2024 DEI Annual Report

Our commitment

We aim to create an inclusive workforce that values and promotes diversity over the long term. We believe a more diverse team of associates can help us better achieve outstanding results. Areas of focus in our workforce diversity pillar include:

• Establishing and growing a program aimed at providing internship and permanent employment opportunities to historically underrepresented groups as well as a student loan forgiveness program for our interns and permanent employees.
• Refocusing our recruitment practices to ensure we proactively seek a diverse slate of candidates for open roles. If we are unable to source diverse talent for consideration for new roles, we will engage third-party resources to increase our pool of qualified diverse candidates.
• Fostering and supporting diversity among our own associates. This includes expanding our inclusive hiring practices and broadening the diversity of candidates we reach in our recruiting efforts.
• Working to further contribute to the representation of historically underrepresented groups in our industry’s talent pipeline. This includes sponsoring educational initiatives for students from historically underrepresented groups, including scholarship opportunities.

Refocusing recruitment practices and expanding our hiring programs to increase internship and employment opportunities, grow the industry pipeline for diverse talent and foster diversity among our associates

New initiatives since July 2023

• We updated our hiring philosophy and related interviewing toolkit to ensure our hiring process is inclusive and consistent across all roles.
• We explored intentional and proactive hiring techniques to increase the number of students from historically underrepresented groups in our summer internship class, including the following:
• We began inviting intern candidates from diverse and historically underrepresented populations to spend time in Columbus, at Diamond Hill’s office and with our associates; and
• We piloted blind recruitment activities as part of our intern hiring process.
• We worked with The Ohio State University’s Women in Business student organization to create the first Women in Investment sub-group. This effort is led by Diamond Hill associates and is tailored to help students explore, learn and excel in the field of investing.
• We established a new partnership with a Columbus community-based, leadership-development program whose mission is to increase the number of African American leaders while broadening the Columbus community’s awareness of the wide pool of capable and civic-minded African American professionals.

Ongoing initiatives

• Our five-year average employee turnover rate is less than 9%. Therefore, to improve the diversity of our associate population, we continue to ensure we consider a sufficiently diverse slate of candidates in our hiring process. We also collect demographic data from applicants to ensure we meet this commitment.
• We partner with several colleges and universities for recruitment, mentorship and education, participating in a number of virtual and in-person events. For example, our CEO and members of our investment team spoke at a number of events for college students to spur recruitment for our firm.
• We partner with various local Columbus schools and organizations aimed at encouraging high school students to learn about and consider careers in the financial services industry
• Our internship program includes a comprehensive education component, with multiple sessions open to our partner colleges and other diversity programs.
• Our scholarship and loan forgiveness programs are intended to help reverse the disproportional student loan gap and support long-term financial wellness and equity for underrepresented groups. Interns and full-time employees are eligible to receive a monthly contribution to assist with the repayment of their qualified student loans. Additionally, we seek to award up to two scholarships each year to summer interns who demonstrate our core values of curiosity, ownership, trust and respect.
• We continue to offer housing assistance and other benefits for our summer interns to make our program more attractive to a broader population.
• In conjunction with our philanthropy efforts, we established and/or expanded partnerships with several organizations to help build a more diverse financial services industry talent pipeline and broaden our own recruitment efforts. These partners included the National Association of Securities Professionals (NASP), Jopwell, Sponsors for Educational Opportunity (SEO) and Rock the Street, Wall Street.

Our commitment

We believe we can have a positive impact on our industry and our community through our philanthropic activities. Our activities under this pillar are guided by three aims:

• Building a more diverse financial services industry talent pipeline.
• Emphasizing efforts that focus on historically underrepresented groups, with partnerships allowing Diamond Hill to have an outsized impact.
• Supporting organizations that contribute to a vibrant minority business community.

To aid our efforts, in 2020, we pledged an initial $1 million over five years to organizations that support anti-racism and DEI efforts. Thus far, we have distributed and/or committed more than two thirds of our pledged funds to partners and organizations, and we remain on track to distribute at least $1 million by the end of 2025.

Building a more diverse financial services pipeline and focusing on historically underrepresented groups

New initiatives since July 2023

• We were honored to receive the DEI Achievement Award from Thompson Hine, one of our law firm partners, for our DEI efforts. This annual award recognizes one client or other community member who shares Thompson Hine’s commitment to DEI and demonstrates exceptional efforts and leadership in advancing the values of DEI in their organization, industry and community.

