Promoting equal opportunities
"We know up to which point the engagement of our employees is crucial to understand and satisfy our customers. This is why we value highly the respect and appreciation of the diverstiy of experiences, cultures, opinions, physical attributes and group identities. This diversity provides a richness without which the company could neither be faithful to its values nor successfully achieve its ambitions."
Henri de Castries, Chairman of the AXA Group's Management Board
AXA is committed to being an employer of choice when it comes to equal opportunities, and has made it one of the priorities for its sustainable development strategy. Recruitment and working methods and organizations are designed to promote equal opportunities and respect for diversity, as well as contributing to the fight against all forms of harassment and discrimination. This inclusion policy aims to be exhaustive, built around three key areas: gender equality, diversity and the integration of disabled staff.
1) Group HR policy on equal opportunities
The AXA Group diversity and integration policy, signed by the CEO in 2006, seeks to maximize AXA's ability to meet business challenges worldwide and fulfill our customers' and employees' expectations while helping to stimulate innovation and performance.
At AXA, developing a culture of diversity and integration means recognizing and respecting individual differences, recognizing and appreciating a variety of backgrounds, cultures, and perspectives. It also means putting each employee's unique contributions and abilities to good use, regardless of physical traits or whether the person belongs to a particular group within society.
This policy should be a force for change in the corporate culture. It provides a practical, sustainable approach to diversity designed to ensure that AXA's management practices:
- Guarantee equal employment opportunity for all workers at every AXA company, based on merit and ability.
- Raise awareness of and promote a belief in the advantages of diversity;
- Make diversity the responsibility of all employees and executives.
1.1) Implementation
AXA's efforts focus primarily on three specific goals:
- Promote awareness of diversity issues within the organization while demonstrating the company's commitment to diversity, particularly through executive-level involvement and an effective communication campaign.
- Create an integration-friendly workplace that allows teams to flourish by incorporating diversity themes into management practices and requiring documentation of how this has been done.
- Encourage a diverse workforce by systematically incorporating diversity issues into recruitment planning and assignment of shifts.
The content of this policy must be implemented in accordance with local laws and should be adapted to local circumstances. This AXA Global Diversity and Integration Policy requires all AXA companies to define long-term action plans designed to help achieve our objective: to ensure equal employment opportunity for all our workers based on merit and ability.
1.2) Tracking Progress
AXA Group's progress toward achieving diversity and integration is tracked through an annual review by the chairman of the Group, senior managers, and the HR Steering Committee. This review focuses primarily on actions and progress toward achieving awareness, integration in the workplace, and a diverse workforce. The results of the review are presented to the Sustainable Development Governance Committee.
The HR Steering Committee adopted this policy in 2006. A preliminary international HR workshop was held in July 2006. It included an initial exchange of best practices, prior to development of local action plans (for 2007 to 2009) by the end of 2006. A review is slated for October 2007.
Some Group companies, such as AXA France, AXA Equitable (US) or AXA Canada, have carried out a number of proactive actions in line with this Group policy.
2) Equal opportunities : gender
In the area of people management, the organization is formally committed to ensuring that all employees - regardless of their gender or age - receive equal treatment when it comes to opportunities for employment, advancement and training, as well as in terms of compensation. Continuing education and professional training programs are designed to enable all employees, regardless of gender, to expand their skills set and, in so doing, enhance their employability and contribute to the performance of their company. Nevertheless, based on findings from its own strategic data, AXA recently decided to take further steps to ensure equal opportunities for career advancement based on a specific Group-wide policy adopted in 2006.
The aim is to improve global performance trends in this area by capitalizing on the best practices on display within certain companies, such as AXA France. The process is a long one, and it will be several years before the impact can be seen in our statistics.
AXA France obtains the "Equality Label"
On June 7, 2006, AXA France was awarded the Equality Label by AFAQ/AFNOR: today, it is the first French insurance company to have been recognized for its innovative measures to promote equality within the workplace. Indeed, gender equality at work represents one of the key elements underpinning the human resources policy at AXA France. This label, covering a three-year period with an intermediate review after 18 months, recognizes the actions taken by AXA France in this field.
