At Marsh McLennan, we recognize that our company’s greatest strength is the collective talent of our people. Our colleagues bring unique perspectives and experiences that individually makes us valuable — and together, extraordinary. Our shared purpose of making a difference in the moments that matter is only possible when all our colleagues feel that they are represented and respected in the workplace. Therefore, building a culture of belonging continues to be at the core of our strategy and to begin with we have formulated four Diversity Colleague Resource Groups to drive a focused effort towards spreading awareness around:
- Gender diversity
- Multi-generational inclusion
- LGBTQIA+ inclusion
- Disability inclusion
Your leading DEI Initiative:
As an organization we celebrate our differences. The concept of diversity and inclusion is constantly evolving, and we ensure that we continue to advance our diversity, equity, and inclusion agenda to align to the changing environment. We aim to achieve our goals in the short- to medium-term by focusing on increased colleague awareness, reinforcing conscious inclusion, building a sense of belonging and setting up well-defined processes to make inclusion an integral part of our culture. Here’s an overview of the key initiatives we have undertaken to achieve this:
| Gender Diversity | Multi-generation inclusion | LGBTQIA+ inclusion | Disability inclusion |
| Shared best practices and policies across our four key businesses
Unbiased hiring processes and unified goals for the business Offering flexibility; redefined career paths and opportunity roadmap
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Bring together talent across generations and raise colleague awareness to create a sense of belonging in the workplace
Introduce learning, development and growth opportunities to develop the multi-generation talent Build-in diversity goals for all functions |
Focused hiring of candidates from the LGBTQIA+ community
Continue to create awareness and sensitization around inclusion of colleagues from the community Drive sponsorship for this initiative and review policies to ensure gender neutral benefits and practices |
Focused efforts towards accessible infrastructure
Launch PwD Community of Practices and empower ‘inclined’ and ‘interested’ influencers Invite talent through PwD referrals / IJP Launch of curated learning programs / mentor programs basis development needs; mandatory trainings on being an ally and being aware of unconscious bias Build network with external partners working with PwD; participate in external forums and leverage the PwD Pulse Survey to develop infrastructural readiness, policy and process readiness and much more. |
Employee Testimonial for this initiative:
- Praful Mistry
As a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, I feel comfortable being who I am, thanks to the launch of the LGBTQIA+ CRG. Now as a member of this CRG, I also have the opportunity of being a catalyst for change. Some key initiatives we have undertaken include:
- Launching sensitization programs for first line managers
- Launching a campaign on ‘Pronouns Matter’
- Advocacy and adoption of better workplace practices
- Creating an ally network
- Dilpreet Guleria
I’m on a wheelchair, but that does not define me. In 2020 due to the pandemic, I was at the verge of being jobless. I reached out to an ex-colleague who was now working with the Mercer business at Marsh McLennan. I was informed about the organization, culture and opportunities that would be best suited for me, but I had to wait. I knew right away that this ‘wait’ would be much different. After a short wait, I received a call from Mercer and I’m happy to be associated with this organization since 2021. Not just me, there are many persons with disabilities (PWDs) who are gainfully employed at Mercer. I was met with a very warm and the D&I efforts were quite evident. My second exposure to the D&I initiatives was through my engagements with resource groups like AccessABILITIES@Mercer and Disability Friendly. It’s great to see the entire organization being focused on this cause and I am proud to play a small role in this journey.
Marsh McLennan has not just helped me have a good career with a healthy work-life balance, but also turned an introvert like me into a spokesperson for disability inclusion. My stress buster is when I am totally engrossed in my work solving problems and innovating. As I always say, my weekend begins on Monday and lasts for five days. In this short span of 1+ years, I have been part of many D&I initiatives like learning basic sign language and delivering talks to spread the good word.
Mahima Mall
When I finished college in 2021, like every fresh graduate I was extremely nervous about my chances in the corporate world, more so because we were dead in the middle of the pandemic. I was wondering which corporate would want to give a fresher the chance when there were profiles of so many experienced candidates around. And lo and behold, not just any corporate, BUT the number one broker in the world – true to its stature gave many freshers like me – the quintessential Generation Z a dream break!
Since day one, what really inspired me at Marsh McLennan was how everyone swore by the culture of bringing everyone together—different generations, genders and walks of life—to work towards something bigger and create something better for our people and clients. It is an awe-inspiring opportunity to share workspace with colleagues from different generations – some who have work experience almost equalling my age. Learning from them and adding my exuberance makes work extremely exciting every single day. Only 2 months after joining the company, I was entrusted a new project. The initial learning phase was overwhelming, but my colleagues inspired me to go the extra mile and not give up. In this short tenure, I also had the opportunity to being a part of the fun committee and social impact initiatives. These experiences have helped me grow not only professionally, but also on a personal level.
Marsh McLennan truly is the employer of choice and the only thing that matters to us is the talent and attitude you bring to the table.
Impact Statement:
Our greatest strength is the collective talent of our people – we are united in our shared purpose to make a difference in the moments that matter.
- Your advice for organizations looking forward to working in this area:
A unified story on inclusion always helps bring together colleagues and leader on a single platform. While we often get enticed by individual goals and successes, keeping all the initiatives in perspective by bringing efforts together and achieving and celebrating common goals is important. All stakeholders need to be included from the start to make good of the organization’s commitments because the conversation must start from the top. It is therefore important that leaders are committed to driving a culture of change and belonging.
Inclusion imperatives: Identify the primary areas of inclusion that you would like to work in. Focusing on generic inclusion may not bring results, it is important that the organization is purposeful about the topic and can show inclusion with results in the areas that we think are imperative. At Marsh McLennan in India, we are focusing on developing diversity of gender and physical abilities. This has helped us to divert resources, infrastructure, and budgets in a planned manner towards these areas and get positive returns.
Organizational readiness: Readiness of leaders drives them to walk the talk and bring the entire organization on the same page in accepting and creating an environment for inclusion. Regular conversations, webinars, sessions on topics like hiring for inclusion and unconscious bias helps ensure a common outlook towards people from all spectrum and abilities. An environment conducive to questioning and inquisitiveness also enables transparency and acceptance.
Speech to action: Diversity and inclusion needs to transcend from a statement to true actions. Lack of commitment may lead to efforts of the organization reducing to a single person’s efforts and hence the entire cause eventually fading out. To keep motivations high and acceleration, each of the ideas need to be implemented with agility, and policies and processes around D&I should be designed to make it implementable and a way of life. All teams and leaders need to be committed and if need be drive it through KPIs to get desired results.