Nu Skin VP Shares Her Story of Social Impact
Heather Hammond Cruz’s office at Nu Skin looks over beautiful downtown Provo. A line of Nu Skin beauty products in sustainable packaging sits proudly on a shelf. Silver baskets woven out of recyclable materials glint in the sunlit office. Cruz is the vice president of global corporate social responsibility and sustainability (CSR) at Nu Skin. In her distinct journey to CSR, Cruz credits the Ballard Center for Social Impact for giving her the tools and the spark to transform her passion into a career.
Cruz didn’t originally plan for a career in social impact. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in flute performance at the University of Utah and then worked at Stanford University for four years doing event project management. While working in the Bay Area, Cruz started traveling around the world with her friends. She says, “I made sure that I was doing service on those trips, and just really got the bug of giving back. And so I thought, why can’t I make this part of my career?”
Cruz attended the BYU MBA program with an interest in social entrepreneurship. On the first day of her MBA program, she discovered the Ballard Center. “I loved that I could come to the Ballard Center and find people that were like-minded but also stretched my thinking in different ways to be able to think outside of my box,” she explains. “[The Ballard Center] also gave me the opportunity to connect with organizations that I wouldn't have connected with otherwise . . . . It was so empowering for me to have someone in my corner.
“I had a lot of classmates in my program who didn't want to go the path of CSR or social impact because they thought there was no money in it and there was no future for their family, and they were worried about that,” Cruz continues. "I feel like the Ballard Center really empowered me to think beyond that, to be able to think beyond just the financial impact. Honestly, that hasn't been an issue.”
Cruz completed an internship through Ashoka, a top-tier social impact organization. Afterward, she got a job with Nike, traveling across Asia to meet with factory workers and social entrepreneurs in order to help improve the well-being of factory workers.
Looking back, Cruz says, “The Ballard Center was the reason I ended up getting my internship at Ashoka. The Ballard Center was the reason I ended up getting my job at Nike. There are a lot of ways that I connected and was able to have amazing opportunities, post-graduation as well as during my time at BYU.”
After her job at Nike, Cruz worked for MicroBenefits in China and then began working at Nu Skin in 2018. She and her team at Nu Skin have been developing a sustainability program and changing their corporate social responsibility program to something with even greater impact. Nu Skin’s Force for Good Foundation focuses on improving children’s health and wellness locally and across the globe. To address food insecurity, Nu Skin developed a nutritionally enriched meal called Vitameal, which feeds children around the world. The foundation also partners with social impact organizations, from the South Franklin Community Center in Provo to the School of Agriculture for Family Independence in Malawi.
Cruz is passionate about helping children. Through Nu Skin, she has also worked in schools, refugee camps, and orphanages. She says, “It’s been amazing to see that if we work and hope with (children) that we empower future generations and also help the parents and help those that are along the path.”
When Cruz first started her MBA, she did not know where life would take her, but she had hopes of what she could accomplish. “The Ballard Center was amazing because I had dreams and they helped them come true,” she says.
Cruz has become a powerful leader at Nu Skin and in the field of corporate social responsibility. She reflects, “There are a lot of resources at the Ballard Center that can empower any student to be able to make social impact a big part of their career.”