Diversi
ty management has been consolidated as a strategic priority for Human Resources of the Top Employers in Spain, in Europe and all over the world. In fact, in our country the percentage of certified companies in which key performance indicators on this matter are reported to executive management has gone from 59% in 2013 to 69% this year. Besides this, the number of organizations that have diversity as one of their specific responsibilities is growing.
The diversity areas which companies work on the most are gender, disability, management of different generations, nationality and languages.
The 55 Top Employer of our country are clearly advanced in the equality of gender compared to the rest of the world. The percentage of women in the 50 key management positions is growing (26% on average in 2014), which is superior to the international (22.8.) Furthermore, the prediction is that within three years it will be even greater. There are, in fact, companies with a greater number of women in management positions than men and some others that are approaching equal numbers of men and women in management positions.
We can cite the case of Orange that tries to have the same percentage of men and women in positions of responsibility. Furthermore, they always include at least one woman on the shortlist in all of their selection processes.
Another aspect of management diversity within companies is the increasing coexistence of generations of varying mentalities and values, the reason that demographic evolution and aging have also turned into a priority for Human Resources. The Top Employers companies in our country are equipped with a large number of diversity programs focused on the incorporation of young professionals but are clearly behind the average in Europe and the world in the management of the elderly and older generations. A clear area of improvement.
The companies of our country instead stand out in the area of disability management. The distribution cooperative Consum, for example, just signed a collaboration agreement with the ONCE Foundation to incorporate 30 individuals with disabilities into their personnel in the next three years.
Natural Fenosa Gas has implemented good practices in the area of diversity, not only with programs for the complete incorporation of individuals with disabilities, but also of battered women and people at risk of exclusion. It collaborates for this cause with different foundations, entities, and institutions.
The adequate management of different nationalities, languages, and ethnicities is also a critical factor, one authentic need for the Top Employers of our country, multinational businesses in 95% of the cases with 125,000 employees on average. Amadeus provider of technological solutions for the travel industry at the global level, is a clear example of a multilingual work environment, since 46% of its personnel in our country are not Spanish and it has professionals with 44 different nationalities of all ages.
Diversity has to take many aspects into account, and in Valeo, they have this clear, an automotive provider present in 28 countries, that considers diversity as a differentiating element,” and works with it from a global perspective: integrating women into management positions, taking care “in a friendly way” of different generations that coexist within the company, gambling on the integration of individuals with disabilities, along with this they have “respect and learning” as an attitude towards new cultures that are incorporated year after year.
The heart of the issue is not in considering diversity, in all of its forms, as something that has to be tolerated, but rather taking advantage of it so that its full potential can materialize.
