PwC - WWF

Communicating
with a diverse
workforce
The PwC Assurance Breakthrough Blog
The diversity of our people, their
backgrounds, talents and interests, that
we have across our region, and globally,
is one of the strengths that we must
continue to harness in order to deliver
value.
Making sure that we are able to respond
to the needs of people of all ages, in
ways that make sense to them, is of
great importance to us. In PwC CaTSH,
Generation Y (Gen Y) now makes up
over 70% of our workforce. So, we are
focusing on how to communicate most
effectively with our Gen Y people,
according to their needs, aspirations and
preferred communication medium. One
milestone has been the PwC Assurance
Breakthrough Programme. This drives
organisation-wide behavioural changes,
promoting interaction and
communication between partners and
staff at all levels, as well as bringing
value to our people and clients through
the PwC Experience. The programme is
designed to encourage junior Gen Y
associates to provide feedback on the
behaviour of partners in the workplace.
With this feedback, we can strengthen
internal communications and
interactions, while helping with staff
retention.
This programme has already had
positive results. In 2011, retention in
Assurance increased by around 2%,
with an improvement of 7% in Hong
Kong.
With social media becoming an
increasingly popular communication
tool in all our territories over the last
few years, we’re conscious of keeping
up-to-date. We communicate regularly
through sites such as Facebook in
Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong, and
Renren in China, but have more to
achieve in this space.
In terms of gender diversity, 64% of our
total people are women, and women
make up 29% of the partnership across
our firms. In 2011, 36% of partners
admitted to PwC CaTSH were female.
Having equal opportunities for all staff
and partners is an important part of
PwC’s code of conduct. Created with
women in mind but open to all staff and
partners, PwC’s flexible working and
career break policies are designed to
allow greater flexibility for people when
they need it.
Celebrating International
Women’s Day
International Women’s Day was
recognised by PwC Singapore with an
appreciation lunch for women featuring
speeches raising the profile of women in
Singapore. Four inspiring female guest
speakers from outside and within PwC
shared their experiences.
In China, where women are entitled to a
half day national holiday, a group of 20
women from the Shanghai office of PwC
China used their half day to volunteer
with the Shanghai Special-Care Foundation.
Embracing Cultures
Culturally, we’re also a diverse
workplace. With the majority of our
people coming from China, Hong Kong,
Taiwan and Singapore, we already see a
rich blend of cultures and nationalities,
allowing us to work well with both
international and local clients. This
gives our people the opportunity to work
with others from diverse backgrounds,
while also increasing cultural sensitivity
and understanding.
Our commitment in Financial Year 2012 is to continue with the
above initiatives to deliver the value that our people are looking
for. From a CR team perspective, our efforts will focus on:
• creating links between our community and environment
programmes and our responsible leadership programmes,
• supporting the expansion of well-being initiatives within
PwC, and
• integrating deeper corporate responsibility themes into the
graduate recruitment process.
24 Corporate Responsibility Report 2011
Corporate Responsibility Report 2011 25