Natalie Cozzi

L’Oréal S.A.: Rolling Out the Global Diversity Strategy

29 October 2017
 Natalie Cozzi

A. Introduction and Summary

Sylvaine Balustre-D’Erneville is Europe’s diversity director for L’Oréal S.A., which is
one of the most substantial cosmetic and beauty company in the world. One of L’Oréal’s
main corporate goal has been to eliminate all forms of discrimination anywhere in its
operations around the globe and to increase overall diversity of the entire multinational
corporation. Because diversity for L’Oréal is a demand that goes beyond what is
“appropriate”, the corporation decided to put a diversity team in place that is headed by their
global diversity direction, Jean-Claude Le Grand. To better promote products to its
multicultural consumers, L’Oréal used approaches, such as, employing ethnically diverse
spokespeople, advertising their products in ethnic magazines, and even partnering with
agencies that emphasis marketing to certain ethnic groups.
L’Oréal decided to assemble a team of diverse individuals in the hopes of forsaking any
form of discrimination. Balustre-D’Erneville partners with George-Axelle Broussillon,
L’Oréal’s corporate diversity manager to implement the corporation’s diversity strategy.
L’Oréal now has created a five-line diversity strategy that factors in Recruitment &
Integration, Management, Career Management, Communication, And Training. Balustre
D’Erneville’s team established that 8,000 managers form 32 countries were to attend a day
and a half diversity seminar. This seminar is meant to focus on all of their diversity policies
in-order to help their managers better understand L’Oréal’s core values. The results of the
seminar had some positive, but mostly negative results. Balustre-D’Erneville and her team
are now focused on what they can do to narrow down the importance of how diversity
amongst their corporation could better off L’Oréal overall.
B. Statement of the Problem
a. There are cultural differences between countries and a low-level awareness from
individuals of the benefits that the diversity strategy could bring to L’Oréal’s
corporation itself and their global sales.
i. Symptoms:
1. Balustre-D’Erneville is L’Oréal implements a diversity training
program that resulted with some negative and confused comments
from the managers.
2. Some of the managers feel as though the diversity training is
unneeded for their branch because they believe they are already
aware of the importance of diversity.
3. The participants feel as though L’Oréal’s team is implying they are
discriminating individuals by targeting them specifically about this
objective.

ii. Root Causes

1. L’Oréal is a company that serves customers with different
vulnerabilities all over the world.
2. The participants in the seminar are more focused on the time
required to learn about the diversity strategy instead of the
relevance of the content itself.
3. L’Oréal’s approach to the diversity strategy was very broad and
did not discuss each individual’s specific strengths and weaknesses
relevant to diversity.
 Natalie Cozzi

iii. The decision facing Balustre-D’Erneville is how she can effectively react
and communicate to the feedback her team received from the managers
about the purpose of a diversity strategy and the training program while
also respecting each individual and understanding their specific concerns.
C. Decision Criteria and Alternative Solutions
a. An effective solution is possible when someone is willing to take a leadership role
and be open about every possibility when working together with their team. A
leader and its team members should be transparent when communicating with
each member which will overall avoid any future problems. A team should accept
that the diversity of talents is the driving force behind creativity and innovation.
b. Alternative solutions
i. Balustre-D’Erneville can speak with each manager more about the value
of diversity with L’Oréal and the main focus of the diversity training
program in-order for the managers to get a more restricted understanding.
ii. Balustre-D’Erneville can implement a different diversity training session
that is specific to each branch and their particular talents and unclear
understandings.
iii. Balustre-D’Erneville could also reach out to other regional diversity
directors and get advice about her corporate manager’s feedback on the
training program

D. Recommended Solution
a. L’Oréal believes that product diversity ensures that there is something in it for
every single one of us and that globalization teaches us every day that common
aspirations and values do indeed exist over and above the differences of different
members. Balustre-D’Erneville and her team should do some more research and
look into the similarities and difference of the concerns of each branch and hold
another seminar specific to these findings. Because many of the managers
complained about the training being a waste of time, the company could maybe
hold the program online or hold several optional dates for each member to do on
their own time. The main goal of the training program is for the managers from
all over is to learn about the main purpose of the diversity strategy and how
beneficial it can be, not only L’Oréal’s team, but also their overall global sales.
Effective communication and attitudes between each member and transparency of
the diversity topic is essential when trying better understand what Balustre-
D’Erneville and her team can do to fix the program.