Patrick T. Ortiz
General Counsel
PNM Resources Inc. (PNM), which has been recognized as one of the nation’s most diverse companies, is an energy holding company based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, whose principal subsidiary, Public Service Company of New Mexico, is the state’s largest natural gas and electricity provider.
In 2002, for the fourth straight year, Fortune magazine ranked PNM as the best U.S. company for Hispanics, and the sixth best company in the nation for all minorities. These recognitions confirm that PNM’s employee recruitment and retention programs have created a corporate culture that not only values, but embraces, diversity.
The company’s law department, which is headed by Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary Patrick T. Ortiz, places diversity in the forefront. The legal department’s recruiting efforts and hiring practices led the way in the local legal community and helped bolster the number of minority corporate attorneys in New Mexico. In 1988, 17 percent of corporate attorneys in New Mexico were minorities. Ten years later, that percentage had increased to 28 percent. In its October 2003 edition, Hispanic Business magazine named Ortiz as “one of the Nation’s 100 most Influential Hispanics.”
PNM understands the value of diversity in its work force. The company actively seeks opportunities for incorporating diversity because it believes that a diverse work force enriches the environment and assists in meeting the needs of its employees, customers, and shareholders.
In 2002, the New Mexico Hispanic Bar Association selected PNM as one of two recipients of its “Benefactor of the Year” award. The other award went to PNM’s primary outside law firm, an occurrence underscoring the importance of partnership between general counsel and their primary law firms on diversity.
PNM supports a number of programs to further the company’s diversity objectives. It offers aggressive leadership development programs for promising employees, extensive supervisory training so that managers and supervisors understand the company’s commitment to diversity, and a college internship program with a focus on training and recruiting talented engineering students from all backgrounds.
The company’s CEO-Aide Program, established several years ago to help bring promising employees up through management, has already produced two current minority officers, one of whom was named by Hispanic Business magazine as one of the nation’s “80 Most Influential Hispanic Women.” Not only is PNM’s diversity reflected in its workforce, it also resonates in top management ranks and the company’s board of directors, which includes three women and two Hispanics.
From the November/December 2003 issue of Diversity & The Bar®