Two hundred strong for ESCP’s 2024 Worker Well-Being Conference: Event Recap

On the 23^rd October 2024 in Dongguan, China we held our very first Worker Well-Being Conference. Hosted at Golden Cup Printing, an Ethical Supply Chain Program (ESCP) factory member and long-standing participant and supporter of ESCP WorkerWell-Being initiatives.

The day kicked off with opening speeches from ESCP ‘s President & CEO, Carmel Giblin & General Manager, Anita Lo, Golden Cup Printing’s Administrative Director, Alice Yeung. These gave great context and understanding of the impact of these initiatives.

‍People-powered Helpline improving retention and productivity

Next up, we had our first panel session which brought together factory & worker representatives. Hosted by ESCP’s Program Support and Engagement Manager, Molly Jiang, testimonials from the panellists shared the real impact on people and business.

To follow, ESCP’s Senior Specialist in Program Support and Engagement, Shalin Zhou, shared an excellent overview of ESCP’s WorkerHelpline, the Helpline is a valuable grievance mechanism channel for workers. First launched in 2010, it has since handled over 20,000 cases and has improved factory retention, turnover rates and productivity. Shalin gave a clear explanation of these positive data trends and how the Helpline not only benefits workers, but factories, through improved visibility of workplace policy comprehension, gripes and root causes of grievances, which ESCP works with the factory to resolve and improve.

Next, we heard from the factories and businesses who implement the Worker Helpline. Florence Chan, Group Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Director at Combine Will and Christina Liu, Product Integrity Manager at Hallmark joined an Effective Grievance Mechanism’s panel session hosted by ESCP’s President & CEO, Carmel Giblin. The session underscored the value of a third-party Helpline for businesses.

Positive early childhood development transforms lives

The conference attendees were invited to lunch in the factory canteen, followed by a tour of the Family-Friendly Spaces childcare facility that Golden Cup Printing have operated since 2017 welcoming around 600 children over the past seven years.

After Lunch, ESCP’s General Manager, Anita Lo, gave an overview of the Family-Friendly Factory program which seeks to build factory’s capacity to improve the work-life balance of workers through improved workplace policy, childcare spaces and training. ESCP aims to support 30,000 children through the Family-Friendly Factory program before the end of 2025.

We were joined by Feng Lin, program Manager at the LEGO Group for a spotlight session on learning through play. She entertained the audience with an interactive ‘Build a LEGO® Duck’ activity which highlighted the importance of play for not only children, but adults too. With 90% of the brain fully developed before the age of 5, we learned the importance of early childhood development and why the LEGO Group has been a long-standing supporter of ESCP’s Family-Friendly initiatives most recently, as the primary funder of the Family-Friendly Factory program.

The Family-Friendly Factory program creates positive impacts for workers, their families and their factories. ESCP’s Program Support and Engagement Supervisor, Nancy Chen, shared data from the program with 98% of workers expressing they were more satisfied with their factory because of the Family-Friendly Factory program. Nancy shared how ​new and improved workplace policies, developed by ESCP with UNICEF’s Family-Friendly Policies guidance and expert advice have improved with a 22% increase in the number of parents feeling they had enough time to care for their children.

To follow, Molly Jiang, ESCP’s Program Support and Engagement Manager, hosted an impact session with working a mother and father. Both parents shared the real impact Family-Friendly Policy, Training and Spaces have had on their lives. From introducing breastfeeding rooms improving the health and wellbeing of mother and child to a family-friendly space which reunited one father with his child and transformed the life and opportunities available to her. We have previously spotlighted Xiaomin and her father’s story – read here.

Worker Well-Being initiatives: good for people, good for business

Our largest panel of the day followed, with representatives from the United Nations Global Compact, unicef, tms and Golden Cup Printing discussing the importance and value of family-friendly workplaces for every stakeholder.

Mr Wu, General Manager of Best Top Factory, a long-standing member of ESCP and supporter of worker well-being initiatives. Mr Wu shared impacts from the Family-Friendly Spaces program, which it has continued to implement since joining the pilot in 2016and has since welcomed nearly 800 children during the summer holidays, doubling the capacity of the space since 2016. But that is not the only improvement, since implementing the Family-Friendly Spaces program, Mr Wu shared factory records that showed a rapid fall in worker turnover rate since the introduction of the program, from 19.7% in 2016 to 5.1% in 2024. He also shared staggering economic savings on new work training through improved worker retention – estimating a saving of £65,000 per year in this area alone.

Mr Xue of the Shenzhen Toy Industry Association gave an overview of the community-based Family-Friendly Spaces which have been implemented with the support of ESCP in China for the first time this year. The community-based spaces are one of the ways ESCP is continuing to develop its programs to meet the needs of more workers and their families.

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Together, we can improve the lives of workers globally

ESCP’s Amy Zhang, Program Support and Engagement Specialist then gave an overview of the Gender Equality program and its impacts. To date, around 20,000 workers have received in-person and online training. Data comparisons from baseline to impact results showed clear gender equality improvements in participating factories, on average22% improvement across a variety of factors to measure gender equality. Closing this segment, Anita Lo, ESCP’s General Manager, shared data from the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap 2024 Report. She shared that if we continue at the current rate of progress, it would take 134 years to achieve gender equality globally. Anita stressed the importance of working together to achieve gender equality in not only the workplace, but society more broadly.

To further the importance of working together to achieve more, Rachael Ma, Partnership and Programme Development Lead​ at Shared Value Initiative Hong Kong​, presented the concept and benefit of Shared Value thinking. Rachael explained the foundations of Shared Value and how they align with the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) along with applicable case studies of companies who have successfully aligned profit with purpose.

That’s all for 2024!

We closed out the ceremony with an awards ceremony for factories participating in ESCP’s Worker Well-Being initiatives followed by a closing speech from Carmel Giblin with her reflections from the day gleaning that in addition to ‘doing the right thing’ worker well-being initiatives are also good for business. Without people, there can be no business. She emphasized how the audience engagement and attendance of the event, with 120 in-person attendees and a further 73 joining throughout the day online, further highlighted the importance of worker well-being and interest from all stakeholders in continuing to make progress.

We would like to extend a special thank you to Golden Cup Printing for hosting our event. We are truly grateful to have an amazing and supportive community and are looking forward to hosting more worker well-being events in the future.

2025, will mark 10 years since implementing the Family-FriendlySpaces program – make sure to sign up to our newsletter and social media (LinkedIn, Twitter, WeChat) to keep up to date on our news and events.  

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