Deloitte, the largest of the Big Four accounting firms by revenue and number of employees, will be reversing its DEI commitments in the US, employees learned on February 10.
As the San Francisco Standard reported, in an email sent to staff, chief people officer Doug Boudoin wrote, “We will sunset our workforce and business aspirational diversity goals, our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Transparency Report, and our DEI programming.”
Deloitte also instructed employees in its Government & Public Services division to remove pronouns from their email signatures, according to the Financial Times. In a memo, staff were told to update their email template to “align with emerging government client practices and requirements,” Business Insider reported.
The changes follow an executive order by President Donald Trump ending DEI preferences in federal contracts. Deloitte, as a contractor to the US government, received around $3.2 billion in funds last fiscal year.
Before the reversal, the firm had multiple DEI targets it aimed to meet by 2025, the Financial Times wrote, including increasing gender and racial diversity in its US leadership ranks and spending $200 million with Black-owned vendors. Deloitte will still be “fully compliant with federal anti-discrimination laws,” Beaudoin wrote in the email to staff, adding that “national communities, local inclusion councils, and history and Heritage Month events" will continue.
Deloitte UK will remain committed to its DEI goals, Richard Houston, senior partner and chief executive of Deloitte UK, said in an email to staff, the Financial Times reported.
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