By: Adrienne Anderson, Senior Manager, Diversity, Belonging and Inclusion at AMD
Published 11-11-22
Submitted by AMD
Originally published in AMD 2021-22 Corporate Responsibility Report
Diversity and inclusion are key drivers that contribute to our ability to build great products that accelerate next-generation computing experiences. Research shows that businesses with diverse teams are more innovative, make better decisions and achieve higher performance. Inclusion initiatives foster a work environment that enables all employees to participate and thrive, which in turn creates a sense of community and purpose – what we at AMD call “belonging.”
As the technology industry and our role in society continue to grow, it is essential that we support the next generation of innovators, whose diverse backgrounds can help create technological solutions for some of the world’s toughest challenges. In particular, Black and Hispanic workers remain underrepresented in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) workforce. Women are also significantly under-represented in STEM occupations, making up a quarter or fewer of the workers in computing and engineering.1 While the tech sector has taken steps to make progress in recent years, it still has significant work to do.
At AMD, we see it as both a challenge and an opportunity for us to create a diverse workforce and promote a culture of belonging and inclusion.
Our Approach
We are committed to growing diversity, belonging and inclusion (DB&I) in our workforce to help embrace different viewpoints and experiences, foster innovation, challenge the status quo when needed and drive business performance. To achieve our aspirations, we want a strong culture that reaches across all aspects of our business.
Our DB&I approach includes:
By building a diverse talent pipeline, encouraging a culture of respect and belonging, and increasing the inclusion of under-represented groups, we will make AMD stronger. We will elevate our talent and improve business outcomes by encouraging employees to bring their whole selves to work. Our Multi-Voice Initiative encourages and supports all AMDers who champion and when needed, challenge our company culture with their unique perspective.
What we are doing is working. In our annual AMDer Survey, we ask multiple questions on how our culture and processes support our commitment to DB&I. We invited 100 percent of our employees to participate in our 2021 AMDer Survey, and 96 percent responded. Their responses to those questions and the overall index score are in the top 10 percent of global companies within the tech industry. In 2021 and 2022, we were recognized by the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index and the Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index as a Best Place to Work for LGBTQ Equality.
Goal and Progress
We have set a public goal and are committed to making meaningful progress to foster DB&I at AMD.
AMD is also committed to increasing the percentage of global female hires in engineering roles and the percentage of the under-represented group (URG) hires within our U.S. workforce year over year. In 2021, we made these efforts a component of our company’s strategic metrics and milestones to inform our annual incentive plan, which is a compensation element of our Total Rewards Program. We are pleased to share that in 2021 we exceeded the hiring goals we set, leading to a 1 percent increase in the total population of AMD female engineers and a 1.6 percent increase in our URG focus areas overall. In 2022, we will continue these efforts for inclusion as a component of our company’s strategic metrics and milestones.
Following the close of our acquisition of Xilinx in February 2022 and the creation of a new business unit called Adaptive and Embedded Computing Group (AECG), we are focused on the integration of our new employees and expanding our DB&I program and initiatives across our larger company. As part of this work, we will re-set our internal DB&I hiring goals in 2022 based on our current company population representation.
For more information on diversity, belonging and inclusion programs and initiatives at AMD, please visit our website.
Footnotes:
About AMD
For more than 50 years AMD has driven innovation in high-performance computing, graphics and visualization technologies. Billions of people, leading Fortune 500 businesses and cutting-edge scientific research institutions around the world rely on AMD technology daily to improve how they live, work and play. AMD employees are focused on building leadership high-performance and adaptive products that push the boundaries of what is possible. For more information about how AMD is enabling today and inspiring tomorrow, visit the AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) website, blog, LinkedIn and Twitter pages.
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