In line with previous years, the Lifeed initiative, launched in 2015 under the name “MAAM”, “Maternity As A Master”, which supports family reconciliation, with a special focus on women’s participation in the world of work, continued in 2022. The programme, which can be used digitally, is aimed at enhancing parenting skills, which are also particularly useful when returning to work, in order to become more aware of the changes and skills acquired through the experience of caring for a child.

Registration is open to both women on maternity leave and new parents of children from 0 to 3 years of age, as well as managers involved with their employees, and from this year also parents of children up to the age of 18. During 2022, the programme involved the participation of about 900 users, who had the opportunity to enhance the skills acquired during their parenting experience.

The initiative is also supported by an online community that allows mothers and fathers to discuss parenting and the path they have taken, integrating their different experiences within a network of participants from various companies, sharing their learning, training and skills development process in a protected and stimulating environment.

In addition, a pilot edition of the MultiMe®Finder programme, a new tool offered by Lifeed in cooperation with the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Chicago, will be launched in 2022. This programme allows to explore and discover own skills and roles in different life experiences, both personal and professional. The initiative involved over 350 employees and extended not only to parents, but also to all people interested in improving their awareness and developing their skills for personal and professional growth. In fact, the programme aims to increase awareness of the roles played in different life experiences, enhancing the skills acquired as opportunities for personal growth, also in the work context.

The Group recognises the importance of parenting for men as well, being aware that it represents a significant opportunity to improve skills such as empathy, listening, understanding of others, patience and communication, and offers free and systematic parenting support seminars for all staff on paediatric prevention and parental support in the developmental and relational journey with children.

In addition, an Active Parenting Support Policy was approved in 2022, with the aim of creating a customised support programme based on the professional profile and personal needs of employees, as well as encapsulating the Company’s programmes and regulations to support staff with children.

Through the Active Parenthood Support Policy, in line with ESG objectives, Poste Italiane strengthens its commitment to enhancing gender balance and overcoming stereotypes, discrimination and prejudice in the workplace, in order to promote conditions, measures and paths aimed at the individual and organisational well-being of people, focusing on paths to support the role of parents and actions to support the condition of women.

This programme consists of pre- and post-work development paths, the use of platforms to improve the soft skills acquired through parenthood, and the possibility of participating in refresher and coaching programmes to facilitate, if necessary, a return to work. In this way, the Group has introduced management and care processes that offer a concrete response to employees, enhancing inclusive policies and representing an investment in the future of the Company and families. Attention is also paid to the role of fathers and the sharing of care burdens in order to strengthen work-life balance mechanisms and measures to promote culturally ready contexts to accommodate these needs.

These initiatives are driven by increasingly innovative ways and perspectives, which aim to improve the quality of life of employees and promote a sustainable and fair working environment.

Within the actions envisaged by the Active Parenting Support Policy is also the launch of the “Mums At Work” project, which aims to offer company coaching programmes to support women returning from maternity leave, in order to facilitate the achievement of a work-life balance. In particular, new mothers are supported for about four months by in-house coaches who help employees refocus their goals and reconcile their new family needs with their return to their jobs at the Company.

The Company, in addition to guaranteeing the use of breastfeeding time off in accordance with the regulations in force, recognises the possibility for working mothers to be assigned during the first year of their child’s age to their municipality of habitual residence or to a neighbouring municipality, provided that it is within their own Macro Territorial Area, without prejudice to their duties. In addition, with regard to tasks that can be remote, from 2022, the possibility of increasing the number of days on which work can be performed in smart working has been introduced for parents of children under three years of age.

The Company supports school and career guidance projects, recognising the responsibility of socially responsible companies to promote the growth of the younger generation and to collaborate with the school system and families. For this reason, Poste Italiane collaborated with Consel-Consorzio Elis to participate in the two-year “School4Life 2.0” project, aimed at fostering a structured connection between schools and businesses and preventing school drop-outs.

Poste Italiane has also implemented programmes to strengthen the alliance between the corporate world and the world of education, with initiatives for orientation and dialogue between generations. These programmes provided opportunities for collaboration between seniors and students to overcome vertical barriers and foster the exchange of experiences to support inclusion and employability.

Role models, mentors and in the future also trade masters are the roles that the company experts identified play to inspire young people and guide them in their study and work choices, encourage the expression of their critical thinking, transfer trade-related skills and bring them closer to the complex and ever-changing world of work. In fact, Poste Italiane continued its collaboration with “Valore D” for the realisation of orientation programmes aimed at encouraging girls and boys of school age to follow their aspirations, free from gender conditioning, through dialogue with internal role models, in order to actively affect common stereotypes that accompany the younger generations.

