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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: JPMorgan Chase Leads on Supplier Diversity

5/4/23
In recent years, many companies and organizations have reexamined strategies within Supplier Diversity programs to improve outcomes and advance diversity, racial equity and inclusion. One of the companies at the forefront of these efforts is Partnership member JPMorgan Chase.  The financial services firm showcased how it has transformed strategies to be more intentional during the Partnership’s One Houston Together Spring CPO Convening. Improving outcomes for Minority Business Enterprises is one of the two priorities of One Houston Together alongside talent advancement and board representation for people of color. In 2020, JPMorgan Chase committed $30 billion over a five-year period to advance racial equity. The firm is harnessing its business, policy, philanthropy, and data expertise to reduce the racial wealth gap in Black, Hispanic, and Latino communities. Part of the bank’s commitment includes $750 million in additional spending with Black and Latinx suppliers.  JPMorgan is using five focus areas to drive a comprehensive strategy across the entire supply chain that includes:  Billion Dollar Roundtable membership  Tier 2 Program  City/Local Market Strategy  Supplier Diversity and Strategic Sourcing  Education and Development of Diverse Suppliers  Jim Flynn, Executive Director of Global Supplier Diversity at JPMorgan, said implementing a place-based strategy has allowed the firm to understand the ecosystems and cities where targeted minority business enterprises (MBEs) reside to either bring them into the procurement process or connect them with other community partners or resources. Houston is one of five cities where JPMorgan is implementing the place-based strategy.  “The old supplier diversity model was all about finding diverse suppliers and asking them to spend,” Flynn said. “The new model is about ‘what are all the things you can do within your organization to uplift those businesses and do more.’” One example is what Flynn calls the now, near and far strategy, which focuses on what the JPMorgan Global Supplier Diversity team can do for MBEs depending on the MBEs’ needs and where they are as a business.   “Many of these MBEs are corporate ready now, they just need access. So [it’s about] how can we help them break down barriers and become a disruptor in a convivial way with our colleagues to open a door,” Flynn said.  Flynn said measuring outcomes has been key to ensuring the sustainability and success of the program. JPMorgan’s Global Supplier Diversity team includes a business development group that is tasked with managing a portfolio of newly onboarded Black and Latinx businesses. Their job is to connect them to resources and be their internal champion. In addition, JPMorgan has started to measure the economic impact on an individual business level by collecting feedback from MBEs through a survey that asks questions such as:   Did your sales increase? Did your staffing levels increase? What other good things happened?  Flynn said asking businesses what they need on an individual level has allowed them to learn that it is important to create multiple pathways “because each journey is different.”   Learn more about One Houston Together and take the 2023 Equity & Inclusion Assessment. 
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Racial Equity

2023 Houston Regional Equity & Inclusion Assessment Now Open

3/31/23
The Greater Houston Partnership has launched the 2023 Houston Regional Equity & Inclusion Assessment, a robust tool to help businesses and organizations of all sizes enhance their equity and inclusion strategy and increase community impact. The Partnership held an in-person kickoff event on March 31, with over 40 organizations attending. Attendees heard from past participants about the benefits of the assessment for delivering business results, communicating progress, and generating value for shareholders, employees, customers and the community. The assessment is a standardized diagnostic tool based on the Global DEI Benchmarks and helps organizations evaluate their performance on 275 indicators across 15 different categories. The assessment, which is conducted biennially, is open to all organizations with five or more employees in the 12-county Houston region and closes June 1.   Participants will receive a confidential individual scorecard and the aggregate assessment results will provide industry benchmarking and a collective look at the progress the region has made over the last two years. Hear from previous participants on how the assessment has helped their organization:  The tool is a major part of the Partnership’s One Houston Together commitment to leverage the power of the business community to address racial inequities.   If your organization did not participate in 2021, please complete the form on this page to receive your organization’s unique password and view frequently asked questions and a fillable PDF of the assessment questions. A total of 120 companies and organizations took the inaugural assessment in 2021, providing a baseline for the region and serving as the first of its kind among major U.S. metros. View key findings from the assessment here.  
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Related Events

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Houston DiverseCity Summit

The Greater Houston Partnership proudly presents the Houston DiverseCity Summit, an inspiring one-day convening to advance equity and inclusion in the greater Houston region. This gathering of leading professionals…

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Executive Partners