Employees
Editor’s note: In March, Best Buy is proud to honor Women’s History Month and celebrate our women employees. Read on for the story of one of our women leaders.
A year ago, assistant sales manager Valerie Holt was assisting a customer with a hearing disability and struggling to communicate with the customer.
Written notes and a few online searches for translations helped them navigate through the experience, but Valerie knew the customer deserved more. Following that interaction, she decided ‘never again’ and went home to learn American Sign Language (ASL).
Black History Month is an annual celebration of the past, present, and future of Black people in America.
This month, Best Buy is proud to highlight the stories of our Black employees with events like Trap Yoga, as we continue cultivating an inclusive culture.
Throughout our company, Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) have been created to provide a space for diverse employees to come together in one place, providing allyship and community within Best Buy. One of those ERGs is our Black Employee Resource Group (BERG) that is made up of more than 1,300 members.
For the fifth year in a row, Best Buy is proud to be recognized by Barron’s 100 Most Sustainable Companies.
In announcing this year’s list, Barron’s specifically highlighted our commitment to helping customers reduce their carbon emissions, our e-waste recycling program and our gender-diverse board of directors. Our efforts have consistently placed us in the top five, coming in this year at No. 4.
Best Buy is committed to making a positive impact on the world and the people in it as we aim to form meaningful relationships with all our stakeholders, including employees, customers, vendors, our communities, and the environment.
If general manager Dan Schwalenberg had to pick one of his store associates to appear on “Jeopardy!” – it was going to be Mitchell Macek.
“Mitchell is thorough and has great attention to detail,” Dan said.
Mitchell, an employee at our York, Pennsylvania store And rising sophomore at Villanova University, was selected to represent his school in the “Jeopardy!” National College Championship.
He’s one of just 36 students chosen to participate in this competition, with the winner of the tournament earning a $250,000 grand prize and the title of Jeopardy!
For the seventh year in a row, Best Buy has been named to Fortune’s list of the World’s Most Admired Companies. Best Buy ranked third in the category for specialty retailers.
This prestigious list recognizes companies that are leaders across a variety of performance and reputation metrics. Our inclusion is a testament to the work done by our employees every day. Their expertise and passion to serve our customers brings life to our purpose to enrich lives through technology.
About the list
Fortune partnered with Korn Ferry, a prominent global organizational and research firm, to create this corporate reputation list, which considers the highest-revenue companies in 52 industries, including 333 companies in 30 countries.
With his retirement around the corner, Tim Nickel, didn’t think his legacy after 15 years at Best Buy would be gift cards. But then again, he didn’t know his idea would help keep more than 200 tons of plastic waste from landfills.
That idea was a recyclable paper gift card.
![](https://corporate.bestbuy.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Nickel_Timothy-Inset-245x368.jpg)
Tim, who’s our gift card production manager, is responsible for printing the cards and getting them on store shelves in the U.S. and Canada. In 2011, he learned just how many gift cards go to landfills and that each one takes around 500 years to break down.
Ciji Jumpiere doesn’t shy away from challenges — she faces them head on.
By day, Ciji is general manager of the Best Buy store in Harvey, Louisiana, where she has a team of more than 60 employees. By night, she’s pursuing her master’s degree in business administration. In her free time, she mentors fellow Best Buy employees. And 24/7, Ciji is a wife and mother of three.
“She never sits down,” said Ken McCullum, Best Buy senior market operations and service manager, who has known Ciji for six years.
For the 17th year, Best Buy was named one of the best places to work for the LGBTQIA+ community, earning a perfect rating of 100% from the Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index.
Best Buy has taken great strides to work towards a more inclusive workplace for everyone. We are proud of this recognition, which reflects our continued commitment to workplace equality.
“We are committed to creating a workplace where everyone feels safe and supported in being their authentic selves, where our uniqueness and our diverse perspectives accelerate our learning, growth, and how we reflect all our communities,” said Mark Irvin, Best Buy’s chief inclusion, diversity, and talent officer.