Fred Melkey

Emerson Electric Co

Fred Melkey has over 20 years of experience related to Affirmative Action (AA) compliance. In his current role, he is the Corporate Director of EEO and Affirmative Action for Emerson Electric Co. He has responsibility for development, delivery and monitoring of over 100 affirmative action plans (AAPs) and coordinates the response to OFCCP audits.

Fred began his 20-year career with Intel corporation as an Industrial Engineer. After a decade of technical and management roles, he was asked to turn his passion for recruiting, developing, and mentoring new engineers into a full-time HR role in the Corporate College Recruiting group. After gaining experience in several HR disciplines related to talent management, diversity outreach, and HR Information Systems, he was recruited to join Intel’s fledgling Corporate Diversity organization to apply his analytical skills and HR expertise to this new area of focus. In this role, Fred first began by designing and implementing remedies related to OFCCP conciliation agreements, preparing AAPs, and responding to new audits. This ultimately led to his “mid-life crisis” in which he decided to go to law school mid-career. He has since held EEO and AA related roles in a wide variety of industries while working for The Hartford Insurance, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Emerson.

Fred has held leadership positions for several local Industrial Liaison Groups, authored law review articles related to the Americans with Disabilities Act, and taught Statistics at the University of California San Francisco’s Sacramento campus. He earned a BS in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University and an MBA from the University of New Mexico. He graduated with Honors from the University of Connecticut School of Law and is admitted to practice in Connecticut.