The Fortune 500 published today, as it has annually for 67 years. It remains the mother of all the lists we publish; this year, despite overwhelming headwinds, the companies on the list generated $13.8 trillion in revenue, or two-thirds of the U.S. economy. As a team we are mining the data in increasingly vital ways, and you should too — the list is wonderfully searchable.
Here’s where inclusion minded folks can dig in:
Choose your own adventure
The list is searchable by sector, industry, and headquarters city and state, and new filters will help you find some companies that are outliers in important ways. Do they make the employee-inspired Best Companies to Work For list — and are growing jobs? Are they profitable, and with female CEOs? Do they share their diversity data? Are some states expanding and others contracting? Play around and see what you find. (One thing, no female founders are currently CEOs…)
And yet, it was record-breaking year for female CEOS
There are now 41 women running Fortune 500 companies. Now, real talk, that’s only 8.1% of the whole cohort, it’s still a benchmark worth celebrating. Better still, for the first time ever there are two Black women in top spots — Roz Brewer of No 16 Walgreens Boots Alliance and Thasunda Brown Duckett of No. 79 TIAA. And top five alert: Karen Lynch of No. 4 CVS Health, is now CEO of the highest-ranking business ever run by a woman. Click through for more.
There were 24 newcomers
The list evolves with the ebb and flow of revenue, and this year, 24 new companies joined the list. Four new-comer companies are led by women, one of color — Judith Marks the CEO of Otis Elevator, No.236; Vertex Pharmaceuticals, led by Reshma Kewalramani, No. 448; homebuilder Taylor Morrison Home, at No. 452 with Sheryl Palmer at the helm; and Nasdaq arrived at No. 480, with Adena Friedman as CEO.
Clearly, leadership from the top matters: Alan Murray and I caught up with Friedman recently, to learn more about her push behind a new stock exchange rule change requiring companies to disclose the diversity of their boards. It’s worth your time.
Takeaway: the work has just begun
For the first time ever, inclusion data is being collected and published as part of the 500, an effort to encourage more companies to publicly report their numbers. A dreadfully small number do. (Expect more slices on these data as they come in.) This development is a promise Fortune was able to keep to our readers by virtue of a unique partnership with Refinitiv called MeasureUp that encourages companies to track and share their diversity numbers.
David Craig, the CEO of Refinitiv, has penned an opinion piece that makes it clear that these companies still have a long way to go when it comes to publicly reporting (and improving) their numbers on racial and ethnic diversity. Only 262 companies reported some level of race and ethnicity data, but few gave full, granular accounting:
- Only 18 Fortune 500 companies publicly report “the fullest breakdown of their U.S. workforce (across Black, Hispanic, Asian and Other minorities, and the proportions of these groups in the workforce, management and board, plus racial pay gap data).” The ones that do so: Air Products, Allstate, Amazon, American Express, Bank of America, Bank of New York Mellon, Citigroup, Estée Lauder, Intel, JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft, Nike, Target, Owens Corning, UnitedHealth, Verizon, Visa and Wells Fargo.
The numbers remain daunting:
- Black Americans account for just 5% of manager positions in the 80 Fortune 500 companies for which data were available, compared to a 13% share of the broader U.S. population (according to U.S. Census data). Hispanics and Latinos held just 6% of manager positions against an 18.4% share of the population.
“Publishing these kinds of numbers takes guts,” says Craig. “But it is an important step toward making meaningful progress.” And it requires a willingness to share actual numbers and not, say, report “underrepresented minorities” as a single block. “The number of companies willing to disclose granular data is disappointing,” he says. “Granular data is vital in building a nuanced picture that can then led to a nuanced response.”
Ellen McGirt
@ellmcgirt
Ellen.McGirt@fortune.com
On background
An interactive map of the history of Black professional athletes, racism and housing Louis Moore, an associate professor of history at Grand Valley State University, has created a fascinating story map that highlights the problems that elite Black athletes from Jack Johnson to LeBron James have historically had with racism and their homes. All the stories are jarring, but Lenny Wilkens’s arrival in St. Louis in 1960 really stings. “For Sale” signs courtesy of the KKK pop up on the lawn of his home in Moline Acres, a city suburb. His neighbor exits his car backwards for four years so he won’t have to look at him. “One evening the Wilkenses find their collie, Duchess, frothing at the mouth in their fenced-in yard. They rush her to the vet. Too late, the vet says. She has been poisoned.” Each node links to a local news account.
Knightlab
On being Black in Nova Scotia and celebrating Canada’s difficult history The story of the Tulsa Massacre brings to mind others, large and small, with common themes of violence, plunder, and erasure. This one, from the 150th birthday of the Canadian Confederation in 2017, deserves some attention. Journalist Denise Balkissoon tells the tragic tale of Africville, a small but important Black neighborhood in Nova Scotia, razed by the government in the mid-1960s for its land. All that’s left is a tiny museum, all heart, and no power. “People who lived there are still alive,” she says. “There's a 72-year-old named Eddie Carvery who hangs out in a trailer outside the museum every day, unwilling to leave without reparations.” Anniversaries necessitate the reconsideration of heroes like Edward Cornwallis who founded Halifax, “and who encouraged the genocide of the Mi'kmaq who already inhabited the place he wanted to found.” She talked to Black Nova Scotians about what their lives were like then and now. “They moved them out in city garbage trucks," said one about the Africville destruction. The museum commemorating the neighborhood is totally isolated from the community. “There's no bus that comes down here."
The Globe and Mail
Let’s make the workplace safe for grief Grief is more than just a temporary condition. It is a form of invisible disability, causing people to spiral into anxiety, depression, become withdrawn or scattered. And now, more than ever, there’s a lot to grieve. And yet, there are few companies that have clear policies or positions for bereavement, and fewer if the person who has been lost is a friend or more distant relative. The "take all the time you need” approach can do more harm than good, suggests Jennifer Moss of Plasticity Labs. She offers several tips on becoming a more responsive workplace, and all of them involve an authentic willingness to confront the truth. It helps grieving people feel less alone. “It’s critical for business leaders to make understanding grief part of other trainings that employees get on emotional intelligence, mindfulness, and so on,” she says. (A raceAhead re-share, by request.)
Harvard Business Review
This edition of raceAhead was edited by Wandy Felicita Ortiz.
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