Holiday Inn 2012 Annual Report Download - page 35

Our talented People 33
OVERVIEW BUSINESS REVIEW GOVERNANCE
GROUP FINANCIAL
STATEMENTS
PARENT COMPANY FINANCIAL STATEMENTS OTHER INFORMATION
Celebrating diversity
Being a global organisation operating in nearly 100 countries and
territories around the world, we recognise the importance and
benefit of ensuring our workforce fully represents the communities
in which we operate and the guests who stay in our hotels. We value
our employees as unique individuals, with the different ideas,
perspectives and energy they bring. We have created an inclusive
culture where people are encouraged to be themselves. This is seen
in our Room to be yourself employer brand and drives higher levels
of employee engagement and, as a result, improves business
performance.
Currently, 35 per cent of our middle to senior leadership population at
our corporate offices are female and we continue to explore ways to
increase the diversity of our management team. In 2012, we launched
a review of diversity and inclusion that will ensure we have the right
combination of policy and practices to further improve our
recruitment, retention, development and career progression of
minority groups, including a focus on increasing the representation
of women at all levels of our business. The Group is also committed
to providing equality of opportunity to all employees without
discrimination and continues to be supportive of the employment
of disabled persons.
Our Board’s commitment to supporting diversity is set out on
pages 50 and 58. Currently our Board comprises three women
(27 per cent).
Ensuring health and safety
Providing and supporting a safe and secure environment for our
guests, employees and visitors is paramount, and IHG applies high
standards of health and safety across the Group. Our Global Risk
Management team evaluates policies and procedures, operating a
range of health and safety and security measures and we require
everyone to comply with relevant health and safety legislation.
The Group ensures that we protect the health of our employees
through suitable work-based strategies; minimising the risk of injury
from work activity; ensuring that sufficient resources, information
and systems are in place to address health and safety; and involving
employees in continuous improvement, reporting and the review of
health and safety matters.
Further information on our approach towards health and safety and
security can be found on pages 38 to 44 and on our online Corporate
Responsibility Report viewable at www.ihgplc.com/responsibility
Being the first hotel company to be trusted to help run the
Athletes’ Village was a groundbreaking opportunity for IHG. It
gave us the chance to show thousands of athletes and a team of
8,000 volunteers, employees, contractors and secondees what
world-class service is all about. The London 2012 Olympic and
Paralympic Games were great for our colleagues too. Our
Olympic secondees learnt many new skills to take back to their
hotels and offices, and the first intake of talent from the IHG
Academy at Newham were able to benefit from local work
experience and hospitality training. The Olympics has enabled us
to inspire our next generation of talent to achieve great things.
Before the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games began,
we were embracing the Olympic spirit across the whole business.
Not everybody got to carry the torch or work in the Athletes’ Village,
but we tried to provide opportunities for all our People to have the
chance to feel part of the experience.
Examples of our People being part of the Olympic and Paralympic
experience include:
• we organised a charity fundraising campaign, ‘Race Around
the World,’ which got more than 60,000 colleagues running,
swimming and cycling and helped raise $300,000 for the IHG
Shelter in a Storm Programme;
• we gave more than 1,400 people the chance to take part in an
Olympics Masterclass, run by some of the world’s top athletes, from
cycling with Victoria Pendleton to swimming with Ellie Simmonds;
• we received more than 550 entries in our Design a Keycard
competition for our hotels at the Athletes’ Village;
• 72 IHG employees were given the opportunity to become Olympic
Torchbearers. They were nominated by colleagues for showing
remarkable feats in the environment and community or for having
an extraordinary personal story;
• on 24 July 2012 the Olympic Torch Relay reached our UK Denham
corporate office and 800 colleagues, friends and family were able
to see the torch first-hand and cheer four IHG colleagues as they
became official Olympic Torchbearers; and
• we were proud that 47 of our hotels across the country were given
the important task of looking after the Olympic Torch Relay crew
– helping to make the Relay such a success.
External recognition
We are incredibly proud of the external recognition we receive
across the globe as an employer of choice. In 2012 we:
• featured in The Sunday Times 25 Best Big Companies to
Work For;
• received recognition for our employer brand at the Personnel
Today Awards 2012 winning the Award for Employer Branding;
• were named in the top 10 of the World’s Learning Elite –
recognising the effectiveness of our use of formal training
together with coaching and on-the-job learning;
• were recognised as one of India’s Best Companies to Work For
in 2012;
• were recognised as being one of the 100 Best Human Resource
Management Companies in China; and
• were listed in The Job Crowd’s The Top Companies For
Graduates To Work For in 2012/13.
London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games: Giving our People a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity