The Umbria Chamber of Commerce is committed to combating all forms of discrimination in the workplace (gender, age, disability, ethnicity, religious faith, sexual orientation) and to enhancing diversity within the organisation, with particular regard to equal opportunities between men and women. Not a declaration of intent, but a precise commitment. The organization has in fact signed the charter for equal opportunities and equality at work, i.e. a decalogue which acts as a programmatic reference framework to guide all those who sign it in its application.
The charters are organized at a national level, one for each country and signed jointly by over 17 thousand signatories (public and private organisations, NGOs and trade unions), representing 17 million employees. The 26 Charters are set out in the EU Diversity Charters platform.
The president of the Umbria Chamber of Commerce Giorgio Mencaroni declared: “With this signature we want to contribute to spreading a stronger awareness on these issues among our companies. We need an alliance for equal opportunities, to make people understand that diversity and inclusion they are not “soft” issues in the organization of a company, but they can represent a tool for competitiveness and development”. Promoting diversity and inclusion in the workplace means, for example, transmitting a strong message of welcome and valorization to employees, identifying effective measures for reconciling life, guaranteeing equal career paths for men and women.
Thanks to this approach, the Single Guarantee Committee of the Umbria Chamber of Commerce won the Future Female Award “Welfare and sustainability of women’s work” promoted by the Equality Councilor of the Umbria Region. Furthermore, the European Commission has chosen to dedicate the month of May to the theme of diversity and inclusion with the European Month of Diversity. Awareness initiatives are underway throughout Europe and the Umbria Chamber of Commerce is also dedicating a specific event to the theme: on May 24th, in San Gemini, a reflection meeting entitled ‘Tea with teambuilding’ organized by the Committee for female entrepreneurship. “The first step to breaking down any type of stereotype or prejudice about others is mutual knowledge and understanding that the diversity of others can represent an opportunity” underlines the President of the Committee Dalia Sciamannini.
The day, in which entrepreneurs from the Committee’s network will take part, includes specific experiential activities aimed at mutual understanding and interpersonal openness, with a final moment of synthesis and discussion.
