Marriott International was named one of Black Enterprise magazine’s “30 Best Companies
for Diversity.” Black Enterprise, the nation’s premier business and investment
publication for African Americans, evaluated diversity programs, consulted
with diversity experts and corporate diversity officers, and conducted an
extensive survey of 1,000 of America’s largest publicly traded companies and
50 leading global companies with significant U.S. operations.“Marriott is a better company because of its diverse workforce. Our
associates have diverse experiences and feel comfortable sharing their ideas
and concerns. This lends to the positive experience that they provide our
guests,” said J.W. Marriott, Jr., chairman and chief executive officer of
Marriott International, Inc. “We have diverse suppliers, a diverse board,
diverse senior management, and we provide promotional opportunities to all
employees regardless of ethnicity.”
  The companies that made Black Enterprise’s list outperformed other
corporations in their peer groups in four key areas: the percentage of total
procurement dollars spent with companies owned by African Americans and
members of other ethnic minority groups; the percentage of African Americans
and members of other ethnic minority groups represented on corporate boards;
the percentage of senior management positions held by African Americans and
members of other ethnic minority groups; and the percentage of African
Americans and members of other ethnic minority groups represented in the total
workforce. The complete list and the methodology will be included in the Black
Enterprise July issue, which will be on newsstands June 28.
  Marriott recently pledged to do more than $1 billion worth of business
with minority- and women-owned suppliers and to double the number of its
hotels owned by minority owners and franchisees in five years. So far this
year, it’s doing business with four newly signed minority- and women-owned and
managed financial services firms. Recent successes include the groundbreaking
earlier this year of a Courtyard by Marriott hotel in Harlem, N.Y., with
significant minority ownership, and the opening of the Residence Inn Columbia
in Maryland owned by Integrated Capital, an African American privately owned
real estate equity group.
  “A racially and ethnically diverse workforce impacts both the top and
bottom lines of corporations as they target African American, Latino and Asian
consumers to grow revenues, profits and market share,” says Black Enterprise
Careers/Lifestyle Editor Sonia Alleyne. “In order to keep American industry
globally competitive, it is essential that corporate America makes full use of
all the human resources and intellectual capital—regardless of race and
ethnicity—at its disposal.”
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