Javade Chaudhri
General Counsel
Headquartered in San Diego, Sempra Energy is a Fortune 500 energy services company with annual revenues topping $11 billion. With 14,000 employees worldwide, Sempra Energy develops energy infrastructure, operates utilities, and provides related products and services to more than 29 million consumers in the United States, Europe, Canada, Mexico, South America, and Asia. Sempra Energy’s subsidiaries include the Southern California Gas Company and the San Diego Gas and Electric.
(L to R): Veta T. Richardson of MCCA; Javade Chaudhri of Sempra Energy; and Guy Rounsaville, Jr. of Visa International
“Sempra Energy is a global company and diversity is an integral part of our business strategy,” says Javade Chaudhri, executive vice president and general counsel. “Diversity enables us to be a top-performing company of growth and value. Our commitment to diversity closely links us to our customers and the communities where we do business. We’re proud of the fact that the Sempra Energy companies purchased nearly $215 million with women, minority, and service-disabled veteran-owned businesses last year.”
Sempra Energy’s ranks are diverse, from construction technicians working on the street to the customer call centers in which 16 different languages are spoken. The demographics in its legal department mirror the commitment to inclusiveness. Twenty-six percent of the department’s attorneys are minority and 27 percent are women. Of the attorneys reporting directly to the general counsel, 21 percent are minority and 37 percent are women.
The company’s commitment to diversity extends to its vendors, including outside counsel. Over the past year, minority-owned workers’ compensation firms have become Sempra Energy vendors, and it continues to identify additional minority firms for litigation, finance, employment, and intellectual property work. Sempra Energy has created partnerships with majority and minority firms in litigation practices, and has instituted a policy whereby minority partners or associates in its majority firms must be assigned to all Sempra Energy matters. Additionally, the company has requested that its law firms work with minority-owned legal services businesses, such as court reporting, couriers, and copying services.
Sempra Energy earned the top spot in DiversityInc. magazine’s yearly list of “Top 50 Companies for Diversity” in supplier diversity and came in 19th place for overall diversity last year. It has been listed among the top five of Fortune magazine’s “America’s 50 Best Companies for Minorities” since 1998. Sempra Energy received the Exemplary Voluntary Efforts (EVE) Award from the United States Department of Labor for the quality of its affirmative action programs, and it was chosen as a benchmark study site for former U.S. Vice President Al Gore’s “National Partnership for Reinventing Government Achieving Workforce Diversity.” Closer to home, Sempra Energy received the Corporate Leadership Award from the County of Los Angeles Commission on Human Relations.
From the November/December 2006 issue of Diversity & The Bar®