Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Speaker A: Hello and welcome to our next episode of the Work Healthy podcast, which is actually been listened to all over the globe. And thank you so much for that. Joining us on our mission to make work healthy today, we're joined by Debbie Bullock, who's head of well being at Aviva. To her colleagues, they simply call her the conscience of the business. And definitely she has a real passion for workforce health. We talk about reframing mental health as mental fitness, the power of advocates, the importance of lived experience, and why she makes sure to leave loudly most days. But first, I asked her how she's made workforce health a strategic priority at Aviva.
[00:00:52] Speaker B: So one of the core things to do is understand that actually if you want your people to perform well, they need to be well. And it's really crucial if you want to transfer performance, that they're at their best to support your customers or to do the certain role they've been allocated. So it needs to be a business strategic priority, especially in a service industry like the industry Aviva are in, because actually the interaction our customers have is with our people. You don't get to take home a thing. Often when you buy insurance, you get a piece of paper or an email now, and as a result, you don't have that kind of purchase. So being a service industry, our people are crucial to that and they will perform at their best and serve our customers at their best if they themselves are well, if they work in an environment that is supportive, where they've got a supportive leader, where they've got a role with purpose and clear accountabilities, all of that underpins that performance. And obviously not least, if you can keep them well, they're less likely to be absent. So you'll have reduced absenteeism and reduced presenteeism where they're at work, but not performing at their best because they're under the weather. So that kind of strategic approach to wellbeing comes from the fact that your people are an important asset to your business.
And them being unwell or leaving because you don't care for their well being can create that kind of strategic challenge around attracting and retaining talent.
[00:02:27] Speaker A: And I see, I don't know whether you call yourself this or whether or not somebody else does, but the conscience of the business when it comes to health and well being.
[00:02:37] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So it was, it was coined in a conversation rather than anyone particularly calling it out, but it's kind of like reminding sometimes the business when, when you can be particularly focused on outcomes for customers, for shareholders, just reminding senior stakeholders and leaders to think about the, the decisions that you might take and what impact that might have on colleague wellbeing doesn't necessarily mean you'll change that decision, but you just need to factor in that thought process around what impact might it have on colleagues wellbeing and whether that'll be a negative impact, a positive impact, and you know, just factoring it in, but with a commercial lens.
Yeah, so that's the conscious rule. If you like sitting on the shoulder of someone going, have you thought about.
[00:03:31] Speaker A: Okay, so senior leaders are oftentimes people who maybe turn up to support HR by making a pleasant speech or something like that. How did you manage to turn the dial and get them convinced that this was a business imperative and that there's a more holistic view of what health and wellbeing actually is right today?
[00:03:56] Speaker B: Well, I was quite lucky in the fact that a lot of our senior leaders were already switched onto this. But then there's the financial impact of it. So there is research out there that showcases, for example, just from a mental wellbeing perspective, not the broader wellbeing perspective, that for every pound you invest in mental health activity, there's a £5 return on that in terms of reduced abscess, absenteeism, reduce presenteeism. So if you're talking to someone who believes in numbers and wants to look at roi, there is data out there to support it.
So that's one benefit, but just understanding that it's the right thing to do. I was pushing on open doors at Aviva, but that's one of the key deliverables, because if you don't look after the well being of your staff, someone else will. And I also use the phrase, if you don't make time for wellness, you will have to make time for illness.
And if you look at it from a, from a societal point of view, having being at work should be net positive on your overall well being. You know, having a purpose, something to get out of bed for in the morning, being able to earn an income, making connections and collaborations, you know, when, while working with people, all these have a positive impact on your overall well being, especially your mental well being. And you need to make sure that the work that's going on and how you treat those people at work doesn't take that away and make it net negative. So understanding that that impact that that has and the role we play on supporting those people to stay net positive from a wellbeing perspective just needs to be embedded in what we do as a sustainable business.
[00:05:42] Speaker A: And you talk a lot. I Mean, I think you did your own personal dissertation on mental health and I know there's so many areas to go into here, psych safety. And we'll come to the managers and the leaders in the organization in a moment. But that whole, whole space of psychological safety, how do you make sure that Aviva is psychologically safe for people?
