Malk Partners Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Policy

 Purpose 

At Malk Partners (“Malk”), we value our differences, want to ensure all individuals have equal opportunities, and feel a sense of belonging within our organization. We believe that the collective sum of our life experiences, knowledge, inventiveness, innovation, self-expression, unique capabilities, and talent that Malk team members bring to their work makes up the core of our company culture. As a company founded on a model of community, we strive to build a diverse team and recognize more is more when it comes to diversity. We also know that a diverse workforce has a greater quantity and quality of resources to draw from and, therefore, a greater ability to cultivate happy employees and collectively achieve our goals. Our stance on DEI extends throughout the firm, the management team, and our engagements with external stakeholders. 

Approach 

Malk advances its commitments to diversity, equity, and inclusion both through its internal practices and the work we do for our investor clients: 

• Policies: Malk codifies its commitments to equal employment opportunity and promoting a work environment free from discrimination and harassment through employee handbook policies. 

• Trainings & Tools: Anti-bias and inclusivity topics are consistently integrated into workforce and manager trainings, including those covering manager onboarding, performance management, and meeting etiquette. Malk encourages employees to share aspects of their identity via Slack profiles to facilitate a more inclusive and collaborative workplace across departments and roles. 

• Recruitment Practices: Malk’s guiding philosophy for recruitment is to hire for culture add and values alignment, not culture fit. Malk strives to diversify its candidate pipeline through a diverse internship program, to create a pathway for individuals from underrepresented minority backgrounds to get exposure to ESG and financial services prior to joining the workforce. Malk targets high diversity index universities to reach candidates from diverse backgrounds during campus recruitment. All job descriptions are also reviewed for inclusive language before being posted. 
• Employee Resource Groups (ERGs): Employee resource groups are in place for BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and female-identifying employees. These groups provide a forum for employees with shared identities to connect and grow through ERG-sponsored mentorship programs, professional development workshops, and social events. Malk sponsors these efforts, and executive sponsors are appointed to ensure diverse perspectives are consistently filtered up to the executive level.

• Compensation and Promotion Equity: Malk works to provide compensation to all employees that is equitable, rewards them for the value they create for the business, and provides for peace-of-mind and a high quality of life. Malk maintains internal pay equity, compensating employees who have similar job functions and experience with equal pay, regardless of their gender, race, ethnicity, or other statuses. In addition, Malk promotes and awards supplemental variable compensation that objectively rewards strong collective and individual performance. Both promotions and variable compensation elements are determined through a bi-annual process that considers evidence-based performance across firm-wide competencies that both calibrate proposals and mitigate bias. The People & Culture team regularly conducts compensation and promotion equity audits to track and ensure internal consistency. 

• Metrics: Malk maintains and reports on the diversity metrics of the organization on a quarterly basis to our team and the Malk Board of Directors. These metrics include representation by ethnicity, gender, and age by employee level, benchmarked against the management consulting industry. 

Advancing DEI in Our Work 

As an ESG advisor to the private markets, Malk consistently highlights the value to investors of integrating DEI considerations into investment processes, portfolio management, and firm strategy. Malk evaluates DEI at the portfolio company level during due diligence and monitoring, supports efforts to collect DEI data across client portfolios, and assists with firm alignment to DEI best practices and industry frameworks. 

Expectations 

Malk, its employees, and managers are expected to uphold and fulfill the following expectations related to diversity, equity, and inclusion: 

• Employees: demonstrate professional and inclusive conduct, acknowledge and welcome other perspectives and viewpoints, and flag behavior inconsistent with Malk’s values and policies. 

• Managers: lead by example and demonstrate a positive influence on teams, offer opportunities for recruitment, development, and promotion consistent with this policy, and assist with employees who make reports of behavior incongruent with this policy. 
• The Company: implement DEI policies, trainings, and guidelines, foster a safe and inclusive work environment, and communicate progress on DEI efforts with relevant stakeholders. 

Closing 

We are always striving to resist the temptation to say we have “accomplished” diversity and then rest on our laurels. At Malk, diversity is not a quick slogan or quantifiable goal; it is a core aspect of our firm’s ethos. It makes our company culture unique and inviting to a broad and diverse workforce. We want everyone who comes to work at Malk to truly feel welcome and invited to bring their full selves. As a result, we think ambitiously and sustainably about diversity and continue to come up with ways to encourage it. This policy will be reviewed annually to both remain accountable to actions set out within it and capture the progress of the firm.