'I Love My Job’: Why My Company Is ‘The Best Kept Secret in Silicon Valley’ — From a DEI Lead
Welcome to I Love My Job, the series where we hear from real women who really love their jobs. In this edition, we sat down with Charisse Daggs, Group Manager for the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) group at Intuit, the global technology platform behind TurboTax, QuickBooks, Mint, Credit Karma and Mailchimp.
In her role, Daggs serves in the DEI Center of Excellence and drives the racial equity strategy and training for the company. She notes that what excites her the most about her job is getting “to wake up every single day and help leaders at Intuit be the most inclusive and build an analysis for racial equity as they lead and drive high-performing teams.”
In the nine years she’s been at Intuit, Daggs has been able to try on multiple roles in a variety of teams, from tax to corporate social responsibility to DEI. “I love that I've been able to grow within the company, and I'm actually on my third career,” she notes.
And, not only has she grown her own career, but Daggs is passionate about helping others grow, too. For Daggs, mentorship is her greatest passion, and she has created multiple mentorship and sponsorship programs in support of college preparation, financial prosperity and community engagement. Daggs also helps others by serving on the Scholar Advisory Committee of the Jackie Robinson Foundation.
To find out more about why Daggs loves working at Intuit, and her advice for other women thinking of joining the company, check out the video below. We also share highlights from this video discussion in the following article.
How has working at Intuit positively impacted your career?
Working at Intuit has been an incredible ride because it has allowed me to see so many different parts of the business. I started in the corporate tax team, then I transitioned into corporate responsibility. So I was able to do philanthropy and a lot of community engagement. And, now, I am able to help our internal customers, our employees, think about diversity, equity and inclusion.
I am the poster child for career mobility and owning your career because every time I want to try something different, the answer has been “Yes. And how can I support you?” I just love that about working at Intuit.
How would you describe the culture at Intuit?
First and foremost: customer-centric. We are obsessed with our customers, both internal and external customers. We pride ourselves on being innovative, moving with speed and being collaborative. We also have a culture for being really nice. Throughout my career, everyone has been more than willing to stop and help and jump in during times of need — I love that about Intuit’s culture.
I fundamentally believe Intuit is the best kept secret here in Silicon Valley.
We have the benefit of being next door to some awesome tech giants that get a lot of publicity for their culture, but Intuit is the best kept secret because we're the 35-year-old startup. We still move with agility and move really quick, but we have the organizational rigor of a fully mature company.
What are you proud of about Intuit?
As a company, Intuit pivots and iterates to meet the needs of their employees. They have such a huge focus on employee wellbeing; a specific example of that would be my involvement on the REAL team, which stands for Racial Equity, Advancement and Leadership team. This is a CEO-created team to understand the needs of our Black employees, customers and communities after the murder of George Floyd. I just love how our CEO came out and publicly said that we stand against all forms of racism and created this team.
Through this team, we've been able to put our heads down, dive deep in the data and really understand the intrinsic challenges and come up with some data-backed solutions to help our Black employees.
What sets Intuit apart when it comes to supporting and advancing women?
Intuit supports women in the workplace profoundly by supporting diversity, equity and inclusion. That is not just in our values, that's who we are and how we're expected to lead as employees.
We are so proud to be ahead of the tech industry. When we think about gender diversity from our executive footprint, 32% of our executives are women. Our CEO champions women furiously and really lives for inclusion.
And, we also have so many initiatives internally. Tech Women at Intuit is one of them, where we have a team that sits on the diversity, equity and inclusion team that focuses primarily on building, attracting, retaining and developing women in tech, which is a huge priority for our company.
Could you tell us a little bit about the ERGs at Intuit?
At Intuit, we have 13 global ERGs (employee resource groups) which include the Intuit African Ancestry Network, Intuit Latinos Network, Intuit Women’s Network and Intuit PRIDE Network, just to name a few. In February (Black History Month), we have a whole month of programming dedicated to Black health and wellness.
Our ERGs have been on fire, creating really meaningful programs around education, financial wellness, physical wellness and mental health. We also have other ERGs, such as our Asia Pacific Network, which has incredible programming this month for Lunar New Year. Our ERGs drive a ton of programming, engagement, educational opportunities and they’re resources for our actual business.
What advice would you give to other women who are thinking about working at Intuit?
Number one: don't sleep on Intuit! Again, we are the best kept secret. If you are interested in working at Intuit, I can already imagine that you must be collaborative, wicked smart and want to solve big customer problems. Every day, we’re energized to solve those big problems.
Join Intuit if you want to work with people who are smart and innovative in an incredibly supportive environment that truly champions diversity, equity and inclusion so much so that it’s a part of our values and how we lead.
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