Nicole Hughey will be sharing her story during our Opening Ceremony, Saturday, April 27. 

Nicole Hughey is a visionary Executive skilled in diversity, equity, inclusion and social impact, strategy planning and execution, organizational effectiveness, communication, influencing, and inclusive leadership. She is a trusted leader and advocate for all.

In her former role as Senior Vice President, Head of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion and Social Impact at SiriusXM, Nicole established and led SiriusXM’s DE&I strategy, mission, goals, and priorities and the company’s philanthropic strategy. After joining the company in 2020, Nicole rolled out mentoring and leadership programs for underrepresented employees, created the “Pathways Program” to create an avenue into the company for students from HBCUs, launched the initiative “Can We Talk?” to engage employees in authentic conversations about race, diversity and equity, and created company-wide communications to ensure employees were aware of and could participate in cultural-specific music, talk, sports, and podcast programming. She created the company’s first holistic philanthropic strategy, SiriusXM Cares, which brings together social equity giving, employee giving, and corporate giving in alignment with the communities in which the company operates.

Before joining SiriusXM, Nicole spent over 25 years in the insurance and healthcare industries, largely focused on DE&I. During her tenures at both Mass General Brigham, New England’s largest healthcare organization, and Travelers Insurance Company, Nicole was a DE&I senior leader and played an integral part in developing and executing diversity strategies that impacted over 75,000 and 30,000 employees, respectively.

Nicole is a frequent contributor on a variety of speaking engagements where she shares her knowledge and expertise with others. Nicole has been a guest speaker on several podcasts including Black Enterprise’s Class is in Session, Diversity Pivot Podcast and Cause Talk Radio, a feature in articles including CoolstuffNYC, a presenter at several conferences and webinars, including Columbia Business School, From Day One Conference, She Runs It Multicultural Bootcamp, Fairygodboss’ Top Diversity Priorities, and is a repeat featured speaker at the Leeds School of Business University of Colorado (Boulder) Certificate in Environmental, Social and Governance Strategy Program. In Spring 2023, she was honored to be the University of Hartford’s Spring 2023 Undergraduate Commencement Speaker where she addressed more than 800 graduating students. Most recently, she has been recognized as a 2024 and 2023 Top 15 Chief Diversity Officer, Crain NY’s 2023 Top DE&I Leader, a 2023 Most Influential Executives in Diversity & Inclusion by Savoy Magazine, a 2021 Outstanding Alum for Exceptional Professional Success at her alma mater University of Hartford, and a 2021 honoree of the 100 Women of Color of Connecticut.

Nicole holds a B.S. in Business from the University of Connecticut, an MBA in Organizational Behavior from the University of Hartford, and an Executive Strategic Change Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.

Currently, Nicole is the Board Chair for the Urban League of Greater Hartford, a member of the Board of Visitors for the University of Hartford’s Barney School of Business, and a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. She lives in Connecticut with her family.