Boston Scientific's DEI Employment Practices: What the Company's Own Documents Show — and What They Mean for Employees

Published August 27, 2026 · Last updated August 27, 2026 · By Fett Law — Michigan Employment Discrimination Attorneys

Boston Scientific Corporation's own SEC-filed compensation plans document, in the operative plan language rather than in a report's narrative, that its annual employee bonus pool was funded in part by "performance against global gender and US (inclusive of Puerto Rico) multicultural goals" for five consecutive plan years, 2021 through 2025. Those goals were the company's published "3Up by 2023" targets: raise the share of women at supervisor and manager level to at least 43% globally, and the share of "multicultural talent" at the same level to at least 23% in the U.S. and Puerto Rico. The company also told readers that every people leader was expected to follow its "diverse slate guidelines" for manager-and-above recruiting, and it ran two development programs described as supporting women and multicultural employees. Boston Scientific Corporation holds a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Federal Supply Schedule contract and publishes an Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity policy naming a Corporate EEO Officer responsible for its Affirmative Action Plans. Similar practices were the basis of IBM's $17 million False Claims Act settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in April 2026.

Key facts

Did Boston Scientific tie bonus pay to gender and race goals?

The metric appears first in the 2021 Annual Bonus Plan, filed as an exhibit to a Form 8-K on November 24, 2020. The plan's glossary defines the measure by name:

"Human Capital Scorecard means, with respect to a Performance Year, performance against global gender and US (inclusive of Puerto Rico) multicultural goals that are aligned to 3UP 2023 goals, leadership bench retention goals, and performance against annual renewable energy and recycling index goals that are aligned with environmental strat plan goals."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2021 Annual Bonus Plan, § IX (Glossary), filed as Exhibit 10.1 to Form 8-K, November 24, 2020. Emphasis added.

That single sentence does two things at once. It makes gender and "multicultural" representation a funding input for the bonus pool, and it ties that input expressly to the company's published numeric representation targets — the "3UP 2023 goals" described in the next section. The same plan states that the bonus payout is determined "based on the Company's performance as to Sales, Adjusted Earnings Per Share, Human Capital Scorecard, and its attainment of quality goals."

The 2022 plan carries the identical definition, with "leadership goals" substituted for "leadership bench retention goals" and the 3UP reference retained. Beginning with the 2023 plan the measure was renamed, and the reference to the expired 3UP target was dropped — but the demographic clause itself survived word for word:

"Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Scorecard means, with respect to a Performance Year, performance against global gender and US (inclusive of Puerto Rico) multicultural goals, Engagement goals, and performance against annual environmental goals that are aligned with the Company's environmental strat plan goals."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2023 Annual Bonus Plan, § IX (Glossary), filed as Exhibit 10.1 to Form 8-K, November 21, 2022. The identical definition appears in the 2024 plan (Exhibit 10.1 to Form 8-K, November 22, 2023) and in the 2025 plan as originally adopted (Exhibit 10.1 to Form 8-K, November 22, 2024). Emphasis added.

How much money the measure moved is stated in the company's own reporting:

"The ESG scorecard is weighted at 15% of our total bonus pool funding and equally divided among three ESG performance metrics."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2022 Performance Report, p. 9. The 2023 Performance Report, p. 9, restates the 15% weighting for 2023.

What this meant in practice — stated precisely. The demographic measure was one of three metrics inside a scorecard weighted at 15% of total bonus pool funding, and the company said those three were equally divided. On the company's own arithmetic, that puts roughly five percent of the bonus pool's funding on a measure of how many women and how many "multicultural" employees held supervisor and manager roles. That is a smaller share than the ten percent Walgreens disclosed, and Boston Scientific never published the numeric thresholds inside the metric or whether it ever changed a payout. But the mechanism is the same one at issue in the IBM matter, and it is documented in a filed plan rather than a brochure: for five plan years, the money available to pay bonuses at a company of roughly 59,000 people moved, in part, with demographic headcount.

The people who know what that produced further down are the managers who carried the goals, the human-resources and compensation staff who scored them, and the recruiters who were told what the numbers needed to be.

Sources: 2021 Annual Bonus Plan · 2022 Annual Bonus Plan · 2023 Annual Bonus Plan · 2024 Annual Bonus Plan · 2025 Annual Bonus Plan · 2022 Performance Report.

Did Boston Scientific set numeric representation goals?

The 2021 Performance Report states the goals in the company's own words:

"Increase our goal for representation of women at the supervisor and manager level by 3 percentage points or more, to at least 43% globally"

"Increase our goal for representation of multicultural talent at the supervisor and manager level by 3 percentage points or more, to at least 23% in the U.S. and Puerto Rico"

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2021 Performance Report, p. 21. The same targets appear in the 2020 Performance Report, People section, p. 27.

