The Business Community's Role in Addressing Racial Inequities

What can individual companies and the broader corporate community do to help eliminate racial disparities?

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2021 SXSW

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Conversations

The Greater Houston Partnership presented Houston House during the 2021 SXSW virtual conference. The event featured candid conversations around a series of topics including innovation, the future of energy and DEI. 

Member Case Studies and Conversations

How 3 Companies are Advancing DEI in Houston

How are local business leaders working to advance diversity, equity and inclusion within their companies and what is the Partnership doing through One Houston Together to help guide that work?

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Member Spotlight on Sodexo's Roadmap to Global Inclusion; Updated MBE Analysis for Houston

Mia Mends is the Global Chief DEI Officer and CEO of Impact Ventures at Sodexo, an international facilities management and food services company with 420,000 employees worldwide.

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How 2 Organizations are Building a Sustainable Process for Hiring Diversity

The Partnership’s One Houston Together Talent Roundtable gathers the region’s leading employers to share best practices and tools for advancing talent diversity in deliberate and measurable ways.

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Driving Action to Advance Inclusion and Strategic Talent Development and Retention

How does a global company launch an effective diversity and inclusion strategy from the ground up? And what does outside-the-box thinking look like when it comes to education benefits that significantly move the needle on talent retention?

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Member Spotlight on JPMorgan Chase's $30B Commitment to Racial Equity

As part of its ongoing effort to showcase success in supplier diversity, the Partnership’s One Houston Together initiative hosted its latest roundtable discussion in late April featuring a case study with financial services firm JPMorgan Chase & Co.

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Key Articles

10 Proven Actions to Advance Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Bain & Company
Bain’s research finds evidence that 10 specific tactics—some common, others underused—are particularly effective at advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace.

Amplified Calls for Racial Equity Need Amplified Responses, Boston Consulting Group
Despite efforts to promote equity, many employees say companies haven’t done enough. Creating an equitable environment goes beyond hiring a diverse team—and benefits the entire company. 

Getting Serious About Diversity: Enough Already with the Business Case, Robin J. Ely and David A. Thomas, Harvard Business Review
This argues that to fully benefit from increased racial and gender diversity, organizations must adopt a learning orientation and be willing to change the corporate culture and power structure.

Leading on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, PwC
Learn how a DEI data focus can help corporate directors oversee DEI progress.

The Curb-Cut Effect, Angela Glover Blackwell, Stanford Innovation Review 
Laws and programs designed to benefit vulnerable groups, such as the disabled or people of color, often end up benefiting all of society.
 

Houston Demographics

Greater Houston Basic Demographics

A look at the Houston population by race, ethnicity, age, education and other factors.

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Urban Disparity

The Kinder Institute examines gaps in income, educational attainment, neighborhood services and other metrics and their impact on opportunity.

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Understanding Houston

Understanding Houston aggregates data across multiple sources to provide an accessible, one-stop platform for understanding key quality of life issues in Houston’s three most populous counties.

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Related News

Racial Equity

One Houston Together Member Spotlight: Chevron’s Employee Sponsorship Journey

2/28/23
As part of an ongoing effort to showcase success in the retention and advancement of racially diverse talent, the Partnership’s One Houston Together initiative hosted its first roundtable of 2023 featuring a conversation with senior HR leaders from Chevron who discussed the company’s journey to develop a formal employee sponsorship program. Increasing racial equity in the corporate talent pipeline and board leadership is one of the two priorities of One Houston Together alongside increasing spending with Minority Business Enterprises. The roundtable discussions are designed to share best practices and showcase Partnership members that are leading change.  Joyce Beaugh, Senior Manager of Strategy, Planning and Analytics and Michelle A. Snoddy, Senior HR Manager in Petrotechs, shared details on the development and evolution of Chevron’s sponsorship program now in its third year at the energy company.  While traditional mentorship often involves a senior professional providing advice and guidance to a junior professional, sponsorship requires more active advocacy by the senior for  the junior professional’s career advancement, supporting  their aspiration for growth opportunities and a leadership role within an organization.   “In its simplest form, it’s the difference between advice and action,” Snoddy shared with the roundtable participants. “It’s a senior person actually sticking their neck out for another and utilizing their brand to influence that person’s brand.”  Chevron’s journey in sponsorship began several years ago when benchmarking data suggested junior employees might benefit from a formalized sponsorship program that paired them with Chevron’s senior leaders. The company reviewed research and reached out to other businesses and organizations to get examples of successful sponsorship initiatives and decided to pilot their effort with three divisions to gauge effectiveness. They began with a cohort in Finance in 2021 and expanded the program to the Downstream and IT divisions in 2022.  Chevron uses a data-driven approach to identify junior or sponsored employees with strong and sustained performance who may be experiencing headwinds in their advancement. Sponsored employees must be nominated to participate. Each sponsorship cohort runs for a full year and matches between seniors and juniors are done in part through a proprietary software program, with input from business unit leaders to ensure strong matches. Each cohort begins with formal onboarding for both sponsors and sponsored employees to define expectations and foster productive connections.  The size of cohorts and focus vary depending on the business unit, but in one example of positive results: of the 60 matches over two years in Finance, the promotion rate among participants is 44% higher than non-sponsored employees.  Beaugh said it’s important that the senior leaders involved in the program be in a position of power to influence the junior person’s career trajectory and growth opportunities. The company’s extensive data informs where there are breakdowns in advancement within business units and where sponsorship might be most effective. Long term success metrics for the sponsorship program include increased depth and diversity of talent pipeline and measuring participant career progression and employee satisfaction. “No one is successful without help,” Snoddy said. “Informal sponsorship has been happening for generations, but it hasn’t happened for everyone. We’re taking that informal relationship and formalizing it so that others who might be experiencing headwinds on their journey get the same opportunities.”  In addition to the conversation with Chevron, the roundtable also featured a presentation by Sadie Funk, National Director of Best Place for Working Parents®. The Partnership is the Houston region sponsor for the campaign that enables companies to assess the family-friendliness of their policies and receive a special designation based on their results.  The brief 3-minute survey allows companies to self-assess across 10 research-backed policies that benefit both working parents and the company’s bottom line. Houston companies on the whole ranked high in more than half of the categories in the organization’s 2022 National Trends Report. Best Places is currently active in 14 cities across nine states. Funk highlighted why Best Place for Working Parents® policies are important in today’s post-COVID working environment and they will be in the future:  60% of non-working parents say childcare is the top reason they do not participate in the workforce.  Only 27% of families have the father as the sole breadwinner. 73% of highly credentialed women who leave the workforce say they would have stayed had they had access to flexibility at work.  83% of millennials say they will leave one job for another with stronger family policies and supports.  Replacing an employee costs a business six to nine months of that employee’s salary on average.  Learn more about One Houston Together and read about other case studies.  Want to join the Talent Roundtable? C-suite and senior HR/Talent/DEI leaders from Partnership member companies, please email DEIAssessment@houston.org.  
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Human Resources and Talent Event

