American Airlines, Accenture Earn Top Ratings on New REDI Index and Monitor, A Record Number of Companies Join National Faith@Work Conference

IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Washington, DC — America’s biggest companies are embracing religiously inclusive workplaces at a faster pace than ever before, according to the 2024 Corporate Religious Equity, Diversity & Inclusion (REDI) Index and Monitor, released by the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation (RFBF).

The REDI report finds that 429 (85.8%) Fortune 500 companies now mention or illustrate religion as part of their broader commitment to diversity, more than double the number in 2022 (202 companies, or 40.4%). The study also found a 68% increase in the number of Fortune 500 companies showcasing that they have faith-oriented employee business resource groups (EBRGs), rising from 37 companies in 2022 to 62 in 2024.

American Airlines and Accenture are the most religiously inclusive global companies, according to the 5th annual REDI Index.

“They are a role model for best practices of religious inclusion for other companies around the world,” said RFBF Founder and President Brian Grim. “Their progress in benchmarking this area of diversity is an invitation for every company to join this journey.”

“At American Airlines, our purpose is to care for people on life’s journey, including our customers and our 130,000 team members,” said Cedric Rockamore, VP, Global People Operations and Chief Diversity Officer. “A key component of caring is creating a diverse and inclusive culture where we can bring our authentic selves to work daily. We are so pleased to be recognized as #1 on the Religious Equity, Diversity & Inclusion (REDI) Index for our ongoing commitment to being a religiously inclusive workplace. Our team members, across all faiths and beliefs, help us better understand and serve our customers around the world.”

“At Accenture, we are committed to helping all our people thrive,” Accenture’s Global Change Management Lead and Interfaith ERG Lead Sumreen Ahmad said. “Recognition as a leader in the interfaith space from partners such as the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation demonstrates the importance of religion and faith to our people and as part of our overall inclusion and diversity efforts.”

FULL REPORT available here.

The REDI Index is a first-in-class benchmarking system for measuring how well companies integrate religion (including non-theistic beliefs) into their communications, policies, and programs.

Full executive summary and report of the 2024 Corporate Religious Equity, Diversity & Inclusion (REDI) Index and Monitor found at this link.  

Other top faith-and-belief friendly companies among the U.S Fortune 500 include Equinix (#2), DELL (#3), both rising in the rankings this year. Salesforce and Intel (tied for #4), and Tyson Foods (#6) moved up two spots. AIG, American Express, PayPal, Intuit, Texas Instruments, and Google round out the top 12 on the Fortune 500 list.

“Equinix knows we can best innovate and serve our customers when we have an inclusive culture where we each bring the best parts of ourselves to work,” Equinix’s Maria Medrano, VP, Global Head of Community, Diversity & Inclusion, said. “This includes religious identities, an aspect that’s important for three in four Americans according to the latest Gallup data. Religious inclusion opens our world even more, allowing for diversity, connection-building, and a fostering of learning and respect.”

“The hard work and commitment of Interfaith’s leadership team enhances our inclusive culture for everyone,” Dell President of Global Sales & Customer Operations Bill Scannell added. “I am continually proud of the community and connection our Interfaith ERG members provide within Dell Technologies. It is an honor to be one of the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation’s Top Faith Friendly Companies for 2024.”

“At TI, faith-based networks are an important aspect of our inclusive workplace,” said Yesenia Moore, vice president for Talent Management, Diversity and Inclusion at TI. “The REDI Index recognition highlights the diverse backgrounds and perspectives our employees bring to make TI a great place to work for all people, which we believe makes our company stronger.”

The Intel Corporation’s Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer, Vice President of Social Impact, Dawn Jones said, “Getting involved with a faith-based ERG has many benefits to the individual employee and helps us build an environment of innovation, inclusion and enthusiasm for Intel as a great place to work.”

 New participant BMC comes in at #1 among companies not on the Fortune 500 list. “We celebrate this milestone not only as a testament to our efforts but also as a reaffirmation of our dedication to building a more inclusive world for all,” BMC’s Global Head of Corporate Citizenship & Impact Wendy Rentschler said. “Inclusion isn’t just a goal; it’s a fundamental pillar of our organizational culture, driving innovation, collaboration, and sustainable growth.”

