Using learnings from past for a more inclusive future

"Coming from a multicultural background I have experienced biases on various levels and topics, also in the workplace. These biases have affected me, especially early on in my career, and as a result I could not always bring my best and authentic self to work, which also impacted my performance."

I want to ensure that our colleagues and the generations to come have a working environment without biases and where everyone, regardless of their background, religion, gender, and age can truly be themselves and get equal opportunities to grow, both in their career and personally.

"We need to recognise that everyone is unique in their own way, and that the diversity that a person brings can manifest itself in a different way of working, communicating and collaborating. Key to eliminating biases is that we should not judge each other by our actions or appearance. Instead, we should try to understand what drives the other to do so and search for the underlying rationale by engaging in conversations.

I really enjoy the culture within FrieslandCampina, paying great attention to diversity, and giving me the opportunity to work on it as part of the Inclusive Diversity (ID) team as we, of course, also still have biases to work on."

"The Cultural Diversity sub-team works on various initiatives to honour different cultures and religions. We recently created a Cultural Awareness Toolkit to build cultural competence, and honour important international holidays with webinars and posts on the intranet. We also help improving the lives of refugees who are forcibly displaced by collaborating with TENT and Refugee Talent Hub. Recently the department I work in started a holiday swap pilot, giving every colleague the opportunity to take a day off and celebrate the day(s) that they find important.

I am thrilled by the positive impact that our Inclusive Diversity efforts have on the wellbeing of our colleagues. We observe that creating awareness and opportunities for dialogue result in elimination of biases and make great impact on the lives of people. Colleagues feel accepted and respected and thrive both professionally and personally."