A Champion for Diversity

Grant City, Missouri, in the state’s northwest corner, is cattle country. Teresa McNeal grew up on one of the town's many cattle farms. Active in 4-H and FFA, she majored in agricultural business at Northwest Missouri State University.

McNeal knew she wanted to work in agriculture, either in a sales or marketing capacity. “I always had a passion for ag and for sales,” she says. An 18-year veteran at Syngenta and its legacy companies, McNeal has spent about half her tenure in sales and half in marketing.

Out of college, she became a sales representative in southern Illinois for Novartis; she was there when Novartis became part of Syngenta in 2000. “I really enjoyed that position and the satisfaction of helping farmers grow more crops,” she says. After several years, she moved to Greensboro, North Carolina, as the company's North American e-business communications manager. This experience ignited her passion for marketing, which McNeal further explored through several roles at Syngenta locations in both Greensboro and West Des Moines, Iowa.

When she moved to Overland Park, Kansas, in 2010 to become a district sales manager, she was, at the time, the only female Syngenta employee in the country with that title. (Today there are two). After gaining sales management experience, she was able to return to marketing as the customer marketing manager for the Heartland South commercial unit.

A couple years ago, one of the company’s directors asked her to become a diversity and inclusion champion for the Syngenta commercial business. Champions from all lines of business meet monthly to look for ways to accelerate diversity and inclusion opportunities. For North America, the team focuses on three “streams” or defined areas: talent acquisition, communication and education, and business resource groups. Teresa supports the business resource group stream, which identifies options to bring groups together to help advance employee enthusiasm, professional development and community engagement.

The mission of the D&I champion network was initially focused on ways to recruit more women into the company, but today it has expanded, McNeal says. “Now it’s not just about diversity in hiring, but diversity of thought, including from the current talent pool.” That brings the engagement and retention of employees into their purview, too.

In 2015, McNeal moved to Minnetonka, Minnesota, for a new position in soybean product marketing and recently became North America soybean product marketing head. “For me, my passion is how we can help farmers grow more and feed an expanding population,” she says. “I’m very proud to work for Syngenta knowing that we have a strong commitment to sustainable agriculture and that we address food security globally.”