[00:06:03] Speaker B: So psychological safety is a bit of a buzzword, but actually what it comes down to is trust and lack of fear. So that kind of lack of fear that if you bring something up, whether that's be a leader, a colleague or somewhere in the business and that can be well being related or work related, that actually you're not going to be penalised as a result.
So if make a mistake at work and you're fearful about, and you don't trust your leaders about what might happen if you share that, you might hide that, compound it and that that could actually make the situation worse. Whereas if you can be open about it, deal with it, sort the problem out and learn from it, that kind of culture of openness and trust will build that. And that applies from a wellbeing perspective. So being able to share how you actually feel or the situation that you've got around something and being able to share that openly without fear that it will your future career or anything like that, that's what creates that culture of psychological safety. And an element of that is also that fear and you know, lack of fear and trust comes from a diversity and inclusion perspective, which is a key part of, of well being in terms of underpinning it. So knowing that you know, however you choose to identify from a gender perspective or what your sexuality is, your, your religion, your culture, any of that kind of characteristics that you might have, you should be able to bring your whole self to work. Because if you can't, your well being is going to be not in a great place because you're constantly having to hide who you are. So having that trust and that lack of fear about sharing those parts of yourself so that you can bring your whole self to work, that underpins the entire well being and culture of an organization.
And I've always said wellbeing is like a three legged stool and if you've got all three legs, it's really sustainable, does its job really well missing one or two legs and it becomes less effective. And those three legs are personal accountability because you do need to take control of your own wellbeing. The second leg is the benefits an organisation can offer because that helps you, when you do take control, helps you achieve the things that you want to achieve. But the third leg of the stool, and one that often doesn't get talked about enough, is the culture of an organization because that will underpin that kind of piece of well being. And without that, you know, the stool's not, not going to be as effective or sustainable.
[00:08:32] Speaker A: How would you describe the culture of Aviva?
[00:08:36] Speaker B: Inclusive? I think we, we have got psychological, safe culture. I don't think we're perfect everywhere. I still think there are elements to go and, and culture often takes a long time to change. You can't do culture change from the top down. You can't say, right, this is the new culture at Aviva, full stop. You can't do that from a top level down. There's an element of a requirement to come from the bottom up as well as the top down, because your culture is what is the actions that people take every day. It's not what we say the culture is. It's the small behaviours and incidents that happen across the business on a day to day, what people experience when they come into the office, when they work from home, when they interact with their colleagues and their leaders.
So it's kind of that espoused values and we get it right a lot of the time we're still not perfect, so we've still got plenty of a way to go, but I think that's always the case.
[00:09:36] Speaker A: And you talk about leaders there again and we touched on it with the mental health discussion just in terms of the importance of the line managers and them being that sort of contact point now more than ever between people and then suddenly having to, you know, be very focused and aware of the mental health of the direct reports. But you're very focused on supporting them because they can be left out in a lot of organizations sometimes. Could you talk into that a bit?
[00:10:09] Speaker B: Yeah. So very much so. As part of my degree apprenticeship that I did, funded by Aviva, actually, but in management and leadership, one of the end reports I did, and I wanted to look at it from a wellbeing perspective, is, you're right, leaders play a crucial role in any organisation in what it actually feels like as an employee and how you're cared for. Your leader is the first person you would turn to usually if you want to raise a concern.
So how they respond impacts your wellbeing. But actually taking on all of that work as a leader can have an impact on your own well being if you're not supported. The good news is it can have a positive as well as a negative impact on your well being, because we know scientifically that if you help other people, whether that be in a line manager role or generally, then you get a positive buzz from that. So that's got a good impact. But equally, if you're not given time to do the people leadership role in your organisation, then you could be dealing with your team's wellbeing challenges and trying to still deliver your full amount of work. So as well as potentially taking on the concerns of the individuals you're supporting, you're maybe working harder and longer hours. So add those two trigger points together and your well being as a leader might then suffer as a result. So it's really important that an organisation provides support and training for leaders in terms of how to signpost so they can share with colleagues where to get the support they need, but also how to set boundaries as an individual, because they need to look after themselves to be able to look after someone else. And that's really important.
