The UPS recruiting team takes a break at a recent job fair sponsored by the National Society of Black Engineers.

‘Our charter calls for an environment that embraces diversity, and that’s what we strive to create here,” says Tandreia Bellamy, an industrial engineer and manager at UPS (Atlanta, GA), the world’s largest package-delivery company.

At UPS, African Americans, Hispanics, Asian Pacific Americans and other minorities make up over one-third of the company’s 320,000 employees in the U.S. and accounted for over 50 percent of the company’s new hires in 2001.

The UPS Diversity Steering Council is co-chaired by the company’s CEO, Mike Eskew, who started at UPS as an industrial engineer himself, and a senior vice president of human resources. It seeks to foster diversity throughout the company. The council’s efforts are paying off. Among its many awards and honors, UPS was named to Hispanic magazine’s 2002 list of top 100 corporations and labeled a “best company for minorities” by Fortune magazine.

Engineering and IT opportunities are plentiful at UPS. Bellamy says the company has more than 2,000 industrial engineers, who are involved in planning, work measurement, process improvement, quality and cost control. And there are 4,500 information technology employees who support the company’s infrastructure. UPS has fourteen mainframes, 5,000 servers and 240,000 PCs. The UPS global telecom network transmits more than three million packets of tracking data each day via cellular and radio connections.

The IT challenge is significant, Bellamy notes. “We deliver over thirteen million packages a day, and we know where all of those packages are – that involves capturing, storing and retrieving the data for all of those packages.”

www.ups.com Headquarters: Atlanta, GA Employees: 360,000 Revenues: $31.3 billion Business: Package management and delivery

UPS is adding more automated sorting facilities, and many engineers and IT professionals are involved. “In a lot of places, we’re switching from a human knowledge base to using computer power to actually do the package sorting,” Bellamy says.

Engineers work in a variety of areas. “We partner with several vendors to have conveyor systems and equipment and trailers and other vehicles built to precise specs,” says Bellamy. “Our own engineers, EEs, MEs, and computer engineers, are involved in a lot of that – design, planning, statistical control. We have three different corporate engineering departments: automotive, plant and industrial engineering. Our automotive engineers do a lot of work on engine efficiency and emissions reduction.”

At UPS, two programs in particular stress the company’s ongoing commitment to diversity: the Community Internship Program (CIP) and the Black Executive Exchange Program (BEEP). Both help keep senior management aware of the needs and challenges of a diverse workforce.

The CIP immerses senior managers in a four-week program in New York City, Chattanooga, TN or McAllen, TX. There they live in depressed areas, serve meals to the homeless, help rid inner city communities of drug paraphernalia, build houses for immigrants and help teachers manage classrooms. “Even in the worst economic times the program has never been cut because its impact is so large,” says Bellamy. “It really puts senior-level managers back in tune with what the everyday impoverished person has to go through. It helps increase empathy and people skills.”

BEEP strives to broaden the career aspirations of young African Americans and introduce them to a variety of professional careers. To date more than 250 UPS executives have participated in the program. Bellamy herself is active in BEEP. “I go to colleges and talk to NSBE groups about understanding the synergy of business and engineering,” she says. “I show them that it doesn’t help to design the world’s greatest widget if it’s going to cost you more than the consumer is willing to pay – or if it doesn’t fit into your overall business scheme.”

One of a UPS fleet of 747s on the way to its delivery destination.

UPS has been involved with the Inroads intern program for the past seven years. “In 1996, we started out with four interns; this past year it was up to twenty-six.” Each participant works with a mentor who is also a BEEP member, and all receive UPS scholarships. Several Inroads participants have successfully made the transition into full-time management.

The company runs an engineering management trainee program that was established in 1999 to help recruit engineering graduates from colleges and universities nationwide. In past years, as many as 100 trainees have enrolled in the two-year rotation program that gives them the skills and experience they need to become successful supervisors. So far, more than 200 participants have moved up to management positions.

“IEs who start the program are exposed to all aspects of industrial engineering: operating plan development and execution, route optimization, process improvement and new technology implementation,” says Bellamy.

The program is open to all recent college graduates with engineering or information technology degrees, and UPS does much of its recruiting through engineering societies like SHPE, NSBE and SWE.

Bellamy is actively involved in the program and enjoys the chance to work with the new engineers. “I get out there and talk to students. I keep track of people in the engineering management trainee program and follow up with them after they’ve completed it. Two students who went through the program just staffed a recruiting booth at NSBE in March. To see them grow, to see the light bulbs go on, is extremely rewarding.”

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