Our people are what makes Glassons and Hallenstein Brothers the iconic brands they are today. Whether it be our frontline staff in our stores, our dedicated staff at our DC's or the office staff in the engine room, all play a crucial role in our success.
We recognise this; our people are entitled to feel valued, respected and appreciated. We also want to make sure they feel safe and happy whilst at work
An empowered workforce makes for a happy crew - and we are committed to supporting that empowerment by promoting our values of respect, dignity, non-discrimination and providing safe workplaces. We review performance and job satisfaction six monthly, setting goals and KPIs with staff to ensure they continue to grow in their roles.
We're very serious about providing our staff with a safe place to work. Our health and safety policies and programmes go beyond compliance to ensure this. We care about our employees - feeling safe in their workplace is a given for us.
Healthy, valued staff are more likely to be productive and have more to contribute. Simple really. HGH cares for staff in a number of ways; one of those is our membership of the Employee Assistance Programme, EAPworks.
EAPworks can provide assistance and counselling to employees in need in a number of ways. The programme can help employees with stress or relationship issues, as well as providing mentoring, career planning, life transition skills and more.
We actively promote health and safety throughout the business. Our Health and Safety Committee (which includes HGH Board members) monitors HGH health and safety and regularly reports directly to the Board with recommendations for improvements. We also have a workers committee who provide very valuable 'shop floor' health and safety input on specific issues.
Supporting our staff early in their careers is critical to ensuring a dynamic workplace and this is something we focus on doing really well. Healthy, happy, empowered staff can achieve great things!
Once a staff member is part of the HGH family, we provide ongoing professional development support through numerous training opportunities.
The need for agility around day-to-day operations, to work remotely and to adjust to a new normal were learnings that came out of the COVID-19 experience, has helped us innovate, and led to us focusing on improving communication and education of customers and staff, mainly through digital channels.
We've focused on:
We're an Equal Employment Opportunity employer with policies that ensure we employ a diverse and inclusive workforce. Everyone who joins our team is supported with a comprehensive induction programme and a career development plan that we develop together.
As a business, we encourage diversity and inclusion not only within HGH, but also in our interactions with customers and suppliers. We have introduced a programme that educates our employees on unconscious bias with a view to encouraging more mindful interactions and more inclusive decisions.
HGH is a strong advocate for women excelling in the workplace, and we provide many opportunities and pathways for our female workers to further their careers in management within the fashion industry.
It's well-documented and commonly accepted that embracing and supporting diversity in the workplace results in increased productivity. An inclusive culture boosts morale and encourages creativity and self-expression. We recognize and encourage that dynamic, because it's great for everyone, our staff, our customers, and our business.
For HGH, an ethical factory is one which focuses on worker welfare, has a safe working environment, upholds international labour rights, and respects the environment.
We don't own or manage factories ourselves - we outsource our manufacturing to selected partners - ones that we know meet our high ethical and quality standards. Because we build close relationships with our suppliers we can, and do, demand high standards and transparency from them.
Our manufacturing partners are located in four countries:
China, India, Bangladesh and Vietnam.
Our supplier code of conduct is created for the purpose of ensuring that HGH suppliers put into place safe working conditions and their employees are treated with respect. Our Code of Conduct encompasses the core labour standards of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). These include:
Workers' welfare and safety is a cornerstone of our ethical factory programme and auditing gives us the visibility into a typical day within a factory. Our external audit partner, Qualspec SgT, conducts factory audits on our behalf to assess our suppliers' compliance with our Code of Conduct.
As a company we pay 'Fair Wage' and support 'Living Wage' by working with our suppliers to meet Living Wage benchmarks.
A Living Wage should be earned in a standard work week (no more than 48 hours as a maximum) by a worker and be sufficient to afford a decent standard of living for the worker and their family.
Elements of a decent standard of living include food, housing, and other essential needs such as clothing, education, healthcare, transport and including provision for unexpected events.
A Living Wage should allow individuals to work and help themselves and their families escape poverty.
We report our wage gap analysis annually in our sustainability report.
