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Being a "Pioneer" in Global Maternity Benefits: Vodafone’s Talent Retention Strategy
EXCERPTS
THE “PLUS 1” PRINCIPLE
Vodafone was a member of the European Round Table of Industrialists (ERT). In 2012, the ERT announced an innovative three-year pilot program to promote women to non-Executive Director and Supervisory board positions. According to the ERT, the program had two initiatives: (a) to bring about awareness in women that they were welcome in the industry and would be supported in the industry and, (b) to give a greater visibility to its member company’s efforts to recruit and develop female talent.Vodafone, as required of each of the members of the ERT, voluntarily declared its targets toward the ERT initiatives. In 2012-13, Vodafone aligned itself to the ERT initiatives and stated that its priority was “Diversity & Inclusion”... |
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GETTING WOMEN ON BOARD
In 2008, Vodafone stated that it had implemented a new training strategy to improve gender diversity across the group. The new strategy aimed to build a more employee inclusive culture. The strategy also included senior leadership training on diversity across the group...
IMPETUS TO THE NEW MATERNITY POLICY
Doherty, the visionary behind the global maternity policy, stated that in her analysis of global female employee turnover at Vodafone, she had found that countries such as Italy, Portugal, and Romania had lower employee turnover...
INPUTS FROM KPMG STUDY
Vodafone Group commissioned KPMG to do an analysis on cost of recruiting, training new employees, and retaining the existing female workforce by offering paid leave. KPMG stated that its work for Vodafone was designed to meet the company’s specific requirements...
LAUNCHING THE POLICY
On March 6, 2015, Vodafone announced that it would be one of the first organizations in the world to introduce a mandatory minimum global maternity policy. Analysts observed that other than the United Nations, very few global organizations – and even fewer multinational corporations – had adopted a minimum maternity policy like Vodafone...
UNIQUE AND PIONEERING
The employees of Vodafone across the globe welcomed the new policy, and it was also supported by some analysts. The analysts felt that unlike flexible work policies where women had to negotiate with managers and often had to take pay cuts, the new policy would actually help women transition into their jobs after giving birth without it squeezing their earnings or affecting their careers...
THE OTHER VIEW
Critics observed that all companies could not follow Vodafone’s lead in maternity benefits. They said that smaller companies, especially those with a bigger female workforce, might not benefit from the maternity policies...
LOOKING AHEAD
Analysts cited Vodafone as a “pioneer” in framing its global maternity policy. While companies like Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (Deloitte) , Google Inc (Google) , Facebook Inc (Facebook) , and Yahoo Inc (Yahoo) offered paid leave, it was observed that there was no geographical uniformity like Vodafone...
EXHIBITS
Exhibit I:Comparison of Vodafone’s Global Revenues and its EBITDA (2009-2014)
Exhibit II:Comparison of Vodafone’s Global Employees During 2009-2014
Exhibit III:Vodafone’s Women Workforce in Senior Leadership Roles, Senior Management, Middle Management and Its Diversity Values
Exhibit IV:Vodafone: Voluntary Leavers, Involuntary Leavers and Average Turnover Globally (2011-2014)
Exhibit V:Country-wise Comparison of Paid Maternity Leave in Days & % of Pay During Maternity Leave
