How Capital One Holds Itself Accountable on Diversity and Inclusion

When Shavonne Gordon, pictured above, took the job as head of Capital One’s diversity recruiting in 2014, it was a time, she says, “when the tech industry got called to the carpet for not having enough Black and Hispanic workers.”

Shavonne knew the tech world. She started her career with Capital One as a systems and database analyst. Now, as vice president of enterprise diversity recruiting, Shavonne oversees Capital One’s companywide strategies for attracting diverse talent. 

Capital One has long been focused on diversity and inclusion. In particular, they’ve been out in front in the finance industry around pay equity issues, regularly conducting pay equity analyses to ensure that women earn 100% of what men are paid, and people from underrepresented groups earn 100% of what other employees are paid. Last year the company launched its Impact Initiative, an initial $200-million, five-year commitment to support growth in underserved communities and advance socioeconomic mobility by closing gaps in equity and opportunity.

We interviewed Shavonne for our Future of Recruiting Report. She spoke to us about a wide range of topics, but we were especially intrigued by her thoughts on diversity and inclusion, which we’re sharing here.

Q: How does the increased emphasis on diversity, inclusion and belonging affect recruiting? 

Shavonne: Honestly, at Capital One, diversity and inclusion has always been a focus. But if I think about how it’s impacting recruiting, it’s really giving our recruiters an opportunity to spotlight certain things. It helps us reemphasize the training we give our recruiters on a regular basis, which is that part of our conversations with potential candidates should be about Capital One’s DIB culture. I want to know from my recruiters: Are you talking to candidates about our business resources groups, such as VOICES [for Black employees and their allies] or Blacks in Tech? Are you talking to them about the community events that we do as a part of our Impact Initiative?

That helps the candidate see that DIB is a part of Capital One culture. I also continue to remind my recruiters that they should be having that DIB conversation with every candidate, not just the candidate from an underrepresented group. People’s natural tendency is to say, “Oh, wow, I’m interviewing a Black woman, so let me talk to her about Voices [the ERG for Black employees].” But my feeling is “Hey, you should be having that conversation with everybody because it’s a topic of interest to everybody.” So, it’s giving us an opportunity to reemphasize intersectionality and start to push our hiring managers to do the same in their conversations with candidates.

Q: How can companies hold themselves accountable?

Shavonne: Accountability is the key, right? For many companies, this is a moment of reflection, a time to look at where we have opportunities and where we might have processes that are not equitable. And that means looking at: What are your promotion rates? Are they at parity across all genders and race, as well as LGBTQ+, veterans, and people with disabilities? Are your retention and hiring rates at parity? And do you feel like you’re hiring from what’s available in the market for all the roles you hire? If the answer is no, you need to look at how you’re going to address that.

At Capital One, we have slate requirements for most of our teams because if the hiring manager isn’t actually seeing talent from underrepresented groups, that means they’re not going to hire from those groups. So, there needs to be at least one woman and one person of color interviewed for roles. We have panel requirements too. That’s because if I’m a Black woman and I’m coming to interview for an analyst role at Capital One and we’re on Zoom and the only people I see on my Zoom screen all day don’t look like me, that sends a message to me as a candidate about the culture of the company. So, it’s important to make sure interview panels are diverse.

Q: What is Capital One doing to hold itself accountable? 

Shavonne: At Capital One, we looked at promotion rates and saw that there was an opportunity for us to promote more associates of color. We actually just launched a new program called Advancing Black Leaders, which is designed to look at the challenges that typically stand in the way of advancement for Black leaders in corporate America. One of the things this program does is help Black associates find a senior-level sponsor they can partner with, who will advocate for them and help them advance in their careers. We’re also setting up a similar program for our Latinx associates at the director and senior director level. So, these are a few of things we’re doing in response to our own reflections at Capital One, places where we needed to make the processes more equitable and put plans in place to address inequities.

Q: How has Capital One approached its relationships with Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)?  

Shavonne: A lot of companies recruit at HBCUs now but we’ve differentiated ourselves in the market by investing in HBCUs and partnering with them. Capital One has sat down with people at HBCUs and asked: How can we help you? Do you need curriculum enhancement? Would you like us to spend time with students, working on their skill-building and figuring out how to brand themselves? Do you need conference rooms equipped with video technology so students can come in and conduct interviews virtually if they don’t have access to that stuff at home?

We try to partner with the HBCUs to find out what their needs are first, and then see how we can help them. It might be money, but maybe they don’t need money. A lot of these places have an influx of money now, but maybe they need somebody to sit down with them and create a plan for how to use that money. So we try to take a deliberate approach with HBCUs, based on what they need.  

Q: Does it make it easier to hire diverse talent now that the talent pool has opened up with the rise of remote work? 

Shavonne: I think it does. I’ll use myself as an example. I’m a Black woman. If I ever think about finding a new job, I want to go to a place where I feel like there’s a community that’s going to welcome me. If I move somewhere for a job, I’m going to want the opportunity to interact with other Black women or a community that supports Black people. If you’ve got companies in locations where that doesn’t exist, it will be very difficult for them to hire diverse talent. 

But if you start offering opportunities in which it doesn’t matter where you work, then what you’re saying is, “Hey, Shavonne, you can stay in that culture that is nurturing and supporting you, and still have an awesome job with an awesome company that may be in a completely different location.” It absolutely makes it easier to hire diverse talent and a lot of companies are now starting to figure that out. COVID has proven that we don’t need to all be in the office together sitting around a draft table to make this work.

*Photo from Capital One

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