Johnson & Johnson is a company that brings innovative ideas, products and services
to advance the health and well being of people. Three brothers, Robert, James, and
Edward founded the company in the year 1886. They built and started the company in
New Brunswick, New Jersey. They formed the first, first aid kit in 1888, which is the
standard kit for treating injuries. In 1910, James took over full leadership of the company
until 1932. During his time as the leader, the company opened their first overseas
company in the United Kingdom in 1924. Then, they started to build more companies
around the world through out the years. The company has strived to work hard to bring
new products in healthcare around the world to different cultures, and genders. Not only
do they care for the diversity of their customers, they also care about the diversity of their
employees.
Johnson & Johnson started relating diversity to their company I believe when they
began to expand their business. At first the company started in 1886, and was located in
New Jersey, USA. Eventually in 1924 the company realized that not only did the U.S.
need help with medical inventions and healthcare products but the world did, so they
opened an operating company in United Kingdom. This was only the first of their
expansion. Six years later they opened one in Mexico and South Africa, and a year after
that they expanded to Australia. The company installed a baby powder machine in the
Sydney warehouse, and it confirmed the widening acceptance of their products by the
Australian public (Dang, A., 2012). In 1932, Robert Johnson II took over the company
who was the son of the company founder. He realized how important it was to expand
more across the world and made the company a global decentralized family of
companies. Robert held Chairman and CEO of the company for many years to come, and
formed an operating company in Argentina and Brazil in 1937. In that same year he
formed Ortho Research Laboratories Inc. to create products for women’s health care.
Then 20 years later, they opened an operating company in India. From 1976 to 1989, a
man named James E. Burke was the chairman and CEO of the company. Throughout his
time of leadership he expanded the company even more to open operating companies in
China and Egypt. Then from 1989 to 2002, Ralph S. Larsen’s, CEO, expanded the
company to Russia and Eastern Europe (“Johnson & Johnson History”, 2015). Today,
their CEO and Chairman is Alex Gorsky. Alex mandates excellence in diversity, and
created a Global Office of Diversity & Inclusion. This office reports directly to him.
Johnson & Johnson is a company very invested in the diversity of their employees
and company. The company is listed number 9 of Diversity Inc. of the Top 50 companies
for diversity (“The DiversityInc Top 50 Companies for Diversity – DiversityInc”, 2015).
Johnson & Johnson defines diversity as a “a variety of similar and different
characteristics among people including age, gender, ethnicity, race, religion, national
origin, disability, sexual orientation, thinking style, background and all other attributes
that make each person unique.” The Company’s goal for diversity is to maximize global
diversity and inclusion to make for great business results, and competitive advantage
(“Frequently Asked Questions”, 2015). They understand that differences in age, race,
gender, nationality, physical ability, thinking style, sexual orientation, and their own
background brings out their work and effort in their business. Getting to know their
employees and where they come from help the company better understand products that
they have that make the world better, and creating new products to make the world even
better. Having a diverse work force reflects the diversity of the consumers (“Our People
& Diversity”, 2015).
The company’s board of directors and their managers are very invested in making the
company a better and diverse company. Alex Gorsky, the CEO and Chairman for
Johnson & Johnson mandates excellence in diversity, and as stated before he created a
Global Office of Diversity & Inclusion, which reports directly to him. In addition, he is
committed for them and board of directors provide the managers with resources to help
diverse thinking styles to make sure everyone can get along, communicate, and
understand everyone’s differences and similarities in opinions. The managers are also
responsible for providing tools and resources to recruit, develop and advance the talent
across the company and make it more diverse (“Frequently Asked Questions”, 2015).
Even though the company’s goal is for diversity, they only hire from the communities
where they do business, and will not offer a visa or work permit for someone to work in
the company in a different country. If they live in India lets say, they will not offer a
work permit to work in the USA. The employees also must be fluent in the country that
they work in. Some members of the company that are dedicated to making Johnson &
Johnson continue with their success of being a diverse company, and well liked company
by their employees are Anthony Carter who is the Vice President of Global Diversity &
Inclusion in the Global Diversity Office. He is part of the Medical Devises and the
Diagnostic Group. There is also Smita Pillai, the Director of Global Diversity, and Donna
Wilson, the director of Global Diversity Consumer Group of Companies. Though these
members are important to making the company so much more diverse, the managers of
the operating companies and the employees are also a big importance of continuing to
make the company more diverse (“Employee Resource Groups”).
Johnson & Johnson does have great data and statistics that they provided at the end of
year 2012, to show how diverse their company really is. Though some of the data may
have changed from 2012 to 2013, most of it should be around the same. If you separate
their company by region they have twenty percent of employees in the Asia-Pacific
Region, twenty-nine percent in the Europe, Middle East, & Africa Region, and fourteen
percent in the Latin America Region. They remaining thirty-seven percent of employees
are apart of their North America Region. Even with the North American region having
the most percentiles of employees, those in the USA are also very diverse and may come
