Report of the Fox News Workplace Professionalism and Inclusion Council
dated December 29, 2020
Introduction and Background
Since its last report on May 27, 2020, the Fox News Workplace Professionalism andInclusion Council (the “WPIC”) met with the Honorable Paul D. Ryan, Fox
Corporation’s NCG Chair, on June 1, 2020, and with the full NCG Committee onJune 10, 2020. The WPIC also held numerous informal meetings from July throughNovember, focusing first on the finalization and implementation of the Great Places toWork (“GPTW”) employee survey, which Fox News launched on August 24, 2020,and then on analyzing the results, including Fox News being certified as a Great Placeto Work. The WPIC also met a second time with NCG Chair Ryan on December 14,
2020. All such meetings were held via teleconference. WPIC members Kevin Lord,
Executive Vice President of Human Resources, Fox Corporation; Lily Fu Claffee,
Executive Vice President & General Counsel, Fox News Media; Sylvia Hewlett,Author & Chair Emeritus, Center for Talent Innovation; the Honorable Barbara
Jones, Partner, Bracewell LLP; Virgil Smith, Principal, Smith Edwards Group LLC;
and Brande Stellings, Principal, Vestry Laight LCC, attended all meetings.
Meeting with Fox Corporation’s Corporate Governance Committee Chair onJune 1, 2020
On June 1, 2020, the WPIC held the first of two meetings for 2020 with Fox
Corporation’s NCG Chair, the Honorable Paul D. Ryan. This meeting focused on
the preparation for the GPTW employee survey to be conducted later in the year, andFox Corporation’s response to the COVID pandemic.
Ms. Stellings provided Speaker Ryan with the rationale for selecting GPTW toconduct the survey and how the survey would allow the WPIC to focus on its keymandate. Ms. Hewlett discussed the merit and value of the GPTW survey questions.
Speaker Ryan was very engaged in the discussion, noted that he had experience withGPTW, ands was impressed with the survey’s diagnostic tools.
Next, Judge Jones explained the steps taken by FOX to care for its employees in
response to COVID-19. These measures ranged from the waiver of medical
insurance premiums for all employees to pay incentives, transportation assistance, anddaily catering for those essential workers physically at the office despite the pandemic.
Judge Jones noted that she expected the GPTW survey to be better received due tothese ongoing programs, and that FOX’s response to the pandemic would likely
encourage employees to respond with more candor. Speaker Ryan noted that he wasimpressed with the steps FOX has taken.

Mr. Smith then discussed certain best practices that FOX developed during COVID19 but can live on after the pandemic wanes. These included FOX’s initiatives toincrease Employee Engagement, the efforts of the Diversity & Inclusion Team, andthe several Mental Health benefits available to employees.
Meeting with Fox Corporation’s Full Corporate Governance Committee on
June 10, 2020
On June 10, 2020, the WPIC met with the full NCG Committee, which in addition toits Chair, Speaker Ryan, is composed of Roland Hernandez, Chair of the Audit
Committee, and director Anne Dias. The WPIC gave the Committee a detailed
briefing on the GPTW survey results and the measures mentioned above. TheCommittee was appreciative of FOX’s efforts for the well-being of its employees, andwas pleased that the WPIC is moving from a statement of values to a very practicalapproach. The Committee noted its confidence that the GPTW survey would be avery valuable tool.
Informal WPIC Meetings
Throughout 2020, the WPIC conferred multiple times to fine tune the specifics of theGPTW survey. This included the addition of five custom questions the WPIC createdthat were included with the standard GPTW questions. These custom questions weredesigned to yield an index measuring the extent to which progress has been made at
Fox News over the past year regarding sexual harassment, racial bias, anddiscrimination, as well as workplace respect and inclusion.
Fox News is Certified as a Great Place to Work
Beginning in March 2020, Fox News employees began working in various, non-typical
work locations due to COVID-19 in order to keep employees healthy and safe while
maintaining news gathering and on-air production intact. Additionally, 2020
presented an extremely hectic period of news coverage of major events such aspresidential impeachment proceedings, national protests over the death of George
Floyd, and the 2020 Election. Despite these challenges, the GPTW survey wasconducted from August 24 to September 8, 2020. The survey required employees torespond to a set of 60 statements, as well as the five custom statements added by theWPIC. Its aim was to enable Fox News to see how it compares to the best employers
and gain perspective from everyone in the organization. Employees were sent
individual invitations and were able to provide anonymous feedback through any
device and from any location. The response rate was 51%, which is a good response
rate for the first year of this type of survey. The goal going forward is to improve theresponse rate each year.
On September 11, 2020, Fox News was informed by GPTW that, based on its survey
results, Fox News was certified as a Great Place to Work. Specifically, 75% of2