And I think there's not enough research on the impact of managing a team, on a team's well being, on the leader themselves. So that's why I did a very small study as part of my management report for my degree. But yeah, would love to see that expanded.
[00:12:11] Speaker A: And do you think it's harder for people in that role now than it was maybe, you know, three years ago? The expectations have grown. Have they?
[00:12:20] Speaker B: I think it's talked about more openly now and that can make it harder, but can also make it easier. So in some respects it's raised the expectations of what's required in that role, but at least we're having conversations about it. And it's not just being brushed under the carpet and forgotten.
One of the challenges leaders face now in that role is managing hybrid workforces quite often. So if you were in the office full time previously, for example, and you were face to face with your colleagues, it's sometimes easier to be able to understand how their well being is right now because they might be quieter than normal or, you know, you can physically see the impact.
And that's not always the case when you're working virtually or if you're remote, not just from a work from home perspective, but, you know, with the increasing technology advancements, you know, you might not be based in the same office location as your team, for example, so that kind of remote hybrid working can mean it harder for a leader to look at what's responsible, you know, what is the well being of their team, which is why you need to equip them particularly well.
[00:13:30] Speaker A: And in terms of isolation.
Obviously a lot of complaints about loneliness from people working remotely. How have Aviva tried to overcome that?
[00:13:40] Speaker B: So we've got a couple of tools actually. So we have an internal social, we use Yammer, which is a Microsoft SharePoint tool, and as well as business groups on there to talk about things. We have social groups on there, you know, whether that be book clubs or gardening groups. I think there's a show as your pets group, you know, kind of thing. And that helps people connect who are like minded. We also have an Ms. Team site for colleagues who are menopausal, for example, or other other themes and topics like that. And we also have something called Aviva Connections. So we heard from some colleagues that they can sometimes even come into the office, let alone work from home and not really speak to anyone on a social basis all day, every day. And we wanted to provide ways that we could help people with that. So we've got an online tool to support that, to just have a chat with someone about what was on the telly last night or, you know, if they want to have a chat about the weather or sport or whatever. And we've also introduced of our offices, happy to chat benches in our communal areas. So if you sit there, bit like the buddy bench in a school playground kind of thing. But it's, you know, we still have that inner child in us, you know, that you don't want to randomly approach a stranger. But if someone sat on a happy to chat bench and you know, you're feeling a bit isolated that day, then you can go and chat about, you know, whatever the latest thing is, hobbies, football, sport, whatever. So those are some of the ways we're addressing that kind of isolation perspective from Aviva's point of view.
[00:15:14] Speaker A: And like the last 24 months obviously has every business, every organization has been turned upside down. What's it been like and how is the workplace a different place now than it was 24 months ago in Aviva?
[00:15:29] Speaker B: Well, we've reimagined our offices to include more collaboration spaces, recognizing that when people come into the office, a lot of the time what they're doing is coming in to collaborate. So we've created, you know, additional spaces around that we've obviously made.
The majority of our workspace is flexible working so that you can just drop in. So you might have focused work areas or you've got team desks where you might want to sit. So we've taken the opportunity to refresh some of our or all of our offices to kind of think about it. Differently and create some more of those spaces where you can come together to collaborate. Because that's often why people are returning, you know, coming into the office as well. So we've done a little bit of that, but actually I don't feel it's that much different. You know, I think there's a lot of people who are pleased to be back in the office, you know, pleased to be. Connecting with people doesn't suit everyone. And it's about those making those individual connections and things that work for you, for the business.
[00:16:33] Speaker A: Is it up to the individuals to decide or have you put rules in place or what way does it work?
[00:16:38] Speaker B: We encourage colleagues. So a lot of our colleagues are looking at coming in sort of three, two or three days a week. But we talk about having an adult to adult conversation with your leader about what is the requirement with your. What's the requirement for your role. So some roles might require you to be in the office more than others, but then also taking into account your personal circumstances and training. So it's about an adult to adult conversation to create something that's right, but with the kind of principle of, you know, we're looking if it's appropriate for the role two to three days a week in our offices.
