Our inclusion strategy
We’re taking action to remove barriers for our colleagues, customers, and communities to realise their potential. This supports an inclusive environment where our colleagues can flourish, and helps to drive the strong and purposeful delivery of our strategy.
The different ideas and perspectives that a diverse workforce brings help us innovate and grow in a sustainable way.
Our global ambitions
To achieve progress, we are focused on specific Group-wide ambitions for which we hold senior executives accountable1.
Embracing our unique international footprint, we adapt the implementation of our strategy to ensure it remains locally relevant and compliant with local laws.
Global gender representation
After achieving our ambition of having 30% of senior leadership roles held by women in 2020, we set a new ambition to reach 35% by 20251.
We remain on track, with 34.6% of senior leadership roles held by women at the end of 2024, an increase of 0.5 percentage points since 2023.
Global ethnicity representation
To better reflect the communities we serve, we have enhanced our approach and set an ambition of having 3.4% of leadership roles held by Black heritage3 colleagues across the UK and US combined by 20251.
In 2024, 3.0% of leadership roles were held by Black heritage colleagues, maintaining our 2023 position.
Inclusive culture
Our inclusion index looks at how inclusive our culture is by measuring colleagues’ feelings of belonging, psychological safety, perception of fairness and trust in our annual all-employee engagement survey.
In 2024, we achieved a score of 78% – three points higher than our ambition and on par with the financial services industry benchmark.
1 These numerical ambitions do not form part of any US-based senior leader performance or other objectives, or in other jurisdictions where application of such should not apply under local law.
2 The focus for this ambition is on the UK and US, where Black colleagues are particularly under-represented. The starting point is 31 December 2020.
3 We define Black heritage to include all colleagues in the UK who identify as Black or mixed race where one of the ethnicities is stated as Black, and in the US who identify as Black or African-American.
Our four priorities
We have made progress, but we know we still have more to do. Our four priorities are focused on building an inclusive culture across the organisation:
We’re focused on ensuring our hiring processes are fair, transparent and inclusive for all, so that every candidate, regardless of their identity or background, has an equal opportunity to demonstrate their skill and potential.
Our actions:
- More than 14,000 hiring managers globally completed the mandatory inclusive hiring training in 2024, which is aimed at enabling fair and inclusive decisions that are in line with our hiring principles.
- We have developed partnerships including the #Merky Foundation and the 10,000 Black Interns initiative that have resulted in a 43% increase in Black heritage hires in the UK since 2022.
- We target a wide student population to improve the representation of our global graduate intake. In 2024, 45% of new graduates were women and 9% were of Black heritage.
- We received a 91% ‘fully fit for purpose’ rating in the most recent neurodiversity audit and increased support to candidates through the Disability Confident scheme.
Note: The ethnicity representation data is based on employees who have shared their ethnicities, in markets where it is legally permissible and culturally acceptable to collect this information.
We’re focused on ensuring all colleagues have access to development opportunities to achieve their potential, allowing us to benefit from their diverse experiences and perspectives.
Our actions:
- In 2024, we relaunched our Accelerating Women’s Leadership programme, which aims to strengthen our talent pipeline by improving the representation of women in senior leadership roles.
- 4,052 women and 4,103 men participated in our Coaching Circles programme, which matches senior leaders with a small group of colleagues to help them develop leadership skills and build professional networks.
- We partner with specialist firms to help tailor our standard development programmes. For example, 41 participants in the Solaris programme for Black heritage women in the UK have completed the programme to-date, with 20% of participants being promoted.
- In 2024, we launched The VOICE blueprint in partnership with LSE – to support individuals, people managers, and organisations in retaining and advancing colleagues from lower socio-economic backgrounds within the UK financial services sector.
Note: The ethnicity representation data is based on employees who have shared their ethnicities, in markets where it is legally permissible and culturally acceptable to collect this information.
We’re focused on ensuring we have an inclusive environment where different perspectives are valued, and colleagues want to stay and develop their careers.
Our actions:
- Executive sponsorship of our global employee networks (for example, our Ability network to promote disability and neurodiversity inclusion) is provided by the Group Operating Committee and Non-Executive Directors of the Holdings Board, who champion these employee resource groups and drive change.
- We've improved family leave policies to further support flexibility and work-life balance. 94% of primary caregiver employees are offered at least 18 weeks of parental leave on full pay. 74% of secondary caregiver employees are offered at least two weeks of paid leave. We also offer 5 fully paid days of carers leave to 67% of employees, and compassionate leave to 79% of employees.
- In 2024, we launched the Global Carers Charter, which comprises a series of tools, policies and support available for colleagues with caring responsibilities. Following its launch in the UK, the Charter was awarded Ambassador Status by Carers UK.
- In 2023, we entered the Social Mobility Index for the first time and gained recognition as a top 75 employer. In 2024, we improved our ranking by 30 places, to number 37.
We’re focused on ensuring we provide an accessible and inclusive banking experience and working within our communities to create positive impact.
Our actions:
- We’re investing in academic sponsorship programmes that help young people from a range of backgrounds enter our industry, and in skills-building programmes for under-represented groups in the community. For example, our Stormzy partnership is funding 60 University of Cambridge scholarships for Black and socially disadvantaged students.
- We’ve continued to support female-owned businesses through the launch of HSBC UK’s £250m Women’s Business Growth Initiative and our existing Mujeres al Mundo programme in Mexico.
- We’ve expanded our Supplier Diversity portal to Mexico, Hong Kong, India, Australia, Malaysia and Taiwan. The portal enables small and medium-sized enterprises or businesses that are majority-owned, operated and controlled by historically under-represented groups, to register interest in becoming an HSBC supplier.
- In 2024, we launched the Accessibility Hub, promoting digital accessibility and education to the general public. Since launch, it's attracted 150,000 views and more than 1,000 individuals across 140 companies globally have participated in our specialised digital accessibility Training 1000 Programme.
Global representation data
We’re creating an accurate and transparent view of our workforce so we can effectively target our actions and measure our progress.