Study on non-legislative initiatives for companies to promote gender ...

112 Gender equality initiatives
This Skills Training to become Site Manager has been developed at Sodexo S.A. in
France and it is addressed to high-performing women employees in operations to
give them additional skills and prepare them to be promoted to site managers.
The programme is based on the observations that kitchens are to a large extent led
by men and that in catering at Sodexo, less than 20 % of the leading employees are
women. A reason behind this might be that, in general, catering is very demanding and
hardly compatible with private life (due to shift work and working long hours). Nevertheless,
at Sodexo work-life balance and working in higher positions in catering can be
combined quite well, as work in company restaurants usually takes place between 8
a.m. and 3 p.m.
The skills training challenges the stereotype that men are cooks and chefs while
women work in supporting functions as well as the cultural tradition that one has to
have a cook background to become site manager. Sodexo re-thought job descriptions
in operations and found that there is no clear reason behind such modes. To
give the large number of women without (complete) cook education who are working in
Sodexo restaurants the possibility to become site manager, clear curricula about the
skills of applicants have been formulated. In fact it is important that restaurant
managers are close to clients and customers.
For these non- or less-skilled employees (not only for women, but a huge majority of
these employees are women) a specific training programme to become site manager
has been developed. This gives women the possibility to reach the first level of
management; and Sodexo will then also be able to help them grow further step by
step.
One of the objectives of PSA Peugeot Citroën SA’s Agreement on Gender Equality and
Employment for Women is to ensure that individual pay raises and promotions are
awarded to women in the same or higher proportion as their percentage in the
workforce (i. e. the share of the budget for individual raises and promotions for women
is equal to or more than the share of women in the workforce).
By 2010, pay gaps between men and women shall be overcome. Moreover, the
company also aims at increasing the number of women employees in higher
positions/in technical jobs through training and further improving working conditions
and adapting the structures of professional life.
Siemens AG (Austria) has developed the programme women ahead! that bundles
measures and initiatives to promote an open and gender neutral feed-back culture
within the company. An enterprise culture where family issues are understood and
persons with family are supported (i. e. employees – men and women – shall not fear to
experience a break in their career or a decline in status because they want to take
parental leave or have child care responsibilities) shall be achieved. Among others, at
the annual appraisal interviews, a special focus is put on the further career development
of persons who are working part-time (i. e. training possibilities are discussed,
etc.). In the annual pay reclassifications and when bonuses are shared, equal treatment
of men and women (and part-timers) is ensured.
The Women’s Career Development Programme of Royal Dutch Shell plc is a 3 day
residential course given by women (who are predominantly staff of Shell). The course
consists of several modules that cover the business case (Shell’s D&I policy and the
reasons behind), gender cultures (as analysed by Dr. Pat Heim; to understand invisible
cultural gender issues or negotiation styles/conflict solving styles of men and women,