[00:17:15] Speaker A: Okay, great. It's interesting just because that kind of takes us into that area. When we talk about culture, we talk about like job design. And this has become kind of pretty kind of cool right now. Talked about a lot. Even though for a lot of organizations, job crafting was, you know, part and parcel of what they did a number of years ago. But have you guys done any work in terms of redesigning jobs and roles?
[00:17:40] Speaker B: So we have an organizational design team and a business architecture team that work with our business areas and our people, business partners. So when areas of the business are looking at what their work area should look like and what their structure should look like, they work closely with that. But equally I feed into our organisational design team to say, you know, if you were designing a job from a wellbeing perspective, you know, it would have purpose, clear accountabilities, empowerment and a generally sustainable workload. And they're working to those core underpinning beliefs when they're working with the areas of the business to sort of like say, right when we're designing these structures and these roles, these things should underpin, you know, as well as the technical skills you might want for a role, these things should underpin it.
And those are things that help make work good for you, you know, that make that you know, net positive impact on your overall well being. So I think building that into job roles and job design is really important, rather than just thinking about the roles, responsibilities, and the technical elements of a role, just kind of like build that in that purpose and that generally sustainable workload element.
[00:18:57] Speaker A: So some organizations kind of take a very homogenous view of the workforce, whereas you guys seem to slice and dice it a little bit more and deal with sort of cohorts and even life stages. You've sort of split it up in that way. Talk to us a little bit about that.
[00:19:14] Speaker B: Yeah. So one of the benefits of being a large organization is we have a broad brush of people, so we're a diverse and inclusive organization, and we want to make Aviva as welcoming to all of those groups, regardless of where you're from. So we're multi generational. There are five generations of people working at Aviva, anything from 18 to nearly 70.
But equally, we've got various cultures, cultures, religions, genders. And to support that, we have six Aviva communities. And each of those communities focus on different things, but also focus on the intersectionality between those communities. And they are Balance, which is about gender parity. Pride, which is our LGBTQ group.
Generations, which is about age, making sure everyone at all age is welcome. Aviva Abilities, which is about visible and invisible disabilities. Carers, which might be elder care, child care, or any other caring accountabilities you've got. And the last one is Aviva Origins, which is about culture, social mobility, and religion and making sure we're inclusive. And those employee resource groups really challenge the business to shine a spotlight on how, if things are different for any of those age groups, you know, those groups, what. What kind of changes might be we want to make and how we might focus on that. And we, as a wellbeing team, work really closely with those groups to understand what challenges they might face that are different. So, you know, men's mental health, you know, how might we approach that differently to women's mental health? You know, little things like describing it as mental fitness instead of mental health changes the dynamic quite often. From a. From somebody's viewpoint. You take the menopause, which we. We started to do a lot of work on after speaking to our Aviva generations and our Aviva Balance communities. But we've also been speaking to our Aviva Pride community because it affects those colleagues who are gender fluid or trans, you know, so not using the term women when we talk about menopause, but people who are experiencing it and equally talking about the cultural Differences, you know, some cultures and languages don't even have a word for menopause.
So, you know, just working with those groups to understand how we might chop and change what we offer or how we offer it, it's not. So it's about equity rather than equality. Quite often, yeah.
[00:21:46] Speaker A: There's a lot in that, isn't there? I mean, because one of the stories that. Because I know one of the things you're very driven by is stories in Fever to try and get messages across.
[00:21:57] Speaker B: Lived experience is a brilliant way of sharing stories because our colleagues really resonate with that rather than, you know, someone from the wellbeing team saying, oh, you ought to think about this. That kind of lived experience is really strong in terms of helping you promote what, where you want to be as an organization and what support you can offer either from an intervention or a prevention perspective.
