RS Earns a 95/100 on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's 2023-2024 Corporate Equality Index

The HRC Foundation's annual CEI is the leading U.S. assessment of LGBTQ+ workplace equality, and as a proudly inclusive company, RS is honored to have increased its ranking by 15 points this year.

FORT WORTH, Texas, Jan. 10, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- RS, a trading brand of RS Group plc (LSE: RS1), a global provider of product and service solutions for industrial customers, has received a score of 95 out of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's 2023–2024 Corporate Equality Index (CEI). The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) is the nation's largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) civil rights advocacy organization, and the CEI is the nation's foremost benchmarking survey and report measuring corporate policies and practices related to LGBTQ+ workplace equality.

The first CEI, in 2002, featured 319 participating businesses. The 2023–2024 CEI features 1,384 major U.S. businesses — a 334% increase — and showcases how U.S.-based companies are successfully promoting LGBTQ+ friendly workplace policies in the U.S. and abroad. Further demonstrating the tremendous trajectory of the CEI, this year's data revealed that a record-breaking 1,340 businesses have non-discrimination protections specific to gender identity, up from just 17 in 2002. These critical non-discrimination protections now cover 21 million employees in the U.S. and around the globe.

The CEI rates employers providing crucial LGBTQ+ protections to over 20 million U.S. workers and an additional 18 million outside of the U.S. Companies rated on the CEI include Fortune magazine's 500 largest publicly traded businesses, American Lawyer magazine's top 200 revenue-grossing law firms (AmLaw 200), and hundreds of publicly and privately held mid- to large-sized businesses.

The CEI rates companies on detailed criteria falling under four central pillars:

• Non-discrimination policies across business entities
• Equitable benefits for LGBTQ+ workers and their families
• Supporting an inclusive culture
• Corporate social responsibility

"For well over two decades, businesses have played an important role in furthering LGBTQ+ equality by centering employee needs and voices when it comes to workplace inclusion. While there is much more work to be done, year-over-year growth in CEI participation is evidence of a business community that recognizes the responsibility and value in upholding equity and inclusion," said RaShawn "Shawnie" Hawkins, Human Rights Campaign Senior Director of Workplace Equality. "Our goal at the Human Rights Campaign Foundation is to work in a spirit of partnership with companies, providing educational resources and leading benchmarking and collaborating on ways for businesses to support the LGBTQ+ community at a time when we face unprecedented legislative attacks, heightened anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, and physical violence. The CEI is an ever-evolving tool — a blueprint that companies can use to show up more effectively in supporting their LGBTQ+ employees and their families." 

"We're extremely proud to have improved our ranking on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's 2023–2024 Corporate Equality Index," said Katie Cartwright, RS Vice President of People and Culture – Americas. "Last year marked our first year of participation in the CEI survey, and we leveraged the insights provided by our inaugural evaluation to further expand the policies and benefits designed to support our LGBTQ+ team members. Creating an inclusive environment where our people can bring their best selves to work is fundamental to our success. So, we're both pleased and proud to have demonstrably improved equity and inclusion in our workplace over the course of the last HRC CEI evaluation cycle, and we remain committed to listening, learning, and growing and ensuring that our employees are heard, represented, and respected at work."

In 2022, RS extended employee benefits eligibility to domestic partners, added paid leave for adoptive parents, and expanded its health insurance coverage to include transgender medical services. In 2023, RS:

• Launched the U.S. chapter of SPECTRUM, RS Group's LGBTQIA+ Employee Resource Group (ERG)
• Created an LGBTQIA+ specific benefits guide accessible to all employees so that individuals who don't wish to out themselves can still readily access information about relevant personal and familial benefits
• Created and launched a Transgender Inclusive Policy and Personal Transition Plan
• Signed the Human Rights Campaign's "Count Us In" pledge, which brings businesses together in allyship with the LGBTQ+ community and sends a powerful message to extremist lawmakers advancing anti-LGBTQ+ legislation that equality for all is not negotiable
• Celebrated its second year as a corporate sponsor of Dallas Pride

Other companies that earned a score of 95 on the HRC Foundation's 2023–2024 CEI include 1-800-FLOWERS, Adidas North America, Advance Auto Parts, Advanced Micro Devices, AirBnB, Allianz Life Insurance – North America, Ally Financial, AstraZeneca, BP America, Cisco Systems, Deere & Co., Dropbox, Foot Locker, Gap, The Hearst Corporation, Kaiser Permanente, Kellogg, Kohl's, Merck, MetLife, Michelin North America, Peloton Interactive, Petco Health & Wellness, The PNC Financial Services Group, Rockwell Automation, Rolls-Royce North America, Sony Electronics, Target, The Cigna Group, Tillamook, Tractor Supply, Under Armour, United Airlines, Walgreens, Wells Fargo, and Wendy's.

For more information about the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation's Corporate Equality Index (CEI), please visit www.hrc.org/cei to access the full report. For more information about RS, please visit us.rs-online.com/about-us/.

About The Human Rights Campaign Foundation
The Human Rights Campaign Foundation is the educational arm of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), America's largest civil rights organization working to achieve equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ+) people. Through its programs, the HRC Foundation seeks to make transformational change in the everyday lives of LGBTQ+ people, shedding light on inequity and deepening the public's understanding of LGBTQ+ issues, with a clear focus on advancing transgender and racial justice. Its work has transformed the landscape for more than 15 million workers, 11 million students, 1 million clients in the adoption and foster care system and so much more. The HRC Foundation provides direct consultation and technical assistance to institutions and communities, driving the advancement of inclusive policies and practices; it builds the capacity of future leaders and allies through fellowship and training programs; and, with the firm belief that we are stronger working together, it forges partnerships with advocates in the U.S. and around the globe to increase our impact and shape the future of our work.

About RS in the Americas
In the Americas region, RS stocks more than 250,000 industrial and electronic products from more than 700 trusted suppliers. These solutions cover categories extending from automation and control equipment to interconnect, passive, active, and electromechanical components and include more than 80,000 high-quality, competitively priced RS PRO products. For more information, please visit https://us.rs-online.com or connect with us via social media on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube.

About RS Group
RS Group plc provides product and service solutions that help our customers design, build, maintain, repair, and operate industrial equipment and operations, safely and sustainably. We stock more than 750,000 industrial and electronic products, sourced from over 2,500 leading suppliers, and provide a wide range of product and service solutions to 1.1 million customers.

We support customers across the product lifecycle, whether via innovation and technical support at the design phase, improving time to market and productivity at the build phase, or reducing purchasing costs and optimizing inventory in the maintenance, repair, and operation phase. We offer our customers tailored product and service propositions that are essential for the successful operation of their businesses and help them save time and money.

RS Group plc is listed on the London Stock Exchange with stock ticker RS1 and in the year ended 31 March 2023 reported revenue of £2,982 million.

For more information, please visit https://www.rsgroup.com/ or connect with us on LinkedIn or Twitter.

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Editorial Contact & Media Inquiries:
Erica Goode, RS Director of Marketing – U.S. and Canada
[email protected]  

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