Awards
Above and Beyond Award for INCLUDE's Julie St. Marie
Julie St. Marie, Executive Sponsor of the Corporate INCLUDE Employee Business Network, was honored with 2010 Above and Beyond Award (AABA) as part of the Network & Affinity Leadership Congress (NALC.) AABA honored eight individuals across businesses for their efforts and achievements in building affinity and network groups. These individuals, in addition to their "day jobs," work tirelessly to increase employee participation, nurture future leaders and advocate on behalf of the diversity represented by their members. These champions ultimately work together across corporate and community borders for their affinity groups and their organization's business success.Within Best Buy’s Corporate Employee Business Network INCLUDE (Focus on Abilities, not Disabilities) Julie’s catalyst and role model approach leads others to ‘higher purpose’ by creating the foundational discipline to make ideas happen. Julie has made an impact to the culture at Best Buy, from developing new positions for INCLUDE members, igniting growth initiatives, assisting in policy change for health and accommodation programs, initiating consortiums with retail competitors, and ultimately recognition with President Bush’s 2008 Department of Labor’s New Freedom Initiative Award. The EBN INCLUDE blends naturally to Julie’s leadership style as an initiative that aims to bring everyone involved with Best Buy, from customers to employees, family and the community into the process of shaping inclusion practices.
International Corporate Citizen Award – Best Buy Corporation
Presented in conjunction with - Twin Cities Business Magazine, AJASA Technology, South African Consulate General, International Business Resource Group, LLC, Fredrikson and Byron P.A., Women Venture, Faegre and Benson LLC, MN Best Enterprises, Inc. The Twin Cities International Citizen Awards honor Twin Citians whose work has contributed significantly to international understanding, cooperation, friendship and development.2010 Recipients
International Citizen Award –Dean J. Brian Atwood
International Immigrant Achievement Award – Hyon Kim
International Corporate Citizen Award – Best Buy Corporation
International Leadership Institute celebrates 16 years of service.
www.internationalleadership.org
25 US Organizations Receive Annual Diversity Council Honors Awards During Reception in Atlanta
The Association of Diversity Councils recognized the top 25 organizational diversity councils in the US with the 2010 Diversity Council Honors Award™ presented during the Diversity Council Honors Award Reception last evening at the 11th Annual Summit on Leading Diversity Conference in Atlanta. The award recognizes and honors the outstanding contributions and achievements of the nation’s top 25 diversity council groups that lead diversity processes in their organizations and have demonstrated results in their workforce, workplace and marketplace. Best Buy, in its very first year of participation, placed 17th.Click here to see the top 25.
2010 Diversity Leader Award
In the 2010 January/February Issue, Profiles in Diversity Journal will announce that Best Buy among other organizations will receive the "2010 Diversity Leader Award®" for demonstrating outstanding diversity communication practices during the past year. The Diversity Leader Award® is awarded to companies that share their success stories with the magazine's readers on a regular basis, by taking advantage of the magazine's special features, by sharing their news releases, and by offering profiles of their thought leaders.Download the official press release.
Best Buy Honored by the Detroit Hispanic Development Center (DHDC)
The Detroit Hispanic Development Center has helped over 100,000 families in the southwest region of Detroit. The Detroit LatIN group has consistently volunteered through this organization to make Detroit a better place to live. Examples of their exemplary work include helping with Extreme Makeover III and bringing the Geek Squad academy into Detroit for the first time. The LatIN group was recognized at the annual Partners Breakfast in the fall of 2009.About Detroit Hispanic Development Center
The Detroit Hispanic Development Corporation's mission is to make a difference by creating life changing opportunities for youth and their families. We are committed to meeting the needs of our community by providing quality, innovative and culturally appropriate programs and services, primarily in the Southwest Detroit community.
DHDC provides many services to the community including adult education classes, summer youth camps, and urban arts academy entrepreneurship.
For more information, check out http://www.dhdc1.org/
Best Buy and CEO Brian Dunn Honored by BRAG
BRAG is the Black Retail Action Group. Best Buy received the BRAG Corporate Award at the BRAG organizations' Annual Scholarship and Awards Dinner Gala on October 23, 2009. Best Buy received the award for the Company's efforts to create a diverse and inclusive environment for our employees and customers. BRAG recognizes outstanding achievements made by persons in retail and related industries as well as other business and industry sectors, the arts and education.The theme of this year's 39th Annual Gala was "The Power of Change." At the event, BRAG also awarded two scholarships for students to attend Parsons School of Design and the Bronx School of Science.
Examples of Best Buy's diversity efforts noted by BRAG are:
- Memphis Cultural Immersion
- 200 Employee Business Networks within the organization (corporate and field)
- Women's Leadership Forum (WOLF @ Best Buy) for hiring and developing women
- Spanish language website
- Second language learning opportunities available to employees
About BRAG
The Black Retail Action Group was founded in 1970 as an outgrowth of a similar organization, the National Negro Retail Advisory Group (NNRAG). Although the latter organization folded, some of its members felt that the group's basic concepts should continue and with a nucleus of NNRAG members, the Black Retail Action Group was born.
