L'Oréal USA Receives Corporate Empowerment for Women Award at CEW's 2021 Women's Leadership Awards

L'Oréal USA Receives Corporate Empowerment for Women Award at CEW's 2021 Women's Leadership Awards

L’Oréal USA today received the 2021 Corporate Empowerment for Women Award from Cosmetic Executive Women (CEW) at the non-profit's annual Women’s Leadership Awards. The award is presented to a beauty company that that commits to gender equality and promotes female leadership and advancement.

“Under the leadership of Stéphane Rinderknech, President and CEO of L'Oréal USA, the company now has the highest level of gender equity in the company’s 68-year history,” said Carlotta Jacobson, President, Cosmetic Executive Women, as she introduced Rinderknech at the virtual event to accept the award on behalf of the organization. Jacobson noted that, for the first time, three of L’Oréal USA’s four business divisions are now led by women.

“I am proud today to represent a long legacy of L’Oréal USA actions toward gender equity – a legacy of proactive initiative that extends back decades,”Rinderknech said, adding that because of those actions, and “the unwavering commitment of my current colleagues at L’Oréal USA – we have an incredibly talented pipeline of female leaders and we have been able to reach the highest level of gender equity in our organization’s history – with a strategic leadership committee that is 50% women.”

As part of his remarks, Rinderknech reaffirmed his commitment to fostering a culture of equity at L’Oréal USA. “I pledge to do everything in my power to ensure that we don’t lift our foot off the accelerator as we move toward that vision,” he said.

The Women’s Leadership Awards featured one-on-one networking sessions between honorees and attendees from across the beauty industry. The event also recognized Emerging Leaders—the beauty industry’s rising stars. Included in the 2021 honorees is Cara Kamenev, Vice President of Consumer Engagement at L’Oréal Paris, who first joined the company in 2012.

Speaking to his plans for the work ahead, Rinderknech said, “Simply put, we aim to set a best-in-class example for our industry,” noting the foremost importance of placing women in the key leadership positions. “Second, it means ensuring that women are paid equitably. And third, it means creating a dynamic, diverse and inclusive workplace that supports and promotes women at all levels and dimensions of diversity,” he said.

Last month, L’Oréal USA became the first company worldwide to be EDGEplus certified, a new certification from the EDGE (Economic Dividends for Gender Equality) global standard that enables organizations to go beyond gender and measure the intersectionality between gender and race/ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability and nationality. The results of the certification process demonstrated that L’Oréal USA exceeded the EDGE standard for pay equity at the organizational level, virtually eliminating a pay gap based on gender.

Seven years ago, L’Oréal USA became the first company in the US to be certified by EDGE, and in the time since, the beauty leader has worked closely with the organization to ensure that its programs, practices and path forward are in line with its mission.