Thrive within a diverse community
We’re a diverse global team where everyone’s different ideas, backgrounds and viewpoints give us a unique perspective to address big issues. You’ll find an inclusive, diverse and welcoming organisation that cares about your views, your wellbeing and your future.
We asked some of our colleagues to share their experiences of #LifeAtAXAIM. Here Lui from our Hong Kong office explains much he enjoys being part of a diverse global community at AXA IM. “We work very closely with teams based in, for example, France, the UK, China and Korea.” With access to people with different backgrounds and perspectives, it’s a dynamic environment where he enjoys the feeling of support. “There is a sense of being part of a big community.”
At AXA IM, family life is important to us.
We know that there’s no such thing as a ‘typical’ family. We’re committed to supporting our people, whatever their family circumstances might be. Whether you’re a single parent, part of a same-sex couple, have care responsibilities for an older relative, or other commitments to people you are closely connected to outside of work, we want to support you in achieving a work-life balance that’s right for you.
We are taking a number of actions to support working families:
- Individual coaching for parental leave transitions.
- Global webinar series available to all employees covering a broad range of topics from caring for elderly relatives to coping with fatherhood for the first time.
- Inclusive Global Parent Policy offers the same minimum parental leave provision to all AXA employees, globally.
- Promoting more agile and flexible ways of working to help employees fulfil their professional ambitions whilst also managing the challenges of family life.
- Sharing employee testimonies (including fathers) of working parenthood and senior leader support for the topic.
Empowering female talent
Making gender diversity progress within AXA IM
A challenge facing the asset management industry globally is the underrepresentation of women in the workforce, plus even higher levels of gender imbalance in senior and investment roles. As at the end of September 2021, 26% of women are part of our global senior leadership population, 40% compose our Management Board and 38% our Board of Directors.
We have now set ourselves a new target of 1/3 of women in global senior leadership positions by 2025. This is ambitious but achievable by undertaking proactive steps to improve gender equality:
- We are rolling out a programme for all hiring managers globally on inclusive recruitment practices. The program looks at the importance of structured, consistent interview techniques and also how to mitigate the potential bias in the process. It also underlines the business case for greater diversity and how it can support the performance of the team as well as our ability to innovate.
- At the beginning of 2021 we launched a new emerging Female Talent Program to help manage the unique challenges women face as young professionals that could potentially curtail their future access to leadership position.
- We are reviewing on an annual basis the succession planning for all the Management Board members and their direct reports monitoring and strengthening female pipeline.
- Working with an external partner, we have taken a data-driven approach to analyse more precisely AXA IM’s gender diversity.
- To complement our continued groundwork on gender diversity, we undertook a series of workshops for HR Business Partners to better equip them to have the right level of conversations with the business.
Supporting gender diversity within the industry
Gender diversity is a wider asset management industry's concern. As a responsible business, we are continuously working with our peers to help nurture a strong pipeline of female talent for the future. A cultural shift is needed to change perceptions of the industry and encourage more women to pursue a career in this industry. We are very conscious of how crucial it is for us to actively play our part in bringing about change for the long-term.
- Women’s Empowerment Principles
In 2019, we became one of the 65 global investment institutions to support the Women's Empowerment Principles – a UN Women and UN Global Compact initiative calling for companies to advance women empowerment in the workplace. Our gender diversity voting policy echoes our engagement efforts.
This commitment follows the signing by AXA Group of the Women’s Empowerment Principles in December 2018.
- Women in Finance Charter
In 2017, we signed the Women in Finance Charter, a pledge for gender balance across financial services. Read the Charter for more information.
- Our commitment to gender equality for companies we do business with
Research: Our research reiterates the importance of gender equality for investors from a financial and impact perspective. It provides innovative and substantial investment framework for our analysts, PMs and the market.
1:1 and collaborative engagement: We aim at driving changes in investee companies through frequent and active discussion around gender equality. We are also part of e 30% Club Investor Club in the UK. In November 2020, and with five other asset managers, we launched the 30% Club Investor Group in France which we are co-leading and which seeks to increase gender footprint at governance and leadership levels.
Voting policy: Our gender diversity voting policy echoes our engagement efforts. It is revised every year. In 2020, we expanded our gender diversity voting policy, where we will target listed companies in developed market economies where at least one-third of the Board of Directors is not gender diverse.
Supporting greater transparency in gender pay reporting
Our commitment to close gender pay gap is a key business priority for us. Each year we issue a gender pay gap report detailing our statistics. Overall, we hope to demonstrate the holistic approach we take to the measurement and progress of gender equality globally across our business.
EDGE Certification
This tool assesses in thorough detail the gender equality of our various policies, practices, people data and employee perceptions (across multiple countries) and then benchmarks these findings against both global standards and our peers. The granularity of this assessment enabled us to develop a comprehensive, impact-oriented action plan to sustainably improve our gender diversity.
In Q1 2020, we obtained our recertification and are planning to undertake recertification in 2022.
Hear first-hand from our people, partners and external experts, as they share their stories on how at AXA IM we are driving progress and serving both the changing needs of our customers, and the world we live in.
AXA Week for Good at AXA IM
Where we take collective action for a more sustainable world
