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

Gender equality initiatives 131
“distortion of competition” be avoided so that new participants have a real
chance to compete?
• Participation of SMEs: The diversity of participating enterprises also concerns
the size of the companies. Many responsible organisations report on the
difficulties to recruit SMEs as they often lack a systematic HR policy and
therefore are not able to answer questionnaires or set measures in all fields
required. Even if SMEs are active in these fields they seem to be too self-critical
to call such measures gender equality or CSR-activities etc. and thus, do not
see themselves as a target group of the initiatives.
• Participation in times of economic crisis: Gender equality and social
responsibility is often seen as an additional target which can be aimed at if the
company’s results are satisfactory. In times of economic crisis and negative
business performance these additional targets are often sacrificed for the core
business issues. Equality measures are regarded as a cost factor which could
be reduced easily as the financial value of gender equality is difficult to measure
and often shows its positive impacts more in the long than in the short run.
• Balance between quality and accessibility: Non-legislative initiatives promoting
gender equality rely on the voluntary participation of companies and
therefore must orient their procedures, services and organising principles to the
requirements of the companies. However, the initiatives will only be assessed
as valuable in societal terms if the requirements for participation are sufficiently
demanding and go beyond lip services, if standards and practices address
crucial areas and induce sustainable change, and if this is actually evaluated so
that the companies can serve as real role models.
4.3 Benefits and challenges for the enterprises
Impacts of non-legislative initiatives on gender equality are easier to identify at the level
of the participating enterprises as compared to the societal level. It shall be noted
however that these initiatives certainly interact with other measures taken by the
companies’ management. As gender equality has to be considered a dynamic process
the impact of the initiatives can be shown by a change in the companies’ corporate
culture rather than in terms of figures.
Although more and more enterprises commit themselves to corporate social responsibility
and set their goals beyond profit maximisation, a responsible management will
only implement voluntary measures if the enterprise itself can benefit from such
measures. Thus, the participation in non-legislative initiatives promoting gender equality
will only be attractive if gender equality can be seen as a business case, i.e. if the
participation has positive impacts on the company. The analysis of the initiatives and
the participating enterprises revealed several of these positive impacts:
• Recognition for the company: The participation in such initiatives often does
not initiate totally new processes in the company but puts spotlight on actions
already existing. Thus, the initiatives support and enhance management
principles already on the way and serve to confirm the efforts made. Enterprises
can present themselves as role models. As large enterprises are nowadays
requested by customers and business partners to show engagement in
CSR/diversity initiatives the signing of a charter or being awarded is an external
“proof” of the engagement.