Gender equality goals and progress

By 30 June 2021 Handelsbanken aims to have 30% female leaders and 40% female leaders by 2026.

We're conscious we've not hit our target for 2021, but we remain committed to taking a long-term approach and we'll strive to embed sustainable change and progress as we look towards 2026.

• Increase of 10% (2016: 18%, 2022: 28%) of women in leadership positions since 30 June 2016
• 47% of new recruits were women in 12 months to 30 June 2022
• 50% increase in our female leaders since 2016

• Women Returners programme - we’ll partner with an external company called Women Returners, utilising their extensive experience in attracting a cohort of women returners to the job market.
• Mentoring framework – launched in June 2022, there have been 100 volunteers (25% of which were female) across the UK, who came forward to invest their time in developing others and supporting career progression. The framework encourages employees to take ownership and responsibility of their own development and consists of a mentor library, guides and toolkits to support a variety of mentoring relationships across the Bank.
• Our new management and leadership development offering was launched this year providing inclusive, accessible learning to all colleagues, irrespective of their role, across key areas of a management and leadership journey. Starting with ‘Developing a Management Mindset’ through to ‘Leading with Impact’, this new approach empowers our people to take responsibility and accountability for how they develop their skills and shape their career.
• The Diversity and Inclusion Working Group have been instrumental this year in driving initiative and action as part of our wider Diversity and Inclusion strategy to raise awareness levels across the UK. This has been achieved through a Diversity and Inclusion Focus Calendar which drove monthly awareness, resources, education and engagement.
• Creation of two employee resource groups (ERGs) – following the launch of our ERG Framework, two were created for ‘Gender’ and ‘LGBTQ+ and Allies’.  We envisage that these groups of collective employee voices will be instrumental in driving action within our Diversity and Inclusion strategy for 2023 and beyond.
• The appointment of a Diversity and Inclusion lead role this year demonstrates the ongoing commitment by the Bank to increase capacity and capability within this integral area.