In 2022, Poste Italiane continued its commitment to the “Noi Siamo Qui” (We Are Here) caring initiative, aimed at supporting workers with fragility due to serious illnesses or chronic diseases with dedicated listening actions, work flexibility interventions, and the activation of business coaching paths with an inclusive approach to accompany an effective reintegration into work. The aim is to offer, among other measures, a listening pathway to identify the main cultural, organisational and management implications of fragility conditions and, at the same time, to spread growing awareness and company proximity on the issue. Among the new services launched for the project target group, the possibility of requesting a second opinion for oncological and cardiovascular diseases was also introduced in cooperation with the Company’s Medical Centre. 

In addition, in order to ensure the re-employment of “workers in fragility condition” who were unable to work at the Company’s premises in connection with the health emergency, Poste Italiane continued the Insourcing and Re-employment programme, which started in 2021. 

In order to promote the psychological well-being of its employees, a new project has been set up in 2022, which will start in early 2023, a “Listening, Guidance and Support Counter”, whose services include access to a dedicated platform to support people’s mental well-being and offer a concrete response to challenges, changes and vulnerable situations that may arise in daily life. The platform will provide access to a network of selected psychologists and psychotherapists to undertake an accompanying pathway, and will make available various accessible content, such as various scientific tests for the self-assessment of global well-being.

In order to promote the psychological well-being of its employees, a new project has been set up in 2022, which will start in early 2023, a “Listening, Guidance and Support Counter”, whose services include access to a dedicated platform to support people’s mental well-being and offer a concrete response to challenges, changes and vulnerable situations that may arise in daily life. The platform will provide access to a network of selected psychologists and psychotherapists to undertake an accompanying pathway, and will make available various accessible content, such as various scientific tests for the self-assessment of global well-being.

In 2022, Poste Italiane promoted, for the tenth edition, the initiative dedicated to disabled children and siblings of employees, which includes two summer holiday periods of fifteen days each. Thanks to this initiative, around 40 boys and girls had the opportunity to spend time being entertained and receiving individual assistance from dedicated caregivers, thus fostering an experience of socialisation and full integration, as well as allowing families to benefit from relief in their daily care needs. 

For the third consecutive year, Poste Italiane also participated in “4Weeks4Inclusion”, the largest inter-company event in Italy on diversity and inclusion. Over the course of four weeks, the event involved more than 300 partners including companies, universities, associations and non-profit organisations who shared events, in presence and digitally, realising moments open to the public and thousands of social interactions. Through the initiative, the Company realised its own event on the occasion of the “Day against Violence against Women” on 25 November, entitled “Corporate Volunteering in Support of Women Victims of Violence”, to show the continuity of its commitment in this area. This was followed up with a targeted editorial plan on the NoidiPoste corporate intranet. In addition, the Company, already a signatory of the Equal Opportunities Charter, joined the “European Diversity Month”, a thirty-day initiative promoted by the European Commission that aims to raise awareness of the importance of diversity and inclusion in the workplace. The Company participated in the project by making an intercompany video with testimonies of people from different cultures and involved the entire company community in the “Let’s Movie” initiative, through which employees were able to share their preferences on diversity and inclusion, suggesting films and TV series on stories of inclusion and respect for diversity to build a virtual commented and shared list.

As part of the promotion of diversity and inclusion, Poste Italiane further intensified its cultural awareness and training activities, including through six “Diversity Innovation Meetings”, with the aim of exploring the main aspects of diversity, focusing specifically on the issues of gender equality, intergenerational alliance, vulnerabilities, interculturality and inclusive language. During these meetings, start-ups, third sector organisations and institutions were invited to share their experiences and knowledge on promoting inclusion. Following their speeches, the participants divided into working groups and discussed together co-generating ideas to be implemented in our specific reality. The initiative received positive feedback from participants for the effective interactivity and the high level of inspiration of the testimonials.

In December, the first functionalities of a Diversity & Inclusion KPI monitoring dashboard were released. Based on the typical processes of the Human Resources function, it analyses, by organisational function and territory, the trend of the main variables on the four Diversity aspects: gender, generations, disability/vulnerability and interculturality. The dashboard will make it possible to keep track of movement across the four aspects and intervene promptly in the event of out-of-line targets and critical situations. It will be a useful tool to accompany an ongoing and widespread awareness-raising on processes impacting on Diversity & Inclusion dimensions.

