Diversity & Inclusion - Embracing and Encompassing Identities | HCLTech

Diversity & Inclusion - Embracing and Encompassing Identities

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CEO's Pledge

CEO's Pledge

CEO's Pledge

A diverse and inclusive work culture makes for a stronger enterprise. Our strength lies in our ability to come together as one. We believe equality and mutual respect must prevail. This belief helpes us excel as an organization, because diverse voices and cultures bring fresh perspectives that strengthen our ability to make decisions and draw insights.

In June 2021, Pride Month, our CEO & MD, C Vijayakumar, signed a pledge with CEO Action. With this pledge, we committed to doubling our efforts to cultivate an environment where all ideas are welcome, and all employees are empowered. CEO Action advocates for a safe environment for employees of diverse backgrounds. It is the largest CEO-led organization of this nature, with close to 2,000 signatories committed to creating a more diverse and inclusive workplace.

This pledge is our commitment to make HCLTech a torchbearer for equality in the workplace. We will do this by encouraging meaningful conversations, spreading awareness on unconscious biases and prejudices, helping other organizations enhance their diversity strategies, and creating enterprise-wide strategic diversity plans.

According to C Vijayakumar, “Diversity is the most sustainable driver of innovation and a primary genome of resilience. It is no surprise, therefore, that teams and organizations with a higher degree of diversity and inclusion almost always outperform those without them. At HCLTech, this has been one of our core guiding principles as a team, and a cultural differentiator that we are most proud of.”

 

Diversity and Inclusion Strategy

Diversity & Inclusion means

embracing and encompassing Identities

embracing and encompassing Identities

Everyone has a unique identity that influences how they work most productively. No matter how different we are, all of us need an environment that is safe, positive, and nurturing. HCLTech’s Diversity and Inclusion strategy was crafted keeping in view that every employee feels included and valued. By fostering a climate free of bias, where equity and mutual respect are intrinsic, HCLTech is a result-oriented and caring organization that draws intellectual strength and produces innovative solutions from the synergy of its people.

Diversity wins when everyone is included

Diversity wins when everyone is included

HCLTech is a next-generation global technology company that helps enterprises reimagine their businesses for the digital age.

The company’s DNA of innovation and its tradition of creating customer value by going far beyond what is expected, only because our diverse employees come from different backgrounds, countries, and cultures. Our strength lies in our global workforce, which is spread across 60 countries, with 222,000+ Ideapreneurs belonging to 157+ nationalities—all working together to build a culture that respects inclusion.

Diversity and Inclusion Culture

Diversity. It’s an asset.

Diversity. It’s an asset.

Having built and scaled a multinational enterprise over nearly four decades, HCLTech believes that diversity in the workplace is an asset for both businesses and their employees, in its capacity to foster innovation, creativity, and empathy in ways that homogeneous environments seldom do. Yet it takes careful nurturing and conscious orchestration to unleash the true potential of this invaluable asset. Because to get the best from someone regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, or disabilities, we must actively include them so that they can contribute to their fullest.

4 pillars of Diversity and Inclusion

Translating a business strategy to a human strategy of inclusion

We are hugely focused on inclusion to maximize talent attraction, growth, and retention. Our talent strategy is focused on the four pillars of Diversity and Inclusion, which includes Gender Inclusion, Cultural Inclusion, Disability Inclusion, and LGBTQIA+ Inclusion.

  • Gender Inclusion
    Gender Inclusion

    Gender inclusion is a practice that helps empower and improve the status of women employees at all levels.

  • Cultural Inclusion
    Cultural Inclusion

    Cultural inclusion is a belief that ensures that every individual is respected irrespective of their backgrounds, cultures, nationalities, their way of working, and their lifestyles.

  • Disability Inclusion
    Disability Inclusion

    Integration of people with disabilities into the workforce by providing them an inclusive and accessible work environment.

  • LGBTQ Inclusion
    LGBTQIA+ Inclusion

    LGBTQIA+ inclusion aims to foster an inclusive, safe, and supportive work environment for all LGBTQIA+ people and allies.

