Are inclusive HR policies good for a brand's PR and corporate image? That's a question many major brands are asking these days.

Consider a hot-button issue such as gender resassignment surgery, a major life change that not all companies support — or want their diversity policies known externally.

AP, reporting on the latest Corporate Equality Index published by by the Human Rights Campaign, notes that major employers including Wells Fargo, Coca-Cola, Campbell Soup and Walt Disney all now (quietly) provide transgender-inclusive health benefits for employees undergoing a sex change. 

Eighty-five others, including AT&T, Sears, Yahoo!, American Express, Kraft, Kodak — which isn't alone in taking public pride in its GLBT Pride program — Morgan Stanley, PricewaterhouseCoopers, General Motors and State Farm pay for a minimum of one surgery during sex reassignment, which is now considered “medically indicated” according to the American Medical Association, and not optional.Continue reading...

PricewaterhouseCoopers officially rebranded today to the name it's best known as: PwC. The corporate video above says it's more than a simple name change and visual makeover, but a freshening of the brand's value and positioning going forward.

The accounting firm, which calls itself "the most recognizable brand among the Big Four global professional services networks," says it's formally adopting the longheld "PwC" moniker "in order to strengthen, and modernize how it represents its worldwide network to its clients, its people and the communities in which it operates."

But it's not completely shedding the 22-letter moniker.Continue reading...