Leading Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Blue Cross NC

Equity is woven into the fabric of our Blue Cross NC purpose:

To improve the health and well-being of our customers and communities – we won't stop until health care is better for all.”

To serve every community, we have to know how to engage every community. To address our members’ unique needs, we have to work together to address our nation’s greatest challenges. We can’t serve our state without understanding how bias and oppression contribute to health disparities.

Recently, our team sat down with Pam Diggs, our Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and asked her personal take on equity issues, including her own personal growth and her experience as the mother of two sons. She spoke with us about the importance of DEI in business and the progress we are making at Blue Cross NC.

Pam, you’ve been our Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for about six months. What attracted you to the DEI role?

I had previously served on the Community Engagement Marketing Activation Team and led a Workgroup to create an enterprise-wide view of our Diversity Business Plan for Marketing. When the DEI Director role came open, it felt like a natural step to apply for the position. Having led equity, public health and social justice programs at previous organizations, I feel honored to serve in this capacity here at Blue Cross NC. We are a leader for DEI in our industry and in the corporate space, and I’m proud to work together with so many talented people to push us further.

Why is DEI work important to you personally?

DEI is important to me personally because the learnings, practices and policies within this field help give language, voice and solutions to experiences close to me and so many others. Both of my parents are cancer survivors, I’m the mom of two young Black boys, and I’ve experienced disparities in maternal health first-hand. All the while, I recognize the privileges I hold growing up in the city of Durham, having earned a post graduate degree in public health and working for such a ground-breaking organization like Blue Cross NC. As long as any of our employees, members or communities are experiencing inequities or injustice, we have more work to do to leverage our positions to center those most impacted by long-standing disparities. We are building on our success, culture and history of DEI as a company to dig deeper for equitable solutions for all.

What is Blue Cross NC’s long-term DEI strategy and goals?

In my first six months as DEI Director, we’ve established three key focus areas and measurable goals for DEI: People and Culture, Health Care Equity, and Strategic Partnerships. Our internal DEI Council – a cross-functional group that provides overall governance and strategic direction for the company’s DEI initiatives – identified the strategy and measurable enterprise goals for each focus area. At a high level, our goals within each focus area are:

• People & Culture: Further embed DEI leadership, representation, and engagement within our workforce
• Health Care Equity: Promote equal opportunities for healthcare coverage, access to care and higher quality of care to all North Carolinians
• Strategic Partnerships: Invest in and partner with historically underserved and underrepresented communities to support economic development leading to healthy communities across North Carolina.

We have specific goals and metrics for each focus area. We can’t change what we don’t track, and we all know what gets measured is what gets done. This is why I’m proud that we accomplished this initial task of setting measurable goals for DEI that will hold us accountable and serve as a north star to guide our work moving forward.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is also very broad, including many different dimensions of diversity. However, it is important that we use data to determine where we have our biggest gaps and opportunities so that we know where to focus to have true impact.

Why is this work important and how does it tie to Blue Cross NC’s Purpose?

Our three DEI focus areas - People and Culture, Health Care Equity, and Strategic Partnerships - align with and are really foundational to our Purpose – we won’t stop until health care is better for all.

For example, we’re being intentional about increasing representation of diverse populations at levels of the company, including leadership and workforce engagement. We’re also aligning with Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association’s National Health Equity Strategy to reduce racial disparities in maternal health by 50% in five years. Finally, we’re investing and partnering with historically underserved and underrepresented communities with a focus on maternal health, behavioral health, diabetes and food security.

We are making a big push to promote more diversity in leadership positions. How is that going?

It was evident to me when I walked in the door at Blue Cross NC in January 2020 that the organization has built a strong culture for diversity. The majority of our company is people of color and has been so for the last three years. In addition, 70% of our workforce is women. That’s a lot to be proud of as well as the way we’re modeling transparency in our employee data through our Quarterly DEI Dashboard, the community of our amazing Employee Networks, and the leadership for DEI that starts at the top with our CEO and President, Dr. Tunde Sotunde. To push us further, we’ve set goals to increase employee representation of leadership throughout the company through recruitment, hiring, promotion and retention for people of color, women, abilities, and veterans. We’re also working closely with our LGBTQ+A Network leaders to listen, act and create more equitable opportunities and an inclusive organizational culture that will support recruiting and retaining LGBTQ+ talent. DEI should be modeled in all spaces where decisions are being made.

In order for us to be successful, every employee needs to work with a DEI mindset. Tell us about the different aeas in the company that are doing DEI-related work?

"The work of DEI is the responsibility of everyone."

Our success depends on DEI being embedded into our DNA as a workforce. Yes, we have DEI leadership throughout the company. Governance and strategic direction for DEI is led by our internal DEI Council. Internal DEI initiatives are led by the DEI Office within Talent Management and HR. External initiatives are led by the Community & Diversity Engagement team and health equity initiatives by the Healthcare and Drivers of Health teams. Multicultural marketing is currently led by the Enterprise Marketing & Brand Creative teams.

While governance and strategy have clear roles, in our pursuit to make health care better for all, the work of DEI is the responsibility of everyone. Every person can and should approach their work through a lens that considers the varying needs of our diverse membership, workforce and state.

What are the most important lessons you've learned on your own journey to understand and promote diversity, equity and inclusion?

We have to get comfortable being uncomfortable in order to grow.         

We all make mistakes. That’s a hard thing to admit at work, but as DEI Director, I need everyone to understand that we all have bias, which we need to work to mitigate, and that we have to get comfortable being uncomfortable in order to grow. My beautiful, survivor mom taught me from a young age that nobody is perfect, but as long as I do my best I can forget the rest! I’ve learned that the most important thing I can do is be my authentic self and lead with a firm understanding of why this work matters to me. That helps keep me grounded and committed even when we face our biggest challenges. If we stand together in solidarity and lead through empathy and an intersectional lens that leverages both our differences, our common experiences, and our connection to humanity for change, we will improve the health and well-being of our customers and communities.

With the help of leaders like Pam, and many others, we have made great progress in our DEI efforts. Some of our accomplishments can be found on our Diversity, Equity & Inclusion website. Still, we, know that this work is not complete. Our commitment will not slow down. It will not waiver. In fact, we will go deeper… we won’t stop until health care is better for all.