Vodafone

Industry: Telecommunications
Areas of excellence: Diversity & inclusion, learning & development

At Vodafone, diversity and inclusion is a top-down commitment driven by the CEO, with the help of campaigns such as HeForShe. Commitment to these movements trickles down to the internal initiatives the team has come up with, such as the recently launched ‘Gender Smart’ program. This aims to help all the leaders gain ‘gender intelligence’ and understand the varying perspectives that come from people of different genders and how this characterises effective leadership. There is also an accompanying Gender Smart training program for women, to help them learn the ‘Lean In’ concept and grow their own careers and others’ by tapping into their full potential and becoming a catalyst of change.

Last year, the team also launched a web-based unconscious bias training program for all employees.

All these training programs point to another need that the team also considers top priority: the requirement for continuous learning that’s vital to a business in the digital field, which is constantly facing disruption.

In line with that, the team created ‘Vodafone University’, a digital learning centre developed with the support of leading academic institutions, such as the London Business School, Harvard University and Imperial College, and accredited by external providers. Specialist and professional courses on sales and marketing, leadership, technology and customer service are available to all employees at any time, on any device. The platform also highlights the mobile nature of the business, and the focus on digital learning is very much in line with the company’s new ‘Big Idea’ following its rebranding – to ready everyone for an exciting future.