What is worker voice and why is it important for human rights due diligence?

Worker voice refers to the ways workers can safely share concerns, feedback, and experiences about their working conditions, particularly within global supply chains. Worker voice is critical to human rights due diligence because it provides direct insight into risks at supplier workplaces that may not be visible through audits or buyer reporting alone. Effective worker voice systems help identify issues early, support access to remedy, and strengthen protections for workers.

How does worker voice complement audits and assessments?

Worker voice complements audits by providing continuous, worker-reported insight from supplier workplaces between audit cycles. While audits offer periodic snapshots, worker voice tools capture ongoing conditions across supply chains, helping brands and suppliers identify emerging risks, monitor progress, and respond more effectively over time.

What is worker-driven human rights due diligence?

Worker-driven human rights due diligence is an approach to HRDD that centers workers in supply chains as active participants in identifying, preventing, and addressing risks. It emphasizes ongoing worker engagement, accessible grievance mechanisms, and accountability for outcomes at the supplier level, rather than relying solely on top-down or one-time assessments.

What are worker voice surveys?

Worker voice surveys are structured tools used to collect feedback directly from workers at supplier facilities about working conditions, risks, and management practices. They enable brands and suppliers to gather consistent, comparable data across supply chains while protecting worker confidentiality and safety.

How are worker voice surveys different from audits?

Worker voice surveys differ from audits in that they are continuous, worker-reported, and scalable across supply chains. Audits typically assess compliance at a single point in time, while surveys reflect workers’ lived experiences and allow organizations to track risks, improvements, and unresolved issues over time.

What types of issues can worker voice surveys identify?

Worker voice surveys can identify risks related to health and safety, wages and working hours, discrimination and harassment, freedom of association, grievance access, and management practices at supplier workplaces. These insights often surface issues that are difficult to detect through documentation reviews or site inspections alone.

What happens after worker survey data is collected?

After survey data is collected, results are analyzed to identify risks, trends, and priority issues across supplier sites. This information is used to inform remediation plans, supplier engagement, and ongoing monitoring. Effective human rights due diligence requires systems that connect worker feedback directly to corrective action and follow-up.

What is the WELL Survey?

The WELL Survey is a standardized worker voice survey developed through a multi-stakeholder design process to capture workers’ experiences and perceptions of working conditions in global supply chains. It collects direct, worker-reported feedback on key labor and human rights topics, enabling consistent and comparable insights across supplier sites, sectors, and geographies.

What is Labor Solutions?

Labor Solutions is a technology company and social enterprise focused on worker-centered human rights due diligence. Founded in 2013 in Singapore, it deploys the WOVO platform — including worker voice surveys, grievance mechanisms, eLearning, and supplier improvement plans — to engage and educate workforces globally, particularly within complex supply chains. Labor Solutions serves 3.8 million+ active workers across 180+ countries in 41+ languages for brands including adidas, Nike, H&M, Dell, Cisco, and Diageo.

What is Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD)?

Human rights due diligence (HRDD) is the process companies use to identify, prevent, mitigate, and address adverse human rights impacts in their operations and supply chains. It requires ongoing risk assessment rather than one-time compliance checks. HRDD is grounded in the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and is reflected in binding regulations such as the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), Germany's Supply Chain Due Diligence Act (LkSG), France's Duty of Vigilance Law, and similar frameworks globally.

Are audits sufficient for human rights due diligence?

Audits alone are not sufficient for effective human rights due diligence. While audits can identify certain risks at a point in time, they often miss ongoing or hidden issues and do not provide continuous insight into workers' lived experiences. Effective HRDD requires ongoing worker engagement, accessible grievance mechanisms, and systems that track issues and remediation over time.

How does Labor Solutions support CSDDD compliance?

Labor Solutions helps organizations meet EU CSDDD requirements by providing worker voice surveys that collect ongoing evidence of worker conditions, UNGP Principle 31-aligned grievance mechanisms (WOVO Connect), supplier self-assessment and action planning tools (WOVO Improve), and auditable case management that documents risk identification, remediation, and outcomes over time.

