RIGHT LIGHT The yellow light in staff scientist James Ford’s lab creates a stable chemical environment and protects the lightsensitive materials with which he works. Ford is at the front lines of new product development. Later product development stages involve the right mix of internal and external expertise.
Social Performance (cont.)
Affinity Groups
We have nine active affinity groups within the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies. Collectively, these groups have more than 220 chapters, 84 of which are outside the U.S., representing close to 10,000 members.
Initiated and driven by employees, these groups provide an open forum for idea exchange and action, and offer a mechanism to strengthen linkages within our diverse communities. Our CEO meets twice a year with group leadership. Our success with our affinity groups and our broad diversity efforts were acknowledged in 2009 when DiversityInc magazine ranked Johnson & Johnson No. 1 on its list of Top 50 Companies for Diversity.
Our affinity groups also help those in need and exemplify Our Credo responsibilities. For instance, our Hispanic Organization for Leadership and Achievement worked with the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) to provide eye screening for more than 350 people at the NCLR convention in Chicago; the screening identified some life-threatening health issues among participants. Our African American Leadership Council partnered with our Access2wellness™ program to provide education on Access2wellness™ at the NAACP and the National Caucus and Center on Black Aged. Our Gay and Lesbian Organization for Business and Leadership partnered with our supplier diversity team to include lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender suppliers on our list of certified suppliers.
Employee Training
Johnson & Johnson and its operating companies provide training across a vast array of topics, from leadership development and management education to training in disciplines such as finance, marketing, business practices and compliance requirements. We offer on-the-job training, plus extensive, globally accessible training and development at the individual, team, organizational and leadership levels. Our School of Personal and Professional Development and our eUniversity are available online to all employees and provide eLearning and classroom courses.
Training is provided, tracked and documented by the operating companies. Employees receive an average of eight hours or more of training per year.
Contractor Safety Management
Johnson & Johnson maintains a comprehensive occupational safety program that includes systems to protect contractors working at Johnson & Johnson facilities.
Due to a few contractor incidents that resulted in serious injury, as well as one fatality in 2007, we took steps in 2008 to revise our Contractor Management standard in collaboration with our Occupational Safety Network. The improved standard and associated contractor safety guidelines were implemented in 2009. They ensure that the qualifications for each job done by a contractor are clearly delineated, and that contractors are sufficiently qualified and competent to do the tasks they are hired to do.
In 2009 we also began tracking contractor injury rates and the percentage of projects in which safety risk is assessed prior to contractor selection, and assessing the level of contractor oversight.
Identifying a significant and increasing risk at one of our locations in mid-2009, we implemented the new program, resulting in a reduction in serious injury rates. Going forward, we will use the three contractor safety metrics to monitor both leading and lagging indicators of contractor safety performance and eliminate serious injuries and fatalities among our contractor workforce.