Responsibility at Tekla
Tekla recognises its responsibility as a brand to mitigate its impact. We design for longevity and produce responsibly, aspiring to move beyond just compliance with social and environmental requirements.
We must make sure our definition of sustainability includes people, as well as the planet, to affect meaningful change. We aim to provide a workplace that operates with honesty, integrity and openness; with respect for human rights and the interests of our community, including employees. These are values we extend to our and to the communities we serve through charitable work.
Supply chain
Actions taken
We introduced our first code of conduct, signed and adhered to by all our , including our warehouse.
View our code of conduct here.
Results
Our code of conduct outlines the high social and environmental requirements of our suppliers, ensures a mutual agreement of these terms and is a statement of our intent to build long-term prosperous relationships with them. All our tier 1 suppliers adhere to this, which in some cases means this agreement extends to the facilities operated by them in and .
We work with like-minded partners who share our values. Any new suppliers must comply with and sign our code of conduct before we can work with them.
Employees
Actions taken
Reviewed internal processes and, where missing, began establishing processes to contribute towards a safe and inclusive workplace that supports employee well-being.
Results
Since the start of 2021, Tekla has grown from a team of nine to 32. This rapid growth means a lot of the work within people and culture has been foundational. We worked with the to identify where we were performing well and where we needed to improve.
Respect for others is embedded in the values of Tekla, and we’re proud of the company’s good despite its small size. However, through this review, we saw the need to formalise and consolidate our inherent beliefs around equality into more structured policies and training. This is something we’re choosing to do now while the company is still small, to establish best practices and guidelines as the company grows.
In line with this, we have already created and introduced: an employee handbook with policies and procedures that reflect Tekla’s commitment to its employees; a business code of ethics; a people's platform that supports greater transparency around roles and reporting structure, a performance review cycle that encourages continuous dialogue and feedback between employees and managers; a monthly town hall meeting; an internal culture committee.
But we know this work is always ongoing. In 2023, we will conduct an employee engagement survey to gain insight into how our employees feel about our company culture. Extra focus will be given to the well-being of our employees and their ability to learn and grow at Tekla. This will include a voluntary gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation section to better understand, evaluate and identify areas for improvement within our culture.
The findings of our survey will enable us to establish diversity metrics and make meaningful decisions about how best to continue for the benefit of the team. It’s not just about what we say or do, but how we make people feel, which matters in ways we can’t measure.
Causes
Actions taken
In the past year, we better defined our approach to working with charities.
We have a local/global approach to charity, choosing to direct our resources towards those that provide support within our immediate community or tackle systemic global challenges.
This led to us working with local charities in Copenhagen and establishing a partnership with ClientEarth, a leading environmental law charity that uses “the law to fight climate change, tackle pollution, defend wildlife and protect people and planet.” Their recent work includes their successful suing of the UK government for breaching its Climate Change Act with an inadequate net zero strategy.
Results
After entering into a close dialogue with Kvindehjemmet, Denmark’s largest women’s shelter and crisis centre, and Kræftværket, a charity that supports young people with cancer, we matched the requested donations of blankets, sleepwear and bedding products. Both charities have expressed how appreciated and used these products have been, so we will continue to build on this relationship and ensure we donate what is needed.
After hosting a successful fundraising dinner for ClientEarth, we noticed a keen interest among our community in the work they do and found our events can increase donations – this particular event helped raise almost €430,000. This is why we’ve chosen to commit to one pro bono event or direct donation a year. You can find out more about the event we hosted by viewing our event booklet here.
Social Goals
Supply chain
– Further develop a social responsibility strategy that deepens our commitments to our and ensures high social standards are met.
Employee
– Conduct an employee engagement survey – including a voluntary gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation section – to better understand how our workforce feels about our company culture and identify areas for improvement.
– Establish diversity metrics and define language around diversity and inclusion in all communications by July 2023.
– Create initiatives around diversity and inclusion as part of our social responsibility strategy.
Causes
– Continue product donation commitment with local charities.
– Continue one annual financial donation or pro bono event to support ClientEarth.
