Many companies talk of having a diverse workforce. But L’Oréal, the iconic cosmetics maker whose products can be found in 130 countries worldwide, is backing up the talk with action. At the U.S. arm of the $23 billion conglomerate, it’s Edward Bullock’s job to make sure that L’Oréal practices what it preaches. As Bullock, the vice president in charge of diversity, explains it, “In order for the company to be global, it first should be global from within.”

That priority for ensuring a diverse company starts at the top. Bullock notes that any outsider can gauge how much an organization values an initiative like a diversity program just by looking at where that position resides within the hierarchy. “I report to the president and CEO,” Bullock says. He also is a member of the L’Oréal USA executive committee. “We see diversity tied to executive leadership. The function is viewed as a business strategy.” As a business function, diversity manifests itself in three areas: L’Oréal’s people; its research and development teams; and its products, suppliers, and brands. “It’s an integrated approach,” Bullock says. “And just looking at one piece doesn’t support all of what we do.”

Diversity among L’Oréal USA’s employees and teams, which manage a portfolio of 19 international brands including Maybelline New York and Lancôme, provides powerful innovation, according to Bullock. “We believe diverse teams are more creative and innovative, and it’s the innovative piece that’s been the hallmark of L’Oréal,” he says. “As we get new ideas and new directions because of teams that represent different cultures, backgrounds, and persuasions, we get an explosion of ideas and opportunities.”

At L’Oréal, management has made diversity training programs mandatory for all U.S. employees, and that requirement includes a diversity assessment. Employees are evaluated on how well they partner, communicate, and work with their peers. In addition, they are asked how they support diversity initiatives. “We can gauge their efforts and integrate that into an assessment tool,” Bullock says.

In research and development, L’Oréal employs nearly 3,000 people worldwide in its 16 research centers. Bullock says he’s encouraged that women make up 55 percent of the global research workforce, a percentage the company claims is unmatched in the industry.

Bullock also works to ensure that L’Oréal USA’s suppliers remain a diverse group. For example, he oversees a Supplier Diversity Council that’s charged with making sure the company buys products and services from suppliers owned by women and people of color. The cumulative effect of the multicultural strategy is assessed in a “State of Diversity” report that Bullock delivers to the executive committee twice a year. The report is drawn from quarterly data assembled from all of L’Oréal’s diversity programs. “What we say is that a company measures what it treasures,” he says. “This must be a part of our DNA, and it must be at every level.”

Bullock and L’Oréal USA have received numerous global awards for their diversity efforts over the past three years (see sidebar, below), but the self-described change agent isn’t resting on his past accomplishments. “I will tell you that this effort is one of continuous improvement,” he says. “We’re not at a point where I can tell you that we’re done.”

To Bullock and everyone else at L’Oréal, the diversity strategy is and always will be more than just good public relations. “When your thinking is diverse,” he says, “you have a competitive edge.”

Diversity in Action

Education: Bachelor’s degree from Norfolk State University in Virginia; master of education from the College of New Jersey

Experience: Before joining L’Oréal, Bullock was manager of selection for a major division of Johnson & Johnson; before that he was director of career planning and placement at the College of New Jersey.

Awards: L’Oréal has won the 2004 Global Leadership Award from Diversity Best Practices; the International Corporate Diversity Innovation Award from the World Diversity Leadership Council; and the Diversity in Advertising Leadership Award from the Foundation for Minorities in Advertising.

Higher honors: In May, Bullock received an honorary doctorate of human letters from Norfolk State University and gave the commencement speech.

Digging Deeper

As a high school student in West Texas, Don Vardeman took a summer and weekend job with little thought that it would shape his future. “I walked around oil fields pouring a little bleach in water wells to keep microbe growth down,” he says. Now, 40 years later, Vardeman is vice president of worldwide projects for Anadarko Petroleum Corporation and presides over the oil industry’s largest annual show as chair of the 2008 Offshore Technology Conference (OTC), which takes place May 5–8 in Houston.

Last year, conference attendees came from 30 countries, and some 2,400 companies set up exhibits that occupied 530,000 square feet — more space than 13 football fields. Sixty-seven thousand oil gurus attended the four-day festival spotlighting new technologies to draw petroleum out of deep offshore wells, and expectations for the 2008 show are just as big.

The impresario of this huge event is Vardeman, who admits he’s come a surprisingly long way in his career. “I was talking about that with my wife the other day,” he says. “Just the thought that a couple of old West Texas folks could have traveled the world and done all we’ve done. It’s because of the oil business.”

Where Vardeman grew up, you went into farming (cotton or cattle) or oil, and for a bright kid with strong aptitude for science, oil called louder. When he graduated from Texas A&M in 1975 with a degree in electrical engineering, the oil business was in a hiring binge. “At my first interview, they said, ‘We don’t care what your first name is, as long as your last name is engineer,’” Vardeman recalls. He got the position without further ado and kept moving up. “I have never worried about reporting relationships as much as I worried about having challenging, fun assignments and working with good people.”

For Vardeman, the hunt for the next challenge has been a career constant, helping to push him up the career ladder. He had already been in the oil business more than 15 years when he first got involved in the OTC in 1993. His involvement deepened until 2000 when he was invited to join the board. This year marks the first time he’s chaired the conference.

A key focus of the OTC is technology. Revolutionary advancements are letting the industry look for oil in places that would have been unimaginable a generation ago. Vardeman recalls that the first offshore well he worked on, in the early 1990s, was out in 2,200 feet of water. Today there seems to be almost no limit to how deep companies can go in the hunt for petroleum. Anadarko, for example, recently completed drilling its Cheyenne Well in the Gulf of Mexico in 9,000 feet of water, a record-breaking depth. And, of course, those extraordinary depths up the technological ante.

