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Santander takes a holistic view of diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) that encompasses all our stakeholders and the entire value chain.
Our global DE&I strategy for 2020-2025 inspires us to operate in an ethical, conscious and transparent manner to accelerate change and make headway with enhancing employee and customer experience, based on trust.
DE&I is linked to our corporate culture, acts as a driver of the Group’s transformation, and promotes sustainable, responsible and inclusive growth. What's more, DE&I has a long-term positive impact on people, teams, organizations and broader society.
DE&I principles
Diversity
Recognizing and supporting all types of diversity (gender, ethnicity, religion, age, sexual orientation, disability, socioeconomic background, etc.) to understand customer needs better and offer innovative solutions.
Equity
Promoting meritocracy and equal opportunity in the entire employee experience cycle to prevent bias that leads to discrimination. Building accessible products and environments for customers and encouraging investment to reduce social inequality.
Inclusion
To generate a respectful environment in which people feel valued so they can realize their full potential and sense of belonging.
Embedding diversity, equity and inclusion in our Group leadership principles for our top management to engage in, and commit to, DE&I. Their performance and remuneration reviews include ESG standards and targets linked to DE&I.
"Diversity only adds up if we create the right environment. It is not just about policies and quotas, but rather a complete change of how companies operate, hire and promote their people in order to embed diversity in an organisation’s culture"
A holistic DE&I strategy
People
One of our key aims is to create an inclusive working environment where everyone feels safe and free to express their identity, ideas and opinions.
Our General Code of Conduct promotes equal opportunities, diversity, non-discrimination, zero tolerance for labour or sexual harassment, an inclusive and respectful work environment, work-life balance, and human rights.
Canal Abierto is our ethical channel to report unlawful conduct anonymously. As part of our active listening campaign, Your Voice, we gauge employees’ opinions on DE&I to guide our actions.
Customers
Cultivating diverse teams enables us to understand better the needs of our customers and to come up with innovative solutions.
Santander has a commitment to make branches and online banking accessible and products simple and inclusive for all groups.
We also promote financial inclusion and empowerment to make sure everyone can access basic financial services that adapt to their needs. We break down barriers by focusing on underbanked communities, senior citizens and low-income households.
Shareholders and investors
Our DE&I disclosures are transparent and follow ESG standards. We also monitor our targets and public commitments closely.
We make the content we post online and our general shareholders’ meetings accessible through subtitles, sign language interpretation, barrier-free spaces and other elements.
We also run NGO donation campaigns to contribute to social cohesion.
Society
We promote actions that generate a positive impact on communities through strategic alliances and investment focused on education, employability and entrepreneurship to boost a fairer society.
We are part of Fortune Magazine's 'Change the World' 2024 list, which recognizes companies with innovative business strategies that have a positive social and environmental impact.
And across the entire value chain
Vendors
We embed DE&I and other sustainability standards in our vendor approval and ESG risk management as well as in product and service procurement to enhance DE&I in our sustainable supply chain management.(1)
“(1) We embed DE&I in the card purchase, hardware, electricity, transport of cash, ATM and hotel subcategories.”
People, our leading light
Gender equality
We base career development on meritocracy and encourage our employees with high potential to become inclusive and representative leaders.
People with disabilities
We seek to achieve the real and effective inclusion of the more than 4,700 employees with disabilities who work in the Group.
Ethnic and cultural diversity
We are a global company in which 165 nationalities work, we have a wide cultural diversity in our top management and board, which enriches our decision-making.
Generational diversity
We have four generations working together and are aware of how intergenerational teams helps us get closer to the communities we serve.
LGBTI+
We promote an environment where everyone can express their identity and sexual orientation comfortably and without judgement.
DE&I governance
We discuss DE&I matters at the highest level of management; it’s one of the Group board of directors’ nondelegable topics.
DE&I features in many of our internal rules and policies. Our global and local executive committees review them as follows:
DE&I impact
employees felt "included"
employees felt "included"
*91% aggregate participation
We measure and assess our impact in terms of diversity, equity and inclusion by fostering a culture that is rich in diversity and where everyone feels valued and included.
We run an engagement survey, Your Voice, to gauge perception of DE&I matters and spot areas for improvement.
In 2023, 9.3 employees out of 10 said they felt included in terms of gender, nationality, sexual orientation, religion and other aspects. This score puts us 0.5 above the sector average and in the top 5%.
Protocol against workplace, sexual and discriminatory harassment and promoting moral integrity at Work
Santander’s anti-harassment policy reinforces the Group's dedication to combating discrimination. It sets out minimum standards of behaviour and outlines the channels available to report issues and the protection offered to staff who make complaints. All incidents are treated confidentiality and overseen by an impartial investigation team. The Protocol is the cornerstone of the mandatory training initiative slated for all employees in 2024.
Awards
We feature in DE&I indices and rankings. They include:
- Best Bank for Diversity & Inclusion in Brazil
- Best Bank for Diversity & Inclusion in Chile
- Best Bank for Diversity & Inclusion in Mexico
- Best Bank for Diversity & Inclusion in Spain
Euromoney - Market Leaders in the Diversity & Inclusion category in Poland
Euromoney - Market Leaders in the Diversity & Inclusion category in Brazil
Euromoney - Market Leaders in the Diversity & Inclusion category in Chile
Euromoney - Market Leaders in the Diversity & Inclusion category in Mexico
Euromoney - Highly Regarded in the Diversity & Inclusion category in Argentina
Financial Times / Statista – Featured in Europe's Diversity Leaders
Fortune Magazine - ‘Change the World’ list 2023 (1st bank in the ranking)
Fortune Magazine - ‘World’s Most Admired Companies’ list 2024 (7th most admired bank in the world)
Fortune Magazine – ‘Change the World’ list 2024