Diversity & inclusion

Creating a great experience for all employees

The center of what we do is to connect people and cultures across the world. We understand that we cannot fulfill that role without a strong and enduring commitment to the diversity and inclusion that reflects our world. One of our foremost objectives as an organization is to create a collaborative, inclusive and diverse environment – within Verizon, with our customers, and among our business partners and suppliers. We believe this commitment is essential to the success of our business.

Our Equal Employment Opportunity Policy implements our commitment to diversity and inclusion.

Verizon’s commitment to diversity and inclusion encompasses the principle that all employees should be compensated equitably for similar work and should have an equal opportunity to contribute and advance in the workplace.

In January of 2017, Verizon published its Pay Equity Commitment where it committed to identify and promote best practices in compensation, hiring, promotion and career development; to develop strategies to reduce unconscious bias; and to make hiring, promotion and compensation decisions that promote pay equity. In October 2017, Verizon removed from its employment applications around the globe all questions seeking current or past salary information of applicants for employment.

We continue to invest in the growth of women and people of color on the V Team. Among our most successful initiatives:

• A 12-month mentorship program that matches senior executives and women V Team members with the goal of advancing leadership skills and development.
• Competitive Advantage, a six-month program supporting managers who are people of color, fosters leadership development and networking with senior leaders.
• We launched in 2016, and are expanding in 2018, required workshops for our leadership team to explore unconscious bias and how to mitigate its impact to create a more inclusive workplace.

We promote diversity and encourage the contribution of diverse business partners to our success in our Short-Term Incentive Plan, which includes a 5 percent diversity and sustainability metric relating to the percentage of minority and female employees based in the U.S., our overall supplier spending directed to minority- and female-owned firms, and reductions in carbon intensity.

Verizon is a sponsor of Women in Technology and Entrepreneurship in NY (WiTNY). We partner on a number of initiatives, including the "winternship" program – two-week internships for college freshmen and sophomores during their winter break. In January 2017, Verizon was the first company to partner with WiTNY to pilot the initiative. We had five winterns who all came back for internships with Verizon in the summer of 2017. As a result of the pilot, in 2018 WiTNY plans to expand the program to include more than 40 companies and 170 students.