Employee Resource Groups (ERG) at HCLTech

Groups and networks keep the conversation going

Groups and networks keep the conversation going

From tapping into professional networks that support women and people of color to supporting the development of employees, the Employee Resource Groups are indispensable to the long-term vitality of our workforce and business. Our Employee Resource Groups have been an integral part of our diversity and inclusion journey—and a key to maintaining a richly diverse talent base.

Employee Resource Groups (ERG) at HCLTech
  • Pride@HCLTech
    The group shares unique insights from LGBTQIA+ inclusion, helping contribute to an inclusive workplace that welcomes and values differences.
  • Ability Connect Network
    This is a community that helps and supports all people with a disability through awareness, advocacy, resources, and opportunities.
  • Women Connect Network
    The Women Network provides members with opportunities to facilitate their professional development, help reach their career aspirations, and have open dialogues about the barriers and misconceptions that exist for women in the workplace.
  • Single Parent Network
    Single Parent Support Network is a voluntary, employee-led group of active single parent HCLites who contribute both by improving social and emotional wellbeing for other single parents and their families, and by being the catalysts to improve inclusion in the workplace.
  • The Heritage Network
    The network is for "like-minded" HCLites who feel strongly about understanding different cultures and sharing knowledge about their own.

COVID-19 and the importance of inclusion

COVID-19 and the importance of inclusion

COVID-19 is a humanitarian crisis that is affecting the health, wellbeing, and lives of all our communities in different ways. The transition to new ways of working in the context of the global pandemic presents both challenges and opportunities for promoting diversity, and for fostering inclusion.

Women at the workplace: It’s no news the COVID-19 crisis is likely to put working women under pressure owing to taking on greater care of demands at home. This could result in women taking reduced pay or leaving their jobs in the future.

New ways of working: There has been a radical shift in the mindsets of people in terms of embracing work-from-home, demanding more flexible work arrangements in place, transparency and agility in the system, and having equitable access to technology and resources, which experts suggest, might lead to a substantial change in how businesses are run and operated post-COVID-19.

 

Inclusive in new ways of working

Inclusive in new ways of working

Diversity and Inclusion are at risk in the long-drawn COVID-19 crisis, and it's no longer just a matter of compliance or something to tick off. To respond to this situation, we have taken some definitive steps. These include:

A Virtual Inclusion Lab:

The Inclusion Labs adopt a top-down approach across key diversity and inclusion elevators to improve the “Inclusion Quotient” of Senior Leaders, Business Leaders, and People Leaders.

  • C-Suite/Executive C-Suite/Executive
    Leaders as Sponsors
  • Business Leaders as Inclusion Champions Business Leaders as
    Inclusion Champions
  • Managers Leaders as Inclusion Practitioners Managers & Leaders as
    Inclusion Practitioners
HCLTech Diversity & Inclusion - Awards Recognitions

The state of D&I trends & progress

The state of D&I trends & progress

25%

women

in the HCLTech Board

in the HCLTech Board

27%

women

globally

30%

women

new hires

9%

increase in employee

headcount of persons

with disabilities

2018

Pride@HCLTech launched

157

Nationalities

Celebrating the contribution of women

Women empowerment is an important part of our holistic diversity agenda, and we believe in initiating changes that will play a pivotal role in this direction. At HCLTech, we are committed to women empowerment, celebrating the contribution of our women employees as well as women in our client and partner ecosystem, and nurturing the next-generation women leaders through mentorship.

Women Lead

The Women Lead initiative is a 1:1 mentorship program for aspiring women leaders. It began in Australia as a response to the lack of women leaders in Australia’s top companies in 2015. Today the program has developed itself into a multi-activity, multi-geo platform dedicated to women leadership and is currently active in North America in simultaneous and decentralized cohorts New York City, Texas, Carolina, and SFO.

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sheInspires

As a future-oriented organization and a corporate citizen, HCLTech aims to be at the forefront of encouraging diversity.

With a message to create role models for the next generation of STEM leaders, #SheInspires captures the life stories of women who’ve blazed a trail in the STEM fields. We’re hopeful, with these stories, we will help inspire the next generation of women leaders in STEM.

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IWD

For more than four decades, HCLTech has been at the forefront of employing and empowering women. We partnered with the International Women’s Day organization for the fourth consecutive year in 2022. IWD plays a critical role in pointing out the significant gaps that still exist today. This helps organizations, like ours, create and sustain a gender-equal world.

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