This year’s REDI Index includes the first major bank, health care system, comprehensive services firm, big four accounting firm, Aerospace manufacturer, and metal galvanizing firm, among others.

“At Citi, we foster an inclusive environment where all can thrive as their authentic selves,” said Erika Irish Brown, Chief Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Officer and Head of Talent. “For many, that includes feeling safe practicing and sharing their faith at work, whether through the clothing and head coverings they wear, the food they eat, when and how often they pray throughout the day, or even taking time off to practice their faith.”

Kaiser Permanente Vice President Laura Long said, “Kaiser Permanente is excited to be the first health system to participate in the Religious Equity, Diversity & Inclusion (REDI) Index. Embracing religious diversity strengthens our organization and enhances respect, understanding, and collaboration by tapping into the collective power of individuals from varied lived experiences and backgrounds.”

Metal galvanizing firm AZZ CEO Tom Ferguson, said “We at AZZ are truly appreciative of the recognition of our efforts to create a faith friendly work culture in support of our mission to grow servant leaders.”

Among other first-time participants, West Monroe’s Casey Foss, Chief Commercial Officer, added, “West Monroe is committed to fostering an environment where every individual can bring their whole self to work, including their religious beliefs. We strive to cultivate a place of mutual understanding, recognizing that the diverse experiences and faiths our employees carry with them daily profoundly impact how they experience work.”

 Outside the US Fortune 500, Qualtrics continues to make progress in benchmarking success. “At Qualtrics, we value being a diverse, equitable and inclusive team, and we believe our differences make us stronger,” said Julia Anas, Qualtrics Chief People Officer.”

General Fortune 500 Findings (REDI Index + REDI Monitor)

• — 429 companies (85.8%) mention, refer to or illustrate religion on their main diversity landing page, up from 202 (40%) in 2022
• — 62 companies (12.4%) publicly report having faith-oriented ERGs, up from 37 companies (7.4%) in 2022
• — The average REDI Monitor score across Fortune 500 companies increased from 2.1 in 2023 to 3.6 in 2024, further indicating a surge of attention to religious inclusion and diversity.

 Key Survey Findings Among 32 Top Faith-Friendly Companies (REDI Index)

• — 94% featured religion on company’s main or other diversity page, up from 92% in 2023
• — 97% sponsor faith and belief employee resource groups, up from 92%
• — 94% share best practices with other companies or organizations, up from 88%
• — 94% clearly address religion in diversity training, down from 96%
• — 87% provide chaplains or other spiritual care for employees, up from 80%
• — 94% are attentive to how religion impacts stakeholders, up from 80%
• — 94% communicate accommodation policies for employee religious needs, up from 92%
• — 91% annually announce procedures for reporting religious discrimination, down from 96%
• — 100% report that their employees attend religious diversity professional conferences, up from 92%
• — 72% match employee donations to religious charities, the same as in 2023
• — 100% equitably celebrate or honor holy days of their employees, involving thousands

Other notable findings and impact of the study

• — Recognizing the work of the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation, the White House has recognized that Faith-and-belief ERGs are a practical way that companies across America are building cultures of mutual respect and allyship. ERGs are recognized as an effective way to combat antisemitism, Islamophobia, and all related forms of religious discrimination and bias.
• — In all, more than 3.4 million people are employed by companies participating in the REDI Index survey.
• — Companies participating in the REDI Index include global leaders in professional services (Accenture), technology (Bosch), retail (Target), internet (Google), food (Tyson), electronics (DELL), manufacturing (Intel), airlines (American Airlines), customer relationship management (Salesforce), financial services (American Express), semiconductors (Texas Instruments), insurance (AIG), and energy (CMS energy).
• — Citigroup is the first major bank, KPMG is the first Big Four accounting firm, Kaiser Permanente is the first Health System, Aramark is the first in the comprehensive services field, and Rolls-Royce is the first in the Aerospace manufacturing industry to opt in.
• — The APPENDIX to the report (pages 27-29) has a useful article by Kent Johnson, JD, for HR and DEI professionals titled What Faith-Oriented DEI Contributes to “Belonging”. In short, a religiously inclusive workplace produces a deep and wide sense of BELONGING to the entire enterprise.

