ICICI Prudential Life Insurance has introduced 'ABCD' framework of initiatives to foster Diversity & Inclusion

ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, an equal opportunities employer, has put in place a comprehensive framework of initiatives, to build an equitable workplace and provide a definitive direction to Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) in the Company.

Built on the "ABCD" framework, the Company's D&I interventions include Attracting diverse talent and enhancing Belongingness and inclusion at the workplace through enabling policies, and creating awareness and sensitisation programmes. Besides, it also includes building Connect with employees from diverse groups, by providing supportive policies and platforms. This includes internal and external forums of women leaders to learn through role modelling. The framework also focuses on tracking progress on gender diversity by publishing Diversity dashboards. With these initiatives, the Company aims to improve overall diversity, including the representation of women and integration of Persons with Disabilities and LGBTQs in the workforce.

Recently, the Company also instituted a Diversity Council as part of its D&I agenda. Comprising both senior women and men leaders, the Diversity Council steers the D&I agenda, including strategic accountability for results, governance and oversight on diversity efforts and promotes company-wide communication on its progress.

The Company's efforts to strengthen gender diversity and foster an inclusive culture has resulted in the overall composition of women increasing to 27%. Significantly, women's participation in the Company's process and support functions is now 40%.

The Company has also initiated a drive to recruit from women-only graduate universities, to enhance the participation of women in frontline roles. Moreover, recruitment partners have also been educated to proactively provide a balanced mix of candidates for filling job openings at the Company.

The Company has in place, various enabling and supportive policies catering to the varied life stage needs of employees. With these policies, it aims to encourage greater participation of women in the Company's workforce and support them to stay invested in their careers for the long term.

Furthermore, to enhance belongingness and inclusion, the Company has made employee policies gender-agnostic, removing the gender binaries from the policy language. Additionally, the Company has expanded the definition of family, which previously referred to the spouse to include same-sex partners. Adoption and surrogacy-related leaves have also been extended to all primary caregivers, including male employees.

Understanding that flexibility is a key issue for many working women as well as for men colleagues with specific lifestage needs, the Company provides its employees an option to avail a sabbatical or flexible working hours to meet their personal and official commitments. , The Company will also bear the cost of all primary caregivers, irrespective of whether they are male or female, wanting to take their child (upto 2 years), along with a caregiver, on official business trips.

As part of its agenda of building connect and support, the Company has recently formed a Women Resource Group comprising senior women employees offering guidance and advice to younger women colleagues on managing careers, career challenges and balancing work-life at various life stages or other work-related aspects. Besides, the Company has also put in place an interactive forum - Udaan - hosting exemplars who have reached the pinnacle of professional excellence, thereby encouraging learning via role modelling.

Ms. Urvi Chhaya, Senior Vice President, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, said "We are proud of being an equal opportunity employer and our endeavour is to strengthen our efforts to foster a genuinely inclusive culture in all our practices. We have instituted our equal opportunity, D&I policy with a focus on gender as one of our priority areas. Further, we have also formalised a Diversity Council comprising the leadership team that steers and reviews the D&I agenda in line with our "ABCD" framework. Our people-centric policies and processes are anchored on the principles of our cornerstones of supportive environment, fairness and meritocracy and promoting a level playing field with the objective of ensuring the benefits can be availed by all our employees, thereby making them feel valued and included.

We believe Indian women have a huge role to play in realising India's dreams and aspirations to build a developed nation. Our policies and initiatives aim to ensure our women workforce feels supported, valued and respected at the organisation. We have been consistently working to balance the gender diversity of our workforce, which has led to an increase in the representation of women in the Company's workforce. We are committed to fostering diversity and building a culture of inclusion at our organisation."

Shares of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company Limited was last trading in BSE at Rs. 407.45 as compared to the previous close of Rs. 405.35. The total number of shares traded during the day was 12865 in over 1064 trades.

The stock hit an intraday high of Rs. 408.05 and intraday low of 403.15. The net turnover during the day was Rs. 5214392.00.

Source : Equity Bulls

Keywords

ICICIPrudentialLifeInsuranceCompany INE726G01019 Diversity Inclusion