PHASE ONE – LAUNCH OF 135 HENRY BOOT
The Group’s Community Partnership Plan was shaped from a community engagement consultation we undertook with our people in 2020.
The plan has found us collaborating with, and supporting, our charity, educational and community partners to create meaningful and lasting impact on their work. In doing so, we have engaged our people to get involved and utilise their skills, knowledge and experience to make a difference for our communities.
key objectives
- To provide a strategic approach to charitable support, educational engagement and volunteering.
- To provide guidance as we support our charity, educational and community partners.
- To engage our people to get involved and utilise their skills, knowledge and experience.
The Group’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy aims to work with all our partners to ensure our business and sector is truly representative, and that we offer all our current and prospective people an inclusive, accessible and forwardthinking workplace.
We aim to create a fair, accessible, diverse and inclusive working environment, while acknowledging the challenges our sector has traditionally faced in achieving this.
key objectives
- Success for all – All employees will have the best possible opportunities for success, free of the barriers of prejudice and discrimination.
- Inclusivity for all – To promote inclusion and accessibility for all.
- Knowledge for all – Enabling and ensuring impactful change through knowledge, awareness and cultural shift.
The Group’s Net Zero Carbon Framework aims to guide the business to achieve NZC for all direct emissions by 2030.
Since 2020, a team comprising of colleagues from across the Group, with support from consultancy firm Anthesis, have analysed the Group’s directly controlled Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. Following this, the team produced a Framework which will help guide the business in two phases to reduce directly controlled carbon emissions by 2030.
key objectives
- To achieve NZC for our directly controlled GHG emissions (Scopes 1 and 2) by 2030.
- To enhance our understanding of our indirectly controlled GHG emissions and deliver reduction solutions.
- To empower our people and partners to take positive action to collaboratively decarbonise.
PHASE TWO – LAUNCH OF RESPONSIBLE BUSINESS STRATEGY
PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING RESPONSIBLE BUSINESS STRATEGY
135 Henry Boot and the wider work undertaken in 2021 put us in a strong position to develop Phase 2 of our Responsible Business Strategy, which launched in January 2022. Phase 2 sets ambitious objectives and targets for the medium term, ensuring we maintain our bold and determined approach to achieving significant environmental and social value through our work.
In developing Phase 2 of our Responsible Business Strategy, it was vital that we captured the opinions and views of our people and partners. We wanted to understand the issues they thought were the most material when considering how our business generates positive impact and social value.
STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
Our Responsible Business Committee undertook a stakeholder mapping exercise to understand how best to engage our stakeholders. Desk-based research and employee engagement was undertaken to create a shortlist of material issues, which was also influenced by the ambitions of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
IDENTIFY ISSUES
Based on the stakeholder mapping exercise, we conducted a Responsible Business Survey amongst a representative sample of our people, customers, suppliers, advisers, professional membership bodies, charity partners, education partners and community partners. They were asked to rank a series of responsible business issues to assist us in determining which issues should be the most material to our Group.
PRIORITISATION AND SELECTION
Our materiality assessment identified that the top three issues our business should focus on are:
- Promoting positive health and wellbeing for our people.
- Ensuring our business is equal, inclusive, diverse and accessible.
- Achieving net zero carbon (NZC).
DEVELOPMENT OF RESPONSIBLE BUSINESS STRATEGY
Following the materiality assessment and the prioritisation and selection of our key areas of focus, we began to develop our Responsible Business Strategy. The Strategy will guide us to have a positive impact on these issues, and ongoing stakeholder engagement will be undertaken to ensure that the aims and objectives remain relevant and impactful.
responsible Business strategy
Our Responsible Business Strategy focuses on four key strategic pillars ‘Our People, Our Places, Our Planet, and Our Partners.’
Our Purpose is to empower and develop our people to create long-term value
and sustainable growth for our stakeholders.
Pillar 1 – Our People
We will support, develop, engage and empower our people to have an exceptional working experience, to be the best versions of themselves, and to deliver long-term value for our stakeholders.
Pillar 2 – Our Places
In fulfilling our purpose, we will support and engage the communities we work with, and alongside, to create long-lasting social value.
Pillar 3 – Our Planet
We will protect and preserve our planet by reducing our environmental impact, consuming responsibly and safeguarding our environments.
Pillar 4 – Our Partners
We will collaborate with our partners to deliver exceptional results, create value and share knowledge, solutions and creativity to address key issues.
Our Ambitions will be delivered by our people working closely with our partners –
delivering collaborative solutions with real impact.
Our Values will underpin and align everything we do.
We also engaged our stakeholders to understand which of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) they felt our business could most positively impact. Based on the feedback received, the Responsible Business Committee selected the five UN SDGs above as those best aligned with our corporate purpose and which we can most positively impact.