[00:22:17] Speaker A: And having so many people in all those different cohorts. And particularly, let's talk about age in some ways, and I know age can be associated with sort of, you know, people being, you know, stuck in their ways or whatever and quite negative. But obviously it can be a really positive thing too. But as an organization, I mean, one of the stories you told was actually about sort of, you know, somebody saying, oh, can I have a fan on my desk? Is it in the policies and the rules and the like? And this is around a menopausal person, wasn't it?
[00:22:49] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:22:49] Speaker A: So I mean, like, how do you transform an organization and bring people with you to the way the organization is today, culturally? And when you find that some people, that's going to be a big change.
[00:23:01] Speaker B: Yeah. So, and that, that example was quite some time ago. Luckily that, you know, that's not where we're at now. But, but that's why we want to do. Some of. It's about removing sometimes the stigmas and the, the myths, you know, the urban myths around what you can and can't do. And that's where again, the leaders play a really. And making sure you equip them and have them understand about empathy, authenticity and vulnerability so that they can have that adult to adult honest conversation with an individual about what they need. And one of the things we've done to help that conversation for both the individual and the line manager is we've introduced something called a workplace adjustment passport. So what that is, it can be used for any number of things and it's the way to record a conversation, conversation you might want with your manager about any adjustments you might need that might be a fan on Your desk if you're menopausal, or it might be, if you're caring, you know, a change in your working hours to accommodate, you know, picking. Picking up prescriptions for an elder, you know, an elderly relative, or, you know, going with them to certain things, or if you've got a condition yourself, going back to our Aviva abilities, you know, how might you best take in information, you know, if you're neurodiver, diverse, needing time to process an instruction, for example. So writing that into a workplace adjustment passport helps kind of your leader understand what works best for you, how they can accommodate you where possible. It's not always possible, but where possible within business, what we can do as a business. But the good thing about it is it also means if you move to a new manager, you're not faced with having those conversations from scratch again. You take that passport with you, roll to roll. And that really helps then, okay, so.
[00:24:57] Speaker A: This is basically, this is me. Essentially, this is how I work best. These are some of the limitations maybe I have. And rather than having to get to know each other and understand that over a period of time and maybe mistakes happen, this is very much. I hand it to you at the start. And does the manager hand me theirs so that I can kind of have a shortcut to understand them?
[00:25:17] Speaker B: Well, the manager might have. You know, not everyone chooses to have a workplace adjustment passport. It's just. It's an individual preference. But, yeah, if an individual wanted to do that, they could. Yep.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: Okay, great. And you mentioned the menopause. But for many people in the workplace, women's health has become a really big issue. And thankfully some progress has been made on that. What other things around that whole area would you have promoted?
[00:25:44] Speaker B: So I think what's really important is making sure people know what support is available to them. So, you know, we've got equal parental leave for our colleagues. So regardless of gender or. Or whether your baby or new child comes through adoption, surrogacy or childbirth, you've got the opportunity for that kind of equal parental leave, which levels out the playing field in an organisation. So that's six months full pay and then six months unpaid, and that's whether, you know, whoever you are in the relationship and if you both work for a viva, you both get that kind of thing. So that's really important. I think flexible working policies is really important as well to support people. And then you've got things like fertility, time off of fertility treatment. We've got an app that supports colleagues through menopause and that Kind of stuff. But equally we've got health checks available through Aviva Digicare+Workplace which are for anyone. Because while we talk about supporting a particular group, we recognise that everyone's got different needs.
So women's health is one issue. But equally, for example, as I mentioned earlier from a mental fitness and mental health perspective, you know, male suicide is quite high. So how can we make sure those colleagues feel comfortable to talk about that either to someone outside of the organisation? But how do we signpost them to the right tools and support for them individually? There is so much an organisation can offer and it's about finding the right way to support people as best we can.
And a lot of that comes from empathy and understanding in the first point as well as being able to signpost them to help if you can offer it.
[00:27:34] Speaker A: One of the things I see you talk about is advocates in the organisation.
I saw at one stage somebody asked you who advocates for you and couldn't really answer it. And that was, well, nobody. So this is a big part of the organization now. So talk to me about that.
