Working Mother Award Acceptance Speech

Reggie Van Lee

Thanks and good evening to all of you!

When I was first asked to represent Booz Allen Hamilton tonight, I said, "Why me? I'm not a mom!"

And the answer was, "because it's so important for the people at this conference — the HR folks, the communications folks, the working mothers themselves — to know that other people ... line managers, other senior executives, and men ... are as committed to work-life balance and diversity in the workplace as they are.

Something funny happened at Booz Allen six, almost seven years ago now, when we first decided to participate in the Working Mother 100 application process.

We had been talking about work-life issues for a while — as a global strategy and technology consulting firm whose employees travel for a living, we had to.

And we'd also been talking about how important diversity was to us and to our clients — diversity in terms of talent, diversity in terms of perspective, diversity in terms of background. Yes, we thought about these things, and we talked about them.

But back in 1998 or even 1999 work-life balance and a focus on diversity weren't truly engrained in our culture. We thought all the right thoughts, we said all the right things, but it wasn't enough. Everyone at Booz Allen wasn't yet walking the talk.

That's where the Working Mother process came in. It gave us a framework to start measuring ourselves against the best of the best. It gave us ideas that we hadn't tried before. And it lit a fire in our bellies.

Booz Allen knew — had known for years — that we needed working mothers. We needed women of color. We needed people of all backgrounds and mindsets. Without them, we would clearly not be able to live up to our brand promise of "delivering results that endure" for our clients.

We simply couldn't afford to overlook rich sources of talent — more than 50 percent of the talent pool — just because they had other things going on in their lives or because they had different requirements of Booz Allen as their employer.

Working Mother has helped Booz Allen take our thoughts about this being the "right thing to do" and turn them into actions. Measurable, demonstrable actions. Actions that have helped us recruit — and retain — thousands of the best and the brightest people. People who happen to be different. People who are leading Booz Allen into its next 90 years.

That's why Booz Allen is so proud to sponsor this wonderful event. And that's why I'm so proud to represent Booz Allen on this stage tonight.

Thank you, Working Mother, for making Booz Allen a better place for all our people to work.