Sodexo achieves Government’s Disability Confident Leader Status

Sodexo has achieved Leader status in the UK Government's Disability Confident scheme.

The accreditation is an external validation of Sodexo’s commitment to promote the recruitment, engagement and development of people with disabilities, a key commitment outlined in our Public Service Pledge.

A key element of the accreditation is to show leadership, to challenge and to share best practice.  In order to do this, Sodexo has continued to partner with external organisations, such as Ways into Work, and clients to support people with disabilities to develop employability skills and secure employment.

Achieving Leader status validates work undertaken across the business and by the Sodexo UK & Ireland Disability taskforce, made up of Diversity & Inclusion, HR and Communications colleagues who have been working to ensure thinking about disability becomes further integrated into policies, practices and behaviours.  Over the past 18 months, the taskforce has driven activities, such as:

• Launch of a companywide reasonable adjustment/accommodation policy and process, following an employee consultation which outlines how employees can make requests, and where line managers can get support.
• Ensuring employees are asked if they would like to request adjustments during recruitment, learning and development, and when registering for company events.
• Adding accessibility information to the recruitment website so people can understand how to amend the font size and background, as well the launch of a dedicated email address for anyone experiencing accessibility issues when making an online application.
• A comprehensive awareness-raising campaign for the UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities (3 December), which included personal stories from employees, and webinars on invisible disabilities and mental health  Increased visibility of our client partnerships and of employee personal experiences of disability via our D&I blog and podcasts

In 2015, Sodexo globally committed to providing 100% of its workforce with access to programmes for people with disabilities by 2025.  The company has also signed up to the Global Business and Disability Network, part of the International Labour Organisation.

Megan Horsburgh, head of diversity and inclusion, Sodexo, said; “Achieving Disability Leader status is an external validation of our ongoing commitment to promoting the recruitment, engagement and development of people with disabilities.”