Kate Federhar runs the Digital Operations and Technology team at Lumen. When she started, she was a team of one surrounded by a lot of data-driven men. The team she built over the past five years has brought in women from different ethnic, religious and sexual orientation backgrounds.

Another area of diversity that this team has embraced is educational diversity, a key differentiator in Federhar’s team make-up. Bringing on people without a marketing degree or without a college degree at all has allowed people to show new ways of thinking and new operational approaches.

The team has brought new technology to fruition in record time. They were able to implement an entirely new E-commerce platform within six months, change how the organization handles its web operations and start to integrate smarter AI throughout the organization. None of this could have been accomplished without the people on the team, who are a shining example of diversity to others in the organization. In fact, 69% of the team are members of one or more tracked category within the diversity and inclusion company metrics.