Optimized printing

2017 Corporate Responsibility Report

Listening to our employees

We foster a culture of open dialogue and frequent feedback on all levels, where employees and managers are encouraged to maintain regular exchange, as described in our behavioural framework. In addition, once a year, we seek feedback more formally through the Employee Engagement Survey (EES). The EES is an opportunity for us to hear from our employees what engages them and what ideas they have to improve their experience at Swiss Re. Feedback from our employees in the 2017 EES shows that we continue to make progress. After a steep increase in employee engagement from 2015 to 2016 (+9 percentage points), our 2017 employee engagement score further increased by 2 percentage points from 67% to 69%. With a high response rate of 87%, our overall engagement score puts us well above the Aon Hewitt Global Financial/Insurance Average benchmark of 65%.

We are proud to see that various areas improved in 2017. Diversity & Inclusion continues to advance, as 84% of surveyed employees feel that Swiss Re values diversity and has an open, inclusive culture that exceeds the Global Financial/Insurance Average Benchmark of 77%. Customer Focus also emerged as a new area of strength, with 75% of employees who feel encouraged to suggest improvements that will better serve customers. Overall scores show that in terms of Work Fulfilment, 75% agree that their job is a good fit, and 73% feel a strong sense of accomplishment in their work. Finally, the area that has improved the most since 2015 is Empowerment/Autonomy, driven by 70% of employees who feel they are able to influence decisions affecting their work, which directly supports our People Strategy.

Feedback from voluntary leavers also shows strong progress on our employer value proposition; our key strengths have become stronger and weaknesses have improved (overall the Net Promoter Score has increased by 20 points since 2013).