How to create a genuinely inclusive culture for women

This Utility Week Intelligence Research report asks what good looks like when it comes to policies in the workplace that support women, helping ensure they thrive and stay in the utilities industry.

Does your company genuinely walk the walk when it comes to inclusivity? Perhaps one of the metrics that will one day help determine this is, ‘Does your organisation feature a cohort of company-inspired children resulting from its fertility policy?’

Sounds far-fetched? It shouldn’t. Centrica is now the proud parent of ‘Centrica babies’ – the result of two years’ worth of a ‘Pathway to Parenthood’ policy that includes sponsoring fertility treatment for employees to the tune of £15,000, including IVF, sperm donation and egg freezing, or backing workers who want to start a family via surrogacy or adoption. (Centrica isn’t the only utility making strides in this area: earlier this year, Welsh Water became the first fertility-friendly accredited employer in Wales and in the water industry in recognition of the “exemplary” support it’s providing to colleagues facing fertility struggles.)

“Emerging leaders in Gen Z are values driven. They are going through websites forensically to figure out where they want to work, and when it comes to inclusion, you cannot bluff: you have to demonstrate what you’re doing, and the progress you are making on those commitments”

Kat Parsons, Centrica

“IVF and fertility issues are horrendously stressful, so it’s about being able to support someone,” explains Kat Parsons, group head of diversity, equity and inclusion at Centrica. Employees transitioning between genders are also given differing amounts of leave depending on the complexity of the process, Parsons explains.

Parsons admits that Centrica has the luxury of being a very large organisation with the financial muscle to make a difference. But that heft has resulted in some particularly progressive schemes.

“We are trying to be conscious of having policies in place for different life stages. The menopause; for becoming a carer.” She expands on the point. “I can get 20 days’ leave a year if I get to the point where I am having to care for a relative. No evidence needed – I ring up one day and explain, and I get 20 days, and it is logged on the system. As a female at any life stage, we’ve got you covered.”

The example of Centrica is not, then, what Parsons would call “pink-washing” – espousing inclusivity that isn’t reflected in reality. “There are a lot of organisations that I think do that.

"They slap a Black History Month or Pride month badge across LinkedIn.” But companies that aren’t walking the walk don’t scrub up well in the eyes of younger generations, she adds. “Emerging leaders in Gen Z are values driven. They are going through websites forensically to figure out where they want to work, and when it comes to inclusion, you cannot bluff: you have to demonstrate what you’re doing, and the progress you are making on those commitments.

“And I love the fact that they [emerging leaders] are more demanding and switched on about the company they want to align with.”

A Utility Week Intelligence Report in association with the Womens Utilities Network