Diversity and Inclusion Initiatives

TTI’s Global Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) Committee came about organically. While many of the Company’s ESG activities are directed from the Board and management level, our Global D&I Committee started in 2019 as an employee-driven initiative to promote diversity within the Company. Initiated by our Milwaukee business unit (BU) in North America, other BUs in the region have quickly been inspired to follow.

The first initiatives involved distributing surveys, backed by local human resources (HR) teams, which revealed that employees ranked diversity as a key corporate value they wanted to support. Prompted by this, the groups launched recruitment initiatives and relationship-building activities. These early efforts had many successes with employees from diverse backgrounds noting their approval of the Company’s human-centric workplace environment. As such, when asked why he joined TTI, Faisal Elmi, an Assistant Product Manager for Milwaukee cited the “people first culture” as a key factor.

In 2021, TTI kicked off quarterly Global D&I Committee calls. One achievement in 2021 was a series of workshops held in North America featuring the speaker, Monique Betty, professionally known as ‘Coach Mo’. Betty’s sessions taught attendees how to participate in allyship and courageous conversations. Other sessions on subjects such as unconscious bias were taught by Jessica Sharp, an organizational psychologist. Employees at these workshops shared important experiences, such as blind spots and personal stories. From these initiatives, relationships developed into mentorships.

The presentations and workshops were discussed during a Global D&I Committee meeting, and positive feedback saw the adoption of similar initiatives through several North American BUs. On a personal level, employees at the Floorcare head office in Charlotte, North Carolina, gathered together recipes representing all the cultures in the office. A cookbook titled, A Taste of Diversity was printed and distributed to staff. On the other side of the world, diversity champions in TTI’s Asian Innovation Center based in Dongguan, TTI AIP in China, shared efforts to build facilities that support diverse employee religions. With the Global D&I Committee established and a regular cycle of sharing implemented, as we advance, TTI will organize global programs across BUs to celebrate diversity throughout the Company.