[00:27:52] Speaker B: Yes, I think advocacy is really important part of, especially from a career development perspective. So at the time that conversation was in, in respect of career development and I think quite often if, if you can advocate for people in terms of career development, progression, succession, some might call it mentoring, some would call it a sponsor. You know, there are different ways you can look at that kind of element and I think it's really important that we have that kind of working with people who you, who you find support and understand you, to put you on the stage if you like and help them grow.
Someone once said to me, a flower doesn't compare themselves to the flower next to them. They are both beautiful in their own right. Right. And I think that's true about individuals. We need to think less about competing and more about shining each other and letting you know and helping each other shine. So let's all. And, and that's where the advocate role comes in if, if you like. So it's about helping someone grow in their career by advocating for them in a conversation, making sure they get the credit they deserve for whatever they've done recently. You know, if you've come across that and just championing their work and, and their deliverables. But it can, it can apply from a wellbeing perspective as well. So, and that's, that's either being an advocate or an ally. So if you're seeing behaviors from a diversity inclusion perspective, from a well being perspective that aren't inclusive or don't support well being, are you, are you allied to that community and speaking out or are you just letting it ride and go silent, you know, and then you're not, not play, you're not doing that role justice by not speaking up if it's safe to do so. So there's that element of, you know, quite often I see food, for example, offered as recognition and reward.
Not so much now in Aviva, but certainly outside of it. You know, my partner will often come home and say, oh, did a good job today, got a bottle of wine. And I said, you don't drink wine? And he goes, yeah, but nobody ever offers anything else, you know, kind of thing. So that recognition for him is devalued because is the what goods? Wine. But also, if you were a recovering alcoholic, that, that wouldn't support your well being. If you had an eating disorder and it was always chocolates or, oh, let's go for a team meal out, you know, then you are, you are creating that inclusion, that impact, negative impact on someone's well being by not being thoughtful about the people within your organization and what you're doing and how you ally those kind of. What about these people who, you know, you wouldn't consider it acceptable now to go to somewhere where, you know, a wheelchair user couldn't access if you had one in your team, but you don't think twice about using a meal out as a way. But that excludes someone who's got an eating disorder, perhaps who doesn't feel comfortable eating in front of someone. So we need to think more carefully about how we are inclusive to support well being, and that includes advocate and allyship.
[00:31:11] Speaker A: Okay. So it's a much more thoughtful workplace when you're thinking about where people are coming from and what maybe recognition will look like to them and how to land. Because it's interesting that allyship and kind of putting yourself in other people's positions and speaking out at a moment rather than letting something go fits in really nicely with something. I was reading today about your annual general meeting and that your chairman, I think, called out something on behalf of your CEO, Amanda Blank, or Blanc, is it?
[00:31:49] Speaker B: Yeah, Amanda Blank. So we did have a couple of shareholders make some comments which were deemed inappropriate from Aviva's perspective around, you know, whether a female was in the right role. And our chair did call them out at the end saying all those comments were not welcome and not flabbergast. You know, was flabbergasted at the fact that they've been raised and it's really important to showcase that kind of leadership of calling those inappropriate behaviours. You know, we have values at Aviva and we expect people to act and, and live within those values within the organisation and act on it if that's not visible. So to see it at the highest level of the organisation, you know, and call it out at the annual general meeting is important from a role modelling perspective, because as well as we talked earlier about lived experience being really important, but so is role modelling from a leadership perspective.
So role modelling the right behaviours from a diversity inclusion but also from a wellbeing benefit is really important.
You know, it's great to.
And I try and do it. It's something I call. One of the things I do is called leave loudly.
So if I'm leaving at 3 o'clock to go and do something to support my well being, I will leave loudly. I won't sneak away with trying to like, oh, see, if I sneak out, nobody's noticed, I'm going at three because I'm a little bit embarrassed. I will leave loudly. I will say, I'm off now because I'm going to whatever it might be. Gym, swim. Yeah. Bake a cake, see my kids at school, whatever it might be, that leaving loudly and role modeling that as a leader within Aviva, you know, is something we can encourage. Whether it be saying, I always take an hour for lunch because I walk my dog, or you can't contact me at this time because I'm spending time with my family, whatever that might be, or I spend 20 minutes every day coloring to support my mental health. You know, every role modeling story by a senior leader or a leader within the organisation lands really well. And the more we do it, you know, it has the same impact as that kind of lived experience.
