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Diversity and Our Business Success

Workforce diversity is integral to TransCanada’s strategy for growth, and has been for years. Our goal is to ensure that our workforce is highly qualified and reflects the diversity found in the communities where we operate. While we always hire the best person for the job, employees from other cultures and backgrounds sharpen our competitive edge while creating a more rewarding place to work.

To attain greater diversity, we have clear internal practices, policies and procedures. In addition, as required by law, we follow the provisions of the Employee Equity Act in Canada, which means we strive to identify and close gaps in the employment and career growth of women, visible minorities, Aboriginal people, and people with disabilities while still adhering to the principle of hiring the best person for the job. In the United States, Equal Employment Opportunity legislation encourages us to do the same with respect to women, racial and ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, and veterans.

We work closely with a wide range of community-based organizations that foster diversity. These range from the Women’s Leadership Forum that encourages women to reach their full potential to the New Horizons Mentorship Program that assists new Canadians in navigating cultural issues within the workplace. In partnership with the Government of Alberta and several private corporations, we have used the Immigrant Works Program to place immigrant workers within our company. This excellent program matches unemployed or under-employed foreign-educated workers with job opportunities in many fields.

In recent years we bolstered our efforts to make all TransCanada employees even more aware of the importance of and need for greater diversity. So far, these efforts have focused on our Canadian operations. We published several relevant articles on diversity to raise awareness among our employees. We designed and conducted recruitment training sessions aimed mainly at managers in the company. The sessions dealt with issues like equity, discrimination and respectful treatment in the workplace. The managers came away with a better understanding of cross-cultural recruiting and a set of practical tools they can use to avoid discrimination when hiring. In 2009, we will extend diversity awareness training to our American employees.

Tracking equal employment opportunity data in both the United States and Canada is an integral aspect of our commitment to diversity. We achieve that by:

• Counting the number of employees from specific diversity groups;
• Monitoring managerial success in meeting diversity objectives;
• Documenting our overall progress in creating an inclusive workplace;
• Engaging a third party consultant to conduct employee interviews about diversity; and
• Providing quarterly updates to our senior executives.

The on-going importance of our attempts to foster greater workplace diversity cannot be over-stressed. According to Renate Poole, TransCanada’s lead on diversity issues, “To attract and maintain the skill sets we will need to grow in the future, we need to ensure TransCanada is an appealing organization to join. That means it’s important that in all our operations we reflect what the labour market looks like.”