Illumia is recognized as a leading education technology software and consulting services provider. We take this responsibility seriously and continually seek to create and develop strategic business partnerships that meet the needs of the colleges and universities we serve. We are committed to developing mutually beneficial relationships with small, women-owned, veteran-owned, minority-owned, disadvantaged/disabled, and LGBTQIA+ businesses.
Illumia’s supplier diversity efforts center around our corporate commitment to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and our desire to support clients in achieving their diversity goals. We seek to offer our clients quality solutions at competitive prices while creating business relationships that allow diverse organizations to succeed. Our goal is to provide viable business opportunities for diverse suppliers that fulfill mutually beneficial business needs and enable the growth of diverse businesses in our communities.
One of the challenges we face in our commitment to supplier diversity is opportunities to engage diverse suppliers in the provision of our services. As a software and consulting provider, Illumia employs staff to perform most if not all duties associated with our work, and opportunities to subcontract are rare. Additionally, when we do partner with vendors, the services are within highly niched specialized areas, such as door locks, security software, card manufacturing, or merchant services. Still, we’ve made it our mission to determine how we can better engage diverse suppliers. Below we outline our current objectives and strategies related to supplier diversity.
Objectives
As we continue to strengthen our supplier diversity efforts, we have identified the following key objectives:
- Actively explore diverse businesses that can provide competitive, high-quality services and whose business models are aligned with Illumia’s business strategy
- Ensure diverse suppliers have opportunities to be part of Illumia's business partnerships
- Continually communicate the value of supplier diversity with internal and external stakeholders
- Leverage supplier diversity results to help meet our clients’ supplier diversity requirements
These objectives are updated as needed and communicated broadly to the company.
Strategy
As a broad strategy, Illumia is continually exploring national, regional, and local efforts that enable us to be aware of diverse resources.Working collaboratively with various functional groups, our supplier diversity efforts help us identify ways for departments to explore partnership opportunities with diverse businesses and our clients whenever possible.
Illumia encourages all departments to identify and include diverse providers to help fulfill business needs whenever possible. Diverse businesses that add value, demonstrate their ability to provide high-quality solutions, and are competitively priced, reliable, and aligned with our values are included in our strategic business model. This company-wide policy reflects Illumia’s commitment to creating opportunities for diverse companies to market to Illumia and encourages Illumia to offer opportunities to diverse companies.
We continue to be proactive and to improve how we attract our diverse suppliers. Ilumia is committed to this goal and is assertive with appropriate initiatives to support the goal. We will promote this philosophy and incorporate it into our business development efforts, yielding better financial performance for Illumia and a positive economic impact in the communities where we do business.
Broader Scope
Our supplier diversity initiatives are part of a broader commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility. Illumia supports the notion that being in an organization that has an engaged and empowered workforce allows employees to bring their authentic selves to work, which in turn allows Illumia to provide the best solutions and services to our clients in ways that positively impact our communities.
Illumia is committed to attracting, developing, and retaining the talent needed to achieve our business objectives while building a workforce that reflects the communities and clients we serve. As our organization has evolved, we have aligned our talent strategy to emphasize engagement, belonging, leadership development, and equitable access to opportunity across the enterprise. This work is integrated into our overall business strategy and reinforced through intentional programs, policies, and leadership accountability that cultivate a high-performing and connected workplace.
Our strategy and initiatives are designed to foster an inclusive culture through:
- Support from senior leadership
- The ability to link the organization’s inclusion and diversity strategy with the overall business strategy
- Emphasizing the importance of inclusivity in and to the organization
- Diverse representation
- Metrics to measure progress
- Consistent communication of goals and efforts
- A long-term strategy
- Fostering impactful client outreach and engagement programs
These inclusion and diversity strategic pillars focus on communication and accountability, educational programs, partnerships, and policies and practices. As an example of policy commitments to diversity, in 2020, Illumia created a program to match employees’ contributions toward qualified 501c3 charitable organizations that are not-for-profit. Our company also grants 16 hours of volunteer time to employees who commit time to the critical imperative of social justice, community outreach, and volunteering.
Illumia also supports an inclusive and diverse workforce through Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) for women (Women in Search of Excellence – WISE), minority ethnic groups (Tapestry), LGBTQIA+ community (PRIDE), Military and Veterans (MVF), and Mental Health Awareness (MHA). In fact, about 1 in 4 US employees are members of at least one group.