In addition, to support the focus on the Corporate Volunteering project, an inspirational streaming event was organised, extended to the entire company population, with the aim of reflecting, through external and internal testimonies, on the meaning and value of the role of a volunteer in the social area and in the Company. The event was an opportunity for colleagues to take a closer look at the activities of Corporate Volunteering and its evolutionary perspectives, with the possibility for everyone to contribute with their own participation to the new social objectives that arise and move also in workplaces and relationships from a social and community welfare perspective.

Poste Italiane has designed multi-year initiatives aimed at promoting interaction between different cultures and experiences through envisioning programmes and the dissemination of knowledge in organisational and managerial environments, with the objective of promoting a cross-cultural vision open to multi-level confrontation and geared to organisational and social cooperation.

The Diversity & Inclusion programmes, in line with the provisions of the Company Policy, are monitored using indicators developed annually in collaboration with the Group’s Sustainable Development, Risk and Compliance function in the Corporate Affairs area, in line with the evolutionary guidelines of the corporate sustainability plan.

Poste Italiane maintains, in continuity with the previous year, its Diversity & Inclusion Plan, drawn up following an active participation process which envisaged the establishment of cross-functional working groups made up of professionals and middle-managers who operated according to a bottom-up logic, elaborating project proposals that have been evaluated on the basis of two variables, the qualitative-quantitative impact on the company population and the speed of implementation. The Plan is aimed at generating significant change processes that bring added value to people, organisational behaviour, leadership styles and relationships within the Group. Through the implementation of targeted projects and initiatives, as well as communication and awareness-raising campaigns, the Group promotes engagement, listening and trust, the creation of inclusive working environments, and in general, the improvement of the corporate organisation through the enhancement of differences.

Moreover, to further spread knowledge and understanding of the importance of each individual within the Company and of the initiatives supporting diversity, and to promote the contamination of different cultures and experiences in order to trigger participatory processes characterised by the co-presence of a set of different cultures among people, a special “Diversity & Inclusion” section is available on the NoidiPoste corporate intranet, containing news, documents and multimedia material. Finally, a series of podcasts entitled “In Other Words” was launched, which aims to focus on listening in the telling of stories of diversity and inclusion.

The Company’s commitment to promoting an inclusive culture is a cultural journey that can enrich the experience of staff throughout their working careers, with both individual and collective benefits. To this end, the Company works constantly and systematically, implementing synergistic actions to develop analysis models and indicators consistent with people management processes. This system allows management to evaluate scenarios, objectives and metrics in a transparent and visible manner both within the organisation and for external stakeholders.

“La tua opinione conta” is the listening digital tool (available on the intranet and app “Noi di Poste”) that Poste Italiane  created in 2019 and updated every year in order to monitor the appreciation and committment of its employees
 The tool will soon be extended to the retired employees of Poste Italiane.
 
In-house surveys help Poste Italiane to monitor professional topics (e.g. smart working or mobility), dig up personal interests (e.g. sport or  family services) and obtain insights about wellness and well-being.
 
In particular, as part of the process of listening to its staff, Poste Italiane has launched a survey called “V.A.L.O.R.E. Activities of listening to the staff of Poste Italiane”
 
Vita (Life), Azione (Action), Lavoro (Work), Opinione (Opinion), Realizzazione (Execution), Esperienza (Experience)
 
V.A.L.O.R.E. aimed at analysing the perception of the working environment, the promotion of improvement processes and the level of involvement of employees
 
The survey involved a large number of Poste Italiane Group employees working in the financial and digital sectors, broken down by age, gender and geographical area. The survey focused on 6 pillars (Integrity and transparency, Leveraging of people, Support for the territory and the country, Customer experience, Decarbonisation of buildings and logistics, Sustainable finance) related to the 20 relevant issues. The respondents expressed their level of agreement with a series of statements related to the areas of interest, using a scale of assessment from 1 to 5 (from “I agree strongly” to “I do not agree at all”).
 

RESULTS
The majority of Poste Italiane's employees involved in the survey expressed very positive opinions in terms of the Company’s sentiment and reputation. In the analysis, 76% of employees (76% of women and 77% of men) stated that they felt that they were active and participated in the company.
Poste Italiane is considered an ethical company, which is growing and is the market leader in Italy, open to innovation and able to look to the future.
The Company’s good reputation in Italy is evident to the respondents. Poste Italiane is, according to those who drive it every day with their work, decisive in the growth of the country, and its presence improves the quality of life of people. How does it do this? Through the decisive contribution of its employees.
In fact, it is clear that a strong sense of responsibility has been growing among the respondents: almost all respondents are aware that the company’s results also depend on the quality with which the tasks entrusted to them are carried out, and that the reputation and image of Poste Italiane depend on their work.
 
