Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) is a key element of our Sustainable Business Model and a crucial feature in our pursuit of excellence as a core value. We believe that a diverse, talented team—providing varied perspectives, and working together with trust, respect, and professionalism across the entire organization—is critical for innovation, problem-solving, promoting a positive culture, achieving our goals, and thriving in an ever-changing world. By embracing our unique strengths and differences, we respect and learn from each other, foster a high-performance environment, and support all employees in achieving their career potential.

Our commitment to DE&I transcends a table in our proxy or corporate sustainability report. Our DE&I program reflects our deep commitment to diversity of thought, experience, and skill, and our focus on creating opportunities for the people and communities in our home region—Appalachia. We continue to invest heavily in creating, developing, and expanding opportunities throughout the Appalachian region. Our company-wide efforts—through the CNX Foundation, CNX Mentorship Academy, and The Headquarters at CNX—focus on improving traditionally overlooked and underserved rural and urban communities in the region.We are committed to ensuring that everyone is welcome and has the same opportunities for career advancement, including access to training, mentorship, and professional development. We embrace employees of all backgrounds and experiences and invest in the personal and professional success of everyone. We are proud of our significant achievements to date, but we remain focused on opportunities for continuous improvement, including gender diversity, where we have made meaningful progress, increasing the number of women in management to 23%.

One of the challenges we face in hiring and retaining women is our decision to not offer to work-from-home or hybrid work arrangements. This was a careful, considered decision that best fits our strategic goals and objectives and reflects our operational commitments. CNX recognizes that working in-person five days a week can be challenging for some of our employees, and takes a flexible approach, empowering people leaders to make arrangements with employees on an individual basis. Flexible work arrangements are evaluated and modified as necessary to ensure they fit the needs of employees on an individual basis, including opportunities for part-time work, reduced work hours, job sharing, and contractor arrangements.

Our unique approach to DE&I—focusing on the needs of our region and individual employees—includes:

  • The Mentorship Academy, which focuses on local high school students from rural and underprivileged communities and connects the region’s premier employers, organized labor, building trades, and community focused nonprofits with this young emerging talent. The Mentorship Academy helps to provide family-sustaining jobs that aid the individual students and our region as a whole
  • Supporting workforce training for individuals from our region’s under-resourced communities through a CCAC tuition program focusing on veterans, women returning to the workforce, and individuals directly impacted by the opioid epidemic, among other constituencies
  • Supporting WE@CNX (Women Engaged at CNX), an employee resource group open to all employees
  • Providing leadership training for high-potential female employees through the Women’s Energy Network
  • GROW (Get Ready for Opportunities at Work), a newly launched mentorship program for women at CNX
  • Partnering with EmployHER Washington, which brings multiple nonprofit resources and prospective employers to the communities of women across the region
  • Surpassing supply chain goals of at least 6% Diverse Business Enterprise (DBE) spend and 7% DBE representation on the CNX-approved vendor list
  • Providing workspace at The Headquarters at CNX for nonprofits and minority and women-owned business enterprises
  • Providing grassroots feedback to management through our employee Diversity & Inclusion Council

Mirroring the historic composition of our Appalachian region—and the immigration story that it was built on—three members of our six-member executive management team are first-generation immigrants, while the remaining three have multi-generational roots in the region.

Equitable Pay

We pay for performance and Excellence in our daily work, and we pay well, as we perform well. We believe that a winning team and high-performing individuals should receive compensation above our peers as well as the market median. Our compensation is highly tailored to the individual, the scope of responsibility, and specific job duties. We are committed to continuously evaluating our internal processes and procedures for promotions, pay adjustments, bonuses, etc. to provide fair and equitable pay that is highly individualized. During 2023, we performed a pay equity study and individually reviewed and compared the compensation of each woman in the company to male counterparts, assessing their roles and scope of responsibilities, years of experience, and performance. We made adjustments in line with our commitment to equity and parity. The pay gaps noted in the chart below are driven by a lower percentage of women to men in each of the broad level categories and differences in market rates among the span of roles within each category.

Gender Pay Ratio (women TDC as % of men TDC) Age
2022 2023 20241
Executive Officer2 0.26:1 0.63:1 0.89:1
Senior Management 0.65:1 0.73:1 0.87:1
Supervisors/Managers 0.87:1 0.85:1 0.81:1
Exempt Professionals 0.71:1 0.69:1 0.79:1
Non-Exempt Professionals 0.79:1 0.80:1 0.82:1
1 As of March, 2024
2 In 2022, there were multiple appointments to the executive team, including CNX’s first Chief Risk Officer.

