Top Gay-Friendly Companies

We all grow up imagining the exciting careers will will have as adults. We find our interests, focusing on our happiness and paths to success. Often, our career choices require us to work for a large company and sometimes we end up there out of necessity.

We become so focused on our careers and making a living that we often don't anticipate discrimination towards gays in the workplace. We ponder over many questions: Should we come out? How will we be treated by my peers? Will we get passed up for a promotion because we am gay? Do our partners qualify for benefits? Is there a gay organization at work?

To help assist us in finding a gay-friendly work environment with positive answers to many of these questions, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) evaluated the policies and practices of over 300 companies, scoring them for their "friendliness" toward gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees and their partners.

What is the criteria?

Companies must be either:

• A Fortune 500 company
• One of the 200 largest privately held companies from Forbes Private 500, or
• Other companies with at least 500 employees

HRC doesn't evaluate universities, government employers, non-profits or companies with fewer than 500 employees.

How are companies scored?

Companies were rated based on the following criteria:

1. Non-discrimination policy includes sexual orientation.
2. Diversity training including sexual orientation offered.
3. Non-discrimination policy includes gender identity and/or expression.
4. Diversity training including gender identity offered OR supportive gender transition guidelines in place.
5. Parity in at least one transgender wellness benefit (Including counseling by a mental health professional, pharmacy benefits covering hormone therapy, medical visits to monitor the effects of hormone therapy and other associated lab procedures, medically necessary surgical procedures such as hysterectomy or short-term disability leave for surgical procedures).
6. Company-provided domestic partner health insurance.
7. Parity in COBRA, dental, vision and domestic partners’ legal dependent coverage.
8. Parity in at least three other domestic partner benefits* (Including FMLA-like leave,† bereavement leave,† employer-provided supplemental life insurance for a partner, relocation/travel assistance, adoption assistance, qualified joint and survivor annuity for domestic partners, qualified pre-retirement survivor annuity for domestic partners, retiree health care benefits or employee discounts).
9. Company-supported GLBT employee resource group or firm-wide diversity council that includes GLBT issues, or Company would support a GLBT employee resource group with company resources if employees expressed an interest (counts for half credit).
10. Engages in appropriate and respectful advertising and marketing or sponsors GLBT community events or organizations.
11. Engages in action that would undermine the goal of GLBT equality.

The companies were rated on a scale from 0 to 100.

What new criteria was added to the Corporate Equality Index for 2006?

In 2006, HRC added transgender wellness benefits to the CEI. The automatic point system has been removed and replaced by point deductions for companies that undermine the goal of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equal rights.

Which companies ranked the highest?

The following 138 companies received a perfect score of 100 from HRC for their policies for gay, lesbian and bisexual employees and their partners.

Arnold & Porter (Washington, DC)
AT&T Inc. (San Antonio, TX)
Avaya Inc. (Basking Ridge, NJ)
Bain & Company Inc. (Boston, MA)
Bank of America Corp. (Charlotte, NC)
Bausch & Lomb Inc. (Rochester, NY)
BellSouth Corp. (Atlanta, GA)
Best Buy Co. Inc. (Richfield, MN)
Boeing Co. (Chicago, IL)
BP America (Warrenville, IL)
Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. (Watertown, MA)
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. (New York, NY)
California State Automobile Association (San Francisco, CA)
Capital One Financial Corp. (McLean, VA)
Cargill Inc. (Wayzata, MN)
Carlson Companies Inc. (Minnetonka, MN)
Charles Schwab Corp., The (San Francisco, CA)
Chevron Corp. (San Ramon, CA)
ChoicePoint Inc. (Alpharetta, GA)
Chubb Corp. (Warren, NJ)
CIGNA Corp. (Philadelphia, PA)
Cisco Systems Inc. (San Jose, CA)
Citigroup Inc. (New York, NY)
Clear Channel Communications Inc. (San Antonio, TX)
Clorox Company (Oakland, CA)
CMP Media LLC (Manhasset, NY)
CNA Insurance (Chicago, IL)
Coca-Cola Company (Atlanta, GA)
Consolidated Edison Co. (New York, NY)
Coors Brewing Company (Golden, CO) Corning Inc. (Corning, NY)
Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (New York, NY)
Cummins Inc. (Columbus, IN)
DaimlerChrysler Corp. (Auburn Hills, MI)
Dell Inc. (Round Rock, TX)
Deloitte & Touche USA LLP (New York, NY)
Deutsche Bank (New York, NY)
Dorsey & Whitney (Minneapolis, MN)
Dow Chemical Co. (Midland, MI)
DuPont (E. I. du Pont de Nemours) (Wilmington, DE)
Eastman Kodak Co. (Rochester, NY)
See complete index...