Business
consultancy Accenture has been awarded a prestigious international award for
helping women to advance in the workplace.
Catalyst,
an organisation promoting women in business, said the global nature of
Accenture’s programme was a key factor in the company winning the 2003 Catalyst
Award.
The
programme, ‘Great Place to Work for Women’, started in the US in 1994, but has
been customised to fit each country’s social and legal requirements.
Gill
Rider, Accenture’s chief leadership officer, said that in the UK, Accenture is
using flexible working and increasing awareness of training programmes to
encourage women to come back into the workforce.
She
said equality is being monitored at recruitment level, by watching attrition by
gender, and by looking at the percentage of women in senior positions.
"We
are trying to improve the lifecycle of women working for us," she said.
"This
means recruiting, developing and retaining women so they reach their full
potential.
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"I
think we have come a long way, but we want equality in everything, and for all
talent to be treated equally."
Globally,
the number of women senior executives at Accenture has almost doubled since
1994, and now sits at 10 per cent.
