Our commitments

As a global brand, we engage with many diverse cultures and communities and believe our employees should reflect this diversity. Therefore, we are working with third-party I&D experts to identify and remove bias and barriers in our recruitment process so we can attract and retain top talent from all backgrounds and experiences.

We have invested more than 450 hours of training for our HR community to adopt a competency-based approach and new practices. We are coaching all our managers on ways to hire a more diverse workforce and have accelerated this effort in 2023 with a bespoke Balenciaga inclusive recruitment training course.

Balenciaga is encouraging its markets to consider innovative approaches to its hiring process. For example, in 2021 we collaborated with local schools, institutions, and associations (OXFAM and CARITAS), to hire unemployed talents and refugees.

Balenciaga believes talent can be found everywhere. That is why our Design team created its first scholarship program [in addition to the regular internship program] that offers a 6-month mentorship for one student at a partnering fashion school with limited connectivity and exposure to the fashion industry. Since its launch in 2020, Balenciaga has supported 3 students from Europe, Latin America, and Asia.

Balenciaga believes education and dialog is key to fostering change. That’s why the House has hosted several awareness sessions that address the importance of diversity, equity, and inclusion in corporate development—and why it is essential to be engaged with different causes. [see Journalist Aïda Touihri Interview Series example]. 

Managers and employees are required to attend four Inclusion & Diversity courses that cover the definition of I&D, how to fight bias, challenging the glass ceiling and mental health.

Also, 100 percent of Balenciaga managers and 80 percent of our employees completed an unconscious bias training in 2022.

All those programs are part of our on-boarding processes everywhere in the world. Supported by Kering, Balenciaga employees also benefit from a permanent eLearning path to deepen their knowledge of all dimensions of Inclusion and Diversity.

Balenciaga offers development opportunities for all employees and practice a transparent promotion process that empowers them – particularly women - to drive their professional growth.

We acknowledge the importance of supporting women’s advancement and the need to eliminate obstacles often encountered in their professional life. Balenciaga has provided more than five hundred coaching career conversations for female colleagues to identify challenges and aspirations.

We are also committed to being transparent about our results and are proud to share that for the past two years, most of our employee base and leaders are women:
-    61% of all employees
-    62% of our leaders
-    67% of our executive committee
-    59% of career moves involved women resulting in 35% achieving a promotion.

We offer equal opportunity for employees and foster a culture where managers and employees feel comfortable taking advantage of tools to make it happen.

This year, we organized a Global Learning Day focused on two areas: ‘Unlock Your Future' and 'Boost My Team Performance & Engagement'. More than one thousand employees attended the Kering Conference and 731 employees including 177 managers participating. We have also implemented a retail career path based on skills progress and performance assessment to unlock functional transversal moves. So far, 405 retail employees have benefited from a career move. 

Balenciaga stands against any form of discrimination and supports organizations fighting injustice with multi-year financial resources and advocacy campaigns.
-    Social Justice: NAACP and OutRight International
-    Diversity in Design and Mentorships: Share Africa
-    Internships for Priority Education Areas Youth: ViensVoirMonTaf!

We know we can always do better. That is why we track our progress through an employee listening survey and adjust our programs and support. This effort has allowed us to continually make progress across two key areas:
-    employees feeling they work in a nondiscriminatory environment [81%]
-    acknowledging we hire people from diverse backgrounds [79%]