The release of RFBF’s 5^th annual report once again coincides with this year’s “Dare to Overcome” conference in Washington DC. Hundreds of EBRG leaders share research about the link between religious inclusion and greater employee well-being, retention, and overall productivity as well as ways to improve policies and practices that promote a “faith-friendly” workplace, free of hate, harassment, or discrimination.

Sessions over the 2-day program focus on action steps for building support for a faith-based BERG, exploring programmatic approaches to growing engagement, and fostering dialogue to bridge cultural divides and collaboration toward shared ideals. Speakers and sponsors include Dell, American Airlines, Accenture, Coca Cola Consolidated, Equinix, AZZ, Deloitte, Paypal, Merck, Service Now and others.

Outstanding individuals are also spotlighted. The ERG Leader of the Year Award recognizes a champion for putting the principles of Covenantal Pluralism into practice within their own company and across companies and society. The A21 Catalyst Award highlights an ERG’s effort to raise awareness and impact to combat Human Trafficking.

For the first time, conference attendees are participating in a social impact activity to raise awareness and encourage action against global hunger in commemoration of World Hunger Day. DELL Technologies, in consultation with the Busch School of Business, CVS Health, and Merck, is leading a hands-on “feed the hungry” community action, packaging food onsite for the homeless in collaboration with The Nation’s Mosque, Catholic Charities, and the Helping Hands initiative of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Olivia Lang, Founder, Higher Purpose Consulting LLC, helping to organize the service event, said “The Food for the Hungry Sponsorship is a cause which merits the generous support and devoted efforts of the corporate  community. I am so grateful to Dell Technologies and the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation for leading with compassion and prioritizing the needs of our most vulnerable.This is what true corporate citizenship looks like!”

Grim founded RFBF with a mission to make the case that religious freedom is not just good for the economy, but also for business, through research, workshops and thought leadership. With a background in research of religion and world affairs, he served as director of international data at Pew Research Center and as chair of the World Economic Forum’s global council on faith.

For more information, contact media@religiousfreedomandbusiness.org

• Phone – Gary Ritterstein: 321-243-9780

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ABOUT THE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND BUSINESS FOUNDATION

The Religious Freedom & Business Foundation (RFBF) is the preeminent organization dedicated to educating the global business community, policymakers, non-government organizations and consumers about the positive power that faith and religious freedom for all (including those with no religious faith) have on workplaces and the economy. RFBF is a non-partisan, nonpolitical, multi-faith registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization in the United States with work worldwide. It does not take a position on current political debates. For more information, please visit religiousfreedomandbusiness.org.

Accenture will lead this roundtable discussion at Dare to Overcome, Tuesday, May 21, 2024, from 3:30-4:15pm. Location: Busch School of Business, Room 207.

Honoring Difference with Respect: Living your core values, right after their next level session “How Faith/Belief-Friendly Workplaces Help Overcome Polarization”

Religion and innovation are seldom used in the same sentence. Typically we tend to think of religions as opposed to innovation, and research even suggests that the most religious countries are the least innovative on most measures. But are there conditions under which religion might actually be a catalyst for innovation? What role does religious freedom play in this regard? In this conversation, our speakers will address these questions and examine the role of religious freedom in fostering innovation.

Affiliations:
Dr. Andrew Abela, Dean, Busch School of Business, The Catholic University of America
Dr. Brandon Vaidyanathan, Associate Professor and Chair of Sociology, The Catholic University of America
Dr. Marco Ventura, Professor, Department of Law, University of Siena
David DeWolf, CEO | Board Chair, Knownwell, an AI solutions company
Lee Carosi Dunn, J.D., Director, Cloud Policy for North America at Google Cloud

At Forbes HQ in NYC, the Forbes Impact Lab and the Coalition for Faith and Media hosted an inspiring evening with pioneering leaders and corporate changemakers who meaningfully leverage faith in order to create strong businesses, prosperity, and more good in the world.

