Wells Fargo Press Release

Amanda Hendrickson
Oct 22, 2021
3 min read

Updated: Dec 28, 2022

September 23, 2020

CEO Charlie Scharf’s Promise to Enforce Diversity and Inclusion Standards

NEW YORK — On behalf of CEO Charlie Scharf, Wells Fargo sent the following message to all employees today:

Many of you have heard about the comments made in our June “Commitment to Change Memo.” This is not the standard we follow when conducting daily business. We will do better and have made a diverse and inclusive work environment our top priority moving forward.

Scharf has spoken with several news outlets expressing his regret following the incident. We are addressing this directly to keep our customers and employees informed on the situation. Scharf knows that public apologies are not enough which is why he has committed to change.

“I apologize for making an insensitive comment reflecting my own unconscious bias. There are many talented diverse individuals working at Wells Fargo and throughout the financial services industry and I never meant to imply otherwise,” stated Scharf. “I’ve worked in the financial services industry for many years, and it’s clear to me that, across the industry, we have not done enough to improve diversity, especially at senior leadership levels. There is no question Wells Fargo must make meaningful progress to increase diverse representation. As I said in June, I have committed that this time must be different.”

In addition to Scharf’s verbal commitment, we have implemented some changes in the past few months. We have hired new diverse senior leaders and are in the process of hiring a leader for the new Diverse Segments, Representation & Inclusion Group who will oversee advancing the company’s diversity efforts. Other efforts underway include:

Reaching out to diverse talent: to help expand our outreach and sourcing opportunities with diverse talent, our University Programs team has been working closely with our Operating Committee leaders to help build engagement with historically Black colleges and universities, or HBCUs, and Hispanic-serving institutions, or HSIs.
Anti-racism training course: a new live anti-racism training course is being developed — we’ll share more information as details come together.
Senior leader accountability: operating committee leaders have been working with their Diversity & Inclusion consultants and HR business partners to integrate D&I into their business plans and reviews, and each operating committee member is an executive sponsor for at least one of our Team Member Networks.
Executive compensation: as part of the year-end evaluation process, operating committee members will be evaluated based upon their progress in improving diverse representation and inclusion in their area of responsibility. These evaluations will have a direct impact on year-end compensation decisions.

This is an important moment in our firm and we will not let it go by without substantive changes. Once again, Wells Fargo apologizes for this unacceptable situation and commits to doing better in the future.

About Wells Fargo

Wells Fargo & Company is a diversified leader in providing financial services through banking, investments, and mortgage products for customers. Since 1852, Wells Fargo has enabled more than 7,300 locations and 266,000 team members across the globe. Named one the Fortune’s Largest Corporations to do business with since 2020. For more information, please visit Wells Fargo Stories.