 
TO BE COMPLETED BY THE CUSTOMER 
The pillar that obtains the highest ratings is that of customer experience. Poste Italiane is seen as strongly motivated to aim for modernisation and innovation. It is a feeling deeply rooted within the Company that the process of digitialising products and services has been launched successfully.
Customer focus reaches levels of excellence: employees consider that the Company lives on the enthusiasm of its employees and on the service given to its customers, is attentive to the quality of services and products offered, guarantees the privacy of its customers, employees are careful to listen to customers and respect process standards to offer high-quality services.
Finally, there are very high ratings for the pillar that measures how active Poste Italiane is in the growth of the community: support for the territory and the country. Poste Italiane is seen by its employees as a key asset for the country: it contributes to Italy’s growth, modernity and, through its actions, supports digital development. Also for this reason, almost all the respondents say they are proud to work for Poste Italiane and would fully recommend working there to those who are looking for work.

Moreover, as a consequence of this survey, Poste Italiane identified work-life balance as a source of well-being for its employees. With this in mind, the Group has strengthened its focus on the social and family aspect of workers, in order to support the role of parents, with an integrated action that has provided guidance for young people and support for families.

As part of the actions taken to support spatial and temporal flexibility of service and the strengthening of welfare tools that make it possible to reconcile personal and family needs with professional ones, remote working experimentation was extended to additional organisational areas, increasing employee engagement and making work processes more efficient, consistent with the Digital Transformation and Change Management programmes undertaken by the Company.

Composition and breakdown of Poste Italiane SpA’s Board of Directors by gender and age*

	2020			2021			2022
	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Total
Board of Directors	5	4	9	5	4	9	5	4	9
< 30 years old	-	-	-	-	-	-	0	0	0
30 - 50 years old	-	1	1	-	-	-	0	0	0
> 50 years old	5	3	8	5	4	9	5	4	9
Board of Directors (%)	55.6	44.4	100	55.6	44.4	100	55.6	44.4	100
< 30 years old	-	-	-	-	-	-	0	0	0
30 - 50 years old	-	25	11	-	-	-	0	0	0
> 50 years old	100	75	88.9	100	100	100	100	100	100

* The figures refer to the headcount.

Classification of employee by category, gender and age group*

	2020			2021			2022
	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Total
Executives	519	159	678	481	146	627	512	167	679
< 30 years old (%)	0,2	-	0,2	-	-	-	0	0	0
30 - 50 years old (%)	35	40	36	36	42	38	35	43	37
> 50 years old (%)	65	60	64	64	58	62	65	57	63
Middle managers	7,763	6,945	14,708	7,822	7,034	14,856	8,040	7,132	15,171
< 30 years old (%)	0,3	0,2	0,2	0,3	0,2	0,2	0,4	0,2	0,3
30 - 50 years old (%)	45	44	44	49	47	48	51	49	50
> 50 years old (%)	55	56	55	51	53	52	49	50	50
Operational staff	48,982	59,215	108,197	47,111	56,375	103,486	48,213	56,970	105,183
< 30 years old (%)	11	6	8	12	6	9	14	8	11
30 - 50 years old (%)	46	46	46	48	46	47	49	47	48
> 50 years old (%)	42	48	46	40	47	44	37	46	42
Total	57,264	66,319	123,583	55,414	63,555	118,969	56,765	64,269	121,033

* The figures are shown in Full Time Equivalent (FTE) terms for both permanent and flexible personnel.

Number of personnel bother diversity indicators
 

	2020			2021			2022
	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women	Men
Personnel with disabilities	3,383	2,202	5,585	3,123	2,171	5,294	2,934	2,239	5,173

Diversity of workforce by gender
 

Women in the workfore by category (%)*	2020	2021	2022
Management positions	31.9	31.5	32.4
Top management**	17.3	17.9	16.3
Junior Management***	33.6	33.4	34.3
Revenue-generating functions****	32	31.3	29.4
STEM positions*****	20	21	20.8

* Percentages regard the presence of women in formally designated organisational roles within Poste Italiane and Group Companies.
** Includes first and second level personnel within Poste Italiane, the chief executive officers and general managers of the main Group companies and personnel reporting directly
to them.
*** Includes managers other than Top Management.
**** Includes organisational roles within the Post Office Network (MP) and Business and Public Administration functions (MIPA).
***** Science, technology, engineering and mathematics. These may include for example, the following professions: computer programmer, web developer, statistician, logistician,
engineer, physicist, scientist.