Eric Osterhout

Eric Osterhout (he/him) has been putting diversity, equity and inclusion at the forefront of what he does throughout an extensive career that has spanned the staffing, supplier and buyer sides of the ecosystem. Since joining energy firm Enbridge five years ago, the senior advisor, global talent acquisition (vendor management) has worked to develop creative ways to increase spend through diversity-owned staffing suppliers and more recently has turned his focus on ensuring diversity at the candidate level.

“The more I get involved in it, I’m more looking at the candidate level of diversity and engagement, and to me that’s where we are making a difference and that’s what I feel good with at the end of the day,” Osterhout says.

Being an influencer is to be an ambassador; it’s very hard sometimes, but I start where I can and grow from there — and help others do the same thing.

Transparency with diversity is extremely important for organizations to scrutinize how they source talent and identify potential bias, but it’s only within the past few years that suppliers have been required to provide candidate diversity data, Osterhout notes. While disclosing diversity data has been mainstream in full-time employee hiring for most organizations, it is still not as common that suppliers providing external workers are asked to provide this same data in North America. To that end, he is devoted to working with suppliers to procure this data and helping them increase their diverse candidates.

Osterhout understands you have to ask the hard questions and engage in difficult discussions in order to effect change. Beyond his work within Enbridge, he’s very active in the DE&I space; he is known to host and attend events that support diversity, equity and inclusion and is a frequent participant on DE&I-focused panels. He is committed to creating safe spaces for people to have those hard conversations in order to ensure that diverse candidates — as well as suppliers — are given equal opportunities. “To me, being an influencer is to be an ambassador,” he says. “It’s very hard sometimes, but I can start where I can and grow from there and help others do the same thing.”