The company then reported its progress against them by number. Its 2022 Performance Report records women at 42.6% against the 43% goal and multicultural talent at 22.6% against the 23% goal, under the heading "3Up by 2023 objectives to increase opportunities for representation of women and multicultural talent."

When 2023 arrived, the goals were replaced rather than retired. The 2023 Performance Report sets out "2030 aspirational goals" under the heading "Diversity in leadership":

"50% women in mid-level leadership roles (global), from a 43.5% baseline in 2023"

"27% multicultural talent in mid-level leadership roles (U.S./Puerto Rico), from a 22.6% baseline in 2023"

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2023 Performance Report, p. 32.

What this meant in practice. A goal expressed as a percentage of a named job level, measured annually against a baseline, can only be met by changing who is hired into or promoted into that level. What makes the Boston Scientific version different from a goal that sits in a report is the sentence quoted in the previous section: the company's SEC-filed bonus plan defined a funding metric as performance against goals "aligned to 3UP 2023 goals." The target and the money were connected in a document filed with the federal government.

None of that establishes that any individual decision turned on race or sex. It establishes what the company measured, what it paid against, and what it told managers to move.

Sources: 2021 Performance Report · 2022 Performance Report · 2023 Performance Report.

Did Boston Scientific require diverse candidate slates?

The sentence reads in full:

"Every people leader at Boston Scientific is expected to develop and implement a DE&I plan and follow our diverse slate guidelines for recruiting manager and above roles."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2022 Performance Report, p. 27. Emphasis added.

Two honest limits belong here, and they cut in opposite directions.

Against reading it too strongly: the company wrote "expected to," not "required to," and it did not publish an audit mechanism, a threshold, or a consequence for a manager who did not follow the guidelines. Companies that operated hard slate rules — Comerica, for example, which audited every vice-president-level and above requisition and required a written business reason when a demographic threshold was missed — said so in detail. Boston Scientific did not.

Against reading it too weakly: a "diverse slate guideline" is by definition a rule about the demographic composition of a candidate pool, it applied to every people leader, and it covered every manager-and-above requisition at a company with tens of thousands of employees. The document that says what the guidelines actually required is an internal one. Recruiters, talent-acquisition staff and hiring managers who worked manager-and-above requisitions at Boston Scientific between 2021 and 2025 are the people who know whether a slate ever had to be reopened, a candidate added, or a decision deferred to satisfy it.

Source: 2022 Performance Report.

Did Boston Scientific run programs restricted by race or sex?

The Accelerated Diverse Talent (ADT) initiative is described by reference to the groups it supports:

"The Boston Scientific Accelerated Diverse Talent (ADT) initiative supports the development of women and multicultural talent with the potential for advancing to more senior leadership roles."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2022 Performance Report, p. 27. The 2021 Performance Report, p. 23, describes the program as launched to "support the development of women and multicultural talent," using "coaching and mentoring, development assignments and executive sponsorships."

The company also published what the program delivered. Its 2021 report states that of nearly 80 employees who participated in ADT that year, more than half moved to a different role or were promoted, and nearly 30% of those promoted moved up to vice president or director level. That is a concrete career benefit attached to a program named and described in terms of sex and race — which is why the eligibility question matters, and why the absence of a published eligibility rule is worth stating rather than glossing.

GROW — Give Real Opportunities for Valuable Work Experience — is a closer question still, because its description changed between report years. The 2021 Performance Report ties its origin to specific racial groups:

"expanded GROW — Give Real Opportunities for Valuable Work Experience — after talking with Black, Hispanic and Latinx employees who build our medical devices and are interested in furthering their careers in business roles at Boston Scientific"

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2021 Performance Report, p. 23.

The following year the same program is described with the racial enumeration removed:

"Our development program GROW — Give Real Opportunities for Valuable Work Experience — was inspired by conversations with employees who build our medical devices and are interested in furthering their careers in business roles."

Boston Scientific Corporation, 2022 Performance Report, p. 24.

Read fairly, the 2021 sentence describes how the program came about — "after talking with" — rather than who could join it. GROW ran at the company's Maple Grove and Arden Hills sites in Minnesota.

The balancing evidence, which belongs on this page. Boston Scientific publishes an Equal Employment Opportunity policy statement signed by its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer that says the opposite of a restriction:

"We do not and will not make any personnel decisions (like recruiting, hiring, job assignments, and promotions) based on age, color, national origin, citizenship status, physical or mental disability, race, religion, creed, gender, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, genetic information, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local law."

Boston Scientific Corporation, EEO Policy Statement, signed by Michael Mahoney, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer. The company's Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement states that "[p]ersons are recruited, hired, assigned and promoted without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, citizenship, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, veteran status, age, mental or physical disability, genetic information or any other protected class."

