Cable Prepares to Celebrate Diversity Week

diversity

“We need diversity of thought, experience, product and people. To best reflect the customers and communities we serve, we’re infusing diversity and inclusion into our governance, workforce, sourcing, programming and community investment practices,” writes David Cohen, the Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer of Comcast. In anticipation of Diversity Week, which will be held in New York City next week, we’d like to take a moment to recognize these types of commitments and initiatives taking place across the cable industry.

The Walter Kaitz Foundation, also known as cable’s diversity advocate, works year-round to raise funds and support programs that increase diversity within cable. Two of the organizations that it supports are hosting their annual conferences next week that center around themes on fostering multicultural and diversity practices across the industry.

KaitzHeader

Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT) is holding several workshops and sessions the week of September 28 dedicated to promoting and creating environments that support women’s leadership and advancement in the work place. Concurrently, the National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC), also supported by the foundation, will host a conference that will highlight influential people of color in cable as well as findings from the 2015 NAMIC AIM and WICT PAR Surveys.

The 32nd Annual Walter Kaitz Dinner, to be held on Wednesday, September 30, is also an important opportunity and space where cable networks, programmers and operators can get together with various stakeholders in the industry, with the mutual goal being to build and celebrate diversity across all cable platforms and workforces. Audiences will also gather to honor the diversity champion of 2015, Univision Communications Inc.

The mission of the Walter Kaitz Foundation is to serve as a catalyst for increasing diversity in cable through its workforce, supplier base and programming. As we prepare for Diversity Week, we look to cable leaders to help make our workforce and ideas keep pace with our country’s changing demographics, in very much the same way that our industry keeps pace with the evolution of television, media and technology.

Check back here next week for updates from New York City on Diversity Week, and follow #OneActionKaitz on Twitter.