employees concurred that Fox News is a Great Place to Work. As a benchmark, only
59% of American workers who take the GPTW survey identify their employer as aGreat Place to Work. Moreover, Fox News scored over 80% favorably on the fivecustom questions created by the WPIC as an index to measure improvement in theimportant areas of sexual harassment, racial bias, and discrimination. Considering thisis the first year Fox News participated in this prestigious survey, these results are very
good. Fox News announced the survey results and its certification as a Great Place toWork in a company-wide Town Hall on September 24, 2020.
Next Steps
Regardless of Fox News’ generally high marks on the survey, the WPIC has led Fox
News to focus on areas where there are clear opportunities to improve theengagement and overall experience of its employees.
For instance, to gain actionable insight from the survey results, the WPIC asked
GPTW to aggregate the feedback from a subset of questions from the survey to create
an “Inclusion Index” to serve as a guidepost to identify and engage with employeesthat may have felt excluded or unheard. Analysis of the survey results revealed anacute gap in the scores for engagement and overall experience given by Black andmulti-racial employees in comparison to all other demographic groups. Additionally,employees across the company gave low scores for fair recognition and the ability toexpress themselves.
The WPIC will continue to oversee and lead Fox News in its efforts to analyze survey
results, develop follow-up plans, and act to improve employees’ experience to ensurethat Fox News is a Great Place to Work for All. In order to accomplish this goal, theWPIC will be partnering with the Fox News Diversity Council to brainstorm. TheWPIC is also looking at survey trends across Fox News and will conduct focus groups
to drill down on potential areas of concern. Further, CEO Suzanne Scott has
required each of her direct reports to identify and set forth action plans in a minimumof three areas that department survey responses indicate can be impacted andimproved, including training and development, organization design, and leadershipcoaching. These action plans will be reviewed by Ms. Scott and Mr. Lord, who also
met with each of Ms. Scott’s direct reports and emphasized the need to drive a more
inclusive environment.
Meeting with Fox Corporation’s Corporate Governance Committee Chair on
December 14, 2020
On December 14, 2020, the WPIC held the second of its two meetings for 2020 withNCG Ryan. The WPIC briefed Speaker Ryan about the GPTW survey results andFox News’ certification as a Great Place to Work. The WPIC also discussed theexcellent results on the 5 questions it created, including that one of the highest scores3was in response to a question addressing the meaningful steps Fox News has takenover the past year to address sexual harassment. The WPIC also discussed that thesuccessful survey results were not uniform, but instead also revealed opportunities for
improving the experience of Fox News’ Black employees and for improving theperceptions of fairness among all employees.
Speaker Ryan was very engaged and explored with the WPIC ways at better
understanding the survey results, such as conducting focus groups and pulse surveys.
In addition to the partnership with the Fox News Diversity Council and the actionplans mentioned above, the WPIC noted that it is already working with a diversity
expert, is considering the possibility of engaging a vendor that can help the WPIC tobetter understand the data, and is also looking at how other companies havesuccessfully dealt with similar issues. At Speaker Ryan’s suggestion, the Council
intends to draw from all of these resources to create a bespoke plan for Fox News
designed to address the areas for improvement identified by the survey results.
Looking Forward
The WPIC will continue to work together to set the agenda and topics to beaddressed at future meetings. One challenge the WPIC has faced is notification, forthe external members of the WPIC, of certain claims of misconduct where thecomplainant has requested strict confidentiality and non-disclosure. The full WPIC
has discussed the challenges posed by these and other confidentiality obligations, suchas the attorney-client privilege. Notwithstanding these issues, the WPIC members
have worked closely with Fox News leadership and looks forward to building on thesuccesses over the last two years to further Fox News’ goal of increasing diversity andmaintaining a strong culture that is inclusive and welcoming for all of its employees.
Central to this goal will be the creation and implementation of the action plan
discussed with Speaker Ryan.

4