If your family is anything like mine, it’s quite possible that your children have reached the age where they have either entered the workforce or are readying themselves for this important rite of passage. You may also have reflected on the potential challenges your children could face as they start their careers.
Above everything, I want this for my kids: Regardless of who they are, what gender they are and what their heritage is, they should be treated fairly and have an equal opportunity to succeed, contribute and make a difference. For now, this remains an ideal, not yet a milestone achieved. Eliminating disparities in compensation that have historically left women more financially vulnerable than men remains a work in progress.
At Swiss Re, I work with our more than 15,000 employees globally to ensure all of our employees can thrive and grow in every one of our workplaces. We remain steadfast in our commitment to ensuring equal pay for equal work, everywhere in the organisation. This means a non-discriminatory approach to determining compensation and benefits, at every level and regardless of employees’ gender, race, age, ethnicity, and sexual orientation.
This priority is why Swiss Re is taking a “first mover” approach in our industry this year by adopting what we are calling our 2025 global pay transparency minimum standard, with the aim of helping ensure that all of our employees understand Swiss Re’s compensation philosophy and framework how their compensation is set in their respective market, and how it develops in line with their career path.
Change – but not fast enough
A quarter of the way through the 21st century, the world has changed from when I entered the workforce. But it hasn’t changed fast enough. In fact, in the European Union, an analysis from 2022 showed an average 13% pay gap between men and women. This disparity leaves women more vulnerable to financial hardship and poverty and facing bigger challenges in funding their retirements. This challenge in closing the pay gap persists in other geographies, too.
The urgent need to address such disparities led to the EU’s Pay Transparency Directive, which is due to be enforced by June 2026. By then, employers in the EU must inform job seekers about their starting salary or a position’s pay range. For employees, they’ll be able to ask their employers for information like average pay levels, broken down by gender.
At Swiss Re, we support the EU’s directive and are working toward fully complying with it.
As a reinsurer, we operate in a global marketplace where our broad geographic diversification enables us to help our clients with protection against peak risks. Our diverse workforce is a key strength of our company, too. So we asked ourselves: Shouldn’t Swiss Re’s own pay transparency initiative go beyond the EU and instead become a global programme that encompasses all the locations where our employees reside, while complying with local regulations and contexts?
The answer was a clear yes. I’m pleased with how our project is advancing.
Just the start
We have started sharing salary information for US job seekers in specific states as recent regulations were introduced.
This year, we have also introduced some of the key elements that form the EU’s directive in our nine European locations. We are communicating compensation ranges to our internal employees in Germany, France, Denmark, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Slovakia and Spain and have started to post base salary ranges on job advertisements for those locations.
For us at Swiss Re, increased pay transparency means providing more information to candidates about what they can expect to earn, and why. Internally, we have developed tools to provide our employees with details about their salaries and the pay range relative to their role. For our non-EU Swiss Re locations including Switzerland, these changes will begin taking effect over the course of 2025.
By being transparent about salaries, we aim to have a significant impact on workplace equality. By transparently and proactively addressing this with our employees, we also believe this will result in higher engagement and employee satisfaction. It can provide an objective guidepost for us to measure ourselves by in our drive toward equal pay for equal work, or work of equal value. This is something worth fighting for and is a basic human right.
We are also convinced of this initiative’s business case: Companies that show fairness and which value equality can distinguish themselves in the marketplace for talent, attracting top candidates for in-demand positions while cultivating a positive corporate culture. This isn’t just a “nice to have”. We think success on pay transparency can ultimately translate to commercial success.
Tough questions, fair answers
Of course, compensation is a complex field. We don’t expect Swiss Re’s pay transparency initiative to answer every question that employees have about their compensation. This is a journey Swiss Re has been on since 2017, when we completed our first pay equity audit. We regularly monitor pay equity across Swiss Re through statistical analyses and external audits, in line with local regulations. We review individual salaries against Swiss Re’s compensation ranges relevant in the local market.
Many factors help companies determine compensation, including the scope of the role; on-the-job responsibilities; and individual employee profiles that include unique skills and experiences. All these factors can impact pay. Compensation also isn’t a single number, it’s a range. So my Human Resources team will be here, to answer the tough questions that will undoubtedly come up.
Swiss Re has already received plaudits for its efforts to fairly compensate employees. We are now Fair Pay Workplace Certified. I’m confident that continued, focused progress on this front, including going beyond the EU’s directive to establish transparency across Swiss Re’s global footprint, will help ensure we remain an employer of choice for those seeking a career home where their work can really make a difference.
Keeping pay secret perpetuates inequality and the gender and racial wage gaps we as a society so urgently need to close. By contrast, pay transparency creates opportunities, not just for the employees who benefit from this openness but also for the companies committed to creating a work environment where every single person is treated fairly and compensated appropriately for their valuable contributions to their employer’s success.
I couldn’t wish for anything more for my own children as they begin their careers.