Ongoing initiatives

• We continue to seek partnerships with organizations that source financial services career opportunities for members of diverse and/or historically underrepresented groups.
• We collaborate with SEO Career, a professional development program focused on mentoring and job placement for historically underrepresented groups, to recruit and hire top talent from for our summer internship program. SEO also hosted a discussion with our associates to highlight our partnership and the work the organization does.
• Our CEO and associates have been speakers at and participated on panels at industry conferences, discussing our DEI initiatives and journey.
• Our associates participate on the DEI committees of various industry trade associations, both to share ideas and best practices and to develop recommendations and materials to support further industry progress.
• We share and discuss our annual progress reports with our partners and clients and collaborate about our respective DEI journeys.

Emphasizing efforts that focus on historically underrepresented groups, with partnerships allowing Diamond Hill to have an outsized impact

New initiatives since July 2023

• We sponsored the first regional Student Diversity Leadership Conference, which was a multiracial, multicultural gathering hosted by four high schools in Columbus. This event focused on helping students develop effective strategies for social justice practice through dialogue and networking.

Ongoing Initiatives

• Our partnership with the National Association of Securities Professionals (NASP) supports its mission to convene, educate and advocate for historically underrepresented and other diverse professionals. For example, our President was a keynote speaker at the 2024 NASP Women’s Forum. This event — conceived, planned and hosted by women of color — featured panels and interactive discussions around the advancement, support and empowerment of women in the financial industry.
• We participate in the Columbus Partnership’s DEI Leaders Forum, collaborating with other participants to develop materials and recommendations to assist with the recruitment and retention of Black and minority talent.

Supporting organizations that contribute to a vibrant minority business community.

New initiatives since July 2023

• We have taken additional steps to increase our support of the minority business community, with an emphasis on equity promotion and leadership development. We established a new partnership with the African American Leadership Academy (AALA) to help expand the number of African American leaders excelling in their professions and engaging in community service throughout Central Ohio.
• We partnered with the Ohio Chamber of Commerce’s Research Foundation on a first-of-its-kind Ohio Black-owned business economic impact study. This research is intended to help Ohio policymakers and other key stakeholders be more intentional about fostering the success of Black-owned businesses.

Ongoing initiatives

• To support our associates’ engagement with charitable organizations, the firm makes annual financial contributions to non-profit organizations that have Diamond Hill associates as members of their boards or committees.
• Our firmwide community service initiative encourages associates to give their time to local non-profit organizations. Our community engagement calendar also helps promote cultural appreciation and increases our associates’ awareness of local volunteer opportunities.

Our commitment

We believe we can positively reinforce our DEI efforts internally through our policies, processes and philosophies. Externally, we can extend our impact by partnering with vendors who share our commitment to advancing DEI. Because DEI progress is a journey for us as well as our vendors, we want to evaluate our partners based on where they are trying to go. Our current stated commitments are to:

• Conduct a review of existing vendor relationships to ensure we are doing business with partners who are committed to and hold themselves accountable for DEI progress.
• Ensure at least one minority-, LGBTQ+- or female-owned or -led firm are included in new vendor searches whenever possible.
• Continually evaluate our internal policies, processes and philosophies to ensure they combat systemic biases and create an environment of equity and inclusivity.

Partnering with vendors who are committed to DEI progress

New initiatives since July 2023

• We formalized the distribution of our DEI vendor questionnaire as part of our vendor RFP process.

Ongoing initiatives

• We partner with minority-, LGBTQ+-, and female-owned food, entertainment and other local recreation vendors. We distribute our DEI vendor questionnaire to these vendors as part of our vendor selection process.
• We share our DEI vendor questionnaire with partners and clients wanting to implement a similar survey at their organizations.

Evaluating our internal policies to create an environment of equity and inclusivity

New initiatives since July 2023

• We created additional learning opportunities by offering associates DEI-focused training on inclusive culture.
• We increased the frequency of our associate engagement surveys to help us better understand where we are strong and where we have work to do in ensuring that our culture is inclusive.

Ongoing initiatives

• We partner with a digital health platform vendor to provide a meaningful range of family-focused services to our associates, which ensures our associates and their families in all locations have safe access to health-care travel assistance and treatment for certain services that are not locally available.
• We offer associates a parent transition month in addition to our paid parental leave to support new parents returning to work with additional flexibility in adjusting to new routines.
• We provide paid parental leave benefits for birth parents to 12 weeks, irrespective of birth type, consistent with the Family and Medical Leave Act.