JPMorgan Chase scrubbed its bylaws of gender designations as pressure grows from both society and investors on global businesses to show they are diversifying and becoming more inclusive.
The largest U.S. bank swapped the use of "chairman" with "chair" and also switched out "his," "him" and "her" pronouns with non-gender specific terms. It used chief executive officer to replace he, for example, in its revised bylaws issued on March 16.
With social investing on the rise, corporations are under increasing pressure to boost gender diversity as evidence shows it adds to better long-term corporate performance. Empowering women to participate fully in the modern economy could add about $20 trillion to world's gross domestic product, according to estimates from Bloomberg Economics.
The bank also removed this sentence: "The masculine gender, where appearing in these Bylaws, shall be deemed to include the feminine gender."
JPMorgan Chief Executive Officer, Jamie Dimon has voiced support for LGBT+ rights and has condemned the rollback of protections for transgender people, as well as racism in the wake of the death of George Floyd.
The bank has earmarked $30 billion in investments to drive an "inclusive" recovery from the pandemic and break down barriers of "systemic racism," according to its website. It says that almost half its new hires globally are women and almost 60% of its hires in the U.S. are racially or ethnically diverse.
The bank has four women on its 10-person board, while its 18-member operating committee has eight female members. In 2019, 73% of executive and senior level U.S. employees were men, according to the bank.
