Zalando, Europe’s leading online platform for fashion and lifestyle, published its second annual diversity and inclusion (D&I) report, ‘do.BETTER’ recently. The report refers to Zalando’s D&I strategy which was published in May 2021, setting out 12 concrete commitments. These contain specific targets, against which Zalando tracks its progress in this report. Over the past year, Zalando increased its share of women in its five top leadership levels and in tech jobs, launched new training programs for leaders and Zalandos, increased representation on its Zalando shop to reflect the diversity of its customers, and set further ambitious targets to become the starting point for fashion that is truly welcoming to everyone﹣talents, leaders, customers, and partners.
“We want to listen, learn and take action for Zalando to build a diverse and inclusive experience, and to foster an environment where everyone can thrive,” said David Schneider, Zalando co-CEO.
“This year’s D&I report shows our progress and brings us one step closer to our vision: To be the starting point for fashion that is welcoming to everyone, be inclusive by design, bringing to life the diversity of talents, leadership, customers, and partners.”
Women in Leadership
Zalando’s current share of women in its five top leadership levels is 35.2 percent, compared to 30.4 percent last year. To address the gender imbalance in leadership positions, Zalando is developing tailored programs for women. These initiatives include ‘Career Circles’, a group mentoring program to support and guide women to become future leaders.
Women in Tech
Zalando’s current share of women across all tech jobs is 21.2 percent, compared with 16.7 percent last year. The following initiatives are part of Zalando’s pledge to invest five million euros in dedicated programs to attract, develop and retain more women in tech roles and raise the share of women in tech to 40-60 percent by 2023: Doubling junior roles in tech jobs to attract women early on, diversifying the internal talent pipeline for senior roles, and increasing the representation of women in our talent pipeline overall.
D&I partnerships
By 2025, Zalando aims to be a central collaboration point in fashion, bringing together brands, retailers, NGOs, academia and community thought-leaders to systematically empower and amplify underrepresented voices in the industry. The following collaborations are working towards this target: Zalando supports The Valuable 500, which is committed to achieving disability inclusion; started a long-term partnership with the Afro-German Academic Network (ADAN), aiming to promote young talent through a career with Zalando; and partnered with JA Europe to organize hackathons focused on diversity and inclusion in order to promote positive values to young Europeans.
