ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Three national linen and uniform service chains have won the 2020 Diversity Recognition Award from TRSA, the associationfor linen, uniform and facility services.
TRSA says the award reflects these members’ dedication to the “unlikeness” of individuals and their encouragement or facilitation of such variation in human qualities in their workforces. Winners will receive their trophies March 25 at the TRSA Legislative Conference in Washington.
Healthcare launderer Angelica (Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois) is being honored for its variety of initiatives. TRSA says the company continuously measures its workforce diversity to ensure it doesn’t decline; it has held steady in recent years around its current level of 82.26% minority.
Diversity is promoted in the Angelica code of conduct (provided to all management and hourly staff). Top-level executives emphasize with plant management teams the value of uniting different cultures to strengthen the company.
Employees are engaged in national ethnic heritage celebrations, and they read the company newsletter’s quoting of world leaders espousing diversity and inclusion. Angelica recruits through LocalJobNetwork.com, which distributes job openings to diverse talent pools in a nationwide network of over 15,000 local community organizations.
Morgan Services’ Buffalo, New York, facility works with a local municipality that assists refugees with finding employment, shares TRSA. Morgan staff and case worker teams collaborate in managing hiring of non-English-speaking individuals of Hispanic and Somalian background.
Because many of these new applicants and new hires have no previous work experience, the facility has adapted a new onboarding program to follow up and work with this agency to manage attendance issues and language barriers. Recent hiring of bilingual office staff helps ensure retention of these employees. Morgan is headquartered in Chicago.
Purestar Group, the hospitality laundry specialist based in Las Vegas, is committed to diversity throughout the organization, starting with executive leadership, according to TRSA. Led by Ann Berry, board chair, women comprise 50% of the C-suite team, nearly twice the average representation of females in such roles in the industry’s public companies. Nearly 50% of first/mid-level managers are female and total female representation for the organization is 49%.
Through employee engagement initiatives, the company identifies talented women interested in operations growth, developing specific plans for each driven participant. Each is assigned a mentor to support their leadership progression and help champion their successes. Several women currently participate in this program.
The TRSA Diversity Recognition Award acknowledges members’ efforts that represent a step forward in attracting or acknowledging diverse talent, improving intergroup interaction in a multi-cultural workforce or otherwise promoting and fostering inclusivity to support employees in any group. It was presented for the first time in 2019 to UniFirst Corp. (Wilmington, Massachusetts) and Service Linen Supply (Renton, Washington).
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