Gibbons Diversity Initiative Presents Quarterly Trendsetter Award

The Gibbons Diversity Initiative (GDI), an award-winning corporate initiative promoting diversity and inclusion in the legal profession and business community, has presented its Trendsetter Award to Richard E. Meade, Vice President & Chief Legal Officer for the International Division at Prudential. Mr. Meade received the award at a quarterly meeting of GDI, held at the Gibbons headquarters on May 13, 2016.

As VP and Chief Legal Officer of Prudential’s International Division, Mr. Meade leads a team of lawyers located in the US, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. He also oversees Prudential’s Operations and Systems legal team, which advises on issues related to corporate real estate, intellectual property, and technology and general vendor contracts. In addition, Mr. Meade is a member of the senior management team in the Law, Compliance, Business Ethics & External Affairs Department (LCBE). He has been the Chair of the LCBE’s award-winning Diversity Steering Committee since 2006, as well as the Executive Sponsor of the Department’s Internal and Outside Counsel Diversity Committees. He also played a key role in launching the multi-company Inclusion Initiative, which focuses on increasing corporate expenditures on minority and women owned law firms.

Mr. Meade joined Prudential’s Corporate Law Department in 1985. He became head of the Individual Insurance Section in 1987 and later served as chief legal officer for all of Prudential’s domestic individual insurance businesses for ten years before assuming his current role and responsibilities in 2001.

GDI presents its Trendsetter Award at each of its quarterly diversity meetings, which all firm attorneys are invited to attend, and feature some of the most eminent voices on corporate workplace diversity and supplier diversity, renowned thought leaders who are purchasing executives, diversity officers, and other leaders of corporate America and key associations focused on diversity issues. Through the Trendsetter Award, Gibbons and GDI honor individuals who embody global leadership and vision with regard to supplier and workplace diversity. Recognizing the most vital, current thought leadership is critical to the development and effective messaging of GDI’s own thought leadership.

Previous recipients of the Trendsetter Award include Michael M. Reuter, Director of the Gerald P. Buccino ’63 Center for Leadership Development at Seton Hall University’s Stillman School of Business; Brenda Ross-Dulan, Executive Vice President and Regional President of Wells Fargo’s Southern New Jersey region; Ramón J. Pineda, a senior vice president and general manager of Univision Television Group; and Nelson Diaz, a member of the Board of Directors at Exelon Corporation.