Because rightly or wrongly, sometimes people feel that they can't do that kind of thing. Even though we tell them they can do it, they don't actually do it if they're not seeing that being done by people more senior in the organisation. Because you think, oh, well, you say that but you don't mean it. If I want to progress, I've got to be like you.
So that role modeling is really important.
[00:34:27] Speaker A: And that very question, the sense that, you know, the people who get on in organizations are the people who work late and who kind of have visibility around the office. And how do you break that down and show people it's not the case?
[00:34:41] Speaker B: So I think role modeling is one of the keys from our senior leaders so that you can be Senior and you know, so we, until recently we had two job share at senior level, two male job shares at very senior level in the organization, proving that, you know, everyone said, oh, you can't be a director and job share. Well, actually you can. We've proved it. It works kind of thing to gents who've only recently left Aviva and moved on to other things. But, but that kind of disobeys that and celebrating the success of people who aren't doing long hours. So calling out great projects from part timers, calling out great projects from, you know, work from home. And one of the things we, we have encouraged our leaders to do is for a while, from a diversity inclusion perspective, we've been saying, you know, think you need to find people who don't necessarily think like you, speak like you, look like you.
The, the new one we've added is work like you. So just because you like being in the office, it doesn't necessarily mean you should surround yourself by people who are solely working in the office or, or who work 9 to 5 or who are neurotypical and you're, you know, on your diverse. So if you're those things, whether it be work, sound, think, look. So adding work like you to that mix is what enables us to make sure our colleagues don't always hire and promote and give opportunities to clones of themselves, whether that be, you know, for any kind of characteristic, including their working style and pattern.
[00:36:24] Speaker A: That's really interesting. I mean, and how have you trained them to, number one, recognize that they might be doing it, but number two, to sort of say, you know, well, maybe you should think differently about this.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: So we have a number of trainings. So our learning and development platform within Aviva is called Aviva University. So we've got some mandatory training for people, leaders and also open training to all colleagues. So over 90% of our colleagues have done anti racism training, for example, on there. And also so any line manager who's hiring, whether that be internally or externally, has to go on a training course, a license to hire course, and that includes training and work on inclusive hiring as part of that, including making sure that you make the recruitment process as inclusive as possible. So we talk about, for example, when helping people prepare for an interview, thinking about if someone you're interviewing is neurodiverse, they might need longer to prepare or they might need questions delivering in a different format. If you've got a menopausal person who's mid interview and suddenly has a hot flush, how are you gonna, how are you Gonna deal with that as an interviewer. All those kind of things are built into that, training that help people with that. And we have regular kind of Araviva communities that I mentioned earlier. They do a good job of lots of content, seminars and stuff on our yammer and on our intranet to help people.
[00:37:56] Speaker A: Okay, just two probably questions before we wrap. One would be around data and you know, I don't know if you have a dashboard even around sort of diversity and inclusion and geometrics around that. Do you share that publicly with people? Is there transparency around that?
[00:38:16] Speaker B: So we do, we ask, we ask our colleagues to voluntarily fill in data on our HR system.
And we've encouraged that. And that's grown massively recently in terms of how many people have completed that, even if by completing it they've chosen not to say. But that is one of the options within it. And we do have targets around some elements of our diversity, inclusion work, around gender, around equality, and those are kind of baked into overall programs. But we do look at the data and we can cut listening survey information by different kind of data that we have on our HR management, but only a very limited number of people can access that.
So that can access the core data that sits behind it. So we protect the people's data who've chosen to volunteer it. But yeah, as a people function, we do look at whether that's impacted anything like trends, whether that be leaving, hiring, promoting, you know, whether people are flexible, part time work, full time work, what gender they are and those kind of things. So we do use that information to support our diversity, inclusion work.
[00:39:31] Speaker A: Great. So last question.
