MGM Mirage, Cox recognized as leaders in diversity

By Steve Green

Thursday, March 11, 2010 | 2:05 a.m.

Las Vegas-based MGM Mirage has once again landed on an important national list of the nation’s top companies for diversity.

The casino-resort operator is the only Nevada-based company and the only gaming company on DiversityInc’s 2010 Top 50 Companies For Diversity list issued Wednesday.

Other big companies active in the Las Vegas economy ranked this year include Bank of America at No. 9, Cox Communications at No. 21, JP Morgan Chase at No. 34 and Wells Fargo & Co. at No. 43.

Atlanta-based Cox, with 1,300 employees in Southern Nevada, was hailed by DiversityInc as a “remarkable company for diversity.”

Cox President Pat Esser “signs off on executive compensation tied to diversity, meets regularly with employee-resource groups, personally signs off on diversity metrics and progress and regularly uses the intranet to communicate his diversity commitment to the staff,” DiversityInc said.

“Diversity training is mandatory for the entire work force and is held for a full day every month,” DiversityInc said about Cox, adding the company sets aside 47 percent of its philanthropic endeavors for multicultural charities and has boosted its emphasis on supplier diversity with 17 percent of direct contractors either minority- or women-owned companies.

MGM Mirage was ranked No. 24 by DiversityInc, publisher of DiversityInc Magazine.

MGM Mirage was also on the list in 2006, 2007 and 2009 and was named a “Noteworthy Company” in 2008.

The ranking comes as MGM Mirage continues to emerge from a challenging 2009 in which it and other gaming companies endured the deepest recession in memory on the Las Vegas Strip.

MGM Mirage in 2009 worked through additional challenges including the need to shore up its balance sheet with a public stock offering and debt exchanges; and to finalize financing for its $8.5 billion CityCenter joint venture resort complex that began opening in December.

Through it all, MGM Mirage executives say they continued to stress the company’s diversity programs that for years had been championed by Punam Mathur, senior vice president of MGM Mirage Corporate Diversity and Community Affairs.

Mathur left the company in April to join NV Energy as vice president, human resources.

MGM Mirage’s diversity efforts are now managed by Phyllis James, MGM Mirage senior vice president, senior counsel and chief diversity officer; and Debra Nelson, vice president of diversity and community affairs.

Chairman and Chief Executive Jim Murren has also played an active role in the 10-year-old program.

“I can’t overemphasize the power of having our chairman standing before a group of employees talking about why this is important to him personally,” James said in an interview Wednesday.

The company’s long-standing diversity committee of its board of directors is also a powerful force signaling to managers and employees how important diversity is to MGM Mirage.

New to the program are Chairman’s Diversity Roundtable discussions featuring Murren and other top executives.

“Diversity is an absolutely vital component to the DNA of this company,” Murren told a roundtable in November. “This program is not going away. As long as I have breath in my body and as long as the company wants me around, diversity will remain a core priority. This program is about everyone here at MGM Mirage. You have a vital role. We need to have candid, direct conversations. If you don’t take the responsibility to help us be better, then don’t complain about it. We need all of you.”

MGM Mirage has been considered a leader in diversity in the gaming industry since the early 2000s.

That’s when the company, then known as MGM Grand Inc., came under fire from critics for what they called its inadequate spending with minority suppliers. At the same time, observers were paying more attention to the lack of minorities in the executive ranks of casino companies.

MGM Mirage, long controlled by billionaire Kirk Kerkorian, responded to these circumstances with efforts first championed by then-CEO Terry Lanni and then by Murren.

Those efforts have included formal diversity training for employees and managers; outreach efforts to minority organizations and formal programs to find and hire minority contractors and suppliers.

MGM Mirage has long maintained that championing diversity is not just the right thing to do, but it’s a business imperative as the company seeks to attract and retain minority customers at its casinos and resorts in the United States and China.

That point was noted Wednesday by DiversityInc, which said of MGM Mirage: “One of the best companies anywhere at branding itself as a diversity leader, MGM Mirage has a strong focus on diversity training to create an inclusive workplace as well as culturally competent customer service.”

James on Wednesday said that even as the recession squeezed the company in 2008 and 2009, diversity wasn’t a line item in the MGM Mirage budget that could be cut because diversity is part of the company’s culture.

“It would be like cutting off your right arm,” she said.

This year, the company will continue with its Chairman’s Diversity Roundtables and is also looking at broadening its diversity training so that more front-line employees are included.

MGM Mirage says 9,948 employees, mostly managers, have completed its formal diversity training program.

The company has also stepped up marketing to multicultural groups that in the past may have thought they were not welcome in Las Vegas or couldn’t afford to meet in Las Vegas, James said.