Kroger has several public DEI programs, frameworks, and commitments on its website. However, many companies with public DEI profiles like this have started to publicly back off or quietly remove DEI programs in the past few months. What is the state of diversity, equity, and inclusion at Kroger? Here’s everything you need to know. Kroger’s DEI Program Department Status: Active Department Trend: Unchanged Recent DEI Report: 2023 Policy Title:…
Last week, NPR reported on several companies that have removed some DEI language from annual reports. PepsiCo, #44 in the Fortune 100, was briefly mentioned. We maintain the Fortune 100 DEI Database, so I wanted to investigate. Here’s what we found out about PepsiCo’s DEI language over the past few years. PepsiCo Stopped Producing DE&I Reports In 2022 PepsiCo released DE&I reports in 2020,…
In a subtle change that appears to be missed from last year, Best Buy has removed key diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) commitments from its 2024 Corporate Responsibility & Sustainability (CRS) Report. I compared Best Buy’s 2023 CR&S Report to its 2024 CR&S Report. The difference revealed that measurable DEI hiring goals, once central to Best Buy’s strategy, have been replaced with broad statements about…
In its annual report released on October 10, 2024, Accenture wrote, “We have an unwavering commitment to inclusion and diversity.” Less than four months later, Accenture CEO Julie Sweet said in a memo to employees that the company has canceled four DEI-related goals and programs. Here’s the recent timeline of Accenture’s DEI policy from 2017 until now. The State of Accenture’s DEI Policy Department Status: Active…
In early February, Meijer released a press release stating that the company “reaffirmed its commitment today to growing its selection of Black-owned brands.” The supplier inclusion program at Meijer started in 2021 and has grown the number of Black-owned brands by 35% since then. Meijer joins a growing list of companies that support DEI in recent months. Here’s everything you need to know about Meijer’s…
Fiona Cicconi, Chief People Office at Alphabet (parent company of Google), sent an internal email to staff on Wednesday. Reuters first reported on the story. In the email, Google announced that is has stopped its diversity-hiring goals. But this is just the latest step in Google’s steady retreat from DEI that started in 2023. Here’s the timeline. The State of Google’s DEI Policy Department Status: Active Department…
The ideas behind “Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion” (DEI) in the workplace date back to the 1960s. But the actual phrase likely first appeared in the 2000s and the public didn’t take notice until 2022. More specifically, Google Trends shows that the topic “Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion” wasn’t searched until the third week of February 2022. In just three short years, DEI fully embedded itself into…
UPDATE: Caterpillar Inc. (enterprise-wide) mandated 5-day RTO on April 9 with a start date of June 2. Read the full memo here. I received an email from a Caterpillar employee stating this: “Caterpillar Resource Industries has mandated 5 day/week return to office for all employees beginning Feb 1, 2025. It will be closely tracked and employees that do not comply will receive a ‘does not meet…
On September 16, 2024, Amazon issued its sixth publicly-shared return-to-office (RTO) policy. But on December 16, 2024, Business Insider reported that Amazon may not have enough space for some employees in some locations. Here’s everything you need to know about Amazon’s RTO policy. Latest Amazon RTO Policy September 2024: According to CNBC, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy sent a new memo instructing corporate employees to…
Many RTO announcements are met with public employee backlash. And a few recent surveys show the same. A Gartner survey of 2,080 knowledge worker employees from May through June 2023 found the following: Intent to stay among knowledge employees surveyed was 8% lower with strict RTO mandates Intent to stay among high-performing employees surveyed was 16% lower Intent to stay among millennial employees surveyed was…