Relentlessly promoting a culture of inclusion

Health checking our remuneration in terms of gender equity is a commitment we began several years ago. Every two years we perform a granular gender pay gap analysis using Logib, the Minister of Equality between Men and Women's standard analysis tool, enabling employers to conduct their own equal-pay analysis.

This year, the analysis indicates that the gender pay gap, i.e. differences in salaries not explained by objective factors such as grade, seniority, etc., has increased from -0.3% to -1% to the detriment of women. It is not a massive trend but still a sign that invites us to the utmost vigilance.

We correlate this slight shift to the application of a more flexible reward policy where salary and performance ratings are now connected. It then remains crucial to ensure that the assessment of performance is free from bias to avoid the tendency to attribute proportionally higher performance ratings to a specific gender over the other.  

To put these results in perspective, the 2021 edition Eurostat report shows that in 2020, women’s gross hourly earnings were on average -13% below those of men in the EU. The smallest gender pay gap was measured in Luxembourg (-0.7%).

These results show us that we need to keep on challenging our internal processes and ensure, in particular with the shift to a more flexible salary grid, that we manage with an acute gender lens our pipeline of talents. Our approach through data will help us tackle these challenges while unrolling our strategy for the coming years, when we expect to see a positive impact in the figures. The goal is to unleash the potential of both men and women to the top and walk to a more equitable future.

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We continue to enthusiastically support our internal and greater community with various events throughout the year.

• International Men’s Day: we celebrated International Men’s Day for the third time with a virtual panel. The topic of this year was ‘Better relations between men and women’ and the conference was streamed to 200 people. The idea behind this celebration is to improve gender relations and promote gender equality, so this day is truly about supporting both genders.
• International Women's Day: this year's edition welcomed many events within our doors. First we recognised the efforts of our support group ‘Women and Men Committee at PwC’ through an informative session where they presented their achievements and their programme for progressing in terms of equality in our firm. We also joined our EMEA network activities during the whole week with a series of actions and conferences about gender bias, allyship, empowerment and gender equality for a sustainable future. We had the opportunity of hosting a creator’s market (with 100% women creators) in our atrium proposed by Women in Business A.s.b.l.
  Finally, we ran our panel conversation for the fifth consecutive year, together with AMCHAM Luxembourg and the Luxembourg American Chamber of Commerce in New York, on the global topic, #BreakTheBias. Prominent leaders from different sectors took the stage to discuss what they are doing in this area and what their priorities and challenges are.

• Diversity Day: this particular event aims at celebrating the diversity of our firm’s people and invites us to experience another great angle of our diversity: nationalities and ethnic origins through culinary art. An incredible cake contest displayed the skills of 16 pastry chefs who offered delicious treats to more than 200 testers who happily left their desks to enjoy a delicious moment on 12 May 2022. They elected three happy winners who took some prizes home.

• Pride EMEA Month 2022: was celebrated for the third consecutive year, and the whole month of June was dedicated to raising awareness of the LGBT+ community’s challenges and how we can make a more inclusive workplace. The speeches and sessions were grouped into everyday actions that can have positive impacts: how we think, how we speak and how we act. As a national action, PwC Luxembourg was a sponsor for the first time of the Luxembourg Pride Parade 2022 on the 9 July and participated in the pride march with a group of employees.

Another action in terms of awareness, we launched two new states of the art I&D training:

• Inclusive Mindset Badge: A PwC global network initiative that our firm helped create and develop. We want our People to acquire new competencies and soft skills that can help lead to a more inclusive workplace. This certification programme covers topics such as biases, microaggressions, allyship and more.

• Shining through our diversity: A LGBT+ dedicated training where our People can discover the world of LGBTQAI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual and agender), learn the meaning of each of these letters and open the door to the world of inclusiveness. This training explains why it is important to talk about this topic at the workplace, why we need allies and how to become one.

I&D has taken its place in our People’s minds as an expectation of a healthy and reliable workplace. We continue piloting our actions and monitoring our progress by reporting objectively where we stand with timely measurements and relevant data. In FY22, we witnessed how the I&D path joined energies across the firm and how the tone from the top nurtured our People at all levels. We are thankful to our People for embracing their role in I&D and recognising that it matters for all of us.