Procter & Gamble (P&G) Philippines earns the highest award for the Gender-Inclusive Workplace Category in the prestigious United Nations Women’s Empowerment Principles (UN WEPs) Awards in the Philippines.
The recognition is given to Asia-Pacific businesses and corporations that have demonstrated exemplary adoption of relevant gender-inclusive measures in the workplace. This may include innovative approaches to equal recruitment and development, accelerated actions to guarantee the safety and well-being of female and male employees, transformational initiatives to support family responsibilities of female and male employees to address the unequal care burden, addressing specific needs of female and male employees, support in providing flexible work arrangements, and promoting women’s career development and leadership.
The company was recognized for its industry-leading policies, inclusive programs, and equitable practices under its We See Equal program.
“For P&G, beyond just saying we champion gender inclusiveness in our workplace, we are committed to putting words into action. We have boldly changed policy to go beyond what’s standard and mandated. For instance, our industry-leading Share the Care policy removes gender bias in a company-wide paid parental leave policy because we recognize that caring for family and the home has no gender. It is a shared responsibility. It also leads to positive change in perceptions around parental roles and outdated stereotypes of women as the sole, full-time primary caregiver in the early stages of a child’s life,” said Anna Legarda-Locsin, Communications Director of P&G Philippines.
Share the Care is P&Gs industry-leading global paid parental leave program that provides a minimum of 8 weeks fully paid parental leave and offers all kinds of parents an equal opportunity to care for and bond with biological or adopted children new to their family. New fathers are now enabled to share and support in caregiving duties beyond the standard 7 days mandated by Philippine law. The groundbreaking parental leave program applies to all employees who are welcoming new children to their families, regardless of gender or marital status. Meanwhile, birth or adoptive mothers continue to receive the 105 calendar days of fully paid maternity leave.
Aside from industry-leading policies, P&G enables equal opportunities and access for women and men via inclusive programs that are employee-led, HR-enabled, and leadership-sponsored. It supports equitable practices especially in traditionally male-dominated work environments such as manufacturing, sales, and IT.
P&G’s intentionality to nurture and enable equal opportunity and access for women to show their merit and succeed in the workplace has led to more equal gender representation at all levels. The current P&G workforce is at a healthy 53% female – 47% male gender balance, with senior management levels at 54% female, up from 40%.
The UN WEPs Awards are organized by WeEmpowerAsia, a UN Women program funded by the European Union, which promotes women’s participation and leadership in the workplace, marketplace, and the community. UN Women is the UN agency for gender equality and women’s empowerment.
“Employers have a critical role in fostering gender equality and inclusion in the workplace and society. The time to do it is now. There is a real opportunity and responsibility for businesses to use what we have all learned this year about agility and flexibility to push equality and inclusion in the workplace and remove the barriers that prevent its advancement.” Legarda-Locsin added.