How does Labor Solutions differ from EcoVadis?

Labor Solutions is purpose-built exclusively for worker voice and worker-centered HRDD since 2013. EcoVadis is primarily a supplier sustainability rating platform that entered the worker voice space in 2024 through the acquisition of Ulula. Labor Solutions reaches 3.8 million+ active workers directly through a dedicated worker app and multi-channel access, with validated survey methodology and case-managed grievance mechanisms used by adidas, Nike, H&M, and others to meet CSDDD obligations.

What is the WELL Survey?

The WELL Survey is Labor Solutions' validated worker survey methodology, designed specifically for supply chain environments. It collects primary human rights risk data directly from workers including working conditions, recruitment fees, health and safety, discrimination, and freedom of association. Results are reported with demographic disaggregation and risk classification aligned to international standards including the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

What is WOVO Connect?

WOVO Connect is Labor Solutions' operational grievance mechanism, aligned to UN Guiding Principles Principle 31. It allows workers to submit concerns via app, SMS, QR code, or IVR. Cases are tracked, assigned, and resolved through a structured case management workflow with full audit trail. It is used by brands including adidas across 400,000+ workers to meet CSDDD and LkSG grievance mechanism obligations.

What does CSDDD require for grievance mechanisms in supply chains?

The EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) requires companies to establish or participate in effective operational-level grievance mechanisms that allow workers and affected stakeholders to raise concerns about adverse human rights and environmental impacts. These mechanisms must be accessible to all affected stakeholders, protect against retaliation, and be aligned with the effectiveness criteria in UN Guiding Principles Principle 31. Companies must also provide or cooperate in providing remediation where impacts have occurred. WOVO Connect is Labor Solutions' grievance mechanism designed to meet these requirements.

How does worker voice support LkSG compliance?

Germany's Supply Chain Due Diligence Act (LkSG) requires companies to implement a complaints procedure accessible to workers and communities in their supply chain, assess human rights risks on an ongoing basis, and take preventive and remediation measures when risks are identified. Worker voice tools support LkSG compliance by enabling companies to collect direct evidence of working conditions from workers, identify risks before they escalate, document the effectiveness of grievance channels, and demonstrate active ongoing engagement with their supply chain workforce.

What is WOVO Improve?

WOVO Improve is Labor Solutions' digital supplier self-assessment and action planning platform. It allows suppliers to assess the maturity of their labor rights and due diligence systems, generate automated improvement action plans based on assessment results, and track remediation progress over time. It closes the loop between worker survey findings and supplier-level change — creating documented evidence of HRDD effectiveness that brands can use for CSDDD and LkSG reporting.

What is the difference between a worker voice tool and a whistleblower hotline?

Worker voice tools like WOVO Connect are designed for supply chain workers to raise day-to-day concerns, access training, respond to surveys, and engage with grievance processes at the factory level. They are accessible via app, SMS, QR code, or IVR, and built for low-literacy, low-trust contexts. Whistleblower hotlines are typically phone-based channels for reporting serious legal violations within a company. Global helplines can satisfy a regulatory checkbox under CSDDD or LkSG but rarely work in practice for supply chain workers, who need embedded, trusted, local-language channels built for their reality.

Which industries and sectors use Labor Solutions?

Labor Solutions is used across apparel and footwear, electronics, fast-moving consumer goods, agriculture, seafood, and retail supply chains. Clients include global brands such as adidas, Nike, H&M, Dell, Cisco, HP, Diageo, Carter's, Puma, OVS, and Decathlon. Labor Solutions tools are deployed wherever complex, multi-tier global supply chains require ongoing worker engagement, human rights due diligence, and compliance with CSDDD, LkSG, or other emerging HRDD frameworks — particularly across Asia, Africa, and Latin America.