At Havas, we have an overarching commitment to the advancement of women and their careers. Quite simply, we want women to be able to grow their careers at Havas.
It is with this meaningful intention that we have a variety of global initiatives that hone-in on women’s leadership skills, champion gender equality, and promote women to leadership and decision-maker positions in all aspects of our business. As a result of our efforts, we have seen an increase in women in all levels of leadership. Our work is not done as we proudly continue to bring forward new initiatives that support the women of Havas.
Propelling our Femmes Forward
In 2017, we looked at our global data and found that women in senior manager and director-level roles were not advancing to the next level at the same pace as their male counterparts. After extensively researching women’s advancement programmes, we leveraged best practices from a variety of approaches and developed our own programme Femmes Forward, which launched in 2018. Femmes Forward if focused on accelerating the progression of women’s careers at Havas through a mix of skills-based training, leadership assessments, inspiring talks with female leaders, group coaching, networking with senior leaders, mindfulness and more. Following the programme, participants have advancement plans to help guide their progression into their next roles.
Femmes Forward has run seven classes, nominating 150 women from 23 countries and 57 different agencies to participate in the development programme. As a result of Femmes Forward, we have seen a 27% overall promotion rate amongst all participants, a 50% promotion rate one year after completing the programme. The retention rate amongst all participants is near 90%.
Despite the circumstances of the pandemic this past year, Havas has not let our commitment to women waver. We launched Femmes Forward on Air, a fully virtual adaptation of the Femmes Forward programme which is currently in progress and will reach every region over the coming months.
Women Who Inspire
Havas Group India also launched Women Who Inspire, an initiative fostering gender diversity and female leadership through a core group of leaders to influence, inspire, and mentor the next rung of leadership.
Women Who Inspire meet to discuss key issues, opportunities, and the great work that women leaders do across the group. The group’s objective is to bring about a cultural transformation and mindset shift that will help the company to build a diverse and strong workforce that is futuristic and encourages many more women leaders in the group.
Women Who Inspire will allow the women of Havas Group India to have meaningful exposure to mentorship and networking, plus the exchange of ideas and experiences, that will lead to growth and projection into leadership opportunities. This initiative is intended to create an inclusive environment where women feel they can fulfill their career aspirations, while also opening the eyes of all employees – both men and women – to the unconscious biases that play a role in gender disparities in the workplace.