Fostering Flexibility, Inclusion & Diversity

Our Equal Employment Opportunity and Diversity Policy fosters inclusion by providing an environment where everyone can be themselves and feel valued, involved and respected for their perspectives and contribution.

Flexibility is an important part of Suncorp’s culture and even before COVID-19 more than 80 per cent of our workforce took advantage of flexible working practices on a regular basis. As a result, Suncorp has a more engaged workforce, reduced absenteeism and workplace stress, and a greater ability to respond to the changing environment.

Suncorp is enhancing the cultural diversity and capability of our people to better serve customers and the broader community. Suncorp continues to build the cultural capability of our people and create employment pathways for Indigenous Australians, refugees and migrants, through partnerships with Clontarf Foundation and Multicultural Development Australia. 

Through Suncorp’s partnership with Multicultural Australia, more than 56 employees participated cultural awareness training, cultural immersion, career mentoring and volunteering opportunities which all help our people to better serve our diverse customers and work within diverse teams. We also supported employment pathways for Multicultural Australia’s clients through job readiness and career mentoring sessions delivered to more than 400 people this year.

In 2019-20, Suncorp’s partnership with Multicultural Australia received the Minister’s Choice Award for Outstanding Engagement at the Multicultural Queensland Awards for its
contributions to promoting diversity and inclusion. 

Suncorp supports our people aged 50 years and over through the Envisage program, which helps them make positive choices about planning the next phase of their lives and careers. Participants are encouraged to take a holistic view in planning for the future by focusing on career, identity, wellbeing, finances and relationships.

Suncorp continues to take great pride in being an industry leader for workplace gender equality, with a focus not just on leadership roles but all levels across our organisation. In 2019–20, Suncorp was recognised as an Employer of Choice for Gender Equality by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency for the seventh consecutive year.

We educate our leaders to ensure gender bias is removed from recruitment and people practices, including performance reviews, promotions and access to policies such as parental leave or flexible working arrangements.

Suncorp also provides learning and coaching for women to develop and strengthen their career resilience skills through the Accelerate Women in Leadership program. This helps Suncorp grow our pipeline of female leadership talent.

Following ongoing role pay equity and gender pay equity gap analysis conducted across the organisation, in 2019-20 Suncorp introduced a target to reduce the gender pay gap by five percentage points over five years. Suncorp actively reviews role pay equity throughout the year and actions any issues identified through our remuneration review process

Suncorp’s Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) are networks created by our people, for our people. They foster a diverse and inclusive workplace and bring employees together around a common purpose, interest or background. In 2019-20 Suncorp formed two new ERGs:

• enAble was formed to support people with disability and accessibility requirements. It empowers members to achieve their best, showcase their abilities, helping to improve the experience for people with disabilities at Suncorp.
• ARISE was formed to advocate for ethnic diversity within Suncorp and to ensure our teams at all levels reflect the communities in which we operate.

Our other ERGs include:

• Amplify, an LGBTIQ+ and allies network supporting LGBTIQ+ inclusion.
• Women Connect, a women’s network supporting gender equality and female leadership.
• Evolve and NZ Millennials, communities for millennials to share ideas and engage with other young professionals.
• Life X, a dedicated resource group for our mature-age workers.
• Servus, for employees who have served in the defence force or emergency service organisations, or are a family member of someone serving.