Diversity

Age

Thought Leadership and American Values Bring Fae Javadi to the U.S. and CNX

Faegheh “Fae” Javadi is a Senior Engineer with the Operations Technology group at CNX. As one of the foremost data scientists in the company, she engages with operations teams to improve data gathering and processing on the thousands of datapoints CNX collects every day. She also plays a critical role in extracting knowledge from that data for strategic decisions, safety, efficiency, and environmental impact. But her path to CNX was quite different than most Appalachian-born employees.

Born in Urmia, Iran, Fae studied software engineering in-country, earning a Bachelor of Science, followed by a master’s degree in Artificial Intelligence. At that time, the Marcellus Shale boom was occurring in the U.S., and Fae saw opportunities for Artificial Intelligence to solve the complex problems facing natural gas companies in Appalachia.

Fae moved to the U.S. for a second master’s degree—this time in petroleum engineering—at West Virginia University, under the tutelage of Dr. Shahab Mohaghegh, one of the primary thought leaders in the application of data-driven methods for oil and gas. While there, she performed research on artificial neural networks in reservoir engineering.

After graduating from WVU, Fae started working as a reservoir engineer while keeping up-to-date with the ever-changing machine learning and AI fields. “I always saw these complementary skills as a tool to improve processes,” she said. “This led me to an exciting opportunity with CNX, where a progressive team was seeking to complement their existing capabilities. After several conversations, I realized that CNX is willing to invest in its employees’ skills, explore innovative solutions, and offer its employees growth opportunities. CNX’s progressive approach and future plans were among the main motivating factors for me to join this team.”

After joining CNX in 2022, Fae began implementing those new tools with operations while simultaneously pursuing American citizenship. “My life journey as an immigrant has been an adventure. From celebrating successes to overcoming challenges in my personal and professional life, each experience has shaped who I am today,” she said.

“It was a very challenging decision to emigrate to a different country more than 6,000 miles away and start a life away from my family and friends. For me, it was a choice to move to the U.S., not another country, and later decide to become a U.S. citizen, mainly because of American values. I highly appreciate that in this nation, individuals can shape their own destiny and identity through their choices, efforts, and abilities. I love to be part of a society where independence and self-determination play a significant role in shaping the future of individuals.”

In October 2023, Fae and her husband became the first U.S. citizens in their family. Today, she is a leader in CNX’s Diversity & Inclusion Council, which Fae called “a driving force for promoting diversity and fostering inclusivity within the company.” As the company continues growing in diversity and data-driven methods, employees like Fae are leading the way.

Veterans—Their Next Chapter At CNX

CNX is proud to support veterans as they transition to life after military service. The competencies acquired through service equip veterans to seamlessly transition to successful careers at CNX. Five percent of CNX employees are military veterans.

“The resiliency the military helps foster in a person’s attitude and personality has been a big impact on my career. As volatile as the oilfield industry can be, being resilient to the ups and downs has been a huge benefit. Here at CNX it’s a similar culture to the Marines in that it’s a small force of high-performance people working to accomplish difficult tasks. Honestly, the largest motivator for joining the service was the opportunity to receive the GI Bill. Both of my parents had grown up on farms and neither went to college. My father had served in the Army and then went straight into construction. The GI Bill represented an opportunity for me to earn the money for college on my own and not put financial stress on my family. The second largest motivator was the opportunity to serve in what I perceived to be the toughest, most challenging, most disciplined branch of the U.S Military. The Marines are made up of extremely tough people from all corners of the world. I wanted to challenge myself against, and be part of, a group of people who hold themselves and others around them to the highest standard.”

Christopher Benamati, Manager—Quality Assurance
Marine Corps, Vehicle Recovery Specialist, Stationed in Camp Lejune, NC

“Being in the military helped me to appreciate the freedoms that most Americans take for granted. I am proud of this country and I’m glad that I have the opportunity to work for an American-based company that is helping the country use American-based energy sources. The Army provided a good sense of structure to my life. Following the chain-of-command and having the right processes and procedures in place helped to create a controlled environment. A controlled environment helps to prevent accidents and makes everything more efficient. I feel that this same structure is present at CNX.”

Jarrod Shultz, Environmental Specialist, Army Tank Commander, Stationed in Italy

  • The Diversity and Inclusion employee resource group organizes a weekly mental health walk where all employees are invited to unwind and engage while getting vitamin D.
  • WE@CNX (Women Engaged @ CNX) is an Employee Resource Group that is open to all CNX employees. Employee resource groups are voluntary, employee-led groups whose aim is to foster a diverse, inclusive workplace aligned with the organization’s overarching mission, values, and goals.

  • Pauline Clarchick received the Pioneer Award from Women’s Energy Network