Report: Houston Companies Lead When it Comes to Family-Friendly Workplace Policies

1/18/23
A recent research study assessing family-friendly policies at companies in 15 U.S. metros shows that Houston ranks high in six of 10  areas, from employee and dependent healthcare offerings to paid parental leave and remote work.  The 2022 Best Place for Working Parents® National Trends Report examines the benefits and policies of businesses that promote family-friendly work environments and their competitive advantage in attracting and retaining employees. Participating companies were surveyed about their policies across 10 proven practices shown to be effective in supporting working parents as well as businesses’ bottom line. Houston is one of 15 metros that participated and a total of 65 companies in the Houston region completed the survey prior to September 21, 2022. Southern Methodist University’s Center on Research and Evaluation collaborated with Best Place for Working Parents® to complete the report.  Fifteen industries were represented among the Houston survey participants, with the highest participation in the nonprofit, professional services and finance & insurance sectors. Companies of all sizes participated, including large (29%), mid-sized (30%), small (27%) and micro (14%) organizations.  Houston ranks among the top 3 metros for the following policies: Employee and Dependent Healthcare Paid Time Off Parental Leave  Nursing Benefits Child Care Assistance Remote Work LaTanya Flix, Senior Vice President of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the Partnership, led the launch of the assessment in 2022. “The results are compelling because the Houston region has not been recognized as a leader in this area. It is exciting to see our companies’ efforts recognized and to know how we compare to other regions," Flix said. "The findings demonstrate that Houston area companies are implementing proven practices that benefit families, increase employee retention, and ultimately make their companies more competitive. We have momentum in Houston and the Best Place for Working Parents® assessment is a useful tool to support companies in continuing to develop, implement, and improve their policies and practices." In addition to providing a view on the current policy environment, the national report also sought to evaluate the success of implementing the top ten policies in creating family-friendly workplaces across size and industry, and what changes had occurred in these policies pre- and post-COVID. Several key findings from the report include: Most family-friendly companies offer healthcare, paid time off, remote work, and flexible work policies. 90% of Best Place for Working Parents designees have these policies because they are affordable and effective, whereas onsite child care and backup child care are the least frequently offered. Larger companies offer a wider range of family-friendly benefits, whereas smaller companies are focused on a few benefits that have a very high impact. An organization's ability to implement policies increases with its size. Micro and small organizations, however, are also capable of implementing a range of the top ten family-friendly policies and are above average in implementing high-impact benefits, such as on-site child care and backup child care. On average, Business & Information and Finance & Insurance organizations offer more family-friendly benefits compared to other industries surveyed. Business & Information and Finance & Insurance organizations each offer five family-friendly benefits above the national average, which is more than any of the other industries surveyed. “In order to create workplaces that are both family-friendly and business-friendly, we must first understand the specific needs, trends, and challenges of Best Place for Working Parents businesses across each industry and organization size. With the ability to benchmark a company's performance against similar organizations, business leaders can gain insights on best practices in recruiting and retaining employees and identify tangible ideas for how to implement research-backed family-friendly policies in their own organizations,” said Sadie Funk, national director of The Best Place for Working Parents.  View the complete report here and take the assessment here.   
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Related Events

Demography

One Houston Together Assessment Kickoff

Kickoff the Biennial Houston Regional Equity & Inclusion Assessment with the Partnership!  Join us to:  Network with…

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Executive Partners