I, Mark Howard, personally commit to the following:

Personal Commitment

• I will use my voice as a leader at Nationwide and in the legal profession to advance diversity, equity and inclusion in the legal profession and in my community.
• I will listen, learn, and engage in purposeful conversations with our associates to become a more culturally competent leader and ally.
• I will take actions to promote and model a culture within our team that is intentionally inclusive, and known as a place where all team members’ voices are heard, valued and respected.
• I will drive leadership development, cross functional and stretch assignments to enhance readiness for different roles and opportunities.
• I will seek diverse slates in hiring and will join my direct reports, people leaders and all members of our team in learning the benefits of diversity, equality and inclusion to our law department, businesses and community and advocate for their support and engagement.
• I will meet with our LCLD Fellows, Pathfinders, and Alumni to discuss their experiences and ask each individual to provide at least one recommendation for how our organization could improve.
• I will support and promote our company’s overall DE&I efforts as the C-Suite leader for Corporate Sustainability.
• I will continue to support the efforts of Nationwide’s Social Justice Task Force.

Organizational Commitment

• We will continue to incorporate DE&I considerations into succession planning for leadership roles.
• We will develop and enrich sponsorship programs for our law department.
• We will continue to build on our strong Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council on a broad slate of initiatives, programs, and partnerships- internal and external.
• We will continue to support LCLD and participate in its programs.
• We will continue to partner with one of our trusted LCLD Member law firms to host and sponsor an LCLD 1L scholar.
• We will partner with a law firm/s to host an LCLD Leadership Lunch, or other similar event.
• We will meet annually with the Managing Partner/ Relationship Manager from each of our established outside counsel network firms to include discussions of results and expectations regarding DE&I and to foster the sharing of best practices among our network firms.
• We will leverage our enterprise-wide DE&I initiatives and encourage participation in them to include Associate Resource Groups, leadership development programs, mentoring circles, Future of Work and Future Leader Ready Sprint as well as community leadership and volunteer opportunities.
• We will continue to empower and serve our communities through our corporate sustainability efforts and the Nationwide Foundation.