The ceremony, which took place on Monday 25th January, celebrates companies which help to make life easier for families across the UK. The awards form part of the Mumsnet’s Family Friendly programme which aims to improve businesses’ family-friendliness, both for employees and for consumers.
Unilever won the Internal Innovation Award for its Family Friendly Benefits programme which enables agile and flexible working and offers family friendly benefits to employees. The initiative includes providing ‘back-up’ care to support employees when care arrangements for children and elderly people fail, in addition to partnerships with nurseries to waive registration fees and provide priority access. Guidance on parenting, from family planning to returning to work, is also offered to employees as part of the MAPS (Maternity and Paternity Support) programme.
The second award was for Customer-Facing Innovation and the Dove: Self-Esteem Project, which delivers self-esteem education to 8-17 year olds through lessons in schools, workshops and online resources. The project aims to empower and help girls build body confidence and self-esteem by encouraging positive emotions and attitudes to body image.
Tim Munden, Vice President of Human Resources for Unilever UK& Ireland said: “Unilever prides itself on being a family friendly employer and we’re absolutely delighted to have won these awards. Supporting our employees to balance their responsibilities at work and home is incredibly important and brings clear business benefits too, helping to retain and attract the best staff.
We’re also passionate about helping young people to reach their full potential. Over the past 10 years, our Dove: Self-Esteem Project has reached over 1.8 million young people in the UK with self-esteem education, so we’re truly delighted that Mumsnetters have given it their vote of confidence too”.
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About Mumsnet
Mumsnet is the UK’s largest network for parents, with over 77 million page views and over 16 million visits per month. It has 180 local sites and a network of over 7,500 bloggers. It regularly campaigns on issues including support for families of children with special educational needs, improvements in miscarriage care and freedom of speech on the internet.
About Unilever:
Unilever is one of the world’s leading suppliers of Food, Home and Personal Care products with sales in over 190 countries and reaching 2 billion consumers a day. It has 172,000 employees and generated sales of €48.4 billion in 2014. Over half (57%) of the company’s footprint is in developing and emerging markets. Unilever has more than 400 brands found in homes around the world, including Persil, Dove, Knorr, Domestos, Hellmann’s, Lipton, Wall’s, PG Tips, Ben & Jerry’s, Marmite, Magnum and Lynx. Unilever’s Sustainable Living Plan (USLP) commits to:
- Decoupling growth from environmental impact.
- Helping more than a billion people take action to improve their health and well-being.
- Enhancing the livelihoods of millions of people by 2020.
Unilever was voted Britain’s Most Admired Company 2015 and was ranked number one in its sector in the 2015 Dow Jones Sustainability Index. In the FTSE4Good Index, it achieved the highest environmental score of 5. It led the list of Global Corporate Sustainability Leaders in the 2015 GlobeScan/SustainAbility annual survey for the fifth year running, and in 2015 was ranked the most sustainable food and beverage company in Oxfam’s Behind the Brands Scorecard.
Unilever has been named in LinkedIn’s Top 3 most sought-after employers across all sectors.
For more information about Unilever and its brands, please visit www.unilever.com.
For more information on the USLP: www.unilever.com/sustainable-living/