Catalyst has announced that ING U.S. Financial Services (USFS) and Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. are the recipients of the 2008 Catalyst Award, which annually honors exceptional initiatives from companies that support and advance women in business. This year’s award-winning initiatives reflect Catalyst’s global perspective and the potential significant impact of women’s talent and advancement to leadership positions in the global marketplace.

The award serves as a call to action to effect positive and lasting change for women and business. As in the past, both of this year’s Catalyst Award-winning initiatives were evaluated in a rigorous year-long process against an extensive set of criteria: business rationale, senior leadership support, accountability, communication, replicability, originality, and measurable results. ING USFS’ initiative, Beyond Diversity: Building One ING Culture, has created a unifying culture that identifies diversity and inclusion as a business imperative, increased women managers at the top-most level, and become a model for the global organization. In 2001, recognizing the need for change, the company used a transition period of rapid acquisitions and subsequent consolidation to identify the necessary levers for culture change. ING USFS then capitalized on different talents, perspectives, and ideas to increase diversity and inclusion across all of its business locations.

The resulting “One ING” culture benefits all employees, with a strategic focus to include women and other diverse groups. The components of the initiative include, among other things, a comprehensive project to uncover employee needs that has led to skill-building initiatives, targeted recruitment, and mentoring programs, as well as an “acceleration” or “deceleration” of up to 10 percent of each business unit’s bonus pool that is linked specifically to performance on diversity measures, judged quantitatively and qualitatively by the CEO.

Since the initiative’s inception in 2003, ING USFS has increased women’s representation on the senior management team from 25 percent to 50 percent, and currently, two executive women in profit-and-loss roles manage 80 percent of ING USFS business. Two out of three people in the succession pipeline to CEO are women, and the percentage of women in people-manager positions has increased from 2003 to 2007.

Nissan Motor’s Japan-only initiative, Women in the Driver’s Seat: Gender Diversity as a Lever in Japan, uses diversity to secure business success by increasing women’s participation and contribution in all areas of the business. The business case for having women as decision-makers and in positions of influence within the company was developed in response to research identifying women as influencers of two-thirds of all car purchases. With the support of many senior leaders and champions, the resulting diversity strategy focuses on three areas: engagement, education, and advancement of women. The components of the initiative include, among other things, career advancement support through specialized “Career Advisors” for women only, as well as ergonomic adjustments to equipment and other improvements in facilities and working conditions at plants that allow women to contribute fully.

The initiative showcases solid increases for women in positions of influence in Japan. Since 2004, women in management positions have increased from 36 to 101 women, and the percentage of women managers in the design, planning, and product planning function has doubled. The percentage of sales people (Car Life Advisors) at Nissan-owned dealerships who are women has increased as well, while the percentage of women in manufacturing plants more than doubled. This is also the first time an initiative from a company headquartered in Asia has received the Catalyst Award.