Forbes’ Chief Impact Officer Seth Cohen did a great job making the case for religiously inclusive workplaces in conversation with Accenture’s Sumreen Ahmad and the Today Show’s Savannah Guthrie.

Representatives from the faith@work community also included Google’s Farah Siddiqi, Leslie Funk and Naomi Kraus, American Airlines Rev. Greg McBrayer, Princeton’s Dr. David W. Miller, the Aspen Institute’s Simran Jeet Singh, and Religious Freedom & Business Foundation’s Dr. Brian Grim.

The Coalition for Faith and Media leaders Sheri Dew and Brooke Zaugg as well as Forbes’ Ali Jackson-Jolley all helped guide the event. Stay tuned for more to come!

Your Faith

ServiceNow will lead this roundtable discussion at Dare to Overcome, Wednesday, May 22, 2024, from 11:00-11:45 am. Location: Busch School of Business, Room 207.

A roundtable for people to share stories of Interfaith within their companies or personal journey that deepen relationships & help all learn what works!

Register for monthly networking meetings, 1:00-1:30pm BST, 2nd Thursday each month.

Join us on 6th June at 1:00 pm BST (8:00 am US ET) to hear from the UK’s top faith-friendly companies, Baringa and Rolls-Royce, as they share an overview of their faith-friendly policies and programmes.

See more at FaithAtWork.uk.

DELL-sponsored “Feed the Hungry” Multi-Faith Prayer & Service Project

Join colleagues from DELL Technologies’ Interfaith employee resource group and others for this special service project at Dare to Overcome, Wednesday, May 22, 2024, from 7:30-8:45 am. Location: Heritage Hall at The Catholic University of America, Washington DC. To participate, must be registered for Dare to Overcome.

The vision of the Dare to Overcome conference is to overcome those things that prevent unity, justice, tranquility, security, general welfare, and the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. This year DELL Technologies’ Interfaith employee resource group will lead a pilot of a social impact activity that provides an example of a possible faith-led initiative that companies can take back with them to replicate in their own communities.

All attendees to participate in a “feed the hungry” community involvement event on May 22 to draw attention to the World Hunger Day (a separate annual event observed later in May) to raise awareness of the global hunger crisis encourages action towards ending global hunger. This will begin at 7:30 am with a multi-faith prayer gathering for those suffering from food insecurity and hunger followed by a hands-on one-hour community event packaging food onsite for the homeless in collaboration with The Nation’s Mosque, Helping Hands (Latter-day Saints), and Catholic Charities in Washington DC. DELL Technologies, in consultation with the Busch School of Business, is taking the lead to organize the event. Colleagues from Merck and CVS Health are also supporting this initiative.

• Title: Executive Seminar on Championing Dignity in the Workplace
• Date/Time: Monday, May 20 Noon – 5pm
• Place: Maloney Pavilion, the Busch School of Business at CUA
• Cost: $75 per participant
• Description:  

This half-day seminar is an opportunity for HR professionals to discuss faith in the workplace and to learn more about the Busch School’s Dignity of the Worker framework for addressing contemporary shifts in the HR landscape, all while earning SHRM continuing education credit.  The seminar will be conducted in two sessions:

Randy Reardon, VP of HR at Labcorp – “How Bringing your Faith to Work, in the Way of St Francis, Encourages Dignity in the Workplace.”

Discussion on how the Way of St. Francis can be practiced within the organization, allowing dignity to flourish by allowing all to bring faith to work.

Tracy Phillips, Professor at the Busch School – Dignity of the Worker Workshop

An interactive workshop on how you and your team can implement concepts in The Dignity of the Worker Framework to instill human dignity-centered best practices in human resource management.

A full agenda will be sent out after registration.  Lunch and cocktail reception are included in the cost.

BYU: MBA Faith@Work Case Competition

BYU’s Marriott School of Business and Wheatley Institute will lead this roundtable discussion at Dare to Overcome, with students from Columbia Business School & Kelley School of Business at Indiana University. The panel will address the relevance of this topic in MBA programs today and ways universities and companies can work together to improve unity, justice and peace for society.

Wednesday, May 22, 2024, from 10:00-10:45 am. Location: Busch School of Business, Room 207.