The company's Annual Report on Form 10-K likewise describes its employee resource groups as "voluntary, company sponsored employee groups open to all employees." Note the scope of that sentence: it covers the resource groups. It does not describe GROW or ADT.

A published policy is a statement of intent. Whether a particular program was in practice offered to some employees and not others — whether a manager was told a nomination slot was for a woman or a multicultural candidate — is a fact the documents cannot settle. If you were told you were, or were not, eligible for one of these programs, that is first-hand knowledge the public record does not contain.

Sources: 2021 Performance Report · 2022 Performance Report · EEO Policy Statement.

How Boston Scientific's DEI program changed, 2019–2026

Why these practices matter legally

Title VII protects everyone, in both directions

Title VII makes it unlawful for an employer to discriminate against any individual with respect to compensation, terms, conditions or privileges of employment because of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. It does not create a protected class of beneficiaries and an unprotected class of everyone else. In Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services, decided June 5, 2025, a unanimous Supreme Court rejected the "background circumstances" rule that several federal circuits had used to require majority-group plaintiffs to make an extra showing before their claims could proceed. In Muldrow v. City of St. Louis (2024), the Court held that a plaintiff challenging a discriminatory job transfer need show only "some harm" to an identifiable term or condition of employment — not a "significant" or "material" disadvantage. That standard reaches actions well short of a firing: a lateral move, a lost development assignment, an exclusion from a candidate slate.

Section 1981 reaches race discrimination in employment contracts

42 U.S.C. § 1981 guarantees all persons the same right to make and enforce contracts as is enjoyed by white citizens, and it applies to employment relationships. Two features matter for anyone evaluating an older claim: it carries a four-year limitations period, and it requires no charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission before suit. It also has no damages cap. (Title VII, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2.)

For federal contractors, the False Claims Act is now in play

The False Claims Act route for federal contractors. On April 10, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that IBM would pay $17,077,043 to resolve False Claims Act allegations that it failed to comply with anti-discrimination requirements in its federal contracts — the first settlement under the DOJ's Civil Rights Fraud Initiative. In August 2026 the government resolved a second, larger matter: under a settlement agreement effective August 21, 2026, five Deloitte entities agreed to pay $21,500,000, of which $9,995,000 was restitution, covering conduct from January 1, 2017 through the settlement date. The certification hook is specific — Title VII as incorporated into federal contracts and FAR clause 52.222-26 — and the government's theory reached not only what Deloitte certified to its contracting agencies but what it "publicly represented" about its compliance. The agreement adds a second and independent theory: that Deloitte "allocated costs to its federal government contracts relating to these practices and sought payment and reimbursement under its federal government contracts for such costs." The whistleblower was paid $4,300,000. Both settlements resolved allegations only, with no determination of liability, and Deloitte denies the conduct.

Why that matters for a company in Boston Scientific's position is the overlap in the conduct described. The practices the Justice Department identified in the IBM matter were a diversity modifier tying bonus compensation to demographic targets, "diverse interview slates" based on race or sex, racial and sex demographic goals for business units, and programs whose eligibility was "limited on the basis of race or sex." The Deloitte agreement describes the same architecture in more detail: "non-public race and sex-based workforce composition goals for business units," progress flagged "in green, yellow, or red," senior personnel "evaluated, in part, based on their contributions to helping Deloitte achieve its workforce composition goals," candidates "identified by race and sex in a spreadsheet," and two programs "where eligibility to participate was limited on the basis of race and sex."

Boston Scientific Corporation's documented position sits partly inside that description and partly outside it. The bonus-funding metric keyed to gender and multicultural goals, and the numeric representation targets those goals expressed, are squarely within the first and third categories — and unlike most companies in this series, Boston Scientific put the language in an SEC-filed plan document rather than a report. Its slate practice is documented in one sentence and its programs are described in demographic terms without a published eligibility restriction, which is weaker. On the contractor side, the company holds a VA Federal Supply Schedule contract and publishes an affirmative-action policy naming a Corporate EEO Officer responsible for Affirmative Action Plans — an obligation that attaches to covered federal contractors.

To be clear about what is and is not established: no court or agency has found that Boston Scientific's practices violated any law, no enforcement action against the company on these grounds has been announced, and the IBM and Deloitte settlements each resolved allegations without any admission or determination of liability. But practices like those documented above are precisely the categories that can give rise to liability under Title VII and § 1981, and, for companies doing business with the federal government, potential False Claims Act exposure. For the complete framework — the four illegal DEI practice categories and when you can sue — see our guide, Is DEI Illegal? 4 Illegal DEI Practices & When You Can Sue.

