Inclusion and wellbeing

Our purpose as a firm is ‘Investing for the long term. Our futures depend on it’. It helps shape how we think, how we act, and how we create lasting impact for our clients, customers, shareholders and society.

We’re committed to running our business in a responsible way. This in turn influences our inclusion and wellbeing (I&W) strategy, which is about fostering a dynamic, multi-faceted and thriving workforce. Bringing together colleagues from different lived experiences and with different ways of thinking helps us:

• build an inclusive culture
• strengthen our teams
• enrich our insights into client needs and investment strategies

Our approach is broad and focused on driving real change. We aim to:

• acknowledge, value and support difference in representation, including through an intersectional lens, and cultivate diversity of thought
• address any inconsistencies in our existing practices and help reshape talent processes, benefits, and policies to ensure fair, transparent, equitable outcomes
• prioritise the wellbeing of our employees, so they have access to the support they may require at different life stages and moments
• drive personal transformation in leaders and employees, helping them recognise and mitigate bias, so they can identify, model, and advance inclusive behaviours that promote wellbeing and facilitate positive business outcomes
   

At the heart of these goals are four key principles that help identify and prioritise our initiatives:

Talent: advancing inclusive and equitable policies and practices to attract, develop, and retain a diverse pipeline of talent

Culture: cultivating and promoting an inclusive company culture where all employees feel heard, respected, and valued and their wellbeing is supported

Measurement and reporting: tracking our progress to drive better results and improve transparency and accountability

Community: promoting inclusion and wellbeing beyond our business, across our wider industry, with our customers and clients, and in the communities in which we operate

We are committed to a long-term goal of gender parity across our workforce, and to increase the representation of women on the board and in senior leadership. To recognise our commitments, and to measure progress in relation to the diverse representation of our people, we currently have goals in place in relation to gender and ethnicity, and hope as disclosure rates increase that we can better monitor representation of other diversity dimensions. We are also committed to the FTSE Women Leaders Review, the Parker Review, the FCA Listing Rules and are also signatories of the Women in Finance Charter, a UK government backed initiative designed to improve gender diversity in senior management across the financial services sector. We have seen consistent improvement in senior female representation year on year since signing the Women in Finance Charter in 2018 and currently have 37% senior female representation and continue to aspire to meet the goal of 40% senior female representation. In the UK, we also report on gender and ethnicity pay gap.

Find out more in our Social impact report

Our Group Inclusion & Wellbeing team leads our global strategy. They work with our Group Management Committee and Governance Committee. A dedicated council, chaired by a GMC member, helps define and oversee initiatives across the business.

We work with external partners to deepen our understanding of inclusion and wellbeing. They include:

Our employee networks help colleagues connect, share experiences and build an inclusive culture. They create space for open conversations and raise awareness of the issues that matter most. Our networks include:​

• Ability​
• Neurodiversity​
• Culture and Ethnicity​
• Family and Carers​
• Military and Veterans​
• Pride​
• Social Mobility​
• Women’s Network​​

We benchmark our progress through external assessments, including:

• MindForward Alliance – Thriving at Work Assessment​
• CCLA – Corporate Mental Health UK 100 Benchmark​
• LGBT Great – Investment Industry Benchmark Tracker​
• Carers UK – Carer Confident​
• Henpicked - Menopause Friendly Accreditation