Campbell Soup Company, Deloitte, Royal Bank of Canada and Telstra Garner 2010 Catalyst Awards

Catalyst said that initiatives from Campbell Soup Company, Deloitte, Royal Bank of Canada and Telstra Limited are the recipients of the 2010 Catalyst Award, the annual award that honors exceptional initiatives from companies and firms that support and advance women in business.

"These initiatives exemplify our Catalyst vision of 'Changing workplaces. Changing lives'," said Ilene H. Lang, President and CEO of Catalyst. "They impact the lives of employees, families, and communities by transforming organizations, and serve as models that inspire and encourage others to embrace inclusive workplaces that benefit women, men, and business."

Catalyst Award-winning initiatives, the group noted, are evaluated in a year-long process against a set of criteria: business rationale, senior leadership support, accountability, communication, replicability, originality, and measurable results. This year's Award winners include a company where women run the largest and most profitable businesses, a second-time Catalyst Award-winning company, a Canadian bank that expanded its women's initiative to benefit other diverse employee groups, and the first initiative from an Australian company.

Campbell Soup's initiative, Winning in the Marketplace, Winning in the Workplace, Winning With Women, has utilized employee engagement, knowledge sharing, and creativity to develop a culture of diversity and inclusion and support the company's overall plan to transform its workplace and marketplace performance. From 2005 to 2009, women in executive roles increased from 21 percent to 25 percent. In manufacturing roles, the percentage of women and women of color plant directors and managers increased from 14 percent to 21 percent, and from 1 percent to 3 percent, respectively.

Deloitte's The Women's Initiative: Living the Lattice, builds on the success of the Task Force of the Initiative for the Retention and Advancement of Women. The mission of the Women's Initiative (WIN) is to drive marketplace growth and create a culture where the best talent chooses to work. It has fueled significant increases for women in leadership: women's representation as partners, principals, and directors has risen from 6 percent in 1995 to 22 percent in 2009, and representation of women senior managers has increased from 23 percent to 36 percent in the same timeframe. In addition, the gender turnover gap decreased from 7 percent in 1995 to less than 1 percent during 2009. Deloitte reached an additional milestone in 2009 when it surpassed the 1,000 mark for U.S. women partners, principals, and directors.

RBC's initiative, Client First Transformation, embeds diversity and inclusion (D&I) principles into its approach with employees, clients, and communities, reframing the company's business strategy to be more client-focused and revitalizing its corporate culture. The initiative continues to generate solid increases for women across the company: building on a base, women in executive roles (executive VPs, senior VPs, and VPs) increased from 35 percent to 39 percent from 2005 to 2009, and women's representation as corporate officers (senior VP level and above) has grown from 27 percent to more than 30 percent during that same time period. Women in the high-potential talent pool increased from 31 percent to 43 percent, with 21 percent being visible minority women.

Telstra's Next Generation Gender Diversity initiative uses an integrated approach to increase women's representation at senior and pipeline levels and engage men as change agents, creating an inclusive culture of mentoring and networking. It has delivered solid increases for women leaders at Telstra and in the community: for women in the pipeline (general managers, area managers, and managers), total share of promotions grew steadily from 29 percent in 2006 to 41 percent in 2009. Representation of women on the CEO Leadership Team increased from 6 percent to 31 percent, and the number of women corporate officers has grown from 31 percent to 35 percent during that same time period.

Campbell Soup, Deloitte, RBC, and Telstra will present in-depth discussions on their initiatives at the 2010 Catalyst Awards Conference at The Waldorf=Astoria in New York on March 24.

The conference, which is sponsored by The Coca-Cola Company and Walmart, will feature keynote speaker Anne Mulcahy, Chairman of Xerox. In the evening, the 2010 Catalyst Awards Dinner, sponsored by PepsiCo and Shell Oil Company, will be chaired by Jim Skinner, CEO of McDonald's.

Catalyst is a nonprofit membership organization working globally with businesses and the professions to build inclusive workplaces and expand opportunities for women and business. With offices in the United States, Canada, and Europe, and more than 400 preeminent corporations as members, Catalyst is the trusted resource for research, information, and advice about women at work. Catalyst annually honors exemplary organizational initiatives that promote women's advancement with the Catalyst Award.

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