INSIDE MOMENTIVE

“Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced.”—James Baldwin

Antoine Andrews

May 10, 2022 | 5 min read

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Many companies today are navigating the complex questions of what social impact or ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) means to their company: where and when should they speak out and take a stand? And how can social impact strengthen their business while staying true to their values and ethos as a company? 

Getting to these answers takes time and will be unique for every business. However, asking the right questions, including the tough ones, and listening to all voices, especially those that have been historically unheard, can get us closer. 

At Momentive this is what we do—weaving together the best of humanity, AI, machine learning, and billions of questions and real responses—to drive better, more confident decision-making. In the past few years, through the launch of our social impact strategy, and Momentive Together, we’ve been applying these strengths to help ourselves and others carve out the most effective business strategy for social impact. 

Through Momentive Together, we believe we can drive real progress for equity, sustainability, and social justice. We also believe this work is as important as the products we launch and the financial targets we set. It drives long-term value, employee engagement, and creates a thriving company culture. It’s how we attract and retain our employees, our biggest source of innovation. It matters to our customers and to our shareholders.

Our 2021 Social Impact Report is where we tell this story—the story of our ongoing journey to align social impact with our core business.  Identifying where we can take the lead—because we have a unique ability to do so. Aligning to peers who exemplify best practice. And understanding where we have work to do. Below are some standout highlights from the past year and where we are going in the year ahead: 

We launched our Social Impact Advisory Council, made up of eight cross-functional global members representing human resources, communications, product, legal, and research, to champion our long-term social impact strategy from every corner of Momentive’s business. This group of leaders also allows us to embed diversity champions in critical functions within the organization.

We continued to embed DEI into everything we do, including across our strategy for social impact. This begins with our 2024 goal to achieve gender parity for men and women in our workplace, while also including space for representation from the trans and non-binary community. In 2021, we maintained our representation of women (44%) and women in technical roles (28%) while experiencing over 16% organic business growth. Our board continues to have gender balance and 30% identify as Black, Latinx, Indigenous, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, or “two or more races.”

The lived experience of our employees continues to be a priority. From screening tools to a diversity-first approach for executive hires, each year we are expanding inclusive hiring and recruiting practices based on what our current and potential employees say works. Our Allyship at Work training, in partnership with LeanIn.Org, and our employee resource groups and diversity, inclusion, and impact groups are part of ensuring an authentic and inclusive experience for employees. We are holding our leaders accountable through specific DEI and social impact actions and targets. 

We have taken our thought leadership in DEI a step further, not just looking at how we use our own voice, but how we amplify others’ voices. Our research data and Tableau’s powerful visualization tools now work together, and last year we collectively published dashboards that tell the story of DEI disconnect between execs and employees at work, the demand among the workforce for more sustainability practices at their companies, and the impetus behind the Great Resignation to see how people of different backgrounds are approaching work. 

Our Supplier Diversity Coalition brings together 23 leading companies including 23andMe, Box, Intuit, Slack, StitchFix, Zendesk, Zoom, and more every other month to share best practices, learnings, and failures to advance supplier diversity. Starting this year, our Workplace Diversity Reports will help Momentive and our suppliers understand their current DEI practices, how they compare to others in their industry, and how to develop a roadmap to improvement.

Through the launch of Workplace Equity IQ, created by our social impact, product, engineering, and professional services teams, we now provide customers a deep and nuanced view of the entire employee experience to identify which actions will make the most impact so that they can better inform their DEI roadmap and build a thoughtful talent strategy for the future.

We’ve refined our philanthropic pillars to promote high-value, equitable education, providing access to career development and opportunities for marginalized communities, and minimizing our impact on the environment. Volunteer hours increased 14% to over 1,100 hours and we raised over $16M to date through our signature initiative SurveyMonkey Contribute. We aim to triple volunteer participation over a 2021 baseline by the end of 2022.

We laid the foundation of our future emissions reduction and environmental strategy through our first full greenhouse gas footprint for Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions. Additionally, this year marked a milestone as we completed the migration of 100% of our data processing and storage globally to the cloud with the potential to reduce data center emissions by 88%.

Our company has a legacy of doing good. Since our founding we’ve spoken out on the issues that matter to us, pioneered approaches to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and through SurveyMonkey for Good executed an impactful strategic giving program.   

Over the past few years as the world faced a widespread health pandemic, global protests for social and racial justice called for radical change, and the impacts of climate change became increasingly present and urgent, we decided it was time to take the next step in our social impact journey. One year in, Momentive Together is focused, active, and stronger than ever, ready to spark meaningful change and shape a better future through social impact.