The DiversityInc
L eTossp
Como5
panies fon0
r Diversitsy® Lea
conversation relevant during these
downturns, not just with the CEO
and senior leadership but at all
levels within the organization.
4
Customer
Relationships
As the demographics
of this country
change dramatically, culturally
competent customer
relationships are vital to
success. This not only applies to
consumer-facing business but to
business-to-business companies
and business-to-government
companies as well. For more on
customer relationships, go to
www.DiversityIncBestPractices.
com/customers. See our webinar
on customer relations at www.
DiversityIncWebinars.com/
customers
Marilyn French Hubbard: There’s
a huge opportunity to look at
specific diseases among minority populations. We know that
hypertension is an issue for African
Americans, so what can we do to
look at the surrounding causes?
As we look at growth and sustainability, we’re going to have to build
coalitions with other industries,
like pharmaceutical companies.
Gadsden-Williams: This is a huge
area for us given that hyperten-
Customer Relationships
Percentage of Total Advertising
Dollars Spent on Multicultural Advertising
20%
15%
10%
16%
5%
0%
5.5%
DiversityInc Bottom Quarter
Top 50 of 352 DiversityInc
Top 50 Participants
sion, diabetes, cardiovascular
disease, sickle-cell [anemia], and
other therapeutic diseases are
areas that we manage within our
organization. We have to take a
different approach, so we’ve beefed
up our multicultural-marketing efforts within the U.S., understanding that there is no one-size-fits-all
marketing approach as it relates to
our unique customers. We have to
be very strategic. We have partnered with mega-churches around
the U.S., the Congressional Black
Caucus, the women’s caucuses,
Asian caucuses, etc., and other key
organizations to provide us with
unique insights so we are better
equipped to understand and to be
able to take care of our patients.
Linda Jimenez: We actually have
a department called The Voice of
the Customer and they do a lot
of communications, focus groups
and surveys with our customers.
We try to link that back, showing
that those areas where trust is high
from associates also means that
there is a great deal of productivity.
That means that at the end of the
day, that particular business is successful in the marketplace. You’ve
got to reach out to your marketing
and advertising teams, to your clinical staff, and you’ve got to make
sure that they’re aware of all of the
nuances of dealing with healthcare
as it relates to immigrants, African
Americans, men, women, and all of
the diversity dimensions that we’re
familiar with, even as it relates to
aging, life and disability issues.
GOLD-STAR ANSWER
Anand: Diversity is a great differentiator for us. We put it on
proposals, we talk about it, and it
gives us access to the C-suite. Not
long ago, we actually built in diversity consulting for a client system,
and this was a $50-million contract
for a large healthcare system and
we won the contract. Was diversity the only factor in winning the
contract? Absolutely not, but it certainly was a factor and one that our
competitors couldn’t match.
Mark: Increasingly, clients are talking and asking for both supplier
diversity and work-force diversity,
and not about what your policies
are and what you’re doing but
about diverse teams—but it’s not
Gadsden-Williams, Vice President and Global Head, Office of Diversity and Inclusion, Novartis AG (Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. is No. 31) Rita Taylor-Nash,