3) Workplace diversity
In addition to gender equality, the Group HR policy on equal opportunities is based on a certain number of actions aimed at promoting minorities. Some of the Group's companies, such as AXA France, AXA Equitable (US) or AXA Canada, had been particularly active in this area.
Diversity in Canada and the US
AXA Canada has adopted an innovative human resources strategy. Indeed, this company represents a model when it comes to diversity, with four women on its Executive Committee out of a total of 12 members, and an exemplary site in Toronto, where 27 ethnic groups are represented and 22 languages spoken.
In the United States, AXA Equitable is going to develop a 4-point Diversity Action Plan: 1) Transform the corporate culture through training of executives and then managers; 2) Take advantage of recruitment opportunities to increase the percentage of minorities and women in senior positions;3) Develop talent through a process that is still being finalized;4) Use targeted internal communication.
AXA Equitable has also created a Diversity Advisory Council whose job is to establish programs to encourage diversity in recruitment, development, and retention of talented individuals who belong to minorities, and to raise awareness of this among outside audiences such as clients and suppliers. This is particularly important since members of the Hispanic, African American, and Asian communities will make up 28% of the U.S. workforce by 2008.
The anonymous resume in France
In 2004, AXA France signed the Diversity Charter, which notably sets out the principle to promote plurality and seek out diversity through hiring and career management as a source of progress for the business. Similarly, the proposals presented in a report on job discrimination submitted to the French Prime Minister in late 2004 by Claude Bébéar, entitled Des entreprises aux couleurs de la France, raised awareness on this important issue. One of these proposals, calling for the use of anonymous resumes for job applicants as a way of ensuring fair treatment, quickly became part of AXA France's official hiring policy. In this way, as of January 2005, AXA France began rolling out a policy of accepting only anonymous resumes, initially covering applications received over the Internet for open sales positions (around 20,000 resumes received in 2004). For other types of resume, including those sent in by mail or email, a review is currently underway. The possibility of ramping up this operation to include Direct Assurance and AXA Assistance will also be looked into. The entire process will be carried out under the control and moral authority of a prominent figure or organization, possibly from outside of the company.
4) Hiring the disabled
AXA companies around the world are particularly sensitive to the issue of hiring disabled staff. Like AXA France, many of them are developing employment policies that promote hiring people with disabilities. The proportion of disabled staff is available in the "Performance" section.
Disabled employees at AXA France
In 2003, AXA France signed a four-year agreement with the trade unions promoting workplace opportunities for people with disabilities. In addition to new hires, the agreement also covers disabled people who were already employed by the company when it was ratified. AXA France's objective in signing the agreement is to have five to six percent of its total workforce comprising people with disabilities by the end of 2006. Apprenticeship and training contracts leading to accreditation will also be offered to young workers with disabilities. Other initiatives include job adaptation training and ongoing support for employees with disabilities. The latter include identifying work tasks that are compatible with the disability, improving site accessibility, and reorganizing workstations and work schedules.
A dedicated team ("Mission Handicap") has been set up to oversee this commitment.
At December 31, 2004, the number of disabled employees covered under the agreement was 490, i.e. 4.1% of AXA France's total workforce. One year on, at the end of December 2005, 785 employees were identified, representing 6.2% of the total workforce at AXA France. The increase seen in relation to 2004 is partly down to efforts made by the Mission Handicap team to train personnel administrators to refine the methods used to identify workplace disabilities and, in so doing, enable a greater number of employees to take advantage of the services offered through Mission Handicap. In 2006, the system used for legal purposes to count the number of disabled employees was changed: previously, a disabled employee counted for several units (due to the added weight of his or her disability). This is no longer the case. Accordingly, the number of disabled employees as expressed in units was 426 for 2006, which represents about 4% of AXA France's workforce.