In the years since its inception, BRAG has consistently maintained a record of accomplishments in attracting young people to the retail industry. For more information, visit the BRAG Web site: http://www.bragusa.org/dd09/index.html
Best Buy named among the "Best Places to Work" for the fifth straight year
Best Buy was named among the "Best Places to Work" for the fifth straight year by the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the nation's largest civil rights organization working to achieve lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality. Companies receiving this distinction scored 100% on the Corporate Equality Index, indicating inclusive workplace policies for GLBT employees."The 2009 Corporate Equality Index shows that corporate America understands that a diverse workforce is critical to remaining successful and competitive," said HRC Foundation President Joe Solmonese. To that end, Best Buy's commitment to support local growth plans through the hiring and retention of diverse employees is gaining the attention of other large corporations.
About the Corporate Equality Index
The Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index, first published in 2002, is an annual measure of how equitably large private businesses in the United States treat their gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees, consumers and investors. Ratings are based on factors like non-discrimination policies, diversity training and benefits for domestic partners and transgender employees.
Visit www.hrc.org for more information. Stay tuned for information regarding Best Buy's upcoming Diversity Week, October 6-10!
Store 493 Receives an Award for Hiring the Best
On Thurs., July 10, 2008, Ryan Seymour, General Manager of store 493 in the Potomac Yards in Alexandria, Va., accepted an award for Best Employment Practices. The award was presented to Ryan at the Association for Persons in Supported Employment (APSE) conference in Louisville, Ky.Each year, APSE recognizes organizations for Best Employment Practices at their annual conference. To receive this prestigious award is an honor for Best Buy, Ryan and his store. The award recognizes businesses that hire persons with disabilities, fully integrates them into the workforce and encourages other organizations to do the same.
The story of store 493 was captured in the award nomination process. A customer, who happens to own an employment agency for individuals with disabilities, shopped at the Potomac Yards store and observed multiple store employees with disabilities serving customers. This customer was so impressed with how the store used the abilities of these individuals and mirrored the community that she completed a nomination form for the APSE award. Ultimately, the store won for its hiring efforts!
Ryan Seymour and Tracy Garvin, Manager, were both interviewed and the story is published in the Spring 2008 issue of theAdvance, a publication of APSE. The story highlights the management's motto of "we focus on the ability and not the disability" and how the Best Buy value of unleashing the power of people are lived out on a daily basis in store 493. The article also introduces three store employees with disabilities (Jai Datt, Lisa Goodwin, and Robyn Schuler). It tells how they were hired, how their talents were discovered and utilized and how much they contribute to the family environment at the store.
Ryan and Tracy have learned a lot from their experiences working with people with disabilities and they offer great advice to business leaders responsible for hiring:
- "Instead of finding ways to exclude, start to look for ways to include people who may have disabilities." and "People with disabilities are going to bring out the best in your team. They will probably bring out the best in you if you are a leader, because you'll learn to look at yourself differently."
- Ryan Seymour, General Manager
- "I'll tell you in the beginning; it was a struggle because I was very nervous. Because you're sympathetic to the situation that they are in and sometimes you feel that they should be able to get away with more. That it's more acceptable for them to have poor performance or things like that. And that was just the wrong mentality right off the bat. Jai helped me through that and he really taught me a lot. Jai, Robyn and Lisa are amazing people."
- Tracy Garvin, Manager
Best Buy Named Hispanic Retailer of the Year
NEW YORK -- Six retailers in five categories received 2008 Hispanic Retail Excellence Awards at the fourth annual Hispanic Retail 360 summit that was held, July 28-30 in Miami.The award winners and categories this year are:
Mass Retail: Target Stores
Grocery: Jewel/Osco and Hy-Vee (tie)
Convenience Stores: 7-Eleven
Drug Stores: Longs Drugs
Specialty Retail: Best Buy
The awards, based on a poll of more than 1,000 Hispanic-focused retailer and supplier executives, including members of conference's 22-company Retailer Advisory Board, is designed to recognize leadership among retailers targeting the growing Latino population. Recipients were asked to write in the name of the retailer in each of six classifications (Drug Stores, Convenience Stores, Grocery, Mass Retail, Specialty Stores and Department Stores) that "has done the most in the past year to ."
The Advisory Board, representing retailers with more than 42,000 stores and more than $190 billion in annual revenue, also heavily influenced the content of the conference program. The board includes retailers from across all channels of retailing and foodservice such as ExxonMobil, Giant Eagle, McDonald's Corp., Minyards, SuperValu and Winn-Dixie. The full list of advisory board members and updated agenda may be viewed online at www.hispanicretail360.com.)
Last year's winner of the Hispanic Retail Excellence Award was Phoenix-based Bashas' Food City. The 2006 winner was Anaheim-based JAX Markets and the 2005 winner was Pros Ranch Market, which operates Hispanic market stores in Southern California and four in Phoenix.
From Convenient Store News: http://www.csnews.com/csn/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003825646
Disability Initiatives Recognized by U.S. Department of Labor
Best Buy received the Secretary of Labor's 2008 New Freedom Initiative Award from the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) this month, in honor of its outstanding efforts and commitment to improving the workplace for its employees and customers with disabilities.This award recognizes Best Buy's initiatives produced by its grassroots, cross-functional Employee Business Network called INCLUDE. Within months of its formation in 2006, INCLUDE received more than 300 inquiries regarding accommodations and other disability issues, many of which resulted in changes designed to improve employee and customer experiences.
As part of the effort, Best Buy has also established strategic partnerships with disability organizations, including the Maryland School for the Deaf, Career Opportunities for Students with Disabilities and the Minnesota Business Leadership Network. These partnerships and the overall success of INCLUDE are already translating into a competitive edge for Best Buy by closing gaps not only in its workforce, but also its customer base. http://www.dol.gov/odep/newfreedom/2008nfi.htm