People automatically will probably say, you know, it's easy for Aviva or these large companies because they've got big budgets and all this. And you know, whereas if you were tomorrow advising an organization of 20 people, 200 people, 1,000 people, what do you think are the key things that they should be focusing on in terms of trying to make their workforce healthier and their workplace healthier?
[00:40:01] Speaker B: So yeah, I think there are benefits and disadvantages to both actually, because while we are a very large organization which might bring some benefits, actually communicating with 24,000 people is not easy.
And the challenges some of that brings, things of trying to get some consistency or where do you allow individuality in different parts of the business? So if you're a small organization of 50 people, you could almost probably stand in the middle of the office and talk to people all at the same time kind of thing, which you can't do in a larger organization. So it comes with some benefits.
But in terms of the key things, the first things I would look at is that kind of do the roles you offer and I'm going to go to these same four things again. Do they have purpose, clear accountabilities? Are the roles empowered and are the workloads generally sustainable? That costs nothing as an organisation to look at and that really does honestly underpin how someone feels about working for an organisation. The second thing I would do is build trust and be an empathetic leader who is vulnerable and authentic. Again, that costs nothing. But your role as a leader is important and if you invest in their well being and understanding them and what's going on in their broader life, they will invest more in your organization.
So it makes, that's where the good business sense comes from. They'll invest in you if you invest in them and that includes their well being. But you'll be surprised actually potentially how much you already might offer that you don't think of as well being. So you know, if you're a small organization in a, in a local town, you might have a mute, you might have an agreement with a cafe around the corner for a discount. So that's going to help with financial well being. You might have a local leisure centre in, in the town that says oh well as an organization we'll give your staff 10% off.
You know, those kind of little wins which cost you nothing as an organization but add value to the employee proposition and why they might want to work with you and for you.
So those are kind of some of the things. But the four key things are the ones I mentioned at the start and.
[00:42:10] Speaker A: If you can bring it together into some sort of a plan plan which you can share with everybody to sort of say this is the journey we're on and maybe have some data to, to see how people are getting on.
[00:42:19] Speaker B: Yeah, and ask them. Yeah, that's, that's the other thing, you know, adult to adult conversation. You know, obviously you can't, any organization, regardless of size can't do everything that would, that you would want. So you know, speak to your employees and say how, how can we make, you know, the best thing from a wellbeing perspective? You know, it might be something as small as getting a kettle and some coffee and tea in the office, you know that or playing a radio instead of having definitely silence. You could be really surprised how easy, you know, it could be to do it. And they will be the ones to have a conversation and if you've built that trust between them, they're not going to ask for the ridiculous, they're going to ask for the realistic.
[00:43:01] Speaker A: Yeah, that's fantastic. Debbie, listen, I've thoroughly enjoyed the conversation with you today. Oh, sorry, one before I go, because I should have said this. You guys run a program about domestic abuse and it's something I just have written down here, so I'd be really annoyed at myself if I didn't raise it before I go. So could you just very quickly talk into that?
[00:43:22] Speaker B: Yes, certainly. So one of the things we've done around training colleagues and understanding things for our customers is domestic abuse affects more people, I think, than anyone would like to acknowledge and more than we would like. And we need to protect our customers, especially from potentially financial domestic abuse and that kind of coercion.
So we provide training on Aviva University around domestic abuse and how to recognise it and how to get support. And we provide options for colleagues who may be on the receiving end of domestic abuse to speak to an appropriate person. Now, we know our colleagues, but we're not necessarily subject matter expertise on this. So we worked with a domestic abuse charity called Safe Lives and they helped us create the content for this. They've done some training with our customer champions and with key personnel in our people function to understand, if someone came to us raising those concerns, how we are best equipped to support them.
[00:44:30] Speaker A: Some really interesting insights from Debbie Bullock and Aviva. I know a lot of people will be inspired to implement a lot of those across their own organizations. I know I'm gonna leave loudly from now on, and loudly and proudly next up with our Work Healthy podcast series. We talk Burnout with Professor Wilmar Scheffeli from Utrecht University. Do please join us for that.
