Nike, the global sports retailer, has set a number of ambitious goals it wants to achieve by 2025 to foster a more inclusive workplace and culture. Some of these goals include increasing the representation of women globally at the VP level and above to 45% of its workforce, as well as increasing the representation of racial and ethnic minorities at the Director level and above in the U.S. to 30%.
In support of these goals, Nike partnered with 10KC to help them build and scale an existing employee mentorship program for U.S.-based employees.
Before developing a formal program, Nike had a decentralized and informal mentorship program in place.
Crystal Neill, Nike’s mentorship program lead and Senior Program Manager of Global DEI Development, was tasked with finding a solution that would make mentorship “centrally focused and business-centered.”
10KC automated and refined Nike’s mentorship process
Neill started by connecting with the existing mentorship groups at Nike. She gleaned insights from existing mentor/mentee pairs and used their feedback to outline a new vision for mentorship at the company. Her team drafted five guiding principles for the new program, which included:
- Creating safe spaces
- Building trust in leadership
- Strengthening team-playing mentality
- Growing cross-cultural awareness
- Accessing more career opportunities
With the new foundation drafted, she turned to 10KC to implement a solution. Nike’s driving principle was empowering and enabling employees to realize career goals. With these ideas in mind, Nike consulted with the 10KC team at the partnership kick-off.
Together, Nike and 10KC created a program that used 10KC’ SmartMatch algorithm to pair mentors and mentees, build meaningful interactions based on the 10KC curriculum, and run surveys to measure the participants’ progress and satisfaction. Structured conversation guides helped sustain the nine-month program.
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