Guy Rounsaville
General Counsel
Visa International believes that a collective strength is borne from leveraging the multitude of backgrounds and experiences of a worldwide team, making Visa a better place to work. It also makes Visa a better business partner for its members, merchants, and customers.
Perhaps this is why Visa’s diversity efforts, set forth in its Diversity Mission Statement, are strongly supported and endorsed by its CEO and senior management team.
Guy Rounsaville, Jr., executive vice president and general counsel of Visa International, has been one of its most vocal advocates for diversity. Rounsaville was a co-founder of the California Minority Counsel Program and, prior to joining Visa, was chair of the Diversity Council at Wells Fargo. He led the implementation of the latter’s diversity programs, and brings this same level of commitment and support to Visa’s diversity efforts.
“This is an exciting initiative for Visa,” said Rounsaville. “As a global organization, we are extremely diverse and we’re looking forward to leveraging that strength to enhance our business and the quality of the workplace.”
Under Rounsaville’s leadership, the legal department has not only pursued but also achieved significant diversity outcomes. Of the eight attorneys in the department, 50 percent are minorities and women.
The legal department’s day-to-day practices are further evidence of how it has wholly incorporated Visa’s core diversity values. The department actively promotes the utilization of minority law firms and requests that firms staff Visa matters with minority and women partners and associates. Additionally, it audits these firms to ensure that this request is taken seriously.
The legal department is also interested in diversity in the community where Visa is situated, and where Visa’s employees live and work. Their community involvement spans a broad variety of public advocacy groups and non-profit organizations, including the Black Women’s Lawyer’s Association, the Asian Law Caucus, Disability Rights Advocates, and La Raza Centro Legal.
On a corporate level, Visa provides a wide variety of employee benefits and resources in recognition of the differing needs and lifestyles of the workforce.
It maintains a diversity initiative, whose development derived from a series of employee focus groups on the topic of diversity in the work environment.
Rounsaville, who is the initiative’s executive sponsor, lends the program the executive weight it needs to flourish.
The corporation is currently sponsoring the participation of minority and female employees in formal mentorship programs, and is a sponsor of the Inroads intern program.
In addition, Visa has established a formal diversity council with employee subcommittees focusing on education and awareness, hiring and employee development, and communication and community outreach.
These efforts ensure that diversity is, and will remain, a core value of the Visa corporate culture.
From the November/December 2003 issue of Diversity & The Bar®