Boots has a proud history of championing women and today we continue to drive inclusion, champion diversity and promote opportunity for everyone.
This past year, we continued to introduce new initiatives to support women in their day to day experience of working at Boots and in their aspirations to develop and progress. We have introduced DEI workshops and menopause training, implemented new recruitment software and surveyed team members on flexible working. We have also introduced support for team members experiencing menopausal symptoms by covering the prescription costs for those able and wanting to take Hormone Replacement Treatment (HRT), and launched a new partnership with Busy Bees Nurseries to offer discounted childcare to our teams.
As we look ahead to our ambitions for the coming year, our Business Resource Groups will continue to focus on how we better understand the impact of the menopause and remove barriers to accessing support. We will roll out a reciprocal mentoring scheme to help senior leaders understand more about the lived experiences of our team members, promote specific DEI e-learning and work with our new Business Resource Group for working parents and caregivers.
We are proud that we continue to close our gender pay gap and excited by our future plans to keep moving forwards and create an environment in which all team members can thrive.
Creating a truly inclusive and diverse workplace is important to us all at Boots and we gladly publish our gender pay gap report. We have made some great progress, reporting a 0% gap on median pay, down 2.7 on last year, and significantly better than the national average. Our mean pay gap is 18.2%, which is broadly consistent with last year, however we recognise that there is always more to be done and will continue to inspire and support all of our team members to reach their full potential.
Seb James, Senior Vice President and Managing Director Boots, UK and ROI