Vardeman’s best tip for maximizing time at OTC.08? Don’t miss the breakfasts, which start at 7:30 a.m. “You beat the traffic, get good food, and have your pick of parking spaces,” he says. “The breakfasts really are the OTC’s best kept secret.”

Continental is the official airline of OTC .08.

Leader of the Pack

When Deborah Alderson, president of SAIC’s Defense Solutions Group, was selected by Women in Technology as the winner of that organization’s 2007 Leadership Award in the corporate category, no one who knows her was surprised. In the nominating application he submitted on Alderson’s behalf, SAIC chief executive officer Kenneth Dahlberg credited her commitment as a key driver behind the growth of SAIC’s Women’s Network from roughly 800 members to more than 2,000 in just one year.

Dahlberg also referenced Alderson’s many other accomplishments inside and outside the company — from narrating a stirring profile alongside ABC News anchors Diane Sawyer and Robin Roberts of Navy Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper as an example of women’s leadership, to leading her group to the highest possible rating from the defense industry’s benchmarking organization, to the positive impact her mentoring work has had on many small and disadvantaged businesses.

If there is a common thread running through all those accomplishments, it’s a focus on people. Alderson’s motto is “Take care of the people, and the rest will follow.” With responsibility for a group that numbers nearly 10,000, that’s not always easy. Nevertheless, she maintains an open-door policy and travels extensively to provide personal encouragement and leadership to members of her group at its many locations worldwide.

“It’s the way I was raised,” she says. “It’s ingrained in my being. My mom raised three daughters on her own and always emphasized that we had to treat people the way we wanted to be treated.”

Alderson says she realized early in her career that the word “I” meant nothing. “I found that if you surround yourself with good people who want to succeed, treat them with respect, and keep an eye out for meeting their individual needs, everything else falls into line. But it doesn’t just happen. You have to recognize each person as an individual, recognize their individual needs, and ensure they are being met.”

It’s an idea that has served Alderson well throughout her 25-year career in an industry that was decidedly male-dominated when she started out. There’s been a “sea change” since then, she says, with both public and private sector organizations investing in the development of women in technical fields.

After earning a master of science degree from Virginia Polytechnic University, Alderson joined Advanced Technology Inc. in 1983 as a systems analyst in support of Navy maintenance programs. She moved to Techmatics Inc. as a program manager two years later, ultimately rising to vice president with responsibility for 90 percent of the company’s operation and a seat on its board.

When Techmatics was acquired by Anteon Corp. in 1998, Alderson was named a senior vice president there. She led her group to double-digit growth each year and played a leadership role in Anteon’s 2001 initial public offering. She joined SAIC in 2005, where her Defense Solutions Group works on a range of technical projects in support of various federal agencies.

Sound exhausting? Not to Alderson.The most fulfilling aspect of her professional life, she says, is “developing a diverse workforce and the many different approaches and ideas that spring from that diversity.”

Say It Again, Sam

Simultaneous translation is no easy feat, says Samuel Chong, president of the Los Angeles Chinese Learning Center and Abacus Consulting Services. It’s so demanding, in fact, that even the best interpreters can do it for only about half an hour. Chong says he had to take the certification exam twice before passing. Even now, he still finds simultaneous translation challenging.

“It requires a lot of brain power and energy,” Chong says. “You have to listen to the source language, understand the meaning, translate it in your head, then speak the target language while continuing to listen. After about 20 to 30 minutes, the interpreter gets extremely exhausted.”

Chong recalls an interview he translated between Rupert Murdoch and Changle Liu, president of Hong Kong broadcaster Phoenix Television. “They started out talking in normal speeds, but as they got more and more interested in the topic, they started to speed up. It was intense.”

A native of Beijing, Chong arrived in the United States in 1993 at age 15. After obtaining degrees from the University of California at Berkeley, the London School of Economics, and Carlos III University of Madrid in Spain, he couldn’t find a job in 2002. But he saw a growing need for Chinese language instruction and seized the opportunity to open his own learning center. He started with one-on-one classes, teaching not only the language, but also Chinese culture.

“Chinese language is embedded in Chinese culture, and vice versa,” he says. “The two cannot be separated because Chinese people use hidden messages in their conversations. They’re not that straightforward. For example, when they really don’t want to do something, they’ll say ‘I’ll think about it,’ or ‘I’ll see if I have time.’ They give you a lot of explanations to save face. Americans tend to be more direct.”

Chong’s timing couldn’t have been better. Students were soon clamoring for his services in such numbers that he had to expand to group sessions. The center currently counts more than 200 students, and Chong employs several tutors who travel to private homes and, increasingly, to businesses. (He also offers classes in simultaneous translation.) As one of the world’s fastest-growing economies becomes more accessible to the West, students are joining Chong as he takes advantage of a historic opportunity.

Jim and Janine Harvey, a married couple from Covina, Calif., were at the forefront of that tidal wave. They first came to the Chinese Learning Center two years ago — Janine needed to learn Chinese for business trips to China, and Jim wanted to explore the country without having to rely on an interpreter while his wife was in meetings. “Samuel’s been extremely patient with me,” says Jim, who is now fluent enough to navigate through China on his own. “I can buy myself a bus ticket and get a meal.”

When he’s not teaching, Chong serves as a freelance translator for business clients like the Federal Reserve Bank of Los Angeles. He is also one of only 30 certified court interpreters of Mandarin Chinese in all of California. Chong’s expertise has even led to 15 minutes of TV fame. While working as a Chinese culture consultant for an episode of TNT’s The Closer, he appeared on-screen as a Chinese tourist who had lost his camera. He may never become a movie star, but Chong is already a Hollywood success story.