Were you affected by these practices at Boston Scientific?

If you worked at Boston Scientific Corporation — or applied there — between roughly 2020 and 2025, the documented practices above may have touched your career in ways worth examining:

• You were passed over for a promotion into a supervisor or manager role during the years the company was working against published targets to raise the share of women at that level to 43% globally and the share of multicultural talent to 23% in the U.S. and Puerto Rico — and later toward 50% and 27% by 2030.
• You applied for a manager-and-above role and never reached an interview, during a period when every people leader was "expected to" follow the company's diverse slate guidelines for exactly those requisitions.
• You were not nominated for a development program — the Accelerated Diverse Talent initiative or GROW — that the company described as supporting women and multicultural talent, and that it reported led to promotions for a substantial share of participants, nearly 30% of them to vice president or director level.
• You were a bonus-eligible manager or executive whose own bonus pool was funded in part by "performance against global gender and US (inclusive of Puerto Rico) multicultural goals," and who saw how that metric was cascaded into instructions to hiring teams.
• You were a recruiter, talent-acquisition specialist or HR business partner with first-hand knowledge of what the diverse slate guidelines actually required, and whether a requisition was ever held open, a candidate added, or a decision changed to satisfy them.
• You worked in compensation, finance or corporate-responsibility reporting and saw how performance against the demographic goals was measured, scored and translated into the bonus payout.

There is a separate question worth asking if your work touched the company's federal business. The False Claims Act's qui tam mechanism lets an individual bring a claim on the government's behalf, and potentially share in any recovery, where a company certified compliance with federal anti-discrimination requirements while doing something else — the theory the Justice Department used against IBM and then Deloitte. Boston Scientific Corporation holds a VA Federal Supply Schedule contract and Defense Health Agency purchasing arrangements, and it maintains Affirmative Action Plans under a named Corporate EEO Officer. What certifications were made in the relevant period, and what they said, is the sort of thing an insider may know. Qui tam complaints are filed under seal, so a whistleblower's identity is initially protected while the government investigates. Both Title VII and the False Claims Act prohibit retaliation against people who assert their rights or report violations.

A federal settlement is not a substitute for your own claim: when the Justice Department resolved the Deloitte matter, it expressly preserved the EEOC's right to pursue charges alleging the very same conduct, and preserved individual liability. Nothing about that settlement compensated a single employee or applicant.

If any of these fits, it costs nothing to find out where you stand — meet our DEI discrimination lawyers, or start below.

What could a claim against Boston Scientific be worth?

Whistleblower rewards under the False Claims Act

Under 31 U.S.C. § 3730(d), a qui tam relator receives 15–25% of the government's recovery when the Department of Justice intervenes, and 25–30% when the relator proceeds without intervention. The Deloitte settlement supplies a paid benchmark rather than a projection: the relator received $4,300,000 — exactly 20% of a $21,500,000 recovery. That settlement also shows why False Claims Act exposure outruns the money actually lost. Of the $21.5 million, $9,995,000 was restitution — roughly the government's single damages — so the resolution came to about 2.15 times the actual loss, because FCA recoveries are built on multiplied damages plus per-claim penalties. As a second illustration, arithmetic alone: an intervened case resolving at IBM's $17,077,043 would pay a relator roughly $2.6–$4.3 million. A contractor with a larger federal book or a longer conduct period could produce a materially larger number.

Damages in individual discrimination cases

Back pay and front pay are uncapped under Title VII. Compensatory and punitive damages under Title VII are capped by employer size — $300,000 for employers with more than 500 employees, a bracket Boston Scientific occupies many times over with roughly 59,000 employees worldwide — but race claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 carry no damages cap at all, which is one reason race discrimination cases are often pleaded under it. Several state civil-rights statutes are likewise uncapped, including the Minnesota Human Rights Act, which governs the company's large Minnesota workforce, and Michigan's Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act. Prevailing plaintiffs generally recover attorney's fees on top. For a sense of what employment discrimination cases can produce, Fett Law's own results include a $10.5 million race and age discrimination class action against Ford Motor Company, a $1.1 million jury judgment against the Michigan State Police, and a $460,000 reverse-discrimination settlement for three corrections officers. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Class action potential

Class actions are built on a single policy applied to many people — and a bonus plan that funds the pool for an entire company, or a slate guideline that every people leader is expected to follow on every manager-and-above requisition, is by construction companywide. Historic employment-discrimination class settlements show the range such cases can reach: Coca-Cola paid $192.5 million (2000), Texaco $176.1 million (1996) and Novartis $175 million (2010) to resolve class claims.

Every case depends on its own facts — these figures show the range the law makes possible, not a promise of any outcome. The fastest way to learn where your situation falls is to start a confidential intake or request a free consultation.

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