Operating Responsibly

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

HCSC is committed to building upon its contributions to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Our Center for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion aims to strengthen and embed DEI in everything we do.

In 2022, we’ve focused on elevating our DEI strengths, impact and progress by:

• Cultivating an equitable environment for employees and members.

• Growing our position as a DEI industry leader.

• Addressing systemic barriers that may create disproportionate advancement opportunities for people of color.

• Evolving our supplier diversity practices to improve our utilization and spend with diverse suppliers across all areas of the organization.

By embedding DEI across our business and processes, we have accelerated opportunities to drive diverse engagement and inclusive experiences for our employees, members, customers and communities.

Business Resource Groups

Our nine Business Resource Groups bring together employees with common interests or backgrounds to impact the business and our communities. 

• Hosting a discussion on what it means to be transgender as an educational opportunity for allies across HCSC.

• Creating programming to support our first official Juneteenth holiday. 

• Presenting about Native American engagement at Seramount’s 2022 EmERGe Leadership Summit and for HCSC’s Health Equity Steering Committee. 

Recognition of our DEI Practices, Programs and Strategies

Diversity MBA — 50 Out Front Best Places to Work for Women and Diverse Managers — Best in Class ranking for recruitment, representation and accountability

Forbes — Best Employers for Women, Best Employers for Diversity 

National Business Inclusion Consortium — Best-of-the-Best Corporation for Inclusion

G.I. Jobs — Military Friendly Employers (Silver) 

Human Rights Campaign Foundation — 100% on the Corporate Equality Index

Disability:IN — 100% on the Disability Equality Index 

Supplier Diversity

A diverse supply chain is critical to the success of our business. Our employees, members, customers and communities we serve expect us to be inclusive in all aspects of our business, including our third-party relationships. 

This includes our supply chain, our providers, producers and other business partners. These diverse partnerships improve our ability to innovate, maximize our operational effectiveness, and ultimately, enhance our ability to serve our members. Our total spend with diverse suppliers increased from 4.27% in 2021 to 4.71% in 2022, representing 2022 disbursements of $170.2 million to diverse-owned businesses. 

HCSC is a member of several nonprofit advocacy organizations that promote the inclusion of their business members, assisting in their growth and connecting them with prospective customers: 

• National Minority Supplier Development Council.

• Women’s Business Enterprise National Council.

• National LGBT Chamber of Commerce.

• National Veteran’s Business Development Council. 

• Disability:IN.

We engage with these organizations in matchmaker events, access their databases to identify potential businesses for inclusion in sourcing opportunities and participate in their conferences. 

Sustainability

At HCSC, commitment to sustainability is at the core of our business practices. We operate in accordance with the triple bottom-line theory, which calls for the pursuit of actions that support people, the planet and prosperity. We’re committed to reducing our emissions in measurable ways. Five of our 2022 energy efficiency projects resulted in a reduction of about 170,000 kilowatt hours in electricity usage across the enterprise — roughly equivalent to the amount of carbon sequestered by approximately 2,000 tree seedlings growing for 10 years.

We continue to offset 100% of our electric power usage-related emissions with the purchase of renewable energy credits. Our employees recycled nearly 3.7 million pounds of paper and 145,000 pounds of electronic equipment in 2022. These efforts translated to saving about 36,300 trees, 13 million gallons of water and 6,200 cubic yards of landfill space.

Composting partnerships diverted nearly 71,000 pounds of organic waste in Chicago and Montana. Leftover prepared food from the Chicago headquarters is donated to The Chicago Bridge Project, providing about 5,000 meals for city shelters in 2022.

HCSC actively minimizes waste output when expanding its building portfolio. Our design and construction team diverted nearly 91% of the construction-related waste from landfill during the modernization of a dynamic new workplace that opened in 2022 in Downers Grove, Illinois. We’re conscious of the biodiversity impact of our facilities and planted a dedicated native plants garden at our New Mexico headquarters in 2022. 

HCSC recently welcomed beehives to its health plan headquarters in Montana, New Mexico and Texas, expanding an initiative that started in Chicago in 2019.

We also expanded our Chicago-based urban beekeeping efforts to host over 400,000 honeybees at our Montana, New Mexico and Texas headquarters buildings. HCSC also participates in science-backed initiatives that support strategic sustainability decision-making. In 2022 all headquarters buildings earned WELL Health-Safety Rating certification, and our New Mexico headquarters joined those in the rest of our states as certified by Fitwel.