«By working together to achieve gender equality we create a win-win situation as we build a more prosperous, fair and balanced world for everyone.»
Andreas Frank, CEO SCOR Switzerland and Group Head Corporate Sustainability
Interview with andreas frank
What does the Advance motto «stronger when equal» mean to you personally?
Stronger when equal means for me in the first place that we are all better off when gender equality is achieved. It means that all individuals, regardless of their gender, can reach their full potential, without being held back by discrimination, bias or societal expectations based on gender.
By working together to achieve gender equality we create a win-win situation as we build a more prosperous, fair and balanced world for everyone.
What advice about creating a diverse and inclusive workplace would you have liked to get as a young leader?
I remember my first day at university some 27 years ago. We played a quiz answering a set of questions and then counted points on our individual results. In a second step, we discussed our results in small mixed groups and had to agree within the group on one answer for each question.
And guess what: the group result was by far better than the average of the individual results. This game really marked me, and I am convinced that the more diverse the group, the better the results. And yet, we need to remind ourselves every single day to avoid falling into the trap of our unconscious biases.
«Gender equality should become something natural that we don’t even discuss or think about.»
What would you tell young people who want to have a career and a family? How should we raise our children to achieve gender equality faster?
There are different family models, and each couple needs to find their own way and choose the model that best suits them. I can only speak from my own experience what worked well for me and for us as a family.
The model we had chosen for our family was not a very traditional one: On the one hand, we had our kids rather young compared to the average age of parents in Switzerland. On the other hand, my wife and I have both always worked full time. This has allowed us to advance our careers in parallel, in particular when we were in our 30s.
I am not saying that it wasn’t difficult at times, but in the end it worked out for us. At the same time, we are role models for our children. They have grown up with this family model and might apply a similar one when they will create their own families.
The Advance initiative for a gender-equal workplace started ten years ago. What kind of progress would you like to see over the next ten years in terms of gender balance? And what, in your view, is the role leaders need to play on this journey?
First of all, I want to say a very big thank you and «chapeau» to the Advance team for the great work they are doing.
If I look back 10 years, I believe it is fair to say that the environment has changed significantly, and that gender equality and diversity and inclusion are topics that are now discussed in pretty much every board room in Switzerland. However, we are still far away from true gender equality.
So if I could express a wish for the next 10 years I would hope that we get much closer to a true gender balance at all levels of society, not only on company boards, but starting at the private level, how the housework is split between couples, the child raising etc., that there are equal opportunities in education and employment and equal wages.
I would wish that there are no barriers to achieving one’s goals, and that individuals can make choices with no fear of judgement or discrimination. Gender equality should become something natural that we don’t even discuss or think about.
How much time do you invest in domestic work?
I am married and have three teenage children. I met my wife at university where we both studied international business. She has always been working full time in similar roles to mine as our careers progressed in parallel. I am very proud of her and also proud of us as a couple how we managed to balance family and career.
Of course, it was stressful at times, in particular when the kids were smaller, but it only worked because we were both committed to doing our part. I would say that the work is more or less evenly distributed between us, however it is true though that my wife was carrying a significant additional burden when the kids were smaller in organizing for example medical appointments etc. My preferred type of housework is cooking and gardening, and I love to vacuum-clean.
scor has chosen «hacking» by ariane lugeon
Partner companies of the exhibition could choose an «Advancine» artwork as part of their sponsorship, which will continue to inspire employees, managers and customers alike after the exhibition at the company headquarters.
Discover the artwork «Hacking» created by Ariane Lugeon!
in Conversation with scor
How is Gender Diversity connected with the business success of your company?
As a global independent reinsurance company, SCOR contributes to the welfare, resilience and sustainable development of society. Our clients are from all over the world with different backgrounds and needs.
To serve our clients the best possible way we need to represent the diversity of our business equally on our workforce. Diverse teams take the best decisions, and these need a safe space to flourish. At SCOR, our behaviours, our beliefs, our values, and our ways of working are driven by the passion and expertise of our people. All of us, individually and collectively, in our shared purpose, are what makes SCOR.
What are your most successful initiatives to balance the gender representation in management?
SCOR Group strives to implement concrete actions to promote gender equality at all levels of the organization and developed a roadmap, based on:
six priorities
- Strengthening the visibility of female talent
- Raising awareness of gender equality
- Reinforcing our external partnerships and the actions of SIGN+ (D&I ERG)
- Attracting women graduates
- Working to achieve gender pay parity
- Ensure the representation of women at the highest levels of the organization
3 key areas of focus
- Recruitment, delivering a robust inclusive process and hiring behaviors through recruitment-specific training, skills-based evaluation system, panel interviews, working with talent acquisition partners with a D&I lens
- Training, ensuring representation of female talent within the leadership programs, reaching the parity target
- Remuneration, monitoring pay gaps continue via in-depth analysis based on a pay analysis tool and the «Global Job Grading» classification helping to ensure equal pay
Why did SCor choose The artwork «Hacking»? What are the messages you would like to convey to your workforce and beyond?
The title of our Advancine is «Hacking», which we like to interpret as «cracking the code». The code is a symbol for computing and mathematics and as such speaks to insurance people, so we see a natural link to our core business at SCOR.
The artist’s message of combining old with new patterns fits perfectly in a transformational time of insurance offerings. There are a lot of old ideas like protecting people and making society more sustainable, combined with new ideas like closing protection gaps or prioritizing prevention.
At the same time, the invitation to crack or hack the established codes expresses a certain rebellion against old patterns and systems. We need to be courageous to try out new patterns. This applies to our approach to gender equality and to diversity and inclusion in the wider sense, but it is also important on a more general level to foster innovation in our industry.
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